What Amos expected to see was a dungeon entrance. They usually just looked like a large doorway that led to large stairs going down into the dungeon. But what he actually saw was a large stone fort.
At first, he was unsure if he was in the right place or not. It was only when he saw the sign above the entrance to the fort that he realized he was in the right place.
"Capital Dungeon" is what the sign read.
'Guess I'm in the right place. But how do I get in?' Amos thought
Amos walked closer. The fort was simple in design. It was in the shape of a square with high walls.
The entrance was a gate. currently, it was open. Amos walked in. It was like a mini tunnel, and at the end of the tunnel was another gate. But this one was closed. Amos looked around him.
'Is this some kind of kill room? Like if a dungeon break happens. A monster enters, and then both gates close, the monster is probably pelted by arrows and magic.'
He looked around the tunnel. There were slits in the wall where people could shoot out from. Plus there was an opening in the roof. What they used that for, Amos had no idea.
Finally, Amos heard a noise. A slit slid open. A pair of eyes looked at Amos from the slit.
"Sorry that I took a while, but most enter in the morning, and right now it's noon. Are you new or something?" The man asked.
"Yeah I just got to the city recently," Amos answered.
"Alright well, all I need is your adventurer card."
Amos pulled out his card and placed it into the slit. The man grabbed it and began to check it. Amos could hear the sound of him sucking on something. Then a small puff of smoke came out from the slit.
"So what's with the fort? I've seen dungeons before, but never with a fortress surrounding it." Amos asked to kill time.
"Well, you know what dungeon breaks are right."
"Yeah, it's when no one enters a dungeon in a long time so the dungeon master or whatever sends a bunch of monsters out of the dungeon. But that's what I'm saying. There are probably tons of people that enter this dungeon every day. So there's basically no chance of a dungeon break."
"You are right about that. But I guess no chance is still too high for the royals and nobles. Not that I'm complaining though. Because of this useless fort, I have a sweet job. Anyway here's your card back. You are good to go in. Oh yeah, I almost forgot. You can pay 4 silver for a little booklet that tells you a lot about this dungeon and all dungeons in general."
A puff of smoke came out from the slit as well as Amos card. Amos took his card back from the slit while fanning the smoke out of his face. He then thought about the booklet. He would normally immediately say no. But 4 Silvers wasn't that much money to learn about the dungeon so he bought it. He dropped 4 silvers into the slit. Then a booklet came out. As soon as it did Amos heard a lever being pulled. Then the gate blocking him began to rise.
"Don't die." Was the man's goodbye. Then the slit closed.
Amos walked forward. Finally, before him was the entrance to the dungeon. The entrance itself was a flashy door. On the frame of the door was a stone carving of monsters and humans fighting each other.
Amos walked up to the door. As soon as his finger touched the door it began to creak open.
Beyond the door were stairs going down. The whole tunnel was made out of smooth gray stone.
Amos took a step forward. It was his first time ever being in a dungeon. Although he heard lots about them and seen them from a distance, he never entered one himself.
As he slowly descended the stairs he began to read from the booklet. He already knew the basics so he skipped past the first page. He stopped and read when he got to a section named "What are Dungeons?"
He began to read "Only recently have Dungeon delvers discovered what dungeons truly are. The truth is that dungeons are also monsters. They look like insectoid embryos and are buried deep within the dungeons. They are dungeon masters. The dungeon is like an extension of their body that it can control at will. They create monsters and treasures to lure in people. Once those people die within the dungeon it absorbs their bodies, drawing energy from it."
Amos was amazed reading that. He always wondered what dungeons were. He had always known vaguely that some sort of creature named a dungeon master controlled them, but he never knew what they were.
Amos continued to read with newfound interest. He also learned it was illegal to kill a dungeon master.
'Never thought I'd see the day when it would be illegal to kill a monster.' He joked to himself.
Unfortunately, that was all that was written about dungeon masters. The rest of the booklet was about the layout of dungeons and the leveling systems for animals.
Animals went as such: level 1-25 is just regular animals, 25-50 is empowered beasts, 50-75 magical beasts, 75-100 mythic beasts, 100-125 legendary beasts, and last but not least 125-150 godly beasts.
Although the only godly beasts to ever exist could be counted on one hand and most of them were seclusive or generally stayed away from humans.
He read through the rest of the booklet quickly. It was less interesting than the dungeon master part, but more helpful to him now that he was a dungeon delver.
To summarize, it said dungeons were separated into floors. Each floor was enormous and had its own style. Some styles were forest, cave, maze, and city just to name a few. But each floor had a designated level range. The ranges were level 25-50, 50-75, and if it was a big dungeon 75-100. The capital dungeon was a large dungeon so it had all 3 floors.
Just as Amos finished reading the booklet he could see the end of the stairs. Light crept in from the bottom.
Amos quickened his pace until he reached the bottom. Looking out from the stairs a jungle lay before him. The overabundance of trees and shrubbery made it hard to see far into it. The trees reached high with vines hanging from them.
Above the forest was a crystal ceiling. The crystals shined a light blue providing light to the whole floor.
Amos took a step forward while being mesmerized. Only once he got a long view did he look around him. To the side was a party of adventurers taking a break on some rocks and eating their lunch.
The reason why people formed parties was so they could fight monsters above their levels. For example, 5 people who are level 50 could fight evenly with a level 60 magical beast. The exp would be split and the parts evenly distributed. Some people thought forming parties was more effective for leveling up. Additionally, by grouping together they could complete max-level increase tests that they could not do by themselves.
He also noticed a man wearing some kind of contraption on the ceiling. He was scraping some of the crystals off into a bucket.
Once Amos got over the awe of it all, he got to business. He was currently on the first floor. The monsters here could only be in the range of level 25 to 50. So he needed to reach the next floor which was 50 to 75. This would be his hunting ground from now on.
Amos marched his way into the jungle. Within he could hear birds chirping and distant fights. It was hard to traverse with the excess vegetation.
Amos pulled out his sword. He used it like a machete to hack through the vines.
As Amos walked he spotted numerous empowered beasts. With his high perception, he could even spot some of them trying to hide.
Most empowered beasts would avoid him as they could sense his strength.
As Amos hacked through another vine an empowered beast saw him. It pounced out from the vegetation. Amos easily dodged to the side as he was much faster than the beast.
The monster was level 42. It was an enormous orange tiger. If Amos measured it then he would be able to see that it was about 6 meters long(20 feet). But to Amos, the tiger was barely a threat. The tiger got into a stance and circled Amos while growling.
"Don't do it," Amos said.
Amos would gain barely any experience from killing it and it wasn't worth taking the parts, so he would just have to leave the body. He was hoping instead that it would just run away and save him the trouble. But the beast didn't give him much of a choice.
The tiger pounced again. This time Amos jumped on top of the tiger and stabbed his blade into the back of its head.
[Critical hit]
The tiger wabbled about for a few seconds before collapsing.
[ slain - Great Tiger - lvl 42 ]
[ 674 exp ]
Amos sighed. His level was so high that 674 exp was barely a drop in the bucket. Not to mention that normally the tiger would be worth a decent amount of experience, but due to him being at the level he was, it got a large reduction.
But Amos just shrugged and continued. Amos looked back at the booklet. At the very back of it was a complimentary map of the first floor. And judging from where he was it was only a little further until the stairway to the next floor.
Amos cut through the final vines. They fell to reveal a large door. It was the same as the one he used to enter the dungeon. Amos walked up to it and opened it. He then walked down the stairs again. It took him about 30 minutes to reach the bottom, and when he got there he saw multiple branching paths.
This floor was in the style of a labyrinth. The monsters here were magical beasts that ranged from level 50 to 75. They had a serious chance of injuring or even killing Amos.
Amos took in his surroundings. Since Amos had a high intelligence and perception he would just be able to remember his way around as long as he paid attention.
As he was about to go forward he sensed something approaching. He stopped and waited.
A group of adventurers then came around the corner. There were 6 of them in total and some of them were covered in blood. Their levels were all around level 65. It seemed as though they were ending their day and heading back up.
When they noticed Amos they all tensed up. It was quite common for adventurers to fight and kill each other over loot in the dungeon. But once the group noticed that Amos was all by himself they all relaxed.
Amos and the group passed each other without any issues. But just as the party went through the door one of them turned around and said "You should be careful if you are by yourself. We saw a high-level Praetorian Golem around the maze today."
The person then waved goodbye. Amos sighed.
'Great. Going by my luck now I'm definitely going to run into it. Oh well, I didn't come in here to pick daisies.'
Amos then entered the maze while keeping track of the path he took. And as if it were a self-fulfilling prophecy Amos found the golem they were talking about. Thankfully Amos found it and not the other way around. Now Amos was stalking it, deciding whether or not to go for it.
[ 4 armed Praetorian Golem - lvl 72 ]