Leon's journey to Xert was as uneventful as it could be. Since Xert was in a huge no monster zone, Leon couldn't even slay monsters for extra coins nor get experience to level up.
However, Leon saw some villagers from the village Xert, and some of them looked at Leon in awe. This was quite unfamiliar for Leon as adventurers were quite normal in this world. It was everyone's dream to become one as they hear stories of powerful adventurers strong enough to defeat a whole army with a swing of a blade, however, the reality is often disappointing.
Most people who try to become adventurers were like Leon and incredibly weak with little potential as they either are in poor circumstances like lack of money for better equipment to level up or have basic classes, which made it harder to become stronger.
These types of people would often give up and choose another job to pursue like being a merchant, farmer, blacksmith, government official, etc. Those who stay like Leon often never made any progress or died in an attempt to risk their lives for a chance to become stronger. Even adventurers with great talent and backing died as the world of adventuring was the ultimate gamble, where even the strongest could die suddenly if they weren't careful.
Even faced with such a risk, Leon had never truly thought of doing something else, as adventuring was something so natural to him it felt like he was born for the job. Although he wanted to follow in his parent's footsteps as great adventurers, something about the idea of adventuring made Leon's blood boil and his heart grow fiery as well.
As Leon was about to approach Xert, he checked his stats.
Level: 3
HP: 35/35
Experience: 21/35
Title: Beginner Adventurer
Class: Rogue
Mana: 8/8
Vitality: 12
Strength: 7
Intelligence: 9
Agility: 21
Luck:12
Blessing: None
Stat Sheet: Show
Skills: BackStab, Dash, Stealth
Passive: Dagger Knowledge
Leon slouched in his horse and whined to the trees surrounding him
"Damn it. *sigh* My stats are almost the exact same as the last time I saw Dan and Max. Tch, they're gonna tease me about this. The only thing that increased was my agility. Better hide the stats so I don't die of embarrassment."
+Stat Sheet: Hidden to All
As soon as he hid it, Leon could see a small village sign that said 'Xert'. He sped up his walking speed to a run, as he was excited to finally see his friends after a month. Just as he entered the village, his friends were already waiting for him.
Dan was the first one to talk.
"Leooooon, how's it going? Hey, hey did I tell you that I am finally level 7."
Leon's eyes widened.
"Really? Damn Dan, you've really been putting in work."
Max stepped in front of Dan and pointed to himself.
"Don't forget me. I'm almost level 7 as well. 10 exp and I am catching you, Dan. What about you Leon?"
Leon tried to hide the pain in his face as he was shrugging and smiling, however, in his heart, he was wincing in pain as his friends were moving on without him.
"Who knows? It's a mystery. *wink Some things are best left unsaid."
Dan and Max didn't pressure him any further sensing his sadness. They left to join the group outside the giant door engraved in the mountain. The group assembled from various guilds was made up of veteran adventurers. Leon saw a total of five different people besides himself and his friends. The five were made up of four E Tier adventurers and one D Tier Adventurer, whom Leon recognized as the nasty, backstabbing Jacob.
As Leon and his friends walked to the group, Jacob, who was the person in the center of the group, saw them and sneered.
"Well look who else took the job, the three idiots. Tch, your lucky your parents were friends with the guild master, Leon. With your worthless value, you couldn't have made it into a regular guild let alone The Chosen. Anyways since I am the highest Tier here, it should be natural, that I am the party leader."
Leon looked like he wanted to object, but Max stopped him. The group proceeded to approach the giant door. The door itself was a sight to behold. It was made of Steel, which was unusual as steel was not the normal material for buildings in Partha. However what Leon took notice of was not the material, but rather the intricate carvings etched into the door. While the door was so old that the carvings were hard to see, Leon did make out one thing. He saw Mt. Olympus with all twelve major Greek gods fighting. Leon wondered what this place really was, but Jacob was not as interested and walked straight past the door.
Inside the place, Leon could tell this was at least a monument of some sort. After walking around for a while, Leon noticed how there were many dead ends that reminded him of a labyrinth or maze, which Jacob noticed and ordered one of the E-tier adventurers to draw a map of where they went.
After aimlessly walking around, they found a way out of the maze and were met with a giant long hallway made of moldy cobblestone. The hallway had no light source, so the groups' measly torch barely illuminated the surrounding past 6 feet.
While Jacob was not the greatest example of how kind humanity could be, he took his job as a leader seriously and turned around to face his group.
"Alright guys, we can do two things. One, we go back out and ask the Guild to scout, whether this place is safe or not. Two if the group wants to, we can go explore this place ourselves. "
Everyone but Leon and his friends agreed to continue to explore the monument. Leon was a bit hesitant but saw no reason to not go and they raised their hands as well.
As they continued down the giant hallway, they saw another giant door that had many giant metal bars welded to the wall to make sure no one ever entered. Thankfully, the bars had been so old that they were brittle and weak, even though they were afoot in thickness. Jacob and another E-tier adventurer were both Barbarian classes and both wielded hammers. With their incredible strength as Barbarians, they slowly chipped away at each bar. As soon as every bar was broken off, the door opened itself leading into a giant room, which had weird etchings of four animals barely visible in the distance. The party moved into the room and knew they made a mistake as soon as they could see the end of the room clearly. Because what lay at the end of that room behind bars taller than the eyes could see was something that silenced words. The only word that came to Leon's mind was Death.
For behind those bars, a huge figure with a body of a man, dozens of wings, and hundreds of snakes for hands lay imprisoned.
The fear of everything made Leon feel like he was suffocating from the fear. Leon's mind could only scream one thing and unintentionally he relayed it out loud.
"Run."
But before they could make it 5 steps towards the exit, the huge door creaked shut and the carvings of animals came alive leaving the party trapped with four pairs of eyes staring at them from the darkness.