Chapter 188

01 The bizarre, treelike hands twitched and stiffened, almost trembling, as they grasped at the sky. However, whatever they sought to cling to was now beyond their reach, and they wilted to the ground, never to move again. “Have we won?” Leonhardt asked himself as much as anyone else as he gazed at the Wicked Hands of Creation. The stratum boss had quickly blackened and collapsed, just as proper trees would have if they’d been struck by lightning. Leonhardt had felt neither an expectation of victory nor a reaction at finally routing their enemy. The job was not yet done, and there was no choice but to keep marching forward. There was no path that led home now, other than the one that demanded he and his allies brandish their blades to cut a way through to the future. All their weapons and armor had been strengthened for the battle with the Bladed Beast of Many Legs on the fifty-seventh stratum. No expense had been spared; they had used the strongest materials they’d possessed. Adamantite, basilisk hide, and red dragon scales had all been liberally put to use. Additionally, they’d been provided with enough spare weapons, potions, and other supplies to engage with several stratum bosses. What was thought to have been more than enough had been furnished in preparation for the worst. After they’d felled the Bladed Beast of Many Legs, Leonhardt and the soldiers had been given no recourse but to advance because of the corpses that flooded up from the stratum below. Thanks to the Sage of Calamity covering for them in the fifty-eighth stratum, all they’d had to do was push through the army of corpses and dive deeper in to the Labyrinth. Unfortunately, the fifty-ninth stratum had depleted far more supplies than expected. Although their preparations had seemed perfect, what remained of the army had long since used up the spare weapons. Their armor was dented, and some had damaged joints, even coming apart in some places. The cache of arrows and throwing spears that the baggage-carrying slaves and raptors had brought had very nearly run dry. Even the store of ley-line shards, critical ingredients for potions, had been exhausted. The potions themselves had been used up as well. Even so, Leonhardt and his men continued to draw breath. “We won…” Leonhardt clenched his fists. “We…survived!!!” There had been no need to announce victory with a shout, as everyone knew that true victory still lay ahead of them. Contenting themselves here would mean not seeing Leonhardt’s lifelong desire made manifest. Leonhardt looked back at his soldiers, at the comrades who’d fought alongside him. Everyone was bone-weary and sitting on the ground. Their numbers were even lower than when they’d first arrived on this stratum, and not a single person was uninjured. All were steadily recovering, thanks to the special-grade Regen, but some were severely wounded and clearly needed further attention. Nonetheless, everyone still had hope in their eyes. They’d made it this far. They’d secured yet another stratum. Not one among them would hesitate to take the next step. “Nierenberg, you all right?” “Yeah, better than the general.” Nierenberg approached, dyed in frightful colors from the blood of monsters and patients. Likely he had gotten involved in the fighting as well. The left hand he casually hid in his pocket bore a severe wound that traced its way up to his elbow, though it was currently healing, due to the effects of the special-grade Regen. Most likely, Nierenberg had suffered other, less visible injuries as well. Although he approached Leonhardt with no small amount of difficulty, he wore the same sullen expression he would have any other day. Something about the sight elicited a feeling of gratitude from Leonhardt. Leonhardt was the general, the leader. He was more inspiring to the troops than anyone else, and every member of the Forces counted on him to lead the way. However, Nierenberg hid his own condition from Leonhardt and feigned calmness so as not to cause the general unnecessary worry. Even the other soldiers, wounded and weary though they were, could see it. That Leonhardt was still able to stand on his own feet was a testament to those who supported him. The thought inspired a new well of energy from within Leonhardt’s exhausted body. I can still do it. I can still hold my sword. The boss of the Labyrinth still lives… Leonhardt took a breath, clenched his weapon tight in his hand, and issued an order to Nierenberg. “Focus treatment on the soldiers who look like they can still fight. As soon as you’re done, we move onward.” “Understood.” It was a cruel order, but nobody voiced an objection. Even if they’d wanted to temporarily return to the surface, surely the stratum immediately above them was crawling with corpses. The Sage of Calamity had sacrificed herself to lure the corpses and open the way, but it was a whole kingdom’s worth of walking dead fused with the monsters that had destroyed them. No matter how unintelligent and weak their cobbled-together bodies were, their numbers were likely more than a single person could have ever hoped to burn to ashes alone. Supplies were nearly exhausted, and many soldiers of the Forces were seriously wounded. The prospects of them overcoming another battle were slim. However, if they turned back here, if they gave the Labyrinth time to recover after they’d gone to great pains to weaken it, the city above would not survive. Under Nierenberg’s direction, the Forces were able to gather some ley-line shards for Mariela, though only a few. All the shards had been recovered from monsters defeated on this stratum. Little remained of the magical power of the moon or the crystallized materials, and Mariela made sure to craft only the necessary concoctions that Nierenberg requested. “These are the last two mana potions…” “You two should drink those.” “What…? But…” Mariela’s colossal magical power had almost run dry from frequent potion making, as evident from her hazy grip on consciousness. Even so, she’d refused to drink a mana potion until she was at her breaking point, because once she finished making potions, there was nothing more she could provide. Likewise, Sieg had expended nearly all his own magical power using his Spirit Eye. Although he had a few arrows remaining, he was probably unable to fire any more. He’d reasoned he could still protect Mariela with his sword, and that would be enough. That was why he hadn’t bothered to drink a mana potion. “Drink them. Your work here isn’t done.” “…I understand.” “All right.” Other than Leonhardt and Nierenberg, the only ones present who knew why Mariela and Sieg had been ordered to restore their magical power were the pair themselves. The four had heard it the day Sieg’s Spirit Eye had been restored. Freyja had explained it to those present in Sunlight’s Canopy at the time, though the “reason” she’d given was characteristically vague: “Endalsia’s about to be devoured, and those two are essential to saving her.” Originally, even Nierenberg had believed that Mariela’s presence was essential because she could make the quickly deteriorating mana potions and that Sieg was needed as her escort. In other words, he’d thought the two were necessary because of what they could provide in terms of fighting power. However, now that they’d reached the deepest part of the Labyrinth, Nierenberg felt he’d been mistaken. There was no logical basis for Nierenberg’s new presumption, but this flash of intuition was similar to what he’d felt that night in Sunlight’s Canopy when he was in the ley line and saw Endalsia. The sensation in his gut was the same. He understood that Endalsia had little life left and that these two were needed to save her. Nierenberg trusted that Leonhardt harbored a similar intuitive feeling. Those few remaining soldiers gazed at the stairs that led to the stratum below. Though it would have been more accurate to say they stared down a hole leading into the abyss, as the path forward could no longer be rightly called stairs. The seriously wounded soldiers who couldn’t be healed enough via potions or healing magic to return to the front lines stayed behind, reducing the Labyrinth Suppression Forces to about fifty people. “Let’s go.” With the few remaining troops, Leonhardt, Mariela, and Siegmund quietly proceeded toward the next stratum. 02 The place below was flooded with light, as though the darkness up to this point had been merely a bad dream. The soldiers could almost feel their weary bodies being healed and comforted by that divine glow, the dawn painting over the long, dark night in an instant. The light filled their bones, which had grown chill from the dark above. In that light, there was hope. Although they were still in the Labyrinth, this stratum had no end, and other than the spot where they stood, even the ground seemed ephemeral. It reminded Mariela of the ley line. The reason the Labyrinth had dug deeper and deeper was to reach this place. The last remaining monster, after consuming the people of the Kingdom of Endalsia and of the Citadel City, had devoured its fellow monsters. Then it had eaten its way below the kingdom, toward this strange location, while absorbing the power of the ley line and creating monsters as it went deeper and deeper. That path had become the Labyrinth, serving to protect from invaders. Now Mariela at last understood the reason for the Labyrinth: it was all an effort to buy time. A stall tactic to ensure that the boss of the Labyrinth would reach this place. On its journey, it had cast off its right and left legs, discarded its stomach, and even lost both hands before finally arriving here. This was as far as the Labyrinth boss had gotten, and the Forces had caught up. Here, the sixtieth stratum of the Labyrinth, was where the boss had finally reached the ley line, though not physically. Instead, the immense magical power gathered by the enormous Labyrinth had allowed this sixtieth stratum to transcend mere physical distance, enabling it to connect to the far-off ley line. In front of Leonhardt and the rest who had made it to the deepest part of the Labyrinth were the figures of the Labyrinth’s boss, their archenemy over the span of two hundred years, and the spirit Endalsia. Long had it been said that only those who dared to challenge the Labyrinth would know its boss when they confronted it. When he looked upon the visage of this being, Leonhardt felt that old story was true. He sensed the will of the Labyrinth, his own hatred and that of his fellows who dared to descend deeper and deeper, from the monstrous thing before his eyes. But Leonhardt had never imagined the boss would look like this. With no arms or legs or even a visible spine, the horrible shape possessing only a head and torso, the boss of the Labyrinth, had its teeth sunk into Endalsia. Endalsia was a being with a silhouette so vague one could only barely recognize it as humanoid, though warm light still emanated from her. Mariela understood by way of her own Nexus that Endalsia was a part of the power of the vast ley line, the depth of which couldn’t be measured through mortal means. Mariela and all other people, spirits, magical power, and life forces that couldn’t be seen or touched existed in the same world. The ley line connected all of it, and it was the very reason seemingly different substances and energy could exist together and change each other. Endalsia, being unified with the ley line, most likely arranged and controlled the flow of Drops of Life and the energy that circulated through the ley line and the world. She used that power to continue protecting both the humans she loved and the kingdom they lived in. This had been done through her eye, the Spirit Eye. Unfortunately, Endalsia was now so frail that she seemed like she could vanish at any moment. To the naked eye, the Labyrinth boss seemed to be “eating” her, but what Mariela felt through her Nexus and what Sieg saw with his Spirit Eye was that even if the boss decided to open its mouth, Endalsia wouldn’t be set free. Her power as the warden of the ley line, and her very existence, were being absorbed by the boss of the Labyrinth. Endalsia loved people and had chosen to live with them. She had refused to accept the Labyrinth boss’s desire to destroy humans and remake the land as a place only for monsters, even if that refusal came at the cost of her own existence. What remained of the Labyrinth’s boss as it slowly consumed Endalsia and grew ever closer to unifying with the ley line was being burned and destroyed. Perhaps that was Endalsia’s way of resisting. The monster was already a pitiable sight without its limbs, but its blood was boiling, and its body was burned and blackened like coal. What skin there was looked lumpy and swollen, possibly from the boiling body fluids. The horrible creature’s internal pressure must have been fluctuating, as its eyes had protruded and ruptured, and bloody foam bubbled from its mouth. No one dared to even hazard a guess as to what kind of monster the boss of the Labyrinth had been originally. This transformation had rendered it unrecognizable. However, great power also streamed into the boss of the Labyrinth from its partial unity with the ley line. The ley line’s power was now the boss’s own, immediately healing any injury, and then the energy from the conflict immediately destroyed its body again. It was an endlessly repeating cycle of destruction and regeneration. What could the boss of the Labyrinth hope to achieve from such hellish suffering? —I must get it back.— Mariela had the feeling she’d heard the thoughts of the Labyrinth boss through her Nexus. It’s just like that story Emily and the others were reading… Mariela recalled the story she’d overheard children reading in Sunlight’s Canopy, “The Legend of Endalsia.” The poor monsters had been living peacefully with the animals and the spirit Endalsia, but then they were driven to another part of the forest because of the arrival of the human hunters. The monsters attacked the village of humans to try to take back their home, but Endalsia’s grief over losing her love, coupled with her powerful determination to protect her child, drove the monsters into the Fell Forest, and they were unable to return to their former home. The Fell Forest was far, far larger than what eventually became the humans’ territory. It had plenty of places for the monsters to live. They could have easily found free and happy lives. At least, that was how Mariela had felt after she’d first heard that story. Now that she saw the state of the Labyrinth’s boss, however… Mariela realized that what the monsters wanted wasn’t the land itself, but rather the place where they could be with Endalsia. It was said that the magical gems inside the bodies of monsters determined their form. Corruption in the world mixed with magical power to form those gems, and the corrupted magical power they exuded would gather to form monsters. Though monsters produced magical gems when killed, their source was the evil that people produced: malice, hatred, jealousy, terror, anger, and lust. Hungry, thirsty, and unfulfilled, that corruption coagulated and produced monsters, so it was no wonder they hated people. If there just weren’t any humans, the monsters could have lived with Endalsia and the forest animals as gentler creatures. Monsters couldn’t coexist with humans. If a monster and a human met, they’d have to be separated, or one would destroy the other. Endalsia loved a hunter and had chosen the humans. That was why she couldn’t be with the monsters anymore. Still, she didn’t have it in her to destroy the monsters, her former friends. So instead, she chose to stay sequestered from them. From the Kingdom of Endalsia. Even that decision had likely been born of Endalsia’s compassion. However, the poor monsters hadn’t understood those feelings. Maybe they’d felt like they’d been cast aside, or even robbed. —I must get it back.— Even though they’d been shut out of the hunters’ village, the monsters had probably been awaiting their chance from within the Fell Forest the whole time. The faint memories of their once-happy lives remained as the years wore on. —I must get it back. I must get Endalsia back.— Even now, a poor monster was consuming Endalsia and trying to absorb the entire ley line, urged to do so by those very same feelings as when the monsters had attacked the village of the hunters. As Mariela and all the other onlookers found themselves at a loss for words at the unimaginable sight of the Labyrinth’s boss, Endalsia suddenly opened her eye as though she’d awakened from slumber. It was only her left eye that opened. It shone the same brilliant verdant shade as Sieg’s Spirit Eye. The color was a gentle, comforting shade to them, like new leaves sprouting on a dead tree in winter. —I am so glad you have come. My beloved children.— For the spirit Endalsia, who had lived for so very long, all people who dwelled in this land were her children: Sieg with his Spirit Eye, Mariela with her Nexus, Leonhardt, every single soldier in the Labyrinth Suppression Forces. She cast her affectionate smile upon all of them indiscriminately. After Endalsia looked upon everyone like a mother delighted at the growth of her children, a terrible sadness clouded her expression, and she turned her gaze to the boss of the Labyrinth as it continued to consume her —This child has not had a single thought ever since that day two hundred years ago.— Had the loss of self-awareness been the price of obtaining power beyond any individual’s capabilities in order to consume humans and fellow monsters? Or was it instead the result of continuous regeneration and destruction over two centuries? Regardless, in its current state, the boss of the Labyrinth no longer understood that just because it was driven by a desire to get Endalsia back, that did not mean the day would ever come when it could live with her again. This monster, the Labyrinth boss that was the mere shadow of its former self with no arms, no legs, and no abdomen, simply continued to devour Endalsia. It could not survive unless it devoured her and become the master of the ley line in her place. Even if it did become the master of the ley line, could it even endure it, now that its senses had been worn down until not even a fragment remained? —Please set this poor child free.— Endalsia gazed at Siegmund, who had most markedly inherited the blood of the hunter she loved. Then she turned her eye to Leonhardt, who had led the others in the fight to this point. Leonhardt nodded in affirmation of the request and focused his attention on the boss of the Labyrinth, his longtime enemy. “Pitiful… This is the enemy that has opposed us for so long?” Leonhardt muttered as he stood before a monster that didn’t even have the strength to fight back. Perhaps, in that moment, Leonhardt felt something akin to compassion toward the monster that had tried so hard to go back to the happier days its kind had once known. “Siegmund, release it from its fate, and save the spirit Endalsia.” “Sir,” Siegmund replied in obeyance. He felt sure that it was for this very deed that he had regained his Spirit Eye. “Sieg, take this.” “Thanks, Mariela.” Mariela handed Sieg a single arrow she’d taken from a wooden crate. Freyja had given it to her, saying, “Use this at the very end,” and Mariela had fastened it to the raptor. Surely if ever there was a time to use it, it was now. The wooden arrow, bereft of a metal arrowhead, had been carved from the sacred tree behind Sunlight’s Canopy. When Freyja had spoken to the tree’s spirit, Illuminaria, the tree had dropped a branch, and Sieg had personally carved the arrow from it. Endalsia was the queen of the forest spirits. That included sacred tree spirits. An arrow made from the branch of such a tree wouldn’t hurt Endalsia. If Sieg used the arrow in conjunction with his Spirit Eye, it was possible to defeat the boss of the Labyrinth without endangering Endalsia herself. Siegmund nocked the arrow and drew it back. The spirits, guided by Sieg’s Spirit Eye, gathered to save their queen. Endalsia, queen of spirits, did you guide me here…? Sieg wondered. Had it been due to her guidance that Mariela awakened the exact same day Sieg was being transported to the Labyrinth City? His meeting with Mariela wasn’t the only happy coincidence, either. There was the time when the guidance of a forest spirit had saved his life back when he’d been taken to the Fell Forest by the son of the merchant who had been his master. Perhaps even the arrow that had defeated the wyvern by chance when the monster had crushed his Spirit Eye had been because of Endalsia. It all seemed to Sieg like some sort of mysterious guidance he’d been previously unaware of. If that was the case…if even his meeting Mariela had been the will of Endalsia, or of the ley line… My profoundest gratitude for your guidance, and for a destiny that allowed me to meet Mariela… Siegmund drew his bow, imbuing it with a magical power that only he possessed, along with his deep, unwavering gratitude.