“Cory, what the hell!” I muttered. The crystal, who had promised me this room was relatively safe, shimmered into existence above my head.

“I’m sorry! This shouldn’t be possible. A huge surge of mana swept in as the room was about to close!”

“Why didn’t you stop it?”

“I tried to, but it was too powerful. I’m sorry!”

I shook my head and turned back to the huge ant in front of me. There was no way we would hold up against that thing if it charged at us….

But it didn’t move.

“Captain, what the hell is that thing?” Leah moved next to me and spoke in a whisper. “Your friend said we would be up against normal soldier ants, but that thing is an ant queen… and it's the biggest one I’ve ever seen.”

Before I could answer, not that I had any information which would be helpful, Rose appeared in front of me. She floated out to around halfway along the room and waved her hand through the air before she returned to me.

“What the hell did you do that for?”

“I think this is a combination of the first two rooms." She spoke quietly, her face scrunched up as she ignored my glare. "We moved the swarm room back, so it seems to have merged with the copy-cat room... I think.”

“That thing is NOT a copy.” I shook my head as Leah stared at me in confusion. I didn't try to explain my one-sided conversation, that could wait for a later date.

“Not exactly, but it might work like them. It won’t change its size, but you can think of it in a similar way to how we used the mirror.”

“So… we can limit how many people need to fight it?” I frowned as I stared at the ant queen in the distance.

“I think so, yes. This isn’t an exact art, but I’ve heard of similar things in the past.” Rose didn’t give me a concrete answer, but there wasn’t much I could do about that. “Some people tried to force mana into a dungeon to spawn more creatures, but the team inside got wiped out. This only works on lower level dungeons, as the mana needed to spawn higher level creatures scales exponentially. Anything past level twenty-five is close to impossible.”

“Right.” I turned to Leah with a smile. “We don’t have to fight it yet, get everyone to relax. We’ll rest up before we go against it.”

The tension drained out of her as she turned and ordered the troops to break off. After the boss monster in the distance hadn’t made any movement to us for several minutes, it was clear that the battle wouldn’t have to start straight away, so the rest of the group calmed enough to take stock of the situation.

The rest of my buffs fell off over the next five minutes. The longest duration was fifteen minutes, whilst the lowest was ten. Rage buffs cost less as they ranked up, whilst my Novice buffs cost more but gained increased duration. Even if they had ranked up, it would still be massively inefficient to keep them all running.

I need to figure out a way around the upfront costs...

None of them had gone up a rank from the previous battle, but then again I had only used them once. Using the buffs on a group sped up their progression, but if it was so easy to increase them then everyone would have mastered their skills long ago. That, added to the fact skills gained close to no experience outside of combat, made it hard to efficiently rank up Supporter buff skills. The cost to benefit of any experience gains was insanely low.

My mana regeneration was still capped at one percent of my total, which gave us under an hour and a half to wait. When I advised Leah of the time-frame, and she tried to argue. It wouldn’t take that long for everyone else’s mana to recover, and a long time in the face of the boss monster would eat at their courage.

But I disagreed. If I told her what my actual plan was, she would immediately refuse to go along with it, so I gave her an excuse that was also the truth. After she heard my mana would take that long to recover, she was speechless for several seconds before she passed down the command to take a long rest.

I was still level eleven after my last battle. The sheer number of ants we defeated should have been enough to push me past the next boundary, but the appearance of the ant queen had technically locked us in combat.

The villagers and former bandits had merged together. During the battle, I had seen several people show their talent for combat, whilst others had held back. That could have been because they were scared, or they might have had another reason for it.

“So, what happened between you and Ray?” Leah asked me after several minutes had passed. The rest of the raid had gathered into several groups, which left me alone with my second-in-command.

“He hurt a friend of mine, and I managed to… I thought he’d died.” I shook my head. “I guess that was a bit optimistic."

“Not really.” Leah bit her lip for a moment before she continued. “I have heard of this resurrection method the cult has. It's mostly rumours, but the main thing that we hear about are the disadvantages."

"Oh, like what?" It was a surprise that Leah knew about it, but maybe she had heard the details during her stay at the bandit camp. Though Clive didn't trust the villagers that much, Leah seemed the type to keep her ear to the ground in any situation.

"Their power is lower, they lose it over time, and they will die again after a set time. Normally a year or so at best." Leah shuddered. "And when they die again, they're REALLY dead."

“I guess Ray did.” My fists whitened as I gripped my staff. “I guess he didn’t care about the side effects, whatever they are.”

“The ones I heard of were bad enough, so what else could be worse? Being deleted from the world is the worst thing I can imagine..."

“Deleted?” I tilted my head to one side. The word made sense to me, but how would someone who lived in this place understand how that worked?

“Never to be reborn, never to ascend.” Leah frowned and stared at the floor. “It would be their final end. No way to come back from that.”

“So he’s dead for real this time? That’s some good news at least.” I grinned and stood up. The word she used did spark some curiosity, but asking any further questions right now would be a waste of time. I could always try Rose or Cory first. As we had been talking, my mana had returned to full, so now was the perfect time to move on with my plan. “Stay back, don’t attack, wait for my signal.”

She nodded and passed the order along. The Warriors lined up in front of the fragile casters and the rangers, whilst the melee Adventurers took up positions just behind the front line. They could dive in and out of cover as needed, and this formation meant they wouldn’t be open to direct attacks for extended periods.

That was how they had held out against the ant swarm. The effectiveness of the tactic when it was put up against a monster that loomed in front of me was far less certain, however. But I knew one thing that they didn’t. This ant queen would scale based on the number of opponents, along with their collective levels.

What would happen if you lowered the strength of a beast like that? I guess I'm about to find out.

“Wait, are you really thinking about fighting that thing alone?” Rose appeared by my side, her eyes wide as she tried to push against me with no effect. “Ant queens constantly call on their followers to do their dirty work, they’ll overwhelm you before you can do enough damage. She has a maximum number she can control, but every one you defeat will just be replaced in seconds.”

“Sure.” I waved her warning away as I glanced into my inventory. I kept my words quiet to avoid spooking the rest of the group. “I heard the voice mention perfect point when I hit Ray. Is that something like an exact area you can hit to increase your chance to crit?”

“Yes, it is.” Rose gave up her futile attempts with a sigh. “But even for a beast that large, your aim would have to be perfect. The point moves around constantly, so it's not possible…”

“Cory, this is a beast in your dungeon, right?”

“Yes.” Cory answered after a short pause, as though the words were being dragged from him. “Are you telling me you want to… cheat?”

“It’s my dungeon, right? How can this be counted as cheating.” I chuckled to myself at the trepidation in his voice. “Can you highlight it for me?”

“I think so. There's some leftover mana from the surge, so I can give it a shot." Cory focused for a moment before he turned to me again. "This is a one time deal. Without these perfect conditions..."

"I get it, just do your best." I nodded and turned back to the ant queen. A small orb of light shone on top of its head, though it did move back and forth as the beast followed me with its gaze. It didn’t stray too much, but it was clear that a random strike would have little chance of hitting it.

It shouldn’t be too hard for me to hit it, but even that won’t be enough.

The abilities and stats of the enemy would be lowered, but it was still a behemoth which could squash me like a bug. Ironic, but it was the truth. The armour on its skull was thick and heavy, but I had a plan for that.

I strode towards the mirror. After my plan had been formed, there was no reason to hold back. Leah and the others would be thrown out as the fight started, but that increased my confidence.

Despite the fact they were part of Leah’s village, I still didn’t trust them.

All it takes is for one person to be under Clive’s thumb, and I’ll get a dagger in the back. The quicker we get out of this, the better.

My paranoia might be a bit overblown, but it had kept me alive up to now. As I reached the mirror, I pulled out my staff and raised it above my head. The ant queen shook slightly as it registered my level and class. The only noticeable difference was that the armour plates had shrunk significantly, but the rest would have to be discovered when I fought it.

“Rook, stop!”

Leah’s shout didn’t stop me as my weapon crashed into the mirror. A flash of light blasted through the room and blinded me for a moment, after which I checked and confirmed that the rest of my allies had vanished.

Alone at last.

The ant queen shook and took a step towards me, or at least it tried to. As soon as it lifted its leg, its entire form shook as though it was about to collapse. The beasts size now worked against it due to the massively lowered stats I had forced upon it.

But I didn’t have time to congratulate myself before a wave of ants spawned from the ground by its feet.

“Let's see how this goes.” I grinned to myself and stared at the ant queen in the distance. Whilst others would see this monster as a terrifying opponent, I had a different view. I saw it as the perfect grindstone for my skills. At worst, Cory could just pull me out if anything terrible happened.

He had cheated once, why not twice?