"How is he that strong in his old age?!" Roy says with a baffled look.

"I-I don't know." Takagi replies while huffing.

"I thought I was pretty strong for my age...But I guess I am not..." Roys says with his head down.

"Let's go inside, it's pretty late already." Takagi says while trying to cheer up Roy.

Both of them head inside.

The Next Morning,

*Knock* *Knock*

"Roy~Wake up~" Saika says with a sweet voice. Hearing Saika's voice Roy wakes up from his sleep.

*Yawn*

"Yeah, I am awake." Roy says in a sleepy tone. Roy goes to the shower to wash up. He goes downstairs and sees Takagi and Atsushi sitting down at the dining table.

"Good morning, Roy." Takagi says with an energized voice.

"Yeah, Good morning." Roy says.

"Make sure to eat a lot today." Atsushi says.

"Hmm? Why?" Takagi asks.

"We will be going on an adventure today. So, you will need a lot of energy."

"Adventure?" Roys says in an unsure tone.

"Where?" Takagi asks.

"The Phantom Cave."

"WHAT!!!" Roy and Takagi shout.

"B-but that doesn't exist, right?" Takagi says.

"Yeah, It's just a rumor." Roy says while looking at Atsushi.

"No, It exists." Atsushi replies.

'The Phantom Cave' is a dungeon that is still undiscovered. Reason? Because people never saw it for themselves. Many people claim to have seen it. But when they go back to explore it, it just vanishes Like it never existed.

"How do you know if it exists or not?" Roy asks Atsushi with a questionable look.

"Soichiro and I found it by accident." Atsushi says with a gloomy look.

"..." Roy is silent after hearing the name 'Soichiro'.

After they finish eating they get ready to go and explore the dungeon.

"Where actually is the dungeon?" Roy asks Atsushi

"It's behind the Waterfall of Zilhan." Atsushi says

Roy stops and asks again with a confused look, "Wait, what! there was nothing when I visited, I went there a lot of times."

"You will find out." Atsushi says.

"By the way, Why are we going to the dungeon?" Takagi asks Atsushi.

"To get you guys some early experience." Atsushi replies.

"Early experience?" Roy says.

"If you become a Knight, your main task will be to explore dungeons."

"Huh? That's it?" Takagi says with a questionable expression.

"Of course not." Atsushi replies.

"Anyway, when are we leaving?" Roy asks.

"Right now." Atsushi says.

All of them get ready to leave for the dungeon. The Waterfall of Zilhan is not far away from where they live. So, they decided to go there on foot.

-

-

They reach the Waterfall of Zilhan.

"See, as I said, there is nothing." Roy says with a smirk

Atsushi walks toward a stone wall behind the waterfall and punches it. The wall crumbles as if it is made of mud! Roy and Takagi just stand there with their mouth wide open.

Behind the broken wall, there is a big rock. Atsushi effortlessly pushes the rock to the left.

"What the-" Takagi and Roy are speechless.

"Do you see now? Anyway, let's go inside."

They go inside the cave and it is very dark, so, Roy uses his fire magic to light up the place.

"It's massive!" Takagi says with an astonished expression.

"Yeah!" Roy is also surprised by how big the cave is.

They start walking down the cave. Takagi starts talking, "How did you find this cave?"

Atsushi replies with a nostalgic look, "Soichiro and I were on a mission when we accidentally found this. We tried clearing this cave but there were just too many monsters. We slowly cleared this cave but we didn't fully explore it."

"Are there still any monsters lef-" Roy tries to say something but he gets interrupted when he hears loud cracking noises.

Suddenly four ghouls appear right in front of them from beneath the ground.

"Stay back!" Atsushi shouted.

"Do you think these things will scare me, Old man?" Takagi walks in front and throws his spear towards a ghoul; The spear separates the ghoul's head.

"One Down, three more to go." Takagi walks forward while saying those lines. Suddenly a fireball passes by Takagi's side and hits one of the ghoul's bodies and burns it to ash.

The other two ghouls are running towards Roy and Takagi.

"Wind Magic: Air Drill" Takagi's right-hand gets covered with wind. The ghoul tries to attack him with a hammer but Takagi dodges it and strikes the ghoul's chest but his hand doesn't pierce the ghoul's chest completely, it stops midway. But still, the ghoul dies.

The other ghoul comes in the direction of Roy and attacks him with a hammer but Roy dodges it.  The hammer hits the ground and the ground breaks in a cobweb shape. Roy jumps up and unsheathes his sword. He tries to cut the ghoul's head but misses and hits the ghoul's shoulder.

The ghoul's whole right arm falls off. Then Roy walks past the ghoul while cutting the ghoul's head clean off.

"Good job." Atsushi says.

They start walking again as if nothing happened. Atsushi and Takagi were walking in front and Roy was following them from a bit far. Roy inwardly thinks while looking at the ground, 'Should I also name my moves like Takagi? But it will be a pain saying it every time.'

Somehow he loses Atsushi and Takagi.

"Where did gramps go?" Roy says with a neutral expression.

Roy looks around but he can't find anyone.

"Well, Whatever."

Roy continues to walk. After five minutes of walking, Roy comes across a 'BIG DOOR'. The door is at least ten meters tall.

'Whoa!' Roy thinks inwardly as he sees the big door. The big door is massive! It has various designs from a carved dragon, serpents, skulls, swords, etc.

He walks to get close to the door. He is a few feet away from the door. He thinks to himself, 'How can I open this door? It's definitely not gonna open if I just push it.' Roy keeps scratching his head for ideas to open the door.

A few minutes go by, Roy is still thinking about how to open the door.

Roy gets frustrated and screams, "Ughh, let's just try pushing it."

To his surprise, the door starts to slowly open. Roy just stands there with a neutral face thinking, 'I..could have just done that from the...start.'

A dark-black aura is coming from beyond the door. When the door fully opened the atmosphere around him started to get heavier. Despite feeling the evil aura, Roy walks through the door.

He sees a spacious room that has no light. It is completely dark. As he starts to walk down the darkroom, he sees a sword buried in the ground. The sword looks old but it is not rusty. Roy gets closer to the sword to see it properly.

*Creak*

But all of sudden Roy hears a creaking sound.

Roy turns around to see that the door is closing off. After the door completely closed off, Roy turns back around.

The sword that is buried in the ground, looks magnificent. Roy is stunned looking at the sword. The sword had a grayish hilt, finger guards on both sides of the blade, a red gem embedded in its core.

Roy puts his hand on the sword's hilt and tries to pull it but it is stuck. Roy gets frustrated and puts both of his hands on the sword and tries pulling it as hard as he can. His hand slips and he falls to the ground on his back. His hands get bruised up. Drops of blood are pouring down to the ground. He tries pulling the sword again but this time he pulled out the sword with ease.

"What the-" Roy thinks out loud. The sword was very heavy. He tries to swing the sword but he wasn't able to swing it properly. For some reason, Roy starts to feel very tired. He feels his energy slowly being sucked out of him.

*Thud*

Roy falls to the ground on his back, 'What...What's happening to me...' Roy becomes unconscious.

...To be continued