Inside the dungeon outside Chandola.
On the second floor.
"Woohoo!!" I screamed in joy, my breath coming in ragged gasps as I stood over the defeated body of the Chunky beast. The adrenaline still coursed through my veins, making me hyperactive and giddy.
"We did it, Systie!" I exclaimed, looking down at the trembling cat inside my shirt.
"Shut up, human. I am still processing what happened," Systie snarled back, its voice sharp but familiar. At this point, I was pretty much used to its quirky, moody nature. Normally, I wouldn't forgive that statement, but this time, I let it slide. After all, the cat did risk its life to distract the Chunky Rat when I was almost out of it. Even though the cat has a foul mouth, it does care about my well-being.
I smiled and pulled the cat out of my shirt. "My shirt isn't your resting place, you know!" I said while patting its tiny head, causing it to purr with satisfaction. "And thanks. I couldn't have defeated that chunky thing without your help."
Systie huffed. "That's not enough, human. You need to prostrate on all fours and sing the praise of my greatness. That's the least you could do after I saved your sorry ass from being squashed by a giant rat."
I sighed, shaking my head at its narcissistic attitude. "You know, a simple 'you're welcome' would suffice."
Ignoring my comment, the cat leapt onto my shoulder. "Let's move on. This place is giving me the creeps."
I chuckled at its antics and focused on the task at hand. A whole bunch of red and purple roses sprawled out in front of me, just waiting to be picked.
I activated my
After about 10 minutes of hard work, I managed to collect around 100 red roses and 20 purple ones. Together, that's 14,000 cents. Wahaha, I'm rich now.
With that task done, I delved deeper into the dungeon to see if I could find anything related to the mysterious organization that Terra-sama had talked about. After about 30 minutes of lurking around, I stumbled across a giant metallic door with strange engravings made of some unknown red liquid.
"What's that?" I asked the cat, pointing toward the red engravings. The furball finally jumped out of my shirt after seeing the engravings and studied them.
"It's a message written in an ancient language. Want me to read it aloud?" I nodded, and the cat processed the message:
P.S. This is a low-level dungeon, so you will be fine but don't enter dungeons alone. It's dangerous.> Huh? What's this all about? Did whoever created this dungeon expect someone to chase after him? What does 'I killed your dad' even mean? Who is this guy talking about? I am so confused. "Is that what's written there, or are you pulling my leg!?" "If you doubt me so much, then study that language yourself," the cat huffed, looking annoyed at my question. "Oh, by the way, that red substance used to write the message is actually blood." I immediately pulled my hand away from the door. "Which psychopath uses blood to write a message!?" "I don't know. He didn't include his biodata in the message," the cat taunted. Ignoring it, I looked at the door. It was locked, and it looked like a mechanical lock. I immediately took out a lock-picking pin. Why do I have it? Because I'm a thief, that's why. I hoped this was a normal lock and not a magical one. Fortunately, it wasn't a magic lock. After a bit of twirling around, I heard a *click* sound. Bingo! "See, being a thief has its perks," I gloated to the cat, which just huffed and entered the room while saying, "I will make sure to tell Terra-sama about this as one more of your evil deeds—" But then the cat suddenly stopped mid-sentence and jumped back, shrieking and clinging to my shirt like it had seen a ghost. It looked pretty terrified. Gulping, I peeked into the room. The room was pretty dark, but I could make out most of its structures. The whole room looked like it was made out of some kind of steel-like metal and looked quite big. What truly unsettled me were the many large tube-like structures filling the room. They were filled to the brim with a strange glowing green liquid. Looking closely, the tubes housed many rats, all of different sizes and with labels. Yes, this whole room was some kind of research facility used to conduct experiments on rats. The whole scene looked like it was pulled out of my worst nightmare. No wonder the cat was scared. The rats inside the tube had their eyes closed, but I could still see them show slight movements like twitching fingers. *Gulp* Let's hope they remain inside the tube until we escape from this place. I approached the nearest tube and looked at the label. Unlike the weird message on the door, I was able to read what was written. Inside the tube was a small, normal-sized forest rat, floating motionless in the green liquid. I moved to the next tube, my eyes widening as I read the label. The creature inside was a much larger, nearly two-meter-tall rat. I swallowed hard. The rat looked exactly like the one we encountered in the grasslands outside the city. Moving on, the next tube housed a Inside was a massive, nearly twelve-foot-tall rat. The label read: I gulped loudly, my eyes fixed on the monstrous creature. It was a terrifying sight, with brown fur, large sharp claws, and giant buck teeth. If I had so much trouble just defeating a normal Chunky Rat, then how would I deal with this mutated one if it ever woke up? The answer was a resounding NO. Unless I managed to level up my basic class, there was no way I could beat that thing. I needed to get out of here quickly. With that thought, I looked around to see if I missed anything and walked back toward the giant metal door. *********************** In the guild hall of Chandola It was one of those extremely annoying days for Jenny, the receptionist at the adventurer's guild. She was the unfortunate soul who had to do the night shift that day, and it always sucked to stay awake at night all alone. This wasn't the first time she did a night shift, but today was somehow much worse than any other day. As she was wobbling around, trying to control her sleep, a piece of paper fell atop her head, jolting her awake. She picked up the paper and unfolded it, her eyes widening as she read the two words written inside: Immediately, she grabbed a palm-sized blue bird-like crystal from her desk. Placing her hand on the crystal's head, she waited anxiously. After a few seconds, the crystal bird's eyes opened, projecting the image of a red-haired man in his mid-20s. His face was wrinkled, and he had dark circles under his dull black eyes. He almost looked like an overworked employee of the guild hall, but Jenny knew better. The person in front of her was someone who could topple the entire Chandola city without much effort. "What happened?" he asked, his voice cold, almost devoid of emotion. Jenny fidgeted under his gaze but quickly explained, "Um, I just received a notice from one of the spies in the city. The notice said, 'Red Alert.' What should I do?" The man thought for a moment, his expression unreadable. "Don't do anything," he finally said. "I will take care of this matter personally." With that, his image disappeared, and Jenny released a huge sigh of relief. She leaned back in her chair, her heart still racing. Whatever was happening, she just hoped to stay out of it.