Sunlight

The zombie in red fell to the ground and dissolved and an embellished large chest appeared on the other side of the room along with a way down.

Saric and co. stood there a bit shocked, they knew Atlas was strong but why would he just end the fight immediately? It was so... anti-climactic. Saric looked to Lager to see him a bit disheartened, one of Lager's open secrets was that he rather enjoyed watching the strange movements of the boss and the others.

Atlas stowed the core that dropped from the zombie in red and turned back to the party, "...? Ah, sorry, I got irritated for some reason," it called out seeing the confusion. Saric just sighed and shook his head while patting Lager's shoulder.

"No, it's fine, I suppose the Rush was enough for the trainees today, we'll be heading topside shortly. You're going deeper right?" Saric asked as he stepped off the raised platform.

Atlas paused and looked at the stairway leading down, certainly, that's what it said it would do but... The reason why it wanted to get stronger was just to relax, and what's the point if you don't relax along the way? "No, I think I'll follow you for now," the golem answered after a moment of deliberation.

Saric, Lager, and Vale responded the same way, "Huh?"

Atlas let out an uncharacteristic laugh, "I've already got the markings fitting your order, right? Someone from the adventurer guild already invited me to leave the dungeon so it shouldn't be a problem if I leave with you."

Vale responded as usual, with a dopey grin and a laugh, "Awesome, Captain you gotta let em' come with us!"

Lager had nothing to say and just looked confused, and the young knights seemed approving. Saric shrugged, "Well, I suppose, but please keep in mind that if you get irritated you must not resort to violence unless it's self-defence," he relented as he gestured to the remaining cores laying on the platform.

Atlas put his longsword and tower shield away and nodded, "Of course, I do not get irritated easily, and I know how humans can get around monsters, or I think I do anyway." The golem gathered the rest of the cores then proceeded to the chest, it was the exact same as the chest that appeared on the previous floor. Even with its minimal contact with video games in its last life, it knew this was a common thing, so why were dungeons designed the same way?

It thought on it for a moment before throwing the idea away, it didn't matter even if it did figure it out, so it didn't bother. Inside the chest was a few neat looking monster cores along with some large fangs. Atlas picked up the items and carried them over to Saric.

"Your group should know how to put these to use, yes?" The golem asked while holding out the materials.

Saric responded in the affirmative and did not wait on ceremony to store the items away, he had no reason to refuse the items. He explained that in order to get back to the surface they just needed to either backtrack to the safe room on the same floor or head down the stairs to the next safe room. Safe rooms are the only places in dungeons where space magic is unrestricted, meaning dungeon divers that either have access to space magic or related magical items can freely move between floors they have been to, including the entrance.

Saric explained that he himself actually has an affinity with space magic and is able to use enough to move between floors. He also explained the reason he wears the blindfold is to always train space magic bit by bit though didn't go into detail how he used space magic to see. Clearly, it wasn't conventional sight as he was unable to tell Atlas was a golem but it was enough to fight.

Going to the next floor was obviously easier but Saric opted to return to the previous room to let the young knights get a bit more experience and left after Atlas visited the fourth floor's safe room for when it comes back. This time Lager and Vale were in charge of helping when things got too dangerous for the young knights while Saric and Atlas stood by the side.

Progress was smooth, the zombies and chimeras on the way back were only small fry and small in number so Lager and Vale only had to step in once during the trip back. Saric and Atlas made small talk on the way, and Saric informed the golem of the uses for cores.

Generally, they're used to make and fuel magic items from weapons to household appliances, but Saric was reminded of a particular experiment that failed from Atlas' way of using them. Two generations back there was a scholar who attempted to use slivers and powdered sand made from cores to propel a chunk of iron from a tube made from more metal but the results were an extremely inefficient weapon only usable by mages with a large energy pool, and even then the energy was much better spent simply casting spells.

Of course, this translated to an attempt to make firearms to Atlas, and the scholar was either someone like him or a misplaced genius. Certainly making guns would be an achievement here but there were many problems in introducing such a thing to a world of swords and magic. Atlas shook its head and cleared its thoughts, while it could probably make them itself it's just like Saric said, woefully inefficient, though the same could be said of it using the cores as grenades.

They soon reached the safe room and Atlas felt the same force faintly trying to stop it from entering as before, but still easily walked through. Saric and the other weren't too surprised, they figured the golem had to be the anomaly, while it was different from the fifteen-foot golem in the reports it was highly unlikely there would be two sentient and powerful golems running around ignoring adventurers and attacking monsters, thus it must have already crossed the safe room once when moving down a floor.

Everyone stood in a circle around Saric as he chanted under his breath and the air started to crackle. A magic circle spread out from his feet and encapsulated the group before the scenery changed to a similar but noticeably different safe room. This one was much better lit, larger, had a large door-less exit to the outside. There were a few adventurers around along with two individuals wearing the same type of garb as Saric's group.

Atlas got its first glimpse of sunlight in this world filtering in from the door and even without being under it, the golem felt a sense of warmth spread.