Monarch Chapter 54

Chapter 54

Rayne ducked—barely.

A rusted mace screamed past his ear and smashed into the stone wall, spraying chips across his face. He didn’t flinch. Another undead lunged from the right, its broken spear thrusting straight for his ribs. Two more were closing in behind it, weapons raised, hollow eyes locked onto him.

Four at once. He might have panicked two days back, but now, it was just routine.

Rayne twisted his body, letting the spear scrape across his leather before he snapped a hand out, grabbed the shaft, and yanked. The undead stumbled forward, and Rayne slammed his elbow into its skull. Bone cracked like dry wood. The thing collapsed, twitching on the floor.

No time to breathe.

The sword-wielder barreled in, swinging downward with a jagged, two-handed strike. Rayne rolled under the attack, gravel grinding beneath him, and sprang back up in a single motion.

Another undead came from the left, its short sword stabbing straight toward his throat.

Rayne stepped into it.

His blade flashed.

Steel met rotten flesh, slicing clean through the neck. The head tumbled and bounced on the ground. The body staggered a step before collapsing.

A mace crashed toward him again.

Rayne brought his sword up, blocking the blow, but the impact rattled down his arm and numbed his fingers. The undead didn’t stop pushing. Its jaw hung open, teeth clicking, strands of dried muscle dangling.

“Back off, you ugly fuck,” Rayne growled.

He shoved forward with all his weight. The undead stumbled, and Rayne drove his boot into its knee. Something snapped. The creature toppled. Rayne finished it with a downward strike that split its skull.

Three down.

Only the sword-wielder remained.

It was the biggest one and had the least amount of rotten flesh on its body. From his experience, these were the hardest to kill.

It snarled and rushed him with heavy, jerking strides. The sword arced in a horizontal sweep meant to cut him in half.

Rayne leaped back. The blade carved a groove in the stone where he’d stood.

His breathing grew sharp. Sweat soaked his underarmor. His muscles were sore after all the fighting, and he had gotten a nasty bruise on his ribs from one of the previous battles, but he still looked at the undead with a calm gaze.

Losing focus in a battle was a death sentence.

He shifted his stance, recalling everything he knew in the Swiftwind style.

The undead charged again.

Rayne dodged left, and the sword sheared past him. He moved again, cutting right, then forward, then twisting around the creature’s reach. His body flowed the way Bran had instructed him. Light on his feet, never staying still.

Losing his shield had made him rely on the style, and the undead were the best sparring partners. Weak and predictable.

The undead swung wildly again, clearly frustrated, the sword slamming into the floor and wall in a frenzy.

Rayne let it miss him. Let it overextend. He watched the rhythm of its movements.

And when the next overhead strike came, he stepped into its guard.

Rayne’s sword shot upward, piercing through the creature’s jaw and into its skull. The undead jerked violently, rotten fingers spasming around the weapon handle.

Rayne grit his teeth and shoved harder, driving the blade all the way through until the point burst out the top of its head.

The undead fell still.

Rayne yanked his sword free and staggered back, heaving for breath. Ichor dripped from the blade. His arms trembled, not from fear, but from exhaustion gnawing at every bone in his body.

How many had he killed today? Twenty? He had lost count after the first two undead groups.

Then, notifications buzzed in his head and he pulled them up expectantly.

You have slain Common Undead x 4.

You have gained adequate experience.

You have levelled up. Level 25 reached.

+2 points gained in Strength. +2 points gained in Endurance. +2 points gained in Agility.

You have levelled up Sword Mastery. Level 3 reached.

Skill Stealer Activated.

+1 point in Arcane.

Rayne couldn't help grin. Another point in Arcane, another level, and he had finally managed to level up Sword Mastery. All the time in the dungeon fighting undead with the Swiftwind style was really paying off.

But the main point of his happiness was still the increase in his Arcane stat.

He had already gained 4 points in it by now, and he had only been fighting undead for what felt like the third day. And the results were already showing.

[Lesser Regeneration] felt much faster in healing his bruises.

Rayne wiped the ichor off his blade, stepped over the fallen undead, and leaned a hand against the wall before resting his body.

Then, he pulled up his status.

***

Status (1/3)

Name - Rayne Frayser (Human)

Age - 21

Class - Soldier

Rank - Common Soldier (Forsaken), Valeria Kingdom

Level - 25

Health - 81%

Mana - 87%

Stamina - 71%

Stats

Strength - 52

Vitality - 19

Endurance - 49

Agility - 49

Arcane - 15

Status (2/3)

Titles -

Bastard of the Fraysers

The Tortured Child

Soldier of Valeria

Survivor of the Trolls

Otherworlder

Skills -

General Skills

Valerian Language Mastery (Basic) - Level 5

Lycarian Language Mastery (Basic) - Level 2

Foraging (Basic) - Level 2

Mathematics (Basic) - Level 2

Toughened Physique (Uncommon) - Level 3

Footwork (Basic) - Level 3

Unarmed Mastery (Basic) - Level 2

Pain Tolerance (Uncommon) - Level 3

Class Skills (2/10)

Sword Mastery (Basic) - Level 3

Formation Knowledge (Basic) - Level 1

Unique Skills (4/10)

Skill Stealer (???) - Max

Goblin Tongue (Uncommon) - Level 1

Umbral Sight (Uncommon) - Level 1

Lesser Regeneration (Rare) - Level 1

***

It looked like the most beautiful thing ever. His stats were finally reaching close to 50 in some stats, while he was approaching the great wall of Level 30.

He couldn't be sure, but if he spent a week on this floor, he might as well gain a level or two more. And upgrade Arcane to at least 20 points.

That had seemed like a task that would take a year just a week back.

Though, that didn't distract Rayne from his actual goal which was to get the hell out of here. Killing undeads was fun since they were only level 15-20, and moved like rookie soldiers in a battle.

But there was still the threat of the chimera, and Rayne still hadn't been able to figure out who had cleared the dungeon. All of it made it hard to treat the place as an experience and stat farming ground.

He sighed, gave one last look at the fallen undead, and decided to explore more of the level. By his estimates, he had only explored half of it, and each dungeon room he had found was empty.

He started walking again, hoping that today would be the day he would find the stairs.

***

Rayne didn't find the stairs. At least not the ones he was looking for.

He had been walking for two hours since his brief rest and had fought two more groups of undead which gave him no stats, and passed another dungeon room that had turned out to be empty as usual.

So, when he came across another one after ten minutes, looking the same as the others, he expected it to be the same empty space until he opened it up and froze.

Because the room wasn’t empty.

Soft green moss blanketed the stone walls like a carpet, glowing faintly under clusters of gentle light. A hot breeze went past his face as he stood in the doorway, and a staircase spiraled out of the wall on the far side.

Rayne blinked, lowering his sword without thinking.

“This… is new.”

He looked at the staircase for a moment before something else took his attention.

A short, twisted tree growing from a mound of soil at the center. Its bark was pale and cracked, roots spread thin across stone as if desperately clinging to life. And there were three fruits hanging from the branches.

Round, orange-red bulbs the size of his palm. Even standing in the doorway, they gave off a faint, sweet scent, almost like citrus mixed with honey. His stomach growled before he could stop it.

The past three days, he had lived on river water and seaweed he had found on the river bank. Fights had helped to keep his mind off hunger, but now looking at the fruits, he couldn't help but want to take a step in the room.

Though, at the last moment, he paused.

Rayne craned his head like usual, looking for any monsters around, and only stepped inside when he saw nothing. Still, he kept his eyes on the staircase in case something descended from there as he stepped toward the tree.

The journal only had one paragraph on the dungeon sometimes having fruits and vegetables growing in the room. And it only told him two things.

One was that anything grown in a dungeon was special and wasn’t found anywhere else in the world. Second, all of it was rich with mana and delicious.

Rayne crouched beside the tree, studied the fruits, then plucked one. The stem detached with a soft snap.

“You better not kill me,” he muttered.

And bit into it.

Juice burst across his tongue. Sweet, bright, and refreshing enough to make his whole body tense. He froze for a moment, then devoured the rest with zero dignity. The fruit’s flesh melted clean down his throat, warmth spreading through his limbs like he’d just drunk a stamina potion.

“Holy, that’s good.”

He grabbed another. And then the third. He ate all of them with a gusto, feeling mana seep into him with each bit. Whatever these fruits were called, they eased the ache he felt all over his body and even took the edge off the exhaustion he felt.

For the first time since entering the dungeon, Rayne felt rejuvenated.

He almost felt bad that there were not more of them, and scanned the room once to see if he could spot any that might have fallen on the ground, but there were none.

He sighed, hoping to find more of these in the dungeon. They would make for a great food source.

“Alright,” he murmured, rolling his shoulders. “Food’s done. Time to see where that staircase actually leads.”

He cast a glance back at the moss-covered room, at the tiny tree that had basically saved him from going back and eating seaweed. Then he turned toward the spiral staircase.

Just before stepping on it, he checked all his gear. His armour had dried in a day, and he felt much safer with it. There was a small chance that a monster might be waiting for him, and he wanted to be ready if that was the case.

Rayne ascended the stairs slowly, keeping his head low in case of a surprise attack.

When he took the last one, his eyes widened at the chamber that opened up in front of his eyes.

Patches of grass and dirt covered the wide area around him, and roots grew on the walls. The chamber was twice as big as the one below and after scanning it, his eyes fell on the centre.

Three more trees—larger than the one below—spread across the middle of the room. Their trunks twisted upward like coiled serpents, each one bearing a canopy of several fruits, brighter and fuller than the smaller tree had.

Rayne exhaled sharply.

“Oh, thank the gods, I found food.”

He slowly approached the trees after scanning the room once for any danger, and began to count each of them. If he was right, there were at least two dozen of them. Enough to last him several days, especially if he ate in moderation.

But as he moved to pluck one of them, a sudden thought entered his mind.

Why were there two rooms made here when the same fruit was grown below too? What was the reason? As soon as that question rang in his mind, a chill went up his spine.

Rayne leapt back just in time as something massive crashed down where he had stood.

Ground cracked and dust billowed, revealing a creature that had been invisible till now.

It unfolded from the impact with a wet clicking noise—six legs splaying outward, mandibles snapping like twin blades. Its shell gleamed dark and oily, reflecting the glowstone light in warped patches.

It looked like a beetle. A giant one that could turn invisible.

Rayne’s stomach turned cold.

The bug’s shell shimmered, bending light around it as if struggling to hide again. The air wavered around its body, a distortion like heat on desert sand.

The beast clicked its mandibles twice, and charged.

Rayne yanked his sword from his side, heart slamming against his ribs as he sprinted to the side.

So much for free fruit.