The Demon Queen's Royal Consort-Chapter 102 - Dungeon - X

But when it set...

...the frozen hell began.

On the first night, they had nearly lost the fire. The flames, suffocated by the cold that seemed to have a will of its own, dwindled with every gust of wind that invaded the cave. For hours, they took turns blowing on embers, rubbing their hands together, resorting to whatever minor magic could keep the fire alive.

Because they knew—if the fire died, the cold would consume them in minutes.

And now, in that heavy silence, as the wind whistled outside like a starving specter, they all thought the same thing:

'When will he wake up?'

"Dália?" Dorian broke the silence.

"Hmm..." she grumbled in response.

"He should have woken up before me. I still don't understand why he's like this," he said honestly.

"I... I don't either," Dália admitted, her voice weary. "Phew... His body is in perfect condition. His wounds were healed long ago, and I can't find any anomalies or head trauma."

"Could it be poison?" Seraphine suggested.

"If it is, it's one I can't detect, which should be impossible, even for a dungeon of this level."

"Phew... All we can do is wait, then. I'm still not in the best shape either," Dorian added. "And honestly, I still don't know how that lunatic took down those two abominations."

Dorian had woken thirty hours later, at the end of the first freezing night. Aeloria, Seraphine, and Dália had subjected him to a thorough interrogation about what had happened.

And what they discovered was that they had been very, very unlucky.

When they had tried to escape the dome, the noise of their battle against the mercury copies had drawn the centipede's attention. But it wasn't alone. Another aberration—a humanoid grasshopper with six bladed arms—had joined the fight for their heads.

What followed was pure chaos.

Dália, Aeloria, and Seraphine had blacked out upon colliding with the centipede's chitinous shell. It fell to Glenn and Dorian to protect the group and face the creatures.

Dorian recounted everything he remembered up until the moment he landed a critical strike on the centipede's head. But he was adamant: it hadn't died instantly. And his description of the grasshopper made one thing clear—the real threat hadn't been the centipede.

This content is taken from fгee𝑤ebɳoveɭ.cøm.

If all five of them together couldn't defeat it, how had Glenn, alone, killed both?

Dorian described Glenn's insane speed, his combat instincts, his near-precognitive reactions. In his own words:

"Worthy of being classified as an aberration."

But even that, in the group's eyes, shouldn't have been enough. Except for Dália, who suspected Glenn had ultimately resorted to his warrior weapons.

Aeloria had seen the state of the dome after the battle. He knew something far worse had happened after Dorian blacked out in the toxic cloud.

Seraphine was by far the group's worst-tempered member—a fact everyone noticed but chose to ignore, letting her deal with her own issues.

But not everything was problems and sorrow. If there was one good thing about nightfall, it was that the group had finally figured out what kind of dungeon they were in.

As night descended, a massive red moon hung in the dungeon's starless sky. And with the temperature drop, the mist froze, turning the swamp into an opaque sea of ice.

This effect revealed what had been hidden beneath the nebulous veil.

They were on a mountaintop and that was the dungeon's essence.

Mountain ranges.

Behind them, a smaller mountain with a passage at its summit, similar to the one they had exited. Ahead, a third mountain rose a thousand meters away and a thousand meters higher, imposing and threatening.

And beyond it, four more mountains loomed, culminating in a final peak where, even at this distance, they could make out ruins like those they had found inside the first.

Dungeons followed defined patterns—everyone in the group knew that. The problem was, until now, they hadn't been able to decipher this one's.

Now, it was clear.

The challenge was to conquer each mountain until they reached the highest, where, without a doubt, the corrupted artifact awaited.

But discovering the pattern didn't make their lives easier. Over the past two days, Dália, Seraphine, Aeloria, and finally Dorian had debated the best approach to survive this hell.

The dangers were obvious. This wasn't a dungeon where they could simply charge forward without a strategy.

Between the mountains, a potentially lethal swamp prevented any hasty crossing. The group had already learned firsthand that the creatures here were endless—even if there weren't many like the giant centipede with a black serpent for a tongue, their numbers alone would overwhelm them.

And the problems didn't end there.

While observing the next mountain for strategies, they noticed movement at its summit. Not just one, but two grasshoppers resembling the one Dorian had described appeared from time to time, dragging centipede remains and hurling them down the mountainside.

"Let's organize everything we've discovered so far," Seraphine said. "Apparently, these six-armed grasshoppers are the mountain guardians."

"They hate the centipedes, but the moment we engage, they'll prioritize exterminating us," Dorian added, recalling how the grasshopper in battle had often ignored the centipede to attack them instead.

"We inferred that the first centipede might have been the guardian of the first mountain," Dália mused. "But since the dungeon portal placed us beyond it, we didn't have to fight it—which led to the guardian leaving the mountain and pursuing us."

"Given that this mountain had one grasshopper and the next has two, we might be right," Dorian said.

"If we could see the area before the first mountain, we'd know for sure," Dália replied. "But based on everything I've seen in dungeons, the initial terrain always hints at strong monsters guarding important areas."

"But we still don't know how we're getting to the next mountain," Seraphine reminded them. "And that's not even the biggest problem. The real challenge is facing two grasshoppers at once. Not everyone has Glenn's speed."

"I can keep up!" Seraphine said firmly. "But even so, it's two!"

"Phew..." Aeloria sighed, stepping closer. "We collapsed the tunnel to avoid being ambushed from behind, but now we have few options for moving to the next mountain."

"Maybe Glenn can send us there with one of his spatial rifts?" Seraphine suggested, glancing at Dália.

"I doubt it. I've never seen the Young Master cross such a large distance. But I can't say for certain."

"What if we jumped with reduced gravity?" Aeloria proposed. "We don't need speed to reach the next summit we just need to get there."

"It would take a lot of force, but it might be our best bet for now," Aeloria agreed.

The group nodded, and ideas continued to flow. Planning alleviated their sense of helplessness, creating a harmony they hadn't shared before.

Meanwhile, lying beside the fire, Glenn remained motionless.

None of them noticed the pitch-black ring on his index finger.

It was dull, unpolished, so plain it had gone unnoticed.

Not even Dália, who shared Glenn's bed and warmth, made the connection between his strange condition and that ordinary-looking ring.