Is It Wrong For An Assassin To Be In The Dungeon? V1 (Danmachi Fanfic)

Chapter 34: Survival

It's quiet. Very quiet. Nothing but the distant footsteps pattering on the rock hard ground of the Dungeon. And us.

"Come on, don't give up yet..." Bell pants as he struggles to help Welf with his injured foot.

"We're lucky we got away." Lili sighs.

"I wouldn't be so happy yet. I only have one Flame Flask left. Those Hellhounds were a real nuisance."

"Yeah... Erk!" Welf grunts as he clutches his leg. Bell slows down to check on him.

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah... I'll manage." Welf mumbles weakly. "Our luck's crap, though."

I can tell he's lying, by the way he bites his lip as he limps one step after the other. But what other choice do we have? We've already ran out of healing supplies quite some time ago. Best thing for us to do is shut up and push on.

"We needed to get back to the surface as we can, but instead we fell down two floors." Lili grumbles. "It's a miracle we even survived the fall in the first place."

"Yeah. And without the salamander wool the Hellhound's breath would have wiped us out." Bell adds.

"We owe Miss Eina big time." I say as I check the rear of the group.

Strange as it seems, the darkness seems to swallow any light we try to provide, as if staring at the world through a thin veil, the result an almost greyish landscape. No matter how brightly my torch burns, it is as if something is always lurking in those shadows, waiting for a moment of weakness to strike out.

Trudging on, we turn around a corner, only to come face to face with a great wall of rock.

"Another dead end..." Bell sulks despondently.

"We have to turn back." I say hurriedly. "We can retrace our steps if we-"

Suddenly a burst of hisses and growls erupt around us, causing us to draw our weapons and assume a defensive circle. The hisses and growls grow louder and wilder by the second, yet we can't see the monsters. It is as if the Dungeon was toying with us, making us its playthings, seeing how we would react, breakdown and eventually succumb to the Dungeon's monsters.

I look at my teammates. Though their mouths remain tight-lipped their eyes tell me a different story.  The light in their eyes, fragile like a flickering candle flame. We're all at our breaking point. We want to scream, drop everything and run, huddle in a corner. But we can't. If we do, only death awaits us.

We have been down here for seven hours.

As the sounds die begin to die down, Welf sighs heavily, and looks at his injured leg, its wound bleeding through the bandages.

"Bell, Li'l Lili, Marcus." Welf calls to us with a weak grin on his face. "Leave me if you must."

"W-Welf!" Bell retorts angrily. "I would never do such a thi-"

"With my leg in this pitiful condition, I will only slow you down. It would be best for you guys to just leave me."

"But I can't do that!" Bell argues.

"Do we have a choice?" Welf says frustratingly. "The longer we stay in the Dungeon the more likely all of us would get killed."

"But we can't leave you!"

"There is another way..." Lili cuts in.

"Another way? What way? Tell us!"

"If we want to survive, we can also try going down to the 18th floor."