Chapter 20: Depths

Chapter 20: Depths

"You all stay here, Hana and I will go upstairs so we look less threatening."

Alissa frowns but she accepts. We start climbing the spiral staircase, it goes up the 3 floors and ends up on the cupola.

In the middle of the way, we hear footsteps above. A large woman in plate and leather comes out with a tower shield and behind her is a dog wereanimal woman archer in monster leather.

"Who are you and why are you here," The archer tells us, arrow nocked.

"Wolf Ryder, adventurer, just like you. I'm here because one of my companions sensed one of my friends, Nour Asaf.

The archer expression lightens and pulls the shield woman upstairs. More footsteps and in a minute Nour appears.

"What a coincidence! Never thought we would meet again inside a dungeon," Nour says with arms open wide. He is wearing his black leather again, this time he has a pristine black scaled shield hanging on his back.

He goes down the stairs and we shake hands.

"Was bound to happen, right? Neither of us can resist the call of the dungeons," I smile.

"How are you doing, Wolf?" His eyes turn warm.

"The same as always, very happy. You?"

Even though we have the problem with Darean my mood isn't bad.

"Just starting my adventure, let's say that I'm very excited, no marriage proposal to take me away from here this time," he smiles, "Come upstairs, the view is wonderful."

"This is Iana, a tracker we hired," he points to the wereanimal woman.

She has skin black as night and curly, short, boyish hair. Her black ears are nearly camouflaged among her hair.

"This is Bellatrix, a Blood Slave," he points to the other woman.

She removes her helmet. Bright red skin, two small protrusions on her forehead and swept back, glossy black hair that reaches the shoulders. Her grin shows some very pointy fangs. She's a devil-type demon.

"So, you are the Wolf Ryder?" Asks Iana, her pretty eyes open wide.

Oh boy.

"W-well, what do you mean by this?"

"You know, the one who killed the Symbol and the one the town criers announced some time ago."

"Yes, that's me."

"Wow! Amazing," she shakes my hand vigorously.

"I never thought you would be so small, some stories tell of your cold, killer eyes, of your booming commanding voice, your hundred spells you can call on a whim," she looks at the girls," But the other parts are true, just what is so special about you?

The spells is partially true.

"Nothing, really," I smile wryly.

She holds her head in her hand and pouts cutely. I feel 2 of the girls are getting very annoyed. I hurry and continue the introductions, Nour lifts his eyebrow.

"Another fiancee?" He laughs.

"Look who's talking," I rebuke.

Midori and Bellatrix smirk.

"Anyway, let's go to the top of the tower, the view there is pretty good," Nour swiftly turns around.

"Let's bring everyone, I can leave my elemental here as a guard."

"Wonderful."

The view really is nice, though just a bit windy, perhaps I should summon a wind elemental if it gets worse. We can view the entire island, we are on corner of a once marble town, possibly filled with living armors, not really a good place to go. There's the corner of an abandoned farm covering a good part of the island, in there we will be too exposed to the flying monsters of this level. Near the path we came there's the light forest, the safest place to go through, we will take a spiral stairs there and go to the next island, there are no stairs for the next level on this island.

We look up the blue sky, the lights slowly dims as the sun sets outside the dungeon, it's weird not seeing a sun and not having an orange sunset to appreciate. As the light dims little stars can be seen very far in the distance, the mana crystals still retain some light, giving us the same light as a moonlit night. The little stars that surround us gives me a chill, I feel as if we are drifting among stars.

I see Ciel smile in a way she didn't smile before. It's a daring smile, one you do before you jump from the plane and open your parachute. A smile of nostalgia, adventure was something she missed and now she's getting it back.

We set up camp on the cupola and decided to spend the night together. Safiya, Alissa and Ciel got in charge of dinner, although Iana knows how to cook an adventurers cooking is far too rough for our sensitive palate. I force my disgust away and help butcher 2 harpies that Nour shared with us, my [Dismantling] getting its rare use. Then the girls fry the bird parts, tastes like turkey with a mustard aftertaste, something on their fat does this.

Even though people here eat orc and goblin, only when it's explicitly part human they don't eat it. Cannibalism really is a taboo here, but it has a line much further than that of Earth.

After the gruesome butchering the girls responsible for the dinner don't need our help anymore. Lina and Bellatrix start maintaining the weapons and armor while Iana talks to them about enchanted bow maintenance. Hana and Midori go fawn over Aoi, tickling her belly, she seems to love the new dragonkin acquaintance. Roxanne comes to my side, she's having Ted and Suzy try to dance, I can see some jealous glances from Ciel towards the golems. Nour sits in front of me.

"Say, Nour, you might have some more experience on this type of thing so I want your opinion."

I tell him of Darean.

"Wow, well not that surprising, some people can be vengeful. I agree that he doesn't want to kill you, most likely have you sent as a slave somewhere, I know some circle of magi use illegal slave mages," he says to me.

Roxanne shudders.

"I was afraid Dawn of Fire was involved in something like this. I feared what they would do if I traveled alone so I ran from Goloria and went to Rabanara, which seemed a place not under the influence of the circles of magi," Roxanne says.

"Yeah, some of them are really bad, but you just need someone to vouch for you and they run away. They don't want to suffer through an investigation so they keep away from people that can bring them trouble," Nour says while nodding, "But anyway, I really think Darean has backing."

"Backing?" I ask.

"Yes, that rogue space mage is not cheap and it's not easy to find, you know the empire is very protective of [Gate]. This is not something a simple adventurer can find with just money, he needs connections and someone to vouch for him, though he's seriously misusing his power."

"Who would back him, then?"

"I don't know. I don't have connections in the underworld, at least not here..." He cleans his throat, "So I don't know much about the factions that work here, I just know who to avoid. But we can try to make a deduction, do you know if he has allies and enemies?"

"I only know Vanea Anara seems to dislike him."

He winces at her name. Roxanne looks at him concerned, she hasn't met the little devil.

"So she could be his enemy. Perhaps he's the one who's blocking her."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, you know that Vanea wants the emperor to recognize the efforts of her family, right?" I nod, "To do that she's gathering allies, people who can owe her favors, people she can buy, people she can protect so they will swear loyalty to her, all this stuff, this being the reason she's one I want to avoid. The thing is, she can't get anyone near her, someone is blackmailing or buying out any ally she can get, most likely some faction from the capital."

"So, Darean is position 1, he likely has a close relationship to the Lord and by extension he can get near Vanea rather easily, he seems to be showing he's romantically interested in her, though that could be fake. Being an adventurer means he most likely works for money so he can be bought, he's the perfect spy on the Anara family," I say.

Rabanara's closeness to adventurers seems to be backfiring on this part.

"Exactly, at position 1 Darean might as well be considered a knight working with the Lord, I hear they fight together a lot. This is only guesswork but it's the closest you have. Sorry, but I can't help much more, since I don't have connections all I can do is get you bodyguards, but I don't think that's the kind of help you want."

Roxanne nods in agreement.

"Yeah, I don't want to live in fear. I was only looking for advice anyway. Say, if you have a name, body description and a possible quirk, like the smell of the hair product someone uses, how easy can you find this person? Though I know she could be using [Ignorance] to keep low."

"That depends a bit, but the smell is a good thing, sniffers don't care about illusion spells. If the town doesn't suffer with smuggling then it's rather easy to lock down the town and make a sweep. If this person is in Rabanara then I think the Anara family can find them. I assume you got a lead?"

"Yeah, do you know hair products that use Ranja?"

"Oh yes, from the High Forest, one of the few things they export, those elitist bastards. Safiya loves it, bit expensive though," he whispers and then smiles, "How did you get that information? You should have gotten very close to smell a hair product."

"Well, I talked to a spirit of one of the kidnappers, he gave me a very good description of the one who lead me to the trap."

Nour knits his eyebrows in worry

"You didn't mess with him, right?"

"No, no. I still have my blessing, I didn't do anything bad."

Nour's expression relaxes in relief.

"Dealing with spirits of the dead is very... dangerous. Lots of nobles got their lives ruined by going too far and the temple getting a whiff of what they have done."

"Ciel is a former priestess, she helps me keep in line."

He chuckles.

"You got some good companions, I see. Rather, good wives-to-be."

Roxanne chuckles.

"Just what a good husband-to-be deserves," she gives me a kiss on the cheek.

I smile. A productive conversation, now I know I actually got some bargaining chips for Vanea.

"How did the 9th floor go for you?" Nour gives a pained smile, "It was a nightmare for us, those damn spiders kept crawling up to me and Safiya. Then we met two minotaurs, luckily for us one fell on a crumbling piece of the floor and disappeared a few levels below. But we ended up meeting it again before we found the stairs."

"Oh, well I just met a Shadow Satyr on the floor we arrived, behind him was the stairs so it was rather quick."

Nour's mouth hangs open.

"T-that's unfair, you and your damn good luck."

After dinner comes time for the bath. Safiya is a fellow mage who knows how to make a bath in a few seconds, though I saw Nour's bathtub was smaller than ours. With the summons, we have the added cheat of not needing to keep guard.

Bath ends up being Alissa's time, can't really make too much noise so Hana and Roxanne are left for bedtime, the gag will get used again with them. When Lina tries to "practice" Ciel sighs.

"Even you, Lina?"

"I... I..."

"She just wants to make me happy," I say.

Ciel rolls her eyes but she keeps watching Lina with the corner of her eye.

I spend some time reviewing our coordination tactics. I decided to teach them a few commands in English, it's a good thing to be able to yell orders without the enemy knowing what they mean.

The living armors occasionally patrol the lower floors but none came up towards the cupola. The anti-monster stone should have some effect on them too.

Today is the 28th.

A silent storm called Hana's mouth wakes me, Roxanne wasn't awake yet so she just swallowed all by herself.

"Better this way, I get it all for me," Hana smiles.

"Shameful, she's also your wife-to-be, you gotta share everything," I say.

I actually got Hana, she looks away and blushes.

My [Summoning Magic], [Space Magic], [Sword Use], [Andraste Language] and [Dismantling] increased by 1 (now 11+11, 14+18, 9+7, 8+2 and 0+3)

Lina is leveling up nicely, now she's level 18. With this amount of extra skills points her learning rate is very fast.

Hana increased her [Block] by 1 (now 8).

"Why is your block so low? I would expect someone experienced like you to have it higher. Especially when your style is about blocking and countering," I ask Hana.

"Well, I don't really have the... delicacy, to learn how to block so effectively. Besides, with my strength and endurance I can just take the hit, even if it's not on a shield. If an attack can't penetrate my skin or scales, why block it? These things aren't just for the fetishists like you," she smiles and points to the scales on her cheeks," You know, these things already deflected a few blades.

She really fights like a barbarian. I see Midori has a two-hander with her, she might be even worse than Hana.

For breakfast, we share our charcuterie with Nour.

"So, where are you going after this?" He asks.

"We will go to the 13th floor."

Nour and Safiya grimace.

"Ugh, I might as well pay for someone to help me skip those floors. Why are you going there?"

The Shadow Satyr was just an entree of what I really want. Two special monsters from the 13th floor.

"Well, there's a monster I want to fight, for magic research. Though the description of that floor sounds interesting."

"The monsters of that floor do have some very good uses for poison and dark magic," Safiya says.

"Something like that, mostly poison, I don't deal with dark magic," I say.

"You sound just like Rania," he smiles nostalgically.

"What would she research?

"Alchemicism. She had a very peculiar habit of trying out acids. You know, the Orc Headhunter was really lucky, she had just used all her acid," Nour makes a pained face, not because of the orc, but because of the image of what acid does.

Lina's Trivia: Alchemicism is a magic school where alchemy is combined with spells. I can learn it with the skill system but I can't use it since I need to ingredients before I can cast a spell and the skill system does not give me the knowledge of which ingredients I need.

"I, uh, I would rather not fight with acid, I'm having Roxanne create some poisons and venoms, though. I mainly want paralysis, some monsters are quite valuable if you get them intact."

Roxanne looks at me with an evil smirk.

"I would rather create healing potions but poison can be fun too," she says.

"I see, well we rarely bring the bodies back, don't really need the money so Rania had no reason to hold back, besides for the effect it has on my mental health."

"Well I, I also don't hold back, the less time fighting a monster the better," Safiya smiles a bit painfully.

"The girls are the same, sometimes they hold back for me, I just do not do well with gore," I scratch my cheek, shyly.

"Don't be ashamed of that. Everyone has a weakness," Alissa says, tapping my shoulder.

Thanks, honey.

"My weakness is invisible enemies," Hana says.

"My weakness is swarms," Ciel says, frowning.

Dream Eaters attack in swarms.

"My weakness is spiders," Safiya says.

Nour shares an understanding look with her.

"My weakness is heights," Lina says, lowly.

"My weakness is cute enemies," Midori says.

Everyone raises an eyebrow at her, she chuckles.

"I simply can't kill the Rabid Rabbit," she shrugs.

Ciel puts a finger in her chin.

"Understandable," she says.

Roxanne nods in agreement.

"Some people say you are not a proper adventurer if you can't handle gore," Nour says.

"To hell with them!" I yell

Nour laughs.

"To hell with them!" He yells too.

We break camp and say our goodbyes. Nour is going to a bigger island while we are going upstairs to the closest stair for the next dungeon floor.

We meet some proper Living Armors this time. A trio that looks like plated knights, they all use long swords.

"Let's test our melee again. Lina, Wolfy, you two fight together one of them, you may have skills but it's not the same as having experience," Hana says.

We nod. I give the warbow and bodkin arrows to Alissa, she won't be able to do much with just her normal bow. The nature elemental will be ready, any sign of blood and she will restrain the armor.

The Armors are in the street walking towards us. We move out of our hiding spot and they immediately charge towards us.

"I can handle the first strike," Lina says.

I kinda agree, my "Strength" isn't rising quickly enough even though I have been doing strength exercises, [Stonebody] is a cheat.

The Living Armor slashes sideways towards Lina. It was smart enough not to go all-in on a single strike. She grunts and deflects the blow upwards. She counters with strike on the knee and the armor gets dented, forcing it to kneel for a second.

I strike the bevor on the neck of the Armor, there aren't many openings in the armor so I have to create one. Nothing visible happens to the bevor but a few more strikes will be enough.

Hana is not using her shield, she deflects the first strike with her sword and kicks the Armor away. She summons her wings and charges towards it.

Ciel keeps the Armor away, it tried to force itself into her guard but she forced it back with a strong thrust towards its chest, denting the armor.

Our Armor steps back and slashes downwards towards me, I dodge backward and feel the tip of the blade get slow down by [Wind Armor]. It immediately slashes sideways towards Lina, she deflects upwards again and strikes the shin. The leg gets lifted with the strike and it jumps back to keep its balance.

Hana strikes the Armor's sword upwards, opening its guard and hits it with her shoulder, sending it flying backward. She lands on top of the arms of the Armor, preventing it from getting up, then she grabs the bevor and rips it away. She thrusts her sword into the neck and it pierces the coif, the Armor struggles for a few seconds but "dies".

The Armor tries to charge again and Ciel finds an opening on the armpit of the Living Armor and disables the arm. The Armor tries to strike with a single arm but Ciel blocks the strike with her small shield strapped to her forearm, then she jumps backward and gets ready for the next attack.

Lina charges forward and strikes downwards, the Armor parries and tries to twist its sword to pull the hammer off Lina's hand. She goes with it and bashes the Armor's hand, making it wince. I slide my blade below the bevor and it gets snagged into something, I pull my sword with all my strength and something snaps. The Armor recovers from the wince and kicks my shield, keeping me away.

Ciel deflects an awkward blow from the Armor and slides her blade past the Armor's neck, she turns it around and uses the hook on her glaive to snag the bevor and pull it. The Armor stumbles and Ciel sweeps his legs, making it fall face down on the ground. Ciel thrusts and pierces the Armor on an opening at the back of its waist, making it desperately spasm. The Armor turns around and grabs the blade when Ciel tries to thrust again. She wrangles it from its hands and jumps backward.

The bevor is hanging from our Living Armor's neck, exposing the mail coif behind it. One of its legs is lame and it can't walk properly. I feint and strike the Armor towards the neck but it deflects my sword away. Lina charges and gets her shield kicked, I feel mana flowing through her, she holds her ground. She uses the hook on her hammer to pull the good leg of the Armor. It falls back on the ground.

Ciel's Armor struggles to get up, it draws a dagger and lunges towards her. Ciel easily deflects it and sweeps its legs again. The Armor falls and Ciel drops on top of it. She draws a dagger and jams it on the opening of the bevor, the Armor tries to struggle but "dies".

I step on one arm and Lina steps on the other. She smashes the helmet of the Armor and it caves in, the Armor loses most of its strength. I thrust with all my strength and pierce the coif, the Armor slowly stops struggling and "dies".

I raise my head and look around, we are the last to finish. Hana is looking at us with a smirk. I just take a look at her work and smile.

"You fight like a barbarian," Ciel says.

"Only Hana could do such a thing," Lina says.

Hana laughs.

"I rather have magic than just muscles," Hana says.

"Let them be envious for a bit more," I say.

Magic really makes things much easier.

The remaining metal of the Living Armors corrodes and turns rusty, parts of it turn to dust. This is why their metal isn't too valuable, it quickly ages when the spirit dies, even when the Armor looks new it's going to degrade a lot after killing it.

We leave the small ruins and move towards the light forest.

I'm glad it's daytime and bright, there's a chance Shadow Satyrs appear in dark places. Even though they are rare and valuable I'm not so eager to find one again.

Alissa stops and stares towards the sky, her eyes narrow and then she smirks.

"A Kite Dragon, looks young."

"Oooh, how big?" I ask.

"Looks to be around 2 or 3 meters long.

"Can you hit it?"

"Just gonna prickle him at this distance, but it will certainly get his attention."

Time for the real test of the warbow.

"Let's get to a clearing and set the trap. Roxanne, how's the paralysis venom?"

"On a Kite Dragon it should take a minute or two to act," she taps her chin.

"Perfect we can certainly hold it down until then."

Screw Shadow Satyrs, a Kite Dragon is even more valuable. This dragon is flat and long, it has no wings but long flipper-like limbs on its side, it swims through the air like a flatworm, its head is flat and triangular like a crocodile's but its eyes are on the sides of the mouth and move independently like a chameleon's. Its scales make high-quality scale armor, even better than ours.

I look up and don't see anything, the dragon has some camouflage, he lights his own scales to look bright enough you mistake it for the sky. I take 5 points from [Parry] and put it in [Electric Magic].

Alissa nocks an arrow on the warbow, she waits, her eyes glued to wherever that dragon is. With nearly inhuman speed she draws her bow and releases the arrow. It flies high and I see a small blur on the sky, the arrow hits this blur and I finally manage to spot the outline of the dragon.

Silently the dragon comes, its entire body snakes towards us in a fast zig"zag pattern.

Hana is in the middle of the clearing while everybody is hiding behind a tree.

"COME HERE LITTLE WORM, I WANNA USE YOU AS BAIT FOR FISHING!" Hana taunts and strikes her shield."

"UROOOOO!" It answers.

Its crocodile mouth opens and light comes out of it. A huge clump of ice shoots out of his mouth and towards Hana. She dodges sideways and the ice scratches her shield. The clump explodes in the ground, covering everything with an unusual chilling thin layer of snow.

Hana breathes fire around her, she would quickly get frostbite otherwise.

"URAAH!" The dragon screams again.

Using its side flippers it swipes at Hana, the attack sends flying multiple emerald scales of her shield.

I cast [Discharge]. Low voltage, high spread. The entire dragon gets covered in sparks coming out of my fingers. Unlimited Pow-...

The dragon turns to me with anger in his eyes. He opens his mouth again and mana gathers.

Fuck! More power!

An arrow pierces the top of its mouth and it stops charging mana. It turns to Alissa.

Fuck! EAT MORE POWER!

"[Wind Hammer]!"

"[Torrent]!"

It gets disrupted again and with another arrow on its mouth it decides not to open it anymore. It turns upwards and starts to leave.

MAXIMUM POWERRRR!

My head hurts and my MP drops like a waterfall but finally, the dragon starts convulsing. This is what [Discharge] is all about, disabling the enemy.

An arrow pierces its head. Damn thick skull, it didn't penetrate much.

Another set of attacks from Ciel and Roxanne. Scales break off its head, I feel tears forming at the coins disappearing.

Hana scoops Roxanne and lays down beside me, with Roxanne on top of her.

Ciel sighs and lays down on my other side. Lina releases my arm and moves over, laying down on my belly.

I cast [Purify Body] on Lina and Hana.

"Thank you, Wolfy," Lina says and curls up.

"Muuch better, that thing feels horrible," Hana says.

I sigh.

"Getting myself paralyzed wasn't such a good idea," I say.

"Eh," Hana shrugs.

"I'm not that good at improvising."

"That's why we are here," Alissa says.

"To clean up your doo-doo's," Roxanne pokes me.

Alissa plays with my hair and we spend some time like this. Life or death situations are the best for forming bonds.

When we move it's 6 PM.

That was the last of the tunnels. After another spiral bridge, we enter the central island. It's a place with very few monsters so fellowships camp here. Though not many fellowships come here in comparison with the other floors, the Nalusa being one of the reasons why.

I would rather not camp here, it's always going to be tense meeting other fellowships with the number of women ours have.

We move inside the marble ruins and look for a clock tower. It's like the entire town simply petrified into marble. There are carts, people, guards, animals, furniture, everything is made of marble and glued to the ground.

We find a specific house and enter, the stairs are there.

We reach the 12th floor.

This floor is called Faded Glory. There's two huge roots going in a spiral, they are as thick as Rabanara's castle. There are multiple islands stuck on those roots, simple marble bridges connect each island, and Marker Kites show when it's safe to move, multiple are swinging about.

Around us, there's no more blue sky, only a sandstorm a dozen meters away from the roots. The sandstorm is the only source of light, it produces a weak light that flickers, once in a while the sand sparkles.

Above and below a black mist slowly blocks our view, preventing us from seeing too far up or down.

Our island is a piece of a town, we find a walled-off house and set up inside, ignoring the statues(?) of people, I pull our tent in the backyard.

The first thing we do is take a bath.

"Say, Hana, you said you wanted a reward?"I grin.

I pull out a leather belt. She looks at me with hunger.

I wrap the belt on her neck. Bypassing the tip through the buckle the more I pull, the tighter it gets. I put on my "Sex Maniac" build.

She doesn't even say anything, she just turns around and spreads herself for me, I thrust immediately.

With both hands, I pull the belt in sync with my thrusts. She grabs the belt to give her a little more air but it's not enough, soon enough her strength starts to vanish, eventually she can't hold the belt anymore and lets it go.

Her back arches and she chokes, trying to breathe. Little by little she loses her strength and her eyes go white. I loosen the belt and she gasps for air.

When the gasps reduce a little I pull the belt back and resume thrusting.

I slap her ass, again and again, she cums again and again, every time she cums her legs shake more and more. I feel like I'm riding a bull, I wonder if [Riding] would help here.

I let her breathe two more times until I push her to the limit. She stops moving and uses all her strength to pull the belt back a little to breathe. As her desperation grows I feel her insides tighten more and more.

I take my points off and cum inside her then I let the belt go and she collapses, barely any strength to let herself from drowning on the tub. Roxanne pulls her to the edge of the tub where she wheezes and coughs.

"Don't... heal me..." She mutters in a rough voice.

Alissa looks very frisky so I take her next. Slowly from behind, I thrust, one hand on the base of her tail, the other arm wrapped around her throat. I choke her lightly and bite her ears, making her squeal.

She claws on my arm as her desperation grows. I relent and she coughs. Once we continue, I hold it in until she's desperately out of air, then I cum inside.

After she regains her breath I keep my tongue inside her mouth during the rest of the bath.

Hana has been getting better at roasting meat with her fire breath, though I had to heal her throat for this dinner. Aoi is trying to help but her flame is still too unsteady for roasting. We eat some nice Minotaur meat with not-potato and not-onion soup.

"So, what do you want for your reward?" I ask Lina.

She makes thinking sounds and fidgets about.

"I... don't know..."

"How about a massage?"

Ciel, who was almost falling asleep suddenly opens her eyes.

"S-say, Wolfy, I'm gonna be on the front line too, d-don't I deserve a reward?" Ciel tries to sound as innocent as possible.

Alissa mutters something to Roxanne.

"M-me too! Using spells is tiring, you know! Walking around all day on those boots that you like makes my feet sore, you know," Roxanne says, nodding and grinning.

"Well, I do like them but you use those high heeled boots because you like them too, I'm not forcing you," I answer.

"T-that's not... I still walked a lot, and, and-and-and..." She loses her train of thought.

I smirk.

"I will do all of you."

I put 20 points in [Massage], that's the maximum. I start with Aoi and massage her little body, she has a bit of meat to knead and seems to love having her scales pressed, I do it until she sleeps. Then I do Hana so she learns how it's supposed to feel, I mix some kisses and a few licks and get plenty of giggles in return, who knew that even Hana would be ticklish. I do Ciel as Hana copies my every move while doing Roxanne. As her reward, I did Lina for twice as long as any.

Ciel got frisky after all that, she might have a slight foot fetish.

Today is the 29th.

Me and Hana gained [Massage] with 1 point. I increased my [Sword Use], [Electric Magic] and [Summoning Magic] by 1 (now 9+8, 11+12), my [Light Magic] and [Mana Control] by 2 (now 6+6 and 0+9).

Lina is now the same level as me, though she has less experience. I left 5 SP on Lina so she can grow her skills with more ease, like enchanting.

Lina Skill ReportPhysicalSkill NameLevelSkill NameLevelSkill NameLevelHammer Use6+8Parry2+3Dodge1+3Block6Muscle Explosion2+0Shield Bash1+0Battlefield Perception2+0Dwarven Pride Style2+0Enhanced Speed2+0 MagicalSkill NameLevelSkill NameLevelSkill NameLevelSense Mana1Mana Control3Mana Efficiency1Fire Magic1Earth Magic5+0Light Magic1Space Magic1Conjuring Magic1General Enchanting7Magic Tool Carving1 MiscellaneousSkill NameLevelSkill NameLevelSkill NameLevelGeneral Blacksmith4Sewing4Housework1Cleaning2Washing1Math4Riding1Stonebody (innate)315 Remaining Skill PointsOBS: Level means (free point)+(trained point)

With this we remove the Rings of the Servant. After a few more levels I think the girls are going to use it again except me and Lina, we want everyone to be on a similar level. Currently, the other girls are suppressing their skills growth so we have some extra skill points to use on what's necessary, like resistances.

I switch the girls extra points to [Enhanced Speed] except Ciel because [Refresh] is going to be useful here. These enhancements skills aren't passive bonus to our status, they give you "intuition" and muscle memory of how to improve such status, though there might be a slight amount of magic involved into those skills. If I concentrate I can think of ways of moving faster and more efficiently but it takes a mental toll, it's impressive that Hana has so many of these enhancements skills.

If the last floor was unpopular this one is deserted, it's because there's only a single type of monster here, Symbol of Envy, threat level 6. It is disgusting ball of meat, its eyes secrete a petrifying liquid, and it's black and white tentacles are long and sticky. Thankfully they don't move unless an enemy is found, otherwise, we wouldn't be able to casually spend a night on this floor.

Lina's Trivia: There was once a rich and xenophobic kingdom of chimeras during the Age of Oppression that left others to fend for themselves. The envy the others felt birthed this horrifying monster and eventually the kingdom fell to it, so the legends say. It would hide in their wells, making people unknowingly ingest the secretion and it would spread through the air once the water dried like when used for cooking or washing. Once the contamination reached a critical mass a bit of mana was all it took to start a chain reaction and petrify everyone and everything.

is it Valuable? Yes. is it worth the risk of getting petrified and dying? No.

We move out of our campsite and walk towards the edge of our island, there's a bridge that leads us to an island embedded into the roots. The Marker Kite shows only a slight turbulence.

"Can you do this?" I ask Lina.

She fidgets and I grab her hand. She slowly calms down and breathes deeply.

"Yes," she says, resolute.

As we pass the bridge Aoi flaps her wings and closes her eyes, feeling the wind.

"Please don't even think about trying to fly here," I tell her.

"Kweh!" She chirps as if she's offended.

"Just making sure," I shrug.

We move into the new island, a few pink willows and a lake cut in half. The water flows down into the nothingness but the level of the lake's water does not change.

We reach the root and see a staircase carved into it. It leads us to top of the root. It's windy so I summon a nature elemental.

The nature elemental turns it's arms into vines and we tie the vines to our belts. Tied to one arm are Hana, Roxanne, and Ciel with Aoi on her shoulders; and on the other are me, Lina, and Alissa.

It's a long climb until the next island. The wind starts to change and I wonder if this path was a good idea.

"Oh no," Alissa mutters, "IT'S COMING, IT'S ROLLING DOWN!"

Alissa points forward, there's a small ball on the distance rolling down the root. Ah shit, terrible place.

"PUSH IT OVER THE EDGE. WAIT FOR MY SIGNAL," I yell.

I summon a wind elemental.

Hana moves to the front and readies her shield. We huddle up behind the nature elemental.

The ball rolls rapidly. It's 2 meters tall, full of disgusting tentacles covering half of the surface, and small eyes covering the rest. There's a mouth somewhere but that's not important.

I wait until it's around 50 meters from us.

"Elemental... now!"

The wind elemental swipes her hand sideways with great strength and a strong gust of wind hits the rolling ball. It flies sideways and rolls off the root. Mid"air a black tentacle shoots towards the root and gets stuck to it.

"NOW!" I yell.

"[Wind Hammer]!"

"[Torrent]!"

I cast [Earth Bullet].

An arrow flies into the tentacle that grabbed the root. The tentacle releases the root and it flies away towards the nothingness with great speed.

"Alright, move forward quickly!" I order.

"Is the fall not gonna kill it?" Asks Hana.

"The book tells to never underestimate it, that ball of horrors is tenacious," I answer.

"It was like a horror story," Alissa says.

"O-ok, let's go then," Ciel looks backward repeatedly in worry.

We quickly jog upwards. Ciel and Alissa keep glancing back every once in a while.

"Kweh!" Aoi yells.

I follow her gaze. There's a second root that twists around the one we are at. Over at the distance, there's a ball that's shooting tentacles and using its momentum to swing forward very fast. It's coming at us.

"Well, I'll be damned," Hana says.

We run with a spring on our step. Nothing like being chased to give you renewed vigor and a horrible chill on your back that only gets stronger.

The monster gets closer. The root it is on will pass right on top of us, at this speed, it will intercept us.

"Elemental, again!"

It swipes and the monster gets hit with another strong gust of wind. It swings towards the root and it disappears behind it. I bought us a few seconds.

We pass by the root above us and I hear a disgusting sound of meaty flesh.

"Above!" Alissa yells.

The ball swung behind the root and now it's coming down directly on top of us. I cast [Earth Bullet] on it and it stops in the middle of the air. An arrow flies and pierces an eye.

"Niroahoaho!" It screeches in a distorted voice.

We keep running and the sound of wet, meaty flesh reaches our ears right behind us. Ciel cuts the tentacle that grabbed the root. Aoi throws a fireball and Hana fires her breath.

*FOOOM!* The air behind us turns into flames.

"NIOOROROROAHO!" The distorted screeching gets louder.

We see the ball flying back, a tentacle grabbing further away from us. Multiple tentacles got charred but the monster has fast regeneration, it's a complete cheat, not that I'm not a cheater too.

We are reaching the end of this root, it turns upwards suddenly but there are a small arch and stairs carved inside the root.

We hear another wet, meaty sound and I look back, nearly at our side the slightly charred monster is flying towards us at a frightening speed.

A huge [Ice Lance] pierces it and it flies back from where it came from.

"NIROOONIO!"

It swings around and in a few seconds it's on the other side of the root. We reach the entrance and move up the stairs. The entrance gets covered by the monster and a long white tentacle waves upwards towards us.

Alissa dodges the tentacle and it gets stuck on Lina's shield. With a single motion and the help of [Telekinesis] I draw my sword and cut the tentacle.

"NAAAARIAAAA!" The monster screeches in anger.

Roxanne hurriedly pulls a potion and splashes it on Lina's shield, the tentacle stuck on it fizzles and melts, the petrification that was starting to appear stops and slowly recedes.

"Don't stop!" Hana yells to us.

We quickly move upwards and get out of reach.

The stairs go up for a long time, the small mana crystals giving just about enough light that we don't trip during our run. Suddenly the stairs turn into marble.

Our stairs end into a castle room. We push a very small door and we are into a hall, this was a secret exit, camouflaged into the wall.

This castle is filled with statues(?) of chimeras. Most have legs of bulls, chest of humans, arms of lion-type beastfolk, wings of dragonkin, heads of dog-type wereanimals, and tail of a succubus. Chimeras have many variations but this is the most common among soldiers. Their armor is light, delicate scale. They carry spears, short swords, and bows.

We go upwards, towards the highest tower. Hopefully, the Symbol of Envy won't catch up, they have more trouble moving upwards then downwards.

The guard-like chimeras change into softer, smaller and well-endowed women chimeras wearing very light and risque clothing. If I were to guess it was once semi-transparent.

"The chimeras are very good painters, too bad we can't see anything now that it is petrified," Alissa comments.

"True, it almost seems like there's no decoration at all," Ciel says.

With a bit of difficulty, we navigate the confusing castle and reach the correct tower. When you can fly everywhere it seems that walking distance is not of much concern to the castle engineers.

After another long climb we reach the top. I switch my points so me and Ciel can cast [Refresh] on everybody and regain some lost stamina. The spell doesn't produce energy, it only speeds up the replenishment so we have to take a quick break to eat some snacks.

The room at the top is rather fascinating, it's full of trinkets, gadgets, multiple telescopes, and books. Though I can't read any I see the name of a few has the titles written in relief on the book. With a little bit of luck messing with the skill system, I learn that the language of the chimeras is called "Reo".

With a bit of pain in my heart, we leave the room, on the only window of the room there's a bridge connecting to another staircase inside the root.

Alissa looks down for a few seconds and squints her eyes.

"It's still chasing us and it's almost completely regenerated, it seems."

We start running again, the spring on our step comes back.

This time the stairs are short, we come upon the plaza of a town. A quick look into the map and the compass and we find the way to the bridge we need.

Alissa stops us all.

"There's one right where we are supposed to go."

"Go around then?"

"Yes, but we have to be quiet."

We all look at Hana.

"You better just put some points in [Quiet Steps]," she says scratching her cheek.

Even [Quiet Steps] is not enough to completely silence Hana's stomps.

We take a turn and move two blocks down, then we turn back to the direction we should be going. We move more blocks forward but we hit the town wall. The exit is a block to the side, we might be exposed to the monster if we leave this way.

"Can you cast [Ignorance] on all of us?" Ciel asks.

"No, too much mana and I don't have all my mana due to the elementals."

Alissa's ears twitch.

"Oh no," I say.

"Oh yes," she smiles wryly, "It's coming directly towards us."

"Run."

We run from behind our cover and dash towards the gate. Outside is a brick road into thick woods.

We reach the woods.

"Faster! They are both coming!" Alissa yells.

"I can't!" Lina yells back.

Her small legs are taking its toll. I slow down and move beside her. With a yank, I grab her by her armpits.

"Put your weapons away!"

She stores them inside her [Item Box], she's much lighter now. With this, I can carry her like a princess.

We are reaching the bridge. The Marker Kite is flapping wildly, fortunately, the wind elemental helps protect us.

"Hanaa...!" Roxanne complains.

Roxanne stores her staff in her [Item Box] and Hana puts her weapons away. Hana slows and sweeps Roxanne off the floor.

I put all my strength in running. The sounds of wet, meaty flesh get louder.

"Elemental, now!" Roxanne orders.

A gust of wind flies by us. Roxanne chants hurriedly.

"[Torrent]!"

The sounds of chase wind down.

"Nature elemental, after this bridge you stay and hold them down!" Roxanne orders again.

The sounds of the chasers increase again, I glance back and see both of them swinging upwards from below the bridge. I throw an [Earth Bullet].

"[Wind... Hammer]!" Ciel manages to cast something while breathing heavily.

The nature elemental unwraps from us and stays behind. I feel it immediately getting hurt by monsters.

This new island is a cave, it's too large, it won't stop the monsters.

We run uphill, pebbles roll down all the time and it's hard to keep your footing. My legs ache but I trained for this, all that strength training wasn't for nothing, I can hold on much longer.

The nature elemental dies.

The stalagmites and stalactites increase in number and size. I get an idea.

"Roxanne...! Explode... the stalactites!"

"The what?"

"Pointy things... on the ceiling!"

"Oh, right. Hold onto your butts! This will make a mess!"

I feel mana gathering, a lot of mana. The fleshy sounds are increasing rapidly.

"Wind elemental... hold them!" Ciel orders.

The wind elemental explodes in a storm of wind. The fleshy sounds decrease.

They quickly increase again. I see a dark shadow coming.

"[EXPLOSION]!"

The blast was too close, I fall down and twist my body not to fall on top of Lina. My vision gets covered by dust and steam.

I hear the sounds of flesh hitting stone but they are muffled.

"The rubble is going to disappear soon, keep moving!" Roxanne orders.

We don't have time to catch our breath, we run again.

The sounds of flesh die down and only our echoing footsteps and quickened breaths remain.

The cave finally opens up into another small wonder. A mana crystal cave. Twinkling lights, rotating shadows, rainbows of colors, small sounds of cracking and tinkles, all this creates a slightly psychedelic show. Most crystals are transparent, only a small number has other colors besides green. The green crystals have waving forms with multiple curls and turbulent points, they grow in many directions but mostly upwards.

Lina's Trivia: Mana crystals are solidified mana that grows in mana-heavy places, mostly places where there's danger of a mana storm appearing. They can acquire an "affinity" to a magic type, we say that this crystal has "attuned". While most crystals naturally attune to the most prominent element of the environment they can also attune to any magic school, including spells or magic types not covered by the skill system. Attuned Mana crystals gather environment mana and turn it into the mana of its affinity, aiding in casting any spell related to that affinity.

Unfortunately, these crystals are all part of the dungeon. If we break them they simply disappear, but their effects are very real. This place would make a very good place to practice [Wind Magic]. Ciel looks around with a pained expression.

"If only we weren't being chased," she mutters, which echoes on the cavern.

We let Roxanne and Lina down. At the center of the crystal room there are our stairs.

We reach the 13th floor.

I drop down on all fours to catch my breath.