Nothing but disbelief filling his mind, Foster stared at the spot in which all those people stood just earlier. Even when the noise of more and more people rushing into the large hall would usually be deafening to him, he wasn't distracted in the slightest.

"He... He's...

" He muttered quietly to himself. He only snapped out of it when Lynol pulled on his arm. The line was moving pretty quickly, since more employees were brought out to take care of the large influx of people that were coming in. Apparently they had heard that this was going to happen today.

"Hurry it up, we need to get in there quickly.

" The swordsman said, while Foster slowly stared at his friend,

"We have to follow them.

"

"Huh? What, do you want to try to show off to them too? I thought you did not want to join any guilds.

" Lynol replied with a frown. Immediately shaking his head, Foster leaned over toward his friend, whispering into his ear,

"The strategist... He's from the same place as me.

"

Lynol opened his eyes wider,

"That guy? Hm, interesting. Then you're right, we do have to follow them. And to do that, we have to first sign up at the desk.

" He pointed out, continuing to drag Foster down the line. It didn't take long until they were the next to be helped out.

"Are you five a party?

" The employee asked immediately, and Rae quickly replied with a nod. Without saying anything else, the employee pulled five white marbles out of a jar, and placed them on the table,

"Each of you, take one of these and press a drop of your blood onto them. If you don't have blood in the conventional senes or, for some reason or another, cannot currently use it, pouring your mana into the marble is fine as well. If that is not possible either, please move over to the side, and someone will come to help you momentarily.

" The employee explained, trying to get through everything as quickly as possible. Not wanting to wait for too long either, the group all grabbed the marbles and each put a drop of blood onto it. Immediately, the pure white marbles turned black. Practically ripping them out of their hands, the employee grabbed the marbles and placed them into a small glass bottle.

"Thank you. Make sure to stay safe. Please move over to the teleportation platform. Next!

" The employee yelled out, and the group of five did as told as the next party stepped up behind them.

"Erm... what were those for?

" Foster asked with a wry smile, and surprisingly, this was something that Octer and Lynol didn't seem to know about either. While the group stepped onto the platform, waiting to be let into the dungeon with a large batch of people, Kyla started to explain,

"It's a system designed specifically for this dungeon! The marbles are now linked to our mana signatures, so the moment that we die, they shatter and someone is notified. If the whole party is wiped out, they will send someone to investigate~!

" She said, in a weirdly far too excited tone of voice. She continued to speak about a bunch of different things, while more and more people gathered on the platform. And about five minutes later, the magic circle underneath them started to glow.

Foster was completely focused on the fact that he had to run off and find that strategist the moment that they went into the dungeon. It's been about twenty minutes, and the floors in this dungeon were supposedly huge mazes with numerous different routes. So if he didn't find them now, then he would probably never be able to catch up to them. He was so focused on all this that he didn't even fully notice that his body started to feel lighter and lighter as the magic circle became brighter.

And then, he felt weightless. It was a weird sensation for sure, but it didn't take long until it became weirder. His sight was filled with bright light, but it didn't hurt his eyes at all despite that fact. And once the bright light subsided, Foster felt the weight of his body return, and the view in front of him had completely changed. Instead of that large crowded hall, he was in the center of a circular room, that was basically abandoned, beside the two people standing next to the platform.

"Please step off the platform, thank you.

" An employee of the organization managing this dungeon said, and everyone did as told.

"That it? Do we need to do something else?

" Foster asked, looking at his group, and Rae quickly shook her head,

"No. Now we just need to get into the dungeon through that large door over-

"

"Right. Lynol, I'll be heading off first! Make sure to keep to the route we planned out, I'll find you guys there!

" Foster said, yelling out to them as he started running toward the entrance to the dungeon. Rachel, Kyla and Octer were completely confused about what was going on, but Lynol just stood there, letting out a deep sigh,

"Don't worry about him, he'll be fine.

"

---

"Thirteen enemies ahead, at position 2. Four hiding behind the rock, the rest burrowed underground.

" A calm and collected voice explained. The moment he finished speaking, some of the fighters right behind him already ran forward. Small monsters, a mixture between something like an oversized mole with sharp claws, burrowed out of the ground. Before the dirt had even fully settled, their heads had already been removed from their bodies, and dissipated into nothingness a moment later. The same man that had discovered the monsters earlier let out a deep sigh,

"This is so bothersome. Why can there just not be a way to skip to the last settlement we reached?

"

"This is already more than easy enough with you here, Sam. We should reach the first settlement by the end of the night.

" The man next to him pointed out, his heavy plate armor making bothersome noise with every step he took. Sam rolled his eyes, and pulled a small object out of his pocket. With a single touch of his index finger to the small circular spot in the back, it lit up.

Swiping over the object with his thumb, the things displayed on it changed, and Sam pressed onto an image of the monsters that they had just encountered, before a map of this dungeon appeared instead. After pressing on the spot where the monsters had been found, and then seemed to enter more information on another screen that popped up.

"Seriously, why do you keep fiddling with that artifact all the time?

" The man next to him asked, letting out a deep sigh. Sam looked at him over the edge of his glasses, and quickly replied,

"It lets me collect a lot of information about this dungeon. I enter the information about the monsters we encounter, where we do, and what they drop, if they drop anything at all, and then it automatically updates the data that I had found before. Like this, we can find the easiest route through each floor, and know where to find whatever it is we need.

" Sam explained. He saw it in this man's eyes that, despite the fact that he was the one that asked, he clearly didn't actually care about what he was doing, as if he was just trying to be nice.

All of a sudden, a shiver was sent down Sam's spine, and he turned around,

"A humanoid target is approaching from behind at high speed. It doesn't seem like it's running away from something, but rather... it seems like whoever it is, they're looking for us.

" Sam warned the others, pulling his leather gloves over his hands in case he needed to cast any spells, and watched as everyone in the group took on the proper stance for this.

"Hm. Arcia, just go ahead and scare off whoever it is.

" Said the only one that didn't seem to care. The man wearing that flashy, bright armor. Sam let out a deep sigh,

"Seriously, Cain? Could you take this any less seriously?

"

"Why would I take it serious? It's just another random adventurer trying to show off to us.

" Cain replied with a shrug. At the end of the day, he was probably right. But even then, Sam didn't like to take any chances with things like this, especially since his whole being told him that something was different about whoever was approaching right now.

Maybe that was why it took him longer than normal to notice the large monster burrowing its way into this tunnel from above, right as the man that was running toward them came closer.

"Shit!

" Sam let out. It didn't matter if this was the first floor of the dungeon, having a rare variant drop right on top of some poor sap was still dangerous. He really didn't like to watch people die.

Rocks started to fall down to the ground together with the mole-like monster that was maybe two or three times the size of the others. But even though this was the case, the man that was running toward them, clad in all black, didn't stop for even a moment.

Just when he was about to impact with the monster, did he slow down. He twisted his body around, and hit the monster's head. An explosion of power shot into the monster's body, together with some sort of black, sinister energy.

"N-Necromancy?

" A mage from the group muttered, and Sam became even more focused on what was happening. The monster's body twisted around mid-air, and the man that had run toward them once more twisted his upper body, practically using his whole weight to strike at the monster while it was falling to the ground, making it slam into the ground violently. Just a moment later, its body started to disappear.

"Finally... caught up... to you...

" The man said, breathing heavily. He had been sprinting this whole time, so it made sense that he was a bit exhausted. Slowly, the man approached the group, soon locking eyes with Sam.

"You.... get the ** over here.

"