5 My arrogance will get me killed

Leofric's figure left the general store on the path to Babel Tower, the one tower in the city that was built right above the Dungeon.

He didn't know much about its history nor the purpose behind it, but as far as he knew from word of mouth, the thing had been there since the very beginning, although it was much smaller before the gods descended.

Still, he heard that people back then were already dungeon crawling even without a blessing. Be it humans, animal people, prums, dwarves, elves, they all dived into the dungeon and relied only on their raw strength to either come out successfully or die honorably in order to give the surface dwellers more time to prepare for the next wave of monsters that would rush up from inside.

For Leofric, those people deserved the highest form of respect and recognition. He almost peed himself to face a kobold and he was already boosted by his goddess blessing, he didn't know if he would be able to do the same without it.

It was like seeing a shooting live, no matter how many times you experience it, there will always be a lingering shadow of helplessness in your heart when it happens.

But he? He was finally over that.

Leofric couldn't call himself the best of the best, but he was a full-fledged adventurer for sure.

That's why he was going down a few floors today. In order to get stronger, the challenge must either increase or keep consistent.

It wouldn't do to just stay around the first floor.

"Leofric?" Hearing his name, he stopped and turned to look at whoever called.

"Eh? It's Halrod then, it's nice to meet you elder... but what are you doing here?"

"I just wanted to check up on you, it has been a few days since you stopped by to learn more about the Dungeon." Halrod stood straight in front of Leofric, an aura of grandeur and pride coiling around him.

Elves were probably the only race that could live long enough to make people not consider if they would ever die or not.

For someone like Halrod, who was already showing signs of becoming a gramps, one would have to ask himself just how much experience this man had. It wouldn't be far-fetched to say that he saw entire generations of heroes growing and dying along the way.

"Haha! It's okay, you saw how much I progressed, right? Besides, I don't plan on going below the fifth floor so soon. With what you taught me about the first floors, I wanted to focus on first getting stronger before turning my attention towards studying again."

Halrod nodded but there was a shadow of doubt concealed in his eyes and... some level of worrying. "Don't get conceited, Leofric. The worst thing that an adventurer can do inside is growing complacent and stride around as if he was on a holiday."

"Yeah, yeah! Don't worry gramps! This grandson of yours won't be making any newbie mistakes like that, now I have to go, the sun is already high and I need to hunt!" Leofric pushed aside all of Halrod's worries and trotted his way to the dungeon while stretching and sucking a mouthful of the fresh breeze of the morning.

"This kid... he will regret this one day." Shaking his head, Halrod left, it was time to update his god of Hecate and her child's progress.

###

I'm in such a good mood.

After eating to my heart's content yesterday, I got to sleep with goddess again, we cuddled like a couple and I could freely feel her lower parts in my hips!

Ah... those thighs, those incomparably beautiful twin peaks... how good would it be if we were in a relationship...

Unfortunately... ahh, it feels so weird that she is a goddess, immortal, and everything else as well. How old is she anyway? A few thousand years? Hundreds of thousands of years? Besides, would she be able to give birth to a child of mine? I don't want to just have a taste of beautiful women after all... it would be a dream coming true to have a real family...

As much as I like Hecate, I don't think it would be fine to have a relationship like that with her, my heart bleeds for considering this, but maybe the right choice would be to just draw a clear line...

There are so many beautiful women in this world, after all, I can't just lock my sight towards the first one I saw.

With those lewd thoughts in my head, I finally arrived at the dungeon's 4th floor. The shining specks of light coming from the wall were just as similar to those on the floors above, nothing about the structure or feel of the place changed even though I was now two floors below the ones I usually explore.

I had three bags with me this time, two pouches hanging by my waist, and a small-sized adventurer backpack. It cost me 500 Valis to buy it, but it was worth it.

The backpack was enchanted with some sort of magic. It could carry much more weight than normal backpacks and it wasn't limited by volume, just by weight limit, meaning I could stuff hundreds of magic stone shards inside without worrying about running out of space so long as the weight limit wasn't broken.

Usually, these kinds of bags are used by supporters. But Hecate Familia is just a beginner one, nobody would be willingly looking to enter our ranks or help us without monetary compensation and I couldn't afford to hire one for now.

I heard that level one parties usually make around 25 thousand Valis per day, although they have to share this amount between their groups usually consisting of four to six, and subtract the guild and their Familia's tax at the end of the day, the amount of money they would get in the end was way higher than anything I could earn on my own right now.

That's why getting stronger and diving deeper is a must to make my Familia grow. Only by having real abilities will I be able to attract people to our ranks.

As always, the dungeon was filled with paths that intersected and slopes that went down to god knows where.

There were fewer traces of adventurers there compared to the first floor. People tend to gather at the beginning road on that floor, but the lower you go, the wider and more confusing the layout of the dungeon gets. The first floor had a very straightforward path to the second floor, and so did the second to the third, but from that point on it was kind of abstraction to say that there were stairs leading down... one could choose any direction and eventually be able to find a path downwards even if it didn't look reliable.

The holes were the most common ones, but they were dangerous for adventurers below level 2, sometimes they extend so much, they can take you down by two to three floors directly, and they tended to be more common next to monsters spawning areas, meaning you could get yourself surrounded pretty quickly if you decided to use it.

Only those who could overwhelm monsters like kobolds and goblins without any care in the world would choose to use them for the sake of conveniently saving a few dozen minutes of travel.

###

I kicked the ground and jumped away.

The sword slashed bellow my boots almost hitting my ankle.

One, two, three, ...., seven, seven goblins gathered together. That was a first for me, and that wasn't all, their leader was taller, his muscles were bigger, and he was carrying a rusted iron sword. He probably picked it from the body of some unlucky bastard that got too careless.

The goblins were humanoid creatures, they had three small horns protruding from their heads, yellow reptilian eyes that always seemed to make them look like they were bored, and their green bodies were covered in slightly brown fur from the chest area to the base of their feet.

"Gyaah!" One of them came forward and tried to tackle me, I blocked him with a hit using the edge of my shield.

"Gugugug!"

I wanted to finish him but three others acted in accordance to their friend and started attacking me.

"Ugh!" I felt that one, straight to rib cage... I almost lost my breath.

I waved my sword and beheaded one of them.

The attacks were getting quicker and more coordinated. What the hell is going on here!? This doesn't feel right!

"Kyahh!"

"Ahhhgh!"

Their leader moved and slashed at my head, I was occupied trying to fend off four at the same time and barely had time to react!

If I hadn't pulled back at the last moment he would have killed me!

Stopping to catch my breath I brought my hand to cheek and frowned, there was blood running down my neck, the bastard managed to cut me with the sword.

"Gauagagaga!" The leader stomped his feet, a victorious beastly cry came from his stinking mouth.

"Tsk!" My legs were starting to fail me. I got too careless and was ambushed! I have to flee.

Turning around I wanted to run but a familiar sight made me stop and get white like a ghost.

Five of them, dog-headed... great, just what I needed a monster party!

"No..." Tears were welling up in my eyes, I managed to kill another Goblin but their numbers were overwhelming me, it was one against ten.

Slowly but surely my arm was getting torn and bruises were covering my body.

One of them jumped from a bling spot and headbutted me in the guts, I don't know how but he was too strong, I was sent flying above the group of monsters with that attack, only stopping after hitting the wall on one intersection.

"Uhhhh!" Coughing I tried to recover my breath, the monsters were running towards me!

Ahh! I don't wanna die!

I turned around and started to run, looking down my body was a mess. Blood was seeping away from various holes and injuries, be it claws, fangs, punches, and slashes, all kinds of injuries had accumulated on my body.

My left hand felt numb, I couldn't move it properly and I already downed a 500 Valis potion.

I kept running away but the cries of the monster were getting near instead of further.

Is that it? Could it be that I would die in such a pathetic way? A stream of tears started to fall down from my eyes.

That's right, I had forgotten this feeling of being useless... the acting just naturally disappeared, the bravado was merely a play after all... I was a coward, I was afraid of pain and death! I don't want to die here... someone.... helps me!

I kept crying in my heart, but nobody appeared.

At some point I arrived at a narrow pass, it was a dead-end, no paths forward, the only way out was by retreating, but...

I turned and saw them, from ten it went to fifteen, new monsters hopped on the train along the way.

I bit my lips and raised my sword, there was no choice now! To fight or to die! I had to fight!

The fight started once more.

"Guuah!"

"Kekiki!"

I waved my sword left and right, I couldn't defend anymore, every hit was taken head-on as I held on to the pain to keep myself awake.

Soon the monsters started to force me against the wall behind me, but that gave me an idea. I wasn't kidding when I said it was a narrow pass, only two of them could fit there!

My memories felt like they had received a boost at that moment, memories of time playing action-based RPGs flooded my eyes. The funneling strategy! How could I have forgotten that!

When facing large groups of enemies, one of the most efficient ways of fighting them was forcing them into narrow places where only one or two of them would be able to attack you!

That was one of my grinding methods in RPGs, I would gather a crowd of monsters and lure them places like that where I could easily kill one at a time without sweating!

My confidence came back followed by a boost of morale. Stepping back I lured the monsters towards me and sure enough, only two at a time, the others couldn't flank me anymore!

"Hahaha! Die! Die! Die!" I must have gone crazy at that moment. The taste of vengeance was like divine nectar reinvigorating my body as I started to dumbly kill them with simple and quick piercing attacks, if I had a spear it would have been even easier.

Eventually, only the goblin leader remained, he kept staring at me, growling like a wild dog.

"Ha... haha! I killed them all, you little bastard! How does it feel huh? To see your kind shredded like minced meat! Mwahaha! You thought you could kill me, but I'll be the one to kill you!"

"Guagagaga!" The goblin leader howled and slashed at me, I parried using my sword as I couldn't move my left hand anymore.

Our strength was evenly matched.

We traded blows and the sound of metal colliding with metal resounded again and again.

"Uh..." My vision became blurry and I almost lost my balance.

The goblin used the opportunity and slashed me, blood gushed out like a fountain, he managed to cut through my leather armor, ripping apart the skin between my shoulder and chest, the wound was at least the size of a standard ruler, but it didn't felt deep, the armor probably saved me...

"Fuck!" I cried in pain and with a roar, I kicked the goblin's legs and something snapped, I think I broke its leg.

"Guaaahh!" Sure enough, the miserable was crying in pain, but I didn't care!

I was furious! He tried to kill me, he injured me so much that I would have scars from that day forward and maybe even PTSD! I was completely enraged!

"Damn you!" I kneeled above him and pierced his manhood with my sword, making the Goblin cry in pain once more.

But I didn't stop there, I started punching him in the face. At some point, it started to deform and get swallow, seeing his face getting purple from the beating I laughed.

My punches getting increasingly quicker and stronger, at some point the goblin stopped struggling, it was dead...

"Huuu... Huuu..." My chest felt heavy... It was difficult to breathe... I grabbed my sword and shield and started ripping the magic stone shards from the monsters, their body would explode in a mist of ashes once I took their magic stone, it acted as a core for their bodies, after all, removing it would always have such effect.

From the fifteen I killed, there were three surprises, a goblin fang from the goblin leader, a kobold claw, and a kobold rib.

"Ha... haha... at least you were kind enough to leave an apology behind..." I shook my head and sighed.

The scenes where I tortured the goblin played on my head once more... the only comforting part of this trip, was that it was probably the most profitable one so far... still...

"I need a bath..." Leaving those words behind I downed another potion, my last one, and left for the entrance.

Even so, my body was still shaking... this feeling of being powerless, of looking at death in the eyes... I actually made a mistake... Ah, Leofric, you're a pathetic fool... a few moments of success and you let it go to your head, your arrogance almost got you killed today...