The Reincarnated Vampire Just Wants to Enjoy Her New Life

Chapter 117: Floor 87

Wearing the outfit commissioned by Elli, I posed in front of the mirror before letting out a massive sigh.

No matter how much I liked it, there was no way I could wear such a thing in public. The same went for the underclothes that Anathousai made for me.

But the difference was that the dokkaflar traditional clothes were much bulkier and couldn't be concealed underneath my robes, so the privacy of my own room was the only place where I could wear it.

And due to that, eventually I returned to wash my clothes then switched outfits, back to what I was wearing the last day.

"C'mon Claret, we've got work to do."

"Yes Master!"

With those words, I touched the fountain and teleported to the floor I had business at.

I stared down at the first monster to appear on the floor.

Its large stature, round joints and bulky limbs surrounding a spherical body, and a small squash head laying on top. The black sheen which proudly declared its unyielding spirit which encompassed its entire body. The monster, or rather, monstrous creation stood before me like an undeterred palisade.

The adamantium golem stood there before me, unmoving as it looked upon me with disinterest.

For me, on the other hand, I licked my lips, imagining the sweetness of its essence as I sucked it out of its core. But first, I had to get crack the tough outer shell so I could suck up the delicious syrup within.

Lowering my hips, I rushed the construct, leaving Claret behind to watch.

The golem raised its giant arm in an attempt to crush me, but it was far, far too slow and predictable.

Just like all the times before since I had returned home, I simply weaved to the side, bypassing the massive hand plant and jumped up through the gap under its armpit. I stuck a hand onto its ponderous body and used the friction between its smooth body and the natural grooves on my palm to swing my body around onto its vulnerable back.

Here, I placed my other palm onto the hard surface and forcibly discharged my mana into the black metal that comprised its defences.

As if my mana was some sort of powerful acid, the metallic body of the golem warped and cracked before growing so brittle that the weight of my body was enough to cause it to crumble, exposing the delicious looking core inside.

As a finale, despite the golem's attempt to reach for my body in its blind spot, I thrust my head in through the gap and bit into the incorporeal energies which swirled in and around the shining stone housed inside of the golem's spherical body.

And with the taste of a rich chocolate ice cream, I enjoyed the construct's mana to my heart's content.

Soon, as if its strings were cut, the adamantium golem lost all strength in its body and toppled over before it disappeared in a shower of light particles.

The only hint that there was anything there before being a single black adamantium ingot and a fist sized crystal glowing with mana.

I threw the crystal and ingot into my bag before continuing.

"That's one down."

All my stock of mythical metals had already been spent for the sake of the settlements, but even then there were requests for more coming to the Hunter's Guild. While there were a few hunters who wished for equipment made from such metals, most of the requests came from craftsmen who needed them to make new tools to up their game as the hunters raised their levels and delved deeper into the dungeon.

The problem was that there weren't any hunters who had reached far enough in the dungeon to gather these materials in the first place. If I wasn't the one to do it, these requests wouldn't be filled for at least a few more months. Most requests were for things from much shallower floors, so there wasn't too much incentive to push so close to floor one hundred.

There were some who liked to concentrate more on making progress, but due to the variance of monster types that show up, continuously pushing through the floors wasn't possible without spending time to gather essential resources in previous floors or spending time to fulfill requests to buy those needed supplies. The people from the settlements couldn't just feed directly off of the monsters endlessly, and they didn't have a wide enough variety of built in weapons without need of any maintenance.

Even the more magically inclined hunters suffered from the need to replenish their MP, not to mention the seriousness of the setbacks injuries would have. There were people making health and mana potions, but the need to rely on those rather than having extremely fast ways to replenish their HP and MP in the dungeon like I did meant that they had to spend that much more time on the lower floors just to gather resources to continue pushing through the floors.

It was a vicious cycle which seriously slowed their progress when compared to a vampire such as myself. The only other one who could accomplish what I was doing was perhaps Claret. Though that did depend on how effective it was for her to feed off of the mana inside of the dungeon itself. We hadn't really experimented on such a thing. She really didn't like to eat anything but the mana treats I made for her after all.

But still, it was pretty incredible how much of a difference a little bit of knowledge made.

These adamantium golems used to take up a significant portion of my MP and quite a decent amount of time to defeat. While my level has risen to 281 since then, and my skills have ranked up, that alone didn't answer why such a fight had grown so easy for me.

The information which Peitho had given me back in the Labyrinth City Knossos after my work for her there included details regarding the properties of the three major mythical metals I had asked about.

Adamantium was the hardest and heaviest of the special metals, but its main weakness was that it was a poor conductor of mana. Mana had trouble flowing through it, making enchanting adamantium quite difficult and limited. But when it came to beating adamantium, the same property became its weakness. Adamantium, once it was saturated with mana to its limit, destabilized its crystalline structure and grew extremely brittle, to the point where in extreme circumstances, the structure of the metal could fail from its own weight.

Of course, the microscopic mechanisms was purely speculation on my part, but the overall effect was exactly as stated on the sheets I had received.

Along with that, I had learned quite a bit regarding the other two metals I had asked about: mythril and orihalcum.

Mythril was the lightest of the metals, but was quite average when it came to its other properties when compared to the other mythical metals. It was known as the universal metal, as it had few weaknesses. On the other hand, aside from its mass, it had no real strengths either. If one had to destroy something made from mythril, the best way was to reduce its temperature to the point that it grew brittle, then break it with blunt force trauma.

Using that strategy, facing the first mythril golem of the floor, I condensed and chilled the air around until I had a globe of liquid air floating above my palm. Together with my hastily made weapon, I rushed up close to the mythril golem and ducked under its sweeping arm before throwing the chilled liquid into its chest. The sound of high pitched pinging and fizzing as the super cooled liquid interacted with the room temperature metal. As my magically produced weapon wasn't enough on its own, I discharged my mana as a frozen mist into the centre of the golem's chest, further cooling the mythril armour protecting its core. Once I judged that I had done enough, I slammed my foot into the ground, twisted my body starting with my hips, and lunged my fist at the coldest point of the construct's armour, easily breaking through. At this point, I merely leapt into the hollow cavity of its chest and enjoyed my second dessert of the night, a soothing vanilla ice cream.

Orihalcum on the other hand was the magical metal. Mana passed through it like electricity through gold in addition to just plain being an excellent conductor of heat and electricity. This made its compatibility with magical enchantments as well as being used as magical equipment superior to any other metal. Orihalcum was even decent at protecting against magical attacks, as its structure could sap active spells of its mana, though often that alone wouldn't neutralize most spells. Due to it being a metal with properties primarily connected to mana, while it was stronger than steel, it wasn't even close to being as strong as mythril against physical attacks.

My claws couldn't do much against it, as the extended parts were made from my aura, but punching worked wonders, amongst other forms of physical manipulations.

When I finally found an orihalcum golem, I simply rushed it without any particular preparations. Even before, the orihalcum golems were the easiest for me to deal with. Like with the adamantium golem, I slipped under its first attack with its heavy fist, then sliding between its legs I spun around and leapt onto its back. From there, I held a hand out like a knife and thrust the bare claws of both hands against its shimmering metallic surface. While softer than the other metals, orihalcum was still a particularly strong material, and so while my claws were able to dig in successfully, the tips of my fingers couldn't make any progress on their own. But that was still within my calculations.

The golem retaliated against my presence and bent an arm around its back in ways which would have dislocated a living being's shoulder. But that was exactly what I was waiting for. I wrapped my legs around the construct's upper arm then bent my back as I pulled my legs towards my anchored hands. With a loud creak, the golem's shoulder separated from its body, exposing its internal workings. Pushing off of its back as the other arm tried to grasp at me, I swiftly landed then kicked back off the ground and dove head first through the large opening I had created to enjoy the rich strawberry ice cream of its internal mana.

Now that I knew how to fight these things properly, even without the added levels I had, I was able to make swift progress through the floor. Even when I had to take them on two or three at a time, their large bodies interfered with each other, rendering their numbers advantage moot against my small size and high speed. And as I already knew the way after clearing the floor once before, it was only a few hours and a nice supply of mythical metals safely secured in my bag before I was standing in front of majestic double doors.

I casually pushed the large doors aside and walked in as if I owned the place.

In a sense I did, so it wasn't exactly wrong, at least.

What stood before me was a large golem, much larger than the thee varieties on the floor. It stood about five meters high, its pearl white body with technicoloured inlays decorating its surface. In one hand it had a polished black tower shield suitable for its size, and the other a six meter long double headed spear held right in the middle.

The first time I had fought it, it was a serious pain in the ass. That shield was made entirely of adamantium, and its thickness meant that saturating it with mana took longer than any one opening I could get. Its body was primarily composed of mythril, allowing it to move quite fast despite its size and had good durability due to its increased thickness compared to the normal golems outside. Those seemingly decorative inlays were in fact made of orihalcum, absorbing any magical attack designed to weaken or break through the mythril which composed most of its body. Then finally there was that spear. Comprised of adamantium blades, a mythril shaft, and orihalcum inlays to protect and enhance the entire structure. Combined with the inhuman joints of the golem allowed it to always attack while minimizing its openings and blind spots.

At first glance, this thing had no weaknesses at all, as any possible one was covered by the other metals.

The first time I fought it, there really was little I could do. I may had been vastly faster than it, my magic was largely ineffective against it, and staying in one spot against its body to perform a brute force attack was next to impossible due to that weapon.

The solution then, was not to aim for the boss's weaknesses, but its strengths, and use it against it.

In the end, the mythical metals' inherent properties were things which was difficult to overcome, both in their strengths as well as their weaknesses. That held true to both those trying to defeat them as well as those who create using them.

I spread out my arms and forcibly sprayed out my aura as if I was trying to fill the room with it.

Behind me Claret started to shiver. Despite all her loyalty, overcoming her base instincts was still something quite difficult. I could only apologize to her in my heart regarding that.

As if this act was the firing of a starting pistol, the sparkling golem's body exploded with an acceleration that defied its massive size. It obsidian shield thrust in front like a bulldozer being launched from an aircraft carrier. Right before impact, the shield gave way and instead the shining blade of its spear took its place, thrusting right at my midsection.

Of course I had no intention of taking such a destructive attack head on. I ducked down below the blade, but experience told me that such an act alone wasn't going to be enough, so I kicked off the ground and followed the construct's receding shield.

As expected, or rather, as usual, the moment that it looked like its thrust was going to miss, the golem dipped the blade tip downwards, gouging the ground where I previously stood. By following the movement of that oversized block of metal, I not only avoided the change to the boss's attack, but prevented any immediate follow-ups.

That wasn't to say that where I went was safe at all.

The jet black shield slowed its movement and reversed, intent to crush me under its weight. But it wasn't like I was just waiting to let things happen without doing something about it. As the thick shield threatened to crush me, I grabbed the edge and pulled myself to its inside before throwing the weight of the giant slab behind me.

My hands thrust out again and reached for the white and rainbow wrist. The moment the coldness of the metal was transmitted to my brain from my fingers, I forcibly injected my aura straight into the mythril and orihalcum composite. The shimmering rainbow of the orihalcum took on a new radiance that glowed, but rather than with any normal light, it glowed black, as if it was trying to suck in all light that it touched.

From the corner of my eye, the glint of a black blade flying through the air from behind the golem's back entered my vision. Without slowing the transfer of mana from my body to the boss's, I slipped under the construct's arm and hooking my claws in the seams between the two different metals, I crawled across the bulbous body, away from the spinning blade.

Left, right, up and down, sometimes even jumping over or dropping under, I dodged the spear which spun like a helicopter blade as it tried to catch me as I clung closely to the golem's body, all the while I infused my mana into it. The orihalcum glowed more and more strongly as the blackness of my aura seeped through its surface in greater and greater concentration. And with the added mana at its disposal, the golem's movements increased in speed as it used the power it was provided to its fullest capability.

Everything had a limit, and that was the whole point.

All along, a dull whine slowly grew, first felt through my body and eventually growing audible then almost deafening. Only a few minutes after the battle started, the golem suddenly jerked with loud pinging sounds echoing from all over its body. Then with a loud crack, all power escaped from the construct's body and it fell.

To confirm it all, I ripped open a small hole in its body and glanced inside.

The large core which should have been powering the golem couldn't be seen inside of its body. Instead, surrounding the bracket where the core was supposed to be held, was crystalline fragments of varying sizes, all glowing ominously the same colour as my aura.

I dipped my face down to the glowing mass and sucked on it like a vacuum.

The taste of the mana that was overflowing from the crystal fragments was mild. It was like drinking an ice cream slurry diluted with a large quantity of water. I could taste what was supposed to be there, but mixed with so much of the mana I had expelled during the fight, the taste itself was extremely dilute. It really was the same as the blood of a vampire, my aura had very little taste to my own senses.

But it wasn't like I couldn't refill my depleted MP pool this way, so it was worth putting in the effort.

When I finished my unsatisfying meal and stepped away, the unmoving lump of metals soon evaporated in particles of light leaving five assorted ingots and the largest mana crystal I had found to date. The thing was as big as both of my fists put together, with the next biggest being half that.

But as to the value of such a large crystal, I didn't really know. These things were used to power things that ran on mana, but I didn't know the difference between using a single large crystal and many small ones.

Once I had a bit of free time, that was something I needed to learn about for sure.

Or rather, how mana powered items in general worked. Because if it was even remotely like electricity, there was a whole ton of things I wanted to make.

Now that the floor's boss had been defeated, a treasure chest appeared near the back of the room and a door behind it opened up.

I put away the contents of the chest. It was just an assortment of cut gems. Personally I didn't really have any use for this sort of thing, but it would be a waste to just leave them.

That aside, my stock of mythical metals had been restored, and I had more than enough for the request at the Hunter's Guild.

Now that I no longer had any business on this floor, I made my way through the door at the back.

(It's still early, so I probably have enough time to challenge the latest floor.)

When I arrived at the next fountain room, I touched the fountain and together with Claret, I teleported to the latest floor I had reached: floor 99.

Exiting the fountain room, I was greeted with the sight of some sort of ruins.

The left and right of me had tall, cracked wall extending from the entrance. The path in either direction was quickly blocked off with shorter walls which forced me to go straight if I wasn't going to climb them. Not like I would. Even though those three story high walls were quite imposing with their sturdiness and heavy weight despite the extensive weathering and long gash like cracks, it wouldn't be hard for me to scale them.

But such a thing was a trap. It was always a trap. What lay beyond the lips of those walls were always an unreasonable number of monsters and traps without any walls or other terrain to stop them from gathering around any intruder who tried to circumvent the path laid out.

Ahead of me was a wide path, but only after a short distance, there stood an inner gate. But it was broken. The walls surrounding it had collapsed on top of it, making the way impassible. The fact that there was vegetation growing in between the pieces of rubble suggested that it was wedged in there quite well. In other words, breaking through wasn't allowed.

Not like it would be worth the effort. It would likely just be faster to take the unbroken side path available instead.

While I didn't know exactly what was waiting for me here, this place was likely the ruins of some sort of fortress, and thus the monsters that would show up would be related to that theme.

I checked my supply of blood and confirmed even if it was tougher than expected, I wouldn't run out before I was able to retreat and make my way back.