The Summoner's Rebirth: Awaken, Milady

"As much as I'd like to rest, we have a limited amount of time. Shall we proceed right now?" Aria lowered the girl down from her back and huffed her breath. Her body felt worse than ever.

Ever since they stepped into this dungeon and met their enemies, she had never gotten to take a proper rest. She was sure that her body was going to collapse after her adrenaline runs up. Whether she would make it out of the dungeon before that happens, it wasn't certain yet.

Aria actually felt threatened, and she was wondering whether this dilemma was going to cost her a lot more than she thought.

Trying to stay positive, Aria began to look left and right in order to get a clearer grasp on where they ended up in. They had ran around quite far, but Aria remembered running in circles for quite some time in order to manage the dodging. She traced back her steps and measured roughly how much they had gone deep into the forest, looking at the corpses and trails.

"Yes. I think so too. We should finish this before it's too late," Alena checked her status to make sure everything was alright. The repercussions were dulled down to just feeling like she's submerged in ice water, unlike the previous round where she couldn't breathe at all and fell into a comatose state.

She won the 'battle', but she still wouldn't use [Ilyin] unless needed. The catch was that if she wanted to call out the ice spirit one more time, she would have to go through the pain again. This time, she wasn't sure if just willpower could last her through.

The pain that she felt wasn't just mentally straining, it wasn't just a haunting feeling. It also affected her physique, leaving her trembling uncontrollably even after the ice spirit had returned into her space. The spirit was noticeably quite angered and irritated, making Alena feel even worse.

Their states were terrible, but they were able to go on. Because they wanted to live on. Because they had to live on.

Why would they die inside such a dungeon?

'I've gone through worse than this.'

Once, she had even lost a limb, but it was immediately treated by one of her colleagues. Even so, she couldn't help but remember the vivid feeling of having your limb cut off out of nowhere.

In this case, only a boss fight was left. This dungeon was quite odd.

Normally, one would consist of several stages before jumping into the boss stage. However, this dungeon's stages were all held in one place, without being separated by any gates. That means, when they continuously faced against the insect hordes, those were the stages being hurled at them without a break. They had already passed several stages even without them knowing.

Thus, Aria took the opportunity to assume that there was only the boss stage left now that the hordes stopped.

This was their perfect time to relax, but they had to remember the three hour time limit Gin set them up for. Also, if Aria rested for too long, then her adrenaline would end and become a burden for her.

"Did you do what I asked you to?" Aria inquired as she borrowed Dianthe's power to create fresh water for her to drink, gulping it down in large amounts and offering the child some.

The child refused the offer, then brought up a bottle of her own and presented it to Aria. This bottle did not contain fresh water to drink, however.

Right after Alena recognized the rain as [Crystal Water], Aria had instructed her to contain as much of the water as possible.

Thus, Alena was currently holding a decent amount of [Crystal Water] stored into a bottle.

This was because Aria realized that if the insects were crystallized creatures, then there was a high chance of the boss being the same case. If so, then they had to preserve this peculiar water to use it for the boss.

"One bottle, huh? That's pretty good.. But if the boss is a moving insect, it'll still be pretty hard," Aria pursed her lips.

Higher-leveled insects were known to have high agility and a hardened carapace to make up for their frail body. This carapace, if removed, will lower the insect's defense by a mile's worth, but when it is still attached, it will create a huge problem for them.

They followed the trail Dianthe had created. It brought them to a tree.

Standing in front of a gigantic willow tree, Aria narrowed her eyes down on the middle of the trunk. There was a large chunk that was dug out and emitted a crimson hue. Crystal covered the object, which proved that this was related to their enemies, or at least had a connection with this dungeon's solution.

"This thickness.. I'm afraid that just pouring it over the surface wouldn't be enough to melt it," Aria knocked on the object and sighed. She drained their wet clothes that had been drenched by the same rain and poured every drop into the bottle, adding it up to around two liters of liquid.

"Still not enough. This type of thing needs a strong.. force to be shot towards the core. Only then would the thing be shattered," Aria frowned, not finding any suitable solution at the moment.

Musing on the problem, Aria suddenly thought of an idea after thinking about it.

"...Actually, there might be a way," Aria looked at Alena with gleaming eyes.

The child tilted her head innocently, wondering what Aria was trying to imply.

Aria giggled slightly before starting to tell the child what her plan was.

"You're telling me to... let the slime drink all the water, and shoot it out as a jet?" Alena raised her brow at the plan Aria disclosed, wondering how the woman came to such a solution.

"Do we have any other option? Slimes are very flexible, they can double in size. Even your small little guy enlarged itself when it attacked back then, right? Tell it to do the same thing, but this time.. we'll use this water and shoot it!" Aria proclaimed.

"Ahh.. I suppose there's no other option. If you think that this will work.. then, we'll just try it," Alena also couldn't provide the elder with a better solution and ended up going with the suggestion Aria gave.

She let out her obedient puppet, the Silver Slime. It was currently quite tiny, but it was still somewhat larger than the usual wandering slimes.

"Haah... Here, drink this water, but don't digest it. Keep it in yourself," Alena commanded.

The slime obeyed, coming near the bottle Alena gave and sipping from it. Its body absorbed the water and stored it inside, the slimy texture slowly increasing in size as it drew more liquid.

Then, after it finished drinking up until the point Aria marked, the slime took off and began to stand before the tree. It awaited Alena's next order patiently, keeping the liquid inside its body.

Alena looked at Aria, who gave her a nod as means of motivation. The child took a deep breath before channeling more mana so that her slime could work. After gathering the necessary energy, she began to lead it towards the slime.

"[Compress]!" Alena shouted, commanding the slime to shrink in size. The water pressure inside the slime significantly increased, containing all of the stored water into a bomb that would explode at any moment. The slime became very tiny, until it couldn't compress any further and was on the verge of exploding.

"Now! Shoot it!" Aria bid her time, getting into her stance. 

Her eyes were locked onto the crystallized tree. To be exact, the being that laid inside the tree. She had already made guesses on what the boss was going to be, and she gripped her sword [Halvargg] tight. Her sword was already laced with some of the [Crystal Water] they possessed to deal more damage in case the boss was weak to it just like the other guys.

Their plan turned out to be very successful. The jet the slime unleashed had quite the great force, and ended up drilling a clean hole into the chunk. The hole increased in size, starting to corrode altogether.

The moment the crystal fully melted and the boss gets let loose, it should go into berserk mode.

Aria was not going to belittle a C-ranked dungeon boss, even if it was an insect type that was known to be weaker. She had just came back from Leonis' dungeon, and she also remembered Rallaka's dungeon. Even beyond the scales people placed onto these mysterious gates, there were exceptions.

There was nothing that guaranteed whether a certain dungeon would be one of those exceptions or not.

The only comforting fact they knew was that they should be able to get one free blow on the boss for the panic mode it'll enter after being revealed. In this period of time, they had to land one good blow.