The Trap in Sector 99
Tap.
A magic scroll tumbled across the floor after being clipped by a boot.
Kyle stared blankly at it for a moment, then turned toward Bennett.
"It looks like an enchanted scroll, sir."
"Must have been left behind by whoever was lying in wait here."
"Pardon?"
The party members belatedly grasped the meaning behind his words and snapped into defensive positions, weapons raised. If Bennett was right, that meant an ambush had been set in this very corridor.
"They just pulled back," Bennett said calmly. "It's safe for now."
"Well... that's a relief, but..." Erika murmured, still anxiously scanning the shadowy corners of the passageway. "If they set an ambush, wouldn't their goal be to wipe us out? Why would they suddenly retreat?"
"I couldn't say."
Bennett bent down and picked up the parchment. Unlike the common scrolls he had handled before, this one radiated an unmistakable, suffocating sense of high-grade refinement.
"Erika."
"Yes! Let me take a look."
She took the scroll, examining the runic script woven into its surface, and her eyes promptly widened to the size of saucers.
"Wait... this is a 6th-Circle spell?"
"What did you say?!" Edgar blurted out.
Every eye in the party locked onto Erika. Even Bennett looked surprised.
"A 6th-Circle scroll?"
"Yes! Magic scrolls always have inscriptions noting what spell is sealed inside... Look right here. It says Blaze Beam."
Erika pointed to a cluster of tiny, glowing glyphs etched along the wooden spindle, so minuscule one had to squint just to make them out.
"Blaze Beam is a high-tier 6th-Circle offensive spell. It isn't an area-of-effect spell—it focuses entirely on a single target—which makes its concentrated destructive power absurdly high."
The standard offensive spells deployed on the battlefield usually belonged to the 3rd or 4th Circle, and even those commanded extortionate prices on the open market. But a 6th-Circle attack spell? Such a scroll was practically impossible to find; whatever price the seller demanded, buyers would pay without question.
"...Whoever dropped this just handed us an absolute fortune," Kyle whispered in awe.
"No kidding," Edgar agreed, swallowing hard.
Bennett carefully tucked the scroll into his coat. If no opportunity arose to use it down here, he could always sell it once they returned aboveground.
"Let's move."
With Bennett in the lead, the party resumed their advance. Their destination was Sector 99.
The layout below the main deck was remarkably straightforward. Aside from the compartments necessary for navigation and mechanics, the vast majority of the subterranean hold was dedicated to cargo storage. The sections were numbered sequentially, making navigation a simple matter of pressing forward in numerical order.
The only real annoyance was the claustrophobic atmosphere caused by towering stacks of steel shipping containers, accompanied by the stale, metallic stench of damp sea air.
Splash. Splosh.
Their boots disturbed shallow puddles standing on the rusted deck plating.
After navigating the maze of containers for a while, Bennett abruptly raised a hand, halting the party.
"It's dangerous ahead."
"Sure looks like it..." Edgar muttered, grimacing.
They had just cleared Sector 78 and were standing on the threshold of Sector 79.
Up through Sector 78, the containers had been stacked densely on either side of a narrow path. Sector 79, however, was entirely different. The containers that should have packed the space were nowhere to be found, completely removed from the perimeter.
At first glance, it might have seemed like unutilized cargo space, but a closer look revealed a deliberate, tactical kill zone. Containers had been rearranged to brick off both lateral walkways, leaving only a single, exposed corridor straight down the center.
It formed an intentional bottleneck.
Across the open expanse, containers were piled into an elevated platform that provided ideal sniper perches, while their side offered zero cover or concealment whatsoever. Stepping even a single pace beyond their current threshold was practically an invitation for a hail of bullets or arrows.
"Edgar."
"Ready, boss."
"Deploy the shield. Half-size."
Edgar nodded, stepping forward and planting the base of his tower shield firmly against the deck.
Clack! Whirrr!
The interlocking metal plates of the dwarven-crafted shield expanded outward. While not extended to its absolute maximum dimensions, it widened sufficiently to shelter all four party members in a tight formation.
Huddled behind the reinforced barrier, Bennett's team crept forward step by methodical step.
Less than a minute into their march, a prickle of sharp killing intent brushed Bennett's neck.
Crack!
A gunshot shattered the silence, accompanied by the violent ring of metal impacting metal. Edgar hitched his stance, absorbing the shock through his thick forearms.
Bennett glanced at the point of impact on the front plate and gave Edgar's shoulder a steadying pat.
"Keep pushing."
As expected of masterwork dwarven craftsmanship, the specialized alloy easily resisted the round. There was neither a dent nor a crack—a testament to the limitations of standard 5.56mm ammunition against heavy dwarven metallurgy.
Clang—!
Another gunshot cracked, followed immediately by the harsh ricochet off the steel face.
Realizing that single shots could not pierce the barrier, the shooter abandoned precision and opened up on full automatic before the reverberations could even fade.
Rat-tat-tat-tat!
"Holding up?" Bennett asked over the deafening racket.
"Piece of cake, boss!"
The shield shuddered under the relentless kinetic impacts, but it was nowhere near enough to break Edgar's stance. Directing Edgar to maintain their current marching pace, Bennett drew Shooting Star and slipped toward the right flank of the shield.
The instant the gunfire stuttered to a halt for a reload, Bennett swung out from cover.
Thwip.
With a faint mechanical click, a bolt charged with arcane energy streaked across the dark hold, blazing with brilliant light.
Kaboom!
The spell infused within the bolt detonated upon impact, completely obliterating the sniper's nest. The blast caved in the heavy shipping container, hurling molten shrapnel and spewing a violent plume of flame into the air.
Yet Bennett knew immediately that the threat was far from neutralized.
His Detection radar lit up with sudden, rapid signatures.
'Hm?'
Bennett tilted his head in mild surprise. The presences picked up by his spatial sense carried no internal aura or mana whatsoever—they registered as ordinary civilians. Yet their speed across the deck far exceeded anything a normal human was physically capable of.
'Esper abilities?'
That theory dissolved seconds later.
Whirrr— whirrr—
Accompanied by the high-pitched hum of electric servomotors, figures darted into view. They wore the desert-camouflage combat fatigues of the United States military from the dungeon world.
What caught his attention, however, was their gear.
Carrying standard-issue assault rifles was expected after seeing the bridge, but their limbs and spines were fitted with peculiar metallic armatures—external jointed frames hugging their bodies from the waist down to their combat boots and wrapping around their upper torsos.
It looked cumbersome at first glance, yet radiated the chilling, alien aura of advanced unknown technology.
One thing was undeniably clear: that bizarre contraption was granting ordinary humans agility and burst speed that defied human anatomy.
Without hesitation, Bennett dumped all six stat points he had saved up directly into Agility.
"Dharma Ahkhar!"
Bellowing the fanatical chant unique to Ra'al's cultists, the soldiers opened fire. As trained infantry, they didn't charge blindly; they advanced using bounding overwatch and rapid evasive zigzags.
Bennett pulled back behind Edgar's shield just in time as errant rounds sparked off the steel faceplate or tore into empty air.
"Halt."
"Yes, sir!"
"Hold this position and maintain full defense. Erika, suppress any snipers you spot."
With crisp orders issued, Bennett vaulted out from behind the bulwark.
Crack! Crack!
Return fire converged on him instantly.
Yet Bennett was already activating Flash Sprint. Even assisted by motorized exoskeletons, soldiers relying purely on human eyesight and reflex could not hope to track a target moving at blinding, supernatural velocity.
Before the burst of Flash Sprint even expired, Bennett raised Shooting Star.
Marksman Lv.3
Fired mid-sprint, the bolt tore through the air and struck with surgical precision.
Thunk!
The projectile punched squarely into the lead soldier's chest. However, the heavy ceramic armor plate tucked inside his tactical vest managed to stop the physical penetration. The soldier staggered backward, quickly caught his footing, and leveled his rifle muzzle again with a sneer.
"You think a pathetic little arrow can—"
BOOM!
The enchantment carved into the bolt's tip detonated a fraction of a second later, blowing the soldier off his feet. He hurtled through the air like a ragdoll and slammed violently into a steel container, collapsing into an unnatural heap. He was dead before he hit the deck.
A second soldier grimaced and swung his rifle toward Bennett, spraying automatic fire.
Rat-tat-tat!
Muzzle flash illuminated the container corridor, but Bennett had already vanished from his sights. Even without Flash Sprint active, an Agility stat hovering near 90 was terrifyingly swift—especially against an adversary who possessed no personal mana cultivation.
Realizing his target had slipped past his peripheral vision, the soldier spun his rifle around with impressive combat instincts. But before he could pull the trigger, Bennett clamped a gloved hand around the rifle's barrel and wrenched it downward with brutal force.
The soldier grunted, trying to fight for leverage while drawing a combat knife with his off-hand.
"Ugh?!"
Bennett's raw Strength easily outmatched him. The rifle was ripped from the soldier's grip in a single motion. When the man lunged forward with the combat knife, the thrust looked laughably sluggish to Bennett's sharpened senses—lacking both speed and weight.
Bennett cracked the heavy frame of Shooting Star across the soldier's forearm, knocking the knife clattering to the floor. With fluid efficiency, he ripped the spare magazines clean off the soldier's plate carrier and tossed them backward toward his party. This was valuable salvage; it needed to be preserved.
Suddenly, Bennett's head snapped sideways on pure reflex.
Crack!
A searing wave of heat grazed past his ear, and a bloody cavity punched straight through the forehead of the disarmed soldier in front of him. The corpse slumped backward.
Bennett instantly stepped behind the falling body, using it as a shield as sharp cracks echoed in rapid succession.
Bang! Bang-bang! Bang!
To an untrained ear, all gunshots sounded alike. But having watched Balduin test-fire his salvaged Glock, Bennett recognized the distinct report of a handgun instantly.
Peering past the dead soldier's shoulder, he assessed the new shooter. This man also wore US military fatigues, but instead of an assault rifle, he wielded a semi-automatic pistol paired with a tactical combat blade. Furthermore, his exoskeleton differed from the previous ones: while the others were bare metal armatures, this model was reinforced with composite armor plates that clamped over his limbs like mechanical plate armor.
It looked far heavier, yet Bennett raised Shooting Star without hesitation.
Th-th-thump!
Three bolts whistled into the corridor—and Bennett's eyes narrowed.
The armored soldier executed evasive maneuvers far more violent and explosive than his comrades. Deflecting one bolt with his blade and rolling beneath another, he closed the gap in a tight, weaving zigzag.
It was an intimidating rush. After a brief calculation, Bennett shifted his aim and swept the crossbow downward.
Crack! Boom!
Rather than targeting the soldier directly, the spell-tipped bolts shattered the steel deck plating at his feet. Ripping metal and concussive shockwaves threw off his footing, violently arresting the momentum of the exoskeleton charge.
"Motherfucker!"
Hissing an unmistakable curse, the operative leveled his sidearm. Gunfire flared in rapid succession, but Bennett held the dead soldier aloft, letting the heavy ceramic vest absorb every slug while he reloaded Shooting Star in a single practiced motion.
Thud, thud.
Crouched behind the meat shield, Bennett's eyes caught a familiar cylindrical object dangling from the corpse's tactical belt. It was the same throwable ordnance he had discovered earlier in the officers' quarters.
Bennett unclipped it and hurled it straight at the approaching operative.
The soldier, who had been advancing while firing his pistol, instinctively moved to bat it away with his knife—before his eyes practically bulged out of his skull in sheer horror, and he dove headfirst behind a container.
Clack!
The metal cylinder bounced harmlessly off the deck plating, rolling to a halt.
The soldier blinked, poking his head out with an expression of bewildered disbelief. Then, a sadistic grin split his face.
"Stupid savage... you don't even know how to use a grenade!"
Discarding his empty handgun, he lunged forward, snatching the grenade from the floor.
"Die, enemy of Lord Ra'al!"
He yanked the safety ring with a violent jerk and cocked his arm to throw. But the instant the grenade cleared his fingertips, an enchanted bolt whistled through the air and struck the flying canister dead-center.
"Wait, what—?"
KABOOOOM!
The concussive shockwave and razor-sharp shrapnel shredded the soldier at point-blank range, tossing his mangled body through the air like discarded trash.
Watching the fireball dissipate, Bennett mentally took note of the demonstration. So that was how the little metal orb worked—an alchemical explosive spell encapsulated inside a steel shell.
'On behalf of my world?'
It seemed to imply he was the very first scavenger to bring down one of these modern soldiers.
"Bennett-nim!"
"Were there any other snipers?" Bennett asked as Kyle and the others jogged over.
"There was one more lurking above, but we suppressed him."
"Good work."
Sweeping his Detection across the area to confirm no further hostiles remained, Bennett caught his breath.
"Let's secure the loot first."
The party immediately set about stripping the fallen soldiers of their firearms, spare magazines, and the mysterious mechanical frames clamped to their bodies. Examining the corpses closely, Bennett was convinced that those slender metallic frames were the sole reason for the soldiers' unnatural mobility. Their physical bodies were far too frail to generate such explosive bursts on their own.
Excluding gear damaged beyond repair in the fighting, their haul amounted to three assault rifles, five loaded magazines, two intact exoskeleton harnesses, and a handful of fragmentation grenades.
When Bennett inspected one of the harvested exoskeletons up close, his eyebrows rose. It was far more intricate than he had anticipated. While the exterior presented simple articulation braces and titanium alloy struts, the inner housings were packed with tightly engineered servos, hydraulic lines, and miniature circuit linkages.
When he manually manipulated a knee joint, the interconnected mechanical gears rotated in seamless, whisper-quiet synchronization.
The energy source driving this machinery was an identical high-density power cell to the one retrieved from the Robot Dog. The moment Bennett slipped the battery out from its chassis, the entire exoskeleton froze rock-solid, resisting any further manual movement.
Having grasped its basic principles, Bennett stowed the salvaged technology into his Sub-space Pouch.
He checked the faded white stencil painted on the bulkhead.
— Sector 80.
They were getting close. Sector 99 was just ahead.
When they finally arrived, Sector 99 looked nothing like what Bennett had envisioned.
It carried the uncanny atmosphere of an isolated homestead built deep in the wilderness.
Resting directly in the center of the vast compartment was a single shipping container. It had been heavily renovated into a habitable dwelling, complete with cut-out square windows and domestic furnishings arranged neatly around the perimeter.
Yet what demanded immediate attention was the man standing calmly in front of the container door.
Aside from his emaciated, hollowed-out appearance, there was nothing superficially striking about him. Yet, instinctively, one's eyes were helplessly drawn to his presence. It was difficult to determine whether to call it charismatic allure or an eerie, hypnotic gravity.
Bennett remained completely unaffected, but the moment his companions laid eyes on the man, the focus vanished from their gazes.
Bennett channeled a burst of Psionic Energy into his hands and clapped loudly.
Crack!
A pure, invisible shockwave rippled through the air, snapping his party members out of their trance like cold water dashed across their faces.
"Wipe the drool off your chins," Bennett muttered dryly.
"Ah... y-yes, sir!" Kyle stammered, flustered.
Bennett swept the vicinity with Detection once more, but sensed no hidden ambushes. The man was truly alone.
Closing the distance, Bennett halted several paces away. His party hung back on high alert while Bennett faced the man one-on-one.
"Are you Ra'al?"
"I am. And you must be Bennett."
Contrary to expectations of a fanatical, bloodthirsty cult leader, the man's demeanor was remarkably composed and gentlemanly.
"Your command of the common tongue is impressive," Bennett noted evenly. "I wouldn't expect it to share much with the Dungeon Language."
"It is the tongue spoken by those who have placed their faith in me," Ra'al replied with a faint smile. "Would it not be unseemly if their god could not understand their prayers?"
He gestured toward the modified shipping container behind him.
"Would you care to converse for a moment before we resort to violence? I have several questions I wish to ask, and I imagine you harbor a few of your own."
"After you," Bennett said politely.
"Allow me to prepare a decent cup of tea."
Nodding cordially, Ra'al turned on his heel and stepped inside the container.
The instant the man was out of sight, Bennett snapped open his Sub-space Pouch, pulled out the calcified anomalous fragment, and brought the reinforced butt of Shooting Star smashing down upon it with a surge of Psionic Energy.
Crack!
The fragile talisman shattered into fine, lifeless dust.
"SCREEEEEEAAAAAAAGH!"
A horrific, blood-curdling shriek of agonizing spiritual torment erupted from within the container. The sheer psychic pressure was so violent that Kyle and the others dropped to their knees, clutching their heads in pain.
Bennett, completely unbothered, carried out his next action with mechanical detachment.
Ping! Ping!
Yanking the safety pins off two fragmentation grenades with his teeth, he whipped them cleanly through the cut-out window frame.
"Get down!"
Despite their disorientation, the party followed his command instantly, throwing themselves flat against the steel floor.
KABOOOOOM!
The enclosed steel container bulged outward from the violent pressure spike. Shattered glass, splinters, and black smoke erupted from the window apertures in a roaring wave.
Bennett rose from behind his cover, weapon leveled.
"You wretched, insolent insect... How dare you play games with me?!"
Staggering out through the smoke and fire, Ra'al was a grotesque sight. Having absorbed the full concussive fury and shrapnel of two grenades inside a sealed steel box, there was hardly an inch of unblemished flesh left on his body.
"I offered you the supreme honor of receiving my divine presence—"
Bennett ripped the parchment of the 6th-Circle scroll in his hand.
A concentrated pillar of blinding violet radiance surged forth, tearing through the air with a deafening roar and slamming directly into Ra'al's mangled chest. It was the spell they had picked up earlier—the single-target annihilator, Blaze Beam.
"AAAAAAARGH!"
The devastating beam blasted Ra'al backward, pinning him against the rear wall of the container as his flesh incinerated under the searing magical heat.
Bennett raised Shooting Star. Before arriving at Sector 99, he had swapped out the box magazine for a fully loaded 30-round drum filled exclusively with spell-forged bolts.
Th-th-th-th-thump—!
Thirty enchanted bolts tore through the air, unleashing a cataclysmic barrage of magic into the ruined container within a matter of seconds.