The magic crystal above Inanna's head lit up, and she cast Mud Swamp in a slightly flustered manner.
The solid ground beneath the Earth Worm instantly turned into a muddy swamp, and the rocks it had dug out turned into slurry.
However, the depth of the swampified ground was limited. In the deeper underground, at the tail end of the giant worm's body, the soil was still firm.
Relying on that small solid section underground, the Earth Worm was still slowly retracting downward.
Lin Jun naturally wasn't going to just watch it escape.
"Inanna, keep casting Mud Swamp! Don't stop!"
"Okay."
At the same time, the Pujis that had been taking damage all this while finally started fighting back. The "pop-pop" sounds of mushroom cannons echoed nonstop.
Lin Jun concentrated all firepower on the cracked sections of the Earth Worm's rocky armor.
On the panel, the Earth Worm's HP kept dropping. At its current digging speed, it wouldn't be able to escape!
It's going to work!
My hope of escaping the dungeon!
After this, as long as I temporarily move over and finish eating the Earth Worm to obtain its skills, I'll be able to dig upward and see the sun again!
It's really been a long time since I last basked in sunlight.
But… why is the ground shaking again?
The direction the tremors are coming from is…
"Inanna, run back!!!"
"Huh?"
Inanna, who was focused on maintaining Mud Swamp, didn't react at all. She only subconsciously took two steps back.
The next second, another giant worm burst out of the rock right in front of her!
The protruding rocky armor swept past. Inanna was sent flying into the tunnel as if she'd been hit by an uppercut.
"Inanna? Inanna!"
No response.
Lin Jun hurriedly opened the panel — down 400 HP.
Fortunately, she had over 3000 HP, so she was still far from dying. But she had clearly passed out.
Nearby, four Pujis carried the unconscious Inanna and the fallen A-rank magic crystal and retreated deeper into the tunnel.
Inanna was temporarily safe.
But the battlefield situation was not optimistic.
The second Earth Worm that had suddenly barged in was rampaging around the cavern, crushing large numbers of Pujis to death.
The Mud Swamp trapping the injured Earth Worm, without Inanna's maintenance, was gradually hardening, and its underground drilling speed was clearly increasing.
That one…
Why is there a second Earth Worm?
Did I place too many magic crystals and the attraction was too strong?
Or do these worms have some kind of companion instinct and help each other?
There was no time to think.
The second Earth Worm was definitely impossible to deal with, so Lin Jun could only focus all firepower on continuing to attack the injured one.
Ignoring the continuous casualties of the Pujis, Lin Jun poured out firepower with everything he had.
As long as he could press its HP down before it escaped…
"What? You're saying I was knocked away by another Earth Worm?"
23 Pujis.
And 1 Inanna, who had already woken up but was still confused — and even a little excited.
This was all the remaining force that had retreated back to the Mushroom Garden.
The severely wounded Earth Worm ultimately escaped with its last sliver of HP.
The remaining Pujis, under harassment from the other Earth Worm, suffered heavy losses.
Even worse, many areas had collapsed. Many Pujis couldn't return to the tunnel they came from and could only be abandoned helplessly.
The only thing worth celebrating was that the mana fluctuations from the battle had scared away all nearby small monsters.
They didn't encounter any more attacks on the way back.
Otherwise, not a single one of them might have made it back.
Right now, Lin Jun felt like a stock investor who had gone all-in and come out naked.
All savings gone.
Fortunately, there is no mortgage system in the dungeon.
He still has a Mushroom Garden…
The joys and sorrows of mushrooms are not connected.
While Lin Jun was secretly heartbroken over his losses, Inanna was in a good mood.
She didn't know that Lin Jun was hunting Earth Worms in order to escape the dungeon.
She also didn't know how much he had gambled on this hunt.
In her eyes, they could just organize another hunt later.
After all, it's not like there would be two Earth Worms every time, right?
She only knew that Lin Jun kept his promise.
The A-rank magic crystal tied to her mushroom cap officially belonged to her now.
Inanna decided that from now on, she would call Lin Jun Boss!
As for almost getting bitten by an Earth Worm?
She had no real sense of it at all.
She suddenly passed out, and thanks to LV4 life regeneration, she was already full HP when she woke up.
She had no memory of being injured at all — it felt like she just lay down and earned an A-rank crystal.
She was even thinking…
Maybe next hunt, she could get another A-rank magic crystal?
In one corner of the Mushroom Garden, beneath a giant mushroom, at the end of a 10-meter-long tunnel made of mycelium, there was a 3×3 underground space.
Lin Jun's true body — an ordinary-looking green mushroom — was here.
In the same room was also a special Puji emitting a powerful aura.
Unlike the other disposable Pujis, this one had been nurtured since the very beginning of the Mushroom Garden's establishment, and all its skills and level had been raised to Lin Jun's current limit.
This was the strongest Puji.
It was Lin Jun's personal mount.
Now the problem in front of Lin Jun was:
Should he honestly spend a long time accumulating strength again and hunt Earth Worms once more?
Or should he return to the original plan and, the next time the Flame Demon goes out, risk everything and use the super Puji to smuggle his main body upward?
At the same time, at the passage between the Deep Layer and the 10th Floor, near the Flame Demon's nest.
"So hot! Is this the deep layer of the Amethyst Dungeon? Don't tell me it's all lava zones? Are you sure that young lady would be in a place like this?"
Night Owl tugged uncomfortably at her tight clothes.
She had zero heat resistance. She could barely stand here only after drinking a Flame Protection Potion.
Even so, she felt miserable and just wanted to leave as soon as possible.
A Cooling Spell fell on the group, and Night Owl finally looked more comfortable.
"That really saved my life."
The light on Ivan's staff faded. The halfling archmage smiled and nodded.
When his magic addiction wasn't acting up, he was actually quite reliable.
Captain Nova held the positioning crystal and sensed it.
"That's right. The direction guidance is almost horizontal. It should be in the upper half of the Deep Layer."
"But this is the Deep Layer! I might not even survive a month here!"
Unlike the first ten floors, which had clear tier structures,
Each layer before had its own characteristics — monster level ranges, exploitable rules, and so on.
Night Owl believed that as long as she had a guide, she could survive alone without much trouble.
But the Deep Layer was different.
This place was pure chaos.
Monsters of any level could appear here.
More importantly, the monsters wander around. Every time adventurers come down, they might encounter a completely different situation.
Just like the information they had from three years ago said there should be an LV59 Flame Demon at this passage.
But now, aside from lava, there wasn't any monster here at all.
Of course, this was a good thing.
But it also meant that the Deep Layer had changed again, and that information had become completely outdated.
"Alright, once we find her, we'll know how she survived."
The half-dragon Gar's tone was no longer as depressed as before departure.
The two worst possibilities — the Parasitic Tree and the Tentacle Nest — had already been ruled out.
In his opinion, the chances that the Duke's daughter was alive and mentally healthy were much higher than expected.
Well… probably increased from 2% to 20%.