As we were flying over the ocean, I had Diane and Bella both looking for an island that we could land on. The sun was already on the horizon, and I didn't really want to drive several hours through the sky after dark, not even sure if I was going in the right direction. Diane's limit for how long she could log in was almost over for the day, so it was better to try to handle the drive in the morning.

"Uhh… Drake?" Bella's voice called out to me while I was catching up with Ella through private messages, making sure to stay up to date on the 'manhunt' back in Evergreen.

"What's up?" I asked, glancing back and seeing her staring out of the window to her right.

"Does… that count?" She asked, pointing towards a large island off to our right in the distance. However, the island wasn't on the surface, but rather seemed to be resting on clouds.

Even Diane looked over with interest. "There is no way that's a natural phenomenon. Maybe a dungeon?" She suggested, and I hesitated before driving the car over. Dungeon or not, a place to park for the night was needed. As long as it wasn't too high-level, my stealth skills would protect us after we cleared it out a little bit.

"I'm just going to take a look. If the dungeon is low enough level for us to tackle, we can stay there for the night." I told them, slowing down as we approached. Once we were within scanning distance, I swept over the edge of the island with Detective Analysis to look for any monsters.

"There are… serpentine figures burrowing beneath the surface, into the clouds." I informed them. "My appraisal is registering them as Iron Lashers. On the bright side, their level is only in the low nineties, so this dungeon should be fine for us."

Diane and Bella glanced at each other, before ultimately nodding their heads in agreement. I drove closer to the edge of the cloud island, parking the car on a large projected platform for us to get out on. "Make sure you can build here before we make a move." Diane said as I grabbed my backpack out of the trunk.

I nodded at that, turning towards the island and casting Martial Construction. Sure enough, I was able to detect several common materials within the ground that could be used, primarily the thick, rocky surface.

After giving the duo the signal and stowing away the car, we walked over and stepped onto the island, still under the effects of my Ghost Zone. On the surface, the island seemed quite calm, just a large, rocky plateau floating in the clouds. All of the real activity was happening underground, where the monsters were tunneling.

"How do we draw them out…?" Bella asked curiously, but Diane just pointed into the distance.

"Fire an arrow over there. Try to make it hit the ground as hard as you can. Tunneling predators can often sense vibrations on the surface. We'd already be swarmed if we weren't in the stealth field."

Bella gulped, nodding and drawing her bow. A ki arrow appeared on the string, and she held the shot, charging up energy for a few seconds before releasing. The arrow whizzed out, smashing into a protruding rock in the distance.

Immediately, the ground began to shake. Dozens of Iron Lashers rose from the ground. Each one was a tendril several meters long, with a sleek, iron hide and lines of vertical mouths filled with razor sharp teeth. They began lashing at the spot where the arrow landed, screeching in frustration.

Diane shuddered slightly, grabbing her daggers and running forward. "I really don't like tentacle monsters…" She muttered under her breath. Before leaving my Ghost Zone, she activated her own stealth.

"Keep firing." I told Bella, summoning my three clones to send out. "You're about to have a lot of targets. The more you contribute, the faster you'll level up."

Bella bit her lip, but did as I said, firing one arrow after another. She seemed determined to level up her ki arrow skill, as every other arrow fired was made of energy.

Once my clones left the protected zone, another wave of lashers rose, dozens of them this time. I let my clones make some noise, distracting the monsters as needed while keeping my attention primarily on Diane's fight.

Soon, the halfling girl appeared behind one of the lashers, stabbing forward with her dagger wrapped in a dark glow. I had found out on the drive over that this was a skill she learned called Vital Stab. It increased the piercing power of her strike, making it more likely to land a fatal hit if she struck a target's weakness.

Unfortunately, her strike didn't have such a lethal effect this time, the tendril she struck lashing back out at her and sending her flying away. Acting fast, I projected a platform beneath her feet, and she grunted. "Drake! Where's the weak point?!" She called out, switching to her draconic form for extra agility.

My eyes focused, activating Greater Detect Weakness. Since I was still in the stealth field to protect Bella, I quickly typed out my response to her. They don't seem to have a distinct weakness. Each tendril is just a single mass of living metal, without any internal organs. I'm also not seeing anything controlling them.

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"Great, so they're living ore veins!" She hissed, dashing from one tendril to another and slicing them with her dragon claw daggers. "At least they don't regenerate!"

As if on cue, one of the lashers that she had previously struck let out a whine of pain. The other tendrils nearby reached out and began to bite at its iron skin, gnawing it apart under our horrified gazes. Those that were injured previously by Diane seemed extra ravenous, and their wounds began to heal over as they consumed their weakened friend.

"I had to say it…" Diane grunted, before shaking her head. "Okay, here's the plan! Bella, fire all you can, and don't stop until you can't fire anymore! Drake, your clones won't be able to pierce these things at their level. Make them run around and stir up the nest! You use your skills to injure as many of them as possible with me, and make them eat each other!"

I complied, giving my clones the order to start running around the island plateau. Meanwhile, I used my fire and water intents, forming elemental blades that spun among the growing hordes. While I would have liked to practice Shallow Palm here, it was utterly useless against a monster without an internal weakness.

Sure enough, as soon as any tendril received enough damage, it began to let out a shrill cry that sent other tendrils around it into a feeding frenzy. While this did heal those other monsters, it also proved an effective way to reduce their numbers, so long as we could keep up the damage.

That must be why Diane's in her dragon form, so she can use her shadow attacks without burning energy. I thought to myself, watching her send out spears and blades of darkness.

As the battle raged on, more and more Iron Lashers appeared, until the entire island looked like it was covered with giant, angry iron trees. At that point, we had been fighting for nearly twenty minutes, and Diane grunted. She broke away from the group of lashers she had been fighting, using her stealth to weave through the packs and into the safe area around myself and Bella.

"I'm at my limit." She said, shaking her head. "I'll see you both tomorrow. Neither of you are allowed to die here, got it?"

After she said that, her brand went dim, and her Chosen stood up with a slight groan. Bella and I looked at one another and nodded gravely. If either of us died, we would immediately be sent straight back to Evergreen. Bella may not be listed as a criminal just yet, but there would be no easy way to retrieve her if she respawned all the way back there.

As for me… all of Evergreen had apparently been notified about me, and Ella said that there were at least two guards monitoring every city's respawn point. On the surface, this was to greet players as they either first joined the game or respawned, but their gazes had become more focused after I was exposed.

"How many more monsters do we have to lure out?" Diane's Chosen asked with a tired sigh, looking at the writhing hordes outside my stealth field.

"That's all of the ones I saw underground. Now, we just need to get them to kill each other." When I said that, Diane nodded in understanding. She swapped her daggers out for a staff, and began hurling spears of darkness through the air.

Bella, meanwhile, was still focused on just firing as many arrows as she could. Her damage output wasn't great against such armored targets, but as long as she contributed, she would get some experience. After a few more minutes, her eyes widened. "Ki Arrow just hit twenty! Should I go ahead and fuse them?"

I knew the reason she was asking this. We had just recently planned to get her the Fire Arrow skill, hoping to let her merge that with her proficiency skill as well. "Do it." I said, and she nodded her head.

Afterwards, she no longer used normal arrows. Every time she drew the string of her bow back, an energy arrow launched out. Or two, whenever she used her Twin Shot skill.

Between the three of us, it took another half hour before the last two Iron Lashers were left on the hole-riddled plateau. All of the others had been brutally cannibalized, not a scrap of their corpses remaining. Using my elemental blades, I slashed out, splitting each of the tendrils in half. They let out pathetic whines for several long moments, flailing about before going still.

Seeing this, Diane huffed. "They'd better be worth all the trouble. Bella, how's your experience?" She asked as the three of us walked over to collect the corpses. After eating all of their compatriots, these two had grown larger, reaching eight meters in length and evolving into Steel Lashers.

"Pretty… pretty good. I'm up to fifty-six now." She said with a satisfied smile. Meanwhile, I collected the corpses into my inventory and began to dismantle them. Well, not really dismantling, since they were just a solid mass to begin with. Rather, I simply appraised the total value of the 'inert living steel'.

"Between the two of these, we can get about thirty-three gold." I reported, and Diane grimaced. Obviously, we would have gotten a lot more if we had been able to kill and harvest each individual monster, but their mechanic of devouring each other when injured would have made that tricky at best.

"Well… if this is a dungeon, where's the entrance? Or if it's an open-air one, the chest?" She asked, and I began searching around.

Eventually, I spotted something underground. "Most of the lasher tunnels lead back to the core of the island, where I'm seeing something strange in the scan. That's likely the entrance to the proper dungeon."

When Diane heard that, she hesitated. "We'll wait for my player to get back tomorrow to decide if we're going to challenge it. Like she said, we don't want any of us dying here. For now… can you still make us a house?"

I smiled, confirming it. Without hesitation, I entered 'construction dragon' mode, and quickly erected a stone house while fixing the foundation where the numerous tendril monsters had broken through before. "There aren't any plants here for me to make into furniture, so we'll have to make do. Thankfully, there seems to be a water reservoir in the cloud, if someone wants to explain to me how that makes sense. So, we have a working bath."

"Dibs." Diane quickly called out, running over to me. "As for furniture, we got these before leaving." She said, opening a trade window to trade me a large bed with green bedding. "We've each got our own."

After saying that, the halfling rushed towards the bathroom, glad to have a proper bath.

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