The severed cross-section of the Tentacle Mushroom Cannon slowly writhed, its tip gradually reweaving itself into a complete conical structure.
Under the effects of [Mycelial Reconstruction LV2], the Knight's six fungal tentacles had now mostly returned to their original state.
Compared to other parts, they were just slightly paler in color.
In contrast, the claw marks on the outer shell remained clearly visible.
The shell was a product of skills and fell outside the scope of reconstruction—it could only be replaced later through generating a new shell entirely.
The demonic tide outside finally entered its final phase. The monsters all began returning to their respective floors, and those dragon beasts also drilled back into the fissures one by one.
The monsters reverted to their usual state of attacking each other.
Lin Jun watched as a Fang Beast suddenly clamped its jaws around the tail fin of a small dragon beast before departing, carrying its struggling prey into the stairwell.
Some monsters that had gotten lost wandering the fifth floor, unable to find their way back, all gained a negative effect if they exceeded LV25.
[Fixed Status: Soul Siphon (Gradually loses attributes and skill proficiency)]
Clearly, this was the dungeon's method of restoring the original order between floors after the demonic tide.
If they couldn't return for too long, they'd probably be drained dry eventually.
But... having one's soul extracted...
Just thinking about it made Lin Jun shudder.
Fortunately, Lin Jun himself didn't have this effect.
Not only did Lin Jun lack it, but the dragon-person also didn't have it.
This aligned with Lin Jun's speculation—both he and the dragon-person weren't part of the demonic tide.
Lin Jun himself went without saying—the dungeon family had never truly accepted him.
As for the dragon-person, this could be seen from her behavioral patterns.
During the demonic tide period when monsters were in harmony, she would attack other monsters over food; rather than rushing out of the dungeon like other monsters, she wandered around the fifth floor looking for Lin Jun's Puffballs to eat.
Lin Jun's own special status was due to his Hero title.
As for the dragon-person?
It was probably because of her identity as an ancient dragon's offspring.
Speaking of the dragon-person...
"Hungry..."
Inside the cave that had collapsed to barely 20 square meters.
The dragon-person crouched in a corner, claws resting on her knees, eyes fixed on the several Battery Puffballs on the other side, practically drooling.
Sigh—
A Battery Puffball crossed over the debris in the middle, "puff-puff"-ing as it walked to the dragon-person's side.
She immediately grabbed the Puffball and held it close, affectionately rubbing it with her cheek. The Puffball was quickly cut by several gashes from the scales on her face.
Just like Dilan, after being parasitized, the dragon-person had also developed an affinity for the Puffballs.
At least she didn't wake up and immediately fight Lin Jun's Knight to the death again, and was even willing to listen to him somewhat.
Of course, she still had to eat the Puffballs when she needed to...
The Battery Puffball with only 10 health points was scraped to death by the scales, and after the dragon-person had finished being affectionate with it, she began gnawing along the edge of its mushroom cap.
This dragon-person wasn't very smart.
After briefly connecting to the fungal network and communicating, Lin Jun discovered her intelligence was about that of a child.
This level of intelligence did match her performance on the fifth floor.
But logically speaking, with one parent being human and the other an ancient dragon—neither being low-intelligence beings—there was no reason for her to be this stupid.
The half-dragon people he'd encountered before seemed to have intelligence no different from ordinary humans.
The answer lay in the dragon-person's status panel:
[Fixed Status: Congenital Deficiency - Intelligence (Intelligence attribute reduced by 80%)]
While intelligence attributes were related to spellcasting ability and couldn't be equated directly with IQ.
But with such congenital deficiency, she was probably born mentally impaired, which manifested in her attributes as low intelligence.
Moreover, she had more than just one congenital deficiency.
[Fixed Status: Congenital Deficiency - Mana Leakage (Mana within the body naturally decreases over time)]
Lin Jun suspected she must have offended the heavens in her previous life.
Mana was the foundation for most skills.
Magic goes without saying, but many other skills that didn't seem like magic—such as [Assault Launch]—actually required mana consumption too, just in very small amounts.
When mana was depleted, not only could skills not be used, but it would also cause dizziness, nausea, and even unconsciousness.
Lin Jun had plenty of experience with this—when he first arrived in this world, knowing nothing, he'd stepped into quite a few such pitfalls.
So no wonder she didn't eat Hallucinogenic Puffballs.
All the Puffballs she ate had the [Mana Storage] skill.
This eating behavior was probably her way of replenishing her own mana.
Just like now—as the dragon-person ate the Puffball in her arms, Lin Jun could see on her status panel that her mana, which had been one-third depleted, was slowly refilling.
Of course, the Puffballs' good taste was probably another factor.
After all, [Mana Storage] wasn't a skill unique to him.
Stuffing the Puffball's last little leg into her mouth, the dragon-person licked her lips with lingering satisfaction.
"Are you full?" Lin Jun asked.
Hearing this, the dragon-person's golden pupils shifted slightly, moving her gaze from the remaining Battery Puffballs to the Knight.
In her perception, the Knight Puffball was the guy talking to her—a delicious but very strong guy.
"Want to eat more!"
Lin Jun glanced at her status panel.
Her mana was completely full and she still wanted to eat!
"Help me with something first, and after you're done helping, I'll let you eat more, okay?"
Looking back at the remaining three Battery Puffballs, the dragon-person nodded vigorously.
What Lin Jun wanted her to do wasn't anything else—just dig their way out the same way she had dug in.
Their previous battle had caused most of the cave to collapse, and the several Puffballs responsible for digging had unfortunately been crushed to death.
The Knight did have digging skills, but how could its efficiency compare to those claws of the dragon-person?
That was [Sharpness LV9]!
However, the reality was that Lin Jun had miscalculated slightly.
Lin Jun thought she relied on her claws for digging, but actually the claws only served to break rocks—the rest was accomplished by forcing her way through with pure physical prowess!
After she squeezed through, the rubble and dirt would close back together, making it unsuitable for bringing the Puffballs along.
The Knight had no choice but to follow closely behind her, getting kicked N times by her inadvertently, barely managing to squeeze through.
This was only possible thanks to its hard shell.
As for the three shell-less Battery Puffballs... they couldn't keep up from the very beginning...
So when the dragon-person came looking for Puffballs with an expectant expression, Lin Jun was already drenched in sweat...
Lin Jun was genuinely afraid she might decide to eat the Knight again on a whim.
It wasn't that he was worried about actually being eaten—in truly dangerous situations, he could complete the final step of parasitism and turn her into a puppet.
But what about after that?
Would becoming a puppet count as brain death? Would it trigger the Vengeance Mark?
Lin Jun didn't know, and he had no desire to gamble on it.
So he still had to fool this simpleton who only knew how to eat.
"Ah... over there," one of the Knight Puffball's tentacles pointed toward the forest, "food is over there. You can eat once you get there."
At the same time, Lin Jun hurriedly located a small patch of relatively intact fungal carpet in the forest, right by the ruins of Dilan's hut—one of the few pieces of fungal carpet that had survived the trampling of the demon horde.
On the fungal carpet, full speed ahead—mature two Battery Puffballs!
The fifth floor still wasn't safe, with quite a few monsters still wandering around looking for the way back.
However, with such a dragon-person following Lin Jun, they either ignored them or simply took detours.
Of course, there were also those with poor judgment.
Lin Jun sincerely thanked them for buying him just a little bit more time.
...
By the ruins of Dilan's hut.
The dragon-person eagerly grabbed a Puffball that hadn't fully charged with mana and began devouring it with big bites—she was hungry again after that bit of exercise.
Before long, a question came through the fungal network from the dragon-person:
"This one... doesn't taste very good..."
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