The descent into the fourth level felt less like a tactical dungeon raid and more like a funeral procession for the laws of physics. White Wolf led his team through a tunnel that was still smoking, the walls glowing a dull orange where Danikeli had accidentally brushed against them while "helping" a group of shadow-bats find their way to the light.

  As they rounded the final bend, the tunnel opened into a colossal amphitheater of obsidian and brass. In the center stood the Mid-Boss of the upper Derinkuyu strata: the Level 25 Aegis-Automaton. It was a towering mass of reinforced iron, powered by a core of compressed mana that hummed with a deep, mechanical throb. Its arms were twin hydraulic rams, and its "face" was a single, glowing red lens.

  "Engage defensive formation Delta!" White Wolf commanded, his voice returning to its practiced edge. "Red, take the flank! Green, prepare the dampening seals! This thing is immune to standard elemental fire, so we have to—"

  "Wow!"

  The exclamation echoed off the obsidian walls like a bell. Danikeli sprinted past the Wolffire Group, his oversized sword clanking against his thigh, his face lit up with the purest joy White Wolf had ever seen.

  "A giant robot! It’s just like the ones in the picture books!" Danikeli skidded to a halt at the foot of the massive iron feet, his head tilted so far back he nearly tipped over. "He’s so shiny! Look at his big red eye!"

  The Aegis-Automaton’s optical sensor clicked, zooming in on the small organic lifeform. A series of internal gears ground together, and the air filled with the scent of hot oil and steam. It raised a massive iron fist, the hydraulics hissing as it prepared to pulverize the "intruder."

  "Danikeli, get back!" White Wolf roared, lunging forward. "That’s a Siege-Class Golem! It doesn't have a 'play' mode!"

  "Does he have a name?" Danikeli asked, completely ignoring the shadow of the descending fist. "He looks like a 'Bumper.' Can I see your buttons, Bumper?"

  The iron fist came down with the force of a falling building.

  The Wolffire Group braced for the impact, expecting the boy to be flattened into the stone. Instead, as the metal made contact with the air six inches above Danikeli’s head, there was a sound like a blacksmith’s hammer hitting a cold anvil. The "Great Sage" magic, sensing a "heavy object" approaching the boy's joyful space, didn't just heat up—it hardened.

  The boy's passive mana formed a localized heat-shield so dense it acted as a solid barrier. The iron fist stopped dead in mid-air. The kinetic energy had nowhere to go, rippling back up the Automaton’s arm. The massive brass rivets holding the shoulder together began to glow white, then yellow, then pop like popcorn.

  "Oh, you want to do a high-five?" Danikeli laughed, reaching up to pat the glowing, semi-molten surface of the iron fist. "High-five, Bumper!"

  The moment his small palm touched the metal, the "immunity to fire" the Golem supposedly possessed was revealed to be a lie. The Great Sage magic operated on a thermal scale that the ancient Nev?ehir engineers hadn't even theorized. The iron didn't just melt; it turned into a gas.

  A vertical shaft of white light erupted from Danikeli’s hand, punching straight through the Golem’s arm, through its torso, and out the back of its reinforced power core. The "Big Toy Robot" shuddered, its red eye flickering once, before the entire twenty-ton structure slumped forward, turning into a puddle of bubbling slag before it even hit the ground.

  "He was so excited he melted," Danikeli said, looking at the steaming pile of scrap with a bit of disappointment. "I didn't even get to see if he had a wind-up key."

  White Wolf stood frozen, his claymore halfway out of its sheath. He looked at the puddle of what was once a Level 25 Boss, then at his men. Red Wolf was staring at his axe as if it were a toothpick, and Green Wolf had simply sat down on a rock, covering his face with his hands.

  "Boss," Red Wolf whispered into the silence. "I think we're the ones who need a five-hundred-yard head start. From him."

  White Wolf sheathed his sword with a slow, deliberate click. He didn't look at the steaming pile of slag that had been a Siege-Class Golem; he couldn't bring himself to. Instead, he turned to his team, his shoulders sagging under the weight of his useless, top-tier armor.

  "New plan," White Wolf muttered. "We aren't clearing this dungeon. We’re babysitting a supernova."

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  "Boss, my 'Dampening Seals' are vibrating so hard they're going to explode," Green Wolf said, still sitting on his rock. "Every time that kid gets 'happy,' the local reality temperature jumps by a thousand degrees. We're going to be medium-rare before we hit the tenth floor."

  White Wolf nodded, then turned to Danikeli. The boy was currently poking the edge of the molten puddle with a stick he’d found, looking genuinely dejected that his "robot" friend had liquified.

  "Hey, Danikeli," White Wolf said, forcing his voice into a tone he imagined was 'fatherly' but sounded more like a man negotiating with a live grenade. "You’ve done... a lot. You’ve cleared more of Derinkuyu in twenty minutes than most guilds do in a month. Aren't you getting a little... sleepy?"

  Danikeli looked up, blinking. "Sleepy? But I haven't even found the bottom yet! And I haven't seen any more kitties."

  "Exactly!" White Wolf jumped in, kneeling so he was at eye level with the boy—while carefully staying outside the 'charred circle' of Danikeli’s boots. "The bottom is a long way down. And the best adventurers always take a 'Power Nap' before the big finale. It helps your... uh... 'spark' recharge."

  "Does it?" Danikeli asked, tilting his head. "I do feel a little bit fuzzy. Like a warm blanket is inside my tummy."

  "That's the nap calling to you," Red Wolf added, stepping forward with a rare, desperate grin. "Tell you what, kid. We’ve got this special, high-grade adventurer’s bedroll. It’s extra soft. Why don't you curl up here by this nice, warm... uh... melted robot, and we'll go scout ahead? We'll come get you when we find something really, really cute."

  Danikeli yawned, and a small puff of literal dragon-fire escaped his lips, singeing the tip of White Wolf’s helmet plume. "Okay. But only for a little bit. Don't let the grumpy statues eat all the snacks without me."

  The Wolffire Group moved with frantic speed. They unrolled a thick, enchanted fleece blanket in the corner furthest from any flammable structural supports. As Danikeli curled up, hugging his old sword like a teddy bear, the air in the room finally began to cool from 'Blast Furnace' to 'Very Hot Summer.'

  "He’s down," Green Wolf whispered, checking his mana-tracker. "The readings are stabilizing. If we move now, we can hit the next three floors and actually use our weapons for once. I didn't spend ten years training in the Second Multiverse's Hero Academy to watch a toddler high-five a Golem into gas."

  "Move out," White Wolf commanded, his voice regaining its edge. "Quietly. If we wake him up, I’m quitting the guild."

  The three men crept toward the descending archway, their boots barely making a sound. They disappeared into the darkness of the fifth level, desperate to find a challenge they could actually understand.

  Behind them, Danikeli let out a soft, rhythmic snore. With every breath, the stone beneath his head turned into a soft, malleable clay, and a faint, blue-white pulse began to emanate from his chest, searching for something deeper in the earth.

  The Wolffire Group descended into the fifth level with the desperate energy of men reclaiming their dignity. The air here was damp and smelled of sulfur, a welcome change from the dry, pressurized heat of Danikeli’s presence. They finally reached a vaulted chamber where a pack of Level 15 Obsidian Hounds—beasts made of jagged volcanic glass and shadow—snarled in the darkness.

  "Finally," Red Wolf breathed, his axe humming with a crimson light. "Something that doesn't melt when you look at it!"

  "Formation Diamond!" White Wolf commanded. "Red, take the lead. Green, keep the shadows pinned!"

  The fight was a symphony of professional violence. Red Wolf’s axe shattered obsidian ribs with every swing, while Green Wolf used his jade staff to weave chains of light that bound the hounds' muzzles. White Wolf moved like a blur, his claymore shearing through the shadow-cores of the beasts. For ten minutes, the guild hall's Number 1 group fought with a terrifying, synchronized precision. They took hits, their armor denting under the pressure, but they countered with the lethal expertise that had made them famous.

  As the final hound dissipated into a cloud of ash and glass shards, the three men stood panting, their chests heaving, sweat dripping from their brows.

  "Now that," Red Wolf gasped, leaning on his axe, "is what a dungeon crawl is supposed to feel like. I actually had to try for that one."

  "It's good to see the floor isn't made of lava for once," Green Wolf added, wiping his brow. "I was starting to forget what it felt like to actually swing a weapon instead of just watching things evaporate."

  "I think the puppy was just trying to say he wanted a treat," a small, high-pitched voice piped up from the shadows behind them.

  "Exactly, it’s all about the rhythm of the—wait," White Wolf started, his heart nearly stopping as the familiarity of the voice registered.

  He spun around, his claymore leading the way, only to find Danikeli sitting on a pile of shattered obsidian shards as if they were a pile of pillows. The boy was rubbing his eyes, his sword belt slung haphazardly over one shoulder, looking like he’d just woken up from a nap in the middle of a war zone.

  "Danikeli?" White Wolf choked out, his voice cracking. "How... how long have you been standing there?"

  "I'm not standing, I'm sitting!" Danikeli corrected him with a sleepy grin. "I woke up because the doggies were being very loud. I think they wanted to play fetch, but you guys broke their toys. Do you think they have any more friends further down?"

  Green Wolf slowly lowered his staff, staring at the five-hundred-yard stretch of tunnel they had just cleared. "He followed us. He followed us silently. Boss, he’s a Great Sage level stealth specialist too?"

  "I just followed the light!" Danikeli said, hopping off the glass pile. The obsidian beneath his feet immediately turned to sand from the residual heat. "Are we going to find the bottom now? I think the big doggies said the bottom is where the best snacks are."

  White Wolf looked at his men, then at the child. The professional pride he had felt seconds ago was currently being incinerated by the boy's innocent gaze.