Dungeon Delving is Damn HARD (Danmachi / Sharingan)

[CapCaverna]

A/N: Heya. This is a repost of my fic on Spacebattles. I'll be posting chapter 1 and 2 today, then update once a day until I'm caught up

Also, until I'm caught up, all the links on my signature will point to pages on Spacebattles or Scribblehub.

Having been an antisocial nerd his entire life Roland Sinclair had just started getting out of his shell and having a little fun when his life came to a very sudden end, thankfully his death was amusing enough to atract the attention of a ROB and he got sent into the world of DanMachi.

With limited knowledge of the plot and setting but having read a lot about mythology he decides he'd best avoid sex ofenders, incestuous and often apocalipse bringing deities and spend his second chance at life exploring the dungeon and the wonders of magic he had always daydreamed about... now, if only he could manage his growing addrenaline addiction and the unwanted attention of a wine god, he may even survive long enought to enjoy it.

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Prologue

I was looking at my phone and trying to message my friend to know if he was already inside while waiting in line to enter the convention. I had been to one convention before but this was the first time I was actually doing cosplay so I was very excited.

Truth be told me and my friend had wanted to come as the main character from overlord, I wearing momon's armor and my friend in his skeleton robes but, as it was my first time, the armor had turned out so shitty I was too ashamed to wear it and my friend had similar trouble so we went with our second option, the fast option.

Cosplaying as Uchiha Shisui was incredibly easy, dark blue clothes a forehead protector some contact lens, sandals, a leather chest protector and a foam sword at my back and I was done, less than 3 days to get it all and extremely convenient since we were out of time, my friend's costume as Itachi was even easier with the large coat in place of the clothes, the bastard I bet it was cheaper than mine too.

Suddenly I noticed a loud noise coming from above so I looked up and stared directly at a burning piece of debris as it smashed right through my upper body pulverizing my head and chest, sending what remained of my body flying and on fire while leaving a two meters wide hole in the ground and pelting the bystanders with pieces of bone and asphalt.

Floating there above what little remained of my body, a hand, most of a forearm and two legs, I continued to stare stuned "Well… that just happened." I couldn't help but say, at least it had been so fast I didn't even have time to feel pain.

I was floating in the air a little above the crater, my body now transparent and without any strength, stuned I tried to touch one of the pieces of my body only to pass right through it, shit I was a ghost wasn't I?

Looking at everyone screaming in horror or running away from the scene I felt strangely detached, a fat guy trying to crawl away while screaming like a little bitch, two hot girls wearing Alliance of Legends costumes frozen in shock, a mother cradling a little boy in a darth Vader costume who had been hit by one of my bones… I wondered if anyone was gonna miss me.

Fuck, thinking about my life I never really did anything that I liked, always doing what others expected of me, always woried about how other would think, always trying to apear normal, always too afraid to step up, to do something, shit I had even died a virgin because I was too stupid to ask a girl out.

If I knew it was gonna end so soon I would have done things differently.

A Loud, guttural voice spoke from behind me it's words echoing in my very soul as it seemed to shake the world around me and I felt pain at my very core, filled with dread I noticed my extremities had started to dissipate in the air, almost unable to stop myself I turned and looked at the…thing that had spoken.

Eyes, eyes and mouths and too many limbs coming out of tentacles made from screaming heads, they were all looking at me, all starring as if I was a particularly interesting insect, then the tentacles shifted revealing what laid inside them and I screamed, I screamed as I tried to claw my eyes out, tried to rip out my own hearth or bash my skull until it caved in but my hands had dissolved and I couldn't even close my eyes, I screamed until my entire body had dissolved and I didn't have lungs anymore and then did it some more anyway.

I felt myself snap back into sanity as suddenly as I had died, I didn't feel my body recovering and couldn't speak anymore but the last thing I remembered was looking at something, and then darkness "Sorry, sorry, didn't mean to appear like that but you were kind of a last minute addition and I was getting ready to leave"

Crouching In front of me was a young Steve Buscemi wearing a white shirt and jeans, he poked at me with mild interest and I wondered if this was the devil, I had always thought he would look like Al Pacino.

"I don't think you'll wanna see what I really look like again huh?" he commented before lifting me up in his hand and turning what remained of my soul from side to side "Don't worry it seems you're still salvageable, a bit more effort than what I was looking for but what can I do"

I didn't really remember what I had seen but I still shuddered, I did not want to go through that again, what now… do I go to Hell? I doubt I deserve heaven but I don't think I did anything bad enough to burn for all eternity.

"Well usually I tend to give you guys the illusion of choice, offer to let you go and all that but we all know you're all gonna take the reincarnation option in the end" the creature shrugged and swiped a strand of hair out of his eye "So let's see, where can I send you… nope, nope, already did that one… there! There's already a lot of them playing over there, no reason not to do it myself."

As for skills… yeah you don't have anywhere near enough good karma for something good, nope no broken system or inspect for you… hmm nope… ha, you'd like that wouldn't you… snort you really think we don't know when your kind is trying to game us by exploiting some 'weak' skill?"

The… creature continued answering questions before I had ever formulated them leaving me incredibly frustrated and confused as it kept me inside its hand then it focused back on me and sighed heavily

"Fine, I suppose it's kind of my fault for letting you look where you shouldn't and I'm not completely opposed to making someone OP every once in a while but you will only get the eyes not the entire body"

'What?' I wanted to ask him but the second I tried to speak I felt a wave of pain wash over what remained on my being.

"Tsk, don't try to speak" the creature chided me while bringing me closer to his face and poking me with a finger "now let me ask you, do you prefer a random rebirth or keeping your current body? Yeah, probably for the best since a medieval society, even one with magic, isn't the best place to be a baby, or a girl, or the poor, or… well you get it, plus there's already a neat spawning mechanic over there so I can even save some power when building your body, let me just fix you up a little and… done, well here you go"

Then the bastard squeezed his hand and everything went black.
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I Woke up in darkness, held in place by walls around me as if the thing had squeezed me inside a box, testing the limits of my box I felt the wall in front of me give a little so I braced myself against the back of the box and pressed my shoulder against it before pushing as hard as I could.

With the sound of breaking glass the wall shattered and I half fell out of the box into a forest, light coming from the ceiling as if it was illuminated by thousands of lamps, looking around myself I noticed I was a meter from the floor hanging from a dark gash on the wall so I put my arms around the rough stone and pulled myself free falling on all fours on the soft grass.

Taking a few seconds (alright it was quite a few minutes) to freak out I finally managed to gather my wits and take some deep breaths, then I pinched my arm to see if that would wake me up.

It didn't, I started hyperventilating again.

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Patting my clothes to get rid of the dirt and trying to use my hands to comb my short hair back into place I took stock of my situation once more while pretending I hadn't just had a panic attack, At first I thought I was still wearing my cosplay but, upon closer inspection I noticed my clothes had much better quality, they fit me better and even the leather armor in my chest was much harder and heavier with a layer of metal underneath it for some actual protection.

Grabbing at my back I pulled my foam sword to notice it had now became shining steel with a wicked edge, passing it lightly over my arm actually shaved off my hair better than a razor, using the sword's side I checked my reflection only to find two red eyes with three tomoe each staring right back at me.

Holy shit I had freaking sharingans!

Channeling power into my eyes happened almost on instinct and I saw the tomoe starting to rotate until they took the form of a pinwheel with a back dot on the center, turning towards a tree I tried to burn it with amaterasu but nothing happened, damn did I have to train it or something? What did that… thing say again? it was answering questions I hadn't even thought to ask so…

Of course, if I had to ask for one of those overpowered eyes I'd try for the greatest of them all, the one capable of Kotoamatsukami, I had Shisui's eyes and he never had amaterasu.

Eager to test it out I instead concentrated on the one ability common to all Uchiha, around myself a green flame appeared starting to condense into a single gigantic bone around my body, then the side effects hit me, I felt a terrifying pain, my eyes were killing me, grabbing at my face with both hands I felt them being covered in blood before exhaustion hit me and I passed out.

I woke up with a groan, my eyes were still hurting a little and I now had a killer headache to go with it, at least I wasn't face down on the floor anymore, instead I felt a straw bed under me, not exactly the most comfortable but the… creature had said I'd be in medieval times.

"Hey you survived!" Came a cheerful voice from the open door, it only drove another spike of pain on my head "We'd all thought you're gonna die since the banshee herself threw you into the inn but guess not"

Opening a single eye I glared at the man on the door, the guy wore an old green shirt and was completely average except for the pair of cat ears atop his head, he seemed somewhat amused at my predicament.

"Hey don't glare, it's not my fault you gave yourself a mind down" he entered the room and put a plate of soup on the table before helping me up into a sitting position and handing me a cup of water "anyways how the hell did a newbie like you make it all the way down here?"

"Here, where?" I asked while patting myself to see there was nothing missing besides my sword which I found hanging by a chair.

"Rivira of course, what other town did you think you'd find inside the dungeon?" he said and then noticed me looking for my things "yeah don't worry nobody dared touch anything since the Banshee paid for it herself and even Bors don't wanna mess with her, anyway what's your name?"

"Ugh, I'm Roland Sinclair" I was still disoriented by my headache but Dungeon, what the heck? "And I didn't even know I was inside a dungeon"

"I'm Villi by the way and damn, that's some vicious prank someone is playing on you" the cat man said and started walking away not really that curious, or just unwilling to get involved "anyway you're gonna be here for a while, the Goliath just spawned and you're gonna have to wait for some big shot to slay it before you could make it upside again, drink your soup when you're feeling better come down, I'm sure Bors will be able to figure things out"

He waved me away and I cradled my head once more, this reincarnation thing was already turning out worse than I thought, and what the heck was a mind down? Did I run out of chakra or something?

A few minutes later I managed to get out of the bed and sit at the table to start drinking my soup, it was thin and without spices but I was hungry enough it didn't matter right now so I devoured the entire thing and reclined back into the chair, the headache was still strong but no longer crippling.

Finally making my way downstairs I saw a plethora of different people wearing all kinds of classic adventure gear from full plates to mage robes and anything in between, some of them glanced my way with frowning looks but I ignored them until I saw the cat man waving me over towards a large, muscular man with an eyepatch.

"So you're the guy who dared go after the banshee huh!" the Eyepatch man said while grabbing my shoulder and invading my personal space "tell me your secret boy did you really tap that?"

"What?"

"the woman, did you tap that?" he embraced me and made a very lecherous face "I mean she terrifies me but I can't deny the elf is hot"

"I don't even know who you're talking about!" I protested and the guy forced me into the seat before his face became serious again.

"So how did a little newbie like you find yourself down here?" he asked while taking a huge drink from a wooden mug.

"I don't remember, I barely remember my name really" I told him and it wasn't exactly a lie, I didn't remember anything from this world.

"Well you don't have any head wounds but I guess the banshee could have healed you" Bors mussed and took another swing of his beer "anyway, from your disposition I'd guess you're a very new level 1 so you're stuck here until someone slays the Goliath and even then, if you don't manage to get a group, it's unlikely you'll make it to the surface by yourself"

"I… can't I just get someone to take me up then?" I asked while massaging my temple.

"Ha, do you have a lot of coins with you? because nobody will want to take care of a newbie in the middle floors unless you can make it worth the danger" Bors laid back and, seeing my look sighed "Look, your familia will probably come get you soon and, worst case you can probably return with the Loki or Ganesha familia expeditions, they're big and powerful enough not to mind a single newbie tagging along"

Wait, Loki familia? Dungeon? I started to connect the dots, I was in DanMachi wasn't I, home of the asshole gods and overpowered adventurers, shit I had only read the first few volumes of the manga, why couldn't I have been sent to Naruto or Avatar where I knew the entire plot?

Releasing a groan I let my forehead bang against the table in frustration, I was stuck deep inside the dungeon and didn't have any coin whatsoever, how was I gonna eat? Where would I sleep? From what I remember this was supposed to be a safe floor but monsters could still come from other floors so even foraging wasn't very safe much less sleeping outside the city, glancing at the muscular wannabe pirate I asked "You wouldn't know how I could get some coin would you?"

"Hmm, well your gear seems to be high quality so I could pay you some Valis for the sword and armor… let's say around 15 thousand for the set" Bors patted a pouch on his hip.

I didn't know how much my gear was worth but judging by the glint in the man's eye he was probably trying to cheat me, plus I'd be without a weapon, inside a dungeon, with murderous monsters, not something I was eager for.

"Ha, good joke, no seriously is there any way to earn some money around here?"

"Well there's a lot of adventures waiting for the Goliath to be slain so I could use some help in exchange for food and letting you crash at my room" said the cat man who was passing through their table before continuing to serve what seemed like dinner.

Noticing the frown on my face Bors smirked at me "You're an adventurer alright, don't like doing housework" Then the arrogant bastard took the time to pick at his nose dismissively before continuing "Tell you what nobody's gonna want a green rookie like you to delve into the Tree labyrinth but I could get you a job as a supporter, for a price"

"And what exactly would I have to do?" I asked suspiciously while narrowing my eyes at the man, his whole greedy face just screamed scammer.

"Wow don't you have some creepy eyes, don't worry I don't deal with shady things, plenty of money to be made the legal way if you know how to do it" he took another swing of his mug and wiped his mouth with his arm before releasing a burp "you just have to carry their gear, stay out of the way, keep yourself safe and harvest the monsters for drops and magic stones"

"And what's in it for you?"

"35% of what you get" I was about to protest but he leaned over the table and glared at me "Don't even try, a supporter won't be making all that much so it's just not worth my time for anything less, plus I'll be making sure you actually get paid and chose a more respectable group, no telling what can happen in the dungeon if you try to find a group by yourself"

Shit he was right, I didn't read the manga all that long but I know the tropes, there's bound to be a lot of assholes in the dungeon who wouldn't mind killing me just for the gear on my body even if they weren't that great.

Trying to ignore my headache I considered his offer, I didn't really know if I could trust the guy but he at least would have an interest in seeing me come back alive since I'd be paying him and, even if the pay was small, it would probably be worth more than my average equipment so I didn't really have to trust 'him' to find a good group but his greed, plus I'd get to observe some experienced adventurers with my sharingan and copy their moves "So I won't have to fight for them?"

"Well… it's the dungeon so there's always the chance of a monster party and ambushes, you'll have to at least survive long enough for them to finish everything off but nobody will be expecting you to kill anything"

"Alright I'm in" I agreed and almost banged my head against the table when the guy patted my back with the strength of an elephant.

"Great, you can rest and recover today and leave tomorrow with the party I found, I have a good feeling about you boy don't disappoint me too much"

Seeing as disappointing him probably meant I'd be dead again I'd try not to do it at all if I could help it, ready to go back to my room and try to sleep my headache away I started to push my chair back before remembering one last thing "hey Bors, this Banshee you guys keep mentioning saved me, who's she?"

"Filvis Challia from Dionysus familia" he told me with an unusually serious voice "She's a survivor from the nightmare on the 27th floor and since then everyone who gets into a party with her dies"

"She kills then?" I asked in surprise, I thought the guild kept things like that from happening in danmachi.

"Who the hell knows, plenty of adventurers die every week in the dungeon it could just be luck" he sighed and finished his beer "Personally I saw her when she returned from the nightmare, she spent weeks covered in blood, her hair all messed up and with a crazed look in her eyes, I think it broke her and now she just runs away whenever there's real danger but, no matter the truth, nobody wants to risk an unreliable fighter"

Yeah, thinking about it I know it's cruel but I probably wouldn't party up with someone like that either, an unreliable supporter wouldn't cause too much trouble but a fighter who ran away could probably mess with the entire formation

"Anyway I have money to make, see you tomorrow kid" Grabbing his mug he tied it wo his belt and got up before throwing a few coins to the table "Use it to pay for another night here I'll take it from your pay later, with interest of course"

Asshole, grabbing the coins I approached a busy Valli "hey, is this enough for another night?"

"Yeah, Bors left you just enough for it and a meal" the cat man told me while filling another plate with soup for his other costumes "Anything else I can do for you?"

"You got a mirror around here I could use?"

"Sure, I have a small one on the back" putting the plate down he took a second to search inside the kitchen and came back with a handheld mirror a little bigger than my hand, then continued serving his guests.

Going back to my room I locked the door and took off my shirt, the mirror was small but I managed to check out the faulna on my back for the first time, at first I thought I didn't have one but then I remembered gods had to use blood to activate it, cutting one of my fingers with the sword I let a drop fall over my shoulder finally revealing my status.

it looked like a huge eye surrounded by tentacles with the information written in english between the spaces

Roland Synclair – level 1
Strength – I - 0
Endurance – I - 0
Dexterity – I - 0
Agility – I - 0
Magic – I - 15
Skills:
- Chosen of an Outer God : Since your god cannot physically manifest into the world without risk of destroying it he has chosen you to act as his avatar allowing you to modify your own falna.
- Mangekyou Sharingan: Can never forget what one has seen, after study can read muscular tension to predict how one will move in the future, makes it easier to learn techniques one has seen, greatly increase ability to track fast moving objects, can see the amount of magic a target has and if it is being affected by any mind altering spells.
Grants the spell: Lesser illusion (capable of applying lesser illusions simply by looking at a target, the illusion's quality depends on how much concentration is put into it, affects two senses but can be easily broken if noticed)
Grants the spell: Greater visual illusion (Capable of applying strong illusions when meeting the eyes of the target, which are harder to resist, more difficult to notice and can affect stronger targets)
Grants the spell: Izanagi (Can turn reality into ilusion to completely heal the user even from death at the cost of an eye)
Grants the spell: Izanami (Can trap an enemy into an inescapable illusion of repeated actions regardless of level leaving the target frozen in place until said target fully accepts the consequences of his actions at the cost of an eye)
Grants the spell: Kotoamatsukami (Can enter a target's mind and implant false memories changing their actions while making them believe it's from their own will regardless of level, uses an enormous amount of mind, causes severe damage to vision and requires a long recovery period)
Grants the spell: Susanoo (Can manifest a magical construct around the user in the form of a giant warrior equal to a Monster Rex a level above the user that has enormous endurance and strength but costs a large amount of mind and causes severe damage to vision)

With an effort of will my fauna disappeared once again and I was left thinking, so I didn't have chakra, the being who sent me here had modified my skills into working with mana instead and, from the looks of it I had a normal sharingan without the uchiha bloodline meaning I'd have to be very careful when using the mangekyo unless I wanted to go completely blind.

The greatest question for me was Kotoamatsukami. would I have to wait ten years to use the spell once again like that crow in naruto? From what I understood of Danmachi levels are steps towards divinity and even a level 1 adventurer was better than an average human in every way so did my fauna act like Danzo's hashirama cells allowing me to recover faster?

With my mind filled with questions. I laid my head on the pillow, then exhaustion hit me like a truck and I was sleeping in less than a minute.

 

[CapCaverna]

The next day after waking up and eating breakfast Bors handed me a huge backpack and told me to follow him, almost dragging me away from the inn and leading me into a small gathering of rough looking men.

The first guy was about my size but build like a wardrobe with wide shoulders and bulging muscles wearing some fur and a single sword at his hip, the second was much taller had even more muscle, either that or they were more evident since he didn't wear a shirt, had a huge shield at his back with a mace by his hip, the last man looked like a classic rogue thin and with only a long dagger as a weapon but holding several pouches by his hip.

"Yoh Bors this the newbie you were telling us about" asked the first guy with his hands at his hip.

"Yep, this is Roland Synclar, Roland thats Mord Latro the party leader" Bors pushed me away from him and waved "Well I'm done here good luck"

"So you're the newbie the bossman was telling us about huh" Mord looked me over with a critical eye then snorted "I suppose if you're not fighting it could work but we're not waiting for you if we have to run"

Looking at my out of shape and slightly overweight body I blushed causing the three of them to burst out laughing, the skinny guy shook his head and waved me over "Ha, don't worry kid we weren't like this when we started too, anyway I'm Scott Olds and that's Guile India over there"

"yeah, yeah, now he're how this is gonna work" Mord told me with a serious expression "We're not going much deeper only to the 19th floor and we'll avoid the more dangerous monsters, our goal is to hunt Battle boars for Boar meat so things are gonna get heavy for you, just stay out of our way and try not to lag too far behind, if we find a monster party drop everything and run away Understand?"

"Understood" I nodded, quite happy with the instructions even if I'd prefer a lighter load than meat. At least the party leader seemed more or less competent.

My initial load turned out to be an extra bag with potions and antidotes, a few meters of rope, some rations, three thick spears, an extra sword and mace and two sets of extra throwing knives for Scott in case they were needed leaving the adventurers with as little extra weight as possible so they could fight better.

We left Rivia behind us and made our way towards one of the walls while making some small talk "So, how did you turn up down here alone anyway newbie, did your party die on the way down?"

"Shut up Mord what if that really happened" chided Scott

"Heh, he's an adventurer if he can't take it he shouldn't even be in the dungeon" the man boasted "And it's not like one can't make a living outside Oratio, my cousin is only level 1 and he lives quite comfortable, I hear he only has to fight monsters once a month in his city"

"No, I didn't lose my team" I told them and thought about it a little before deciding to play along with Villi's idea, it was as good an explanation as any "My familia played a prank on me, they dumped me down here on the safe floor while recovering from a night of drinking"

"Assholes" Mord said and the other two nodded before he wrapped an arm around my shoulders. "If you put on some muscle you can come find me later, Ogma is a great god."

"Thanks"

Soon we arrived at a huge, uneven hole in the ground where I could see the lower floor almost 30 meters down "alright guys you know what to do, Guile goes first and secures the landing while the newbie jumps last"

Then they proceeded to make their way down the edges of the hole taking care not to slip on the rocks until they stood ten meters from the ground floor and just let themselves drop down, I followed them as best as I could then looked at the party searching for enemies down on the ground and towards the walls, shit that's a long drop.

Taking as much care as I could I found some holds at the edge of the wall and lowered myself letting my body dangle down in the air, glancing down again I gulped and let myself drop, the ground hit me hard sending a jolt of pain up my knees and I forcing me to bend them until I lost footing and fell on my ass but it was nowhere near as painful as I thought it would be, shit I didn't think I could make this jump before without breaking some bones.

Giving me a hand Guile pulled me to my feet before pulling out his mace and started to walk in front of our little party.

The 19th floor was filled with strange trees and everything around was made from wood covered in a glowing blue moss or green foliage making it hard to see too far away from our location and leaving large shadows growing towards the ceiling, suddenly my eyes caught movement to our right and, before I could shout a warning, Mord turned towards the right and swung his sword in a devastating doward blow cleaving a centipede like monster in two and all hell broke loose.

From above us in the trees a dozen clawed centipedes started revealing themselves, their carapaces had acted as camouflage but now they pounced down on us with two sickle like from legs, Guile lifted his shield and bated the first four aside with a mighty swing before smashing another against a tree with his mace, Mord acted like a brute swinging his sword with all his strength but not completely without skill parring a blow aside before cleaving a second monster's head and dodging yet a third one.

Of the three Scott was the most skilled, his reflexes were top notch as he pulled two daggers and threw then lodging the projectiles on the pouncing centipede's unprotected bellies causing them to screech like mad, then he jumped up and kicked a monster towards Guile and bounced off a tree to slam on top of another pinning it down against the tree with his dagger between the joint of its carapace.

My eyes caught it all at the same time but my reaction felt slow and heavy I barely managed to pull out my sword and block two sickles from piercing my head, the monster released a screech in my face and used its superior strength to push me down to my knees and slowly overcome my arm's resistance until one of the sickles drew blood from my cheek, gritting my teeth I released a scream and put as much strength as I could manage to push the beast to the left while throwing my body to the right, the roll dislodged most of the extra weapons I carried at my back but allowed me to survive.

Acting on instinct I slashed at the beast only for my sword to bounce of its carapace and almost fall off my numb hands as the impact left them trembling, my eyes caught the second monster attacking me but it was just too fast, with my arms still a little numb I couldn't block the blow and barely managed to dodge one of its sickles before the second one hit me right in the heart, the armor managed to save my life but it drove all the air out of my lungs and sent me thumbing through the ground, thankfully away from any of the attackers.

The distance gave me just enough time to recover my breath and get back on my feet even if my chest was still hurting like hell, coughing a couple of times I looked at the two giant insects coming towards me, their black eyes glinting and sharp mandibles clicking in eagerness at an easy meal, shit I could die here, I could really die and not the immediate painless death of my previous life but I could actually get eaten alive piece by piece.

Breathing hard I stopped being stupid, stoped trying to copy my companions or study the beasts and focused entirely on what was important, surviving against a monster who completely beat me in status.

A kind of calm state feel over me as my eyes focused on the monster's movements and my mind started working overtime, in the few seconds I had I did my best to regain my breath and come up with a plan of action, after that single exchange I knew there was no way I was gonna kill any of the creatures by myself they were so far above my level it wasn't even a contest but at least they weren't so fast as to become blurs to my new eyes, my heart started beating harder against my chest as excitement filled me and I moved.

Running to the left I put the monsters behind each other so that they would come one at a time and observed them as close as I could, my body couldn't compete with their speed but my eyes caught their every movement noticing the second one of the beasts lifted its front from the ground and attacked, twisting aside I parried one of its sickles trying to slash at me and kicked its head away from me causing it to lose balance and smash into a tree then I rolled under the second beast's pounce as it smashed the wood on the ground.

I still wasn't fast enough and one of its blades nicked my leg leaving a gash the size of my hand but I managed to get at the creature's back and turned away to run back towards my party, not my best decision since the beast swung its body back bludgeoning me with its carapace and sending me flying before twisting around and spewing liquid towards me.

Covering my head I did my best to let the liquid fall on the backpack while desperately trying to find the second beast, thankfully it had gotten its sickles stuck to a tree and was still trying to pull it out, turning back to the immediate treat I moved the second I saw it's attack start and managed to parry another two sickle blows aside before my hands became too numb from the cheer strength of them and the monster managed to beat the sword out of them with the third hit then it flew forward to bite me opening its mouth wide, I knew I was done, it was just too fast.

A throwing knife flew over my shoulder and buried itself deep in the monster mouth causing it to hear back in pain and splashing me with green ichor then Mord was there cutting of the creature's head with a single blow before kicking the second so hard it was flattened against the tree it had been stuck into, he took the time to get his sword point between its carapace and pierced it until it stopped moving "Good job keeping two of the things occupied newbie but try to stay a little closer next time"

As I stood there breathing hard Mord cleaned his sword on a piece of cloth tied to his waist and snorted "Come on get harvesting already we don't have all day"

Still recovering from the scare, I took a few seconds to regain my breath before slowly lifting my hand to my face and wiping the ichor away from my mouth… Strange, why was I smiling? I took one last glance around before grabbing my sword and looking it over, it didn't have any ichor so I put it at my back and straightened myself "fuck so that's the diference between a level 1 and level 2"

"Level two, what're you talking about, those things are all level 1" Mord kicked a centipede over rolling on its back "Sure they're a little strong but nowhere near a level 2 monster, if we find a group of those we're running away"

"Shit", taking a few more breaths I managed to find the smaller dagger Bors had lent me and pull it out before looking at the centipede "shit where's the magic stone in this one again?"

"The chest newbie, it's always the chest"

"Right… shit" taking the first magic stone out was complicated and took me nearly a minute of cutting at the things belly but it became much easier after that and in a few seconds I had 13 magic stones and two centipede carapaces on my bag, Mord saying there was no sense leaving drops even if they weren't what we were waiting for and the carapaces were light enough.

Things weren't so hard after that, we didn't get ambushed by any more large groups and Scott managed to find most other mobs before they were even close allowing Guile to tank them much easier to the point I only had to defend myself when a firebird showed up and tried to fry me from range, thankfully my eyes noticed the gathering of mana, acting fast I managed to hide behind a tree when the bird washed my location with a breath of fire in the shape of an arrow and Scott managed to snipe its wing with a throwing knife, he lost the knife but we got three fire feathers in exchange.

Once we had to hide from a group of four bugbears, giant bears capable of walking on two legs and far too agile for their large bodies but the party had some herbs to mask our scent and our scout saw them from far enough away we had time to hide, we still stayed in place for almost ten minutes after they passed us just to make sure before Mord patted me on the shoulder "Lucky you, we'd probably get away but no way could you outrun those things if we got into a fight"

Then we finally made our way outside the forest and I saw a large stretch of land with wooden corridors running all over the place forming cliffs covered in glowing blue moss and a large carpet of hip high grass, without the trees to block vision we were immediately noticed by a group of seven lizardman wielding metallic flowers, four of them had long spears made from rose stalks, their blades a sharp red rose bud while another two had large wooden clubs and the last one had a blooming flower as a shield and a large sword.

After a second of hesitation the lizardman with a shield released a loud roar and they all charged us in a mad rush, Scott threw a few daggers at him but the lizard blocked them all with ease so he changed targets and managed to hit the eye of a spear wielder causing it to stumble and slow the others down giving our tank time to get ready, when they were very close Guile hid his head behind his shield and released a counter charge, exploding into movement so fast even my eyes couldn't keep up he smashed straight into one of them like a bowling ball while sending two others sprawling the blow so hard he broke the one he had aimed for leaving it twitching into the ground.

Mord dashed ahead of the group and engaged the shield wielder in single combat while Scott finished off one of the fallen lizards before they could recover and engaged another dancing around its stabs he used the dagger to parry the spear letting it pass his side before grabbing the shaft and getting in close with the beast, the Lizard dropped the spear and attempted to bite him but it was too late his dagger piercing right through the beast's neck.

Guile started trading blows with a club wielding lizard when the last one managed to flank him, remembering everything I had seen from both blade wielders I pulled my sword out of my back and corrected my grip then used Scott's footword to dash across the field and release a devastating downward slash on the Lizard's lifted arm, the blow was perfect cutting deep into the lizard's biceps to the point I felt it's bones breaking but not cutting all the way through, the beast reacted faster than I thought possible twisting around to claw at me and yanking my sword out of my hands, with a sore wrist I avoided a new scar by millimeters as I kicked away from the lizard and found two of Scott's throwing daggers on my belt.

My sharingan had watched the man throw the things more than a hundred times by now so I let instinct take over not thinking about my actions, swinging both arms the daggers flew towards the irate lizard one of them hitting it in the snout and bouncing away as I didn't have enough strength to pierce its hide but the other pierced its eye causing it to thrash and scream in pain then start running away.

"hey!" I screamed seeing my sword still stuck on its arm, thankfully Guile had managed to finish his opponent, dropping his shield the nearly nacked man dashed after the beast and pounced, using both hands he swung his mace and pulverized the lizard's knee actually sending its leg flying then caving it's head in when it fell down.

Grabbing the dead Lizard by its remaining leg Guile happily waved at me and dragged the corpse through the grass leaving a large train of blood behind him, then he grabbed the sword and pulled it loose before throwing it to me "Thanks for the save newbie, careful with your weapon, its from average materials but well made"

"Thanks" putting the sword away I picked my knife and started digging for the magic stone, cutting at an humanoid's chest left me with a queasy feeling in my stomach, they were a little too close to humans for my liking but I ignored it and by the third one it barely affected me, turning to the resting Guile by my side I asked "why're we after Battle boars anyway, if we want money wouldn't any monster do?"

"Usually yeah" the barbarian said and spilled some cold water over his head to refresh himself "but with the Goliath holding up the way for the last two days Rivira is bound to run out of food soon and Battle Boars are one of the few beasts to drop meat"

"Hey Newbie, less talking, more harvesting!" Screamed Mord from the shade of a tree while Scott kept an eye out for new threats "Come on I could do a better job!"

"Asshole" I cursed again but I was already starting to get the impression the bastard just liked messing with people.

"Don't mind the boss he's a softy inside" Guile confessed while I gathered a few Lizardman's nails that had dropped and kept them in the bag, "Come on our goal is just ahead"

Another two lizardman parties latter and we reached our target, a large wooden clif wall with a dozen ropes hanging from it, before reaching the top there were two small huts hanging halfway off the cliff like bird's nests with large spikes in a circular position protecting the base, the spikes were made from tree trunks and positioned with just enough space between them for a human to pass comfortably, some of the spikes were rotted and one had fallen down and started to be decomposed by the blue moss while vines were trying to claim the suspended houses with the wall itself seeming to eat at the structures.

"Yeah it seems we're gonna have to tell Bors to put some new spikes in, come on newbie get cutting" Mord shouted and all four of us started to clear the place of vines and check that everything was alright "Damn dungeon keeps trying to fix the terrain so Bors has to fix things every week of two but monster farms like this are how the city is still standing"

I could see it, despite the decrepit look the location had been giving me. I could see how three to five people could hold this location against a lot of monsters if there were not too many flying ones "Aren't the fire birds a problem?"

"All wood on the 19 floor is fire resistance and we treat the covers making them almost impossible to burn so, as long as we kill the birds fast they aren't a threat" Scott answered while Guile and Mord picked the spears from my pack laying one of the ground at their backs and hold one each, then Scott shouted from one of the houses "Come on kid climb in"

Pulling myself up with one of the ropes I used my dagger to clear the vines from the second house and saw the wall was really eating the little building, slowly dragging the structure inside itself. It'd probably take another month but the house would eventually be consumed by the wooden clif.

Inside the house was a small bag with two small potions and a large crossbow with a lot of bolts spread on the floor, some of them were even engulfed by the wall already, gathering the mess of ammunition I pilled them all against the window and turned towards my companion watching him load the crossbow just by pulling it's string, shaking my head I lowered the crossbow and used my entire body to arm it not wanting to tire myself out trying to imitate the level 2.

"Everything ready boss?"

"Ready!" Mord shouted back while stretching his arm and I watched as he pulled one of his pouches off his belt and threw it behind the two warriors, it immediately started smoking and, soon after I started hearing roars "Aha here they come!"

Turning my head towards the horizon my increased vision soon caught sight of the monsters, they were spread out and in small groups but there were a lot of them running our way, at least 40 lizardman were leading the charge but they soon got outpaced by a group of large Bugbears and at least 20 Battle Boars, the swines were almost two meters tall with tusks the size of swords and must have weighed almost a ton, then came the centipedes and other insects.

The dragonfly's made it to our spot first, large and with long bodies only a little smaller than a man there were 10 of them and they started pelting our position making Guile raise his shield for protection, Scott immediately started sniping them down taking out two of the things before they even noticed but I didn't feel comfortable wasting ammunition on the things since they were too thing and agile, then the first bolt of fire hit his position making him duck down as three Firebirds took turns bombarding his position.

Lifting my own crossbow I aimed at one of the birds flying lazily in the air and shoot hitting it squarely in the chest, my sharingan making the feat easy, the other two birds scattered and, while I took my time reloading, Scott took out a second and another two dragonflies.

I missed the second shoot since every enemy had started flying as fast as it could but at least they had started focusing on us allowing the two on the ground to focus on receiving the first charge, Battle Boars and Bugbears reached first, their large and fast bodies punishing the ground when a battle boar got one of its legs stuck in a hole and flipped, I could hear the sound of it's leg breaking even a kilometer away and then a bugbear hit his fallen body sending them both sprawling.

Another five of the large monsters fell in the small holes while two bugbears actually got impaled in large spike traps on the ground, the wooden spikes weren't enough to immediately kill the muscled beasts but they were quickly stomped to death by those behind them.

The first Bugbear to reach the circle triet to jump over the spikes but choose one of the better ones and it didn't snap under the beast's weight, the monster was stuck there trying to climb up long enough that I just took my time and used my third shoot to pierce one of it's large eyes, the crossbow having enough strength to drive the bolt right into its brain.

The spike circle funneled the beasts right to the only opening being guarded by the two warriors and they braced themselves receiving the first two battle boars right on their spears and killing the monsters instantly, kicking their bodies away they had time to receive a second charge killing another bugbear and wounding a battle boar before one of their spears snapped and they had to retreat a little, Mord picked up the second spear and the fight truly started as the warriors fought to keep too many monsters from entering the protected circle.

Scott finally took out the last firebird and I actually managed to clip a dragonfly's wing causing it to fall down on top of some monster, the first centipedes started arriving and climbing over the larger beasts to get to the humans inside forcing Guile to exchange his own spear for the mace and keep the bugs away while his party leader killed the larger monsters.

With only a few dragonflies still alive I had the time to look at the wave of monsters, there were still quite a few bugbears trying to destroy the spikes and having some success with the more deteriorated ones but, without the room for a charge, the battle boars were less than effective, unfortunately the lizards had started arriving now and they could fit between spikes if they could get through the rest of the monsters.

Deciding to experiment I concentrated into one of the more effective bugbears and tried to send it an illusion of a human by his side, casting lesser ilusion took a little effort and I felt some energy leave me but was kind of instinctive, unfortunatly I saw no effect, I also saw no fluctuation on the things magic with my eyes, I was concentrating on the beast for almost 40 seconds when I finished arming my crossbow and shot it in the neck not killing it but wounding it enough that other beasts forced it away.

Then I saw another bugbear looking at me, its face filled with rage and changed tactics, meeting its eyes I cast Major Visual Illusion instead feeling a large drain on my magic and having to grab the edge of the window to steady myself, I made the thing see and smell every monster around itself as a human, the effect was instant, I saw some of my mana entering the beast's body from its eyes and almost… infecting it before it went absolutely feral killing three bugs and even caving another bugbear's head in before the other monsters noticed and turned against it.

Scott was mostly ignoring the four remaining dragonflies now and instead aiming for the lizardman squeezing through the spikes and keeping them from succeeding, monsters and bug corpses were starting to act as obstacles to the lizardman and a few were even killed by mistake by the larger monsters.

Noticing how effective my little sharingan trick had been I started looking for another beast to trick catching the eyes of another bugbear and a wounded battle boar the result was… impressive even if it left me panting in exhaustion, the first bugbear had just been killed when the second one went insane, as for the battle boar it had been forced back and allowed to retreat building space to gather a strong charge so, even wounded it came back moving at 60 km/h, using its tusks it gored the first bugbear it hit while simply stomping on six lizardman and a few bugs continuing to attack everything in a straight line until it was stopped by the cheer amount of corpses in its way, then it proceed to stomp or try to gore anything that came even close.

Stumbling away I put my back against the wall and cradled my head almost falling down from the headache, I could feel myself being just short of a mind down, shit I had gotten cocky and almost fucked up.

Pushing myself away from the wall I grabbed my discarded crossbow and tried to arm it again but my arms were shaking from the effort, I didn't even notice my own sharingans had deactivated so, when a blur flew through the window and hit me in the leg with a shot I was caught completely by surprise and released a scream of pain.

Looking at my tight I saw the dragonfly's projectile piercing me almost all the way through and nearly pulled it out before remembering blood loss was a thing, with some effort and a lot of gritted teeth I managed to ignore the pain and load another bolt before looking at the fight bellow, without my sharingan for help I could barely make out what was happening in the confusion so I just aimed at the mass of monsters and shoot hoping to hit something, then another dragonfly almost took my head off and I just ducked down.

A minute later I remembered the small bag of potions and found the health one, pulling the projectile off I splashed the potion on my tight and saw it knitting back together at enormous speed, a few minutes later I was completely healed and the noise from fighting had disappeared.

"Hey… huff, hufff… you alive there newbie?" came Mord's voice from below so I gathered myself and answered.

"More or less!" noticing my headache getting better and my sharingan reactivating I released a breath of relief "had to use a potion"

"Eh what can you do, they're cheap ones anyways, come down here, time to get harvesting!" With a sight I managed to push myself back on my feet to see Mord posing above the body of a large bugbear and giving a roar of triumph "take that you overgrown rug who's your boss now huh!"

Scott just palmed his face while Guile was sitting down and laughing loudly, covering a large claw mark on his chest with bandages

Using one of the remaining ropes hanging from the safehouse I lowered myself back to the ground and looked around at the massacre, blood painted the floor completely red and there were literal piles of monster corpses where they had tried to climb over each other to get to the warriors, seeing as nobody else was moving I pulled my dagger and resigned myself to harvesting everything by myself, still a little shaken I had to ask "Shit wasn't this too dangerous?"

"Naa, it was a little harder than usual but that's just because some of the things went berserk and Mord took the opportunity to save some Valis" Scott told me with a smile while I ripped a magic stone from a crushed centipede.

Finishing the easier monsters I gathered the dropped items in a spot without blood or ichor and approached my first bugbear, getting to the muscular beast's magic stone was a pain in the ass leaving me elbow deep in its gut, thank the gods the monsters dissolved into dust after I took the stone away making my job easier with each one I finished "What do you mean?"

"Heh, this isn't the first time we do this newbie" Mord bragged, then kicked the body of a lizardman away and cleaned a spot for himself to sit "we must have done this what, a hundred times before we dared even try with only three people"

"A hundred and fifteen" Scott corrected "then we did it another five times with an extra party looking over to save our asses in case we messed up"

"Yeah that seems about right, pass me the water Guile" Grabbing the bag of water Mord took a long drink and sighed in happiness "sure Rivira lost some adventurers when it first started doing this but we got it down to a routine"

Looking around I couldn't see how the warriors would have survived without my illusions driving monsters insane, the lizardman or centipedes would have eventually gotten into the clearing and overcome them with numbers.

Releasing a laugh Mord decided to explain "You don't really think we usually fight everything here do you? Let me tell you newbie the secret to surviving the dungeon is to work smarter not harder, you saw how the battle boars and bugbears were the first to arrive and blocked the patch for the others right?"

"Yeah, they were pretty disorganized"

"Well this won't work on the deeper floors but here we just have to survive long enough to get the biggest amount of monsters in a small area then Scott there start throwing two or three magic bombs to kill most of them, after that we just have to finish off the stragglers, groups with a powerful mage have it even easier since they can chant without interruption inside the safehouse"

Turning towards the rogue I saw him patting one of his larger pouches at his waist, thinking about what I had seen I nodded, yeah I could see it working, the larger monsters get funneled into a smaller area trying to get to the warriors while the smaller ones are forced to climb over or squeeze between them, when they were as concentrated as the party could manage someone just blows them all up.

"Worst case scenario the explosions buy us enough time to climb the ropes to safety" nodded Guile while pointing at the cliff with his thumb.

"Wouldn't that be a little too… easy?" I questioned, from what I remembered Adventurers only gained levels when they went through challenges

"Well… not easy, it took a lot of training" Mord told me and grabbed a piece of ration "newbie let me tell you a secret, not everything has to be about gaining levels, sometimes it's alright to just make a living, sure I'd get more excelia if I was constantly putting my life at risk but, the thing with taking risks is that sometimes they don't pay off and, if it's your life on the line…"

"Yep" said Scott sitting besides his party members and taking the water from Mord's hand "they say Oratio is the city of adventurers but a better name would be the city of the corpses, for every Sword Princess or King there are tens of thousands who die"

Continuing to harvest crystals and drops I spent the next hour and a half just slashing open monsters and watching them decompose into dust, when I was finally done my arms were aching and my back was killing me from having to lean over so many corpses but we had three pouches full of magic stones, a nice pile of smaller monster drops and almost 70 kilos of boar meat, it would have to be washed and cooked at the town but would feed us for a few days.

"Great, that should be enough, we're going back before it gets too dark" Mord told the group as I finished putting everything inside the giant backpack.

Carrying everything was hard and left me huffing and puffing to the point I had to concentrate on putting one foot in front of the other or risk falling down but, surprisingly, I made it all the way, the bonus from being a level 1 being impressive, thankfully we only got into another two small fights and I didn't have to engage since the dungeon hadn't spawned things back yet.

We reached the town when the lights were almost gone and the party decided to celebrate the delve in the pub but I was just too tired, my entire body was aching and my back was killing me, I didn't even know how I hadn't fallen down yet so I just handed the entire haul of drops to Bors for safekeeping and distribution, handed the magic stone pouches to Mord and ignored everything else until I saw a bed in front of me, then I fell on top of it and passed out.


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A/N : Thanks for my patrons : Xhaustedhero, AkumaSmaG, Iori Daemona Angel, AlliterativeArts (Eric Faust), Icewing, Comics, DERMONIAN, Davvy chappie, Banh Bao, Ian Michael, WanderingDaemon, Scott, Tony Martinez, Travis cox, Chaos, Rootbeerguy and High Priest of Torga for supporting my work!
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If you like my work, take a look at my other novels or my patreon. You can support me for a single dollar.

 

[CmirDarthanna]

Would it be possible to turn the Dungeon into a minion through kotoamatsukami?

 

[Ghostcraft19]

This is great but the prolog should probably be threadmarked

 

[CapCaverna]

A/N: So, chapter 2... As I said, I'll be posting a chapter every day until I'm fully caught up, I'm also writing a new chapter this week.

If you want to read ahead, every chapter is free on my patreon.

Also, found out how to threadmark the first post... I just started posting here, so I had some trouble with that.


Ah... right, this came up on one of my other fics, but I crosspost on a lot of other sites, usualy, my name is some variation of CapitãoCaverna, but I created this account with a different name, and I haven't found a way to change that yet, it didn't really come up before yesterday, when I finally started posting something.

Dungeon Delving is on Royalroadl, Webnovel, Spacebattles, Scribblehub and Archive of our Own... yeah, I kinda post everywhere... shame on me... Still, more readers, more feedback, more chances to attrack patreons... there's really no drawback.

In truth, my brother once had one of his stories stolen and posted on other sites, so I decided to do it myself, people can't post my story on other sites if I'm everywhere.

Someone still managed to copy my stories and turn them into an AI read audibook on youtube but... what can you do? At least they point out I'm the author.

Also, some of the accounts bellong to my brother. He decided to help me out by reposting it on other sites, but they all go to the same Patreon: CaptaoCav...


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Getting up from bed the next day turned out to be a harder feat than expected. Not only had I slept in my gear, my muscles were also aching and rigid from an entire day of activity. For someone who had spent most of the previous year without physical activity even the increase in physique from my Faulna wasn't enough to heal completely in only a single night.

With a groan of pain I managed to push myself away from the bed, my entire body stiff like an old man's, and sat down at the wooden chair, slowly moving my muscles to heat them up I started thinking about my first dungeon dive, the danger, the heavy smell of blood, the different monsters and flora, I couldn't help myself I started to laugh, this was what I had been missing, this was the kind of thing I had always wanted to do.

Well I could do with less pain but it was a small price to pay.

Pulling the mirror I had borrowed yesterday I let a drop of blood from my finger fall on my back and used it to read my new faulna

Roland Synclair – level 1
Strength – I - 11
Endurance – I - 8
Dexterity – I - 12
Agility – I - 13
Magic – I - 55
Skills:
- Chosen of an Outer God.
- Mangekyou Sharingan (Shisui).

Hmm, it was a fairly large growth for a single day of work, I had no delusions that I could match Bell's rate of growth so the large increase must have come from surviving the 19th floor and several level 2 monsters on my first try

Taking some time to recover I slowly walk down the stairs towards the ground floor with a newfound resolution, no more conforming myself to other expectations, I'd been given a new lease on life, time to live it as I want.

"Aw, aw, aw" I said after each step and glared at the snickering Villy looking up at me, I never had an impressive glare in my previous life but glowing red eyes were great for intimidation.

I had just sat down in front of Villi when Mord poked his head on the door and smirked at my rigid body "there you are come on!" he waved me over with a bag filled with coins.

Releasing another groan I swore in my mind, couldn't the damn guy have waited a little to show up? grabbing at my chair I sighed and pushed myself back up "aw, aw, aw"

"Come on stop being a pussy" Mord called from outside, gritting my teeth I increased my pace as my muscles finally started to come loose from my movements.

Getting out of the building I almost jumped as a trunk like arm wrapped itself around my neck and pulled me closer "Hurry up newbie drinks are on me" Mord said at my ear forcing me to try and push the bastard away from my face with another groan at the physical strain, the asshole didn't even budge.

"The hell, why the sudden generosity?"

"Heh, it's not every day we make such a killing newbie" he laughed and let me finally break free from his arm, starting to lead me towards the only pub in the town "Not having to use the magic bombs let us earn far more than usual"

"How much?"

"For you? about 9 000 valis" he threw a little pouch at my chest which I almost didn't catch "For us, almost a week of work in the upper floors"

"Ugh, at least I can pay for my stay until someone kills the damn Goliath" I said and let the man lead me inside the pub, the place was almost empty so early in the day but Scott and Guile were already seated on a table with two extra mugs of beer.

"Ah don't worry, if someone doesn't kill it in about a week Bors will probably form a party to hunt it down" Scott said from the table "He just doesn't want to have to pay people to do it"

"Yep that's Bors alright, always looking out for number one" Mord laughed and sat down, I took a little more time before I managed to lower myself to the chair and take a swing of the beer, it was terrible.

"Ugh what is this shit?" I asked when I managed to swallow the horrible thing

"It is shit." Scott said with a perfectly serious face, then burst out laughing when I spit it out on the floor and tried to wipe my mouth clean. "Just kidding, we all know it tastes terrible but with the path to the surface cut off the pub can't resupply so people start getting… creative"

Looking at the ale in my hand I frowned "Ugh, do I wanna know where this comes from?"

"No, you really don't" Guile told me with a resigned voice before taking another swing of the mystery liquid.

I continued to look at the thing at my hand with suspicious, it didn't exactly taste like piss but it was close, what the hell it's free I'll drink it anyway, taking another swing to the cheers of my companions I swallowed and stretched my back before asking "So why have I received so little coin?"

"What, you expected equal share?" Mord mocked then started enumerating things on his fingers "first we had to pay Bors for using his monster farm, then we had to pay for the supplies and everything we used, then Bors take a share from the remaining and THEN you get your 10%"

"Well, you also had to pay Bors his finders fee and for lending you gear so…" Said Scott with a laugh "In Rivira the elder always wins"

All three of them took lifted their mugs and sighed at the same time "Greedy bastard"

"Why don't you just… use the spot?"

"Several reasons really, want some meat?" Mord told me and flagged a servant over to order breakfast when I shook my head "first, someone has to maintain the farming spots and Bors make you pay ten times if he finds out you used it without his say so, then a lot of the gear we used, especially the monster bait, isn't exactly legal so it's hard to aquire"

"Plus its expensive" Scott added with a sigh while Mord ordered some bread "Bors gives us all the equipment we need and takes his cut when we return, in the off chance we don't break even he takes the loss instead of us"

"Ugh" i said and finished my beer "I guess that's fair"

"You think Bors' is gonna send us out again?" Asked Guile with his mouth full when the breakfast finally arrived.

"Well probably one other time, his usual adventure parties are stuck on the middle floors so he doesn't have many options" Mord said and released a huge belch before slamming his mug on the table "Ah, getting stuck here may turn out to be very lucky for us"

"So, you guys still need a supporter?" I asked knowing that even with my eyes I wouldn't survive an encounter with even a single monster on the 19th floor much less the large groups we often meet

"What the hell sure, you weren't a complete waste of space like our last two supporters" throwing some valis on the table Mord laid back and relaxed "We're planning on a shorter delve later after lunch you can tag along for the usual 10% if you want"

Finishing my bread with eggs I nodded my head, not like I was gonna miss another chance to grow and watch level 2 adventurers to steal their moves, plus I hadn't had that much fun in… ever. Leaving the pub with the three of them I asked "Is there a place to wash myself here?"

"Take the town's northern exit. There's a small lake there that's not too close to any of the entrances to the 19th floor so it's mostly safe" Scott pointed out to me.

Tying my new fortune to my waits I thanked them and followed the directions, when I woke up I hadn't noticed but, after sweating so much while fighting and sleeping in my clothes I had started to smell.

Looking around as I walked I saw dozens of adventurers walking around with a variety of gear from full plate to barely any clothes, most were humans but there were a few pallum and animal people all around, all of them looking annoyed and some even fighting on the streets, thankfully I managed to sneak away without grabbing any attention.

Outside the small town there were quite a few people guarding or putting up tents to wait for the Goliath to be slain, in truth there was nothing stopping people from trying to sneak through the monster rex or run away from it but most didn't want to risk it, as Mord had explained yesterday while hunting, the beast wasn't the fastest but had enough power that a single bad hit could kill a fleeing level two adventurer so people who could afford it prefered to wait.

I reached the small lake to see there were nobody around so I spent 15 minutes making sure there weren't any monsters close by before taking off my clothes and washing myself as best as I could without soap, I managed to get myself clean and get rid of most of the blood on my gear before another party joined me making me hurry up since I didn't trust the others to keep their hands away from my gear.

Wearing wet but clean clothes I started exploring the safe floor making sure to keep an eye out for anything I couldn't handle.

The Dungeon really was a marvel, this floor's ceiling must have been at least half a kilometer high and the colorful glowing crystals made for a relaxing atmosphere almost making me forget how dangerous this place was, thankfully movement at the edge of my vision quickly snapped me out of it and I ducked as a stone hatchet flew over my head to bury itself on a tree.

With a loud 'squee' a large bipedal rabbit with red eyes tried to headbut me with its small horns, on pure reflex I managed to kick the little bastard away and took some distance until it recovered.

Twisting my head I smiled, the bloodthirsty little thing looked really cute as it crouched down and grabbed at the ground then pulled a second stone ax and puffing itself up to appear more threatening.

"You know what, you'll make for a great test subject" I told the monster as it tried to hack at my leg.

From what I remembered from the show Almiraj were somewhat weak level 1 monsters and my eyes gave me a huge advantage over the beast even if it was a little faster than me, pulling out the hard sheat of my sword I waited for the little beast to attack again before dodging aside and delivering a strong blow against its side sending it thumbling away.

The little guy recovered fast grabbing it's ax it used it's powerful legs to jump at me preparing for an overhead swing, lifting my weapon I tried to block the blow with a single hand but it had far more strength than I thought possible blowing right through my block and making me desperately jump back to avoid getting hacked in half, my heart beating hard against my chest at the excitement I started to smile, it seems the beast was a middle floor monster after all.

Reading myself for a fight I narrowed my eyes at the rabbit, I swore it was sneering at me for getting pushed back while pulling a second stone ax from the ground to hold in his left hand "Why you little… you know what, why the hell am I even fighting you right now?"

Staring at its smug little eyes I quickly composed an illusion and then took a few steps back to watch its effects, with an angry squeak the rabbit attacked the ground where I had been standing then took a large leap away before releasing a gasp of pain and dropping his right ax.

Looking around himself in confusion the almiraj moved it's intact arm before grabbing its weapon back and screeching in anger, its red eyes shining with rage at me before it launched the ax, it was far enough away that I managed to sidestep without problem, my second ilusion was better composed, in it I charged the rabbit and completely ignored any attack before grabbing it by the face and smashing it into the ground, I used the pain from getting smashed by the centipede as a base for the monster and it was much, MUCH more effective than just hitting it with a stick leaving it keening on the ground.

I had to confess watching a monster angrily swinging at empty air before falling to the ground by itself was amusing but the lament of pain made me feel bad for the little thing.

The monster took long enough to recover that I looked around and, seeing no other adventurer, decided to start testing things out with my illusions, I didn't pull out the mangekyou so I wouldn't risk my eyesight but there were plenty of things to test with illusions before I could really use them in a fight.

Good thing too since it turns out using illusions was hard, much harder than it seemed in naruto.

Creating an illusion didn't happen instantly like when I had watched anime, no I had to be able to picture in my mind what I wanted to project as perfectly as I could and anything I wasn't able to imagine was missing from the ilusion making it easier to break out of.

Projecting a single static picture for a few seconds was easy and barely took any effort or mind. I could make the almiraj see me standing around him without moving for hours but a more intelligent opponent would easily see through the illusion and ignore it.

Another thing to note was that the more senses I tried to fool the harder it became, creating visual illusions was made extremely easy by my sharingan since I was able to perfectly remember anything I had seen but the second I tried to project something I hadn't seen or worse, affect scent, hearing and tact, it became a thousand times harder and more expensive.

Creating the best and longest illusion I could I made the little rabbit start running in circles after a screaming copy of me, hitting the copy would feel like hitting a wall and it smelled mostly like me, then I stopped to consider, yeah I could make a stupid monster confused and helpless but another adventurer would never fall for it.

Despite my best efforts I had failed to consider a lot of things, the effect of wind on the clothes, some of the shades, the way my clothes looked from the back which I hadn't seen with the sharingan, the footprints I left in my path, how I'd sweat after running so much… there were thousands of little mistakes which could give the game away against a more cunning being.

Thankfully it seemed I could train my illusions, the more I tried to project something the faster and better I could do it, not because of the simple repetition but because I could remember it better, correct things that were missing as if I were creating a picture inside my mind and every time I remembered it I could put on a little more detail, make it a little closer to reality.

It seems like big and fantastical illusions could work very well on monsters but I'd have to rely more on subterfuge against human opponents.

Taking out my sword I walked towards the tired rabbit who had finally given up on following my illusion I sent it a vision of the dungeon without me in it so, although the beast turned around when it heard me approach and started sniffing at the air in confusion it remained in place as I grabbed my sword with both hands and split its head in half with an overhead swing.

Cleaning my blade I pocketed its crystal and sighed, my head was already aching from using too much mind and I'd have to support Mord's party in another two hours so I just went back to the town.

"Hey newbie! good work yesterday" Bors waved at me as I was entering the town, by his side was a redhead amazoness in real life bikini armor.

Thank you ROB for giving me the sharingan so I may never forget this view.

I mean, the adventurer woman I had already seen in Rivira were hot but they were mostly wearing full armor so I hadn't been able to truly enjoy the view, the woman had the body of a fitness model and an extremely cute face, she had a six pack together with visible muscles in her arms and legs but was still completely feminine, without the bulk of a bodybuilder.

Yep that confirms it, the gods were perverts and falna actively made people hotter, damn I used to live in a tropical country so I wasn't exactly a stranger to women wearing very little clothes but I had never seen anyone with a better body even on TV.

Bors seemed to almost be trying to escape from the amazon as he quickly finished his talk and hurried over to me, he kept glancing over his shoulder until the woman left the town completely and only then relaxed throwing himself on my shoulders and almost causing me to fall.

"Phew! How I hate first class adventurers" he said with a tired voice "Always wanting discounts and I can't even pressure them"

I facepalmed at his sheer shamelessness before curiosity got the best of me and I started to talk "So, who was she?"

Bors raised an eyebrow at me "Ah look at you, barely an adventurer and already trying to pick up women, I'm so proud!" he mocked "Farna's too much for you though, she's the vice captain of the Ganesha familia, they're bringing up a strong beast and wanted to know the Goliath situation" he finally allowed me to push his large body away and righted himself before smiling widely "I managed to get them to kill the damn thing and even pay for support from our strongest adventurers"

"Hmm, You think I can hitch a hide to the surface?"

"Probably, hell Ganesha is the god of the masses so they may even do it for free if you don't piss them off" He slapped my back twice and smirked "anyways congratulations newbie, you didn't die good job, Mord said you did alright"

"You're just happy cuz you got your 30%" I accused and had to dodge another painful slap to the back as Bors smirked.

"Heh, I can't really deny that's part of it" The large man said while we walked back towards the center of the little town "So… wanna watch the goliath fight? Since you saved me from that harpy I can find someone to protect you for only 5 thousand"

"Fuck off" I gave him the middle finger but he just messed up my hair and walked away, probably to try and scam someone else.

A nap later and my mind was mostly recovered, my muscles were back to giving me trouble though so I waited for Mord's party at the town's entrance while stretching and moving my limbs to try and get rid of their rigidness.

I waved Guile over when I caught sight of him carrying a large backpack and soon all three of them were waiting for me to put everything on my back and start walking again, I was thinking about ways to maximize my ilusion's effects when I noticed we weren't on the same patch "hey aren't we going the wrong way?"

"Nope, we're going to the 19th floor the proper way this time, the shortcut we took yesterday was great to reach Bors farm but if we aren't after that it has too much risk of getting us caught in a monster party" explained Scott by my side, the skinny man seemed to be the tactician of the party.

"Catch" said Mord without warning and I almost missed the small, square leather bag he threw my way, opening it I saw two small red vials and four green ones nested safely between some kind of foam "the green ones are weak antidotes, yesterday we avoided them but the 19th floor is full of poisonous things so it's better that everyone has at least four of those things before going down"

"Thanks"

"Oh you're giving those back when we return, don't worry about that newbie" he said and we finally reached the entrance to the next floor, a huge cave leading down illuminated by a mixture of crystals and moss.

Midway down we faced a bugbear and, later, a mad beetle, the beetle was the first single monster to give the party some trouble, mainly because the tunnel wasn't large and the creature had an extremely hard carapace, I kept my distance since I could barely see the movement of its arms even with my eyes, Scott finally had to take one of the spears and pierce its magic crystal when Mord got a deep slash to his tight, at least the thing dropped an antenna as a consolation prize.

The entrance to the large tree labyrinth looked like a jungle for giants, roots taller than me spread through the wooden floor and maxive trees climbed towards the ceiling with limbs spread over our heads in twisting paths so large they could easily support a battle boar on top of them and everything illuminated by the strange moss leaving almost no shadows anywhere.

Our first encounter was a group of lizardman, six of them without weapons charged at us jumping over a root but, without defenses or weapons they were easily picked off, three falling to guile's daggers before even reaching us and the rest getting cut down or clubbed to death by Mord and Guile.

I can't say I'll ever get used to the sight of smashed brains all over the floor when harvesting the lizardman but I did manage not to throw up and, I guess it did incentivise me to work faster so they would dissolve into dust.

The man sized fire birds were harder to take down but we only found one that Guile had to lure down while Scott and Mord climbed trees to ambush it.

Together the party had to take some large detours to avoid any bright colored or too large flower unwilling to risk getting poisoned but we were all forced to drink antidotes after dozens of small, bipedal mushrooms burst out of the ground all around us, thankfully the little nuisances were very weak level 1 monsters and even I managed to kill them with ease but we all grew more and more sluggish with every one killed, our blows losing strength until, by the end of the fight I couldn't hold my own weapon and was barely keeping myself up with Scott and Guile only a little better.

Thankfully no other monster attacked at the same time and we all recovered after taking the antidote and waiting 10 minutes, wrapping some clothes over my face I put on some gloves and harvested their crystals while trying to hold my breath and it either worked or they were no longer releasing poison because I didn't have to use another dose.

A few hours later I noticed I had started to see faint shadows over the movements of the lizardman and centipedes, by far the most common monsters we fought.

"Hey Mord, can I try to fight one of the lizards next time?" I suddenly asked as I was harvesting another bugbear, this one pretty badly hurt since Mord and Guile had gone to town on it after it had thrown Scott at a tree and made him pass out.

"You sure? they're far weaker than minotaurs but they're still considered a level 2 monster you know"

"Yeah but that's because of the weapons isn't it? they don't seem as fast as the other level 2 I have seen" I told him unable to mask the eagerness in my voice "If one shows up without weapons again can I fight him?"

"You know what, sure, try and not lose a limb or something and you should have made enough to buy a better healing potion" he said as I tied up another full pouch to my bag and got up from the bugbear's dust "Scott can you spot the little madman?"

"Sure, I'm fast enough to keep him from dying immediately"

Seeing all three of them agree I smiled "Thanks, I have been watching them and think I can handle one if I don't have to worry about other things"

Then we heard the screaming, we looked at each other for a second before everyone turned to Mord, a second scream of pain started and didn't stop as some unlucky adventurer started to suffer, Mord swallowed before meeting each of our eyes and sighing.

"Alright we're gonna check it out but safely! If it's a monster party or an irregular we're not gonna be able to help you understand?" When I nodded he motioned for Scott to scout ahead while we followed as fast as we could without making much noise with me copying their movements, walking besides Guile we traded amused glances as we both were able to hear Mord's soft grumbling voice "Godsdamnit my soft heart, you don't run towards the screaming Mord, never run towards the screaming…"

Nearly a minute latter the screaming stopped and I heard a loud roar of rage take its place almost causing me to stumble, the closer we came to our target the more we started to hear of the struggle as something large smashed against the trees, then Scott dropped from a tree near Mord and we all stopped.

"get the fucking spears out, we're fighting it" he told everyone and hurried towards me as I took of my bag and took out his bow before stringing it.

"what is it?" Mord asked as he dropped any extra weight he held and readied himself.

"A Vouivre"

Another loud roar with a distinctly feminine tone rattled the trees around us and sent a shiver down my spine.

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A/N : Thanks for my patrons : Xhaustedhero, AkumaSmaG, Iori Daemona Angel, AlliterativeArts (Eric Faust), Icewing, Comics, DERMONIAN, Davvy chappie, Banh Bao, Ian Michael, WanderingDaemon, Scott, Tony Martinez, Travis cox, Chaos, Rootbeerguy, High Priest of Torga and James Williams for supporting my work!
.

If you like my work, take a look at my other novels or my patreon. You can support me for a single dollar.

 

[Bermuda]

I think your order in the Threadmark is wrong.
It shows Chapter 1 then 2 and then Prologue.

 

[CapCaverna]

Thanks, I think I fixed that now. Still getting used to posting here.

 

[Venyr4434]

alisson Rafa, will there be lewds?

 

[NutakuFan]

Ah... right, this came up on one of my other fics, but I crosspost on a lot of other sites, usualy, my name is some variation of CapitãoCaverna, but I created this account with a different name, and I haven't found a way to change that yet, it didn't really come up before yesterday, when I finally started posting something.

Click to shrink...

Make a name change ticket with an admin

 

[Domar7431]

In the Prologue:

"stuned" should be "stunned"

"woried" should be "worried"

"apear" should be "appear"

"starring" should be "staring"

"hearth" should be "heart"

"but what can I do" the saying is usually "but what can you do" even if you're the one that needs to do something.

"back dot" should be "black dot"

"mussed" should be "mused"

"tied it wo" should be "tied it to"

"ilusion" should be "illusion"

I don't think Izanami costs an eye, Itachi used it on Sasuke and was fine afterward.

"my fauna" should be "my falna"

"I had a normal sharingan without the uchiha bloodline meaning I'd have to be very careful when using the mangekyo unless I wanted to go completely blind." ...what? A few problems here, firstly you don't get a sharingan without being an Uchiha or getting one transplanted. There's no people in the elemental nations born with non-uchiha sharingan. Second, the problem with sharingan transplanted into non-uchiha is that it stays in a permanent always-on state. It's a constant drain on your chakra and causes sensory overload so you need to keep the eye covered when not using it in combat. Third, the loss of eyesight comes from using the Mangekyo Sharingan, regardless of if you're an Uchiha or not, exactly why this happens isn't really explored. The way to keep it from happening further is to transplant an eye from another Mangekyo-possessing Uchiha, both of your eyes then become the Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan. Since the rob didn't give him Eternals and there's no Uchiha in danmachi, we can only hope he added some regeneration effect, otherwise our MC is gonna go completely blind in a few years even if he holds back on special technique usage.

 

[Nahin]

Retard mc with too much stupidity

 

[CapCaverna]

Alright, had a case of food poisoning and couldn't really post, or even write for some time, but I'm back... still not at 100%, but recovering.

I hope you guys enjoy the chapter.

__________________________________________________________

"Shit!" Mord almost didn't manage to stop his own scream as he lost all color on his face. "Shit, can we take it?"

"It's wounded and some of the previous party fighting it may still be alive." Scott told us while tying a quiver to his waist and pulling out a stamina potion.

"Shit." Mord cursed again before downing his own stamina potion. "We can't let this chance pass us by."

"What's a Vouivre?"

"A draconic female monster, like a lamia from the middle floors, but far bigger and stronger." Mord explained while everyone got ready. "Thing is, it's really fucking rare and always has a lot of drops. If we kill it, we can earn enough for half a year of work."

"It's also really fucking strong, it's like a mini boss monster. Kinda like the infant dragon on the upper floors." warned Scott while patting me in the shoulder.

Looking at the three of them, I only saw small valis in place of their eyes. There was no stopping it now.

Considering my options, I dropped everything I was carrying and sighed. At every encounter we had, I had been training my illusions, I was almost out of mind to cast and I wouldn't make it back without them. "Any of you guys have a mind potion?"

"I have one." said Guile. "It's from some annoying mage we partied with two months ago, I just never got rid of it."

"Ha! I knew the fights were a little too easy." Mord said in triumph. "You got some kind of daze or confuse spell you've been chanting?"

"I can create crude illusions." I confessed a little of what I could do while taking the small blue vial from Guile's hand and downing it in a single gulp. "It's much harder to use against stronger monsters and works best when there are more than one, but I can probably make it miss some blows or leave itself open a couple of times."

"Will it work on this monster?"

"Fuck if I know, I could use it on the bugbears…" I trailed off and shrugged.

"Fine, try to create openings for us if you can, but we won't be counting on it." Mord nodded at me and took a deep breath. "Alright, we're gonna try and get the jump on this thing. Kid, you just stay away from the fighting and watch out for other monsters, Scott, keep your distance and harass with arrows, if Guile and I die, just run and try to get the kid back to Rivira alright?"

"Sure Boss." Scott lied and squeezed his bow harder, making the wood creek.

We approached the Vouivre's location as carefully as we could, using one of Scott's scent masking herbs and making sure to avoid stepping on anything and cause noise. Thankfully, there weren't any dried leaves or twigs in the ground.
We made good time towards the monster, before all of us crouched under a root and I got my first look of the draconic monster.

It was large, larger than a bugbear by far. Mord was right when he said the thing was like a lamia, it had a large reptilian tail that was much thicker than those depicted in stories, looking heavy and with a round ending.

The woman part had bluish skin, with hard brown scales covering its privates, a large pair of wings sprouted from its back, with massive thin claws at the end of muscular arms, too large for its body, it's hair was long and it had needle like fangs all over its mouth. It was also covered in blood and eating the flesh of a dismembered woman.

I was frozen as I stared at the towering beast.

It must have ripped off the woman's limbs right where her body had fallen before attacking the torso itself, because there were trails of blood in four directions.

Entrails were pulled out and spread over the moss on the floor. The beast had broken her ribs and pulled them open like a door to get access to the heart and lungs that it was currently chewing on.

Another man was pinned by the stomach to a root by what must have been his own spear, his arms and legs flapping bonelessly and some of his intestines hanging out of his belly, the trails of blood told me he had struggled to pull himself free before dying.

A third man had his legs cut off and was laying face down a few meters away, with yet a fourth laying against another root, blood all over its clothes.

I crouched there and my eyes took it all in, every speck of blood and gore, every piece of this horror hit me like a punch to the stomach and I knew I'd never be able to forget it for the rest of my life. No wonder the Uchiha went mad.

Taking my time to register everything around the large beast, I managed to keep myself from throwing up and spent almost a full minute just trying to hear and see everything about the situation.

Almost trembling from just the presence of the beast, I knew I couldn't afford to take it easy.

I activated the mangekyou, immediately feeling a aching sensation in my eyes and, unable to catch it's eyes, threw the best lesser illusion I could at the beast. I showed it the location as it was before anyone moved in, then nodded towards Guile.

The large man stood slowly, making as little noise as he could and released a very slow, very deliberate, sigh of relief when the Vuivre didn't react.

We had planned it before arriving, I'd mask their view and try to mask their noise, before both melee fighters approached.

I wasn't sure I could do scent as well, so I decided to focus on the other two senses and allow both melee fighters to get a devastating first blow against the dragonkin while it didn't know they were there. With some hope, all the blood would mask their approach.

Thankfully, the beast was already relaxed enough after the fight that the illusion took hold.

Mord and Guile made their way towards the beast, Guile in front with his shield and spear at the ready. Once, they had to freeze as the Vouivre smelled them on the air and lifted it's head to look around but, not seeing anything, the creature dismissed its concerns and continued to eat.

From his place up on a branch, Scott pulled out an arrow and started testing if he could get a good enough footing to draw it, the branch was wide enough that he soon found a comfortable position and waited while both warriors flanked the beast and prepared their blows.

Unsheathing my sword and crouching between some roots where I could still keep an eye on the beast I watched as Mord and Guile took their positions one in the front and another at the creature's back then stabbed with their spears aiming for the monster's crystal to end the fight early.

Mord's spear pierced all the way through the vouivre's torso but somehow missed her crystal, the beast reacted with serpentine reflex twisting away, Guile's spear leaving a deep gash on its chest but failing to pierce it.

With a loud roar of pain it whipped its tail around and hit Guile's shield, sending the man stumbling back while striking blindly behind itself forcing Mord to retreat then it lifted its head and opened its wings wide, releasing another roar of rage so loud I had to cover my ears.

I felt my ilusion break as the beast's magic was roused and tried to send another one, something hastily put together that would only leave static copies of adventurers I had seen laying around the beast, hopefully confusing it a little but it didn't take hold, the Vouivre in too much pain and rage to be fooled by a lesser ilusion.

Guile threw his spear like a javelin but the beast batted it aside with an arm and took the time to break the shaft of the one piercing its body, pull it out and throw it away.

Then it reeled away with a screech of pain as an arrow sprouted from its left eye, Mord and Guile didn't waste the chance.

They struck as one Mord jumping up to try and get to the beast head while guile delivered a powerful blow to it's chest caving in some of the creature's scales, the beast twisted around with a wide sweep of its arm and Mord was forced to block with his sword or be disemboweled by its claws.

A second arrow nicked its neck and it roared again, its wings retracting to protect its head before its eyes focused on Guile and it was all the warrior could do to survive the fury of blows it released.

Claw swipes dug deep gashed in Guile's shield forcing the man to retreat while the beast keep Mord away with tail strikes which hit the ground with so much strength it sent wood flying like shrapnel, another two arrows hit it in the chest and tail but the Vuivre just ignored them and continued it's assault.

I kept trying to catch it in another Illusion but it was too strong for me and I was left feeling useless as the group fought for its life.

Mord finally managed to dodge the creature's tail and, blocking the shrapnel from reaching his face with an arm delivered a deep cut to the vuivre's waist, the beast twisted around once again delivering a devastating tail strike against Guile's shield and sending him flying through the air.

Ducking under another arrow the female dragonkin focused on Mord and delivered strike after strike even as blood flew everywhere from the deep gash on her waist.

Mord was overwhelmed, with only his sword he wasn't able to fully block its claws and was scratched again and again making his armor look more like rags and leaving his arms trembling from the strain, in desperation he took a claw swipe to the chest armor in order to focus fully on a new strike.

With a scream he delivered a full powered chop towards the beast's limbs somehow managing to sever both of them just below the elbow, the creature was beyond caring thought and just struck like a snake biting down on his neck and riding him to the ground.

Scott frantically shot arrow after arrow but the beast curled her tail around Mord like a snake and let the arrows pierce her strong muscular coils while she savaged Mord's neck.

Looking around I noticed Guile finally getting up but his shield arm was hanging limply by his side and he had clearly hurt his leg since he was limping as fast as he could towards the two fighters.

"Crap he won't make it" I didn't even notice I had spoken out loud, I was afraid, no, terrified, our party was losing and, although the vouivre was deeply hurt it still seemed strong enough to finish off Guile and face Scott alone.

I knew what I should do now, there was no shame in retreating from an enemy vastly more powerful than myself, we had even discussed it, Guile was too hurt to escape so he would draw the monster's attention and Scott and I would escape to live another day.

Fuck, I knew Scott wasn't gonna abandon them of his own accord but if I ran first he may follow, I could be saving his life even.

Even if he didn't follow me, I could be careful and use my illusions well enough to have a chance of making it up to the 18th floor, certainly more of a chance than if I faced the powerful monster as a level 1 with all my attributes below three digits.

The hell, for all I knew those guys could have been planning to kill me after dealing with the Vouivre to avoid paying my 10%, we only had a professional relationship where they were paying for me to act as a supporter it's not like we were a permanent party and the money from such big haul could be enough for them to turn against me, I even vaguely remember Mord acting like an asshole towards Bell on the Danmachi anime.

With trembling legs and my heart threatening to burst out of my chest from fear I ran.

My first throwing dagger hit the Vouivre on the shoulder and the second dug into its neck as I circled the beast to get a better angle, it wasn't enough to get it to release the limp form of Mord from it's coils but its remaining eye glared my way as the beast took another bite of the man.

The sheer amount of rage there, seeing the boiling hate on its eye, I knew even visual contact enhanced by the mangekyo wouldn't be enough to affect it so, more or less on instinct, I activated my trump card, Kotoamatsukami.

In an instant I felt myself being drawn into its eye, felt myself fall into an abyss of darkness only sometimes illuminated by scenes of blood and carnage, the only feelings this creature felt were rage and a very muted amount of pain, it didn't even take pleasure on it's kills, not really.

Grasping at its consciousness I desperately tried to find a way to influence it, to change the rage it felt, every time I tried a wave of red hot hate washed over my work tainting it back into incoerent, bestial madness, there was something controling the beast, a sinister influence permeating its mind and filling it with the irrational desire to eliminate every intruder.

Feeling a mind down coming and knowing Mord didn't have enough life left on him for me to take my time I flailed around desperately.

Wielding my power more like a hammer than the delicate instrument it was supposed to be, I felt something give, the influence inside its mind snapped, breaking the connection it had with the creature but the backlash disrupted my technique and I didn't have enough mind to fight back.

In desperation, my only thoughts to shift the beast's attention from its current prey, I managed to send it two imperatives, the first telling it that Mord wasn't important and the second that I was.

I came back to myself with a scream of pain, I had the worst headache of my life and I felt like my right eye was about to explode as a flood of blood ran down my face but it worked, the draconic woman released Mord's body and lifted itself up to stretch its wings.

Blocking another arrow with the stump of an arm the beast found me standing there and narrowed its eye.

"Oh crap" I said as I cursed myself for my stupidity, why the hell didn't I just make it ignore me too.

The beast would then have turned towards Guile or Scott, both of which are far more likely to survive it's attacks, but nooo I had to be the hero and now I was gonna get murdered by a half dead monster.

Stumbling once from the pain I managed to get my feet under me and ran towards Guile's discarded spear as the Vouivre released another roar that shook me to my core and charged.

Dropping my sword I ran as if my life depended on it, I ran with everything I had expecting the creature to bite me in half with every step I took.

I reached the spear and slid down on the moss grabbing for it's shaft, turning around I briefly registered Scott's body thumbling away from the monster holding one of its amputated wings, making sure I planted the butt of the spear on the ground like I had seen the warriors do yesterday I braced myself to receive the beast's charge.

Unfortunately a Vouivre was not a boar, seeing the spear pointed its way the monster twisted aside flowing around the spear with ease, only the fact my mangekyo were open saved me as I managed to follow its lightning fast movements.

Releasing the spear I cried out and tried to protect my head and neck with my arms.

It hit me like a truck, its hook like fangs biting down on my forearm and crushing my bones before its body slammed into me and drove my back into the ground for several meters, then it trashed its head wrenching my arm out of its sockets and lifting my feet off the ground and slamming me back down driving the air out of my lungs.

Opening its mouth the beast released my arm only to bite into my shoulders sending another wave of pain through my body.

I screamed in fear and, with a desperate drive to survive, I managed to grab its face with my left hand. The beast ignored me until I dug my thumb into its eye sockets.

Screeching in pain the Vouivre pulled its face away from me before striking blindly at my arm biting off my pinky and ring finger together with some of my hand, it pulled its head back to finish me off.

Opening its mouth impossibly wide to show a row of bloody fangs the Vuivre reared back for a new strike, looking at it I saw my death bearing down on me in slow motion.

The large mace hit it on the side of the head with all the strength Guile's arms could muster sending the creature's entire body away from me, releasing a whimper of relief I managed to turn my head enough to see the vouivre's serpentine body twisting uselessly at the ground.

Even blind and with half its head caved in the monster still seemed to be trying to get to me until Guile laid a boot at its back and used his mace to pulverize its head against the wooden floor ending it once and for all.

Laying there on the floor with a pool of blood starting to spread from my wounds I could only stare at the dead monster, the tip of its tail still twitching about before I burst out laughing.

I had survived, despite the incredible stupidity of what I had done I survived, then the adrenaline started leaving my system and the pain hit me.

Sucking in a breath I dared look down at my shoulder to see a large piece of it just missing with bite marks left on my exposed bone, I couldn't move my arm and was barely hanging on to my consciousness as the pain continued to increase.

I wanted nothing more than to give up and pass out, the only thing keeping my eyes open was the fear I wouldn't wake up if I did so I focused my sight on Guile and watched as he released his mace and walked towards me.

"Stupid kid…. haaa…. haaa…" he said as he approached me his shoulders dropping from exhaustion "Should have ran"

"I… argh! I'm telling myself the same thing" I confessed.

Kneeling down besides me Guile took out several vials from the pouch at his side and opened the first pouring it down on top of my shoulder, my muscles contracted as the potion felt like alcohol being thrown on my exposed wound but the bleeding immediately stopped, throwing the vial away he opened another and poured it at my arm with the same result.

"Ugh… so tell me doctor… huff… will I live?" I tried to joke but it came out with far too much truth to be funny, I had lost a lot of blood.

"It's not gonna be pretty… haaa…. and you're gonna have to see a specialist to fix this mess on Oratio but you're gonna make it" the large man said still trying to recover his breath "Hopefully we're all gonna make enough that we won't be in debt after this"

Guile Helped me drink a third potion vial, I felt my wounds all close leaving me with an odd tingling sensation over them so, of course the headache from overusing my eyes came back in full and even the potions couldn't stop the bleeding from my right eye.

Turning my head away from Guile I closed both eyes to see if the pain would go down but it was no use.

For a few minutes I laid there breathing hard while Guile ripped my shirt and used it to wrap my arm against my body then he got up and kicked my leg lightly "Come on get up, we don't want to tempt the dungeon into sending a monster party after us"

Remembering the place I was laying on was actually a semi sentient thing hellbent on killing me I opened my eyes wide and pushed myself up as fast as I could, it was not a good idea as Guile had to hold me up until the world stopped spinning and I regained my footing.

Note to self, blood loss and exhaustion did not allow for fast movement.

Finally managing to look at my surroundings I saw that Mord was actually alive if in an even worse situation than me, he was sitting against a tree pale like a corpse and with a chunk of his neck missing and one of his legs bent into an odd angle while his armor had to be discarded, his shirt absolutely soaked with blood.

Surprisingly there was an elf laying beside him with a pair of amputated legs by his side, the male wasn't awake but his chest was moving and his stumps were already healed.

Finally I found Scott forcing a potion down the throat of the elf woman leaning against a root as she tried to wave him away to check on her remaining companions, she didn't seem ready for a fight as she constantly missed his hands or fell back down as if drunk.

He finally lifted her in a princess carry and laid her back down besides her companion before coming to stand with Guile and me.

"So they were alive after all" Guile commented as Scott came closer "what's up with them?"

"They're Loki familia, it was their leader's first time leading them on the lower floors and as far as I could find out from the girl they had shitty luck" Scott explained before turning to me and looking over my limp arm "You alright? think you can continue walking?"

"I won't be fighting anything but I think I can make it back to the town if we stop to rest once or twice" I gave him my best guess, it wasn't the time to act proud since our lives were still on the line.

"Good… good" he trailed off while looking towards our wounded, all three of them didn't look like they were gonna be walking anytime soon "Alright Guile you carry Mord, I think I can carry the crippled elf without much trouble and you newbie watch the girl, she hit her head but is mostly alright you just have to keep her awake and walking"

"You sure?" asked Guile with a lifted eyebrow

"Shit I don't want to just leave them here man" Scott sighed and covered his face with his hands while releasing a long sight "Look if we travel carefully the both of us should have enough time to lay them down and kill any monster we can't avoid but if things look bad we abandon the elves and ran for it alright?"

Without a better idea we both nodded and got into action.





____________________________________________________


A/N : Thanks for my patrons : Xhaustedhero, AkumaSmaG, Iori Daemona Angel, AlliterativeArts (Eric Faust), Icewing, Comics, DERMONIAN, Davvy chappie, Banh Bao, Ian Michael, WanderingDaemon, Scott, Tony Martinez, Travis cox, Chaos, Rootbeerguy, High Priest of Torga and James Williams for supporting my work!
.

If you like my work, take a look at my other novels or my patreon. You can support me for a single dollar.

 

[Ghostcraft19]

Does this mean the Loki familia is mostly weakened?

 

[CapCaverna]

Does this mean the Loki familia is mostly weakened?

Click to shrink...

Nope, the main fighters from Loki are still ridiculously strong, but Loki familia is huge, and there are weaker members.

At the moment, Loki familia's main force is doing a delve, pushing deeper into the Dungeon. Those are just third string members that didn't get to go in the delve. You'll notice that they're still delving in the lower floors despite being third string.

Both are canon members of Loki familia too, but they don't really appear in the novels, or at least aren't focused on.

 

[CmirDarthanna]

Huh, I wonder if they're gonna get rewarded by Loki for sticking their necks out for her kids.

 

[Snoopcrackgod]

Nice

 

[shakeval]

Shit, I wonder how much Excellia he got being in that fight, would have to be a wicked high amount considering the rank of the monster, sure he didn't kill it but a rare and powerful monster with only a couple party members. . . . .yeah, gotta be some serious growth.

 

[CapCaverna]

Alright, here's chapter 4.

For personal reasons, I'll skip posting tomorrow, but you guys can still find my content for free on my patreon if you want to read ahead.

I'll be back with chapter 5 on wednesday. Hope you guys enjoy the chapter.

________________________________________________

Truth be told, we weren't exactly ready to make our way back to Rivira, but we had to, at the very least, get away from the clearing where we fought.

I still wasn't thinking clearly, but I managed to get one of the elf's arms over my shoulder and, with Scott guiding me, hobbled away from the blood filled place.

We must have made for a sorry lot. Guile and Scott were carrying two cripples like backpacks, while I and my elf companion stumbled around like a couple of drunks.

I must have lost some time then because, next thing I knew, Scott was guiding me into a spot between tree roots where Mord and the elf male were already lying down.

It was a collection of roots from different trees that had twisted around each other and then dug into the wooden floor before spreading apart, leaving a hollow spot between them, almost like an underground cave.

My companion just mumbled incoherently as I guided her path towards our temporary resting place. With another groan, she collapsed against the root, her eyes unfocused.

Lying against the wood of the ground, I wasn't much better. My head was still killing me, my right eye was aching and I was having trouble breathing.

Shit, I wasn't certain I could focus enough to fight a 10 years old right now, much less cast illusions, and my shoulder was still dislocated. The bites on my arm and shoulder were also starting to hurt again despite the healing potions having closed the wounds.

"You alright there?" asked Scott as he crouched over my body and looked at my wounds.

"Perfect." I lied and stared at my limp arm. "Can't you at least put my arm back in place?"

"Well, I can try, if you really want me to…" He looked over my arm again and shook his head. "But, I really don't recommend it. Even if I do it right and don't make it worse, your arm is still broken. The cheap potions we used aren't that effective."

"Ugh…" I groaned and considered it, but decided not to take the risk. "Fine, you wouldn't have another mind potion you were hiding for later then?"

"No, never needed it." He patted me on the leg and got up to check on Guile who was breathing hard and massaging his wounded leg.

Putting my good arm over my eyes, I tried to take deep breaths and relax my muscles to alleviate the pain. It wasn't all that effective.

I hadn't really noticed before, what with the life or death situation and the tension of just getting away from that clearing, but I was utterly exhausted, my body felt like I had just ran a marathon; every muscle was aching and complaining after each breath.

A few seconds later, I just passed out.

Mord was the one who woke me up. He did so by throwing a roll of bandages on my face, making me jerk upward and jolting my wounded arm, causing my head to explode with pain once again.

"Fuuuuuck!" I groaned as I cradled my head with my good hand and tried not to throw up.

"Shit, sorry newbie." Came Mord's weak voice, with at least some amount of regret.

Taking another couple of deep breaths, I finally managed to open a single eye and glare at the pale party leader. He didn't look good.

Pieces of his neck and shoulder were still missing and he was pale like a corpse. Mord seemed barely awake, his body resting against the tree and his eyes struggling to focus on me, so I decided to drop it.

Taking stock of the situation, I noticed some ichor from a centipede at the entrance of our little resting place, and the fact that Guile and Scott were nowhere to be seen.

My heart skipped a beat for a second, causing me to hold my breath, but I saw most of their gear resting against the tree at Mord's side, with the Vouivre's drops poking out from inside the bag. At least they hadn't abandoned us.

"What… happened?" Mord finally asked while trying to focus enough to look at my wounds, his voice was extremely worried, despite the sheer exhaustion. "Where's everyone else?"

"We killed the thing." I answered before registering what he was really asking about and smiling. "Everyone is alive."

"Thank fuck… ugh, always knew greed would do me in." Either that was enough to satisfy his curiosity or Mord was just too tired to continue talking, because he let his head hang down on his chest and closed his eyes.

Damn bastard, going right back to sleep after waking me up.

I continued to look around, the elf woman was also missing from the cave, but her companion was left laying at another corner, wrapped in a cape, his chest slowly moving up and down with his breathing.

I snorted in amusement, legless the elf was still alive it seemed.

Pushing myself fully into a sitting position, I finally wiped the blood from under my right eye. Trying to open it caused me a lot of pain, so I grabbed for Mord's thrown bandages and wrapped them around my head until it was completely covered.

I tried to send some power into my eyes, the left eye was working alright, but I felt some kind of blockage against my right one. Some instinctual understanding told me I wouldn't be able to activate the mangekyou on that eye for at least a few days, and the Kotoamatsukami seemed to be permanently beyond it now.

Fuck, not even a week into this world and one of my greatest strengths was already gone.

Why the fuck didn't I let Scott handle the Vouivre? He'd probably be only a few seconds slower than me at reaching the beast anyway.

Searching my own backpack, I found another stamina potion and drank it down before gathering my courage to stand up. Even with the medicine, my body still felt heavy with exhaustion.

The temptation to just lie down and take a proper nap was strong, but I just knew something worse would turn up if I closed my eyes again, probably a wild floor boss or something. I just had that kind of luck.

Another few minutes and I had finally recovered enough to push myself up, even if I had to use the tree as support. Making sure I still had a few throwing knives in my pants, I grabbed one of the extra spears and used it like a cane to walk towards the entrance.

Looking outside, I saw the moss on the floor was covered with spilled blood and ichor in various spots, but there were no corpses or any signs of the rest of the party.

Lowering my head, I walked through the entrance as carefully as I could manage, only relaxing when I saw Scot, Guile and the elf woman sitting around a small fire, some kind of large plant burning on top of it.

Holding on to my spear/cane tightly, I made my way towards the three of them. "What's going on?"

"Hey you're awake!" Greeted Scott, while the other two just nodded. "Come, sit."

A few more steps, a loud groaning and some amount of pain later, I was sitting besides Guile, while the large man slowly threw yellow leaves inside the fire. "Why are we just sitting here again?"

"Saelus and your party leader need rest." Answered the elf woman, speaking for the first time since I had seen her. She actually looked both embarrassed and annoyed to do it.

Looking at her eyes, I saw a small amount of distaste for all three of us in her face. Damn, I forgot elves were kinda racist here.

"This is Remilia." Scott introduced while fanning the flames. "She has some medical training and was able to help Mord and her own companion, but we have to let them rest while the potions work or risk them dying."

"It's the least any adventurer should know when delving." She mumbled while stealing a glance towards the root cave and biting down on her nails. "We should give them another hour at least."

"Excuse us if we're not from a first class familia." Guile grumbled and threw another leaf.

A sudden noise to the right caused me to jump up, my spear held tightly. The sudden movement gave me a bout of vertigo and I almost fell down as my vision went white. A second later, I managed to refocus and see all three of my companions relax and sit back down.

Looking towards the noise, I saw an arm sized branch lying on the floor, signs of blunt force damage where it had broken from the tree.

"Ha, even burning so much monster repellent, we're all still jumping in fear like rookies." Scott mocked and received a venomous glare from Remilia.

"If you haven't noticed, we had to fight at least three times since we stopped." The Elf commented while finally releasing her weapon, a short and thin sword.

"Come on, sit back down Roland." Guile pulled at my clothes and I relaxed, letting him help me sit down.

"Alright, what's the plan now?" I finally asked after a minute of silence.

Scott looked at the Elf, but she didn't even open her eyes to acknowledge the question so he shrugged and answered.

"We guard the cave for another hour or so before Mord and the Elf can take another dose of healing." He said while poking at the fire with the tip of one of his long knives. "With me and Remilia back in fighting shape, and Guile protecting the wounded, our chances are much better."

Scott didn't seem to be lying, so I sighed in relief and felt a weight I didn't know I was carrying lift from my shoulders.

I had a sudden impulse to laugh out loud but, looking at the stern figure of the Elf sitting straight like I ruller, I decided to hold myself back. I doubt she'd appreciate my good humor after losing most of her party.

"Here." said Guile as he threw me a water pouch and some kind of meat ration. "You better eat something before we make for the village."

"Thanks." I nodded his way and bit into the meat. It had the texture of rubber and tasted even worse.

I made a face at ugly thing but, after the first bite hit my stomach, I finally noticed just how hungry I was, so I forced myself to continue eating before washing it all down with big gulps of water.

"Don't worry newbie, after getting to Rivira, we're gonna feast like kings.'' Scott leaned towards me and patted my shoulder while laughing at my distress. "We've got the full loot from a Vouivre and the gratitude of the Loki familia, we're set for… HEY!"

The rogue was fast enough to jump back as I almost spewed water all over his face. My face had gone white and I had to force myself to release my spear once again. "Coff… coff… which familia did you just say?"

"Do you have a problem with the Loki familia, Supporter?" Asked the Elven woman while looking to see if any water had hit her armor, utter disgust in her face.

"Nope… no problem at all!" I quickly denied. "Just to be certain, you're talking about Norse god Loki right, son of Odin?"

"I don't know what the Norse are, but Loki-sama is one of Odin's daughters, yes." The elf answered looking at me suspiciously.

I was hoping that wasn't the case. Damn I knew it would be impossible to not get involved with some god or another, but did it have to be one of the worst ones out there?

I mean, I had only watched Danmachi up to season 2, so I knew very little about the Loki familia besides the fact they were strong and had Ais but, if they aren't some kind of evil mastermind last boss, I would eat my shoe.

Come on their head was Loki, shapeshifter god of lies and fire. The guy, or girl here I guess, was the father/mother of the worst monsters in Norse mythology and the one to cause Ragnarok. There's just no way he/she wasn't planning to destroy Orario behind everyone's back… or worse.

I mean, in the anime, Loki seemed like just a mischievous god, but I didn't trust that at all. Gods, in nearly every mythology, were considered arrogant assholes. Even the ones that weren't really evil usually considered humans as beneath them.

Well, danmachi was an adaptation, so it wasn't completely outside the realm of possibility that their Loki was a good guy/girl, but I wouldn't bet on it.

Noticing all three of my companions were now giving me odd looks, I gave them my best innocent smile. "Yeah, when you guys go talk to the Loki familia for a reward can you, maybe, not mention my name?"

"Why?" Asked the elf, her eyes narrowed into tiny slits.

Before I could answer, Scott jumped up from his sitting position sending us all into alert. "Who's there!"

Oh, thank god, a distraction!

Everyone went quiet for a few seconds as we waited for an answer, or a monster to rush in.

The silence lasted long enough that I was about to try and change the conversation when the answer finally came.

"Well, well, well, what do we have here?" Said an arrogant voice from between the trees, it seemed to be slightly disappointed.

I briefly let myself relax when everyone turned away from me, then I noticed the way they had all straightened and were holding on to their weapons and swallowed hard.

Grabbing the shaft of my spear, I took stock of my situation. My head was still pounding and my right arm was useless, but I felt better after eating something. Nowhere near fighting shape, but mobile at least.

From the forest, I saw three men walking towards us. They were large and built like Guile, massive and filled with muscle, but also wearing thick, cloth armor that made them look even bigger.

"Greetings." Said Scott. He got up and looked up in the trees behind the men, searching for something. "We're just taking a rest before making our way back to Rivira, our friend got hurt early on, so we did not have much luck this delve."

Seeing as Guile and Remilia followed Scott's example, I tried my best to get up without showing just how wounded I was. No need to show more weakness than what was already obvious.

"Really?" Said the one in the center while scratching at a thick beard. "Interesting, because my friend here just heard something about a Vouivre, a very rare monster isn't that right?"

We all traded glances, then Guile slowly put himself in front of our party while Scott and Remilia attempted to shield the cave from the newcomer's sight.

My heart started beating hard against my chest, while bile rose into my throat. I did not like the way this conversation was going.

"Indeed." Guile said slowly. "Damn strong too, we barely escaped the thing with our lives."

"Yeah, the damn thing almost killed my friend over there before we managed to stun it and run away." Scott nodded, but his eyes never left the trees and his hands slowly loosened his throwing knives.

The three newcomers briefly looked at each other and laughed mockingly before the leader focused back on Guile and gave him a smirk. "Somehow, I don't think I believe you."

Shit! Sending a small amount of power into my good eye, I ignored the pain as it hit me and activated the mangekyou once again.

I wouldn't be able to use any believable illusions right now, but the increased visual power and prediction ability would be the only thing allowing me to survive a fight and even a second distraction was enough to save my life.

Fuck, could I kill a human? Monsters were one thing, but I had never gotten into a serious fight before, spars and play fighting yes, but I had never thrown a punch and really meant to hurt somebody.

All three men unsheathed their swords and started advancing and Remilia shouted, trying one last time to avoid the fight.

"We're from the Loki familia!" She cried out, lifting some emblem up into the air with one hand while squeezing a beautiful dagger on the other. "The monster's loot isn't worth that much to us, we can just give it to you but, if you fight us now, the Loki familia will never forgive you!"

The men paused when the leader lifted a closed fist, his eyes showing amusement. "Hmmm… a good proposal, and what's to stop you from hunting us down anyway after reuniting with your familia?"

"I swear in my name as Remilia Forestwind, I and my companions won't even mention your existence." She said and I had some hope that we wouldn't have to fight. "We don't even know your names."

Lifting his large sword to rest on his shoulders, the bearded man laughed out loud. "Well, I do like earning money without doing any of the work after all, why not?!"

Ramilia and I both relaxed when the man's companions lowered their weapons, getting robbed of our well earned loot sucked, but it beat getting murdered for it.

Everything happened in an instant. The bandit leader went from relaxed and friendly to grinning like a maniac and delivering an all out strike towards Guile's head at the same instant that Scott kicked my legs out from under me and jumped towards the elf.

My fall was sudden and painful, it also saved my life as I felt something sailing right where my neck used to be, the air whistling at its passage.

My companions weren't fooled by the man's words and had been ready. Scott had saved Remilia from another two arrows by smashing into her with his shoulder causing both her emblem and dagger to fly away from her hands.

At the same time, Guile acted fast, lifting his arm, he used his shield to receive the blow and struck one of the others.

The second man had lowered his guard in order to sell their ruse and would have received a killing blow to the head had Guile been in perfect condition. Unfortunately, his leg was still wounded and had faltered upon receiving the leader's strike.

The mace's blow struck the man's shoulder instead, causing him to stumble back with a cry of pain and temporarily taking him out of the fight, but I lost sight of the battle soon after.

A fourth Bandit rushed in under some kind of camouflage skill, attempting to stab Scott on the back. The bandit seemed almost invisible, his body changed colors with the background, but my improved eyesight caught the minute differences in the air.

"Watch out!" I screamed at the same time that I lifted my spear and stabbed the center of the bandit.

The second I struck, I knew I had made a mistake. A combination of using my non-dominant hand and hesitation at hurting another person made my stab far weaker than it should have been. It pierced the first layer of cloth armor the bandit was wearing, but barely drew blood and got stuck into his gambeson.

The short man turned around, almost wrenching the spear out of my hand, and struck at my fallen form, but I was already rolling into my good side, dodging his blow. I'd still have been cut, if one of Scott's knives didn't pierce the man's arm, causing him to swear.

His skill disrupted and opportunity lost, the man jumped back as Remilia rushed him and delivered a series of slashes with her sword, forcing him to retreat constantly or risk dying.

Even the single glance I took of her fight was enough to know, the only reason the man survived was that she was still tired and hurt. Her technique was far better than even Scott and Guile together.

Finally pushing myself up, I decided she had the rogue well in hand and rushed the three warriors in front.

Scott and Guile were fighting fiercely; their combined might and my help were enough to reach a stalemate with the bandits.

Wounded as I was, I wasn't much better than a distraction in the fight and, even if I had the speed to get past any of the bandits guard, which I didn't, I also didn't have the strength to deliver a telling blow, but I still used my spear's reach to threaten them like an annoying wasp.

They may suspect how weak I was, but nobody wanted to risk ignoring me and finding out.

Despite the danger, I smiled, things were going our way and, soon, Remilia would deal with the rogue and come help us, those bastards had chosen poorly.

Of course that's when everything went wrong. I felt the impact before I could react, a crossbow bolt hitting my armor with the strength of a sledgehammer, piercing its metal and my chest at the same time.

I stumbled aside, the pain making me lose sight of the fighting for a few seconds as I stared at the large feathers sprouting from my chest armor with a strange fascination. I had forgotten about the… crossbowmen.

Grabbing at the bolt, my first instinct was to pull it out. I grabbed the shaft and it sent a jolt of pain through my body, snapping me out of my daze and back into the present.

What the hell was I doing? Looking around and trying to get my bearings, I saw the guy Guile had wounded rushing me, his eyes filled with anger at their failed ambush.

With no time to think, I stabbed at his face with my spear, but he parried it aside with his longsword and stepped inside my guard before stomping me, aiming for my wounded arm with a cruel smile.

I tried to dodge it, but the man was just too fast, clearly a level two adventurer, even if barely. The kick hit me with such strength I lost my footing and went flying. With how much pain I was feeling in my arm, I didn't even register falling on the moss covered floor.

I knew I had to move if I wanted to live, but I couldn't, the pain was just too much. Curling up into a fetal position, I threw up on the floor and felt hot tears soak the bandage over my eye.

The damn bandit took his sweet time, the fact he wasn't worried about my companions made me even more afraid and I finally managed to slightly push myself up. Looking around, I saw my spear lying just beyond my grasp and tried to crawl towards it.

Putting one foot on my wounded arm the bandit pushed me away from the spear, flipping me over to fall back on my back.

"Tenacious little fuck, aren't you?" He mocked before stepping on my chest and pushing me down, giving a twist of his wounded shoulder, he asked. "Any last words?"

I took a deep breath and then pulled one of my throwing knives from under my pants, stabbing him on the back of the leg as hard as I could.

His greaves only protected the front of his legs, so my dagger pierced deep into his flesh. With a scream of pain, the man lifted his foot at the same time as he swung his sword towards my head.

I rolled towards his good leg, causing him to completely lose his footing and fall over my own body.

"Goddamnit!" The guy screamed as I grabbed at his body to stop him from getting up. "My leg, you stabbed my leg, you motherfucker!"

Ignoring the pain of my broken arm, I hugged the man's arms, desperately trying to stop him from killing me, fear and leverage giving me the strength to resist him, even if he was far stronger than me.

Without the room to swing the weapon, he started hitting my head with the pommel again and again. We struggled like that for a few seconds, my face getting covered with blood and sweat.

When he pulled his hand back for another hit, I managed to knee him between the legs, causing him to finally drop the sword.

With a roar of rage, the bandit grabbed me by the hair and pulled my head away from his armor. My burst of adrenaline fuelled strength had finally run out.

I could barely resist as the man rolled us aside, putting my back against the floor and squeezing my neck with both hands. His face a mask of incoherent rage, he leaned in and screamed at me, finally meeting my eye.

Bleeding, exhausted, almost completely out of mind and slowly getting the life squeezed out of me, I still smiled and used 'greater visual illusion'. In an instant, I sent the man an illusion of the only thing I could think about right now, pain.

His roar of rage turned into a whimper and he released my neck to cradle his arm against his chest. Grabbing a second dagger, I screamed and jammed it up into his neck, and then I did it again, and again.

I continued to scream and stab him in the face even as he fell on top of me, forgetting everything else but my need to survive.

A clap of thunder snapped me out of my stabbing, letting the dagger fall from my numb hands. I tried to wipe the blood away from my face, turning my face aside. I started dry heaving until a second bolt of lightning filled my vision.

Following the path of the lightning, I found Ramilia on her knees, one hand holding her shoulder where a bolt had pierced her and a second holding the ornate dagger she had dropped at the beginning of the fight.

Another swing of her dagger released a third bolt towards the trees. I watched as she swung the dagger another two times before it crumpled to dust in her hand and she collapsed back, apparently spent.

Without the strength to even move, I turned my face away from the dead man on top of me and waited to see if one of the bastards had survived to come kill me.

After a few minutes, when nothing happened, I managed to gather enough strength to push the body aside and crawl away.

"hey… haaa… you're alive." Guile said from above, causing me to look up.

He looked like crap, his face was covered in cuts, his nose and lips were busted and it looked like he was gonna lose an eye while his other one was as red as my own. It was already starting to swell up too, making it look twice its usual size.

"You… coff, cof… you look like crap." I said, too tired to even care.

"Thanks, you too." Bending down, the large man grabbed my good arm and pulled me up, and onto his back.

My legs felt like jelly and I couldn't find purchase into the floor no matter how much I tried, so I was forced to just let them drag on the floor as he carried me towards the cave.

"Sowy fho noth healing yoh." He said with a swollen lip. "Ran outh pothions outh here."

Doing my best to keep my wounded arm and the crossbow bolt still sticking out of my body from banging against anything, I didn't say anything. I had nothing to say, really.

Guile dragged me inside the cave and carefully laid me down on my back. Watching the entrance, I saw Ramilia still pressing down on the bolt at her shoulder to stop the bleeding, followed by Scott.

This time, he hadn't escaped unharmed. He was missing his left arm from just below his shoulder and had tied some cloths around it to stop the bleeding; he also had a large sword gash on his chest.

"What. Happened?" asked Mord, having finally woken up again.

"Thieves." Said Scott, as if that answered everything.

"Fuck."

Yeah, fuck was about right.

Eventually, Ramilia bent over me and carefully poked at the bolt on my side. Her own bolt was still stuck on her shoulder, held in place by bandages so it wouldn't shake.

"Roland, right?" She asked, but didn't wait for me to answer before looking me over, she cleaned the cuts I had and bandaged them, but left the bolt alone. "We don't have enough potions to heal you if we pull it out, so you're gonna have to take it until we reach Rivira."

"OK." I was so tired of this delve I had gone monosilabic. I just wanted to be done with it as fast as we could.

After that, I just went numb, losing track of things and barely managing to follow instructions as we made our way back towards the village.

I think we stopped to fight the dungeon spawns another two times, but I didn't even see which monster it was. My eye refused to really focus before we finally reached Rivira. The second I caught sight of the entrance filled with adventurers, I felt my body give out.

Everything went black.


____________________________________________________


A/N : Thanks for my patrons : Xhaustedhero, AkumaSmaG, Iori Daemona Angel, AlliterativeArts (Eric Faust), Icewing, Comics, DERMONIAN, Davvy chappie, Banh Bao, Ian Michael, WanderingDaemon, Scott, Tony Martinez, Travis cox, Chaos, Rootbeerguy, High Priest of Torga and James Williams for supporting my work!
.

If you like my work, take a look at my other novels or my patreon. You can support me for a single dollar.

 

[CmirDarthanna]

Feels too convenient he lost one use of the strongest mind control ability on his second day of getting dropped into orario.

 

[walket11]

I'm a bit confused why you said Kotoamatsukami is now permanently gone from the eye... when it normally doesn't get permanently used, just a long cd... and earlier you even said it may have a shorter cd then danzo's 10 years because of the falna, but now your saying its gone forever?

 

[CapCaverna]

I'm a bit confused why you said Kotoamatsukami is now permanently gone from the eye... when it normally doesn't get permanently used, just a long cd... and earlier you even said it may have a shorter cd then danzo's 10 years because of the falna, but now your saying its gone forever?

Click to shrink...

You have to understand it's from the Mc's point of view. He isn't the font of all knowledge.

Earlier, the MC considered if his falna could improve the cools own, that doesn't mean he's right about that. Just that he considers it a possibility.

The MC also thinks Loki is a villain, because he knows Norse Mythology better than he knows Danmachi. He said he only watched two seasons of the show. As he said in the chapter.


Now, he fells like he can't use it, that doesn't mean he's right. Just that it's how he feels.

I want to make this absolutely clear, the MC isn't right all the time, he can have misunderstandings, what he feels can be wrong, and he can fail.

If you must know, yeah, the falna does decrease the time he can use it, and the higher level he achieves, the faster it can become. Right now, it'll take him about 8 years to use it again, but that time can shorten as he grows in level. Or if he finds someone with the right spell to heal his eyes.

Right now, he's utterly exhausted, has just been through several fights, is wounded and has just used the Kotoamatsukami. He feels like he can't use it, and using it has damaged his eye enough that he can't even use the mangekyou, but that will change after some rest and healing.

 

[Wind85]

It seemed to me that healing with full restoration of lost limbs was almost a dream in Orario.
If someone does this, that person charges hundreds of millions for a spell, if not more. A prosthesis that did not fully compensate for the loss of a hand bankrupted the Miach family. Loki's family had a second-level girl who ran with glasses.

 

[walket11]

You have to understand it's from the Mc's point of view. He isn't the font of all knowledge.

Earlier, the MC considered if his falna could improve the cools own, that doesn't mean he's right about that. Just that he considers it a possibility.

The MC also thinks Loki is a villain, because he knows Norse Mythology better than he knows Danmachi. He said he only watched two seasons of the show. As he said in the chapter.


Now, he fells like he can't use it, that doesn't mean he's right. Just that it's how he feels.

I want to make this absolutely clear, the MC isn't right all the time, he can have misunderstandings, what he feels can be wrong, and he can fail.

If you must know, yeah, the falna does decrease the time he can use it, and the higher level he achieves, the faster it can become. Right now, it'll take him about 8 years to use it again, but that time can shorten as he grows in level. Or if he finds someone with the right spell to heal his eyes.

Right now, he's utterly exhausted, has just been through several fights, is wounded and has just used the Kotoamatsukami. He feels like he can't use it, and using it has damaged his eye enough that he can't even use the mangekyou, but that will change after some rest and healing.

Click to shrink...

Ah that makes complete sense and was what I suspected was going on. The confusion came from this sentence.

Some instinctual understanding told me I wouldn't be able to activate the mangekyou on that eye for at least a few days, and the Kotoamatsukami seemed to be permanently beyond it now.

Click to shrink...

The way this is worded seems like hes getting an instinctual feeling its poof gone forever and will never recover. Maybe something about how it's gone for now and he has no idea when it will be available again, it would be less confusing for a reader then saying its permanently gone, when it's not.

 

[Wintercat]

The character is making mistakes, and assumptions, but they're working on limited knowledge and making use of the knowledge they do possess.

That said, their question about the SON of Odin is likely to spark some questions in a few peoples minds, and Loki herself might actually act offended about it, especially about the size of her chest. That said, I think it might be hilarious this way.

The protagonist is relatively new to using their abilities. At that stage, the feeling "gone forever" might be due to the feeling of being unable to use the ability at all for a long time, mistaken that it wont recover at all. I could see this being something along the lines of "It won't be back in 5 years time... I guess I lost it for good." At the same time, I am hopeful that the Sharingan doesn't come with the flaw of losing vision permanently over time, worn down by use. I seem to recall Mangekyo Sharingan had that sort of a flaw, and the only real way to counter it was to acquire, what was it, the Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan?

Basically, a version that suffered no more vision loss or anything? Except that required another person with Mangekyo Sharingan I believe, so yeah, not exactly an option.

So all I can hope here is that the protagonist's falna gives them an option to make their eye always recover, eventually, even without having to acquire that 'final form' of the eye, so to speak. That said, I figure the gains should be worth it nevertheless.

Looking forward to seeing where this will go. Watched.

 

[CapCaverna]

Heya, here's the next chapter.

Again, I'll skip tomorrow and post the next chapter in two days, I hope you guys enjoy it.

___________________________________________

The Beast's needle-like teeth sank into my flesh with incredible ease, biting off my entire arm and swallowing it in a single gulp.

With its sharp claws, it grabbed me by the shoulder and lifted my body up until I could stare into its glowing red eyes.

"Persistent little shit, aren't you?" The beast told me as its claws ripped out my belly, spilling blood all over its shirt.

In front of my eyes, the creature shifted, it's snout retreated while its claws turned into daggers until all that was left was a large man holding me by the throat and frowning.

With a roar of rage, the man drove his dagger under my neck once, twice, three times, then he smashed me against the ground and continued to stab me over and over and over…

I woke up with a scream, my face was covered in sweat and I was completely out of breath, for a few seconds, I searched aimlessly for my phone to see what time it was until I remembered just where I was and sighed.

At least I HAD woken up.

Looking around, I noticed I was resting on the floor of a tent. If I squinted my one good eye, I could see Rivira from the gap on my tent's opening. Letting myself relax once again, I dropped my head back on the pillow and wiped my face with the covers.

Taking stock of my situation, I saw that my wounded arm was in a cast. I no longer had a crossbow bolt sticking out of me and my wounded eye was properly bandaged, even better, my headache was gone and I felt… good. I was also incredibly hungry.

All in all, it was not perfect, my arm was still aching and my muscles were all protesting any movement I made, but I was well rested and not in immense pain, so it was a huge improvement.

When no one came to check on my scream I sighed, my gear laid beside me but there was nothing else on my tent and I desperately needed a little food.
I managed to push myself into a sitting position, then grabbed the pole in the middle of the tent and pulled myself back on my feet, I didn't even lose balance.

Stretching my back I briefly considered looking for a cane but decided I didn't need it and walked out of the tent on my own two feet. My first steps were careful and uncertain but I quickly gained confidence and was walking normally by the time I stepped outside.

It was still night at the 18 floor of the dungeon but some of the white crystals in the ceiling were already starting to shine down on the city, giving me a great view of the giant tree in the middle of the floor.

I was just starting to smile while staring when the desperate face of the man flashed into my mind, filled with fear and pain as I stabbed his neck with my dagger until there wasn't even blood anymore.

Falling to my knees I started dry heaving while trying to banish the image from my mind.

In my eyes I could see every drop of sweat on the man's face, every twitch of his flesh as my dagger cut it, the way the blood sprayed out from his veins, my sharingan had recorded it all and made absolutely sure I'd never be able to forget it.

I must have stood there for an entire minute before I was able to think straight, the panic and desperation of the memory finally left me and I started to really think about my actions at that time.

I had never killed a man, no I had never even thought I'd have to kill a man before coming here. It was both harder and easier than I had thought.

Harder in the sense that I didn't want to do it, my body itself had fought against the action pulling my blows, making them weaker than I knew was needed, slower too, until I was so desperate to survive that I acted on pure instinct.

It was also easier, my dagger punched through his skin with barely any resistance, humans were far more fragile than even the weakest of monsters, their blood flowed freely from any wound, pumped out by their own beating heart.

Regaining control of my body I spit to the side and wiped my mouth with my arm, slowly my breathing started to return to normal and I got up before spitting once more to get rid of the foul taste in my mouth.

I still felt a little guilty about the act but it had been a matter of life and death and, surprisingly, I knew I'd do it all over again if it was needed, I wasn't about to become a mass murder or something but, if pressed, I knew I wouldn't hesitate again.

I didn't know if that was a good thing or not, I had been raised religiously and, while I had distanced myself from any church after growing up and didn't exactly follow the bible, I had taken the 'thou shall not kill' part of it seriously.

"Hey, you're up" came Mord's voice from inside another tent, pushing my musings to the side I turned towards him.

Mord wasn't looking great, his shoulder was still wrapped in bandages and he looked white as a ghost but he was walking around normally and seemed to be in high spirits.

"Morning, you're looking happy" I grumbled while grabbing at the sling on my arm.

"Why wouldn't I be?" He said and patted me on the back with far less strength than usual "We survived newbie, not only that but we also made a killing, what more do you want from a delve?"

I suppose he was right, pinching the bridge of my nose I sighed "Alright what now?"

"Now we make our way to the medical tent, Zenobi said he wanted to see you again after you awoke" he said and turned me towards a small tent with a red cross in front of it "the kid's a hard worker so he should be awake already"

"What about you?" I asked, looking him over he didn't look all that well.

"Ahh, he already looked me over, turns out I'm fine but healing potions aren't the best at treating blood loss" Mord coughed into his hand "You on the other hand, you've been asleep for three days now, we were starting to get worried"

"What?" I asked dumbfounded at the same time as I felt my stomach grumble loudly "Shit, you think I can eat something first?"

"You know what, I'll leave you with the guy and grab some breakfast for us alright?" Mord smiled as he guided me towards the medic "I heard you saved me… thanks I owe you one"

"I didn't really think about it" I confessed embarrassed, I hadn't fought the Vouivre to save Mord, or at least not only to save Mord.

Even now I didn't understand why I had charged the monster like that but at least I knew being a hero was only a very small part of it, I barely knew Mord and, while I liked him, we weren't even friends yet, not really.

Pushing the tent flaps aside, Mord poked his head inside and shouted "Hey Zenobi, the newbie finally woke up!"

"It's Modaka, Mo. Da. Ka." A frustrated male voice said from inside the tent. "Get him inside them"

Being pushed inside the small tent I saw a short, young guy sitting behind a desk, his chest was mostly bare with only a strap over one shoulder holding his shorts up, he had huge bags under his eyes and seemed incredibly tired.

"Good luck, I'll find something for us to eat" Mord closed the flap and shouted, already walking away.

"So you're the medic?" I asked while lifting an eyebrow.

"Not really" Modaka sighed while scratching at his eyes with both hands "but I'm the closest thing to one down here, of course they made it my job"

Getting up from behind the desk the guy took out my bandages and looked inside my eyes before checking my arm.

"As I said I'm not really a healer but your companions wanted me to have a look at you anyway" He told me as he handed me a green potion to drink "you're gonna have to check with someone up there in Orario but you seem ok, I'd say you were just suffering from overusing your <mind>"

"I see" I drank the potion, a warm feeling filling my throat before both my muscles and my wounded arm stopped aching, scratching at an itch inside my cast. I frowned "why am I in a cast? Shouldn't potions have dealt with it."

"Sure, if you were willing to pay 120 thousand valis" he told me while sitting back down "it's cheaper to just put it in a cast and drink a common potion a day, should take about two weeks to completely heal"

It made sense, in the show any potion used had healed just about everything and yet, potion tiers were still mentioned, there were still elixirs worth millions and other medicines and treatments.

"Thanks Modaka" I said when it became clear the man couldn't do all that much, three days without eating had left me ravenous and I was eager to see if Mord had found some food.

"What did you just call me?" he asked, almost jumping out of his chair, his eyes shining like stars.

"Ah, Modaka?" I said while taking a few steps back, the guy looked like he wanted to jump me and I had no desire to feel his bare chest against me.

"Thank you! Thank you!" he buried his face against an arm and actually started crying "You don't know how much this means to me!"

"Riiiight, you sure you don't need to rest or something?" I suggested, the guy looked exhausted and was clearly having some kind of mental breakdown.

"No, no, I need to finish this paperwork for the monsterphilia but thanks for asking" I gave him a nod and hurried out of the tent to search for some food "ugh, why can't Farna-sama do those things, it's always me"

Back outside I didn't see Mord anywhere, my stomach was rumbling again so I started walking towards the city, walking through the camp I saw drawings of an elephant mask everywhere.

On the patch to Rivira was a clearing without any tents, instead there were dozens of steel cages filled with monsters and guarded by adventurers in similar gear to Modaka.

Looking at them I recognized a cage with four lizardmen and another with a mad beetle but there were also small green humanoids that were probably goblins, metal rabbits, harpies and even a huge cage with a giant green snake curled up inside it.

Passing the cages several of the guards gave me suspicious stares but I just nodded at them and moved on, too hungry to even watch the beasts.

I caught Mord just as he was leaving the Inn, he waved me over and I attacked the bag he was holding devouring everything without even looking while shoving him back inside, there was no way a single bag would be enough.

An hour and almost six hundred valis later I pushed my chair back finally satisfied, Scott and Guile had turned up for breakfast earlier and thanked me for the help with the Vouivre but had already left to pack up their things.

Apparently the Ganesha familia had killed the Goliath yesterday while I was still asleep and the party had managed to convince the familia to hire them for help leaving the dungeon.

Usually Ganesha's adventurers were more than enough for middle and upper floors but, with almost a hundred monsters being carried in cages, they needed all the help they could get and Mord's party were mostly competent even wounded as they were.

Good thing I woke up when I did or they'd have to pay for someone to carry me up.

"Damn just where did you put it all"

"Shut up, it's been three days alright I was hungry" I glared at him even as I tried to adjust my pants so they weren't so tight.

"Anyway that's about it, Dorlia is probably gonna want to meet with you before they depart but we should be back in Orario a little after midnight"

"Good, I think I need some time to rest and recover before I come back here" I told him, the dungeon was beautiful and all but I needed some time to deal with everything.

"Don't we all? At least you'll have you'll part of the lot" Mord grumbled angrily before draining the rest of his beer and slamming the mug down, frustrated he let his head bang against the table "Fucking asshole thieves"

"What do you mean?"

"Even with all three of our savings I don't think we have enough to fix Scott's arm" He confessed with a sigh while waving the bartender for another refill.

"Can't you guys reattach his arm somehow? I though that's why we were carrying that elf's legs with us"

"Well we managed to recover his arm but, with the Goliath still up and Rivira without supplies there wasn't any potion or healer strong enough down here and it's too late now" pushing himself back into a sitting position Mord scratched at his eyes "Getting something to restore the limb after so long would cost us more than we have ever made but we can probably get him a prosthetic if we take a loan"

"Shit" Looking at my immobilized arm I thought about my own missing fingers and grimaced. It seems I'm not getting those back anytime soon "What happened with those bastards anyway, did we get them all?"

"The elf got their leader and one of the snipers with her magic weapon and Scott managed to kill the other fighter but at least one of them escaped" he confessed "Ramilia was sure she had hit one more guy with her last thunderbolt but the weapon was already crumbling and we never found a body"

I closing my eyes I had to squeeze the edge of the table to keep my hand from trembling, one of the guys who tried to kill me was still alive, a thief and murderer with reason to take revenge on me was still out there.

"Goddamn poachers, with how many wounded we had we couldn't even risk bringing one of their bodies to find out from which familia they belonged to"

"There's nothing we can do?"

"Well if I recognize the guy in the street I'll certainly petition Ogma to deal with him but, those things happen in the dungeon" finally getting his refill he looked down at his beer for a second before giving a bitter smile "At least Freya, Ganesha and Loki manage to keep things mostly civil in the surface but down here? All that matters is strength"

I gritted my teeth in a sudden bout of impotent anger, it's not that I wanted everyone death for daring to attack me but, the fact that they could just attack someone without provocation and escape without repercussion left a bitter taste in my mouth.

"Don't worry about it newbie, get your share of the money, have some fun, life's too short to focus on every shitty thing that happens" pushing his chair back Mord grabbed his full mug and stretched his back "You know what, I'll even bring you to the entertainment district after you take off that cast, a level one fighting a Vouivre in melee range and surviving? The amazons are gonna love you there"

Can't really say I was against that, I wonder what kind of entertainment a fantasy world would have.

"Well, I have to finish packing my things, I'll meet you in two hours at the entrance to the 17 floor alright?"

I waved him away and finished my own beer, the good kind now that Rivira could resupply from Orario "Hey Villy, is my room still free?"

The cat eared innkeeper looked my way while cleaning a table and nodded "Yeah, with the Goliath down and one of the big familia's camping outside very few people stay here. Why, want to rent it again?"

"Not really but, can I use it for an hour or two?"

"You know what, sure" he told me and was about to continue with his work before he thought of something "but no funny business you hear me! No leaving suspicious stains all over my room, if I have to clean it after you left I'm blacklisting you"

Ugh, now I'm gonna keep imagining white stains everywhere.

Entering the room I found the mirror right where I had left it, closing the door I sat on the bed and lifted my shirt up, it was awkward with my cast but I eventually managed to expose my back and smear a drop of blood on it.

Roland Synclair – level 1

Strength – I - 72

Endurance – I - 98

Dexterity – I - 64

Agility – I - 58

Magic – H - 199

Skills:

- Chosen of an Outer God.

- Mangekyou Sharingan (Shisui).


I felt a warm sensation fill my body as my falna was updated, every attribute had a significant improvement and magic had almost tripled after using my eyes so much.

It wasn't really worth the loss of a kotoamatsukami but at least it took a little bit of the sting off.

With the increased attributes I felt even better, the soreness of my body was almost entirely gone and I felt strong despite having an arm out of commission, no wonder adventurers continued to risk their lives in the dungeon, the feeling of improvement was almost addicting.

Hiding my falna again I took a deep breath and just tried to relax, there was nothing trying to kill me right now, no danger I had to watch out for, no pressure.

I could almost feel the tension leaving my body but, before I knew it, the face of the man I killed flashed in my mind, as detailed as the moment I had killed him, I remembered every pore on his skin, every drop of…

Jumping out of the bed I shook my head and made myself busy creating illusions.

Thinking about my experiences it was clear that every illusion I had created took time and effort to make but it also got better, more detailed and realistic after each use.

I suppose the ninja in Naruto had generations to optimize their genjutsu, to make them as complicated as they could and realistic enough to even fool other ninja but I was starting from scratch.

It was the difference between doing complex calculations from scratch and having a known formula for it, the same result could be achieved but the first would take far more time and effort while being far more likely to make mistakes.

At least the sharingan helped me tremendously when casting visual illusions.

I started simple, the first illusion in my repertoire would be something I wouldn't even need to think about, I'd simply fill my enemy's vision with darkness, robbing them of sight.

Monsters could make do with other senses and adventurers would quickly realize something was wrong and break the illusion but it would earn me a few precious seconds of confusion until I could create a better illusion, probably more than enough to finish an opponent.

The second illusion served the same goal, I concentrated on the pain I had felt in my fights and made it into an illusion that would last a few seconds, if the Almiraj I had killed was any indication it would be very effective against monsters and I was sure any adventurer would at least flinch away.

Thinking about it, do monsters even feel pain like humans or was it just muted, every monster the party had fought on the 19 floor had continued fighting while ignoring any wound they received but the Almiraj had became almost incapacitated when I made it feel pain with an illusion, interesting.

Both illusions didn't really require much preparation or complexity but it was good to have then ready, to think about them as if they were skills I had access to instead of having to come up with solutions on the spot, I'd have to train until casting them became an instinctual response in a fight but, for now, they were good enough.

Then I started building my first complicated illusion, using everything I had seen I started making something able to fool even an experienced adventurer, slowly the image started to form in my mind.

The illusion would start very simple. I used the mirror to look at myself from every angle until I could replicate the look of my own body perfectly, I included everything I could think of, the sound, the smell, the wind, I put everything I could into a couple of seconds of action.

When cast my enemy wouldn't lose sight of me or anything, instead the illusion would start at the exact same spot as me and act exactly as I would, it would be capable of dodging a single attack before striking with an overhead blow with my sword.

My own body would be hidden from the targets sight so I could act freely while he dealt with my illusion, hopefully whatever I was fighting would try to block my overhead strike and open up its chest for a quick kill but I could also use the time to escape, buy myself some space or just keep an enemy occupied for a few seconds.

It took me a little over an hour to make the skill and keep it in my memory, not bad for something I was doing for the first time and, coupled with the mangekyou the illusion is good enough to fool even a level 3 adventurer for a few seconds.

At least I think it is, hopefully, I'd have to test it out.

I was also pretty sure I could use the experience I gained to create something similar in about half the time now.

Unwilling to risk missing the meeting I grabbed my things and left the inn with a wave towards Villy, it was finally time to enter Orario.

_______________________________________________

A/N : Thanks for my patrons : Xhaustedhero, AkumaSmaG, Iori Daemona Angel, AlliterativeArts (Eric Faust), Icewing, Comics, DERMONIAN, Davvy chappie, Banh Bao, Ian Michael, WanderingDaemon, Scott, Tony Martinez, Travis cox, Chaos, Rootbeerguy, High Priest of Torga, James Williams and Michael Neal for supporting my work!

If you like my work, take a look at my other novels or my patreon. You can support me for a single dollar.

 

[CmirDarthanna]

How depressingly low. It's no wonder the vast majority of individuals can't make it past level 1 even after spending the vast majority of their time grinding away.

 

[CapCaverna]

How depressingly low. It's no wonder the vast majority of individuals can't make it past level 1 even after spending the vast majority of their time grinding away.

Click to shrink...

Yeah, that's a complain I got from my fic, and I actually increased the amount of progression I initially planned for.

It's just... I hate that most writers have their MC's able to follow Bel's growth without any justification. I mean, come on, Ais was fighting terrifying monsters as a child and it still took her an entire year to become level 2, and she was the fastest ever recorded before Bel.

My MC doesn't have Bell's growth skill, it will take time for him to grow.

You know, in Danmachi there's two kinds of XP (they call it different, but we all know it's XP.) One increases your atributes and the other allows them to increase a level.

In my view, what happened was a great achievement and, if he had an attribute at D rank, it would be enough for him to rize in level, but it only gives so many atributes.

The vast, overwhelming majority of adventurers don't increase their levels. I'll have my MC grow faster than Ais, but he won't be a match for Bell, not in growth at least. Sorry if that annoys you.

 

[CmirDarthanna]

Yeah, that's a complain I got from my fic, and I actually increased the amount of progression I initially planned fo

Click to shrink...

I'm not complaining. The author of danmachi was supposed to show how difficult it was to level up and raise stats but realize it would make everyone into dead weights with how bullshit he made Bell and how quickly things were progressing.

 

[Altrium]

it seemed like an interesting premise, until you had a dude with literally 0 in stats fighting things on the 19th floor without instantly dying. none of his skills boost his body, a single swipe and he'd die, and he's not reacting to those.

that's so far into AU as to crack fic levels of "what?".

the goblins on the first floor regularly kill people who are actually fit, and know how to fight.

which, the mc doesn't. he has sharingan, he's not suddenly a ninja, he doesn't know how to dodge roll, he doesn't know how to block or parry. "i see them moving" doesn't instantly equal "i understand how I should move in response.". he's also, as you said, out of shape. the first chapter, and you completely shat all over the setting, and ruined any and all sense of balance, or progression. how is dungeon diving supposed to be difficult, if he can fight things on the 19th floor, a place most adventurers never reach, when he's an out of shape nerd with no skills or knowledge on anything about fighting, and is weak enough to die to a single goblin on the first floor.

sorry not sorry cause holy hell that is terrible.

 

[CapCaverna]

Wow, that's harsh.

In my defense, the creatures he fought are all still level one, and I consider that, the main reason people die is that they take on more than one creature at a time.

It's been my experience that, in a fight, the most decisive factors are Skill, the ability to see and react to your enemy's actions, the number of enemies you face and your willingness to actually hit something.

Of those, the number of enemies is the overwhelming decisive factor. Fighting two enemies isn't twice as hard as fightin one, It's ten times. I always thought of the goblins and kobolds on the first floors as weaker than normal humans, but they work in groups against mostly single adventurers, and that's why they get kills.

Yeah, my MC fought some monsters, but he only acted as support, and barely survived some of the centipedes, which are level one monsters whose main danger is their poison. At least in my interpretation. His skill grew exponentialy through his sharingan ability to copy fighting ability from watching movements, his eyes can follow their movements, even if his body can't react fast enough to win even a solo fight againt them, and they are bestial enemies, without skill.

The MC can't really fight things on the 19th level, not alone, but he can, for a short time, survive it, with some luck and adrenaline.

Still, pity you don't see it that way.