Finished taking a breather, he began to observe the way forward. He would need to jump nearly two metres to land on a stone block affixed to the wall... then keep moving rapidly to avoid the traps and dangerous drops.

Ryuji thought he could fly at the start, the wings of his demon form able to perform small bursts of flight... However, there are arrow traps and spikes affixed to the ceiling to kill anyone who tries.

"This is so troublesome, maybe I should have taken the other passage..."

With a leap, Ryuji kicked off the platform and into the air, his legs stretched before landing on a stone block sticking out; then he jumped to another, his body moving around the spike traps in a dance before he jumped into the air and landed in front of a golden chest.

"Oi! What the hell is a chest doing here!"

He felt anger as if the chest was taunting him. He began to hate this dungeon and its damn traps, and now...

Ryuji opened the chest before a flash of light erupted, and a figure appeared... it was a grey-skinned goblin with a white loincloth but with a giant hammer.

It was a trap!

"Woah!"

He jumped, dodging the hammer strike, and kicked the goblin across the face. It stumbled backwards before Ryuji picked it up and threw it into the void.

Normally, he loved to fight, but when their only place of battle was a stone less than a metre wide and long. He wasn''t interested in those kinds of odds. Ryuji watched the monster drop from the pillar and waited for a sound to show he hit solid ground.

...

...

Bang!

A faint sound echoed after nearly a minute of falling; that meant this drop wasn''t a joke or something he wanted to risk his life on testing!

"That was... weird, but what''s this?"

He could feel the gemstone in his pocket before smiling and putting it inside.

"Ah, right, it is a dungeon... the chest vanishes and the gemstone appears. However... it feels strange to just accept these crazy events."

"Now I have to leave?"

Ryuji was about to jump back to the previous platform when the wall behind the chest that vanished started to tremble and then collapsed, revealing a doorway.

"What the hell? Did the dungeon create an alternative path for me?"

He looked inside, and there was a long, narrow pathway. It smelt damp and mouldy. However, there was enough room to walk through, and Ryuji couldn''t detect anything dangerous with his increased sense of danger and magic-seeing eyes.

He let out a grunt.

"Let''s go...," he whispered.

[Gained: Skeleton Archer Marking (Legendary)]

[Gained: Skeleton Knight Marking (Rare)]

Now, with all five gemstones, he sat on the long stone bridge, dangling his legs off the edge while eating a warm sausage sandwich. Thanks to his storage, it remained hot and didn''t become soggy.

Ryuji began to understand the reason people formed parties, though he enjoyed fighting alone and getting right into the heart of combat. When alone or faced with these moments where the conversation would help dull the eerie silence and lonely feelings. Ryuji couldn''t help but want a group of comrades.

''Is this a side effect of bonding with others? Was mother this lonely when I wasn''t around, is that why she made the classes so cheap for the other housewives?''

He licked his lips, finishing the last bite of his meal, feeling a warm sensation in his stomach and the feeling of strength filling his body.

"Now then, let''s keep going..."

***

When he returned to the door with runic letters and the five gem slots, he wondered what else this place could offer to him before he started to affix the gems, hoping and praying there wasn''t some mystical order because he had no clue and didn''t want to spend hours in this place.

However, this time, it seemed Ryuji was lucky as he placed them inside the glowing sockets, feeling an almost magnetic sensation and crackle of lightning when he lifted them close!

The gemstones glowed brightly, and the door began to open with a slow groan as the rocks and old metal parts began to move.

''It didn''t explode... so I guess this is the right sequence, thank god!''

The door revealed a large hall with an empty pedestal in the centre. The roof above had beautiful paintings, and murals depicting battles between man and monster covered the walls.

It felt like a historical scene, from the entrance where man fought simple monsters to the end near the pedestal where a golden being came... Ryuji felt like it resembled an Apostle... but that Apostle attacked the humans, in the last part of the mural, the humans perished...

''To overcome all monsters and threats, then destroyed by the messenger of whom you served? What a cruel fate...''

Ryuji didn''t know what to make of it. It was simply a hypothesis based on the scenes and what he had experienced.

Even though he realised from meeting Alan, learning about the curse of his bloodline and the one who was likely behind it, being a goddess of light. He still wished to believe some gods weren''t twisted and evil, like mirrors of humans.

''However, we were created in their image. If we are dark, treacherous and evil, then even the most holy god has those traits... I suppose.''

Ryuji approached the pedestal, finally reaching the end of the hallway before the entire room began to shake. His sense of a boss fight all but blared as he watched the various archways for the appearance of such a threat.

With his back turned to the pedestal, a tremendous storm of bones seemed to be dragged from the walls, breaking the stone and the very pillars that held the room together. It created a towering giant of bone from countless humans formed in the air. It created a ghastly form and filled with a gloomy aura.

"Grrr!"

The sound of rattling bones rubbing against themselves almost sounded like a human groan while armed with a huge spear of pristine white bone. The monster hovered with rotting wings as if to mock or mimic the Apostle who took their lives.

''It''s behind me...''

"E....nd.... our....eternal suffering.... betrayer...."