I found myself standing before the entrance of the dungeon with liquor in one hand and a tree branch in the other. I wasn’t completely drunk, nor have I blacked out. I survived in the dungeon somehow with only a broken bottle as a weapon and dead drunk. I guess with a shield and what I guess I can call a club, I should be able to do better. How am I supposed to drown in my sorrows with alcohol when I can’t help but think of the dungeon when drunk.

The entrance seemed to suck me in as I stumbled inside and my surroundings changed completely. The hot summer climate was replaced with an eerie chill and everything was different shades of blue. The ground was dark blue and the torch upon the wall was possibly white but was influenced by the colors around to be a light blue. Every time I enter the dungeon, it will be completely different from the last. There was even a different kind of monster to face this time, some sort of lizard.

Not a humanoid lizard, but a normal one if normal lizards were blue and the size of a dog. It crawled up the wall and hissed at me. I put away the booze and raised my shield to prepare for whatever this thing was about to do. It let go of the wall with its front legs and lifted its body perpendicular to the wall, then jumped towards me. Out of reflex, I dodged to the side rather than trying to block it with my shield.

The lizard slammed onto the ground hard and made a gurgling noise, but was up on its feet again hissing at me once more. This time I didn’t give it a chance to climb the wall and slammed the branch down onto its body, pinning it down but not doing much else. It started to squirm and try to claw and bite at the branch. I was sorta hoping the branch would just kill it but no such luck, I didn’t swing hard enough or the offshoots cushioned the blow, or the shape was just plain awkward.

Should I stomp on its head or bash it with my shield? It couldn’t really do anything in this state, but if I stay here for too long more will appear. After a good long swig of the good stuff with my off hand, I made a decision. The branch was replaced with my foot and I started breaking off the offshoots, then flipped the branch so I was holding it by its heavy side. My makeshift club was now complete and I brought it down upon its head with a sickening crack.

Pieces of bone, blood, and brain matter splattered across the ground. Like that, there was one less monster in this damnable place. No loot this time so the body would rot. I wiped some of the gunk off the branch onto the lizard’s lower body then continued on to the next room. Same thing as the previous room, nothing but blue and another hissing lizard. I’m not sure if it was just my imagination or not but this room felt colder than the previous.

This time I had a plan. The lizard crawled up onto the wall like last time and got ready to pounce. I kept the branch facing its thin side towards the lizard, it’d be like a spear that the lizard would skewer itself on. No way for the blow to be cushioned by offshoots or just pin down the enemy, this was a sure-kill strategy. The lizard was too stupid to recognize this and suspended its front in the air and launched itself at me.

Just as planned, the lizard impacted with the end of the branch and the branch shattered while I felt like my right arm was on fire. I dropped the branch and fell over from the impact. My right hand was all bloody and the arm felt like it’d have a nasty bruise later unless the blessing from the shield stops it. Not totally sure how that shit works yet.

The lizard wasn’t much better off as it squirmed on the ground a few feet away from me with a nasty splinter. It thrashed about as blood sprayed from its chest before going still. Somewhat successful the plan was, but not as good as just dodging and bashing it in the head. Now I had half the branch I had before to work with. It went from being around half my height and being like a spear on one end and a club on the other to being basically just a club the size of my arm.

Since my right hand was a bit mangled, I swapped my shield over to that side and picked up the club with my offhand. Not that I’m any good with my left hand, but it was better than dealing with picking up and swinging a branch with a scraped up hand. The only good thing that came out of this room is the fact that only my arm was damaged and the bottle was safe and sound under my shirt. Which I took a drink from to help dull the pain.

I continued onwards to the next room with my buzz coming back nicely. My head was in the clouds and I couldn’t feel the pain. The third room was much the same as the previous, it wasn’t until the later rooms that things would get noticeably bigger and have more enemies. I took no chances with fancy strategies and just dodged the incoming lizard then bashed its head in before it could even recover from its impact with the ground.

By the time I reached room seven, I was able to swap back to my dominant hand and the lizard dropped some loot. A gray colored rock fell from its body, probably some ore but unlikely to be as valuable as that copper from before. When I slipped it into my shirt, its coldness seemed to cut straight into my body. Every time I went deeper into the dungeon the temperature got lower and lower, it was not my imagination. No extra clothes to slip on or anything I could really do other than drink more and feel the fire from my stomach spread throughout my body.

At this point, I was full on drunk and stumbled into room eight. I considered going back since I managed to get some loot and got a bit used to fighting. Maybe it’d be best to go back and get a proper weapon, but yesterday I managed to get to room ten and it was a break room with good food and alcohol. If I made it to room ten again and found another break room, would I not get more alcohol to drink? It’d save me on drinking and eating expenses and the day would become pure profit with the rock.

Room eight was a mistake. There were two lizards instead of one and they weren’t up for taking turns. They immediately climbed up the walls and readied themselves at the same time. I prepared myself to dodge and one of them jumped towards me, only one of them. The first one I dodged but the second one actually delayed for a second to jump towards where I dodged. Damn lizards knew teamwork. There was no dodging nor was hitting it out of the air an option so I lifted up my shield and hoped for the best.

I was glad that I swapped my shield back to my left before entering this room because my right arm had already dealt with enough abuse back in room two. It slammed into me hard and fell over backward, right over where the first lizard landed. Instead of climbing up the wall it bit my hand and started shaking its head back and forth. Waves and waves of pain hit me as it tried tearing my entire arm off. I lifted up the branch with my other arm and bashed its body multiple times but it wouldn’t let go.

No matter what I did, it kept biting down and tugging at me so I kept hitting it. I couldn’t hit it in the head from my position on the ground, but I could hit everything else and did so. Blood and scales scattered across the ground and I hit it so many times that its spine showed. No more tugging and shaking but it refused to stop biting me until I dropped the club, slid my hand under the side of its mouth and forcibly pried it open. And then it fell down to the side, lifeless. For all I know, it had been dead for a while but I didn’t notice because it was still biting me.

For a few moments all I did was breathe heavily, then I remembered the second lizard and jumped to my feet. It was already dead. Its brain painted the shield as it hit it headfirst and killed itself on impact. The relief robbed my legs of their strength and my vision went black for a few seconds from getting up so fast so I fell on my ass and sat there for a few minutes. No way I could do a fight like that again so I forced myself to get back up again and started heading back the way I came.

In every room I passed, I found the enemies I defeated decaying on the ground. It smelled horrible and almost made me vomit. Not that I had any food in my stomach to vomit out. Right then, I only had booze in my stomach and was constantly adding more to give myself to motivation to keep going. I would have to find someplace to eat dinner after getting out of the dungeon.

And then, I managed to leave the dungeon without any implications inside. Not much time had passed since I went down so there was no chance for any new spawns on the way back. And my wounds were already starting to heal though my left arm felt like it was only hanging to my shoulder by a thread with all the damage done to it. The surface itself wasn’t as kind as the way back up to it.

I had just started getting used to the cold within that version of the dungeon so it felt extremely hot when I came out. That, and well there were other people at the entrance of the dungeon witnessing me coming out. Wouldn’t be too bad as a lot of people in town know that I went down there and survived, it was no big secret. However, this was obviously a separate trip from the first, a second voyage into the dungeon.

Alone, that was enough to start rumors about me becoming a professional dungeon diver. Which if I want to live longer than one year, I pretty much am now. The biggest problem with this is the people who saw me. They’re the people who normally go into the dungeon and make their living off of it, entering twice a day every day and trying their luck at getting loot from the earliest floors. Jerry and his gang. And if I remember correctly…

“Old man, you caused me to lose a fucking bet and you have to nerve to show your face in front of me? And right after going down the dungeon a second time. It’s as if you’re rubbing it in my face or saying you’re the real pro dungeon diver,” said Jerry in a bit of an unreasonable rage. Not sure what he bet on me doing but he obviously bet a lot on it to be this pissed off.

I looked around me to see if I could just run away and avoid this bullshit. Unfortunately, two of Jerry’s goons blocked off the escape routes. Only way out was through Jerry, or hopping back down the dungeon for another foray. Which I’d rather avoid at this point. I sorta just want to snack on something and pass out somewhere that won’t give me back problems.

“There’s no running here. Just you and me, and my friends, face to face. Let’s talk this out,” said Jerry as if he was trying to calm me down when he was the one who was exploding in my face just a second ago.

“What did you bet on me doing?” I asked, partially to move along the conversation to find out what he was on about, partially because I was curious about it. What was this bet that he was so sure to happen? Passing out under a tree? Getting lost and going the opposite direction of the dungeon? Backing out of going to the dungeon and coming back to the bar.

“My bet was on you dying in the dungeon. You see, I know how you are in your drunken moods. You’ll do anything once you get worked up and you’re able to actually focus in your stupor enough to do that thing. And I was right, you made it to the dungeon, you just didn’t die. Now I’m out quite a bit of silver and word on the street is that you have a shield with a divine blessing on it, shines in the sunlight quite nicely,” said Jerry, obviously trying to steal my shield away from me. Normally, I would have backed down even with this shield being divine and the task tied to it.

I didn’t have any chance of completing the task anyway. But there was a complication in giving up the shield. My arm was still fucked to hell and without the shield slowly healing it, I’d probably have to sink all the money I got from Jeff into a doctor then still likely lose my arm. At this point in time, giving in to Jerry’s demand is not an option.

“You losing the bet isn’t any of my business. Besides, the shield is a normal wooden shield, see?” I said while pointing at the shield. Thankfully with my quick thinking, I realized the symbol on the shield was covered with the lizard’s last thoughts. I still tried to deflect responsibility for the outcome of the bet in case he still wanted me to give the shield even if he thought it was normal.

“Stop trying to hide it with monster bits, we saw you carrying it through town,” said one of Jerry’s underlings.

“That’s right, we’re not so easily fooled. Give up the shield or I’ll break your arm and take it by force,” demanded Jerry. He even took a weapon off his back, an ax. Which doesn’t seem like the weapon of choice when breaking someone’s arm, felt more like a chopping off sorta thing.

I lifted up the branch in my hand and said in response, “My arm is already broken.”

Then, I walked backward back into the dungeon because what the hell was I going to do with a tree branch against three armed men with one of my arms down. Even if my left arm wasn’t fucked, I wouldn’t have tried my luck with them. They knew what my shield was and didn’t know it wasn’t actually that valuable. And now they were camping the outside and I had to reach the rest area in the dungeon in order to stay long enough to where they might be gone the next time I leave the dungeon.

This time, the dungeon was warmer than the outside world.