While the merchants sat in their carriages, Joachim placed one foot after another, following after them as they strolled through the forest that the locals so kindly gave it many names.

The Forest of Death. The Forest of No Return. The Forest of Nightmares.

While Joachim did see the reason for the forest names, the adventurers hired to protect the merchants, and assistants, like him, to a lesser extent, dispatched the monsters by the packs. He even got to finish off a few of the monsters. Joachim daydreamed of leveling-up again, but that wouldn’t happen until months later.

Joachim knew what he agreed to when accepted to become an assistant to one of the merchants. But the long walks were getting to him.

At first, he was a bit leery about the idea of cutting a big portion of the road by going through the forest. But with competent adventurers, the journey had more leg pain than dangers.

One of the adventurers, Anastashia noticed him daydreaming and jogged over. She wore heavy armor, the color of the night’s sky when the moon hid. And carried a spear taller than herself.

[Heavy Spear Striker - Lv. 37]

Adventurers had such crazy high levels.

With the butt of the spear, Anastashia tapped his leg. Joachim stumbled forward before catching himself. “You holding up alright?” Anastashia asked.

He nodded. “Just tired from all this walking.”

“Keep it up one more day, okay?”

One more day of this forest and Joachim could stop torturing his feet through these treacherous untraveled roads.

“Will do,” Joachim said, at that moment a root caught his boot and sent him sprawling onto the ground. Joachim shot back up and turned his eyes away from Anastashia, who struggled to hold her laughter.

“Are you traveling through here to attack the dungeon later?” He instead changed the topic, his cheeks reddened from embarrassment.

The held back laughter disappeared, her eyes turned serious. “We’re adventurers looking to earn money, not madmen looking for death.”

“Are dungeons that different from monster hunting?”

To that question, Anastashia just nodded.

Another adventurer, a scout archer, who sat on top of the first carriage in the chain, leaned down to say something to the driver.

Not a moment later the chain of carriages slowed before stopping completely.

“Stay safe, I’m going to see what’s happening.”

Anastashia jogged down the line of carriages and huddled up with the rest of the adventurers.

After a short discussion, the leader of the adventurer group, a big man with a knight’s plate armor, walked into the middle of the carriage chain and called up everyone.

“Monsters are coming from the north side.” He lifted his arm and pointed out the side. “Going to be another pack of low-level monsters. We’ll stay and wipe them out.”

The merchants nodded to his decision and holed up in the carriages. The assistants, Joachim included, hid behind the carriages on the other side from where the monsters will come, as their lives more expandable.

Joachim peeked out of the side of the carriage, watching the monsters slither in with barks and growls.

[Scalescythe - Lv. 17]

[Scalescythe - Lv. 14]

…

[Scalescythe - Lv. 21]

A massive group of Scalescythes. Joachim counted at least a couple dozen of them which wasn’t surprising as they were probably skirting the Dungeon’s influence’s borders.

The archer loosed an arrow from the top of the carriage. It flew to and through one of the heads of the monsters, then another one before hitting a tree behind. Two monsters dropped just like that.

The remaining Scalescythes didn’t seem to mind the death of their friends and slithered in closer. A few closest creatures launched a barrage of wind slices with the sharp scythes they had for arms.

Anastashia dashed in front of the wind slices. With every movement, she slashed and swiped the slices out of the sky.

A few of the slices got through but other adventurers took care of those. Then they counterattacked. Arrows pierced heads, spears skewered bodies, swords slashed away the scythes.

Anastashia twirled her spear, blocking one of the scythes, then knocked it away and swung her spear diagonally, the sharp edge cut the monster with force.

The upper half of the monster flew and landed next to where Joachim hid. Still alive, the creature flopped up. Joachim fumbled for his dagger attached to the left side of the belt. He couldn’t waste the opportunity to gain experience especially from a monster as high level as this.

Joachim drew the dagger and stabbed it into the eye of the monster.

[Scalescythe defeated. Extra experience gained for defeating a being above your level.]

[You have reached Level 4!]

[Gained: 1G 1P!]

I’ll have to thank Anastashia later. Likely Joachim gained more experience from this one monster than throughout the whole trip. Although, until they leave the forest and enter a town, assigning of attributes will have to wait.

With the adventurers overpowering the monsters, the fight ended without a spectacle. A short cleanup and salvaging usable parts from the corpses later, the carriages bumped through the forest paths again.

The merchants drank and discussed shares for the monster parts. The adventurers walked on the sides of the carriage chain, looking out for more monsters.

Then the forest changed. The quietness erupted into a cacophony of growls and barks everywhere around the group, before the sound drifted away from the group and back into the quietness. Whatever had awoken, the monsters of the forest ran away from it.

The scout already on the move, bow and quiver on his back, ran into the distance. And other adventurers urged both the merchants and the assistants into the carriages, rather than to hide behind. Once everyone climbed were safely in, Joachim climbed onto the last carriage in the chain. As he held onto the side border, the pace went from leisure travel to escape the danger speed.

The adventurer soon returned with an empty quiver and Joachim oversaw the talk. “Couldn’t get it to turn away, it’s running straight for us.”

The man with knight’s plate armor asked, “Level?”

“Forty-nine.”

The man then started cursing.

“Any possible reason why it’s chasing us?” Anastashia asked.

The scout shrugged. “Hunger, insanity, fun, whatever.”

The heavily plated man gave out orders. “Revis, position yourself on top of carriages and prepare to use skills. No holding back.”

The scout nodded and went to pick up more arrows from the first carriage.

“We’ll be fighting on the run, poking and keeping the monster behind the carriages. Chip its health away.”

As the adventurers hushed their voices and whispered, Joachim couldn’t hear the rest of the talk. Joachim felt the bumps as the carriage shook from time to time, and not from the roots.

Adventurers jumped down from the carriage and started jogging behind the last carriage, keeping the pace with ease.

A gray monster entered the sight.

The top of the carriages measured to half of the creature’s height. The beast had four legs bulging with muscles and strength, each of them looked like it could easily crush a carriage or two if it ever tapped on it. The creature had a build similar to a Twotail they encountered previously in the forest, except this monster had no fur, no tails, and the gray color of the monster’s skin resembled steel armor that was textured like skin and muscle more than actual skin.

As the creature ran after them, the ground shook, trees shed leaves, and wherever the creature stepped it left indentations in the ground.

[Unknown - Lv. ??]

Joachim blanched. It was one thing to hear its level from adventurers, it was a completely different thing to see question marks from your own skill. His fingers grabbed onto the carriage tighter, whitening from pressure, as he tried to steady himself in the ever-rocking carriage, but his eyes never left the monster.

An arrow ripped through the air, leaving sparks of lighting as it crashed into the monster. The arrow shattered and lightning spilled out of it. For a moment everything went white, and Joachim only heard buzzing. A moment later the whiteness disappeared and the monster looked unharmed.

The leader of the adventurer’s cursed and dashed in front of the monster, his sword clashing with the beast’s leg. The creature paused for a moment, but the sword left no wound. Monster’s leg swung at the leader which he dodged to the side, then Anastashia jumped from the other side, her swear diving into the monster’s body. As she pulled the spear, the monster took a step back, blood spilling from the wound, before scarring up in moments.

The monster charged at the adventurers but they weaved and dodged around his giant legs. The monster stomped at them, hitting nothing but leaving holes in the ground. The battle looked to be a long and draining one, but not dangerous.

The adventurers kept the monster busy, increasing its wounds bit by bit. The monster moved in more chaotic ways, not only trying to crush the adventurers with its massive legs, but it also tried to bite. Every attempted bite had such force that it wouldn’t be weird if it crunched a tree in half or an adventurer in metal armor.

Then, it looked like the monster had enough of playing around. The creature lowered its body, its legs tensed and bent. And the monster jumped.

The giant body flew right above the carriage, Joachim’s eyes following it. As the body started falling, an arrow struck the monster’s body, exploding in flames and lightning, knocking the massive beast off its course.

The creature landed a couple of steps away from the carriage, on his feet unhurt. Everything around it rose. Broken roots and branches, the carriage and people inside it, dirt, dust.

While the carriage landed onto the road and after swerving a little drove away, Joachim landed outside of it. He tried to grab onto the carriage, but the sudden shift of directions foiled his attempts and he smashed into the ground.

The adventurers were around the beast already, keeping it busy. Joachim struggled up but the carriage sped away from him.

The leader swung the sword at the monster, stopping it for a mere moment. “Can we save him? Options?” Joachim heard the now faraway question.

A couple more arrows slammed into the creature’s side doing visibly no damage. Joachim heard no answer. He ran after the carriage, yet everything got further and further away.

He heard the growls, buzzing, explosions from the direction of the carriages, but even after running for a while nobody showed up to grab him, and the carriages got out of sight.

Joachim stopped and stood alone on the road. Chasing after them and the monster will be dangerous, staying in place will also be dangerous. Joachim checked his items. Coins jingled inside the pouch, attached to his belt, but the knife disappeared.

He then turned around and walked.

Joachim returned to the place where he fell off. The place wasn’t difficult to find, it had a huge monster-sized indentation on the ground.

Joachim looked around to see if any items dropped out of the carriage. After scouring the surrounding, he found the knife. Joachim turned in the direction where the creature came from. If everything runs away from it, then the direction should be safe for a while.

So Joachim walked. He needed to cut through the forest into the main road. It might take a week or longer to get to the town, but he could pay for it, and safety sounded good. So Joachim walked.

The sun blazed at him from above, the roots annoyed him from below. He wiped the sweat away and as he took a few more steps a clearing came into his view.

Joachim stopped, paling. There should have been no clearing in this forest. Did I find the dungeon entrance? That would be just my luck. If the monster came from here it would make sense, right out of the dungeon, hungry and bloodthirsty.

He stepped forward to get a better view of the clearing, to confirm the entrance. Weird. Too quiet, too empty. A few more steps. A stone tower stood in the center of the clearing. Color returned to Joachim. Dungeons were called dungeons because they went down into the earth, not up into the skies.

Is there someone insane enough to live inside this forest? Joachim walked into the clearing. He looked out for anything that moved, snapping his head whenever wind rustled some leaves. Seeing nothing dangerous, hearing nothing more than wind, Joachim reached the tower’s door.

He inspected the tower from up close. Whoever made the tower, made it without physical workers. Some stones looked like they were stretched, other big pieces of stone were quite literally bent. And the stone broke before bending or stretching.

Joachim hoped—for either to nobody be in here, or at least no one insane—and knocked on the door. When no one answered, he knocked louder. Joachim caught movement in the second floor’s window, but by the time he looked up, nobody stood next to the window.

Then he heard movement, the door opened. A young woman stepped outside, Joachim raised his head to meet her eyes.

[Student of Fire - Lv. 3]

The young woman’s clothes looked strange. Light blue pants that had cuts everywhere, some of them even looked… intentional? Who would cut up a good pair of pants? She also wore a black shirt, but somehow it didn’t cover the arms a little past the shoulder.

The woman’s face looked surprised. Not angry, not insane, good. Joachim showed her his best business smile.

“Good day, miss. Are you living here?”

The young woman’s face changed from surprise to pure disappointment. Joachim’s smile faltered. Was she waiting for someone else?

“Do you speak…” The woman spoke in the language of the neighboring empire. Her eyes dropped to the side, checking something on her Status. “…Osmela? Osmelian?”

As an assistant, Joachim picked up a few levels in different languages. He placed back the business smile on his face and repeated the greeting, this time in her language.

“Good day, miss. Are you living here?”