Chapter 105 Dungeon Core: “The Eternal Training Ground”

POV Ziiipe

"Hey, don't fall! We still have many crates after this one. Why do you think this crate has air holes? It wasn't with the other animals. Wait, what if it was accidentally placed in the wrong section and now whatever creature was inside is now dead?" The voices slowly woke me up, and then I felt a large jolt as the box was roughly placed back on the ground.

"We have traveled for months; if there was something living inside, it would have died and smelled terribly. Stop talking nonsense." There was a moment of pause before the first voice spoke up again.

"You saw some of the creatures that we have brought here. I don’t think all of them would smell if they died." There was a longer pause before I heard cursing. "Well, what are you waiting for? Peek inside."

My sleep is now completely gone, and I looked towards one of the holes that let in light and allowed me to breathe during this journey. It didn’t take long for me to see an eye looking in and seeing me. I waved back quite happily.

"Hello there, can you perhaps help me get out of this box?" The person who looked at me quickly backed off so I couldn’t see them well, and there was silence.

I started to push with my back onto the lid of the box. This way, I got the most leverage to open the box. I knew that it wasn’t going to be good enough as I knew how many nails were put into this box and how strong I would need to be.

"I still need your help; I can’t get out of this by myself. You don’t need any extra tools, just pull at the sides." There was a moment of silence, but then I heard movement. As soon as they started to pull the lid, I could hear the squeak of the nails that could no longer hold on, and promptly the lid was pulled off.

Everything was so bright I had to blink multiple times before I could see anything. In front of me stood two large-looking men; it was hard to tell from their faces what they were thinking, but at least they didn't look angry.

"Did we just find a stowaway?" one of the workers asked. "No, you didn't. Ziiipe paid for passage, well, the delivery of the box. I have that receipt somewhere here." I went through my pockets and found the right one soon enough. "Here."

The older-looking one looked the receipt over and made a weird noise. I wondered what that was about. The younger one, however, asked me a question. "What's your name?"

I gave him a big smile. "My name is Ziiipe. It starts with a 'Z', has three 'I's, and ends with a silent 'E'." It made me so happy that I could use my name.

"Well, that’s an unusual name, but what about your last name?" the older worker said. "Yep, that’s what I was going for, and it's just Ziiipe. I like to have only one name."

Both workers looked at me and then looked at each other. "Well, you are still going to have to come with us because we only transport animals and monsters, and you are neither." The older worker wanted to continue, but I interrupted.

"What do you mean I am an animal; you are an animal." That made him stop speaking, and it kinda looked like he was frozen for a while. The younger worker laughed, which earned him a punch to the shoulder from the older one, but he just kept laughing.

He stopped laughing and looked into the box where I was standing. "Wait, why isn't there any waste, and where did you get food and water from?" That question made me smile widely, and I could feel how my eyes shined from excitement.

I had a woollen trench coat on because if I didn’t, I would have frozen to death during this flight. I pulled it open and revealed many of the bags I had.

"You see these? They are expandable bags. This one has food. This one holds piss. This one holds shit, and this one has water. Wait, perhaps these ones are the other way around; it's kind of difficult to tell the difference in this light?" I happily looked back up, but my smile dimmed a bit. Both of them had gone a little bit white in the face.

"Please, just leave," the older worker said. I didn’t wait another second, quickly taking all my stuff from the box. The last thing I did was take out the wooden lifts and my shoes. When I started to put them into my shoes, the younger worker spoke up once again.

"Why are you putting wooden blocks into your shoes?" I laughed a little at that. "These aren’t wooden blocks; they are wooden lifts. With them, I will look a lot taller than I am, and I need every inch of height I can get so I can join the Adventurers' Guild."

This time, the older worker laughed. "Good luck with that," he then started to leave, but I stopped him. "You can take the box. I know it’s technically mine, but I have no need for it, and trust me, it’s a well-built box."

He shrugged his shoulders and then moved back. I got out of the box with all my stuff now on me and watched as they left with my box that was no longer mine.

It was at this moment that I noticed the world around us. No one was looking at us, even if we had been a strange sight, at least I believe that we must have been. The people went about their business, and it seems that they didn't care about others' business.

"1-2, pull; 1-2, pull," I heard over all the other voices. When I looked towards that voice, I saw five large men pulling a rope that was attached to a pulley system, which was bringing something to this level. In fascination, I watched.

It took them about a minute before I finally saw a large wooden platform reaching the ground level we were currently on. On it seemed to be a lot of heavy boxes. It was all so fascinating, but then I started to look around more.

I need to reevaluate my statement of this being ground level, as I could see many airships at this height. When I had completely turned around, I saw that we were on a cliff quite high up, and beyond the cliff edge, a city larger than I had ever seen.

“Eternal,” I had finally made it. I ran to the edge and looked and just kept looking. There were so many people, and they looked so small.

This city was surrounded by walls, and it looks like many of the buildings had been recently repaired or built. I wanted to go down there and see how they were built and from what. But I held my excitement back. There were things I needed to do.

It didn’t take me long to find the stairs downwards. It was a long way down, and so many others were using the stairs as well. It was also awkward to walk with the wooden lift in my shoes. I should have practiced more, but I didn’t have time.

If I hadn’t gotten on that airship that day, they might have found me. Those worries are now a continent away; now I need to focus on my current problem.

When I reached the end of the stairway, I quickly needed to turn my head so I wouldn’t look towards the dungeon entrance. There was a good chance that if I saw it, I would try to rush into it, and without an adventurer card, that might bring trouble.

On the street, there were even more people than I imagined, and now they were so much bigger than from up above. Fortunately, it was not hard to find the target.

The adventurers' guild hall was big, but I almost didn’t make it there. Just the thought of the wonderful smells of a street full of food makers made me hesitate even now as my feet wanted to go backwards.

My head, however, was determined, so I walked inside. The building was so large, but I could smell nature in it. It was also loud, but that was towards one side of the large room where it looked like there were corridors that led to eating and drinking areas.

My target was the receptionists. There were 15 of them, but behind everyone was a long line of adventurers or soon-to-be adventurers. I didn’t miss the fact that I was the shortest one.

"Please work, please work, please work." When I reached the receptionist, her smile wavered a bit. "How may I help you?" This was bad; she didn't look like she was going to believe any stories.

"I would like to register as an adventurer." She didn’t respond immediately, just kept looking at me, but I couldn’t understand why. Eventually, she sighed.

"How old are you and what rank?" The first question and I already needed to stretch the truth. "Ziiipe is older than I appear to be, and I’m bronze rank."

There was a moment of pause before she started to struggle with my name. "My name is Ziiipe. It starts with 'Z', has three 'I's, and ends with a silent 'E'. There is no last name."

"Thank you for the clarification. While bronze rank is more than fine for joining the Adventurers' Guild, the age limit for joining is 16." She gave me a pointed look, and I started to understand what she meant.

She simply didn’t believe I was old enough but also didn't want to insult me if she was wrong. "Ziiipe might not look it, but Ziiipe has seen and done things that have forced Ziiipe to grow up fast. I will be truthful; I do not know my exact age, but I’m pretty sure I’m close to 16."

It took a while, but eventually, the receptionist slowly shook her head. "Ziiipe is strong. I'll show you." I pulled out my trusted hammer. For a moment, I looked at it. It was really old, so old that the wooden handle had multiple different hand marks rubbed into it over time. It had a normal striking side, but on the other side was a rounded tip. I saw her eyes go wide, but that didn’t stop me.

The table in front of me had fascinated me as soon as I arrived here. It was made of wood but the tree it was from had grown so fast, yet it still looked like a tree that had grown over multiple years. Magic had something to do with it.

Well, I had my own magic. I hit the table edge, concentrating on the skills that I had. The result was that I perfectly took out a rectangular piece of the table the exact size of my hammer's head. The surrounding tables had gone silent. "See, Ziiipe is strong?"

There was a moment of silence. "There is an exemption, and you just demonstrated it. Proficiency in attack skills can grant you membership to the Adventurers' Guild as early as age 14. I do not like it, but from the look of you, I don’t think you have any other options, do you?"

I shook my head. "Didn't think so. Let's fill out your membership card. Name, Ziiipe. Gender, Male." I quickly shook my head, which made her stop. "No, I’m a female."

One of her eyebrows rose really high. "People don’t mess with you if they think you're a male. So, I cut my hair short?" She gave me a slow nod, and she looked a bit sad.

I wonder why she is sad. Perhaps something bad happened to her today. It took us about 10 minutes to finish registering me. When I was done, I had an Adventurer's Guild card and a pamphlet.

It was a good thing they gave me this because I only had three copper coins left after I paid for my registration. The pamphlet had a lot of information, but most importantly, it stated that Guild members could stay in Guild housing for quite cheap, and that every new adventurer should use the available free information about the dungeon. I followed the instructions but didn’t find what I was expecting.

I had expected a small room with perhaps a few maps of the different floors and a few piles of papers full of information about traps and monsters. What I found was what seemed like a room larger than the entrance hall.

It was a grand library dedicated to the dungeon. There were rows and rows of bookshelves filled with so many books. The walls were filled with maps of floors and regions of the dungeon.

"How big is this dungeon?" I accidentally said out loud, and the person walking by me laughed a bit. "You have seen nothing yet, little one," his words made me smile. Time to absorb information. It was hard to contain myself, but I followed protocol and acted as you should in this hall of knowledge.

Four days later, I was down to my last copper coin, but the time spent inside the Guild headquarters was time well spent. Now, however, it was time to leave and finally see the dungeon for myself.

Before I left my room, I looked into the mirror to see the shining eyes of a young excited girl that kinda looked like a boy. I had been truly liberal with my truth-bending. In fact, I wasn’t even 14 yet, but they didn't need to know that. Walking through the city was distracting, but only a little bit. Then, however, it happened. I saw the entrance and I simply couldn't think.

There was no telling how long I waited, frozen at this magnificent site. The pillars themselves were already so large, but how is this the entrance? It is something I could never have imagined, but I could see the weird construction of the dungeon.

Normally, we took something and then made it look how we wanted it to look, but here the pillars were already like this, already like they were and always meant to be like this.

So many people were inside the entrance room, but calling this a room was a stretch. It took me a while because there was an actual line to get in. When I finally entered the portal, I emerged in a small looking room that kinda looked like a cave.

Now this was more like the rumors of the dungeons I’ve heard of before. The first opponent was a rabbit with a flat horn. I readied my hammer and struck it straight at the corner of the horn when it charged me, killing it instantly. It was going to be a long journey before I reached my first goal of getting to a hub station.