Crossing The Third Line

At around 6 a.m., Ais, Isaac and Tiona found themselves back in the dungeon, right in front of a staircase leading to the 33rd floor. While the two girls couldn't hide their slight frowns at the thought of having to enter the Haunted Halls again, as most monsters there were anything but a lovely sight, they had been there so many times that they had grown mostly numb to the experience. As for Isaac? He only showed a small smirk of excitement while anticipating all of the research that he would be able to perform here.

The 33rd floor was also known as the 'Third Line', because this was the place where most adventurers managed to obtain the rights to rank up to Level 4. Well, thanks to maxing out his stats at every Level so far, Isaac would at least have to pass another ten floors to even get close to ranking up again himself. By now, all of the benchmarks that regular adventurers had set had completely lost their meaning to him. Nonetheless, it still made it easier to compare himself to the average person - not that he did that often.

As mentioned before, this thematic zone stretched all the way to the 36th floor and looked just like a necromancer's lair. Confusing hallways and the familiar labyrinthian structure had returned. Only every now and then would there be larger caverns and mausoleums, or even massive caves that were at least a few hundred meters high. Some of them contained graveyards with blank gravestones, while the graves in front of them had undead monsters crawling out of them. Honestly, all this did was provide shock value, as the monsters were a lot easier to kill while they were still partially stuck in the ground and not fully aware of their surroundings.

On these four floors, Isaac encountered and fully researched seven different species in total. Three of these were the most numerous, and also the reason as to why this thematic zone had obtained its name.

The weakest of these undead species were the Skeleton Soldiers. They were about as tall as an average human and looked just like one would expect the vast majority of a necromancer's army to look like - skeletons made of quite resilient bones with a blue glow haunting their empty eye sockets. They could be found wearing many different kinds of armours and weapons, which were mostly tattered beyond recognition, and almost none of the skeletons were exactly the same. It was speculated that adventurers who died on these floors would join them in their ranks, as quite often, Skeleton Soldiers who wore the exact clothes and wielded the same weapons as those who had recently gone missing in these halls had been encountered. Still, that didn't really matter. In essence, they were all just reanimated skeletons that were only capable of relatively clumsy movements. They made up for this with their overwhelming numbers, though. None of the groups that Isaac came across had less than 40 members. The stats that they were the most proficient in varied from skeleton to skeleton, but none of them managed to surpass D-575 / 6350.

Also about the height of an average human were the Zombies who really didn't need too much of an introduction. After all, they were exactly what one would expect - rotting bodies that still managed to stumble towards their opponents with bloodlust all over their faces. No matter how grievous the wound, unless one managed to destroy both their brains and non-beating hearts, they couldn't be killed. Well, unless one made use of every monster's weakness, which was their magic stone, but that would be wasteful and should only be done in emergencies. Zombies were quite slow, so most adventurers thought of them as simple 'walking bags of excelia' that they could harvest anytime that they wanted to, once they got over the horror and disgust. Still, if one of them managed to get too close to their prey, then they could easily rip it apart with their Strength, which could reach up to C-600 / 6450. Just like their entirely boney 'friends', they also appeared in huge groups, composed of at least 30 individuals.

Third and last on the list of undead monster species were the Ghouls. They were also humanoid in nature and their height could reach around three meters when they stood on their legs. Usually, they would walk on all fours and propel themselves forward using the strength in their arms as well. They had grey dead skin, very small black eyes and no hair on their bodies whatsoever. Their mouths were almost unreasonably large, taking up at least a third of their heads, and were filled with sharp fangs and a long snake-like tongue. Both their claws and teeth could secrete poison, which, coupled with their extreme speed, could easily take their enemies off-guard. Usually, they hunted in packs of at least 15 and were capable of employing a few different formations and tactics, making it even more difficult for their prey to escape. To be fair, it was unknown whether they were actually undead or not - they were just assumed to be, as none of them had ever been discovered to have a heartbeat. Their Agility could reach up to C-650 / 6650 and by killing them, Isaac finally gained very small amounts of excelia again. It wasn't much, but it was better than nothing.

Ogres were up to five meters in height and, yet again, humanoid in nature. They either wielded huge stone clubs or any large weapons that adventurers had left behind in these halls, although the latter was a lot rarer, as most people that could make it here would make doubly sure that their party was more than sufficiently prepared to take on all potential dangers that they could come across. Only during the times when these floors had first been explored did a lot of people die here. The Ogres had blocky faces with unrefined features and sported huge tusks. Aside from those and their bones, they seemed to mostly consist of muscles, which their green-grey skin could barely contain. They had an even better recovery ability than Trolls and unless their vitals were attacked, any wounds would heal in a matter of minutes. Normally, they roamed the halls in groups of twelve and were quite adept at working together. Sometimes, multiple of such groups banded together to form a tribe of hundreds of individuals, which were a true nightmare to encounter for most parties. Both their Strength and Endurance could reach up to B-700 / 6850, which enabled Isaac to gain more than just a handful of excelia from them. His growth slowly started to return to the speed he had showcased before he had ranked up. What made him rejoice even more was that thanks to their astonishing regenerative abilities, he didn't need more than a single group of them to fully research their species. Their abilities were in no way comparable to Mermaid Blood, but they were far more numerous… which wasn't a good enough reason for him to pursue mediocrity.

The hardest to notice amongst the monster species populating these floors were the Gargoyles, which were mostly made up of ash-coloured rocks. They could be up to four meters in height, had dark-red eyes and usually appeared in groups of ten. The huge wings on their backs could only really be made use of in bigger rooms, as anywhere else, due to the limited space, they would be more of a hindrance instead. For monsters as tall as them, these halls felt very cramped, so they usually didn't give chase once their prey left the rooms that they spawned in. Besides a heart, they had no internal organs at all, but even that weakness of theirs wasn't easily attacked. Their Endurance could reach up to B-750 / 7050 and coupled with their sturdy bodies, harming them was easier said than done, unless a weapon of sufficient quality or an offensive mage was around. Besides their peculiar physical bodies, they had no special abilities, but that didn't mean that they had no tricks up their sleeves. Usually, they engaged their enemies by ambushing them, which was remarkably effective. Quite large parts of these floors were made of the same material as their bodies, and there were a lot of statues of all kinds of beings and monsters scattered around. By hiding amongst those, they could take their enemies by surprise.

Only in the largest of rooms in the Haunted Halls could the last two species be encountered, the first of which were the Gryphons. They needed such an environment to make use of their wings and superior mobility. While they were 'only' three meters long and about as tall as the average person when they stood on all four legs, they were still dangerous opponents. More than half of a Gryphon's body was that of a golden-furred lion, while its head, wings and front feet were those of an eagle. This, in and of itself, wouldn't be that scary, as dispatching regular lions and eagles wasn't even a challenge for most stronger Level 1 adventurers. What made Gryphons so terrifying to face were both their extreme speed… and that all of their stats - aside from Magic - were equally as high, fixed at B-775 / 7150.

By far the most dangerous monsters on these floors, however, were the Hippogriffs. They appeared alongside Gryphons and didn't look all too different. Instead of a lion's body, they had a white horse's. Compared to their distant relatives, they looked less ferocious and more regal and imposing. All of their stats were even higher, at A-800 / 7250, even Magic was included this time. They were capable of using wind Magic and wind enchant type Magic to either attack their enemies by throwing blades made of air at them or to massively boost their speed. On the surface level, they seemed reminiscent of Ais. Still, as always, Isaac didn't show the beautiful beasts any mercy. Even without making use of his Anemoi Steps, he could easily weave through their rapid attacks, staying completely untouched. Although the Hippogriffs' air blades were invisible, they could still be detected, as when one looked right at them, there would be a slight distortive effect applied to everything they were currently in front of. It was an incredibly minor detail that most adventurers were wholly incapable of noticing, especially because the wind blades moved extremely quickly, but for Isaac, it wasn't too difficult.

In his old world, both Gryphons and Hippogriffs were said to guard treasures, but in the dungeon, there was nothing of value to find in the rooms that they built their nests in. That was… mildly disappointing, to say the least. Thankfully, he wasn't completely delusional and hadn't expected anything in the first place, so he didn't get too annoyed.

When continuing to the 37th floor, the staircase led them straight into an unfamiliar palace, which was exactly what Isaac had hoped for. There was always the possibility that an entirely unknown Monster Rex resided here, although that wasn't very likely. While he wasn't sure whether he would survive an encounter with such a floor boss, especially this deep into the dungeon, wasn't that what his two lovely bodyguards were here for? There was nothing to fear.

Up to now, he had yet to even attempt to fight the Goliath, the very first Monster Rex of the dungeon. Speaking of, it should be respawning in six days… so he should pay it a visit when it finally did. He was more than confident in being able to kill it, albeit by using a suboptimal strategy. Maybe he would have enough time to finish his preparations for his third custom Magic before then, which would make it a lot less annoying of a battle, but he highly doubted it.

Fortunately, the group wasn't as unlucky as to stumble across an as-of-yet undiscovered Monster Rex in the very first unexplored palace that they entered. Because of that, the only challenges that this floor provided were the various mausoleums which required a specific number of monsters to be slain before they could advance.

Amusingly enough, however, some of the groups of monsters that Isaac encountered in between those 'challenges' were actually bigger in number and therefore harder to deal with than the ones that he had to fight in the enclosed rooms. For regular adventurers, the mausoleums were death traps, but unless every single cubic meter in there was filled to the brim with enemies, he could still stroll through the place as if it was his own backyard. The less space there was, the harder it was for his enemies to move, while he was only slightly inconvenienced.

Eight different monster species spawned on this floor, replacing the ones from before. The weakest of them all were the Skull Sheep, which were 1.4 meter long sheep skeleton monsters. They had dark skin draped over their bodies starting from the backs of their heads, which made it hard to predict their attacks and made them seem as if they were just skulls hovering in the empty air if one didn't look closely. As it was naturally quite dark on this floor, the sheep could easily camouflage themselves. They could shoot bone stakes at their opponents as well and usually gathered in groups of ten or more, attacking all at once. Their stats were heavily leaning towards Agility, which was all the way at A-825 / 7350.

Next in line were the Loup Garous, whose height was very… diminutive. They only reached up to 1.3 meters and had muscular, humanoid bodies with a wolf head. Groups of them had made it to the surface in the past before Babel was used to seal the dungeon, and they had attacked villages on moonlit nights. They were the main reason as to why Werewolves got a bad reputation, as to a terrified, ignorant farmer, both of them would seem one and the same. On the 37th floor, they roamed around in groups of multiple hundreds and used white bone knives or cudgels to fight, perfectly showcasing their Dexterity and Agility, which both were at A-850 / 7450.

Obsidian Soldiers were monsters with a weirdly shaped obsidian body made of solidified lava. They had a single purple light in their heads, resembling an eye, and were quite slow compared to the other monster species. To make up for this, up to twenty of them would follow other groups of monsters around, waiting for those that they followed to engage an enemy and hold them back long enough for them to join the fray. Whenever expedition parties tried to force their way through this floor, they didn't rely on their mages too much, as the Obsidian Soldiers amongst the incoming monster waves were extremely resistant to magical attacks. They could even shield other monsters from them, to an extent. Once they finally made it to their enemies' sides, their high Strength allowed them to pummel them easily, although it was still slightly less than their Endurance, which capped at A-875 / 7550.

There was also a stronger version of the Lizardmen, the Lizardman Elites. Yes, it was a very ingenious name that made Isaac frown more than once after he heard it, but at the least it got the point across. They had blue scales that were extremely resilient, and often wielded crude bone weapons although they weren't actually proficient with them. When it came down to it, they almost always threw them away and relied on their claws and teeth to tear into their enemies. Some amongst their numbers were even able to attack with small fire breaths, but it was quite rare, only one or two amongst their usual groups of 50 would be capable of it - and they would usually be their leader. While their Endurance lagged behind it slightly, their Strength was all the way at S-900 / 7650.

If this had been a game, Isaac would have long since complained about all the 'reskins'. This notion just grew stronger when he encountered the first Barbarians. No, they weren't actually humans, like their names implied. Instead, they were similar to the Minotaurs from quite early on in the dungeon. They were at least two meters tall and had two large and curved horns, black skin, red hair and yellow eyes. There were no surprises, they simply relied on their physical might to crush their opponents - both their Strength and Endurance could reach up to S-925 / 7750.

Although the Spartoi were amongst the most numerous, they also made it into the ranks of the strongest monsters that could be encountered here. They were improved skeleton monsters that spawned with weapons and lances made of bones, and kite shield-like protectors. Contrary to many other monsters, they actually knew how to use their tools of slaughter, especially well even. They could use actual military formations and the bigger their group, the more terrifying the danger that they posed. Fighting less of ten of them felt like fighting a party of veteran adventurers, while any more than that made them feel like an overwhelming battalion. With Isaac's prediction skills, they weren't able to threaten him or to push him into a corner, but for anyone else, fighting a huge group of them solo while at the same Level was basically suicide. Both the Spartoi's Strength and Agility were at S-950 / 7850.

'Lambton' was the nickname that adventurers gave to the Worm Wells - and Isaac couldn't really figure out why. What did 'Lambton' even mean? The only two relatively likely possibilities that he could come up with were that it was the name of one of the first discoverers or victims of the beasts, or that it was literally meant to signify that they could eat a ton's worth of lamb. The latter of which would honestly just be stupid, but it wouldn't even surprise him at this point. Oh well, anyway, that wasn't really of importance. They were relatively rare giant snake monsters that were five meters thick and more than ten meters long with blue skin and three sets of amber eyes. The closer one got to their tip, the sharper their heads got, but their mouths were still capable of swallowing a couple of adventurers whole. On the top half of their mouths, there were 18 holes which they used to sense heat, vibrations, et cetera. If those were damaged, they found it really hard to navigate, as they were accustomed to using both their eyes and these holes at the same time.

Although they were rare, Isaac was lucky this time. As they could move between floors by burrowing into the dungeon's walls, they often moved to the Haunted Halls as well, which was where he encountered a few of them. Usually, because their stats were so much higher than the monsters there - both their Strength and Agility could reach up to S-975 / 7950 - they would wipe out any parties that they came across. Well, not this time. Only rarely would any of them burrow down any further, as the temperatures there were too hot for them to be comfortable. The reason why Isaac hadn't included them in his list of Haunted Halls monsters was because while they could make it to these floors, they didn't spawn there, ever. At least according to his bodyguards.

Lastly there were the Peludas, dark green dragon monsters with 20 meter long, snake-like bodies and four legs. They resembled porcupines, as there were lots of poisonous needles on their backs, which they could fire at their enemies. Even Abnormal Resistance, if not of a high enough grade, couldn't defend against the poison's effect. That wasn't the only dangerous part about them, though. They could also stand on walls and breathe fire, the latter being a trademark of almost all dragons so it wasn't really a surprise. While they kept to themselves and wandered the palaces alone, they weren't actually rare, so if an adventurer was unlucky enough to stumble into multiple of them before finishing the earlier ones off, fighting a whole group of them wasn't impossible. Every single one of their stats was at SS-1000 / 8050.

By the time that Isaac was ready to move on to the next thematic zone, it was around 8:30 a.m., so only about two and a half hours had passed. Although his gathered excelia hadn't soared through the roof, most of his Level 3 stats would still be at more than 300 should he choose to update. Still, because of his Divine Being Skill, he most likely wouldn't even have a need to do so before maxing out his stats for this Level. Even now, if he went all out, he would already be strong enough to kill the strongest Level 4 monsters that had been found so far.

-----

With a last, defiant roar, a Minotaur collapsed to the floor, its body devoid of life. Seconds later, another two THUDs could be heard. This time, however, their sources weren't carcasses, but Kalin and Mina, who were very much still alive. They were resting while leaning against the wall and breathing heavily, but there were wide smiles on their faces.

All of the surrounding monsters were temporarily being taken care of by Aselina and Averin, while Jakk was off protecting Quinn who was still trying his hardest to catch up, growing stronger on some of the upper floors.

It had taken Kalin and Mina everything they had to bring down this Minotaur. Such a feat was impressive, to say the least, as the beast had about double their stats, which was seen as a completely 'impossible' battle in the eyes of this world's inhabitants. Only some of Kalin and Mina's stats had reached A. Before Isaac's appearance, it was simply unheard of for anyone to beat a Level 2 monster without at the very least getting most of their Level 1 stats to S… and having a full party to support them.

Admittedly, if the two had faced some other Level 2 monster, their fight might have gone differently, they might have actually died. Thankfully, Minotaurs weren't exactly known for their speed. Still, it couldn't be considered their weakness either, especially because they were still faster than the two of them.

Only by confusing the mindless beast by alternating their attacks and juggling its aggro did they slowly manage to whittle it down over the course of multiple minutes. Their training bore fruit, as it enabled them to predict quite a few of its attacks. If not for that, they wouldn't have been able to last nearly as long as they had needed to.

Both Kalin and Mina had long gotten the qualifications to rank up to Level 2, even far before fighting the Minotaur, but they decided against it, choosing instead to follow Isaac's example and to try to gain as many stats as possible before advancing. While they would, most likely, not be able to max all of them, they at least wanted to be able to say that they had tried their hardest. The easy and mainstream way might be tempting, but it would leave them with many regrets. Slaying Minotaurs was currently their only way to still gain significant amounts of excelia, which was why they attempted it today, but only after a lot of preparations and consulting their teacher about the monsters' attack patterns.

A few minutes of rest later, Mina rose to her feet and reached out a hand to pull up Kalin as well.

"Ready for the next one?"

Seeing the confident smirk on her lips, Kalin couldn't help but laugh and nod. As both of them had grown to be about equal, a kind of friendly rivalry had formed between them long ago. Neither of them would slow down while the other one still kept going.

"I thought you'd never ask."

It only took about ten minutes for yet another Minotaur corpse to hit the floor. If she had borne witness to such a feat before meeting Isaac, then Aselina would have been shocked out of her mind, but now, she was only impressed. At the same time, she couldn't help but look forward to her own future exploits.

The spectating Tabitha and Suicia, however, weren't as indifferent as her. Although they had seen the students perform quite amazingly before, it had still been in the realm of what they thought to be reasonable. Only now did they truly realize just how outstanding they had actually become. A cold shiver ran down their spines.

"Facing Minotaurs at their Level? They're mad."

Their initial thoughts were along these lines. They had thought that the two would have to be saved by their stronger companions, but very quickly, their worried whispers were replaced by astonished silence.

Only after the fifth Minotaur was slain did Tabitha snap out of her disbelief.

"... I haven't felt so wanting in a long time. I'll apply for a few days of leave to gain more excelia once we get back, will you join me?"

At her friend's inquiry, Suicia nodded slightly.

"Right now, we're understaffed, so the Captain won't allow it. But in a few days, once the Vice-Captain's group returns, we should be good to go."

Even though the two were conversing with each other, they still paid close attention to their surroundings and the targets of their protective services. They gave their best.

But it wasn't good enough.

Just slightly outside of their range of perception, a figure clad in a black robe was hiding in the darkness. Their face was hidden behind a veil and only their eyes were exposed. Judging from how they could stay hidden even around two relatively strong Level 3 adventurers and still managed to observe the students from so far away, they had to be at least Level 3 as well.

After making sure that their eyes weren't playing tricks on them, the figure furrowed their eyebrows tightly. With a deep, masculine voice, the unknown man whispered to himself.

"It is just as we were told, they have too much potential. I need to report back as soon as possible, they need to be nipped in the bud."

Without anyone noticing his presence, the man slipped away even further into the darkness and quickly followed a certain path, until he finally reached a familiar spot. After making doubly sure that nobody was around, he reached out to a hidden lever disguised as a part of the dungeon's wall, opening a secret door that led to a manmade labyrinth.