“It’s hard to believe that someone could do something like this… at least it looks interesting.” Mikey says to himself as he peers out from behind the cover of some massive mushrooms, watching as a flock of Undead birds go flying past. They leave a trail of colorful spores floating in the air in their wake, the spores falling to the ground like a rainbow of snow to carpet every surface in this part of the seventh floor.

  “It is sort of pretty.” Agrees Carther. “You know, in a, will kill you instantly without protective gear sort of way…”

  Some loud buzzing can be heard drawing near and the two quickly duck back into cover. Some distance away, a beetle with horns like a rhino and large enough to pull a carriage, goes buzzing by and lands on a nearby branch. Its shell is covered in scrapes and lines and spores, but they have yet to take root through its shell. Still, it looks like it is weakening, and must have been fighting for its life for a while now. Unfortunately, it is too large and conspicuous, drawing attention to itself almost immediately.

  A swarm of Undead move to attack it almost as soon as it lands, the poor beetle not even getting the chance to fully retract its wings before the first wave is falling on it.

  Swinging its horn around and kicking like a mule, the beetle fights off dozen of Undead, throwing the rotting things around and crushing them underfoot.

  “Move, move!” Dale orders in a loud whisper, pushing on people's shoulders to get them running to the next piece of cover.

  Behind them, the beetle is rampaging and tearing through groves of mushrooms like a bull through a teashop, drawing even more attention to itself by the moment. The hazmat suit clad adventurers of the Golden Mare are more than happy to take this chance to gain some ground and sprint for the cover of the next tree, running in through the open doorway.

  Getting inside, Carther and Mikey turn to watch the fight unfold. Dozens of Undead birds and other beasts are scratching and pecking away at the hard shell, but their attacks are ineffective and only serve to further infuriate the beetle into crashing into its surroundings, reducing everything that gets crushed into puddles of gore and explosions of even more spores.

  Just as they are about to look away and leave it to its fight, something big comes crashing though the canopy of mushroom laden branches. With a heavy impact, a large snake that is almost nothing but bones and mushroom flesh collides with the beetle and sinks its fangs into the beetle’s back, easily breaking through its tough shell.

  A pair of skeletal, malformed wings extend and retract, stretching from the back of the snake as it feeds on its meal and forcible swallows it whole.

  The humans find it hard not to watch the horror of what is going on before them. To watch as the snake closes it mouth down on the massive horn of the beetle, stop, and then for their flesh to start to bubble and move. Soon enough, the beetle’s horn is piercing out through the skull of the snake as mushroom flesh moves to seal everything together.

  In a matter of moments, the winged Undead snake had absorbed the beetle and used its part to enhance itself.

  The humans quickly turn away and leave. The last thing they need is to have that thing hunting them down. Especially after what they had to deal with on the sixth floor where they lost another man due to underestimating one of those things.

  The evolving Undead. Whatever it is that is going on down here, some of the Undead, those that are noticeably stronger than the others, seem to be able to grow and advance themselves by absorbing other beings. And unlike on the first layer, where it had just been the boar boss and the Rose of Death, trapped in its room, these things are free to wander and hunt as they please. To grow as they continuously prey on any freshly spawned monsters.

  “Fuck this place, fuck this… Why the hell did I even sign up for this?” Mikey hears someone asking themself.

  Mikey honestly wants to agree with him. This is entirely not what he was expecting when he signed up either. And quite frankly, it probably isn’t what anyone else expected. They probably all imagined just fighting some zombie and some bitch in black robes with some poisonous mushrooms in the background. Not this horror of twisting and melding flesh bullshit!

  Still, Mikey doesn’t need his comrades freaking out on him. Enough people have already died as is. Normally, it would be Dale keeping everyone in line, but he is far too busy leading the way and making sure everyone doesn’t get ambushed.

  So, he walks over to the guy, one of the archers that he doesn’t remember the name of, because it’s not like he knows everybody in the clan. Not when it has over four hundred members across three kingdoms. Putting a hand on his shoulder, he tries to lighten the mood and laugh. But not too loud. Being too loud draws attention.

  “You signed up for the money, remember? A thousand gold! After we get out of here, we are going to be rich!”

  “Yeah, yeah… a thousand. A Platinum coin… I’ve never seen one before.”

  “Neither have I. Hey, what you planning on spending your money on first? You going to blow it on some pretty ladies, right? Hahaha!” Mikey laughs as he pats the guy on his back, his quiver full of arrows shaking with the hits.

  He just turns a bit and looks back at Mikey, returning an awkward laugh. They can’t see each other through their tinted visors, but Mikey can easily imagine the guy blushing.

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  “Haha, ah, no… I, I’m planning on using the money to move my family to a big city in the east. Maybe Gally, or somewhere in the Cantson Republic. Use the money to buy a nice place and retire from adventuring, maybe open a little business or something. Treat my parents right, for once…”

  “That sounds like a great plan. Just remember that that is why you’re here.”

  “Yeah, yeah, you’re right. And after that, will be a nice visit to the red-light district! Gotta treat myself, hahaha…”

  Mikey slaps his back again and laughs.

  “There you go, hahaha! Now you’re speaking my language! Maybe I’ll open a brothel wherever it is you’ll end up at, so you can spend your money there.”

  “Can I get a discount?”

  “Hah! Sure, but only if you bring plenty of customers with you!”

  They share a laugh for a bit, because they really need it to keep sane, even if that laugh is more of a loud giggle. Still, it seems to have helped the guy calm down a bit. Get his nerves back under control.

  Just as Mickey is about to ask him what his name is, they get interrupted by Dale calling everyone forward.

  They quickly move to catch up, joining everyone else by a window to peek out the side of the tree.

  “Listen up, we are nearing the stairs to the next floor. We are doing well. We just need to keep it up like this, and we should be able to safely make it through. Our goal is that tree over there.” Dale says as he points to a rotting tree in the distance, easily a couple of kilometers away. With how rotted it looks; Mikey wouldn’t be surprised if the thing were to fall over at any moment.

  “We will follow the route in your maps, just like planned. Stick together, don’t get separated. If you do, stick to the route and try to catch up with us. If you can’t…” He doesn’t say it, but everyone knows. Anyone that gets left behind is as good as dead.

  It’s a good distance to their next bit of cover; they’ll have to move fast.

  Dale nods, and finishes. “Stick together, stick to cover, and move when the coast is clear. We can do this.”

  He gets a series of nods and yes in approval. And then everyone is on their way to the exit, all silently huddling up by the doorway and waiting for the orders to move.

  Minutes pass by in silence as Dale they watch everything going on outside. Minutes quickly turn to almost an hour, but no one complains. They are used to it by now. After all, it is only because they have been sneaking around like this that they are all still alive.

  Hard to imagine that we are following the same route that that party took with the Necromancer. I still can’t believe that those idiots let themselves get tricked like that… Let’s just hope that it is true that this is the fastest route down.

  Eventually, an opening shows itself and Dale waves everyone forward. Mikey watches as everyone rushes out in a crouching sprint. Up ahead he can spot Susan helping the little healer, Elaine run, one hand held on her shoulder and the other holding that curved sword of hers. Mickey elects to wait so he can run with Carther. After the two of their four tanks have already died, Mickey has no intention of being too far from his friend’s side so he can try and keep him alive.

  Aside from Dale, Mickey isn’t particularly close to or really know anyone else here. And even then, Dale is more of a boss than he is a friend.

  With their hearts pounding in their chests, they run out in the open, a line of yellow-green suits scurrying across a rotting branch as fast as they can while remaining stealthy. As they move, they leave trails through the spores, like moving through a thick layer of freshly fallen snow. Undisturbed, the spores are beautifully colorful and mix together to create a rainbow of fluffiness on every surface. But the trails they cut through them are ugly and brown. The spores getting crushed underfoot and mixing together in a dirty mix of colors until the trail behind them is like one made of runny shit.

  Up ahead, the head of the group make it to the cover of some growths of overhanging mushrooms, growing out like a small forest with this much larger one. They move in with weapons drawn, quickly and silently cutting down any enemies found inside before heading in deeper.

  Dale stops at the edge of safety, waving for everyone to move and hurry up. Mikey can hear everyone running around him breathing heavily though their filters, the sound coming out muffled and buzzy.

  Up ahead, someone beside Dale is pointing up and to the side. They start waving even more franticly, beaconing for them to hurry the hell up. Mikey take the risk of turning to look.

  “Shit, birds! Move, move, move faster! Go!”

  Like a moving cloud in the sky, the birds emerge from the back side of a distant tree and nearly block out the dying false sun in the sky with the sheer force of numbers. Like an angry storm cloud shitting out rainbow sprinkles, the massive flock moves through the sky as it hunts. Occasionally, a detachment of birds might break off and dive down to strike some unseen place, no doubt swooping down to kill any the few remaining, living creatures of this layer that they can find.

  Mickey quickly gives up on his crouching run, throwing stealth to the wind as he speeds up into a full sprint along with the others.

  But unfortunately, they aren’t fast enough. Before they can make it to cover, the birds spot them, several detachments of Undead birds breaking off form the larger mass like massive tentacles to dive down and towards the running humans.

  Mikey makes it, Carther pulling just behind him along with two others. They don’t stop moving and keep heading deeper in until the foliage overhead will protect them.

  Behind, they hear screaming, people shouting for people to move.

  Mikey turns. Someone had tripped and fallen, having caught their foot on something covered by the spores. Someone had stopped and turned to try and help the guy back up.

  Mikey recognizes the bow he is holding. He was literally talking to the guy not an hour earlier. He turns and sees the birds swooping down at them, gives up on helping the guy to his feet and draws his bow. He fires twice and reaches for a third arrow, but he never makes it. He gets hit by the swarm, sent flying into the air by a hundred little bodies tackling him all at once. A larger bird, that is more mushroom than it is feather, swoops down and grabs him by the shoulders.

  With several flaps of its massive wings and the guy frantically swinging his bow around like a bludgeon, screaming bloody murder, the bird lifts him off into the air and flies away.

  Mikey watches, because that is all he can do. He watches as the man is torn limb from limb as several more birds join the first and fight over his body, tugging him left and right.

  Behind, Mikey can hear as the healer girl starts whimpering and Susan tries to console her.

  The other man, who had fallen in the spores, is already dead. He had tried to fight back, kicking and screaming, but there was little he could do as a hundred birds had pinned him down and tore into his back with beaks and claws. They are currently feasting on his corpse like a committee of vultures digging into a dead deer on the side of the road.

  One of the birds sitting on his back turns its head and looks towards Mikey, its dead eye seemingly peering into his living soul from how it is looking at him. He can’t help but to take a step back at that, swallowing down a mouthful of spit and fear both.

  “Let’s go.” A crestfallen Carther says as he pulls on Mikey's shoulder.

  “Ye, yeah… let’s go. We need to kill the Necromancer…”

  They leave the birds to their meal, the raid party having been reduced in numbers yet again and not even knowing if they are any closer to reaching their objective.

  “I never even learned his name…”