Stinks
The room was filled with a very stinky odor.
As he opened the door, Waldo spontaneously covered his nose. Even Arthur, who was used to the stench, couldn't stand the smell.
Inside the room, tons of goblin corpses sprawl on the ground. A black-haired boy stood in front of a woman wearing torn chainmail armor who huddled behind him.
That boy was Allen, and the woman behind him was Lavinia.
After Waldo opened the door, Lavinia immediately hugged Waldo's legs. She looked very tired and miserable. Waldo, seeing how tattered and ripped Lavinia's clothes were and a slew of goblin corpses on the floor, assumed the goblins had almost raped her.
"Lady, may I know your name?" asked Waldo
Arthur gave Lavinia a blanket and hot water. Lavinia then wrapped herself in that blanket.
"La-Lavinia…" she said.
Hearing that name, the soldier suddenly yelled.
"LA-LADY LAVINIA?!"
The other soldiers were also shocked.
"A palladium-ranked explorer, Lavinia?!"
"What?! She is still alive?!"
"If I'm not mistaken, her entire party has been missing for the past three months,"
When Waldo saw Allen, he assumed he was one of the abducted explorers because he was with Lavinia. But he appeared too young to be an explorer because you must be at least 15 years old after the maturity ceremony to become a dungeon explorer.
"We're sorry, we'd love to get you out of here quickly, but we can't. Mr. Mathius ordered us that no matter what happened, we had to walk straight to the end of the first floor and meet the main force. Because this dungeon's passage always changes, we need a specialist to come back. Don't worry; we will accompany you very well." Explained Waldo.
The soldier continued walking. Since Lavinia was unable to walk, Arthur offered to carry her on his back.
"I...I'm sorry, and thank you," after Lavinia said that, she immediately fell asleep on Arthur's back.
After a few walks, Arthur looked at Allen, who was walking in front of him.
'How can such a small child be inside the dungeon? Is he one of the explorers brought by Miss Lavinia's party?' he thought.
Waldo had previously asked Allen about it, but Allen didn't answer anything. He was just silent.
Actually, Allen was only nervous, his stomach hurt, and his mouth felt hard to open, exactly like the first time he saw Lavinia..
'Oh no, I've been ignoring that guy, even though he's talking to me,' thought Allen.
Arthur quickened his pace. He was now walking right beside Allen. Waldo told Arthur to talk to Allen because he thought that Allen might not want to talk to him because they were so different in age.
"Hey, what's your name?" Arthur tried to hide his nervousness.
"A-allen," Allen answered.
Hearing that name, Arthur suddenly said
"Allen? Allen the Exterminator? The hero of the war 1000 years ago?"
Allen frowned, he didn't understand what Arthur was talking about—not the language, but the meaning of his words.
"Don't you know? It's a famous story in our area, a hero who eradicated many monsters instantly. His body is small, and his body is agile. Come to think of it, he had red eyes, too, like you."
Allen was interested in the story. He wanted to hear more about it. He liked the word "hero" that Arthur used.
"Would you—" Allen bit his tongue.
He wanted Arthur to tell him more about the hero, but he had already lost momentum, and now he was embarrassed to start the conversation again.
Arthur realized it. Allen might be just a clumsy little boy.
"My name is Arthur, by the way," said Arthur.
Allen smiled; he was glad Arthur continued talking. Allen then reached out his hand to Arthur.
"You want to shake hands? But sorry, I can't use my hand right now," said Arthur while giving an eye signal about Lavinia.
Allen lowered his hand again, and looked at Lavinia, who had fallen asleep on Arthur's back. He recalled what Lavinia had said to him in that room. It makes Allen gloomy again. He hoped Lavinia could forget everything after she woke up later.
After an hour of walking, they finally reached the end of the hallway; there was no other way but through the big 2-meter-high door in front of them.
Waldo asked five people to push it together.
The door opened
It was a big chamber, and inside there was a herd of monsters….
"ORC!"
About thirty orcs that were 2 meters in size sat on the floor. When the soldiers started to open the door, the orcs immediately stood up and immediately attacked them.
"WUGHAAA!!! LIKK... QUMAN!!!" yelled the orcs.
"EVERYONE, GET READY!"
No one was prepared at that time. They had been caught off guard since they had not encountered any monsters along the way.
"AAAAAAH!!!"
"ORC!!!
"LOTS OF ORCS!!!"
They fell before they could do anything, frightened, and their legs wouldn't move.
Arthur immediately leaned Lavinia's body on the wall. But before he could take off his sword, one of the orcs was behind him.
'This is bad,' thought Arthur.
Then suddenly, the orc that tried to attack him fell.
"Huh?"
There was a sword embedded quite deeply in the orc's neck. Purple blood flowed out of the orc's neck. Someone pulled out the sword from the orc's neck, it was Allen.
"It's already broken," he said while holding the sword.
"Allen?!" Allen stood in front of Arthur while checking his broken weapon. Allen then picked up one of the fallen soldier's swords and quickly slashed the necks of the approaching orcs one by one.
'That kid is so strong!' thought Arthur, amazed.
As more and more orcs came, Waldo told everyone to gather in front of the entrance because Allen couldn't kill all of them by himself. Waldo and Arthur, the two of them, formed a unit to attack the Orcs that managed to get past Allen.
"Arthur, somehow now I'm really not afraid of anything; it's all thanks to you," Waldo said while vigorously swinging his sword at the orc.
"Haha, don't say that, milord. It's probably all because of Allen. We can calmly fight the weak because he can handle many orcs simultaneously."
"Maybe… but if you weren't around, I'd probably stay scared and just watch these orcs attack us."
Waldo split the orc's flesh with a smile. He was no longer terrified of anything. Everything would be fine if he were with someone he trusted.
That's right. Everything will be fine-
*BRUG
A large mace flew past Waldo. The mace hit someone beside him; that someone was Arthur.
"A-a-arthur?"
Because of the mace, Arthur's body was thrown backward.
"ARTHUR!" Waldo immediately panicked, leaving his position. He ran straight to where Arthur was thrown.
Arthur's right shoulder was bleeding heavily, and a lot of blood was coming out of it. Arthur held his sore shoulder while trying not to faint. Moreover, his leg was slightly sprained because he was thrown backward.
"AaaaaAAaaaa..." Waldo, who saw the blood oozing out of Arthur's shoulder, felt weak, so he covered the blood that was oozing out with his hand.
"Arthur, how is this? What... what should I do?"
Arthur did not answer. He tried his best to endure the pain in his shoulder.
"Hey, please, tell me what to do!"
"ARTHUR!"
"HEY ARTHUR!"
Two orcs came through the door. Barkaley's soldiers stood up and held the orcs back as much as they could, but the commoners could only stand still, and some even ran away.
"AAAA!!! I CAN'T DO IT ANYMORE!!!" shouted one of the soldiers. He ran back.
"HEY, IF YOU GO BACK, YOU WON'T BE ABLE TO COME BACK!"
As soon as the soldier said that, the hallway shifted, being replaced by another hallway, and the soldier who ran earlier disappeared somewhere. Waldo no longer cared about the person who ran away. He was only focused on the wounded Arthur.
"Arthur!"
"Calm down, sir, I'm fine, I'm still alive." Arthur's voice was hoarse. He said it while feeling the pain in his shoulder.
"Arthur, what should I do?"
"Why are you becoming weak again? Calm down. If you calm down, I won't die. Please do first aid."
Waldo took a deep breath. Gingerly, he picked up the soldier's bag that carried the medical kit.
Allen, who saw Arthur's condition, realized that he had to finish off all the monsters faster.
Allen jumped onto the wall and used the wall as a foothold.
Allen quickly bounced from the wall to the floor and then to the wall again, and in every bounce, Allen targeted the orc's neck. One by one, the orcs fell.
In just five minutes, all the orcs were eliminated by Allen alone. Now Allen stood on top of the orc corpses, pulling out his sword stuck in the orc's neck, then splashing the blood on his sword.
"Allen is so strong. You really look like Allen the Exterminator, the hero of a thousand years ago," Arthur said admiringly.
Allen immediately looked at Arthur. Allen thought that Arthur had already fainted before, he was really worried about him. Arthur's neck, shoulders, and chest were covered with bandages. His head was also covered with a little bandage. He was walking with a spear because his leg hurt.
Allen ran over to Arthur.
"Aa…are you okay?" Allen inquired, nervously.
"I'm fine; thanks to Mr. Waldo for treating me, and thanks to Allen for taking out all the orcs." Arthur stroked Allen's head gently. Allen smiled embarrassedly. He felt very happy to be praised by Arthur.
Waldo then also approached Allen and praised him.
"That's right. You're probably as strong as a palladium-ranked dungeon explorer, or maybe even stronger."
"Of course, he entered the dungeon together with palladium-ranked dungeon explorer Lavinia! He must be on the same level as them!"
'No, I'm not the one who went in with her,' Allen thought. There was no way he would say that now. He didn't want others to know that he was a child raised in a dungeon, let alone tell them he was raised by monsters. If these people knew, they would probably hate him. The human hatred for monsters was so deep, he could see it in how Lavinia hated his mother.
'I'm always amazed by people younger than me. First Arthur, then this kid. Even this small child is already this strong, both physically and mentally. Whereas these soldiers behind me...' Waldo looked at the soldiers lined up at the back, doing nothing during the battle with the orcs.
Seeing Waldo's gaze, the soldiers averted their eyes.
"You should be ashamed..." Waldo said to them in a loud voice.
"But I wouldn't blame you; I'm scared too. If I were in your position, I wouldn't have been able to move either. We'd probably all be dead if these two weren't here."
The soldier, who had turned his face away, now looked at Waldo.
"I FORGIVE YOU ALL. Let's take what happened here as a lesson. In the future, we will all work together. It's not just you who are afraid. Everyone is afraid. Like Arthur and me, let's fight our fears together this time. If you don't want to go forward, it's okay, stay behind, don't be afraid of my punishment when we return, be afraid of monsters only."
Waldo raised his sword high, then shouted excitedly.
"LET'S FINISH THIS RAID AND GO HOME!"
The soldiers who heard this had hope, they all thought
"If we're with this guy, we'll be fine," they cheered, raising their swords.
"BARKALEY! BARKALEY! BARKALEY! BARKALEY! BARKALEY!"
Now they confidently continued on their way, heading towards the main force.
Allen, who also smiled and was happy with that situation, did not realize this raid was what made his life scattered.
As they reached the end of the passage, the chamber where Leofric's party fight.
Allen witnessed Leofric stab Queen Orc's body in front of him.
"MOTHEEEEEER!!!!"