37 - Entering the Dungeon

Val arrived at the town gate and spotted a set of guards. The guards differed from those he had met before when he entered Loka Town.

The guards were not busy they were just standing by the gate waiting for people to approach, it was still a little early before adventurers and merchants would typically leave or enter the town.

Val approached the guards and asked,

"Hello, could you please instruct me on how to get to the dungeon?"

The two guards turned their attention away from the main path leading to the gate and toward the boy who had spoken to them.

"Who are you, are you an adventurer? Only adventurers are allowed to go to the dungeon."

Val was surprised by this, he was unaware that dungeon access was only allowed to adventurers, the booklet he had read did not mention this, but Val decided it was pointless to think about this and responded to the guard's question,

"Yes I am an adventurer, my name is Val, F-Rank."

As Val answered he brought out his guild card and showed it to the guard who had requested his identity.

The guard quickly looked and confirmed his identity, the guard thought the name sounded familiar but could not think of why, so he moved on and responded to the boy's original request.

"If you head down the road on the right, and follow it through the forest, you will eventually reach the dungeon. The road was built as a direct path to the dungeon so you could not get lost. There are also regular guard patrols to stop people from trying to steal adventurers' treasures and rewards."

Val nodded in understanding and quickly thanked the guards for their help and headed the way he was instructed.

It was only as Val had left and was 25 meters away did the guards notice the small feline cub walking next to him. When they saw the feline cub, they remembered where they had heard of the boy. He was the half-elf kid who had helped fight against the notorious bandit group and had cut the hand off an arrogant and troublemaking young adventurer.

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Val followed the road instructed by the guards, and after about 30 minutes he reached the forest. The road continued into the forest, Val found the scene quite beautiful with lush trees creating a beautiful natural fence.

Val continued down the path for another 20 meters until he reached a large spire. The spire was at least 25 meters, but it was hard for Val to tell exactly how tall it was.

Next to the spire was a brick building similar to the buildings in Loka Town. Val was aware that the spire was the dungeon and the building next to it was used to guard the dungeon, through the cooperation of the guild and the Count's men.

Val approached the building, he had learned in the booklet that he had to 'sign in' before entering the dungeon. 'Signing in' was a term used that meant signing your name and providing your guild card, to prove you are an adventurer and have authorization to enter the dungeon. For higher-tiered dungeons, you would need a higher guild rank, but this dungeon was the lowest rank thus any adventurer could enter.

As Val reached the building he was met by a lady with long blonde hair and blue eyes, she was quite beautiful, with a large bust and ass but a thin waist. She had a uniform on that was similar to the guard captain but still noticeably different. She had an air of authority around her, and Val could tell just by the way she carried and presented herself, that she was powerful.

When she reached Val reached her hand out and simply said,

"Guild card?"

Val pulled out his guild card and showed her, she took it and wrote down his name. Once done, she returned the card and told Val,

"You may enter the dungeon".

Once she said that she turned back and returned to the building. Val did not say anything the entire time. Val felt like it was a little weird of an encounter, but got over it quickly.

He was excited to finally enter the dungeon and see what it was like.

Val and Leo walked closer and stood in front of the dungeon. Val picked Leo up and held him in his hand. He had read that when entering the dungeon, a party had to be touching one another so that they all enter at the same starting point.

Just like how there are multiple entry points to consecutive floors, there are also multiple starting points to the first floor. Which is chosen at random when entering the dungeon.

Val placed his hand against the dungeon and after a moment, he was surrounded by white lights, which forced him to close his eyes. He felt a strong spatial mana surround his body, and when the light diminished, he opened his eyes.

He was able to tell it was spatial mana due to his Spatial Talent and his Physique.

When he opened his eyes he placed Leo on the ground and looked around.

He was surrounded by tall, thick trees, some of which stood 20 meters tall. The trees had grass and shrubs surrounding them, and there was no man-made path. It looked like an untouched forest that had never been seen or touched by people before. In the sky was a large sun, with only a few clouds, keeping the temperature of the forest quite hot.

Val scoped the area but found no other living things. No goblins nor people. He opened [Personal Dimension] and let out Larz, who looked like he had just woken up from a nice nap.

Val spoke to Larz telepathically, explaining that they could be attacked at any moment, but that the only enemies around would be goblins. Larz was not particularly worried, he was pretty confident in himself, which was standard for a dragon, who had instinctual pride.

Val thought about what they should do, Val wanted to explore and fight, practicing his Skills and teamwork with Larz and Leo.

Val had a pretty good grasp of his skills, which currently favor high mobility, and surprise attacks, similar to an assassin. He also wanted to practice using his black short sword. He had used it a few times to get a grasp on its skills.

From what he could tell, he believed the weapon to be quite strong and well-made. Probably by a pretty good magic blacksmith, but he knew that he did not know enough about the skills of magic blacksmiths and the standard outside the border area of the kingdom to truly determine the quality of the weapon.

From what he had figured out during his travels to Loka Town, the sword had two skills, both Shadow Skills. The skills were [Shadow Slice] and [Shadow Link], both skills seemed to be fairly useful. Though, as they were skills from the sword and not Val's own skills, he did not know how to use and utilize them naturally as he did with his own skills.

The [Shadow Slice] skill allowed Val to cover his blade with shadows, increasing the sharpness of the blade, he could also release the shadows from the blade when swinging to shoot a projectile shadow blade at opponents.

The [Shadow Link] skill allowed Val to create a link between the shadow of the sword with a shadow within a 20-meter radius of the sword. With the link between the two shadows, the sword could pass through. The only use Val could think of so far was to stab the sword into the shadow and have it appear from the connected shadow.

The skill seemed strong but had a lot of drawbacks which Val had found. It was a short sword so there was not a large distance that could be traveled after exiting the connected shadow. Leaving Val's only feasible option, to attack the feet of his opponent.

Using the skills did not come naturally to Val so he was still not very good at using and utilizing them, he needed time to practice and gain familiarity with them to fully incorporate them into his battle strategy.

Besides fighting goblins, Val also wanted to explore for treasures. He knew that a lot of natural treasures would have already been found, but with his [Mana Eyes] he believed he had a far better chance of being able to find hidden treasures than others. It was very rare for young adventurers to have mana-sensing or perceiving abilities as they were generally high-ranking and very rare. So he assumed that not many people with such abilities would have come to this dungeon since the dungeon had only been around for less than 10 years.

Dungeons naturally appear at random. Dungeons will stay active for a random amount of time. When they break, it is called a Dungeon Break and it can be considered a natural disaster. A monster horde with be released from the dungeon, including all the floor bosses and sub-bosses. The horde will go on a rampage, destroying everything, until they are killed. There are signs of when a dungeon is close to breaking, and the Loka Dungeon is not considered a threat of breaking at the moment. But that could change at any time as its life span is random.

Val activated his [Mana eyes] at a passive level, which he had learned to do over the last few days. This allowed him to keep them active for an extended amount of time with less strain on his eyes, but he could not focus on anything. This meant that he would be able to notice any mana signals but would not be able to determine what anything he was seeing was (To be able to picture it, it would be like not being able to see the outline of anything, so everything you see is merged together, only the mana particles which are seen as colors are in focus. It is similar to a blurry photo or a photo severely out of focus. If you still can't imagine it, let me know in the comments and I will try and describe it in more detail).

When Val looked around with his eyes he noticed that everything around him had a slight trace of spatial mana surrounding it.