Chapter 35: Dark Knight

"So this is the 9th floor... I'm not able to feel a hint of life from anywhere ahead of us with deprehendre." John muttered.

They had entered the 9th floor after Ariel had defeated the boss. Even John didn't see that Wind Spear coming, and from the looks of it, Serena has also developed a similar spell.

"Concept magic is so fun to learn, once you completely understand an element, you can create different forms of a spell with it. But it takes training, dedication and magic power which the 3 of us are fortunate to have." John said.

"Yeah, yeah, don't forget the knowledge, which is something only you have. Sometimes I wish I could see what goes on inside of your head." Serena said.

"Haha... I wish you wouldn't do that, Mind reading magic doesn't exist, right?" John asked.

"It does, Most royals have at least one servant who can use it, however, you have to be thinking of it out loud for them to be able to read it. In other words, they can't just read your concepts but they can make it so you think of them and they can read that." Said Serena.

"Then that means... That king could have used it on me... No wonder he tried to kidnap me..." John muttered.

"Did you just say, king!?" Asked Serena

"Yeah, he wanted John to work for him, so we left," Ariel said.

Wow, she just made that seem a lot simpler than I could imagine with no effort.

"Wow, I can imagine that... But how were you able to get away?" Serena asked.

"Like this, Furtim," John said.

"Oh, I see... Yeah, I suppose that would work." Serena said.

"But that won't work against those guys," John said as he pointed at the piece of armour that laid on the floor.

"Why not?" Serena asked.

They had been walking for a while, and they finally encountered the first monster.

"That is... I'm not sure, I didn't test it out since Rose was with us back then. But I have a feeling they can feel us even through Furtim. Let's find out." John said.

The two girls nodded, and they quietly walked passed the armour.

"It worke-?"

Before Serena could finish, another Armour which was behind her got up and swung its sword at her. Seeing this, John pulled her towards him and it missed her.

"Looks like it won't work. What sucks, even more, is we're going to have to physically break the armour, magic won't be very effective. What the hell is wrong with this dungeon, why is magic becoming less effective over the floors!?" John asked.

"T-Thank you," Said Serena as she moved away from John, with slightly reddened cheeks.

'Hm... Why does she look embarrassed?' John wondered.

They were surrounded, 2 armours were blocking where they came from and 2 armours blocking their path forward.

"Tch, I'll handle the two at the back, you handle the two at the front," John said.

"Yes!" They replied.

John lept at the two Unanimated Armours blocking their return route and diagonally swung at one of them with his right dagger, he had already activated magic strengthening and supplied mana to his dagger so his swing would have been hard to parry.

Instead of parrying them, John ended up cutting through the gaps within their armour. But thanks to that, he got to see where their core was.

It took that moment to swing at John while he was still in the air. Without any way to dodge, John cast.

"Velox"

And propelled himself backwards, barely avoiding its swing. As John was sent back, before he bumped into Ariel and Serena, he cast Velox again, mid air and propelled himself back to the armour who missed its swing at him.

John used his momentum to pierce the middle of its chest-plate with his left dagger and muttered.

"ignis iecit"

In that moment, a ball of flame which was formed from John's magic travelled through the tip of the sword to the inside of the armour and hit the core directly.

After that, the core of the Unanimated Armour broke, and the armour broke down to just pieces of good looking armour.

While John's dagger was still stuck inside of the broken armour, the other armour beside it swung its sword at him. It wasn't fast, but it looked like it could hit hard. John dodged it by stepping back to Ariel and Serena's side to see how they were doing.

"How's it going on your end?" John asked as he forcefully separated his dagger from the broken chest plate.

"It's resistant to ignis and Ventus... I don't want to waste energy using higher-level spells... Any idea on how to beat them?" Serena asked.

"Yeah, the armour is resistant, but the core isn't if you can find a way to get the spell through the gap."

"Where's the core?" Ariel asked.

"In the middle of the chest-plate," John replied.

"Leave it to me," Serena said before casting a new fire spell.

10... No, 15 Fire arrows were formed in front of the two girls and with a flick of the staff, they showed down on the armour. Most arrows were deflected by their armour, however, thanks to the angles some managed to get in through the gaps and pierced the core..

With just one hit to the core, it ended up breaking, and both armours broke down

"That's pretty strong. Is that one of the spells you came up with during those 7 days?" John asked.

"More like, the only one, aside from Ariel's Combo Move," Serena replied

"Oh yeah, the one you used against me. That was really strong." John said.

"Wasn't it!? Was that all of them?" Serena asked.

"No, there's still one more," John said as he pointed at the one watching them.

"Why isn't it moving? Is it scared?" Serena asked

"No, I just happened to cast, gravitas on it, ahead of time so I could take care of the other one first," John said.

"How can you say these things so casually? And why didn't you just cast' Gravitas on both?" Serena asked.

"It takes a lot of energy to use it on even just one object, imagine using it on two," John replied.

"Fair enough, aren't you going to finish it?" Serena asked.

"Right," John said as he walked towards it.

He increased the amount of magic being supplied to his blade, around 3x more than usual, and swung his blade horizontally at it.

Before his blade hit, he muttered "Tonde flamma"

In a swift motion, as if it were cutting through butter, John's blade cut the armour vertically in half. There was a burn effect remaining on the area where the armour had been cut, thanks to his spell

"J-John... What was that? You just cut through a special type of armour which is resistant to offensive magic..." Serena asked while trying to hide her shock.

"This ore is a good thermal conductor, so when we were training, I tried increasing the temperature of the blade by mixing it with Ignis, thanks I was able to cut through things a lot easier than before." Answered John.

"C-Conductor?" Muttered Ariel with a confused expression.

"W-Well... I'll teach you two when we get back..." John replied.

'Should I have not used it?' He wondered.

The two silently nodded and moved on. Their reaction was a bit weird.

***

They moved through the floor, either running past the armours or engaging them in fights in cases where they weren't able to get through and wasted a moderate amount of energy.

Finally, they reached the boss's room after another hour of taking the wrong turns and reaching a dead-end.

"Why are these dungeons designed as mazes? Why!?" John shouted as he punched the ground.

When they reached the door entrance, their adrenaline ran out and all the hunger we had been holding back came crashing down at once. So they decided to have their very first meal in a while.

"Mn! This is really good! John, who taught you how to cook?" Serena asked.

They were eating a packed lunch of sandwiches, which he had made before they entered the dungeon. He had made around 20 boxes so it should be able to last them 5 days, if they ration it, it will last longer. John knew that just eating sandwiches isn't healthy, so he added chicken to some of them and rice balls.

"Life experience," John said with a hollow expression.

"Wha-?"

Before Ariel could finish, John repeated "Life experience."

"O-Okay..." Serena muttered.

The sandwiches were made with butter and ham. John was really surprised when they didn't know what cheese was, but that's fine. If he ever became a merchant, he'll create ingredients and dishes they've never heard about.

John knew how to process cheese thanks to all the tutorials he watched online. John was also a decent cook because his uncle would teach him and tell him that cooking is something one should learn from a young age.

Although John wasn't as good as modern-day chefs, he knew how to make sauces and omelette rice or tuna rice. On second thought, John might not become a cook, but he still knew how to make Sauces and cheese. If he couldn sell them, he should be able to make good revenue.

"John, what are you thinking about? You have the creepy-looking grin on your face... Could it be? Puberty's finally catching up to you? Are you starting to show interest in that?" Serena said as she teased him.

"Funny coming from someone who clearly hasn't shown any signs of development despite going through puberty," John said with an annoyed expression.

"W-What did you just say! I'm still growing!" Said Serena with an annoyed expression.

"I know, It was a joke," John said as he chuckled.

Having fun like this, Tends to make them feel less nervous before they head in to fight the boss, John was sure that's the case.

"Is everyone ready?" John said as he placed my hands on the door.

"Yeah, Let's go." Said Ariel.

Serena remained quiet, it looked like she was still mad about that joke earlier.

"Well, then. Stick to the formation." John said as he opened the door.

The doors opened, and inside stood a single figure. The Darkness and bloodthirsty being emanated from that single Armoured being was insane, It was even stronger than the spider queens.

"Is this the 9th floor?" John asked as he walked in.

"That's!?" Serena said.

"Serena, do you recognise that?" John asked.

In the middle of the boss room stood a being who wore armour which covered its entire body. Its hands were pure skeleton, and its helmet covered its face. They could only see its bright red eyes through the helmet.

It wore a purple robe and carried a sheath containing a long sword on its back. With deprehendre, John couldn't feel an ounce of life coming from it.

"That's... A dark knight... An undead formed from the deep hate of a knight before he dies. Its strength is on par with A-Rank monsters, It doesn't die no matter how many times you kill it, and it is definitely stronger than that spider on the 10th floor." Serena replied.

"So what's it doing here?" John asked.

"While it's strength is high, it's considered a B-Class monster. Despite being immortal, since it's extremely disadvantageous against priests, after they have been killed, before they can resurrect themselves, a priest can purify it, So their immortality won't work." Said Serena.

But in their case...

"Do you get it? He's the worst enemy for us, a party who doesn't have a single mage who can use the holy element..." Serena continued.

"Crap... I never expected us to meet an undead this soon. Well, I guess the armours are undead... Looks like we're in trouble." John said as he tried to hide his worry.

"Now isn't the time to play around, Even if we beat him, he'll just keep coming back..." Serena said.

"Do we retreat?" Ariel asked.

"I'll think of something, For now, let's-"

Before John could finish, The Knight stretched out its arms and cast a Fire orb at them. The orb was Small, but John could tell it was dangerous..

"Glacies" he muttered.

The size of the Ice spike was twice the amount than usual. John aimed at the orb and propelled it towards it before the orb hit them. The orb was fast, but the room was big so he had enough time to counter.

Steam was formed when the two spells clashed, but John's Glacies had completely evaporated. He cast another glacies at the orb and during that moment he grabbed on to Serena and Ariel and used Velox and Levite to bring them to the sky.

His 2nd Glacies managed to weaken the fire orb, but it wasn't enough. Despite being weakened, once it made contact with where they were standing, the fire orb caused a small explosion, but we managed to avoid it since he had already brought them up to the Air

Once it noticed that they were in the air, it began to charge another fire orb to fire at them.

"Oi... Are you serious? A Dark knight who can use magic?!" John exclaimed.

'Come on, Dungeon, Can't you balance your System!?! Why is the 9th Floor boss stronger than the 10th!?!' John thought.