“It’s a dungeon entrance.”

Jill spoke up, despite everyone already realizing the situation. Despite knowing, everyone stared at Jill anyways. Mash had to ignore the face in the wood as he did so. It seemed to be trying to meet his eyes now, and it bothered him. As he caught a glimpse, he lashed out with an attack, though it did nothing to face, just hitting the wood while the face vanished from sight. The others were now staring at him, and Mash shrugged his shoulders while giving them an explanation.

“It’s the thing I saw earlier, I think it's messing with me. I also think it might be upstairs, instead of down.”

This was the other interesting aspect of the staircase. It lead up and down, and whereas the path downwards was hidden by shadowy darkness the opposite path was shielded by a bright light. It felt like a dungeon entrance as well, but it was also different. Mash was uncertain about where to go, but it was clear the face wanted him to follow it. His instincts were telling him to do the same, but those always seemed to put him in more dangerous situations, even if they did usually benefit him. His brother seemed to be contemplating something as well but ultimately came to a decision.

“We are going to split up. I believe that you should stick together and explore the upper floors, while we will head beneath.”

Arthur’s words surprised Mash because he assumed that he would want to protect them. However, it seemed that he was in sentinel mode, and figured that this would be the most effective way to save the kids. He said as much as he continued.

“You are all familiar with one another and have powerful healing capabilities to boot. If you find the children, teleport them out; and heal them once you can. Clearing the dungeon is not a priority, and you should not attempt to do so unless absolutely necessary.”

They nodded along and headed towards the staircase. His brother stopped Mash, handing him a familiar exit key. This confused Mash. Not the item itself, he understood why he received it, but the fact that his brother had dungeon keys at all. Normally, only adventurers could enter dungeons, unless there were circumstances like these. Why did his brother have the item? That was a question for later though, and he followed the others as they stepped into the light.

The transition felt different than the other dungeons, the biggest of which was that he didn’t really feel like he had teleported. It was as if the portal was merely a decoration. Although one look around told him that wasn’t true. It was a long jail, rows of cells adorned four different floors, and Mash heard cries and wails from some, but most were silent. Mash was going to approach one of the cells, but felt something enter his mana territory from above, and yelled towards his friends.

“Dodge!”

Even as the word left his mouth he jumped forward, launching a counterattack upwards. The sound of clattering metal could be heard behind him, but he didn’t hear any screams from his friends. He didn’t need to hide his abilities in here, and Priscilla knew, guiding him to use lightning instead of his wood. He held his hand upward, knowing that the power of this attack would be lower than what his wood could manage. Although his goal wasn’t power here, but speed and a distraction.

The attack did more than that though, as lightning branched into the dark ceiling above, illuminating the monsters before striking them. They were abominations of human and spider parts, that walked across the ceiling and were connected to cages by long chains, that attached like a spider's web might. The cages were what they dropped on them. The lightning hit each of them, drawn to the metal chains that were connected to their bodies. The lightning surged into their bodies stunning them and causing them to fall. Two had died from the fall, skewering themselves on their own cages. The other three landed twirling in the air. They managed the motion by flattening their arms into narrow lengths of flesh that allowed them to turn in the air. It didn’t matter though, as the others were prepared and attacked the creatures. Despite their stealth and adaptability, it seemed like their defenses were rather weak.

Between the three others, they managed to kill the monsters before they could attack again. Mash moved closer to the two skewered ones. He felt the rush of a level as they died, but wasn’t sure if it was true. The creatures’ bodies were twitching rapidly, and Mash hoped that it was their death throws. It did let Mash get a better look at the things though. One had a spider’s body, but where the head would normally be, sprouted a human torso and all its accompanying limbs. The second was much more deformed and was only had the neck and head of a human. They were disgustingly hairy, both the human and spider portions sprouting large patches of hair like some kind of mold. The way its spiderlike legs scratched at the human head in a panic, revolted Mash. He almost threw up but resisted the urge. Mash only hoped that he would not have to use his carnivorous tree skill in this dungeon. Mash turned back to the exit but saw that a gate had fallen and sealed it shut. He hadn’t seen it as it had been hidden behind the light of the entrance.

"Jill, can you teleport through that?"

She vanished for a second, but reappeared near the gate, not past it. She stumbled a bit as she reappeared as if the gate had pushed her back somehow. She tried once more but got the same result. Shaking her head, she turned to the group.

“No, it pushes me back, like when I try and teleport to where someone is already standing.”

That meant that their only way out was either clearing the dungeon or using the key but judging by the number of kids he could hear crying, he figured the key wouldn’t be able to get all of them out. He would apologize to his brother later, but for now, he needed to find the keys and could guess who had them. Time to look for who ran the prison.

First, though, he walked up to a nearby cell where he heard some crying from. Inside he saw a group of three children. Two were human as far his senses could tell, but one was like those things from earlier. He or she was clearly incomplete, as patches of skin were torn and he could make out blood leaking from the spaces. It didn’t take to genius to figure what was happening with these kids. It was this scene that finally got Mash to throw up, both from extreme rage and disgust.

The reaction was strangely comforting to Mash. He actually felt something for the kids that he killed. Unlike before, there was a sharp feeling of disgust that got him, to puke his breakfast on the floor beneath him. Was it his growing connection with Priscilla, or was it the earrings, or maybe the marks? It didn’t matter what the cause was, but it was clear that something was pushing back against the changes the class system was forcing on him. He could feel something about his kills now, and the knowledge that he killed innocent children sickened him. It was worse than the wound from earlier, his stomach felt like it twisted more now than it had from the attack earlier. He had felt glad to level from killing them earlier, but now he regretted each one. It wasn’t worth the levels.

After he had nothing left to empty, all that was left for him was rage. Unhindered by anything else, it felt like his body was burning. The face that had trailed him, that head smiled and laughed at him, that was who he would direct his anger towards. He would find this thing that had done this and give it the one thing it deserved. A slow painful death. The others seemed just as resolved as him, some even seeming more resolved than he was.

Mash tried destroying the cell gates but found them to be too hard to break. Jill’s teleportation worked, but she couldn’t do it for every cell. She teleported Luke inside as well, seeing if he could heal the kid, but it didn’t work. No, their best choice was to find and kill the warden and use its keys to free the prisoners. With a plan of action decided, the group headed to the obvious location of the warden. It was a big door, several times larger than any of the cell doors, and it connected to a room that spanned the entire back wall. Mash didn’t have to see the freakish face, to know that it was behind those doors. As stated at the doors in the distance, he realized that the prison was lit up. Why would the creature, keep lights in here?

The spider creatures had no eyes, and he doubted that the monster would need light to see. For the children and human prisoners? No, there was no reason for it to do that. Mash guessed that it was for him, some kind of sick taunt meant to get his attention. Whatever the monster thought, it was clearly enjoying the attention Mash was giving it. He was fine with that; it could enjoy whatever it wanted so long as he was able to kill it.

Before proceeding though, the group took the opportunity to level. Each person got to level while the others watched for enemies. Mash went last, as he was the highest level and most perceptive of the group. The process only took a few seconds for each of them, but it didn’t hurt to be diligent. When it was Mash’s turn, he knew what to expect as he thought on his status, the information matching what he had counted.

Name: Mash Class: Scale Wood Devourer

Level: 47 → 51

Health: 1240 / 1240

Energy: 2000 / 2000

Fortitude: 110 → 111 + 13 → 124

Endurance: 80 → 82

Strength: 75 → 77 + 3 → 80

Agility: 75 → 76 + 4 → 80

Intelligence: 120

Wisdom: 69 → 71

Charisma: 63 → 65

Free Stats: 0 → 20 →0

Mash allocated his stats quickly. He decided not to raise his intelligence like he normally might, since it always took him a little time to adjust to the new range of his mana territory, so he focused on other improvements. He decided that the most important thing was his durability and used his free stats to improve his physical attributes. The surprising thing was the improvement he had across the board and wondered where that came from. He didn’t know exactly but pushed back the concern for now and would worry about that later.

The other thing that got his attention was the speed of leveling and his current level. This dungeon was probably considered to be a rank above, or there was some reason for the rapid leveling. Either way, he was quickly approaching the next rank. There would be a lot of problems with ranking up in here, but he might need to do it. Unless there weren’t many monsters he didn’t know if he could prevent the level-ups. As he came back to himself, he saw that his friends were ready to move, and Mash quickly rose to meet them. As he pushed himself off the ground, he realized that the floor was made of metal too. The strange part was that it wasn’t cold though and felt warm to his touch. It was odd, but he ignored it. A lot about this place was strange, and his friends were anxiously waiting for him. They walked quickly heading for the large room.