Chapter 56 Something Wrong
Ethan greeted him in return and asked, "Good morning, lad. Why are you here? Did you take another beast cage cleaning mission?" His voice sounded pleased when he uttered the last sentence.
"Ah no, senior. I\'m here to ask if Teacher Christie requires some help?"
He then took a lunchbox from his bag and handed it to Ethan. "Senior, for you. My mom made it as thanks for the gift."
Ethan\'s eyes lit up upon seeing it. "Really? It\'s been a while since I\'ve tasted home-made food. I hope it won\'t disappoint."
Although this kid was greedy and played too much, at least his mother was a considerate person.
"It won\'t," Lucas said confidently.
"Oh, Teacher Christie doesn\'t seem to be in need of a helper yet. The previous situation has been more or less resolved. It was very urgent, so she hired some specialists for the job." He opened the lunchbox and was surprised at how appealing the food looked. He began to salivate as he continued, "But I\'ll ask her again. I\'ll tell you once I have an update.
Give me your ID, and I\'ll add you in Starlight Chat."
The messaging feature of the Starlight Academy site and app was also called Starlight Chat.
Lucas nodded his head as they exchanged contact. He only had enough Starlight Coins for today\'s entrance fee, so he wanted to scout for a suitable mission to do after this.
"Right, senior, I have a question. Is there a purpose for creating a cage inside a regulated dungeon?"
Ethan pondered for a moment before he answered, "Not that I know of. Wait, do you mean traps? If so, then it\'s to trap the beast to hunt them easily, right?"
Lucas shook his head. He also thought that it was a trap before, not until it dawned on him that it wasn\'t a mere trap.
However, the two had different purposes. One was used to catch a beast, while the other was used to contain one. And he knew that what he had seen was not a trap.
Even a senior student like Ethan does not know anything like that. There was no purpose for installing a cage inside a regulated dungeon after all.
Since even senior Ethan was clueless about the cage\'s purpose, Lucas did not linger in the Beast Stadium anymore and went to the dungeon area.
Upon arriving, he immediately noticed a lot of people around the dungeon\'s entrance. This was a pretty normal scene during the day, as most students would go inside these hours to begin their hunt.
The receptionist as well as the two guards were already different from yesterday as well. Enjoy more content from empire
After paying the entrance fee, Lucas stepped on the dungeon\'s entrance and arrived inside of it a brief moment later.
Suppressing the nausea that he had slowly gotten used to, Lucas did not linger in the Safe Area and immediately went out to hunt.
This time, he still planned to hunt the Shadow Lynxes, but he planned to go deeper and explore. If he found another kind of beast that he could handle, then Lucas would not shy away from it as well.
Before going to Giant Dark Forest, though, Lucas planned on checking the cage first. He was infinitely curious about its purpose as well as what kind of beast could have been contained there. Or was it \'what beast will be contained there\'?
Right before he could leave the Safe Area, though, his attention was attracted to a sudden commotion not far away from him. Wanting to satiate his curiosity, Lucas changed direction and went over to take a look.
As he got closer, he immediately heard the murmur spread through the gathered onlookers. His eyes narrowed in shock, and his breath paused when he caught sight of what had attracted the crowd\'s attention.
Four dead bodies are being carried into the Safe Area by some senior students. As he looked closer, his eyes widened in shock as he saw the familiar red-black bandana draped over the corpse\'s arm. Not only that corpse, the other four were also wearing the same bandana from what he had seen yesterday.
Their dead bodies, mutilated and full of ghastly wounds, were horrible to behold, as if they were killed by a ravenous beast that did not stop attacking even after their death. Even so, Lucas could tell that they belonged to the seniors he had seen in Giant Dark Forest the day before.
"Isn\'t that the third time this has happened in the last two weeks?" Whispered a young man, his voice barely audible over the hum of the crowd.
Another person nodded his head and muttered, "Yeah. The death rate in this dungeon has been high lately. Don\'t tell me we\'ll graduate with less than thirty percent of our class population?"
A woman nearby shuddered. There were indeed deaths everywhere in the world, but deaths inside a regulated dungeon were usually restrained and controlled compared to unregulated and in the wild.
The regulated dungeons were supposed to be a safer alternative to gain strength, not another version of the harrowing reality in the wild.
\'Something\'s wrong,\' Lucas thought with a scowl. The death of his batchmate and the senior\'s he had helped in White Stone Cliff resurfaced in his mind at this moment.
As one saying goes, once was an accident, twice was a coincidence, but three would be deliberate.
Although he couldn\'t confirm that foul play was involved, there were already several signs suggesting so. He might have ignored these signs before, but he knew that he could not afford to do so now.
And it just so happened that one sign clearly indicated the involvements of some senior students that he was also familiar with. Although this particular sign does not mean anything, it still points out the fact that those senior students were in the two areas where the \'murders\' had taken place.
Suppressing the tumultuous thoughts ringing in his mind, Lucas left the Safe Area with an unsettled heart.