Dungeon Odyssey [EN]: Chapter 77

Dungeon Chronicle – Episode 78

# 78

Dungeon Chronicle

Boreas groggily opened his eyes, his mind still clouded as if he were in a dream. Even after opening them, his thoughts remained hazy, his head slow to function.

“Ugh…”

Was this the aftereffect of leaving the 10th floor? With a heavy head and weakened body, Boreas managed to sit up.

“Is anyone there?”

He called out, his throat parched, but received no reply. Frowning, he straightened and took a deep breath.

Even that small action helped him regain his composure, clearing his dazed mind slightly.

“I don’t feel well at all. I need to finish this quickly and go back.”

Boreas, talking to himself as he rubbed his dry throat, suddenly froze. Only now did he realize the labyrinth was eerily silent.

He shouted his adjutant’s name, a feeling of dread washing over him, a sensation he hadn’t experienced even on the fiercest battlefields. Still, there was no response.

Flap, flap!

Instead of an answer, the faint sound of a bird’s wings echoed from the distance.

“Gurgle…”

A suppressed groan cut through the air. He snapped to attention.

Why had he only noticed it now? His expression hardened as the pungent smell of blood assaulted his nostrils.

The aura of death hung heavy over the entire labyrinth, and a cold hand seemed to trace its way down his spine, sending shivers through him.

“Damn it…”

Boreas groped for his beloved weapons, feeling the ominous presence that had now fully revealed itself.

However, his fingers only met the cold, smooth stone. The two curved swords he distinctly remembered placing beside him before falling asleep were gone.

“Ploutos! It’s an enemy attack!”

As a last resort, he extended the fingernails on both hands and shouted with all his might. The labyrinth, deeply slumbering, belatedly awoke to his fierce and sharp roar.

“Kuaaaak!”

“Who is it!”

“It’s an enemy attack!”

The once-silent labyrinth erupted in chaos. Moments later, his adjutant came running.

“Lord Boreas, you must escape! The enemy attack is… Gurgle.”

Before he could finish, the adjutant coughed up blood and collapsed, crimson liquid gushing from between his fingers as he clutched at his neck.

“You bastard!”

A blurry shadow materialized behind the fallen adjutant.

“I took care to prepare a place for you to sleep, but I guess you didn’t appreciate it?”

A crooked smile stretched across the pale face revealed beneath the hood. Kim Jin-woo, the former king of the Exiles, no, Kim Jin-woo, smiled coldly as he gazed at the enraged Boreas.

***

“You deceived me!”

Kim Jin-woo sneered, watching Boreas tremble with uncontrollable rage.

“You were so easily fooled, it was almost embarrassing.”

The attack had been a resounding success. Perhaps lulled into a false sense of security after the initial assault, the soldiers from the 10th floor seemed to relax as soon as they entered the Exiles’ labyrinth.

Ariane, the Queen of Dreams, greeted them as they entered the death zone without suspicion.

Under her guidance, the soldiers of the 10th floor succumbed to a sweet but deadly dream, a dream that would be their last for most of them.

“You treacherous bastard! You had a foot in both camps!”

Kim Jin-woo looked momentarily dumbfounded at Boreas’s outburst. Judging by his reaction, Boreas still believed him to be the king of the Exiles.

“You’re truly just a fool who only knows how to fight. Do you still see me as the king of the Exiles?”

“You, don’t tell me…”

A flustered Boreas stared at Kim Jin-woo, his eyes widening in horror.

“You, you are the King of the Nagas!”

“It’s difficult, it’s difficult. Is it really that hard to understand?”

Enraged by the continued mockery, Boreas charged at him.

Flap!

Morrigan stepped into his path.

“The Raven of the Battlefield!”

Boreas roared as he blocked the female warrior’s power-infused fingernails.

“That’s right! If I just cut off your heads, my work will be done! Resent your stupidity for walking to your death without knowing it!”

Boreas’s attacks intensified, as if he intended to eliminate his target and escape, now that things had taken such a turn.

The sound of flapping wings and the chilling wind generated by Boreas swirled around them.

It was a close fight. Considering Boreas was suffering a penalty for leaving his designated floor, he was putting up a surprisingly good fight.

However, Boreas soon began to feel dizzy. In comparison, Morrigan seemed to have more energy, making it clear that Boreas was being pushed back.

“You have no honor as a warrior! The Nagas were serving a mere swindler as their king!”

Boreas’s eyes were bloodshot, frustrated by the constant surprise attacks and the fact that he was forced to fight an uphill battle without his weapons.

“Maybe.”

It wasn’t wrong, but what was absurd was that Morrigan actually agreed with Boreas’s words.

“Isn’t it all good if we win anyway?”

Kim Jin-woo smiled wryly and crossed his arms.

“My King! I have gathered the enemies in one place!”

At Quantus’s report from the distance, Kim Jin-woo glanced at Boreas and spoke unnaturally loudly.

“Then shall we finish this off?”

With those words, he turned and left.

“You bastard! Where are you going!”

Boreas shouted angrily, but Kim Jin-woo didn’t look back.

***

Thanks to Ariane, the Queen of Dreams, it had been easy to cut off the enemies’ heads, but their forces were still formidable.

It was a large force of nearly 2,000, so even though they had reduced their numbers throughout the night, more than 1,000 remained.

“I don’t know why we have to go this far. There are as many as 700 troops playing around half a day away. Why are you making things so difficult when it would have been easier to bring them here and deal with them all at once?”

Even Quantus looked questioningly at Ortea, who had joined them at some point. Kim Jin-woo said nonchalantly as he looked at them.

“If we had been so greedy, the enemies would have reorganized their forces and launched a counterattack long ago. The magic of the dream Ariane cast isn’t that powerful.”

“Then what if we had used that explosion from the beginning?”

“That’s impossible. It would be one thing to hold them back. The explosion we used at that time won’t do any real damage to the enemies’ strong bodies.”

Kim Jin-woo was skeptical about reusing the bomb, having already experienced that its power was insufficient to overcome the durability of the 10th floor soldiers.

“They’re a disorganized mob, but we’re also a disorganized mob. In terms of troop quality, we’re at a disadvantage. We can never win if a full-scale battle begins.”

Kim Jin-woo absolutely wanted to avoid a free-for-all.

The allied forces on the 9th floor couldn’t overwhelm the enemies in terms of numbers or quality.

They might appear dazed due to the surprise attack, but if they properly reorganized and faced each other, the allied forces on the 9th floor would undoubtedly be defeated.

That’s why he was going to such lengths to use numbers to his advantage.

“It’s about time Boreas is released. Tell Ariane to pretend to attack appropriately and then withdraw the troops.”

As soon as he finished speaking, Boreas, wounded all over, was seen rejoining the enemy ranks.

“Good timing.”

Morrigan appeared at his quiet mutter, wearing a dissatisfied expression. She was clearly angry about having to let go of the enemy she had caught.

“Don’t make such a face. We still need a leader to prevent the enemies from scattering and running wild.”

In reality, the labyrinths on the 9th floor wouldn’t be able to handle even a fragmented army from the 10th floor.

Each unit had at least ten hero-level summons, and if you added the nobles who had fallen but whose natural strength hadn’t declined, it would be too much for the individual labyrinth owners to handle.

So, Kim Jin-woo didn’t want them to scatter. And he believed Boreas would be able to fulfill that role sufficiently.

As expected, Boreas was gathering his troops and quickly leaving the labyrinth. The troops, who had been running around in confusion and showing signs of desperation, began to retreat under Boreas’s command.

“The war is just beginning anyway.”

If Kim Jin-woo’s purpose was simply to drive the 10th floor forces out of the 9th floor, he wouldn’t have gone to such lengths to make things so complicated. But he was looking further into the future.

He refused to allow the demoralized 10th floor nobles to fully recover their troops and hole up in their labyrinths.

That’s because the 10th floor would have to be conquered someday anyway, and it was advantageous to inflict even a little damage now.

***

“We beheaded eleven hero-level summons, and four hundred and twenty-three below that.”

“I guess it was greedy to want to include the nobles in the spoils of war.”

“The power of the succubi didn’t reach them. I tried to touch a seemingly weak one, but fifteen succubi were sacrificed.”

Kim Jin-woo smiled wryly at Ariane’s report. Even in their weakened state, the nobles weren’t easy to deal with. The thought that their dormant fighting spirit might be awakened by this battle made his resolve even stronger.

“Tell all the troops to begin the pursuit now.”

“It seems the enemies are heading straight down to the 10th floor in the direction they’re retreating. Do we really have time to pursue them?”

Ariane asked skeptically, but Kim Jin-woo didn’t change his mind.

“I’ve already taken care of it. They have nowhere to return to.”

***

Boreas gritted his teeth.

“We’ll reorganize on the 10th floor and wipe them out!”

The soldiers, their morale shattered by repeated surprise attacks, moved their feet heavily at his words. Boreas’s adjutant spoke as he looked at the soldiers.

“The damage isn’t as great as we thought. Only eleven have been defeated, excluding the lower-ranking soldiers.”

Malaga, who had taken the adjutant’s position in place of Ploutos, who had died in Kim Jin-woo’s surprise attack, reported on the situation.

“So, we need to reorganize even more. I’m going to gather only the elites on the 10th floor and have a proper fight.”

Boreas of the Freezing Winds, who ravaged enemies like the wind, had been unable to exert his full strength because he was tied down by leading a large army. He gritted his teeth in anger.

“I will definitely cut off the head of the Raven of the Battlefield, no, the King of the Nagas.”

His adjutant nodded and comforted him, a chilling glint in his eyes.

“It will definitely be so.”

After venting his anger and retreating for a long time, the noble coalition forces, having arrived near the passage connecting the 9th and 10th floors, were forced to stop again.

“What the hell!”

The passage they had intended to use had collapsed, as if someone had deliberately destroyed it beforehand.

“What about other routes?”

“If we detour, the passage will be connected again in less than a day.”

Boreas, gauging the direction based on the adjutant’s words, gritted his teeth and ordered.

“Detour!”

At his command, the soldiers, exhausted from the night raid and battle, began to move their feet again, staggering. And that was the beginning of true hell.

Attacks came from everywhere they went. If it had been a normal attack, the scouts wouldn’t have failed to discover it, but the enemies were all undead.

They, devoid of life, hid beneath the ground, suppressing their presence, and ambushed the ranks.

Of course, it wasn’t difficult to kill them, as they were few in number, but there was minor damage every time.

Moreover, what was even more terrible was that the attackers were the corpses of their allies who had been caught in the previous explosion.

“Detour!”

Even as they continued, enduring the damage, the road was eventually blocked.

The passages had collapsed, rendering the map prepared before the war useless, blocking their way every time, driving Boreas to the brink of madness.

Now, he just wanted to escape the 9th floor as quickly as possible, regardless of revenge or anything else.

But that wasn’t as easy as he thought. In addition to the constant enemy attacks, an explosion once again engulfed the ranks.

The damage wasn’t great, but the morale of the soldiers, who had barely recovered, plummeted.

They were born as fierce beasts, but their teeth and claws, dulled under their lazy master, began to lose their sharpness again.

“Anyone who refuses to obey orders will be beheaded unconditionally!”

Boreas, having personally beheaded an ally who was causing a commotion, shouted fiercely, and the nobles who had retreated far away protested.

Even though they were fallen, it wasn’t easy for Boreas to control them as they gathered in groups and made a fuss. Moreover, the nobles’ eyes held an unusual glint, as if they were reliving their past violence in this last battle.

“In fact, if you think about it, you’re the one who should be held responsible for the defeat! Nearly 1,000 soldiers died without even fighting properly because they followed your command! What face do you have to order us around!”

Eventually, one of the impatient barons pointed his finger and shouted. This was not good. There were signs that the soldiers were splitting up. He needed to fix it.

But the enemies didn’t give Boreas time to recover the situation.

“Enemy attack!”

A crossroads divided into five branches, and countless troops rushed towards the long noble coalition forces.

***

“What’s the damage?”

“More than 400 troops have been lost. But we’ve defeated more enemies than that, so it’s no different from us winning!”

How good would it be if that were true? But this was the enemy’s territory. The enemy’s troops were constantly being replenished, and the troops that had been consumed were attacking them as the undead, so the fatigue was immense.

In addition, Boreas was in a terrible mood because he was being chased and driven away, and now he didn’t even know where he was.

“Tell all the troops! From now on, attack the enemy’s labyrinths as they come! If there’s a suitable labyrinth, reorganize and try to counterattack!”

“I understand!”

“Send a messenger! Tell Lord Parthenon about the current situation in detail!”

“If you do that, Lord Boreas will be held responsible for the defeat…”

The ruthless and violent Parthenon wouldn’t forgive a defeated general. But even so, Boreas was unstoppable.

“Tell Lord Parthenon! I, Boreas, have already prepared for death, but I must kill the King of the Nagas!”

It was virtually a declaration that he would die with his opponent, and the adjutant looked at him with an astonished face before turning to carry out the order.

“Prepare for battle! The scout has discovered a labyrinth two hours away!”

At the scout’s report, the soldiers glared at the darkness ahead with venomous eyes. Before them lay some labyrinths that had rejected the allied forces.