Arriving at the entrance of the Grand Hall, Kersey got off the back of the motorcycle. “Heya…”
She returned the helmet to Aunt Aniler.
“Make sure to message me often once you go down. You can talk about anything. Aunt will definitely reply when she has time. If I don’t reply for a long time, it’s because I’m busy with work, not intentionally leaving you on read.”
Aniler opened the visor of her helmet and looked at Kersey with reluctant eyes.
“Yeah, I definitely will, Aunt. Speaking of the store…”
“Don’t worry about that. I can manage for two weeks. You should focus on your own safety.”
Aniler took off her gloves and rubbed Kersey’s pink hair with her firm knuckles. Kersey smiled shyly at that.
Aniler withdrew her hand and said, “If there’s no special circumstance, you should be at this spot two weeks later. I’ll specially free up that day to pick you up.”
“I’ll let you know when I’m coming back, and I can go back on my own. No need to come specially.”
“Hahaha! Isn’t it more fun to think no one’s there and then find someone waiting? Think of it as a surprise. I’m off!”
Aniler laughed heartily, closed her visor, and rode away.
“You already said you’d definitely come, so it’s not really a surprise.”
Watching her aunt fade into the distance, Kersey didn’t bother smoothing down her messy pink hair. Keeping that hairstyle, she walked all the way to the Dungeon Hall to meet up with her teammates.
Cass and Bried laughed at her for a while, then Bried helped her tidy up.
Cass changed into new armor made of cloth and leather—an outfit that could be described as completely sacrificing defense for agility, with many buckle pockets for easy access to various supplements. Bried still wore her windbreaker over her usual battle suit.
Kersey changed into a white embroidered Priestess Robe, with an unexpectedly well-fitting breastplate underneath that Cass’s teacher had given her, which increased casting speed.
Earlier, Kersey had suspected that Cass had peeked at her personal website profile to find out her measurements, since Kersey had a voluptuous figure and rarely found clothes that fit well.
Cass loudly protested her innocence and even showed her chat history with Siloque (who had temporarily changed her nickname to “Teacher”) to prove that the other had prepared it, finally convincing Kersey.
‘ “Whether it’s Bried or Kersey, how does Siloque manage to buy clothes in exactly their sizes…” Cass wondered, but she felt asking would be pointless. She just hoped Siloque wasn’t actually a criminal who stole girls’ data.’
Now, back to the present.
The three of them easily dealt with the boss that guarded the entrance to the second floor, then crossed the second-floor map that was so straightforward you could walk it with your eyes closed.
Arriving at the Boss Room of D Area on Floor 2, Cass checked the time. The three discussed their roles, confirmed methods to deal with the monster’s special attacks, and after some preparation, they entered.
The first major challenge Team Cass faced was the gatekeeper boss to the third floor—the Rotting Treant Deleus.
At least, that’s what Cass thought at first.
One minute after the battle began.
“Bried!”
Cass, LV26, shouted her teammate’s name to warn her. Cass nimbly dodged the tree root that Boss Deleus swung down, thick as an undersea cable—
“!!!”
Cass glanced at the priest standing at the edge of the Boss Room, gripping her staff intently, dressed in white, LV24.
Ugh!
The tree root slammed into the ground, creating rippling cracks. Although Cass managed to dodge by turning sideways, a large piece of flying debris tore through the sleeve of her left arm and cut into her skin, leaving a bloody gash. To be honest, she could have dodged it. Cass deliberately took that splash damage.
The next moment, a soft, glowing pale green energy orb enveloped Cass’s left arm, and the pain from the wound immediately vanished.
“Thanks!” Cass kept her eyes on the boss while thanking Kersey, who was in a relatively safe position behind her. Although Kersey couldn’t see her, she nodded firmly.
Bried, LV25, was as fast as an orange meteor. Her rapier, like a rocket launcher, pierced a large hole through the tree root.
Deleus, whose massive body required looking up to see fully, felt the pain of the damage and let out a heavy cry like an ancient bell, echoing repeatedly—it sounded quite pitiful.
【Velocity Layering】was so explosively powerful that Bried didn’t land after her charge; instead, she stepped onto the wall of the room. She reversed her blade, bent her knees, and after gathering strength, activated her Talent again. An orange streak once again arced through the air—
Wooooo—
A thin line pierced Deleus’s fluorescent red eyeball from right to left, bursting out green-purple liquid. Deleus flailed its branch arms somewhat wildly, creating a large cloud of dust and tremors on the ground.
Guh!
Due to her own explosive speed combined with the unfamiliar vertical falling speed, Bried flew a hundred meters through the air before finally landing. She couldn’t stabilize after skidding five meters and had to drive her rapier into the ground, leaving a trench, to barely stop.
A large shadow fell across Bried’s face.
It was one of Deleus’s countless branches. At that moment, Bried’s legs still needed some time to recover.
“Huh?! — Hmm?”
Cass had intended to go over and block with her sword to buy time, but she stopped midway. That was because Kersey’s casting speed was faster—the skill 〈Starlight〉 shone in Deleus’s remaining eye, causing the branch’s swing to veer off course.
Bried dodged Deleus’s whip-like branch attack by a hair’s breadth. It was so thrilling that even Cass, watching from the side, broke out in a cold sweat. Bried, however, calmly raised her sword, readying her next thrust attack.
‘ “The two of them are also constantly adapting to the dungeon. Our rate of improvement is really fast. It’s not to the point where we can easily one-shot the boss, but when fighting a boss, we no longer feel scared or so nervous that our hands shake. This must be the composure that comes from leveling up and improving skills.”‘
Cass marveled inwardly, her eyes closely tracking Deleus’s next move.
Deleus’s massive body suddenly leaped up, shaking the air violently. The moment it neared the top of the room and began to fall, the three of them took their third dose of antidote.
This was the prelude to the boss’s poison mist attack. The three needed to jump simultaneously just before it fully landed, to avoid being hit by the shockwave from the landing…
After that, Bried was responsible for most of the damage. Cass just trimmed the boss’s side branches, Kersey did her best with healing support, and even the final blow was left for Bried.
That’s right—to give her teammates a chance to shine, Cass was deliberately “playing weak.”
Five minutes later, the three high-fived each other to celebrate defeating the boss for the first time.
They had originally wanted to open the treasure chest, but the lingering poison mist from Deleus smelled too foul. The three only took the core and the boss’s drops before hastily leaving the room and arriving at the third floor.
Stepping onto the grass, the three froze for a moment as they looked up, marveling at human insignificance while also sighing at the beautiful scenery formed by the countless towering giant trees on the third floor.
Stepping onto the small bridge over the stream, though they didn’t know who built it, Cass was grateful not to have to cross the dangerous stream. Cass almost wanted to stand on the bridge and take a photo of the stream and forest, but time was a bit tight, so she followed her teammates into the Giant Tree Forest shrouded in thick fog.
Cass checked the Ring Chart time. 10:23 AM. The time was barely okay. Their location was—
“Cass, you seem to know this place well,” Bried asked, following Cass as she sped through the forest of giant trees.
“Wait… wait a second! Bried, mm—”
“Hold on tight to me. Keep your head down.”
Since Kersey’s movement speed wasn’t fast enough, Bried was carrying Kersey on her back as she ran, and she wasn’t slow. However, every time Kersey’s large “marshmallows” launched soft attacks on Bried during the movement, Bried’s brow furrowed a little more.
“Yeah, thanks to the map coordinates and route my teacher gave me, we can get through smoothly.”
Cass led the run, keeping the Ring Chart’s window visualized in the upper left corner of her field of view. It showed the fastest and safest route marked by Siloque—anyone who wasn’t blind could follow it.
“Actually, I’ve been wanting to ask: what is Cass’s teacher’s full name? You always call her ‘Teacher, Teacher,’ and I rarely hear you call her Wolf,” Kersey asked while tightly holding onto Bried.
“Um, I’m not really sure… Anyway, she just tells me to call her ‘Teacher.’ Oh! Look! We’re here.”
As a strong light appeared before the three, they realized they had walked out of the forest and arrived at a vast lake area. At the same time, they saw three figures fifty meters away.
On a slightly wider open space at the edge of the lake, two monsters had cornered a person by the lake. If that person took one more step back, they would fall into the water and attract the Fenru monsters in the lake.
After putting Kersey down, Bried quickly noticed the abnormality of that “human”: “That one doesn’t seem human, does it?”
A young girl, thin and seemingly somewhat short in stature. Her equipment consisted of a dark red leather short jacket with light copper armor over it, leather pants on her lower half, boots that reached near her knees, and a coarse gray wool cloak draped from head to waist as the outermost layer.
The unusual point was the pair of cute animal ears swaying on her tea-brown hair. On her cute face—visible even from far away—and her fair arms, red patterns like tattoos appeared, and her expression was slightly ferocious. Her whole body emitted white smoke as she gripped a military saber, aiming at the monsters.
“That’s right. She’s a Foxman, a type of orc,” Cass replied.
In front of her were two black bears, wearing—or rather, floating—a layer of blood-red transparent-looking armor.
“Orc? Could it be that she’s pretending to be in distress to lure us closer and then eat us? And these black bears are ‘Rage-stacking Bears,’ right? But they’re wearing armor? Are there such monsters on the third floor?” Kersey doubted hesitantly.
“From the fighting spirit on her, the cost of this ‘honey trap’ would be too high… It’s fine. She’s an NPC, she won’t be hostile to us. Our Dungeon Task starts with helping that Foxman.”
Cass’s Wraithblade emitted a fierce light.
“Oh… if she’s an NPC, then it should be fine,” Kersey finally raised her staff.
“Kersey, I need you to provide cover! Let’s go! Bri…ed? — Huh!?”
Just as Cass took her first step, Bried had already reached the battle scene ahead. The orange-haired swordsman’s rapier swept past the red-armored bear, piercing through the gaps and stabbing the big black bear’s leg. The Foxman girl’s eyes widened, and her animal ears shot straight up.
June 10th, 10:31 AM, the mission begins.