Chapter 38: 038. Sub-Heroines Are Still Heroines [II]

’Fu—’

Lyra was completely drenched under the swamp water as the dirty toxic liquid made its way into her mouth.

She gagged, squirming violently as the abrasive muscular tongue of the monster wrapped around her torso completely, crushing the breath from her lungs and forcing her deeper underwater into the pitch-black abyss.

’Fuck you!’

The woman adjusted her hand on the hilt of her chipped sword.

Despite the crushing pressure of the swamp water restricting her movements, she twisted her wrist and immediately tore through the flesh, cutting the tongue apart completely in a sudden eruption of dark blood.

The pressure released. Kicking her boots wildly against the murky depths, she pulled herself to the top of the dark water bursting through the surface while gasping greedily for air.

Once her head broke through the surface, Lyra’s orange eyes widened.

The cavern had descended into utter chaos.

Several swamp monsters were attacking from all directions. They were vicious, leaping amphibians with venomous spines and jagged-toothed mud-dwellers surged from the bogs in a frenzied wave.

Eternia was attacking several swamp monsters simultaneously with her twin blades, transforming into a violent whirlwind of silver steel.

She deflected a venomous spine with one blade and severed a mud-dweller’s head with the other with flawless footwork.

A few yards away, Mandy was even putting in some work as he flipped through the damp air, narrowly dodging a snapping jaw.

CLANG!

Mandy parried a crude spear thrust with his blade.

SHLUCK!

He drove his sword straight down into the goblin’s skull with a breathless grunt.

However, Ren simply stood on a patch of elevated glowing green moss. He had a pristine sword resting casually on his shoulder with his other hand tucked leisurely in his pocket.

He wasn’t even looking at the monsters; he was merely observing the ceiling fungi, completely unbothered by the slaughter happening a few feet away.

Lyra treaded the dark water staring at his relaxed posture.

’Is he that stro—’

Suddenly, two massive glowing reptilian eyes appeared in the dark water directly below her dangling boots.

Ren’s eyes caught the massive mana signature shifting beneath the surface.

"Eternia, get her out of there," Ren instructed firmly. "She is employing us. If she dies in that muck, she isn’t paying us any money."

Eternia sliced the throat of a leaping amphibian, pausing for a fraction of a second. She didn’t understand why her Master was doing this.

They had already harvested enough cores to walk out of here incredibly rich, so why was he even bothering with all of this trivial mercenary work for a rude commoner?

Regardless, she didn’t question her Master. Her left hand shot out, the bones and flesh rapidly transmuting.

Her arm turned into a massive slick Snake tail as it wrapped securely around Lyra’s waist and lifted her up into the air like a cracking whip.

"He—!" Lyra screamed, the word torn from her throat as she was violently yanked up from the bog and as she yelled, the water beneath her violently erupted.

The mouth of the monster opened up as the oversized Snake monster emerged, shaking off the slime and mud. It was a colossal, scaled beast... the C-Rank Swamp Dragon opening its fangs wide to bare at her.

It was as if the world had become slow motion. Lyra looked directly into the glowing eyes of the monster.

Immediately, all of the fierce independence and confidence she had felt initially completely left her body.

Her legs trembled uncontrollably. Though nobody could see it since her trousers were already thoroughly drenched, the girl had peed herself in pure paralyzing fear.

Eternia swiftly retracted her snake arm bringing Lyra safely to her side but she deliberately didn’t set her down gently.

She dumped the woman back into the swamp water on the shallow edge of the bog, dousing Lyra in the murky water all over again.

Lyra managed to pull herself up onto her knees while sputtering and coughing. "Hey!"

Eternia ignored her completely.

She lifted up her curved blade as her transmutated hand rippled and turned back to normal. She pointed the tip of her steel at the towering serpent-like monster with her golden eyes glowing with a terrifying, ethereal violet light.

They might both be snakes, but Beastkin deeply resented being compared to mindless dungeon monsters and the same was true for her.

Immediately, her blade began glowing with crackling soul energy.

’If every time I was met with a terrifying monster and I peed myself...’ Eternia thought with her lip curling in disgust, ’Master would have laughed at me.’

Eternia could only see that this rescue was the casual goodwill of her Master.

All these meager silver scraps that he would make from this escort mission were nothing compared to the massive amount of gold he possessed.

He was merely sparing this pathetic girl the time of day out of sheer boredom but that wasn’t why she was so incredibly annoyed.

Eternia had heard quite a few tragic tales from the older slaves back in the pens... tales of slaves that had been resold because their noble masters had fallen deeply in love with a fiery, independent commoner who had been physically weaker than them.

By that extension, once the new commoner bride viewed the loyal slave as a threat or a nuisance, they would demand to have them resold or executed.

’I don’t want Master to fall in love with someone and dispose of me,’ she thought, her grip tightening on her hilt.

She was about to rush the monster to prove her worth and solidify her place at his side.

"Eternia, calm down..." Ren said smoothly, his voice echoing across the water. "I’ll do it myself."

Ren blurred across the stepping stones moving with explosive velocity.

He lifted his dark steel blade effortlessly as he closed the massive distance between him and the towering Snake that had turned its glowing eyes toward him.

SLASH! SLASH! SLASH! SLASH!

Four blinding arcs of silver light painted the dark cavern. He didn’t even use a named skill as he relied entirely on pure speed and flawless precision with his blade whistling through the humid air.

He immediately appeared behind the beast, landing gracefully on a mossy rock.

Lyra’s orange eyes widened to the size of saucers.

She could recognize that elegant flowing swordsmanship from a mile away as she had spent countless nights huddled in her bed, watching the magical broadcast mirror.

’That was the sword of Ren Crowhurs—’

Before her mind could even finish the name, the oversized snake monster immediately burst into dozens of perfectly severed pieces.

Massive chunks of scaled meat and bone splashed into the water, leaving its oversized, glowing C-Rank core floating up top to the swamp water as it was stained with the dark blood of the Swamp King.

Witnessing the apex predator get dismantled in a fraction of a second, the remaining nearby monsters that had been attacking Mandy shrieked and fled immediately, diving back into the deep mud.

Ren casually slashed his sword at the air with the immense force clearing the blood completely off the steel, then lifted it up to rest on his shoulder again.

’I’m bored man...’ Ren thought, letting out a long exhausted sigh.

He had the ability to use Sword Aura to send invisible, devastating slashes from afar.

He could implant volatile lightning runes on the body of the monsters, electrifying them from the inside out.

He could even use his terrifying Starfire spells but so far, he was just really bored. The enemies here died if he simply swung his arm fast enough.

’I think we’ll leave after this.’

Ren didn’t want to sound like an overpowered protagonist constantly complaining about a lack of challenge, but these lower floors really weren’t worth much of his time or energy.

Maybe the higher floors would be better. He would see it once he went on that upcoming Floor 60 raid with the Twilight Guild.

He turned his head toward his Vanguard. "Eternia, you should get the co—"

"I’ll get it!" Lyra shouted, interrupting him.

Before anyone could stop her, she dove and swam frantically through the murky swamp water toward the floating gemstone, making all three of them thoroughly surprised.

A crystalline chime rang vividly in Ren’s head followed by a glowing blue interface that materialized over his vision.

『 Target: "Lyra" has gained 50 Points of affection! You may now view her status! 』

『 Name: Lyra 』

『 Age: 18 』

『 Race: Human 』

『 Relationship: Romantic Interest 』

『 Affection Points: 50 / 100 』

『 Hearts: 0 』

『 Emotional State: Awestruck, Immensely Relieved, Embarrassed, Deeply Infatuated. 』

『 Likes: Elegant swordsmanship, fair transactions, alchemical ingredients, providing for her little sister, Ren Crowhurst』

『 Dislikes: Charity, being pitied, self-righteous heroes, feeling helpless, owing unpaid debts. 』

『 Note: Sub-Heroine huh... I guess that’s fine. 』

’She likes me?’ Ren blinked, staring at the glowing blue text.

He hadn’t even done anything remotely romantic. 𝒻𝓇𝑒𝘦𝘸𝑒𝒷𝓃ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝒸ℴ𝘮

As the woman finished swimming and triumphantly held up the glowing sphere, Eternia blurred to the edge of the water.

The woman used her transmutated snake hand to aggressively wipe the core right out of Lyra’s grasp.

"That belongs to my Master..." Eternia spat, glaring down at the dripping commoner.

Ren chuckled at the petty display.

"Gather up the rest of the cores, Eternia," Ren commanded lightly. "And let her have a fair share since she is hiring us."

Lyra’s orange eyes sparkled as she looked up at him.

Contrary to the popular, widespread public opinion that Ren Crowhurst was a cold, abusive, and utterly irredeemable noble villain who lost constantly to Jace... she knew that he had a genuinely sweet side to him and though he was wearing a rugged commoner’s disguise right now, seeing him act so fairly made her heart flutter wildly against her ribs.

Ren stepped to the edge of the rock, extended his glove downward, and offered a charming smile. "Why don’t you let me help you up?"

Her eyes glittered. She paused and blinked, looking around the empty expanse of the bog to see if he meant anyone else but she was the only one in the water.

A massive, hopeful smile broke across her face, and the woman began eagerly swimming over to him, reaching her dirt-stained hand up to meet his.

However, before their fingers could even brush, Eternia intervened.

The Snakekin turned her other hand into a massive snake appendage.

She violently wrapped it around Lyra’s waist and lifted her entirely out of the water, hoisting her high into the air and unceremoniously dropping her onto the solid mud a few feet away.

"Don’t worry, Master, I got it!" Eternia chirped, offering Ren a bright, perfectly innocent smile.

She could not let this love story blossom!

Life continued naturally from there. With the Swamp "Dragon" dead, the remainder of the floor was eerily quiet.

They left the main swamp area, navigating through a twisting labyrinth of damp luminescent tunnels, before finally arriving at the hidden eastern ridge where she needed that special medicine.

Tucked away in a small, glowing grotto was a patch of vibrant silver-leafed vegetation.

Lyra knelt reverently in front of the growing herb bush. She meticulously washed her hands with clean water pulled out of her meager storage ring then she slipped on a pair of clean leather gloves to avoid contaminating the roots and began carefully plucking the glowing silver leaves.

"My sister has a severe magical condition," Lyra explained softly, placing the leaves gently into a padded wooden box. "It is called Glass-Blight. It aggressively crystallizes the respiratory system, turning the lungs into brittle mana-glass and makes every single breath feel like inhaling burning needles."

She paused, brushing a dark lock of wet hair from her face. "These specific silver leaves are desperately needed for brewing a repressing agent. It slows the crystallization down but... they only appear and bloom here when the Swamp Dragon’s ambient mana saturates the cavern during its respawn cycle."

She closed the wooden box, clutching it tightly to her chest as a profound overwhelming sense of relief washed over her features. "My sister will be so incredibly happy."

With that done, she carefully placed the box into her spatial ring.

She stood up, turned around, and immediately dropped straight down into a formal flawless kow-tow in the damp dirt right in front of Ren.

"Master Ren Crowhurst!" Lyra declared, her forehead touching the earth.

Mandy stiffened entirely, his hand flying to the hilt of his sword as he stared at the kneeling girl. The disguise was supposed to be flawless. How the hell did she know?

"How did you know?" Ren asked, calmly crossing his arms over his chest.

Lyra slowly raised her head, her orange eyes burning with intense admiration.

"Your swordsmanship... I watch your swordsmanship every single time on the broadcast mirrors. Every tournament, every duel. I watched your highly publicized battles with the Hero where you lost all of them."

She climbed up to her knees, looking at him as if he were a god of war.

"I memorized your exact footwork, the precise angles of your parries! Though mine is a mere pathetic imitation. However, I can confidently say that the Hero must be cheating or rigging the field somehow. Because after analyzing your form, I don’t understand how you’re losing those battles when you’re clearly dominating every exchange!"

Ren smiled genuinely at her sharp observation.

He really did like this girl. She wasn’t blinded by the propaganda of Plot armor, and her combat analysis was completely accurate.

"Don’t worry," Ren said smoothly, offering her a confident wink. "I already beat Jace the last time we fought."

"Yes, I watched that match too!" Lyra replied enthusiastically, her face lighting up. She bowed her head once more. "Please, I ask for you to teach me the true way of the sword! Take me under your wing!"

However, all Ren could think about as he stared down at the kneeling Sub-Heroine destined to inherit an absurd amount of wealth and political influence was...

’Do I want a Magic tower or not?’