Cade checked his storage again to choose something that he can use as material to upgrade his other linked equipment, the hoodie, mouth mask, white t-shirt, and jeans.

He decided to hold on upgrading his mouth mask because he had his plan on it after he saw that the body armor changed shape after the upgrade.

Cade wanted to change the mouth mask’s shape too and he had an idea on what he can use as material to upgrade it.

At the moment, Cade had lots of endurance crystals, skill books, and other equipment.

If he used the endurance crystal, he could put the endurance stat on his equipment. It will greatly help him in his explorations since his endurance was low.

However, looking at his newly iron stat, the new stat will be zero. It will not be able to help him at the moment. He put that idea away.

For skill books, he thought that maybe his equipment will acquire skill if he used them as the upgrade material. However, none of the skill books in his possession was something that he likes. He dismissed the idea completely.

As for the other equipment, they were either weapons or armors. Cade did not get any clothes equipment he can use.

He can use the weapons or armors but looking at his upgraded cardboard equipment, Cade was afraid that the clothes will be hard and uncomfortable to wear.

He did think that that won’t happen if he used the cardboard equipment for example. Even after it turned to iron it still had the cardboard textures. However, he did not want to try it.

The upgrade was irreversible and if he messed up his linked equipment, it will affect him a lot.

Cade was dependent on them like normal clothes. He did have normal clothes with him but he rarely used them in the dungeon because they cannot provide him with any protection against monster attacks.

When his clothes linked equipment started smelling bad, that was when he would wear normal clothes. Since Cade’s linked equipment cannot be destroyed forever, he did not wash the clothes, he burned them and then waited for it to restore itself to new and wore it again.

He had been doing that a lot since he started exploring the big tongue toad dungeon. Many people were passing by and if he smelled bad, people will start talking about it and he might gain another kind of fame.

Cade was already popular with his cardboard, if he got popular for smelling bad too, he did not know where to hide his face.

He might not be able to get a girlfriend too if he had the smelling bad fame. Cade did pass by some explorers that smell bad and he did not want to be like them.

“What should I do? The skill book is total no. Using the weapon or armor is a no too. Endurance crystal? That is the best choice now. Or should I just wait until I get out of this dungeon?” Cade thought properly of what he should do.

In the end, he decided to wait until he got out of the dungeon. He will buy some clothes equipment he likes and use them as the upgrade material once he got out of the dungeon.

“I guess that’s it,” said Cade and he closed his system and decided to rest for the day. He did not want to continue exploring the dungeon for the day.

***

Big Tongue Toad Dungeon, 4th Floor.

“Leader! Leader! Hold on! Don’t close your eyes! Stay with me!” a dark skin man was running while carrying an injured man on his back while shouting at him to stay awake.

The dark skin man was Raja. After he separated with his friend, Deury, he joined a small party of explorers to explore the big tongue toad dungeon.

“Ra-ja…” said Nick. The man that Raja was carrying was the leader of the party he joined. He was heavily injured and blood was everywhere on his body.

With tears, Nick said, “Le-t me d-own… You… sh-ould… run a-nd warn o-ther expl-orer about t-hat thin-g.”

Raja was running as fast as he can and he was injured too but not as much as Nick. He was running to the best of his ability because he wanted to save Nick.

Nick continued, “Wh-en you ge-t out o-f th-is pl-ace, pl-ea-se tell my f-ami-ly that I am so-rry. I love th…” After saying that, Nick’s eyes turned cold. He died.

“No! No! Noooo!!!! Leader! Nick! Wake up! Please, please wake up! Please!! Nick!!!” Raja was begging Nick to stay awake, however, Nick died. No matter what he said, there was nothing he could do to prevent Nick’s death.

Raja’s step stopped. He put Nick’s body on the ground and stared at him. Raja’s eyes started gleaming with tears and he cried while hugging Nick’s body.

Supposedly, with the new dungeon rules, anyone who died inside the dungeon would evaporate and be revived outside the dungeon. However, Nick’s body did not evaporate.

Not only Nick’s body, everyone in Raja’s party went through the same things. They all died but they did not evaporate and revived outside the dungeon.

‘Klak! Klak! Klak!’ footsteps can be heard from further in the direction where Raja came from. When Raja heard that, shivers ran through his whole body and he looked in that direction.

Raja gritted his teeth and he looked at Nick’s body. “I will pass your last words to your family. I am sorry, leader. I need to leave you here,” said Raja and he wiped his tears. His journey with his new party was short but he got close with them easily in a span of a few days.

Raja treated them like his own family and the same went to Nick and his other party members.

After saying his last words to Nick, Raja stood up and continued running leaving Nick’s body there. A few minutes after Raja left Nick, three humans’ figures were walking towards Nick’s body.

“Hoh~ Look who we found here. The monkey that ran away earlier,” one of the human figures said. The other two stayed silent. He raised his leg and stomp on Nick’s body.

A small explosion happened and Nick’s body exploded to pieces. “Heh,” that human figure was satisfied with what he had done. The three of them continued walking.

“Let’s chase that other monkey,” said the human figure that stomps on Nick’s body. The other nodded in agreement to that suggestion.

The three of them lowered their body and jumped forwards. Their jump was so strong that the ground break.

***

A day later.

A long blue tongue was launched at Cade at high speed. Cade used his shield and easily parried that tongue. Without wasting any more time, he cut the tongue in two.

It was the same strategy he had been using in fighting the big tongue toad all this time but after he upgrades his linked equipment, killing them became much easier.

Cade launched forward and slashed the big blue tongue toad in two easily with his new and improved cardboard short sword.

The toad evaporated and dropped an item. Cade stared at the item and “YES!!!!” he screamed and jumped in joy because the toad dropped a puzzle piece.

It was the fifth puzzle piece that Cade got for the day. However, he was happier this time because he got a different part of the puzzle.

After Cade increased his luck to 91, he rarely got nothing when he killed a monster. They will always drop something. His probability of getting the skill book had increased and he got quite a lot of them including the rarely blue tongue skill book.

The first four puzzle pieces that Cade got were all the same one. They were the E grade big blue tongue toad’s limbs. The puzzle piece that he just got earlier was the E grade big blue tongue toad’s head.

According to the system, there were 4 parts of the puzzle for the toad. Cade was currently in possession of two of the four parts. If he found the body and blue tongue puzzle piece, he would be able to complete one of the puzzles and used them to increase his stats.

The thought of getting more stat points made him feel so happy. He could not help but want to kill more big blue tongue toad.

Cade was closed to the boss floor room of the third floor. However, he decided to wander around more until he got the body and a blue tongue puzzle piece.

While wandering around and killing the tens of toads, Cade finally got himself his third puzzle piece. It was the E grade big blue tongue toad’s head. All that was left was the blue tongue puzzle piece.

Cade continued his killing and suddenly, he met a familiar face again. It was Shihoon. Both of them were surprised to see each other.

While Cade was looking at Shihoon suspiciously, Shihoon looked the other way like he was guilty of something.