I ACCIDENTALLY MARRIED A DUNGEON

The cut-off vines of the Numenroot pulled back in unison, wrapping tightly around themselves, and out of the mess it reconstructed itself into a crude humanoid form, towering over four meters high now, more robust in the trunk, looking like an almost titanic being rather than a tree.

Felix recalled his cards into his hand, then drew out another four from his coat pocket. A total of ten cards, which was the maximum number he could handle simultaneously, with enough combined power to both deflect and attack, without focusing all his attention on each card separately.

Dune had already walked a few steps ahead of him.

I need to end this before that seal starts breaking under the strain. This thing’s got to have a limit somewhere. Nothing regenerates forever, right?

He turned to the left, watching the new vines of the Numenroot lash about, testing the air in front of it as Dune closed in on it, the distance between them only a meter now.

"Do what you are best at!" Felix shouted, immediately beginning to run.

Dune ran at full speed. The new vines immediately reacted, lashing towards her from three sides at once, but were intercepted and deflected by the hovering cards. Dune jumped at the last moment, landing on the shoulder of the Numenroot and punching it right in the shoulder. The blow knocked the whole mass backwards, and her other hand seized one of the thrashing vines and tore it out of its roots, while she jumped away.

"Not too bad, actually." Felix was on it in an instant, the cards cutting in front of him, rotating quickly in tight circles as they jabbed right into the open vines, each rotation driving them even further inside.

Dune kept pulling on the vine that she had grabbed, straining against it.

"Circle around it!" Felix stomped his foot into the side of the creature, causing the whole thing to stumble sideways.

Dune reacted immediately, swinging wide with the free vine and looping it around the legs of the creature itself, holding it down by its own appendages.

Felix’s eyes shot up, more vines coming in behind him, while the cards stopped drilling, instead turning their attention to intercepting them and giving him a couple of seconds. He looked down at the root attaching the legs to the ground and breathed deeply.

"One more push." He opened his Numen core up and sent Numen through every part of his body simultaneously, jumping in the air and kicking the creature in the face. The head of the thing flew back, and the vine wrapped around its legs finally got it off-balance.

"On its feet, now!"

The cards rearranged themselves, hitting hard against its chest, combining to form a spin attack which hit at precisely the same time Felix’s left fist followed a half-second later, landing with a full second impact. The monster dropped down to the ground below it, collapsing under its own weight. He landed upon its chest, glancing over to where she stood..

Dune was already set up at the foot of the creature, in the exact place where its last few large veins connected with the root. She put all of her power into a single fist, just like he’d been drilling into her every single day, and struck at precisely the same moment Felix compressed his own Numen and drove his right hand into the monster.

SECOND IMPACT!!

The explosion spread outwards from both points, digging a full meter deep and several meters wide, with the very ground collapsing in around the sheer force of the blow. The monstrous body of the Numenroot blasted itself apart within that explosion, bits of living matter scattered across the floor of the crater.

Felix rose to his feet, gasping for breath, his right arm hanging limply at his side from the immense pain that still screamed far behind the adrenaline surging through his mind. He turned, raising his left hand to reach for Dune, when his eyes fell to the bottom of the crater.

He turned deathly pale.

The veins weren’t slowing down. They were spreading in all directions along the floor of the tunnel, shivering and quivering like severed tentacles grasping helplessly for some point to hang on to, already starting to heal themselves in a dozen places at once.

"We can’t win this." The words fell out of him flat, quiet, almost disbelieving. "We need to go. Run. Now."

He whipped his head around towards the exit of the tunnel, which was already narrowing further under the veil of creeping vines.

"Hurry!" He started running Dune was matching his speed effortlessly right next to him, close enough to see just how much trouble he was having keeping up his own pace.

She snatched him out of nowhere. "I’ll carry you."

"What, no wait, what—" He didn’t get any further with the sentence when she already heaved him over one shoulder and took off running, the tunnel entrance in front of them getting narrower and narrower with every second under the growing wall of vine.

"I can run by myself! Put me down! This is embarrassing! I have legs, Dune, legs that have been with me my entire life and still work perfectly fine, for the most part—OW, my arm! Put me DOWN! I don’t want to be carried like a sack of potatoes, I have a REPUTATION!"

"You’re injured. And exhausted." She tightened her hold on him even more, jostling him hard enough to knock a fresh grunt out of him. The ground beneath them began to shake, loose rocks raining down from above.

"Not that it means I can’t run in a straight line. This is defamation of character, that’s what this is." Felix struggled uselessly against her hold.

"Sabrina says to quit acting like a child and stop moving."

"...Fine." Felix shut up and glumly sulked.

Dune abruptly skidded to a halt in front of the wall of vines that completely blocked their path in the tunnel. She hit them, but only dented them a little before three more vines crawled in to fill the gap. She ripped and pulled, but they multiplied even faster, their thin tentacles already curling around her ankles.

"Dune." He tapped her on the shoulder, his tone urgent. "Dune, turn around."

She stilled and turned.

The Numenroot was completely restored behind them, no longer the partial humanoid form from before, now a being that was whole again, composed of vines and roots twisted into the form of a towering being, standing at least eight meters high and blocking out what little light was getting through the overhead canopy.

"We’re doomed." Felix whispered, sounding between terrified and incredulous. "We are so doomed. Put me down. Put me down right. I would rather be dead than be squished flat while being carried around by you like I’m some fucking bag of turnips."

She placed him on the ground gently in spite of his urgency, crouching briefly to wipe a smear of blood from his cheek with her thumb.

"Stay here. I will protect you."

He looked at her for just a moment too long before he shook his head sharply, forcing his attention away. "Absolutely not."

"You cannot fight. You are weak right now." Dune insisted, turning back towards the towering figure ahead of them.

"And i don’t give two fucks about it." Felix shoved himself upright using his one good arm, swaying slightly before finding his footing. "i refuse to let someone else to fight for me while I sit back and watch. I don’t need protection."

The remaining cards levitated up off of the ground beside him.

"Now that sounds appropriately heroic."

Visit and read more novel to help us update chapter quickly. Thank you so much!