Unconsciously, Ye Yu once again arrived at the second level of the dungeon. Since the number of people on the first floor was gradually increasing, and it was starting to feel troublesome, Ye Yu decided to head to the second floor, where there were fewer people.
He still clearly remembered the route he took yesterday. If he wanted, he could easily descend all the way to the fifth floor.
However, because of Eiina's repeated warnings yesterday, Ye Yu reluctantly gave up on that plan for now.
"Forget it, I'll just explore the second floor a bit more. Maybe there really are too few monsters on the first floor, which is why I haven't encountered any," Ye Yu thought to himself as he leisurely wandered the second floor. Time passed, and by the time dusk approached, Ye Yu still hadn't made a single discovery.
Even someone slow to react would start to feel that something was off.
This couldn't just be a matter of luck. Due to some other reason, he simply wasn't encountering any monsters.
With this thought, Ye Yu frowned in frustration.
Why exactly was he not running into any monsters?
As he touched the walls of the dungeon's labyrinth, a certain possibility suddenly occurred to him.
If the dungeon itself was alive, and the monsters' births were controlled by the dungeon, could it be that the dungeon was afraid of something? Could that be why no monsters were spawning near him?
Was the dungeon... afraid of him?
Ye Yu rubbed the tip of his nose, feeling that his own theory might be a bit too arrogant. He was just an ordinary person after all—why would a dungeon that even the gods cared about be afraid of him?
Unconsciously, Ye Yu found himself at the staircase leading to the third floor. Looking down toward the deeper levels, he fell into thought.
Should he continue going down?
Though Eiina had warned him, it was really frustrating not to encounter a single monster.
Sighing lightly, Ye Yu finally chose to press onward. After all, it was too unsatisfying to keep returning empty-handed.
With that resolve, Ye Yu roamed around the third floor—but still found no trace of any monsters.
"This is really... interesting," he muttered under his breath, glancing at the staircase leading to the fourth floor, which he passed for the fourth time.
Just like yesterday, there wasn't a single monster on the third floor.
"If you really are a living dungeon, can you tell me what it is you fear? I can't think of anything about myself that should scare you..." Ye Yu whispered with a sigh, then without hesitation descended to the fourth floor, and quickly made his way to the fifth.
"If you won't spawn monsters near me, then I'll just keep going down until you finally do."
If anyone else heard this, they'd think Ye Yu had gone mad. But in this dungeon, there was no one to warn him of the dangers of such reckless behavior.
After all, blindly trusting strangers here could easily cost one their life. A passerby might suddenly become an enemy who stabs you in the back.
Soon after the fifth floor, Ye Yu found the stairs leading to the sixth floor. Once there, he finally slowed down.
The sixth floor was completely unfamiliar to him—the terrain, the layout, none of it was known.
But it wasn't impossible to find his way. The dungeon had existed for countless years, and countless adventurers had come and gone. The frequently traveled routes and the paths leading downward naturally differed from other parts.
By subtle clues—scratches on the walls at corners, relatively smooth pillars, less dusty corridors—Ye Yu could still easily determine the right way.
Before long, he passed the seventh, eighth, and ninth floors. In less than an hour, he was almost down to the tenth floor. Even seasoned veterans familiar with the layouts of the first ten floors probably couldn't move as fast as Ye Yu.
After all, they had to constantly watch for monsters suddenly bursting out of the walls, while Ye Yu didn't have to worry about any of that.
This dungeon, notorious for its extreme danger, remained calm and peaceful before Ye Yu, as if it were nothing more than his own backyard.
"If I go any further down... I'll reach the tenth floor, right?"
Staring at the staircase descending before him, Ye Yu sighed with a troubled look.
After all this time, he still hadn't encountered a single monster.
"This can't be explained by luck anymore... what exactly is going on?"
Just as Ye Yu stood at the foot of the stairs, agonizing over whether to continue downward, a sudden roar echoed from below.
It sounded like the bellow of some kind of bovine creature—but this was no gentle cow's cry.
A monster... appeared?
Ye Yu was momentarily stunned, then finally realized that he had at last come across a monster.
The ground trembled beneath his feet as the beast thundered forward, and it seemed to be charging straight at him.
The joy of spotting a monster instantly vanished. Ye Yu suddenly remembered something: although he'd found a monster, this creature was probably from below the tenth floor, right?
No... that bellowing roar sounded exactly like the Minotaur—the monster unique to around the fifteenth floor, according to Eiina.
Though Eiina's lessons were often dull and dry, Ye Yu had still managed to remember some key details, and the Minotaur was one of them.
Eiina had only briefly mentioned this beast, which roamed near the fifteenth floor, but Ye Yu knew it was a Level 2 creature.
Though the difference in levels seemed small, Level 2 monsters were far more powerful than Level 1 ones—an entirely different league.
"So... in a situation like this... should I run?"
Recalling Eiina's words, Ye Yu muttered to himself.
The earth beneath him continued to shake, and the terrifying roar of the beast grew louder and closer—but Ye Yu still wore an expression that betrayed little sense of urgency.
It was as if, having finally found a monster after all this time, the fact that he now had to run away left him deeply dissatisfied.