"The smell is horrible..."

Anna groaned in displeasure as they stood under a bridge, right at the entrance of the sewer system.

She wished that she had some pegs to block out the stench.

"I didn’t miss this smell... Do you have everything for the trip down there, or do we need to visit the market?"

Fang Raon asked.

"Last night, I spent several hours gathering everything, as I already knew that we’re going to try this."

Anna said.

She then opened her inventory, and first of all, she took out a candle lantern and lit it up with a box of matches.

She handed that to Raon.

"And these are for you~"

Anna took out several flasks and handed them all to Raon, and he recognized few of the flasks, but few were unknown to her.

"Some healing potions, and these are...?"

Fang Raon asked as he looked at the strange liquid in one of the bottles that seemed to be glowing slightly.

"Mana Recovery Potions. You’ll be needing those."

Anna said with a smile.

"Oh... Thanks."

Fang Raon securely put them all inside his inventory so he wouldn’t accidentally break them and waste them.

"Now, what is the plan, brother?"

Anna asked with a bright gaze.

"...You’re letting me do the planning?"

Fang Raon asked in surprise.

He thought that this was Anna’s party, so she was going to do everything, and he was just supporting her.

"Of course. I’ll follow your plan, no matter what it is."

Anna said with a serious gaze.

She never planned to be the "team leader" of the party and was always going to let Fang Raon be one.

Because she believed that her brother was an amazing leader, and under his lead, they would easily clear the quest.

"Alright... Let me think."

Fang Raon rubbed his chin thoughtfully.

He tried remembering the first time that he went to the sewers with his first character and his first-ever party.

Back then, it was just him, Tessa, Rosabella, and Dewrey.

’We didn’t get very far, but the Angry Rats are very sneaky, and they are usually acting together. Hmm, I wonder how those three are doing.

’I do kind of miss them. Hopefully they’re doing good.’

Fang Raon shook his head, as his thoughts wandered away, and then he quickly came up with a plan.

"Since we have to fight through the hordes of Angry Rats, I think it would be wise to create a distraction to draw them away from us.

"If we can avoid fighting any Angry Rats at all, that would be most beneficial for us. Otherwise, I might need to spend my mana, which is bad, and you might exhaust yourself if you have to do all the fighting by yourself."

He said.

"How are we going to do that?"

Anna asked curiously.

"Well, I’d prefer if we did this quest during daytime, so there are other players also exploring sewers, which would make Angry Rats busy fighting them instead of us.

"But since we are doing it now, I do have quite a crazy plan, and I am not sure whether it will work."

Fang Raon said.

"What is it?"

Anna asked excitedly.

She liked the sound of crazy.

Fang Raon smiled, and he then leaned closer to her to whisper into her ear. She just listened, her eyes widening with each word.

"Oh, hehe~"

She giggled and looked at her brother with bright eyes, and she smiled cheekily as she liked the sound of that!

"Let’s do it!"

"Do you have a map of the sewer?"

Fang Raon asked.

Anna nodded, and she brought out the map that she had purchased and unfolded it like a treasure map.

"We need to find a spot."

Fang Raon said.

"What about this?"

Anna pointed at one of the spots on the map. It looked like a chamber deep in the sewers. It only had one entrance.

It looked like a dead-end.

"It’s quite deep... Do you think we can make it there?"

Fang Raon asked.

"I can use Read to avoid most of the Angry Rats. The deeper we go, the harder it will be because there will be so many.

"And wouldn’t your plan work better if we were right at the heart of the Angry Rats Kingdom?"

Anna asked with a smile.

"...Yeah, it would."

Fang Raon chuckled, and he nodded.

After folding the map, Anna slipped into her pocket, and she then turned to the sewer entrance with a frown.

"What a smell... Alright, let’s get going!"

She excitedly took the lead, and Raon followed right behind her into the dark and smelly sewer.

With the help of the candle lantern, they were able to cast away most of the darkness, but they still didn’t know what hid within the shadows.

However.

Anna continued to use Read to make sure that they didn’t encounter anyone, and slowly, with the help of the map, they kept making progress.

Whispers~ whispers~ shuffle~ shuffle~!

Occasionally, they heard strange whispers, as if the walls were talking, and then shuffling like someone was following them.

"There have been so many deaths in these sewers that they’re haunted now. This is called the Player Graveyard, after all."

Anna said.

’Every new player goes to visit these sewers most likely, and because of their overconfidence, there are a lot of deaths.’

Fang Raon thought.

The sewer system was like a maze. Without the map, it would be impossible to navigate through it all.

"To the left."

Anna said, and took the left path, as she sensed something on the right path that she didn’t like at all.

A few times, they had some close encounters with Angry Rats, who were busy eating the remains of some unknown creature.

Thus.

They were able to evade them.

However.

They were now getting very deep in the sewer, much deeper than when Fang Raon came here with Dewrey’s party.

"A little problem."

Anna said with a strained smile as they stood at the crossroads of three paths, and she sensed something.

"If we go down the middle path, we’ll encounter twenty Angry Rats. If we go down the right path, we’ll head to the Angry Rats sleeping nest.

"And if we go to the left path, there are also a lot of Angry Rats, but it is the direct path to that chamber."

Anna said.

"It is impossible to avoid fighting?"

Fang Raon asked.

"...Not necessarily if we go to the right path. I can sense that there are a lot of Angry Rats there, but they are mostly sleeping."

Anna said.

She said "mostly" because she could tell that there were some Angry Rats that hadn’t quite settled down for the night.

They were trying but couldn’t just get comfortable enough to fall asleep.

Just like some humans, trying to fall asleep after a long day but just couldn’t get their thoughts to stop racing.

"Show the map."

Fang Raon said.

Anna pulled out the folded map, unfolded it, and they looked at where those three paths were heading.

"The right path takes quite a detour. Even if we get past the Angry Rats sleeping nest, there is a good chance that we’ll encounter more of them.

"And if we happen to fight near the sleeping nest, we might wake up all of them and be in really big trouble."

He said.

"Ah... You’re completely right!"

Anna exclaimed.

She hadn’t thought of that and realized that there were indeed quite a lot of dangers if they decided to go down there.

"The left path is the most straightforward path. It is also further away from the sleeping nest, so even if we fight, there won’t be danger of waking up the other creatures."

Fang Raon said.

He didn’t like the middle path at all, so he didn’t even think about going there, as there were a lot of Angry Rats and it was also close to the sleeping nest.

It was literally the worst path to go to.

"The left it is."

Anna folded the map and pocketed it.

She then reached out to her heavy-looking sword and pulled it out, and she also retrieved a shield from her inventory.

"I’ll do the fighting. You just stand back, brother."

Anna said with a serious look on her face.

Fang Raon nodded.

They then entered the left path, and after walking for a few minutes, the heavy stench was getting stronger.

It was the smell of the King Angry Rat, coming from somewhere in the sewers ahead.

It was said that the King Angry Rat was the smelliest creature in all existence, smelling like rotten eggs mixed with a sewage dump.

The players that have successfully killed the King Angry Rat had said that the fighting was not the hardest part.

It was to stay conscious through the overpowering stench that was the true challenge.

Squeak~ squeak~ squeak~!

In that moment, they heard the loud squeaking. It was very loud. And coming from many Angry Rats too.

At that moment, Fang Raon cast the candle lantern’s light deep into the path, and there they saw them.

Dozens of Angry Rats, circling a small area, and in the middle of it all, there were two Angry Rats clashing—butting their heads together aggressively.

They were fighting.

It was like they had entered some kind of underground Angry Rat fighting ring!

"...What is this?"

Fang Raon asked in surprise.

"It looks like that one Angry Rat is challenging the other for a duel for the leader of the pack."

Anna said.

’...They are quite similar to humans, I guess.’

Fang Raon thought.

In that moment, Anna stepped forward, and before any of the Angry Rats noticed her, she slammed her sword down.

The sword split one of the Angry Rats in half, and the blood splattered like a gruesome painting across the ground.

Some of the blood landed on Anna’s beautiful face, but she just smiled like a crazy sword maiden, and she lifted her sword again.

Finally, the Angry Rats saw her, and before they could even become angry, Anna was already swinging the sword.

SWOOSH~ CRUNCH~ SPLATTER~!

"HAHAHAHAHA!"

"..."

Fang Raon watched in silence as Anna, laughing like a crazy woman, slaughtered the Angry Rats one by one.

’I feel bad for them for some reason.’