ALL NOVEL Chapter 27 - The Bronze Giant
“Damn it!”
Hildegard let out a brief exclamation.
“This dungeon is truly vicious!”
How much time had passed since they entered the dungeon? Having descended all the way to the sixth floor, the party’s assessment of the dungeon was completely different from their initial impressions on the first floor.
On the second floor, they encountered a massive slime mass occupying the entire dungeon passage. The nun knights had to advance while carving through the slime filling the corridor, as if excavating a tunnel.
The third floor was a dungeon where the passages themselves were composed of golems, constantly shifting their layouts. After wandering aimlessly before finally grasping the situation, the nun knights could only clear it by smashing through corridors until the golem cores were discovered.
On the fourth floor, they faced a narrow stone path formed over a magma lake. The problem was that while some sections were genuine solid paths, others were illusory fake stone paths, and yet others were real but invisible to the eye.
To make matters worse, flame-attribute or dual flame-rock attribute demonic beasts would sporadically emerge along the paths, making it extremely difficult to focus on finding the correct route. Still, this section was navigated without too much trouble thanks to Sophia’s clairvoyance.
The fifth floor required solving puzzles each time a blocking demonic beast was defeated during progression. The catch was that failure to solve a puzzle within the time limit would instantly teleport them back to the fifth floor’s entrance, naturally reviving any previously defeated demonic beasts.
Fortunately, as Conra had a talent for puzzles, the party eventually cleared the fifth floor after several trial-and-error attempts.
Thus they arrived at the sixth floor, which happened to be the dreaded open-field dungeon Sophia and Hildegard had feared – specifically, the notoriously tricky subtropical jungle terrain.
As it was still a dungeon, the items acquired from defeating previous floor guardians contained clues to clear the sixth floor.
These were none other than a sixth floor map, compass, and parchment with coded hints.
The problem was that this process closely resembled the quest progression method of the MMORPG Lee Bum-seok (Sophia’s previous life) had played. With map and compass in hand, following the hints would lead them through various ordeals to a location, only to find another hint pointing elsewhere at the end.
Then that next location would yield a new hint, sending them elsewhere, and so on – essentially combing through the entire jungle in such a manner before finally arriving at an altar not far from their initial sixth floor entrance.
When the trio reached the altar, it was glowing blue in real-time, seemingly attempting to summon something.
It was at this point that Hildegard sighed in exasperation.
Sometimes, when someone becomes too angry, they regain their composure instead. At this moment, the three were observing the glowing altar with steely expressions, as if by unspoken agreement.
If the hints they had found so far were accurate, this was undoubtedly the final location of this dungeon. Suddenly, Hildegard remarked:
“As expected, this does feel like a rather artificial dungeon, doesn’t it?”
“Indeed. It certainly wasn’t in the form I’m familiar with regarding dungeons.”
The dungeons Sophia knew typically fell into one of two categories: either ruins-like dungeons, or recreations of past space-times.
For the former, one simply had to explore them like investigating an ancient mage’s hideout or relic. For the latter, the dungeon took place within a recreated old era’s space-time, requiring the party to discover and fulfill the clearing conditions desired by the dungeon.
“At least none I know of took such a child’s game-like form.”
Upon hearing Sophia’s response, Conra nodded at the phrase “child’s game” before scrunching his face in a strange expression.
‘No matter how I think about it, to call a dungeon that would undoubtedly annihilate any “local powers” Sophia and Hildegard mentioned a “child’s game” does seem to cross a line, doesn’t it?’
Of course, Conra knew Sophia was not referring to the difficulty level.
It did feel strange, somehow. Although this was his first dungeon experience, he still sensed the atmosphere was unlike any he could have imagined. To put it bluntly, regardless of difficulty, the essence of the dungeon the trio had cleared felt like it evoked the intellectual amusement or plaything of nobles in some way.
Someone had clearly played a prank. There were ample grounds to make such a judgment.
“In any case, if you want to know, wouldn’t it be best to deal with the guardian about to be summoned first?”
As Conra said, their priority was to first defeat the guardian about to manifest.
The blue light emanating from the altar grew increasingly brilliant, eventually intensifying to a blinding glare that seemed capable of searing one’s eyes.
The trio gradually closed their eyes at that moment, heightening their other senses. Soon, Hildegard murmured softly:
“Here it comes!”
Wooooooh!!!
Accompanied by a weighty roar, a mountain-cleaving horizontal slash swept across the trio’s location. Lightly retreating to evade the strike, the three then immediately launched themselves towards their opponent, moving even faster than their previous evasion.
It was the next instant that they opened their eyes to observe their foe.
The opponent’s appearance resembled a massive, armored giant. The sixth floor’s gate guardian possessed a sturdy, bronze-like luminous physique, donning a helmet akin to a bird of prey’s head and matching bronze-hued armor.
“Uwah!”
Kwaaaang!
The instant they opened their eyes, the summoned guardian was raising its greatsword overhead. Instinctively raising her halberd to vertically deflect the lightning-fast overhead strike, Hildegard’s lips quivered.
‘This one’s attacks are heavy.’
Yet her expression remained undisturbed. For immediately after parrying the greatsword’s overhead slash, she confirmed Sophia’s figure had already launched itself behind the giant’s back. However, her smile soon vanished.
With a sharp ‘kirik’ sound, the bronze giant shrugged off Hildegard’s halberd thrust, twisting its upper body in a half-turn to swing its greatsword. Twuushaang! Accompanied by that impact, Sophia’s form deflecting the greatsword with her longsword was sent tumbling away.
“You bastard!”
With a battle cry, Hildegard swung her halberd’s axe blade towards the exposed back of the bronze giant’s knee joint, intending to restrict its mobility with that surprisingly agile physique. But as expected, the bronze giant nimbly deflected her halberd’s axe strike.
Of course, Hildegard was not discouraged – she had never expected it to be that easy. She immediately retreated while carefully assuming a stance with her halberd’s spear tip leveled forward.
Conra did not miss the opportunity, leaping forth with bestial movements. Springing off the bronze giant’s knee, he channeled all his might into a spear thrust aimed between the helmet’s openings. However, the bronze giant only needed to turn its head, causing Conra’s attack to glance off its helmet’s sloped surface.
“Hey, turning your head at that moment is cheating…!”
Before he could even finish, Conra’s form was ruthlessly slammed into the ground, his ankle caught in the bronze giant’s grip.
“Kuhuk, d-damn it.”
Having suffered broken bones and internal injuries from the impact, Conra lay on the ground coughing dryly while wheezing harshly. Through his blurred vision, he saw Hildegard succeeding in driving her halberd’s point into the bronze giant’s helmet slit.
Hoping she would finish it here, Conra’s expectations were immediately dashed when the bronze giant displayed masterful half-swording, shattering Hildegard’s halberd shaft. Unable to continue her halberd techniques, Hildegard was forced on the defensive against the giant’s greatsword half-swording skills.
Had there been no other combatant in the party, even the formidable nun knight Hildegard may have faced a dire crisis. As Conra coughed while rising, he chanted a spell before slamming his spear’s shaft into the ground with a ‘khung’ sound, causing jungle vines to manifest like serpents, binding the bronze giant’s ankles.
Immediately after consuming an alchemical elixir, Conra then charged the bronze giant again in a druid transformation to a werewolf form.
At that moment, Sophia, previously sent tumbling away by the bronze giant, also reappeared near it with a ghostly poise. With her loosened golden hair whipping about, Sophia’s azure eyes blazed with a lethal aura towards the bronze giant.