A bit dumbly, Leah and her party followed behind the Teudents as they—with seemingly no whatsoever—set off into the sprawling cave mouth. The snow-covered terrain of the dungeon's sed-floor forest was quickly repced with the dark stone of a cave system. Piles of ash covered the floor, alongside deg bohe prey of those monstrous wolves that had attacked them.

  It didn't take long for those exact beasts to emerge. Where Leah aeam had struggled to defend themselves against their vicious cws ah, the Te delvers were barely fazed. All five moved with practiced efficy, making short work of the snarling monsters.

  Their tank, Natalie, was especially entrang to watch. She swung her mountainous warhammer around like it weighed nothing at all, batting wolves wherever sto flesh, tossing them like ragdolls. Leah almost wondered why this team was even on the sed floor. From how fluidly they hahe enters, couldn't they be ohird?

  Were they even level-two delvers, for that matter? Or level three? Higher, even?

  Deeper and deeper they winded into the cavern, Leah and her party following behind the Teudents, the whole situation feeling a bit surreal, watg just how effortless the expedition seemed to them. They barely even o catch their breath between fights—as soon as one ended, and they checked that everyone was fihey tinued on.

  At one point, the team stopped to mine a vein of iron ore embedded into the cave walls, which Leah had briefly felt like protesting—they didn't know how much time their teammates had—but the pint dried up, sidering the sheer speed they were already w at, and the benevolence of their aid in the first pce.

  The brief mining break was its own perplexi, since Jordan had teased Natalie about how she 'should still put her mining skills to good use', and that there was no 'o be shy', which had drawn a blush from the red-haired girl and some hurried shushing. Leah wondered what all of that was about, and why someone would be shy about mining skills, but she expected she wouldn't be getting any answers.

  Soon enough, they arrived at what could only be a boss chamber: an arched doorway with runes inscribed into each stone block. The entrance led deeper into a curved hallway, but they paused outside it.

  Leah briefly sidered insisting that she and her party help Natalie with the boss enter since if they failed, it meant their friend's lives were also forfeit. But, again, her argument dried up before she even voiced it. Because if they'd made such short work of the regur monsters of the cavern, the boss monster might pose some difficulty and even incur some injuries in the worst case, but a team wipe? It didn't seem pusible. And the team's one request had been to keep the experiend loot to themselves.

  So after briefly ferring with each other, and after Leah passed over the four keys with her teammates' names on them—she suspected they would be found somewhere ihat climactic chamber—she watched the five Teudents walk, uned, through the arched doorway, headed for a boss fight.

  ***

  Natalie sighed a quick breath of relief as they put the roup of delvers behind her. It had felt pretty weird, being followed around and watched as they cleared the dungeon. Especially sideriate of dress: the total odesty her armor afforded her.

  Natalie had known about the possibility of bumping into other people in the dungeon, but still, she wasn't aced to the stily cd armor—much less other people ogling her not-so-subtly in it. Natalie couldn't even really bme them for how many times she had caught them looking. The armor was basically desigo force people's eyes across her body.

  She was doubly thankful they hadn't insisted on joining them in the boss chamber, si would've ruiheir goal today. Their use of the [Erotite Arrow]. Obviously, Natalie had no iions of fug a boss monster in front of anroup of delvers. Even in front of her own team, the idea was rather embarrassing. Though the event with Ana earlier had warmed her up to that particur iability, at least.

  She set all of those thoughts aside as she strode through the arched entrahe dungeon was as deadly as ever, and she couldn't afford distras. Especially when she wasn't fighting for her own team but another oirely, today.

  The four missing individuals worried her. She agreed with Leah's appraisal that the keys probably meant they were alive. But like always, the dungeon couldn't truly be relied upon. They very well might be dead, the keys simply taunting them deeper, however muatalie had assured them otherwise.

  An enormous cavern opened around them as they walked deeper in. Like the rest of the sub-dungeon, bones, ash, and jagged rocks littered their surroundings. A cave-dwelling, a home for the vicious wolves they'd killed so many of.

  Oructure broke the natural surroundings, positioned directly in their path, a terpiece of the boss chamber. A throne of carved dark gray stoted out at the far end of the cavern. To either side of it sat wolves as least twice as rge as any they'd seen so far, with midnight bck fur and glowing e eyes.

  Then, the mai itself. Seated ihrone, legs crossed and reing zily against the armrest, sat the two wolves' apparent master: a woman with angur, predatory features and e eyes even more vibrant than her panions'. Humanoid, but far from human, she was half-wolf and half-woman. Her limbs ended with paws for both feet and hands, and her gray skin was covered with bck armor. She wore an expression of veiled, predatory excitement, the attention of her e eyes sharpening on Natalie as she and her party walked deeper into the cavern.

  [Hellhound - Lv. 2]

  Her status read the same as the actual wolves. That was iing.

  "Jackpot?" Jordan murmured to Natalie. "She's mostly human, at least."

  "It's the best we'll get," Natalie murmured back.

  They were unsure how the [Erotite Arrow] would work when it came to creating a 'al Boss', but they'd chosen to err on the side of safety. In case it didn't e with any transformation, Natalie would rather not have to fuck a real mohat would be … weird.

  Reag the ter of the cavern, Natalie aeam came to a stop. her the two enormous wolves nor the woman ohrone showed any iion to move. Most bosses began the fight themselves—but it seemed this time, they were given a brief moment of calm. The opportunity to act first. Natalie wondered whether that was annal the dungeon wahem to hurry up and use the erotite arrow.

  "Shall I, then?" Jordan asked.

  Natalie eyed the woman awo wolves for a moment lohen, she shrugged.

  "Go ahead, I guess."

  Jordan eased her bow into her hand, moving slowly and non-threateningly—in case a sudden movement would prompt the fight to begin. She he pink-tipped arroulled the string back, keeping the on poi the floor.

  "However this works," Jordan said. "We're probably going to be down Natalie, while she hahe boss. So it'll be us fainst the wolves. I'll take the attention of one, Sofia, you the other?"

  Sofia grunted in agreement. "Shouldn't be a problem. The boss is the real challenge. We hawo add-ons, even if we're suboptimal front liners."

  "Then, is everyone ready?"

  At a series of nods, Jordan moved. Natalie barely eveered it. Jordan had raised her bow and loosed the arrow before Natalie reized she had acted.

  Jordan, as the team's rogue, had always excelled with matters of finesse and aim. The fragile pink projectile streaked through the air before smming into the exposed neck of the humanoid boss—a perfect hit, before anyone had time to blink.