“Be ready.”

  That was all I said after we accepted the prompt to continue to the next floor. By now, since other members of the family had already made it to the floor, we pretty much knew what to expect.

  And the reason why we had to be ready was because the boss of the second floor behaved a bit differently from the one on the first floor. Instead of being located in a very obvious “boss” room at the end of the floor, this particular boss could be found anywhere on the second floor.

  The second floor was a densely populated jungle environment. There was dim green light covering the entire overgrown forest, a light rain, and heavy humidity. Mosquitoes and other bugs even existed in the jungle to quite literally add to the ambience of the jungle.

  Vines hung from seemingly every tree, and moss covered practically everything that could be touched.

  For all intents and purposes, we were in a jungle.

  “We haven’t gotten attacked yet, and I don’t see a giant anaconda anywhere, so I think we can assume it isn’t here.”

  Uncle Terrance was right. We’d been standing in the same location for a few seconds now and we hadn’t been attacked. From what we’d been told, if the boss happened to be near the entrance to the floor, then it would’ve attacked us the second we appeared.

  Now for the hard part. Finding it.

  Again, unlike the previous floor, the boss here was somewhere out in the jungle and it could actually move around. Only it wouldn’t necessarily be moving toward us and would only attack if we neared it.

  Worse yet, the thing was apparently perfectly camouflaged in the forest and would only make the task of finding it that much harder. Not to even mention the obvious—the boss wasn’t the only opponent on the floor, and there were plenty of much smaller snakes that could cause plenty of problems for us.

  Well, plenty of problems for us if we were all still below Level 30 and didn’t possess Skills, Traits, weapons, armor, and a lot more battle experience than we had before. As long as we stayed focused and gave the floor the respect it deserved as a place where we could lose our lives, we would clear the floor with ease.

  This wasn’t arrogance speaking.

  This was the result of surviving long enough to not only grow in personal power but also be able to benefit from the power of information. And the second part was far more important. We knew what to expect, and since the Dungeons didn’t change, we just had to prepare accordingly and allow our preparation to showcase its worth.

  It probably took us about an hour to both find and eliminate the boss of the floor.

  Along the way, we were attacked many times by the smaller snakes, but seeing as we stayed focused the entire time, no attack was ever really a surprise and nothing came close to forcing any sort of desperation out of us.

  It was a clean operation from start to finish.

  Ding!

  Congratulations on Completing Floor Two!

  Proceed to Next Floor? Or Accept Current Rewards and Exit?

  Rewards Granted!

  Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

  700 XP Granted!

  5x Vine-Serpent Hide

  5x Vine Venom Sacks

  150x Coins

  The rewards were not accepted, but just like it on floor one after we rejected them, it showed us a list of everything we received.

  It would only be after we left the Dungeon in full that everything would be given to us. It was a nice little feature since we wouldn’t have to worry about dragging everything we got around while trying to conquer the Dungeon.

  Of course, the decision to reject the rewards for now and travel to next floor wasn’t a spur-of-the-moment decision but something we decided to do long before we entered the Dungeon. Someone would need to eventually tackle the third floor, and I volunteered to do it.

  After talking with everyone else in the team, they agreed too, and so the plan was formed. As long as everything went to plan on the second floor, then move forward to the next. Only this time, it would be uncharted territory and our advantage of information would be moot.

  Once the prompt was accepted, we all suddenly found ourselves on the floor wading through dark murky-looking water.

  A few sparse trees that were growing out of the water could be seen, and there were even lily pads with small frogs on them.

  A swamp. The third floor of the Dungeon was actually an entire swamp. Nobody was in a rush to move in the waist-deep water. This was a Dungeon filled with snakes, which meant that the water was obviously filled with them.

  “No one move.”

  None of them said anything, nor did any of them move. By now I had built up plenty of trust in them since our very first excursion on the first floor, but more than anything, it was the water here that gave them pause.

  I wasn’t about to claim that I was unmatched versus every single being in existence when it came to water, but I was definitely the most in tune with it out of everyone in the family and in the community.

  A few moments later…

  I thrusted my spear into the water with both speed and power, and the sound of water splashing around was mixed in with the sound of a blade piercing flesh.

  What I pulled up out of the water was something that looked more like an eel than it did a snake. Literally, apart from the head shape common to most snakes, the rest of the body matched that of an eel. It honestly looked disturbing in how it connected to the head itself.

  “I couldn’t see it at all… the water didn’t even move.”

  “No, Renee, it didn’t. This one might be all you, nephew.”

  Well, I’m sure if I wasn’t here, then they’d be able to figure something out and they were overreacting a bit but letting the one person who could dominate the area do just that wasn’t really a bad idea.

  And that’s exactly what I did. While the members of my family kinda just followed after me as I moved around, I was mowing down these eel-snake things like a lawn mowing company hitting a residential area on a crisp Saturday morning.

  Even when the boss showed up as a damn two-headed snake-looking thing that rose up out of the water looking like something out of a Greek movie, there was no special battle to be had.

  We were fighting stronger things in the Gauntlet Dungeon regularly. To make matters worse for the mini hydra eel-snake thing, its biggest ability apart from its size and power was spewing a high-powered jet stream of water. All it did was make sure I never ran low on mana.

  Needless to say, we were soon looking at the clear notification.

  Ding!

  Congratulations on Completing Floor Three!

  Proceed to Next Floor? Or Accept Current Rewards and Exit?

  After taking a few moments to catch our breaths, it was decision time.

  We planned for both the second and third floors, but there wasn’t any current plan for going past that. Of course, it was included in the plans to clear the third floor, but we had no idea about what we were facing and how hard or how easy it would be.

  Well, it was easy.

  “What does everyone want to do? Personally, I won’t mind calling it quits right here and going home, but if everyone’s alright with going to the next floor, then I won’t mind that either.”

  Uncle Terrance responded first.

  “Didn’t get to do much of anything the last two floors. I’m ready for some action.”

  Then came Uncle Robert.

  “Well, you’re the Squad Captain, Freddy, your call.”

  That was a little weird to hear from my Uncle, but I’ll take it. Now to Aunt Renee.

  “I can’t be the party pooper now, can I? To the fourth floor we go.”

  With that decision made, the Dungeon showed us the rewards we received.

  Rewards Granted!

  2000 XP Granted!

  Top Contributor of Floor Five Awarded!

  10x Bog Serpent Scales

  2x Bog Water Poison Vials

  1x Bogwalker Boots

  150x Coins

  Ah some boots huh? That’ll be nice.