“Why is the lighting here so dim?” Venessa complained as she stepped on a dead monster’s skull.
“It shouldn’t be like this originally,” Sam replied.
“Maintain the formation, and stay behind me,” Asher said, interrupting their conversation.
He didn’t want them to step out of line and stumble onto some rune formation that would trigger a trap.
“Hmm, these guys are doing well for first years,” the fourth Professor said as he watched both teams.
In Kevin’s team, the one leading was Elena, followed closely by Kevin.
Although not comparable to the Greville, the Rothschild’s Bloodline ability made it easier for their descendants to accumulate and accept mana in their bodies.
It was a bloodline that affected their affinities with mana instead of granting them control over mana.
The Greville family was unique in having a bloodline that allowed a person to control mana as they wished.
And due to this, Elena had the highest mana sense compared to the whole team.
Kevin was the only person who could compete with her in terms of Mana sense, but it required him to use his lightning element.
So, instead of wasting his energy, Elena suggested she take the lead.
The reason Asher and Elena were leading their teams was to avoid Rune Formations set in the Dungeon.
Unlike monsters, they didn’t know what the rune formations would do to them.
In this race, they needed to be more aware of the runes than the monsters they would face.
And just like that, Asher’s team began moving inside the Dungeon.
But they were maintaining their pace and not rushing toward the center.
“Are you okay?” Venessa whispered to Alyssa.
“Yeah,” Alyssa replied as she kept floating in the air.
If her body had not been healed, Alyssa could only have maintained floating in the air for an hour, making her the worst teammate in Dungeon Exploration.
But currently, her body was healed, so she could maintain floating for 6-7 hours. The only reason to stop would be the intense headache she would get as a side effect of using Gravity magic.
‘I can’t sense all the runes,’ Asher spread his mana sense to cover a lot of distance ahead of them.
‘Did he do this knowing I am a Greville,’ Asher thought.
“Stop for a second,” Asher raised his hand as everyone halted.
“Did something happen?” Damian asked, standing in the middle.
Their formation was Asher and Sam at the front, while Amelia and Alyssa were in the center, with Venessa holding the rear.
“I need to check something,” Asher picked up a bone of a dead monster that was nearby.
“Is something wrong with this monster?” Sam asked.
“Aren’t these the monsters that World Academy’s Hunters hunted to clear this dungeon,” Damian said.
“No,” Asher replied.
There was no reason for the people who cleared this Dungeon to leave the monsters nearby like this.
Every monster was a valuable resource despite the abundance of Dungeons present in this world.
It wouldn’t make sense that they would leave a dead monster corpse here.
“This monster doesn’t belong to this Dungeon,” Asher said, his eyes staring further down the dimly lit path.
“Really?” Amelia asked as she looked at the few dead monsters around them.
Suddenly a thought clicked in her head.
“Are these the monsters that they placed inside the Dungeon?” Amelia asked.
“But why are they dead?” Damian asked.
“Fireball,” Asher summoned a ball of fire as he lit up their surroundings even more.
Currently, Amelia was casting the light ahead of them, but Asher’s fireball illuminated the area even more.
“Are these burn marks?” Amelia noticed the black stain on the walls.
“These are the traps from the Rune Formations,” Asher replied with an indifferent look.
“What?!” Damian and Sam exclaimed at the same time.
“You mean..” Damian began, both he and Sam looking ahead into the Dungeon with nervous expressions.
“Isn’t that too much for a trap, though?” Damian said, looking at the monster’s corpse.
“This doesn’t make sense,” Amelia spoke out.
“Monsters would sense such a formation easily,” she said, bringing their attention to a key piece of information they had forgotten.
It was established that monsters could sense the mana from the runes, so they could actively avoid traps made from runes.
This was also one of the reasons that made a Runemaster much weaker in combat.
Even if they made a trap, the monster would sense that and avoid it.
“Not unless they mask the Rune formation with another,” Asher said as he concentrated on his mana sense.
Suddenly mana flared around his eyes, making his crimson-red eyes glow.
Alyssa could sense Asher’s mana.
‘Don’t they notice it?’ she wondered as she saw that no one other than her reacted to Asher’s mana sense.
From the moment her body was healed, her mana sensitivity had increased significantly.
She was even able to sense the minute differences in mana when people around her rank used spells.
“Did they figure it out so early?” Arman said as he looked at Asher’s team.
It was one of the clues they had purposely set, and they wanted to see if the students were aware of it.
“Well, it’s not like Professor Neyman placed any lethal traps for them,” Elsa replied.
“But they would be out of the race if they get caught in those traps,” the third Professor said.
“That’s on them. We can always treat them back to their best conditions,” the fourth Professor laughed.
‘These guys,’ Arman thought.
Both of them were respected professors who were three-star, just like him and Elsa. But the difference was that they only taught third and fourth-year students.
They were present here only to grade the two teams as this kind of test was different from what World Academy did before.
‘But he is sharp,’ Arman noticed that Asher was incredibly sharp for someone so strong.
It was often seen that those gifted in talents as a hunter often neglected such crucial details. It was the experience they gained in their later years that helped them gain the eyes to notice such small details.
“Well, the first step to being a good Hunter is studying your environment to gather knowledge about the enemies even before you face them,” the fourth Professor laughed as he said this.
“Let’s focus on the test,” Arman reminded both of the old men to concentrate on the test.
“What do you mean by ‘mask’?” Damian asked as he crouched to touch the bones of the monster.
Asher’s eyes moved around as he sensed a faint feeling of mana around the corner of the wall they were about to pass through.
He immediately threw the bone toward the wall, creating enough pressure to activate a rune hidden behind it.
BOOM!
An explosion occurred in front of them as Amelia instantly cast a mana barrier to protect them from the flames.
“Warn us before doing something like this,” Amelia said as she looked at Asher.
Asher didn’t look back, but he started walking toward the spot where the explosion had occurred.
Sam, who was beside Asher, had just witnessed an explosion happen in front of him. If not for Amelia’s mana barrier, he would have had to use his aura to defend himself at the last second. Even then, he was sure that due to his lack of awareness, he would have gotten a few burns.
‘This would have been enough to stop my mana sense if it wasn’t Rank A,’ Asher thought as he looked at the masking runes that were visible to him.
It was something that only high-level Runemasters could do, but masking the runes was indeed possible. Although it reduced the effect of the original rune that was masked, it was mainly used for security measures against Hunters below Rank A.
‘It will be difficult to spot them in the middle of a fight,’ Asher could see that Neyman had used the special walls of this Dungeon to increase the masking of the runes.
These walls were special as they would slowly absorb the mana around them, making the rune hidden behind the wall. On top of that, it was masked, so unless the wall was impacted by enough pressure, the runes would not activate.
“Let’s go,” Asher said as he looked behind him.
But as they were moving through the narrow, dim path, Asher could sense the presence of many Rank D monsters that were ahead of them.
“Get ready to fight,” Asher told them as he flared his mana.
As he said that, all of them became alert as their relaxed eyes turned sharp.
ƥαṇdα-ηθνε|·ƈθm
“Fire Wolves?” Amelia recognized the beasts.
These were special wolf monsters that had a blue flame around their tails, and their eyes shone blue in the dim lighting.
“You guys fight them,” Asher said as he looked at another couple of D Rank monsters lurking in the Dungeon’s shadows.
‘Don’t show your presence,’ Asher reminded his beast.
He had noticed it last time, but his strange beast somehow made a C Rank Monster step back in fear.
At the time, it happened because Rifir faintly showed his presence as it looked at the Mid C Rank monster as its food.
But this time, he didn’t want the monsters to run away.
As it would only waste their time if the monsters avoided them.