The fish definitely tasted completely unique, so there was no way to explain the taste. However, Max didn't hate it.
"I was thinking of exploring that today after resting for a few days. I think I'm completely ready."
The player nodded.
"First, I will teach you how to enhance your defense, without changing the amount of aura in your body."
"You concentrate more of on one part and less than others, right? I know that."
"Oh, then the flying aura stab..."
"I know that too."
"What about enhancing your vision and seeing aura?"
"I know it."
"Alright. Your aura is not strong enough for other stuff and I can't teach you the sixth sense because it will take too long. You will stay behind me and support me."
"Okay."
The duo dived into the water and swam to the other side.
They stepped out of the river and approached the dark passage.
As the two went through the entrance, Max received a message.
[You are the first player to discover the secret dungeon: The Hero King's Grave!]
[You have received 10000 EXP!]
[You have leveled up!]
It's good that Max was behind the NPC so he couldn't see his expression.
"By the way kid I never asked for your name."
"It's Max Veritas."
"It's very unique."
"I hear that a lot."
It was dark, so Max activated the small but very bright, light producing rock attached to his waist with his aura. He explored a few dark places before.
The man also had such an item. In facts it was quite common and cheap.
It was eerily quiet. No monsters. They kept walking.
"Left!" The man called out. I turned and prepared myself.
A dark colored snake-like monster blew through the wall and lunged at the man with its circular mouth and row of razor sharp teeth. He cut it in half with his beautiful, white sword and golden aura. The monster stopped moving, just like how a human would if their spine was severed.
"I'm sure more will appear, you take the right side!
The two men kept moving in the long, straight passage.
Very soon, Max was attacked. His reflexes were pretty fast and his agility was high and so he managed to cut them before they touched him. They were fast though, but he was enhanced with aura and the tunnel was quite wide so he was able to create some much needed space between himself and the deadly wall.
The duo kept moving and the frequency at which they appeared kept increasing slowly. Max gained EXP each kill. 400 to be specific.
One of them managed to reach his side. It started sucking in his armor easily. Max realized that his flesh would disappear instantly if he got touched by their circular mouths. He severed it quickly and it lost its bite strength instantly.
His armor was significantly damaged.
They kept getting attacked and it was becoming overwhelming.
"Let's try running!" The player yelled.
"Go!" The man responded. They started sprinting while looking at the walls.
It barely helped. The monsters still attacked them strongly. Max's armor was destroyed and weakened in several places. His flesh was mostly fine. However, if he got hit in the weak spots in the armor, he would suffer a fatal injury. His flesh would be sucked in like water.
Max defended himself while running and once he truly knew that he wouldn't be able to handle this any longer, he activated Phase.
It got so bad that one would would pop out every second. Max couldn't keep up and used one of his strongest abilities to simply evade them.
The man was doing fine still, probably. The player couldn't see his expression because he was very fast.
His combination of his sixth sense and stats higher than Max's by a lot was enough to not need a system assisted super ability.
"Just keep running!"
Max didn't have to worry about the monsters for 10 seconds.
The player kept running and automatically evading with the system's help and the NPC kept defending himself.
Five seconds remained.
He saw a light.
"JUST A BIT MORE!" Max screamed.
Three seconds.
...
One second.
And his ability ran out.
Max was a few meters away from the source of the light and so he dived forward, pushing himself with legs that he concentrated a lot of aura into.
And he spun in a circle with his sword. Slashing off the attackers and rotating in the air. He flew forward five meters and got out of the dirt tunnel.
The man also did the same thing Max did because it was getting too overwhelming, even for him.
Except he flew faster in the air, and landed much farther into the new dungeon section.
They were in a cave expanse, with rock surrounding them.
The snakes could no longer touch them.
They were similar to the snakes that extended from the flower monster to pierce Max. They were simply there to pierce.
"Are you alright?" The man asked Max.
"Yeah, my armor is very damaged, but I am barely bleeding."
"I expected you to die, kid. You're good. You have the skills. You just somewhat lack the power."
He doesn't know about Phase.
The man had his dark armor damaged in several places. It seems the monsters managed to just barely touch him a few times before he sliced them. It was enough to cause some bleeding though which needed to be treated. He wasn't invincible.
The duo checked the small cave expanse and didn't find a threat. There were only more tunnels.
Max took a couple of potions from his inventory and gave the man one to drink and one to pour over his wounds.
Max wrapped bandages around his wounds. The two rested for a while. There didn't seem to be any restrictions on resting. They decided to set up camp here, to recover their health and aura.
He drank some water from a pond that was glowing from crystals in it. There were no fish here.
Since there didn't seem to be any danger here, Max and the mysterious NPC decided to rest.