Within the fifth floor,
"Would you look at that…" Agatha murmured, a slow smirk curving her lips. She tilted her head, long dark hair cascading like spilled ink over one shoulder. "A thick skull for a mage." Her fingers drummed lazily on the armrest, each tap echoing softly in the silent chamber. "Should I say you possess the probability of a warrior rather than a mage?" She chuckled low in her throat. "The way you handle rigid situations is impressive… a bit rough around the edges, but highly amusing."
She paused, watching as he downed yet another healing potion, the soft glow illuminating his battered face for a fleeting moment. "Three whole floors, completely leveled. Seth will weep over the details of the demolished sections… he's going to give me an earful." A theatrical sigh escaped her. "And still, I don't feel like intervening."
A genuine spark of delight lit her violet eyes. "But I must admit, watching you improvise has been one of the best entertainments I've had in a century." Her grin widened slightly, revealing the sharp edge of a predator's amusement. She leaned forward, elbows resting on her knees, chin cradled in her hands as if savoring a private performance.
Beaumont finally stepped fully into the fourth floor, the transition threshold humming faintly beneath his boots as the last remnants of liquefied earth settled behind him. He finished drinking the second health potion in one long pull, the warm, honeyed liquid sliding down his throat and spreading restorative fire through his veins. The worst of the sonic damage receded his ears no longer rang like struck bells, the bleeding had clotted, and the bone-deep bruises lightened to dull aches. He tossed the empty vial aside; it shattered with a crystalline tink against the stone.
This floor was as vast as the previous ones, a colossal chamber stretching into vast distance, but what made it radically different was the light.
Brilliant, steady illumination bathed everything. Electrical lamps, dozens of them, ringed the high edges of the ceiling line's like artificial stars. Their glow was clean and utterly alien. No flickering torches in sight, no hovering mana orbs, no bioluminescent moss. Just a mechanical radiance that pushed back the darkness with clinical efficiency. Beaumont tilted his head back, staring upward in open awe, his mud-streaked face catching the unfamiliar glow.
"Wooh… this is amazing," he breathed.
His heightened senses reached out instinctively.
I don't sense any mana coming from those lights, he thought, brow furrowing. This looks like some weird alchemy stuff. A short pause as he scanned the chamber. The only mana I can sense in this place…
Heavy stomps approached from ahead deep, rhythmic vibrations that traveled through the stone floor and up into his bones.
…are the ones in front of me.
Two colossal earth golems emerged from the center of the chamber, Twenty feet tall, the two presences stood ahead, massive enough to bend attention around themselves. Towering, top-heavy, and brutally muscular in silhouette, they possessed broad shoulders, thick barrel torsos, and oversized fists the size of cargo crates. Their entire bodies were composed of jagged, weathered gray stones and boulders fitted together like a nightmarish natural jigsaw puzzle. Cracks between the rocks glowed with faint, dormant earthen energy, and patches of ancient moss clung to their shoulders like old scars.
Their massive limbs ground against the floor with each step, leaving faint cracks in their wake.
Beaumont brought his gaze fully onto them. His expression shifted from wary alertness to pure skepticism, then;
He burst into a fit of uncontrollable giggles.
The laughter ripped out of him like a dam breaking, startling the quiet chamber. He doubled over slightly, clutching his stomach as wild, wheezing laughs echoed off the walls. "Hahaha! You cannot be serious!" he shouted between gasps. "Aha—ha, wait, stop!" He choked on his own breath, eyes watering with mirth. The laughter tapered off into lingering chuckles as he wiped a tear from the corner of his eye with a muddy knuckle.
Hands planted firmly on his waist, he straightened up, still grinning. "Are you mocking me...or are you just simply underestimating me?" His voice carried clear across the vast space, laced with genuine disbelief and rising cockiness. He folded his arms across his chest, head tilted. "Should I remind you who I am?"
The golems continued their inexorable advance, heavy stomps growing louder, the ground trembling faintly with each impact.
"I AM Beaumont!" he declared, voice booming with theatrical flair. "Earth-born!" He took a stoic stance, feet planted wide, shoulders squared. "And you brought forth earth golems?" A low, dangerous chuckle rumbled in his chest. "The earth is my playground. I can bend it at will. As a dungeon, you never stood a chance from the very beginning."
He spread his arms wide in a grand, almost mocking gesture, voice dropping to a low, intimate tone as if speaking directly to the dungeon itself. "How disappointing. Although, you can't be blamed. That has been your fundamental design since your inception."
In her observation chamber on the true fifth floor level, Agatha's smirk faltered for the briefest instant.
"An Earth-born?" She let out a sly, theatrical sigh and fully reclined in her chair, the obsidian surface shifting to cradle her form perfectly. "Ahh, perhaps you're right. This will become as boring as watching a buffoon trying to read a book."
She closed her eyes for a brief moment, drawing in a slow breath. When she opened them again, her gaze had transformed—cold and empty. The playful amusement had drained away, replaced by something far older and more patient.
"Such grand theater for an audience of one," she whispered. "They always scream their names to the walls, as if the stone cares who it buries." She leaned her head back against the chair, a dull, dead look settling into her violet eyes as she continued watching through the mirror. "He thinks his bloodline makes him king of this dirt… but a dungeon has no king."
Her voice grew softer, almost intimate, as if Beaumont could somehow hear her. "Let him twist the ground. Let him tear the floor apart. In the end, he will still be bleeding on my floor, breathing my air and die in the dark." A faint, humorless smile touched her lips. "The earth always wins, little prince. It just waits for you to let go before it eats you."
Back on the illuminated floor, Beaumont stepped forward into a solid fighting form. The bright electrical lamps cast sharp shadows across his mud-caked figure, highlighting the tension in his muscles and the fierce determination burning in his bloodshot hazel eyes. Warm amber sigil circles flared to life around both wrists, spinning with controlled intensity. Mana surged visibly through the intricate patterns, casting a golden radiance that clashed beautifully with the cold white light of the ceiling lamps.
He fixed the two advancing golems with a dead, unyielding glare.
The first golem raised a massive fist the size of a barrel, stone grinding as it prepared to strike. The second shifted its stance, lowering its center of gravity, clearly built for raw power and durability rather than speed. Their runes pulsed brighter in response to his presence, drawing on the ambient mana to reinforce their forms.
Beaumont's lips curled into a predatory smile. The air around him thickened with raw earth mana, faint tremors already rippling outward from his feet. Small pebbles on the floor began to levitate and orbit his boots in lazy circles.
"Let me decide your fate!"