Kyle Barlow and Anton Wixes weren't surrounded by just two or three Hollow Knights, but rather by a small horde of eight.
There shouldn't have been so many of these monsters gathered together on the fourth floor, but apparently, Kyle and Anton couldn't figure out an effective way to kill them.
I wasn't surprised that something like this had happened, because Classes existed in this world—and that meant some types of magic were effective against certain monsters, while others weren't.
The Hollow Knights were clad in steel armor, and unless Anton's attacks were a continuous barrage that overheated the metal and killed the creature inside, his fire magic was useless.
That fire would probably be more effective against physically weaker enemies, like the Ghost Wizards.
To make matters worse, Kyle Barlow was a healer. Simply put, all of his abilities were geared toward healing others, not harming monsters.
FOOWSH!
Growing impatient with the situation, Anton raised his right hand and conjured two fireballs. They spun in orbit around each other before flying off in two separate directions. When each struck a Hollow Knight, the enemies were briefly staggered before pressing forward again.
"I warned you!" Kyle shouted.
"I'm not dying here! Sorry, man, but I'm out of here!" Anton exclaimed. He summoned the same magic again, but this time he held two small fireballs in each hand.
Just as Anton was about to hurl the fireballs at the approaching Hollow Knights to clear a path for his escape, a high-pitched metallic sound rang out.
Anton turned toward the noise and saw a Hollow Knight. A moment later, the knight's chest was pierced by a sword blade. His eyes widened, and Anton shouted:
"Sun!"
But when the empty armor collapsed, Anton Wixes was stunned to see it wasn't his bodyguard coming to the rescue—it was me, the son of a poor dockworker, grinning with excitement.
[You eliminated 'Hollow Knight (Rank D)!]
[You received +50 Soul Fragments!]
"Summoner...?" Anton growled through gritted teeth.
"Brandon!" Kyle called out, looking at me with a mix of joy and relief.
The clatter of the fallen Hollow Knight drew the attention of others. One rushed toward me before I could retrieve my sword from the first knight's back—but I wasn't alone.
Leaping from my shadow, Rosella Tynes dashed forward to protect me. She slashed with her slender blade three times, severing the helmet, torso, and legs of the second Hollow Knight in rapid succession.
But she didn't stop there — Rosella continued her sprint to shield not only me, but the others as well.
I wasn't very skilled with a sword, but I did my best to keep up with her.
Thankfully, Rosella's fencing more than made up for my lack of technique, and in no time, the two of us had defeated all of the Hollow Knights.
When the last of them was down, I stepped on its torso to keep it from rising and drove my sword into the lower back of its armor—Rosella had told me minutes earlier that this was likely where the creature lingered during battle.
[You eliminated 'Hollow Knight (Rank D)!]
[You received +50 Soul Fragments!]
Anton straightened the collar of his soot-stained white tunic and adjusted his black pants and thick boots.
"Ahem... Thanks for helping us deal with those monsters," Anton said, holding his chin high. "I was just about to incinerate them all—with the help of my friend here..." He placed an arm over Kyle's shoulder.
Kyle glanced at Anton out of the corner of his eye and took a deep breath. If it had been anyone else, Kyle would probably have chosen to pull his arm away. However, Kyle was fully aware of how beneficial a connection with someone of Anton's caliber could be, even though he also knew that Anton intended to leave him there to die before Rosella and I arrived.
"I'm glad we made it in time. Now I understand why you hired a bodyguard," I said to Anton in a light tone. "A wizard needs a front line, and it can be difficult to trust complete strangers assigned to your group."
He seemed surprised by my comment, but quickly hid his surprise and smiled.
"Yes, that's exactly why my father hired him," Anton agreed, seemingly appreciating the remark.
As I've said many times, Anton was a person who disgusted me. This feeling wasn't just because he was a rich kid with no merits, but because he looked down on others who didn't have as much money as him.
However, I had learned from Hunter Ruse how to deal with people like that sometimes instead of just punching them.
"Is there any chance you ran into the instructor?" Kyle asked Rosella and me.
The blonde girl quickly shook her head. "The only person I saw was Brandon."
"And the only person I saw, besides you two, was Rosella," I added.
"Hmm..." Kyle put his hand on his chin. "I saw in a guidebook that the Sun Temple Dungeon has six floors. We were on the sixth, so..."
"Actually, Brandon and I already talked about that," Rosella cut in, interrupting Kyle's loud reasoning.
"I was on the sixth floor, and he was on the fifth. When we met, we came to the conclusion that we needed to go the opposite way to find the others. That theory proved to be correct because we found you here on the fourth floor."
Kyle's brow furrowed. "That doesn't make sense, because I didn't go down any floors, unless..."
At that moment, Kyle, Rosella, and I looked at Anton, who was rummaging through the remains of old armor left behind by the Hollow Knights.
When Anton noticed our stares, he looked confused. "Why are you all looking at me like that?"
"When were you going to tell me you weren't on this floor from the beginning?" Kyle asked.
"You didn't ask about it, so I didn't think it was relevant information."
"We were looking for the way up! If you came from the floor above, you already knew the way!"
"Actually, not really. Five minutes after I woke up, I fell into a hole, and that led me to the fountain where we found you a few minutes later."
Kyle massaged his temples. "I thought you were there because you wanted water, but... now it makes sense why you were practically naked at the time."
"Naked?" Rosella and I asked in unison.
"I was wet and needed to dry off," Anton argued in his own defense.
This group discussion didn't get us anywhere, but it gave Rosella and me valuable information about water.
Not only were we both tired from fighting many monsters on the way to the fourth floor, but we were also exhausted from exploring. Not only did we walk through dozens of long, narrow corridors, but we also trekked more than twenty kilometers through dense forest.
A place with water to drink and bathe seemed like a good choice, not to mention that water was a common necessity among humans, and others who came to the room might end up following the sound of water.
So, we chose to spend the night where Kyle and Anton had met.
When we got there, the place was exactly as I had imagined — a shallow pool of water in the middle of a dilapidated chamber.
Thanks to the erosion of the earth caused by the rain coming from the Forest of Thorns, the wall of this chamber had collapsed, creating a small waterfall. This partially explained the hole Anton had fallen through; after all, the erosion had not only affected this chamber, but also the corridor on the upper floor.
"Ow..." Rosella groaned as we arrived at the chamber.
"At least there's some life here," she said, commenting on the plants growing around the natural pool.
We quickly set up camp. We had all received survival training in school, so we carried some basic items in our bags—canteens, sleeping bags, and flint, for example.
In a few minutes, the warmth of a campfire was already soothing us.
Since we were still inside a dungeon, there remained danger. For this reason, we agreed to sleep in shifts.
There were four of us, so we agreed on two-hour shifts. In total, each of us would sleep at least six hours, which was enough to recover for now.
I volunteered to take the first shift, preferring to sleep six hours straight rather than having to wake up later.
Fortunately, no one objected. Everyone was exhausted.
During my shift, I heard only noises coming from the other corridors and didn't open my eyes even once, but as expected, no monsters appeared.
We were still on the first floor of the Tower of Babel, and we had fought hard in the last few hours. It would've been odd if we had encountered more monsters.
When my shift ended, I approached Kyle and woke him up with a few nudges to the shoulder. Sleepily, he put on his glasses and stood up.
I found a comfortable spot near some leaves and the fire, and fell asleep within minutes.
I hoped to get a long and well-deserved rest, but after a few good dreams, I woke up to something shaking me.
I opened my eyes slowly and found Anton's frightened face. His eyebrows were raised, his eyes were wide, and his mouth was open.
"Hey, hey! Wake up, Summoner!"
Once again, Anton hadn't bothered to say my name. However, I didn't even have time to get angry about it.
When I got up enough to lean on one elbow, I looked at the fire and saw Rosella coughing up blood while kneeling on the ground.
Rosella put her hand over her mouth, trying to stop the blood from flowing out of the back of her throat, but it ran between her fingers.