Harem Protagonist’s Sidekick

Nora groaned and took a drink from her canteen. "It's so goddamn hot that my character is literally melting! Can't you get us there any quicker?" 

I turned on her with a glare, my torch shaking violently atop my pack. "If you think you can do better, then have at it. This part of the dungeon is unexplored, so there's only vague landmarks on the map." 

"Ahh..." Nora hung her head. "Fine, then just try to hurry up." 

I unfurled the corners of the wrinkled map, the humidity doing a real number on it, and told the group to hang a left. We'd managed to gather enough fish to lure the creature out. Now it was just the fact of finding where its lair was located. All we knew for sure was that it was somewhere in this cave, but with how many twists and turns there were, it felt impossible to navigate. It was more like a labyrinth than a cave. 

Sweat dripped down the back of my neck, among other places. It was hard to blame Nora for being grumpy. It felt like a sauna in here, and my life was literally depleting before my eyes, a flash of red on the edge of my vision every few seconds. 

Actually, I took that back. I could blame her. She wore a thin piece of cloth, and I was walking around in an almost full suit of armor. She had nothing to complain about. 

We ventured down a center path that increasingly grew steeper. I snickered as Ethan tripped over a rock jutting out of the ground. The girls glowered at me, but it was worth it. Branching off to the right, a strange humming sound began. It was rather quiet at first but became louder and louder the deeper we went. By now, it was almost ear-splitting. 

"Jeez, that's so obnoxious," Amelia said, stopping in her tracks. 

Ethan pressed on, grabbing her hand and pulling her along. "It should get better soon. That noise means we're about to trigger an event. If we're lucky, it'll be the boss fight." 

"Oh, sorry." Amelia said, pleased by the recent development. "I didn't know." 

Ethan shook his head. "I'm not upset or anything." 

Nora punched me in the side like I was somehow to blame for my best friend paying attention to the tall blonde. I flicked her in the forehead, leaving a red mark. This didn’t sit well with her, and we were soon punching and flicking each other with no regard for how much faster we were depleting our health. I was positive I was taking more damage from the intense heat than her, but health bar be damned, I'd take this stupid midget down with me. 

"Knock it off, you two. I think we're there," Ethan said. 

Sure enough, a bright light was visible at the end of this path. I didn't know for certain whether the boss lied up ahead, but, regardless, I quit messing with Nora and extinguished my torch. 

"Everybody should take a drink from their canteens too." 

Listening to our big-shot party leader, I drank the last swig from my canteen, then returned it to the holster on my hip. My character was replenished, and my vision no longer flashed red. 

We arrived at the end of the path and stepped into the bright light. The noise immediately dissipated, and I blinked away the sudden brightness and surveyed my surroundings. The first thing I noticed wasn't something I see, but rather something that I felt. There was a draft whipping around us, and it was no longer unbearably hot, which must be why the boss made this his lair. The second obvious thing was the bone pit in the middle of the room. The skulls ranged from being about the size of a human head to something I could only believe once belonged to a dragon. I gulped and glanced upward, not wanting any unexpected surprises. 

You never forgot screaming in terror when a monster dropped from the ceiling in front of you. Also, Ethan refused to let me forget about it either. 

Fortunately, no monsters were lurking up there. Of course, there was a gaping hole in the cave ceiling, allowing light to filter through and causing this place to be so bright. Stalagmites covered in moss and vines that almost wind down far enough to touch the ground hung from the ceiling too. I brushed past one of those vines as I moved near the pit. The stench must have been overwhelming, and I received a popup message warning me I would receive the poisoned status by remaining around it. Bugs swarmed around it, eating whatever remaining skin is still on them. 

It was enough to make me queasy. 

"So, what do we do now?" Amelia asked. 

Nora sneered. "Don't you know anything? Now we have to lay out the fish, so the boss'll show up." 

Ethan strode over to us, growing bored with tugging at a vine. "You could have said it nicer, but you're right. We gotta put the fish down." He kicked at one of the skulls, sending the insects into a tizzy. "I'd recommend here since this seems to be where it eats." 

He pulled off his pack and began dumping the fish into a pile. The rest of us followed suit until we emptied our packs. The pile ended up being fairly high, sitting at around the height of my waist. 

I swatted at a group of flies who decided to ignore the old bones in favor of fresh meat. "Where should we hide? There's not really any cover." 

Ethan considered that. "What if we pitched a tent?" 

Pitching a tent? That sounded risky, but there wasn’t much else we could do given the circumstances. Hopefully, the dull tan color of the tent would help avoid the monster's attention. Nora was quick to set it up, and we settled inside. We had decided that anything not necessary for combat would be left here, so I dumped my canteen and pack. 

And we waited. 

It was quiet enough, the buzzing of the bugs nearly inaudible from this distance. Yet, they were all I could hear. Shouldn't a huge dragon be making a ton of noise? Was it not going to show? 

My fear remained unfounded, as there was a howl that sounded like dull knives scraping against each other. Then, the flaps of the tent blew around in a sudden gust of wind until Ethan and Nora held them steady. Amelia stared at the two of them with bated breath. Another howl and the wind halted completely, only to be replaced by the disgusting sounds of something tearing into the fish. 

Ethan peeked his head out of the tent. "It's distracted. We gotta go before it can try to get away." 

The blonde gulped. "Attack?" 

Nora grinned and pulled out her dagger. "Attack!"