"Don't you think one of your colored flames would be handy?" Yaga asked mockingly, wagging a finger in circles.
"Remember where we are. Even a tiny flame would consume mana from the natural nexus. I'm a warrior—I'm a warrior, not a spell-caster, so I don’t have much to waste on our comfort," Leered replied as he checked his most recent wounds. They had already healed, thanks to a small health potion that had been enough to stabilize him.
"Besides, don’t you think you could use some perception training? You never know when a well-placed critical hit could turn the tide of battle," the human added.
Ahead, a faint thread of light began to emerge—they were close to the entrance of the next dungeon level.
"Ha! Am I hearing my greatest rival admit to needing the strategy of cowards? Don't disappoint me like that, if you use strategies from the weak, what says that about me?" Yaga scoffed, scratching his head. "You don’t need critical hits or weak spots when you have enough strength to make every blow lethal!"
It was understandable coming from Yaga’s mouth. After all, among the giant culture, warriors either mastered melee combat or wielded devastating spells, honing their chosen style to its limit. Yaga had trained relentlessly to refine his fighter and tank classes, neglecting skills like perception and agility—something that quickly caught up to him. As he took another step forward, his foot landed on a hollow rock, which gave way under his weight, throwing him off balance and sending him crashing down.
"Remind me again—why didn’t we just use reinforcement techniques to punch through the rock like it was smoke?" the giant grumbled, now furious.
"Because we already did that three convergences ago," Leered answered. "And if you recall, it took every platinum-ranked healer on that convergence using their best techniques to keep us alive afterward. Sure, holding the weight of a mountain was great training, but we nearly wiped out our entire group on that raid."
Leered stepped through the exit, Yaga following behind. The new hall was curious—not as massive as the one where they had faced the Diamond General’s army, but the aftermath of battle was evident. Claw marks scarred the walls, and enormous cracks split the floor. At the center of it all lay a pile of dented and torn golden armor, its metal so battered it looked more like cheap brass than gold.
Across the room, a figure was tossing aside pieces of armor with evident frustration.
"Inspection… Fuck, Gold King? In dwarven lands, this wouldn’t even qualify as brass!" a female voice muttered in annoyance before hurling a massive war helmet. Yaga caught it midair—it had a crown embedded in its design and a dragon-shaped faceplate, resembling the helm of the great general he had defeated.
"Inspection—oh! Finally! Finally, something good! Come to mommy!" The stranger’s tone shifted to excitement as the sound of metal being smashed echoed through the chamber. The roar of hammer blows shook the towering pile of discarded armor, eventually sending it toppling over—revealing two familiar figures.
Resting against the back of a large, sleeping wolf was a man with reddish skin and a pointed tail. His face was hidden beneath a wide-brimmed hat, and at his sides, two crystal-like weapons—small hand cannons—gleamed in the dim light. Despite appearing asleep, the moment Yaga and Leered stepped into view, the man wordlessly raised one of his cannons in their direction.
"Freeze," the stranger said flatly, lifting his hat slightly with his tail to get a better look at them. Beneath it, a single reddish horn was visible, along with a pair of predator-like eyes—undeniably those of a demon. He evaluated them for a moment before scoffing.
"Oh. It’s just the two idiots who finished a raid by dropping the whole damn dungeon on the boss’s head. Never mind." He lowered his gun and dropped his hat back down.
"Nice to see you guys defeated your commander too. By the way, thanks for the warm welcome, Pein," Leered said with a smirk at the group's summoner and marksman. But his attention was quickly stolen by the rhythmic pounding of a hammer—there was still one more figure to assess.
At the center of the room, standing atop the remains of what had once been a dungeon commander, a small figure moved with purpose. A pair of large, grayish braids swayed back and forth as a dwarf gripped a set of tongs, struggling to pry something from the corpse’s armor. After a few seconds, she finally yanked free a small plate of whitish metal with a blue glow.
Just as this was happening, Yaga hurled the war helmet he was holding toward Pein with incredible speed. The demon, without even looking, fired a shot from his hand cannon, obliterating the projectile inches before impact.
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"Nice try, mud muscles. Next time, it’s my turn. I wonder if your terrible speed stats would let you react like me," Pein sneered.
"Don’t make me laugh, lazy beet. As if your flimsy weapons could pierce the skin of the future king of giants!" Yaga retorted, pounding his chest.
"Jackpot! I knew, there had to be more to this damn dungeon than just worthless stones and metals only humans would care about!" The dwarf, Anvil, cheered, waving the small ore plate like a trophy. She danced in place for a few seconds before finally noticing Leered watching her with a mix of joy and curiosity.
"Oh, hello, Lee! Do you have any idea what this is?" she asked excitedly. "Sacral steel! Do you know how rare this is? Do you know what it’s worth?!" Her honey-colored eyes shimmered with a faint blue glow—proof that she had been using Inspection to evaluate the loot.
"From how excited you look, I imagine it’s as valuable as hunting a black ice boar during the Winter Festival?" Leered guessed, unfamiliar with anything that didn’t involve combat.
But as the glow in her eyes faded, he quickly grabbed her cheeks and pulled her closer—though it took some effort, dwarves were far heavier than they looked.
"Anvil, do you remember what Claymore said about wasting mana on whims?"
"Don’t lecture me, mister intensive training with mountains!" she huffed, slapping his hand away. "Unlike you, I specialized in the Master Creator class—I’ve trained to have plenty of stamina and mana reserves to create everything necessary in battle."
"And don't interrupt me again. This is important. This is sacral steel. A single nugget of this material can upgrade the purity and capabilities of the weapons or equipment it strengthens!" The dwarf said with total seriousness, now the one who had jumped to grab her companion's face, holding him by the beard to bring him down to her level, "do you have any idea how strong a weapon forged using only sacral steel is? "said Anvil to Leered′s face.
"Claymore's relic weapon?" Leered asked, grimacing in pain just before he was released.
"That's right. I'm not surprised he's the one with something like that. I mean, eldest son of one of the oldest and richest families in Elfinghard. Who would have something like that but that rich guy?" The dwarf said, carefully putting away the valuable ore.
"[Everyone, gather on the floor of the penultimate level of the dungeon.]"
It was as if a thought invaded everyone in the vanguard team at the same time. It was Claymore's voice—the leader of the group summoning them to the top floor before entering the dungeon boss area. It was time to attack with everything, so the four present in that room grabbed their things and started making their way to the designated room.
"I hate that stupid astral communication magic. It makes my brain itch." The demon said while scratching his pointed horn with annoyance.
"Anvil, pass me the statstone quickly. I want to check if I'll blame Claymore for wasting our time." Yaga said as they walked, to which the dwarf quickly threw him an elongated multicolored crystal, which Yaga quickly began to squeeze in his hand.
The statstone was a valuable material in this world, more for its reading capabilities than its seemingly infinite hardness. When in contact with a living being, the statstone stops showing a colorful rainbow and begins to display colors, one by one. Those who studied the mineral's capabilities noticed that, depending on the color, intensity, and brightness, the stone visually represented the multiple stats of the one who held it, for a better and most precise measurement there exist some places called "Statistic centers" where people get a deep measurement test with multiple statstones at the same time to rank their level on each stat.
- Blue for speed and agility
- Gray for defense
- Yellow for perception
- Red for strength
- Purple for magical power
- Pink for agility
- Orange for accuracy
- Green for luck
- Etc, etc, etc.
The moment Yaga pressed the crystal, a huge light illuminated the dark stairwell, the red and gray colors highlighting first. "That damn commander didn't make me improve in anything!" shouted the giant.
"Calm down, big boy. Ours was quite similar. Besides, for an accurate measurement of the statistics, you know well that you have to go to a statistics center and do that crystal capsule thing, but last time you got like a 200 Level strength, you still want to rank higher? " Pein said, with a curious look in his brown colored eyes.
"I have to, the actual giant King has to be at least a 300 level ranked strength." Yaga respond.
"Will they all be there by now?" Leered asked while walking next to Anvil.
"Probably. Claymore ordered Beo to look for some hidden entrance to the boss room or possible hidden traps. As soon as we finished with our commander, Igra decided to check if Argo and Acante's group were okay. You know what they say, if you corner a mage, he's finished." Anvil said as she descended the stairs, aided by the light caused by her powerful companions as they gauged her abilities.
"I guess Wado and Muramasa will be busy in the containment team," Leered said, looking at the ceiling after spotting the end of the stairs.
"It stands to reason. After all, all of us Adamante rank are here. Those two are the insurance of the association; if we all die down here, at least there will be someone who can finish the fight on the surface." Replied the dwarf.
"Aren't you interested in knowing what your level is after that commander?" Leered asked curiously.
"Ha! Unlike you idiots, I don't need a number to confirm that this dwarf body is hard as granite. Those freshly pressed gold sheets are proof enough for me. Besides, the wit of a blacksmith can't be counted with simple numbers." The dwarf said with some arrogance and satisfaction in her voice.
"We heard that," both the giant and the demon said. They quickly threw the latter, tossing the statstone to Leered, asking him to please put it away.
As they went down, none of those present even thought to ask Leered if he was interested in measurement own stats now. After all, not long ago, in a reading center, everyone had already witnessed the level of their companion.
At the moment of contact with a living being, the statstone turned a deep black. After that, it began to review the statistics. The only color the stone never showed was white. Some thought it was because whoever showed a white color would have null capabilities to analyze, others believed that the crystal just can't show that color. The truth is, it was very difficult for everyone present during Leered's reading because the brightness that the multiple crystal capsules showed when reading his stats was something that overwhelmed every one of those in charge of the reading and members of the Adamante rank present there. For everyone, it was impossible to see that those colors reached a level of brightness bordering almost white, every one of his stats was greatly beyond level 100, it was normal for a hero to surpass level 100, but only in one stat, in some special cases as the Adamante ranked heroes they pushed greatly further the level even in 3 different stats.
That color was only noticed by the leader of the group, the only one who watched the measurements of Leered was Claymore, the specialists couldn't read an exact number on every stat that time, but that green glow was about to become white, and the number 99 coming right after everything turned almost like looking directly to a sun was something that now was engraved in the leader's mind.
That same intense green color was the one that appeared for an instant on the statstone just before Leered kept it in his back pocket—a bright green that was about to turn white.