This Dungeon Grew Mushrooms

The roommate’s sudden frenzy slowed Sigmund for a heartbeat, but he still used his superb technique to blast the two rushing knight puji aside—one was cut cleanly in two; its pre-death self-destruct was stopped by a quickly raised blood shield.

“Why?” Sigmund asked mentally.

“Get it! If you grab that puji, I’ll give you more time each day to control the body!” the roommate didn’t explain—he dangled a tempting bargain instead.

What secret did that seemingly ordinary puji hide?

What did it have to do with the roommate who had long been masking his soul as a puji form?

Questions crowded Sigmund’s mind, but he suppressed them. The immediate task was Arama: win the fight, and Arama’s daughter and that puji would be his trophies.

He slashed at the staggered, one-armed Arama once more.

At that moment a chilling force burst from the side—the other puji that had been repelled earlier. It catapulted back at far greater speed, mycelial tendrils spinning into a dense whipping-blade storm that blocked Sigmund’s route to Arama.

Sigmund had to change tactics and met the whip-storm with a full-force reverse slash.

He had expected to cleave that puji in two—but the blade met fungal resistance with a teeth-grating tear. Two tendrils snapped, yet the puji used the recoil to flip away gracefully; its cap bore only a deep gash.

“Sanctum-tier?!” Sigmund’s mind jolted.

A few days ago, anyone claiming a sanctum-tier puji existed would have sounded insane. Now the absurd truth stood before him.

More startling: in the brief pause after the clash, the severed tendrils and gash squirmed with frenzied mycelial motion and regenerated at a speed visible to the naked eye.

“Regeneration faster than a troll?” This overturned everything he thought he knew.

Still—it wasn’t enough. The baffling reality made him eager to finish. He didn’t want more surprises. “Blood Manipulation · Hundred Arms!”

The move’s effectiveness against an opponent holding a Sunstone was reduced, but against a sanctum-tier puji it was more than sufficient.

Blood poured and gathered wildly across the field, shaped by his will.

Knives, spears, swords, halberds, axes, hammers—

Countless weapons formed from congealed blood in an instant, as if gripped by an invisible army, becoming a devastating storm that shredded toward the knight puji from all directions.

The puji moved with nimble speed, whipping its blade-tendrils to full effect, clashing and parrying amid the blood-weapon maelstrom. Metal rang repeatedly; chitin fragments and snapped mycelium flew everywhere.

When a blood knife finally pierced its rear, the puji stiffened. More attacks followed, and in a single breath the mighty sanctum-tier knight puji was torn apart into a storm of fungal fragments.

The furious duel—from the puji’s ambush to its total shredding—lasted less than a minute.

But that minute was enough.

Farther off, tearful Inanna sprinted to the dull, fallen Sunstone greatsword.

Without hesitation she hoisted its heavy blade and pressed the glowing Sunstone against the chest of her remaining knight puji.

The wind rose.

[Bondsmith]

A terrifying hurricane formed at the narrow valley mouth with no warning, whipping up stone and blood-spray.

The mages—those most sensitive to mana—felt it first. What had been chaotic mana across Dragonhowl now funneled into the storm’s center.

On the ground, dead puji carcasses, still-fighting puji, and the fungal carpet on the cliff faces—every strand of mycelium created by Lin Jun’s power—was ripped free like iron filings to a magnet. Mycelium tore from soil and rock and was dragged into the growing vortex.

Mana was relentlessly compressed; mycelium forcibly reassembled. Under countless horrified stares, a shadow large enough to blot out moons began coalescing in the cyclone’s eye.

A massive behemoth—so huge it nearly clogged the entire pass—took shape in the whirl. Its rounded cap brushed the rock walls; its shadow swallowed a great area, dimming even the three moons.

“What… what is that?” a demon spearman trembled.

“A colossus… a puji of monstrosity-grade?” another officer murmured, face a mixture of disbelief and terror.

“It’s huge…”

The battlefield quieted for a heartbeat—only the crackle of flame and the groans of the wounded remained.

Even Inanna stood speechless, staring at the mountain-sized puji with parted lips.

Lin Jun’s reminder finally snapped her back. She dashed to the fallen Arama to drag him from danger.

“Don’t you dare!” Sigmund’s eyes flared. Dozens of solidified blood spears tore through the air toward Inanna’s back with shrill whistles.

The giant puji shifted like a moving fortress and blocked the spears between itself and Inanna.

With a thunderous smack, a tendril thicker than a troll’s waist lashed out and struck the blood-spears. On contact the spears exploded—blood and shredded mycelium spraying out.

The severed tendril’s wound writhed and, with visible speed, knitted itself whole. The scattered blood under Sigmund’s control recondensed.

With weighty “puji” thuds, the behemoth stepped forward.

A furious troll swung an iron cudgel and hit the giant’s foot, spraying mycelial debris—but the attack was meaningless. The behemoth’s massive foot crushed the troll and his roar into the soil; silence followed.

Some goblins in the demon lines urinated and fled at the sight; even seasoned warriors broke into cold sweat before the titan’s bulk.

Sigmund himself was not cowed—he had faced abyssal beasts before—but this spectacle still tested his understanding. His combat instincts, however, remained sharp.

Blood light flashed. Over a dozen blood-formed weapons streamed out like bolts and slammed into the giant’s left foot, ripping its balance. The colossal mass pitched forward like a collapsing mountain, spreading terror across the demon ranks.

It didn’t fall. Four thick tendrils braced against the rock walls and steadied the body.

Sigmund struck again—dozens more blood weapons shot out and detonated, severing the left-side tendrils supporting the beast. Yet within breaths the giant had largely restored its shattered foot and planted it firmly.

[Behemoth LV5]

[Life Essence]

[Regeneration LV7]

[Mycelium Reforge LV8]

[Crystal Symbiosis LV8] (from the dead knight puji)

Watching tendrils endlessly regrow, Sigmund recognized a real problem.

“All units—concentrate fire, attack!” His command snapped the stunned demons to action.

Swords and arrows and spells rained like pebbles on the behemoth, but ordinary troops couldn’t compare with Sigmund’s strikes. Fireballs only blackened the cap; half-demon blades stuck in the resilient mycelium; arrows lodged deep without piercing through.

The behemoth ignored the insults and trudged forward, inch by inch forcing the demon line back as Inanna signaled human troops to pull inward.

Some swift bloodborn and half-demons tried to flank it.

[Infrasound Burst LV9]

An invisible, devastating force emanated from the behemoth. The low-frequency waves reverberated and compounded within the narrow rock walls, magnifying their destructive power.

Soldiers who couldn’t flee coughed up blood and dropped. Those nearer the center collapsed in waves—lustrous blood streaming from eyes, ears, nose, mouths as internal organs were pummeled to ruin. Life and death blurred.

Sigmund himself, too close and unprepared, swallowed the shock—blood trickled from his mouth. He coalesced a circulating blood shield around himself to blunt the aftershocks.

The sight chilled the demon ranks; their momentum stalled.

“Don’t retreat!” Sigmund spat, wiping blood from his lips. “Regeneration consumes energy—use fire! Use corrosives! Strike until it can’t regrow!”

Under his orders, the demons lashed out harder—oil flares flung, enchanted flames burned, corrosive magics sizzled on the cap.

Then the behemoth made a baffling move: it sank its bulk down and sat like a small mountain.

“Out of energy?” a demon officer hoped, loosing arrows faster.

At the behemoth’s base, the knight puji that had removed the Sunstone slipped into the underground tunnels, cocooning and burrowing away.

Lin Jun, still in Sigmund’s head, screamed a warning: “Little Xi, run!”

Sigmund realized a dread possibility—and it was confirmed soon enough.

A terrifying surge of berserk energy erupted from the motionless behemoth, like a volcano on the verge of eruption. The wave of raw, catastrophic power drew even Vilaris’s attention.

Sigmund’s pupils shrank to pinpoints; he raised blood to shield himself.

Boom—!