The sound of heavy metal slamming against the stone floor made Kanos's ears ring.
Kanos sucked in greedy breaths, leaning against the wall of their rented room, clutching his heaving chest. His wooden brush fell to the floor. On the table, his sketchbook was still giving off wisps of thin blue smoke.
Right beneath the table lay a two-handed greatsword.
Belida took a step forward, grabbing the sword with his right hand. His arm muscles tensed. The giant man lifted the pure steel sword as if it weighed no more than a broomstick, his eyes studying the details of the blade intently.
"The blade is almost as long as my chest," Belida muttered. His voice was filled with a rare sense of awe. "Pitch-black steel. Wide, but strangely not as heavy as it looks."
Kanos wiped the cold sweat from his temple. His head was still throbbing from fighting off the nausea.
"I made a blood groove running down the middle of the blade," Kanos explained with a raspy voice. "It reduces the metal's mass without sacrificing structural integrity. I made the hilt textured so it doesn't slip when your hands are covered in blood."
Belida rotated his wrist. The giant sword sliced through the air of their cramped room with a sharp hum. Whoosh. Just the wind from the swing was enough to blow the dust off the floor.
"Perfect," Belida said simply. He strapped the sword to his back using the leftover leather straps from his old armor. "How much health do you have left now?"
Kanos summoned the system panel in his mind.
[ HP: 10/60 ]
Sleeping all night had decently bumped his health back up to thirty, but making that giant sword just now successfully sucked out twenty points in one go.
"Ten," Kanos answered flatly, forcing his body to stand. "Still double digits. Not looking to die today. Let's go before I change my mind."
Marrath in the morning was way crazier than yesterday afternoon. The streets were packed with adventurers in all sorts of armor and weapons, all walking in the same direction: the center of the city. Toward the giant crater they'd seen from the cliff yesterday.
The smell of roasted meat for breakfast mixed with the stench of sweat and rusted steel. Kanos purposely walked close behind Belida's broad back so he wouldn't get run over by people twice his size.
The closer they got to the city center, the heavier the air felt. There was a static pressure that made Kanos's arm hairs stand on end.
They arrived at the edge of the Marrath Hole.
Up close, the scale of this place was truly nauseating. This wasn't just a hole. It was like a giant well piercing through the belly of the earth. The stone walls spiraled downwards, lined with incredibly wide stone stairs carved directly into the crater's cliff. Along the edges of the stairs, dozens of merchant tents and guild outposts were neatly lined up.
"We won't go down too deep," Belida said, his voice slightly drowned out by the noisy chatter of thousands around them. "Floors one through five are usually already cleared by low-level adventurers. Our target is floor six. The monsters there are valuable enough, but they don't require a large party to kill."
Kanos just nodded. His stomach churned looking at the depth of the hole that ended in total darkness.
They started their descent down the giant stone stairs. The atmosphere immediately changed drastically. The hot air above suddenly turned cold and damp the moment they passed the surface level. Sunlight was slowly replaced by blue glowing moss growing on the crater walls.
Floors one through three were exactly as Belida said. Devoid of monsters, just filled with leftover carcasses and groups of resting adventurers. But the moment they passed a stone gate heading into floor four, the corridor changed into a network of dark, narrow caves.
The dead silence immediately felt wrong.
Belida walked in front, his right hand already resting on the hilt of his greatsword. Kanos walked five steps behind, his eyes darting wildly across the cave ceiling. He kept his Structural Analysis skill active continuously even though it made his head spin a bit. The blue grid lines appeared and vanished every time he focused on a stalactite.
"Stop," Belida whispered suddenly.
Kanos immediately hit the brakes.
From the corridor ahead of them came a weird scraping noise. Scrape. Scrape. Crack. Like rusted metal being forcefully dragged across the stone floor.
Belida drew his sword from his back. The sound of black steel scraping echoed against the cave walls.
From out of the dark shadows, a creature crawled out. It looked like a centipede, but it was the size of a coconut tree trunk. The terrifying part was, the outer shell of this creature wasn't normal chitin, but a cluster of iron ore and rocks fused with its flesh. Its many sharp legs pierced the cave floor every time it moved.
"Ore Centipede," Belida took his stance. "Stay back, Kanos. Their shells deflect normal bladed weapons."
The monster hissed loudly. Its jagged-tooth-filled jaws opened, spewing sulfur-smelling smoke, and then its long body immediately slithered forward, lunging at Belida with a speed that made no sense for its size.
Belida swung his greatsword with full force, meeting the lunge from the side.
CLANG!
Bright sparks flew as Kanos's black steel clashed against the monster's iron skin. The centipede was pushed sideways, crashing into the cave wall, but its shell only suffered a shallow scratch. The monster quickly turned around, its legs crawling up the cave wall to attack Belida from above.
Kanos narrowed his eyes, studying the monster's body intently. The blue grid from his skill immediately dismantled the structure of the disgusting creature's body.
Kanos's lip twitched. "Stupid design."
"Belida!" Kanos yelled, his voice echoing. "Don't slash the back! The armor is thick, but the joints between the body segments are hollow! Hit the gap between its belly and back when it bends its body!"
Belida, who was blocking an attack from above, immediately glanced in the direction Kanos pointed.
The centipede leaped down from the ceiling, its body arching into a U-shape to slam Belida with its hard head. The exact second its body arched, a small gap filled with soft, unarmored flesh was clearly visible between the iron plates on its back.
Belida didn't waste the opening. The man didn't parry. He shifted his body to the side, utilizing the momentum of the falling monster, and thrust his greatsword right into the narrow gap under its belly.
CRUNCH!
The black steel pierced the soft flesh mercilessly, ripping the monster's internal organs from the middle all the way to the tail along with its own downward momentum. Thick, dark green blood sprayed everywhere.
The giant centipede shrieked with a deafening screeching sound, convulsing violently on the cave floor before finally stopping completely. Dead.
Kanos lowered the arm he used to shield his face from the blood splatter. His breathing was still a bit fast, but a transparent blue screen immediately popped up in front of his face.
[ ENEMY DEFEATED: ORE CENTIPEDE (LEVEL 14) ]
[ EXPERIENCE SHARED: WEAPON CRAFTER & TACTICIAN (50% CONTRIBUTION) ]
[ EXPERIENCE GAINED. LEVEL UP! ]
[ LEVEL: 2 -> 3 ]
[ HP FULLY RESTORED ]
Kanos almost laughed out loud when he felt warm energy suddenly flow through his entire body. His dizziness vanished completely. The pain in his ribs subsided. HP fully restored upon leveling up. It was the most cliché game feature ever, but right now he was genuinely grateful this crazy system followed that rule.
"This sword," Belida's voice caught Kanos's attention. The giant man was pulling his sword out of the dead centipede. He wiped the blade, which was coated in green blood. "It didn't dull at all. That gap you mentioned was incredibly narrow, a normal greatsword would have definitely gotten stuck on its stone plates."
"I told you, it's pure steel with a precise structure," Kanos walked closer, feeling his body infinitely lighter now. "Good job, big guy. You've got decent accuracy."
"Your eye's analysis is more terrifying," Belida replied honestly. He stared at Kanos for a moment. "How did you find the monster's blind spot in a matter of seconds?"
"I'm an illustrator. If a structure's proportions are flawed, my eyes immediately itch." Kanos crouched next to the centipede's carcass.
He pulled an empty ink bottle from his pocket—the leftover squid liquid he'd used up this morning. Kanos dipped the glass bottle into the puddle of thick green blood oozing from the monster's belly.
The smell was absolutely terrible, like rotten eggs mixed with copper. But the consistency was thick.
"Mid-level monster blood," Kanos muttered in satisfaction while corking the bottle. He tucked the bottle safely into his pants pocket. "We'll test it tonight to see the ink quality."
"That's a toxic liquid, Kanos. Ore Centipede blood can burn normal skin."
"Relax. As long as my brush tip doesn't dissolve, the poison won't bleed into the ink when I draw," Kanos stood up, dusting off his pants. "Let's keep going. My health is full again. Let's drain this floor dry."
Belida snorted softly, seeing Kanos's suddenly enthusiastic behavior. The knight flicked his sword one more time to throw off the remaining blood, then nodded.
The two of them were completely unaware that at the end of the dark corridor they had just passed, a pair of eyes behind the shadow of a stalactite had been watching them this whole time. Eyes that didn't glow, but carefully recorded the entire conversation and short battle just now.