Chapter 93: The Right Hand Of The Boss

After fighting several ghosts, we reached a point where our mana had fully recovered, so we decided to take a short break.

“Ah, it feels like there’s no end to this,” Sarah sighed in boredom. “It’s not like it’s hard to defeat these Ghosts, but it’s so tedious. At this point, I think we could even fight the ones at the dungeon entrance to increase our level.”

“That’s out of the question. So far we’ve had the numerical advantage on our side, but facing an army of those creatures is a completely different story,” I said to Sarah while checking our progress on my HUD.

Alicia and I had gained 2 levels and 8 Status Points each. As for Sarah and Justine, they had gained 4 levels and 16 Status Points each. After distributing those points and focusing on the stats I wanted to improve for each of them, this was the final result.

[

Name: Richard Forster

Class: Valkyrie Tamer

Level: 12

Valkyries: 3/3

Health: 160 points

Mana: 75 points

Strength: 26 points

Defense: 11 points

Magic: 10 points

Agility: 13 points

Status Points: 0 points

]

[

Name: Sarah Lockhart

Level: 7

Class: Swordmaster

Title: Valkyrie

Master: Richard Forster

Health: 110 points

Mana: 50 points

Strength: 15 points

Defense: 3 points

Magic: 13 points

Agility: 4 points

Status Points: 0 points

]

[

Name: Alicia Ludvila Von Astrea

Level: 7

Class: Saintess

Title: Valkyrie

Master: Richard Forster

Health: 70 points

Mana: 100 points

Strength: 1 point

Defense: 2 points

Magic: 18 points

Agility: 5 points

Status Points: 0 points

]

[

Name: Justine Blackwood

Level: 5

Class: Sage

Title: Valkyrie

Master: Richard Forster

Health: 90 points

Mana: 110 points

Strength: 1 point

Defense: 2 points

Magic: 18 points

Agility: 6 points

Status Points: 0 points

]

As for skills, only Sarah and Justine managed to gain new ones. Sarah gained Flame Sword, and Justine gained Water Prison.

[ Flame Sword: The user can cover the blade of their sword in flames for a short duration. The flames on the weapon can feed on other sources of fire and grow stronger.

Cost: 8 MP ]

[ Water Prison: The user surrounds a chosen target in a sphere of water that repels attacks coming from outside while drowning the prisoner inside. The user must maintain the channeling of this skill; otherwise, Water Prison will be dispelled.

Cost: 10 MP ]

“They are really good powers!” Sarah said, impressed.

“I agree, but I don’t think they would be of much help here,” Justine said, her fingers resting on her chin. “My Water Prison might cause damage when it hits the target, but would I drown a Ghost? I don’t think so. And this fire ability…”

“What about it?” Sarah asked cluelessly while savoring a piece of cake that Joseph’s wife had offered us. And honestly, it was really good.

Justine looked at her as if she were a helpless red-haired version of Erina. “Do you remember what Rick said to Carl about gases inside the mine? Some of them might cause explosions when they come into contact with fire, so we need to be careful about that.”

“Oh! I didn’t think about that. Is that why you haven’t used your Fireball until now?” Sarah asked, impressed, as if Justine were some kind of genius.

Justine looked at the girl with a grim expression on her face. “Don’t tell me you would have tried your new skill if I hadn’t told you about it beforehand.”

“No, I wouldn’t do that!” Sarah said in a nervous voice that completely gave her away.

“Hehehe.”

“Hey, don’t laugh at me, Alicia.”

“I could say we were lucky you didn’t have such a power before, Sarah. If that had been the case, we might have blown ourselves up,” Alicia said.

“You little shrimp!”

“Hey, you girls, don’t fight,” I said to them, though I couldn’t stop smiling. Watching the girls interact with each other was somehow relaxing, and we were making good progress with our grinding.

Everything was going so well that I almost forgot the kind of place we were in.

“What do you humans think you’re doing here?” a sharp, shrill voice said to us.

“Huh? What was that?” Sarah asked.

The four of us looked around, searching for the source of that voice, until Alicia pointed to the ground. “Right there!”

I looked where the young woman was pointing only to see a strange creature… but also—

“Tiny,” Sarah said bluntly.

The creature had no face, just a single eye, and through it you could tell it was furious. “What’s your problem?! Why is the first thing you call someone you just met ’tiny’?!”

The creature in question looked like a black stretched octahedron, and what kept one of its tips standing on the ground were a few tiny legs it used to move around. On the opposite tip there wasn’t a head, but a red eye, which—aside from its voice—was the only part of it capable of expressing any emotion.

“Well, that was the first thing that came to my mind.”

“You humans have no respect for my grandeur! I’m Derug, the right hand of Zalrorg, the Great Master of this dungeon. And in the name of my master, I came here to punish you intruders!” the demon, who couldn’t have been more than 15 cm (5.9 in) tall, declared.

Someone let out a suppressed laugh. When I looked to the side, Justine was holding back her laughter, but she quickly reached her limit.

“Hahahaha! He said ’grandeur’, but he’s so small! What’s he going to do to us, bite our ankles?”

Justine, who was usually so composed, was dying of laughter at the monster in front of her. This wasn’t going to end well.

“Hey, Justine. It’s not cool to mock someone because of their height,” Alicia said, approaching the monster. The princess offered a small piece of the cake she had been eating. “Sarah is always teasing me because of my height, so I know how you feel.”

Derug looked at the girl in surprise, then stared at the piece of cake she was holding out to him. With a quick whip-like motion, he knocked Alicia’s hand away.

In the middle of his small body, a toothy mouth suddenly appeared, and from it came a much deeper voice.

“Who do you think you are, offering me crumbs?! Guards!!”

The tiny demon’s voice sounded even louder than before, echoing through the walls of the mine. Derug wasn’t a combat monster, but his role was to act as an alarm against meddling adventurers.

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