Dungeon of Pride, Laplace

Bolan's expression was red, he had the urge to punch the face of the latter, however, he controlled his anger and asked "Hoh, is that so? Good luck with that. Anyway, why are you all who have reached the ninth floor doing on the eight floor?".

The moment he was asked that question, Harris' expression became ugly and his mood became sour.

"We are on the eighth floor became we have some commission that we must complete or else we wouldn't bother to be here".

A lie, anyone listening to it, can clearly tell that. he must have suffered a devastating defeat on the ninth floor and scurried back up on the eighth floor.

Nevertheless, Bolan wasn't interested in the other party's business and thus did not probe much. He looked all around the place, found an empty spot far from the other teams and started directing his teammates.

"Newbie you also go there and start mining. Remember this is a dungeon, you don't know when you will be attacked so stay on your guard".

Simon did not comment much, took the pickaxe and started mining. From the moment he created the dungeon, this was his first time looking at it from the perspective of an adventurer. Him deciding to join Bolan's party was precisely to know what motive drives the adventurers to dive inside his dungeon.

After a while, when Simon was starting to get bored of mining, he saw the man named Harris approach Bolan from the corner of his eyes. As his sense of hearing was much sharper than an ordinary human, he could hear them just fine from this distance.

"What are you doing here? The ores in this place are being farmed by my team, find someplace else" Bolan said dismissively, he wasn't pleased with Harris approaching the place his team was already mining.

"Haha, don't worry. We have already mined plenty and have no room with us to bring more. You can mine as many ores as you want from this place. I'm here to ask you about something else".

Hearing that the other party wasn't here to hog their mining place, Bolan gestured with his head for Harris to go on and state his business.

"Have you heard of this rumour of a strong adventurer team that was newly spotted in this town?" Harris asked.

"There are lots of new and strong adventurers team coming and going in this town every day. You think I keep a tab of every single one of them?" Boris said swinging his pickaxe hard.

"That's not what I'm saying… don't tell this to anyone, but my informant told me that in just a week this team cleared more than twenty floors. Not only that, but they are also the ones that are currently leading the exploration to newer floors".

Bolan stopped swinging his axe and glanced towards Harris who had a serious expression plastered on his face.

"Which team are you talking about?" He asked, since there were so many strong teams arriving in this town, that it was hard to tell which team harris was talking about.

"You know the team who all uses a mask to cover their faces and have no insignia on their armours?" Harris explained.

"You don't mean the No Named Party? Hasn't it only been a week since they arrived here? Are you telling me that they have already cleared more than twenty floors?" Bolan asked, disbelief was apparent on his face.

The team he just mentioned did not have any name when registering with the adventurer's association which was already a peculiarity since one cannot dive inside the dungeon without registering a name for their party.

'No Name' was a name that the surrounding adventurer gave them since they always covered their faces with masks and wear robes to cover themselves. Because of this, the No Name party garnered much of the attention of the town.

Harris nodded "Yeah, that's what my informant told me. However, that is not the point, what is even more astonishing is that one of the rumours that he told me, said that they have already breached the thirtieth floor and are on their way to explore the next one".

SILENCE… the moment, Harris reported that the two of them became silent, only the continuous sound of pickaxe hitting the cave walls rang out in the surrounding.

Bolan's face continuously twitched, his eyes and mouth wide open. One couldn't blame him, he was an adventurer who belonged to the lowest hierarchy amongst the adventurers. He who had spent months of his time reaching the current floor, couldn't believe his ears.

Apart from that, there was also this weird chill in the air that made one's hair stand on end coming from somewhere.

Bolan was just about to say something when he realised that he was suddenly feeling lightheaded and dizzy. The world around him started spinning and he fell on the floor. What was bizarre was that before fainting he noticed that it was not only him but also his teammates and the other teams similarly fainting on the floor.

Simon who was listening to their conversation, was also exposed to this sudden chilliness in the air but because he was much higher level than the ones around him and because of him being a demon noble, he was able to easily fend off the effect.

"Did somebody break the effects of my artefact?" a foreign voice came from the distance.

The moment Simon heard the voice, he narrowed his eyes, took out the phoenix's sigh and hid himself.

STEP.. STEP… a few seconds later, sounds of footsteps approaching near could be heard before a group of people showed their appearance from amidst the midst.

"Hmm? That's weird, it's gone. I definitely felt the presence coming from here?" a person wearing a mask and a robe to cover themselves said.

"You must be mistaken there is no way, an adventurer capable of only roaming on the upper floors would be able to break the effects of an artefact like that, Sable" The person who was also dressed similarly like the former, stated.

When Simon who was hiding in a corner, saw who it was, a frown hung on his face. As per their comments, it looked like they used some kind of artefact to put everyone around this part of the dungeon to sleep.

More importantly, that mask and that appearance, there was no doubt in his mind that the No Name Party Bolan and Harris were talking about just a few moments ago, was definitely the ones in front of him.

What was their objective behind doing something like this?

The person addressed as Sable, glanced at the bodies lying around the floor before nodding his head. For some reason, he felt like the numbers did not add up. There were twenty-three people lying around the floor in total.

As per the guidelines set by the adventurer's association, a minimum of six people was needed to tackle this floor. That is to say, if there were four teams around this part of the floor, there should be one more person.

Just as Sable was getting suspicious, his teammate beside him called him out.

"Hey, are you coming or not? If we are late, the guild master will not leave us be. You already know important this mission is for us, we cannot screw it up. he is already waiting for us on the thirty-first floor"…

"I Know, I know... you don't have to repeat it every time. I tell you, it is all because of that traitor Boris and his incompetent brother. If not for him spilling out the secrets of Forest Spring Spirits to them we wouldn't have to go through all this trouble" Sable complained, with his hands clenched and eyes burning with anger.

"Hey didn't I tell you not to mention that? What's the point of us being so secretive in diving inside the dungeon if you simply start shouting our objective" the other person complained.

"Relax, there is no one around, you said it yourself. Besides, it's not like walls have ears"… the voice kept on coming from the distance before it disappeared altogether.

The Mist suddenly shifted as if being willed by someone and Simon's appearance came into view. Right now, his crimson eyes were glowing brightly, and his horns and fangs protruding out threateningly.

The effects of the trinket was deactivated and a thick amount of bloodlust surrounded his body. The reason for that was none other than the conversation the people who had just travelled from here had.

From what he heard, these people were here for the Forest Spring Spirits that he had taken under his wing. How did they know they were here? Who were they? Simon had many questions.

Suppressing the urge to just charge at them this instant and spill all the information out of them, Simon took a deep breath before muttering [Teleport].

The scene around him changed and he was back to the place he was most familiar with. Or that should have been the case given that the place he was now, looked very different than the last time he left the place.

"Is this Main Floor?" there was so much change that Simon doubted his eyes. For starters, the mountains he had installed here, were now full of greeneries and various kinds of mystical trees.

The gardens had beautiful flowers with speckles of multiple coloured lights roaming around. What's more, when he looked towards the centre of the floor, he saw a splendid canopy of crystals. The trees of mana crystals had grown up to a height of twenty meters and surrounded the pond in the centre magnificently.

The pond itself looked more mythical than before. However, it was not all of this that was the most mind-boggling thing that he saw, nor was it the white palace beside the pond but the clouds looming over the ceiling of his main floor.