11 Days Before Bell Meets Ais and the Main Series Begins.
The 18th floor, the "Under Resort," lived up to its reputation. The soft, bioluminescent glow of the gargantuan trees and the distant sound of falling water made it easy to forget they were thousands of feet beneath the surface.
The Loki Familia had set up some temporary camp, the lighter color of the tents standing in stark contrast to the verdant greenery.
Why temporary camp you ask? Well they are here for a short break or recovery. They are not here to rest for an entire night.
Yuuya sat on a smooth basalt rock on the periphery of the main camp, his back to a massive tree. He was currently the most popular mystery in the expedition.
"You know, lad," Gareth started, hauling a crate of supplies nearby and wiping his brow. "We're in the Safe Zone. No monsters spawn here unless the Dungeon has a particularly nasty stroke. You can take that bucket off your head. Breathing is easier when you aren't filtering it through steel."
Tiona, who had been hovering nearby with cat-like curiosity, bounced over. "Yeah! Aren't you hot in there? We've been walking for hours! Even Ais-chan takes her light armor off when we camp!"
Ais, sitting a few feet away sharpening her rapier, looked up silently, her golden eyes lingering on the silver helm.
Yuuya didn't move. "You could say I have some experience. In my book, the moment you feel safe is the moment a taser finds its way between your ribs. I'll remove it soon enough—once I'm strong enough that I don't need the extra layer of caution."
"Taser? What's that?" Asked Tiona while tilting her head.
"Well if I were to put it in simpler terms, imagine a small wooden box that fits in your hand. Except that seemingly uninteresting wooden box have two metal points in one its side which also have a lightning spell on it. Usually meant for self-defense." Said Yuuya. "Some are meant to deter people and some are made to make people have a glimpse of the afterlife for a brief moment. Trust me, you don't want to experience that."
Tiona who have absolutely no idea what Yuuya was talking about humors him anyways. "Yikes, sounds like you experienced it yourself."
Yuuya grimaced under his helmet. "You don't wanna know."
"Still, that's a bit paranoid, even for a solo," Tione remarked, crossing her arms. "Unless you're hiding a scar? Or maybe you're just incredibly ugly?"
"Or maybe he's a wanted criminal," Bete Loga scoffed from a distance, leaning against a tree with his usual scowl. "Probably hiding a face only a mother could love."
"Hey! Hey! do you know where I can buy that thing you called taser?" Asked Tiona enthusiasticly. "It looks like we could use it on Bete!"
"Oh shut yer mouth you dumb amazon!" Replied Bete.
Yuuya let out a dry, metallic huff of a laugh. "Nothing so dramatic. But if my silence is making you all this twitchy, I'll offer a compromise."
The executives paused. Even Finn, who was looking over a map with Riveria, tilted his head to watch.
Yuuya reached up. With a mechanical click, he unlocked the narrow visor—the horizontal plate that protected his eyes. He slid it upward, revealing the sliver of his face that housed his eyes.
The reaction was immediate.
Tiona leaned in so close she was nearly nose-to-nose with the helmet. Her eyes widened. "Whoa..."
Riveria stepped forward, her brow furrowing. Under the shadow of the helmet's brow, Yuuya's eyes didn't seem to reflect the bioluminescent light of the 18th floor at all.
They looked like two deep, endless pits—staring out from the steel like twin voids in the fabric of reality.
"Your eyes..." Riveria whispered, her hand instinctively moving toward her staff. "There is no light in them. It's as if they're consuming the environment."
"They're just dark brown," Yuuya replied flatly. "Really dark. Not as rare as other eye colors out there, but still fairly uncommon."
"They don't look like brown," Tiona muttered, mesmerized. "They look like the bottom of a well at midnight. It's kinda spooky... but cool!"
Ais stared intently. For a split second, she thought she saw a flicker of something in those voids—not darkness, but a drive. A goal to achieve beyond the layers of desire to get stronger.
"You have the eyes of someone who has seen the end of the world," Finn observed quietly, his tone respectful.
"You are overthinking it really." Yuuya said, snapping the visor back down with a sharp clack. The voids disappeared, replaced once more by the cold, indifferent reflection of silver steel.
The interaction left the camp in a strange sort of contemplative silence. The Loki familia's guest was no longer just a powerful stranger; he was a man with a face that invited a thousand questions.
[Way to go.] the System whispered. [Tell them they're just really dark brown while your pupils look like they're literally made of anti-matter.]
'I'm not lying though.' Yuuya thought.
After that, during their free times, every one of them—from the Amazon twins to the High Elf—couldn't help but ponder what the rest of that face looked like.
After some few hours of rest, the temporary tents are being folded one by one. The march to the next floor now begins.
The march from the 18th floor toward the descent into the 19th was a somber affair.
The "Under Resort" usually lifted the spirits of adventurers, but as the Loki Familia approached the jagged maw leading into the Large Tree Labyrinth, the air grew stale and heavy.
Yuuya walked near the flank of the vanguard, his eyes wandering all over the place that is new to him.
As they rounded a massive, calcified root system near the floor's edge, he stopped dead in his tracks.
To his left, the verdant grass and trees simply... ended. In its place was a perfectly circular, terrifyingly smooth abyss. It wasn't a natural cave or a pit formed by erosion. It looked as if a god had taken a colossal, red-hot ice cream scoop and carved a chunk out of the world.
"What is that?" Yuuya's voice was sharp, cutting through the rhythmic clanking of the march.
Finn, Riveria, and Gareth all stopped simultaneously. The reaction was visceral. Gareth's grip on his axe tightened until his knuckles turned white. Riveria's breath hitched, her eyes reflecting a sudden, cold shadow. Even Finn, the ever-composed strategist, visibly shuddered, his thumb tracing the scar on his hand as if it had begun to itch.
"We call it 'The Great Chasm'" Riveria whispered, her voice trembling with a rare, raw edge. "It has been there for seven years."
'Well this is new. The mention of such hole is never stated in the original lore.' Thought Yuuya.
[It was made by one her spell.] The system chimed.
"The Dungeon has tried to repair the floor around it, but the stone in that circle... it refuses to grow back. It is dead space." Continued Riveria.
Seeing this unexpected change in this world's settings, Yuuya decided to dig in for more information.
"Seven years?" Yuuya walked to the very edge of the smooth rim. "What caused this? A floor boss?"
"No," Gareth grunted, his voice like grinding stones. "A monster of a different sort. I was on the surface that day, lad. I felt the tremor in my boots all the way up. For a moment, we thought the tower of Babel was going to tip over. The earth didn't just shake; it screamed."
Riveria stepped up beside Yuuya, staring into the dark depths of the hole. "It was the 'Maiden of Silence,' Alfia of the Hera Familia. During the final days of the Dark Age, she faced the Astraea Familia and their allies right here. Perhaps she grew tired of the noise of the battle and cast her ultimate spell."
"Genos Angelus," Finn added, his voice low. "That was the name of her most powerful spell. The Bell of Judgment. The same magic that killed the Leviathan. She didn't just destroy her enemies; she erased the very concept of the floor they were standing on."
"Aye, it's a miracle the 18th floor wasn't completely destroyed that day." Comment Gareth.
Yuuya looked down into the abyss.
Genos Angelus. He knew the name from his memories, but seeing the physical scar—the sheer, terrifying scale of it—put the power of the magic he now wielded into a chilling perspective.
'Well, looks like I now know what's the next spell I'll be creating.' Thought Yuuya amusely.
[Satanas Verion to win the battle. Genos Angelus to win the war, cripple the enemy, and turn everything in a 100 meter radius into dust.] The system said. [You might as well change your name into Alfia at this point.]
'and turn into a girl? Shut your trap system.'
Yuuya's train of thoughts were put into a stop as Finn speaks. "I've spent seven years analyzing that day," Finn continued, his blue eyes clouded with a confusion that clearly still haunted him. "And to this day, I cannot make sense of her motives. She was a Hera executive. She was supposed to be the vanguard of the evils during that uprising."
'There's more?' Thought Yuuya.
[Well it appears this world is more different than we expected.]
"Why?" Yuuya asked, turning his helmet toward the Braver. His question short and full of curiosity. "She was the enemy. Isn't that enough?"
"That's the problem," Finn said, shaking his head. "If you were to look at the records during that time, you'll notice a fairly obvious detail. Let's take Zald as an example. The 'Gluttony' of the Zeus Familia. He appeared in multiple skirmishes. He burned down storehouses, he clashed with the Ganesha Familia, he acted like a conqueror. But Alfia? In the entire duration of the uprising, she appeared exactly once."
Gareth nodded. "Aye. Just one battle. She didn't hunt civilians nor kill anyone. She didn't target the Guild. She didn't even intentionally destroy the city's infrastructure—this crater and the damage to the surrounding floors were simply the byproduct of her spells during that one fight."
"She moved through the city like a ghost, ignoring the chaos she was supposedly leading. It was as if she was... testing us." Riveria added, her gaze fixed on Yuuya.
"And looking back at it, it might've been her whole intention." Finn said as he looked at Yuuya as his brow furrowed. "She had the power to end Orario in a single night if she had truly wished it. But she chose one battle, one spell, and then she was gone. It's the greatest mystery of the Dark Age—why a woman with the power of a God acted like a judge instead of an executioner."
Yuuya remained silent. For a moment.
Then he spoke.
"She used her self as a stepping stone." Yuuya said. "A wall for the next generation to climb. She used herself so that the people who will be left behind can become stronger."
Finn stayed silent for a moment before nodding to Yuuya's statement. "I... Used to think about that as well and you might be correct. She made herself look evil on purpose. To be honest, if she were to return, her only problem would be clearing her name to the masses and perhaps, the guild as well."
"Aye, when people hear or see a connection with Evilus, watch them go crazy and start pointing fingers." Said Gareth.
"You cannot blame them. It was Orario's darkest era after all." Added Riveria.
Yuuya stood at the lip of the abyss, the wind from the lower floors whistling up like a mournful flute.
But he isn't done yet on his questions. He feels like he can squeeze out a little bit more information.
"You said she was gone," Yuuya said, his voice flat. "Did she retreat? Or did the Astrea familia finish her?"
The three veterans shared a look—a mixture of respect and lingering dread.
"Neither," Riveria replied, her gaze softening with a touch of tragic recognition. "According to the report from the Astraea Familia, Alfia didn't lose the battle because she was outmatched. They said she lost on purpose and perhaps, because she was dying long before she ever stepped onto the 18th floor."
Yuuya tilted his head. "Dying? You mean the incurable disease?"
"Yes" Finn confirms. "An incurable, agonizing affliction that had been rotting her from the inside for years. The Astraea girls reported that after she cast Genos Angelus, the sheer strain of the magic caused her to vomit an inconceivable amount of blood. She was standing in a pool of her own life force, yet she still held her ground."
"It worsened her condition just like the time when she used that magic against the Leviathan." Gareth said, folding his arms. "After unleashing that spell, the battle continues. Eventually, the girls managed to land a combined attack—a desperate, all-or-nothing strike. It didn't do much to her outside, but it shattered what was left of her internal stability. It was concluded she must've suffered from hemorrhaging, organ failure... by all rights, she should have been a corpse already."
"And then?" Yuuya pressed.
"She spoke her last words," Riveria said. "No one but the Astraea Familia heard them, but they said she looked... satisfied. Peaceful, even. She walked to the edge of this very hole and willingly let herself fall. At that depth, with the flames of the lower floors waiting below, she would have been incinerated before she ever hit the bottom. Considering the state of her health and the seven years that have passed, it's a certainty she is dead."
Finn rubbed his chin, a small frown creasing his brow. "There was one detail, though. Something the top members of Astrea mentioned in the private debriefing."
The mention of said detail immediately catches Yuuya's attention.
"They said as she fell, a sliver of light—almost like a falling star—seemed to follow her down into the darkness immediately a second or two after she threw herself into that hole," Finn continues. "It was subtle and fast, almost invisible to the naked eye. Only the higher level members like Alise Lovell managed to notice it by that time. They concluded it was likely an after-effect of the mana saturation from the battle, or perhaps just a trick of the light in the chaos."
"In the end, it was decided that the girls must've been just exhausted from the battle." Added Riveria.
Yuuya went still.
A sliver of light.
'A sliver of light huh,' Yuuya thought. 'This world is a lot more different than I thought it was.'
[I can confirm.] The system replied. [Compared to your memories, a lot of things changed. Bell made a promise to someone, gained Liaris Freese earlier than planned because of it, Alfia's name being surprisingly quite clean despite her affiliation, and heck—even Freya being a virgin goddess.]
'This world felt quite a bit like a fever dream.'
[Yeah. Though I will say it myself, the person Bell made his promise to? It's definitely connected to Alfia herself. It's either her, that perverted grandfather of his—old man Zeus, or it's another person we didn't know about.]
'Bell refers to that person as her, so it was most likely that it was Alfia.' Replied Yuuya. 'When I find the correct timing, I'll ask Bell about this.'
Yuuya's pondering and conversation with the system has left him being silent for too long. Drawing the attention of others.
"You alright, lad?" Gareth asked, noticing Yuuya's silence. "You're staring into that hole like you're looking for her."
"I'm just thinking," Yuuya replied, snapping his visor back down. "That if a woman like that chose to die, she probably made sure there was nothing left to find. She silenced her own story."
"Perhaps," Riveria said, turning back to the column. "But the silence she left behind is still felt every time we pass this place. It is a constant reminder of that era. A scar from seven years ago.
The march continued and Yuuya fell back into rank as the expedition began its final approach to the 19th-floor entrance. His mind was still pondering about this latest development.
And strangely, he felt drawn towards it. As if beckoning him to dive deeper into its mystery.
'Just another reason to get stronger.' Thought Yuuya.
He might still be weak. His path towards strength and his goal may be long but along the way, he'll make sure to dig into this topic.
Floor by floor, he will make sure to uncover the secrets, clues, and other things left behind by the past. Until the itch he is feeling disappears.
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