A Trash Novel's Only Reader-Chapter 15: Something Off

The underground parking structure sat on the east side of the city, half-collapsed and covered in grime. Shu stood at the entrance with his bat resting on his shoulder, staring into the darkness below.

’Sixty to eighty snakes,’ he thought, rolling his neck once. ’That should clear the fifty-kill mission in one go.’

He pulled out the mission paper and checked the address again. The location matched, and the smell coming from inside definitely matched something that housed a nest of venomous creatures.

"This should also be a good opportunity to level up," he said, thinking back to Raniel, "since the main characters have started to appear, I have a feeling shit is about to get real."

He started heading inside, tapping the bat on the ground to make some noise, he didn’t want to go running around wasting energy. 𝒻𝑟𝘦𝘦𝘸ℯ𝒷𝑛𝘰𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝘤𝘰𝘮

The ramp spiraled down into darkness, each level darker than the last. By the time he hit the bottom floor, the only light came from cracks in the ceiling far above.

He activated Slaughterer and the purple aura crawled up his arms. The heat settled behind his skull, and his senses sharpened.

Something moved to his left.

He spun on instinct and swung the bat backward without looking. The impact cracked against something hard, and a serpent the size of his leg went flying into a pillar.

"Nice try," he muttered, turning to face the darkness.

More hisses answered him, low and guttural, echoing off the walls. Shapes began to emerge from behind the cars and pillars, slithering into the light.

His smirk faded.

Five serpents approached him from different angles, and every single one of them was massive. Not the small ones described in the mission, these things were the size of anacondas, thick bodies dragging across the ground with heavy movements.

’The mission said sixty to eighty small to mid-sized snakes,’ he thought, tightening his grip on the bat. ’These are way too big.’

Yellow eyes locked onto him from the darkness, unblinking. The nearest one opened its mouth, and the fangs that came out were long enough to punch through his arm.

’Did they mess up the intel, or is something else going on here?’ he thought, shifting his weight. ’Either way, I didn’t come all this way to turn around.’

The first anaconda lunged, mouth wide enough to take his whole shoulder.

He dropped low and let it sail over him, then drove the bat upward into its exposed throat. It gagged and thrashed, so he grabbed its tail with his free hand and swung it sideways into a pillar.

The impact cracked something inside the serpent, and it dropped twitching.

[Objective: Kill the Serpents (1/50)]

’One down,’ he thought, already attacking. ’But these things are way tougher than what the mission described.’

Two more came at him together, one high and one low. He backpedaled until his heel hit a car bumper, then kicked off it and vaulted onto the hood. The serpents crashed into each other below him, tangling for a second.

He jumped down and drove the bat into the back of the nearest one’s skull, then stomped on the second one’s head while it was still disoriented. The ground under his boot cracked, and the serpent stopped moving.

[Objective: Kill the Serpents (3/50)]

The last two circled him now, more cautious. One slithered around a car to his right while the other blocked the path forward.

’Flanking me huh,’ he thought, eyes darting between them, ’so y’all are not dumb after all.’

The one on the right struck first, coming around the car fast. He sidestepped and grabbed a loose chuck of the ground from the floor, hurling it at the other serpent’s face to buy himself a second.

The rock cracked against its skull and stunned it long enough for him to focus on the one in front. It lunged again, and this time he let it get close, close enough to smell the venom on its breath, before he swung the bat sideways into its jaw.

The hit sent its head spinning, and he followed up with a second swing to the same spot. The jaw shattered, and the serpent collapsed sideways.

[Objective: Kill the Serpents (4/50)]

The last one recovered and charged him head-on, faster than the others. He planted his feet and swung the bat like a golf club, catching it right under the chin. The upward momentum lifted its head, and he stepped in with a second hit to the exposed neck.

The crack echoed through the parking structure, as the serpent dropped.

[Objective: Kill the Serpents (5/50)]

He straightened up and rolled his shoulder, breathing harder than he expected. The system screen popped up beside him.

[Kill Record: Venom Serpent x5]

[Base EXP: +750]

[Credits: +620]

[Level Up! Lv.5 -> Lv.6]

[Free Stat Points: +3]

The level-up hit him in the chest, and he steadied himself against a car. His muscles burned, but the growth pushed through it.

[Slaughterer has leveled up]

[Slaughterer Lv.2: Active command skill. Can be activated at will and boosts all stats +20% for 35 seconds.]

[Side Effect: Increases aggression, bloodlust, and risk-taking while active.]

’Twenty percent now,’ he thought, flexing his fingers. ’That’s a decent jump.’

He dismissed the screen and crouched beside the nearest serpent, reaching for its head to dig out the core but his hand passed right through it.

He blinked and tried again, same thing again. The body was fading, turning transparent like smoke, until it vanished completely.

’What the hell?’ he thought, looking at the spot where the corpse had been. He moved to the next one, but it was already gone too. All five of them, dissolving into nothing right in front of him.

He stood up and looked around, ’monsters don’t just disappear like that. Cores are supposed to stay behind at minimum.’

Something was off about this dungeon. First it was the size of the snakes, not it’s the bodies vanishing, none of it matched what the mission description said.

’Should I risk it and keep going?’ He didn’t really need to think about it that long, ’yeah, the stronger the monsters, the more the exp.’

He adjusted his grip and walked past the last row of broken cars, following the thick scrape marks on the ground. The trail went toward a collapsed ramp that should not have been there according to the mission paper.

’So they really gave me fake dungeon info,’ he thought. ’If this is a setup, I am definitely filing a complaint if I make it back alive.’

......

Far beneath the parking structure, a massive serpent lay coiled around broken pillars and crushed vehicles. Its body was thick enough to block half the chamber, and old scars crossed its scales where fire and blades had failed to kill it.

Silence ruled the nest until faint vibrations traveled down from the upper levels. A foreign rhythm entered its territory, then came closer with each step.

Its tongue flicked once, tasting blood, mana, and something unfamiliar mixed together. The coils tightened around the pillars as instinct pushed through its body.

One of its eyes opened, a narrow golden slit staring into the darkness where the intruder approached. Domain pressure spread from the giant serpent in a slow wave, claiming every inch of the chamber as its own.