The next morning, Cerion and I prepared ourselves for our dungeon run. I had been a little too excited to sleep much, but thankfully sleep became less and less of an issue as constitution rose. We were stuffing our spatial trinket chock-full of provisions, a sleeping roll, and some tents as well as some monster repellent powder that Doran had given us. Apparently, the stuff was pretty uncommon, because different monsters reacted differently to different powders, so to get your hands on powder that scared away most monsters, you had to pay top coin.

“Don’t worry about it.”, he had said, “Your levelling speed is the top priority right now. Don’t waste time.”

With a nod, Cerion and I had finished our preparations.

By the time the sun was starting to rise, an attendant had escorted us to a tunnel that led to the surface. The exit was sneakily hidden in a well inside a wealthy neighbourhood. We hurriedly climbed up to the top in hopes of not being seen by any citizens at this early hour, but it turned out that we hadn’t needed to worry at all. As we climbed out of the well, we were met with two well-equipped knights, wearing silver armor with red capes and golden accessories. These were royal knights. One of the two approached us.

“You are Cerion Rass and Arthur?”

We nodded. “We are. I assume you two are royal knights?”

Instead of responding to my question, the knight simply droned on.

“We will be escorting you to the [City of tears] dungeon nearby. Please follow closely.”

He turned around briskly and walked at a marching pace. Cerion and I struggled to keep up with his walking speed, so we had to resort to jogging. The other knight followed behind us, escorting us to the dungeon with his partner.

The neighbourhood we had found ourselves in seemed rather affluent. While the houses and small shops weren’t large, per se, they were well built and maintained. There was just something off about the well-decorated area, it looked like a village out of a fairy tale.

“What is this place?”, I asked the knights.

Unfortunately, they didn’t bother to respond. Cerion was kind enough to share his thoughts with me, though.

“This is probably one of the districts where the more affluent commoners live. The capital is quite crowded, so the average housing price is sky-high. Some of the richer peasants and merchants will still have the coin necessary to settle down here, though. Buying a large manor in the capital, on the other hand, simply isn’t affordable for anyone but nobles.”

I nodded. It made sense. Living in an idyllic, quiet little neighbourhood was rare even outside of the capital, let alone in it. Maybe if I ever started a family in the future, this is where I would live.

A few dozen minutes later, we arrived near one of the large walls that separated the different districts. Guards were posted at the gates of what looked to be a large barracks, or possibly a fort of some kind. Instead of walking to another district through the gates, our escorts entered the barracks, after showing the guards a golden token inlaid with rubies. They made way, allowing us to enter the little fort.

As we headed deeper and deeper into the building, I started to notice more and more guards, to an almost ridiculous degree. This building was almost better defended than the guild in Reito. I started to put two and two together.

This building guarded the entrance to the dungeon.

Cerion and I stayed quiet throughout the rest of the walk, not wanting to draw too much attention.

Eventually, we reached a pair of heavy copper doors, which could have easily allowed Doran’s griffin to pass through them.

Our escorts once again went through an identification process, one even we had to join, showing of our guild tokens.

After that was done, the doors to the dungeon finally opened, as an internal mechanism of cogs and belts started to creak.

The doors revealed a tiled pathway down to a circular platform.

One of our escorts turned to us.

“This is the entrance to the [City of tears]. Step onto the platform and pull the switch. The elevator will head down for about thirty minutes. After that, everything you encounter will be a monster. Remember this. We expect you to take the elevator back up in one week. If you do not return in time, a search party will be sent out. That is all.”

With another turn, our escorts left the room, never dropping the guise of professionalism.

I looked over to Cerion, who nodded determinedly. We stepped into the hallway and onto the platform, mentally preparing ourselves for our campaign. A moment later, Cerion pulled the lever on the side, and the platform started moving downwards.

Like our escort had claimed, the elevator ride took about half an hour to reach the bottom. When we finally did, we found ourselves in another hallway with a pair of copper doors at the end. We stepped forward and pulled the lever, activating the mechanism that would open the doors.

Slowly, the heavy copper doors creaked open, revealing a large, dark open expanse.

We found ourselves on a large grassy plain that was lit by blue fruits hanging on nearby trees. The cavern ceiling was visible far in the distance, revealing that we were actually deep underground, despite our lush surroundings.

The blue fruits were actually quite incredible, because the amount of light they gave off was more than the amount of light that the lanterns up above did, keeping our surroundings well-lit in a blue hue.

The plants around us looked alien. The trees from which the fruit hung, for example, looked like large willow trees with purple leaves, instead of green ones.

The grass was also slightly off, colored leaning more towards blue than green.

In the distance, we saw a large, elaborate city, with towers and spires reminiscent of the capital skyline. Blue light shone from the buildings, lighting up the dreary and sad outlook the architecture seemed to imply.

Finally, as a very obvious nod to its namesake, the entire area was covered in a light drizzle, coming from the ceiling of the cavern.

“So this is the city of tears, huh? Are we heading to that city?”, Cerion asked.

“I’m not sure. I think it might be best to scout out the surroundings of the city first and work from the outside in. That’s what I did the last time I ran a dungeon. It was a great way to make sure I killed as many monsters as I could, without missing any.”

“That seems like a good strategy, but if we don’t find any monsters on the plains, I think we’ll have to head to the city regardless.”

“I can see the sense in that. Let’s do things that way.”, I replied, satisfied with our plan.

As I walked into the plains, Cerion took out a scroll and a pencil and started drawing.

“What are you doing?”, I asked.

“I’m drawing a map. This place is huge, and I don’t want to get lost.”, he replied.

“Huh.”, I said dumbly, “I hadn’t thought of that.”

I walked up next to Cerion to see how he was doing.

“What’s that yellow spot on the map? Is it…moving?”

“It is! That spot marks where we are. The scroll is enchanted to do that.”

“No kidding. Thank your dad for me later, will you? Thank Helios for tools like this…”

Cerion smiled goofily.

I brought my attention back to our surroundings. We were heading into enemy territory, and now was not the time to converse.

After a few minutes, the foliage of the forest became denser, though not dense enough to cover our view of the city a few hours ahead. Cerion was starting to draw an outline on his map, while I had kept an eye out for monsters. So far, I hadn’t seen anything.

My efforts were about to be rewarded, however, because as I was looking around, Cerion and I heard a screech. We drew our weapons and prepared for a fight, backs against one another, listening for footsteps. I slowly spread my dark mana around me, ready to activate my skills.

Instead of a rampaging monster, however, a shrieking, translucent blue ghost appeared, flying straight through a tree, right at us.

Making a quick decision, I decided to counter its charge with a use of [Overloaded sword]. I swung my greatsword, which sucked in the dark mana I wrapped around it like it was made to do so, and sent a fast black arc at the ghost, tearing its form in half. Instead of disappearing in a tuft of smoke, it looked like I had popped a bubble. It deformed and disappeared, turning into a puddle on the ground.

Cerion and I waited for it to move again, or for any other ghost to appear, but after five minutes of nothing, we lowered our weapons.

“You know, when I saw the ghost, I expected it to be of the dark affinity, but it looks like it might be water instead…”, I hypothesized.

“We can’t be sure, but your guess may just be accurate.”, Cerion replied, “I’m a little disappointed it was so weak though.”

“Maybe more will show up when we head deeper into the dungeon?”, I asked rhetorically.

Unfortunately, it seemed like I had jinxed our party, because we heard another shriek. And then another, and a few more. Eventually, the whole forest seemed to be shrieking.

“You know that maelstrom skill you like using, Arthur? I think you might want to use it now…”, Cerion said fearfully.

Agreeing with him, I nodded, creating hundreds of small black cutting blades around the both of us, spinning them quickly. It hadn’t been a moment too soon, either, because right as I finished setting it up, the first ghosts appeared, rushing into the maelstrom. Once again, a single touch of my mana was enough to tear them apart, turning them into puddles. After a few minutes, hundreds had died.

I turned to Cerion.

“Doesn’t this remind you of the spiders? At this rate, we’ll reach level 50 in no time!”, I gloated.

“It wouldn’t be a tier 3 dungeon if this was all it did, Arthur.”, Cerion cautioned me.

I nodded. He was right. This was too easy, so I put up my guard again.

After a few dozen more died, the ghosts started to back off, keeping their distance. Now that they had slowed down a little, I got a better look at them.

They looked like the upper half of a human, sometimes in the form of a skeleton or half-rotted corpse, sometimes in the shape of an actual person. They wore translucent rags and torn clothes, which turned into water as well when they died.

It was actually rather creepy. If it wasn’t for the fact that dungeons created their own monsters out of magic or adopted them from outside, I would’ve thought these were actual people at one point. Still, with the amount of monster farming the army probably did in here, there was no way that was true.

The ghosts continued to circle around us, avoiding my maelstrom. Every now and then, a ghost would get brave enough to test the waters, but by and large, they stayed away. A few ghosts would pull plants and rocks out of the ground and throw them at us, to little success. This told us something important, though.

“These ghosts are somewhat intelligent.”, I said to Cerion.

“Indeed. On some level, they possess the intelligence to learn and strategize. It’s not very impressive so far, but still.”, he replied.

Eventually, our stalemate was broken by the sound of heavy footsteps in the distance. Cerion and I noticed a change in the ghosts as the footsteps got closer and closer. They were calming down, stopping their shrieking and just floating still in the air, staring at us. Gradually, their color turned red, rather than the previous blue.

“Something’s coming. Prepare to run if necessary.”, Cerion whispered.

A moment later, a large metal hand pushed the leaves of a large willow tree to the side, revealing himself. It was a large suit of armor, rusted in many places, with weapons of all kinds pierced into the metal. Holes that had been torn into the armor revealed that there was nothing inside the suit: it was moving on its own.

Now that it had reached us, all of the ghosts had turned blood-red and deathly silent. The visor of the giant suit of armor glowed red, sending the swarm of floating monsters into a frenzy.

This was the start of round two, it seemed.