My Perfect Isekai: Pragmatic Protagonist, Progression Fantasy and Strategy

We ran through the pulsating entrails of the eleventh floor. I ignored the stench of sulfur and deep rot. The murderous sprint forced us to ignore the minor monsters. Ordinary bugs died under our boots before they could take a position to attack.

Suddenly, the purple mycelium collapsed with a wet squelch. We fell to a lower level. We landed softly in a closed branch of the corridor, flooded with shallow sludge. The exit was immediately blocked. A gigantic swarm of mutated insects poured out from dark holes in the fleshy walls. Hundreds of predators with black chitin cut off our escape route.

Shnee bent her knees. Her rapier hissed, ready to cut. Her assassin speed and classic ice magic were enough for her.

”Stop,” I threw calmly.

I scratched my neck. I looked at the pouring horde with Brazen chill. Pure logic analyzed the physics of the environment. Pushing into such a mass of chitin with a blade would cost too much energy. However, I sensed solid rock under the elastic layer of mycelium. I found a point of support.

I took a step forward. I crouched and placed my open hand directly on the ground. Instead of wasting resources on area spells, I pumped kinetic force straight into the stone hidden under the sludge. The earth acted like a bending spring. It soundlessly absorbed my push.

I waited three seconds. I allowed the monsters to run right into the epicenter of the trap.

I released the push.

The energy released from the stone exploded from below with a dull roar. Concentrated force brutally tore the ground, throwing hundreds of armored insects high into the air. The horde immediately lost its point of support. The bugs spun helplessly under the fleshy ceiling, completely disoriented by the loss of gravity.

”Now, Shnee!” I growled, getting up from the mud.

The elf exploited this gap flawlessly. A wave of raw frost shot from her hand and blade. The temperature in the cave dropped drastically. Extreme cold hit the defenseless monsters in flight. The insects froze to the bone in a fraction of a second.

Physics claimed its due. The frozen lumps crashed back onto the floor. The sound of the impact resembled breaking thousands of goblets at once. The mutated insects shattered into fine dust, covering the ground with cloudy mana stones.

I dusted off my coat. It was a clean job using basic physics.

We moved on at a murderous pace. Acid fumes ate the oxygen, forcing the lungs to make a painful effort. Every second of delay worked to our disadvantage.

The corridor narrowed sharply. A hundred meters ahead of us, I sensed crisp air. The Room of Breath was just around the corner. However, a biological obstacle blocked the way. It was a pulsating resin wall. It cut off the entire corridor from ceiling to floor.

Shnee slowed down, preparing to attack. Classic frost billowed from her rapier. She intended to shatter the barrier with temperature.

”Do not slow down!” I growled firmly. ”We will trample this!”.

I ignored the sticky structure of the material. Pure logic suggested the simple physics of an impact. I compressed kinetic energy in my right shoulder. I did not slow down even for a fraction of a second. I hit the barrier with full momentum, delivering a punch right into the middle of the elastic wall. I acted like a human ram.

The resin did not absorb the impact. It exploded with a wet snap. Pure force tore the blockade to shreds in a fountain of yellow slime.

We fell straight into a vast cave.

I stopped with a slide on the rocky floor. It smelled of pure death. The bottom of the cave was full of holes. Boiling acid filled every gap. Corrosive pools bubbled, releasing toxic fumes into the air. Crossing to the other side required jumping across basalt paths.

Suddenly, the vault above our heads twitched violently.

A gigantic mass of meat and chitin broke away from the dark with a massive crash. The monster landed on the hard rock right in the middle of the arena, crumbling the basalt under its weight.

It was the Toxic King.

The boss of the eleventh floor resembled a monstrous hybrid. A cross between a giant scorpion and a disgusting centipede. He measured well over ten meters. A shiny armor covered his back. The chitin plates reacted to movement, tensing like biological armor. The carcass literally dripped with corrosive venom.

The beast snapped its massive pincers. A double stinger rose from his abdomen. The blade aimed straight at my chest.

”Get out of the way to the oxygen, bug,” I muttered with Brazen chill, cracking my neck.

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The monster did not intend to wait for the development of tactics. With terrifying speed, completely inadequate to his gigantic mass, he went on the offensive. He opened his chelicerae wide and spat out a gigantic acid wave. A cascade of green death filled the entire front half of the cave, rushing straight at us.

Instead of backing away, I put my left hand deep into my coat pocket and raised my right loosely in front of me. I compressed the air on the front line to the density of a titanium plate. The acid wave hit the invisible barrier with a deafening hiss. The liquid broke into thousands of harmless drops that burned shallow holes in the basalt. I blocked this mindless strike without twitching a single muscle.

”Extreme stupidity,” I threw with a cold voice. ”You burn a massive amount of mana on area attacks instead of condensing the force in one point. You lose power with every meter covered. Cheap tricks. Do it properly, or I will trample you into this mud without a fight”.The Toxic King fell into a murderous fury. The boss understood that ranged combat made no sense. He braced his legs against the slippery stone and threw his body forward in a direct charge. He lowered his pincers, intending to cut me in half with one move.

I did not flinch. When he struck, I took the hit on a condensed shield of force. The ground under my boots cracked, but I stopped his momentum in place. I halted the pincers just centimeters from my face. According to the mentor’s tactics, I began to coldly point out the enemy’s mistakes.

”Bad stance,” I reprimanded him coldly. ”You left your center of gravity too far behind. You try to crush me relying solely on mass, instead of synchronizing the movement of your rear segment with the attack. The force escapes to the side. Zero stabilization”.

I withdrew the barrier by a centimeter, breaking his balance, and then struck from below with pure telekinesis. I brutally knocked his head up, throwing him a few meters back. The disoriented monster landed hard on the floor. The boss did not intend to give up, however. With a spin defying biological logic, he shot the spike on his tail forward. The strike was perfect. It carried the entire mass of the monster. The speed broke the sound barrier. The blade aimed straight at my chest.

A flash of genuine appreciation appeared in my sapphire eyes. ”Much better. Excellent weight transfer,” I praised quietly.

The Toxic King jerked with a piercing scream. He understood that engaging in close combat with my hard physics was an absolute mistake. Tearing off half of his spike stuck in the rock, he broke free, turned around, and with a huge splash dived into the deepest pool of acid. The liquid immediately closed over his chitin armor. He began to circle the bottom, hiding from my sight, and the acid in the tank started to bubble dangerously. Devouring mana from the acid, he pumped systemic regeneration into himself, preparing a strike from a blind spot.

”Watch out, Dave!” Shnee warned. ”He is devouring mana from that tank!”.

I looked at the surface of the corrosive lake with clear pity. ”Extreme stupidity,” I said slowly, with a tone devoid of mercy. ”Hiding in a pool full of liquid from someone who holds space in his bare hands?. That is not a shelter. That is a statistical error baked in its own acid”.

I straightened the fingers of both hands and raised my arms up. I did not use water magic. I fired up ruthless telekinesis in a hard lift mode. Millions of liters of concentrated acid lost contact with the bottom in a fraction of a second. The entire contents of the pool rose upward with a deafening roar, creating a levitating cube of corrosive liquid.

The bottom of the pool turned out to be bare granite. Right in its center, completely exposed and stripped of cover, lay the disoriented King, kicking in panic with his legs.

”Change of force,” I threw coldly.

I clenched my hands into fists and lowered them with brutal force. The cube of acid weighing hundreds of tons crashed down. The liquid hit the monster with the force of a falling skyscraper. The kinetic push combined with the sudden hit of force literally dented the boss’s armor straight into the solid rock. The reactive armor cracked with a dry snap, exposing soft tissues around his neck.

Pitch-black darkness poured out of my right hand again, crystallizing into sapphire karambits. It was the Abyss Claw. I bounced off the edge, falling straight into the now empty pool. With surgical precision, I drove the claws straight into the cracked gap in the chitin, completely ignoring the remnants of poisonous slime. I reached deep. My fingers clenched on the main nerve and the hard core of the beast. A fraction of the Sapphire Arsenal detonated in my hand without warning.

The Toxic King stiffened. A second later his giant body cracked and silently turned into a storm of dried ash, which mixed with the remnants of acid. From the gray cloud onto the granite fell a heavy Core of Essence weighing a good three kilograms, shining in the gloom with a deep green.

I withdrew the coating, allowing the darkness to return to my veins. I jumped back onto the safe edge of the path. The wall of purple mycelium at the other end of the cave slowly dropped. A small chamber hewn in solid stone appeared before us. The Room of Breath. In its center levitated a spinning Prism.

We entered the zone. The stench of rot disappeared as if cut with a knife, replaced by the crisp air of a safe haven. I leaned loosely against the stone wall, closing my eyes for a fraction of a second to cool my heated weaves. My engine worked stably.

Shnee stood next to the pedestal. With a quiet sigh, she pulled the leather glove off her left hand and wiped sweat from her temple. Her cold demeanor broke, giving way to fanatical respect. She looked at the pulsating core on my hand.

”Absolute domination,” she said quietly. ”You destroyed the entire biome of this floor without even drawing a real weapon. This core... is more powerful than anything we brought Silas from the third level”.

I smiled with the corner of my mouth, coldly weighing the heavy stone. Pure logic suggested simple math. The caloric density of this drop is enough for a massive upgrade of the Vessel or to completely overturn the local economy.

”You are right, Shnee. It is powerful,” I answered calmly, sliding it into the spatial pouch at her belt. ”That is why we will not go to Silas with this for more pocket money”.

The white-haired girl raised an inquiring eyebrow. ”So what is our new operational plan?” she asked specifically.

”We are changing the scale in Oakhaven,” I threw firmly, pushing off the wall. ”We will not buy beer tickets in the tavern for this piece of crystallized mana. We will take over the western guild of armorers. We will force them to forge equipment on our terms. Let old Silas prepare updated ledgers, because in the morning we are dropping into his hideout with capital that will break the local aristocrats in half”.

I placed my hand on the Sapphire Prism. Shnee stood next to me and did the same, and her lips curled into a trusting smile. Space around us flickered and folded inward. The rotting corridors of the eleventh floor faded, spitting us back out into the dirty gloom of the Lower City of Oakhaven a fraction of a second later. Verification was completed. The machine started for good.