Chapter 29: First Chamber

The dungeon entrance looked more like a fancy garden gate than a monster lair. Flowers grew in neat circles around the opening, and vines decorated the stone archway like someone had hired a landscaper.

“This doesn’t look dangerous, right babe.” Eren asked with a teasing tone. She was definitely blushing with that word. “Babe” was outside of Elven Love Language. It was fun to tease her.

She is excited but doesn’t want to show it in front of the cubs. My Emily, she is adorable…

Emily pulled an arrow from her quiver after a secret melt down. “It doesn’t look dangerous but that’s how most dungeons work. They look pretty until something tries to eat your face. I found two in the last years.”

“Is this similar to those or..?” Eren was genuinely curious.

Emily answered with frown. “This entrance is massive comparing to the ones I found. I accidently fallen inside them. They were just like two small pits in the ground. There was no stone structure like this. “We should be careful.”

When Eren and the two wolf cubs entered here yesterday, he thought the inside was a cave. But when Emily showed him the wall corners at several points, it became clear that this was a structure.

The female cub sniffed at the flowers at the tree entrance then looked inside toward the stone walls.

[These smell weird. Like meat pretending to be flowers.]

“She says the flowers smell like meat,” Eren translated.

“Smart cub.” Emily stepped through the archway first, her katana ready. “Stay close and watch your step.”

The moment they crossed the threshold, Eren felt it. A weird pressure, like walking into a room with bad air conditioning. The temperature dropped and the sunlight behind them seemed to fade faster than it should.

He could swear he didn’t feel it like this yesterday.

[You have entered: Verdant Hollow Dungeon – Floor 1]

[Current Party Number Satisfied: 4 members]

[Recommended Level: 8-20]

“That sound wasn’t there yesterday. I think the dungeon only allowed us to wander in the entrance area without reaching the required number. But I’m not sure.”

The tunnel ahead was wider than Eren expected. Glowing blue mushrooms grew along the walls, giving everything a creepy underwater feeling. The ceiling was high enough that Emily could shoot without worrying about hitting rocks.

“This isn’t where we hunted yesterday. This is probably the real entrance area, Emily.” He felt pressure unlike yesterday.

“Stay alert,” Emily whispered. “This looks like a plant dungeon that my mother used to tell me in bedtime stories. Before she left me, that is. But anyways, plant dungeons have flesh eating monsters and tiny bug type which like to hide in the walls.”

Cubs were pretty excited and wondering how meat-vegetable would tasted after hearing her words.

They moved forward carefully. The cubs walked on either side of Eren, ears swiveling at every sound. Their playful energy from earlier was completely gone with a rumbling sound.

After about fifty feet, the tunnel opened into a large chamber. Eren’s first thought was that someone had turned a cave into a greenhouse. Thick roots covered the floor, moss grew on every surface, and vines hung from the ceiling like natural curtains.

His second thought was that something was moving in those vines.

Emily saw it first. “Bats. A lot of them.”

Eren looked up and immediately regretted it. The ceiling was covered in them. Dozens of bats, maybe more, all hanging upside down and watching them with glowing red eyes. But these looked drugged unlike yesterday’s versions.

“These are bigger than the yesterdays’ cave bats. And they look berserk” Eren said. The cave bats from before were maybe the size of pigeons. These things looked more like small dogs with wings.

Actual working wings!!

“Dungeon monsters are always tougher,” Emily said. She was already drawing her katana in a cool pose. “When I attack, they’ll all fight back. Be ready.”

The male cub growled quietly. [We know how to fight flying things.]

His sister flexed her claws. [Let them come. We’re hungry.]

“The cubs say they’re ready,” Eren told Emily. He pulled out his knife with one hand and grabbed the bow Emily had given him earlier with the other.

Looking at the bow in his hands made him nervous. He’d tried using it during the morning slime hunt. The results were embarrassing. Out of twenty arrows, maybe three went in the general direction he aimed.

Emily had laughed so hard she couldn’t breathe.

“Alright,” Emily said. “On three. One… two… three!” But before she could finish counting two cubs already attacked. They didn’t know numbers or what she meant.

“I would be angry if they weren’t so cute..” Emily shouted with a small smile.

Her katana wind slash flew and hit a bat square in the chest. The bat exploded into sparkles before it even fell.

Then all hell broke loose.

The bats dropped from the ceiling like a swarm of angry fruit. Their screeches filled the chamber, echoing off the walls until Eren couldn’t tell which direction they were coming from. He secretly cursed a few times.

The cubs launched themselves into the air many times with their jaws snapping. The female cub caught two bats in one jump, her teeth crushing them with a wet crunch. Her brother was even faster, spinning mid-air to slash three bats with his claws.

Emily’s low range katana slashes flew nonstop. Every strike hit a bat or two. She made it look easy, like she was shooting targets at a carnival instead of fighting in a dungeon.

Emily would be a world-wide super star in live action versions of tv shows and animes. She would rock the whole world with that pose.

Eren lost his concentration for a few seconds because of the sight he saw as Emily bent her legs toward the ground and drew her sword from its sheath from the side.

He whispered his thanks to everyone who allowed him to come to this universe and see this sight with his own eyes.

“Hey, use your arrows instead of staring at my butt. You won’t find a better training ground than here, Silly!”

Eren tried to shoot his bow as she said. The arrow went straight into the ground three feet in front of him.

“Forget the bow!” Emily yelled with laughter. “Use your knife!”

A bat dove at Eren’s face. He swung wildly with his knife and somehow connected them in the air. The bat shrieked and veered off, green blood spraying from its wing. But s-he was damn sure it was an accidental move.

Maybe his insane stats worked, he wasn’t sure.

[You have killed Dungeon Bat (Level 10)]

[You gained 95% energy]

Another bat came from his left. Eren stabbed at it, but the bat was too fast. It scratched his arm with it’s claws before the male cub tackled it out of the air.

The scratch burned like someone had dragged a hot iron across his skin.

Eren gritted his teeth and kept fighting. Minutes blurred as they hunted. Eren lost count of how many bats there were. He just kept swinging his knife, occasionally getting lucky and hitting something just like yesterday.

The fact that today’s Bats were higher level and could fly with their wings had increased the difficulty. He now missed the beasts he had easily hunted yesterday by jumping on them.

With his stats, he was probably the strongest person in the room, but he still couldn’t control his body like the others.

He thought maybe being athletic was a spiritual thing. Or he wasn’t meant to be a warrior. He continued swinging his knife, wondering if more combat practice would help or not.

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