CHAPTER 15: Salamander Dungeon

Soon after everyone started drinking, almost the whole familia was drunk, except Ais, Lefiya and Aiden, who were drinking juice.

Bete soon got drunk and started making fun of Bell. And Aiden realized that Bete had noticed Bell when he was drunk and was making fun of him on purpose.

Bell ran out of the pub after Bete made fun of him.

Aiden didn't care too much, instead he waited for the food to arrive and when it did everyone was surprised at the amount of food Aiden ate.

"Where does all that food go with that body?"

"Hey, Aiden, how about an eating contest?" Raul said.

"Hey Raul isn't it a bit unfair he already ate 3 plates." Anakitty said.

"I don't mind. Let's do this." Aiden accepted and then it was decided to have an eating contest with a few more people from the pub and the familia.

"3, 2, 1 Start!" 

With the signal, everyone started eating.

"Where's all that food going?!"

"Does he have a hollow in his body or something!"

People around were watching in amazement and astonishment as Aiden ate everything on the plates one after the other in the eating contest.

By the 3rd plate, there were already some people who were being eliminated and as the plates increased, so did the number of losers. Some were trying to soften the food with drinks, some were trying to prevent the feeling of satiety by eating fast, some were using their own methods, but it was not working, Aiden continued to eat fast and with appetite.

.

.

.

"The Winner is Aiden Kurogane!!" 

After everyone but Aiden gave up and Aiden ate more than anyone else, Aiden won and the cost of all the food was split between the losers.

The celebration continued until after midnight, after which Loki familia returned home in full drunkenness.

Afterwards, everyone in Familia went back to their rooms, but Aiden meditated in his room for a while, but he still couldn't meditate fully, which seemed strange to him, but he was patient and tried to sit in the Lotus position and meditate until morning, and just as he was feeling something, the sun came up and the sunlight on Aiden's face distracted him and he opened his eyes.

"At least that's something. Whatever, well, today's special goal is to use these dungeon keys." Aiden said while looking at the dungeon keys in his hand.

[Name: Salamander Forest Dungeon Key]

[Rarity: C]

[Type: Key]

[A Key that allows you to create an Dungeon. You may use it in Orario Dungeon]

[Name: Poison Forest Dungeon Key]

[Rarity: C]

[Type: Key]

[A Key that allows you to create an Dungeon. You may use it in Orario Dungeon]

"With these two dungeons, I hope I can use the body cleansing method after these dungeons."

Aiden first spoke to Finn, Gareth and Riveria, and then after breakfast he went to the Hostess of Fertility and then to the dungeon.

Aiden first used the dungeon key for the salamander forest and after going through the transparent portal, the surroundings changed completely.

Aiden was in the middle of a beautiful forest and there was no road anywhere.

[You've entered the Salamander Forest Dungeon]

[You can not exit the dungeon. Please defeat the boss or find the Hearthstone]

"I have to find a road." Aiden said and ran towards the nearest tree and when he climbed up the tree and almost reached the top, he looked around and saw smoke rising from several places.

"They say there is no smoke where there is no fire, so there is fire there." Aiden said and sprinted through the forest towards the smoke he saw closest.

When Aiden was moving towards the smoke, he got there faster than he expected because the smoke was also moving towards Aiden, after all, fire cannot stay where it is in the forest.

"Cough! Cough! Ugh! It's hard to breath in smoke." Aiden said.

Aiden looked around and saw who had caused the fire.

"Finally fire Salamanders!" Aiden said with a happy face.

Aiden first observed the number of salamanders and then put on his gloves and covered himself with mana. He focused most of the mana on his hands.

"Huu... I guess I can start now. [Dash] and [Body Strenghtening]." The mana surrounding Aiden's body changed from blue to red as soon as he used the body strengthening skill.

[Skill [Dash] Leveled Up]

'Finally.' Aiden thought when he saw the skill leveled up.

Aiden quickly came out from behind the tree and went to the nearest salamander. He took a sword from his inventory and...

*Slash!

Aiden cut off the salamander's head in one move, but when he looked at the sword, he realized that it was dulling even though he was using it for the first time.

"The body of these things is so hot that when I cut their heads off with a sword, the sword starts to dull and its durability drops a lot. Even though the sword is E rank, I didn't think it would dull so fast." Aiden said.

Seeing the death of the salamander, the others quickly came to Aiden, and these salamanders were now completely covered in fire, even spreading it around.

'Hm... I wonder if this works.' Aiden thought about it and then started running fast. As he ran, he picked up a few small/medium sized stones from the ground. Then Aiden ran to the next nearest smoky place with the salamanders following him. Whenever the salamanders slowed down in their pursuit, Aiden threw a stone at them, angered them and made them come after him.

When another salamander came to the place, Aiden again killed 1 of them and sent the others after him.

Continuing in this way, Aiden gathered all the salamanders in the 5 salamander territories into one place, except for the biggest one.

When Aiden came to a large field, he stopped and looked at the dozens of salamanders following him.

"Not yet... Not yet... Not yet... Now! [Hour Of The Genius]!"

As Aiden used the skill, the Golden Clocks reappeared and stopped. With the clocks stopped, the Salamanders coming at Aiden slowed down almost to a standstill.

'Good.' Aiden said with a smile.

With time almost stopped, Aiden drew his sword and killed all the salamanders in what seemed like an instant from the outside.

Then Aiden collected the fallen ones, as he had done with the Salamanders he had killed before. All Salamanders had the same item.

[You've acquired the [Orb Of Fire] item.]

[You've acquired the [Orb Of Fire] item.]

[You've acquired the [Orb Of Fire] item.]

.

.

.

"I think only the boss is left." Aiden said and went to the place with the largest burnt area between them. There were a few more salamanders around and in the middle of them was a bigger salamander that was burning with a blue flame unlike the others.

Aiden then looked at the remaining time of his skill and saw that there were two and a half minutes left.

"That should be enough." Aiden said because if he turned off the skill now and went into the fight he would suffer a heavy loss of hp and pain and that would not be good in a fight.

Aiden quickly killed the salamanders near the Salamander Boss and quickly attacked the boss, but he couldn't even get close to the boss because the heat around the boss was incredible.

Aiden tried to attack by throwing the sword, but as soon as it touched the boss's body, it started to melt.

[Mutated Salamander Boss]

[Rank: B+]

"Why do I have such bad luck even though I got Luck skill!" Aiden said.

Since Aiden couldn't get close, he thought of another solution and immediately took a bow and arrows from his inventory.

'Normal arrows won't be affective against it but I hope this works.' Aiden thought. 

Aiden aimed at the boss with the bow and infused his shadow mana into the arrow.

"Now [Snipe]."

A translucent scope appeared in front of Aiden's eyes.

After a perfect aim, Aiden let go of the arrow and it quickly went to the boss.

*Stab!

*Grrrrraaaahhhh!!!

As the arrow traveled, the shadow mana around it began to absorb the flames around the boss and it stabbed the boss.

Seeing the arrow sticking, Aiden quickly left his place and climbed up another tree a little further away, this time firing arrows infused with shadow mana one after the other.

Aiden knew he had to take down the boss in time, so he used almost all his arrows and made sure to hit the boss especially in the mouth.

*Booommm!!!

The boss's flames continued to scorch the surroundings as the arrows pierced.

The first thing Aiden did when he realized he was out of arrows was to look at the duration of the skill and he was shocked.

[15]

[14]

"Holy! No more arrows, then I'll have to be creative."

Aiden took out a spear from his inventory and added shadow mana to it, then used the Bow to throw the spear, but he didn't stop there and quickly ran to another tree, grabbed another spear, and while injecting shadow mana into the spear, he jumped as high as he could from another tree and threw the spear with all his might at the boss.

*Raaaagggghhhhrrrr!!!

*Boooommmm!!

Two spears hit the boss's head at the same time and suddenly the two shadow mana touch each other and they grow and shrink again, but when they shrink the boss's head is gone.

[Notice!]

[One of the hidden pieces about shadow mana has been unraveled.]

Aiden picks up the item dropped from the boss before checking the system message.

[You've acquired the [Mutated Orb Of Fire] item.]

[Name: Shadow Mana]

[Rank: Special] (Depends on the user)

[Description: Second Mana.]

[Effect (passive): Predation: Shadow mana eats and strengthens any counter-energy it comes into contact with.]

[Effect (passive): Black Hole: When two sources of shadow mana come into contact, they create a gravitational collapse effect. This causes the shadow mana to grow and shrink, creating a destructive force that can erase anything caught within its radius.]

"So this shadow mana explodes when it comes into contact with pure mana, and if it comes into contact with itself it creates a black hole." Aiden said but then...

"Ugh!!!! Arrrgghhhh!!!!!" As the time ran out, an excruciating pain shot through Aiden's body. Veins started to protrude from the bottom of his face towards his left eye, some blood flowed out of his left eye and the sclera of his left eye turned completely red and Aiden vomited blood.

[The skill [Hour Of The Genius] deactivated.]

[Used time: 5.00 minutes]

[Backlash: Loss of 50% Hp.]

As the pain subsided, Aiden realized something worse.

"M-My left eye... I can't see. My left eye can't see a thing."

================================

Sorry readers I got exams so I couldn't write. I also started rereading danmachi and the Sword Oratoria series so I don't miss anything.

Dear Readers I'm actually posting a patreon link. I publish the novel for free, whether donations are made or not, but it takes a really long time and effort to write, and in return for this time and effort, I expect donations from those who can at least, after all, I have to survive.

Here is a Discord server link for you.

https://discord.gg/WqSpSasytA

I would also appreciate if you support me on Pat*eon. Writing takes quite a bit of time and that's all I do outside of school, so if you support me on pat*eon it will help me a lot.

Join my Pat*eon https://www.pat*eon.com/DEADLY_SHADOW

Thank you to my Patreons

Emilio Gonzalez