Second World



It had been five days since Jack and Arlcard first entered the mausoleum. At this time, they were still wandering through the unending maze.

"Bloody hell! We've already spent five days inside here. How deep is this bloody Mausoleum? Horatio could already be starting his siege up there!" Jack said with worry.

Arlcard didn't answer because he also didn't know. He never expected they would be spending days to get to the deepest floor of the mausoleum.

They were currently twelve floors below. Each floor consisted of a series of cubicles linked by doors. They had to keep going from one cubicle to the next until they found one with the stairs to the lower floor.

Each cubicle had different contents. Sometimes they were empty. Sometimes there were monsters. Sometimes there was a totem that gave them buffs for a limited time. Sometimes they contained a treasure chest. All the treasure chests he had found were bronze grades, though.

On the first two days, Jack still spent time to unlock all these treasure chests. On the third day, he no longer bothered. His primary objective was to get out of this place.

Unfortunately, once one came down the stairs, the stairs vanished. They couldn't go back up again. Arlcard said that there would be a portal back out once they arrived at the deepest floor.

"Do you know how many floors in total under here?" Jack asked.

"I told you already before. I don't know," Arlcard answered.

"How can you not know? This is your quest, isn't it?"

Arlcard didn't reply. He was getting annoyed by Jack's complaints, but he couldn't blame the guy. If they didn't go back up soon, Horatio would be screwed. Horatio needed Jack to go up against his father, and he couldn't cancel the rebellion once it started. Marcus should notice the rebel army's movement once they advanced to Vacharest. If the whole operation failed due to his quest, Arlcard would feel bad about it too.

"We should reach the lowest floor soon," Arlcard finally said.

Jack knew Arlcard didn't truly know. Jack sighed. He didn't mean to put pressure on his companion, but he had promised Horatio. Not to mention John, Jeanny, and Thelgrun also awaiting his aid. He didn't want to disappoint them all.

"Let's stop wasting time then. Let's go," Jack said.

They were in a cubicle that was meant as a camping site. In this place were beds and food. If they ate the food and slept in this place for at least five hours, they would receive buffs that not only increased their attributes and defenses but also increased the exp points they received in the next eighteen hours. When they were tired, they looked for this type of cubicle to rest in.

Unfortunately, the exp points provided in this place weren't much because there were not that many monsters. Most of their time was spent on finding their way through the maze.

Jack couldn't use his incorporeal state to find his way here. When he tried to, he found that he couldn't get past the wall of the cubicle he was on. He also couldn't interact with the wall's mana to find out what was behind the doors. Hence, he could only do this the old-fashioned way.

He used a pen and paper from his inventory to map the cubicles and doors they had passed through. Without the map, they might accidentally circle back to the cubicle they had been to before.

Yet, even with the map, they could only descend an average of two to three floors a day. This was because each floor was truly huge. Jack couldn't believe this was the underground of the tiny mausoleum they entered from. He was sure this place was a pocket world.

Each floor also had a boss room. This was the room before the cubicle with the stairs to the lower floor. Every boss was a different monster but they always had the same level and grade, which was level 76 mythical, except for the last one they encountered before going down to the twelfth floor. That previous boss was level 77 mythical.

That was because Arlcard had increased to level 77 in the middle of the eleventh floor. All the monsters in this place followed his level.

Therras also increased one level to level 76. Only Jack didn't enjoy any level-up since the exp points he received were divided between his three classes.

After spending hours maneuvering around the cubicles and with the aid of Jack's hand-drawn map, they finally arrived in another boss room. This time, the boss was an avian type. A huge fat chicken with three heads. Its feathery wings produced violent winds when they flapped. Each of its three heads shot different elemental energies of fire, ice, and lightning.

However, since it was also a level 77 mythical. Against Jack, Arlcard, and Therras. The fat three-headed chicken stood no chance.

Jack used Runestone of Luck every time he slayed the boss of a floor. He didn't get anything noteworthy from those bosses, but he did get a few unique-grade equipments and plenty of super rare ones.

He would donate the unique equipment to the guild. His transformation prism couldn't fuse unique-grade equipment to produce legendary-grade. Its limit was creating a unique grade. The regal outfit he wore was also better, so he had no use keeping the unique equipment dropped from these bosses. 

He bet Jeanny would be glad for this. Unique grade equipment was still extremely rare even among top players.

He himself felt no joy. Rather than getting these loots, he preferred they reached the bottom of this place. He shoved all the loot into his storage bag and ran to the next room, which as expected, contained the stairs to the lower floor.

He made a resolution. He couldn't let Horatio's rebellion fail. If they still had not reached the bottom by the time this day was over, he would use Pandora to escape this place.

Arlcard would be disappointed. His companion quest might even fail, but he guessed he had to make the hard choice. Horatio's quest was tied to the fate of a nation and a potential ally to Themisphere. It was more important.