The dungeon was rather bigger than we could had expected, but we moved rather fast through it, reaching its depths. After a long way down, we realized that there were no more branching paths and it all led to a long road all the way into a very big room.
In our way down, we encountered six separate groups of twenty walking mushrooms of all colors, they were all low-leveled and gave tiny amounts of EXP each, but in big groups like these, their EXP ended pilling up quite nicely. Acorn helped a good amount as he shot down the mushrooms by firing the acorns I made for him. I wish he had some sort of simple to use and strong magic like fire magic or something, but that seems quite impossible.
Nonetheless, when we finished the sixth wave of tiny walking mushrooms by defeating their Giant Orange Mushroom Leader, I ended leveling up again to level 14 in both race and job class. Each mushroom gave little EXP alone but they were twenty every wave, and they were six waves! We easily crushed them and made them into a near endless supply of mushroom to cook and eat for the future, and we got a nice amount of accumulated EXP, which was increased thanks to my Accelerated Growth Green Magic Spell, which increases EXP gained. Titan also had it as he had Green Magic as well, as he was an Ent.
[Your Race and Job Class Levels have increased from level 13 to Level 14!]
[The Level of [Belle] has increased from Level 11 to Level 12!]
[The Level of [Loki] has increased from Level 10 to Level 11!]
[The Level of [Silver] has increased from Level 7 to Level 8!]
And my three pets were growing stronger! …Well, only Belle and Loki were pretty decent, but Silver even at Level 8 still had very weak Stats, she was a tiny snake that would need even more EXP to show off her true potential. She hasn't learned any new Skills either, which worries me a little bit… I hope she learns anything after evolving.
"Well, here we are…" Rita said, as we looked in front of us, there was a big towering door in front of us showing a strange sign resembling an orange mushroom cap. But the door was completely covered in moss and also… black stuff.
"I remember reading from the Key info something about… a Calamity Mushroom Seed? What was that? Is that the final boss?" I wondered.
"It probably could be related to it… This is a low-level dungeon so I hope we don't get to fight something overwhelmingly strong…" Said Titan. "I'll go in the frontlines just in case. I got the highest HP and Defensive stats."
"Alright, you do you." Said Rita.
"Thank you Titan." I said.
"No problem… Now let's finish this off already, it's getting late and I have to wake up early tomorrow for work!" Titan pushed the door wide open with his log-like arms, as darkness greeted our sight.
Pure darkness… I readjusted my eyes into this darkness as the illumination of various mushrooms stuck around the walls and ceiling quickly made up something from within the inside.
There was a tomb. It seemed rather ancient, and had strange runes encrypted all over it. The tomb emanated a strong dark presence, it was… quite miasmic and toxic in nature. My entire body felt a strange repulsion against it.
Suddenly, a cracking and malefic voice resonated through the entire cave. There was nobody but us, and the door behind us quickly closed, without letting us walk outside.
"You… You dare enter the tomb of an ancient nemesis?!" Roared the malicious and cracking voice. "I have reawaken at long last after the fragmentation of the world and its reconstruction, and the first thing I find is that some of you lowly mortals are already crawling into places you shouldn't be walking into!"
"W-Who are you? What are you talking about?!" I asked timidly, I felt a growing and darker pressure pushing me down, forcing me into my knees. I saw Rita and Titan also falling to their knees, resisting an incredibly strong pressure like nothing ever before.
"Who… I am?" The cracking voice asked. "I am the Most Impure. The Sludge, the Rotting One, I am The One that Endlessly Decay… I am the Dark Demon King of Miasma!"
As he said such words, we all froze in fear. Could this guy really be the damn World Boss?! No way! No way in hell, right?! How could the damn World Boss that the entire Player Base is trying to slay appearing here from all things? This little dungeon we found in a random key dropped by a walking mushroom?! What sort of insane development is this?!
"T-The World Boss?!" Asked Titan. "This is unbelievable…"
"…I-Is this bad?" Asked Rita.
"Very." I told her.
"Oh…" She sighed.
"…You've stepped over your boundaries by daring to enter the secret dungeon where the Hero that managed to seal me in the past resides! Do you truly believe you can revive him?! Hah! I have long ago infected his corpse! I cannot come here as this Continent is far away from my authority… but I let you meet your beloved Hero! GAHAHAHA!" Laughed the Demon King, as if he were really like a game character, very cartoony and cliché.
TRUUUUUMMM…!
Suddenly, the tomb where the Mushroom Hero was resting broke out, and from within, a large quantity of miasma began to come out. An immense amount of black mold started to spread across the floor, and the figure of an armored man, as tall as three meters emerged. His helmet was shaped like a mushroom cap, but it seemed he was actually a human?
He was emanating a deadly presence… and just like the Demon King said, he was long dead. Was he… being reanimated into an Undead somehow?
"Kill… Die... Kill… DIE!" He muttered faintly.
And then, he charged straight towards us, as he materialized a black sword by merging the black and miasmic mold covering his entire body.
"RAAAAAH!"
