The goblin king’s reanimation was not a one-time occurrence. A small fraction of the monsters we encountered after that also returned to life. Determined to discover the cause, we investigated each corpse until we formed a hypothesis.
“It really seems to be true,” Yagami-san marveled. “They can come back to life if a magic stone remains inside them.”
“And the higher the monster’s level, the more likely it is to happen,” Shinonome added. “The goblin generals we defeated earlier didn’t resurrect themselves even with their magic stones intact.”
“Yes, level appears to be a factor too. This will be a real headache,” Yagami-san said. “To ensure a kill, we either destroy the magic stone before they go down or behead them like Amane did. We have to be more careful as we fight and make sure the stones are destroyed even though it’s akin to burning money.”
He considered the facts for a few seconds, then came to a conclusion. “If we’re right and a monster must be high level to come back to life, then it’ll happen more often the deeper we go. I say we rest for a few hours on a safer upper floor and continue downward later. Everyone okay with that?”
“Yes, sir!” we replied with a round of nodding.
I agreed with Yagami-san’s prudent decision. Defeating monsters was easy for this party, but worrying about which monsters would respawn took a psychological toll. To rest and regroup was the best path forward.
Although, if I was alone, I would’ve kept going.
We took to formation again and were trekking back to a safe floor when the dungeon began to tremble.
“What’s going on?!” said one of the party members. Another member screamed.
Alarm at the sudden change swept through the party members—and I wasn’t above it. What was this? The first possibility that jumped to mind was a dungeon collapse, but something about that wasn’t right. From the way the dungeon vibrated to the clattering sounds that echoed inside, if I had to guess, I’d say it was a—
“Hey, look, over there!” shouted one of the party members. He pointed in the direction of the clamor. “That better not be what I think it is!”
Like a family of meerkats, we turned our heads in unison in the direction of his pointing finger—and got a vicious shock.
A stampede of over fifty monsters barreled toward us from the way we’d walked from. They were charging toward us, but their eyes were unfocused, like we didn’t even register to them.
I bit my lip in horror, then shouted the name of this phenomenon.
“Monster swarm!”
Like the name suggested, a monster swarm was a phenomenon where a large number of monsters appeared at the same time and swarmed the dungeon. Each monster swarm had a different trigger, from stepping in a monster spawn point to pure coincidence. The trigger this time was the latter, I suspected.
Monster swarms occurred regardless of rank or dungeon, but they were never much of an issue for me. Worst-case scenario, I used Dungeon Teleportation to bail myself out. Unfortunately, for normal adventurers, these encounters were life-threatening.
“Tanks in front!” Yagami-san ordered.
“Yes, sir!”
The two tanks formed a defense to stop the monsters. The path was narrow, so they succeeded in slowing the horde, but that left the others without much space to launch attacks. The monsters would break our defense in a matter of time. The group desperately considered ways to fight back.
“Leader, monsters are coming from over here too!” Shinonome-san shouted.
“A different direction?!” Yagami-san yelled.
What Shinonome-san said was true. As if their plan were to utterly drown us, another large group of monsters charged us from the opposite direction.
Normal monster swarms didn’t operate like this. Something was definitely wrong. I grit my teeth in frustration. Everyone was frozen in dismay and confusion, but Yagami-san rallied us with a firm order.
“Retreat! This won’t end well!” he shouted. “I’ll use ranged magic on them while we find an open area! Move it!”
Those of us in the rear were now the frontline as we fled through the only tunnel available. Yagami-san and the others followed behind me and Shinonome-san.
“There’s another horde up ahead!” warned one of them.
“Not down this path! Go!”
As we encountered more forks in the road, most of them had an army of monsters lying in wait. Each time, we found an empty tunnel and pushed onward. Along the way, that off feeling buzzed in the pit of my stomach again. There were so many monster swarms that the empty tunnels felt like a path sketched by some unseen hand.
“Something’s wrong,” I muttered. “This is getting suspicious…”
I didn’t know why this many monsters had spawned, but if the dungeon wanted to kill us outright, wouldn’t it flood all of the tunnels? Yet, somehow, we kept finding escape routes laid out as tantalizing as cheese for a mouse.
We were being baited. That was the only conclusion I could reach. As much as I didn’t like what was happening, we couldn’t stop. Not even revealing my hidden powers would bail us out of this situation. The best option was to obey Yagami-san and follow his wealth of battle experience.
My head knew that, but my heart wouldn’t stop racing. Our retreating feet pounded the rocky floor of the dungeon until we reached our final destination.
“Look, there’s a big room over there!” Shinonome-san said, delighted. “That should give us room to fight back!”
No one hesitated. We slipped through the passage that led to the open space, but when we stepped inside, a shiver coursed through my body.
“What was that?” I said, whirling around. The prickling I felt was completely new.
Yagami-san showered the monsters that pursued us with magic and miraculously made it into the room. The room that I realized was flanked by two open doors.
“Get outside!!” I screamed.
Yagami-san heard me and widened his eyes. “What’re you talking about, Amane? A legion of monsters is out there. We have to defeat them or we won’t—”
He never finished his sentence. The deafening sound of the doors slamming shut drowned him out.
“What was that? The doors shut behind us?”
“Did we make it past the swarm?”
The others were confused by the sight, but the closed doors calmed them despite their surprise. My heart didn’t stop racing, so I couldn’t share in their relief. If my hunch was right…
“E-everyone, turn around,” Yagami-san said, voice trembling. His stare trailed upward. I took a deep breath, turned slowly, then saw it.
I knew this was coming.
A monster reminiscent of the orc general pulled itself out of the wall, where it towered at least five meters above us. Two giant fangs hung from its mouth, and its stony body was painted a muddy red. Something about it emitted an odd, unnatural air. Its thick hands grasped a greatsword that was almost half its body length.
Fear quickly engulfed everyone there.
“No way. We’re not even on the last floor. Why is something so strong here?”
“Was this a trick?!”
I quietly used Appraisal.
High Ogre
Level: 40,000
Extra boss: Onizuka Dungeon
Its level was the same as that cyclops, which I had been lucky enough not to fight the other day. Like mice stumbling into a snake den, we found ourselves in a death trap.