566 Feels Like A Trap

It's been too quiet…

After how many times we got attacked by Shadow Devourers before we went inside this room, I was expecting this place to be filled with traps as well.

But instead of that, we've met with no resistance so far while we continued to advance.

There were still tons of doors along the way and each of them was a prison cell with a Rejmar inside of it.

I wondered why these people were kept here while others were kept in the cells on the floor above instead.

That was when I noticed one of the doors seemed to be glowing and all of us turned our attention to it.

Runes started to appear in the air around the door, forming into some sort of arc reminiscent of a doorway.

Then, even as we watched, the door that the runes were surrounding slowly faded away as if it was turning translucent before finally disappearing, leaving a blank wall behind.

Huh…

"I did not just imagine that, did I?" I muttered.

"You did not, Master."

Yes, thank you for affirming that I was not going crazy, Eins.

Gwen also nodded, "I saw that as well, Aster. But I suppose we're all wondering what it means?"

"Perhaps… This is just an assumption from me… But do you think that room was sent to the floor above us?" I suggested.

Olgar furrowed his brow, "What kind of magic is that?"

Thorn raised a finger, "I don't think it's impossible though. If he managed to somehow control the Dungeon, he could be using some of the Dungeon's features for himself."

"Could someone really do that?"

"Fuck if I know, but that's what I'm guessing is happening here. I know some Dungeons can change their layout so it might be that."

I turned to the two Rejmars, "I feel like it might be a little late to ask this but what exactly was this guy's goal when he destroyed that city? Or more specifically, why did he create Shadow Devourers in the first place?"

Both of them shrugged before Olgar answered me, "No one knew. He just showed up one day and then unleashed those monsters on the city before disappearing. We had even thought that the monsters might have also killed him with how suddenly he came and vanished."

Great… So we have some crazy dude who kidnapped an entire bunch of Dungeoneers to be used to create monsters and we don't even know what his goals are.

The only thing I know about this guy so far is that he writes BL smut and hides the book in his drawer.

Hey, maybe he's trying to create Shadow Devourers to recreate his BL scenes? You never know.

As we walked past the door that had just disappeared, another set of stairs greeted us at the end, leading even deeper down to the lower floors.

Seems like this place goes deeper than we thought.

As we started to advance towards the stairs, an audible click came from behind us and we turned to see what caused the noise.

A figure was moving in the darkness and I immediately shone the light from my [Spotlight] on it.

Oh, it was another Shadow Devo-- Wait a minute… This one has thicker limbs and looks a bit shorter…

Ah, it's that Renegade Shadow Devourer I see. Has it come back to attack us again despite running away the last time?

Judging by how it was standing there menacingly, I would assume that was the case.

All of my companions rearranged themselves quickly to the appearance of the new threat, Gwen taking the front with the other two on her flanks.

The monster sprinted towards us on all fours, as though aiming to ram itself into our vanguard to throw them out of its way.

I fired a [Static Bolt] at it to try and stop it from reaching us but the monster managed to duck out of the way before the magic hit it.

Gwen and the others braced themselves in preparation to receive the attack, only to stare in wide eyed shock as the monster leapt over them to reach its claws towards me.

Why me?!

I brought up my Light Sword to defend myself but it seemed like it was unnecessary since Eins leapt into the air and kicked at the monster, sending it flying back from where it had come from.

The three Rejmars quickly descended upon the monster and finished it off quite easily after that.

But instead of the monster dropping a Mana Crystal, it simply melted away and disappeared.

"That was just a Shadow Summon," Gwen concluded, glaring at the ground where the monster had been.

Olgar spat on the ground, "Tsk… So the damn monster is too afraid to even face us on its own. Bet it got that from the traitor."

"At least we managed to end it quickly. That thing was pretty annoying to fight if we faced it head on," Thorn commented.

And as though fate was laughing at us, more movements could be seen in the darkness and an entire horde of Renegade Shadow Devourers appeared.

What the fuck? Even if the real one had the ability to summon more of itself, it uses up mana to do that right? The strength of the Shadow Summon should be proportionate to how much mana was used to summon these things too. What's more, isn't the spell normally restricted to only one summon?

But yet when I inspected them with [Screened], all of them had the same stats as the original one! How is it able to summon all of these and maintain the original… Ah…

Of course… That Liquid Mana… Well shit… This is not really an ideal situation…

Should I just call out my Shadow Guards and fight them now?

Before I could decide however, Gwen, Olgar and Thorn had turned around and ran towards the stairs behind me, the three of them grabbing both Eins and my hands as they ran past.

"What are you standing around for?! Let's get out of here!!" Olgar roared.

Well… I guess we can just run away for now.

Predictably, the monsters weren't that keen on letting us escape and immediately started giving chase. It was quite intimidating to see an entire horde of those shadow monsters running after us.

Unfortunately, the monsters were catching up to us since, no offence, the Rejmars did not exactly have the longest strides.

"Eins," I called out.

"Understood."

With that single word, she freed her hands before picking up both Thorn and Olgar to lift them over her shoulders like they were two sacks of potatoes.

As for me, I picked Gwen up in a sort of princess carry before both Eins and I dashed towards the stairs.

Just in case, I even used [Fire Blast] to temporarily stop the monsters, though it wasn't as effective as I liked since the ones behind simply pushed the ones on fire aside to continue the charge towards us.

I decided something more solid might help so I used [Earth Ball] and launched the projectile towards the leading monster's legs.

The ball of earth smashed against it, causing the monster to trip over and fall on the ground, which in turn made the others behind it stumble on it as well.

This resulted in a small pileup as the Shadow Devourers behind it failed to stop themselves and also ran straight into the pile.

We managed to reach the stairs without any other hindrances and quickly descended down the steps before the monsters could recover.

I wasn't sure if they would follow us down the stairs but the main thing was to get away from here first and we could think about that later.

When we reached the bottom, we found ourselves in a wide hall with walls and both the floor and ceiling painted completely black.

The issue was that there were no visible exits aside from the stairs behind us.

I looked behind us and directed my light towards the top of the stairs, waiting to see if the monsters would start descending after us.

But even after waiting for a minute, I saw nothing appear at the top of the stairs.

Huh… It seems like we actually escaped from them?

Eins and I lowered the Rejmars we were carrying back on the ground since now the coast was clear.

"Sorry about that," I apologised.

Gwen giggled, "Hehehe~ You can carry me anytime you want, Aster. I don't mind~"

The other two were looking in our direction so I coughed to hide my embarrassment, "Ahem… Where are we now?"

Before anyone could answer though, the stairs that we had descended from were suddenly blocked off by a wall dropping down from above, preventing us from going back up.

A Rejmar that I did not recognise also materialised out of thin air in the centre of the room, his face partially covered by a hood though his eyes seemed to shine in the darkness.

"Welcome to my Dungeon. I see you have made it past my Shadow Devourers so congra--"

His words were cut short when I opened a portal to teleport in front of him and punched him in the face, sending him flying all the way to the other end of the hall.

What? I already said I'd punch the bastard!