Adam-"There's just no end to these things"
Adam slashes through another one of the plant monsters.
Adam-"I have to have killed over a thousand of these things already. I figured the numbers would slim down eventually. But they just keep coming in waves over and over"
Vines spring up from the ground trying to twist around Adam's legs. Adam jumps up and slashes the vines on the ground.
Adam-"The worst part is I'm running out of mana. I still have about half left but I have to use it sparingly. If I keep dishing out big attacks like I did earlier I'll run out"
A plant monster runs up behind Adam. Adam swiftly decapitates it.
Adam-"Hopefully I've managed to redirect enough of these monsters away from my friends. But I can only keep this up for so long, even if these monsters aren't very strong on their own"
One of the monsters climbs out from a hole on the ceiling of the cavern. It connects to some vines and launches downwards towards Adam. Before it reaches Adam it's shot by an arrow to its head. It then falls to the ground behind Adam.
Adam-"Is that an arrow? Joe?"
Joe-"Hey Adam, need some help?"
Joe appears out of one of the tunnels high up on the wall.
Adam-"I'm glad to see you're alright. Do you know where the others are?"
Joe-"No, you're the first person I've found. Archery skill: magic arrow!"
Joe shoots one of the monsters climbing down from the wall on the other side of the cavern.
Adam-"You should conserve your mana, it would be really bad for both of us to run out"
Adam(in his head)-"Individually these monsters are pretty weak so Joe should be able to take out a couple. But there's no way he could handle hoards of them like I've had to"
Joe-"Why are there so many monsters in this area? I've only seen several at a time"
Adam leaps forward and slashes through several monsters.
Adam-"I've been trying to lure as many here as possible, you not seeing many hopefully means it's been working"
Joe-"That would explain why there's so many here. How have you been luring them though?"
Adam-"Just killing as many as I can as fast as I can"
Adam continues cutting through multiple plant monsters.
Adam-"Earlier I was using skills to destroy a whole bunch at once. However the amount of monsters attacking me has dwindled down so I can just cut them normally to conserve mana.
Joe-"You had even more than this?"
Vines start to creep up behind Joe.
Adam-"Joe, behind you!"
Joe-"Archery skill: wide arrow"
Joe shoots a magic arrow with a tip about a meter in width. It travels slower but is able to cut all of the vines.
Joe-"Don't worry I'm okay. I didn't let that training go to waste"
Flashback to when the group was stuck in the village for multiple days while waiting for the villagers to wake up.
Adam-"I can't believe it, I lost to Elise again. I'm the one with the sword I should be better at wielding those dreaded ping pong paddles"
Joe-"Hey Adam, can I talk to you for a minute?"
Adam-"Oh hey Joe, what is it?"
Joe-"It's just, now that we are a team and I'm staying with you guys. I want to be as helpful as I can be. The thing is, I know I'm much weaker than the rest of you"
Adam-"You're not weak. You're a long range fighter of course you won't be as good in close combat"
Joe-"Everyone else has better long range attacks than I do. I was hoping when we met Marigold that I would be able to become stronger. But I wasn't strong enough to get my skill evolved. That's why I wanted to ask you a favor.
Adam-"What is it?"
Joe-"Can you train me, I need to become strong enough and skilled enough to get my skills evolved. And when I do I'll be able to be helpful when fighting against powerful people"
Adam-"Well if you're hoping you'll get super strong overnight that's not going to happen"
Joe-"I know that"
Adam-"But if you really want to, I can try to teach you some basic stuff. Help you learn new skills, combat techniques, and boosting your mana reserves"
Joe-"You'll help me increase my level?"
Adam-"Levels are really important, but they are definitely not all that matters. Julius is a lower level than me yet I'd say he's stronger than I am"
Joe-"Thank you Adam"
Adam-"No problem, besides, maybe helping you get stronger will save me one day"
Joe-"So when do we start?"
Adam-"We can go ahead and start right now. We'll start off lightly though, just do five hundred pushups"
Joe-"...what?"
End of flashback.
Joe(in his head)-"That was when I learned him and Elise did five hundred pushups for a morning warmup. Watching him do those in under a minute was honestly terrifying"
Adam-"Now that you're here our priority should be to find the rest of our team. Dealing with these swarms of monsters will be easy when we are together"
Joe-"Once we all meet up, we'll be able to get out of here pretty easily. We'll just dig up to the surface"
Adam-"For some reason, I believe it won't be that easy. Either way, we need to find the others"
Adam jumps away from the monsters up to the hole with Joe.
Adam-"But first-"
Adam points his sword at Joe.
Adam-"How can I be sure this is really you?"
Joe-"What!?"
Adam-"How do I know you're not a monster creating an allusion?"
Joe-"What are you- oh yeah it did that earlier"
Adam-"Well?"
Joe-"How do you expect me to answer that?"
Adam-"Tell me something only the real Joe would know"
Joe-"Ummmm... hold on... one time when I was a kid. I was playing hide and seek with some other kids in my village. I hid inside of a composter. It was gross and there was rotten food in there but I was determined to win so I sat there. Turns out the other kids god bored and stopped playing so I sat there for over an hour. Then someone opened the lid to the barrel and tossed in more rotten food on top of me. I was so embarrassed that I waited for another few minutes before I climbed out and jumped into the river to clean off"
Adam-"...Hmmm. That doesn't really let me know if you're the real Joe or not"
Joe-"Can we move on now?"
Adam-"Yeah that question doesn't really help does it"
Joe-"Well how do I know you're not an illusion?"
Adam-"I'm not telling you an embarrassing secret"
Joe-"Now that's just not fair"
Adam-"Let's get going the monsters are climbing up here now"
The two of them start running down the tunnel.
Joe-"Any idea how to find them?"
Adam-"We just keep fighting monsters and running down tunnels. We'll have to run into them eventually"
End of chapter 80