30: An Honest, Simple, Regular Dungeon, Part One

An Honest, Simple, Regular Dungeon, Part One

With that first fight out of the way, Neve and Erin made their way through woods filled with sickly trees and a mild fog and arrived at the point on the map that Neve wanted to investigate.

The dungeon she'd seen to the north.

Unfortunately, she hadn't quite found the right words to tell Erin about what she was, but she figured she could do so later. 

[We're in no hurry,] she thought. [As long as she can fight well, any other annoying thing is fine. That's all I care about.]

Carved into the side of a mountain, almost as though the world was trying to tuck it away and hide it, was a set of black doors carrying intricate carvings on their regal wood. Words appeared before the healer.

{Catacombs of The Old Lords}

{Mimimum Players Required: 1}

{Players: 0/4}

{Recommended Level: 30}

[YES!] Neve thought, nearly throwing her fists into the air. [I lucked out!]

If she was being honest, Neve had fully been expecting to find another level 50+ dungeon. She would not have been surprised at all to see the recommended level being somewhere around 60, or 70.

To find that she was *above* the recommended level made her feel like she was dreaming, after everything she went through. 

At the same time, this did make another thought pop up in Neve's mind. 

[This dungeon can only be tackled by a maximum of 4 players. It's level 30, and it's the only one near the Main Dungeon. If our group hadn't taken the approach of tackling the Main Dungeon immediately, we absolutely would have run into the issue of some people not being able to reach 500 AP before the first day ended. I'm sure there's something we could have done differently. Maybe we could have had half the group enter the main dungeon and half go out looking for dungeons outside, or something? But seeing this makes me think that the move we made of tackling the Main Dungeon quickly was somewhat optimal.] 

All that stuff, though, didn't matter anymore. It was just some food for thought she got in the moment.

"Oh?" Erin asked, peeking over her shoulder at her. "You seem rather joyful all of a sudden. Do you like dark, cramped spaces? Because I would be very surprised if this door didn't lead to such an area."

"N-No, it's, ehm, I'll explain later."

"Hm. Sure. There certainly does seem to be no end to the questions I have about you."

Focusing back on the matter at hand, Neve calmed down.

What did matter was the reward listed for defeating the boss here.

It was something Neve could actually use, for once.

{Reward:}

{Spell: Holy Beckons}

{Creates a field that damages all Impure-type enemies that pass over it}

It was a Priestess-Class spell. Perhaps the only one that Neve would be able to find out here.

She couldn't let this chance slip.

"I must say," Erin spoke up behind her, "it does seem like this adventure-seeking of yours does tend to bring you to treacherous places, given how you ended up back at my home as well. Do you truly wish to go in there?"

"Uh, yeah," Neve replied. "I have it on good authority that there's something here that'll be useful for me, so..."

Erin sighed, putting on a slightly sad smile as she walked up to the doors and stood next to Neve.

"If you believe it is truly necessary, I suppose I will follow you. I do hope we will visit some slightly more appealing locations, at some point. Perhaps a beach? Oh, and that you will be providing me with some form of a reward for being as helpful as I am," she said, wrapping an arm around Neve's back. "I am a princess, after all. In case you have forgotten. We do tend to be quite selfish," she whispered into Neve's ear. 

Neve blushed slightly, turning back toward the black doors. Her hands shifted on her staff a little as she cleared her throat.

[It's so easy to forget that she's a summon with how she talks. Are all summons like this? If that's the case, I feel like being a Summoner-class player might make you go crazy.]

She placed a hand on the door, and, steadying her rapidly beating heart, she pushed them open. 

The doors led to a tight, cave-like corridor. She cast {Candlelight} and walked in. Erin followed closely.

As the doors closed behind her, Neve's first move was to try to push them open again.

{You cannot leave until the boss is defeated}

[Okay, so that wasn't just part of the punishment. I guess that applies to all dungeons, then. At least you get to see what level they are before you go in.]

Turning back toward the dark path ahead, Neve's grip tightened around her staff.

[Okay, don't let your guard down. Just because you're over the recommended level doesn't mean this will be easy. Especially since my Endurance isn't that high. One wrong move and it's all over. Thomas and his goons proved that a person that's dozens of levels higher than their opponent can lose with just one lucky blow. And I just took down a level 60 boss just before this. The same thing could absolutely happen to me if I'm not careful.]

On that note, she and Erin began walking deeper into these catacombs. The lack of any sounds in the air made things feel particularly eerie as the cave-like walls around them narrowed, growing more and more cramped until, finally, Neve and Erin came out to a place that seemed ancient.

"Wow," Erin said, slithering forward. "What strange architecture."

They'd emerged at a room built from stone. A lit chandelier at the ceiling cast white-blue light all around them, rendering Neve's {Candlelight} redundant. There were statues lined across the room's sides, depicting what looked like humans holding weapons and wearing crowns.

Several coffins were positioned in a row before them, all the way from the entrance to the door at the other side of the room.

What truly caught Neve's eye, however, was a body to the left. A skeleton wearing what looked like low-level thief armor, with three arrows stuck to its cuirass.

Neve walked over to it while Erin continued scanning their surroundings.

An inventory menu popped up with a name over it, confirming what Neve began to suspect as soon as she saw the corpse.

{Thief}

{Carl Sats}

Level 18

[This was a player. Someone from the other nine expeditions. Judging by how under-leveled this guy was, maybe he came in here with others thinking he'd be protected and was the first to die. Maybe, he was running out of time for the AP quota and this was the first place he could find. I don't know. Tough luck, though.] 

"Erin, stay alert," she ordered. "We can probably expect enemies pretty soon."

"I understand," she replied.

As soon as those words left the lamia's mouth, something happened.

One of the coffins in the room saw its lid be pushed up and thrown aside. The metal fell to the ground, earning a loud, echoing thud. Neve stood up and quickly positioned herself behind her summon, who was slightly hunched over, baring her claws.

[Ah... Skeletons, then?] Neve thought. [I've fought them a ton. They're very common in low-level dungeons, so the whole strat I used to go by of only taking low-level missions that I knew I could clear meant that I always saw these things. They're easy to predict and they're weak to Fire-type damage and Blunt weapons. If it's just them, it shouldn't be an issue.]

She heard bones clattering against each other as two more coffins suddenly saw their lids being thrown aside.

However, although they'd done so, and Neve could hear them moving, it did not seem like the skeletons wanted to come out of those coffins.

[What are they waiting for?] Neve wondered. [Do they want us to step up? Or...]

Something hit her.

Neve gasped, taking multiple steps back. 

Her chest hurt like hell. Looking down, she found out why.0

An arrow was sticking out from her body. 

[... What?]

It was like taking a punch to the gut that one hadn't seen coming. It knocked the wind out of her lungs, pushing her back and pinning her to the wall momentarily.

With her jaw on the ground and with Erin looking back at her just as surprised, Neve stared at the arrow between her breasts.

She raised her head then, looking around the room.

Finally, she realized:

[They're invisible.]

Before she could cast {Healing Ground}, she felt she needed to make sure her summon knew this fact.

"Erin!" She struggled to say. "They're-"

"I know, I saw!"

Immediately, the lamia began slithering toward something Neve could not see. The healer blinked, surprised, but quickly set that aside and cast {Healing Ground} under herself.

Erin began swiping at the air, as far as Neve could tell, with her claws.

In addition to her healing spell, Neve cast {Hard Target} on herself to reduce incoming damage from projectiles. As soon as she finished casting that, another arrow struck her stomach.

"Aaaagh, shit..."

It hurt, but she couldn't do anything about it, as she had no clue where the attacks were coming from. All she could do was wait for Erin to finish them, and hope her head wasn't targeted.

Thankfully, it seemed like she had soon after that second shot.

EXP Gained: 40

EXP: 370/400

EXP Gained: 35

EXP: 405/400

Level Up!

WS Tokens Gained: 100

WS Tokens Gained: 100

WS Tokens: 5681

Neve calmed herself down, watching as her body slowly pushed the first arrow out on its own, and then looked back at Erin.

[Is it because her fighting instincts are so sharpened? Or, maybe lamias have better senses than humans? Whichever it is, I'm glad. She's really turning out to be such an amazing reward! I would have absolutely died here, if I didn't have her with me.]

"... I think that was all of them," Erin stated. "I don't-"

And, she disappeared.

As Neve finished healing, she quickly resummoned her.

"think- huh?" Erin looked down at her own hands. "There it is again. What just happened?"

"I'll explain once we're out," Neve promised. "For now, just stay alert."

[Holy fuck, that was bad. This dungeon is going to be so annoying, I can already tell.]

pqdm.com