Date: March 12, 2023 - 1:20pm

Location: Merrick

It has been three years since the first Dungeon Outbreaks. For many countries throughout the world, this day is considered a national holiday, although, since this particular anniversary is a Sunday, it doesn’t really matter. Nonetheless, memorial services are held throughout the world and the following day will be the holiday instead.

However, today is also a reminder of more than just the losses caused by the Dungeons. It is also a reminder of treasure seeking and adventuring. Rates of casualties were high during the first year and following the first month of the B-rank Dungeon appearances, but after that, Dungeoneering was seen as a lucrative profession that was well worth the risks. Thanks to huge advances in technology, especially in developing Dungeon cores as highly efficient and clean sources of energy, the profits from Dungeon clearing skyrocketed.

For B-rank Dungeons, the total value of Dungeon cores, common monsters, mid-bosses, and the Boss altogether, could reach almost $200 million. And, if you factored in the various rare and very rare items that could drop, you could earn even more than that. For example, a B-rank Archery Bow could range in value from between $30 million to even as high as $90 million. However, there were riches to be obtained even from lower ranked Dungeons. Even D-rank Dungeons, after trading in all of the drops for cash, could be worth more than $1 million.

Using that value as a basis, many newly awakened Dungeoneers end up completely dropping all of their old plans for the future to seriously pursue Dungeoneering. If they could even just clear one or two D-rank Dungeons a year, even if split ten ways, they would be set for life. And, after clearing enough D-rank Dungeons, they could naturally become strong enough to even take on C-rank Dungeons in the future, which were worth up to twenty times more when cleared.

All of this was the reason why Todd Phillips told his parents that he was planning to drop out of the school in order to become a Dungeoneer. His parents tried to argue about the dangers and that there were plenty of Dungeoneers who pursued other careers and education paths at the same time, but Todd was adamant. The time he spent on school would be a waste when compared to time he could spend on studying Dungeons or training his Skills. They were still skeptical, however, and insisted that he should only start trying it out during the summer, while on break from school. Todd pretended to compromise, but he secretly stopped attending his classes and started training and preparing for the next D-rank certification exam.

After spending the morning studying at the downtown library, he ate lunch and was on his way back to the library to study some more. While waiting to cross the street, he noticed a man wearing a face mask. His face was hidden, but Todd thought his hair and even the mask itself seemed familiar. Todd must have been staring a bit too intently as the man also looked back at him and seemed to notice his gaze. At first, the two looked at each other a bit awkwardly, and then almost simultaneously they finally recognized each other.

“Carlos?” Todd was the first to speak.

“Todd, right?”

“Yes, it’s me.” The two of them happened to take a few of the same electives at the same university, and even partnered up for some assignments. However, neither of them would exactly call the other person a friend. Perhaps slightly more than a casual acquaintance. “Um, how’s it going?”

“It’s fine. You?”

“Yeah, I’m doing fine as well. Just planning to study.”

“I see. I’m here to go shopping for some new cooking equipment.”

“Ah, yeah, you were in the culinary department.”

“Yeah. Are you still in English?” Todd hesitated a bit before answering. Should he just casually lie and say he was? However, seeing Carlos’ mask, and remembering that he had asked him about it before, he decided not to. “No, I’ve changed my plans.”

“Oh? What did you transfer to?”

“I’m dropping out.” Carlos didn’t seem particularly surprised by the sudden revelation. “I awakened as a Dungeoneer a few weeks ago and I’m planning to take the D-rank certification exam next Saturday.”

“I see…well, if you really think it’s not something you can do while being in school-”

“It’s not! I need to be as focused on this as possible!” It was almost as if Todd was arguing with his parents again. Despite how strong Todd’s response was, Carlos’ expression hardly changed.

“Well, it’s up to you on how you want to do it. But, you still might want to take it a bit slow and be careful. Even D-rank monsters can be very dangerous.” Todd was ready to launch into another animated argument, but he held himself back, since he knew that Carlos was speaking from his personal experience.

“Yeah, of course. That’s why I am studying up on monsters and Dungeons as much as I can.”

“That’s good. Whether you’re doing this because you think it’ll be exciting or you just want to help people, you should always keep in mind your safety.”

“Uh, yeah.” Todd’s primary motivation was the money, but he thought it would be bad to say that right now. The two of them turned to face the street again and saw that the light had not changed. Or maybe it had, and they just hadn’t noticed it the first time. Either way, they continued to wait. Then, just when the light changed, they felt the ground violently shake and a great flash of light appeared in the middle of the crosswalk. When the light faded a bit and the shaking started to cease, everyone nearby could see a giant, green oval-shaped portal suspended above the crosswalk.

There were a variety of reactions to this sight. The cars stopped in front of the crosswalk remained there, but their drivers were clearly upset. They knew traffic was going to be shut down for a while. Currently, they were debating in their heads whether to risk it to just drive through anyways before the police shut down the road or just wait here. There were also three different reactions amongst the pedestrians. Some who had never seen a portal in person before were taking out their phones to try and take pictures or film it, before realizing that this could not be done with ordinary cameras. A couple more knowledgeable pedestrians just crossed the street, expecting nothing to occur and that this was just a slightly unusual occurrence. A third group, always fearful of the unknown, didn’t want to take any chances and started running away.

Then, there was Todd. Todd, although surprised for a second, thought that this was a golden opportunity. Due to party size limits for all Dungeons, one of the hardest parts about raiding lower-ranked Dungeons is registering for them. With a few exceptions, it is essentially first come, first serve when it comes to Dungeon raiding, at least in Merrick. Unranked Dungeoneers, though, would not be allowed to register for any Dungeons above D-rank. However, there was one exception. Dungeoneers who report the existence and location of a Dungeon Portal before it is officially listed are always entitled to a party spot in the Dungeon raid. This was set up to prevent Dungeoneers from recklessly and prematurely entering Dungeons on their own.

However, lower-ranked Dungeoneers usually still find it too risky of a proposition to raid these Dungeons so there is a system that allows them to sell their party spot to another Dungeoneer. For example, for a thirty person B-ranked Dungeon, they could sell the spot to any Dungeoneer that registered after the thirtieth registration. When it comes to claiming the piece of the pie for such a lucrative Dungeon, a cautious, unranked or D-rank Dungeoneer can still end up receiving a big payoff despite never joining the raid.

Todd took out his smartphone and started walking towards this gold mine of a portal. He had to control his excitement as he went to the Dungeon reporting website on his phone. However, his connection was really slow, so Todd looked around to see if anyone else was doing the same thing. It didn’t seem like anyone else was doing so, but Carlos was walking over to him.

“Todd, you shouldn’t get too close.” Carlos was right, but Todd just couldn’t help himself. This was a never-before-seen portal! It was green in colour, nearly twenty feet high and about nine feet across at its widest. What else could this be but the first A-rank Dungeon Portal! Oh, the amount of money he could make off this doesn’t compare to clearing D-rank or even C-rank Dungeons. With that much money, he could buy stat-enhancing equipment or weapons, or even just choose to retire the very next day.

“Hey, Carlos, do you think you can try looking up the Dungeon reporting website on your phone? My connection is really slow for some reason.” Todd registered Carlos’ words of caution, but they simply were not a priority right now. At Todd’s words though, Carlos did reach for his phone. However, before he pulled it out, Carlos suddenly jumped towards Todd and tackled him to the side. Todd’s phone dropped from his hand and clattered against the pavement.

A surprised and now-angry Todd was about to yell at Carlos when an ear-piercing scream could be heard nearby. Todd looked over and saw the people now shouting and running away in a panic. Next to the giant portal was a creature that resembled a black bear, but with three key differences. It stood on its hind legs, it was dressed in red armour, and it wore gauntlets on its fore paws that each had three, knife-like blades on them. The monster seemed to growl in annoyance at its prey that had just barely gotten out of reach.

“Run,” Carlos said to Todd as he let go of him. Todd was still too shocked to move or say anything. The monster looked over at Carlos, and eyed him cautiously. Carlos used his Mentalism Skill to seem more intimidating. This kept the creature back long enough for him to reach into his Inventory and equip a C-rank Dexterity Ring and a C-rank Strength Ring, each increasing the respective Stats by 50 points. He never planned to use them, but he was glad now that he let Haley convince him in the end to hold onto some equipment for her.

Right as the monster seemed to be wisening up to Carlos buying time, Carlos was already dashing towards the monster. Carlos telegraphed a body blow, and when the monster was in the midst of reacting to that, Carlos’ suddenly gave a swift uppercut to the monster’s chin. The strength and speed of the blow caught the monster completely off guard and it teetered about in a daze. Carlos charged up a Power Strike and kicked at the monster’s ankle. While still unbalanced, it fell to the side and Carlos delivered a Power Strike to the creature's face while it was in the middle of trying to recover. Carlos could feel the creature’s skull crack from the impact and black blood splashed out of its broken face. It fell onto the ground with a heavy thud and then disappeared into black mist.

“W- what?” Todd weakly gasped out, still lying on the ground.

“I said to run.” Carlos spoke louder this time. Right as the monster died, the cars stopped at the crosswalk raced forward, taking their chance to get out here as soon as possible. The pedestrians were also mostly cleared out of the area by now.

From out of the portal, two more monsters identical to the first emerged. Maybe I can just pick up Todd and run right now, Carlos thought. Then, two more monsters left. I guess I just have to stand my ground until he can leave by himself. His Insight Skill let him know there was a less than 50% chance of defeating all four of them. The odds weren’t too bad. Then, a fifth one emerged from the portal. Less than 30% now. Still manageable. Two more, totalling seven, were now outside the portal. Less than 5% chance. Retreat strongly recommended.

“Todd! Get up and run!” This time, Carlos’ words finally seemed to do the trick and Todd got onto his feet, but he didn’t run.

“I- I’ll fight, too!” Todd didn’t really mean it, but he didn’t want to flee as a total coward while someone else fought right in front of him. Carlos’ Insight Skill let him know that Todd’s assistance would be negligible. The seven monsters started to move closer, and Carlos used his Mentalism Skill to keep them focused on him as the major threat. Then, Carlos finally received the update he was waiting for.

A-rank Dungeon Monster defeated.

Strength increased by 4 (Bonus Stat points gained to Strength Growth Specialization; Bonus Stat points gained due to difference in Rank)

Defense increased by 2 (Bonus Stat point gained due to difference in Rank)

Stamina increased by 4 (Bonus Stat point gained due to difference in Rank)

Dexterity increased by 4 (Bonus Stat points gained to Strength Growth Specialization; Bonus Stat points gained due to difference in Rank)

Magic increased by 2 (Bonus Stat point gained due to difference in Rank)

New Skill acquired: Haste D

New Skill acquired: Unarmed Combat Arts D

Skill upgraded: Power Strike B to Power Strike A

Skill upgraded: Mentalism A to Mentalism A+

Although Carlos had no plans of Dungeon raiding, it did not mean he made no preparations whatsoever. For the last three years, he trained himself both physically and mentally, and in the end, he raised all of his Skills by at least one rank, and brought all of his Stats up to 99. Now, with his Stats finally exceeding 100, he was reaping a plethora of bonuses. And, thanks to his Insight, Mentalism, and Mental Resistance Skills, he had no problem quickly understanding how to utilize them.

“Todd, get out of here now before you get me killed.” Carlos used his Mentalism Skill to also manipulate his tone to produce the best results. Todd barely hesitated a second longer before running away.

Carlos put on a bit of a swagger and taunted the nearest monster. It fell for the taunt and charged at him before the others. Carlos had charged up a Power Strike and used Haste to increase his movement speed in the same fluid movement as his taunt. The monster thrust out an arm to drive its clawed gauntlet into Carlos’s chest, but he dodged it and delivered a Power Strike uppercut that tore the monster’s head off of its body. A trail of black blood sprayed out as the rest of the monsters came running at Carlos.

The remaining six monsters tried to box in Carlos, and since each of the monsters stood more than a foot taller than him, it was also difficult to land clean hits on their heads, the least armoured part of their bodies. However, they didn’t know that Carlos had just acquired a new attack.

With his increased speed, Carlos suddenly closed the distance to one of the monsters on the edge of surrounding him and punched it in the chest. Thanks to the Unarmed Combat Arts Skill, he could apply Defense Pierce on his punch. The armour shuddered from the impact and the monster was knocked backwards and crashed into the pavement, winded. Having broken out of the attempted containment, Carlos had more space and more time to charge up another Power Strike.

A few of the monsters were even more wary now as they reassessed the threat level. However, Carlos successfully taunted another one of them, who quickly charged forward to its instant death by another Power Strike. The remaining four stood their ground and seemed to be silently communicating to each other while sacrificing the one that was knocked onto the ground as they did nothing when Carlos went over to finish it off.

The final four charged forward, with two of them leading to attack simultaneously. Carlos had time to discreetly charge up another Power Strike since then, but he knew they were expecting that. One would definitely die from the attack, but the second attacker would rush in. Even if Carlos evaded the charge with his speed, he would likely lack the speed to evade the remaining two. However, there was one thing they failed to consider due to Carlos’ constant taunting.

Carlos ran away. Everyone had fled the scene by now, and there was nothing else to be gained by him continuing to fight them. Now that Carlos simply had to run away without fighting, the monsters were simply not fast enough to catch up to him. As a precaution, though, Carlos did run away in the direction where the fewest number of people fled to, just in case some hadn’t gotten far enough away. If Carlos just kept running, and only had to help one or two other people at most, he was sure that high-ranked Dungeoneers would arrive in time to deal with the monsters.

However, a second before planning out his full escape route, his Insight Skill discarded all those plans. Then, a second after that, Carlos felt the portal flash once more. From out of the portal, a giant, orange bear emerged. Other than the colour, it was similar to the D-rank Dungeon Boss in its appearance, including the armour that covered its body. However, it was even larger, and its markings were black in colour, and did not appear to resemble the shapes of markings from the D-rank Dungeon Boss. In particular, it had a large black marking on its chest that seemed to resemble some sort of roaring beast.

The giant bear let out a powerful roar that reverberated around the area, causing the traffic lights, shop windows, and other glass objects to shatter. Carlos was alerted that he resisted the effects of fear due to his Mental Resistance Skill. His Insight Skill let him know that there was a 0% chance of defeating that monster, with a 0% margin of error. Annoying inputs like this is what makes Carlos wish sometimes that he had more control over when the Skill would be active.

Things got even worse. After the giant monster fully emerged from the portal, more of the smaller, bear-like monsters also started pouring out. Some of them were like the ones that exited earlier, but there were also some that held weapons other than the clawed gauntlets, such as claymores, halberds, and spears. Well, Carlos wasn’t keen to know how different they each were, and despite looking back, never stopped running. Thankfully, with his Mentalism Skill, he made himself out to be as insignificant as he could in the body language of his running, and the giant bear turned around, disinterested in such weak prey. Another similarity it shared with the D-rank Dungeon Boss. It turned around in search of more worthy prey, but the smaller warrior bears, seeing their comrades chase after Carlos, also joined the pursuit.

For Carlos, this still would have been fine. It was unfortunate that there was nothing he could do to delay the giant bear, but if he at least kept this group of monsters distracted, he was mitigating the potential damage and he was more than confident in his speed to continue evading these monsters until reinforcements could arrive. However, right when Carlos had turned the corner, he saw Todd, lying on the ground, frozen in fear, panic on his face. He didn’t know the effects since he resisted it, but Todd must have just been in range of the roar and suffered from some debuff. If it was just Todd, the situation was still manageable, but he wasn’t alone. Next to Todd, also lying immobile, were a few schoolgirls.

Against his Insight Skill’s advice, he turned around and ran towards the charging monsters. He wasn’t planning to fight them all off, but to run in a different direction to lead them to. However, there were now more than thirty of them, and even just breaking through had abysmal odds. It didn’t matter, though. For Carlos, if any of them died because he ran past them, he treated it the same as if he was the one to kill them himself, and he could not allow that.

Carlos’ Power Strike instantly killed one of them, and perhaps because they were too surprised by the sudden turnaround, or were wary of some new trap, the nearest monsters were not quick to react, and Carlos managed to slip past the first group. Next up were bears with halberds. The first one swung its weapon, aiming to decapitate him. Carlos went low and ran past him. The next one, however, swung at Carlos’ waist level. With his increased movement and enhanced Dexterity, though, Carlos jumped off the ground and over the attack. A third halberdier bear slashed downwards at him right as he landed back on the ground. However, Carlos delivered a power strike to that bear’s leg while it was in mid-swing, causing it to let go of the weapon as Carlos’ fist smashed through the armour and tore its leg apart.

Carlos picked up the fallen halberd and continued onto the next group, running past the remaining halberdier bears. Carlos had never held such a weapon before, and it was heavier than expected. Playing into this, Carlos exaggerated how unwieldy the weapon was for him and the claymore-wielding bears eagerly awaited him. Carlos taunted one of them, while still playing up the burden of carrying the halberd, and that one seemed ready to duel. Perhaps these bears were especially prideful, because the other claymore-wielding bears made no move at all to try to surround him or overwhelm him with numbers. In fact, some of them seemed to be warning the other warrior bears from interfering. Well, that was more than welcome by him, but he had to be quick about this, lest the earliest bears let the others know about his feigning.

The bear waited for Carlos to approach, and after formulating the next course of action, he made his move. Carlos slowly charged at the bear, seemingly struggling even more to keep the halberd in hand. The bear waited for Carlos to enter its attack range, but just before he did, Carlos went down low, as if being weighed down even more by the halberd, and then attacked with incredible speed. He thrusted the halberd into the bear’s neck, and although he tried to evade it at the last second, it still cut at least an inch into its neck. Black blood sprayed out and the surprised bear used a free hand to bat the halberd away. Carlos let go of the halberd and ran past it. His objective was never to kill any of them, but to just evade for as long as possible. There was one claymore-wielding bear that was close enough to try to attack him while he was running by, but Carlos had saved up a Power Strike for this. He punched through its chest armour and killed it before it could swing its weapon.

Carlos gained some distance from the shocked and outraged claymore-wielding bears and was up against the last of them. It was a mixed group of gauntlet bears and spear-wielding bears. As he approached, Carlos felt his lungs start to burn. He still had mana to spare, but he was finally starting to feel the physical after effects of constantly using Haste while fighting past the bears. After one final push, though, he could finally just focus on only running.

The gauntlet bears charged in first while the spear-wielding bears spread out in the back to close off Carlos’ retreat. Just as the first gauntlet bears were about to attack, Carlos dove and rolled on the ground. The bears did not anticipate this move and some of the gauntlet bears simply couldn’t attack such a low target. In fact, a couple of them nearly tripped into another bear when they tried to come to a sudden stop. Carlos rolled past some of them and tripped one of them over so that its body could impede the ones he just passed. Carlos quickly got back up and continued to run. One gauntlet bear managed to catch up to him right as he was getting back up, but Carlos swept at one of its ankles to knock it over.

The spear-wielding bears held their ground and waited for Carlos to enter their attack range. He charged right at one of the bears, and then stumbled. Or at least, he appeared to. The bear, fooled into thinking Carlos had finally tired himself out, attacked. The very second it did, though, Carlos dodged the attack, perfectly predicting the path of the attack and just ran on through, not intending to waste any more of his mana. Carlos was sure that they wouldn’t be able to catch up to his pace, but they still were not finished. As a final, coordinated attack, the spear-wielding bears through their spears at Carlos. Carlos had to look behind him and carefully observe the throwing motions and timing to avoid them all. However, he did succeed, and was finally on his way out.

Just as Carlos was finally about to feel some relief, he saw the green portal again. Surrounding it were at least twenty more warrior bears, and even more were coming out. His Insight Skill let him know there was little chance of breaking past this group with the other bears still pursuing him. Thanks to his Mental Resistance, Carlos still did not despair and quickly thought up what to do next. There was almost no chance of getting through this unscathed, so he considered the acceptable level of injuries he could sustain.

Before Carlos could finish his calculations though, there was suddenly the sound of an explosion from behind him. Carlos stopped running for a second and looked back. Chunks of pavement flew up into the air and a glittering blue mist appeared out of a crater in the ground. Then, Carlos saw something blue flash before his eyes and hit another bear behind him. It exploded with a huge cloud of blue dust, the explosion consuming both that bear and everything else within several feet. The bears just outside of the blue cloud were knocked up into the air and glittering blue dust rushed past their bodies. Within seconds, the bears were covered in some sort of icy film and then their bodies shattered into pieces. Another blue flash appeared, and this time Carlos saw what it was. It was an arrow.

This arrow created another blue explosion that killed several more monsters at once. The few ones that remained scattered about, and the bears by the portal were now distracted by the explosions. When the mist cleared away, both the blue mist and the black mist of the dead monsters, Carlos could see a man in the distance. He had a bow in his hands, and for just an instant, he looked like he was out of arrows. But then, a blue arrow suddenly appeared, nocked in the bow. He fired his shot and the arrow exploded on more of the monsters, leaving only one warrior bear left behind Carlos.

Carlos quickly started running towards the man. On his way there, the final warrior bear tried to get in his way, still holding a grudge against him, but Carlos dodged its attack and knocked it over. Then, because he didn’t want to use another Power Strike, he finished it off by crushing its throat with a stomp. On the other side, more bears continued to exit the portal and there were now more than twice as many of them, with that number continuing to increase. The archer came up to Carlos.

“Are you okay?” There wasn’t really any concern in the man’s voice, but nor was there any ill will. It was just a question that he asked more out of obligation.

“Yes, I’m fine. Thanks for your help.”

“Are there any other Dungeoneers around?” he asked. “Preferably A-rank.”

“No, not that I am aware of.” Carlos either forgot, or simply didn’t think it mattered, to mention Todd.

“Damn, how do I keep getting mixed up into this,” the archer muttered to himself.

“Should we retreat?”

“That would be a good idea.” The archer looked like he was about to turn around, but suddenly froze in place. “But, I have to stay.”

“I haven’t confirmed, but this portal is almost certainly an A-rank Dungeon Portal. There’s no telling what else could come out of it.”

“Yeah, I hear you. Even if I wished I didn’t.” The man bit his lip as he created another magical arrow and fired it at the monsters by the portal, prompting them to finally advance upon him. Carlos was having some difficulty understanding his sudden action. “Run away. Also, since you seem to be a Dungeoneer, go pick up those kids off the street while you’re at it.”

“Shouldn’t we retreat together?”

“Just get out of here,” he said with an exasperated voice. With his Insight Skill strongly concurring, Carlos started to run away. As he fled, he finally realized who he was talking to. Carlos saw his face on the news a few times, and he was also interviewed alongside Haley once. He was one of Merrick’s A-rank Dungeoneers: Virgil Quinn. Carlos never got the vibe that he was the stalwart, heroic type, but he supposed that this was a mistaken impression. If his Insight Skill could speak right then, it would tell him it wasn’t.