n

n

nAt some point, Kairos no longer thought of himself going down a pathway filled with poisonous daggers. Instead, he began to see everything as a set of patterns and conditions. If he felt pain, he would retract his body. If he felt the bag get caught by the dagger, he would pull a bit faster.

nKairos kept his arm close to his side so that he wouldn’t trigger daggers that were far away, thus avoiding a situation where he couldn’t pull his bag in time.

nIt was almost like he had become a machine.

nMove now.

nStop then.

nSpeed up soon.

nKairos wasn’t truly thinking anymore. Other than thoughts of performing the task before him, all other thoughts avoided him.

nIt was to the point that when he felt that the daggers had stopped coming for him, he was confused. Kairos continued to try to move like he did before, but there was no feedback. Eventually, he snapped out of his stupor and opened his eyes.

nHe was in another room.

nExcept this one was different. Instead of there being other pathways, it was just one giant room. Kairos would’ve considered it a dead end if it wasn’t for the glowing misty blue pillar in the middle.

nAfter a bit of hesitation, he walked towards the pillar and touched it.

nHis hand phased through and a familiar water-like sensation came back to Kairos. A possibility formed in his mind, but he was partly in disbelief.

nHe walked into the blue pillar and had a strange sensation of falling, but not really falling. The misty blue mana wrapped around his body.

nUntil eventually, he found himself back in his room.

n1st Dungeon Floor Cleared – 50 Dungeon Currency awarded

nFirst 25 To Clear First Floor of Dungeon 0032 (25th – by ID: 345315364923) – 5 points awarded

nKairos blinked a few times, looking at the system notifications.

nHe was honestly surprised that he had actually gotten a decently large amount of dungeon currency. Though, maybe that was actually just his misconception with his lacking understanding.

nAnother thing he was surprised about was that he had gotten a top twenty-five achievement as opposed to the traditional top ten. On top of that, it meant that only twenty-four other people had actually been able to pass the first floor of this particular dungeon.

nWhen Kairos recalled all the dead bodies he saw outside he couldn’t help but suck in a cold breath. It was almost like one of those post-secondary schools that had an unbelievably low acceptance rate.

nThough, when Kairos thought about it, that was pretty reasonable given the difficulty. After all, even just the hallway with spears was hard enough, then you would have to get lucky that one of the paths was actually the correct one.

nIf it wasn’t for the man that had indicated that he cleared most of the other labyrinth, Kairos wouldn’t have had such an easy time finding the right path.

nHe looked over to the holographic projections, standing there completely still with the same smile it always had. After walking a little closer, it began to talk.

n“Congratulations on clearing the first floor! Your room will be merged with the dungeon lobby within the next few hours.”

nKairos blinked a few times.

n“Dungeon lobby?”

nThe projection quickly responded.

n“You will join the others that have also cleared the floor! It’s a privilege for all those that have worked hard to climb the dungeon.”

nKairos’ eyelid twitched.

n“Can I be excluded from this privilege?”

nThe projection immediately spoke.

n“No.”

nKairos blinked a few times before letting out a sigh.

n“Can I see my status panel?”

nOnce he said that a panel appeared next to the projection.

nStatus

nFloor Level: 1

nDungeon Currency: 64

nKairos rubbed his chin.

n“Hm… I only remember gaining enough points to have sixty-two.”

nThe projection spoke up.

n“That is because certain actions within the floors can also give points, such as passing through hallways. The dungeon is very generous!”

nKairos sighed.

n“Sure… could you open the store page?”

nThe projection complied.

n“Of course!”

nShop

nBread and Water – 1 point

nFried Rice and Milk – 3 points

nSteak and Wine – 5 points

nBlanket – 4 points

nBed – 10 points

nMore

nKairos clicked on the tab that said more, and several other options popped up.

nProof of Perfection Point – 1 point

nRandom Elemental Spell (1 Available per Participant) – 10 points

nKairos’ eyes widened considerably once he saw what was available.

nHis fingers immediately began itching to spend his points, but he stopped himself from hastily doing anything. Kairos definitely planned on taking the elemental spell, as he had never seen a way to gain a spell like this elsewhere. With how the conversion system worked, it was basically ten points he could use for evolution, when he spent only five last time.

nBut although it was overpriced, he still didn’t have a shadow of a doubt that he wanted it.

nSomething so limited was just too valuable, even if its price was normally lower.

nKairos was also very tempted to spend all of the other points on evolution points. After all, the fifty-four points were more than all of his current status points added together.

nNonetheless, he couldn’t help but feel there was some sort of caveat.

nThere was no way that this place was going to be that generous given how stingy it was earlier. Nonetheless, Kairos couldn’t see a world where he didn’t buy the spell.

nAnd so, he tapped on it.

nHis mind suddenly felt strangely clear as information became infused in his mind. It almost felt as though he had suddenly grown another limb, but he was able to use it as though he had been born with it.

nAfter a minute or so, Kairos muttered to himself.

n“Gale spell?”

nHe opened up his status panel and saw that there was a new addition to his special abilities.

nGale Spell (F)

nThe first thought that came to mind was that this spell sounded similar to Tori’s wind spell. Kairos’ impression of the spell was that it was fairly underwhelming compared to the power of the other elemental spells.

nHowever, his spell seemed to be different, for better or for worse.

nHe was almost full on mana, thus he wasn’t too concerned about conserving it. And so, he tested out casting the spell at its minimum mana requirement.

nKairos could tell something had formed just above his four fingers, but he couldn’t see it. After a moment of contemplation, he held his fingers out straight and pointed towards a wall.

nSuddenly, a whipping sound filled the air before a clear smack.

nKairos raised an eyebrow.

nIt seemed that this spell conjured a wind blade. He decided to pour more mana into it, enough to form a fireball that was a meter wide.

nFaint blue mist had formed around his hand, but other than that, there was nothing showing. Nonetheless, Kairos felt the tip of his fingers get a little heavier as the air around it became quite dense.

nThe charging time was roughly the same as the fire spell, a couple of seconds.

nHe then let it loose.

nA subtle whistling sound filled the air before a loud bang resounded. His wind blade had collided with the wall, but it was still intact. Kairos closed his eyes and pondered over the power of the spell.

nIt definitely paled in comparison with the giant explosion the fireball had as well as the flames that came afterward. However, sometimes the flames were undesirable as they could cause some friendly fire.

nThe gale spell also had the advantage of being invisible. While the pulse spell also had this property, its damage dropped off significantly past a few meters while the gale spell did not have this problem.

nKairos was satisfied with the spell. Though it wasn’t anything too different from his current skill set, it helped tie up loose ends.

nHe then took another look at his status panel.

nStatus

nID: 345315364923

nRank: 471

/1500 Evolution Energy – 500 required for Rankup

nObjective: Clear Dungeon

nProof Of Perfection Points: 5.5

nStats –

nStrength – 12.0

nEndurance – 11.0

nAgility – 12.6

nWillpower – 4.9

nMana Capacity – 9.0

nMagic Affinity – 7.2

nSpecial Abilities: Fire Spell (F), Pulse Spell (F), Gale Spell (F)

nInborn Abilities: Shattered Truth (F)

nHide

nKairos thought about the projection’s words earlier, that his room would be merged with the lobby. That meant he would be placed with other similarly powerful people, thus it was probably best his stats were a little higher.

nOne thing he could assume was that they had gotten the top 25 achievement, and at a higher rank than him. In other words, they would have far more points. Those that were near the top should have countless points from the achievement alone.

nThough Kairos wasn’t sure, if there was an increment of 5 points for each rise in rank, that meant the first person to clear the dungeon got 125 points.

nWhich was quite a terrifying amount.

nKairos thought about evolving, but did not actually have enough evolution energy to do so. The only thing he could hope for was that the others weren’t able to evolve either.

nWith narrowed eyes, he clicked on the option in the shop to buy evolution points.

nPoints: 5.5 – 9.5 | Dungeon Currency: 54 – 50

nThen, Kairos maxed out his physical stats.

nStrength: 12.0 – 14.9 | Points: 9.5 – 6.6

nEndurance: 11.0 – 14.9 | Points: 6.6 – 2.7

nAgility: 12.6 – 14.9 | Points: 2.7 – 0.4

nKairos took several deep breaths as his body began heating up tremendously. He began sweating fairly badly, but it wasn’t too bad overall.

nThe only slight issue was that he had begun to feel hungry.

nIt wasn’t the kind he normally got from spending so many points, where he couldn’t stop himself from tearing through everything around him. However, it would definitely affect him as he moved on.

nThough the effects of the green orb were strong, they weren’t omnipotent.

nKairos frowned.

nHe didn’t want to spend points on bread and water, especially considering that they had the value of an entire evolution point. Yet, at the same time, he didn’t want to consume one of the green orbs just yet.

nIn the end, Kairos decided to wait and see.

nThe hallway in his room that used to lead to a glowing blue mist of mana was now blocked off by stone. As such, there was nothing to do for now.

nKairos laid down on the ground and closed his eyes. His shoulder still ached slightly, but it was mostly his head that was hurting. His hunger couldn’t compare either, as it wasn’t nearly as bad.

nHe passed time with regulated breathing, deliberately taking air in before expelling it out.

nThe stress in Kairos’ mind gradually lowered, becoming far less painful.

nThis was actually something he was quite used to doing, as he would frequently have to deal with excessive amounts of stress. This was something that persisted even after he had gotten his glasses.

nOnly after several years from then, did it calm down by quite a bit.

nKairos sometimes found it a little crazy when he thought back to how bad it was when he didn’t have glasses. Most of his days were spent with closed eyes and regulating his breathing to try and lower his stress, just like now.

nHe honestly had no idea how he had dealt with it before.

nThough, it seemed like he would have to learn soon, unless he could get some replacement for his glasses.

nKairos remembered another small issue.

nIt was almost impossible for him to sleep before he got his glasses, and even if he could, it would be for a few hours at most. The nightmares didn’t help either.

nAnd that was something he was experiencing right now.

nThough his stress dipped, it still stayed above a certain threshold and made it difficult to feel sleepy.

nNonetheless, he wasn’t aiming to sleep right now.

nAfter all, he was going to meet his fellow dungeoneers.

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