Dungeon Menagerie 34 (Patreon)

Commissioned by InfiniteChaosRei

Dungeon Menagerie

Chapter 34

-VB-

Ottar knew that something was wrong when he found himself face to face with a monster he’d never seen before. 

It hovered in the air without touching the ground with its tentacles. It baleful purple eye looked at him, but he could feel that it was looking beyond what was on the surface. Looking beyond the weapons, the muscles, and even every minute movement. It was … analyzing him in ways that only the gods could. 

And once he understood what he was looking at even if he didn’t understand all about it, he knew that he was facing something very dangerous. Dangerous enough that if he did not go all out and kill it from the start, then he would be the one in danger. 

And if he, Freya’s champion, was in danger, then that would mean that his goddess was in danger.

Anyone who pointed a sword at his goddess, never mind actual danger, was someone to be put down at the earliest possible chance.

Whether they be other gods or monsters. 

So he acted. 

He ran forward so quickly that most adventurers wouldn’t even be able to see him. Yet the monster did. 

Then it blocked his attack with the broadsword with one of its tentacles. 

An attack that would have sliced a monster in the Middle Floors in half deflected off of the tentacle.

And then an attack came. 

He rolled out of the way of a slow ball of miasmic fire, but tensed when it didn’t exploded upon hitting the ground. Instead, it erupted into multiple smaller instances and split off into multiple directions. 

Seeing no choice, he put distance between himself and the monster, and slowly analyzed the damage done to the area.

Whatever that purple miasmic fire was, it ate away instead of burning. It looked like flames but it wasn’t.

Because a tree caught up in flames wouldn’t look like it had a large chunk of its trunk eaten away by a thousand tiny bugs. 

No, that “fire” was something he could not allow himself to be struck by. If this monster was physically strong enough to deflect one of his attacks, then its attacks would be strong enough to work on his natural defense.

“What a bad time to not have a shield,” he clicked his tongue irritably. 

Then he jumped right back in. Instead of a frontal assault, he threw his sword in a whirling chainsaw motion and ran forward faster than his flying sword. He attacked with his fists, punching with sound barrier breaking booms as his fists struck at the monster. But the monster’s tentacles were many, and they didn’t need to move as fast as he needed to to counter his two fists with its many. 

Worse, the bone-like armor on many parts of its body and tentacles were durable enough to withstand his attacks. 

He grunted and ducked just as his sword came flying in.

The buzzsawing sword struck one of the tentacles … and dug in.

The monster bristled before -.

Ottar grabbed his sword, pulled it out of its place on the monster’s tentacle before it could pull it and his sword away and out of his reach, and jumped away in a single motion just before the ground all around the monster split open with baleful purple energy. 

He landed back at where he started.

But this time, he’d drawn blood from the thing. 

‘A Lower Floor monster at the very least. An irregular boss, perhaps?’ he thought to himself before whirling his broadsword around. ‘Time to take this up a notch.’

Then he exploded into action again. This time, he moved faster and stronger than before. The ground everywhere he stepped cratered and sank while the air hissed and boomed at the same time. 

The monster hissed and … pulled back. As it retreated, it fired off a dozen more of the baleful fires.

Immediately understanding that this was its attempt to distance itself, Ottar chose to rush in instead. 

Thump.

A chill ran up his spine, and he immediately disengaged.

And he did it just in time to miss a thin black rope that had been about to ensnare his neck.

Then the baleful fires all detonated.

Ah.

He squeezed his eyes and mouth shut, pulled his sword up to shield his face and front, propelled himself up with a jump, and curled up behind the sword.

The baleful purple fireballs all detonated and the smaller resulting fireballs criss-crossed the entire battlefield in a web of attacks. 

Many of them struck him and his sword. Their impact propelled him even further and he gasped in pain for the first time in a long time. 

His back crashed into a tree, tore through it, crashed through the second, bounced off the third, and finally cratered the surface of the fourth tree trunk.

He fell down to the ground with burns all over his body. And his sword…

He opened his eyes and saw it smouldering as something continued to eat away at it.

Ottar gritted his teeth. 

How long had it been since he was put into this kind of a position? Desperately fighting for his life? 

He looked up and saw another monster, and his eyes widened as he recognized it. 

It was the bird of that tamer.

The blind bird didn’t move, almost looking like a statue. 

Realizing that he couldn’t fight off both of them at the same time, Ottar… he chose to do something he hadn’t needed to do in years. 

He retreated. 

-VB-

“Why did you let him go?” 

Mori turned around and looked at the new Friend. Vel’Koz. What an ominous name. 

“Because killing him would have brought more trouble than it’s worth,” Mori responded to the creature of emptiness. “Humans will react violently to the death of one who they call ‘King of Adventurers.’ Such a state of human society will leave our mistress … vulnerable.”

Vel’Koz looked at him with its one burning eye before it turned around and left to join their mistress’s side. 

Mori rolled his nonexistent eyes. 

That one was far too dramatic for his liking.