The Insider System

Chapter 39: Dungeon Time

The elevator had just come to a stop. Looking forward, Lake saw an iron gate with a small group of guards standing by it. "Alright get off, I gotta go." Lake felt Lucas was being a little rude by just kicking him off the elevator but it wasn\'t that big of a deal. Walking over to the gate Lake asked. "Is this the Dungeon?"

"Hello Lake It\'s us." Lake realized these were the guards from the cart. "Sorry, you guy\'s look exactly like all the other guards." Lake had seen guards a few times since he got here and they all wore the same exact armor that covered their face. It was a bit of a safety concern in his opinion but he was sure there was a reason he was wrong.

"Are you ready to go into the dungeon Lake?" Lake was happy Joy was taking him and not some random He had seen her fight against tough odds and win by outwitting her opponents so he had more confidence in his safety with her. "Yeah let\'s go Joy. Is there anything I need to know before we go in?" Lake felt like this was going to be a strange place being under an ancient building and all. "Yes there is. The amount of unholy mana in the world has turned places like these into undead nightmares. Do you know how to fight undead?"

Lake had never seen one before except in movies from his last life so he guessed. "Aim for the head." This was a rule everyone on earth knew. "No, that might slow them down but the best way is magic, the best being Holy magic but the rest of us have to get by using whatever we can." Lake didn\'t have his weapons right now so he was happy that he wouldn\'t need them. He needed to get in the habit of carrying them, but he wasn\'t expecting to fight.

"Alright open the gate, Lake stay behind me until we get to a lit area." Lake didn\'t need to ask about what Joy said because he could see the other side of the gate and it was pitch black of course Lake could see in the dark so he didn\'t care and he wasn\'t gonna brag about his eyes.

"Please keep me safe, Joy." Lake wasn\'t kidding around; he had no idea how dangerous this was going to be and was fine using Joy as a shield. Watching the guards push the gate open Lake tried to get a better look into the tunnel but after a few feet Lake couldn\'t see anymore. "Why is it so dark?" Lake had been sure he was going to be able to see just fine. "This is the birthplace of Dark Mana. We aren\'t exactly sure what Guild Leader Amanda did down here but it\'s been like this since she became a Demigod."

Lake was starting to realize his skills weren\'t omnipotent; they all seemed to have situations where they didn\'t work how he would expect. But it mostly seemed to happen around people who were stronger than him so once again his solution was to get stronger.

"Lake, you ready?" Lake realized he had just been staring down the tunnel this whole time he had been thinking. He bet they thought he was getting cold feet. "Yep, lead the way." Lake started to walk behind Joy as she entered the tunnel once he entered Lake found he could probably only see a few feet in front of Joy.

Lake jumped as he heard them start to close the gate behind them. Pretending he hadn\'t been scared, Lake asked Joy. "How far can you see in front of you?"

"Around ten feet, but don\'t worry the first torch is pretty close; we\'ll be there in less than a minute." Lake wondered why they couldn\'t have taken a light source with them if there were some but he didn\'t say anything since it seemed to be a straight one way tunnel to where they were going.

"Alright we\'re here, can you see it yet?" Lake looked past Joy to see a small light piercing through the darkness and it was growing brighter as they were getting closer. "Yes I can." A few seconds they were standing in a small chamber with three different paths in front of them.

"Alright Lake go ahead and pick one." Lake looked down all three tunnels in front of them and decided there was no difference so he pointed at the middle one. "Let\'s go down this one." Joy started down the tunnel and said. "The deeper we go the more undead we\'ll run into so just be ready from now on go ahead and start gathering mana."

Lake did as she said and tried to gather light mana and found it to be extremely hard. "Joy, why can\'t I gather Light mana?" Lake already knew but he wanted more information about elemental balance. "Dark and Unholy mana are so strong here that it destroys the natural Light and Holy mana so if you want to use light spells you\'ll need to use your own mana."

Lake wasn\'t too happy to hear that he was hoping to raise Light mage by a few levels to unlock two new skills but he would worry about that later. Switching over to Dark mana Lake found Joy was right with almost no effort he was able to gather a huge amount. Lake thought this might be a good chance to unlock the Unholy mage job or whatever it was called but he wanted to ask if there was any stigma associated with using Unholy magic.

"Joy, is it ok for people to use Unholy magic, or is it illegal or something?" Joy didn\'t turn around or stop when she said. "You can\'t really control what affinities comprehension gives you when you unlock it so you\'d be handicapping yourself if you didn\'t use one of the elements you got. The only thing you have to worry about is the Demon Lord might try and recruit you if you show talent for it, and you have to remember if you say no he\'ll just charm you."

Lake didn\'t want that to happen so he decided to postpone learning Unholy magic but he still felt like this might be a good time to get some more magic jobs so he asked. "Is there a type of magic that\'s good against undead other than Holy magic?"

"There are a few that work slightly better than others but it\'s a pretty small difference. The one most people use is fire because it\'s usually the best for attack spells anyway." Lake thought that sounded good, the only problem was he had never seen anyone use Fire magic so he wasn\'t sure what the mana looked or felt like but that was the same for when he had used Light magic for the first time.

After a few seconds of focusing on the surrounding mana Lake was able to pull what he assumed was Fire mana out of the surroundings and after gathering it for a few seconds he got a new job.[New job unlocked Fire Mage] Switching over to it, Lake went ahead and shaped the mana into an attack hearing the name of the spell he threw it behind them. "Fire bolt." He wanted to be ready for when they ran into a monster.

"I can see the next torch up ahead." A few seconds later they were standing in a room that looked almost exactly the same as the last one. The only difference was Lake was pretty sure the bricks that made up the wall were slightly darker than earlier. "Joy, are the bricks getting blacker?"

"Yeah they get darker the deeper you go in, it\'s one of the few ways you can tell where you are down here." Lake found this interesting; he wondered if it was caused by the amount of Dark mana down here. It would make sense that Mana could affect the environment because the environment could affect what Mana was around. That didn\'t explain the Unholy mana though.

"Hey Joy, Why is there so much Unholy mana down here? You only told me why the Dark mana was down here." After Lake asked this he heard something come from one of the tunnels. It sounded like someone was dragging something. He could also hear a few footsteps every now and then. Looking at Joy Lake saw she had also heard the noise. "That\'s what we\'re down here for, I hope you\'re ready to fight."

"Would you mind answering my question real quick before we go?" Lake was more interested in knowing this than fighting some dumb skeleton or whatever it was. "Oh ok, For whatever reason Unholy mana shows up wherever Dark mana is it has something to do with whatever the Demon Lord did to the Dark Goddess."

Lake was surprised to hear that it was almost like the Demon Lord controlled both elements or he had somehow tied them together. "Alright let\'s go, do you want to go first this time, or do you think you can shoot your spells past me without hitting me." Lake didn\'t think that was possible Joy took up most of the tunnels they had walked through. "No, I\'ll go first."