Fenrir

A few days later

I think one more arena should do…

My thoughts are interrupted as Dawn suddenly exclaims, “The City Lord is Tier 2!”

I glance at her for a second before looking at the entrance in one of my dungeon’s instances and finding the Hybrid in question standing there radiating the aura of a Tier 2 cultivator.

“Yeah, didn’t you already know?” I ask out of curiosity as I look back at Dawn again. “Plenty of the intruders have been talking about it.”

Dawn looks surprised for a second before flying over to Fang and saying, “Huh.”

Hmm. Guess she really didn’t know.

Did she stop watching the intruders or something? I know that she’s been playing with Fang more and more these days, but-

“Hey, Fenrir?” she suddenly asks, sounding a little tentative. “Can I ask you something?”

My core pulses slightly in surprise and I ask back, “Sure.”

Just what’s going on with her? She’s never done this before.

Dawn hesitates in silence for several more seconds, making me more and more curious with each extra second, before she finally comes out and asks, “Could I leave the dungeon for a little while?”

“Leave? Sure,” I answer her without any pause.

After all, she usually does it at least once a week or so to go steal from the intruders up above. Albeit through a different entrance and not the main one since they ended up putting too much security around it.

I’m not really sure if they figured out that I – or rather she – was the one stealing their stuff, but they put a lot of security around the dungeon entrance regardless. But that could also be due to those Vampires who apparently weren’t supposed to have been able to enter in the first place.

“Well…” Dawn continues, confusing me for a moment with her still-hesitant attitude, “I’m wanting to take a longer trip this time.”

A longer… trip?

“How long?” I ask, giving her all of my focus.

Dawn bobs back and forth above Fangs head, unconsciously teasing the not-so-little guy in the process before answering, “Maybe for a month or so?”

My core flares in surprise as I exclaim, “A month?!”

She stops moving at this and quickly explains, “Yeah. I’ve wanted to go out and get a look at the surrounding nation and land for a while now, but I have always been too worried to leave you for such a long period of time. But now that you’re Tier 2, it shouldn’t be a problem. Not to mention that contract you signed with those Vampires.”

Somehow, despite her just being a ball of colored flame, I get the idea that she’s doing that very intruder-like action of fidgeting right now. Except without any hands or body parts to fidget.

I look around my dungeon for a few seconds before looking back at her and asking, “Are you just curious about the land? Or is it something else?”

“A little bit of both.” Dawn says before gathering herself back up and beginning to act normally again, “I am curious about the area outside of the city up above, but I also just want to see the outside world more. More than just the city above. And not just the few hills around it either.”

She… huh.

“Okay,” I answer after a second, “that makes sense.”

We both fall silent for a few minutes, with her just playing around with Fang and myself watching the City Lord’s party as they enter the portal to the sixth floor of my dungeon.

Looking at Leon’s other party members, I doubt it’ll take them long to reach Tier 2 as well. But at the same time, his group doesn’t seem to have all that much time to come into the dungeon. Likely due to their leader being the City Lord and having a bunch of management duties that he has to deal with above.

A little while passes and the intruders continue making their way through the sixth floor without much trouble thanks to their leader’s Tier 2 strength making it pretty much a breeze at this level.

“When are you planning on leaving?” I ask Dawn out of curiosity.

She stops playing with Fang for a moment before answering, “In a day or so.”

I quickly look at her, only to slowly turn my attention back to the intruders again as I state, “Okay.”

That’s sooner than I would have thought. But it makes sense.

She isn’t the same as me, despite us both having spent most of our lives in a cave. She isn’t a dungeon core, so she can move around and see things outside of just my dungeon.

It’s only natural that she’d get curious.

Although this means I’ll have to keep the secondary entrance open for a while, and maybe add several Tier 2 guards near it so that nothing unwanted comes in. Which might be a little annoying, but it’s worth it in the end.

“You said you’d be gone for a month?” I ask, remembering the time she mentioned earlier.

Dawn focuses on my core for a moment before turning her attention onto the intruders and saying, “Yeah.”

My core pulses slightly in irritation at the sight of Leon zapping another one of my lycans with his new lightning magic.

That lightning bolt skill of his was annoying enough, but now that he’s able to use magic on his own without it to a limited degree, it’s just even more annoying.

Especially since it’ll mean that he’s improving as a mage as well.

Wait…

Or maybe that’s a good thing?

Uh… I’m not really sure anymore.

I know he can bring me a lot of benefits from being the City Lord, but I’m not sure what exactly would happen if he were to die.

Hmm. Guess it’s not bad or good.

I turn my attention back towards Dawn at the thought before stating, “Just make sure you’re careful out there.”

Dawn goes pink out of embarrassment at my worrying, but I don’t give it much through and immediately get back to work on the eleventh floor.

It’s been a surprisingly long amount of time since I started the floor. Especially since I kind of redid a lot of stuff in it at some point.

But I’m still looking forward to seeing the intruder’s reactions to this arena-based floor.