Monster parade(corrected)

'swing' 'swing'

"Compared to that spartoi, your attacks are so slow and predictable." -Said Mark derisively, as he dodged the stone axes, swung by three minotaurs who were surrounding him.

'GROOOAR!'-Even though they couldn't understand him, they could tell he was taunting them, so they shouted in anger.

One of the minotaurs, got down on all fours and started to charge Mark with full force, ready to impale him, but Mark didn't seem the least bit worried, on the contrary, he showed an excited smile as if he wanted to test something.

Before the monster charged him, Mark's free hand was covered with the aura and he waited for the monster to approach. When the minotaur was close enough, he raised his fist and lowered it with all his strength onto the monster's head, executing a true hammer fist.

'Crack!'

The minotaur's head was driven into the ground, creating a hole and shortly after, its body disappeared, leaving only its magic stone.

'GROOOAR!'-The remaining two minotaurs, didn't care about their fallen comrade and charged Mark simultaneously.

Moving to the side, he dodged the first attack, and taking the sword in a reverse grip, he drove the blade into the monster's temple. Quickly drawing the blade, he spun on himself, cutting the other minotaur in half.

"That was easier than I thought, I'm curious about my stats, but I want to see them once I'm out of the dungeon."

In fact, Mark hadn't checked his status since entering the dungeon. He didn't want to get into the habit of evaluating situations based on his stats, because while it was true that stats played an important role in an adventurer's strength, without good technique, he would only be able to exert a fraction of his total strength.

Trying to forget his curiosity about his status, he went to collect the magic stones. It was the 14th day since he had descended into the dungeon, and he was currently on the 17th floor. The reason behind their long stay was that their losses had driven them into the red, so they had to spend more days than necessary collecting materials to sell.

During these days, Mark was also going to fight around the 19th floor, together with Cruz, but since he wanted to fight alone today, he decided to go to the 17th floor. He had also used these days off to earn as much money as possible, to repay the cost of the armor given to him by Tiona, hoping in this way to create some distance from her.

'With the debt repaid, it won't make sense to go to the dungeon together. I hope with this I can create some distance between me and her.' -Thought Mark rubbing his eyebrows tiredly.

In some ways, he felt quite sorry for her. Out of all the people she could have loved, she chose the one person who wouldn't let anyone else into his heart.

"I think it's time to go back, these stones should be enough, besides it's not long before Goliath is born, is it?"

[That's right, in about ten minutes it will be reborn.]

Even though Mark was on the 17th floor, he hadn't strayed far from the boss's room for that very reason. Goliath had a 14-day rebirth cycle and 14 days had passed since the Loki Familia had killed it.

'tremors'

'GRAAAAAAAR!'

"Hmm?"

After there was a tremor, the echoes of the minotaurs' cries reached Mark's ears

Pausing for a moment, Mark's interest was piqued. From the screams of the monsters, it didn't sound like they were too far away from him, but at the same time, he didn't know what was going on, making the situation too dangerous.

"There are too many unknowns, I'd better go and report."

Even though he had that intention, he couldn't bring himself to leave. A part inside him refused to leave as if it was asking him to go and check it out and the more time passed the greater this feeling was.

'I don't like this, but this feeling is too realistic, is it intuition? Haaa, all I know is that if I don't go, I might regret it, worst case scenario I can run away as fast as I can.'

Making up his mind, he began to run towards the direction the screams had come, not knowing that the fragments within his soul were vibrating.

--- Pov Zoe ---

"There were a lot of Bells."

"I didn't know Bell could multiply."

"Instead of Almiraj, we could also call them little Bell."

"I beg you Zoe don't join them! Besides, they don't look anything like me!" -Shouted Bell offended.

"Hahaha! "(x3)

Several things had changed since both Bell and I had leveled up. The first was that our party had been joined by a new person, Welf Crozzo, who was the one who made the armor Bell was wearing and his new dagger. Welf had made a deal with Bell to be his blacksmith, but to become a good blacksmith, he had to reach level 2 to unlock the development ability.

The Crozzo's were recognized as a family of blacksmiths who could make magic swords, but they seemed to have lost the talent for making them, except Welf, who refused to make them as he considered them weapons you couldn't trust.

With the new addition and Bell and me at level 2, we started exploring the Middle Floors, though we were limited to the 13th floor only. After leveling up, Bell's strength had grown tremendously, and he had unlocked a new skill as well, but he wasn't the only one who grow stronger.

###########################################

[NAME]: Zoe Elpis

[AGE]: 18

[LV]: 2

[BASIC ABILITIES]:

Strength: I 90(310)

Endurance: I 80 (300)

Dexterity: H 100 (700)

Agility: H 100 (700)

Magic: H 150(1800)

[DEVELOPMENT ABILITIES]:

Alchemy (H) ->(G)

Abnormal resistance (I) (new)

[MAGIC]:

-Word magic: using words and imagination, it is possible to cast a spell. It has a high rate of falna consumption

[SKILLS]:

-Eye of truth:

(passive) ability to read inner thoughts.

-Void:

(activate) absorb the magical power from the stones of slain monsters and make it yours.

(activates) the magical power absorbed can be used to enhance a magic, but as a result, you will lose the stat increase.

(stones lv1 ->2: 0/4)

###########################################

I knew that my Void skill was full of potential, but I never imagined that by absorbing 5 magic stones from hellhounds, my magic stat would increase by a thousand. When I saw it together with Hestia and my mother, we stood looking at each other speechless, but the scariest thing was that I could now absorb the magic stones of level two monsters, though no longer five stones but four.

'Looks like it's not just Bell who has an unfair ability.' -With the fact that I could read minds, Hestia directly told me about the skill that Bell possessed, though she didn't go into specifics.

'I find it more surprising that Bell hasn't realized he has such an ability yet' -I thought, laughing to myself.

Unfortunately, our moment of pause was interrupted by the arrival of three hellhounds, so we quickly got into formation. Bell and Welf were the vanguards, while Lili and I provided support.

Two of the monsters went to attack Bell and Welf respectively, while the third shifted its gaze towards us and fired a blaze. Seeing the flames coming, Lili and I separated, and as soon as she got into position, she fired arrows from her crossbow, but the monster dodged to the side, but that was what we wanted.

"Stone arrow!"

From the tip of my spear, a stone arrow was fired, hitting the monster that had just dodged Lili's darts, killing it.

"Good assist Lili." -I said, raising my thumb to her, getting the same reaction.

The others seemed to have finished as well, but without warning, a group of people with oriental equipment passed between us. As they passed us, I recognized the black-haired girl because she had also leveled up, but the thing that worried me the most was that when our eyes met, I could read her thoughts.

<I'm sorry>

'Why was she apologizing?'-I thought, as I watched them run away.

"What problems they had, they even bumped into me." -Welf said irritated.

"I think I saw a girl being carried, maybe one of them was hurt?" -Lili speculated.

"Bell behind you!" -Hearing my shout, Bell ducked just in time, avoiding the Hellhounds' jaws, and while the monster was still in the air, he pierced its head.

"Where did that come from!" -Bell shouted, recovering from the attack.

'tremors'

Strong vibrations started to shake the ground and when we turned around, we realized that our situation was among the worst possible, a huge group of monsters was coming towards our destination.

"We have to leave now! That's a monster parade!" -Said Lili agitatedly.

Realizing the situation, we started to run with the hope of reaching the upstairs entrance, but it seemed that luck was not on our side that day.

'tremors'

More vibrations were occurring, only this time it was coming from the ceiling and shortly afterward huge cracks appeared from which several bat monsters came out, but that wasn't the problem. With all those cracks, the ceiling couldn't hold out any longer, collapsing in on us.

"Earth wall!"

With my magic, I created an earth dome to defend us. If I had more time, I could have imagined stronger magic, unfortunately, I had no such possibility. All the rubble fell on us and due to the weight, the ground beneath us gave way causing us to fall into the void.