The sound of his boots echoed softly against the cold stone.
Step after step, Luki descended the spiral staircase that connected the Dungeon's entrance to the first floor. A torch fixed to the wall every twenty meters cast a flickering yellowish glow, projecting long shadows that twisted over the uneven walls.
It was a familiar path. Even with the muffled steps and the warm draft rising from below, everything there felt known to him—the smell of mold and damp earth, the stifling heat that grew with each level, the faint creak of leather whenever he moved his arms to keep balance.
And yet… something felt different.
Maybe it was the silence.
Normally, on the stairs, you could hear distant echoes even early in the morning, the noises of other adventurers descending or returning from their journeys.
But now, only the sound of his own steps.
The silence was dense, heavy. Not like a natural pause, but as if the place itself were holding its breath.
— Is it just me, or am I getting paranoid? — he muttered in his own tongue, running his gloved fingers along the earthen wall to his right. — The texture feels different…
His eyes scanned the surface carefully. The color seemed darker, a deep brown tinged with green, as if more moisture had seeped in. The texture too, rougher, more brittle in certain spots.
— Wait… why do I remember the color of the wall so clearly? — he whispered, frowning. — That's not normal, since when do I have so much free time to thinkg about this?
He kept going down, but his focus was no longer on the steps. His mind spun restlessly, searching for patterns, trying to reconcile memory with the reality before him.
When he reached the end of the stairway, he stopped.
The entrance to the first floor was there, the stone arch he knew so well. It was the first opening, the northernmost one, and the most used by beginner adventurers. A safe point, or at least, it should have been.
Luki always started from there. A true "wall-hugger," he liked to explore everything, every corner, every dead end, every useless slope of the Dungeon. Almost a ritual. Starting at the same spot always helped him map his progress, to keep control.
And precisely because of that… he knew.
— The passage is bigger.
He narrowed his eyes, stepped forward. His instincts told him something was wrong, but he didn't rely on instinct alone. He measured with his feet: one, two, three… twelve steps wide. Then compared the height with his own body, gauging angles and proportions. He touched the arch, assessing the thickness of the structure.
— Before, the passage was wide enough for five people to walk side by side. Now, ten can pass easily.
He drew half a step back, as if distance might confirm the suspicion. His gaze was pulled into the Dungeon's interior, the very first corridor, the same one he had once taken his first steps in as an adventurer. That place carried memory, weight… familiarity.
And now, it felt… wrong.
His eyes widened for an instant before narrowing. They scanned every detail, every curve, every shadow. His mind, like a silent machine, began to work.
It was like playing "Spot the Differences," with the Dungeon from seven days ago superimposed on the one stretching out before him, and the differences were everywhere.
There was much more luminous moss on the walls. Far more. Enough that the corridor looked as if someone had lit the Dungeon's "lamps." Before, the glow was sparse, limited to small green clusters. Now, it seemed almost intentional.
What once had been raw, earthy-brown walls, had now taken on the solid, uniform look of gray stone. Almost as if the floor had been renovated.
And the corridor itself… was bigger. Much bigger. Wider, taller, deeper. As if the Dungeon had stretched its bones overnight and hadn't bothered to hide the cracks.
Theories whirled in his mind. A natural change? Some magical phenomenon? Divine interference? But it was too early to conclude anything, and besides, he didn't have all day to stand contemplating hallways.
So he just kept walking.
1 meter.2 meters.3 meters.5 meters.8 meters.19 meters.
He stopped.
Frozen.
His expression stiffened with a tension almost melancholic, as if an old, familiar weight had once again settled onto his shoulders. His green eyes, once bright like emeralds, now looked rigid, dull, as if something essential had been corrupted.
There were no monsters. No noise. No metallic scent of blood or decay in the air. Only the tunnel, stretching to its end… and curving.
A sudden curve.
To the left.
....
Silence.
Luki stood there, staring at the change as if staring hard enough could undo it.
...
— The curve was to the right…
...
The Dungeon was wrapped in an almost absurd silence that morning. It felt like every adventurer in Orario had decided to take the day off. Even the monsters seemed to have joined in, as if they had read the calendar and decided it was a good day for a break from their cycle of spawning, hunting, and dying.
Luki walked with slow, steady steps, every muscle in his body strung tight like a bow ready to snap. It had been an hour since he'd entered the floor, and he hadn't covered even a third of his usual route.
Not because he was lost, but because this time, every step was measured, every shadow watched as though it hid some ancient predator.
It was strange. Not even on his first day as an adventurer had he been this tense—or this perceptive.
But he had already accepted that today would not be an ordinary day of work.
That was when he heard it.
— Groah!
The sound burst through the muffled corridor like a sharp crack, a low, hoarse guttural roar. Luki stopped instantly, instincts reacting before his mind could.
Goblin.
He recognized it immediately. Too familiar to mistake.
A funny fact: probably more than half the adventurers in Orario couldn't recognize a goblin by sound, even after years of experience.
He moved cautiously to the end of the corridor and hid near the right turn. Pressing against the wall, he peeked around the corner with the careful precision of someone who knew a mistake could be costly.
And there it was.
A goblin. Alone. Small, with long, thin limbs, a pot-bellied gut, and dirty green skin. Pointed ears, yellowed teeth, wild, gleaming eyes. Everything about it screamed it was just another common goblin from the first floor.
But Luki frowned.
Something was wrong.
'It's… searching the area?'
The goblin wasn't wandering aimlessly, as expected. It was exploring. Looking around. Stopping at small ridges in the walls, sniffing the air, listening carefully… as if it were looking for something. Food? An exit? Other goblins?
The reason didn't matter. What mattered was the behavior, and this was not normal.
Goblins, though dangerous in groups or when underestimated, were never exactly known for cunning. They didn't hunt prey. They reacted. They followed the scent of blood, or the sound of heavy steps. Drifters of instinct. But this one…
This one was thinking. Primitive, savage thought, yes, but thought nonetheless.
'Xeno?'
That was the first association that came to mind.
Thinking monsters. For reasons still unknown, these beings were born in the Dungeon like any other, but were fundamentally different. Not in physical form, but in behavior.
The ability to speak. Self-awareness. Emotional reactions. The capacity to learn, even notions of society.
It wasn't common. It shouldn't be common.
And it definitely shouldn't be happening now.
If logic followed the story he knew, the Xenos weren't supposed to become relevant until much later. The timing simply didn't match.
He leaned against the wall, ears alert for sound, but used the next seconds to organize his thoughts.
Possibilities:
1. The Xenos already existed, but the original story only showed them later.
2. This world follows an alternate path, and narrative timing doesn't matter.
3. His own presence in this world caused unpredictable changes. Classic Butterfly Effect.
4. Last week's earthquake was directly connected to all this.
Luki ruled none of them out.
The most plausible theory, for now, was the fourth. Ever since that earthquake, everything had been different. The Dungeon had changed, its structure, its atmosphere, and now, maybe even its monsters.
That was no coincidence.
'If it really is a Xeno… then I don't know what I should do.'
Instinctively, his gaze dropped to the bronze sword in his hand. For a moment, it felt heavier. Not in weight, but in meaning.
The reason was obvious.
'I don't think I'm ready to kill someone. Monster or not.'
Luki was used to violence. Cutting, stabbing, surviving, it was part of the job. And in the context of the Dungeon, monsters were nothing but obstacles. Instinctive, repetitive, without will or identity. Almost automatons. Almost… easy to dehumanize.
But that thing, what he was watching… was different.
Maybe it was because he came from a more peaceful world. Maybe it was the weight of stories he carried from fiction. Or maybe he simply didn't have the stomach to accept that sometimes, the "monster" wasn't something you could just slice in half and move on from.
To him, that was, or at least could be, someone.
And killing someone, no matter how strange it sounded, was a line he hadn't yet crossed. No matter how much he prepared himself, the thought just didn't fit inside him.
...
Even so, he didn't look away.
He kept watching the goblin in silence, trailing it at a distance with utmost discretion. Every step measured, every breath controlled. He needed certainty.
He wanted to see with his own eyes if this truly was something different… or just paranoia fueled by seven days of waiting and a mind too tired to rest.
If it was just a monster, he would kill it. Without joy, without anger. Just out of necessity.
But if it was a Xeno… then maybe there was another choice.
Long minutes passed in observation. He followed the creature through its short path, noting every reaction, every curious gesture, every hesitation that didn't fit the pattern. Every pause, every glance over its shoulder, every moment of doubt. Behaviors that didn't belong to a common goblin.
Until finally, Luki came to a decision…