Heavy Metal

"W-we made it!"

Exclaimed an out-of-breath man, clutching his chest and clearly exhausted. He was not alone; his friend was curled up on the side, clutching onto something entirely different. His gaze fell on that item, a small monster cage used for transporting milder species. Inside was a small white ant, twitching around.

"You still took that thing with you? There is something wrong with you…"

Eugene sighed. During their escape, he had abandoned the cage, prioritizing his own life. Alanna, on the other hand, insisted on bringing the monster with them. Now, they were certain that this ant was not born in the dungeon. A monster could not leave the dungeon it was created in, and even the strange armor that had chased them could not break this rule.

Alanna, despite the exhaustion etched on her face, cradled the small cage gently. The Gleaming Ant inside twitched, its silvery-white body reflecting the moonlight. Eugene shook his head in disbelief and looked around to make sure that they were truly safe. Four adventurers were with them but some guards had also spotted them and began to approach.

"We can't rest yet. We need to get to the guild and report what happened,"

Said one of the adventurers, his voice steady despite the fatigue he was feeling. The group knew that the armor inside the dungeon was dangerous, it needed to be subjugated. With the darkness skill around its body, it could not be killed by low-level adventurers like them.

"What's going on here?"

"Glad that you asked."

One of the guards sprinted over to the adventurers to ask about the problem. However, before they could answer a high pitch screech erupted around them. Everyone found themselves covering their ears. Alanna took the brunt of this audible attack as the source was the cage with the Gleaming Ant inside. The small creature was giving out a spine chilling sound as it had awoken inside of a cage it didn't want to be in.

"Calm down, no one is going to hurt you."

Alanna shouted while quickly pressing one of the magical symbols on the cage. In a flash, the piercing sound was gone and even though the ant continued, no one was affected by the skill it was using. The group of people turned to her with puzzled looks. The girls responded by laughing nervously.

"Everything is under control now!"

She assured them while the ant continued to rattle inside the cage. It was clear that the creature didn't want to be there, but it also couldn't escape. The strange magical symbols around it seemed to be draining its stamina, and it was already injured. Soon enough, the monster tired itself out and slumped forward, its insectoid eyes glancing at the entrance to the dungeon from which it had been forcibly taken, as if longing to return.

*****

"I can't…"

Within the same dungeon a lone living armor stood, slamming his fists at a strange invisible wall that it could not cross. He had chased down the humanoid beings that abducted his friend but was forced to stop, right before he could cross the threshold of the dungeon's entrance. Rusty, as the armor had come to be known, pounded against the unseen barrier with a sense of desperation. His friend was right there but there was no way of progressing any further.

"What can I do? I need to think…"

Rusty retreated a few steps, trying to get a grip on the strange emotions he was feeling. He wasn't sure what to do; his friend was now gone, snatched away right before his eyes, and he had been powerless to stop it. During the chase, he had constantly used up the mana crystals he had taken from his previous lair, and only one remained. The swirling darkness around him could only function with the aid of magic doping, a state that would not be sustainable in the future.

While thinking, he recalled a scene from the past. He had shot an arrow at adventurers on the second floor and missed. Once they were gone, he thought nothing of it, but they called for help from stronger people. It was now quite probable that after making such a huge scene, people would be after him. Staying in this location was dangerous, so he needed to retreat first and then think of a new plan. His aim was to save Gleam, but to do that, he needed to survive first.

"Don't worry… I'll find you Gleam…"

He glanced at the dungeon stairs that he couldn't approach, then finally turned around. The swirl of darkness emanating from his body subsided as he decided to conserve the rest of his mana. Soon he was making his way back into the dungeon that had become quite chaotic. A lot of monsters had followed after him and the adventurers he was chasing and now they had caught up.

It had been a while, but Rusty had been created on this level. Navigating them was rather easy, and even though the monsters here were now aggressive towards him, they didn't pose much of a threat. A few skeletons charged at him, but even after their blades connected with his body, they didn't cause any damage. His durability exceeded the attacking power of these low-level F-rank monsters and wouldn't even cause him to lose a single hit point.