Chương 76: Chapter 75: One Last Time to Look Cool

After smashing through the wall, the massive hammerhead swept violently to the left, tearing an enormous opening straight through the rest of it. Rayne's heart tightened at the sight. Good thing he had told Tyren to stay upstairs. Judging by the timing, if Tyren had come down, he would have been standing almost exactly where the hammer had broken through. At best, he would have been badly injured. At worst, he would probably be back at the church resting by now. Rayne did not let the thought linger.

"Serin, be ready with Pure White Ward! Asar, look for an opening! Barton, if anything shows up over there, tell me immediately!" As soon as he finished shouting, the dust hanging in the room finally thinned enough for them to see the culprit outside. It was a massive purple-skinned goblin. It was not nearly as absurdly huge as the one they had seen guarding the barricade, but even so, it still stood considerably taller than the Bronze-level Desiccated Guards roaming the streets.

And that was without mentioning the terrifyingly huge warhammer in its hands. Rayne swallowed. He had absolutely no desire to find out what that thing felt like when it landed on him. The hammer-wielding goblin let out an enraged roar. The sheer force of the sound kicked up a gust of wind that blasted straight toward them. Rayne's expression sharpened. He raised both swords and charged forward.

"Careful. It might be a Silver-level monster." Everyone's heart sank. The strongest goblins they had encountered earlier had only been around Bronze level. And now some random brute had shown up and was already Silver level? Rayne kept his eyes locked on the goblin's shoulders. The moment he saw its arm rise, he kicked off the ground and narrowly slipped past the descending hammer. He had intended to attack immediately afterward.

Instead, the instant the hammer slammed into the ground, a violent tremor surged through the floor and nearly knocked him off his feet. Rayne gritted his teeth, forced himself steady, and slashed his longsword across the goblin's arm. The blade left only a shallow wound. Asar had barely regained his footing when the hammer came sweeping toward him next. He had no choice but to throw himself into an awkward roll. Asar escaped the blow. The support pillar behind him was not so lucky. BOOM!

The thick wooden pillar snapped apart under the impact. A series of teeth-grating creaks immediately came from the ceiling above them.

"We need to move! Get out through Barton's side!" Barton did not hesitate. He hoisted his shield and ran over to Rayne, clearing the doorway for Asar and Serin. Just then, Tyren came running down the remaining upper half of the staircase. He crouched at the broken edge, pulled out an armor-piercing arrow, and nocked it. Then he gave a soft whistle. The hammer-wielding goblin heard the sound and slowly turned its head. The instant it looked over, a flash of silver filled its vision.

With a dull thunk, the armor-piercing arrow buried itself in its left eye. The goblin immediately let out a piercing howl. Its warhammer slipped from its hands and crashed to the ground. Its left hand clamped over its ruined eye as its massive body thrashed from side to side, while its right arm lashed wildly at anything nearby. Rayne glanced up at Tyren and silently gave him a thumbs-up. Then he turned his attention back to carefully avoiding the goblin's flailing fist.

With its weapon gone, Rayne seized the opportunity and slashed twice at its lower leg. He had intended to cut through the tendon outright. Instead, he discovered that the muscle there was ridiculously tough. Both strikes opened wounds, but neither cut deep enough to even reach the tendon underneath.

"Damn it. Why is this thing so hard?" Barton raised his shield and charged straight into it. The momentum of his sprint combined with his own strength, slamming into the massive goblin hard enough to make it stumble. But the heavy punch that followed smashed straight into Barton's shield and left a deep dent in the metal. Barton grunted. His right hand, encased in an iron gauntlet, clenched into a fist. Putting every ounce of strength he had into the blow, he drove it straight into the goblin's head.

The hard edges of the gauntlet left a distinct fist-shaped wound across its face, and blood began seeping from the torn flesh. Rayne did not waste the opening. He swung again at the goblin's heel. The first strike landed slightly off target and only cut into flesh. The second struck directly into the wound he had already opened. The goblin howled in pain. Its body swayed, then dropped heavily onto one knee. Rayne was about to retreat when a purple fist came hurtling toward his face.

He raised his longsword and tried to block. The fist slammed into the blade. The sword edge left only a bloody line across the goblin's knuckles. The entire blade, however, bent violently backward. Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road. Crack! With a sharp snap, the sword broke cleanly in half. One section spun through the air and grazed Rayne's cheek, carving a long, narrow cut across it. Blood began running down the side of his face.

"Is this bastard made of solid metal or what?" Rayne angrily flung the broken sword aside. Then he bent down, grabbed a small round stool from the floor, and smashed it straight into the goblin's face.

"You owe me a sword, monster!" The stool struck the shaft of the arrow still lodged in its eye socket. The goblin screamed even louder. It tried to fight back, but this time Barton pinned it down with all his strength. Seeing that, Rayne broke into a satisfied grin. He raised the stool high and started hammering it down on the goblin's head again and again. Just as he was thoroughly enjoying himself, Tyren suddenly shouted from the second floor.

"Greyhound! The goblins are coming back!" Rayne immediately looked outside through the hole in the wall. Sure enough, the goblins that had scattered earlier were beginning to gather around the house again. Several had already climbed through the opening in the wall and entered the building. Tyren hurriedly raised his bow and fired, shooting them down one after another before they even noticed him.

"Barton, get ready to move!" Rayne gritted his teeth and raised the round stool one more time. Putting his full strength behind it, he smashed it into the giant goblin's face. Crack! The stool finally gave out and shattered on impact. Rayne casually tossed away the broken leg still in his hand and tightened his grip on his remaining longsword. Barton saw what he was doing and gave the goblin one last brutal punch before running out of the house with Rayne. The two had barely made it outside when Rayne glanced back.

The giant goblin was already staggering back to its feet. It returned to where its warhammer had fallen and grabbed it from the ground. Its remaining eye locked onto Rayne and Barton. A violent red glow erupted from it, while the black mist wrapped around its body grew noticeably thicker. The next instant, it gripped the warhammer in both hands. Then its entire body began spinning. Still whirling, it charged straight at them.

"Shit! Move!" Rayne shouted in alarm, and he and Barton hurriedly darted to the side. The enormous hammerhead swept through everything in its path. Walls offered almost no resistance, bursting apart one after another as the spinning goblin smashed straight through them. When Rayne saw that the thing was still closing in, he stopped thinking and turned to run with Barton. But after only a few steps, something felt wrong. Where was Tyren? Rayne's head snapped from side to side. Tyren was nowhere in sight.

His expression changed. He immediately looked back. The house they had just been fighting inside was slowly collapsing. And on the second floor, the wooden cabinet blocking the broken opening had only been moved halfway aside. Rayne's heart sank.

"Fuck! Tyren's still upstairs!" He stopped and was just about to turn back when Tyren's shout came from behind him.

"Forget about me! Run!" Rayne clenched his teeth and slammed a fist against his own thigh. The spinning hammer was getting closer. He had no choice but to turn around and sprint after Asar and the others fleeing ahead. Serin and Asar both glanced back at him. Rayne remained silent for a moment. Then he could only shake his head.

"Sorry. That was my fault. I should've had Tyren move the cabinet on the second floor out of the way first."

"Rayne, you did everything you could." Asar's voice was low and firm.

"We went in with no information at all. Getting this far was already more than enough." Rayne did not agree. Maybe that was true inside Blackstone Dungeon. At least they had gathered information. Even if someone ran into trouble, they could prepare for it the next time they came back. But dungeons outside Blackstone would not give them another chance. Rayne bit down on his lower lip.

If he could not even bring everyone back safely inside Blackstone Dungeon, how was he supposed to lead them through other dungeons in the future?

"We'll talk about it after we get back. For now, let's get out of this area." ◆ ◆ ◆ Through the gap beside the cabinet blocking the broken opening on the second floor, Tyren watched Rayne and the others disappear into the distance. He finally let out a breath of relief. He had honestly been worried they might come back for him.

"This place is seriously messed up, isn't it? At least the front section waits until the bells ring before turning into hell. Why is this place already hell the second you walk in?" Tyren leaned against the cabinet and gave two dry laughs. Then his expression suddenly changed.

"Wait. Don't tell me this place gets even worse after the bells ring?" A goblin swarm on top of those shadows. Just imagining it sent a chill down his spine. Tyren drew a couple of breaths, pushed himself upright again, and slowly resumed shoving the cabinet. A huge section of the floor nearby had already collapsed. Even the boards beneath his feet were shaking constantly.

"Come on, come on! This whole house is coming down!" Just then, something at the edge of his vision caught his attention. Something seemed to be climbing up through the stairwell. Tyren focused on it. A goblin.

"Damn it! The stairs are broken! How the hell are you still climbing up here?" He stopped pushing, pulled the shortbow from his back, drew an arrow, and fired. The first goblin had barely fallen when more began climbing onto the second floor one after another. The corner of Tyren's mouth twitched. His expression gradually turned serious, though his lips still would not stop trembling.

"Haha... l-let me look cool one last time!" He swiftly drew two arrows and fired in quick succession, dropping two goblins cleanly. Tyren reached back for another arrow. His hand found nothing. He looked down at his quiver. Empty.

"... You endless little bastards." He immediately pulled out the armor-piercing arrows he had left. At this point, he could not care less whether using them was overkill. One after another, he fired them into the approaching goblins. Ha. These goblins aren't a threat at all. They can't even get close to me. The thought had barely entered his mind when a chill suddenly ran across Tyren's back. His body stiffened slightly. Slowly, he turned his head.

At some point, a goblin had slipped through the broken window behind him. Its poison-coated knife was buried deep in his back. Tyren coughed twice. Blood immediately spilled from the corner of his mouth.

"... Fuck." He gritted his teeth, drew the dagger at the back of his waist, and drove it backward into the goblin's skull. The goblin collapsed on the spot. Tyren dropped to one knee with it. His shortbow slipped from his hand, slid through the hole in the floor, and fell to the first floor below.

"Oh. I'm screwed." Tyren staggered back to his feet. Maybe the wound was simply too close to something vital. He had only been poisoned for moments, yet his vision was already beginning to double. He rubbed his eyes hard. The next instant, a goblin lunged at him. Tyren stumbled backward and narrowly avoided the attack, then whipped his dagger back across its throat. Before he could regain his balance, another goblin came at him from the side. Its knife plunged deep into his right leg.

Tyren immediately lost his footing. His entire body dropped through the hole in the floor. Bang! He crashed heavily into the middle of a crowd of goblins. Moments later, white light flared from within the swarm. Tyren's figure vanished from the room. ◆ ◆ ◆ Owen watched Tyren's final struggle from the Core Chamber. A huge thumbs-up icon immediately appeared across his hexagonal core.

"Tyren's grown a lot too." Owen still remembered the first time he had seen Tyren. Back then, the guy had been reckless and restless, and even in the middle of a fight, all he could think about was how to look cool. Now, at least, he knew when to get serious and when to follow orders. Even so, that cocky show-off streak still surfaced now and then during his final desperate struggle, and Owen recognized it instantly.

"Mm... that's just like you, Tyren." Owen chuckled.

"But you wouldn't be Tyren if you stopped showing off!" As for the overall difficulty of the fight... Owen did feel that he might have put just a few too many goblins in the area. And the Brutehammer Goblin seemed a little too tough as well. It had tremendous strength and destructive power, but once Rayne and the others actually fought it, they had still managed to keep it under control. The real problem was that the thing was way too tanky.

After taking an arrow straight through the eye and having its face pounded with a round stool like Rayne was driving a stake, it still had not died.

"What is that, a titanium-alloy skull...?" Honestly, even Owen had not expected the thing to take that much punishment. Still, if the goblin swarm had not returned later, Rayne and the others might really have managed to finish it off.

"Should I lower the difficulty?" Owen rocked uncertainly from side to side above the pedestal. After a while, he slowly came to a stop. The blue glow across his core dimmed slightly.

"Better not. They'll improve faster if they keep challenging the dungeon under pressure." Owen thought again of the paladin squad that had already set out.

"Right now, there's only one Rockspring core. But what if the other demon cores nearby trigger Demonic Tides someday too? Those bastards have already discovered us. The best thing I can do now is help everyone rank up as fast as possible." That thought reminded Owen of the sword that had just broken in Rayne's hands. It looked like their equipment was starting to fall behind their strength again. But he could not rely on treasure chests to hand them new gear every single time.

Where was he supposed to get that many treasure chests? Owen thought it over from every angle. Then he suddenly remembered a feature he had completely forgotten about.

"That's right! My blacksmith!" Owen shouted, then immediately wished he could punch his own useless rock body. He had already finished setting up the blacksmith's functions. How had he managed to leave the poor guy gathering dust in storage this entire time?

"This is definitely those damn demon cores' fault! Great. That's one more thing I'm putting on their tab." First, he would station the blacksmith near the church. Then he could build a small smithy later, allowing Rayne and the others to enhance and repair their equipment directly inside the dungeon.

"As for the fee... I'll just charge a few magic crystals." Owen could not help laughing. Ever since Harlan's party had brought magic crystals in from outside and used them to buy things from the traveling merchant, Owen had discovered that those crystals could also be converted into Soul Energy.

"Heh heh. Looks like I found another revenue stream besides the adventurers themselves!" Owen was just about to check how much Soul Energy remained in his little nest egg when he suddenly cried out.

"Why did my daily upkeep shoot up this much?!" [Daily Upkeep Cost: 35, 884] He remembered it only being a little over thirty thousand a few days ago! Even after creating those paladins, there was no way the cost should have jumped this much all at once. Owen hurriedly opened the expense records. Sure enough, he quickly found a line that made his entire core freeze.

"Damn it! This cheap-ass garbage system doesn't even give me an explanation!"