After walking for a while, I quickly realized something was off.
I truly couldn't tell where I was going.
Walking straight forward felt like it lead me no where. The corridors twisted subtly, disorienting me without any obvious curves. There were no markings on the blue stone walls, no signs anywhere on the walls. The only source of light came from faintly glowing moss clinging to the walls, bathing everything in an eerie blue hue.
This place felt… strange.
More importantly, I hadn't encountered a single living creature nor any undead. That alone ruled out my earlier suspicion.
If this were a lich's crypt, it would be crawling with undead. At the very least, there'd be bones everywhere.
But there were none. The corridor was unnervingly clean.
Crack.
Crack.
The sound came from behind me. My body reacted before my mind did. I turned sharply, my gun already aiming at the target, and saw two small green-skinned creatures falling out of a crack in the wall.
Goblins.
The name surfaced instantly.
"These bastards…" They were the same creatures that had once infested the western forests of the BloodBone Empire. Back then, I had been sent to exterminate them as part of my mission when I was acting as a mercenary. These green skinned bastards were a menace back then, they were strong and their numbers were off the charts.
The beady yellow eyes of the two goblins gleamed in the dark. Each goblin clutched a crude stone, their bodies twitching.
But I didn't hesitate. An assassin never did. Strengthening my legs with body-enhancement magic, I launched myself forward.
Thwack!
A bullet tore through the air and blasted straight through the face of the first goblin, leaving a smoking hole where its head had been.
The second goblin screeched and lunged, but I raised my dagger calmly, deflecting the incoming weapon with practiced precision.
"Off you go."
Thump.
My dagger pierced cleanly through the goblin's skull. It fell without resistance.
The two goblins collapsed, and within seconds, their bodies turned to ash, scattering into the air. Left behind were two small, gleaming stones.
"Magic stones…" I picked them up, rolling one between my fingers before holding it up to my left eye. "And… such dense magic power."
"Am I still in my world… or was I thrown into some undiscovered plane?" I frowned. The two goblins had been ridiculously weak, yet the magic stones they left behind contained an absurd amount of mana. It didn't add up.
My gaze shifted back to the wall. The crack the goblins had emerged from was gone. I knocked against the stone. No hollow sound meaning it was solid, then where had the goblins come from.
Still clueless, I continued forward. This time, however, I was focused, muscles coiled and ready. If monsters appeared again, I wouldn't complain.
After all, I can absorb these stones… and grow stronger.
....
After another fifteen or twenty minutes, I finally encountered living beings again.
This time not monsters but people.
A group of three men were fighting five goblins. All three wielded swords, their movements coordinated but slightly sloppy.
["Darkness Magic: Veil."]
A thin layer of shadow wrapped around my body, blending me into the dim lighting of the corridor walls. I moved closer to the three, silent as a ghost.
The fight ended quickly. The goblins were dispatched one by one, and soon, the men bent down to collect the magic stones scattered on the ground.
"Paul, we've had a pretty good haul today," one of them said cheerfully. "Let's head back now. If we return early, we can still enjoy the Monsterphilia."
"Stick's right," another added. "We've earned enough anyway. Let's call it a day and relax."
The third person laughed. "To be honest, I wanted to check out the shops near the Colosseum myself. Alright, it's decided. We'll exchange the crystals and enjoy the rest of the day."
....
I understood the words. But not their meaning.
Monster-philia? Some kind of monster-related event?
A Colosseum? Neither the Empire nor the Federation had one. I'd only heard rumors of a distant nation possessing such a structure.
Frowning slightly, I followed them, still hiding in the shadows with my veil magic.
....
By eavesdropping on their conversations, pieces began to fall into place.
I was inside a Dungeon. Beneath the city of Orario.
And here, Gods walked among mortals. The more I listened, the more uneasy I became.
This wasn't a small planar world as I had thought… Could a planar world even allow gods to manifest freely? And more than one at that?
No. This was starting to look less like a planar world, and more like the worst possible scenario.
I had been transported to an entirely unknown world.
....
....
After following them for nearly an hour and climbing two sets of stairs, more people began appearing.
Groups of people.
And races that have been long extinct in my world. Pointy-eared elves. Short, broad dwarves. Beast-humans with animal features.
At this point, there was no need to follow the trio. Everyone was heading in the same direction.
Joining the flow, I climbed a massive set of stairs.
At the top, a vast hall greeted me. Murals covered the ceiling, depicting scenes of gods, monsters, and heroes. At the far end stood a massive exit door.
Turning back and looking at the huge set of stairs, I realized it that I seem to have landed on one of the dungeon's floors, and made my way up, following the trio.
....
The moment I stepped out of the huge tower and into the plaza, I felt a sudden dizziness and a sharp pang of pain.
"Damn." Heat. Blinding, overwhelming heat. The sun stood at its zenith, its brilliance stabbing into my eyes. Instinctively, I knew
The yellow mass in the sky was a real sun.
Not like the artificial ones from my world.
As I was still adjusting to the blinding glare and the wave of vertigo that followed, alarm bells rang violently in my mind. My instincts screamed danger.
"Bang."
I leapt backward just as a green blur exploded from the ground where I had been standing moments ago, stone and dirt scattering into the air.
The blur resolved into a snake, no, something far worse.
It looked like a snake, but was colossal, stretching close to ten meters in length, and that was with only a portion of its body exposed. The rest remained buried underground. Its visible end tapered into a grotesque, bulbous tip.
Criss-cross patterned scales covered its body, each plate tightly layered over the next, radiating an unmistakable sense of density and hardness.
Putting immediate distance between myself and the creature, I drew my gun and aimed straight at the bulbous tip of the creature.
The magic bullet struck true, but instead of piercing through, it rebounded harmlessly, failing to deal any damage. At the very least, this monster was comparable to a three- or four-star. Worse, I was forced to fight it out in the open.
"A terrible matchup."
A quick glance around confirmed another grim detail, the people who had filled the plaza earlier were gone. During my brief entanglement with the monster, they had evacuated completely.
"And looks like there are no reinforcements."
Enraged by the attack, the monster let out a deafening roar. It's bulbous tip split open, unfurling like a grotesque bloom.
My expression darkened.
"Damn. This thing isn't a snake at all, it's some kind of flower-type monster."
"Maybe fire magic may work."
As I rolled to the left to evade its next strike, another vine lashed out from the side. I barely managed to twist my body, but not enough. The second vine slammed into me, sending me crashing into a nearby wall.
I forced myself upright, scattering rubble and dust, and my eyes widened slightly. The second vine was connected to the same monster, and now several more vines broke through the ground, poised to strike like coiled whips.
Just as I braced myself for another relentless assault, the monster suddenly ignored me entirely and turned its head towards the other side of the plaza.
At some point during the skirmish, a dark elf had arrived. She stood at the other end of the plaza, calmly chanting a spell.
The monster roared and charged toward her, only to never reach her.
A torrent of fire descended like divine punishment, engulfing the monster completely. In seconds, it burned to ash. The dark elf didn't even look back, leaving as swiftly as she came.
I crouched down, breathing slowly.
"…What a welcome. First, I find myself in a cave, then somehow I reach the surface, only to face a three-star monster."
Physically, I was fine. Mentally? I rubbed my face, letting out a tired sigh.
....
A few minutes later, I scanned the scorched plaza.
A magic stone gleamed among the burnt ground. The dark elf hadn't taken the planet monster's magic stone. This one was different, yellow, with a faint green.
I picked the magic stone up and hurried into an alley.
"Thank you for the magic stone, whoever you are, dark elf-san. If I can, I'll help you in the future."
"But before that, I need to find a place to stay, then collect more information about this place. And definitely improve my strength."
Only after understanding this world could I decide, was this just another planar world… or an entirely unknown world? And then I would decide how to proceed.