The Achievement Junkie

"ROAR!"

Before Jack was able to warn the party of what to expect, Bowzer's instinct kicked in. The fox started to circulate the energy of his bloodline, making sure all surrounding beasts could feel it oozing out of him.

They understood that Bowzer was the one who yelled but it still put them on guard. If Bowzer felt threatened so quickly, they knew that the enemy was already on top of them.

While Argyle and Tralon readied themselves for battle, Jack stepped in between them. 'This floor is swarming with jakals, so be ready at all times.'

'Right… Now I remember this floor,' Tralon sighed. 'It's one of the few floors that don't have artificial lighting.'

'Of course not, then what's the point of filling it with Jakals?' Jack stated, not paying attention to the annoyed tone in Tralon's voice. 'Bowzer, light the place up.'

A small layer of white flame began to dance around Bowzer's fur. The pitch-black darkness of the cavern was being driven away by the bright, white light. Where regular flames would only light up their immediate surroundings, Bowzer's white flames illuminated everything within fifty meters of the fox, not counting the dim light that went beyond that.

And thanks to that brilliant flame, a band of jakals was spotted heading toward the party.

'Not bad.' Happy to see things clearly, Argyle retrieved his sword and darted ahead to meet the jakals head-on.

They were lanky, reptilian humanoids with snake-like eyes and bristles in place of hair running from the top of their heads to the tip of their tails. Each of the jakals carried a long spear in their hands and were equipped with a quiver of short spears on their backs.

The three largest jakals charged Argyle with their long spears while the remaining seven kept their distance and retreated to the dim light. Their footsteps were completely undetectable, making them terrifying opponents in the dark.

Tralon retrieved a staff and smiled at the jakals who were about to launch a barrage of short spears.

'Don't interfere! They're mine!' Argyle shouted into Tralon's mind.

Not paying attention to Argyle's demands, a few arrows whizzed by and planted themselves in the distant jakals. However, the jakals were entirely fine and completely unperturbed by the arrows now jutting out of them. But more arrows came, one for each of the seven jakals.

'Jack!'

'What? I need EXP and those were just regular arrows with no skills or abilities. The jakals probably didn't even feel them,' Jack laughed.

The young hero would've shot the other three as well, but Argyle was already finished beheading them, cutting clean through the long spears held up in defense.

While a few rounds of short spears had been launched, Tralon easily defended against them with Earth Wall while Argyle charged the last seven jakals and hacked them into bits.

While Tralon and Argyle didn't notice any significant increase in EXP Jack was all smiles as he and Bowzer instantly reached the peak of lv. 34. Considering Jack had technically attacked and participated in killing seven jakals from lv. 56-58, it made sense.

'Another round of jakals and we'll be lv. 35,' Jack stated proudly.

'Jack, how many jakals did you put in here again?'

'Let me think… the third level is one of the larger levels in terms of space so I would guess around five villages' worth.'

'That many?' Stunned, Argyle looked at Jack like he was insane.

'Yeah, but there's no telling how many there are now. After having one thousand years to repopulate, I wouldn't be surprised to find the equivalent of a city's worth,' Jack added. 'But there shouldn't be any more than that because they would run out of food. You don't want to know how hard it was to capture enough of their favorite foods and put them in here.'

'You… I guess that's why we call you the Legend of Trodar.'

'We should be on our toes then. Otherwise, we'll quickly get overwhelmed,' added Tralon.

'Or… we can just wipe them all out.'

'Jack, there's no reason to wipe them all out. Otherwise, this floor of the dungeon would be useless.'

'Just because it would be empty doesn't mean it would be useless. If anything, that means we can use it for something else.' Jack smiled. 'Right now, what I need is as much EXP as possible and that's all I see when I see the jakals. Sure, maybe we can tame some beasts on different floors, but not jakals. And maybe we can use this space for something else later…'

'Are you sure? Once I've killed them all, then all the hard work you put into making this floor will go to waste.' Argyle's words were against Jack's decision, but there was a hypocritical excitement leaking from eyes.

'I'm sure. And it won't go to waste. I'd like to make at least one floor into a fortress of sorts, so why not the third floor, one of the most spacious floors?'

'That's… an interesting idea.' Argyle smiled. 'Jack, you'll have to join me and Tralon when I bring up business later.'

'Sure, but let's clear the third floor first.' Jack turned and showed Tralon a smug smile. 'Also, have you ever seen a legendary spell in action, Argyle?'

More excitement washed over Argyle as he also looked to Tralon with a matching smile. 'No, but I've always wanted to see one.'

'He has seen one. My Spatial Rift that got you here is one such spell,' chuckled Tralon. 'But I guess I can show you another one since you want to witness one in battle. However, I refuse to do so unless both Argyle and I temporarily use your former pact, the one where you do take half of our EXP earned.'

'Yeah, you've got a point Tralon. If it's temporary then I don't mind,' added Argyle.

'Well, it would make it easier on you guys I guess. And you would be able to slaughter everything without having to worry about me getting in your way or affecting the party's pacing,' Jack agreed with a nod. 'Also, we'll need to store all of the jakal bodies. We don't want to scare our guests with the carnage left behind and we can make plenty of things out of the corpses.'

'But we're splitting them. I want half of everything we take while slaughtering our way through the dungeon,' Argyle stated his terms.

'Done.' Jack then put the fallen jakals into his pocket dimension. 'So, let's get the party started.'

Jack quickly overwrote their pacts with the former, now giving him a sizable chunk of all of their EXP gained in the near future. With that finished, the party of three men and a large fox began their march through the cavern, killing everything in sight until they reached the giant gathering of jakals near the center of the third floor.

The only buildings were huts either carved into the ground or crafted by a basic cement the jakals made from the stone walls and some of the entrails from their various species of prey.

As Bowzer's light found the edge of the gathering of huts, they realized how many jakals they were up against. It was definitely enough to fill a small city, a terrifying number. Even Argyle, a lv. 71 swordsman, was hesitant to charge in blindly.

While Argyle was slaughtering all jakals that approached the party, Tralon popped his knuckles and showed a spry smile. He didn't use the staff this time but a copious amount of spacial energy swarmed over Tralon's hands. Then, when most spells would be cast and hurled towards an opponent, Tralon reached out with his right hand and grabbed the space in front of him. Literally.

Tralon's left hand did the same, so Tralon stood there with the fabric of all nearby space held tightly in his hands.

"Rendering Space."

Two words left Tralon's mouth as he crushed the fabric of the nearby space in his hands and ripped it apart.

At the same time, the ground below them began to quake and the roof over there heads shifted. Following Tralon's action of ripping the fabric of space, the gathering of huts shook before there were entirely shredded and decimated by the invisible space that Tralon had destroyed and let loose.

Argyle paused his killing spree as the jakals around him stiffened in terror at the sight of their entire species being obliterated in one fell swoop. And it was an attack they didn't understand, increasing their fears dramatically.

But Argyle only hesitated momentarily. He swiftly slew the remaining jakals that hadn't been eradicated by Tralon's overwhelming spell.

'That… was something else…' Argyle struggled to describe what he had just witnessed. Even the rubble that was left was just finely minced jakals and diced boulders, making the ground look like a giant cutting board.

Jack was in awe. He had seen the attack before, but never with his own eyes. However, his over-the-moon excitement still increased significantly when Jack looked at the explosion of EXP that he received.