Chapter 113 – Hidden Dangers

Kang only grimaced at his weak joke.

Tom regarded him with concern. The other man’s eyes had a permanent strained look to them and given what he was going though he didn’t blame him.

“Just have to keep going.” With a helpless shrug, Kang pulled off his tattered and broken armour and pointed at the middle section. “Adam, is it possible to get more reinforcement in the chest area?”

There was no direct answer, but as they watched, it repaired itself and the central area was twice as thick as it had been.

Tom frowned. He understood the desire for extra protection, but there was a reason they had been wearing light armour to begin with. “Are you sure Kang? Will you be able to move with that?”

Kang snorted bitterly. “I don’t believe I have a choice.” He tapped the thickened metal. It thunked. “Good. That sounds solid.” He sighed. “I’m not doing it because I enjoy it. There’s no not completing this floor. We have to keep going and the only way I’m killing them is by trading hits.”

“But what you’re intending is a bit extreme isn’t it. Giving access to your chest is dangerous. Better to have a removable shield. And it’s not like we aren’t making progress. We have enough time through admittedly only barely. But the important thing is we’re still on track to win.”

The bigger boy shook his head vigorously. “Yes, we’ve made progress, but we’re not leaving room for error. When we’re in control of the battlefield, we’re going to be fine, but what happens when something goes wrong? There’ll be ambushes. You know that. What happens then?”

Tom considered the argument and couldn’t fault the logic. Once they got deeper, it would become harder. “And there’ll be additional monster types to contend with as well.”

“Exactly. We need to be able to get through normal engagements without straining ourselves.” He tapped the new armour. “This will hopefully let me bait attacks safely.”

“Kang, do we really need to push harder?” Tom pressed. “I mean natural improvement will get us over the line.”

“No, it won’t. And yes, we do need to push!”

“Easy there. I was just asking. You seem a little on edge.”

Again, he sighed. “I’ll be fine. This isn’t easy. It’s rough, but don’t worry about me. I’m not going to break.” He stood silently an awkward look on his face for a moment. “Well, my armour’s fixed. Let’s test it out.”

They went in once more.

The difference in the change of approach was noticeable. The drain on his healing reduced significantly, but the key measure of how much they cleared didn’t change. Despite over an hour of combat each session, which was the same as they had done previously they failed to clear the five percent threshold more often than not.

They were making no progress.

Another full day had slipped between their fingers.

“I don’t want to.” Eloise complained. “Let’s do something else. Fighting is pointless. It keeps resetting back to zero and we’re not getting anywhere.”

“We’ve only been doing it for four days,” Kang told her. “You might not be able to see it, but we’re improving.”

“She kind of has a point,” Tom interjected. “We have to start making progress soon. Even if we double our time spent and hit ten percent every time, it’s still going to take twenty runs to finish it. If we use all of our time and fit in three runs per day, that’s too long.”

“We’re improving.” Kang repeated defensively.

“Are we?” Tom asked, raising an eyebrow. Kang was getting hurt less, but every fight was taking longer because of how cautious he was being. While Tom had more mana, it was Kang’s reserves that were becoming the bottleneck. “We’re spending more time for less progress and in that run you almost died.”

“I didn’t,” Kang scoffed.

“Cracked ribs taken early in the fight.”

“It didn’t slow me.”

“And a broken leg at the end.”

“That was to get the kill. That wasn’t a mistake. It was a valid strategy, and I’d already taken out two of them.”

“It was reckless, and you did it because you were running out of mana not because you thought it was the right choice.”

“I… I don’t have the trait you do.”

“I know. But I also know you let the fight go for too long. You need to man up and take bigger risks earlier. Your balance is off.”

Kang’s face went red. Then he glanced at the two girls who were staring at them with all their attention. An ugly expression quickly mastered crossed his face and then he leaned close. “Fuck you Tom. How dare you say that!” he whispered furiously. “You’re not the one getting smashed every fight.”

Tom tried not to react. He understood that anger very well. He patted the tense, angry boy on the shoulder. “I know. I do understand I’ve been a team’s tank before and you’re doing a great job. I couldn’t do better.”

Against these specific enemies, he thought privately to himself to make the statement more true.

“And we can all see what you’re doing and how you’re taking the hits so we don’t get hurt. But I still need you to listen. This is not working. My healing is getting underutilised. You need to push, take more risks, and let us clear things faster.”

Kang looked like he was going to argue, and then a thought occurred to him. He stopped and looked up. “Adam, what was our percentage finish on that?”

Less than five percent.

The fight vanished from the other man. “Fine, you’re right. I’ll be more aggressive and see if it helps.”  

They went in again.

His spear shattered when fighting the first light elemental. It was his fifth since he had started the floor and without hesitation he pulled out the pretty decoy butterfly one.

“That’s my one.”

“It is too.” Tom said, pretending to be surprised. He turned to look her straight in her eye. “Do you mind if I use it? I’m kind of running low on good spears and this one’s reinforced.”

“Um.” She looked very conflicted.

“It’s a good spear.” Briana volunteered. “It might not break like the others.”

Tom could have kissed her.

“Um… then I guess it’s okay if you do.”

With Tom smiling inside at the successful deception. They kept going.

They retreated having completed six percent of the floor. It was a noticeable improvement, as they hadn’t been pushing to exhaustion.

After another break, during which Tom practiced his Earth Manipulation spell, they prepared to leave. Given the circumstances, he would have preferred to be directing his energy toward a dark spell, but he hadn’t studied any in sufficient detail for Adam to create a cheat sheet to facilitate that effort. If nothing had changed, the dark affinity would have been his sixth best affinity and would be useful against the light theme of the floor. Unfortunately, he hadn’t known this hell hole was coming, so he hadn’t studied any in advance. He had considered using shadow, but both he and Kang had agreed it would be a waste. When their rest period was over, they went in again for their fifth and last session of the day. Kang visibly hesitated before crossing the threshold.

“You’re doing great,” Tom told him.

The other man smiled. “I’m just doing my job.” Then he walked forward bravely to face the pain that was required for them to defeat the enemies contained within.

This time, they pushed right to the edge of the starting room, intending to start exploring the larger complex. The exits were all massive, and randomly they chose the one directly to the left of where they had started. The only ones they actively selected against exploring were the two that looked like they would lead to a more central room. All the room exits were the same a domed tunnel that must have been four stories high and slightly wider than that again. It extended fifty metres before opening up into another gigantic room.

From what they could see, this one if anything had even more of the squat but garishly decorated sculptures poking out everywhere.

They maintained their workman like clearing, walking in small circles around the entrance to the tunnel without venturing deeper into the massive new room. The size of the indoor space would have dwarfed his comprehension if he only had earth memories. Having fought in the Underground both in Existentia and the tutorial the room was actually not that large.

They held their position and allowed the monsters to come closer to them. In between fights, Tom healed Kang and when the armour fell apart, he put on the spare suit.

It was not relaxing at all, and it was also boring. It was all very grey and uninteresting, a series of monotone fights one after the other. Launch a Lightning Javelin to kill a stickman and then support Kang while he fought. Then heal him after. Then rinse and repeat ad Infinium.

The entire time, they remained in the tunnel right at the edge of the main room.  

Danger Sense spiked abruptly, but the information it gave was confusing. There was no path for him to follow or act along, just a general alarm. A oh shit someone is about to die level of concern and there was nothing he could do about it. Unbidden, his eyes shot to Kang, expecting the light statue to take off his head or something.

Nothing happened, but then out of the corner of his eyes he saw Eloise and Briana abruptly leap dramatically to the side and simultaneously the screaming of his own skills stopped.

What just happened? He thought to himself, caught off guard by the intensity of the alarm and then its sudden cessation.

There was a whoosh of pressure and a boom from behind them. He flinched and glanced in that direction. Something hard and powerful had struck the wall of the tunnel about ten metres from where they stood. Chips of marble were still flying through the air.

“Tom! Lightning!” Kang roared and pointed.

He spun and peered through the stabbing lights in the direction indicated.

His heart dropped as he saw a new type of creature. It had the same stick like configuration as the others. There was just more of it. A twenty legged monstrosity instead of a minor threat that had possessed less than seven limbs.

The presence of that knowledge was the missing link to bring together the concerns in his brain. The residues of Danger Sense, where the monster stood and the impact on the wall brought everything into context.

A straight line linked them. A trajectory that passed through where the girls had jumped from. His heart thumped in fury as he realised what had happened and how close she had come to death.

Righteous anger filled him.

This was not acceptable.

His fully formed spell was ready, and he didn’t want to worry about it so he released it at the target. Then he would close and tear it to bits with his bare hands. The rage roared and enclosed without an outlet it grew due to the resonance between his mind and gut.

He would destroy it and with his mind made up he started to sprint at it.

The shock wave of the explosion knocked him from his feet before he could take his second step. He felt the warm touch of heat on his skin. There was nothing like an emerging hell scape to inspire a berserker.

Just as he was about to sprint toward the enemy, Kang hip checked him and sent him sprawling to the ground once more. “It’s dead,” Kang snapped at him and the anger vanished, receding back to nothing. Shame flushed through him.

He couldn’t believe he had been about to charge it. To sprint into the open room where who knows how many enemies would have gone after him. He shivered at the chilling image that occurred to him. Him being out there alone, encircled by dozens of monsters that were too powerful for him to fight.  

There was a worried look in Kang’s eyes as Tom picked himself up. The other reincarnator understood how close Tom had gotten to doing something beyond stupid. Tom shot him an embarrassed thumbs up to show he was back in control.  

Relief flooded through Kang, but he didn’t indulge in any petty snide comments. Digs Tom would have been happy for him to take.  “Retreat deeper into the tunnel,” he ordered instead sticking to simple commands to improve their chances of survival.

Tom agreed with the assessment and as they almost ran back down the tunnel he paused to look at the impact site. There were lots of thin slivers of a metallic like plastic spread out over a metre cross section. The ranged attack had been some form of dispersed wide angle kinetic strike. Given some of the sticks had penetrated a finger length into solid rock they would have been deadly if they had struck anyone.

They would have killed the girls if they had connected.

Tom could justify things however he wanted, but the fact was that Danger Sense had failed him. It was not the absolute cheat skill that he had been assuming it was. The ability was demonstrably powerful, but clearly not infallible. It had perceived the threat, but too late to have also given him a path to avoid it.

He felt like screaming.

If had lost them to something simple, he would never have forgiven himself and nor would have Kang. The other boy was putting himself through hell to protect their charges and if they were killed that easily he would be unlikely to recover.

“Shit, shit, shit.” Kang berated himself as they marched back toward safety.

Tom’s mind raced as they did so, replaying the events that almost led to disaster.

The sequence was easy enough to capture. A third type of monster, an evolution on the stick figures had appeared with a ranged attack.

Kang hadn’t been looking out for it sufficiently or based on his self-flagellation had registered it but had then discounted it as a threat. As a result, they had been caught by surprise and nearly paid the ultimate price.

His Danger Sense and Kang’s vision had both been useless, and the girls had almost died.

It didn’t make any sense. Especially how the girls had reacted like they had seen what was coming. They were blinder in here than Tom was. But they had reacted, and he was grateful for that, but it puzzled him. This hadn’t been him saving the day and from the way Kang was acting he was not responsible either.

Tom squinted at them suspiciously.

Was it Adam?

The question made no sense to him because he was confident the administrator couldn’t aid them so overtly… If not that? Then what?

He saw the empty space around their wrists and his cheeks reddened as he realised the truth.  

They had actually worked. He thought in amazement. Yes, he had been selling them for profit via the GODs shop, so by default they were a valuable commodity but this…

They had saved the girl’s lives. The danger sense bracelets that he made for them that had been left unharmed through all their previous encounters so far were gone. As advertised after their once off use they had crumbled into dust.

Brianna noticed where his eyes went, and she touched the spot on her wrist. Her cheeks went pink with embarrassment. “It’s not my fault. I didn’t break it. It just did it itself. Please, you have to believe me.”

“It saved you.” Tom said in amazed disbelief. “It actually worked. Did you get a warning?

“I…” Brianna stopped abruptly looked shy and lowered her eyes. Tom felt like cursing now was not the time for that.

“It was horrible a feeling of death,” Eloise said. “That it was coming, and I had to leap out of the way of it.”

Realisation also showed on Kang’s face, and he was far more decisive than Tom had been. Without a moment’s thought, he grabbed Briana, and spun her around so he could dig in the pack she was wearing. A second later, he pulled out two more of the bracelets. “Put new ones on now.” He commanded and thrust them at the two girls. “They work, so you have to wear them. Whenever this happens, the moment you get a chance, you replace them. Do you understand?” He was shouting at the two girls. “No hesitation. Straight away.”

Briana nodded shell shocked. She looked like she wanted to cry.

“We heard you the first time. You meanie.” Elosie snapped as she hugged the other girl. But neither of them complained about putting the wooden bracelets on once more.

They were still in the tunnel right on the edge of the first room, which they had already cleared completely. Some monsters would have returned, but it wouldn’t be many and right here in the relative safety of the tunnel they were probably on the safest spot on the entire floor.

Kang sighed and looked straight at Tom. “It’s good to know these work.” He fingered his own bracelet. “It means I’m more confident about getting through this.”

“Are we going to return?” Tom asked.

Kang shook his head. “No. It was a shock, but our resources are good. Let’s keep pushing.”

“But we almost died.”

“We’re not in the orphanage anymore, Eloise,” Kang told her. “We’re on the clock. If we can safely keep fighting, then we do. Keep up what you’re doing, and we’ll get through this.”

They returned to the larger room. The only change in strategy was that Tom was called on to throw his lightning javelins more regularly. He suspected that Kang was being extra vigilant now to make sure they weren’t caught by surprise again. Tom doubted it would be effective, and he got used to throwing blind. As a matter of routine, he invested a couple of points of precognition affinity mana into every javelin, and he listened with his internal senses for any type of encouragement to deviate in how he threw the missiles. Whether it was Kang’s instructions or that they acted like a lightning rod or something more exotic he hit the target more often than not.

It felt like another skill was on the verge of being created, but that was probably more wishful thinking than anything, as there was definitely no ding.

“And Adam how do we go this time?” Kang asked tiredly when they returned.  

You’ve managed a personal best and have successfully defeated 23% of the level.

That put that latest run at around fourteen percent of the floor being completed. That wasn’t a personal best, but it was close. They were making progress.

Kang sighed in relief when he heard those numbers. “Two to three days and we can finish this.”

Tom refrained from pointing out the obvious issue that they didn’t know what else was out there. They had, after all, cleared less than a quarter of the entire floor.

Eloise was clapping her hands excitedly. “I can’t wait to get rid of the lights.”

“I know. My head hurts every time we finish.”

“Yes, it’s great progress,” Tom said, forcing himself to sound cheerful. “We’ve all done so well.”

Despite his fears of another monster type throwing a spanner in the works, he had seen enough that, barring a disaster that they would complete the current floor. But he was very aware of the jump in power that followed this one.

He didn’t invest any more mana or fate into the idea, but internally he prayed that floor three wouldn’t have the same leap in strength that this one had. It was probably wishful thinking but if the fate they were investing worked, it was possible. The second floor between Kang’s strengths and his own had been beautifully tailored for them. They counted everything provided they collaborated as a team.

He very much hoped that the arrangement would hold for the next floor as well.

They were all confident that they could win the current floor without deaths, but it was exhausting. Particularly for Kang, who was taking the brunt of the violence. Tom wished he could ease the mental burden on him, but there were no words that he could think of that could help.

They went back into the grind.

There was something soul sapping about the entire experience of clearing the current floor, Tom decided. It was repetitive and boring but also extremely taxing and he wasn’t even the one getting beaten black, blue and red in every fight. There were still some minor hardships. The whole time his eyes watered as he struggled to look through the bright lights to see anything and whenever he actually fought, it was purely with a defensive focus.

His shield and spear were used to hold off a light elemental and only the continual screamed warnings from Danger Sense allowed him to keep that half a step ahead and time his movements to intercept blows intended for Eloise or Brianna.

Then, at Kang’s orders he would use his lightning magic before healing broken bones, deep bruises and bad cuts. The minor stuff he left alone to be dealt with later. 

“This sucks.” Kang said, gasping for air because one of his lungs had collapsed.

“Every victory is a struggle,” Tom agreed.

“It’s bullshit is what it is! The fights aren’t challenging or dangerous they’re just a painful grind. This is a battle of endurance.”

“It’s a death trap that we hope to conquer. The fact we’re living should be enough.”

“For something so deadly, the lack of true danger is annoying. Even when we get swarmed, we can usually retreat because they’re so slow. It’s all so same that it becomes a struggle to concentrate sometimes and it’s not a luck thing.” He waved his still intact bracelet in the air. “If it was, this would have triggered. It’s just an annoying grind.”

“And that’s the challenge we need to beat.” Tom reminded him. “We have to stay vigilant.”

“To staying vigilant.” Kang agreed..