This Dungeon Grew Mushrooms

“Glulu gluglug, gluglu glululu… glulululu…”

What kind of gibberish was it even saying?

Did he really have to learn yet another fishman language?

Lin Jun felt that his mushroom life had become hopelessly entangled with language barriers.

The fishman made those muddled bubbling sounds as it deftly pulled its harpoon back out of the wall. With the tip of the harpoon, it casually pried off several of the hardest bone spurs from the carapace monster’s body, apparently planning to take them back as materials.

After that, it slipped back into the hidden passage, making no gesture to drive away the puji fish following behind it.

The hidden passage was not long, quickly leading to an empty stone chamber. This was clearly not the destination.

The fishman barely paused, skillfully locating another stone slab that appeared seamless, then slipping into yet another passage.

It wasn’t forced open with brute strength. The moment the fishman touched it, the passage opened on its own.

In this way, the fishman continued weaving through the interlayers and secret passages of the massive underwater structure.

Along the way, Lin Jun discovered many traces of past battles, as well as numerous strange corpses similar to the carapace monster.

These corpses all had roughly humanoid outlines, but were haphazardly mixed with traits from various marine creatures.

Some had enormous scallops growing from their shoulder blades. Some had octopus-like tentacles at the ends of their arms. Some had lower bodies twisted into shrimp tails or crab legs…

They looked like crude creations stitched together at random from different marine organisms.

Their only common trait was that the fluid seeping from their wounds was the same pale blue blood.

This forced Lin Jun to seriously consider a question.

This world didn’t have Cthulhu, did it?

The kind of incomprehensible existence that drove ordinary people mad with prolonged exposure… just thinking about it made Lin Jun uneasy.

The fishmen seemed to be fighting these seafood-like monsters, but the purpose of the battles clearly wasn’t hunting for food. Otherwise, they would have at least snapped off the pincer from the earlier carapace monster—there was obviously a lot of meat inside.

They even encountered a moment of danger along the way.

Just as the fishman poked its head out of a hidden exit, it ran straight into a small squad composed of five seafood monsters of different forms.

The fishman reacted instantly, pulling back and sealing the hidden door shut.

Immediately, dull thudding and scraping sounds came from outside. The monsters hammered and pried at the exit for quite a while, but ultimately failed to open the passage and had no choice but to leave in frustration.

Although moving through hidden passages was relatively safe, from this alone it was clear that the fishmen’s situation was far from good. Even in their own dungeon, they had to sneak around to survive.

At last, the fishman brought the puji fish back to the hidden domain belonging to their clan.

And Lin Jun once again met an old, familiar fish.

“Good to see you again, Puji Lord.”

The fishman sage, Gugu’lu, sat upright on a seat naturally carved from multicolored coral. Carried by two strong fishman warriors, he was brought before the puji fish.

This was not an affectation. Both of his legs were gone below the knees, the severed ends covered in thick keratinized layers.

Aside from that, he looked the same as ever—deep-sea indigo skin, covered in wrinkles, a pair of bulging fish eyes that were steady and calm, with the unmistakable air of someone who thought very highly of himself.

Worth mentioning was that in the span of a year, this fellow had already reached diamond rank. The speed of his advancement was quite impressive.

But at this moment, Lin Jun’s attention was no longer on the old fishman’s rank.

His perception was locked tightly onto the staff held in the other’s hand.

It was a strangely shaped staff.

The main shaft was crafted from glow-condensing coral unique to the deep sea, suffused with a soft pale-blue radiance.

However, embedded at the head of the staff was a section of jet-black metal, utterly different in nature.

It was precisely this black metal that, in Lin Jun’s panel vision, possessed a panel of its own:

[Divine Artifact: Ocean Scepter (Damaged)]

A crippled diamond-rank fishman, holding what was practically half of a divine artifact?

And it was right next door?!

Lin Jun suddenly felt a bit of regret for not visiting this place earlier.

As he glanced around at the fishmen gradually gathering nearby, Lin Jun even felt a trace of anticipation.

Come on, show your evil side already. Seize these puji fish and offer them up as sacrifices to your god!

Although puji had no “line of sight” in the conventional sense, the fishman sage Gugu’lu seemed to sense something nonetheless.

He lowered his gaze to the staff in his hand and spoke calmly as ever, “If Puji Lord desires this staff… it can be given to you. But not now.”

“What do you mean?” Lin Jun asked suspiciously.

The old fishman did not answer directly, instead lightly waving the staff in his hand.

Several stone walls around the chamber—walls that looked perfectly solid—suddenly opened into hidden passages, then quickly closed again.

It was obvious that the fishmen’s ability to freely traverse the dungeon’s secret passages was closely tied to the power of this staff.

“For the time being, we still need to rely on its power to resist the enemies that have invaded the sanctum,” Gugu’lu said slowly, his fish eyes fixed on the puji fish. “Once the crisis is resolved, Puji Lord may take it at will.”

The unspoken meaning was that he wanted Lin Jun to help them eliminate the invaders, with the divine artifact as payment.

Logically, it seemed to make sense—but who would really be willing to offer a divine artifact as a reward?

This wasn’t some insignificant fragment. Judging by its completeness, it was likely at least one-third, perhaps even half intact!

And he was offering it so casually?

Besides, how was this fishman so confident that Lin Jun could actually solve their problem right now?

And if he meant it literally—if the fishmen dealt with the invaders themselves and then handed the artifact over to Lin Jun afterward…

Don’t joke. Lin Jun was a mushroom born of heaven and earth, not some fishman’s long-lost son.

Or maybe the plan was simply to use the puji as a scapegoat—let them wipe out the invaders, then turn on them afterward?

Honestly, if that were the case, Lin Jun would find it far more reasonable… and far more reassuring.

Still, as the saying goes, you don’t strike a smiling fishman.

At the very least, the old fishman was formally offering a task involving a divine artifact. Lin Jun wasn’t about to flip the table and snatch it by force immediately.

After all, Lin Jun didn’t urgently need the artifact for anything. This was purely his collector’s instinct acting up.

Setting aside the matter of the artifact for now, Lin Jun explained the purpose of his visit.

“Siphon Tube Worm Crystals… and Merfolk Tears…” Gugu’lu’s fish eyes shifted slightly, as if searching his memory.

“If there’s anything you need, feel free to ask. Weapons, mana crystals, even potions that can regenerate severed limbs—I can get them,” Lin Jun expressed his willingness to trade.

The old fishman nodded, letting out a low gurgle, and summoned a younger fishman.

They exchanged a few words in their rapid, muddled language, and the younger fishman quickly swam off.

About ten minutes later, it returned carrying a large basket woven from tough seaweed, filled with dark red crystal fragments.

“Puji Lord,” Gugu’lu gestured for the basket to be pushed in front of the puji fish. “Siphon Tube Worm Crystals—yes, we do have these. If this isn’t enough, I can also tell you where they are produced steadily, so you may collect them yourself. As for Merfolk Tears, there are no merfolk living within the sanctum.”

The old fishman proposed no conditions at all, seemingly intending to simply give these materials to Lin Jun.

One of the puji fish slowly drifted closer to the coral seat. Seeing this, a nearby fishman guard tried to step forward to block it, but the moment it moved half a step, the surrounding water currents bound it in place.

“Be honest with me. What exactly do you want from me?” Lin Jun couldn’t shake the feeling that this old fishman was being unnaturally generous.

Gugu’lu slowly shook his head, his mental state as calm and steady as ever. “I have merely made a judgment… one that I believe is more conducive to the survival of the fishmen.”

“Survival, huh…” Lin Jun neither agreed nor disagreed. “Fine. Wait here.”

…

At the same time, Lin Jun’s voice rang out in the minds of the core members of the Mushroom Garden.

“Got a job, got a job. Deep-sea exploration. Barehanded seafood harvesting. Anyone volunteering?”

Louisa, Norris, Shou, Starfire… all paused what they were doing and began asking for details through the fungal network.

Only Little Black, sleeping atop a pile of glittering treasure, smacked his lips, rolled over, and remained blissfully unaware.