The next day arrived, and Naruto was ready to enter the dungeon, but before that, he would use his points.
Opening his status window, Naruto pressed the level up option.
[You obtain 1 point from the level up and 3 by killing the fragment]
[Your [Intelligence] has increased in 1] [You have 2 points left]
[Name: Naruto Uzumaki]
[Race: Human]
[Level:5]
[Rank: 0]
[Intelligence: 20 (colourless)]
"Mmm I wonder when I can rank up. Well, that doesn't matter for now, at least the other things continue changing."He had a thoughtful look "If the third one was strength, the fourth will be [Vitality]?"
Naruto didn't waste time staying in the fountain, he wanted to clear this floor, he had spent so much time here. Almost 6 months since he arrived here and he needed to clear 10 floors in these years.
While Naruto was thinking about it, the Dwarf was watching him from the stall. He didn't ask, but from the smile the kid had on his face, it was obvious that he won, even if his body was almost destroyed, he won against a fragment.
If the first have fragments, she wanted him to create a new epoch? This will be interesting.
Naruto noticed that he was waiting for him and waved his hand before he entered the dungeon once again.
[Change of location: First floor- third district]
As he smelled the rancid smell, Naruto felt at home". The only things here were the rats and him, both with the full intention of killing each other.
Walking in the passages, Naruto saw some rats in the rooms, but they didn't approach him even if they saw him. They just stood in their places, waiting for him to disappear.
This time he had an objective clear, he wouldn't waste time in the outer circle. Running straight to the deeper zone, Naruto saw that this district was the same as the other. That convinced him where to find the other piece of the key.
He thought that it would be to obtain an item or something like that, and the clue from the bosses would give him a map.
If he didn't have his stats so over-leveled, would he have needed to search in every corner to find it? The clues might be in the rooms that had more furniture but for now that doesn't matter.
Erasing those thoughts from his mind, Naruto ran for two and half hours to enter the inner circle, this place was bigger.
He went directly to the depths and located the bedroom and the arena. Besides the room, he saw a staircase that went down.
"The water I heard was born here? Then the other key will be in the underground. Just kill the guardian first and do it later." Turning his gaze, Naruto left the room and started to wander through the zone.
This place was almost two times bigger than any of the other 3 districts, even the amount of mushrooms was larger.
As he continued walking and came to a giant room, he understood. At the end of the room, besides the pool, there was a rat.
[Fat rat 150 HP]
A fat rat, fatter than any other he had seen, was in front of him. His size grew only sideways, and it was as tall as Naruto's navel. Even though he considered that in the last months he grew a few cm to be 1.43, his size was smaller than he thought.
It was just a fat rat.
Without losing his caution, Naruto tried to kill it. Did a fat rat perhaps have some special quality to be in the inner circle? A high defense?
Landing a blow to see his reaction, Naruto had chakra on his legs to run if something went wrong.
The fat rat just stood there, motionless.
[Fat rat takes 56 dmg]
"Eh?" Looking at his hand, Naruto couldn't believe that he did so much dmg without using the violent mode. "This fatty only had HP and 0 defense? useless bastard."
Covering his hand with chakra and using a big amount internally, Naruto landed another blow.
[Fat rat takes 104 dmg]
The fat rat just died without making any sound, he didn't even try to defend itself. Just die the way you want, living the life of your dreams.
Looking at his hand and the corpse, Naruto tried to contain the awkwardness on his chest, but it was impossible. He felt like he ate shit looking at the peaceful death of this bastard.
Approaching the rat's body without expression, Naruto broke it down and he saw two items.
Setting aside the fragment and picking up the other, Naruto checked its information.
[Rat meat: besides its horrendous taste, it's a good food to survive.]
...
With his hands trembling, Naruto took the item out of his inventory.
Now near him, he could smell it. Its smell wasn't as bad as the raw meat from the other rats.
Naruto just stood there, his eyes lost focus and his mouth trembled.
He just stood in his place for five minutes until he couldn't resist and knelt down.
"... Was it just bad luck? The small ones always dropped a cheap version of the item... I could be here to obtain food, and not shred a rat every time I want to eat..."
Naruto had an expression uglier than crying. He thought that it was the same and they didn't drop food for a reason, not because he had bad luck.
"Was it just by complaining with Ego about my luck the first day?"
Letting out a sigh, Naruto got up with a defeated expression. He didn't want to fight anymore, just rested for today. This drained his whole motivation.
Returning for the same path, he didn't care about the other rats. Entering the bedroom, he closed the door and went to sleep.
The next day, Naruto lobotomized himself to believe that he never did that before. With a calmer mind, Naruto was ready to hunt some rats to farm food. He didn't know if the next floor would give him food, so, it was better to be cautious.
A piece of meat was enough for three days, so he spent the next three days hunting the rats that spawned after the kill rampage.
Seeing the two stacks he farmed these days, Naruto nodded satisfied.
With everything ready, he went directly to the arena.
[Do you want to challenge the Royal Guard?]
Opening the door, Naruto ran straight to the arena. This time it was an open arena with only one fat rat in the middle, just sleeping.
As he got closer, Naruto could see how the rat grew fatter every meter. With his mouth open, Naruto stopped at the entrance to the arena.
This was the fattest rat he had ever seen.His whole body was covered by rusted armor.
It was almost taller than him, but that wasn't the problem. His fat body could be compared to at least 8 fat rats gathered in a horrendous beast.
Naruto checked his information.
[Royal Guard- Zug 1000 HP]
"Mm I guess I'm looking wrong." Rubbing his eyes, Naruto checked the information again but nothing changed.
[Royal Guard- Zug 1000 HP]
...
Naruto didn't want to fight anymore, how was he supposed to beat a thing that had 1k HP in his base form?
Looking at his hand and then looking at its helmet, Naruto was speechless.
It was clear that he couldn't kill him by hitting his body and the only way was to destroy his head.
"But I didn't have to do it on one charge, just take the time and prepare the things until he enters in his third phase. Fine, let's do that."
Zug just stood there, he didn't make any move even when Naruto was beside him.
Using only the amount of chakra he could control, he covered his hand to protect it with a thick layer. Satisfied with it, Naruto jumped on him and started to hit his helmet.
[Zug takes 39 dmg] [Zug takes 42 dmg] [Zug takes 38 dmg] [Zug awoke and restores 5HP/s]
"What? This dude regenerates? Ugh, I guess now I know what the next phases will be."
Naruto continued hitting the helmet in different spots to dent it, he tried to take off the helmet but the whole armor was a single piece.
As he continued like that, he stopped when he saw the HP under 300. Taking a stamina potion, he continued landing a blow but with less strength, only to not let him regenerate.
[30 CD]
With the timer set on, Naruto landed two hits enough to lower the HP to 250.
[Zug recovers his whole HP] [Zug recovers a fragment of his soul and enters in the third phase] [Unable to recover his identity][Zug regeneration increased x10 for 60s] [Defense increased x5]
Watching the HP bar recover in an instant, Naruto was astonished.
"50hp/s? Seriously, who was the bastard that thought this would be a good idea?" Gritting his teeth, Naruto felt extremely annoyed.
Taking out a health potion, Naruto uncapped it and put it to his mouth, ready to use it when needed.
With all precautions ready, Naruto went on a rampage and used all his chakra to cover his arms.
The damage was completely ignored.
There was no time to doubt.
[Zug takes 13 dmg] [Zug takes 15 dmg] [Zug takes 11 dmg] [Zug takes 16 dmg] [Zug takes 19 dmg]
Health and defense in one beast? At this rate I will never kill him, damn it
[44 s] [875 HP]
Zug didn't make any move, he just stood in his place receiving the hits. Even with that, Naruto started to felt anxious, the pain in his body and seeing how the Zug's HP didn't change made it worse.
The helmet gradually sank but it wasn't enough.
[28s] [728 HP]
No, I couldn't continue like this, just use it.
Drinking the potion, Naruto used the tangled chakra and merged it with the fox one. When he added the last one, his chakra became extremely violent, and a red-orange thin layer covered his body. His eyes turned like a fox's and became sharper.
"Just die! You fucking old bastard!" He muttered with his red eyes.
There was no kindness in those eyes.
Only violent rage, with an excuse to hit someone, Naruto just acted as he wanted.
His hands were destroyed by the violent hits he landed on Zug, but the damage was horrible.
Zug's helmet sank faster until it started to crush his head.
[Zug takes 62 dmg] [Zug takes 75] [Zug takes 68] [Zug takes 71]
When he landed the last hit, a dull noise could be heard in the silent arena.
CRACK!
The helmet gave way and Zug's head was crushed. he didn't die from HP loss, it was only a brutal execution.
[Zug has died]
Naruto tried to continue to hit him, but Zug's body disappeared into dust.
[You have won against the Royal Guard-Zug] [You obtained 400 gold] [You have achieved a victory against a challenging opponent.] [Unable to increase the stats. You have obtained a clue to the hidden secret and a Soul Fragment(empty)*7] [You have achieved a feat(unrated) in your history]x2 [You have achieved a feat(low-fragment) in your history]x2 [The third district stopped the changes. You can leave the dungeon now.] [You can challenge the Rat Leader (???) in the 8 floor] [Returned to the safe zone to continue to the next floor]
Without time to think about it, the scream of a beast could be heard inside him.
What?...
Naruto fainted.
Naruto's chakra slowly returned to him, and the fox one merged with the normal, helping him to restore his broken body.
The dungeon fell in silence.
--------------------------
Lady silhouette and Corvinus were on floor zero, using Corvinus's tv to see Naruto's fight.
She was humming a happy melody as she saw Naruto crush Zug's head. Corvinus twisted his mouth, he couldn't get used to her.
"This kid could be really brutal... This is what you want, Lady?" Corvinus expected that Naruto couldn't hide that rage but seeing the kid in such a state made him feel weird.
The silhouette stayed in silence for a while, thinking about it.
"At first, no. I just think that he could be a bit violent, but it seems that these months trapped there affected him and he didn't notice it. When he awoke, probably he wouldn't remember what he did, but it's okay." She turned to Corvinus. "You know, Eyes. I just want to raise the greatest warrior to conquer my Tower. You and the others just passed through it but didn't conquer it, the last section is something that no one has been able to clear."
"He's talented, but his talent was rotten in his world. As he maintains his identity, I will follow his steps helping him. He is just in the tutorial I made for him. On the next floor, he will slowly show his talent, even more." Her cheerful voice echoed through the room as she disappeared from the scene.
Corvinus didn't reply. Like, he was curious about the kid.
Turning off the TV, Corvinus began to clean his stall. He will get a visitor soon.
--------------------------
After an unknown amount of time, Naruto awoke.
To his surprise, his body didn't hurt this time. Well, the rest of his body aside from his neck.
Getting up, Naruto looked at the scene. The entrance to the outside was opened and some items could be seen in the ground.
"Ugh... What happened? I was fighting with fatty..." With a hand on his head, Naruto tried to remember but nothing came to his mind.
"How annoying, why don't I remember?" Naruto frowned, he didn't want to forget anything.
He stayed in his place, but his mind was blank.
Unable to do anything, he picked up the items.
[Soul fragment: Vitality 15%] [You have obtained the Royal Guard- Zug meat: It has imbued the protector will, can increase normal stats in 15% each one and 5% in yellow tier. Useless after 30%] [You have obtained the teeth of the Royal Guard] [You have obtained a skill fragment]
Looking at his status, Naruto tried to increase his level but this time the xp wasn't enough. But the kill gave him points as usual.
[You obtain 3 points from kill the fragment]
[Your [Intelligence] has increased in 1] [You have 0 point left]
[INT:21]
His head felt clearer and calmer.
"This time it's much more effective, huh. I guess it's the right decision putting the points on [INT]."
His senses felt sharper, and it was way easier to enter the state. Normally he needed to take a few seconds to do it, but with the INT points that decreased a bit.
Leaving his thoughts, Naruto looked outside for a while before he returned to the inner circle. The other piece of the key was missing.
His neck hurt but his body felt better than ever. Motivated, Naruto used the stairs and went to the underground layer.
The floor was dirt, completely different from the bricks in the whole dungeon. And the water could be heard below it.
He continued walking in the area, trying to find something different.
"If this place had some trees, it would be cute."
He continued like that for a while until he noticed something wrong. His mind felt tired, but he was here for less than 15 minutes.
Trying to figure out what happened, an idea came to his mind.
Mushrooms.
A chill ran down his spine. He quickly opened his status window.
[Acquired abnormal status: Confusion] [Lose 0.5 mind/min][25min]
[Mind: 12.2/18]
"When did this happen?!" Naruto was scared, he looked everywhere and tried to find a path to leave this place, but everything looked the same.
Minutes continued but he didn't find a way, only the pain on his neck annoyed him.
"Wait, pain?"
Without any doubt, he took out a health potion from his inventory and started to use his chakra to break his left hand.
As the pain filled his mind, a new message appeared in front of him.
[Confusion status dissolved] [Confusion resistance increased to: 47%]
Awakening from the trance, Naruto saw it. This wasn't dirt, it was a floor filled with mushrooms. And he was trapped by them, his legs were enveloped by some mushrooms. The scene was terrifying, and he took out his legs from it.
With his sober mind, he noticed that the place wasn't even bigger, it was a small room with a broken statue in the center.
Running to the statue, Naruto broke it and a bright item fell from it.
[You have obtained [Wooden key 2/2]] [Item fused [Wooden key]]
Once the item was in his hands, Naruto ran without looking back, he just ran to the fountain and left the dungeon.
He didn't even look at the Dwarf as he just approached the fountain and washed his face.
Naruto was panting with a hand on his chest. The scene wasn't just scary, it was disgusting.
"Hey Naruto, you entered that place? Hahaha." The Dwarf sat beside him. "She always puts the same thing on the first floor."
"There were mushrooms everywhere..."
"Hahaha, at least you obtained the item, others didn't have the same luck." He continued laughing as he asked. "Do you have the clues to the secret?"
"Mm, the guards dropped it." Opening the letter that appeared in his inventory, Naruto read it for him.
"[Dig behind the living monument] What does that mean? Sir?" Naruto noticed how the veins popped out in the Dwarf's hands.
"Fuh, it's nothing, Naruto. Just try in this place, the dungeon didn't have the answer."He went sulking to his tent.
Confused but wanting to do something to forget the previous experience, Naruto began to dig in the safe zone.
Or at least he tried, when he wanted to pull out the dirt, the floor remained intact.
"???" He had doubts, but seeing the darker Dwarf face, Naruto continued in silence.
An hour passed and almost 1/2 of the zone was 'dug', but he didn't find the spot.
The sunset began and he had two hours to find it.
He felt tired but it was the last thing he needed to do here.
Resisting the urge, he continued and when he started to dig at the back of the house, the dirt was soft.
"..." Now Naruto understood why he was annoyed.
Containing the laugh, he dug until he took out a small box. Taking out from the hole, the floor returned to its intact appearance.
Taking out the key, he opened it and took an item.
[Mir's ring: Increased all stats by 5% (only until blue)]
"5%?! The problems are worth it! Hehehe~."
Naruto instantly equipped the ring and he saw how his stats changed.
[Vitality: 71% (yellow)]------>76%
[Strength: 80%]------>85%
[Dexterity: 80%]------>85%
[Agility: 80%]------>85%
[Spiritual energy: 18]------>19.4
[Mind: 92% (Yellow)]------>97%
[Adaptability: 96% (yellow)]------>100%
[HP: 1050/1050]------> 1125
[Stamina: 23.3]------>25.3
[Red Chakra: 24.2(yellow)]------>24.6
[Chakra: 629(yellow)---[10000(?)]]------>736
He had a foolish smile, but he stopped when he looked at the [Adaptability] capped at 100% and didn't advance more.
Getting up, he ran to the Dwarf and showed him his status.
"Why can't I advance my stat? It's 100% but it didn't become green."
"It wasn't supposed that you have a stat that higher in this place. Just wait and it will advance itself or climb the tower to get more fragments."
"Ughh, will it be the same with the others?"
"Yes, at least for the basics they can advance when it reaches 100% and get enough Soul Fragments(empty). It was a small transformation once all your stats became a new color."
"Transformation? Like, get more power or changes in the body?"
"As far as I know, it just grants more power in the first colors. Just obtain your reward for clearing the floor and it will be enough."
"Okay!"
System, give me my reward
[You have cleared the first floor] [Calculating the rewards]
[Your stats will be increased until 100%] [You obtained 21 Soul Fragments (empty). You can use it to increase your stat tier with 5 of them] [For killing two fragments, your clear will be counted as 100%, but you'll have to make up for it on the eighth floor.] [You obtained 1000g] [You received the title [Survivor: Surviving in a hostile situation without preparation]]
[Now you can go to the next floor. Keep up with the great work, climber]
Naruto expected many rewards but not at this point. He began to fantasize about the next rewards.
"Don't be like that, it was a special reward for your first clear, but if you continue like that, maybe she will give you more." Dwarf's voice took him out of his fantasy.
"Tsk, okay. How hard could it be? Now let me use the fragments."
Selecting the fragments in his inventory, Naruto pressed the option of using it.
[-15 Soul Fragments (Empty)]
[Soul Fragments (Empty):13]
[Changing your Soul Fragments (empty) for a Skill Fragment]
[-10 Soul Fragments (Empty)]
[Strength: 100%]------>[6%(yellow)]
[Dexterity: 100%]------>[6%(yellow)]
[Agility: 100%]------>[6%(yellow)]
[All your Attributes are now Yellow tier.][You have taken the first step on the path.]
[You obtain the active skill (Rage of the weak: Opposing his fate, the weak wields the sword. Allow you to burst with 20% more dmg for 30s and increase by 10% the damage you take.] [6 hours CD]
Without wasting time, he took the Skill Fragments.
[Do you want to use 3 or 5 fragments? The skill will adjust to your situation.]
Use 5.
[You obtain the passive (Resilience: As life fades, so the spirit rises to oppose further harm. Your regeneration was augmented by 15%. Can advance with feats)]
Both skills were better than he thought, especially the passive, 15% is a huge augment for that important stat.
He obtained more than he thought and that made him more determined to climb this place.
Turning to the Dwarf, Naruto showed him his status. "Look at this! I get two skills!"
The Dwarf looked at it and was speechless. She really likes him to give this thing…
"Those are good ones, with these two you can climb faster and try other things."
"Hehe, of course! I will climb this to its top!" After saying that, Naruto had a worried expression. "But sir, I need to go to the second-floor. Can I return here?"
"Yes, but it isn't necessary, I will follow you. I had a home on every floor." The Dwarf shrugged his shoulders.
"Nice! Then I'll see you in a while!"
Having a smile, Naruto called the stairs to the next floor.
Opening the door, he took the first step, and the door disappeared.
Looking everywhere, he saw only darkness, so he started to walk.
"It's been a while, Naruto."
---------------------------------
Naruto's losing his mind for the accumulate stress and forget it after he awoke it's something that happen sometimes in people. Years ago I have a friend that suffered from that, she worked so hard in the Uni and sometimes she just was different and forget it at the next day.
I would like you to leave a comment and tell me if you find any problems with the story so far.
--------------------------------
Thanks for reading!
Have a nice day.