“Haha! That was fun!” Leon laughed as the duo stepped through the other side of the portal. A stiff breeze swept past him, and he turned to look around. After a moment, he noticed that they had appeared in an earth tunnel, and the portal still glowed behind them.
[Welcome to the First Floor of the Tower of Trials, the Giant Worm Nest! Defeat the Floor boss to advance!]
A bright screen appeared in front of Leon, and he got the gist of things.
“Hmm, well, how do we find the boss? This place looks like a labyrinth.” Leon mumbled under his breath.
“Well, that is where we put our skills to work. After all, what is a trial if everything is handed to us on a platter?” Jet replied, shrugging and looking around. A shifting sound came from above their heads, and the two immediately looked up, surprised that the sound was so close.
They were met with the sight of a giant worm that was twice as wide as Leon’s body reaching down towards them from a hole in the ceiling, with its horrifying maw wide open and ready to snap them up in one bite.
“Crap!” Leon and Jet instantly jumped back in two separate ways, and Leon summoned a large fire ball in his place, which the worm instantly gobbled up.
Boom!
A dull explosion shook the walls, and the worm’s insides lit up, with its body swelling up with the explosion.
Thud!
The body of the worm dropped out of the hole in the ceiling, and Leon could feel no lifeforce emanating from the horrid looking creature. He summoned a spear and poked at the worm with its tip, but elicited no reactions from the worm. Only then did he know it was truly dead, and he sighed in relief.
“Strange… How did it sneak up on us?” Jet came forward to peer into the dark tunnel above.
“Maybe it is a monster than can stealthily hide its tracks. That is the only reasonable explanation I can think of.” Leon offered, and Jet nodded in agreement. That did make sense. Magic could make all sorts of impossible things possible, after all.
After examining the worm a bit more and figuring out what they could from it, the two set off, with their senses at the highest. They were ready for a worm to appear from anywhere, even out of thin air. If they were not careful, then they could lose their lives in this place.
After some time had passed, they came across a spot with some blood. The blood was not too much, but had still made its mark on the ground.
“Is this worm blood?” Leon asked Jet because he had no idea.
“No. I think it is human blood. If it was a worm, then it would have bled a lot more than this. But who ever left this blood mark is most definitely still alive. Or at least, he did not die here.” Jet made some deductions, and they continued walking.
All of a sudden, Leon realized how stupid he was. He should have sent out his summons as scouts. He had always done that, but for some reason, he totally forgot this time.
With a wave of his hand, a hundred spiders appeared, and quickly dashed through the various tunnels around them. With another wave of his hand, another one hundred rushed out, ready to do their master’s bidding.
“C rank creatures?” Jet tilted his head.
“Oh, yes. I came from the zone for C ranks before we met.” Leon grinned at Jet. He did not mind hiding that fact, as he knew it would astound the dark haired human.
“What?!” Jet’s eyes were wide open at Leon’s admission. Leon was that strong after only just advancing. It was mind boggling. But now, he thought he understood the reason why Leon did not know a lot, and did not act as arrogantly as stronger beings from the Demon Continent were known to act. It was because he would only be regarded as a slightly stronger foot soldier under a stronger undead, so he would not be informed of many things.
All of a sudden, to Jet, things had become much clearer, and he understood Leon a lot better. Oh, if only he knew the truth that Leon was not even two months old in this world.
“Hehe, don’t worry. I am just a special case.” Leon grinned, and waved, continuing to walk forward. He also summoned his elite summons so that they could take up their places around him. As usual, Nedra silently hung around his neck. She was his surprise weapon just in case Jet tried to backstab him.
The two, along with Leon’s elite summons continued through the winding labyrinth for a while more before screens suddenly popped up in front of them, and the ground beneath their feet rumbled.
[The Floor Boss, Giant Worm King, has been killed! You can now proceed to the second floor!]
Jet stuttered in shock and he almost tripped.
“They found the boss so quickly? Damn!” He cursed. Leon just hummed. He had not been aiming for the floor boss in the first place, as he was already aware that there were other people inside the tower. He was more interested in proceeding to the next floor.
“How do we get to the next floor?” He asked Jet.
Jet snapped out of his daze and thought for a moment before remembering what he had read. “We only need to find a portal. There are many portals scattered throughout the floor. At least, that is what the book I read said.” Jet supplied an answer.
“Hmm, okay.” Leon hummed in understanding and began walking forward, but he suddenly got an alert from one of his summons up ahead. The spiders had split up into smaller groups again and again as they made their way through the tunnels, and they had come across many worms, both living and dead.
The spider, and some others, had noticed that the worms had suddenly become a lot more active. Instead of crawling slowly through the walls, they were moving with much more purpose, and were heading straight to one single point. And coincidentally, about twenty of them were heading straight at Leon and Jet!