The next room, the fourth, opened up much wider than the previous room. It seems not only was an artificial convergence different from the first floor, but it escalated in size and difficulty much faster too. Like the previous dungeons, I had entered when it opened up into larger areas I could barely call a room anymore, the monsters were more scattered about and it was actually easier than the previous room to fight. There were more monsters, but we fought less at a time. Though, with how aggressive the beasts were, we had not even a moment’s rest in the fight.

I had to ditch the spear after a few attacks and fight using the flame sword and even the shield. When a sword slash failed to connect or when two or more attacked me at once, a bash to the head with the shield was just as effective at killing them. Not as effective as if they were undead, but few living beings could be unphased after a blunt hit to the head. Whichever ones didn’t die from the impact were finished off with my sword as soon as I got a few seconds respite from the others.

The knight continued to fight quite dangerously until one particularly nasty bird-beast managed to tear the breastplate from his body, opening his vitals up to attacks. Ever since then, he kept close to me, using me as a distraction and bait when he got too many monsters surrounding him to defend himself. It sounded bad as if he was pushing all the work onto me, but in reality, only so many monsters could attack me without getting in each other’s way and he would step in and kill some of them from the sides. Overall, it was actually easier when he used me as a human shield strangely enough.

This continued throughout the next few floors up until room eight. By then, the knight had discovered how fast my wounds healed and lost any sort of hesitation, instantly standing by my side and cutting down everything that got close while ducking behind me as things got crazy. Thanks to that, he suffered only a few wounds while I got chewed all over by the fangs and claws of the monsters. Then again, after some downtime to collect the odd silver ore and clean our weapons, most of my wounds healed to the point where the knight was actually worse off than me. Hiding behind me didn’t make him immune to the occasional scratch and they accumulated, not healing, and would possibly get infected even with proper treatment.

On the eighth floor, the group as a whole decided to take a short break. In other words, the knight and I could rest while the seven freeloaders who had done nothing at all decided to eat a snack and even brought out some alcohol to enjoy. To them, this was nothing but a friendly outing and judging by how fast the first room had been cleared, they would still be this casual even if we weren’t here.

I was torn between swearing at them for forcing all the work onto us and trying to convince myself I should actually be grateful to them. It was like someone offering me a drink but only after I pour them a glass and in the end, I might not even get a drink. There was something humiliating about this whole situation wholly due to their attitudes.

"Soon we'll reach floors where it's possible to enter a rest area. The only thing consistent between a normal dungeon run and one with an artificial convergence. The amount of silver we've acquired from the dungeon just barely covers our entry fee so from now on you'll get a small cut of every ore found as long as you're able to clear the rooms on your own. At any time you can ask for our help but after that, you relinquish any rewards from said room. The exception being special rooms with one elemental enemy where we'll take over the fight and keep the item that drops, understood?" said the woman who had originally narrowed down the crowd to the two of us.

"Yes," answered the knight immediately. They were good terms for him since he was quite injured and at some point in this dungeon, there would be too many enemies for him to fight even using me as a distraction.

As for me, I didn't respond immediately. I agreed to the terms mentally but pretended to think about it for a few seconds. It was my way of getting back at them for how annoying they've been so far. Admittedly, it was petty and likely something they wouldn't even notice, but it brought me some light satisfaction and that was all that mattered. The little things I could do to vent without letting them notice and possibly penalizing me in some way.

"I'm okay with that," I finally said.

"Scratch that for the next floor, I need to stretch my legs after a snack. You two can do whatever you want room ten and up but I'm taking room nine," stated one of the seven, a man wielding a steel pole and a reinforced club.

He rushed through the portal to the next room before anyone could react. The other six simply waved us on, telling us to go onto the next floor for now. There, we found the man who rushed ahead standing over twenty or so bodies, a massacre of the beasts. Every single body, without exception, had a dent in the head with blood and gore spilling everywhere. The man himself was holding one of the monsters up in the air by its neck while bashing another with his club. Brute strength combined with blunt weapons lead to him dispatching the monsters that had given us so much trouble with ease.

At one point he even ditched the club of his own accord and started smashing them with his bare hands, starting by crushing the skull of the one still held up by its neck just by squeezing his hands into a fist while still holding it. It reminded me of the times I was forced to kill monsters by stomping on their heads but he did so willingly while my cases of doing this were more situational. At times, I needed to stomp a monsters head in as hesitating could kill me and I preferred to use a weapon, but this man reveled in the feeling of killing without weapons.

After clearing out the room singlehandedly, he introduced himself while holding the last bird monster which he excessively tore in half, “Del is my name. You two have the good luck of traversing this dungeon with me as I am ready for anything anytime. If things get hard, just call my name and I’ll kill all the monsters even if all my armor is stripped and my weapons broken. And before you even ask, no I will not train you to fight or be like me. My body is earned.”

It was interesting to finally learn one of their names. The group of seven were probably all just as good at fighting as him either due to experience or items. Which explained how the first room was cleared in just the short time it took me to enter the dungeon.

“Well, that’s a unique way of introducing yourself. That reminds me, what are your names?” I asked the others, taking advantage of this opportunity to figure out just who I was traveling with.

“Wait, you came along without knowing who they were? That’s either incredibly stupid or in a way, smart. Did you tag along on impulse or realize that it was a great opportunity?” Asked the knight. Thinking back, it was a little bit of both.

“Really? There are people here that don’t know about us? What a rarity. Are you from out of town?” asked Del.

“Of course he’s from out of town. No one in this city lasts long without hearing our name with our achievements. They shout our names in bars and talk about how much they wish they were us in town. And now, he shall know of our names as well. I am Dedrick, a specialist in spears and other weapons of reach unlike that brute Del,” said one of the other men in the group.

“Melon,” said the woman who had us line up in the beginning randomly. No, not randomly. That was her actual name. She said nothing more about it or herself, simply turning her head to the side. Short, simple, and to the point. Still, being named after a fruit was quite ridiculous. The others ended up introducing themselves in a way similar to Melon, choosing not to be flashy like Del and Dedrick had been. Bornia, the other female in the group and then the final three men: Gadrian, Mantra, and Frank.

“Well my name is Lance, though I’m better with a sword than a spear or lance,” said the knight beside me.

“We don’t care about your names. It’s about time to start clearing out the next floor and we do hope you have enough skill that we won’t have to step in for any reason other than boredom,” said Dedrick while pointing to the portal to the next room.

There were still some scattered silver ores on the floor but some of the group of seven went around picking them up. Perhaps this was them taking responsibility since Del went wild on this floor and did all the work with the implication that they must finish work they themselves had started. Or maybe I’m overthinking things and they just wanted to move on and either forgot about the ore until after telling us to go or didn’t mind picking it up. It was hard to get a good read on their actions but at the very least I had names to place next to their faces.

Room ten did not contain the rest area. It wasn’t particularly lucky or unlucky, just something I was used to by now. Actually, the rest area not showing up was a good thing as I needed to get as far as possible in this dungeon without needing the help of the other seven. After a rest area, the difficulty of the next room ramps up as if the rest area had contained monsters. Rest areas had their upsides and downsides and with how strong the seven were, I believed that we would get to a rest area eventually no matter where it popped up.

Every monster at this point were potential silver ores and pure profit for me and the knight, who I now knew as Lance. Lance took up a position behind me and readied his sword while I lifted up my spear to meet the charge of one of these bird beasts, who were thankfully flightless as the cieling was getting higher and higher to the point where flying beasts would be a serious threat. They mindlessly skewered themselves upon my spear with a cracking noise. A cracking noise?

At the end of my spear, the end had broken off where it had been cut somewhat. The spear had finally met the end of its use but the force of the beasts slamming into the now pole still cut into and killed them. It wasn’t surprising the spear broke with its past damage and the strain of high impacts with monsters, possibly hitting bone and forcing itself through layers of flesh and muscle multiple times within a few seconds.

My spear breaking made no difference to my strategy as once enough monsters were stuck on it I pushed it off to the side and drew my sword and decided to pull out the dark dagger as well. In my dominant hand, I held a flame sword that had a long reach and flames that could cause damage even if I missed the enemy. While in my left, I held a dark dagger that could instantly kill any enemies that got close enough for it to reach.

Before, I kept it hidden and unused due to it being overall safer to use other weapons but in a close-range brawl like this, it was the perfect side weapon. Another reason I was a bit reluctant to use it was due to other people seeing it and getting the wrong idea about it. However, there was only Lance by my side and in this desperate fight, I bet on him not noticing the dagger. Meanwhile, the other seven who might see and recognize the dagger were still in the previous room and by the time they came through, we should have gone deeper into the room.

After finishing off one group of beasts and slipping my dagger away temporarily, Lance started a conversation with me. At first, I was scared that he had noticed the dagger. Or perhaps, he was wounded and needed my help for treatment. There didn’t appear to be any wounds on Lance since it was only the first group of monsters and my dagger made the fight a lot more bearable so my mind immediately went to the worst possible situation. Tons of excuses for the dagger ran through my mind, only to go unused.

“Hey, what’s your name?” asked Lance.

“Excuse me?” I asked back, confused by the question. He was asking for my name? Nothing about the dagger. He wasn’t wounded and nothing important had happened. He simply wanted to know my name since I hadn’t gotten the opportunity before as we were interrupted before I had the chance to share.

“Yeah, you weren’t able to say it because they said it wasn’t important. However, I respect your fighting ability and how you can take hits to the point where your name is important to me,” he said.