The atmosphere in the cave was really bad. It felt like, at any moment, the adventurers might stop mining and try to attack William.

Maybe the only reason they hadn’t done it yet was the risk. They knew William was strong — and now he had Rena with him — which made things even worse for them. It was simply too risky. The chance of them dying was just too high.

William only had to endure those glares for a short while. It didn’t take long before he was once again far ahead of the adventurers in terms of progress. Rena was with him, though she wasn’t mining. Her job was to keep an eye out for anything suspicious inside the cave.

To avoid looking too suspicious, Rena held William’s magic bag and collected the stones he mined. That way, it looked more natural — rather than her just standing around, staring at the cave walls and doing nothing.

Rena was hoping to find something interesting along the cave walls — maybe a clue that could point them toward the portal’s location — but there was nothing. The walls were just like any other cave wall, except they were packed with precious stones — which William was collecting with clear enjoyment.

For quite a while, they only had to walk in a straight line, without needing to choose a direction. That made things easier. No doubt, no hesitation.

But eventually, the cave opened up, revealing several different paths. That made things much more complicated.

What if they took a path that didn’t lead to the portal but instead led straight into danger — something that could cost them their lives? That possibility couldn’t be ignored.

“So… what now?” Rena asked. “I can’t feel or see anything different in these three paths. Which means… it’s just going to come down to luck.”

She was already preparing herself to take a gamble — but William had something else in mind. He knew a way that could drastically help them.

With a smile on his face, he said, “I can tame those little creatures we’ve been seeing around here and send one down each path. I can see what they see.”

“That’s a brilliant idea!” Rena said.

She looked genuinely excited about the possibility. If she were alone in a situation like that, she’d have no choice but to take the risk — but with William there, things were different. She felt much safer with him by her side.

William then stopped mining and focused his efforts on capturing the small creatures that lived in the cave. Most of them were weak magical beasts — similar to rats or other rodents that weren’t any real threat in combat.

He found two small rodent-like creatures and one spider — a pretty big one, which was a little creepy, but still weak.

If he were trying to tame several powerful magical beasts, that would be impossible. His mind couldn’t handle controlling something like that. But since these were much weaker compared to his own power, he could do it without much trouble.

After that, he sent each creature down a different path and sat at the intersection with Rena to wait.

About an hour passed. That’s when the other adventurers showed up.

“What are you doing there?” one of them asked when he saw William sitting on the ground.

William looked at him, frowning slightly.

“Resting. You?”

The adventurers sat down too. “We’ll rest as well.”

Several hours had already passed, so it made sense that they’d need a break — but William knew they had another reason. They wanted to know what he had discovered deeper inside the cave.

“So, did you already check out any of these paths?” one of the adventurers asked.

William saw that question as the perfect chance to deceive the adventurers. He noticed there weren’t any mana stones in any of the three paths, meaning the adventurers had no way of knowing which one he had explored!

It had already been around an hour since his tamed creatures began exploring each path, and William knew the correct one was the middle path — going straight ahead. He figured that out after seeing signs of ruins and ancient constructions at the end of that way.

So, yeah — perfect chance to send them the wrong way.

“We kept going straight, but it didn’t seem like there was much there, so we came back to decide which path to try next,” he said casually.

The adventurers exchanged glances. One of them said, “We’ll check the path to the right, then. You can rest up here.”

They walked off, looking pretty pleased.

“We’ve got a 50% chance of being on the right track,” one of them whispered. “Our odds just got way better thanks to him.”

“In the end, giving up a little of the mana stone profit was worth it,” another one added.

Once they were gone, William stood up. Rena had already caught on to why he said what he did.

“That was pretty clever,” she said. “They’re gonna waste their time walking down the wrong path like a bunch of idiots — but after this, they’re gonna hate us for lying.”

She was still unsure if it was the right move — but only because she hadn’t seen what William saw through the eyes of his tamed creatures.

“Don’t worry,” he said with a small smile. “After today, we’re reaching the next floor of the dungeon. I found the portal.”

“What???”

After hearing that, Rena didn’t even want to sit still anymore. She wanted to head straight for the goal. It had been quite a while since they started looking for that damn portal.

William felt the same way.

They kept moving forward, heading down the middle path — the correct one.

The other two paths, while they did have some mana stones scattered around, weren’t the way to reach the portal, so William had already pushed them out of his mind.

At that point, he’d already gathered a great haul of mana stones, not to mention the body enhancement stones he found earlier. In other words, money wouldn’t be a problem for him once he left the dungeon.

The two of them moved forward, excited to finally reach the portal.

“So what did you see?” Rena asked.

She wanted a better idea of what to expect once they got close to the portal. Rena was the curious type — not someone who liked walking in blind.

“I saw a lake full of mana stones,” William said, “and near the portal, there was some kind of mermaid-like creature. Looked like the boss that’s guarding it.”

Rena imagined the scene — a lake sparkling with blue light from all the mana stones scattered underwater, casting reflections on the stone walls. Her imagination wasn’t too far from reality.

When they finally got there, descending a stone staircase, Rena was mesmerized by what she saw. The portal was hovering in the middle of the lake, and there was a narrow dirt path leading straight to it.

The path was just wide enough for two people to walk side by side.

But the lake itself stole the show. The bottom was completely covered in glowing mana stones, their blue radiance bathing the cavern in an almost magical light.

The glow was so intense it reached the ceiling of the cave.

“Beautiful…” Rena whispered.

William quickly brought her back to reality. “Remember there’s a boss near the portal, so we’re gonna have to fight.”

As soon as she heard that, Rena snapped out of it and focused. They were way too close to the goal to start getting distracted and screw things up now.

They started walking toward the portal, keeping a close eye on the mermaid standing nearby.

She was massive — easily three to four meters tall — and able to balance herself upright using the strength of her tail. In one hand, she held a long, sharp trident.

William could feel it immediately: she was powerful. Definitely not the kind of creature you’d want to mess with casually.

As they got closer, the mermaid opened her eyes and locked her gaze on them. William tensed up for a second… until he realized she wasn’t really looking at them, but at his hand — specifically, at the ring he had received from the Triton King.

The mermaid looked confused. And to both William and Rena’s surprise, she spoke — her voice echoing through the cavern.

“That ring… it belongs to my kingdom? I can’t believe it…”

There was sadness in her eyes. A kind of deep melancholy that made William pause.

“They’re keeping you trapped here, aren’t they?” William said. “Have any adventurers come through this portal before?”

The mermaid seemed startled. “So… you know about them? Yes, I’m being kept here against my will. And no, no adventurer has made it this far before. If they had, I’d probably already be dead. This portal… it’s different from the others. It wasn’t made by them. I wasn’t created by them.”

Rena looked a bit lost during the conversation. She glanced from William to the mermaid, trying to piece together what was happening.

“What if I helped you return to your kingdom?” William said. “I might be able to figure something out.”

“Please,” the mermaid said softly. “Come closer.”

William took a step forward.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep