Dungeon Menagerie 30 (Patreon)

Dungeon Menagerie

Chapter 30

-VB-

They killed the Squig. 

Vanessa gripped her sword and spear tightly as she stared off into the distance where she heard its last shriek when she felt its connection with her snap and vanish.

They could have killed it because they were just adventurers…

But she also got a flash of memory from the squig before it died. And she heard enough to know that they were after her.

Why else would adventurers be following her group? 

This was the exact kind of scenario she wanted to avoid when she became an adventurer, and it was happening right when she needed the least amount of distraction. 

“Bell, we have adventurers who want to rob us,” she called out. “Mori, get ready to get as many of them as possible.”

Her friend silently walked up to her side and braced himself. 

“Chauky, keep Lili safe. Bell, can I depend on you to fight with me against other people?”

There was only a single moment of hesitation. 

“Yes.” Then he walked up to her other side and pulled his shortsword and dagger out. 

Vanessa took a deep breath in-.

“Are you sure that they aren’t just adventurers passing by?” Lili asked from the back.

She glanced over her shoulder to look at the pallum. “I might have thought that if they didn’t kill the squig.”

That comment made Lili looked around, and indeed, the squig was not there with them. “Huh? When -?!”

“He’s dead,” she replied as she looked ahead. “They killed him after stabbing him two dozen times.”

Her words made Bell grip his weapons, and the leather gloves he wore squeezed audibly.

“Mori will make the opening move as soon as they show up. If not, then I will go in and cause havoc. None of them were equipped to look like Level 3’s or 4’s, so they should be at most Level 2’s. Lili, I want you to handle long range support, alright? Chauky will keep them out of their reach as much as she could.”

“A-Alright! I’ll do my best.”

She took a deep breath in and let it out slowly. 

“Then follow my lead. Mori?”

-VB-

Renges knew the moment they were discovered they had fucked up. 

“We need to retreat!” he hissed to Deften, their dubious leader for this operation. 

“We do but to where?” he hissed back. “We still can’t see them, and we can’t hear them anymore. For all we fucking know, they’re already moving away and back up. Or going deeper.”

Everyone in the group was now looking around, but most of them looked towards where they last heard the sounds of battle. 

Thump.

Renges dove down to the ground, and he felt something trying to grab at his neck right before he dove. 

He heard chokes and gags and looked up.

Of his group, just over half got caught by … ropes? Ropes that came out of thin air? 

“Shit!” he hissed as he quickly got back up.

Then he heard a whistle.

He pulled his daggers up, ready to fight off whatever came at him, only to freeze in shock when he saw Deften falling backward with a spear punching through his chest. 

The erstwhile leader gasped and choked on his own blood before he keeled over sideways, his body spasming in his death throes. 

Renges felt his breathes quicken. 

In just two moves, the adventurer party their group had been asked to “take care of” had taken care of half of their numbers and killed the leader. 

But that’s okay! They still had a dozen people left to fight! 

“Rush them!” he shouted, and in the panic, more than half of the survivors rushed forward. He didn’t rush forward, even though he really wanted to get back at the bitch who must have done this. He bared his fangs but waited until the guys at the front got -.

Someone screamed. 

And then something sailed into the air before falling back down right next to him. 

He looked. 

It was a head, and it was one of his people’s head. 

Whoever they have been asked to kill … they were definitely not a Level 2 if they were able to kill Level 2’s so easily. 

He rushed forward. 

He needed to take out the bitch quickly! The longer this went on, the less they were going to get away with it! 

So he dashed forward into the mist, going low and flanking all the way around. 

He heard them fighting in the mist, their indistinct shapes clashing with bits of sparks as the weapons clashed. He even heard the bird monster screeching before stomping on some poor sap. 

But he was behind them now! 

He jumped -!

Thunk.

He lost his balance in the air and there was a sharp pain in his side. What…?

He looked to his left and saw a pallum pointing a crossbow at him.

Ah. 

Shit. 

He was so focused on the human girl that he forgot about the pallum girl.

Renges crashed into the ground and rolled, and screamed as the roll twisted the bolt in his rib and snapped the shaft.

He coughed up blood almost immediately as he tried to get up. He grimaced as pain shot through his body at just moving, and groaned. 

… He was done. He fucked up. 

He fell to his elbow and looked up.

Renges glared at the bird monster as it approached him. Past the monster, its master was looking down at herself and the bodies surrounding her. There was blood everywhere.

Fuck.

They failed. 

And to a green girl who was starting to spaz out about killing someone. The white haired boy, the one that King specifically told them to spare, was by her side, saying reassuring words.

Was this really how he was going to go? Die to some greenhorn adventurers? 

He glared up at the bird even as his vision swam. He knew it from how it felt that this injury was going to kill him if the greenhorns didn’t. He was a dead man.

The monster stared down at him with its bandaged face. 

“Fuck you,” he snarled. 

The bird obliged. 

It lifted one of its legs, placed it on his head, and slammed do-.