Baiting the Horde
"At this rate, we're completely finished!"
"No, not necessarily."
Bennett was momentarily taken aback by the voices, but he kept still and listened. He made no habit of eavesdropping on strangers, but there was little he could do when their words carried right through the wall.
"We're cornered, damn it! How is that not finished?!"
"We're cornered, true, but the undead haven't found us yet either."
"I'm not just talking about the zombies! What about those bastards...?!"
"We need to be careful, of course. But do you really think they'd bother hacking through that entire horde just to hunt us down? Unlikely. Look on the bright side. Because of the horde, they can't find us either."
"Hey... shut up for a second."
After a brief silence, sharp panic cut through the grumbler's voice.
"We're screwed. The zombies are heading this way."
"Oh dear."
"'Oh dear,' my ass! I said we're screwed!"
"Let's clear them out first. If we take them down quickly, we might still be fine."
Footsteps receded into the distance, followed shortly by the dull thuds of combat.
They're fighting the zombies.
The two men were clearly trying to dispatch them as quietly as possible, but no matter how sluggish a zombie was, fighting in absolute silence was an impossibility. Before long, the footsteps came rushing back, closer and faster than before.
"Shit, the whole pack's swarming! What now?!"
"First, stay calm—"
"You crazy bastard! How the hell am I supposed to stay calm right now?!"
Perhaps pushed to his limit by the encroaching horde, the grumbler—who had at least tried to keep his voice down earlier—was now shouting at the top of his lungs.
"Phew... Look, I'll draw as much of their attention as I can. Take that chance and slip away—"
Bennett, who had been listening in silence, pushed open the fitting room door.
The two men, who had just been debating self-sacrifice, froze in place, their eyes bulging in shock.
"This way," Bennett said calmly.
"..."
"Zombies are right behind you."
Snapping back to their senses, the pair scrambled to gather their gear and slipped inside. Designed for a single customer, the cubicle was naturally cramped to bursting, but—
Click.
The moment Bennett opened the hidden door leading into the makeshift storage area, space ceased to be an issue.
"Keep moving forward."
Pulling the fitting room door shut behind him, Bennett followed closely behind them.
Graaaagh!
A heartbeat later, the horde hot on their trail slammed against the outer partition.
Thud. Thump.
The partition groaned under the mindless shoving of the undead, but despite shuddering violently, the false wall held firm. After milling about aimlessly, the horde finally drifted elsewhere.
Only then did the two men exhale the breath they had been holding.
"Thank you for your help," the man who had maintained an optimistic outlook said, bowing politely.
"...Thanks," the grumbler added, scratching the back of his neck with an awkward grimace.
"I am Kyle. I entered this dungeon alongside Edgar here."
"Bennett."
The man who had kept a level head despite their dire circumstances was Kyle. A finely kept sword rested at his hip. The grumbler who had been ready to lay down his life for his comrade was Edgar, armed with a hefty square shield and a mace.
"Are you from the North?"
Looking at Edgar, Bennett couldn't help but ask. Edgar's frame was massive by any measure, and a distinctive brand-like tattoo was etched into the nape of his neck. He was the spitting image of a Northern warrior.
"What? The North?" Edgar scowled, visibly offended. "Hey, Bennett. Isn't that a bit harsh for someone you just met? Calling a decent fellow a Northerner?"
The vehement reaction caught Bennett off guard. Wait, he's not from the North? With that frame?
"What part of me looks like one of those brainless brutes? Judging a man by his looks... that's a terrible habit!"
Staring deadpan at Edgar, Bennett spoke in a flat whisper: "Zombies are coming."
"You nasty little—mph."
Watching Edgar clamp his own mouth shut in an instant, Bennett nodded approvingly. "Right. Definitely not a Northerner."
"..."
The Northerners Bennett knew were relentless combatants who picked a fight regardless of the odds whenever an enemy appeared. They were utterly incapable of keeping quiet or acting with restraint. Had Edgar been one of them, his immediate response to news of approaching zombies would have been to roar, "Smash them all to pieces! Charge!"
"I have a few questions of my own," Bennett said.
"Of course. Please, go ahead."
"That horde just now—were they originally roaming this area?"
"Ah, well, about that..."
Kyle's explanation quickly laid out the sequence of events.
"So you were ambushed by another party on the fifth floor, and while dodging them, you stirred up a mob of zombies? You ran down to the fourth floor, kept evading them, and ended up running into me."
"Precisely."
Bennett looked between Kyle and Edgar. "You two seem capable enough."
"We don't usually get called weak, but... the match-up was rather unfortunate."
Edgar, who had remained quiet during Kyle's recap, cut in with a snarl. "It was the Hunters. Those scum who specialize in human prey."
"The Hunters?"
Hyenas who preyed on fellow scavengers rather than exploring dungeons, stripping their corpses of gear and spoils. They were an infamous syndicate known for lurking in [Easy] dungeons to butcher newly arrived scavengers. Their reputation was atrocious, but because every member was a seasoned killer, other scavengers could do little except steer clear.
"Do the Hunters carry any identifying mark?"
"A black skull tattoo on the back of their left hand."
Bennett's brow furrowed. So it was them.
The crew he had seen on basement level 1, recklessly carving through zombies with noisy abandon—they had skull tattoos etched onto the backs of their left hands.
"There were fifteen of them, right?"
"Huh? How did you know...?"
"I spotted them when I first entered the dungeon."
Hearing Bennett's account of the basement floor, Kyle and Edgar nodded in relief.
"That was a close call. It could have been disastrous."
Bennett tapped his chin in thought. Fifteen members deployed by the Hunters. It might not sound like an overwhelming army, but in standard scavenger party terms, it was equivalent to three whole squads banded together as one. It was a vile tactic made possible only by the lack of restrictions on dungeon party sizes.
They were almost certainly the strongest force inside the LT Department Store dungeon right now. He needed to whittle down their numbers somehow. Avoiding them was an option for now, but they wouldn't stay holed up on the fifth floor forever. Letting a hostile force of that caliber flank him from behind was a recipe for disaster.
I need allies.
Bennett's gaze settled on Kyle and Edgar. As if responding to his resolve, a translucent window materialized before his eyes.
Escape the Dungeon with Kyle and Edgar
🎁 Reward: 15 EXP
💀 Penalty for Failure: Death
"Take your time, but search thoroughly! Check every single corner!"
"Understood!"
The Hunters were tearing the fifth floor apart. Loud crashes echoed across the department store with every passing second, but the syndicate members couldn't care less as they shoved over display racks and flipped drawers onto the floor. The small scavenger party that had arrived earlier was already a pair of cold corpses, and the massive horde of hundreds of zombies had descended to the fourth floor. There was nothing left to impede their pillaging—at least not on the fifth floor.
"We should've hunted down those two runners and gutted th—"
"Wait. Shh."
A Hunter standing guard near the central escalators suddenly perked his ears up.
"What is it?"
"I thought I heard something."
Clang. Clang.
"...!"
Having walked up and down the escalators themselves, they recognized that hollow metallic echo instantly. Drawing his blade, the guard whipped his head toward the sound.
On the staircase where no one should have been stood a lone young man. Catching their eyes, the intruder deliberately took another step upward.
Clang.
The metallic ringing reverberated once more.
"Who the hell is that?"
"Looks like he's alone."
They had been bored out of their minds standing watch anyway. But just as the guards grinned, ready to dismantle the lone fool, their smiles froze at what was surging behind his back.
Graaaaaah!
The horde that had gone down to the fourth floor was now swarming back up the escalator.
Glancing over his shoulder, the young man jumped in place with all his might.
CLANG!
Spurred by the jarring racket, the sluggish zombies surged into a violent frenzy, clawing and scrambling up the steps at double their previous speed.
The stunned Hunters finally realized the man's intention, a second too late.
"Y-You crazy bastard!"
The Hunters lunged forward to cut him down, but as if anticipating the reaction, the young man vaulted cleanly over the escalator's side railing. The central escalators were arranged in a crisscrossing X-shape between the ascending and descending lanes. In a flash, he dropped down toward the fourth-floor side to make his escape, and the raging tidal wave of undead he had dragged behind him slammed headfirst into the fifth floor.