Flying towards the large slab in the distance that began looking like a fossilized tree stump as she got closer, it didn’t take long before she began seeing other adventurers not much stronger than the weak adventurers, she had washed off the stone formation not long ago. Giving her little to no interest when it came to hunting them down, as she ignored them alongside the weaker monsters she encountered along the way.
Planning to first get to the next floor of the dungeon where stronger monsters were more abundant before she began hunting monsters or adventurers, as hunting their weaker counterparts would only waste time at her current level.
Because of this, after flying for a little over an hour through the cloudless sky of the desert, she found herself at the base of the large mountain sized tree stump made entirely out of a reddish colored stone.
[Red Desert Ant, lvl 3]
[Red Desert Ant, lvl 7]
[Red Desert Ant, lvl 3]
[Catkin, Claw Swinger, lvl 9]
[Red Desert Ant, lvl 4]
[Red Desert Ant, lvl 8]
[Human, Sword Wielding Farm Boy, lvl 7]
[Human, Extraordinary Polearm Enthusiast, lvl 11]
[Red Desert Ant, lvl 1]
[Red Desert Ant...]
Finding the place almost completely overrun with weak monsters and adventures alike, as the red tree stump rock was clearly some kind of ant nest that these weaker adventurers took full advantage of to train themselves and increase their strength.
But maybe more importantly than these weaker adventurers and ants fighting with each other, she also saw a large city in the distance located between two tall mountains.
If her intuition wasn’t wrong, the path leading out of the dungeon would almost certainly be located somewhere inside that city. Meaning she would have to go through the city if she wanted to leave the dungeon in the future.
Of course, with what she knew about the cities created by these adventures, she understood that it would be impossible for her to go through the city on her own with her current strength. Especially considering that the city on the other side was far larger and stronger than the one behind the Howling Caverns Dungeon. Meaning that it would be even more difficult to get through it.
Luckily for her, she didn’t have any plans of leaving the dungeon yet and still planned to dive deeper into the dungeon to continue increasing her strength.
As for why she didn’t think about leaving the dungeon through the dreamscape... That was because she had realized during her short flight that opening a path to the dreamscape inside a dungeon was possible.
Maybe it was because she wasn’t on the material plane any longer, but a different plane of existence or maybe something different, like her being too far away from the dreamscape to reach it with her current strength. No matter what it was, all that mattered to her was the simple fact that she was unable to leave through the dreamscape like she had originally planned to do when she needed to in the future.
Adventurer city aside, Scaly got back to the task at hand. Searching for a path leading to the second floor of the dungeon, a task that was simple enough to solve once she put her mind to it, as all she had to do was see where the stronger adventurers leaving the city were moving. Not taking more than a few seconds to narrow down the general location of the path leading to the second floor of the dungeon.
"Look! A dragon!"
"Wow... Is it perhaps the one that the seniors at the guild mentioned entering the dungeon? The scales are so pretty."
"I think so... After all, where else would a dragon come from? They aren’t exactly easy to encounter. Especially inside this kind of dungeon."
And while Scaly found herself busy searching for the path to the second floor of the dungeon, it didn’t take long before the weaker adventurers below began noticing her. Calling out, filled with awe as they paused what they were doing to admire the beautiful dragon above them.
In a way, it was also because of this admiration that Scaly was against killing these weaker adventurers, as while they didn’t provide her with much experience, they did provide her with a lot of praise and admiration. Even knowing how to praise her scales.
Still, while she would have loved to glide around the Red Desert Ant Nest for a bit longer and allow these weaker adventurers to continue praising her beautiful scales and awe-inspiring presence, she also understood that she didn’t have the time to do that.
Not just because she didn’t want to waste time that could be better spent hunting stronger monsters and adventurers, but also because the weaker adventurers weren’t the only ones that noticed her appearance, as the stronger adventurers had also noticed her when she began approaching the Red Desert Ant Nest and spotted the adventurer city.
By now, the adventurers heading towards the path leading to the second floor had already begun retreating towards the city where hundreds of adventurers had started to gather into a small army.
Although the strength of these adventurers was nowhere near the level of the adventurer group she had run into inside the dreamscape, she understood from experience that she shouldn’t underestimate large groups of adventurers, as they had the ability to work together and use magic far beyond their level.
If the dozen or so mages working together within the dreamscape had been enough to threaten her, she didn’t dare imagine what over a hundred mages working together could accomplish, as she had a feeling that she would turn into a very well-done lizard if she got hit by something like that.
Whoosh~
For this reason, she soon enough flapped both of her wings before flying towards the location where the path to the second floor of the dungeon should be located. Not intending to challenge the large number of adventurers that had already managed to gather together and begun slowly moving in her direction.
The one positive thing about so many adventurers gathering together to face her was the simple fact that they were slow and had no way to keep up with her even without her using any wind magic to increase her own speed.
By the time that she reached the stone formation where she had seen the stronger adventurers entering without ever emerging again alongside what looked like a simple path that had been constructed by the adventurers and a few smaller buildings next to the cave like opening leading below the stone formation, any adventurers that might have been on her path had either hidden away or joined up with the army of adventurers slowly approaching her from behind.
Meaning she didn’t end up facing any resistance along the way nor were there any adventurers for her to kill off for a bit of easy experience.
Great as this might be considering that she managed to reach the path leading to the second floor of the dungeon without being delayed, she was feeling a bit disappointed that the adventurers had hidden away or escaped to the second floor of the dungeon instead of facing her.
It also made it clear to her that her current size, while majestic and awe inspiring compared to her past smaller size, also had a certain degree of intimidation that made adventurers far more cautious when it came to fighting her. Once again, igniting her dreams of finding some kind of spell in the future that allowed her to freely control her size. Allowing her to shrink down when needed so adventurers wouldn’t feel so scared about approaching her.
Thump~
Landing on the ground as she thought about potential what kind of magic she might need to shrink down in the future, Scaly didn’t remain still and began moving downwards along the path that had been created by the adventurers. Not planning to wait around for the army of adventurers behind her to catch up.
Slow as they might be, they were still strong adventurers and wouldn’t take too long to reach her...
Ah! Indeed, the path leading to second floor of the dungeon!
And as she made her way below the stone formation into what seemed like an underground tunnel of sorts, she soon enough saw a familiar spiral staircase that she had already encountered several times in the past during her time within the Howling Caverns Dungeon. Filling her with a sense of relief as she made her way towards the familiar spiral staircase.
After all, though she felt certain that the path that the stronger adventurers were following led to the second floor of the dungeon, there was always a chance that she was wrong, and they weren’t going to the second floor of the dungeon.
In which case... She might end up trapped by the army of adventurers chasing her from behind, a situation that would be difficult to get out of...