Chapter 85: Centipede Graveyard Dungeon Part 4

Since Joshua didn't have to worry about collecting the bodies of any of the lizards that they had to kill since they fell off the cliff down into the abyss, he turned his attention towards the light that was shining a bit further down the wall. It was hard to tell what exactly was causing the light with the night vision goggles on so he took them off to try to get a look at his surroundings. The light was strong enough to brighten up the immediate surroundings so he filled everyone else in on that fact.

'Looks like there is some type of large door that's giving off the light.' Aito said as he glanced down towards it without his goggles on. With his improved vision he was able to get a better look at it then Joshua. 'It's a little weird though since I can see a large gem on it. Haven't seen anything else like it in this dungeon so far.'

'Alright be prepared for anything to happen. I'm getting a bad feeling from that door so it can't be anything good.' Joshua responded through the party chat. His aura sense could feel that there was something off about the door, but it was the only direction they could go in if they wanted to clear the dungeon. As they climbed down and got closer to the large door the odd feeling Joshua was getting grew stronger and stronger. By the time they were able to all see the door a loud humming sound started coming from it causing them all to halt in their tracks.

The entire wall that they were hanging on began to shake causing them to cling on to it more to make sure none of them fell off. Even though they had climbed down quite far they were still nowhere near the bottom and a fall would only lead to their deaths if they weren't careful. After a few minutes of shaking all of the commotion seemed to come to a sudden halt as things quieted down, but now Joshua could sense a large amount of aura coming from the door that he wasn't able to sense beforehand. The sudden change was not something he was expecting.

The quiet only lasted for a few seconds before the area around the door suddenly exploded outward creating a large plume of dust below them. The light from the door was still shining beneath them, but it was moving through the cloud of dust which immediately got all of their attention. Along with the light there seemed to be a large figure moving as well that looked like it was coming out of the side of the cliff. Henry quickly used a small spell to blow away all of the dirt and dust so they could get a clear look at what they were up against.

The first thing they noticed was the fact that the door and the giant gem on it was the light source that had been brightening up the area the entire time, but now that door seemed to have fused itself with a giant metallic creature. The metallic form was in the shape of a giant lizard that was around the size of Tank. The fact that it seemed to be completely made out of metal meant that physical attacks would be useless against it, especially if it had some sort of regenerative ability.

The giant metallic lizard let out a shrill roar from its mouth which seemed to morph so that it could create some teeth that gleamed in the light. The light however didn't last very long as the door like object sunk into the body of the creature. If Joshua had to guess the gem was probably its biggest weakness and they were going to have to find a way to get to it now that it was inside of the giant hunk of metal. The light also disappeared the moment the door and the gem were moved out of sight, darkening the entire area.

'Lilly get Light out here so that I can generate some light for us all to see right away. Monika and Henry, you should both create some light sources around the area to make it possible for us all to see what's going on.' Joshua quickly said through the party chat. He could see that the giant lizard was starting to head in their direction, but it was much slower than the other lizards which gave them all time to get in formation. Lilly summoned Light who dived into Joshua's aura helping him brighten up the area and form a projectile shield in front of the giant creature rushing their way.

Monika and Henry both created a few orbs of light each. Henry's orbs floated further away from the beast helping light up the area quite a bit so that everyone got a clear look at their surroundings. Monika's orbs of light floated closer to their metallic opponent since they could be used to attack the creature if necessary. With the entire area lit up Joshua was able to observe the creature, but the first thing Joshua noticed was the fact that when he observed it the system regarded it as an item instead of a beast. This meant that it didn't have levels or stars to judge its strength.

Since Joshua was lit up like a Christmas tree at the moment the giant creature seemed to be more focused on him than anyone else. That didn't come as any surprise to Joshua, so he took advantage of it. He pushed off the cliff and moved away from the rest of the group while taking the attention of the giant lizard away from the spell casters that were preparing to barrage it with a mix of several different spells. They didn't really have much to go off of on how to take it down so they were going to have to take a more all-encompassing approach.

Julia's inferno spell was the first one to come out as it landed on the shoulder of the large creature as it moved its head to the side while chasing after Joshua. The large torrent of flames seemed to heat up the area of metal that the flames contacted and since it was such a large area spell just about all of the creature's shoulder was red hot at the moment. Brook followed up the attack with a blast of water that hit the same spot causing steam to fill the surroundings. The steam made it hard to get a clear sight of the lizard, but the lightning blast from Robin came slamming into the creature soon after so it was unable to avoid it. The blast caused parts of the creatures shoulder to fall off showing that the metal could be affected by rapid heating and cooling.

Even though they had found a way to injure the creature they weren't able to sigh with relief since the part of the beast that was broken away started to rapidly fix itself within seconds. Now they knew that the creature could regenerate for sure and since Joshua could sense how much aura it used when regenerating he knew that they shouldn't go for the long approach of wearing the creature down. Its aura regeneration could probably keep it going for days if they just slowly injured it over time. Joshua wasn't able to keep thinking about such things as one of the creatures large claws started to swipe in his direction. It was an easy thing to dodge, but the tips of its claws elongated at the last moment to reach out towards him.

Joshua quickly blocked the attack and avoided getting knocked off the Cliffside by halting the large arm of the lizard. He knocked the arm aside, but had to dodge all of the spikes that shot out of it as it passed over head. The metal monsters ability to shift its body into a dangerous weapon was noted by the entire group as it continued to strike at Joshua. Cinder turned into her flame form and sent down a few fireballs to slam into the large creature and aid Julia at heating up its body. Brook and Henry focused on cooling it off with water soon after. The steam created for its repeated attack was covering the entire area, but Joshua had no trouble sensing the creature's attacks and focused on trying to find a weakness.

Titus leaped down and slammed into the massive creature, but didn't grapple with it since he had seen how its body was able to shift into spikes. The creature reacted by swinging its large tail in Titus's direction. The tail sharpened into a blade like shape which just missed Titus and cleaved deeply into the cliff side easily cutting through the rock. Joshua took the opportunity while the creature was distracted to slam the creature in the head with his scale blade knocking it up and opening its mouth which were filled with rows of teeth. Titus summoned several vines to wrap around the creature to keep it from moving around too much. The beast would keep cutting them away, but more would just grow back.

When the beast roared towards Titus in irritation Joshua noticed the fact that at the back of its mouth you could see the red gem that was connected to the door originally and knew that he was going to have to get to it somehow. Diving into its mouth was out of the question since it could grow several rows of sharpened teeth that would tear him to shreds if he tried to approach it. They were going to need to hit it with a ranged attack, but he was certain that the creature would move its head out of the way the moment any attack seemed to get close to its weakness.

'We need to freeze its head in place while its mouth is open so that Aito or Katsumi can shoot the gem at the back of its mouth. Cinder's the best one for the job so we're going to need the mages to hold on tight.' Joshua said with a smile as he leaped towards the creatures head. It roared as its mouth opened wide preparing to slam shut with Joshua inside of it, but Joshua with the help of Light projected a massive shield on the inside of the creatures mouth. It was formed from Light's ability along with a large amount of aura, but the lizard was already shifting the inside of its mouth to try to skewer Joshua with several spikes.

Joshua used his own aura shield to hold off all of the spikes and smiled as a torrent of flames covered the lizard's entire head. His shield held up without any issue as the heat started to melt the metallic creature quickly. Soon after a harsh chill swept through causing Joshua to reinforce himself with aura so that he wouldn't be frozen along with everything around him. The now cold metal was shaking slightly as if the creature was trying to budge. The rest of its body was able to move, but its head couldn't move at all.

With a quick swipe Joshua cleared out any teeth that were in the way of the gem before his shield's time ran out. He then leaped out of the mouth that was creaking as the creature tried to close it. Not a second later a pair of streaks shot into the creature's mouth as a bullet and an arrow smashed into the gem at the back of its throat causing it to shatter. The massive creature was frozen in place for a moment before its body started to fall apart.