Siloque’s only chance of victory was that these [Second-form Wraiths] had no intelligence.
“—-!”
The right hand of the Red Specter transformed into a blade and closed in.
Siloque dodged with a huge movement, bending down in a hurry.
It swept over Siloque’s head, slicing off several strands of hair.
The Church covered seventy square meters, and the ruined benches and exposed inner structure of the building were useless as cover.
Confirming his position through the gaps between the Red Specters, Siloque darted into the cluster of ghosts, zigzagging in a Z-shape at high speed.
The Greatsword slashed across the necks of the Red Specters one by one.
“……”
“—-Ha.”
Siloque caught his breath.
The ghosts struck by the blade burst apart like bubbles on soapy water.
Haah, piece of cake!
Siloque absolutely did not think so.
“Ugh…”
His body trembled with tingling numbness, and a sensation almost as good as hanging upside down* ran wild inside him.
Siloque’s level was Lv12-LV130.
Yet he felt no joy at all.
The ghosts flickered like camera shutters, updating and copying Siloque’s level.
Before Siloque could move again, new ghosts filled in from all directions, regrouping and charging at him.
And they were faster.
“Guh!”
Siloque twisted to dodge.
A red blade swept above his cheek, grazing him and leaving a scratch.
This was tough!
He realized the ghosts’ copying was becoming more complete.
They had no intelligence, but bit by bit they were learning Siloque’s combat instincts.
The army of Red Specters stared at Siloque like hungry beasts.
Seven minutes!
I can only hold out for seven minutes at most, Cass, you’d better hurry up! That’s what I wrote in the data!
Siloque desperately wanted to run, but he couldn’t.
***
“Is this…?”
In a secret chamber of the hidden passage, the spacious interior was decorated in warm colors.
There were some emptied treasure chests and broken tables and chairs, and a shriveled humanoid corpse lay in the center of the room.
Humanoid, except for the shriveled triangular ears on its head and a tailbone connected to the spine at its rear.
Orc.
Cass recalled what was in the textbooks.
This corpse was very different from the monsters encountered along the way.
It hadn’t turned to dust, just quietly becoming part of the broken chamber’s decor.
Cass didn’t think too much about it.
Time was tight.
As the data instructed, he took the Monster Tooth Totem from inside the mummy’s shirt.
Buzz—
A prompt sounded on his Ring Terminal.
Cass looked and saw it was a new Dungeon Task.
“So this totem is the key item to start the mission…”
Thinking so, Cass scanned the totem and placed it into the terminal’s storage.
“–!!”
Cass instantly retreated.
Two silver flashes streaked past, and a pair of axes smashed into the spot where he’d just been.
Almost got his head split open.
Standing before him, two monsters with axes had jumped down from the ceiling — bronze-skinned, hollow-eyed, horned [Banana Cult Imps].
Cass had no intention of fighting and turned to run.
He’d lost count of how many traps like this he’d triggered already.
The underground space was far larger than the Church above.
Passages formed by intersecting crossroads stretched in all directions.
A moment’s carelessness would get you lost.
And besides that…
Ooooooh—-
With a sound like a wail from the depths of the abyss, two monsters emerged from the wall.
Their bodies were withered and lanky, dressed in white hooded coats and wielding curved blades.
Cass remembered their name from the data—
[Banana Cult Death Servant]
They moved at speeds that left even Tauren or Maple Court Knights in the dust, closing in step by step before attacking with their weapons.
Cass activated the Friction skill, slid between the monsters’ white blades, locked his escape route in his mind, and sprinted forward without looking back.
He actually took a hit from their attack as he passed, but thanks to his skill, the force was reduced.
Otherwise, Cass would have been cut into three pieces by now.
Don’t get caught up in fighting. If you see a monster, run.
Cass understood what Siloque had meant.
Judging from the force and cunning angles of the attacks, these monsters were definitely above Lv15.
If my skill wasn’t Friction, I probably wouldn’t have survived the first fifty meters…
Could Siloque have been pretending to sleep and intentionally sent me alone?
Cass dodged countless traps and monsters that appeared out of nowhere.
Just retrieving the specified chest items and tools filled almost his entire terminal storage.
At last, he escaped the maze of tunnels inside the cave and arrived at an open area.
What met his eyes was an area like an ancient sacrificial ground.
Countless figures in white robes knelt on the plaza, reverently worshiping a majestic Temple at the far end.
Normally, Cass would have taken a photo, but time was short and monsters were chasing from behind.
Cass dashed onward, heading straight for the Temple at the end.
Legs aching, he ran up to the Temple’s Altar.
“Huff… Huff…”
Cass glanced at his terminal.
It had only taken a minute and a half to get here, but he’d been at full alert and full speed the entire way.
“Wait… I have to run back the same way?”
Right, the monsters.
Cass looked back.
The white-robed figures on the ground showed no reaction, and the pursuing [Banana Cult Death Servants] swayed their heads before returning into the walls of the passage.
However, if you took the sword, all the kneeling worshipers would leap up and enter a berserk state…
Just thinking about it made Cass feel exhausted.
Right now, all he wanted was to grab the [Exclusive Weapon of Cass], end this long day, and go home for a hot bath.
Cass took a blue potion from his waist pouch, pulled the stopper, and gulped it down.
The vanilla ice cream-flavored liquid restored his MP.
He then swallowed a magic potion to relieve muscle fatigue.
Ready to run at a moment’s notice, Cass looked at the Altar.
It was a time-worn, circular platform engraved with mysterious totems and symbols.
A sword floated above it, wrapped in golden light.
The longsword had an intricately crafted guard, a grip wrapped in black leather, and three gems sparkling on the pommel.
In front of him was also a rectangular object about 50 square centimeters in size, meant for Sacrificial Offering.
If you offer the corresponding sacrifice, you can obtain this sword…?
The data said this was a trap.
The sword, which exuded an aura similar to a Holy Sword, was actually just an ordinary blade with illusion magic cast upon it, tricking people into believing it was genuine.
You didn’t even need to offer a sacrifice; just grabbing it would work, but doing so would trigger a mechanism that opened a bottomless pit under your feet—falling straight to the other side of the world wouldn’t be out of the question.
Cass hesitated for a moment, then pulled out a fresh green banana—one given by Siloque—from his terminal.
“The offering is this. Is it really okay?”
It wasn’t that Cass didn’t trust Siloque.
It was just that in this ancient, solemn altar—a place that gathered the sincere faith of worshipers—the correct offering was a green banana, complete with a supermarket half-price discount sticker attached.
It felt completely out of place.
Trying to be respectful, Cass peeled off the discount sticker from the banana and placed it on the rectangular platform.
Silently, the longsword vanished.
From beneath the Altar, a new…sword?—rose up, replacing the previous blade.
But rather than a sword, it looked like a mass of flesh in the shape of a sword.
The entire weapon was composed of pinkish flesh and keratin layers, crisscrossed with countless capillaries.
The vivid red flesh pulsed rhythmically, and in the center of the guard was a round shape that, upon closer inspection, turned out to be a closed eyelid.
Compared to the fake sword from before, this weapon called [Wraithblade] radiated an indescribable sense of strangeness and evil.
“Is this really…a sword? Is this what Siloque called my exclusive weapon?”
I came down from the first floor to the second just for this chunk of meat?
So disgusting.
And way too creepy-looking.
Cass checked the data for comparison.
The AI-generated image of [Wraithblade] made by Siloque was a nine—no, ten—point match with the real thing before him.
Even the villain Dark Witch Mesco from Pretty Cure wouldn’t use such a physically repulsive weapon.
Yet Siloque said this was his exclusive weapon.
Cass covered his mouth, face twisted in dismay.
Without warning, the [Wraithblade] physically opened its eye, a golden iris and vertical pupil staring out.
“——?!”
The [Wraithblade] ignored Cass and locked onto the green banana, its gaze shining with delight.
Then, with a swift motion, it extended tentacles formed from intertwining intestines, scooped up the green banana, and absorbed it into the blade—then let out a satisfied burp with some unknown organ.
Hertanid really liked bananas, and accepting the offering meant he acknowledged Cass as the sword’s wielder.
The whole process was so casual that Cass could barely believe it.
Come to think of it, Banana Cult, Banana, banana=banana?
Could it really be that simple and random…?
Remembering the words from the data, Cass reached out with a hundred reluctant feelings, grasping the hilt of the blood-and-flesh [Wraithblade].
Surprisingly, the grip felt like real leather, and the sound as it sliced through the air was pleasing.
Because the weapon was alive, it couldn’t be stored in the terminal, so Cass had to use a sword bag to carry it on his back.
At that moment, the white-robed worshipers all rose, rushing toward Cass with such force the ground seemed to shake like a magnitude-3 earthquake.
***
Ten meters, nine meters, two meters.
Climbing the last step and shaking off the army of monsters behind him, Cass escaped from the underground space.
He thought Siloque would have woken up by now and they could go home tonight, but what he saw was—Siloque completely surrounded in the center by Red Specters, their arms transformed into blades, leaving no escape.
Cass was dumbfounded—what the hell is this?
The moment Siloque saw Cass, it was as if he’d seen a savior.
“Dungeon Hall!”
Cass understood this immediately.
Before Siloque even finished speaking, Cass had already taken out seven ghosts from the side, slightly slowing the advance of the Red Specters.
“Siloque!”
Cass shouted loudly, drawing the ghosts’ attention to himself.
Then, he crushed a Transfer Crystal, and with a flash of white light, vanished.
Unfortunately, Siloque hadn’t managed to stylishly wipe out the 31 ghosts present.
All he could do was stall for time and run.
From the sword bag on Cass’s back, it was clear the [Wraithblade] was in his possession.
As for these undead of the Banana Cult, deprived of the Great God’s blessing, they would completely transform into monsters of the second floor.
The Church would no longer be a neutral safe zone, but a true monster nest.
Cass using a Transfer Crystal to escape meant Siloque didn’t have to play tag with the Red Specters anymore.
Though I was the one being chased…
The last time I felt like this was when I was fleeing from goblins.
Thanks to the instant the ghosts’ attention shifted, Siloque in the center of the crowd finally found an opening and reached for his waist.
Countless Red Specters with faceless features, their blade arms converging like a tidal wave, were about to tear Siloque into dumpling-sized pieces.
“Heh.”
Siloque smirked.
At the instant the blades touched his pale skin, he crushed the Transfer Crystal hidden at his waist and vanished with a swoosh.
The ghosts pounced on empty air, their unstoppable momentum sending them crashing into each other with a heavy thud.