While those events had been transpiring, Lucielle had killed several more rats and experimented more with her newly acquired power. To say she was happy and satisfied would be a massive understatement.
After killing her fifth rat the Hellfire in her hand had noticeably begun to change color. Whereas before it was a pure orangish flame there was now a hint of purple within the center of the fire ball she conjured. 'Is this a result of burning the monsters? Burning their sins?'
'Thank you Mithrial for the info.' The Hellfire she possesed now was definitely more powerful than the one she had started out with not too long ago and it hadn't even leveled up yet! Lucielle had been using her heightened hearing to scope out her surroundings so she didn't run into a full pack of rats. At her current level of strength she could at most deal with three of them before she would be overwhelmed by their numbers. She wasn't in any hurry to feel the cold embrace of Death once more so she chose her targets with care.
After she had killed her tenth rat she could feel a qualitative change in her hellfire skill as it had finally gained enough exp to level up to level 2. "Finally. It leveled up and I've gotten a much stronger weapon and shield. I wonder how it stacks up to that Stark kids ice magic?
Feeling that she had gathered enough strength for now, Lucielle began to backtrack to the entrance of the Gate before heading down the tunnel that the other two groups had entered. After almost an hour and half of stalking through the tunnels and roasting the occasional rat along the way, Lucielle had finally caught sight of the group of Slayers resting to recover their energy.
When Brian saw the ethereal beauty come out of the darkness of a nearby tunnel and begin to head towards them, a thin smile stretched across his face. 'Looks like she wasn't devoured alive after all. Guess she's as resourceful as she is pretty.'
"You find anything girlie?" Gat asked as he noticed her entering their midst while taking a drag on his cigarette while everyone else continued to rest.
Lucielle looked over the group before answering Gats question and couldn't help raising her eyebrow when she noticed that only one of the teenagers had perished so far. 'That's certainly lower than I was expecting. I expected at least three of them to have died by now.'
Looking over at Gat she answered his question as a frown spread across her face. "Yeah I found something out but you're not gonna like the answer Gat. The situations worse than we realized."
Hearing her words several of the teenagers as well as a few of the adults began to feel worried once again. Even the newbies could tell there was something wrong with this Gate. The monsters in this Gate were more savage and cunning than when compared to how they had been in the past.
"The monsters have been more cunning this time than they have been in the past." Gat exclaimed as he exhaled a cloud of smoke from his cigarette.
"You're right on that but it's not just them being more intelligent. They've also seemed to have started to communicate with one another over long distances as well." Lucielle wasn't too surprised that Gat had noticed the subtle change in the rats behavior as well. "So the boss berserk skill may have changed as well as his usual patterns."
Gat nodded but continued to stare at her. "There's more bad news isn't?" He asked as Lucielle hadn't told him anything that was too out of hand yet.
Nodding her head and sighing. "Yeah.. When I headed back to the starting point where the entrance portal was located I found it empty. I think you already know what that means Gat..."
"Fucking hell...." Gat swore as he snuffed out his cigarette out of frustration.
From the looks she was receiving from the remaining adults and teenagers only she and Gat knew what this meant, so the remaining members of the group looked at one another before looking at Lucielle and Gat for answers. The teenagers especially were getting rattled as Gat hadn't even been this upset earlier when Stark was throwing his temper tantrum. So things must be really fucked up if he was getting pissed now.
"So what's going on? Why is the fact the the entrance portal gone so important?" Chris asked as he looked between Lucielle and Gat.
Looking at the confused youngster Gat sighed before answering everyone's burning question. "Ten years ago, a story appeared in the newspaper of a group of Slayers entered a Rank E Gate and the monsters were stronger and more intelligent than they usually were. After half of their number was eliminated they decided to make their way back to the portal and wait for it to unseal itself but when they returned to the start it was gone. At that point they were utterly decimated with despair for a while before the father of one of the younger Slayers took up a leadership role to lead the rest of the team to finish the Gate. When they finally arrived at the Boss room they encountered a radically changed dungeon Boss. The creature had mutated into a new species and was several times stronger than it originally had been. The Boss was eventually beaten but by then there was only one survivor walking out of that Gate. Long story short we call this a Mutated Gate and the boss is always a grade higher than it originally was."
"how do you know so much about that incident?" Chris asked as his hands clenched tightly over each other as he felt he had already guessed the answer.
"It's because in that raid I lost my son and daughter as well as my best friend. in front of my eyes." The temperature in the vicinity had dropped significantly as Gat finished his tale and his fists were clenched tightly.
Taking a deep breath Gat shook his head. "Fortunately we are in a lower grade of Gate compared to back then so the Boss should only be at the E Grade at most. As long as we're smart and play our cards right we shouldn't have the same fate befall us."
This caused the group to relax slightly and calm down. Some were still shocked over Gats story while others were nervous about facing off against a mutated Boss monster. Lucielle nibbled idly on a nutrition bar as she watched the rest of the group continue to rest up and charge their energy level. 'Even if the Boss has mutated to a higher Grade my newly evolved Hellfire should be enough to tip the scales.'
After a few more minutes of rest, the party recovered their nerve and energy before deciding to move on. Gat was still the de facto leader of the group, even more so now that they knew his tale of surviving a mutated Gate before, while Lucielle acted as their forward scout, as she had the best trained senses out of the whole group despite being the weakest Slayer.
As the party progressed further into the dungeon they steadily came across greater groups of rats though with their superior numbers and improved coordination they were easily dealt with. As they battled through more and more groups of rats their cohesion and trust in one another increased as they began to use as little energy as possible to conserve it for the Boss fight.
Along the way Lucielle discovered that she earned little to no exp from the rats they slaughtered as group. 'Hmmm must be because I'm working in a group now so the exp is being split amongst everyone here. Guess if I wanna level I'm gonna have to venture off on my own more often.' She had level up prior to reuniting with the group but she hadn't used up any of her attribute points as she was saving them for when she really needed them.
However she knew that during the fight with the Boss she was going to have to use Hellfire to defend herself and kill the Boss that much sooner so she devised a plan for her to gather as much skill proficiency as possible before hand since she wouldn't gain any exp along the way.
"Instead of leaving the corpse behind us to give the other rats a trail to follow we should dispose of them." Lucielle said while looking at their most recent conquests.
"What do you know slut? Shut up and keep being a scout, since at least you're marginally more useful even without a power, instead." said Stark, who had decided to vent out his anger and frustrations out on Lucielle. Unfortunately for him Lucielle wasn't as passive anymore so she wouldn't take his insults idly anymore.
"I'm useless am I? So what does that make you, the one who let his teammate get dragged off and eaten, then?" Lucielle asked with a sneer on her beautiful face as she raised an eyebrow.
"S-shut up! You don't know anything about that!" Starks face was flushed red as his anger began to build up once again as he curled his fists into balls. Though his next words were typical for an upset bully. "At least I'm awakened fully unlike you who's powerless without us!"
"Powerless without you? I think not. I'm pretty sure we'd all get along fine without you and all those ice boulders you love to miss so much with." Lucielle laughed loudly but there was no mirth in that laugh and her amethyst eyes glared at Stark as the air around them began to frost over. "Maybe if you had at least hit the rats properly they'd die off faster or you could have done what everyone else had done and saved your energy for the final Boss but no you wanted to show off once again how amazing your power is!" Lucielle shook her head with disappointment as she began to turn away towards the rest of the group. Stark finally snapped and shouted out as he flung an ice boulder at Lucielle. "Fucking die slut!"
Gat had started to move as he saw the boulder forming but he was too slow as it was abruptly racing towards Lucielle but she simply snorted and raised a hand towards the boulder then a resounding explosion rang out in their vicinity.