Chapter 177: Chapter 168 – Floor 136

This 136th floor was of some sort of ruins.

Perhaps a city or a fortress, the wide stone paved pathway allowed ample space to fight.

Or perhaps ample space for a large monster to show itself. But the number of hits on [sense presence] suggested otherwise.

Taking the first turn to a wide street flanked by broken buildings, there stood a single figure in the middle of the path.

The figure stood twice as tall as I did, and was covered from head to toe in black plate armour and had a sword and shield in its arms.

[Adamantium Evocatus Shield-bearer].

As its name implied, the monster's shield was quite large. Almost as tall as it was and shaped like the outer wall of a half cylinder. Its eyes glowed red between the slit of its visor as it caught sight of me and took a ponderous step forward.

I could feel the stone floor shake slightly on each step it took.

As I raised my weapon and popped open the flask of blood on my belt, more armoured figures burst out of the rubble on each side.

Before they could form up and attack me, red fluid in the shape of shotel blades shot out to the left group. A high pitch whine echoed through the ruins as the spinning blades made of mana hardened blood ground through the black armour each of the figures wore.

The force of the impact made them stagger back, but while the magical attack continued its assault grinding through their armour, the others rushed me.

A spear thrust through where I stood only moments before. I grabbed its shaft with my off hand and simultaneously thrust out my weapon, the pointed tip of the bardiche's axe blade pierced my offender's chest plate with the loud screech of metal against metal.

But before my weapon could rend through my target fully, swords and axes swung in my direction.

Letting go of the enemy spear, I pushed off of my weapon and used my embedded opponent as an anchor to propel myself out of harm's way. As I landed on my feet and pulled my bardiche out of the rent hole of my enemy's broken armour, a huge round wall was thrust in my direction.

Holding my pole arm in both hands, I thrust its haft against the black metal charging at me.

A loud clang rung into my ears as the weight of the impact lifted me off of my feet, giving me some room to assess my situation when I regained my balance.

The enemies to my left were virtually defeated. Their armour cut and broken, revealing the shimmering metal that made up the inner body, now twitching as the residual mana escaped their broken cores.

Three enemies on the right, one who's inner body was revealed under its cracked armour, and two who were unharmed. Then finally the largest of them all, the shield-bearer, marched ahead of the others with its shield held in front of it.

The four that were shadowing the shield-bearer each only bore weapons. A spear, a sword, and an axe.

My eyes switched to the largest of the four remaining enemies as it raised its shield. Mana coalesced around it before it slammed the blunt object into the ground, sending shock waves of mana and dust all around.

The ground shook furiously, but not to the point that I would lose my balance.

I did loose sight of my enemies, but [sense presence] made sure that I was aware that the three smaller enemies immediately rushed me under the cover of the dust cloud.

My grip on the blood I had sent loose earlier hadn't been diminished in the slightest, I shot it all as a flat blade across the open street right into the side of the oncoming trio.

The crimson blade broke up on impact against their adamantium armour, but that was enough. They were unbalanced and were primed to be taken down with a single blow each.

I counter charged them, only for my foot to get caught on something hard.

It wasn't strong enough to stop me as it shattered, but the unexpected nature caused me to lose my balance, forcing me to halt my charge and divert to the side, only to be caught further unaware as my feet came upon broken ground.

The cracked but still flat stone ground had become a patchwork of broken rock. Aside from where I originally stood, every surface I stepped on was jagged and uneven.

I grit my teeth at the unexpected conundrum as the largest of the remaining monsters charged me, the others following only slightly behind it.

Once again, I gathered the blood I was using, this time into a sharpened cone. The scarlet bullet was shot out at the large monster, shock waves rippling through the air as it broke the sound barrier.

There was a sharp ping that echoed across the broken ruins all around us, and moments later the shield-bearer fell. It used its shield to support its ponderous body as its form was broken mid-stride.

I couldn't see it, but I could feel it. The monster's leg was firmly detached from its body at the knee.

And with an easy opening, I took advantage of it, driving the blood bullet back through the newly formed gap in its armour as it wrecked havoc, spinning and slicing as I flattened the projectile and drove it through the monster's body.

I was satisfied with what I had seen from my opponents, so it was time to end it before I made a serious mistake.

The three smaller enemies rushed ahead of its towering companion to thrust their weapons at me.

With my bardiche in both hands, I swung it down, only for the axe head to disappear from in front of me.

Instead, the blade appeared behind the sword wielder as my mana bent space itself, warping the space in front of me with the space behind one of the monsters. As my weapon's blade came in contact its target, a shock wave rippled through my body as my feet was lifted slightly into the air.

The screech of metal on metal rippled almost visibly as adamantium shards flew in all directions as the monster's armour shattered.

Shrapnel buried itself into the stone environment or pinged off of the broken corpses around me before the sword wielding figure lifelessly fell to its knees.

Undeterred from its companion's violent demise, the spear user thrust its weapon straight at me.

But unconcerned by it, I simply turned my eyes at the last of the three opponents as I let my mana do the work on this half-broken figure.

Rather than hit me when I chose to not dodge, the spear head instead warped and bent onto itself, the force of the monster's thrust being turned against itself as the spear went through the broken gap in the monster's armour as I bent the space the spear occupied, brute force overcoming the monster's anima with my much higher intelligence stat.

The axe wielding figure continued towards me, weapon raised, undeterred from the fact that it was the only one left.

But as it swung it's weapon down, I simply took two quick steps in and pressed my hand against the monster's chest. With a bit of concentration, I forcibly pushed my mana into its body, past the innate resistance of the adamantium armour, past its own resistance against outside mana, and straight into its core, corrupting its programming with nothing but white noise.

The last figure grew still as its body lost the instructions it needed to move.

Satisfied with my work, I refilled my blood flask from one of the jars I carried, as well as took a quick victory sip before I went on to collect the monster drops and moved on. It was a bit unfortunate that the monsters on this floor were of the non-living variety.

Flesh and blood monsters were easier to deal with as my blood stores were refilled as I killed my enemies, no matter how much MP my attacks consumed.

But it was a minor annoyance, and the progress I was making was quite nice.

A grin crept onto my lips as I picked up my drops and headed out to the next part of the floor.

 

*Sigh*

Things started off pretty well, but as I reflected back on my day while cleaning up in the fountain room, I considered what I would need to do.

That first fight was relatively easy. I came to understand the sort of monsters that inhabited the floor, as well as what it took to beat them. It wasn't like I had encountered every variety of that floor's monsters in that first engagement, but it did give me a good idea of what to expect, and my expectations weren't betrayed.

The floor was filled with all sorts of golem like automatae wearing heavy plate armour.

Breaking through the armour wasn't a big deal, my stats made sure of that.

Nor were the varieties I had encountered. A few ranged monsters later on, from archers to javelin throwers in addition to what I had faced at first.

But as I should have expected, the numbers were a problem.

The further I progressed on the floor, the greater the number of enemies I faced at once. At first there was seven, which quickly became ten.

By the time I turned back, I was facing over twenty at once, and I was at best halfway through the floor.

It was possible that I would be able to finish the floor was I was, but it was a bit greater of a risk than what I wanted. It was better for me to raise my level a bit more before trying to finish the floor.

That, and...

*Sigh*

My eyes landed on the objects leaning against the fountain.

"Njordr's going to kill me."

There stood the bardiche the titan blacksmith had made for me. The whole thing made of adamantium for both destructive power and durability.

Except the shaft had fractured and the axe head flattened.

It was a mistake to pit an adamantium weapon so directly against adamantium armour.

Njordr's work was clearly a higher level compared to the armour of these monsters, but even then it could only take so much punishment. After a dozen or two encounters, the axe head was noticeably warped, and a few more later, the shaft had snapped under the strain.

But it wasn't like I had found a stronger material I could use to have Harja make a new weapon out of.

(Should I just have him make a bunch?)

He'd probably be pretty pissed if I asked that though. Treating a person's work that they put their sweat and tears into as disposable didn't make me feel good, let alone the person who put in so much effort in making it.

(Maybe I should just stop using weapons?)

I didn't like it. This bardiche was so helpful, but against these monsters it couldn't last as it was.

*Sigh*

I picked up and put away the pieces of the broken weapon before making my way out of the dungeon.

As I had estimated, it was about evening when the last vestiges of the sun's daily assault reflected off of the red sky above.

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It would soon be time for me to go home, but before then, I headed into the city.

In even just these last few years, the Hourai Commonwealth had grown quite a bit.

As I walked through the streets, giving a smile or a wave to those who stopped to greet me, I couldn't help but notice it.

The city had grown so lively in only a handful of years.

People were walking through the streets, hardly a care in the world. There were those who were delivering supplies, carrying home groceries, or even those who were simply taking a walk alone or with others.

There were also children playing in the streets.

Though a surprising number of them had celestials in hand or sticking out of a bag. Some seemed to be discussing Goddess's Realm itself, while others were just playing with the toys like dolls.

I couldn't help but wonder how many of those in the latter group were actual players who found extra uses for their celestials, and how many of them simply had particularly affluent parents.

But in the grand scheme of things, it probably didn't really matter. How the kids used the celestials didn't really matter as long as they were having fun. The shortage of dolls was mostly gone already and most of the people buying them at this point was either for kids that were just getting old enough to get into the game, or they were their second or third celestial.

But as long as they didn't hurt themselves or others with their spending, how people used their money wasn't really my business. Such a thing was only an issue at the beginning when the demand ended up far out-stripping the supply, but things weren't like that anymore.

I continued to walk through the streets as I marvelled at the changes.

It wasn't anything new, but when I looked while remembering how things used to look, the contrast was quite evident.

Before, everyone lived in ramshackle homes.

Either in broken buildings barely fixed up enough to be livable in, or just plain in hastily erected tents.

But in just over half a decade, there wasn't a damaged building in sight. Everything had either been completely repaired or fully rebuilt, leaving no traces that these lands once housed a ghost town.

And I knew, beyond the other dungeon entrance, that the place where the fairies settled and had since welcomed others, had changed as well.

Long gone was the mostly empty forest of unusually large trees. Now most of the trees past the dungeon's entrance had a home or business built into its trunk or strung onto or under its branches.

And in between the trees, were brick paved roads just like those I was walking on, and those further had buildings of stone and wood lining them.

As Aurae had once told me, the eastern city was a visage unimaginable back in the elf and fairy homeland of Arcadia. The blend of cultures that felt like none were unwelcome was a sight that she believed wasn't possible anywhere else.

And of course, on the western city, the same was said by the other elders when they admired the homes built into the sides of the trees or other buildings by the fairies.

With that being said, of course the fairies that lived in those little homes were flying overhead without a care about how the roads below were actually laid out.

Nor did they care that the ones wearing skirts were completely exposing themselves.

That was something which I still had trouble getting over even after all these years, and I immediately lowered my eye line when I realized what that little black strip I saw was.

Shaking my head of that sight that threatened to burn itself into my mind, I continued on to my destination.

*Knock knock!*

"Hey, is the boss here?"

"Oh! Miss Scarlet! I'll get him right away!"

My hand stretched out as I was about to tell the young demon store clerk that I could wait, but he disappeared through the door in the back.

Instead, I contented myself to lower my arm and have a look around.

Before, this place was mostly just a forge built inside of a half broken building. It was simply one that was strong enough to withstand the intense heat that constantly emanated while the owner worked. But now things were completely different.

The structure was completely rebuilt and now there was a proper store front, and even a dedicated worker to man the counter while the owner could concentrate on his work in the back where the loud banging was muted to the customers who came.

And all along the walls were various weapons and armours being showcased.

Most of them were primarily made from steel, but behind the counter were a few made from the rare metals. Even at a glance it was obvious that all of them were quality arms and armours.

"Oh, it really is you."

"Good to see you Njordr."

I casually waved at the titan, the difference in height forcing me to crane my neck as far as I could.

"Come to the back. If you're here now, you must be in a hurry."

"Not really, but I'll accept your offer anyways."

I followed the large man to the back, and when he offered a seat I took it, sitting down across from him.

The forge behind him was still lit and I could feel the heat of it on my face. Even with my high stats, I couldn't help but wonder how he could stand working in such an environment all day every day. I doubted I could do the same.

"So, what do you need?"

"Umm, yea. About that..."

I took out the broken bardiche he had made for me from my dimensional pocket and handed the pieces over.

"Sorry about this."

My head instinctively dropped, and I couldn't find it in me to look the titan blacksmith in the eye.

"Hmmm...you went against some tough monsters huh?"

To my surprise, there didn't seem to be any hint of anger or even sadness. If anything, it sounded more like he was frustrated.

"Well, I did use it against adamantium armoured automata. But I probably shouldn't have tried breaking through the armour with your weapon so many times."

"How many did it take to break it?"

"More than a dozen. Almost three I think?"

It wasn't like I was counting, but just over thirty enemies felt about right.

"Hmmm...then it stood up better than I expected."

"You're not angry?"

"Why would I be? You specifically asked for a weapon that could break through heavy defences, even though it ended up weighing so much. If anything, I'm sorry that I wasn't able to make a weapon that met your needs properly."

I didn't really have a counter for that. While on one hand, it was true that I should have been more careful about how I used the bardiche I had commissioned of Njordr, on the other, he did have a rough idea of how I was likely to use it.

Maybe I was just feeling bad about it only because my enemies were the type to wear armour, rather than be naturally armoured like a dragon.

There was a high likelihood of facing off against such a monster, and that was exactly the reason why I had commissioned such a weapon.

But even still...

"Could you fix it, or maybe make me another? I'll just finish the current floor with magic in the meantime."

"...Come back in the morning, and I'll have something ready for you."

"I couldn't do that! You're not like me! You need to sleep properly!"

"One or two nights without sleep's not gonna kill me. And there's no way I can sleep when I failed to meet my customer's needs."

"But..."

"Shoo. I'm going to work."

The large titan got up onto his feet and turned to his forge, quickly feeding it more coals before I could come up with a counter argument.

"Fine. Then the payment..."

"Give it to me after I succeed making a weapon that's good enough for you."

My hand stopped mid-motion reaching for my wallet in my pocket dimension.

"Fine. I'll see you tomorrow then."

Even before I left, I could already hear the sound of scraping coals and bellows being worked.

I gave the clerk a greeting before leaving the store.

*Sigh*

While beneficial, something completely different from what I was expecting ended up happening. I could only hope that Njordr wouldn't hurt himself pushing the limits of his smithing skills.

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