“So Arthur, there was an announcement from Chronos yesterday about someone killing a Demon Lord… and then an hour after that, the president makes an announcement that the people responsible live in America.” Arthur did not dare look at his father in that moment, instead choosing to eat his breakfast.

“Anything you want to tell me? Before I tell you what I know of course.” His father was straightforward when it came to things like this, and Arthur wasn’t sure how he felt about that.

“I… may have been the one to hit the final blow, and I may also have entered a deal with the Guild to be a representative, and I also may need to appear in front of the U.N in a few weeks?” Arthur committed to nothing, instead only saying ‘maybe’. It was a good political trick that Arthur’s father taught him.

Admit to nothing but give suggestions and people will run with it on their own. And if the suggestion is found to be true, you didn’t say it was, you just said ‘maybe’.

“I see. By the way, your LEV is showing.” Arthur looked down to his left wrist, and indeed… the glowing tattoo stating LEV 20 was showing.

“Ah. No wonder.” Arthur didn’t clarify, they both knew he was talking about how his father knew it was Arthur and his team that killed the Demon Lord.

He was level seventeen when he left the house the day before after all…

“Arthur, I’m not happy that people are celebrating killing, but for the human race it is something good. I’m not angry, I’m proud. Just don’t get hurt.” Markus stated, and all was still.

Arthur finished his food in silence and left with a smile on his face, Markus looking at his newspaper with a smile of his own.

In a few minutes, Arthur was at the Guild being shown in by Dante who spoke up as he opened the door.

“Hey, go talk to my sister before you go into the Dungeon. She’s got a few things.” Dante said and Arthur just nodded, knowing the rest of the group wasn’t here yet.

It gave him a chance to think after yesterday’s incident, looking at his hands and clenching them over and over.

He had changed, it was slight, but he had changed after slaying the Demon Lord. He was noticing it only now of course, but his… personality, changed a bit.

He wasn’t some different person, but he felt… easy. He felt calmer than he had been in a while, he felt…

Confident.

It was an odd feeling for Arthur, who had always doubted himself unless confirmed to be good at something. He felt strong now.

He felt it had to do with the being that ‘granted’ him power… and the only power it seemed that he could have gotten would be his new Unique Skill.

Sword Sage, it seemed to be a much higher form of Swordsmanship, given that it gave a similar boost to damage with bladed weapons.

The difference being that with Swordsmanship the percentage boost was something miniscule like two per cent.

With Sword Sage, it was huge, at a whole twenty per cent increase in damage with blades… not only that, but like Swordsmanship, it granted Extra Skills to be used with bladed weaponry.

The Extra Skill Arthur gained was strange though. Before his skill changed to Sword Sage, he had learnt Power Slash and Jagged, the last was apparently a rarer choice for the second skill level.

Now, Arthur lost those two Skills and gained a new one, simply called Slash. He had tried it the night before in his backyard, and he understood the difference between Sword Sage and Swordsmanship.

Swordsmanship was a tiny passive increase and powerful Skills that could only be used a certain amount of times before one got a headache.

Sword Sage had a huge passive increase and a weaker Skill… but it could be used much more freely.

Rather, it almost felt like every ‘slashing’ attack he did was the new Extra Skill rather than something normal. He did them perfectly, without question, but he still had errors with stabs, blocks, and so on.

It seemed like Sword Sage boosted his basic skill with bladed weaponry, little by little until his basic ability with a blade would surpass his peers.

While lost in thought, his team finally arrived, starting with Alice and Michael who lived nearby, then Emilia, then John and Matt, who apparently woke up late.

They walked to the counter to see Ellie waiting for them… with a team in front of her which she quickly ignored.

Apparently someone was trying to flirt. Idiots… she’d kill them if she felt like it.

“Ah, team Einherjar, you need to go over to that room there, the Guild Leader’s waiting for you.” She said, turning back to the other team who were looking at Einherjar with suspicion in their eyes.

Arthur’s team wouldn’t know, since they knew Shaun when the Guild was still starting out and not the impressive building it currently was, but getting to meet Shaun was rare, sure he hung out around the Guild at times, but no one dared to actually talk to him.

Seeing a team being called up by Shaun got some suspicious looks, but nothing more than that as Einherjar entered the room, seeing Shaun waiting with a large table in the centre of the room.

“Hey, you’re all here… swell, look, I got an order from up top. The Guild is to support you six to the best of our abilities, so we got you a few things.” His statement was punctuated with a touch of the table, showing armour and weaponry as Arthur and his friends stared.

“Ellie’s a Mind mage. Anyway, we set you up with equipment, made by one of the High Smiths.” That got raised eyebrows as they looked to the armour.

“What’s a High Smith?” Arthur’s question was met with a chuckle from Shaun.

“Dante, he’s one. He’s the one who made all these, and, under orders from the boss upstairs, we’re selling them to you. Of course, you don’t need to pay right up front, and because we’re half-sponsoring you, we will give a discount.” Shaun’s words were proven by the group scanning the equipment.

All of them required at least a level of ten with a stat higher than twenty, usually in Endurance or Strength, sometimes in both.

Matt was quick to accept some of the weightier armour, after figuring out that the armour auto-adjusted to fit them.

It was a standard effect on all equipment dropped from the Dungeon, and clearly something on equipment made by Smiths.

“You didn’t answer the question though… what’s a High Smith?” Emilia asked as she checked the elbow and knee-guards making Shaun think about it.

“It’s a Guild thing. See, we’re the Adventurer’s Guild, but we aren’t the only Guild that was created in the past two months. The Smithing Guild is one such Guild, and Dante is a member there as well. He’s level nineteen, the highest levelled Blacksmith in the world, so he’s a High Smith.” Shaun’s explanation was continued as Einherjar checked out their equipment.

“A High Smith is considered the best at what they do. Only the Blacksmiths with a level above fifteen can consider themselves High Smiths, and Dante is the strongest.” Shaun was proud of that, given that Dante was his subordinate and teammate.

“Isn’t that weird? I mean, if Dante is part of two Guilds?” Arthur asked as Shaun shrugged.

“It’s not much of an issue. All Guilds use the same system, they’re just places to trade information. Granted, competition is beginning to build up in some, but Guilds at their core provide information and a system to use.” Shaun’s words made sense.

Kind of like how a band can release an album, and then a single member of that band could release his own album, they weren’t mutually exclusive.

“These are good equipment… how much would all this cost though?” Arthur asked with worry as Shaun took a sip of his canteen, now filled with Bell’s whiskey as he considered it for a bit.

Yeah, it was his new favourite, cheap too.

“Let’s see… all of you took something, metallic stuff went to your tank, your berserker and your leader. Leather worked stuff went to the assassin, archer and the healer. The tank got himself a good hammer, the berserker took a whip, the healer took a staff…” Arthur gulped as Shaun continued calculating.

“It all comes out to-” Arthur felt himself blank out when he found out there were five digits in the price.

“Why so expensive!” someone shouted as Arthur felt himself come back and consider the price.

“It’s actually not. This is after a half price discount, so normally it would be over one hundred thousand dollars. This is because equipment is better than any normal version of the same armour. And calculating…” Shaun pointed at Emilia.

“Leather boots, coat, breastplate, knee guards and elbow guards, counting the last two as a single item that’s four pieces of items, the coat is the most expensive piece and the cheapest were the boots, the price range is one thousand dollars to three.” Emilia paled a bit looking at the coat which hugged her frame, keeping it from flapping about as she moved.

“Next, metallic greaves, helmet, leather joint guards, metallic chestplate, the most expensive items on the list bar the joint guards, ranging from two thousand to six thousand.” Matt felt almost physically pained as they continued.

Everyone found that their equipment cost almost ten thousand each if the price was split up. John’s equipment cost the least, given that he just got himself boots and arm guards, as well as a staff…

But the staff was the most expensive item in the arrangement, going for seven thousand because it increased spell count, a rare ability.

“But don’t worry about it. Most of the seventy five thousand you owe can be paid off by the fact that you’ll be providing us with information on new monsters. Even I’ve never been to the eleventh floor, so you should have paid us back by the twelfth or thirteenth.” Shaun’s statement calmed the group down after a moment.

“Luckily the arrangement with the appraisers lets them check out the price for things. Remember, a Lantern Brute’s Soul Stone gets you a clean fifty dollars. The stuff in the new Area of the Dungeon would probably get you more.” Shaun said as they walked out of the place in their old outfits.

No point in making people jealous… and luckily their inventory allowed them to get dressed without showing skin.

They couldn’t try that in a fight, too little concentration for changing clothes, but otherwise it worked out alright.

“Actually that reminds me, why do Adventurer’s make so much money? Wasn’t it that money was becoming scarce?” Matt asked, considering his father owned a business and wanted Matt to work for him, he knew how money flowed in their economy.

Shaun’s face took a grim look as he sighed, looking around for a moment.

“The fact is, almost every government in the world has too much money right now. I’m sure you heard the rumours, of people asking ‘where is the money going’ after Red Sky Day when entire families died.” Einherjar kept quiet as they listened.

“The truth is, every government requisitioned the money if it had nowhere to go, and then Animae came in, and some can be used as lie detectors like my own. We rooted out corrupt officials, and now money doesn’t go missing as often as it used to.” Everyone noted that Shaun seemed really proud about that last bit.

“So because of that, the governments are running smoother around the world, and we all have a bit extra money to make more money.” Shaun’s words were cut off by Arthur.

“So what you’re doing with the extra money… is paying us Adventurer’s for the Soul Stones we collect and other items from the Dungeon. And then using what we give the government, they make more?” Arthur asked as Shaun nodded with a smirk.

“Yeah. Soul Stones are a new form of energy for use, there are scientists we got trying to make phones and other electronics with them, and they can even be used in enchanting items to have elemental effects. To be frank, we’re paying for our scientists to research and make us more money than we lose to you all.” Shaun was at least honest about it, and no one in Einherjar blamed them, that’s how the economy worked.

“So you’re creating an entirely new section of economy… the Adventurers go into the Dungeon and bring back resources. The Government buys these resources, and Adventurer’s use the money they make to buy food, water, and so on, the money would flow back to the Government due to taxes. Then the Government creates new devices and sells them to the general public, and gains even more money flow.” Matt’s statement…

Well, they knew he was smarter than he let on, it surprised no one, the only thing surprising was how calmly he said it.

“Yeah. A healthy economy is determined by exchange of money, too much exchange and your money is worth little, not enough exchange and people are blocking the economy from flowing.” Shaun admitted, and that was some food for thought as they went up to the Access Panel, Shaun leaving them.

Shaun looked to his wrist, seeing the LEV 21 before hiding it once more.

Einherjar didn’t need to know what he did last night, though he would tell them what he found out another time.

Einherjar set up their team formation, and they chuckled as they witnessed Arthur looking reluctant before placing himself as the leader.

And then, the door appeared in the obsidian block… but the Access Panel also changed, showing the two options from the previous day.

Select Area:

Dungeon Entrance

Forest of the Maiden

The difference being that the second option was available, while the first was not. Picking the second option, the ‘door’ flashed and then the second option blanked out.

“So when teleporting back, we just vanish and reappear. When teleporting into the Dungeon, it changes where the door opens.” Arthur noted as they walked into the Dungeon, finding themselves standing on the plateau overlooking the ‘Forest of the Maiden’ Area.

“It’s beautiful honestly.” Arthur’s words weren’t denied, the scenery from where they stood was very beautiful. Bright blue sky, dotted by the occasional fluffy white cloud, the sun wasn’t visible but the sky was bright, and the breeze felt like a soft embrace.

Arthur wouldn’t mind just sitting there for a while, but they knew they had to move forward, and so they looked to the path heading down… and down they went.

Coming down to floor eleven, they knew things had changed.

For one, they found themselves on a forest path, no way back beyond the door behind them, and only one way forward. The forest around them, the trees were showing gaps between them, showing the occasional tiny creature looking at them before scampering away.

Many of those tiny creatures were not normal, such as a fox with blue fur, or a squirrel with a scythe for a tail, but they didn’t attack Arthur’s group, and Arthur could see why, as their souls were much smaller than any of the Einherjar, thus making them weaker.

He was using Soul Sight subconsciously again…

“We won’t be able to chase after them. We’re only allowed on the path.” Arthur stated, seeing the runes lining the path, pointing them out to Einherjar as he tried to walk past the line, instead, pressing into an invisible wall.

“So it’s similar to the caves in that we can only move along the paths, it’s impossible to dig through the walls into another path.” Emilia stated with a breath of relief, drawing a map of a forest would be next to impossible for her, but like this, it would be the same as mapping the caves.

“Yes… but be weary. While these runes keep them out and us in, there might come a time in the Dungeon where the runes won’t be around, or they’ll let the creatures in.” Arthur’s warning got a groan from the group as they began to move.

The last time he made a prediction like that, was the one involving the ‘tutorial’ ending on floor ten, and boy did it end.

Einherjar encountered their first monster by surprise.

As in the monster surprised them.

They had been walking normally, following the new path, branching out occasionally to look at other paths and add them to the map.

Oddly enough, when Emilia made a map, due to her Tracking skill being a sub-category of Mapping, she could immediately determine where the stairs were relative to the entirety of the map.

Basically, if they made the map a grid, she would now exactly where on the grid they appeared from, and would draw from there.

It was a problem for people mapping a new place, but thanks to the skill it seems that they bypassed it.

Anyway, they were walking, and then… it just dropped in the middle of their group.

It was a Goblin, a creature they were used to, they had fought many of them before, Alice pulped them with her hammer every time they encountered one.

This wasn’t a normal Goblin though, given that it immediately lunged at Michael stabbing his stomach with a tiny dagger it held as Michael shouted in pain, holding his wound.

The Goblin wasn’t able to retrieve its dagger due to Michael stepping back while holding the knife where it was, and the Goblin was left without a weapon as Alice swung at its head.

It died, in one hit, much like every other Goblin they fought, but Arthur stared at its soul with trepidation.

Michael removed the dagger, looking at it for a moment before cursing, tossing it on the floor as it faded away, calling out to John for a Recovery, the spell used for abnormal effects, most noticeably poison.

John was quick to use it as they gathered around Michael in a defensive position, the four other members looking in each cardinal direction.

“Arthur what the fuck was that? It looked like a Goblin!” Alice asked in a shout as Arthur clenched his fist.

“Quiet, now!” he whispered back as they all kept as quiet as possible, Michael having been cured of the poison on the dagger as they waited.

“Arthur, we need an explanation, fast.” Emilia whispered, and Arthur nodded, looking around, and then at the canopy above them.

“It was in the tree above us. It was hiding. Its soul was not clear, but coloured a kind of vomit green. It had intelligence.” That was a worry as Alice spoke up.

“It died in one hit like every other Goblin… but they’re a threat now, aren’t they?” she asked as Arthur nodded, they still looked around in worry.

“Yes. Michael, why did you ask for Recovery immediately?” Arthur asked as Michael cursed once more.

“Shit. Literally. The dagger was rusted and covered in what looked like old shit and blood.” The group turned green at the idea of being stabbed with any weapon like that, and it made sense that Michael immediately called out for poison recovery.

“We’ll continue… but after we get out of this place, we’re taking him to a hospital.” Arthur’s words were accepted. Recovery was never used before now, they didn’t know how powerfully it healed.

“Also, I’ll be activating Soul Sight continuously now. It’s difficult for me to make out details while I’m using it, so everyone else will need to guide me as I look out for enemies.” He admitted, now that the enemy souls weren’t clear, they wouldn’t blend into the background until shattered.

“Alright… I’ll be looking above into the trees now too. That was a mistake on my part as the scout.” Michael said, knowing that his injury was payment enough for the mistake he had made.

“John, apply bandaging. It’s a normally threatening wound, but with our physique…” Arthur hinted and John nodded, getting the idea.

Clearly Michael wouldn’t be closing the stab wound on his own right now, but bandaging it would heal it better, and they wouldn’t be moving too fast to get him more injured.

John only had a certain amount of heals to his name, with the staff he could use eight, without it he could use only six. Eight heals a day, and using one on such a stab wound was not as important as say healing broken bones.

Not only that, but their stats affected them in strange ways, and the Vitality stat had to do with recovery. Michael would be fine for moving around, but he wouldn’t be running around without wincing.

They learned their lesson, continuing on their path, encountering a few more Goblins of different types as they moved through the forest.

The one they first encountered as a Goblin Assassin, only attacking from above and wearing only a loincloth so as to take advantage of their green skin and blend in to the leaves.

The other ones they encountered were Goblin Scouts, Goblin Warriors and one Goblin Mage. The Scouts were archers, and the Warriors attacked straight up unlike Assassins, and had a tiny wooden shield looking like a barrel top.

And the one Mage shot a fire ball at them, something Emilia blocked easily as Michael shot its throat out.

They ended up going home earlier than usual, due to wanting to check out Michael’s condition and reporting the Goblin infestation…

They also noticed another thing, courtesy of Arthur.

They were getting less experience than they used to from Goblins. Arthur’s explanation was that the Goblin souls were the same size as the empty ones, just coloured in… and for some reason, that colour allowed more of its soul to condense into a Soul Stone, and less to be converted into Soul (experience) for their level up.

In exchange there were a huge amount of Goblins, given that they had to have at least killed three digits of Goblins before they left, and that had gotten them a level actually, due to the sheer amount they killed.

Arthur was also having fun. Granted, the newer Goblins were scary in their own way, given they moved in formation, were willing to harm each other to kill the six Einherjar, and didn’t move in set patterns they used to…

But Arthur was enjoying fighting them, given the smile on his face which no one judged. He was enjoying killing them, but not because of what that meant, but because he was figuring out new things as they fought.

For one, they were forced to move more erratically to fight the Goblins, resulting in some creative acrobatics from Alice, Emilia, Arthur, and at one point Matt, and this was a good thing.

They were getting stronger, shown by their stats, but they were still learning how that affected them, how to move with their new power and speed, and fighting the Goblins were giving them more surety in their movements.

Arthur’s new found skill with blades interested the group as well, seeing how accurately he killed the enemies, never letting them touch him if they got close enough for him to harm them with his new weapon.

He only took armour from Shaun, so where did he get the new weapon? Why, from the Demon Lord of course. Blade dropped two items, his Soul Stone which was larger than normal, and the sword he had used against Arthur and his friends. It was good, as shown here:

Name: Soul Flame (Sword of a Lantern Hero)

Requirements:

Level: 20

Swordsmanship Skill (or some alternative)

Strength: 25 - Dexterity: 25

Offensive Ability: D+

Passive: Fire Damage added to attacks (D)

It’s offensive ability was high for their level, not to mention its fire damage added was especially good against Goblins. It took the form of a long sword meant to be used with one hand, and it was slightly thinner than the original weapon, but still had that fire flickering through the part where a fuller would be on a double edged European blade.

That centre piece didn’t even exist for this sword, and while that would usually result in a blade that would break in one use, the flames themselves somehow acted as the ‘spine’ of the blade to prevent that.

Arthur loved the blade, and used it well while keeping his Dagger of Hunger in use as either a parrying dagger or to be used to execute the Goblins after using Soul Flame to knock their weapons or shields away.

Arthur also got a chance to test his two new skills, one being Void, the ability his Dagger had to create an effect similar to a black hole.

It lasted barely a second, but it was enough to drag three Goblins into striking range when they were previously three metres away, so he decided that it was an ability to drag opponents close to him.

He didn’t try using it while the Dagger was stabbed into one of them, mostly because there was a chance of gore and he didn’t want that, even if the blood evaporated soon after the death of the Goblin.

And his new favourite skill, Lightning Elemental.

It was a Spell Skill, like John’s Light Scripture, in that it gave him spells to use which required actually saying the names or chanting at higher levels.

In his case, the Skill granted a choice between two spells, which would have an effect on his future growth of the skill.

The first skill, which he didn’t pick, was Lesser Elemental Summon, which would have created a tiny elemental to use magic for Arthur instead of him using it. This was ‘external’ use.

The second skill, which he did choose, was Lesser Spark Step. Everyone laughed at him the first time it was used, and he didn’t blame them…

LSS was an internal use spell, a boosting spell similar to John’s Anima, Enhancing Arts, and it caused Arthur to move faster.

The problem was that Arthur’s Dexterity stat was not high enough to control the new speed, and that when he used the spell…

His hair stood on end, as if he was being electrocuted… it gave him an Einstein look the first time he used it, and the second time his hair instead settled on just looking like he gelled it back.

It still looked hilarious to see the tiny sparks shooting between the strands of his hair, and it apparently made him look like he was starting his ‘super saiyan transformation’.

In a few years, he would be regretting that phrasing, but that’s a story for another time.

Lesser Spark Step was also a continuous spell. It could be activated and deactivated without worry for ‘uses’ like John’s own spells, but it took quite a large amount of Mana for Arthur…

Arthur could only use it for about ten minutes straight before he ran out of Mana and got a headache so bad hangovers looked cute.

He knew about how running out of Mana felt because he had done so before just to know the results, even if he rarely got drunk enough for hangovers.

Their final fight of the day was against two Goblin Scouts, three Goblin Warriors and during the fight three Assassin’s arrived to try and do a pincer attack.

Arthur ended up killing the Warriors with Alice’s assistance, with Matt activating Bulwark to keep them from getting hit by arrows and Michael killing their Scouts. Emilia felt offended at the presence of Goblin Assassin’s considering her role in the team, and so she attacked them, taking them out of the equation.

She had even managed to use Tracking finally, after a Goblin Warrior sneaked off after they assumed it dead, following it to a smaller group of Goblins where it was being healed by placing herbs on its wounds.

They killed it without mercy of course. These Goblins were similar to the more vile editions of the beasts, given how they kept trying to kill the men of Einherjar while just ‘hurting’ the women.

Disgusting filth that had to die, was the general view on them.

Despite the new found seriousness of the Dungeon though, they were having fun with it, in their own way, and they soon teleported back to level up… and get some surprising news.

“Last night I fought the Demon Lord Blade.” A pin drop could be heard.

Arthur Clive

Level: 21 (D-Rank)

Class: Linked Swordsman- Grants one stat point to Strength and Wisdom per level

Gives Soul Sight (Unique) Skill

Anima

Dagger of Hunger

Cloak of Will

Anima Skills

No Change

Primary Element: Lightning

Personal Skills

Tactician II (24/100) - increases Wisdom by 15% (total 125%)

Sword Sage I (16/200)- Any bladed weapon deals 20% extra damage

Soul Sight II (4/300) - Allows insight beyond mortality

Dual Wielding II (16/100) - Greater use of two weapons

Lightning Elemental I (7/100) - Use supplementary lightning spells

Stats

Strength: 29

Dexterity: 34

Intelligence: 22

Wisdom: 34 (42)

Endurance: 22

Vitality: 29