CH.260 Clearing Dungeon 27_001, part 1

CH.260 Clearing Dungeon 27_001, part 1

Our ‘rest’ day went just fine, but it wasn’t that restful for me. I went around the city, picking up preserved, and not so preserved, foods for us. Used Mystik Wok multiple times to make us foods, and also made sure to refill the magic flasks of both Lua and Ria with dragon blood. Agunan actually didn’t mind using the dragon blood in that way and didn’t raise a fuss.

Now with a bit more than a month's worth of food, and sleeping bags and pelts for all of us, we were ready to head to the dungeon tomorrow.

After our morning breakfast, as well as a quick goodbye to everyone, the five of us were off towards dungeon 27_001. Admittedly, this might be just a day trip, but at the same time, depending on the size of the dungeon, we might have to camp there for multiple days, and we were prepared for that. I had some food ready to go in my storage, and I could make more with Mystik Wok and Emergency Provisions.

Our flight to the dungeon was made in the brand new B.E.S. Crystal Core, that I just got. I just wanted to test it out, so I could compare it to Big Core.

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Crystal Core was a bit smaller than Big Core, but because of its structure, it actually had more inside space than Big Core. But it was less armed, having only the tentacle laser cannons. And just like Big Core, it didn’t have any atmospheric dampeners to stop sonic booms, so we would have to fly at subsonic speeds. Well, I could go to supersonic speeds outside of populated areas, but I decided to keep the speed down. And with Crystal Core having better inside areas, we could practice during the flight, while Crystal Core was flying itself. Autopilot for the win.

A lot of the practice was focused on getting us used to our new skills. Well, mainly Ria and Lua. Ria was practicing with Agunan, and when either of them got injured, Lua would heal them with her new skill. Her Mana Healing was still less efficient than her water magic, even with both Agunan and Ria’s affinity to fire reducing the effectiveness of healing water magic a bit, but she was getting the hang of it quickly, and she said she should be able to use it in conjunction with water healing magic.

“... why... Every freaking time...” I complained a bit, as I saw the burned down clearing. Just like last time, there were monsters in the clearing. But this time, they weren’t bugs from the dungeon, because I did block the dungeon entrance with a giant boulder.

This time, a group of goblins had made it their home. The strange part was, there were some larger goblins with them. Or to be more specific, hobgoblins. Hobgoblins are actually quite dangerous, at least compared to their ... not so powerful brethren. Hobs are C-rank and can be quite a threat, especially in large groups. But because they are born extremely rarely under normal circumstances, most people don’t worry about them. The ‘normal’ way a hobgoblin is born is when goblins ... abduct humanoid females and breed with them, but because of how weak goblins are, that luckily doesn’t happen too often, based on what I know.

But a handful had been born here for some reason. I knew the forest had some goblins, but I still didn’t expect them to take over my clearing. ... well, they didn’t take it over like the bugs had, more like they had settled in a corner of the area.

“Ria, do you want to try your skill against them? They are relatively humanoid, so I think they will be good targets.” I asked.

“Yes. If I may.” Ria agreed.

“Can I take the normal goblins? I want to try something.” Alice asked.

“Sure. Get to the teleporter. I’ll beam you down to the ground.” I told the duo.

After the two got on the ground, they got to work. Ria had a bit of difficulty separating the hobs, from the regular goblins, but after she killed the first few normies, the hobs quickly came to oppose her.

While Ria was using Counter Strike to land powerful hits on the hobgoblins, Alice had swapped from a regular outfit into her magical girl outfit and floated into the sky. Then, holding her arms above her head, she materialized a giant ball of fire.

Bringing her arms down, she launched the fireball towards the goblins. At first, I was a little worried that Ria would be caught up in it, but on the way down, the fireball broke apart into many smaller fireballs, which then precisely seeked out each and every goblin on the field, burning holes into their chests or heads.

With the small fray now out of the way, Ria could fully focus on the hobs. And even though hobgoblins are C-rank monsters, Ria’s punches were dealing good damage to them, and in under a minute, Ria had dealt with the six hobgoblins.

The rest of us got down on the ground, and I unsummoned Crystal Core.

“I didn’t know you could use fire magic already.” Lua commented.

“I can’t. Not the System magic, at least. That was done with my unique skill.” Alice answered. “... but it took over two-thousand mana, so it isn’t really usable in most situations.”

“We need to look into some sort of cheaty mana recovery skill for you.” I commented. “Would help if you could steal Agunan’s mana like I can, but even that has its limits. But I can't argue with the power output and accuracy of the spell.”

“Do you think you can make a skill like that?”

“No clue, but I think so. I think that combining a few cards that use Spell Counters would potentially do it.”

“Like Pitch-Black Power Stone?”

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“We are getting through this place quickly. You four clear all the monsters in our way.” I ordered my summons, and they got to work.

Out of the five of us, only Agunan could keep up with their speed, so the rest of just kind of stayed back and walked. I also kept collecting the monster corpses into my Storage as we did. That led me to realize something I haven’t noticed before. The monster corpses from the dungeon have a condition called ‘miasma curse’. It means that they have a lot more miasma than usual monsters, so their materials cannot be used, unless they are purified by Holy Magic, and I can use Storage to purify it as well.

The miasma itself, according to Laura, would result in the equipment made from them being cursed, so you definitely don’t want to use them without the purification. Even high ranking monsters outside of dungeons sometimes have that condition, but Tahlia must have always purified it. One of those ‘It doesn’t really matter, but wish she or Laura had told me’ things right there.

The second large room didn’t have insects. Instead, it was filled to the brim with plant type monsters. The strongest of them was a B-rank man-eating plant, so that was fun.

The third had bird type monsters, with the strongest ones being a group of four griffins.

“... how large is this dungeon?” I asked, in a tone that might have sounded more like complaining.

It was the evening of the day we arrived here, and thus far, we had gone through over 30 rooms of this dungeon. And with the rooms being massive, and filled to the brim with monsters, even with my arsenal of summons, it took a while per room. Also, all of the monsters were high ranking monsters. None had been below C-rank, and most were B-rank.

And eventually, even A-rank monsters began appearing. Which in itself wouldn’t be a problem, but they did slow us down just a bit, especially if I didn't have my A-Forces out here. But I could easily fix that little problem by throwing out some equip spells, so we were making good time.

The only problem was, we now needed to sleep in the dungeon. ... I honestly hoped we’d have this place cleared in one day, but nope. And unlike TinaWood, this place doesn’t have guaranteed safe zones, so we have to use some... not so conventional means of making a safe zone.

“Swords of Revealing Light.” I activated the spell. With it, no monsters should be able to attack us.

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... but we would still have to have at least one of us stay awake, to keep watch, just to make sure. For that, the girls needed more powerful monsters. If something does break the Swords of Revealing Light, the cards Alice, Lua and I have set on us should buy us a bit of time, but still better to make sure.

I gave Lua her own copy of Guardian Angel Joan, as well as Water Dragon, and the cards she needs to summon Water Dragon. Guardian Angel Joan I don’t think I even need to explain, but I added the Water Dragon because she paid some attention to it when I pulled it from the pack.

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But I really need some stronger water attribute monsters. My strongest is Gogiga Gagagigo, and he is uncontrollable. Sure Neo-Daedalus is almost as strong, but still. None of my water-attribute monsters have over 3000 attack, and that is just a shame.

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Giving something to Alice was a lot easier. My dark lineup is a lot more varied. But there was only one she really wanted.

“Can I have the Dark Paladin?” She requested.

So of course I gave her a Dark Paladin, as well as its fusion materials.

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I also let her keep the Polymerization she used to fuse her monsters, and also gave her a De-Fusion to go along with it.

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I did warn her that I’d take them back if she used them on a person, but Alice just reassured me that she wouldn’t do that.

And finally, Ria got herself a copy of Sacred Phoenix of Nephthys. Don’t think I forgot that she wanted it. Sure it might not be quite as strong as the others, but it will buy a bit of time in case of an enemy attack.

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“Master. You should just let me keep guard, so all of you can sleep for the night. I don’t need to sleep, as long as I have food.” Agunan offered.

“Nope. Not happening.” I denied. “I need you in tip top shape for tomorrow, and for that, sleep is important.”

The order in which we were taking turns keeping guard was Alice, Agunan, me, Ria and lastly Lua. The reason I went with this order was because Alice, Lua and I could tell time with out System Supports, so we would be able to time for how long we need to keep guard before waking up the next person. And our System Supports would also wake us up for our own guard shift.

... the only problem was the Swords of Revealing Light. While Lua, Ria, Alice and I could all activate it, if anyone but me activated it, we couldn’t all move inside of them. If Ria activated it, Agunan and I could move inside just fine, but Alice and Lua would be frozen. And if Alice or Lua activated it, Agunan and Ria would get frozen. So the only choice was that I have to wake up every two hours to recast the spell. It could be worse, but I still don’t like it. But better than being eaten by monsters during our sleep, so I’ll just have to accept it.

We naturally didn’t use Level Up!s because we were in a dungeon, so after getting into my sleeping bag, I quickly fell asleep.