Just as they wanted to continue their journey after leveling up, a new notification appeared in front of their eyes.

Warning Travelers

No dungeon level has been cleared for 8 days after your arrival. New travelers have been summoned.

"Shit, is this system just throwing new people at the dungeon until someone clears it?" Fedor cursed.

"Seems like it. If we belonged to the first group that was summoned, our party probably has the best chance. We were pretty lucky with our equipment and have a good synergy between our focuses in battle." Daniel paused a moment, then continued.

"Should we even try to clear the dungeon, or should be wait for more people to be summoned. Everyone we encountered before looked like they came from earth. In the long run, it is probably an advantage for us if we have a larger group of people from earth."

Fedor laughed while Anna looked at him in a weird way.

"I didn't expect you to be this cold. I would hate it if this system plays a dark joke on us and summoned my family to motivate me. My brother is eight and my mother has a heavy limp since a car accident. They would not survive a day here. Besides, in my opinion most people are assholes, we are better off without them." Anna declared.

That made Fedor laughing even louder.

"I don't really care for waiting. It's boring. While I have no family, this system seems motivated to have us clear the dungeon. It would probably not a good idea to test what were to happen, if we don't look like we even try. Besides, I want to be the one that kills the big bad monster goblin." Fedor explainedd.

Daniel nodded, he hadn't thought about that. While he was, like Anna said, a cold bastard, he had family, too and his comrades were right. Going against the systems apparent wishes, seem like a uncalculated risk. After settling the issue, they went on exploring the dungeon.

The next hours went well and they were able to dispatch six groups of the new, larger goblins. Each of the enemy groups had between eight and twelve members. Together, the experience was enough to make Daniel and Anna level up again.

What surprise him the most was that his swordsmanship skill was already at 16%. The more difficult fighting, against the new goblins, seemed to be far more beneficial than blowing up large groups of low leveled opponents and then hacking the survivors to pieces before they were fully recovered. It was shortly after their level up that they received a new notification from the system.

Warning - Floor boss ahead

Five seconds after a visitor enters the room it will be sealed behind. Party members need to hurry to prevent being separated.

"Shit, that makes things more complicated. We have no idea what we can expect and with no way to retreat I don't think we should go ahead. It makes more sense to be prudent an keep killing these stronger goblin groups to level up. We have enough supplies to come back here in a week when we are much stronger." Daniel suggested with a curse.

"Hah, where is your sense of adventure. The fact that we don't know what is in front and have to gamble our life is thrilling. Fighting the other goblins is becoming boring anyway. They may be stronger than the starving ones, but the last groups didn't even manage to wound us." Fedor commented.

"I have to agree with Fedor. It won't matter what we do, at some point we have to take the risk. I think it is better to get it over and be done with it. I want to leave this shit hole and see the sun again." Anna explained.

Daniel was quiet for a moment. Everything in his being was against taking such a gamble, without even knowing the odds. In his opinion, the boss fight should be on a completely different scale then the last fights. If they went ahead, they would have to gamble their life. The thing about gambling one's life was, the more you do it, the worse your chances get. At some point you'll lose.

While a coin flip at a chance of 50%, ten of them had a chance of more than 999 to 1 against you. The way he saw it, maybe he had a chance to convince Anna to wait. But, that was not the case for Fedor. If Fedor left the group and they had to challenge the boss later without a tank, their odds would be way worse. The funny thing was that in his estimation, he had the best chance of survival in their party. Fedor had better protection. But, he was slow and if the boss goblin had enough power, it would be able to penetrate his plate armor. Anna would stay in the back, but she would be vulnerable to arrows and spells. His own speed would give himself the best chances to evade injuries. Reluctantly, he accepted to take the risk.

"Ok, I'm in. But, at least let us talk about different possible scenarios and tactics to handle them." Daniel suggested as a compromise and the others agreed. They went over different tactics and scenarios for half an hour and stopped when they had no more idea what else to think of.

Daniel and his team grabbed their weapons and moved forward. They arrived at a T- crossing, when the tunnel closed behind them. Both sides of the crossing went into a large cave. Daniel and Anna went to the left side and Fedor to the right.

The battle started with Daniel creating a strong Windshield from the cave wall in front of him extending further left into the room. Then, he started to create a huge Air bomb and stepped into the room. A quick look let him curse. There were ten fighters, five archers, a caster and the large goblin boss in the room.

Green Goblin Fighter - Level 7 Green Goblin Archer - Level 9 Green Goblin Shaman - Level 12 Green Goblin Chieftain - Level 15

The Archers were a lot stronger than the small ones they encountered before and they were separated into a group of three and one of two. The chieftain was sitting on a throne and was clad in rusty armor. It had a large battleaxe leaned at his throne. The shaman looked in his direction and it looked like it was already preparing a spell, while the ten fighters were screaming their battle cries and started running at him. He shot his Air bomb at the larger group of archers, counting on Anna to focus on the enemy caster. Before he was able to retreat back behind the cave wall, five arrows hit his shield. Three were deflected enough to miss, while one went into his raised left arm. The last one hit him in the chest and got stuck in his sternum.

The goblin fighters screamed even louder when they saw their prey wounded. But, they became less noisy when Anna's double cast Acid jets hit the enemy caster. It immediately went down and started to scream in agony.

Daniel and Anna managed to get behind the cave wall, before the enemy archers were ready to hit them again. With a growl, he broke off the arrow sticking in his sternum. It would restrict his movement in a swordfight and had to go, even if it made the wound worse. He then prepared another Air bomb, while Anna started to cast her Acid cloud. They fired their spells when the first enemy fighters came around the corner.

Daniel's attack removed three enemies from the fight, while two more were screaming on the ground, trying to remove the acid from Anna's spell out of their fur. Just as the first goblins came into close combat distance, an earth wall was raised. It separated the first two goblins from the rest. With that, Fedor had done his part and was now running into the boss cave from the right side of the T-crossing. Daniel and Anna each hacked at the two goblins. They were too surprised, from suddenly being alone without their brothers, to mount a real defence.

Three fighters, two archers and the boss to go, Daniel thought when he followed Fedor to the other side of the cave. This time, he didn't create a Windshield. He calculated that the archers would be too focused on the mad screaming Russian that was running at them with his big mace.

An Air bomb later, the last two archers were splattered over the cave while the three fighters had given up on breaking through the earth wall and ran in his direction. The caster was on its feet again and the chieftain was striking at Fedor with his battleaxe. His mana was down to 50% so he didn't create another air bomb, instead he ran at the fighters with his saber. They were all a bit injured, either from acid or the explosion of his spell and he didn't know how much of his mana it would take to kill the boss itself.

Daniel heard Anna's curse when he saw that this time, her Acid jets were blocked by a dome of water. He decided to trust her and to ignore the caster that was glaring at the woman that had melted half of its face off.

When he arrived at the fighters, he used his Air wave to make them stumble and to give him a free attack. One goblin went down, holding his gurgling neck wound. Daniel stepped back to get out of reach of the other two goblins short swords. When their attack missed, he killed the next one. He then sidestepped the desperate attack of the last goblin and pierced its skull through the eye. His longer reach from his longer arms and longer weapon had given him a huge advantage and it hadn't even been a real fight.

When he looked around the room, he saw that Fedor was on the defense against the boss, blocking its attacks with his shield. The shaman and Anna had both created water shields in front of them and they were canceling each other out. He smiled, when he saw that the shamans water shield was not extending in his direction. Daniel started to shoot air blades from his Blade storm skill at the caster. It was so surprised by the attack from its flank, that it dropped the shield. A moment later another Acid jet hit its head and the goblin went down.

"A little help here! The bastard is so strong that he broke my arm when I blocked his strike." Fedor shouted.

Daniel smiled. He pulled the pistol out of his inventory and shot the goblin boss into the back of its head.

Fedor started to laugh like a maniac.

"Wow, that was dirty. Kind of reminds me of that Indiana Jones scene." he commented.

Congratulations you have cleared the first level of the goblin fortress. You can now decide to leave the dungeon or move to the second level. All experience from a boss fight doubles.

First clear of a dungeon level in a summoning. All rewards double.

Daniel sat down on the goblins wooden throne and had a look at his status.

Life

Stamina

Mana

67%

85%

36%

The fight had been tougher than even he had expected. Without the ruse of attacking left, then retreating and blocking the passage, it would've been even closer.

"There seems to be a huge gap between the creatures below and above level 10. If you hadn't distracted the caster, I think I would've run out of mana first." Anna commented.

"I agree, the strength of the boss was probably over 70. I think I will need a stronger shield for opponents like that. Can somebody help me to remove the armor at my arm and to set it straight? I don't want to have it heal crooked." Fedor asked.

Anna nodded and went over to help him. After that she helped Daniel so remove the arrows and to clean the wounds.

"The boss would have been a better opponent for me. But, while I could have evaded its attacks, the archers would have gotten me." Daniel declared while they were tending their wounds.

"Yes, we need armor, too. The arrows that got you went through your spell. Without it, that one would have pierced your lung." Anna decided while the pointed at the rest of the arrow shaft while she pulled it out of Daniels sternum.

"I think we can be proud. We cleared this level against enemies at higher level than us, without preparation, knowledge and training. I'm burning to see what the second dungeon level will throw at us. I only hope the bone of my arm will heal in a reasonable timeframe." Fedor proclaimed hopefully.

"Anna is right. Before we start any new adventures, we need to leave and get better gear. Sadly, we are broke and I don't think they take my credit card here." Daniel complained.

"There must be some treasure here. I won't believe that we are stuck in a world were dungeons suck and won't deliver anything useful. You two rest for a moment, I will search the room." Anna declared in a decisive tone.

Daniel decided to look at his status and saw that he had leveled up again. He distributed his points in the usual way.

Status Daniel Krieger

Level 10

XP 33522

Free Attribute Points 0

10

33522

0

Attributes

Strength

Agility

Vitality

Endurance

Mana Capacity

Regeneration

Mana Regeneration

Toughness

31

50

16

30

54

53

11

15

Skills

Slot 1 - Swordsmanship

Slot 2 - Meditation

Slot 3 - Self Improvement

Slot 4 - Channeler

Slot 5 - unlocked at Level 15

Novice 22%

Novice 8%

Novice 8%

Novice 7%

Elements 1/2

Air

Elemental Spells:

Air:

Windcutter

Windshield

Air wave

Air bomb

Haste

Blade storm

7

8

7

8

4

3

Class:

unlocked

"Looks like level 10 gives you access to a class and a second element." Daniel informed his party with a huge grin on his face.