This Dungeon Grew Mushrooms

With each thunderous impact, the defensive magic barriers carved into Tri-Mountain City’s walls shattered one after another—each rupture faster than the last.

When the final barrier broke like splintering glass, the entire mountain city trembled violently. The wall built along the mountainside split down the middle, and half the mountainside collapsed with a deafening roar.

Massive boulders rolled down with the falling towers, crushing buildings into rubble.

A pure, radiant light burst through the rising dust, enveloping the collapsing mountainside. But the brilliance held only for a few breaths before another impact snuffed it out.

Far away, Xenophon and another bloodborn duke, having just routed Arama’s reinforcements, halted their mounts.

The boar-man duke narrowed his eyes toward Tri-Mountain City.

“Is that the backup Lord Valerius prepared?”

“No,” the bloodborn duke said, recalling the blood-red sky earlier. “It should be something His Majesty brought.”

At that moment, the dust rising from Tri-Mountain City suddenly rolled toward their position like a charging beast.

Xenophon snorted twice from his pig-like snout, gripping his still-bloody battle-axe.

“I have a bad feeling about this.”

“It’s coming!”

A warped figure burst forward at a speed beyond visual tracking.

The bloodborn duke reacted instantly, raising both arms. A massive dark-red shield of condensed blood surged up before the army.

Boom!

The shield didn’t last even a heartbeat.

The figure rammed straight through, shattering it—blood crystals spraying out like bullets, mowing down swaths of demon soldiers.

The figure blasted through the remnants of the barrier and smashed into the bloodborn duke. He didn’t even have time to look shocked before he exploded like a water sack struck by a battering ram—bursting into a cloud of blood.

The figure crashed into the earth.

The ground shook like a meteor had struck. A ring-shaped shockwave rippled outward, hurling rocks like shrapnel. Dozens of meters around the crater, demon soldiers were ripped apart by the force.

Xenophon was flung through the air, his thick boar-hide tearing open with gashes from the shockwave.

He rolled to his feet, shaking, staring wide-eyed.

“What in the hells?!”

The figure slowly rose from the crater.

The human shape was long gone. The shattered shell of flesh was stretched by the surging pale-blue flames inside, swollen to more than two meters tall. Its head had become a geyser of energy, devoid of features.

To Xenophon, the thing no longer resembled a human—more like a deadly elemental abomination.

“RRAAAA—!”

The inhuman roar sent waves rippling through the air.

Xenophon immediately activated all his trump cards.

War Frenzy ballooned his muscles.

Bloodlust dyed both eyes red.

Ancestral Totem conjured six crimson rings behind him.

He gripped his loyal partner, the axe “Slaughterer”; the blade vibrated, turning blood-red.

Then—his world froze.

The pale-blue figure was suddenly right in front of his face.

He never even saw it move. Only felt a sudden chill in his chest.

He looked down.

A massive hole gaped in the center of his barrel-like torso.

His axe still hung raised mid-swing; his activated skills flickered and dimmed one by one.

“Im… possible…”

The deaths of two commanders in an instant shattered the morale of the demon army.

Soldiers scattered like panicked beasts fleeing a wildfire. The burning figure didn’t stop—it plunged into their ranks, beginning a massacre.

In truth, the demons weren’t entirely without hope.

Rage had no scouting abilities—she relied solely on raw sight to pick targets, leaving a narrow chance for escape.

A mage who cast invisibility could vanish into the air.

A scout hiding under a camo-net against a cliff could slip past her gaze.

Even burying oneself in a corpse pile worked perfectly.

Of course, these methods were risky—many still died from stray shockwaves.

And as long as she focused on killing as many as possible, Rage always charged toward the densest cluster of demon soldiers.

Once the army fractured fully into scattered fleeing groups, she finally turned toward her next target—Arama’s retreating forces.

…

Lin Jun felt that the stone stele sunk at the bottom of the lake might finally be useful.

He could give it to the pink puji—her father would definitely need it soon.

Rage’s condition was clear now: her soul was burning.

From humans to demons, from nobodies to powerful elites like the Sword Saint, Lin Jun had tasted countless souls and witnessed countless deaths.

No matter how they died—by blades, monsters, fire, drowning, or corrosion—death never seemed to affect the soul itself.

After death, as the body faded, the soul simply detached and joined the world.

But true destruction of a soul…

This was a first.

Yet even so, Rage’s exploding power was absurd—like a soul undergoing nuclear fission.

Judging by her status panel, Rage had already surpassed the emperor—and her stats were rising even faster now.

Of course, in his Inspiration view, her “fuel” was running low.

But taking down Arama would be no problem.

Lin Jun glanced at the pink puji still being carried like a larva between the guards in the web-path.

Time to intervene.

【Creator of Thralls】

A sudden magic vortex roared to life across the embattled field, pulling in the corpses of fallen puji and ground mycelium.

At the same time, number four puji—complaining nonstop about how slow the pink puji was and how it had to keep pushing her forward—suddenly stiffened mid-hop.

Lin Jun plucked out its soul and stuffed it into the forming giant-beast puji.

When the magic vortex dispersed, a titanic puji crashed onto the battlefield.

Puuuu—jiiii—

Suddenly inhabiting an enormous mushroom body, number four looked around in confusion—everything was suddenly tiny.

“Stop spacing out. Block her!”

The image of Rage’s high-speed advance was fed directly into its mind.

“This power… this size! No problem, my lord!”

Rage didn’t even seem to consider puji a target; despite the giant-beast puji’s size, she clearly intended to sprint straight past its feet.

Rage’s speed was terrifying—number four had to spam detection skills continuously just to track her movement.

He couldn’t keep up with her speed, but he had an overwhelming size advantage!

Four massive mycelium tentacles spread wide, sweeping across like a colossal wall blocking Rage’s path.

“Fly away for me! Hahaha!”

Naive number four had no idea what kind of existence it was dealing with.

When that tiny figure collided with the four massive tentacles, a single muffled thud resounded—

And the tentacles exploded.

Only then did Rage finally turn her attention to the giant-beast puji attacking her.

Number four stared dumbly at the torn stumps of its tentacles, suddenly wondering if they’d been made of paper.

Lin Jun: Perfectly according to plan.