Chapter 91: Raid Dungeon (8)

Ketal glanced around, wondering how to exploit the boss’s mechanics. His party members were busy hauling off unconscious mercenaries and the chains were scattered on the ground. Ever since the boss entered its hidden phase, the hole in its chest had closed up, and its chains had come loose. Those chains still lay where they had fallen.

Maybe I can use those,

Ketal thought.

He decided to try the same mechanic as before—bind the boss’s four arms with those freed chains and restrain it again. Some raid bosses required repeating the same gimmick. With that in mind, Ketal raced toward the boss and reached out.

Boom.

He clenched his fist and slammed it down, shaking the entire room.

The monster screamed,

“Kyaaah!”

Without delay, Ketal snatched up the chains from the floor and began wrapping them around the boss’s arms. The cuffs on each end had come undone, so he couldn’t fasten them normally. Instead, he simply wound the chains tightly around its limbs.

Of course, the boss wasn’t going to hold still. There was no way it would just watch while its arms got chained up. It thrashed its arms in an attempt to shake him off, and Ketal was a bit annoyed.

“Stay put,” Ketal muttered, stomping on the boss’s torso in irritation.

A deafening boom echoed, and the boss coughed up blood, even though it was immune to physical damage and hadn’t actually been injured. It had at least been rattled enough to pause, so Ketal kept winding the chains around its arms.

Next, I should anchor these to those pillars on the edges,

Ketal thought. He picked up the chains and headed for the perimeter of the room, only to find no pillars waiting there.

Oh, right.

When the boss entered its hidden phase, the pillars had sunk into the floor. Even with the arms chained, there was nowhere to secure them.

After a brief moment of thought, Ketal made his decision.

I’ll just jam it into the wall.

Ketal took the chain and hammered it into the wall. Cracks formed, and the chains were driven in deep. One by one, he pinned all four of the boss’s arms to the walls until he stood back, satisfied, and looked at the boss.

“Kyaaah!”

The boss flailed, but nothing else happened.

“No, this is not it,” Ketal remarked.

Crack!

With a furious roar, the boss ripped the chains out of the wall. It swung its arms in anger, sending the liberated chains scraping across the floor toward Ketal.

“I guess I don’t need these anymore,” he said casually, catching the flying chain and squeezing until it crumbled into dust.

“Alright,” he added with a bright smile. “What should I try next?”

He kept dodging the boss’s attacks while mulling over possibilities, eying its face. It had a giant eye but a comparatively small nose and mouth—both roughly human-sized. Although it was immune to physical damage, it wasn’t truly invincible. One classic method of killing a seemingly impervious enemy was to cut off its airflow.

In one smooth motion, Ketal soared through the air and stopped right in front of its massive eye.

“Kya—”

The boss’s pupils reflected Ketal’s form. It panicked and tried to respond, but Ketal’s hand seized its head.

Boom!

He slammed its head down so hard that the boss couldn’t even scream—mainly because Ketal’s grip covered both its mouth and nose.

This is a classic move too,

he thought.

An enemy immune to physical blows wasn’t invulnerable if it still needed to breathe. If one blocked its nose and mouth, one could suffocate it. Ketal had seen this method in various stories and thought it was worth a shot.

The boss couldn’t even whimper. Powerful hands clamped down on its mouth and nose with the weight of a mountain, so it flailed its all four arms, desperately punching at Ketal to make him let go.

Boom! Boom!

Each strike unleashed a shockwave, and the boss was indeed superhumanly strong—Cartman had assessed its power as enough to cleave through anything and reshape the very land. However, it was useless here; Ketal didn’t budge an inch. He appeared unscathed, and the boss looked like it was losing its mind.

About thirty minutes passed, and the boss eventually slowed down, more out of exhaustion than a lack of oxygen, because it clearly wasn’t suffocating.

“So, this is not working either,” Ketal said, letting go. “I wonder what’s the point of having that nose if it’s not for breathing.”

Finally freed, the boss unleashed a pent-up wail.

“Kyaaah!”

Its roar reverberated through the room as it staggered upright. It glared at Ketal with pure hatred and lunged at him in a fury. Ketal calmly grabbed its arm and slammed it back down. Then he seized its tail.

“How about I toss you into the hole you crawled out of?” he said, dragging the creature across the ground. The boss tried to cling to the floor, scraping it with its claws, but it was all in vain.

It looked like a tantrum-throwing child being carried off by a parent. Ketal hauled it right to the hole in the ground and flung it in. Its scream grew distant as it fell.

Boom!

After a while, a heavy impact echoed from below. Ketal peered into the hole, looking intrigued.

“That hole is pretty deep. How far down does it go?”

“Kyaaah!”

The boss clung to the walls of the hole and began climbing back up.

“Oh, wow! You’re coming back?” Ketal said with a delighted laugh.

It was all useless effort on the boss’s part, but he neither pitied it nor felt tired himself. If anything, he was having fun.

After all, trial and error was part of the joy of figuring out a raid.

What should I try next?

Ketal smiled to himself as he planned his next move.

***

The party members all stood by and watched with rigid expressions.

At first, they had been filled with awe at Ketal’s strength. They were thrilled at the prospect of surviving and amazed to see Ketal completely overwhelm the boss. Yet, as time went on, their initial admiration faded, replaced by growing fear.

The boss let out a roar.

“Kyaaaah!”

That alone was enough to freeze them in place; it was, after all, an incredibly powerful monster that had knocked out Cartman—an Advanced mercenary—in the blink of an eye. They all knew it was an enemy they couldn’t hope to defeat in their lifetime. However, that terrifying monster was now little more than a plaything in Ketal’s hands.

From Ketal’s perspective, he was simply trying out ideas after another, searching for a way to defeat a boss that couldn’t be killed by normal means. To the others, though, it looked as if he was merely toying with it. And the most unsettling part of it all was the expression on Ketal’s face.

“Look... he’s smiling,” Marcy muttered, her voice trembling.

Ketal’s grin never left his face, as if he was pleased by the boss’s desperate flailing and genuinely enjoying the situation. It wasn’t the smile of someone who enjoyed combat for the thrill of battle. That would have been far less frightening by comparison. This was something else—an utterly foreign expression, more like someone reveling in a new, entertaining game.

They saw the boss as a powerful monster, so they were stumped as to what to call Ketal, someone who was dominating a powerful monster.

Before long, the boss stopped trying to fight back and started trying to escape. It turned to flee in panic, flailing its limbs like it was running for dear life.

“Hey now, I can’t let you do that,” Ketal said. He grabbed its tail again, slamming it into the ground.

“Kyaaah! Kaaah!”

The boss resisted weakly, but it had lost much of its fire. It was strong, yet all its attacks had proved useless against Ketal.

Even so, it

couldn’t

die, and at first, it had tried to find a way to overcome Ketal. But now it knew full well how impossible that was. Terror filled its eyes. More frightening than Ketal’s power was the look on his face—like it wasn’t even considering the boss a living being but a toy, nothing more or less.

The boss no longer wanted to be that toy. It just wanted to get away. Its once-proud immunity to damage—unless someone triggered the boss mechanics—now felt like a curse.

The boss’s eyes flew open, determined. It wasn’t just a mindless beast; it was the Dungeon’s master, a being that had devoured intruding humans and been promised domination over an even higher realm. It refused to let this fear consume it.

The boss didn’t care if its enemy was stronger or if it was treated like a mere toy. It just had to fight and win.

“Oooh! Ah! Aaah!”

With a guttural roar, the boss surged to its feet. Its body swelled, its arms doubled in size, and its tail shed its outer skin as it elongated. By sheer force of will, it had forced itself to grow beyond its original limits.

“Uwaaah!”

It lashed out in rage and renewed pride.

Boom!

Yet, its punch simply stopped mid-strike. Ketal had caught it in one hand.

“So there’s a second hidden phase,” he remarked with interest. “That’s interesting.”

He tightened his grip, then hurled the boss into the wall.

“Urr... uwooo.”

Flickers of fighting spirits in the boss’s eyes dimmed once more.

Its movements grew sluggish, and Ketal found himself lost in thought. He had tried nearly everything he could think of, and still, the boss remained intact—a sign that normal methods simply weren’t going to cut it.

After a brief pause, Ketal hefted his axe. He remembered how the boss’s chest had cracked open when its chains were pulled tight. That wound had snapped shut in the hidden phase, but it was still a weak point.

Maybe all it needs is my full power,

Ketal thought.

The boss appeared immune to normal physical damage, but Ketal wondered if that was only because he hadn’t yet used his true strength.

His eyes grew serious, and he raised his axe. Right away, the boss felt a wave of dread—it was supposed to be invincible until the mechanics were triggered, yet something about that axe told it the next attack was going to kill it.

“Ky—kyaaah!”

The boss suddenly began thrashing in a panic. It tore itself away from Ketal and, to everyone’s surprise, started undoing its own defenses. After a few frantic moments, a glow spread across the boss’s body, which began crumbling into dust.

Even as it died, its expression shone with relief—like it was finally free.

And just like that, the boss was gone.

“Huh?”

𝘧𝓇ℯ𝑒𝓌𝑒𝑏𝓃𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘭.𝒸ℴ𝓂

The party members, still trembling, stared at the spot where the boss had vanished.

A Dungeon’s boss killed itself?

Geinalt wondered.

Even from a distance, they had recognized the look of relief on the boss’s face. Yet, it was mind-boggling. Monsters in a Dungeon didn’t fear death, and they certainly did not destroy themselves out of terror. Once a monster would set its sights on its prey, it would fight to the death—even if it meant losing limbs in the process.

However, this boss had evidently found the situation so unbearable that it chose to vanish rather than continue.

“Huh,” Ketal said, pausing for a moment. Then he nodded. “A self-destruct pattern, maybe.”

He figured the boss had to have triggered its own demise, either because it had finally taken enough damage or too much time had passed—something along those lines. In any case, it looked like that was indeed a valid way to finish the fight.

Stretching his arms, Ketal felt more or less satisfied with how things had gone. Then he turned to the party.

“You guys alright?” Ketal asked.

“Y-yes! We’re fine!” Geinalt answered, snapping to attention like a newly recruited soldier. He was suddenly using polite speech, but Ketal didn’t think too much of it and simply nodded.

“It looks like we need to wake the others.”

The mercenaries were still unconscious.

“I’ll take care of it!” Geinalt shouted as he gave a hasty nod. He rushed over to Cartman, who was still passed out on the ground.