DD 203 Ch 25

Chapter 25

As the sand blocking the raid entrance came down, the first thing I heard was the sound of battle outside. Metal on metal pinged and explosive blasts reverberated through the fist-sized hole that had appeared at the top of the door's arch.

"Hurry. Get it all down," I was ready to get out of the raid. Once our location was known, we were trapped. 

Professor Sai drew her blade to lead the charge out as soon as the sand was clear. She glanced over at my group.

Even Harley was looking tense, her normal jovial attitude nowhere to be seen as we all prepared for what we were about to face.

The summons from Trusk Academy continued to spray sand over us in a gritty shower as they hurried to remove the sand.

No one so much as flinched. A little sand was nothing compared to what was to come. 

The fist-sized hole continued to expand, the sound of battle growing louder. As soon as the opening was large enough, Professor Sai threw herself into the hole and began to wiggle herself out.

The sand elementals continued to spray sand away from the doorway, the hole steadily growing wider.

I wasn't far behind the professor. As soon as I could crouch and make my way through, I shoved myself into the opening in the sand and made my way outside. 

It was almost surreal to be outside of the raid and not be surrounded by limestone walls and columns. Instead, the world opened up around me to a false ceiling and an expansive desert pocketed with oases. Not far from the entrance, a pair of naga fought a team of dwarves.

The naga were defensively slithering back as the dwarves pressed them. There were nine of the dwarves, and from the looks of it, all but one were drones. The one non-drone was wearing dungeon gear, standing out from the rest. 

Professor Sai was already kicking up a storm of sand, rushing across the distance between us and the two groups locked in combat.

I chased after her, activating [Sprint] to catch up.

Two oversized one-handed swords appeared in my hands as I prepared to support the professor. Though the blades’ hefty size did little to impair my fighting, with my present stats it was unlikely that any weapon would be unwieldy for me. I wasn't anywhere near Crimson's level of stats, but I was proud of my progress and my current strength.

Professor Sai was ahead of me, swinging in from the right behind the group of dwarves. She was likely going for what she saw as the strongest of the two groups first. However, I knew that while the dwarves looked like they had the advantage, the Nagas were individually the more powerful fighters. I swung in from the other side to try and debilitate the two Naga before their fight with the dwarves halted.

Swinging across the sand, I activated used Shadow Ambush to close the gap as soon as I got within range of the Naga. I jumped on them only moments after Professor Sai slammed into the back of the dwarves. Her sword cleaved through two of the drones, catching them by surprise, while the dwarf warrior spun and used an ability to block her from hurting the rest.

I was behind the healthier of the two Naga, my swords cleaving into its back on either side of its spinal fin.

It let out a hissing scream as I raked the blades down its back before jumping backwards, just in time to dodge a sweeping strike with its large sword. The Nagas, as usual, preferred large, two-handed blades.

The male Naga had bulky upper frames supported by a short serpent's tail. It tried to drive me back with a flurry of strikes before a dwarf drone dropped a nail on its tail and hammered it in place. The Naga twisted, unsure who was the bigger threat, and I ducked back in, my over-larged swords giving me some additional range as I slashed twice before ducking back out as it swung with its long sword once again.

The dwarven drones piled on the back of that Naga, driving stakes into it and hitting it with heavy mallets. Meanwhile, the warrior dwarf was holding off Professor Sai, creating a clash of blades in the background of my current fight. 

A moment later, the second Naga defended himself with an ability that sent his group of drones flying and swung in to protect the other warrior.

I didn't have to keep them occupied very long before three dragons shot into the sky. The summons swept along the area, breathing fire, lightning, and ice over the group of enemies. I jumped back in time to see the drones were dead and the Naga were heavily injured.

Marin's dragons were followed up by several blasts of magic. Ice and darkness filled the gap and finished off the two Naga.

The one Naga's soul peeled itself off the body and stood up before joining behind me. Watching souls peel off was a little creepy, but in a fight the ability was rather convenient 

I was hoping it would help us push through to the safe zone.

Professor Sai flicked blood off of her blade, having finished the dwarven soldier in that moment of chaos. "Good work, everyone," she said. On edge, she glanced around at the sand dunes that had a few patrolling monsters, but no other packs of dwarves or Naga were present.

The hole by the entrance of the raid was big enough that students were ducking down and scurrying out one after the other. It seemed us starting to fight had made people impatient. Haylon College was in front of the group exiting, along with a few Trusk and Pendulum students coming out.

Pendulum quickly fell into ranks, breaking up and monitoring the space around us all, finding high points around the raid entrance to get a view of what was coming.

One of the people atop of a nearby dune held up his hand before flashing several signals Machen interpreted for me. "Three Naga over that way."

I glanced around at the others to see if anyone else was communicating a signal, and thankfully they were not. "Then it sounds like someone’s going that way," I said to Machen. "We'll clear out what we can.”

“I think it's in our best interest to clear out the straggler groups before we try and push for the safe zone." Machen agreed.

"What are we going to do about the dwarves?" Marin asked, catching up.

I grimaced at the memory of the Dwarven Queen that we had fought on the 25th floor safe zone.

"I think Naga are the safer bet. They can’t repopulate as quickly. Not to mention, that's the way we need to go to get back. If I'm honest, I would rather not try and take down an established Dwarven Queen."

The Berserker grunted, accepting my reasoning, before flashing several signals at the other Pendulum students. People quickly reformed into their groups and headed out. I looked around at the other leaders of the colleges. 

"Let's split up into our schools and push down to the 35th floor," I suggested, letting my swords dip until the tips of the blades touched the sand. "Clear out everything we can and then together we will assault the safe zone." 

I received nods of agreement from Marin and Prince Albar before I sheathed the swords at my hips. 

"We're right behind you," Des assured me, giving me a sloppy salute as Haylon did their best to mimic Pendulum's martial discipline.

Even Harley was taking the situation seriously, the pink-haired bard falling into a group without complaint about her healer harem being split up. 

I pointed in a direction and started jogging. Our class of 25 students was bolstered by the presence of Neldra and Professor Sai.

At this point, the students in the class had significantly upgraded their strength to the point that I didn't think Professor Sai was necessarily all that much stronger than me. If push came to shove, I thought I might be able to beat the professor in a duel given a few of my abilities.

We crested over the first sand dune and monsters came for our group. There was a clean switch as five ranged DPS all stopped running together and blitzed down the group of mobs. No extra person joined them, knowing that would have triggered an enrage function by the dungeon.

The ladies were consummate professional adventurers as we swept away several packs of mobs and pushed out from the raid entrance into the dungeon propper. 

On the third dune we crested, we encountered a group of about 20 dwarves. Only two of them appeared to be warriors.

The Haylon class descended on them like a swarm of locusts, Helen and Myrtle picking up the attention of the two warriors while the rest of the class blasted the drones apart. They then switched to the warriors and brought them down to a bloody heap in no time. 

I came out of that fight with four dwarven specters following me. The naga souls had already disappeared. The ability only lasted several minutes. But oftentimes that's all it took to tip the scales of battle. It would be unfair for me to keep an entire army of spirits at my beck and call, although I wished I had that kind of advantage. Carry them around in my shadows or something.

Our college swept over the sand dunes, killing several more groups of dwarves and only a scant few naga. We didn't encounter another group of naga along the way and headed down through the 32nd, the 33rd, the 34th, and then finally onto the 35th floor. 

On the 35th floor, we came to a halt. I spotted Marin standing with several of the Trusk party leaders, discussing something urgently. 

"There you are," she looked up. "We had several people scout ahead with their summons. It seems your idea was not unique."

I frowned at Marin, not understanding what she meant. "Not unique?" I asked. The queen of the nerds shook her head. 

"No. It seems that the dwarves are already assaulting the naga," she explained. She crouched down in the sand, where someone had already drawn what appeared to be a depiction of the floor. She had a dagger in her hand and tapped on one side. "This is where the boss room and the entrance to the safe zone is. And this," she pointed to some X's that were placed on the quickly drawn map, "is the dwarven attack line." 

The number of X's seemed a little extreme. "How many are there?" I asked, wondering which one of them was the scout.

A thin woman pushed at the bridge of her glasses. "My best estimate is 500 dwarves," she said, using a wand to make a large X in the middle of the formation. "There's an 8 foot tall dwarf right here. Is it still a dwarf if it's that tall?" 

"It's a dwarf queen," I said, understanding what they were seeing. "And that's not good." I shook my head.

The dwarf queen I had briefly fought alongside the harem queen was probably a foe beyond our current capabilities. Even then, from what I understood, we had fought what was likely the weakest queen nearby given she had been displaced by another. This one could possibly be even stronger. 

"She's not that high level," the Trusk student who had scouted said. "She's maybe level 50?" 

I tilted my head sideways. That would be a major source of good news. "Perhaps the safe zone with the dwarves was a low level?" Des turned to me with a little bit of hope. 

"Or that dwarven queen could be an offshoot from the one that exists," I said. "Either way, it doesn't matter. We don't need to deal with the dwarves. What we need to do is get through the naga." 

Everyone nodded, looking at the map in front of us.

While we studied the map, Machen and the rest of Pendulum started coming down the stairs behind us. 

"Looks like I'm late to the party," the big berserker said, an axe hefted over his shoulder. 

"No, you're just in time." I repeated the information we've gotten from the Trusk students to Machen, the big berserker rubbing his chin.

"If we just need to get past the naga, could we come in from the side and flank both of them?" He tapped along the side of the map, suggesting we run along the dungeon wall and through only a slim section of the naga to get to the safe zone.

Honestly, I had been debating the very same tactic. After all... once we got past, the naga would be unable to pursue us, as they were still held down by the dwarves. 

"I think that's not a bad plan, Machen. The biggest risk is that once we get past the naga, there's another danger at the floors below, and we could potentially end up sandwiching ourselves between two hostile groups." 

The big berserker grimaced, and looked back at the map, as if hoping an answer would pop out for him. 

"I think we might have to take the risk," Marin threw in her two cents. "It's not like we're going to be able to farm food on these floors. Sure, they have crocodiles, but I don't recall the ones on the floor dropping edible loot when we had farmed them previously.”

“We don't even know if the floors beyond this one are going to have anything." I said, causing everyone to look worried.

I held my hand up. "But it's still our best bet. If there's not something edible on the five floors below the safe zone, we can always go back up to one of the other two routes the safe zone presents.” It certainly opened up our options.

“And through the naga again." One of the Trusk students added, sounding scared.

"We cut our supplies short. Finding a place to recoup them has to be one of our priorities. Unless you think we stand a chance at cleaving through both armies, both forces, and looting them for all they're worth." I added.

Even as I said that, I knew it might be a possibility. If while flanking into both forces I could build up enough stacks, there was a chance that I could cleave through their forces and even handle the dwarven queen. In fact, the more I looked at the situation, the more I realized the concept was a little wild but possible. It would reduce the awareness of our broader group’s location.

"Actually, that might just have to be the plan," I said, looking back at Candice. She had been my support through most of the raid. She nodded in understanding. I turned back to the map. "The plan will be to come in from this direction." I pulled out a dagger from my CID and drew an arrow indicating our forces. The scout had marked out several large dunes, and I chose one for our forces to gather behind before sallying out. 

Then I glanced at the two leaders. "Our primary objective should be getting people into the safe zone." I nodded to Machen. "If we can get you in the doorway to the boss with healers behind you," I drew a quick stick figure with an axe and several stick figures on the other side of the Naga line with him, "then I think you should be able to hold the bottleneck best." 

Machen crossed his arms and gave a nod of satisfaction with that plan. Meanwhile, I turned to Marin. "There might be significant resistance on the other side of the safe zone." I made a line behind the healer stick figures. "So as soon as we break through, I want Trusk to unload their summons and create a safe spot for everyone else to come down the stairs." I made a little stick figure dragon for Marin and their summons. 

"What about you?" Marin asked.

"Haylon is going to send most of their people with you," I replied, tapping on the expanded map. "However, I am going to hopefully deal enough damage to the dwarves that they don't try to chase us up the stairs." I tapped on the X that had been the Dwarven Queen and glanced around the group to see if there were any arguments. 

Des did not look happy with me, but I flashed her a smile. In fights like this, it was important I did all I could. If we held back, we would lose. We were just barely at a point to be able to handle what we were up against.

I was sure I would have my party at my back, but much of the action would be left up to me, especially if I could get my stacks up to the point that I wanted. I put a hand on my knees and eased myself up from crouching over the map. 

"Now the only question is, where is the Royal College?" I glanced around, but Machen and Marin both shrugged. 

"We ran into him one floor down from the raid," Machen supplied. "They seemed like they were following the plan," he said. 

I shrugged. "We'll wait another hour. If they don't show up by then, we'll have to push forward without them." The last thing I needed was for the Dwarves or Naga to become aware of our plan. This only worked if they weren't expecting us. Half of stealth was speed, acting before one’s opponent even knew there was a game afoot.