After a good night's rest Joshua woke up to the sounds of Lilly snoring peacefully nearby. Both Tank and Cinder were on guard duty in case anything came into the area over night. Neither of them needed much rest and they tended to get any rest that they did need while in the soul realm. Apparently nothing had occurred overnight since Cinder was casually eating from one of the web cocoons that Lilly had left out for her to chow down on overnight. Tank on the other hand was casually meditating with his eyes closed. Joshua could tell he was awake by how active his aura was and he was sure that if anything came anywhere near the center of town Tank would have sensed it from a mile away.
Although Joshua did have the equipment to prevent beast from attacking them whenever they set up camp, this time they weren't in a forest but inside a town that was recently filled with haze. He wouldn't be surprised if a few curious beast tried to enter the area to see what could have caused the change. Of course when Joshua claimed the territory and started putting up defenses he wasn't going to have to worry about that kind of situation. In fact he'd be more worried about the people trying to come over and take the area in six months than any beast that tried to wonder over from the insect forest. He already knew that he was far more than enough to handle any creatures from there.
When Joshua started to get up Tank immediately opened his eyes and nodded in his direction as if to say good morning. Joshua took a long stretch before responding to the massive turtle's gesture. "Morning Tank, anything interesting happen last night?"
"Not in particular, outside of Cinder acting a little stingy and burying one of her cocoons as if trying to hide it from me, everything seemed fairly normal." Tank said with a bit of chuckle. Joshua smiled at the antics of Cinder. Sometimes he tended to forget that the overgrown and overly powerful spider was still a child. Though if Lilly was right, Cinder would probably be evolving to her next stage soon. It would be interesting to see what changes would happen to the spider when that actually happens.
"Well I guess I'll start cooking a meal for the two of us, did you want some lizards to eat or something else while I get things ready for when Lilly wakes up?" Joshua asked as he put his bedroll and other items away into his inventory.
"Sure, I'm a little hungry. I wouldn't mind a few snacks before Lilly starts to feed all of us." Tank said as he rose up and walked over. He was obviously in a smaller size since he didn't want to constantly worry about smashing his shell into buildings or stepping all over cars. At the moment he was about the size of a normal elephant. Joshua put some lizards from his inventory out for Tank to eat and then he started to cook some rabbit along with some eggs for his breakfast with Lilly. Half way through his cooking he could hear Lilly starting to wake up and by the time he was finished she was out and about already putting up her tent and other camping supplies.
"Good morning Joshua, that rabbit smells amazing." Lilly said with a cheery smile as she started to set aside some food for all her pets. She knew that she couldn't summon them to eat at the same time while out exploring so she would have to feed them in shifts. At the moment it was time to feed the pair of rabbits and Flutter. She had placed Cinder back into her soul realm since she had already eaten and would probably just want to digest her food a little bit before heading into the dungeon.
Joshua finished the food and set a portion on two different plates and brought it over to where Lilly was. "Here you go, freshly cooked breakfast. Have to keep our energy up before diving head first into an unknown dungeon." He said as he passed her a plate.
She smiled in thanks before thinking over his little joke for a moment seriously. "Wait, you don't have any idea what a town dungeon is like?" She asked a bit surprised at that. For the most part it seemed like Joshua always had a fairly good idea of what he was up to, but this time around he was going in blind? It was a bit surprising to her.
"I wouldn't say that I have no idea what a town dungeon is like, but this will definitely be my first one." Joshua said before taking a large bite of rabbit meat. He hummed a bit at the good taste before eating some more. It wasn't his mother's cooking, but he was getting better at cooking while camping.
"Then what do you know about these types of dungeons."
"Well, the most important thing is the fact that they're system made dungeons and not ones created by the planet itself. So from that we already know how our rewards may differ. We can expect the monsters inside to not react unless we get within a certain distance, we should find more treasure chest inside with items and stuff since it's system generated. We would normally expect to get less experience, but since at the moment the experience will be doubled that probably won't be the case. Outside of that I'm as blind going forward as you." Joshua said with a calming smile. He knew Lilly was just asking out of curiosity instead of nervousness. Up to this point the only thing that had truly put her on edge was the killing intent from the haze boss, but from now on she'd get better at dealing with things like that.
"Well, I guess it's probably the same level as this town was so it shouldn't be all that difficult, but I'm looking forward to seeing what type of rewards we can get from it. Hopefully Tank and the others will get some new skills this time around." She said with a smile as they both quickly finished their meal. Lilly made sure that each of her pets got more than enough to eat, before putting away the ones that didn't need to be outside the moment they go into the dungeon. With everyone all set Joshua and Lilly headed for the dungeon entrance. Tank made sure to shrink down to a size where he could easily move around inside the dungeon, while Cinder stayed at a size where Lilly could easily sit on her back without any problems.
The moment they entered through the dungeon doors everything changed around them. It was like going through a portal back in the hub city. It was clearly taking them to a completely different location so it wasn't like with the dungeons created by the planet. It was more like the beginners dungeon where people could go inside in groups and not ever have to interact with any other groups the entire time. The experience of such travel was always odd to Joshua, but he was starting to get used to it after having to do it so often over the past few years.
After a few seconds of the odd sensations Joshua opened his eyes to find himself standing in a decent sized hallway with nothing, but basic looking walls on his left and right. Along the walls there were torches that lit up the area, but that seemed to be there just to give the place a certain aesthetic instead of actually having been placed to explore the area. It all just seemed to perfect to be a naturally built dungeon. Luckily the dungeon seemed more than big enough for Tank to stay around the size of an elephant and be able to move around fine. When Tank was so small he was actually a bit faster than when he was in his fully grown size. He wasn't a sprinter by any means, but he'd easily be able to keep pace with them as they explored the dungeon thoroughly.
"Well it looks pretty simple to me, I just hope the enemies follow the same pattern." Lilly said as she hopped of Cinder's back so that she'd be free to move around the place in any way she wanted.
"It's like going through the beginner's dungeon all over again. Though I do expect things to be a bit harder this time around." Joshua said before he pulled out his short sword and led the way deeper into the dungeon. As they moved down the hallway Joshua made sure to map the place out just in case they ever needed to back track to find treasure or the right direction. The system generated dungeons seemed to prefer the more maze like structure than anything else and Joshua was sure of that fact when they came up to their first split. There were three path's laid out ahead of them, but there was no clue to give any idea where the paths would lead.
Joshua immediately sent out an aura pulse to check out what was up ahead. He didn't have to worry about any creatures getting angry and charging over at his actions since they stayed within their allocated areas. Down the right path Joshua could see that it went on far further than his aura pulse could travel so in all likely hood that was the right direction to go if they wanted to get through the dungeon quickly. Down the middle path there was a dead end with a pair of faded creatures waiting for others to come their way. Joshua could sense something off with the corridor through his aura pulse so in all likely hood that path was a trap that would force you to fight the creatures, sadly there wasn't any treasure to get from that direction. Lastly the path on the left lead to another pair of faded creatures that were guarding a treasure chest.
Being a loot master in just about any game he had ever played Joshua immediately lead the group down the left path preparing to face the two creatures to check out the treasure chest. Unlike with the beginner's dungeon the items found could actually be fairly useful to him. He doubted the first chest would have all that much, but even so it would be a start. It didn't take long for the two creatures to come within sight of them and Joshua frowned a bit at what he saw. The two monsters were basically miniature versions of the sub-boss they had just killed the previous day. Of course being smaller and not boss class probably made them far weaker, but the fact that annoying creatures like this were the first monsters he saw, he got a feeling that they'd be a common occurrence in this particular dungeon.
Joshua sighed at that thought, but prepared to fight the two creatures so that he could reach the treasure chest. Lilly nodded to him to show that she was ready to fight as well, while Cinder and Tank both seemed to be prepared to fire off an attack at Joshua's first action. The next moment Joshua stepped forward to get in range of the creatures zone of action. The moment he did, both ghastly figures lead out loud shrieks and started to charge over with their oddly large clawed hand out front preparing to attack him. Clearly these version didn't attack from afar, but what they did do was meld in with the walls as they charged over. It was like they were shadows moving along the wall, so Joshua had a feeling he'd only be able to hurt them when they weren't in that state.
When the two creatures got close Joshua took a stance with his short sword and used a counter attack from one of the little skills he had bought earlier. He used a specific angle to catch his sword along the first creature's clawed hand as he twisted it knocking the ghastly figures attack of course. He turned in air using all the momentum from the creatures blow to pull his sword out and slash in from the side. Since he pulled the move off flawlessly the strikes power grew by ten percent. With his sword being covered in aura he was able to cut clean through the neck of the creature.
The second one tried to follow up, but Joshua followed up by grabbing the first dead creature's arm and spinning it into its partner smashing them both into the ground. Lilly and Cinder sent over large fireballs burning both of the creatures alive and Joshua could feel a decent amount of experience fill his body. "Oh this is definitely going to be a great place to gain some levels." He said with a big grin.