After another hour of tortuous blowing off his feet, Bones' tenacity paid off and he finally managed to instantaneously propel himself a short distance forward!

*swoosh* Success! "I'll be damned!" Bones exclaimed in both surprise and relief. A notification dinged softly in his head, confirmation of his success. He displayed the screen and read the notification.

Congratulations!

You have learned a new skill: Quick Dash

Skill: Quick Dash [basic] - A basic movement skill allowing the user to move quickly, almost instantaneously by a quick, highly controlled burst of movement. It follows a straight movement pattern and can be used in quick succession. If used in succession, the first step consumes the initial mana cost and each step after, consumes more mana than the previous step.

Warning: Each step increases the strain on the body.

Cost: 10 mp + 10mp per dash if Quick Dash was used recently.

Range is 1m and the ability gains 0.1m range per increase in a level

I can't tell how good the skill is compared to other movement techniques, but I shouldn’t complain. I remember the skill Solin used was named differently. Something…something…steps? His movement technique, however, was a class skill.

Bones looked up and, far in the distance, saw the chamber where the Ant Queen laid in her nest, surrounded by guardians. He would have reached The Queen sooner if he wasn't preoccupied with learning a new skill. He was glad he did though. The new movement skill already proved to be invaluable. Quick Dash made it easier to evade attacks and close in on his targets. It did put a damper on leveling his Bone Armor. Not getting hit equals no experience points gained.

The boss fight would be the first proper fight where he would test the extent of the new dash skill. He summoned the lance in his hand and walked out of the tunnel, spreading his aura as much as he could. All the Ant-men in the immediate vicinity went on alert and turned in his direction.

Half an hour later…

Bones swiped the green blood off his lance. A pointless gesture considering it was a summoned lance. It was just one of those things he did absent-mindedly.

The new dash skill is amazing! The distance is short but enough to help avoid big hits and the Ant-Queen's pesky acid spray!

He looked at the messy remains of the queen and smiled. He improved in just a short amount of time. Bone Armor used together with the Mend skill made him practically invincible against low level monsters. Not that he let himself get hit, unless on purpose. With a new movement skill and his perception, he was a hard mage to catch.

A black longsword, chitin helmet and a lot of crafting materials were left behind when the Queen died. The helmet looked like an ant's head. It provided good defense but the design? …yeah, no way I'll be wearing that.

Behind the Queen's body, a portal hummed into existence. The same colorful portal he saw the first time. Bones turned and walked over. He reached out with his hand and a prompt appeared just like the first time, asking him if he wanted to continue to the second stage. Without hesitation, Bones accepted and felt the pull from the portal. The next moment, he disappeared.

When Bones came to his senses, he found himself in a similar cavern he appeared in the first dungeon. Bones frowned, wondering if the second stage would be an extension of the first stage, with a network of tunnels and biodomes.

He looked ahead and started walking toward the tunnel. He noted the ground inclined as he walked through the tunnel and soon, he saw a light reaching from behind the bend in the tunnel.

It seemed too bright, not like a warm white light coming from the fluorescent stalagmites covering the dome ceiling. Bones turned around the bend and saw the outside. A genuine outside, with a blue sky and green landscape.

This dungeon is weird…

The dungeon transitioned from an underground cavern system and into a jungle-like theme. Bones was standing at the base of a hill and was surrounded by dense forest and tangled vegetation. From the looks of the trees and plants, I'd guess the climate is tropical? The humidity…Bones didn't feel, nor he could, the scorching heat from the fake sun.

He looked around and noted he couldn't see anything beyond the start of the jungle. Low visibility. And the ground…he looked down at the ground and saw that the ground was covered with grass to his knees, vines and roots with no actual path leading anywhere. The only clearing was the place he was standing at - in the cavern entrance

He would be lying to himself if he said that the low visibility didn't make him vary.

Trust your instincts and have trust in your perception!

With his mind made up, he descended the hill and stepped forward, pushing through the dense foliage.

WHAT IS THAT? OH GOD, WHAT THE HELL IS THAT??

Bones silently screamed, hiding behind a tree. Not far away from his position, a flying monstrosity was buzzing around. He took a quick peek, identified the creature and hid again.

…

"What?" he suddenly blurted out.

The sound of his voice alerted the monster and it turned in his direction. Please don't come…

His prayer fell to deaf ears as the flying buzz swept through the foliage and between the trees, charging straight at him. He cursed his bad luck and dashed away not a moment too soon. He turned and saw the tree was pierced by a long, beak-like, sharp sucking mouth! The monster was stuck and it was struggling to set free. Bones used the opportunity and casted Bone Lance, piercing the monster's side. Green blood splattered the ground as the lance impaled the monster with enough force to jolt the monster free, breaking its proboscis.

The sight was disturbing as the monster trashed around for a minute until it bled to death. Bones approached the creature and was stunned looking at the weak-ass, dumb-ass, monstrosity.

Spy-quito lvl 21, mutant

He pinched the bridge where his nose would be and tried to get some sense of what he was looking at.

Which came first? The spider taking on mosquito parts or the mosquito taking on spider parts?? Does it even matter which came first? No… but I'd still like to know what kind of system fuckery is this??

"I've no words…I'm not touching this, to hell with the loot! "

The spy-quito, as the creature was identified, was the system's way of mutating two species that resided in the same area over a long period of time, into one that had the lethal traits of both! It had the main body of a mosquito the size of his arms with transparent wings on its back and eight hairy legs like in a spider. From its head a long, beak-like mouth called a proboscis protruded. More buzzing sounds were heard coming in fast and Bones gritted his teeth. Turn flight or fight?

A second of hesitation on his part left him with no choice as a dozen of Spy-quitos charged straight at him. Bones wouldn’t hold back. These mutant monsters needed to be dealt with swiftly and utterly!

He didn't wait for them to come to him. He acted first and used Quick Dash to avoid the first few and position himself in-between them. Once he was in the center, surrounded by spy-quitos, he blasted Bone Nova twice and dashed out of the circle and around the trees he used as cover. Two Spy-quitos died instantly and the third one was squirming on the ground, bleeding out. The rest buzzed after him.

The chase went on for a while with Bones avoiding their charges and using trees as cover against their sharp, piercing attacks. Their bodies were soft, squishy for their level, but what they lacked in defense was compensated by the almost unbreakable proboscis they used to sting their targets and drain them of their vitality. The wings were also sharp, looking like they could take a hit or two.

On one occasion, Bones thought it would be a good idea to get hit on purpose and see what happens. The proboscis pierced through his reinforced coat and out the back. He didn't feel a thing at first but slowly the tingling sensation crept on him.

This prickling sensation…the effects are similar to disruption of nerve signals. No, not just similar. This IS venom-induced paralysis affecting muscle nerves! A strong one too if I could feel it affecting me even though I have no muscles.

He summoned a sword in his hand and with a swift stroke of the sword, cut the elongated mouthpart from the monster's head. He grabbed the proboscis, pulled it out of him and threw it on the ground. The head is spider-like and with the mosquito's proboscis, it delivers the paralytic venom to its target. Once the target is paralyzed, it drains its victims vitality. What a nasty creature!

After killing the rest of the Spy-quitos, Bones changed his mind and looted them of their wings and proboscis. He couldn't deny that the giant straws were sturdy and could be used for…something! As for the wings? They could be used as a defensive layer underneath the armor. Crafty dwarves would probably find a use for it. He was about to leave when he sensed mana radiating from the bodies of the fallen. It was barely noticeable but to his new mana sense, still noticeable!

He leaned closer to one of the corpses and slowly passed with his hand over the body. He stopped at the spot he felt the mana was the strongest and buried his fingers in the monster's body. A few seconds later, he had a grip on something oval and sturdy. He pulled his hand out and in his hand was a small mana stone. He did the same with the rest of them and found that each had a mana stone within them.

"This dungeon had a helluva start!" Bones said, then chuckled looking at the strange corpses of the mutants. He turned around and picked a direction at random. For all he knew, he could be in a dead center of a dungeon so any direction taken would’ve been fine. After taking a few steps he stopped, turned around and headed back to the cavern entrance. He was surrounded by the jungle and he needed a higher ground to pin-point his position. By chance, the entrance was positioned at the base of a hill.

Not long after, Bones was sitting at the top of the hill, overlooking a dense jungle stretching in every direction. He saw a few spots, clear of trees and a few mountain peaks overlooking the jungle below. He frowned because he didn't really see the edge of the dungeon. Just a never-ending stretch of a jungle.

*Hiss! Scree!*

Bones jerked his head in the direction the hissing sound was coming from. It wasn't as near as it sounded. If he needed something to point him in the right direction, he just found it! He slid down the hill and hopped down from the top of the cavern entrance. The mutants were north from the entrance and the sound came from somewhere northeast. He turned northeast and rushed through the dense foliage and into the shade made by the canopy of trees.

He relied on his senses to detect any monsters lurking nearby. Every ten seconds he would hear the hissing sound. He changed his direction a few times but eventually came close to whatever was making the sound. Correction, not A sound but sounds as he realized there were more monsters hissing now. He sneaked around the area until he discovered majestic tubular spider-web structures at the base of the trees and wheel-shaped cobwebs connecting one tree to another.

Spiders...and big ones at that!

The surrounding trees around Bones were completely covered up by the intricate wall of webs, making any possibility of escape difficult. Conveniently, the only place without webs led deeper, toward the hissing sounds. The trap is kind of obvious. The webs though, seem durable. I know I shouldn't, but I really want to touch the webs.

A second later, Bones touched the web and the hissing sounds stopped.

*tap tap tap* sounds were coming from the many legs tapping on the bark of the tree. Bones listened and spun as the tapping sound was coming from all around him. He sensed the first spider before he saw it. Immediately after the first one, dozens of other spiders entered the radius of his senses. Spiders were big, up to his knees but strangely, not as big as the ones he killed before on a quest. These seemed faster and meaner looking. He identified the first one that entered his vision followed by the rest and they were coming in fast!

Jumping Arachnid, lvl 23