Chapter 43: Floral Dungeon Part 4

After reveling in the feeling of gaining a level Joshua turned around to check and see how the rest of the group had done during the fighting. The area around the group was covered in ice thanks to Cinder using it to fend off all of the vines that got past the front line. No one seemed tired in the slightest since it was such a short fight and everyone seemed prepared to move on. Joshua did take notice of the fact that Titus was busy tearing into the remains of the palm tree as he started to absorb it rather quickly. From what Joshua could tell while fighting the thing it seemed to have the ability to manipulate its own energy in a way that it could sharpen its leaves. That would be incredibly useful for Titus in the future.

After finishing absorbing the palm tree Titus also gathered some of the fire absorbing flowers in the area before absorbing their energy as well. "Seems like you're going to make it out of here with the most rewards big guy." Joshua said with a smile as the gorilla finished absorbing the last red flower and looked down towards him.

"This place is filled with a variety of plants with all sorts of different abilities. It would be foolish for me to not take advantage of that fact. Sadly I can only add on two extra abilities to the flowers I grow outside of their own unique abilities." Titus explained. It made a bit of sense in Joshua's mind that he would only be able to give his plants so many power ups while fighting. Otherwise he'd be able to make the damn thing invincible and overpower anyone as long as he had plants in the area. With that thought in mind Joshua was starting to wonder just how powerful Ysildea was considering her ability as an elementalist went beyond just the control over plants and spread out to the control over nature itself. He reminded himself never to get on her bad side in the future.

"Even so being able to make the plants you grow fire proof in the future will go a long ways in combat." Henry said as the rest of the group walked over to the two of them. "Make sure you absorb anything you find useful in this place. It's basically a gold mind when it comes to you."

Titus nodded before he and Joshua once again started to lead the way forward. The group ran into other large groups of plants along the way. The ones they could avoid they did since it wouldn't actually matter if they destroyed them or not. Joshua could already sense that the plants they had destroyed were being replaced quickly and growing back to their former strength. To clear the dungeon they were going to have to defeat the boss otherwise the plants would just continue to come back wave after wave.

With this in mind the group would avoid any groups of corrupted plants that they could. When they were forced into a confrontation by either being surrounded by vines and roots or something similar they would fight their way through killing all of the local corrupted plants and moving on before they could grow back. They forced their way through the forest like this for hours before they came out into another plains like area. These seemed to be the only spaces that were void of danger since the grass wasn't affected by the corruption like all of the other plants.

Whenever they got to take a break by walking through these wide open grassland areas Joshua would think hard about what he figured could be going on in the dungeon for the plants to be corrupted so easily. This was a natural world dungeon so there was no way the system was just randomly creating the circumstances. There had to be a natural reason for what was going on around them to some extent and Joshua had an idea of what it could be. He was starting to believe the root of the problem in this dungeon was some sort of fungal kingdom that was taking control of all of the plants in the area.

There were two main reasons why Joshua was starting to think along those lines. The first was the fact that the corruption was being caused by spores from what Joshua could tell before entering the dungeon. He hadn't seen any of said spores inside the dungeon, but the corruption seemed to have already taken full root inside the dungeon at this point with how easily plants were able to turn corrupted without any signs whatsoever of spores in the area. There were so many corrupted plants that they didn't even hide themselves anymore.

Having spores spread the corruption outside of the dungeon seemed to be a way for the corruption to spread much further than if it was something that slowly creeped outward through the ground. There are several fungus that can spread through spores, but that was something that wasn't only possible for a fungus to do, so Joshua couldn't use that fact as evidence for his idea alone. The second reason for his belief that the corruption was caused by a fungus was the main reason he was starting to feel that his idea was what was going on here.

The second reason was simply the fact that each and every time he saw the roots of the plants come out of the ground to either protect the plants or attack the rest of the group there was something he would always see. The roots were always covered in these red tendrils that seemed woven into them. These tendrils reminded Joshua of the tendrils he had seen escape whenever they took care of one of the flowers that were creating the floating spores in the forest outside of the dungeon.

The fact that the roots were so heavily corrupted in comparison to the rest of the parts of the plants in the area was a big give away in Joshua's mind. He knew that there were several types of fungus in the world before the evolution process that would create networks in the soil that were spread through all of the roots of the plants in an area. The corruption inside the dungeon seemed to spread out in a similar way considering the fact that they hadn't seen any signs of corruption on the plants. The only reason Joshua was able to tell they were corrupted at this point was because their aura was contaminated unlike the natural plants he had seen in the forest beforehand.

If the corruption worked like a fungal network that spread throughout all of the roots of the plants in the dungeon then it would explain why there were so many corrupted plants in the first place. It also meant that no matter where they would go they would encounter more corrupted plants, the only plants that wouldn't have the chance of being corrupted at this point would be the younger ones. Their roots would not have grown deep enough or spread out enough to be contaminated by the fungus. Joshua sighed at the thought of his idea being true, but it also meant that whatever the boss of the dungeon was, it had to be the source of everything that was going on to some extent.

By the time it started getting close to evening the group had made some good progress through the area. Even so they hadn't come across any major land marks that stood out from the rest of the large forest and grassland like areas. With that thought in mind Joshua figured that they should start to push in a specific direction that stood out from the rest of the place. There was only one place that could possibly fit that ideal in the dungeon and that was where the waterfalls landed. They were the only areas that could be different from what they came across so far. There weren't any mountains to hide caves or risen areas that stood out so Joshua pushed forward towards where everyone could see the water falling from the large sphere. Since there were four waterfalls coming from the sphere there had to be four areas that they could check out.

They headed towards the nearest waterfall trying to get there before it could grow dark inside the dungeon. Although there was no sky in the place the dungeon still had this feeling of a natural progression for the day. It was growing more ambient and darker the later it got in the day. The plants were starting to glow regardless if they were corrupted or not giving the dungeon a serene beauty that contrasted the danger that lurked around every corner.

While they were on their way to the nearest waterfall they came across a new type of enemy along with some other trees that they had taken down several times before. The moment they tried to walk around the area vines and roots rose up from the ground barricading them in. In such a situation the entire group formed up and prepared to fight their way out. Joshua gave Titus a nod that told him he could let lose. The giant gorilla smirked before roaring and charging into the nearest group of trees. It didn't matter what type they were they stood no chance against the gorilla and his own army of plants that rose up and fought alongside him.

Cinder kept guard of the group and froze any of the vines that got close to them while the rest started to attack the trees from a distance. Joshua didn't charge in this time like usual as he glanced at the new type of tree in the distance to see what it would do. The tree was different from the others in two regards. It wasn't nearly as big as the other trees and was only a little bigger than its original size from what Joshua could tell. It looked like a magnolia tree with white flowers all over it that tended to drift into the wind and flutter around it.

Joshua observed the tree and wasn't surprised when he saw the name of corrupted magnolia tree. It had three stars by its name and was level seventy-seven. From this he could tell it was a little stronger than the other trees, but not to the degree that would make it boss or even sub-boss level. When they had cleared out all of the other trees the flowers on the magnolia seemed to spread out causing Titus to turn his attention to the tree. When one of the flowers landed on to Titus's shoulder it exploded causing the giant gorilla to grunt in annoyance. For Titus such an explosions was nothing more than an ant bite with his size and vitality, but for Joshua and the rest of the group such an explosion could leave a giant wound if they weren't careful.

If there were only a few flowers here and there then it wouldn't be much of a problem, but the issue was the fact that there were so many of the flowers surrounding the tree at this point that it would be like walking to your death if you got to close. Julia sent a fireball over to try to hit the tree since it seemed so small and feeble in comparison to the other trees, but one of the flowers drifted in the way and exploded on contact dissipating her attack. They were going to have to figure out a way to get through the trees defenses before the other plants could grow back and surround them once again.