Chapter 18

Even though Theodore was in a rush, he wasn't cruel enough to let two starving and tired men dive into an unknown dungeon without preparation.

He volunteered to go hunt for some food while Merlin and Eugene would stay behind and set up camp for the night—or however long it would take for the two of them to regain their stamina—he preferred to only take minimal hours of rest since he wanted to get things done quickly.

Awakened humans usually need less sleep in trade for requiring more sustenance, it was speculated that the humans who'd become "Heroes" need to constantly be aware of monsters, so long rests would only hinder their fighting efficiency.

Theodore was once an Awakened and he could confirm that it was true, at the minimum, he needed to sleep for only four hours a day to function normally.

'I'm not like that anymore though…actually now that I think about it, the more I level up the less I feel sleepy or hungry...' He thought to himself while looking around, searching for something the two men back at camp could eat.

The trees weren't as dense as the other areas and their shapes looked crooked and old, giving off an odd vibe, especially when explored during the night and the only light source came from the moon above.

It wasn't a problem for Theodore though, he had thermal vision, and anything that came into his view was clearly visible due to their body heat.

The real problem was the fact that there weren't any regular animals roaming around this part of Delphi Forest, so searching for something that would be edible for the humans back at camp was difficult.

'Can they even eat gate creatures?'

[If a Creature of the Gates closely resembles an earthly animal, awakened humans can consume them without side effects.]

After hearing the System's voice, Theodore's concerns slightly dissipated. 'Okay, good, that makes things a lot easier for me.'

He'd just slithered past something that looked like a boar, so it became his target for the hunt.

The boar was resting in a small cave, giving him an easy opening to rush in and attack, though it was most likely one of the weaker monsters in Deeper Delphi since Theodore only bit it once and smacked it slightly with his body, but it went down in an instant without putting up much of a fight.

[You killed a 'Golden Boar'. Gained 800,000 EXP.]

He would've felt deplored that he couldn't eat the monster if it wasn't so weak, he doubted he could even get any useful skills from it anyway.

'What skills would I get? Something like Charge? I can do that even without a skill.'

The boar was quite big, so he decided to settle with only one and dragged its body with his tail back to camp.

A fire was lit in the middle while the two men sat around it on large rocks, since they didn't expect to stay the night, none of them brought any outdoor supplies.

They were chatting with each other before Theodore arrived.

"Oh! You're back." Merlin's attention immediately shifted towards his friend when he emerged from the dried, short bushes.

"Looks like we're having roasted pork tonight!" Eugene eyed the golden boar gluttonously, despite always having problems with Merlin in the past, he could never deny the fact that his cooking was top-notch.

"Go on chef, this guy's yours." Theodore flicked his tail and sent the boar sliding across the ground before stopping near Merlin.

The ginger got up to check the ingredients before nodding with approval. "Minimal wounds to the good parts, glad you took my advice properly this time."

Merlin would always tell Theodore not to go overboard with his kills, when it came to hunting monsters. His ice magic would freeze everything down to the bones of his enemies, leaving nothing to harvest or cook.

"Of course, my precious baits need to be properly fed to be effective."

Merlin didn't find that joke very funny, he looked at Theo with a face filled with scorn. "I don't feel like eating now."

"I don't care if you don't want to eat, just cook it already." Eugene sounded impatient, his eyes were still glued to the boar.

The redhead sighed before taking out a dagger from his belt and began flaying the ingredient in front of him. "Anyway, what's our next plan?"

Theodore turned his head to his left and flicked his tongue, sensing a sinister air radiating from the mouth of a mountain cave not too far away from where they were at. "You know me best, so of course we're going inside after the meal."

"…I figured, we can't exactly sleep anywhere without the proper gears."

Merlin had spoken very wise words, in this world where any second could be the last, nowhere was safe to camp out especially in rural areas like forests or mountain ranges.

Special camping tools were created for heroes to feel safer when hunting monsters outdoors, however since their group didn't bring anything with them, they couldn't take the risk of getting ambushed in their sleep.

"To be honest, I'm more worried about Merlin." Eugene spoke as his eyes wandered towards the direction of the ominous cave. "My werewolf form can neglect sleepiness, but what about you? Are you sure you're going to be fine?"

Merlin merely rolled his eyes with a smug huff. "Hmph! Don't underestimate me, I can stay awake for three days straight if I want to!"

"Because you stayed up for too many nights in a row playing video games." Theodore reminded his best friend of his bad habits.

"That was in the past!" Merlin spoke still in a proud tone. "Besides, as a 'Hunter', I need to be patient! Staying awake for days is a piece of cake!"

Eugene shook his head. "Whatever you say, just hurry up and finish the cooking, I'm hungry!"

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After everyone had rested and filled up their bellies, Theodore would lead them closer to the ominous cave. His eyes fixated to the front of him yet still alerted to his surroundings. "Be extra careful."

"I know," Eugene was in his werewolf form, his dark blue mane shone underneath the moonlight above, making him look quite majestic. "Worry about yourself, I'll be fine."

The entrance of the cave was covered by thin and tall bushes, camouflaging it almost entirely, if not for Theodore's sharp senses, it would've gone unnoticed even with Merlin's detection skill, Eagle Eye.

The sinister atmosphere grew stronger the closer they were to the cave, while the two humans became agitated by it, Theodore remained calm as he approached the tunnel.

Before he entered, Theo used his magic to create a ball of fire. It followed closely from the side, lighting up the dark cave for them while also giving off enough heat to keep them warm the further they travel down.

He slithered inside without hesitation and his friends followed suit.

The cave's path led downwards, there were many other carved out trails but Theo only took a single glance at them and continued crawling. He would sometimes make a turn into one of those tunnels though, as if he knew where to go.

It was simple, he was following the evil aura, which formed like a long line of mist as if leading him somewhere.

So far though, they haven't met any creatures, unlike what the troll chief had told them.

'Maybe it's a bit deeper than this.' Theodore thought.

They would travel for almost an hour—which turned into two, then three, yet the path continued to spiral downwards, by the look of things anyone would start to think that the road was never-ending.

"…How long have we been down here?" Merlin spoke, breaking the silence between the three of him.

Theodore glanced at his friends, who seemed to be in a terrible condition psychologically, even Eugene, who had been walking with his back straight for a while, had slumped forward and was trotting along slowly.

'System, can you tell me what time it is?'

[…I am not a clock.]

'At least tell me how long we've been down here, my friends need some closure.'

There was a moment of silence.

[You've been traversing the Ancient Pathway for 4 Hours 28 Minutes. It is now 1:12 A.M.]

'Ancient Pathway? Then this isn't even the cavern itself?'

[I cannot disclose that information.]

'…What level does Gaze of Wisdom need to be?'

[Once it evolves into its final form.]

'When is that? Level 10?'

[I cannot disclose that information.]

'Okay, fine.'

Theodore let out a sigh before speaking to his friends. "It's been about four hours."

"F—Four?" Merlin's eyes widened, he sounded doubtful. "How far down does this path go? Are you sure we're going the right way?"

Theo stared ahead of him, the sinister air had stopped growing in intensity but it was still the most prominent out of all the other roads above them. "I'm sure, something's giving off this dangerous aura, it must be down there."

They continued walking for another half an hour until they were met with five forked pathways, all of which gave off just about the same ominous air as the other. This caused Theodore to hesitate about where to go. "Damn it…"

Eugene took a few steps forward and began sniffing the air. "All of them smelled the same…What's next?" He shifted his sapphire eyes towards Theo, looking at him with expectation.

"…I don't know."

Merlin tried peering into the darkness of each pathway, but found nothing of use like the rest of them. "We might have to just pick."

"From the look of things, yes." Theodore stared at the forked tunnels in front of him, he didn't know what sort of creature rested inside this place so he would rather not have to depend on luck since it could mean potentially endangering his friends.

'Ouroboros.'

[Yes?]

'Can you help me with this?'

[Hm…I—]

[Ouroboros.] The System's voice rang out.

[Ah, I'm sorry Theodore, I can only assist you with your Bloodline Skills, I'm afraid I can't do anything about this.]

Theodore couldn't help but feel a little angry about this, but not because of Ouroboros, he wanted to help but unfortunately whatever sort of contract the god had signed doesn't allow him to do so.

'What could go wrong…' Theo turned his head towards the path in the middle and began slithering down the tunnel.

Merlin and Eugene looked at each other for a moment before starting to walk.

'Woosh.'

Suddenly, everything turned dark, the fireball that'd been lighting up the area for them had suddenly disappeared.

"Guys?" Theodore called out, but to his surprise no one answered him back.

He turned around and used his thermal vision to detect where his friends were, but he only saw the dark blue of his surroundings, no signs of life were detected.

"Merlin? Eugene?" He turned his head frantically to his sides, checking everywhere he could just to confirm that they'd truly disappeared.

"F*ck! I need to get to them before something happens." He cursed out loud, although he knew there was no point in wailing, and instead he decided to venture deeper down the road, hoping he could find his friends that way.

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.

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"What should we do?"

"Wait here for Theo? His senses are sharp so if we just don't move anywhere then it would be easier for him to come find us." Merlin spoke, managing to somehow remain cool despite his giant snake of a friend having just disappeared into thin air.

Behind and in front of them were tunnels. They were currently sitting in a circular-shaped pocket, at the very least Theo's ball of fire was with them so they weren't as afraid.

"SInce the ball's still here then we can be sure Theo's still alive." Merlin spoke, despite saying that, he couldn't help but let his worries show through his tone.

Eugene nodded while looking at the floating sphere. "Yes, if a mage's spell disappeared then the caster either lost consciousness or died…Hopefully he comes to find us soon."

As soon as the brunet finished his sentence, a noise was heard coming from the tunnel behind them. They immediately turned their heads on instinct and got up on their feet.

Merlin knocked a mana-infused arrow onto his bow that was summoned and Eugene extended his claws while getting into a fighting stance.

'Thud. Thud.'

"…Snakes don't make footsteps sound." Merlin narrowed his eyes and prepared to shoot at any given moment.

Eugene took a step back. "Not the time for jokes."

"There's always time for jokes."

The two of them couldn't continue their conversation since something finally emerged from the tunnel, at first they couldn't tell what it was until Theo's fireball slightly moved closer and illuminated the creature.

A pair of blood red eyes stared down at them, the humanoid figure was around as tall as Eugene's werewolf form, but it was a lot skinnier, it looked extremely frail like it could snap in half by the slightest touch, its body was mostly white while some spots were dark grey, it has a long whip-like tail and a pair of horns protruding from its forehead.

"A rai wa neay!!" The creature spoke in a weird language that even Merlin's 'Animal Empathy' couldn't translate.

The redhead didn't have time to think why the skill wasn't working though, because after a second a few more of the same monsters emerged from the darkness.

They all stared at each other in confusion for a moment but then the creature at the front began shrieking and charging at them. "Dai dai! Dai sa!!"

This prompted both Merlin and Eugene to scream with shock as they instinctively turned around and started running down the other pathway behind them.

"F*ck! What the hell!? They're creepy! Why do they walk like that!?" Merlin glanced behind him and instantaneously regretted what he saw.

The skinny white monsters were running at them on all four, because of their humanoid shape, they didn't walk like a quadrupedal and their movements were more than worthy to be used in a horror film. Besides their unusual running, they were showing their rows of spike-like teeth when they shriek and scream at them in their weird language.

"Just run!" Eugene didn't look behind him after seeing how pale Merlin's face became.

They didn't even see where they were going, Merlin was taking random turns while Eugene just panickedly followed behind.

Soon, their luck would run out and they would be forced to stop after finding a dead end, a large metallic door was blocking them from going any further.

They didn't have the time to inspect the details of what they'd found since they were too busy with something else at hand.

Merlin cursed in a mixture of English and Spanish as he turned around and began auto-firing arrows at the monsters, who didn't have the time to react and was hit by the barrage of attacks.

Seeing this opportunity, Eugene let out a fierce roar and charged towards the most injured creature and began clawing away at its skinny body.

There were a total of six that followed them, now only five remained.

"F*ck all of you! You just took at least ten years off my lifespan by making me look at you!" Merlin continued cursing and shot more arrows towards the monsters, this time they were ready and most of his shots missed, partially because the archer was spraying and praying.

Eugene didn't have the time to pay attention to the contents that'd spew out of Merlin's mouth; he was immediately attacked afterward by another skinny creature. He put his arms up to block the whip tail that the monster had swiped at him, and he could feel blood trickling down his forearm.

"Okay, sure dude, you wanna do this?" A hint of annoyance was visible in Eugene's eyes as he rushed forward with his claws extended out, an aura of energy surrounded his hand as he brought it down onto the monster, trimming the tail and heavily injuring it in the process as his claws sunk into its chest.

Eugene went on to his next target, after realizing that the monster's attacks weren't as effective, he became more daring and showed no fear when he faced the enemies head on.

Merlin was doing splendid work at distracting and cleaning up the leftover monsters. He'd managed to kill three of them on his own and the rest was Eugene's work.

Or it was supposed to be anyway.

Suddenly Eugene stopped attacking the last of the creatures and fell over while screaming in pain. "Ahhh! F*ck! What the hell?"

"Eugene!?" Merlin reached into his quiver but to his dismay he realized that it was empty, he looked at the ground hoping to find any usable arrows but by the time he found one it was already too late.

In the corner of the ginger's eyes, he saw the skinny creature rushing towards the fallen Eugene at high speeds, its jaw wide open and revealing rows after rows of sharp daggers while its tail was dripping with some sort of clear, yellowish liquid.

It hit him in an instant why Eugene was suddenly in pain.

'Venom!?'

The monster landed on top of the weakened werewolf and bit him on the shoulder, causing Eugene to cry out and struggle, trying to claw or kick the creature away from him, however this only prompted it to act more violent and pulled the chunk of meat from his shoulder.

"Ah!! F*ck!"

Merlin abandoned his bow on the ground and took out his dagger, he tried to get close to the creature but he was forced to back away because of its whip tail blocking him from taking another step forward. "Eugene!"

"Leave…Leave me! It's fine! Just go!"

"Go where!? I'm not going anywhere!" Merlin had several daggers hidden underneath his clothing, so he immediately threw the one in his hand and took out a new one from his right boot.

The thrown blade was easily swatted away by the monster's tail as it continued to bite and claw at Eugene, but Merlin used his chance while the whip wasn't in a good position to rush in. "Die!"

The dagger found its mark right onto the monster's neck, it let out a shriek and tried to recall its tail, but Merlin had already seen it coming and threw himself and the creature onto the ground, continuing to press the blade deeper into its neck while using its own body to anchor the tail to the floor.

"…Na….Nai tan." It said something in its mother tongue before finally going still, dead.

Merlin pushed the dead creature away and sprung onto his feet, finding himself by Eugene's side. "Dude! Eugene! You okay?"

"…No." The werewolf's eyes were going dull as his chest visibly heaved up and down, his entire body was covered in claw marks and the most serious of all was the missing chunk of flesh from his shoulder, blood had gathered all around his frame and he was only alive because of his 'Beast Transformation' skill.

"Theo…I need to find Theo…" Merlin murmured as he looked back to the tunnel where they'd run from.

"Theo!!" He screamed his best friend's name, but obviously there was no reply, nonetheless he got up and walked to the hole before shouting at the top of his lungs. "THEODORE!"

"…No way he can hear us." Eugene laid still as he spoke, still trying his best to breathe and not pass out. "It's okay, you did your best, Merlin, you don't have to scream anymore…"

Merlin ignored the brunet and shouted again, and again, and again, until his voice and strength finally gave up and he collapsed onto his knee. "No…I can't let you die…THEO! PLEASE!" His voice was rough but it still managed to be loud enough to cause an echo.

…

'Crr!'

The sound of something hard scratching against the cave floors were heard from within, followed by a familiar hiss as a pair of shining green eyes emerged from the darkness. "Merlin!"

"Theo…" Merlin's eyes were filled with hope, he immediately pointed towards the dying Eugene and forced himself to speak. "He…He lost a lot of blood…"

The snake slithered towards the werewolf and began breathing pale flames onto him, the very same fire that'd once healed him in the past. Now Merlin knew no one was going to die tonight.

He let out a sigh of relief. "Thank god you found us…"

Though to their horror, after Theo had stopped using his skill, Eugene wasn't healed.