Year 1451, month 10, day 09

  Today marked the sixth consecutive day that the girls have been entering the dungeon under my supervision. It has become a steady, almost rhythmic part of our lives in Yargan. On this sixth day, the challenge ahead of us was significant: they would be attempting to raid the tenth floor and face the second mini-boss of this dungeon. While I have seen many adventurers struggle and fall against the guardian of this level, I have no intention of letting that happen to my party. I have no intention of having them fight against that giant spider in a way that risks their lives, though I do want them to experience the weight of its presence.

  After completing our standard morning routines at the house—eating a quiet breakfast and checking the leather straps and steel plates of our armor—we arrived on the dungeon’s tenth floor together. I decided that since this is the mini-boss floor, and the mental and physical toll would be higher than usual, we will leave the dungeon immediately after defeating it. There is no need to overextend ourselves when a major victory is at hand.

  Just like how I had experienced it during my own solo grinds, the tenth floor is a composite challenge. It contains monsters from floors six through nine, all appearing in coordinated groups of two. This mixed-unit tactic is designed to catch complacent raiders off guard. The girls have become much better at fighting against more than one enemy simultaneously, finding a synergy between Woya’s defensive blocking and Wyn’s predatory strikes. Even so, the combination of different attack patterns—the speed of a wolf paired with the reach of a mantis—was taxing. I made sure to help them from time to time, stepping in to disrupt a monster’s rhythm before it could exploit a gap in their defense.

  The girls were already intimately familiar with each individual monster’s characteristics, but they had not yet fought against these mixed pairings. This lack of familiarity made them slow to advance to a certain extent. They had to learn on the fly how to prioritize targets while being harried from two different angles. They gradually got used to the shifting dynamics, but there were still several occasions where I felt the need to interfere. The long, jagged scythes of the mantises remained the primary concern.

  Those mantises were still incredibly dangerous. Because their level on this floor has risen from the baseline of 7 to 10, their stats have been naturally enhanced. Even a slight increase in a mantis's Agility or Strength can turn a manageable strike into a lethal one. But they were not the only ones who had become stronger over the past week.

  Wyn has leveled up past 10 now, her movements becoming a blur of gray and steel. Woya, having equipped a combat-related job as a Swordsman, has also seen significant level gains. When you add in the passive job bonuses they receive simply by being in the same party as me, along with their rapidly accumulating combat experience and deepening teamwork, they performed much better today than they did yesterday or the day before. They are no longer just two individuals fighting side by side; they are starting to move like a single organism.

  The girls fought continuously, moving through the damp, torch-lit corridors and defeating the monsters one by one. I acted as their safety net, dealing personally with the enemies that took too much time to kill or those that presented an immediate, lethal threat. When they encountered a combination of an earth turtle and an orc, I took down the turtle myself—knowing its high defense would only frustrate them—while they coordinated their efforts to deal with the orc.

  When we encountered the dreaded double-mantis spawns, I took one of the creatures for myself, leaving them to deal with the other one. It was a strategy we had refined on the seventh floor, and it served us well here. I generally took one of the duo whenever the risk of an accidental injury was too high, but I left them to handle the entire job at times when the pairing was more manageable, such as when two orcs appeared.

  This floor was a bit crowded, a common sight on mini-boss floors, although it was not nearly as congested as the fifth floor. In a dungeon like Yargan’s, the density of people decreases the deeper you go; the weak are filtered out, leaving only the more serious parties. I spent some of our transit time trying to measure our speed compared to the other groups we passed. Even though they are just two, Woya and Wyn are doing a job nearly as good as a full six-person party. They move without hesitation, their trust in me allowing them to focus entirely on the kill. Of course, whenever they are in danger—even if it is just a subtle hunch on my part—I interfere immediately. It is because of this absolute safety net that they are able to fight to their heart's content.

  After defeating a wide variety of mixed monsters, we finally reached the heavy stone doors of the boss room. There were four groups waiting in line ahead of us. We settled in to wait, and almost as soon as we took our place, the party currently inside finished their raid, and the group at the forefront filed in.

  The parties in front of us looked prepared enough. They carried decent equipment—mostly steel and reinforced leather—and their formations were tight. After watching them go inside one by one, I noted that it took an average of 20 to 30 minutes for each party to finish the encounter. They all had the standard six-person composition, so they were likely playing it safe, moving with a cautious deliberation that traded speed for security.

  When more than an hour and a half had passed, the doors finally opened for us. As soon as we entered the room, the heavy doors groaned shut, sealing us in. The environment began to shift as the room materialized; tree-shaped stone pillars started to rise from the floor, and the ceiling became jagged and protruding, giving the chamber the claustrophobic feel of a deep cave.

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  I had already discussed our strategy with the girls while we were waiting in line. I knew from experience that this mini-boss is huge, incredibly strong, and deceptively fast for its massive size. However, its sheer bulk also grants it more blind spots than smaller creatures. My first thought had been a reasonable strategy: I would take the boss’s aggression on myself, acting as the primary target while letting the girls focus on damaging its flanks to gain experience. But after further contemplation, I realized how dangerous that could be.

  The giant spider could clearly feel pain, and like any intelligent monster, it would try to retaliate against anyone causing it harm. Even if a girl stayed in its blind spot, the spider could toss its massive body to the left or right, attempting to crush them under its weight. I couldn't risk them being pinned or harmed beneath that bulk.

  So, I decided to employ the same tactic I had used with Namo, my poor deceased slave, back in the day. The difference now is that I have two capable helpers instead of just one. They would act separately, circling the boss and looking for openings while their focus remained locked on me. If the spider tried to charge one of the girls, the other would immediately move to divert its attention elsewhere, buying time until I could interfere and pull the aggro back.

  With the strategy decided and the girls in position, I started the fight with a heavy charge toward one of the boss’s front legs. I wanted to seize its attention as soon as possible. I needed it to see me as the only threat worth considering.

  In reality, it was completely unnecessary to involve the girls in this fight. I could have killed the boss myself in a fraction of the time. If I were to be more honest with myself, it would have been even easier to defeat it alone, as I wouldn't have had to worry about their positioning. I even found myself restraining my strength as I delivered the initial blow to its leg, making sure I didn't damage it so much that the girls wouldn't have anything left to fight.

  The true purpose of this entire exercise was to help the girls get used to the pressure of a high-stakes battle. I want them to face these monsters themselves to a certain extent. I will most probably deal with these floors as fast and effectively as possible in the future, but right now, I want them to experience every different enemy type. I don't want them to just have high stats thanks to my power leveling; I want them to possess genuine combat abilities and the instincts that come from surviving a floor guardian.

  I continued to deliver calculated damage to the monster, striking it just often enough so it wouldn't forget I was the primary threat and try to rush toward the girls. Woya and Wyn moved with focused intensity, using their steel swords to unleash as much damage as possible on the spider's soft joints and underbelly while its eyes were fixed on me.

  Because the spider was so large, Woya realized quickly that she could not block its direct attacks alone, even with her shield and improved stats. She was forced to adapt, focusing mainly on using her sword for quick thrusts before retreating, while Wyn ran in wide arcs, slashing and stabbing at the boss’s flesh whenever an opening appeared.

  There were a few tense moments where the monster, maddened by the accumulating damage, tried to pivot and attack Woya or Wyn. Each time, I increased the strength of my own blows, slamming my sword into its chitinous shell to force it to focus back on me. In situations where I was out of reach, the girl who wasn't under threat would immediately dash in to land a distracting blow, delaying the spider just long enough for me to catch up.

  By the ten-minute mark, the boss began to lose its footing. Most of its eight legs were either heavily dismembered or severed entirely. The girls were starting to look a bit out of breath, though they were far from exhausted. It was understandable; they had been running, slashing, stabbing, and dodging without a single pause for ten minutes straight.

  Even though the boss was now crippled, the girls did not try to take advantage of the situation to land the finishing blow. Instead, they backed off a few paces, creating space for me. I had never explicitly explained why I always took the final kill, but they had already accepted it as an unwritten rule of our party.

  I approached the twitching, dying boss monster. I held my heavy two-handed sword in my right hand and raised my left hand toward the creature's head.

  “Fire Ball!”

  I shouted the command, and a sphere of fire the size of my head manifested instantly. I launched it directly at the mini-boss’s face. I chose a fire-based attack on purpose, following the common knowledge that insect-type monsters are weak against flames—even though, technically, spiders are not insects.

  I had been a bit doubtful about how effective a single spell would be against such a large target, but the result was a great spectacle. The spider’s body was covered in thick, bristly feathers that were designed to detect movement. These feathers proved to be highly flammable; they ignited instantly, acting as a fuel source that increased the damage of my fireball several-fold.

  We stood back and watched as the giant spider became a blinding yellow lump of fire. The flames eventually shifted to a deep crimson as the monster's body began to disintegrate into mana. Once the fuel was gone, the fire dissipated into nothingness.

  I ordered Woya to wait for a few minutes before collecting the loot, thinking the ground where the boss died might still be dangerously hot. Once the monster had vanished completely and the stone room had returned to its normal state, she moved in. She collected 5 silver and 50 copper coins, along with the guaranteed drop item—the ‘Steel Sting.’ With our objective completed without any difficulties, we left the dungeon.

  Since it was already noon, the sun was high, and the city was bustling. We bought some food from the street stalls on our way back. I had specifically told the girls not to prepare lunch this morning, as I wanted us to spend some time enjoying the atmosphere of the city today as a reward for their hard work.

  “Go home and take care of some superficial house chores, then get yourselves ready to leave for the outer city,” I said, looking at them. “When I get home, help me change out of this armor, and then we will go on a tour.”

  I sent the girls home together before heading toward the Dungeon Raiders Guild to sell the ‘Steel Sting.’ Since the guild building was directly on my way home, I arrived at the entrance in just a few minutes and stepped inside to handle the business.

  [Edited]

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  Heroes:

  Aymeric Petiaux

  Koreyn