Chapter 441 Dungeon's Trap

“Huh? Wait a second… is that thing attacking the Black Rhinos?” Tiona shouted, unable to resist looking back over her shoulder.

Right at the intersection they had just crossed, the caterpillar monster collided head-on with a herd of Black Rhinos charging out of a side path. Without a second of hesitation, the caterpillar attacked them. Once a Black Rhino was splashed by the corrosive acid and melted into a paralyzed lump, the caterpillar unhinged its maw and swallowed its upper half whole.

“Whether it’s us or other monsters, that thing attacks anything that gets close.”

“Does it not distinguish its prey?”

“Who knows, we don’t have enough data to draw conclusions… but it feels like they prioritize attacking monsters,” Finn noted, glancing back and narrowing his sharp Prum eyes.

“Captain.” Tione caught up, handing Finn a piece of charred, blackened wood. “Actually, before we even got there, the Cadmus Spring had been turned upside down. The Cadmus Dragon was reduced to a pile of ash, leaving only this piece of wood behind.”

“I see… So the Cadmus Dragon was killed by this monster? Truly unexpected,” Finn concluded, staring intently at the discolored shard in his hand.

The surface of the wood bore the exact same signs of intense acid corrosion as the stone floor they had just witnessed. Much like the Cadmus Dragon Wing Membrane Aiden’s group had found, this wooden shard was clearly a drop item from the beast.

The guardian of the spring the girls’ team had been assigned to was also killed before they arrived. Except their Cadmus Dragon had dropped this piece of wood instead of a membrane.

“Monsters cannibalizing each other. Hah, that’s exactly why they’re monsters…” Bete spat with blatant disdain, his heavy footsteps echoing down the narrow labyrinth corridor.

“I don’t know if a monster living in the Deep Floors wandered up here, or if the Dungeon just birthed a completely new species… Either way, this is incredibly troublesome,” Gareth sighed heavily, unbothered by the panic as he formed his own hypothesis.

At this moment, the group was just fleeing blindly into the unknown, like a swarm of startled flies.

“Finn, can we kill it?” Ais’s cold, clear voice suddenly cut through the tension, startling the running group.

A momentary silence fell over the party, broken only by the chaotic slapping of footsteps and heavy breathing.

Finn’s breathing hitched slightly before he answered the blonde girl running slightly ahead of him. “Attacking it directly works, yes. But losing a weapon for every strike is a terrible trade-off.”

“…”

“And going up against an army of them is practically suicide.”

“That being said—” Finn shifted his tone, “—there shouldn’t be any restrictions on magic. Although it might be difficult in this situation, if we can buy enough time for an incantation, we could unleash a powerful spell to wipe them all out at once…”

Finn’s analysis came to a halt. Then, as if silently agreeing, Ais and the rest of the party universally shifted their gazes toward Lefiya and Aiden. They were the only two present capable of pulling that off.

Feeling the heavy weight of expectations and pressure bearing down on her, Lefiya squeaked, looking left and right like a frightened animal.

“Tch, they’re spawning ahead of us too,” Bete warned, his voice cracking like thunder.

A massive yellow-green body aggressively squeezed out from the corridor corner ahead, completely blocking their path.

“Everyone, take the right fork, fast!” Finn ordered the second Bete finished speaking.

The group abruptly changed directions, throwing themselves into the only remaining path—an alley even narrower than the one they had just run through. They maintained a single or double-file formation as they sprinted.

“Raul, how are our weapon and item reserves?”

“Eh… ah, yeah, we haven’t consumed anything.”

“Good. Distribute the weapons to Tiona and the others. We stop at the room ahead.”

Looking at the Captain—who had completely memorized the layout of the 51st Floor, a space as massive as the city of Orario itself, without even glancing at a map—Raul took a silent breath of awe and immediately followed orders.

Aside from Ais’s unbreakable sword and Lefiya’s staff, the girls’ weapons had practically all been ruined by the monster’s acid. Therefore, Tiona and the others quickly pulled spare swords and daggers from the long cylindrical bags Raul carried on his back. Even Tifa, who always fought bare-handed, grabbed a pair of refined steel daggers; it wasn’t her preferred style, but it was better than fighting empty-handed.

“Does equipping this stuff even help? It’s just gonna melt again anyway,” Tiona grumbled miserably, giving the unfamiliar curved shortsword a test swing.

Finn unconsciously licked the inside of his right thumb. That familiar, restless throbbing made his heart tighten.

“It’s probably… coming.”

As his ominous prediction settled into their minds, a spacious dead-end room opened up before them. The only exit was the path they had just used to enter.

The moment they all rushed into the space, the lead-black walls on three sides—the front, left, and right—suddenly began to crack and splinter.

“!!”

Bete and the others’ faces drastically changed.

At this point, they definitely wouldn’t mistake the signs. This was the precursor to monsters spawning directly from the labyrinth walls. And on a massive scale. It was glaringly obvious that the entire room was gestating monsters.

A Monster Party.

A sudden, overwhelming horde of monsters spawned in a perfect U-shaped encirclement, leaving only the entrance they had just come through. It was one of the Dungeon’s most vicious traps, capable of plunging any adventurer into the abyss of despair. As if guided by unseen eyes, the Dungeon always crafted these unreasonable, malicious snares.

“Bete, Gareth, Tiona, clear out these newborn monsters. Ais and Aiden, handle those new species catching up from behind. Can you do it?” Finn directed his last question at Aiden and Ais.