Kairos frankly didn’t believe that the dungeon was made so that people could get stronger. There were just too many strange things that made it far too weird. First of all, participants had to pay for proper food. Assuming that cannibalism or eating monsters weren’t resorted to, that was the only realistic source of food.
Yet, that food wasn’t really even food.
Kairos furrowed his brows as he opened up the door, going back into the hallway. Out of curiosity, he tried to go back into the room he just was in and closed the door once more.
However, nothing happened.
Kairos didn’t think about it too much before going to another door, opening it up as well.
He extended his future vision briefly before beginning to close the door.
Once he did, Several beams of water suddenly shot toward him. He stopped himself from closing the door and blinked a few times.
The beams of water weren’t directly aimed toward him. While one targeted him directly, the others instead shot towards his sides, trying to block off his path to dodge.
Kairos couldn’t help but recall the time he was back on the very first floor, dodging spears to get through the hallway. At first, the spears simply shot toward him directly, but over time they began shifting.
Like it was learning.
Kairos narrowed his eyes before eventually coming to that conclusion. It seemed that this dungeon was some sort of method to learn combat techniques in a rather crude way.
Pure trial and error.
As for the bloody pathway with monsters, he was pretty sure that the dungeon was somehow using the flesh that it consumed after the corpse was dealt with. On the other hand, he couldn’t come to any conclusions about the dark pathway.
With the conclusion Kairos had come to, he wondered if he would be able to ‘teach’ the dungeon incorrect ways of fighting. Though he doubted the effect would be too big, he still figured it was worth a shot.
And so, Kairos closed the door.
When the water beams shot towards him, he leaped upwards.
With a dull thump, the beams of water slammed against the wall behind him, spraying droplets of water into the air. They obscured his vision slightly, but not enough to meaningfully stop him.
Kairos slammed his spear into the wall behind him and clenched it tightly, flexing his muscles hard. His body then raised once more, dodging another beam of water that shot towards him and completely avoiding the other water beams that shot towards his sides.
Kairos found himself right next to the roof now, with no higher to go. He once again slammed his spear into the wall, this time throwing himself to the side.
He just barely dodged a water beam that shot towards him. The beams of water hadn’t shot to either side of him. In fact, there was one that shot towards the roof, seemingly predicting that Kairos would become spiderman and crawl on the ceiling.
The water beams that had been shot before were still active and continued to slam hard against the walls. The droplets of water had gradually turned to even thicker mist. As for the water that had gathered on the ground, it disappeared as soon as it hit the ground, thus not making the place flooded.
Kairos furrowed his brows as he found the area he had to dodge had reduced considerably. Nonetheless, he had no time to wait.
More water beams continued to shoot toward him while he was still in the air. Kairos saw that they only aimed towards his sides and above him. As such, he slammed his spear into the wall before flinging himself downwards, avoiding them all.
However, it was now that Kairos found himself in an awkward predicament. To his left was a wall. To his right was a water beam that had been fired earlier.
And above him, were the water beams that had just fired.
In other words, he no longer had any space to dodge.
Kairos saw in his future vision that one water beam would shoot towards his torso, while the other would go towards his legs. In response, he bit down on the bag of orbs with his teeth so that he could hold his spear with both hands.
At the same time, he took an awkward position with his legs almost like he was a sumo wrestler getting ready to fight.
Then, the water beams shot out.
One slammed right below him, dangerously close to making him a eunuch. However, he had no time to contemplate over that, as another one had smashed right onto his spear.
Kairos stuck his arms out while holding onto his spear vertically. The beam of water struck the spear violently, before splitting into two separate ones that shot towards his side. Unfortunately, due to how thin his spear was, it was not enough to divert the trajectory of the split water beams enough to avoid his body completely
As such, the sides of his rib cage were now being battered with a constant gush of water.
The droplets of water had become so dense, that Kairos could no longer even see, making the other sensations of pain even more noticeable.
He could feel the spear breaking through the skin of his palm, another disadvantage that came from how thin it was.
Eventually, the flesh of his palm started to tear apart, forcefully pushed aside.
Kairos could feel his mind spinning, as he gradually felt it was his very bones pushing back against the spear to divert the beam of water.
There was even a point where Kairos forgot about the water beam below him, nearly causing his legs to buckle. However, the intense pain from his future vision reminded him of that clearly, making him keep his legs up even though they had begun trembling.
And right when Kairos felt that this was going to be endless…
[Dungeon Currency Transfer – 1 added]
The water beams suddenly disappeared.
Kairos began panting, now completely drenched. The ground was more or less dry, but the air was still incredibly humid.
Blood began forming from Kairos’ palms, dripping down his spear. There was blood before, but it had been washed away by the water.
He took several deep breaths before composing himself once more.
“…That was much harder than the last one.”
Kairos slowly let go of the spear, letting it hit the ground, and wiped away the water in his hair with the back of his palm.
For a few moments, only the sound of dripping was in the room.
Kairos was intently paying attention to the wounds on his palms. The process wasn’t the fastest, but the bleeding had indeed stopped after a while. When he tried to pick the spear back up, it was quite painful.
Kairos decided to take a small break. Resting against the wall with his eyes closed.
Using a green orb for these kinds of injuries would be an overreaction. He still had eleven of them, but that wasn’t too much for Kairos. And so, he waited for his wounds to naturally heal a little before moving onwards.
He couldn’t help but wonder what was happening with everyone else.
Kairos still remembered that he had tossed Nicole his glasses, and hoped that she kept them safe. He also began wondering what happened to the city that Tiana had created. And what the music trio, Eric, Nick, and Jenny had done during this time.
Though, the only way he would ever get to know is if he got out of this dungeon.
After a bit of time, he looked down at his palms, which had scarred over. Though it was uncomfortable, it was no longer painful to hold onto his spear.
For Kairos, that was enough. And so, he went into another room.
He once again used his future vision to see what would happen if he closed the door, and saw that a green gas would fill the room. Nearly immediately, his flesh would begin corroding and there wasn’t even a sensation of pain, as his nerves would die before they could process it.
Kairos stopped himself from closing the door while beads of sweat began forming on his forehead.
It appears that this was the reason why this place was so taboo.
While it could let one get points relatively easily if one was lucky, it could also kill the person in question.
Kairos left the respective room before trying another one.
This time, he was able to see a figure made out of mana appear, holding onto a sword.
Kairos stopped himself from closing the door. He hesitated, as it didn’t seem to be the most dangerous. Though, the last experience made him a little more cautious.
He closed his eyes for a few moments.
Then, decided that there would be at least some risk no matter what, so he should take chances when he could.
Once the door clicked shut, Kairos turned around to meet with the blue figure holding onto a sword. While the figure appeared to be conjured from mana completely, the sword it was holding appeared to be made out of metal.
The figure did not move immediately, and neither did Kairos.
They looked at each other for a few moments, before the figure appeared to lose patience and dash forth.
Kairos also dashed forth, before suddenly stopping.
The figure swung its sword and ended up missing Kairos. However, it twirled around right after, with deft movements, bringing it down once more.
Kairos’ eyes widened, as he brought his spear up to block.
A loud clang resounded as the sword hit the spear.
Kairos pulled back before sweeping horizontally.
The figure proceeded to dash backward, avoiding it.
Kairos raised an eyebrow before continuing forth, thrusting his spear forwards. The figure seemed unprepared and was stabbed. Kairos noted that the sensation was greatly different from normal, almost feeling like he stabbed through water.
As for the figure, it simply retreated once more after being hit.
Kairos did not chase this time.
“…How am I supposed to kill this thing?”
He raised his hand and pointed a finger toward the figure.
“Maybe…”
A fireball coalesced at the tip of his finger. At this sight, the figure seemed provoked, rushing forth once more.
Kairos ended up only having a brief moment to channel the fire spell, but he threw out the small fireball nonetheless.
The figure was able to duck underneath it and quickly followed up by sweeping with its sword.
Kairos slid back slightly to move out of the way.
Despite missing, the figure still seemed prepared, bending one knee and shifting most of its weight on it before whipping around once more.
Though Kairos wanted to counterattack, that strike was too fast, forcing him to block.
Another clang resounded.
Kairos narrowed his eyes, trying to channel mana for a pulse spell. While it shouldn’t have been visible to the average person, the figure seemed to notice, suddenly increasing the strength from its sword several times over, forcing Kairos to disengage and leap away once more.
He stopped channeling the spell which seemed to calm the figure.
Kairos clicked his tongue.
“So no magic?”
The figure did not respond, instead bending one knee slightly while raising its sword above its head.
This was the same position it had taken earlier, though Kairos hadn’t noticed before.
He decided to challenge it, opting to thrust his spear forth.
Kairos saw in his future vision that the figure would deflect his spear and follow up with another strike.
He thus stopped his spear thrust, instead opting to sweep with it.
Then, the figure responded by suddenly flicking its sword downwards before bringing it up in a diagonal slash, deflecting his attack.
Kairos stopped once again, narrowing his eyes slightly.
He had somewhat sensed it before, but the figure seemed to have a sense of swordsmanship.
Though it was a bit strange, since it seemed both practiced, yet also an amature at the same time.