Chapter 134 Dungeon Core: “The Eternal Training Ground”

Pov Carl

I did not know if I was grateful or annoyed that this way station was so hilly. It helped hide us as we ran but also made it difficult to anticipate when someone would pop up behind a hill and start attacking us.

Ziiipe was somewhat able to locate groups of people who were hostile. The problem was we didn’t have much experience fighting in such battles against other adventurers, especially her.

"There are at least five groups following us, but right now we’re able to keep ahead," she informed me. This was bad news. Perhaps we could take them, but I was not certain. I haven’t gone full-out on adventures in a long time.

Those five groups weren’t really the problem. It was the fact that there weren’t just five groups. It had been perhaps a few minutes, but already there were a lot fewer signs of fighting all around. There was only one reason for that to be happening. Whoever these attackers were, they were winning.

"How bad is the situation overall?" I asked Ziiipe, but she was concentrating on running but still was able to quickly shake her head.

She probably couldn’t concentrate long enough to get a truly accurate picture, but she didn't need to be that accurate, and that shaking of her head conveyed enough meaning that I understood, we were screwed.

When we crested the hill, we surprised two groups, some of whom had just managed to kill a few people I recognized. They looked a bit surprised, but I took advantage of that. Using my devastating charge skill, I ploughed into two of them. Pulling out my halberd, I didn’t hesitate to start cutting the rest of them down.

I hoped that Ziiipe was just as fast as she usually was, and she didn't let me down. Crossbow bolts started to disrupt the mages while I dealt with the rest of the melee fighters.

It didn’t take long for the mages to start focusing on Ziiipe. Normally, that would have been a sound move as she was their biggest threat right now, and their spells most likely would cause friendly damage as I was fighting close up with other fighters. How wrong they were.

Their tactics might have worked if the enemy had a good enough tank to keep me in place, but as soon as they stopped focusing on me, I simply left the fighters near me with another charge and quickly took down the rest of the mages who barely had time to react. One of those bastards had a skill spell, but fortunately, my armor was able to protect me.

The rest of the fighters fell quickly enough as Ziiipe was able to take advantage of them having to focus on me. However, we couldn't stay to loot the bodies.

"We need to move now," I said as I saw Ziiipe slowing down to check one of the bodies. That brought her out of whatever had caught her attention. While this fight was quite fast, the groups following us had closed the distance between us by a significant margin.

One or two fights like that and they would catch up. We continued to run. I pushed a little bit harder, which made Ziiipe barely able to keep up with me. However, we couldn’t slow down.

Soon we weren’t too far from the tunnel, but it was most likely already blocked off. There was still fighting coming ahead of us, but the rest of the way station had fallen silent.

When we finally crested the hill to see the tunnel exit to the Kelso Way, I squeezed my halberd so hard that my knuckles went white.

There were at least two groups of mages in front of the tunnel exit, and at least 40 other fighters dealing ranged or melee damage to three individuals who had obviously tried to escape using this tunnel as well.

I recognized one of them; it was Vinny. The other two I didn’t recognize, but I didn’t have to; if they were fighting with Vinny, they wouldn't be our enemies. "Start dealing with the mages and follow me in. You get next to the healer and your secondary mission would be to protect her," I instructed.

As an answer, she pulled out her long-range crossbow and we started to run towards the three people surrounded by enemies. The mages were mainly focused on dealing with Vinny, and they were able to suppress him almost completely, but fortunately, they weren't able to do anything else. That meant that the first bolt Ziiipe shot managed to find a mage's head.

Immediately, the death of one of their mages interrupted the attacking forces' rhythm. That momentary interruption allowed Vinny and the person with the sword and shield, to take advantage.

Before the attacking force could get their defenses up once again, three more people were dead on their side. Contrary to my belief, the mages didn’t start properly attacking us, instead, they focused on defending against Ziiipe's attacks.

That was a less desirable outcome. However, they did launch a few attacks towards us when we got closer to the melee attackers. It took a lot of mana, but one of my skills allowed me to block magic attacks with my halberd. It was incredibly satisfying being able to swat away fireballs launched towards us. Now came the hard part.

I only did a short charge as I couldn’t get too far away from Ziiipe, but that still allowed me to close the distance fast and cut apart two shield users. I needed to move fast so I could protect Ziiipe but still continue to push through as fast as I could. Of course, she had switched to a close-range and rapidly firing crossbow which was able to keep away a lot of the fighters.

Even then, breaking through and getting to Vinny and the other two cost me three wounds, and one on Ziiipe. It was simply too much to ask to be able to protect against the volume of skill-powered attacks that came towards us.

I was about to reach for a healing potion when I felt all my wounds disappearing. It was the healer. "We need to push through to get to the tunnel," the shield and sword user said, and I immediately agreed.

Now that I had a healer and apparently a tank that could protect me from far away, I started to harass and attack the fighters who were trying to keep us in place.

While before the fight was a stalemate, now we were making steady progress towards the tunnel. It was still difficult, one of the hardest fights I’ve ever been a part of, but I believe we could have made it if the enemies hadn't received reinforcements.

"There's a lot more coming, and someone really strong," Ziiipe said, and we all looked around to see a lot of people cresting the hills.

All of us used our strongest skills and tried to push through. We reached the mages and were only about 10 meters away from the tunnel entrance. My halberd had taken another mage's life when all of a sudden, I felt a surge of mana.

Just in front of the entrance, a really large slab of rock slowly rose out of the ground, blocking our way.

"You pathetic rats, although I have to admit you are particularly tenacious," we all looked towards the unassuming mage who radiated power. "He doesn't feel right," Ziiipe said, but before we could do anything else, he raised his hand and made a fist.

"Get close to me," Vinny yelled, and none of us hesitated. The next moment, the shield he created cracked, but the healer cast some spell on Vinny, and quickly the damage started to repair.

It was only a momentary fix, however, as who knows how many spell attacks started to land on the shield. Sorry, Anna, I don’t think I will be able to get back. I felt how Anna slapped me for not keeping my promise.

That made me look toward Ziiipe and remember the necklace. " Ziiipe, the necklace charge it now! Everyone, get close to Vinny and don't resist the teleport."

No one questioned my words as we all touched Vinny, who was already on his knees, barely conscious. As soon as everyone made contact, Ziiipe triggered the necklace, and the next moment we were gone.

"Don’t let your guard down; this is a dangerous place," I said to everyone, but by then Vinny was already passed out. We were on top of masonry stone with runes on them; otherwise, it looked to be a forest-type room.

Yet, when I looked up, cold sweat drenched me. I recognized the illusionary sky but it was still a lot further up than I had ever seen. I tried to follow the sky to see the edge of the room, but I couldn’t. "Where are we?" I heard the shield and sword user say.