Dungeon Annihiliaton 27

Hey everyone. Sorry for no upload yesterday. When i finished my quota on Annihilation for yesterday I intended to write the next chapter for DR. But... when I took a break I started watching Game of Thrones. Yeah... that was a mistake. I ended up bingeing the first season. Don't worry though, I know that it is very enthralling for me now and thus have made sure to set limits.

Louella

I moved over to Neldor, the Marquis’s party priest when I saw him throw something into the dungeon. “What was that?” 

“Lady Baron. When the Marquis dives a dungeon, he gives it a few items of materials. We’ve had this ritual for a while as some of the dungeons would create items out of the materials after a while.”

“What did you give the dungeon?” This dungeon was already rated to be quite deadly. The last thing we needed was for it to get even more powerful. 

“Nothing too grand. I think the rarest was a bit of mithril. Though none of the dungeons ever start creating that in their halls. We believe they either can’t or won’t.” 

“Interesting. It would certainly be a boon for my town if the tower started to produce mithril.” 

“Yes but try not to get your hopes up.”

We moved back to our respective parties and finished getting ready. It was always a good idea to double check your gear before heading into a dungeon. My staff had indulged in a large amount of lightning mana on the day of the storm when I had flooded all the mana inside my body into it. Now it almost felt like part of me when I channeled my magic through it.

“We are all ready,” Tez said finally.

“Lord Valamar. My party can take you straight to the sixth floor.”

“Thank you for the offer, but we like to challenge from the beginning. It gives you a feel of the personality of the dungeon.”

“Then we will tag along with you. It never hurts to reconquer previous floors.” 

Lord Valamar gave me a grin. He saw through my words. He knew I didn’t want anything to happen to him, so we were following him. “Suit yourself.” 

We walked into the dungeon all the while I felt like someone was watching me. I knew the dungeon was aware of what happened in its halls, but no one was clear on how exactly. I did my best to just ignore it.

Neldor created a light spell that illuminated just about everything for thirty or forty meters. There weren’t even any shadows on the other side of the pillars. I did notice the knight, Liuvan, seemed to get spooked by something. I would have thought as famous the Marquis was for diving dungeons, he would have a better handle on himself.

“Where’d the dwarf go?” Tez asked after we’d been walking for a few minutes. I turned my gaze on the other party and saw that the dwarf was gone. Not a second later, we heard a thump from the distance as a goblin was thrown into the circle of light. Five more bodies soon joined the first. Urena appeared flicking her daggers clean of blood.

“That answers that question,” I said with a chuckle.

“I need to learn from her. I never knew a dwarf could be, well, quiet,” Sara said her ears twitching excitedly.

For the next four floors we bore witness to the marquis’s party steamrolling through the dungeon. I could help but wonder if the host was going to be upset. We made it to the boss door in under thirty minutes. It would have been quicker, but we still had to physically walk the distance. 

Lord Valamar looked to Bruce and Urena, the two that had done most of the work during the trek to this point. “You two get a nice workout?”

“It was decent. Bloody things got much better at hidin towards the end,” Urena said her native dwarf accent leaking out a bit.

Bruce only shrugged. Most of the goblins were done in with a single swipe of his blade. He hadn’t even drawn his shield yet. Or use any mana for that matter. It was all physical.

“I wonder if he’s taking applications for a wife,” I whispered to Ezal while looking at Bruce. Back home, all there were was a bunch of pretty boy nobles that could barely lift a sword. I quite liked the sight of Bruce’s muscles as he mowed down the goblins.

“I think you’d have to pull him off the Marquis. I kind of wonder if there’s something there,” she whispered back. I coughed trying to stop from laughing. That would be a sad day for quite a lot of maidens throughout the lands. 

“Well… I guess it can make for a nice dream,” I said finally.

“You guys are welcome to join us in the boss fight,” called Lord Valamar. We made our way over but made sure to stay out of the way. Bruce pushed open the door and what was being called the Gothic City, named by Ivan as he found it first, opened up before our eyes. Pride stood in the middle of the bridge awaiting his next challenger.

We all walked through the portal before it closed. According to a report, a party had gotten separated due to some of them taking too long to cross through. There was some suspicion on the party, but all reports stated they had been good friends. 

“Bruce. I think you’ll be more than enough,” Lord Valamar said after taking in Pride.

“Yes, my lord.” He pulled his shield off his back and strode forward. He only made it a few feet before something strange happened. 

Pride gripped his head as if in pain. “No… I am Pride. Pride must be number one! This will not stand! Pride will not allow it to stand!” The room suddenly felt like it was in the middle of a vortex. Pride crouched over as cracks appeared on his body. 

“Damn it! Not again. Bruce deal with it. Now!” I heard Lord Valamar shout. A sphere of flames leapt up around Bruce, but he still appeared to be unable to make any headway towards the boss. 

“I am Pride!” I heard before the storm violently ended. Tez and I were the only ones who managed to stay on our feet from my party. His due to his strength and me from being tier two, even then I just barely managed. Rubbing the dust from my eyes, I turned to look at the boss.

Where Pride had been stood a new creature, or at least a much more heavily armored creature. A bluish-green plate armor now covered his with a wicked looking sword. He also looked to be a bit taller. The only thought I had was that it was going to be even harder for people to pass the first boss now.

My party rushed over to join the Marquis since I didn’t think the battle was going to be as easy as it was supposed to be. 

“Is that what I think it is?” Avina, the female of the chained knights, asked her gaze locked on Pride’s armor.

“Orichalcum. This just got a whole lot harder,” Urena replied with a nod.

“The dungeon upped the challenge. We will answer in kind. Let’s go,” Lord Valamar said drawing his sword though I felt mana writhing around him like a wave waiting to break.

“We need to help. We’ll support your party,” I said getting a nod from Lord Valamar.

Bruce rushed forward to I assume try to catch the new Pride off balance with his larger body. Pride turned to meet the charge, dropping and throwing his shoulder into the rushing shield. Bruce brought his sword around, but Pride met it with his own. Meanwhile, Avina and Liuvan circled to attack from behind Pride. Pride didn’t even try to block their attacks trusting his armor to protect him. They both delivered heavy blows to Pride’s back and he didn’t even flinch. 

Lord Valamar shouted for Bruce to move, and us at the back of the group launched our attacks bombarding the area with magic. Ezal sent two fireballs one of which hit Pride while the other struck the ground at his feet. Lord Valamar threw his own fireball that was a deep blue color. 

His fireball slammed against Pride’s shoulder with a heavy explosion. Unfortunately, he didn’t lose his feet. Next, three of my ords impacted Pride while two went wide and struck the ground. Flin managed to sink two iron tipped arrows into the knee joints of Pride’s armor.  

Pride roared then pulled something off his waist. I realized it was a new version of the bone weapon. Before I could shout out a warning, Pride had already pointed it at Lord Valamar and pulled the trigger. With the loudest boom I had ever heard, Pride fired the weapon. I feared the worst but Tez jumped into from of the projectile’s path.

The force from the attack managed to blast him back against the railing of the bridge which was almost two meters behind him. I watched, the world slowing down around me, as Tez fell off the bridge when the railing gave out from his weight. 

Bruce, Avina, and Liuvan renewed their attacks on Pride with the boss only swapping blows with Bruce. Each time their swords met, sparks fell into the air. I started to wonder if we could beat the boss given that nothing appeared to be having an affect on him. 

The battle continued for close to two minutes. We repeated the rotation several more times, each time the marquis would throw increasingly more dangerous looking spells at the boss who seemed to just shrug it off. Pride had fired his weapon two more times but Bruce managed to force Pride to get him to fire harmlessly into the surroundings. The only person that seemed to be having any luck was Flin, as his arrows riddled Pride’s joints with one even protruding from his mask. 

Lord Valamar shouted for Bruce to back away again, and we launched our spells. Pride wasn’t having it this time, and leveled his weapon at Bruce. Bruce just barely managed to get his shield up in time before the projectiles, which were slugs of metal, blasted him back a meter and knocking the large man to his back.

Pride then sidestepped the incoming spells dodging most of the magic. What neither we or Pride didn’t consider was the bridge. The structure couldn’t take much more and five direct hits from our spells pushed it over the limit. The spot that had been the main battlefield crumbled and took Pride with it.

We could only watch as Pride fell, hope that we might actually survive after all filling my heart. Bruce was pulled toward the crumbling hole as Pride latched onto his ankle and pulled him with him. The knights rushed forward to help Bruce as we heard loud thumps. Bruce was trying to shake Pride off with heavy kicks with his free foot.

I heard the sound of metal on metal and Bruce roaring in angry pain. Pride had tightened his grip to the point that he crushed Bruce’s ankle. There was suddenly a flash as Bruce became a pillar of flames. I could even feel the heat from over two dozen meters away. 

The flames died down and the sound of laughter getting further away sounded throughout the boss room. Pride laughed insanely as he fell until he finally passed through the clouds. The knights dragged Bruce up and away from the hole in the bridge which looked like it was ready to expand at any moment. 

“A little help!”

I looked and saw Tez hanging from the edge of the bridge. We rushed over to help him back over. I had to give him credit. He’d managed to survive by melding his hand to the bridge. He was quite literally hanging by a finger. 

With the immediate danger over, we all collapsed to the ground. I hadn’t used so much mana since becoming tier two and felt completely drained. Mary and Neldor healed all the wounds that Bruce and Tez had received. Tez’s arm was broken as well as pulled from its socket. His shield arm was also injured from the few slugs that made it through his shield. 

Bruce was even more injured. His body was covered in bruises and his ankle was completely shattered. If Neldor wasn’t one of the best priests that money could buy, I doubted that he would have been able to recover as quickly. Urena walked back over to the party after picking Pride’s sword up.

“As I suspected. Orichalcum. Damn. I’ve never seen a dungeon use something right after we gave it to the dungeon,” she said handing the blade it Lord Valamar. 

He gave it a few swings to test it out. “Its not the best, but given what its made of. You could plenty of gold for it. Now if you got it to a bladesmith that could work out the problems. You’d have a top class weapon.” 

“There was also this, my lord,” Urena said handing over the token for allowing people to teleport to the next floor.

“Thank you. Tower of Destruction. Lovely name,” he said examining it.

“That allows you to teleport back to the entrance and vice versa, from a platform up ahead,” I explained. After the battle we just had I was ready to return to my manor and just take a long bath. I smiled to myself at the thought that we had only been in the dungeon for close to an hour. We could leave and still have breakfast. 

“After we rest and cultivate we will continue. We shouldn’t encounter something like that again as the next set of floors is less explored,” Lord Valamar looked to me for confirmation to which I nodded in reply.

“How you feeling?” I asked Tez. 

“A bit sore, but Miss Mary knows what she is doing,” he replied. 

“Good. I was worried when I saw you fall,” I said patting his shoulder. 

“I have too many things I still want to do to allow something like that to be the end of me,” he said placing his large hand over mine. He realized what he did and quickly took it back. “Sorry.”

I just shook my head. I wasn’t about to get mad at him after the man just survived a near death experience. I pulled back and looked at the Marquis’s party. They appeared to already be over the intense battle, thought Avina and Liuvan appeared to be sulking off to the side. 

I walked over to the Marquis who was looking at the sword in the dim light cast by the road lamps. “My lord. After a few more minutes, we should be ready to continue. Is sir Bruce going to be okay?”

“Lady Louella,” he said then glanced over at his follower. “Trust me. Bruce has been through a lot worse than that. In fact, I think he should be dead once or twice over. Neldor is a very good healer.”

“That is good if a bit disturbing to hear.”

He laughed then put the sword away in a dimensional bag. “That is the way of things when your lord has a passion for dungeon diving. I have offered them an out but they all say they enjoy it as much as I do. Whether that is just lip service or the truth, that is their own business.”

“If the rumors of you are true, then I am sure they mean every word of it,” I replied. “If you’ll excuse me, my lord.” Walking back to my own party, we rested for about ten minutes before both parties made their way up to the next floor. 

A magnificent yet unsettling city in the red glow of sunset met our gaze as we crested the stairs. This was my second time seeing it, and I still felt my heartbeat faster from the view. A pillar stood at the center of the plaza at the top of the stairs that I didn’t remember from last time. An almost warm light sat at the top illuminating the area. 

I thought I saw it glow briefly when Lucian walked near it, but when I locked my eyes on it. There was nothing to see other than the globe at the top. I decided it was a trick of the light and turned back to the Marquis as we walked to the railing around the plaza. 

“This is quite a spectacle,” I managed to hear Lord Valamar say as he took in the sight.

“Indeed. From what we’ve gathered there are creatures that offer tasks at random in the various houses.”

“Has no one attempted to enter a house?”

“One party stated they were going to. We never heard from them again,” I replied. Ezal had asked one of the parties we had scouting the floor to attempt to enter one of the houses. That was three days ago. Sadly, we were still in a dungeon. It was a risk they understood when attempting things like that.

“Either a trap or an ambush then. Given what we just went through, I’d even say maybe both,” Urena commented.

I bobbed my head at her statement. This place was deadly to the unprepared and even then, is quite dangerous. Just look at how the dungeon adapted to the Marquis’s party. Though given that he mumbled not again when it was happening, they must have triggered such a response more than once before.

“Do you wish to proceed, Lord Valamar?” I asked.

“Yes. Let us check out a few of these streets and see what we’re dealing with. I am technically here to investigate the new dungeon.”

“Then I would like to point out the teleporter incase we get separated,” I said with a gesture to a platform overlooking the side. It was easily large enough for about twenty people. “The person with the token must be the one to press the button to activate the device.”

“The dungeon can teleport people?” Lord Valamar asked with a much more critical eye than I would have expected. I didn’t dive dungeons, but I assumed that they all had some type of mechanism like this. I quickly threw Ezal a raised eyebrow silently asking her the question.

She gave me a quick headshake. “Yes. My lord. Though, a report from the adventurer Ivan claims that one of his slaves was cut in half when her body was partially off the teleport platform. Thus it is not without dangers” 

“Good to know. Alright. Let’s move on. I’m beginning to find this dungeon quite interesting.” 

We made our way down another flight of stairs that took us to a cobblestoned street. We could only make out a few hundred meters before it started curving. Houses sat with many of them not having any alley space between them. A soft red glow emanated from the stained-glass windows that each house possessed. 

“How large to you estimate the city to be?” Neldor asked catching me by surprise. I hadn’t heard him speak so closely to me before and his voice was like silk. He was already the most handsome being I had ever seen. Adding that voice to the package only made him more dangerous.

I had to cough before I could respond. “A few parties have tried to map it. We’ve gotten maybe five percent of it done. The monsters are almost on par with the first version of Pride making it difficult to explore. I’m sorry if that is not what you were expecting.” Something made me apologize for my failure to provide him with an answer. When he looked away and his beauty wasn’t my focus anymore, I shook my head to clear it.

“No. That is alright. New dungeons are dangerous. There is no reason for people to throw their lives away just for quicker answer. Neither Lord Val, nor the Goddess Lelune would be happy about such actions.”

“Thank you for your kind words,” I said bowing my head in response.

We traveled along the street for close to three minutes when the sound of dragging metal reached us. We quickly came to a stop while Bruce braced his shield for what was to come. You could see through it now as there were a few holes from Pride’s weapon. The cost to repair that marvelous item was likely going to be quite high.

At first I thought it was man as the person came into view. That was until he raised his head and the green skin was visible. He dragged a halberd behind that made sparks with each step. He was staring at the ground as if the world was weighing down on him. He didn’t even notice us until he was only two dozen meters or so away.

“Prey…” A cracked and strained voice said causing shivers to go up my back.

“Ready everyone,” Lord Valamar said.

I channeled mana into my orbs, waiting for the opportune moment to strike. Ezal and Flin also readied themselves. The Hunter, I remembered the guild had started to call them, apparently locked on to Bruce as his target and charged. He brought his halberd around his surprising agility given how lethargic the Hunter was a second ago.

Bruce met the attack with his shield and still slid nearly half a meter from the force of the impact. Seeing my chance, I launched my spells. The orbs struck the Hunter square in the chest causing him to twitch. Avina and Lucian rushed in while Bruce brought his sword wreathed in flames up.

The Hunter’s bone sword was sliced in half, while the two Knights’ weapons scored heavy hits on the Hunter’s body. One slicing a line across the stomach, and the other a line down the chest. It was one of the most coordinated attacks I had ever seen. The Hunter grasped his bleeding chest before he collapsed to his knees then the ground. 

“That wasn’t too bad,” Bruce said rotating the arm that was struck. Even if it was only one blow, it had to be sore now from how heavy it had been.

“If the original Pride was at that level, I can see ordinary parties having trouble. They would need to be quite organized for anything under tier one mid to take one of these down. It helps there isn’t a drop to the death but only a little,” Avina said flipping the corpse over with her spear.

“Yes. That is actually quite accurate,” I said. Urena checked the corpse but other than a gold coin and the interesting cloths, there was nothing of much interest. The Hunter’s weapon was ruined as Bruce sliced it in half. She went ahead and put the entire corpse into her dimensional bag. 

That was how the next two hours went before we returned to the teleporter. The Marquis’s party had little difficulty dealing with the Hunters. Though, personally, I felt it was thanks to me stunning them. I decided to keep my mouth shut in case I came off as ostentatious.

It was still a profitable dungeon dive. We managed to collect a decent map thanks to the prowess of the marquis’s party which would significantly help other parties. Not to mention as we were leaving, Urena handed me a sack filled with nearly ninety gold coins. The marquis had more than enough gold as it was and didn’t need the measly amount. I thanked her as it would help me greatly.

“The marquis also wanted me to thank you for your assistance in the dungeon today.”

“Think nothing of it. I am just glad everyone managed to emerge safe and sound.”