Wade had a few things going for him. First was that this wasn't blackrot central. Which meant any damage he did on these creatures was far more permanent than normal.

  Or his old normal, which was hyper-lethal monsters healing just about everything within minutes. This was an upgrade.

  Second, none of them were working together against him, it was more a free-for-all. Which meant it would be natural predator rules of nature: Nobody wants to risk a hospital ride, since there aren't hospitals. And there aren't rides.

  If he damaged the creature anywhere near seventy-five percent or so, there was a very high chance it would decide Wade was too spicy a meal, and the best option was to retreat. Because further injury would mean becoming easy prey for everything else out here.

  Unless the lure trap forced their attention in some way, which could be possible.

  Third item going for him was that the rolly polly, and most animals in general, had only melee capabilities, technically speaking. Few things could do harm from range. Assuming the Arcane Realm followed normal biology.

  But before he had to worry about coming up with a plan that didn't waste some bullets, he heard more sounds up above.

  The rolly polly's health bar started moving away, and Wade heard sounds ahead.

  Like the sounds of footsteps. And a grunt.

  And then a clash of metal on bone, followed by a high-pitched shriek from the Isopod.

  The health bar went down by a few percentage points, and Wade saw another health bar appear. One more familiar:

  Level 51 Greater Infernal Essence - 83%

  Bael.

  "He's back!" Wade turned to Medy, then pointed up, "We gotta help him out!" Then he stopped for a half moment. Did he? "...Wait, he might not need the help."

  Bael was far above rolly polly's level. The System was pretty convinced at least that in a matchup, Bael would sweep.

  Wade's phone buzzed, and he took it out while he had a moment.

  The best kind of kill is overkill Michael, why take a risk that Bael fails a roll up there? Go on, do a little murdering~

  That… made sense. And Wade realized there were other good reasons to poke his head out right now: Experience.

  As in not the number going up, but actual experience casting magic.

  That had been in the back of his mind for a while now. He had put all those points into intelligence, and now he was in the one place he could cast away to his heart's desires. Or at least until it stopped beating.

  Getting up the crevasse turned out to be pretty easy, the shells on all sides acted like simple stepping pads, though he had to be careful with his hands since the sides of those things were real sharp. But otherwise, the agility point he had seemed to carry him enough past all that without issue, and the stamina bonuses from the boots and prior random point equally made pulling himself up leave him with plenty of breath at the top.

  He poked his head up over the lip just enough to see Bael hacking at the creature's exposed underbelly with Leon's longsword glowing a bright blue. It skittered backwards, trying to avoid the sharp blade.

  The monster spat at Bael in the same motion, and a small dome of invisible power caught it right as it was almost about to hit Bael, where the spit cemented in midair, before being dropped down onto the ground like a spent gun shell.

  Bael continued to advance at a steady pace, weapon at the ready.

  He wasn't going all in, and Wade could see why: He was being very careful to keep spacial awareness of anything in the area. Like he expected something else to attack midway at the worst time. That also meant the giant bug here didn't need his full attention to deal with.

  Wade pulled himself halfway out of the barnacle tunnel, then made sure his footing was solid.

  "Uh, any advice on what spells to throw at it? I don't want to waste bullets." Wade asked, and the phone buzzed in answer.

  mana spears, arcane missiles, walls. Go on, spam spam spam (????-)?

  "Super descriptive. Thanks." Wade deadpanned. But he had to start somewhere. He focused on the churning sensation in his chest and general body, forcing it to cycle through into his arms and up his hands, where he imagined a bolt of magic lancing out at the enemy ahead. That's what Zin had taught him, he just had to use it to attack with.

  A blob of blue energy shot from his hand and splashed against the Isopod's shell, looking more like a bit of fireworks that hit a metal tank.

  And the health bar on that thing hadn't gone down either.

  New Personal Quest: Basic Offensive Magic Tutorial - Deal 10% of the current enemy's health pool in damage using Azdrian Standard Arcane Bolts. Rewards: Further questlines.

  "What's a standard arcane bolt?"

  He'd asked Play, but someone else had heard him instead.

  "This?" Medy said, having scrambled next to him up. She aimed a finger forward at the isopod, then pulled her arm back and punched forward. At the very tip of her closed palm, a bolt of blue and purple lanced out, striking the bug.

  Wade saw something flicker blue on the other end. The health bar dip by one percent.

  Medy sheepishly shrugged. "Eh, mana based attacks generally don't do great against creatures in this realm, they're constantly exposed to power down here, a lot of them use mana instinctively." Then she glanced over to Bael. "Do you need help or do you got it?"

  "I'm fine, isopods are of little threat to me." Bael swung his sword at one of the legs as the creature righted itself, and that was far more effective, cutting off a chunk. He dove backwards, using magic to empower his retreat, right as the bug spat on his prior spot. "Call out if you see anything coming on my rear that I haven't noticed. Support fire otherwise."

  "Okie dokie," Medy said, before turning to Wade. "Why did you want to know about an arcane bolt for?"

  "Uh, I need to do enough damage on that thing with bolts. How did you cast it? Any trick in particular?"

  She gave a mild shrug. "Yes and no? They're good to break down unenchanted armor and stuff. You focus on making a solid core with an explosive tip. Just think sharp explosion on the tip, and really compact core. Usually you'd use a stone or some kind of metal center and wrap mana around that, but only got bone out here."

  That was a lot of information. And sharp explosion didn't really go together at all given any amount of thinking. Wade was pretty certain by the time he nailed it right, Bael would have already cut that thing down.

  The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  Which meant he was caught between two pulls. He could try to follow the System's advice here on practicing this bolt thing, and potentially follow more quests which he needed. Or he could do the safe thing and have Bael kill it as fast as possible.

  He was almost about to pick the latter option before he realized something else - this wasn't Play giving him self-centered advice on how to speed his own power up.

  This was the System trying to tell him it was important enough to learn.

  "Bael! Ease up on trying to kill it, I need to practice some spells on it first!"

  "What? Have you lost your senses mortal?! Practice once you're safe!"

  To be fair, that would be the rational idea to do. "Trust me, it's a game thing specific thing!"

  Bael groaned, hand extended out to power another invisible dome that blocked the next spit from the angry isopod. Wade could see it was rethinking its strategy here, and perhaps considering fleeing.

  Unfortunately for it, this was a pocket of dead ends here. Bael was currently at the only fork leaving out of this particular local, part of the reason he'd been so twitchy about checking behind him for anything sneaking up.

  Wade focused on Medy's scattered discussion. He channeled mana out of his chest, into his arm and up his fingers out right before him.

  Solid powerful core, like metal. Wrapped around with a destructive explosive tip.

  He'd seen enough video games and movies to have a pretty good imagination on this. And he'd just seen what Medy had cast herself.

  Wade breathed, and punched forward.

  "Holy shit." He breathed, watching the aftermath ahead. This time, the projectile lanced out of his fist and actually punched into one of the creature's leg joints, and happened on the edge of a plate segment, a weak point. The health bar dropped two percent.

  He looked at his hands, then back at the bug ahead. "That was awesome."

  Wade was almost certain this was just the intelligence points working their own magic. That and the System had specifically told him to cast this spell out of all other spells.

  That hadn't been a fluke.

  It wasn't a Glock but it was technically infinite here. But more importantly: "I'm a fucking wizard."

  Medy clapped her hands, excited. "Nice-nice-nice! You got that quite fast!"

  What was Play's advice on this? Spam spam spam. He could do that.

  Wade fired again. And again. Each shot felt easier than the last, the mana responding faster to his intent. He wasn't bothering with finesse anymore, just raw output, condensed into vaguely spear-shaped projectiles that hammered into the Isopod's underside while Bael kept it occupied.

  Each hit failed to do much damage against the armored chitin that seemed powered by mana as well, but it certainly pissed it off more.

  The creature tried to retreat, but purple-black chains materialized around its legs, like harpoons launched right from Medy's position. Once they hit the bug's armored segments, they split off into smaller chains that speared into the bone under them, anchoring the target down.

  He turned and saw she had indeed been behind that. "I got it, keep shooting!"

  "And don't hit me." Bael grunted, circling around to the other side, head constantly looking at the target and back around to check for incoming. He wasn't diving after the bug yet, giving Wade exactly what he needed to practice magic slinging.

  Wade obliged. The bolts came out faster. It was sloppy, Wade wasn't focused on moving the mana through the same precise circuits, there was enough mana everywhere in his body that he just grabbed random pockets and yanked it up into his arms like a turret loading shells into the chamber.

  Wade really was a turret with twin guns at this point. And the bug ahead of him was the unlucky target dummy.

  At this rate, about thirty shots into it and he'd get that quest completed.

  Aiming wise, it was clear he could use some more practice there. He couldn't hit the same segment twice in a row, but doing Medy's trick of aiming a finger at the target while he charged and compressed mana into his hand helped him with the accuracy once he turned that finger into a punch.

  But with each attack he felt like he was figuring it out more. Better used to the imagination. More confident about trapping the mana into what he wanted it to be and do.

  And then he hit gold. One bolt hit the eye cluster on the Isopod's face, and it shrieked, thrashing against Medy's shackles. And the second bolt launched right after hit a lower portion of the chitin armor, where it actually exploded right a crack in the chitin armor, blowing power into the entire thing, cracking off chunks onto the ground.

  Basic Offensive Magic Tutorial Complete! New questline added.

  Alchemy Reagents (Part 1) - Collect a discarded chitin plate from the current enemy and sell it to a skilled alchemist on Earth. Rewards: Additional Alchemy Recipe. Continued questline.

  "Got it! Kill it off now!"

  The Isopod turned its head his direction and Wade saw danger.

  It opened its mouth.

  The spit flew straight at him, empowered by mana the animal was using by instinct.

  Wade switched tactics mid-cast, imagining a wall of condensed mana directly in the spit's path.

  That… took a lot more mana than he realized, as almost all of it in his body flew off out into the distance to form up something more solid.

  Which ended up being about as strong as a glass wall would.

  The spit broke straight through with almost no resistance before it collided against a wall Medy had cast herself right next to him.

  "Huh." Wade stared at his hands. "That worked way worse than expected."

  Bael took advantage of the opening, driving the longsword between two shell plates. The blade sank deep, and ichor sprayed across the bone floor. He did some kind of spell with the blade inside, and Wade saw a bulge, like Bael had cast an explosion within the embedded blade. The Isopod's health sank down to twenty percent, and it skittered backwards as far as it could with what legs it had left and Medy's chains still holding it tight.

  "Distance." Bael said, taking a few steps back, checking behind him before holding his blade once more in a ready stance. "Anything cast at your hands is best, the further away it manifests the more it costs. By the time you materialized the wall, most of that mana was spent in the travel."

  Wade realized at that point that Medy's shackles had formed right before them, and lanced outwards to spear into the creature. She hadn't cast the chains from other ends or from the ceiling, it had been cast right by the base of their location.

  Wade decided he'd leave the more advanced support spells to Medy, and he'd do the easier job of just damage. So he kept firing arcane bolts.

  The Isopods health bar was going down a lot faster now that most of the armored segments were cracked from Bael's earlier explosive stab.

  Bael dove forward and severed the head in one swipe.

  The creature collapsed, twitching violently. Despite the creepy spasms, Wade knew it was finished - the health bar had bottomed out at zero, and Bael had already turned his attention back to the fork behind them.

  Wade sat down against the side of the small chasm. "That was-"

  "Adequate." Bael wiped gore from his blade with a flick that had a glow rip through the blade. "We need to move. Now. Before something worse arrives. Medy, heading."

  She nodded, pulling out the compass she'd looted off the dead miners. "Still a little ways to go, that way." A finger pointed forward.

  "What about Eri? Where is he?" Wade asked, scooping up a bit of chitin off the ground.

  Cracked mana-infused chitin (Low Quality)

  Well, that's what the System wanted. There was only one skilled Alchemist Wade knew about, and the System was basically telling him he had to get her to earth. He stuffed that piece into his pant pocket and focused on running with the group.

  "Stayed behind to hold off additional problems. Which are going to be coming here real soon." Bael grunted out. "Get moving."

  Wade got back on his feet, and then helped Medy equally climb the rest of the way. "Can he find us again here after?"

  "I told him what to follow." Bael lifted a hand up, signaling for Medy to pick up speed and start moving. She did, and Wade followed behind while Bael took on the rear. "He seemed to understand. And he's undead."

  "What's that mean?"

  "Things avoid skeletons down here." Bael said. "And they're immune to mana toxicity in general. He'll outlive us here by centuries. Skeletons are the most used tool in the arcane realm for a reaso-"

  New Personal quest: Challenge Gauntlet - An enemy forty levels or higher above you is hunting you down. Evade or defeat your hunter. Reward: One storefront coin and one randomized additional stat point if your pursuer is eliminated.

  Wade read that in the same moment something grabbed his leg, flipped him into the ground and dragged him back at full speed.

  He turned in place, watching as Bael sliced through something holding his own hoof, the demon equally having been dragged backwards like Wade had.

  Bael watched in a half-moment as Wade skittered past him. And Wade watched back, equally stunned at what the hell was going on.

  A moment later, the demon lifted a hand out, trying to cast some kind of instant-slice spell, but Wade was too far away, skittering on the slimy ground.

  At which point Wade finally got to see what was ahead of him.

  It had eight legs, and looked like a cross between a spider, an armored catfish and a chameleon. The last part was because two chameleon like eyes were focused directly on him.

  The main problem was that it was clearly larger than him by quite a bit. And a thread of mana was latched tight on his boot, yanking him directly to an open maw of teeth waiting.

  Wade added 'deep sea angler fish' into the description for that thing, solely on the distended jaw and teeth ahead of him.

  Level 56 Greater Chromatic Armored Chameleon- 100%

  So much for creatures here having no ranged attacks. Wade had only a few seconds to come up with a plan and escape this one.

  He grabbed at his bandolier belt, and yanked one grenade off.

  The instant-explosion one.