Leather armor consisting of a top, pants, and shoes. A rusty sword that wasn't useful and a shield... Yeah, it wasn't great at all.
"Why the heck is the only decent item here this leather armor set? Everything else is junk." In the entire chest, the most valuable thing wasn't its contents but the golden chest itself.
If he could store it, he would have taken the chest. But with no place to go and the impracticality of carrying a gold chest while traveling, it didn't seem like a good idea.
"Now, let's continue the skeleton hunt." With a massive amount of mana in his body, his confidence skyrocketed.
"Focus…" He tried to create a barrier for defense, but it wasn't going well.
Controlling mana inside the body was already difficult, and controlling it outside was like trying to catch a fish with rubber gloves on.
It slipped every time.
Forming a barrier meant converting mana into something strong and glass-like that could cover his body.
But it was simply too difficult.
"I should learn magic from the natives of this world. Is their method better?" He knew that in some stories, magic could be cast using patterns, chants, or skills.
But what did this world use? He wished to explore, but that wouldn't happen in this dungeon.
"I need to leave the dungeon." He looked around for a way out.
_______
"Shoot!" Fireballs were the easiest to cast, but they had a cost.
The force of the explosion shattered the skeletons.
He absorbed the black energy and walked in a straight line.
The tunnel seemed to stretch on forever. He had been walking for 30 minutes, but all he encountered were small rooms like the one he had woken up in, each empty.
He had dealt with hundreds of skeletons. By now, he could effortlessly cast Fireball and Healing Magic—both necessary if he didn't want to lose his arm.
His control over mana was still limited.
But what could he expect? It hadn't even been a day since he arrived here. With practice, he was sure he could control mana flawlessly, like other protagonists.
The monotonous sight of rock was becoming boring. At first, it felt fresh, but now it was just dull.
When he finally reached the end of the hallway, a sigh escaped Rain's mouth. "Finally."
A door stood at the end of the hallway. A simple stone door, yet adorned with two skulls as handles.
"Is… this the boss cavern?" He had been searching for an exit, not the entrance to a boss cavern.
Could he even take down a boss? He was a rookie who had only started his journey three hours ago.
"Should... I go in?" He contemplated.
To prepare, he enhanced himself. His magic repertoire was still pretty limited.
He pushed the door.
Thud!
Behind the door was a large cavern filled with... nothing.
It was pure darkness, as if not a single ray of light had reached this place in ages.
Even the light from behind him seemed afraid to enter, stopping at the threshold.
"Light magic." He circulated mana and visualized light—photons, particles of light.
Photons that behaved like both waves and particles, depending on how they were observed.
Mana flowed out of his palm.
It glowed!
His hands glowed, and the surroundings brightened for a moment, but the glow faded almost immediately, even though he was continuously pumping mana into his palm.
"So, it's like a black hole, but only for light. Light gets sucked in and doesn't reflect, due to gravity in a black hole. But here, it must be some kind of magic." He realized he needed a light strong enough to resist whatever magic was at play here.
"Hmm…" He thought for a moment, then an idea popped into his head. "A stronger light." He imagined a concentrated ball of photons.
Slowly, a ball of light formed in his hands. He didn't increase its size but kept pouring mana into it, intensifying its brightness.
"Hmm…" It was difficult.
Compressing mana into a stable ball was incredibly challenging.
The light ball popped multiple times. Fortunately, it was just light; when it popped, it only released a harmless flash, not an explosion.
Pop! Pop!
No matter how much he tried, as soon as he poured a certain amount of mana, the light ball couldn't maintain its form and popped like a bubble.
"Damn, this is difficult." Frustration welled up inside him, but there was nothing else he could do.
Hundreds of attempts later…
"Hah! Hah! Hah!" The continuous use of mana hadn't emptied his reserves, but his body was strained.
His arm tingled from the mana flowing in and out of his blood vessels, obstructing some of their function.
More than physical exhaustion, he felt mentally drained. His brain throbbed, and even thinking felt like a chore.
He fell to the ground.
"Who is it?!" Suddenly, a voice startled him.
"Who is talking?!" Rain asked, stepping back to escape if anything happened.
Physical enhancement was cast, and he was ready to flee.
"Help me! I have been trapped in this cavern for a thousand years now." The voice was kind of mechanical, so it was hard to distinguish the gender of the speaker.
"Trapped?" Rain halted his steps. "How did you get trapped?" he asked.
"It's a long story." The voice turned soft.
"Stop!" Rain shouted. "I have no time for a long story. I can help you, but first, tell me how I can light up this place." Rain wouldn't trust any random stranger.
He had no desire to help anyone, as who knows what would happen? If it turned out to be an evil, strong guy, wouldn't he either be killed or turned into a slave?
"This place seals magic and light. You have to break the seal."
"How can I do that?"
"It's impossible. This place seals light and magic. So without magic, one can't do anything to it. Any magic cast in this place turns into nothingness. Unless you destroy the whole cavern, it's impossible for light to exist here."
"So I have to destroy the cavern, right?"
"Y-yes."
"Okay, let's try." He began to use Fireball.
"Pardon?"
A large Fireball was formed in seconds. Compressing mana was hard, but expanding it wasn't an issue.
But if he wasn't careful, the explosion could take the caster out. Controlling the flow of mana in the Fireball was hard, so a single mistake could cause the Fireball to explode.
Rain raised his hands.
A Fireball larger than an elephant formed.
His hands burned, and his skin turned black. But healing magic from time to time saved his arm and body.
The massive Fireball was his limit, as expanding it further would cause it to explode instantly.
He pushed the Fireball using a strong wind magic. The Fireball gained momentum and hit the ceiling.
KA-BOOM!
Too much mana was in the Fireball. As it exploded, all the energy was released. The explosion was too loud and big, but compared to a nuclear bomb, it was still not strong enough.
Thud!
The whole cave shook. Ceiling remnants fell down.
Dust filled the area, but utilizing wind magic, he cleared the dust from his radius.
A large hole was formed in the ceiling.
"What in the world was that?" Even the speaker was stunned. "How… Can you use magic in this place?"
While the light was sealed, so it didn't work, he could still use magic. He could use light magic, but the lack of reflection of the photons caused it not to work.
But other kinds of magic still worked. So he was a little confused when the speaker said magic didn't work here.
"I destroyed the roof. Should I destroy the walls too?" he asked.
Light seeped into the cavern, but it was slow. The darkness slowly faded away, but it took a minute for a 10m area to be visible.
The sun was up in the sky. It was beautiful and huge, twice the size of the sun on Earth.
Its warmth was so soothing to the soul. The fresh air from outside was so good. Rain, living in a polluted city, had never smelled air this fresh.
"Wow." Finally, the whole cavern was lit up. At the end of the cavern, there was a figure wrapped in a dark robe embroidered with a complex gold design.
The hood covered half the face. From the figure, it looked like a man.
His whole body was wrapped in various chains that… looked holy?
Warm light emitted from the chains. The chains were pure white, but the chains near the man were pure black, as if they had been charred.
"So, he's an evil guy." Only evil guys dressed like this.
The figure raised its head. "Free me… Please." It begged.
Clink! Clink!
The chains moved, limiting the man's movements. The chains were tightly binding him, to the point that even moving seemed impossible.
The chains weren't attached to anything but looked as if they were connected to the sky.
"So… I don't think it's good to save you," Rain said, preparing to leave. The hole in the ceiling wasn't high, and with physical enhancement and wind magic, he could cover that much height.
Wind magic wasn't hard. It was just utilizing mana to move at rapid speed. Just shooting the mana continuously, it behaved like wind! Some visualization of wind was necessary to make it more useful.
"No! No! Don't leave. I will do anything. Just free me from this hell. Please!" The man begged desperately enough to make Rain feel a bit bad.
"I will free you. But answer my question first. What's your name?" He should first learn about what the man did to deserve this. If it was deserving enough, he might just leave him.
"I… I don't know my name."
"Huh?"
"I have been trapped here for a thousand years. I can't sleep. I can't dream. I can't move. I can't talk to anyone. It was a lonely thousand years. I have forgotten my name. Only the deeds I have committed haunt me to this day."
"Fair enough, I guess." Being trapped in a cavern for a thousand years, if a normal human were trapped in a room for a month, he might go insane—let alone for a thousand years.
But that begs the question: isn't he insane and crazy?
As if reading his mind, the man shook his head repeatedly. "No. I am not. My mind is clear. I can't even get mad or crazy. This is the punishment I received. Trapped in a place with no light, never to sleep, never to dream, never to go crazy. The deeds you've done will haunt you day and night, but you will never go crazy enough. You will suffer loneliness, an immeasurable amount of loneliness that makes you want to die, go crazy, and become insane but you will never receive what you wish."
He perfectly spoke all the words his punisher may have spoken. How would Rain know if it was true or a lie?
"What have you done to receive this punishment?"
"I… was once an evil Necromancer."
"Wait, you're a Necromancer?"
"Yes."
"So, the skeleton outside?"
"Yes, I tried desperately to escape at that time. My dark mana escaped this room and formed those skeletons. Yet all the attempts failed, and I couldn't escape this place."
"Oh. Sorry, but I have annihilated the skeletons."
"Uh, it's okay." The speaker didn't mind at all, which made Rain feel relieved. He just didn't want to give any compensation for destroying someone else's property.
The man continued his story in a nostalgic tone. "I was once an evil Necromancer who wreaked havoc in many countries." He began recounting his tales.