Chapter 11: The Wolf and The Boy of the Tomato

"As expected... If you ran into that horde, I wouldn't be speaking to right now." said Hans, taking a sip of tea.

The man was spot on with his assessment. Had I been unfortunate enough to be discovered by even one of those creatures, I'd be rotting in that abominable place.

"Anyway, that's all I really needed to speak to you about for now. Do you have any questions?"

"Do you know any decent armour stores for impoverished adventurers?"

"There a few, but I recommend going to 'Johnathan's Armory' if you want another set of plate armour."

"I see... Alright, I guess I'll get going then. See you around."

I left the room, expression sour from the tiresome events that had just taken place in under twenty minutes. The only thing that gave me any incentive to keep going was the payment I'd be receiving on my way out. Whether it be souls or other form of currency, earning something always lightened my mood.

"Here you go, sir." An employee handed over a sack of coins.

"How much is in there?"

It felt lighter than I had hoped, a mere fraction of the money I got from the villagers. Were those goblins and other creatures really worth this little? I'd have to venture further down if I actually wanted to make a decent income, since this feeble amount wouldn't be able to sustain me for very long.

"12,000 valis, counted and everything."

"Alright, thanks."

"Have a good day, sir."

Now that I had fulfilled my sole purpose of coming here, I guess it was time to go back to the tower.

My eyes scanned over the bare remains of my plate armour, wincing at the common dents riddled throughout it. It was a pitiful sight. Not even a fragment of my cuirass survived the thrashing it took from the goblin, which now left my vitals open to any targeted attacks.

I probably could have spent some souls to repair this disgusting thing. But its overall design vexed me to the core. To begin with, it looked like I was actually encased in poorly welded sheets of metal with no actual form. Never again will I willingly wear a shit-box like that.

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A new shiny set of armour now clad my body. The design was stylish and to my tastes, while also providing adequate protection. It weighed half as much as the other set, giving me increased mobility while trading off structural integrity and the best part about it is that it only costs ten thousand valis. That's right, ten thousand!

If only I had found this place sooner. Then I wouldn't have had to don that piece of shit from before.

"Oh well."

I scanned my card and the fog gate let me through without a hassle. It was the peak hour for adventurers to be heading inside for their daily expedition, and I joined the crowd in their descent to the first floor.

When I reached it, I rushed through the other four floors until l was back at the fifth. Luckily, I didn't have to deal with many monsters and the ones that interrupted me were gifted with a rapid decapitation.

I also passed through the area where I repelled the abyss goblin. The blood, the guts and utter carnage that had occurred in this very spot no longer existed; the dungeon had erased it all while repairing itself. However, the nasty smell still lingered.

"And here I am, on the sixth floor."

I planted my foot on the ground, and it reverberated through the cavern. Appearance wise, it was identical to the fifth, but my instincts told me the monsters here would pose much more of a threat than the weaklings from above.

Caution manipulated each one of my movements. Traps were something I had yet to encounter, but that didn't mean I could act with reckless abandon. A few pressure plates could eliminate me for good if I didn't watch where I was going.

A few minutes in, I finally encountered a new denizen of this floor; a comically large frog. This failure of evolution possessed one malformed eye and looked like it wanted to be hit in the face multiple times, without mercy.

It must have read my mind since it lashed its tongue out at me in a fit of madness and struck to the wall to my left. Fragments cracked off and fell to the ground when I saw the damage.

"Ribbit!"

With a tongue flying in my direction like a whip about to crack, I closed the distance and roundhouse kicked its bulbous eye. It screamed in a pitch high enough to shatter glass, had any been present, and went ballistic by swinging its tongue in a circular motion.

Truly a foolish move on its part. I didn't even have to move my sword to slice it off. Its own velocity did that for me.

The frog collapsed in shock after seeings its own tongue shoot out of his mouth in a trail of blood and crash into a wall. It struggled for a bit before bleeding out and exploding into ashes. The crystal it dropped was only marginally bigger, unless you concentrated it was difficult to differentiate.

Continuing down the eery corridors for what felt like hours, I met a new type of monster; a group of shadowy humanoid figures. They had lanky arms with claws in the shape of knives capable of ripping flesh to shreds in a matter of seconds. The group seemed to have not discovered my presence, as they remained idle in their positions.

Sneaking was out of the picture, it would take too long to retrieve my slumbering dragon crest ring. Even if they hadn't noticed me yet, the blaring clangs my armour produced with each movement would be enough to set them off. So I went head first by striking one of them with a fireball.

The flame hit one of their knees and sent it barreling to the floor. Their attention was now on me; my ambush definitely did not please them.

One of them dashed in my direction and its claw came swiping down in a bid to slash my chest. The movement was as readable as a book and my blade parried it before it got close. Following with a riposte, my sword thrusted through it and it perished.

Then its friends hounded me with their own futile attempts to cause harm.

I leapt out of the way, expanding the distance between us. Getting surrounded meant getting killed; It was not a risk I wanted to take.

I had to pick them off individually.

One by one, they came at me like wild animals, thirsty for my blood. And one by one, they fell until nothing but their magical stones remained. The process was quite boring, a displeased frown planted itself on my face.

My stat increase from yesterday must have been the culprit when it came to how easy this floor was, it had to be.

More of these guys soon appeared from the walls and took up arms against me. I found myself under the combined offensive of frogs and shadow men out for my head.

They also died in less than five minutes.

At this point, I was considering whether to descend even further, but I had already been grinding on this floor for hours on end, with no breaks. There was no merit in continuing like this, I could only force myself for so long before my body rebelled.

Hence, I went back up to surface and found that the sun was already setting.

Grrrrrr! My stomach growled in a furious rage directed at me. Yesterday I was meant to get a nice dinner but my tired state killed any motivation I had so instead I had to eat the rubbish at my inn.

"I guess I could finally give that place a try. I don't smell bad nor do I have any blood on me."

I went down the path I had finally memorised and arrived at Hostess of Fertility tavern. Flocks of adventurers were already sitting inside, getting fresh meals, which delighted my nostrils or getting wasted on fountains of alcohol. I'll never understand why someone would willingly poison themselves with that nonsense.

I took a seat up at a wooden stool next the bar counter.

"Meow, what can I get ya?" asked a brown-haired cat woman. The workers at this establishment wore green dresses accompanied by a white appron and laced headband.

"It's my first time here, what do you recommend?"

The girl tilted her head in a moment of thought and answered, "I guess our steak is a good place to start. We also serve soups and other things by the way."

"Steak it is."

"Any drinks?"

"Just a glass of water will be fine."

"Coming right up."

After she walked away to place my order I was left to observe the area. The lively atmosphere was uplifting in a way I'd never witnessed before. People were actually having fun and enjoying themselves, unlike the constant melancholy which had cemented itself back in Lordran. None of them had to live under the constant fear of losing one's self and hollowing out into a mindless creature for all eternity. It felt nice.

"Meow! The party with the reservation's arrived-meow!"

"It's them, the Loki familia!"

"It's her the sword princess, Ais Wallenstein!"

A group of bigshots entering the area broke my neverending reflections. The instant they entered my line of sight, I could tell these people were much stronger than everyone else in the area. Some wore smug smiles of arrogance, frowns of irritability and even the icy gaze of someone who had seen too much for a lifetime. Above all else was the undoubtable divinity of a God which stemmed from a woman with short red hair.

Losing interest shortly after they sat their table, I turned back only to find my steaming hot steak waiting to be devoured. Saliva filled my mouth, tongue licking my lips with anticipation. I grabbed my knife and fork, slicing a bit off and placed it in my mouth.

Flavours exploded on my tastebuds as the meat practically melted into juicy goodness.

I had found it at last; everything I had gone through was for this moment, the moment to eat something good! With a newfound motivation for life, I scoffed down the rest of the steak faster than lopped the heads off goblins. Only trace amounts of gravy was spared from my devouring wrath.

"Hey waiter could I grab sec-"

"Okay!" The sound of a tankard hitting a table rang out, "Ais, it's about time you told everyone about the story!"

"The story?" said a disinterested voice.

"You know, on the way back a few minotours escaped. And you finished the last one on level five, right? I'm talking about the tomato boy!"

Tomato boy? Now, I was interested; not every day is compared to a fruit or vegetable.

"So anyway, here we have this newbie running around the floor. He ends up with a fucking Minotaur on his ass. Ais then comes in and slices it to bits and the kid gets drenched in a shit ton of blood. He looked like a big, red tomato hehe!"

Awkward laughter came from a few of his comrades, while the rest remained silent.

"And then guess what happened? The Tomato boy runs away while screaming his lungs out, he probably shit his pants as well. The idiot ran away from our princess who saved him. What a loser!" he cackled.

"Enough Bete, It was our fault that a minotour from floor seventeen was allowed to escape. You should be ashamed of yourself."

The wolf seethed with anger and barked at the elf who retorted him. He went on to spout some nonsense to the blonde-haired women I deduced as Ais about choosing him or her and how he hated weak people, etc. The ramblings of a drunk person were truly bizarre.

However, his words turned into daggers, as they seemed to have affected the tomato boy in question. A white-haired kid sprinted out the tavern, head hung down in shame and tears trickling down his face. I could only describe him as crestfallen as his figure disappeared off into the darkness of the night.