Chapter 15: Strangers-in-arms

Run...that was the only thought in Xylos' mind as he madly dashed through the jungle. In hindsight, it was a very bad idea to go alone. Currently, he was being chased by a group of what looked like raptors; if raptors had claws the size of half their body and shot spikes from their mouths.

Xylos ducked behind a tree as a flurry of sharp dagger-like needles struck the tree. Then, He rolled forward before barbed vines whipped at him from above.

One of the raptors tried to veer away from the tree but before it could come to a stop, a barbed vine snapped it up and crunching sounds can be heard. The rest of the group quickly changed directions to avoid the tree giving Xylos some time to catch his breath.

Red, yellow, and grey words and tags appeared all over in the central screen. The tree that he dodged behind was yellow (neutral) and simply turned red a moment ago. The raptors chasing him was in red (hostile). He jumped and glided over a patch of mushroom which was grey (passive), and the moment one of the raptors stepped on it, the mushroom exploded into a cloud of spores and quickly consumed the raptor leaving only bones behind as new mushroom started growing on what was left.

"Fuck!" Xylos cursed. He truly underestimated how dangerous the world of magic is. If he didn't have a system that differentiated between hostile, neutral, friendly, and passive entities; any one of what he encountered so far could end his life.

In the distance, he could see two people moving toward him; he was getting closer to the circle. He suddenly blinked while running just in time to dodge a spider-like creature that appeared from the ground. Then, he quickly turned his body as a wind blade passed by where the center of his body was a moment ago.

In the distance, "See," Levin said after send out an almost invisible wind blade, "He has an extraordinary sense of danger. He could be really useful as a detector, or a scout if we worked with him."

Xylos glared at Levin as he entered the teleportation circle. Then, one of the raptors that were chasing him collided with some invisible wall that shattered some of its oversized claws. Several spikes also flew at the stone circle before they bounced off harmlessly and landed on the ground.

"Did you..."

"Look he also brought some food for us as well. He might not be totally useless." Levin said completely ignoring Xylos

Levin then drew several lines in the air and instantly beheaded the raptor that was stunned and two of the raptors that were beside it. Right after, the remaining group of raptors scattered in all directions. Levin was able to kill about 2 more before they completely dispersed.

"Welcome back," Levin said with a smirk, "I hope you had a wonderful trip. Were you able to find an activation item?"

Xylos wanted to say something to retort but he couldn't think of anything. He basically ran out into a completely foreign dungeon without any planning. The only way he managed to find his way back was that the map on the left-most, screen showed the direction back to the circle. However, it wasn't a complete waste since he managed to record infomation on some of the things he encountered on the way out and back. Currently, they were labeled as "Plant-1", "Monster-2", and similar but the characteristics like color, shape, and basic reactions of them were recorded.

He looked at Levin, and Vivi; They were still neutral yellow but now that he returned there was a speck of green in their names. He wondered if he should share was he has found so far; it would be a way to showcase his resourcefulness. He didn't want to expose too much, so he decided to just describe what he encountered so far.

"I'm not sure," Xylos said and proceeded to describe all the physical characteristics of things that he encountered on the way out and back to the best of his ability.

Vivi and Levin listened intently, they were first intrigued but as Xylos kept going, they were a bit surprised. Xylos only left the teleportation circle for about 10 minutes and managed to describe one hour's worth of things he encountered in detail.

"Hmm, this person is more than he looks," Vivi said telepathically to her brother.

"He has a good memory and analytical skills." Levin responded, "With his help, we might be able to get out of this place much faster."

As Xylos described more and more about what he encountered, their names started to have more specks of green it. Every once in a while, if he described something the twins knew, they would add details about what it was called and what it can do. All of this was stored in a database-like program that he created.

Eventually, the group descended into a discussion about what to watch out for, what to kill and take back to their clan for profit, and what might be a potential activation item. At that point, their names were almost completely green.

"I thought you knew what items to look for when you rushed out" Vivi laughed, "I didn't expect you to blindly rush in like that. Each of the stone statues refers to the required items in a riddle. The first one is , the second one is , the third one is..."

Soon after, they started an in-depth discussion about it and got to know each other better.

Xylos found out that Vivi was a and Levin was a . Both of them roughly derive their power from converting mana into one of the eight elements (Fire, Water, Ice, Wind, Thunder, Earth, Light, and Darkness). They didn't go into detail in what they specialize in, but by analyzing the converted mana hovering around them through his screen, Xylos guessed that Vivi specialized in Light, Earth, and Ice; the more defense-oriented elements and Levin specialized in Fire, Thunder, and Wind; the more attack-oriented elements.

The rest of the evening went smoothly and the Rapclaws that Vivi cooked were passable. Although, Xylos can live on mana having some food still made him feel much better. Once the group concluded the possible activation items it was dark; or at least much darker than before. There wasn't anything like a day-night cycle in the dungeon but the lumination of the area decreased or increased with the passage of time. Based on past experience from Vivi, when the dungeon becomes dark a whole day would have passed.

Although no one in the group was hostile to each other, everyone still somewhat wary of the other and set up their own countermeasures.

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An alarm buzzed out as Xylos was shaken awake.

"Wake up." A male voice said, "Your friend disappeared."

"What friend?" Xylos thought and quickly reached around him and sat straight up. His iconic shield and sword was missing...