Dungeon King: The Hidden Ruler
Chapter 83: [Three Faces of the Blade 1] Marked as Redundancy

Chapter 83: [Three Faces of the Blade 1] Marked as Redundancy

[Location: Ashmarch Pit – Outer Perimeter Encampment]

The blink of teleport ended. Raven stood at the outer wall of Ashmarch Pit.

A storm of fine red ash drifted across the crater’s rim. Velkarin flags fluttered in dry, erratic gusts—still proud, still colorless. The sky churned above, its clouds streaked by red mana flowing skyward from the cracked dome at the crater’s center. The Pit.

Ashmarch Pit was once a Velkarin Axis testing ground for loyalty-program for their soldiers using the sophihsticated steampunk technology the Velkarin Axis has. It had been sealed decades ago after a classified failure protocol. Until now, it had remained silent.

Outside the dome, Velkarin Axis soldiers gathered at the briefing post, receiving orders beneath flickering command glyphs. But the true quest-giver wasn’t there. She waited back at the commando tent—a black-sheathed enclosure humming with relay pings and filtered radio noise.

Raven stepped into the command tent, boots grinding into the grit-covered metal floor. He stopped just outside the light of the projector, watching the officer in red.

"Marshal Rose," he said. "Requesting clearance to enter the Pit."

She didn’t look at him at first. Her attention stayed on the holographic readout, eyes tracking data that danced across a flickering tribunal glyph. Then, without turning, she spoke.

"You’re not the first."

Raven didn’t answer.

"A team went in three days ago," she continued. "High-priority. Internal affair. Their orders were to recover or eliminate War-Magus Kaldrith."

She finally turned to face him. One eye sharp and focused, the other flickering with a soft blue rune circuit.

"He’s the one who built the Tribunal Engines," she said. "Now he’s the one they’re scanning for. Branded traitor for refusing override command."

"So the system’s glitched?" Raven asked.

"No," she said flatly. "The system’s doing exactly what it was designed to do. It’s just doing it to everyone."

She tapped the edge of her gauntlet. "Every tribunal pulse says the same thing: ’Disloyalty persists.’ It’s not a shutdown sequence. It’s a recursive judgment loop."

Raven folded his arms. "You sending me to fix it?"

"I’m giving you a chance to walk into it," Rose replied. "No reset. No orientation. No support. You’ll be flagged by the Pit system as a redundancy—non-essential, unapproved. You’ll be judged accordingly."

She took a step closer, voice low.

"No one’s coming to help you, mercenary."

Raven’s reply was quiet.

"Wasn’t expecting anyone to."

A sharp digital tone cut through the tent as the quest prompt loaded before his eyes.

[System Prompt: Accept Quest – "Trial Reignited" (Tribunal Redundancy Status)]

✅ Accept

A flicker of static warped the quest text.

This wasn’t the usual onboarding script. No clean directive. No dungeon narration. Just a terse journal update and a cold warning.

Raven narrowed his eyes.

So this is what it looked like when you entered mid-sequence. No cinematic. No handholding. Just an open door into someone else’s problem—and if they were still alive inside, it was about to become his.

Quest Journal Entry – Trial Reignited

Marshal Rose has authorized entry into Ashmarch Pit, an active Velkarin tribunal complex currently running hostile loyalty-check routines. A team has already entered and failed to report. The primary objective is to locate War-Magus Kaldrith and determine whether he reactivated the system—or became its prisoner.

Main Objective:

Investigate the cause of Ashmarch Pit’s reactivation.Survive the tribunal trials and extract the corrupted command core.Locate War-Magus Kaldrith or confirm his fate.

Warning: You are entering mid-sequence. System may not recognize your authority.

Raven stood silently. Another party was already inside. Is it the real cartel competitor? Was this zone already marked?

He stepped through the dungeon gate. The world turned dim.

In a breath, he was inside.

The air inside was thick—hot with static, tasting faintly of copper and scorched resin. His system HUD flickered for half a second as though the dungeon rejected foreign presence. The walls pulsed faintly, like they remembered pain. Somewhere deep within, the faint clanking of a chain echoed—not his.

Metal and ash. The tunnel reeked of scorched oil and failed incantations. Pipes hung like dissected veins. This was no battlefield—it was a ruin that had come back to life, dissecting its intruders like an autopsy in progress.

He changed gear, quick and silent. Gone was the standard summoner garb—the muted robe and plain dagger. In its place, he equipped the armor he wore only when entering the depths: a black, tattered set reinforced with stitched leather and cursed alloy, jagged at the joints and shadow-warped around the edges. His dungeon sovereign kit. His fingers hovered over the inventory slot and tapped.

[Visage of the Hollow Forge Equipped]

Mechanical limbs slid over his face. Three pairs of clicking arms clamped around his head. Blurred distortion cloaked his outline. Eye sockets glowed dim.

He sent a quick DM to Theo.

"There are someone who already been inside for three days in Ashmarch Pit. I don’t see any sign of their guild yet. Are you sure this is our competitor?"

Theo replied instantly.

"Yeah. A few names are on my watchlist. If you spot their guild plate, I can verify."

Raven closed the panel.

Ahead, the tunnel opened like a broken windpipe. A collapsed workshop built into the stone—walls lined with shattered shields, processing arms twitching in convulsions.

No summons yet. The system allowed a maximum of four per raid team. If the guild inside was running full capacity, then summoning now could mean giving up stealth and triggering unnecessary aggro. Worse, it could alert the guild that another party had entered.

He had no idea which boss room would come next, or how they’d respond to a third-party interference. So he played it safe.

Mobility. Surveillance. That was the priority.

He would go alone first.

First rule of PvP in a dungeon?

Know the map. Know the enemy.

He swung his chain to a ceiling vent and ascended quietly through the platforms above.

Toward Midboss Room 1.

Raven moved silently along the ceiling structure, gliding between broken porches, sagging ducts, and rusted gantries. He avoided open lines of sight, grappling from hanging pipes to exposed cable lattices, weaving through twisted stalactites like a shadow inside a machine’s ribcage.

The corridor began to widen. A slow mechanical groan echoed ahead—the threshold to Midboss Room 1.

He perched on a collapsed maintenance ledge overlooking the chamber, where old tool racks lay half-melted into the floor. The stench of scorched metal and burned coolant stung the air.

Below, the arena stretched like a broken electricity laboratory. The scorched floor was patterned in long, circular runes. Broken inspection arms lined the walls, their motionless joints twitching like corpses stuck in a loop. This had once been a hangar or repair platform—now it served as a tribunal pit.

In the center, two players barely stood. Their breath heaved. One was bleeding out beside the flickering remains of AX-K9, the first midboss, its corpse still smoking.

Two players. Gasping for air. One was at 10% HP. The Hound was dead—the scorch trail still glowing.

Now.

He dove.

Chain hooked low. He yanked downward, dropping like a hammer.

"Huh? Who are—"

The dagger slit his throat before the words finished. The man dropped. Health already in red.

The other fumbled for a potion.

Too late.

Raven’s chain curled around the second player’s neck.

[Phantom Bind: Activated].

He teleported behind and stabbed from the back.

Force sign-out. A flicker. Loot scattered.

Raven grabbed the drop they farm from AX-K9, as well as their weapon and armor drop before swirl his chain and swung upward again, vanishing into the dark iron canopy.

On his way to second Midboss Room.

He paused at a crooked duct and opened DM again.

"Got glimpse of their guild name tag. Flaying Tiger. Remind you of something?"

Theo responded fast.

"I’ll check."

Raven moved along the ceiling beams. Below, a lone player was grinding mobs—careful pulls, smart movement.

Full health.

Raven evaluated.

He adjusted his footing on the beam, letting his eyes sweep the room.

The player below had just finished off a group of mobs and was collecting material drops—standard resource farming behavior after a boss clear.

The scorch marks near the ruined terminals still glowed faintly, and a small drone crackled in the corner, attempting to reboot. Its red sensor light blinked like a dying eye.

The player didn’t leave right away.

She took the loot and waited, positioning himself near the exit of Midboss Room 1, watching the hallway that led toward the next chamber. No alarms yet. That meant no aggro drawn. But it wouldn’t stay quiet for long.

Unlike the previous two, this one player below was at full health. Finishing him would take time—and worse, it would make noise. A clean kill wasn’t guaranteed, and if the target had fast hands, he could ping his guild before dropping.

Raven’s eyes narrowed. He could hear faint laughter echoing from farther ahead—the second midboss room. Sounded like three people, relaxed. Still fresh.

The boss hadn’t respawned yet.

He waited.

Then Theo messaged back.

"Confirmed. Flaying Tiger is guild who make suspicious selling activity on my watchlist. But be careful. The guild is a dangerous one."

"Dangerous how?"

"Sponsored by Helix Media. Often appear on NekoNekoNyan’s stream, but only show clearing, not dirty stuff like this."

"Son of a..."

"Looks like the leader—that crazy cat streamer—is also doing market manipulation. Wants more than just a contract from big brand that she already have."

"Greedy bastard."