The beaver had been taken by surprise when a rain of wooden spikes was sent its way. Yet as the shadow of the flood of projectiles fell over it, it managed to snap out of its shock, and in a burst of mana, it used almost everything it had to create a barrier around itself. The wood of its nest hastily warped and melded into a dome that would hopefully protect it from the incoming attack.

  In the darkness of its dome, the beaver waited as the multitude of wooden spikes made contact with its hastily created defense. The cracking of the wood was deafening, and the wooden raft it stood on was shaken by the adventurer's overwhelming power. At one point, the beaver thought it was done for; its dome began to crack, and small rays of light poked through. However, as the seconds passed and the tide of projectiles came to an end, the beaver found itself still standing within its wooden dome. It had taken almost all of its mana, but it couldn’t deny that it had been worth it.

  Finally, once the shock of having survived such a powerful attack wore off, it remembered how the adventurer had looked away. The green man had assumed it would die from his powerful attack, and such dismissal made the beaver angry. Dismissing its wooden dome of protection, the beaver focused on the green man, who was not paying attention to it. Instead, he was focused on the other beavers, which would allow the mini-boss to strike.

  Failing to hold itself back in anger, the beaver launched a wooden spike at the adventurer. Yet in its rage, it had failed to aim its attack properly, and the motion of the lake's water shifted the man's position. The shift caused the spike to pierce the adventurer's leg instead of the chest, and in response, the beaver instantly launched another two.

  Considering he didn't know what had caused the sudden sharp pain, Arctur’s training kicked in, and a shield began to manifest around him. Still unstable, the shield was shattered as a wooden projectile struck it, and thankfully, a second missed him by a hair’s breadth as the raft under him swayed. However, by that point, Arctur had an idea of what was going on, and more importantly, he created a barrier in the wooden beavers direction, which blocked yet another projectile. Turning to the beaver, Arctur snarled at it. Even though it was his fault for assuming he had killed it, the fact was that he was now mad.

  Adriana made sure Chuck and the mini-boss were following her as she went a little deeper. Sure enough, they were following but at a distance, so she stopped, which had them stop as well. The action let her know that the two beasts were weary of her, and their next actions made it even clearer. Instead of advancing, the two bosses began to shoot various water-based attacks at her. Blades, bolts, droplets, and straight-up pressurized beams of water. Naturally, Adriana successfully countered all of them, but the sheer amount left her unable to try any squishing tactics. Not that she had any confidence in killing either of the two beasts without unleashing a technique, at least not when they were together. Attempting to do so would waste too much mana, and there was still plenty of fighting to be done.

  Playing along with the two beasts, and before she got serious, Adriana wanted to try to convince Chuck to give up. She doubted it would work, but it might be worth a try, especially if the boss was weary of her and if she could get those extra-strong beavers on their side.

  “Chuck!” Adriana yelled, spending a bit of mana to make her voice carry further than usual.

  The beaver didn’t respond or make any motion that it was considering talking, but Adriana carried on anyway.

  “We don’t have to fight, you know! I know we came in a bit hot, but it doesn’t have to end badly for either of us!”

  “You attacked us first!” Chuck finally yelled, the beasts speaking magic transmitting much more easily than her own.

  Smiling at having finally gotten a response, Adriana was happy to continue exchanging attacks as she spoke.

  “If I remember correctly, you sent that wave at us. Unless you mean us adventurers in general, attacked first. In that case, I can assure you, we are not the same. I promise, if you stop now, we can come to a friendly agreement!”

  “No! You adventurers are all bad! Even now, you kill my friends only because we won’t join you!”

  After hearing the beaver's response, Adriana had to admit it had a point. That said, she had tried to be nice, so now it was time to show it why it should be more than wary of her.

  Alexion recovered much faster than he should have, his eyes turning into orbs of water. He wasn’t sure what had happened to Arctur, but he did notice that his friend's attacks had stopped. More worryingly, an angry mini-boss was almost on top of him.

  Flooding his body with godly mana, Alexion extended a hand as he created a barrier in front of the incoming tail. The barrier was partially made of condensed water and empowered by powerful water-based concepts from his divine mana, which burned through him.

  A glowing tail slammed into Alexion’s barrier, managing to crack and then shatter the hastily created construct. However, that had been more than enough, as it delayed the beaver and stopped Alexion from receiving a crushing blow. With a little more time now available to him and needless worry for his two friends, Alexion spoke the words, channeling plenty of mana in the process.

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  “Crushing Depths.”

  With the words spoken, Alexion glowed with energy; he could not fully contain his mana, and strands of energy floated upwards. At the same moment, the water around the beaver shimmered with power, and finally, in a blink, it compressed with power the beast had no chance to ever defend against. Another blink later, all that remained was the quickly fading red hue of blood and a small bead of compressed flesh.

  Having defeated two mini-bosses, with some assistance, Alexion’s eyes returned to normal as he looked downwards to where his favorite mermaid was. He couldn’t see her, but could feel the mana radiating from down under, and the turbulence of the water, as well as the flashes of energy when the two sides unleashed their abilities. Deciding Adri would be fine, Alexion easily surfaced to see what had happened to his green friend, and the sight he found made him grin.

  After essentially growling at the beaver who had managed to impale him, Arctur's slight green glow began to intensify. Mana rolled off the green man, and the surrounding wood began to flourish with small plants, all in response to his power.

  The beaver, feeling the power radiating from Arctur, knew its end was coming, but it also refused to lie there and accept death. After all, their lord had empowered them for the sole purpose of fighting this group, and he would show them that his lord’s dungeon was not meant to be taken lightly.

  Dan watched with bated breath as the fight between the overpowered trio and his beavers continued. He had feared that four mini-bosses wouldn’t have been enough, but it seemed that that was the sweet spot to push the three friends.

  Naturally, the thought of any other party he had seen so far taking on a Beast Lord and four mini-bosses after already breaking through all those minions was ridiculous. Of course, what was even crazier was that he doubted they had shown all their trump cards just yet. Dan had peeked at their souls earlier, and man, were Arctur and Adriana quite a mix of powers. Not that the elf should be underestimated; the guy was almost a full-blooded celestial; however, something had clearly been tinkered with to let him grow as most individuals did. Dan could only imagine the sheer power the elf would have when he got into the higher ranks.

  After finally pushing the trio to take things more seriously, Dan was already very happy. Then his happiness doubled when he felt the change occur inside the beaver mini-boss. Dan had only seen it happen a few times, the first having been when Fur had sacrificed itself to save Fir. From there, a few of his minions had unlocked some extra ability via the system, and when they did, he always made sure to promote them. And now it was happening again; the beaver had resolved itself to show it was no pushover. With very little mana, it had only one other thing it could do. So, for the second time, one of his dungeon creatures burned its very own life force to fuel its magic.

  The small plants around Arctur began to grow, slowly at first, but with every passing second, they transformed into a variety of vines. These plants quickly spread over the raft, covering the wood with greenery. Yet, the most impressive thing was how many offshoots grew upwards and swayed like snakes mesmerized by a snake charmer. Of course, this snake charmer was Arctur, and the green man was mad. Sure, he enjoyed pain, but only when he was in control, and at that moment, he hadn’t been. So, mana continued to flow, the moment for his power to be unleashed growing closer and closer, causing Arctur to smile with glee as he saw the beaver tremble with fear, at least it had been trembling, unable to move, knowing its end was near.

  He wasn’t sure what had changed or how the creature still had enough mana, but a new dome of wood began to grow around it. The sight made Arctur frown, not because the creature had any chance of surviving his incoming attack, but at the amazing reserves of mana the beast had. Finally, he felt the plants around him were ready. They had grown by incredible amounts with his liberal use of mana, and finished the attack by speaking the words of power.

  “Vine Vipers.”

  A rush of green shot forth from Arctur’s locations, the plants green glow intensifying as they shot towards the beaver's wooden dome. Even as they flew, their transformation wasn’t complete, and they began to meld together until they looked like green leafy scaled vipers, their fangs made of pure green energy.

  Alexion watched as the raft Arctur stood on swayed and lurched forward, the power of the vines shooting forth, making it move wildly. Furthermore, he also lost sight of the green man as all the green vines, leaves, and energy hid him within the raft's confines.

  Following the path of the vines, which were looking more like green vipers by the second, Alexion prepared for impact. The vines crashed into the wooden dome, piercing through with minimal resistance, only to reappear with a half-dead beaver in their fangs, their emergence shattering the dome entirely.

  Feeling the beaver in his grasp, Arctur spent more mana as he adjusted the intent of his technique. His original attack was one of piercing destruction. It was one directed at a target, ensuring it could not escape. However, Arctur always tried to have multiple uses for his attacks, and he shifted the vipers, making them drain the life force of the target their fangs had sunken into. After all, the beaver had injured him, and it would now serve to heal him. Except that the creature had only a trickle of life left, it was more corpse than an actual living thing.

  Having felt the lack of life energy, Arctur was confused. He had barely done any damage to it, so how was it almost dead? In fact, how did it even have enough energy to create the defensive dome? Arctur could feel it; its body also held no mana. Then realization hit him.

  Had the beaver willingly sacrificed its life to fuel its magic? That had to be it; however, if it was a given ability, it had to be rare, because otherwise every other monster would be doing it. And if it wasn’t a given ability, then a dungeon monster having something like that was an odd thing. After all, the resolve required to do it was immense. Even if these dungeon monsters came back to life, Arctur still imagined they all had some will to stay alive; otherwise, the dungeon would be a very different place.