SSS-Ranked Trash Hero: I Was Scammed Into Being Summoned-Chapter 31: Fighting Rats

The darkness swallowed him whole.

Hiroshi stumbled forward as the world shifted around him. The sensation was disorienting–like stepping through a doorway and finding the floor six inches lower than expected. His stomach lurched, and for a moment he thought he might throw up.

Then the feeling passed, and he found himself standing in a corridor.

The ceiling was low, maybe seven feet high, supported by rotting wooden beams that looked ready to collapse. The walls were rough stone, slick with moisture and covered in patches of pale fungus that gave off a weak bluish light.

Hiroshi adjusted his grip on the sword and moved forward slowly.

The corridor was narrow enough that he could touch both walls if he extended his arms. His footsteps echoed softly against the stone. Water dripped somewhere in the distance, a steady rhythm that made the silence feel heavier.

He’d read about dungeons in the books during his recovery. How they were living spaces, created from accumulated death and despair. How they grew stronger if left unchecked. How they lured in prey and fed on the dying.

This one was young. Small. Barely more than a wound in reality.

But it was still dangerous.

Movement ahead made him freeze.

Something scraped against stone. Then a chittering sound, high-pitched and rapid.

Hiroshi raised his sword and waited.

A rat emerged from the shadows at the corridor’s end. Not a normal rat, this thing was the size of a large dog, with matted black fur and eyes that reflected the fungal light like mirrors. Its teeth were too long, jutting out from its mouth at wrong angles.

It saw him and charged.

Hiroshi’s Fighter Instinct kicked in immediately. He could see the rat’s trajectory, predict where it would be in the next second. His mind calculated distances and angles without conscious thought.

The rat leaped.

His Dodge skill screamed at him to move right. He did, stepping aside as the creature sailed past him. It hit the wall and scrambled to turn around, claws scraping against stone.

Hiroshi didn’t give it time. He moved forward and brought the sword down in a vertical cut. The blade bit into the rat’s back and it squealed, thrashing. He pulled the sword free and struck again, this time catching it across the neck.

The rat stopped moving.

Hiroshi stood over it, breathing hard. His heart hammered against his ribs. The entire fight had lasted maybe five seconds, but adrenaline made it feel longer.

He moved forward, stepping over the corpse.

The corridor opened into a small room. The ceiling was higher here, maybe ten feet, and the space was roughly circular. More fungus grew on the walls, providing enough light to see by. The floor was covered in debris–broken wood, scattered bones, piles of what might have been cloth once.

And rats. Six of them, clustered around something in the center of the room.

They noticed him immediately.

Hiroshi’s Fighter Instinct flared as all six turned toward him.

The rats charged as a group.

No time to think. Hiroshi moved on instinct, letting his newly gained skills guide him. He stepped left as the first rat lunged, brought his sword around in a horizontal slash that caught it mid-leap. The blade cut deep and the rat tumbled aside.

Two more came at him from different angles. His instinct told him he couldn’t avoid both. So he didn’t try. Instead he moved toward one, inside its attack range, and stabbed down as it passed beneath him. The sword punched through its skull and it died instantly.

The second rat hit him from the side.

Pain exploded across his ribs as claws raked through his shirt and into flesh. Hiroshi gasped and twisted away, bringing the sword up in a clumsy arc. The blade caught the rat across the face and it fell back, blood streaming.

Three more still coming.

Hiroshi backed toward the wall, trying to limit the angles they could attack from. His Sword Mastery guided his movements, keeping the blade between him and the rats. When one lunged, he was ready. Step, pivot, strike. The rat died with steel through its chest.

Another came low, trying to get under his guard. He kicked it away and followed up with a downward cut that split its skull.

The last rat hesitated, suddenly alone, its companions dead around it. Hiroshi could see the calculation in its eyes. Fight or flee.

It chose flee.

The rat turned and ran for a crack in the far wall, disappearing into darkness.

Hiroshi let it go. He couldn’t chase it into unknown territory, not when he was already bleeding.

He looked down at his side. Three long scratches across his ribs, deep enough to bleed freely but not deep enough to be immediately dangerous. It hurt, but he could still move.

He pulled a bandage from his pack and pressed it against the wound, hissing at the pain. The bleeding slowed but didn’t stop completely. He’d need proper treatment when he got out, but for now this would have to do.

Hiroshi looked around the room more carefully now that the immediate threat was gone.

The thing the rats had been clustered around was a corpse. Human, or what was left of one. Mostly bones now, with scraps of rotted cloth still clinging to the skeleton. An old death, a week old.

Some poor bastard who’d wandered down here and never made it back out.

Hiroshi searched the body quickly. Found a small pouch with five copper coins and a rusted knife. He took both. The coins might be worth something, and an extra blade was an extra blade.

There was only one other exit from the room, a doorway in the far wall, leading deeper into the dungeon. Hiroshi could see more of that bluish fungal light beyond it, and hear the steady drip of water.

He checked his supplies. Half his water gone. One bandage used. Sword still intact but showing small nicks in the blade from hitting bone.

He could turn back now. Report that the dungeon was more dangerous than assessed. Probably very close to advancement.

But he’d come this far.

And turning back now felt like admitting defeat.

Hiroshi tightened the bandage on his ribs, adjusted his grip on the sword, and moved toward the doorway.

The corridor beyond was shorter than the first, sloping downward at a slight angle. The fungus grew thicker here, covering most of the walls and ceiling in pale blue patches. The dripping sound was louder now, echoing off the stone.

At the end of the corridor was another room. Larger than the first, with a pool of stagnant water in the center. And something moved in that water, rippling the surface.

Hiroshi stopped at the threshold and watched.

A shape emerged slowly from the pool. Translucent, gelatinous, roughly spherical. A slime, about three feet across, with a dark core visible at its center.

It sensed him somehow and began sliding forward across the stone floor, leaving a trail of moisture behind it.

Hiroshi raised his sword and prepared himself.

This was going to be different from fighting rats.