After contemplating whether to hire adventurers or fight them himself, Haruki had come up with an excellent alternative. Every time he saw a monster, he would open up a portal into the dungeon and have them all cramped into an extremely small room. After a while, only the strongest of the bunch survived, unfortunately, however, as he kept descending down the cavernous dungeon all he saw were goblins and slimes.
"Dark ice spear," trying to conjoin his magic affinities, Haruki kept experimenting on the weaker monster. "Dammit, it didn't work."
It rarely worked, but when it did the mana consumed to output ratio was marginally lower than the normal spells.
"Dark light, consume them all!" Crawling out of his skin, a miasma of dark consumed every living thing in its wake. Like a parasite feasting on a dead body, the miasma ate the victims alive as they screamed. "At least something is working."
Watching the slimes being disintegrated by the miasma Haruki made his way further into the dank place. A bit overconfident in his plan, he had arrived all by himself in the duchy's closest dungeon. From what he'd heard, only experienced adventurers ever ventured into the dungeon as it was a great way for them to continue their growth after hitting a stunting growth wall.
'I've been stuck at level eighty for a while, and draining levels isn't working either.' Having hit his own growth wall, Haruki was deeply curious as to how he was supposed to overcome it.
Spawning a bunch of demonic spies, he tried to kill some monster with them and see if that would allow him to gain level. Swarming a bunch of slimes with them, he had them eat away at their core, but with the meager experience, slimes gave off he wasn't sure if he hadn't reached the level cap yet or if the experiment wasn't working at all.
"Go and find some stronger monsters for me, especially minotaurs," sending them off, Haruki began looking around the place again.
After a while of searching, he ran into some kobolds which he decided to check his fencing on. One after the other they fell victim to the saber that Haruki had been storing in one of the dungeon portals. Much like Riley's cape, he was now able to store as much stuff as he wanted with the help of his familiar tormentous dungeon.
"Last one…" He muttered. Appearing out of the monster's shadow, Haruki managed to kill the last one of the kobolds.
'I feel like I've been lacking experience with my skills or else these abilities are surprisingly good.' Opening up his screen of stats, he thought of checking in case, by some miracle he'd level up, but the numbers on the spectral screen were still the same. 'If only it showed a list of spells I can cast.'
Not knowing much about magic, whatever he tried seemed to mostly fail. The only other thing he noticed this time were near transparent bony fingers right at the end of the area where it displayed his levels. 'Did I miss that before?'
"What is it?" He mumbled all to himself.
'Announcement: Once a monster has hit a level cap, it must pray on something stronger for a class upgrade!' Muttering that announcement, the skull under the stat screen cackled.
"I didn't know you could speak?" Haruki said, but it didn't reply.
Even at the very beginning when he'd tried to make the announcement voice in his head to explain the abilities more than once, it had always failed to repeat the explanation. The voice itself sounded so similar to that of Asmodia's, it made Haruki wonder if it was just another way for her to remind us who's the real master.
'She did say people get cocky when they get stronger, and listening to her voice every time we level up must be a reminder.' Sensing that one of the demonic spies had spotted a horde of minotaurs, Haruki opened up a portal underneath him before appearing right next to the demonic spy.
Hidden behind a wall of stalagmites, the spies were stalking a hoard of minotaurs pacing around the entrance of a cave. Just one look at her gargantuan body was enough to make Haruki reconsider his decision to come here alone.
'I'm done being dependent on people.' With each step of their feet, the ground shook about violently, and every grunting exhale from their noses steamed the place with a putrid smell. Drenched in sweat, a total of six minotaurs were continuously pacing around making the whole room heat up from their body temperature alone. 'Fucking hell it's hard to breathe.'
Bracing himself, he decided to push forward before his mind changed.
"Shadow sneak!" Activating the spell, he crept on closer to them through the dark spaces by the walls.
Getting close to them, he attached himself to one of their shadows. Now all he had to do was open up a portal underneath to send them all off into his own dungeon and there with the help of the tentacles he could capture them easily without having to fight them head-on.
"Take them aw-" However, it was never going to be that simple.
The moment Haruki tried to call the familiar a bright green necklace around their necks warned them of danger by emanating strong light.
Frantically looking around, they began thrashing about in the air, perhaps expecting the enemy to be invisible. Realizing he didn't have much time, Haruki tried to call onto the dungeon once more, but every time he tried that the necklace would start glowing brighter and brighter.
'Why isn't the dungeon entrance consuming them?!' Glaring at the necklace, he knew it was the cause of all the ruckus. 'That fucking thing must be protecting them…if that's the case then I might have to get those things off of these bastards!'
Coming out of the shadows, Haruki shapeshifted into a minotaur as well. Being right behind one as he escaped through the shadow, Haruki held his hand over the back of its head, and conjuring a giant icicle he shot it right through his cranium.
"Aghhhhh! Fuck this shit!!! Ahaha," raging with the hormones of a minotaur in its breeding season, Haruki was itching for a fight. "I'll tear those fucking skulls off of you bastards!!!"
Stomping at the fallen Minotaur, Haruki mocked the others with a grin.
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