Realm Wars

Eventually, Rosa, Ryu, and Fifi made their way into the dungeons.

Their sixth dungeon turned out to be a room with an exit located hundreds of meters above. The walls were covered with tapestries, and there were numerous engraves on the wall, and all skills and spells were null inside this room.

Climbing the walls was also out of the question, as no one could reach its height with no edges or platform to climb upon.

Ryu tried but eventually gave up after twenty or so attempts. His claws could only reach him so far before he fell onto the ground.

In the end, it took them a week to figure out that the tapestries could be turned into a magic flying carpet with the right words engraved on the wall. Thanks to a random halfbreed that passed the time by reciting the engraved words.

Cathy wasn't with them even after they cleared the sixth dungeon, and Ryu thought that she must be on another dungeon or there must be a number limit in each dungeon.

Either way, the group pressed on. Their seventh dungeon was a little tricky since they had to find the right key of the door in a room filled with keys and random objects. All the keys except the correct one were coated in either poison, paralysis, sleep, and all sorts of status effects. 

And, of course, it was up to Ryu to test them for Rosa. It was a good thing that Rosa was an Elementalist. She could cure him faster than the status effect could spread in his body. Though he was immune to poison, he was not immune to the other status effect.

But sometimes, the woman was giving him a hard time when she innocently prolonged the paralysis on his body.

In the end, the group made way to their eighth dungeon, which was not that hard. They just had to cross a hundred-foot chasm full of razor-sharp blades onto the next floor. And like the previous floor, no skills nor spells worked to cheat your way into the other side.

Most of the experts were strong and easily jumped the fifty-meter wide hole into the next, and those who couldn't have paid a hefty amount of gold or items for the mercenaries to carry them into the other side.

Ryu had no problem carrying Rosa in his arms and jumped over. The problem was the annoying woman who kept annoying him. She blew hot air on his ear and twirled her finger on his chest and waist so that he could lose focus.

Ryu was tempted to drop her on the blades below because it seemed like what she wanted for him to do. If she didn't hold Ferris hostage, he would definitely drop her.

Finally, they made it to their ninth dungeon, where they expected the difficulty to be hard –– and they were not mistaken.

They found a statue of a big man rippling with muscles sitting on a stone chair. He had a confident grin on his face while his buff arm was on the stone table with his palms wide open. 

It seemed like he wanted to wrestle.

The door which everybody assumed was the exit lies behind him. It was shut tight, and everyone wondered if it would open to those who won against him.

Rosa frowned. "It's a contest of strength." Couldn't the dungeon be any more unfair to women like her, who was also a mage?

The others laughed. Most were men who knew that the trial was a piece of cake for them.

Ryu was concerned about Rosa even though she was nothing but a pain in his ass throughout while Fifi giggled.

"Master, it seemed that we are stuck here for ten years waiting for you to get buff so you can defeat that statue in an arm wrestle."

Rosa pinched Fifi's ears.  "What was that again? Care to say it one more time?" 

"Awwwiee. . ." Sparks of electricity crawled on Fifi's skin, but Rosa didn't mind the tingling sensation.

Rosa let go of Fifi's pointy ear while the latter rubbed her injured skin and threw Rosa a pathetic look with her round watery eyes.

Rosa clicked her tongue and pinched her chin.

".. . We could go with Fifi–"

"Shut up, halfbreed!" 

Ryu closed his lisp tight. He was just trying to be helpful. Even if Rosa buffed her strength ten times with her spell, she still couldn't win. Not with her feeble strength to begin with.

"Maybe the statue isn't strong?" Fifi tried to console, and Rosa looked at her with dead eyes.

".. . Maybe it gauges its challenger's strength and adjusts its own for a fair fight."

Rosa and Fifi looked at Ryu like he was some kind of an idiot.

Ryu thought that it was pretty cool if it did, though. In that way, Rosa might have a chance.

"Anyway, we'll know if someone took up the statue. .. Oh, Look! Someone is challenging it this early," Fifi announced, excited.

At least they didn't have to solve door puzzles, Ryu thought. Unlike the others, it was a pretty straightforward dungeon, but. .. there was still the concern of what would happen if they were defeated by the statue and also the possibility that the door wouldn't open even after they won.

Ryu observed the first challenger. Based form the axe on his back and the rippling muscles on his body, Ryu deducted that he was a fighter. The man was big and bulky. In fact, he was the biggest among their group of ten.

"Alright. Let's see what you've got." The man grinned and placed his hand against the statue.

Everyone was amused when the statues gripped the man's hand, and not before long, they both wrestle each other into submission.

"Ragh!" the man shouted, and a burst of explosive power shot to his arm, doubling his strength.

The stone table quaked, and Ryu thought that it would break from the sheer amount of force the man was exerting. The air around the man rippled, and statics cracked around his arm. His veins' bulged, and his teeth barged with his gums, but still, the statue remained grinning.

Sweat coated the man's face, and not for long, his clothes were soaked. Everyone held their breaths when ten minutes passed, and the expert still couldn't move a dint of the statue's arm.

"Eeekk. .. t-that statue is too strong," Fifi cried.

Rosa ignored her and continued observing the statue.

Ryu's unabated attention was also on the two on the table. He couldn't believe that even with the man's strength enforced with a buff, he still couldn't manage to move even a quarter of an inch of the statue's arm.

Ryu took a peeked at Rosa and was more concerned than ever. With her feeble strength, it was impossible for her to advance. There was no retreat either. So she would be trapped in here. That is, if she didn't do something about her strength like Fifi suggested. 

But that would take years, and Ryu didn't have time for years.

Should he just whack her neck and steal her traveler's ring? 

".. ."

Why hadn't he thought of that before?! 

It would be much easier if he did. He could then bring it to Faux or Lizzaforth and ask if there was a way to access its contents.

Ryu was thinking of ways on how to steal Rosa's traveler's ring while the others were focused on the fight between the man and the statue.

Eventually, the man grew exhausted as the bulged on his veins was about to burst from the force he was exerting. His body shook, and with it, his strength decreased gradually, and exhaustion took over.

The statue's grin grew wide, and its eyes turned crescent. With one swift of its hand, the man was sent flying against the wall.

"Woah!"

"What happened?!"

It looked like the statue suddenly had a burst of energy, and in one swoop, he took down the man in the blink of an eye.

Everyone hadn't recovered yet when they noticed that the man's body was disintegrating, and its soul went towards the statue.

"Holy. . ."

"Shit."

The other cursed, and Ryu held his gasp.

The consequence upon defeat is death, like everyone was expecting.

"M-master. .. ," whimpered Fifi. She was looking at Rosa like she was going to die.

Ryu ironed his will to steal the ring from Rosa's hand. She was definitely going to be trapped here.

Meanwhile, Rosa ignored the two. Her eyes were on the statue, planning her next move. She needed another cannon fodder to test out the statue, and if her deduction was correct.. . her lips stretched into a smirk.

But the problem was, now that everyone knew the stakes and how powerful the statue was, no one was willing to challenge it. The bulky expert, who everyone thought was the strongest in the room, was defeated without managing to move the statue's hand, even for just an inch. 

What could they possibly do against it? They thought in unison, and their faces turned white at the realization that they might be trapped in here.

Ryu's face was serious. His eyes remained glued on Rosa's ring that he didn't notice the evil twitching of her lips.

"You go halfbreed."

----

A/N

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