Any adventurer could tell that the air was different in the Dungeon. It was like an invisible line dividing the world above from the one below. The moment they entered, a chilly air filled their lungs, reminding them exactly how far they’d strayed from the watchful gazes of the sun and the moon.
But today the difference was even starker.
“Roaaaaaaaaaghhh!!”
Shouts filled the air on the first floor. It was more chaotic than ever.
“The monsters are agitated!” cried Kaguya, looking around. “I think something’s frightening them!”
“No shit!” replied Lyra. “The ground’s shaking beneath their feet, and it sounds like bombs are goin’ off or somethin’! There might as well be a damn fireworks display!”
She wore a cynical grin. All around her, goblins, kobolds, and other low-level monsters seemed to have taken leave of their senses and were running around like the world was going to end.
“The quakes are way stronger down here!” shouted Neze. “I didn’t really believe a monster could break through floors before, but I do now!”
To the girls of Astrea Familia, the earthquakes felt like a giant had picked them up and started rattling them like a pair of dice. There could no longer be any doubt about the danger of the approaching threat.
“““Groooooooooagh!!”””
“Horde of monsters, spotted dead ahead!” reported Noin, grasping her shortsword in one hand and buckler in the other. “Size is…I don’t know, but it’s a lot!!”
“They’re in a panic!!” added Celty, the elven mage. “They’re attacking anything that comes close!”
“What do we do, Alize?” asked Maryu, turning to her captain for guidance.
The column of Astrea Familia moved swiftly through the Dungeon. Alize gave her orders without a second’s delay.
“Just ignore them!” she yelled. “Our target is the big one!”
With her ponytail fluttering behind her, Alize pulled Crimson Order from its sheath and brandished its narrow blade. With one clean slash, she cut down three monsters that stood in the party’s way.
“““Gyaaagh?!”””
“Don’t slow down! Don’t let anything stop us! Go, go, go!!”
“““Got it!”””
The girls answered their leader’s command with practiced swiftness. The mad rush of monsters ran face-first into Noin’s sturdy shield, and then met Kaguya’s and Lyu’s swords, Lyra’s boomerangs, and Neze’s twin blades.
Thus Astrea Familia carved a path through the sea of foes. But following behind them was the strike team’s smallest member.
“Leave them to me.”
Her golden hair seemed to leave a glittering trail as she moved. Aiz Wallenstein wove deftly between her allies, then raised her sword—Desperate, the Durandal Superior-class weapon.
“Die.”
As if parting the oceans, a single slash cut through the horde and reduced them to ash. The little monster hunter was unstoppable. She spun like a top, delivering another devastating swing, before leaping into a dance of death that dissolved the wall of foes like molten butter.
Her foes were the runts of the Dungeon, but that didn’t make her speed any less impressive. Noin clapped her hand to her mouth in astonishment.
“She’s so strong…!”
“That girl ain’t any taller than me, but look at her go!” said Lyra. “And she’s gonna keep growin’! You call that fair?!”
“Keep your envy to yourself, prum,” said Kaguya. “It’s distracting me.”
But as a fellow swordsmaiden, even Kaguya was forced to acknowledge the young girl’s skill.
“All power, no technique,” she said, “but still, it’s a miracle a child so young can fight like this. Now it makes sense why they call her the Sword Princess.”
Kaguya looked over at the girl once more. Just then, a second figure appeared beside Aiz.
“Hai-yaaa!”
“Guhhh?!”
Lyu was quickly growing accustomed to wielding two swords at once and was making short work of the monsters. The skirmish continued for a short while, then, as the two combatants ran side by side, Lyu realized the girl had been staring at her for some time.
“…Is something the matter, Sword Princess?” she asked with an awkward smile.
“…Have we met?” Aiz replied.
Lyu’s long ears twitched.
Yes, we have! It was dark, and I was wearing a mask, so maybe you don’t remember, but we were basically trying to kill each other!
Lyu attempted to make sure that none of her awkward inner thoughts showed on her face. All she could think about were the events of five days prior.
“I apologize in advance. This is nothing but the futile tantrum of a lost and foolish elf.”
“I don’t understand. Which means…I have to beat you.”
“Insolence!”
Mired in the pain of loss and embarrassment of defeat, Lyu had lost sight of justice, and had been wandering aimlessly through the city when she ran into Aiz. A few tactless comments from the girl, along with her misguided interpretation of the situation, had led to a fight to the death.
A fact that, if revealed now, would be so disgraceful, Lyu feared that none of her fellow familia members would ever want to speak to her again.
There’s no two ways about it—I gave in to my despair and attacked a little girl! I can’t let Alize find out about this, and definitely not Lady Riveria!
Lyu was greatly concerned with appearance and dignity. If her familia discovered this transgression, their teasing was the least of her worries. As for Riveria, the respect Lyu’s kind felt for high elves bordered on divine worship. It was unthinkable to allow her embarrassing secret to come to light.
Luckily, Aiz didn’t seem to have worked it out yet. The mask had done its job, so that was some relief. However, Lyu’s frantic mind still failed to spit out a coherent response.
“Your eyes…and your voice. They seem…familiar somehow…”
“Th-th-that’s because…we got into a fight over the last Jyaga Maru Kun one time!”
Lyu spat out a big, fat lie that raised more questions than it answered. Aiz scrutinized the elf girl closely, while a bead of sweat slowly worked its way down Lyu’s face.
“…Yes. That must be it,” the young girl said at last.
Completely fooled, Aiz moved on in search of her next target. Lyu didn’t know whether to be relieved or concerned.
“…I’m lucky she’s an airhead…”
However, there wasn’t much time to think about it before she heard Kaguya shouting at her.
“What are you doing, standing still like an idiot?! The monsters are going to be on top of us any minute!”
“S-sorry!!” Lyu yelped, and she ran off to rejoin her allies.
By this point, monsters were beginning to emerge from the lower levels. War shadows, killer ants, orcs—all creatures that would only normally appear much deeper. Neze dispatched a few of them, and then called out to her allies.
“Where are we going to fight this monster, anyway? It’s gotta be as big as a floor boss!”
The animal girl furrowed her brow as quakes continued to rock the Dungeon, and Alize echoed her ally’s concerns.
“There’s only a few places we can realistically fight something that size! Plus, we don’t want to get ganged up on while we’re trying to focus on the big one!”
“Right you are, girls,” said Gareth. “We can’t have a scrap with a beast like that in the tunnels. A wide-open space would be much better.”
“A wide-open space, without too many monsters,” said Riveria. “There’s only one place I can think of that fits the bill.”
“You don’t mean…?” asked Kaguya, though she suspected she already knew what the high elf was going to say.
“The eighteenth floor—the Under Resort.”
“The Under Resort! And we’ll be fighting an absolute behemoth!” cried Alize. “I’ve never heard of anything that even comes close to this!”
Floor eighteen was a safe haven where no monsters spawned. While monsters could come up or down from the adjacent levels, to Alize’s knowledge, nobody had ever attempted to conduct such a large-scale battle there before.
However, the eighteenth floor also held special significance to the girls of Astrea Familia. Running alongside Alize, Lyra gave a short chuckle.
“Bet you this was Finn’s plan all along,” she said. “Guy like him, he’d have come up with a strategy the moment he heard the monster was on its way.”
“You mean…?!” asked Lyu, astonished.
“Yeah. That’s why we were waitin’ up top for so long. He calculated how long it would take us to reach the eighteenth floor and sent us off at the last minute so we would meet the monster there just in time.”
Lyra’s words were little more than conjecture, borne of the confidence she placed in her people’s hero, but Loki Familia remained silent, refusing to confirm or deny her theory.
Kaguya, on the other hand, could not hold her tongue any longer. “He’s no hero—he’s a demon! How can he think so many steps ahead in such an unprecedented situation?!”
The tone of her voice was a mixture of fear and awe. Her sentiments were echoed on the faces of every member of Astrea Familia. They could scarcely believe the prum hero had planned everything from the very first move.
“Let’s not forget about the people fighting on the surface,” Alize pointed out. “The Dungeon monster is one thing, but fighting all the Evils at once is even worse!”
“Plus, his top lieutenants are down here with us,” added Lyu. “Is he really going to be all right?”
The two girls couldn’t help but be concerned. For all Finn’s genius, he was on a strict timeline and faced an impossible task. There were bound to be holes in his strategy, weren’t there?
“It’s okay,” someone said.
“Huh?”
It was Aiz, running alongside them.
“It’s okay. Finn’s unbeatable.”
In the young girl’s mind, she was simply stating the truth.
“That’s why he won’t lose.”
Lyu and Alize were a little taken aback by her directness. Meanwhile, Riveria and Gareth gave a little chuckle.
“Aiz is right,” the high elf said. “We won’t get anywhere poking holes in Finn’s plan. Better to focus on the task at hand.”
“Besides, the finest warriors of Freya Familia stand with him,” added Gareth. “They make for troublesome foes, but there’s no one I’d rather have on my side in a war.”
The old dwarven soldier shouldered his battle-ax and gazed at the Dungeon roof above.
“Finn placed his trust in us,” he said. “Now we must place our trust in him.”