Episode 140 -- This Dungeon Is Being Unfair
The first enemy monsters we encountered in the densely forested 26th level were a dozen or so large praying-mantis-like creatures, over two metres long. When I Appraised them....
[Giant Killer Mantis]
B-rank monster.
Eh, just that, nothing more? Well, before I levelled up I'd only see the name of the monster using Appraisal so I supposed learning its rank was a bit more useful.
"What, not more small fry. Tsk..." Fer grumbled before blasting the Giant Killer Mantises to Kingdom Come with bursts of lightning magic. The dozen or so Giant Killer Mantises burned up and died almost before I had finished Appraising them.
".........Fer" I said reprovingly. He had just fired off his lightning magic without warning us or discussing how we were going to fight the monsters. Seeing the results it was clear The Giant Killer Mantises were no real opposition but still, it was rude of him not to consult with the rest of us or share the fighting effort.
"Hoi, big guy. Give the rest of us a chance to fight them, will ya?" Dora-chan complained.
"Fer-ojichan cheated-" Sui-chan added. Dora-chan and Sui-chan were obviously annoyed at Fer's high-handed actions.
"Is that kind of small fry really worth arguing about?" Fer tried to justify his selfishness. "There will be stronger monsters along real soon, I'm sure."
"It's no fun if only one of us does all the fighting, big guy. You're a meanie." Dora-chan said accusingly.
"Sui wants to fight too-. I'll pew-pew the Bad Guys and buzz them with Water Cutter and knock them down a lot-"
I couldn't understand why they were all battle maniacs, did they love the sight of blood so much? I needed to sort things out before they ended up arguing and getting in each other's way in a fight. I didn't want to see Dora-chan getting hit by one of Fer's Claw Slashes by accident or Sui-chan get hurt by Dora-chan's lightning magic.
"Right then, we'll do it the same as before. You can all take turns to fight, OK?" I pointed at Dora-chan. "You fight the next monsters we meet and then it will be Sui-chan's turn. Does that sound fair?"
Both Dora-chan and Sui-chan were reluctant to agree to this but soon acquiesced. Fer's attempt to interrupt and jump the queue were met by three harsh stares and he quickly backed down.
"Next time is me, the boss says so." Dora-chan said happily.
"If you say so, Aruji, Sui will wait because Sui is a good girl-" Sui-chan agreed.
Now that was settled I picked up the drops from the Giant Killer Mantises and we went deeper into the woods. By the way, the drop items were a small magic stone and the front-leg sickles from a Giant Killer Mantis.
The next monster we ran into in the woods was a Murder Grizzly. To me it seemed bigger than the one Fer had subjugated earlier on the surface. When I asked Fer about this afterwards he told me that monsters in a dungeon tended to be larger and stronger than the same kind of monsters outside in the surface world. It was something to do with the concentration of monsters down here and maybe the way the dungeon created them to fight Adventurers. Only the biggest and baddest would be suitable.
"Guaaaargh!" The Murder Grizzly spotted us and lumbered towards us, the big heavy monster moving deceptively quickly.
"Hey ho, here I go!" Dora-chan sang, flying straight into the Murder Grizzly's body like a small artillery shell. Dosh. The Murder Grizzly collapsed in a furry heap as Dora-chan erupted out its back in a spray of blood and organs. And that was that. I collected the drop, a Murder Grizzly fur and we moved on.
The next monsters we met were a flock of Paralyse Butterflies, according to my Appraisal. They were B-ranked monsters, butterflies about one metre long with orange wings spotted with blue polka-dots. They usually flew around in groups making them more dangerous than individuals. There were maybe thirty or so butterflies in the flock coming towards us. Since these were the first monsters of this type I'd ever encountered I quickly asked Fer about them. He explained that after sprinkling a paralytic poisonous dust on their targets and immobilizing their prey they sucked out their bodily fluids while they were still alive.
Sucking out someone's bodily fluids while they were still alive... I shuddered at the thought. This time it was Sui-chan's turn to deal with these horrible creatures and I wanted her to do a thorough job before the Paralyse Butterflies could get close to us.
"Sui, the bug-sans that are coming scatter a powder that makes your body stop moving. Don't let them get close, you should attack them from a distance. "
"Yeah, I understand-" Sui-chan's sniper tentacle was already swinging on target. Pew pew pew! Sui shot down one Paralyze Butterfly after another with Acid Bullets, never missing and finishing the entire flock off in less than a minute.
"Aruji- all knocked down-" Sui-chan said, retracting her sniper tentacle.
"Yeah, you did great, Sui!" When I said that, Sui jumped around me happily pyon pyon. Ahhhh, cute Sui-chan, such a source of healing in this killer dungeon. We still had to keep going though so I collected the drops from the Paralyse Butterflies, the paralysis powder they used on their victims (for safety's sake it was in a number of sealed vials) and we moved on.
As we advanced deeper into the forest beast-type monsters and bird-type monsters would appear and attack us but lose every time against Fer, Dora-chan and Sui-chan in turn, with me left to collect the drops. As time was going on I mentioned we should stop and make dinner soon, but...
"Huh? There's no safe area on this floor?!" I had intended to get Fer to guide us to the level's safe area so we could eat in peace but it turned out that in this sort of forest level no such safe area existed.
"There often aren't safe places in a level that looks like this." Fer explained -- levels consisting of forests, swamps, deserts and the like in what he called 'field' dungeons usually didn't have such rest areas where monsters wouldn't attack the Adventurers. This dungeon was big enough that it had at least one level like the one we were in and Fer had confirmed with his monster sensing ability that it lacked a safe area. The usual process in such levels was to stop and rest and set up a camp with lookouts keeping watch in turn while the others slept. In a field dungeon there was a lot of space for strong monsters to move around in and attack Adventurers from any direction so that made the levels more dangerous. The lack of a safe area for Adventurers to rest, sleep, eat and recuperate was just an extra difficulty factor to deal with. This far down in Doran's dungeon we could expect only high rank monsters would appear so we couldn't let our guard down even for an instant. This wouldn't be like camping in a normal forest.
"Don't worry. It will be fine once I set up my Barrier." Fer said. Oh, that's right. If Fer has his Barrier around us we won't have to worry about being attacked out of nowhere. I looked around, this place would do as well as any other.
"Well, let's eat here then." I said. "Can you set up your Barrier, Fer?"
"Yeah, I got it." he said. Once Fer's Barrier was up I started preparing dinner. But what? Oh, that will work, I think... The boiled fatty Orc General meat I had prepared for ramen noodles later would do nicely as a rice bowl topping, I decided. I cut some of it into thick slices, filled bowls with rice then topped them with the pork slices so they were completely covered. I cut soft-boiled eggs in half and added them, letting the runny yolks dribble over the pork and it was done.
"Hey, it's ready." I announced. Fer, Dora-chan and Sui dived right in.
"Oh, this is delicious." Fer said telepathically, his jaws hard at work in the depths of his first serving. "The meat just disintegrates in the mouth. The flavour is really good too." Fer seemed to like the boiled Orc meat.
"Unm-!" Dora-chan was working his way down though his own rice bowl. "This meat, it's really juicy and soft and the juices are soaking into the rice. It's yummy." Dora-chan approved too.
"This sweet and sour taste- the meat is soft and the egg salty- this is delicious~" Sui-chan liked it as well.
It was popular and easy to prepare once I had boiled the Orc meat and let it marinate in the soup stock overnight back in the inn. Now for my own dinner. I added shredded cabbage to the rice before topping it with boiled pork and a soft-boiled egg sliced in half. My first mouthful, yes, eating your own cooking made it taste even more delicious somehow. The soup stock I had boiled the Orc General meat in had really softened the pork-like meat and impregnated it with the sweet and sour ingredients I had added. That sauce, oozing out of the tightly-bound meat into the rice just made every mouthful taste better. The cabbage added a crunchiness and texture and the sharp sourness of the egg was the perfect topping.
I managed three more mouthfuls before ""Seconds"" came from Fer and Sui in unison. I wondered for a moment just how they could be so well synchronised every time given their differing sizes and appetites but I just dished out more rice, boiled pork and soft-boiled egg for them before returning to my own dinner.
After that there were more demands for ""Seconds"" and by the time Fer and Sui were satisfied the boiled Orc General meat was all gone. I had made it quite a lot of it but it was popular. Maybe next time I'd make a lot more, there were a lot of ways I could serve this sort of meat up. Ramen, for example, if I had the time to make noodles properly...
We took a short rest break to let the meal settle before setting off through the woods again. We ran into more monsters which Fer, Dora-chan and Sui beat in turn while I collected the various drops. As time wore on I noticed it was getting darker. What was happening?
"It's getting dark in the dungeon here. I thought it stayed the same brightness all the time?"
"Ah." Fer explained, "In this sort of level there's a day and night just like outside. When it gets dark out there it gets dark here too." Fer looked around, probably using his monster sensing abilities. "When night falls the nocturnal monsters become active, of course. " Nocturnal monsters? What, like bats and such?
"Geh, is that right?" I looked around too, trying to see anything in the dark forest around us. It was becoming scarier and scarier as the light failed.
Fer, I wonder is your Barrier perfectly good?" I asked nervously.
"Huh, of course it's fine. As I said before, my Barrier can stop anything." Fer paused. "Well, almost anything. If a Dragon should come along that's a different matter entirely."
I felt relieved. No, wait... "If a Dragon should come along, you said. Are there any Dragons around here?" I started looking around frantically but the forest was now totally dark and impenetrable to my sight. What was that noise?
"I wish there were some Dragons." Fer said, licking his muzzle in memory of the Earth Dragon steaks he had consumed at Elland-san's place only two days before. "But no, there's no sign of any Dragons on this level."
You might be disappointed, Fer but I'm relieved. I'll be able to sleep safely knowing there aren't any Dragons around. Tomorrow we'd continue but how long was it going to take for us to reach the next level?
"This level seems to be very big. Can we really complete the entire thing?" I asked Fer who swept his head around again before answering.
"If we cleared the entire level of monsters it would take us more than a month." Fer said finally.
"Wow, that long?" Did we have enough food for that sort of exploration, and did we really want to spend that much time down here anyway?
"Yeah. It looks like it could be fun but I want to fight Behemoth as soon as possible." Fer announced. "I've got a line on the boss area of this level, the place leading down to the next level." His muzzle pointed off to one side of our line of travel. "That way, I think. There's a lot of monsters in front of us but with Dora-chan and Sui along we should get there tomorrow evening."
I wanted to do a bit more exploring on this level but spending even a couple of weeks fighting, collecting drops and searching for treasure chests on a single level seemed a bit excessive. I decided we'd just give up and head for the boss area on this level -- it wouldn't be a room like in the tunnel levels of the dungeon. It would still take us two days to get there even if we hurried, and then the boss, what would it be? That worried me, knowing the strength of the boss monsters we had already encountered previously.
That night's supper was mainly fried food, minced pork cutlets, kaarage and the last of the pork miso soup. I knew Fer and Sui especially liked deep-fried food and, as it turned out, Dora-chan was a fan too after his first bite, stuffing his little cheeks with kaarage and cutlets as fast as he could manage.
After we finished eating dinner I tried to make a house with earth magic to sleep in but for some reason it didn't work. The magic seemed to slide off to one side of the ground I aimed at and didn't activate. I tried again, to no avail.
"Hey, I can't make a house..." I complained to Fer.
"Earth magic doesn't work in a dungeon so you can't make your little house." Fer explained.
…What? How does that happen?
"I told you before that a dungeon is considered to be a living thing." Fer continued. "This soil," he scratched at the ground with his paw, "isn't really soil, it's actually part of the dungeon's, well, body if you like. You can still do earth magic like Stone Bullet but you can't use Stone Wall or anything that manipulates the material of the dungeon itself. That's why folks say that a party member who can use Earth Magic is not so useful in a dungeon."
Well, I hadn't heard that. It seemed unfair that I couldn't use earth magic in this dungeon. It was like the dungeon was cheating, somehow.