Here is chapter 27! Almost at the end of book 1 ^_^ Also 10k avg view another mile stone! Feel like I should do something but again no idea XD Anyways here art I ask someone to draw for me. Not really official but just wanted to see how different artist would portray the characters. Here is one of Sigrid with Alice on her shoulder

By: ngt

Yes I'm getting all the artiests' PM box spammed =X

It had been a month since Sigrid became an adventurer and she had slowly gotten used to her new life here. She would take about three trips a week into the dungeon with a party of rank G adventurers and did her best to guide and teach them throughout the dungeon dive. Most of the rank G adventurers were very positive towards her teaching but of course there were always a those few that didn’t listen, thinking she wasn’t good enough. This didn’t bother Sigrid too much as her goal here was to gather information on the outside world and finding suitable candidates for her future adventurer party. She made sure to never party a second time with those that didn’t respect her as they were no longer considered possible candidates.

However after the entire month had passed, the only two suitable candidates were still John and George, everyone else was lacking compared to them. John had been finding time to spend with Sigrid and Alice whenever he could and they even had training fights against each other a few times. Sigrid was very happy at having such a good friend while Alice couldn’t help but giggle on the side. Alice knew John’s feelings for Sigrid but also knew that due to Sigrid’s innocent nature, she didn’t really understand what love was, besides the love toward her mother. Alice found it amusing when all of John’s attempts were shot down by Sigrid with a sweet and innocent smile, that she never bothered to point this out to Sigrid.

As for George he had been a very good student and under Sigrid’s training, he was getting close to breaking into rank F. That was extremely fast growth almost rivalling John’s growth but Sigrid couldn’t see him as a friend. She didn’t know why, but she subconsciously felt uneasy around him. But she took her teaching very seriously and didn’t hold back because of this small feeling she had.

Today Sigrid and Alice got up bright and early as today Sigrid would be taking George’s group to train on floor 3. The dungeon had changed a great deal in the past 2 weeks, as the normal animals became a threat as well. Of course none of those things were a threat to Sigrid so she could focus all her attention on teaching and gathering information. During breakfast she met John and found out that he would be taking a group into the dungeon as well a bit later in the morning.

“We might see each other inside then.” Sigrid smiled brightly at John.

John let out an awkward smile and shook his head. “Not likely, my group isn’t as experienced as yours, so I don’t think we will be going down to the 3rd floor today.”

Sigrid nodded and said, “I see, we might meet up on the way out then.”

John and Sigrid talked a bit about the parties they would bring into the dungeon today before splitting up. John decided to rest until it was time for his party to meet up, while Sigrid headed over to the dungeon entrance. Soon she arrived at the dungeon entrance and found George’s group already waiting for her.

She waved as she got close and shouted, “Sorry for the wait. Are you guys ready to head in?”

George turned to her and let out a bright smile, “We have been prepared for a long time.”

*Plain South of The Dungeon Town*

Penny stood on a hill overlooking the troops that had gathered here today. There were 200 elite guards sent by the capital and 30 rank C and up adventurers here today. According to the scouts the demons had a force of about 400 imps, 100 hell hounds, and about a dozen elite demons leading them. They were clearly outnumbered but they had to hold on because this was part of the kingdom’s plan. This area was purposely made to look weak to make it the ideal place to attack by having low amounts of defenders here. Once the demons took the bait, the kingdom’s troops stationed just outside the enemy’s detection range would move in. The key was, that the elite forces here held off the first wave of attack so when the enemy’s main forces arrived they would charge in and be ambushed by the kingdom’s main force.

Penny went over the plan over and over again in her head and everything seemed perfect but she couldn’t shake the feeling that something was off. However no matter how much she went over the scenario she could not find anything wrong, so in the end she put that worry aside. She walked around the camp to make sure the defenses were set up properly and everyone was ready.

The sun was slowly rising and soon the demonic forces began to enter the horizon. The charge of the demonic forces grew louder and louder as they got closer. Soon they were easily visible, an army of 400 imps, 100 hell hounds, 10 demonic lava golems, and even 2 fire elementals. The appearance of the demon’s elite troops made Penny frown as those demonic lava golem and fire elementals were very powerful. However when she noticed the young man leading them, her heart immediately sank. This person looked completely normal, like a regular human you would pass while walking down the street. She couldn’t even feel any mana from him at all as if he couldn’t even fight but her 6th sense screamed at her to get away and she knew that they would need the guild master here. Without any hesitation she crushed a guild token, that was used so that the guild master would know if he needed to come to help. She knew, she would probably have to use it at some point but never thought it would be this early.

...

The young man let out a faint smile as he looked at the forces the human had gathered to fight him. Originally it wasn’t his job to come here as a single distraction force didn’t need someone of his stature to lead it but the person in charge of capturing the Ice Maiden was his subordinate. He recently came back and found that his subordinate had failed to capture the Ice Maiden even though he had provided 20 demonic lava golems and 1 fire elemental. When he first heard it, he wanted to rush over and roast that subordinate of his alive but then he heard of the skill book dungeon and the plan of turning it into a demonic dungeon while capturing the Ice Maiden that has taken refuge inside.

This made him very happy as it would give them a valuable resource and a solid foothold in this kingdom but more importantly it would take the credit away from “her”. Just thinking about “her”, made him boil with rage. Argh! So in the end he decided that if his subordinate succeeded, he would forgive that little rat, but he was going to mount the distraction himself to make sure he lured out the old monster the kingdom had hidden near the dungeon. He looked over the soon to be bloody battle field and smiled. While attacking now would probably be for the best, he wasn’t here to win anyways, so he wanted to enjoy himself, thus he gave ample time for the old man to arrive. There had been many stories about the old man among the demons and he couldn’t wait to test him out.

…

Penny stood there frozen as she stared at the enemy forces. “Why aren’t they attacking? What plans do they have?” She was so nervous that she was muttering out her thoughts.

“Penny, calm down!” Jake came up towards Penny. “I know their leader is very powerful but you need to calm down. Remember you are our leader right now and we can’t have you losing it before the old man can get here.”

Penny was startled by the sudden voice and jumped a little. Then she looked at Jake before taking a deep breath and said, “Thank you Jake, I understand. Everyone! Get into battle formation! The enemy could be attacking any minute and we need to be ready!”

Everyone in the camp quickly moved into their battle stations and the atmosphere became heavy. They all knew that this was going to be a tough battle from the start but the appearance of the demon leading the enemy really shocked them all. They could all feel the power hidden inside that plain looking young man but none of them could back down.

Soon sounds of the air breaking could be heard which startled everyone but brought smiles to the faces of the few upper ranked adventurers.

“So the old man is finally here.”

Soon with one final look back and the guild master landed in front of the army. He looked a lot more dignified than normal and the entire atmosphere around him was different. After he landed he looked toward the demon army and immediately frowned. His gaze landed on the young man and after staring at him for a while he shouted, “So to what do I owe the pleasure of meeting the demon general Xaizal?”

“Well if it isn’t the legend Max The Destroyer. I’m of course here today to test that legendary title of yours. I have heard many stories about your feats since I was a kid so when i heard you were in the neighborhood I had to come and ‘see’ the legend myself.” The young man let out a bright smile as he talked to Max but the smile caused everyone on Zeal’s side to shiver.

Max’s laugh roared across the plain, “So it’s just some snot nosed brat who is still wet behind the ears coming to test himself. Well then boy I’m ready when you are.”

Rage filled the demon general Xaizal’s eyes, but he maintained his temper and said “Charge!”

*The Sage Dungeon*

While all of this was happening Sigrid’s party moved smoothly through the dungeon. George’s group had grown a lot under Sigrid’s instruction so that the first floor offered almost no threat to them as long as they didn’t do anything stupid. After only a bit over one hour they made it to the second floor.

Sage kept a close eye on them, since he had been paying a lot of attention to George as well whenever he came into the dungeon. One reason was that he was a potential candidate for Sigrid’s team but he also had very good mana control. George’s barrier was much more wholesome than everyone else. He noticed that a normal adventurer’s barrier was filled with holes that he could get through given time but then there were people like George’s party who had much better control and Sage still hadn’t managed to break through yet. Finally there was George who’s mana barrier only showed tiny openings before they shifted and changed.

As Sigrid’s group moved into the second floor John entered the dungeon with his party. Sage focused a little attention onto John and then to his party. As he checked all the adventurers in the dungeon today he noticed that the level of adventurer was higher than normal. More than half of the adventurer in here today were ones whose mana barrier Sage couldn’t get past. However he only thought it was weird for a second before he put it in the back of his head. Instead he took it as an opportunity to train his mana control and attempt to break past them.

Time slowly passed and Sigrid’s party had almost reached the 3rd floor. Sage finally took a break from all these attempts and notice something was off. He checked the entire dungeon and found it emptier than usual.

“Were my calculations off? I guess I have a group of higher quality adventurers today that they are going through the monsters really fast.” Sage pondered for a bit before continuing to mutter, “Well I guess I can summon some monster and have them wait in the barrack area. Can’t let it leak that I can respawn them too fast.”

After doing that he turned his focus back to George to try and find a hole in the mana barrier. He purposely made the monsters focus on George a lot more than the others so it would force him to be under stress and thus create more openings for Sage. This time it was an elementary tiger that focused attacked George which almost created enough opening but in the end was defeated by the party. This time Sage sent the elite goblin that tamed the white tiger to attack and the results were great. The goblins kept the others back while the elite goblin on the white tiger pressured George greatly. After a few minutes of fighting, Sage got a hang of how the mana barrier maintained itself and broke past the mana barrier.

“Yes! Now let me see your….”

*George’s Mind*

“It seems everyone has entered the dungeon and that means the battle outside should have started too. Hahaha, just you wait dungeon core and Ice Maiden. By the end of today both of you will be under my control. Muhaha!”

...

“Damn it what is going on today, why are all the monsters putting so much focus on me? Could the dungeon core have noticed? No, it’s not possible if he did then he would be sending all the monsters inside the dungeon at us. Only a bit longer and we would have wiped out most of the monsters in the dungeon and then it would only be the dungeon boss and the Ice Maiden left to deal with. And as much as I hate to admit it with ‘that’ person’s help this should be a piece of cake.”

…

“That white tiger sure was persistent, maybe it was the meat I had for breakfast that drew it to me. It was clawing at me like I was a piece of well cooked steak. Still only a bit more and the plan is complete!”

“Is that the rumored mounted elite goblin? Yes to face it now is the best possible outcome, with this girl here she can take care of it for us.”

…

“Arg, why it is focusing me. Those idiots are useless with their power suppressed and I can’t show my true power yet. Damn us help already! Can’t you see we are in… DAMN IT!”

*Sage’s Chamber*

Sage felt a rush of violent red energy coming from George, this power was that of a rank B adventurer but this mana was completely different from any human or elf he had seen. This mana reminded him of the night when Sigrid arrived… this was the mana of a demon!

Sage quickly used a voice transmission token and shouted, “Sigrid get out of there now!”

Edited by: Nova and The super secreted masked editor... from space!