Chapter 74: Clearing the Eight Dungeons

The eight tribulations.

Raive had no idea what was inside the others, but he still couldn’t pass on the opportunity to send someone to check them out.

Of course, Raive didn’t hold back on support either.

He took the eighth tribulation dungeon by himself. Then he assigned Hazel, Shymine, and Therese to their own dungeons. Whether they brought normal players with them or not was left to their decisions.

One dungeon was left with Reinhardt’s family.

Finally, a fifth one was left to Khamish. Same as the others, Raive left it to him whether to recruit more manpower or challenge it alone.

The last three were completely left to the other players. Whether they cleared it with a small group, or a party of dozens, Raive didn’t care.

All he cared about was that, of the eight, their party could now monopolize five of the tribulation rewards, whatever those were.

"The monsters should keep attacking until sundown, and we won’t be back until after twelve hours. So until then, do everything you can to protect the walls." Raive commanded the few surviving officers.

Right.

The main force would be spending half a day inside the tribulation dungeons.

That meant only the soldiers and the leftover players would be left to defend the walls. Raive felt uneasy about it, but given that Hazel and the others had already done their best to funnel the monsters and keep the walls from being breached, they should be able to hold.

They had to.

With that, Raive headed underground, straight toward the black dungeon waiting for him.

"Now then..." He whispered to himself, smiling. "Let’s wrap this up quick and easy!"

Once he entered, silence settled back over the underground space.

Around the same time, the others entered their respective dungeons too.

Thankfully, Raive’s prediction held true.

The other seven dungeons shared a similar structure—a giant monolith at the center, bearing obscure words telling them what to do. The only differences were the design of each space and the type of monsters inside.

Hazel, for one, found herself in a desert-like open space.

Her enemies were strange, giant sand worms, big enough to swallow her and the monolith whole.

"I hate worms!"

But with her ability, she locked down the entire area around her. No monster could move through ground she controlled, so the worms had to surface roughly a hundred meters out and squirm their way toward her instead.

With them exposed like that, she made quick work of them.

Shymine’s space was a bit more complicated.

A thick, tropical jungle. The sound of wildlife echoed everywhere, making her frown deeply. "Are the monsters here all jungle types...?" She muttered.

And just as she guessed, the monsters attacked.

Monkey-like creatures, birds, lizards—varied shapes and sizes, but their weaknesses were all the same.

"Phew...!"

With a deep breath, Shymine froze the entire forest.

The trees turned to slick ice. Monkeys lost their grip swinging through the vines and fell to their deaths. The birds and lizards couldn’t handle the sudden drop in temperature and dropped out of the sky, bodies seizing up.

"This is way too easy." Shymine whispered to herself, pleased.

But outside of those two and Raive, the rest were struggling.

Therese had to fight golem-like monsters while protecting the monolith atop a rocky mountain. Her mana swords barely worked against them without Sword Flash layered on top every single time.

Her mana was vast thanks to her +100 stats, but even she would run dry if she kept that pace up too long.

Reinhardt’s family had their own trouble.

With Kenny shielding the monolith behind his barrier, they were safe enough. But that left them with nothing to fight back with besides the Tree Knight’s swords they’d been given.

Against zombie-like creatures, though, even decapitation barely worked—nothing like the novels promised.

Worse, they couldn’t swing a sword at all unless Kenny dropped the barrier first.

So the most they could manage was relying on Sheila’s weak heat ability to slowly burn the monsters down. Doing that took minutes just to kill one. A trickle, at best.

Khamish had it the easiest among them, being the only one who’d recruited extra hands. In exchange, he’d handed out some protective gear and stat-up candies, but even with that, they struggled plenty.

Their enemies looked like something straight out of hell—burning-bodied hellhounds leading the pack.

"Use the fire extinguishers sparingly! We don’t have much stock left!"

Thankfully, Khamish’s bag held all sorts of random items, enough to patch together solutions as they went.

Those five dungeons came through fine, no lives lost. The remaining three weren’t so lucky.

They’d already lost several of their initial members by the first wave.

Every wave after cost at least one more life just to keep the rest alive. By the end of the twelve hours, groups that had started around sixty strong were down to less than half.

Still, they cleared their dungeons.

That was all that mattered.

Just like before, it was nighttime when Raive and the others emerged. This time, though, there was no giant bonfire burning anywhere, no bodies on display.

"This loop really is different..." Raive whispered.

He turned to the entrance, where he’d left someone standing guard.

"Then, Miss Hercy. Please do it again for me." Raive said, smiling at the woman.

"Y-Yes!"

She nodded and waved her hand, as if working an invisible control panel. A giant screen appeared overhead, roughly a hundred meters tall.

Once it was set up, Hercy gave a nod.

"Alright, everyone." Raive spoke, smiling. "Soldiers, residents, and humans dragged into this stupid trial. Gather at the castle courtyard within the hour."

Normally, one might assume he only meant the other players. After all, by the archangel’s own words, the "traitor" was supposed to be among them.

But—

’She never said it couldn’t be from the NPC side either.’

In fact, when Raive had used the crystal earlier, on the previous loop, the result had shocked him.

Two of the three red beams of light back then hadn’t come from players at all.

They’d come from civilians!