534 Treasure But Mimic

After stuffing the Lich bones and its Mana Crystal into my Pack of Folding, we left the boss room to start our descent into the next floor.

"That was some nice support, Aster. I seriously can't believe that you're just a trainee maid," Kaelin commented.

Eita, however, scowled at Riklan, "What was that at the end? Why did you rush out like that?"

He shrugged in response, "I saw the chance so I took it. What's wrong?"

"Everything? You just abandoned your role as our vanguard and leapt in at the boss! What if you failed?!"

"Come on now, it was a calculated risk since we had Aster supporting us, the risk wasn't that big. Even if I failed, I could have retreated and Aster would have healed me."

Eita narrowed her eyes at him but did not refute his words.

Kaelin chuckled, "There, there, Eita. even you have to admit that he's right. Aster's support is just too good that we can take risks like this that we normally wouldn't under normal circumstances."

"That doesn't mean you need to make Aster's life harder, does it?"

I waved my hand in a placating manner, "Ei… Eita… It's fine, really. Thank you for your concern though, but I'm really fine."

"Ugh… If you say so, Aster…"

At that moment, we reached the bottom of the stairs and, instead of a labyrinth cave like the first two floors, we found ourselves in a giant cavern.

The weird thing was that the entire place was empty, so it's not like it was another boss room or something.

"What's this?" I asked, hoping that these veterans might have encountered something like this before and could explain what kind of room this was.

Unfortunately, it was a first time for them as well since they were also looking around in confusion.

"What… Is this place?" Eita asked no one in particular.

Kaelin frowned, "Odd… Is this a boss room? It doesn't look like a boss room though."

I narrowed my eyes and pointed all the way at the end, "Is that the stairs to the next level?"

Riklan narrowed his eyes and nodded, "That is… Indeed the stairs to the next level. This seems suspiciously simple."

Kaelin groaned, "Don't tell me the entire cavern is filled with traps… I swear if it is, I'm turning back no matter what anyone says."

Our leader sighed, "Well… Let's just proceed forward first and see what happens… So shall we?"

All of us looked at each other before nodding.

I was once again taking up the rear of the party as we advanced into the large and seemingly empty cavern.

Riklan and Kaelin were taking each step as cautiously as possible, making sure that there weren't any traps before taking the next step.

I watched them carefully as well, fully prepared to cast either [Heal] or [Cleanse] on them depending on the situation.

Eita acted as our lookout, the mage constantly looking around to see if there were any monsters or dangers that we might have missed coming towards us.

Surprisingly, there were no traps, or at least we did not trigger any along the way.

How odd… Was this floor of the Dungeon just meant to be a straight path towards the next floor?

Just as that thought crossed my mind, the entire cavern suddenly started to shake quite violently.

All four of us huddled together in a circle, our backs facing each other as we went on high alert, wondering what was causing the cavern to shake like that.

I was fully prepared for some kind of giant monster or something to show up but unexpectedly, the air in the centre of the cavern suddenly shifted as though an illusion had been dispelled.

There, where it was once just an empty space, was now a treasure chest.

"Another one?" Eita muttered, her eyes narrowed at it in suspicion.

Kaelin raised an eyebrow at her, "Are you going to suggest that it's another trap again?"

The mage scowled at him, "Obviously? Or did you forget how the last chest exploded on you and made you taste the wall? And this one is way more suspicious than the other one, right?"

"That… That… Kuhh… Fine… Then do we just ignore it?"

Riklan stared at the chest for a moment before sighing, "I think we should avoid this one this time, especially since we've not seen this type of room in a Dungeon before. Let's go around it."

All of us agreed with his decision and we gave the chest a wide berth as we continued towards the end of the cavern.

But as though the Dungeon was insulted that we had no interest in the chest, the cavern started rumbling again.

Then, without warning, the treasure chest was engulfed in a pillar of fire that exploded out from the ground underneath it.

We were just in the midst of feeling fortunate that we didn't fall for the trap when the fire subsided, revealing an empty hole at where the chest had been.

As the thought of checking out the hole came to mind, a clawed hand reached up and grabbed onto the ledge.

Slowly, it pulled itself up to reveal that the hand belonged to a giant mimic.

The size of the chest that was its head was big enough to fit any one of us in its mouth with a single bite and its legs elevated it to be high enough to almost reach the ceiling in height. Its disproportionately thin arms were also long enough to almost reach the floor, its fingers ending in sharp claws.

[Name: Dungeon Treasure Mimic

Race: Monster

Stats:

350 Strength

60 Dexterity

250 Endurance

400 Magic]

"Treasure Mimic? Oh wow… We hit the jackpot guys," Kaelin laughed, his smile turning just slightly feral.

I raised an eyebrow at him, "Why is this monster a jackpot?"

He turned to me, "You don't know? This is a super rare monster that can appear by chance and if you defeat it, it will turn into a treasure chest that is guaranteed to be filled with treasures! What's more… The stronger the mimic, the better the treasure!"

"But… We first need to beat it right? This one seems pretty strong though?"

Riklan shook his head, "The good thing about them is that they have no ranged capabilities so we just need to attack it from a distance. And since we have this entire cavern to run around in, it's the best location for us right now."

"So we just… Run around the cavern and shoot magic at it?"

"That's the plan, let's go!"

All of them started running towards the other side of the cavern with Eita shooting an icicle at it to start the fight.

The projectile shattered against the Mimic's head, creating an explosion of frost and causing it to stumble back a step.

It let out a roar of challenge before starting to run towards us.

And when I say run, I meant it in a rather generous sense because… Well… It was slow…

Like I could probably outpace it at a slow jog without much problems…

Kaelin joined in and flung a few fireballs at it while Riklan made use of his sword to send waves of fire slashes towards the Treasure Mimic.

Both attacks were enough to stop it from advancing and even caused it to stumble back, though it recovered relatively quickly to start giving chase again only to have another spell hit it to repeat the process again.

I… Don't think I would need to do anything here…

I can see this monster being a threat if we were stuck in an enclosed space with this monster chasing after us.

Even if it was a little slow, it still had quite a long reach and could grab any of us to throw in its mouth if it got close enough.

But when we are given this gigantic cavern to kite this monster… Unless something unexpected happens, I don't think it would be a problem.

That's why instead of directing my attention to the Treasure Mimic, I was making sure that there were no monsters crawling on the cavern walls or ceiling or something like that.

And seriously, it felt so cheaty…

We didn't even need to run at all, we just needed to back away slowly and keep walking in a circle as it tried to chase us. The only time when it was a little dangerous was when one of the three needed to drink a mana potion to regain their mana to continue shooting magic at the monster.

The monster might gain some ground while that happened but we simply needed to run a little bit further before turning around to fight it again.

It felt like we were bullying it to be honest… So I decided not to join in on attacking it with them.

It took a while but after about close to half an hour or so, the Treasure Mimic fell onto the ground with a loud crash, defeated.

The fight was completely monotonous but I guess the fact that there wasn't any real danger involved was a big plus?

Now what's inside the treasure chest?