Chương 2: Floor Two

Apple's Dungeon Adventure [Crafting Progression LitRPG] · Unknown author · 518 chương · ~113 phút đọc · Tạo 05/07/2026

The first thing she registers when entering the second floor is that she'd forgotten something. Pulling air through her teeth like she'd seen some of the Godsent do when they get hurt, Apple tries not to let the mental damage of forgetting the Sahuagin Net affect her too much. It was useful but with the entrance turning red behind her she can't exactly go back and get it. She just has to continue onwards, now that it's gone, it's gone and she doesn't have to worry about it.

The next many things she registers are mostly about how much the second floor has changed from the first. There's still the wet rock of the tunnel she's in but now the pools on either side have been replaced by large colourful plants that Identify tell her are 'Coral Fans'. Another change is that the path between them dips down from her dry portion by the entrance to what looks like waist high water. It's rather pretty if she ignores the fact she's in mortal danger.

She looks ahead, the path staying fairly level now instead of the previous sloping down tunnels. At the end of this particular section it splits evenly in two, one tunnel heading left, the other to the right. The only 'danger' she can see at the moment is making a lot of noise as she traverses through the water. But, given that seems to be her only way forwards, she steps slowly into the cold liquid. Within a few steps she's already up to her knees and eventually the water has soaked her up to her midriff.

She can handle the cold, she can handle the way the water weighs her down, but what she can't handle is the sudden pinching at her legs. Apple looks down, finding that dozens of strange fish have started to gather around her lower half and they do not seem as gentle as the guppy she'd encountered previously. They have teeth, and they're biting!

With a pained exhalation she rushes back out of the water and to the dry land by the entrance, having to pull one of the fish from her knee, wincing at the pain from such an action. Inspecting the fish shows it to be a 'Piranha', and observing it as it wiggles in her grip, she finds the creature has a row of sharp teeth.

Quickly checking her Health she sees it's currently at '80%++' so they didn't do a lot of damage and she's still regenerating, but given the amount of them in the water it wouldn't have taken long before they ripped her apart. Apple throws the Piranha back into the water, watches it swim in circles for a moment and then swim off to join back up with its bitey friends. Friends would help make this dungeon easier.

Giving a quick check to her legs, finding a few relatively small red marks, Apple takes another look at the layout of the floor to see if she missed anything. If the water is dangerous, then how would Godsent even get through the second floor? The coral fans? They line the walls at a height just above the water, the actual plant itself dipping into the water to either sustain itself or some other mechanic she doesn't yet understand. Some are even growing out of the walls.

There are different colours and different types around the area, one that looks almost like a regular bush with coloured twigs and what seems like fur. The ones that seem to be grown flat and without any gaps are the ones above water level… Like platforms? She moves over to the nearest fan, pressing a hand into it and finding it quite solid. Pressing more weight into the plant it doesn't give, almost having the texture of a rock in some manner.

So it's not that she has to go through the water but the water is a hazard of a kind and she needs to traverse the coral to continue. Okay. Apple hops up onto the coral fan, testing a few steps before nodding to herself at how sturdy these plants are. So she was right. Now that she has a way to continue she looks around for the nearest fan like the one she's standing on, spotting it across from her and a little ahead. She can jump that.

Hopping across the gap she lands quietly on the other side, continuing forwards as she jumps over a pool between two coral fans when something catches her eye. Turning back to the pool she'd just jumped, she spots more multicoloured items within. Making sure no Piranha are inside she grabs at the objects, pulling out a small handful of colourful shells. Not wanting to waste a potential resource she places them in her inventory before grabbing a few more handfuls and storing those away as well.

Her panel makes that usual noise, what could she even call that noise? It's close to a bell of some sort but not one she'd heard of. What noise do bells make? A chime? Sure, she can call it a chime. Checking her panel she smiles at her Gather skill going from 'E+' to 'D-'. Her first skill above E rank. That feels like an accomplishment, although it does feel strangely fast.

"I think I messed up somewhere…" One Godsent is mumbling as they stare at something Apple can't see.

"What did you mess up?" A Godsent with a HUGE sword asks in a gruff voice.

"I said I think I messed up, not that I did." The first Godsent grumbles before sighing, shoulders letting their arms fall limp for a moment.

"My skills aren't levelling up nearly as fast as they were when I was Freelancer."

"Oh, yeah," The other Godsent nods, "you messed up. Didn't know how the exp curve works? That's okay, it's not shown openly. See, every Skill has two hidden stats assigned to it, from nothing to the lowest stat the curve is fast, from that to the highest stat is moderate, and after that it's slow. What Skill is it?"

"Mine." The first Godsent grumbles. The Godsent with the HUGE sword laughs for a moment.

"Strength and Vitality. You're a Rogue. Tough break." The first Godsent whines pitifully. Right! That means her Skills are going to rank up quickly to C rank but get much harder to rank after that. That seems helpful for her current situation, although does Inspect have a slower rate of some kind or is she just not using it as much as other Skills? Either way, she needs to keep moving.

Hopping between the coral platforms has her closing in on the split of the cave soon enough, although again she's distracted when one of the coral fans with the strange fur brushes her neck, causing her to let out a short laugh before she manages to clamp a hand over her mouth. It was tickly! She can't be blamed for laughing! A gurgling noise from the left tunnel causes her to grimace and rapidly starts backing up, jumping across to the left wall and pressing herself into it.

She controls her breathing, listening for the noise as it gets closer, now accompanied by the plodding of those webbed feet. Apple has her spear in her right hand, giving her a potential advantage over her oncoming enemy if they're prepared similarly. The Sahuagin hops onto the coral fan across from her, this one wielding what seems to be a shield made from a small coral fan, the side now facing her covered in barbs of some kind that must be under the coral she's currently standing on.

And lucky for her that shield is in the Sahuagin's left hand like herself. Without letting the opportunity slip by, Apple rushes forwards, jabbing at the monster, this time not being fast enough to get the first hit as the Sahuagin pulls its shield up, catching her spear on those barbs coating it. She wants to exclaim her annoyance but needs to act quickly to keep herself from being impaled.

Instead of letting go of her spear to pull another from her inventory, she continues to push it away from her, causing the Sahuagin to stumble back, their arm being pushed away from its centre, the shield that had protected it now hindering it. With no other weapon to hand Apple moves closer and slams the edge of her leather shield into the monster's neck and shoulder, whilst trapping her own spear to her side with her elbow, spinning the creature into the centre of the tunnel and off the coral platform.

She lets her spear go so she isn't dragged down with it, watching as the monster splashes into the water, the Piranha starting to devour the creature as it sinks beneath the liquid.

The Sahuagin bulks up as it hits the water like the previous ones had, but its disorientation from the fall and the strike to its neck slow it down just enough that it can't escape its destruction, popping into a puff of mist several seconds later, its core bobbing up to the surface of the water alongside its shield and Apple's spear, still stuck together. That was a bit gruesome. The lack of blood makes it a little less so but it's still slightly disturbing.

She hadn't really considered that she'd killed these creatures before now. They vanish in a spray of mist, they have a core of some kind, so is it the same as if she were to be killed? Apple cries and cries, she'd been wandering through the village, holding her namesake and marvelling at the colour when someone had run directly into her. That initial impact had only spooked her somewhat but what followed was terrifying. An entire skeleton, wielding a rusted sword, eyes aglow with sickly green flames.

A mist blowing in from behind it. The monster made no sound, it didn't hesitate in any manner as it struck out at the cabbage salesman. Apple had begun to cry when the man fell and didn't get up, the monster turning its hollow gaze in her direction. And then the green eyed Godsent slams into the monster from the side, scattering its bones across the courtyard. She turns to Apple before looking back towards the direction the ethereal mist is spewing from.

"They created a Graveyard in town…" The Godsent whispers, rushing into the mist without another word. No. There's a difference between Monsters, Godsent, and herself. Monsters vanish and drop a core, Godsent simply re-appear elsewhere, and she… Apple looks at her panel once more.

She should have noticed those icons vanishing. She'd gained back five percent of her Anima and in under ten minutes she'll be back to full Health. She should keep moving. Kneeling down she manages to grab the shaft of her spear, pulling it and the shield over to herself and even using it as a scoop to pick up the Sahuagin Core, putting her total up to four. Inspecting the shield gives her a new panel to look at for the moment. Coral Fan Shield Uncommon Uncommon? Her things so far have all shown as simply 'Common'.

And her own shield she'd crafted had a prefix of 'Makeshift' or 'Shoddy' for the leather cuirass she'd made. Now that she remembers the Sahuagin Net didn't have a prefix either. Does that make them special or better in some way? Either way, those spikes on the face of the shield need to go. They might be useful for trapping weapons but a Sahuagin could easily do exactly what she'd just done to one of them.

Moving away from the split in the tunnel she pulls a sturdy looking shell from her inventory, sitting down and chipping away at the spikes of the shield, hoping this won't destroy it somehow. After a couple minutes she has all but the centre spike chipped off. Hopefully this will help her in the long run.

Putting her leather shield into her inventory for now, assuming it might come in handy later, she slides her arm through the leather kelp straps of the coral shield, finding it a little smaller than her own creation but much sturdier looking. And… She touches at the edge of the shield, pulling her finger away when a small red mark appears. It's very sharp. Good.

Readier than ever, Apple stands up once more and begins her journey forwards, pausing rather soon when she approaches the coral that had tickled her earlier. Inspecting it just returns the usual result of 'Coral Fan' even though this one is different from the ones supporting her weight at the moment. Touching the fur finds it a little tickly but also brings to mind a thin string. Maybe…

Putting her weapon and shield away for now, Apple starts following the fur around, finding that it's not growing from many spots like hair might, but the string itself wiggles along the 'branches' of this coral in one continuous line. It starts just at the base of the plant and wiggles its way over every little branch until it ends at the other side. Very interesting.

Taking out a knife she cuts the string away from the base of the plant and pulls, marvelling at how the colourful string is easily harvested from the plant. She grins and pulls out one of the shark fangs she'd removed the bristles from, starting to wrap the coral string around and around like the spools she sees in her mother's workshop. It takes her a full two minutes to harvest the entirety of a single coral fan. Inspecting this spool has her grin widening and her body feeling the need to wiggle.

Spool of Coral String (Green) Common Letting her body wiggle for a moment, Apple thinks over all the creations she could make with string like this. One jumping to the forefront of her mind as she shifts her weight on her feet. Socks. She could make some dry socks. Before she gets carried away, Apple checks the rest of the coral fan, now missing its tickly string coat. It just looks like a bunch of sticks. Green sticks but sticks none the less.

She carefully snaps one of the sticks from the plant, looking down the tunnel and waiting to hear any noise that alerts her to a new enemy. Nothing. She looks back at the stick in her hand, finding it has gone from a vibrant green to a more faded white colouring. Watching its colour fade, another one blossoms up as the stick turns brown and even its name changes. It's a stick! She's found a wood source in the dungeon!

Cheering in her head, Apple starts pulling stick after stick from the poor plant, eventually cutting through its stem and watching as the fan turns brown and falls into a pile of the things. She gathers those up quickly, placing them within her inventory for later. She'd gotten wood, that means she can try to make fire, maybe even fashion two of the sticks into knitting needles to help with making socks. But she doesn't just want green socks…

She looks around at the other colours of coral fan on display and feels another smile on her face. Time to get gathering. Ten minutes later and she's collected four more spools of string; blue, yellow, pink, and orange. They each take up a separate box in her inventory but that's something that might be fixed soon enough. She has a plan! A big plan in fact, a plan that will, for the most part, solve a lot of the problems she's currently facing. Problem one, food.

It's a long term problem and she's not found any more apples down here yet. So food is a problem. This can be solved by looking at certain bitey little fish under the water. She's not sure how Piranha tastes but if that's all she has to eat, it's what she'll have to get used to. Problem two, wet socks. It's not as big a problem as potentially starving to death, but it is a problem. If only because it makes her a bit uncomfortable. That can be solved with a few hours to sit down and knit herself some new socks.

Problem three, warmth. She'd only really noticed it as she was collecting the string, but the cold water on her cotton clothes has really got her shivering. Not enough that she's very worried, but she needs to deal with that soon or she might become ill, maybe even freeze to death! Problem four, inventory. She's running out of space rather fast.

She'd done her best to mitigate the issue with her belt and pouch, but now she's collecting more things, it's becoming apparent that even getting through five floors of this dungeon will fill her inventory up before long, especially at the rate she's actively gathering stuff. And it's not like she's going to stop gathering stuff. It's a Skill to train after all! Problem five, she's still trapped in the dungeon.

As much as her plans are helping her stay alive in the short term, she's within a dungeon that's home to murderous fishpeople. That's not really something she can plan for with sticks and string. Although… She'd not considered making traps yet. Problem six, traps? Could the Sahuagin have those? Maybe. She should stop making lists in her head and focus. Shaking her head, Apple looks around, thinking over the problem with the first three problems. Fire. How does she make fire around her?

She has no way of actually attaining heat at the moment. She could try the stick thing she'd seen people do, but that's probably not good for her at the moment. Sighing, she grabs her new shield and old spear from her inventory. She can explore a little more and hope for some new items to make an appearance that may help her. Sticking to the left like before, she follows the wall as best she can when hopping from platform to platform. Slowly making her way towards whatever this path has in store for her.

Turns out, to nobody's surprise, it has another Sahuagin in store for her! This one is strange however. She hears the splashing of water instead of the plodding feet noise she'd gotten used to. Keeping to the shadowed parts of the tunnel, only now realising that light is coming from the moss on the ceiling. Stopping herself getting distracted she watches as a muscled Sahuagin makes its way straight through the water in the direction she's hiding. Why aren't the Piranha attacking it?

They'd attacked the one she'd dropped into the water and even herself when she'd walked into it. So what's different here? Thinking for a moment, Apple finds what she considers the solution pretty quickly. When she'd entered the second floor of the dungeon she was 'injured' or at least under 100% Health. And before she'd dropped the Sahuagin into the water she'd struck it, likely reducing its own Health in the process. This muscled Sahuagin isn't injured and so, likely, isn't attracting the Piranha. Which means!

She moves her grip on her spear, waiting for the monster to get close enough that she reasons the likelihood of hitting is higher than not, then hurls the spear at the Sahuagin. Her weapon leaves a long red mark on the Sahuagin's waist and Apple watches as the water around the creature begins to bubble with the frantic assault of the bitey fish.

Without wasting a moment, the Sahuagin rushes over to a coral fan nearby, pulling itself up and onto safety, the muscles it gains from being in contact with the water fading. Apple jumps across the room to the nearest coral fan, moving to jump again to keep closing the distance to her opponent, only now noticing that this Sahuagin is different from the others. It has no spear or shield, but a strange looking strip of material that it's placing a white stone within.

It even has a necklace made from shark fangs around its neck. She'd forgotten to observe the creature fully before acting! The Sahuagin spins the cloth around as Apple jumps closer once more. As she's closing in it lets go of one end of the material and her vision goes momentarily white as her head is pushed back, the stone striking her forehead extremely painfully and almost causing her to fall off the coral platform.

Hissing at the pain and trying to focus back on her enemy, she flicks her eyes to the side and finds that single strike had taken off 24% of her entire Health! She can't let that happen again. Apple rushes even faster now, pulling a knife from her belt and ducking under a hurried second shot from the weapon before twisting her wrist and upper cutting the edge of her shield into the monster's chin, leaving a nasty looking red mark on its wet skin.

It gurgles in pain but doesn't let her get in another hit with her knife, kicking its webbed foot out to knock her back and impaling itself on her shield as she brings it up to weather that blow. Pushing forwards and letting her knife drop to focus all her effort on utilising the offensive properties of her shield, Apple knocks the monster off balance and follows it down.

She pulls the shield up before slamming its edge into the Sahuagin's chest, creating another red mark, then a second, a third, and her enemy turns to mist as she drops onto her hands and knees, panting heavily. Checking her Health again as the Sahuagin Core bumps against her fingers, she finds that the kick had only dropped her down to 74% from where the stone shot had dropped it. That's still a huge amount of Health to lose from one attack. And that was from a Sahuagin's weakened form!

Letting herself calm down slowly, Apple slowly leans back into a seated position, staring down the tunnel. Ahead it dips up slightly before dropping again from what she can see. So dry land for a small portion of this particular tunnel. It's blocking off the sightline of the tunnel but that's not a problem given that any monsters on the other side of that rise won't be able to see her either.

She picks up the core and checks over it before placing it inside her pouch, finding she now can't pull the strings to close it. Groaning, she removes the cores, stores them in her inventory and smiles weakly at them stacking up to five. She takes out the spools of string and places those in the pouch instead, not being able to tie the string but knowing they won't roll around or fall out like the smooth cores might. It also clears up five whole boxes of her inventory. So. A new type of enemy.

Range that she can't currently accomplish. She has no idea what sort of weapon that was, but she feels sure that she would need a lot more practice with it to be as good as the monster was. Spear is easy. Stabby stab. Shield is simple. Put between you and bad thing. That thing? No. It's a shame she can't Inspect items the Sahuagin are holding. But she's definitely come to the understanding that if she disarms them of something, it doesn't vanish when they're beaten.

Apple rubs her eyes, blinking away the tiredness that's threatening to make this even more difficult. Which brings up another problem. Sleep. She'll need to eventually even if she can't see the sky to tell what time it is. That's problem seven. Touching her forehead, Apple frowns that she can't exactly bandage this wound so her First-Aid won't be very helpful at the moment. Okay, observation needs to happen. Figure out what's behind the rise in front of her and improvise from there. OPPAI still works.

She pulls herself to standing, checking to make sure she'd collected everything, especially the knife she'd dropped in the fight. From there she again starts hopping between platforms, getting closer and closer to that rise. When she gets there she jumps onto the slightly raised ground and crouches, sneaking her way up to the peak of the rise and peering over. She jolts at the chime from her panel, ducking back down and checking to see that her Stealth had ranked up. That's strange.

Her Stealth hadn't ranked up any when she was just sneaking around without any… Right. So that only improves when she's using it near enemies. Which means that… She peers over the rise and sure enough, a Sahuagin is down there. This one standing, holding a large sword covered in coral and other strange underwater plantlife she can't identify. It's wearing chest armour that seems to be made from many different shells held together somehow.

When it moves slightly from foot to foot, the shells make a gentle clinking noise. Almost musical. It's standing in a thin layer of water and, from what Apple can see from a slight red glow on the floor behind it, standing right in front of the exit. She drops down once more, staying there for a moment before moving away from the rise and back to the edge of the water. That's an issue. That sword looks deadly and with those shells protecting its torso, any damage she'll have to do will be focused on limbs.

She's also not fought an empowered Sahuagin yet beyond the one that had gotten stuck and the one she'd taken by surprise. She can't take this one by surprise. So for now… She starts making her way back through the tunnel. She can check the other path before making a plan for this. Getting to the split in the path isn't difficult, just a little tiring with the constant jumping from platform to platform.

Once her health is back to full she can probably brave the cold of the water to take a small break but that's at best half an hour away if she doesn't get into any more scuffles. Turning left into the unexplored tunnel, Apple readies herself for more fights, only to find the tunnel curves around and down for a short while until the platforms grow larger and cover the entire floor. Ahead the room expands once more and she finds herself immediately confronted by two Sahuagin with spears.

But hey, bright side, it seems they're protecting another chest and not empowered! Downside? They spotted her right away. The first gurgles a shout as the second throws its spear towards her at the exact same time she hurls her own towards it. They both duck the throws in a very similar way, Apple closing the distance towards the one with a working spear to try and get within its reach before it can use the weapon effectively.

She manages it, getting herself into a position that allows her to slam the coral shield into its chest, sending it stumbling backwards, she's getting used to those. The second Sahuagin charges her with a knife, stabbing at her and grazing her right arm painfully. Apple pulls her own knife, in an underhanded grip, slashing at the monster's chest to drive it back and away before bringing up her shield to block the spear throw from the Sahuagin she'd pushed away.

It still hurts but she figures it's less than what it would have been otherwise. Now on the defensive, Apple flicks her eyes between her enemies, watching as they move to try for a counterattack. The one on her left with the chest wound goes for its spear. She rushes it, standing on the weapon, trapping its spindly webbed fingers to the floor.

Instead of simply ramming it she rolls over it with her shield against its neck and back, hearing a gurgled scream for her efforts as she slams into the ground, rolling painfully before managing to scramble to her feet as the Sahuagin with the knife barges past its wounded ally and right for her. Timing it just right, Apple flicks her shield up and into the monster's wrist, knocking its arm wide and allowing her to jab her own knife into its collar bone.

It gurgles in pain at the red mark across its wrist from the shield bash and the new one the dagger leaves. She lets out a shout of pain as a spear impacts her right leg, dropping her to one knee and giving an opportunity for the Sahuagin that's close to her to try for another stab, this time at her head. She doesn't have time to raise her shield to block or deflect the blow so she drops her own knife and grabs the creature's wrist.

In their weakened form they're just slightly taller than her and have much less tone to their limbs. So with her new Strength she manages to catch its wrist and give her time to slam the edge of her shield up into its elbow before throwing herself into it with the sharp tip of her shield, landing on the ground hard as the monster turns to mist in mid-air. The remaining Sahuagin doesn't try to stab her, it just kicks her side, causing Apple's breathing to catch as she rolls onto her back.

The monster gurgles almost happily as it picks its spear up once again, moving to stand above her and raise the weapon in both hands. Apple rolls to her right, the spear going from creating a new hole in her chest to digging into her arm. Her breath comes back just in time for her to shout in pain once more as her Health drops. It's still protecting her but in her prone state, there's not much she can do. She runs a thumb over the damp apple, it had been raining and most Godsent had stayed indoors.

One of them who had, gave her an apple and listened to her question, showing no expression other than rubbing his stubble with a gauntleted hand.

"If you can hold a sword, you can keep fighting." He says finally.

"If you can move your arms, you can keep fighting. If you can see your enemy, you can keep fighting." There's a sound of quiet thunder in the distance.

"And if you can still breathe, you can keep fighting." There's a moment where neither of them move, then Apple nods her thanks and the man continues walking. She can still breathe. Apple rolls away from the Sahuagin, avoiding another fatal blow. She rises unsteadily to her feet, watches as the monster gurgles its delight at the continued fight, switching its spear from its right hand to its left. Easier for it to get around her shield.

Moving her shield around, Apple slowly pulls her hand from the straps, keeping it as if she's just protecting her chest. The Sahuagin rushes forwards, jabbing at her as fast as it can. She dodges what she can but weathers several weakened stabs with her shield.

When she's close enough she steps up onto the chest they'd circled around behind, springing forwards as she pushes the monsters spear hand away from her with the shield she'd transferred to her right, revealing she'd pulled out another knife with her left and slamming the blade into the Sahuagin's neck with everything she has remaining in her. The Sahuagin stumbles for a second as Apple drops, strength failing her now. She's done. She'd given it her best but it's over. Mist covers her vision.

She falls down as she hears the sound of the Sahuagin Core drop to the coral floor. She'd won? If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation. Apple lets out a pained laugh as she pants heavily on the floor. She'd done it. Beaten them both. And with a slight turn of her head and a little bit of focus finds that her Health is currently at 28%. Easy fight. She laughs quietly into the coral floor, closing her eyes for a few minutes so she can catch her breath.

That was closer than any fight so far. If she'd waited before checking this path out she might have had more health, but she hadn't, so again why stress over it? When her arms are feeling strong enough Apple pushes herself up and brings herself up to sit next to the chest, leaning on it for support. This area seems safe enough to take a moment. Whatever's in the chest will hopefully be helpful. She can see several spears on the floor nearby. Two new cores she has yet to collect. And no pesky Piranha to snap at her.

More minutes pass as she shakily wraps a wet bit of kelp around the wound on her leg like she had before, finding that she only needs to do this twice to get the Heal effect back. That drops her back down to 85% Anima but helps her feel a little better. Another few minutes pass before she feels like she has more strength in her body. She sits up on her own power and unlatches the chest. Opening it she lets out a dry chuckle.

Inside is another 'Sahuagin Net', a pair of rather stylish black leather sandals that Inspect informs her as- Leather Sandals Common, Cosmetic -and something she'd seen on the Sahuagin with the strange weapon. She pulls out the necklace, marvelling at how cool it looks. Threaded coral string intertwining small and large fangs with coloured beads between them. It doesn't make noise when she tries to rattle it so it likely won't impede her Stealth skill.

She Inspects it and smiles when the chime notifies her of that particular Skill ranking up once more. Shark Fang Necklace Uncommon Crit Chance+ The necklace seems to have a bonus effect like eating and the First-Aid skill. She's reminded again of that stone striking her and her entire vision going white for a moment. Was that what this does? Assuming there's a low chance for a 'Crit' to happen, and assuming that allows an attack to deal more damage, this necklace is a great boon.

She slips it on over her head, letting it sit against her armour. She puts the net in her inventory before sliding her own basic shoes off and sliding the sandals on. They're rather comfy and come with a button strap around her ankle to keep them secured. How the creator knew to leave them in her size is beyond her, but she's thankful all the same. Her old shoes go into her inventory and fill up another spot alongside her old shield. She needs to either find a use for these things or leave them behind.

But before she starts abandoning her things, she looks at the amount of scraped leather in her inventory along with the rest of the sticky kelp. She knows exactly what she can get started on whilst her Health fills back up. A backpack! The solution to her inventory issues is, from what she can picture, rather simple to solve if she has the right amount of kelp left over. She's almost entirely out of wet kelp, but the other few variants are still there.

This does mean she'll likely run through her supplies but it's for a good cause. Pulling out the dry leather and scraped leather, Apple sets them down in strips side by side. She knows her mother used to make plenty of things out of just cotton, but she'd occasionally have leather equipment on the shelves of their small store. Apple can't remember her ever making those but they were there so she must have. And besides, backpacks sound simple enough.

Out comes the glue she'd harvested and a knife to cut pieces down to size. Which does give her pause. The glue on her belt had held up perfectly, no breaking just yet. Which means she could use glue for the entire thing, but something about the necklace is giving her pause. How had the Sahuagin made holes in the teeth? Looking down at her new necklace, the holes seem fairly even, though parts of the teeth are a little chipped.

She rummages through her pouch, pulling out the last couple bristles from the shark fang, finding them still quite sharp. Turning one around between her fingers it almost feels like a slightly large needle. Apple sets to work creating a small hole in the base of one 'needle' with another of the bristles, finding it goes rather easily once she lines them up. With her new needle in hand she pulls out some of her yellow coral string, threading the end through the needle and grinning to herself.

She's a real tailor now, huh? Glueing several lengths of leather together to make the back of the backpack, she lets that dry whilst doing similar with the scraped leather to make the outside of the item. The bottom can be more hard leather that she glues on, then stitching can help connect the cover to the back… Bit. She really needs to see about learning proper terminology for these parts. Back, front, sides, bottom.

Easy enough but if you're making something like this it might be nice to see if there are actual words for these parts. Or maybe she's overthinking things. Which in itself is interesting, she'd never have considered herself an overthinker before being thrown into this dungeon. With the glue set for the back and bottom of the backpack and the scraped leather front needing to dry before she cuts into it, she gets started on a small pouch to hold her spools so she can free up more space in her belt pouch.

The pouch on her belt can stay where it is for now, it'll be easier to access than anything on her back and who knows what she'll come across that she'll need quick access to. Although, her inventory has been rather quick to use so far. Pausing for a moment, she gets up on wobbly legs to grab all the weapons strewn about, storing them away in her inventory before testing to see how fast she can pull her spear from it. The result? Pretty much instantly.

But only if the hand she's trying to fill with a weapon is empty. She can't pull one of her spare knives into her shield hand when that's equipped either, and she can't pull items out into the air either, only into a free hand. Good to test now instead of trying and failing later. Getting back to her tailoring, Apple stitches up the small pouch with only a touch of glue used to seal any gaps she finds that she missed or stitched wrong.

She's not perfect, but then again she's only at E- rank so far, mistakes are expected when you're learning. Once the pouch is done she cuts the scraped leather front into shape, setting the cut off portions aside for the moment as she lines up the edges to the back. Once again she sets to stitching, going slow and being wary of hurting herself without one of those metal thumb hats her mother has.

When that's about as done as she can expect, she sits the half-finished creation on its bottom, grinning at how it sits up. She needs the flap for the top and the straps to actually wear it, also needing to attach the pouch, but it's already coming along well. The top flap… Thingy. Cover? She doesn't know what it's called but it- Lid? Like for jars? She giggles to herself quietly as she takes the cut out semi-circle of leather, pulling over another piece of scraped to create a lip going around the edge of that.

Sewing that on is easy enough, the strap to keep the lid secure might be an issue however. She could do what she'd done with her belt but she's been wanting to do something with the sticks she harvested, so out comes one of those oddly cylindrical items. She can just cut a piece off, wrap a small strip of leather around it, then use that as an easy way to create a clasp. Getting that done takes barely any time, as does lining up the connective piece on the back of the backpack.

Once that's all set and stitched into place, she starts to sew the lid onto the back of the backpack, liking how the yellow stitching contrasts against the brown leather. The last piece of her creation, the straps, use up the last of her wet kelp, watching as it dries into leather, she really hopes there will be more to collect on the next floor.

Sizing the lengths isn't difficult now that she has the backpack itself made, and with a little more glue and some secure stitching, she's looking at a completed leather backpack! And listening to a chime from her panel!! She'd gone up to E rank just from that!

Assuming she keeps creating things with it that is. Inspect doesn't seem to level up as quickly as the others but that's down to her use of it. And speaking of! Shoddy Leather Knapsack Uncommon Crafted by Apple Okay, so she'd accidentally been calling her creation a backpack instead of what the panel is calling it, but she'd done it! And why is it still labelled as 'Shoddy'?!

Yeah, she can see where the stitching is uneven and parts where she'd used too much glue, but the lid can be open and secured, it's stable and can probably hold things… Not that she's tried yet. It's not shoddy! Grumbling to herself about the cruelty of critics or whatever, Apple still can't stop herself from beaming with pride. She'd made something! It even has her name on it! She'd never in her life made something before this dungeon!

Pulling her things out of her inventory, she starts placing them within the knapsack. She doesn't have much right now, but in go the leftover shark fangs, the pretty shells, all the leather she has left over (which isn't much), the seven Sahuagin cores she'd gained, the spools of string from her belt pouch, and the… No, the bowl of glue needs to stay in her inventory alongside the sticky kelp. She has three spears now and three knives.

Two knives go into her belt loops with the third next to the spears in her inventory. They currently take up a space each, but with how fast they allow her to re-equip herself, they're worth it. Her old leather shield is still in her inventory as well, that… She'll hold onto still. For sentimental reasons. The net! Right! She'd almost forgotten about her new net. The net she's yet to figure out how to use effectively.

It sort of worked on one Sahuagin but she'd missed entirely with her throw, it was only dumb luck that she hit the other Sahuagin anyway. Thinking over how to utilise this effectively whilst tying up the sticks from her inventory into a bundle, she looks around at the relative safety of this small cave area. If she could start a fire somehow, she could let herself rest here, perhaps catch some of the Piranha and see if they're edible. Revenge for the nibbles they'd taken out of her.

But the longer she stays, the hungrier she'll get if the Piranha aren't that nourishing. And she has no idea how to start a fire with the materials at hand. Placing the bundle of sticks into her knapsack, Apple takes another quick look around the cave to make sure she hasn't missed something, then sets her newest creation next to the chest for now. She stands, groaning at her body still experiencing the pains of earlier, wondering exactly how Godsent can keep fighting like this over and over again.

She's experiencing long term pains that she knows the Godsent don't. So what does this make her? A strange mix between Godsent and a regular person? Her Health seems to shield her from experiencing the full damage of any attack, but when enough of them start piling up, even healing isn't bouncing her back to her previously unhurt state. So she has a large portion of the benefits the Godsent enjoy, but still has a mortal form that can be destroyed permanently? What does this make her? A… A demigod? No.

No, that sounds far too grand for the daughter of a tailor and a guard. But like with her thoughts on parts of the knapsack, there are probably correct words for everything, she just has to find them or settle on something that seems right. Or she's once more overthinking things. Determined not to get stuck in her own head, Apple makes her way to where the coral floor splits once more to the walls, the water in the centre at the same level it always is.

The Piranha seem to swim in small packs through the water, sticking by their friends as they go. She's not at full Health just yet, but… Huh. The Sahuagin at the exit is stood in a small amount of water. Grinning now, Apple pulls her new net from her inventory, checking the length of thread making it so she can pull it back after throwing it, she puts her coral shield away before starting to work on her net throwing technique.

It's oddly calming to practise like this, figuring out how to hold the net so the weights create momentum when she throws, finding out she should have tied the thread connected to the centre of the net to her wrist when it goes flying away from her, getting into a rhythm of throwing the net out, letting it settle, then pulling it back in. She's not actively catching anything yet, she's seemingly making a bit too much noise for that, but she's getting a feel for the thing.

When she does start to try to catch some of the Piranha she finds rather quickly that net fishing isn't as easy as that one Godsent made it out to be. The little bitey fish rush away from any disturbance in their water, and by the time she pulls the net back out, the centre of the net comes up without hooking anything at all.

So, not to be beaten by literal fish, she moves further into the tunnel, sets the net gently into the water from one side with the thread pulled through either side of the weighted end, then waits patiently. Once the Piranha are calm and swimming around, she waits for them to get closer to the net before rapidly wrapping the thread around her palm and elbow whilst running in the opposite direction to drag as many of the fish in as possible. Rewarded with both a net full of unhappy fish and a chime from her panel.

Checking that chime out she immediately starts to laugh, nearly dropping the net of fish back into the water.

She got a Fish skill! She continues her giggles, making an effort to get the wiggling net of fish back to the coral floor cave. She can see what the panel is doing of course, Gather isn't Gathering, but still, that's so funny to her. Does her Fish skill help her to move faster in water? At high ranks could she breathe underwater? She continues her giggles as she sits down by the net of Piranha. Fish skill. Letting out a happy sigh, Apple watches as the Piranha cease their flopping and go still.

She picks one up carefully, inspecting it again and finding that it is now labelled as 'Piranha (Fresh)'. So, potentially edible. Maybe. She's not going to attempt eating one raw however. Placing all of the Piranha into her inventory, she considers catching more than the current twenty-one she currently has, when she remembers how they escaped away from the net and under the coral floor she's currently sat on. Is there a space under her that she can't currently access?

Putting her net away, Apple moves once more out of the cave and to the spot where the coral splits off. This time she kneels down and tries to peer into the water beneath the platforms, finding that it gets far too dark to see very far. Light source… She looks up at the moss along the ceiling, grinning. A new thing to harvest! Pulling a spear from her inventory, Apple finds an area of the tunnel where the ceiling is the lowest, then gets to scraping moss from it with the spear.

It's a little difficult and she's not exactly very tall for her age, but bits eventually start to accumulate around her and partially in the water. To her surprise, the Piranha start to congregate around where the moss is falling into the water, nibbling at it in much less of a frenzy than when they'd been nibbling at her and the injured Sahuagin. She at least knows how to get them all into one spot now. Inspecting the moss gets her a quick panel showing it labelled as 'Glowmoss'.

Which seems like a very obvious name to her. Looking from the Glowmoss to the Piranha and back again, Apple licks her lips slightly. It's not like the idea of eating cave moss sounds appealing to her, but if it is edible then… She takes a few bites of a single clump, grimacing before and then feeling a little let down after. It's not horrible, the moss tasting like a slightly mushy apple that consists mostly of an apple's soft flesh. But it's not as horrid as she'd assumed, nor is it a culinary delight. It's fine.

Apple does notice a new image where the Regen and Heal effects show. This one has a picture of a glowing green light and is labelled- shockingly -'Glowing'. Holding a hand up, Apple feels her eyebrows raise slightly at how her skin itself has begun to glow in that same light as the moss. Looking down finds her other limbs also glowing and even her clothes and armour too. The effect lasts only a couple minutes before fading away to normal, but that could come in very useful for finding her way in the dark.

The only downside she can see is this didn't give her the 'Regen' effect. Gathering up more of the Glowmoss, Apple keeps going until her inventory shows it stack up to the limit of fifty. She does keep gathering for a short while after that, hoping to gain another rank in Gather, but when it seems like that's a while away she stops to gather up a handful of Glowmoss to place in her knapsack.

If she had a glass jar it could make a neat little light source, but for now she could either compress it into edible snacks, or- Oh! She has a brilliant idea! Rushing back over to her knapsack, Apple pulls out a single stick, snaps it, then pulls out her knife to start whittling the sticks down into usable knitting needles. With the consistency and stringiness of the Glowmoss, she figures that if she can turn it into a usable string then she could create glowing items!

Even if she likely wouldn't make something out of it entirely, it could be fun to add patterns of glowing symbols or letters to her clothing. And she does have another forty minutes to go before her Health is back to full. Only a few minutes after she started, the knitting needles are about as good as they'll get for the moment. With no way to sand them down, she will just have to do her best and hope she's protected against splinters now.

Grabbing a handful of the moss she starts to wrap it around one of the knitting needles until it's at a uniform thickness. She rolls that over a stretch of kelp leather for a few seconds before sliding the result from the wood. Doing that several times she eventually has a long moss tube of sorts. Starting to pull and twist the material, she's overjoyed when it actually comes out evenly and with the same thickness without splitting.

Repeating this process for twenty minutes, something that's easy to track when she has such a specific Health recovery rate, she has a full spool of what Inspect labels as 'Glowmoss String'. Which. Again. Super obvious naming. She misses the Nesting Guppies already. No, wait, they have a super obvious name too! No creativity around here.

Giggling at her own silliness, Apple takes some of the Glowmoss String and a little of her green and blue Coral String, starting to braid the three colours slowly into a thread of complimentary colours that glows.

She's not expecting to spend all her time here just creating random pieces of clothing from the things she can collect, but as she wraps the braid around her wrist several times before cutting it off and creating a proper loop with the aid of a little glue, she figures that these small stops are helping her mind as much as they are her body. Staying here and just waiting out her Health filling back up without keeping herself busy would have her climbing the walls in no time.

Glowing Friendship Bracelet Common Crafted by Apple She smiles softly at that panel after she uses Inspect on her latest creation. That's nice. She apologises to whatever magicks are controlling these strange panels and abilities for her harsh comments previously. With that done however, she still has a little over ten minutes until her Health is full once again. Putting away the stuff she'd been using, she still feels a little giddy when she looks over her knapsack and how well she'd made it fit her.

It can definitely be improved and she could fit another pouch on it if she gets more material, but right now it's her current pride and joy. Apple makes her way out of the cave, hopping a few times across the coral platforms, and sits facing the part of the river that leads under the coral platform. For the last few minutes whilst her Health is still filling up she pulls a stick, some string, and a clump of Glowmoss from her knapsack.

Cutting a small line in the end of the stick, she wraps the string around that, glueing it in place before attaching the clump of Glowmoss to the other end of the string, creating a very poor imitation of a fishing rod. Even her Inspect skill agrees with her, labelling it a 'Makeshift Fishing Pole'. With her terrible creation in hand she lets the bait sink under the water, attracting Piranha to nibble at it.

She pulls her Fishing Pole up when one takes a big bite, smiling at every Piranha she catches, throwing most of them back into the water so she can go back to fishing. By the time she sees a nice '100%' next to her Health, she'd managed to get another rank in Fish. Something that makes her smirk once again. Fish skill. Taking her armour off and setting it by her knapsack, she puts away everything on her before grabbing a handful of Glowmoss and throwing it off away from where she's about to hop into the water.

Just because she's sure the Piranha won't try to take a nibble out of her doesn't mean she wants them nearby. With her Friendship Bracelet on her wrist and a ball of Glowmoss ready to be eaten, she steps down into the cold water, wading through until she gets to the part where she needs to go under to progress any further. Figuring there's a first time for everything she downs the Glowmoss, takes a breath, then ducks her head under the water.

The first issue she encounters is that the glow from herself and the bracelet aren't very powerful. She can see a distance in front of herself as she walks into the darkness, but it's murky. The second problem is that the tunnel doesn't go down like she expected, so it's more like she's crouch-walking through an underwater tunnel. Both of those problems are put to the back of her mind when she finds many strange objects scattered around the bottom of the tunnel.

Shells like the ones in the pools but bigger and a few open to show strange looking insides. The thing that interests her are the small orbs resting inside the shells, looking almost like the Sahuagin Cores she'd acquired. Moving quickly she starts grabbing at these, sending them directly to her inventory as her eyes are starting to hurt for some reason. Once she'd collected a nice dozen that she can see, she starts back the way she came, eyes stinging now and her lungs demanding fresh air.

The light above her tells her that she's out of that dark area, Apple breaching the surface of the water with an exhalation and then a drawing of fresh breath. Her eyes are still hurting her, so when she clambers out of the river she manages to cut her palm on the edge of the coral fan platform, grumbling as a single Piranha manages to attach itself to her heel as she pulls herself out.

Grabbing that bitey creature and throwing it back into the water, Apple starts rubbing her eyes and trying to make the pain go away. It feels like something similar to her earlier exhaustion. The only thing that had lost her Health was the small red line on her palm that's already fading, but her eyes hurting right now feels like one of those puny mortal issues. If the third floor is underwater she has no idea how she'll make it.

Groaning at that thought, she keeps blinking away the pain, finding it is lessening over time but they still feel sore even once the pain itself is gone. Her Health had also recovered from the cut and bitey fish. She checks the strange orbs, her inventory showing them to be called 'Pearls' and they're also 'Rare' instead of anything else she'd seen! Although not at the moment understanding what their use is, she pulls them from her inventory, storing them in her knapsack for now.

Health restored, armour and knapsack back on, Apple looks down the left tunnel towards the last remaining enemy on this floor. She has her plan, she just has to follow through with it and continue onto the third floor. Act. She pulls the Sahuagin Net out as she hops over the coral platforms towards her enemy, getting it in a good grip, threading and looping the thread section like she had before, making sure she has a good grip on it.

When she's close to the rise that hides the monster she drops the net into the water with a sprinkling of Glowmoss to attract the Piranha. With that set up she starts to run, pulling the net in with a catch of the fish trapped inside. Not wanting them to die just yet she lugs the net up the rise before throwing the entire thing, net and all over, to the other side.

She watches as the Sahuagin with the large sword and shell armour gurgles out its surprise as a school of Piranha come tumbling down into the water around its ankles. It seems confused for a moment until it notices Apple pulling a spear from the air, it shows off its sharpened teeth cockily. Apple flings the spear at the monster, watching as it takes a stance before it grabs the blade of its weapon with one webbed hand, slapping the hilt up to deflect the spear from hitting it.

It almost seems to laugh at the attempt as Apple pulls her second spear from her inventory. That's okay. She learns from her mistakes. Bolting over the rise she holds the spear for a charge as she feels the ground below her allowing her to make a controlled slide down the incline. The Sahuagin, still cocky, changes its grip on the sword to either swing at her or deflect the coming strike.

What it isn't expecting is the spear to vanish halfway towards it and for Apple to move her arm back into the throwing position, the spear materialising back into place as she launches it towards her foe. The Sahuagin can't change its stance fast enough, the spear cutting through its clavicle and leaving a long red mark as the spear goes spinning off. The Piranha go into an absolute frenzy. From both the audacity of being thrown into such a small pool of water as this and the metaphorical blood in the water.

The poor Sahuagin starts hopping from one foot to the other trying to avoid its feet being mangled. Its eyes then focus on Apple, realising it now has to get through her to escape its fate. Apple returns that cocky grin the monster seems to have lost. The monster runs at her, swinging its large sword wildly. The benefit of its enlarged size is that it's currently much taller than her, at least twice as much.

This neat change allows Apple to duck much easier under the deadly attack, pulling her Coral Shield from her inventory as she does so, getting in a counterattack by slamming the sharp edge into the monster's side. It changes its grip back to holding part of the blade, attempting to hit her with the pommel on the backswing. Apple pushes at the Sahuagin's torso, throwing herself away from the attack and onto her back, slightly upright from landing on the incline of the rise behind her.

Her enemy gurgles angrily, switching its sword over to its left hand and going to swing once more. Is all this thing has just large muscles and one way of attacking? Apple kicks one of the Piranha up at the creature's chest, catching it off guard so she can spring up from the ground, slamming the edge of her shield into the monster's wrist once, then twice, letting out a laugh of victory when it loses its grip on the sword.

That laugh becomes a cry as the Sahuagin grabs her hair with its other hand, yanking her backwards as it opens its mouth once more, revealing those rows of sharp teeth ready to dig into her throat. From her inventory, Apple pulls the only thing she can think of that might help in this situation, imposing it between herself and the monster's open jaws; her old bracer. The monster bites down on the hard leather, gurgling its confusion as Apple pulls a knife from her belt, stabbing it into the wrist holding her hair.

She falls heavy to the floor but isn't winded this time. Her foot slams into the side of the Sahuagin's leg, bringing it down to her level for a second before she again slams her foot into it, this time up and under its jaw, slamming those razor teeth deeper into the leather of the bracer and causing it to lose its footing as it falls backwards into the puddle of Piranha. Scrambling to get up before the Sahuagin can, she rushes over to the fallen sword, grabbing it as the monster is pulling fish from itself.

A chime goes off as she picks up the weapon and vanishes it into her inventory. Apple turns, watching as the Sahuagin's grip weakens and goes limp before vanishing into mist, leaving its core behind for her to claim. How nice of it. Letting out a breath she'd been holding for a moment, Apple falls onto her rear once more, watching the Piranha wriggle about in frustration that their chew toy had vanished. She'd done it. Second floor cleared.

Apple watches the red ahead of her change to blue, smiling in victory as she checks what had ranked up during that particular fight.

She snorts at that after a moment of confusion when she realises she had technically stolen the sword from the monster. She checks that out with Inspect as she pulls it from her inventory. Sahuagin Hand & A Half Sword Uncommon Hand and… What? That's a strange way to categorise a sword that's definitely longer than even both of her hands. But she'd already apologised to the panel previously for doubting it so she lets that go.

Standing, she tries to hold the sword in one hand, giving it a swing like the Sahuagin had done. It's lighter than she expected but the swing pulls her forwards, almost causing her to lose her balance and trip. So unwieldy in one hand but better otherwise. She could forgo her shield for something like this but her coral shield has been so helpful in both defence and offence that she really doesn't want to be parted from it.

Resolving to switch things up if a new situation requires it, she stores the sword away once more as she stares across the way at the shimmering blue of the exit. It's not the exit that takes her out, but the one that will take her even deeper into this mess. And it's her only way forward. Taking that first step towards it isn't anything that fills her with more dread than what she felt when first being thrown in here, in fact, she finds there's something close to excitement there now alongside the dread.

The two flavours mixing into something new; anticipation. And so, triumphant, Apple steps through the exit of the second floor and progresses further into the dungeon.