The damp, echoing cavern of the 27th floor was filled with the thunderous roar of the Great Falls, the massive curtain of water misting the air and catching the ambient glow of the floor's glowing crystals.
It was a chaotic zone, usually reserved for seasoned veterans, but today a large portion of the area had been cleared out and secured.
The Loki Familia was in the middle of a mini-expedition. Dozens of lower ranked members were spread across the rocky plateaus, working in coordinated squads to suppress waves of incoming monsters under the watchful, strict eyes of their executives.
"Keep your shields raised! Don't let the Mermans break your line!" Gareth's booming voice echoed over the rushing water as he pointed his massive axe toward a skirmish line.
A short distance away, the primary executives stood clustered near a stone outcrop, observing the formation metrics. Finn leanly rested his hand on the pommel of his spear, his sharp blue eyes scanning the battlefield alongside Riveria, who was quietly reviewing a map.
Ais stood perfectly still, her golden hair swaying slightly in the cavern breeze, while Tiona, Tione, and Bete leaned against the rock face, looking entirely bored by the low stakes training exercise. Lefiya was nearby, nervously clutching her staff, ready to provide defensive magic if a rookie slipped up.
Suddenly, a presence entered the cavern.
It didn't arrive with a loud shout or the dramatic flourish of a battle cry. It was a silent, heavy pressure that seemed to drag the temperature of the room down by several degrees.
[I sense the main forces of the Loki Familia directly ahead.] the System's voice resonated clearly inside Yuuya's mind, devoid of its usual lighthearted cheer, replaced by a focused, somber tone. [According to the data streams, they are conducting a localized training expedition to help their lower tier members. Advise caution.]
Yuuya didn't offer a single mental reply. He didn't even blink. He kept his stride perfectly unbroken, his boots clicking sharply against the wet stone as he walked straight through the center of the secured zone.
His Goliath scarf hung limply over his shoulders, and his face was entirely drained of the lively, expressive panic he had shown just an hour ago with Lili. It was completely, terrifyingly devoid of emotion—a cold, blank mask of absolute focus that looked less like an adventurer and more like an executioner marching toward the scaffold.
"Huh? Hey, look over there." Tiona blinked, her large eyes catching the dark silhouette moving past their perimeter. She perked up instantly, waving her arms aggressively. "Oh! It's Yuuya-kun! Hey! Yuuya-kun! Over here!"
Yuuya didn't turn his head. He didn't offer a wave, a grunt, or a sideways glance. He simply moved past them like a ghost drifting through a graveyard.
"What the hell is his problem?" Bete barked, his nose twitching as his wolf ears flattened against his hair. He spat onto the ground, his eyes narrowing. "The hell is that look on his face? Looks like he's looking right through us."
Ais stepped forward, her golden eyes locking onto Yuuya's retreating back. Her highly instincts—the raw, animalistic intuition that made her the Sword Princess—suddenly flared violently within her chest.
She didn't feel an aura of malice or bloodlust radiating from him. It felt similar to her hatred against the OEBD but this... this was something far worse. It was a void. A massive, suffocating gravity of pure, unadulterated desperation and rage tightly coiled beneath a thin layer of ice.
Without a word to her comrades, Ais's boots moved on instinct. She walked away from the training circle, silently following a few paces behind Yuuya.
"Eh? Ais? Wait up! Where are you going?" Tiona called out, blinking in confusion before running to catch up with her best friend.
"Tiona! Don't just run off!" Tione growled, her temper flaring as she immediately marched after her sister.
Bete let out a loud, irritated click of his tongue.
"Tch! Idiots, the whole lot of 'em! Hey, toothpick, where do you think you're going?!" he muttered to himself, but his own curiosity got the better of him as he slouched forward, trailing behind the group.
Finn watched the sudden migration of his core fighting force with a thoughtful, analytical hum. He looked over at the massive dwarf currently yelling at a group of rookies.
"Gareth! Take full command of the vanguard training! Riveria, with me."
"Are we following him, Finn?" Riveria asked, her brow furrowing as she adjusted her cloak. "He looked... unstable. His focus was entirely unnatural."
"Hestia-sama's vanguard just achieved an impossible Level 4 registration this morning, and now he's marching into the deep floors completely alone with a face like that." Finn said, his thumb subtly twitching—a reliable sign that his primal intuition was screaming. "This is a perfect opportunity to see exactly what kind of monster he really is when the leash is off."
The journey down through the lower floors was an exercise in pure, terrifying momentum.
Yuuya did not slow his pace for a single second. He moved through the 28th, 29th, and 30th floors like a localized hurricane.
Whenever a monster spawned from the walls—like a Bloodsaurus—Yuuya didn't even draw his blade.
He simply stepped inside their guard, channeled Satan's Verion through his fists, and shattered their core structures with a single, brutal strike before moving on, leaving the dissolving ashes in his wake.
The Loki Familia followed him from a safe distance, struggling to maintain their typical conversational banter against the sheer, suffocating speed of his descent.
"Hey! Yuuya-kun! Seriously, why are we going so fast?" Tiona jogged a few paces sideways, trying to catch his eye as they ran through a crystal tunnel.
"Did something happen? Did Bell-kun get a cool new weapon? Are you guys on a secret quest? Why won't you look at me?"
Silence. Not even a twitch of his jaw.
"Tiona, back off, he's clearly ignoring you." Tione muttered, her hand resting near her weapon. "Look at his breathing. He's running at a Level 4 pace, but his chest isn't even heaving. He's completely locked in."
"It's creepy." Bete growled from the rear, his claws scraping against the stone. "He isn't even scanning the corners. He knows exactly where the spawns are before they even open their eyes. It's like he's looking at a map we can't see."
Ais kept her gaze glued to his hands. She noticed the faint, dried trail of dark crimson flakes along his right wrist—blood that didn't belong to a monster.
'He's hurting.' she thought silently, her chest tightening with a strange, heavy curiosity. 'Something inside him is breaking.'
Finn and Riveria exchanged a grim, meaningful glance from the back of the formation. They had traversed these floors hundreds of times, but they had never seen a single solo adventurer navigate the deep corridors with such automated, mechanical ruthlessness. He wasn't exploring. He was executing a straight line.
The transition to the 37th floor was immediate and stark. The dark, damp caverns of the middle floors gave way to the sweeping, majestic, and terrifying architecture of the White Palace.
The walls were constructed of pristine, pale stone, stretching up into towering, vaulted ceilings that resembled a labyrinthine cathedral built by mad gods.
The pressure here was immense. The air felt heavy, thick with the concentrated mana of the deep floors.
Yuuya stepped onto the pale tiles, his boots echoing sharply in the vast, empty corridor. He didn't hesitate. He took a sharp, calculated left turn, navigating the grand pillars with absolute certainty until the massive, circular archway of the Colosseum loomed ahead.
The wide entrance opened into a gargantuan, open air arena built into the very heart of the floor—a notorious, cursed zone where the dungeon's natural spawning laws were entirely broken.
"Yuuya, stop!" Finn's voice suddenly cut through the cold air, sharp and commanding as he sprinted forward, outstripping the others to reach Yuuya's flank.
He reached out a hand, his face uncharacteristically tense.
"That's the direction of the Colosseum! If you aren't familiar with this floor's layout, listen to me—turn back! The structural rules inside that arena are completely different from the rest of the labyrinth! The monsters spawn infinitely, simultaneously, and without any rest periods! A single adventurer cannot—"
Finn's warning died in his throat.
Yuuya didn't even pause to acknowledge the captain's voice. He took one final, heavy step and crossed the massive stone threshold, walking directly into the open expanse of the Colosseum.
"Dammit! He's insane!" Bete yelled, rushing up beside Finn as the rest of the Loki executives halted just outside the grand archway, peering into the massive arena.
The stadium was colossal, surrounded by tiers of ruined stone bleachers that stretched up into the darkness. And the moment Yuuya's boots contaminated the center of the floor, the entire structure violently vibrated.
RUMBLE...
The pale stone walls tore open in dozens of places at once.
The distinctive, wet, cracking sound of the dungeon spawning monsters echoed like a volley of musketry. From the floor, from the walls, from the arches—massive, terrifying shapes began to manifest in rapid succession.
Lizardman Elites with jagged halberds. Barbarians. Spartoi—the terrifying, skeletal warriors clad in ancient iron armor, wielding heavy broadswords. And Skull Sheep, their hollow eyes glowing with a malicious, purple light.
Within seconds, a horde of over fifty, deep floor monsters entirely encircled the lone Level 4.
"Riveria, get your defensive incantations ready!" Finn commanded, his grip tightening on his spear as his battle instincts kicked into overdrive. "The moment he falls, we launch a extraction line! We can't let a promising adventurer die in our watch!"
But before Riveria could even begin her chant, the slaughter began.
Yuuya stood in the center of the rising tide of monsters, and for the first time since he left the clinic, a sound escaped his throat.
It wasn't a cry of fear. It was a low, guttural, and terrifying snarl of pure, unrestrained rage—the voice of a soldier who had spent a past life surrounded by death, and refused to let it claim his family again.
"Get out of my way." Yuuya hissed.
He exploded.
The physical displacement of his movement was so violent that a visible shockwave of compressed air ripped outward from his feet, cracking the pale floor tiles.
He materialized directly in front of the leading Lizardman Elite before the creature could even lower its halberd.
He didn't draw a blade. He brought his right fist back, his knuckles instantly igniting with a blinding, chaotic distortion of sound energy.
•GOSPEL!•
He punched straight through the center of the monster's heavy iron chest plate. The force completely atomized the creature's entire upper torso, sending a massive, cone-shaped shockwave of pressurized air and shattered bone tearing through the three barbarians standing directly behind it.
The force of the strike was so immense that the air in the Colosseum howled like a gale force wind.
"What the... what kind of strength is that?!" Tione gasped, her eyes widening in absolute shock as she watched four deep floor monsters disintegrate into ash from a single, unarmed strike.
Yuuya didn't stop to admire the damage. He danced through the horde like a wraith.
'Aha~ isn't this what you're always supposed to be? A weapon?'
A voice whispered in Yuuya's mind, it was sweet, and poisonous.
'Admit it, Yuuya. You are, and always have been, destined to be a weapon.'
Yuuya dodged a massive broadsword sweep from a Spartoi by a mere fraction of an inch, his body twisting fluidly. In the same motion, his hand snapped out, grabbing the skeletal warrior by its iron helmet and driving it downward into the stone with enough force to shatter the floor, instantly crushing its magic stone.
CRACK. CRACK. BOOM.
'A person—no. You're no person. You're a machine. A machine meant for war.'
The Colosseum went completely chaotic. But it wasn't a battle—it was an absolute, systematically executed execution.
Yuuya moved like a machine designed for the sole purpose of termination.
'That's right, Yuuya. You are nothing but a weapon, a tool.'
He used the monsters' own weight against them, shifting his center of gravity with a terrifying elegance that left Ais completely breathless as the voice in his head continued to speak.
'A weapon meant for nothing but violence and a tool for endless bloodshed.'
A Skull Sheep charged from his blind spot, its horns gleaming.
'So stop playing pretend and start acting like the weapon you're supposed to be~'
Without turning around, Yuuya unleashed a back kick, striking the beast like a cannonball, launching its massive frame across the arena where it smashed into a pillar, instantly exploding into black dust.
'It's easier for you that way anyway. Is it not?' The voice muttered, coaxing Yuuya even more.
"He's not conserving his mind nor stamina..." Riveria whispered, her hands freezing over her staff as she watched the display in sheer disbelief.
"He's not just fighting." Finn murmured, his blue eyes wide, his thumb completely still now as he realized there was no danger to the boy. "He's venting. He is treating the deep floor like a personal whetstone. Look at his eyes."
Through the clouds of rising gray ash and the endless spawning rifts, Yuuya's face was illuminated by the flickering purple glow of dying magic stones.
His dark eyes were wide, burning with a fierce, terrifying fire of pure self-hatred and absolute resolve. Every time a monster fell, another took its place, the dungeon aggressively responding to his presence by spawning even heavier, elite variations.
'Lose yourself to the violence, Yuuya! This is what you're meant to be! Bury everything: your emotions, hope, body, EVERYTHING!'
An entire squad of five Spartoi, larger than the rest, manifested in front of him, their shields locked in a defensive wall.
'BE THE WEAPON THAT YOU ARE MEANT TO BE!!!'
Yuuya didn't slow down. He charged straight toward the iron line, a ferocious, wild grin finally breaking across his face—a look of pure, unadulterated war lust.
The voice in his head is starting to win, making him believe that it was right
He threw both hands forward, channeling a massive Satanas Verion that rippled through the air like a visible distortion wave.
"SHATTER!" he roared.
The sound magic detonated with the force of an exploding siege engine. The iron shields, the skeletal bones, the stone floor beneath them—everything within a ten meter radius was instantly reduced to fine, gray powder.
'Aha~! That's more like it!' The voice in his mind said in glee.
Outside the archway, Bete stood completely speechless, his mouth slightly open, his ears twitching as the sheer volume of the impact rattled his skull.
"That... that guy... he's a monster. He's a complete psycho."
Tiona didn't call out his name anymore. She just stared, a profound, respectful awe washing over her face as she watched the lone adventurer stand amidst a swirling storm of ash, his fists still smoking and humming with dangerous, lethal vibration, waiting for the next wave to rise.
[...u..y...a...!]
Yuuya stood in the center of the bloodless slaughterhouse, his breathing steady, his eyes already tracking the next cracking rift in the wall.
[Yu...ya...a...!]
But just before he can start his next move, his voice or rather, the System's voice pulled him out of his thoughts again.
It felt that Yuuya is starting to spiral deeper to a place that he will have a very, very hard time to crawl out from. Seeing this, the System cannot just stand still.
[YUUYA! Snap out of it!]
Yuuya froze on the spot, his foot halting.
"S-system...?" He muttered.
[You numbhead...] The System sighed. [You're letting yourself be consumed by your own dark thoughts again. Don't believe that voice, Yuuya. You are not a weapon. You are a human. You have a heart, you bleed, and most importantly, you have emotions.]
The System or at this point, Yuuya's alter ego explained to him. Telling him that the voice in his head is lying.
[While it is somewhat true that you're born in a way that suggested you are meant for combat, don't. Don't believe it, Yuuya. You're not, and never has been, obligated to become a weapon; a tool for combat just because you are born with the capability to become one.]
[You are you, Yuuya. You are what you choose to be. You have the right to be whatever you want. The choice to choose the path of your life is yours and yours alone. Will you really allow a random insignificant voice to coax you into thinking that you are nothing but a unfeeling weapon? A being that could only feel emotions through the act of violence?]
"..."
'...heh.' Yuuya let out a quiet laugh.
[...?]
'...for the second time today, thank you, System. Really.' Yuuya replied as he started to calm himself down. 'Thank you for pulling me out, I needed those words more than I thought.'
Yuuya took a deep breath as he started to stabilize his condition. Not a hint of urgency in his expression even when the monsters approaches closer.
'Then, I suppose no more wasting energy then.' Yuuya thought as his hand gripped the hilt of Kurotsuki. 'I must do my part of the script in not a half-hearted manner.'
The atmospheric pressure within the grand, pale amphitheater plummeted the exact microsecond Yuuya's fingers wrapped around the hilt of his katana, Kurotsuki.
A sharp, metallic click echoed across the stone as the blade cleared the scabbard by a mere inch.
In that single breath, Yuuya didn't just adjust his stance—he stepped completely into the zone.
The chaotic noise of the spawning horde seemed to stretch and warp, slowing down to a pathetic crawl in his perception.
Deep within his chest, the hidden reserves of his Falna ignited like a pressurized furnace as he unlocked the absolute ceiling of his mortal vessel.
Limit Off.
[Heh. Cocky bastard. But that's better. Go.]
Yuuya didn't respond, he just smirked, and took off.
Outside the archway, Finn's eyes dilated in sheer, unadulterated shock.
"What...?"
Yuuya vanished.
He didn't just move fast; he entirely ceased to exist in the optical reality of the spectators. A violent, concussive boom of displaced air shattered the pale tiles where he had been standing a fraction of a second prior, kicking up a ring of pulverized stone.
Before the surrounding Barbarians or Spartoi could even register the sudden vacuum of his departure, a blinding, flash pitch black arc-lines violently erupted across the entire eastern sector of the arena.
It was a flawless, terrifying display of execution. Yuuya used his new mastery over Limit Off. The last time he is down here, he doesn't stop until Limit Off becomes a part of him.
Now that he mastered it, he intended to live in it for the entirety of this dungeon run.
"Ais, did you see that?!" Tiona shouted, her voice squeaking in absolute bewilderment as her eyes frantically darted across the stadium, completely unable to track his silhouette. "Where did he go?! He's completely gone!"
"He's... he's too fast." Ais whispered, her hand tightening around the hilt of Desperate. Her golden eyes were wide, tracking only the continuous, explosive bursts of black dust and the brilliant trails left by Kurotsuki. Her heart hammered against her ribs.
Even for a high tier Level 4, the speed Yuuya was displaying was a statistical impossibility.
What followed was not a battle; it was a systematic, automated erasure.
Yuuya moved through the infinite waves like a tempest of steel and sound. Kurotsuki sang a deadly, high pitched song as it cleaved through the thick hides of the monsters as if they were nothing more than wet parchment.
He didn't waste a single movement. A squad of skeletal Spartoi lunged forward with their spears locked in a synchronized thrust, only for Yuuya to materialize directly above their weapon tips, his body spinning horizontally in mid-air.
•Gospel.•
A compressed wall of sound erupted from Yuuya, instantly flattening the Spartois, sending a violent shockwave of debris into the air.
Wave after wave spawned from the weeping stone walls. The Colosseum or rather, the dungeon, furious at the continuous slaughter of its children, aggressively accelerated its output.
Ten monsters became thirty. Thirty became fifty. The pale walls cracked open relentlessly, vomiting out stronger variations to the limit of what it was allowed at that floor.
But Yuuya only pushed his vessel harder. His face was a mask of fierce, unyielding intensity, his dark eyes burning with the image of Bell's blood stained hand.
Even after he calmed down, every swing of his blade was still driven by a relentless, crushing weight of urgency. He couldn't slow down. He couldn't rest. Seventeen days was all the world had given him, and he would drag every drop of strength out of his soul to rewrite that script.
The slaughter continued uninterrupted for under an hour.
Fifty minutes of non-stop slaughter. The arena floor was entirely buried beneath a thick, swirling fog of black monster ash, the stone littered with hundreds of glittering magic stones that the system didn't bother to collect since the Loki familia is watching.
And then, abruptly, the world went completely dead.
A heavy, unnatural silence collapsed over the massive stadium. Yuuya flicked Kurotsuki to the side, casting off a non-existent drop of blood before smoothly sliding the blade back into its sheath with a crisp, echoing clack.
He stood perfectly still in the center of the arena, his chest rising and falling in a steady, controlled rhythm. His expression neutral as he scanned the perimeter.
The walls had stopped cracking. The wet, tearing sounds of the dungeon spawning had entirely ceased. The pale stone structure remained perfectly smooth, the glowing purple rifts fading away into nothingness.
The dungeon had stopped.
Outside the threshold, the Loki Familia executives stood frozen, a profound, chilling disbelief paralyzing the entire group.
"The... the walls..." Lefiya stammered, her staff trembling in her hands as she stared at the empty arena. "They aren't opening anymore. Why aren't they opening? It's the Colosseum! It's supposed to be an endless spawning loop!"
"He outpaced it..." Riveria murmured, her voice carrying a rare, shaky notes of genuine horror. She took a step closer to the archway, her eyes wide as she stared at the vast, empty expanse of ash. "In all our expeditions... in all the centuries the gods have monitored the labyrinth... I have never heard of a single mortal outpacing the generation cycle of a deep floor arena to the point where the dungeon simply... gives up. He broke the floor's mechanics."
Finn didn't say a word. His thumb was entirely numb, his analytical mind struggling to calculate the sheer, terrifying implications of what he had just witnessed.
A single Level 4 adventurer had just forced a section of the deep floors into absolute, forced submission through raw violence.
In the center of the quiet stadium, Yuuya ignored the audience entirely. He closed his eyes, speaking directly into the silence of his mind.
'System. Status check. Give me the current numbers.'
A bright, clear blue screen materialized in his mind's eye, accompanied by the familiar, supportive voice of his partner.
[I've compiled the growth metrics from that run, Yuuya,] the System said, its tone a mix of deep pride and underlying concern. [The Limit Off training worked perfectly, you're holding out well. Here are the current metrics for your Level 4 status.]
~~~~
Strength: 762 ===> 955
Endurance: 795 ===> 935
Dexterity: 801 ===> 932
Agility: 790 ===> 940
PMagic: 795 ===> 901
~~~~
Yuuya stared at the pristine rows of S-rank statistics, and his jaw tightened. He let out a sharp, irritated click of his tongue, his face a dissatisfied grimace.
'It's not enough.' Yuuya thought bitterly, his fists clenching at his sides. 'I've gotten used to this place even though it's only my second time here.'
[Yuuya, those are incredible numbers for less than an hour of work.] the System gently reminded him, its voice soft. [But I get it. If you want to push past the standard limits before the full moon deadline, you need to go much deeper. The deeper floors are the only places left with high-density threats.]
'Alright, down we go.' Yuuya replied. 'We don't stop until the timeline catches up.'
Turning on his heel, Yuuya began walking out of the center of the Colosseum. His boots crunched softly against the thick layers of ash as he retraced his steps, heading directly toward the grand archway where the Loki Familia was still standing like statues.
As he neared the exit, his focused gaze finally drifted upward, giving the group of executives a brief, passing glance.
His eyes were entirely hollow, looking at them as if he had literally just realized they were standing there. He didn't offer a greeting, an explanation, or a nod of recognition. He simply walked past them, his shoulder brushing inches away from Finn's cloak.
A few paces past the threshold, Yuuya stopped. He planted his right boot firmly against the pale stone tile, leaning his torso forward as his muscles tensed one final time.
BOOM.
A shockwave of wind, dust, and shattered debris erupted from the floor as Yuuya exploded forward into a sprint, vanishing down the deep floor corridor like a bullet, leaving a howling gale in his wake.
The Loki Familia stood in the settling dust, their hair and cloaks whipping wildly from the lingering draft.
Bete slowly reached up, brushing a layer of pulverized white stone off his shoulder. He stared down the empty, dark corridor where the boy had vanished, his wolf ears twitching as a rare, genuine shiver ran down his spine.
"Tch..." Bete muttered, his voice unusually quiet, stripped of his usual arrogant bark. "There is something seriously, seriously wrong with that guy."
(Author: my man is just desperate alright?)
∆∆∆∆
The descent past the 37th floor was completely devoid of sound.
Yuuya tore through the deeper sections of the labyrinth like a machine operating on a pre-programmed loop.
The only objective was the termination of anything that crossed his path. The permanent activation of Limit Off kept his body in an overlocked state, but his mind remained eerily still, drifting in a numb, silent focus.
On the floors immediately following the White Palace, the labyrinth began vomiting its true deep floor nightmares.
Packs of Loup Garou—vicious wolves that moved with terrifying agility—sprinted along the pale stone corridors, their jaws snapping as they coordinated their hunting patterns to corner the lone adventurer.
Yuuya didn't even blink. His expression remained entirely flat as he glided right through the center of the pack. His movements were small and perfectly quiet.
Kurotsuki cleared its scabbard with a faint whistle, shearing cleanly through the skull of the leading wolf before it could even register his presence. As the remaining beasts lunged from his blind spots, Yuuya simply extended his left palm toward them.
•Gospel.•
The compressed wall of sound shattered the internal magic stones of the Loup Garou instantly, turning them into falling blankets of gray ash.
He didn't stop to watch them dissolve. He kept walking, his boots stepping over the glittering magic stones without a single glance.
When he reached the 49th floor, the massive, monumental chamber of the Monster Rex loomed ahead. The wide, cavernous zone was dead silent. The legendary Floor Boss, Balor, was currently missing from its throne, still bound to its long, nine month respawn interval after its last recorded defeat.
The dungeon, however, compensated for the boss's absence by spawning an army of its underlings. Massive, grotesque Fomoires cracked out of the weeping walls.
A Fomoire charges at hum floor but Yuuya merely shifted his weight by a single inch, dodging it's charge.
He then swung Kurotsuki whispering across the monster's throat in a silent, flawless arc. He channeled a brief burst of gospel directly into the steel at the moment of contact, the vibration separating the monster's head from its body without a single shred of resistance.
By the time he descended into the 52nd through the 58th floors, the environmental matrix shifted into a blazing, suffocating hellscape dominated by the Valgang Dragons.
The massive, red scaled dragon crawled along the molten rock faces, their throats glowing with the internal heat of impending fire breath.
The immense, sweltering heat of the dragon territory didn't even register in Yuuya's mind. He was still too focused to care. When a Valgang Dragon swooped down from the ceiling, its massive jaws open to incinerate him, Yuuya simply stepped beneath its shadow.
He drove his fist into the creature's underbelly, while also simultaneously casting Satanas Verion that rippled through its scales, fracturing its internal structure from the inside out.
The dragon burst into a massive geyser of black dust, its ash drifting lazily into the rivers of magma below.
He didn't slow down. He didn't care about the heat, the ash, or the endless waves. He just kept descending, a quiet phantom cutting through the deep.
∆∆∆∆
(Author: Yuuya would be entering the glacier territory. I don't know much about the 60th floor, and the monsters of the glacier territory is still unknown. So I'll be creating random ones instead.)
Hours bled into a seamless, exhausting blur of endless slaughter.
Finally, the suffocating, brimstone scented air of the dragon territory began to fade. The temperature in the grand tunnels plummeted at a violent, unnatural rate, dropping from a sweltering furnace to a freezing void within the span of a single corridor.
Yuuya finally skidded to a halt, his boots carving faint, quiet lines into the frost rimed stone floor.
He was standing on a monumental stone platform that overlooked a colossal, yawning abyss. A grand, sweeping staircase—carved from ancient, dark stone—spiraled down into a terrifying, frozen darkness. The air he exhaled materialized as a thick, white cloud of vapor, swirling lazily in the ambient, pale blue light of the floor.
He had reached the gate. Directly below him lay the 60th floor—the beginning of the legendary Glacier Territory.
Yuuya let out a long, slow breath, his shoulders trembling slightly as the immediate adrenaline of Limit Off dialed back just a fraction. He wiped a layer of frost from his eyebrows with the back of his sleeve.
'System.' Yuuya thought. 'Status check. Give me the numbers.'
[I'll be blunt, it almost reached the thousands.]
~~~~
Strength: 955 ===> 994
Endurance: 935 ===> 991
Dexterity: 932 ===> 996
Agility: 940 ===> 998
Magic: 901 ===> 990
(Author: btw, just in case y'all forgot, Yuuya doesn't need Hestia to update his stats because of the system. Meaning the stats you guys are currently seeing, is the current stat that he is fighting with. In other words, as he fights, he grows. Literally.)
~~~~
Yuuya stared at the glowing rows of 900+ statistics. He just let out a small, quiet click of his tongue.
'Well... There's no helping it I guess. Still, it's not enough. 'Yuuya thought, as his gaze drifted back into the entrance to the 60th floor. 'Guess I'm the first ever adventurer entering this place again ever since the era of the Zeus and Hera familia.'
[Yeah, from the 60th floor all the way down to the 65th, it's the infamous glacier territory.]
Yuuya narrowed his eyes, watching the thick crystals of ice creeping along the ancient steps.
"I can't just dive down there now blindly can I?" Muttered Yuuya as he realized he hasn't brought any material that can keep him warm except for his Goliath Scarf.
Just then, he started using his magic AEEOC, as a magic circle appeared in his left eye.
"When was the last time I used this spell again? Ah, when in my first few days as a adventurer. Mainly for money." Thought Yuuya. "Well, the conditions for using it is quite hectic so I never really find any other use for it."
AEEOC or "All Existence Eyes of Creation" is a magic that allows the user to manifest any object at will. Though it requires the user to have knowledge about an object's detail very precisely, as well as it's intended purpose.
Yes it would've been a powerful magic with a lot of potential, especially to a person like Yuuya who have a photographic memory. Allowing him to manifest objects and materials he knows for his own use.
But unfortunately, Yuuya's past life is... For a lack of a better term... Boring or completely unexceptional. Simply put, he has the average life. Your average joe who compared to a typical joe, hasn't have much knowledge of any other fictional works.
Yes. Danmachi is the only work of fiction Yuuya has ever known in his entire life. Let's leave it at that.
Back to Yuuya, he recalled the salamander wool and undine cloth he once seen on the market. He recalled everything, down to it's very last detail and it's purpose.
Finally, after a while, he succeeded in creating it. He also shaped the salamander wool into a cloth so that he can wear it more easily.
[Also, always keep your Limit Off state on, you'll need that two additional levels of boost in endurance to not freeze to death.]
"I know."
With that, he puts on the clothes, layering it upon each other. After his final preparations are done, he continues on his way.
He plunged down the massive stone staircase, crossing the threshold into the 60th floor.
The transition into the Glacier Territory was brutal. The air didn't just feel cold; it felt heavy, thick with a jagged, supernatural frost that clawed ruthlessly at any exposed flesh. Navigating the terrain became an immediate struggle.
The floorboards of the palace were entirely replaced by slick, uneven shelves of ancient permafrost, and towering glaciers serrated the pathways like broken teeth.
Every step required absolute calculated precision to avoid losing footing.
Despite the extreme, lethal environment, Yuuya's breathing remained steady. Beneath his external armor, the layers of Undine cloth and Salamander wool cloth worked in perfect tandem, regulating his internal core temperature against the biting gale.
Combined with his exceptionally high endurance stat and the thick fabric of the Goliath scarf, he was entirely insulated from the freezing death that would have claimed a regular adventurer within minutes.
As he moved deeper into the frozen labyrinth of the 60th floor, a massive, crystalline structure began to materialize through the thick white mist. The ice here grew in beautiful, terrifying geometric formations, resembling a sprawling, silent graveyard of frozen flora.
Thalia's Ice Garden.
Yuuya stopped, his dark eyes staring at the shimmering, translucent spires. This was the notorious sector that even the legendary Zeus and Hera Familias have up on exploring, eventually abandoning its exploration entirely during their golden era.
[Yuuya, the main path cuts directly through the center of the garden.] the System analyzed, its tone turning cautious. [But I recommend finding an alternate route.]
"I know." Yuuya thought back, his internal voice flat and distant. "The events of volume twenty one happen right here in the future. I'm not risking a single butterfly effect."
He deliberately turned his back on the main entrance of the garden, actively searching for a narrow, winding bypass along the outer glacial walls.
He knew exactly what slumbers in the deep future of this floor. Luckily enough, Regina's Revis—the corrupted spirit that would one day entrap Ais—was not yet present. The malice of the floor had not yet coalesced into that specific catastrophe, and Yuuya had absolutely no intention of disrupting the timeline's natural progression prematurely. He needed the future to stay intact for Bell's sake.
Forcing his way through a narrow fissure in the ice, Yuuya completely bypassed the garden.
Though Yuuya did notice that there was a lack of monsters on this floor, another detail that he doesn't know and wasn't mentioned on the wiki.
He deduced that perhaps because there have been no adventurers that have stepped foot in this place for so long, the dungeon simply diverted the energy used to spawn monsters into other floors instead.
By the time he navigated the frozen straightaways of the 61st floor and descended into the 62nd, the mist began to thin out slightly but just slightly.
[Yuuya, I've got some news.] the System spoke up, a digital waypoint mapping itself across his peripheral vision. [If you alter your course and head directly south, you'll encounter a massive cave system. According to my systemic environmental scans... it's a hidden version of the Colosseum tailored specifically to the 62nd floor.]
Yuuya paused at the crossroads. To his left, the dark, descending tunnel led toward the entrance of the 63rd floor and the deeper, uncharted abysses of the labyrinth.
For a brief, fleeting moment, a bizarre, incredibly powerful sensation thrummed deep within Yuuya's chest that he cannot explain. It was a magnetic, instinctual tug—a silent scream from the absolute depths of the dungeon, practically begging him to keep diving down into the dark and he felt attracted to it. It felt old, heavy, and strangely familiar.
He stared down the deep tunnel for three silent seconds, trying to process the feeling he was experiencing.
"Not now." Yuuya whispered. "That's not my current objective."
Turning on his heel, he marched toward the southern vector, tracking the waypoint until the mouth of a gargantuan, jagged cave loomed before him.
At first glance, the interior of the cave appeared to be a completely safe, desolate zone. The rock formations were smooth, undisturbed by the wet cracking sounds of the dungeon's spawning cycles. But as Yuuya walked deeper, the rough stalactites and natural stone walls gradually began to shift.
The jagged rock smoothed out, transforming into perfectly carved, geometric tiers of pale stone buried beneath centuries of undisturbed permafrost.
A massive, circular amphitheater opened up before him, hidden away in the belly of the floor. It was an unmistakable, ancient replica of the 37th floor's Colosseum, completely preserved in ice.
A flicker of genuine interest finally broke through Yuuya's expression. He stopped at the edge of the stone bleachers, his eyes scanning the vast, frozen arena.
"A second colosseum..." Yuuya murmured, his dark eyes narrowing slightly. "There was never a single mention of a place like this in the wiki."
He recalled the deep lore of the world clearly. Even when Zald and Alfia had marched alongside the Zeus and Hera Familias, conquering their way down to the monumental depths of the 71st floor, a secondary infinite spawn arena on the 62nd floor had never been recorded or brought back to the surface. It was a completely blank spot in history.
A cold, quiet breath escaped Yuuya's lips, turning to vapor in the dim blue light. He gripped the hilt of Kurotsuki, the black steel humming with immediate, overlocked anticipation as the ancient stone walls of the hidden arena began to violently crack open.
"Perfect." Yuuya said as the first waves of deep floor glacier monsters began to manifest. "Just what I need."
The ancient, ice locked amphitheater didn't rumble with the chaotic, wet bubbling of the upper floors. Instead, as Yuuya's boots settled onto the frosty central ring, a sharp, metallic chime echoed through the frozen cavern, like the ticking of a gargantuan, subterranean clock.
The pale blue permafrost along the stadium walls cracked open in precise, geometric fault lines. Ten crystalline entities materialized simultaneously, stepping out from the frost. Their bodies were massive, translucent constructs of dense, hyper-compressed ice that resembled towering, jagged centaurs, their heavy hooves ringing out against the stone like iron striking an anvil.
Yuuya didn't wait. His expression remained entirely flat, the world still feeling gray and bland around him as he pushed forward. He blurred instantly, his Limit Off state engaged as Kurotsuki left its scabbard in a silent, seamless arc.
He channeled his sound magic directly into the edge of the steel, expecting the blade to cleanly slide through the first monster's torso just like it had back on the 37th floor.
CRANG
A deafening, metallic screech reverberated through the cave. The high frequency vibrations of his gospel infused blade sheared halfway through the crystalline torso, but the sheer, dense resistance of the ice caught the blade, violently halting Yuuya's momentum.
The kinetic feedback traveled straight up his arms, causing his joints to pop. The icy monster didn't shatter; it merely grunted, swinging a massive, crystalline bludgeon directly toward his skull with terrifying velocity.
Yuuya's eyes widened a fraction. He fluidly twisted his torso downward, letting the club whistle inches above his hair, before pivoting on his heel and driving a heavy kick directly into the creature's flank to force it back.
[Careful now.] the System's voice said. [These things aren't standard deep floor fodder—every single one of these specific monster variant possesses a strength of a mid level 7 and durability of a high level 8 entity. It's the tank of the glacier territory.]
Yuuya skidded backward across the frost, his blade held in a loose defensive guard as the remaining nine ice constructs began to systematically close the distance, their movements heavy but coordinated.
He calmly processed the math in his head. Thanks to his unique growth—maxing out every single parameter at 1,500 points before leveling up across three consecutive levels—his Level 4 status inherently carried a buffer of 4,500 points, including his current stats, that places him at around at 5,400+ points. Placing his stats around mid level 6. Combined with the two level amplification of Limit Off, his actual combat output sat comfortably at a pseudo mid Level 9.
~~~~
Author: here's the math that I use if some of y'all are still confused. This is across all five stat categories.
Lv 1~3: 4,500 points.
Lv 4/current stats: 980+
Limit Off bonus: +2 lv > 3,000 points.
Given how powerful Limit Off is described to be in the lore, let's assume the stat bonus that it gives is maxed out as well.
Total: 8,480 points.
Keep multiplying the 999 until we reach a number near 8,480. For me, I used 999 x 9, giving me a number of 8,991. Subtract that number to Yuuya's points and we'll get 511 points. Placing Yuuya at a mind boggling mid level 9 stats, assuming that the adventurer that would be compared to Yuuya maxes out their stats into 999 all the way to level 9.
Yes, he is broken asf, but that also explains why he can solo dive into this floor.
~~~~
But a pseudo Level 9 output didn't mean he could mindlessly steamroll a pack of highly coordinated Level 7, pretty much level 8 if one were to base it on endurance stats, glacier monsters.
The dense, supernatural permafrost acting as their armor drastically dampened his kinetic impacts. He was actually going to have to struggle.
"Heh. So you're telling me my luck DA worked against myself by giving me the strongest monster of the glacier territory?" Yuuya said.
[Pretty much.]
"Well, at least the Excelia won't be worthless."
He stepped back into the fray, his movements becoming far more calculated.
It took three concentrated slashes of Kurotsuki to completely shatter a single Centaur into glittering shards.
He systematically dismantled the first wave, his breathing turning shallow and controlled as the final centaur collapsed into dust.
The moment the tenth monster shattered, the ancient chime rang out a second time.
The walls cracked open again, and this time, twenty centaurs spawned.
Yuuya didn't complain. He simply reset his stance, his dark eyes observing the pattern. The arena didn't flood the floor with an endless, chaotic ocean of meat; it functioned on a strict, mechanical wave system.
By the time he cleared the third, fourth, and fifth waves, the cold air in the cave was thick with glittering, floating ice dust.
The numbers grew steadily. Wave six brought the total count of Centaurs to sixty. Yuuya's limbs began to feel heavy, the intense physical exertion is actually taking a toll against his body.
Yet, he kept his quiet and just continued on.
When the tenth wave cleared, the grand clock like chime didn't play its standard sequence.
Instead, a deep, ominous toll vibrated through the very bedrock of the 62nd floor.
The permafrost at the far end of the stadium violently exploded outward. A monolithic silhouette dragged itself out of the frozen wall—a gargantuan, multi-armed glacier irregular that towered over thirty feet tall, its frozen skin thick enough to resemble armored steel plates.
(Author: imagine a cyclops that have extra arms.)
"A wave boss..." Yuuya murmured softly, wiping a thin line of sweat from his chin. He adjusted his Goliath scarf.
If this place functioned like a simulation grid, then every tenth wave would naturally conclude with a boss fight.
[Careful, that variant of floor boss is a low level 9.]
"By variant, you mean there are other wave boss variants?"
[Yep, just like the Centaur. The dungeon just really hates you so it gave you the strongest one.]
"Man... I swear, with the amount of hate I'm getting from this place, it'll be the death of me one day."
The giant cyclops roared, a concussive wave of freezing air ripping across the stadium.
Yuuya met it head on.
Due to it mostly being made from permafrost, it was kind of transparent, giving Yuuya a view of where its magic stone rests.
He didn't use any flashy maneuvers; he targeted the joints of the massive construct first, then he casts a gospel to crack the permafrost armor before driving Kurotsuki deep into the magic stone.
The moment it's core is destroyed, the giant shattered with a deafening roar.
[You complained and yet, you destroyed it that easily.]
"Hey, at least I didn't need to struggle with it like back in the time with the Amphisbaena." Yuuya replied.
Yuuya then looked up, his dark eyes narrowing slightly through the mist.
From the frozen tiers, the cracks opened once more. But this time, instead of the standard increment of ten, fifteen separate crystalline centaurs stepped onto the floor simultaneously.
Yuuya paused, his tactical mind immediately identifying the progression trend.
"The scaling increases after every boss."
[Yeah, looks like it goes up by five elements per tier.] the System confirmed, tracking the spawning matrix. [Waves one through ten added ten monsters per wave. Waves eleven through twenty are going to add fifteen. If the calculation holds... by the time you reach wave twenty one, the dungeon will be throwing twenty additional Centaur monsters at you with every single wave.]
"Can this place even hold that many?"
[I highly doubt it. At most, the very maximum that it could do is 100 monsters. Play here long enough and you'll be facing a hundred of this Centaur's every wave. But I'm sure it wouldn't exceed more than that.]
A small, quiet breath escaped Yuuya's lips, turning to thick white vapor in the blue light. The scaling was steep, the difficulty was absurd, and the physical strain was going to be astronomical.
But as he felt his statistics steadily creeping higher and higher in real time, it was exactly what he needed.
"Fifteen." Yuuya whispered, his fingers tightening around the leather wrap of his hilt as the fifteen Centaurs charged his position. "Keep them coming."
∆∆∆∆
The mechanical, clock-like chime of the hidden 62nd floor arena didn't just ring for the start of the thirtieth wave; it tolled with a deep, ominous vibration that shook the very foundations of the frozen cavern.
Yuuya stood in the center of the frosted amphitheater, his breath coming in short, shallow gasps that froze into thick white plumes before his face.
He is exhausted, his stamina is nearly done. Fighting an army of Centaurs with the durability of high level 8 is no joke.The sheer, relentless scaling of the arena had caught up to him.
And for wave thirty, the dungeon had prepared a rather nasty surprise.
The pale blue permafrost along the stadium walls didn't just crack; it completely shattered as yet another one hundred Centaurs poured into the arena simultaneously.
Accompanying the wave boss cyclops who is not alone either, the colosseum spawned two more cyclops.
All in all, a hundred Centaurs and three cyclops surrounds Yuuya at all sides.
"Haha... Give me a break, there's too many of you." Yuuya laughed weakly as the army of monsters surrounded him.
His passive skill, Regen, was still working. As he can feel his stamina and mana recovering, but it was still outpaced by his output as a profound, heavy numbness was creeping into his legs.
'There are just too many of them.' Yuuya noted, his mind entirely quiet and analytical despite the overwhelming horde charging his position. 'If I try to dismantle them one by one, my vessel will experience total structural collapse before I hit the halfway mark.'
He took a slow, deep breath, letting the icy air fill his burning lungs. He had to finish this in a single, definitive stroke.
As the colossal wave closed the distance, their heavy footsteps rattling the stone, Yuuya didn't choose to retreat.
He dropped into a moving stance and began a concurrent chant. He was going to weave the intricate incantation of Alfia's grand magic while simultaneously fighting the wave to buy time.
•Blessing of the root of evil, curse of birth•
Yuuya started chanting into his scarf, his voice clear and focused as he fluidly tilted his torso beneath a massive, crystalline halberd sweep from a Centaur.
He lunged forward, the edge of Kurotsuki deflected a heavy club from a Cyclops, his lips never stopping the rhythm of the words.
•My original sin that devoured half of my body. Its not hard. There is no purification. There is no salvation.•
A sharp, crushing blow from one of the wave boss secondary arms smashed into the ground inches from his boots, launching a shower of ice shards across his armor.
Yuuya rolled through the debris, his dark eyes wide and unblinking, his mind guiding his vocal cords perfectly through the chaos.
•The resonance of this heavenly sound is my sin. The trumpet of gods, the lyre of spirits.•
The moment the chant reached its exact midpoint, the ambient light of the hidden cavern completely shifted.
A blinding, ethereal silver radiance cut through the blue mists as the colossal, majestic structure of the grand silver bell tower manifested directly above Yuuya, hanging suspended in the frozen air like a monument of pure starlight.
The monsters flinched, their instincts registering the sudden, absolute density of the magical signatures filling the room.
But Yuuya was already entering the final sequence, his blade tracing a tight defensive ring to hold back the front line.
•The melody of light, that is, the mark of my sins. Loved by the miniature garden, my destiny is shattered. I hate you. The compensation is here. Destroy everything with the proof of my sin.•
Yuuya leaped backward, creating a sliver of distance between himself and the charging army. He raised his left hand toward the gargantuan silver bell structure, his fingers spreading wide, and delivered the final, definitive anchor.
•Cry, holy bell tower.•
He swung his hand down.
•GENOS ANGELUS!•
The titanic silver bell gave a single, heavy tilt. Then, it swung.
What follows is the shockwave caused by its tolling, its weight demanded total submission from the environment.
For ten grueling, uninterrupted seconds, the holy bell tower tolled continuously, sending visible, shimmering ripples of sheer sonic shockwaves cascading across the frozen amphitheater.
The army of Centaurs didn't even have the chance to retreat. The moment the first vibration touched their dense permafrost armor, the ice shattered into fine white powder.
The sound magic bypassed their durability entirely, target locking their internal magic stones and violently detonating them into dust.
The multi-armed Cyclops let out a silent, strangled roar as the continuous ten second tolling dismantled its massive frame, fracturing its massive steel hard hide until it entirely exploded into a gargantuan geyser of gray ash.
When the final echo of the tenth second faded into the darkness, the stadium was completely vacant.
Yuuya slumped forward, using Kurotsuki as a crude crutch to keep himself from collapsing face first into the thick layers of ash. His vision was swimming with dark spots, his muscles vibrating with a horrific, cold exhaustion.
Click.
The far wall began to bubble, a faint, mechanical chime starting to register the preparation for wave thirty one.
"Not happening." Yuuya muttered softly. "Time out you insufferable dungeon, I had enough for now."
[Better get your arse moving.]
Gathering every single remaining ounce of his physical willpower, Yuuya dragged his heavily exhausted body across the frosted floor, stumbling past the grand stone archway and crossing the threshold out of the Colosseum's boundaries.
The moment his boots cleared the zone, the mechanical chime cut off abruptly, the fault lines on the walls sealing shut as the arena returned to its dormant state.
Yuuya slid down the dark stone wall of the outer corridor, sitting heavily on the icy floor. He closed his eyes, his breathing ragged.
"System... status check. Tell me it's done."
[Yep, you did it, Yuuya.] the System said, its voice full of a warm, profound respect. [Though it was a shame that it didn't allow you to level up, it still manage to max out all of your stats. All of them are now officially standing at 1500 points.]
~~~~
Strength: 1500
Endurance: 1500
Dexterity: 1500
Agility: 1500
Magic: 1500
~~~~
Yuuya stared at the perfect rows of 1500 points across every single category—the absolute ceiling for his vessel.
The sight brings a short lived relief, glad that his hard work pays off.
"Too bad, it still wasn't enough to make me level up. I guess I'll leave the rest to you then."
[Yeah. I won't break my promise. I swear.]
"Hm. What's the time on the surface?" Yuuya asked, his thoughts a bit sluggish from exhaustion as he closes his eyes.
[It took you quite a lot of time when navigating reaching this floor. The rest was spent on you fighting on the colosseum.] System said. [You leaved the surface at 2 months and 5 days ever since the main series began. It was currently morning on the surface and tomorrow, that is the day Bell rescued Haruhime.]
"So I've been down on the dungeon for nine days huh..." Yuuya replied.
(Author: yep, Haruhime's rescue happens on the 15th day of the second month.)
Yuuya then opened his eyes, the cold blue light of the Glacier Territory reflecting in his dark pupils. The timeline was perfectly aligned. He had no more time to waste down here.
Reaching into his system inventory, Yuuya pulled out a high-grade mind and stamina recovery potion. He popped the cork and drank the bitter, glowing fluid in a single swallow, feeling a sharp, immediate wave of mental clarity and physical relief ripple through his exhausted nervous system. The heavy trembling in his fingers slowly settled.
Next, he pulled out a neatly wrapped package of high-calorie, preserved food—still steaming hot and perfectly fresh from the static time lock of his inventory.
He ate quietly, his movements slow and methodical, reclaiming his baseline strength.
Once the package was empty, Yuuya smoothly stood up, adjusting his Goliath scarf tightly around his lower face to insulate his throat from the frost. He grabbed the hilt of Kurotsuki, confirming the solid, unyielding weight of the blade at his waist.
Turning his back on the frozen abyss of the lower depths, Yuuya stepped onto the monumental staircase, beginning his silent, rapid ascent back toward the surface world.
He was maxed out, his limits were obsolete, and it was time to go help his brother and make sure no more bad things happens to Bell.
∆∆∆∆
Author:
And that concludes this chapter. Quite the boring chapter don't you guys think? Sorry for that hehehe. But I really needed to make this part to justify Yuuya's strength (even for a little bit), his level up, and to clarify some things.
But if I were to give my personal opinion, don't take Yuuya's, or in this case, my power scaling too seriously. I just really needed him to be strong for my plan and intended plot.
Besides, once I reach Alfia's debut, this fanfiction would turn into a romance genre. Completely. Although there would still be some action's from time to time, that would only happen for the plot. The focus would only turn back into action on the final season, right around the ending.
With all of that said, for those who are already itching for Alfia's debut, here's how the next chapters would go.
Next chapter, which is chapter 23, would be Haruhime's rescue. Then after that, Yuuya would go back to the dungeon since he still needed to reach level 6.
Then on chapter 24, he would fight a floor boss. Can you guys guess what floor boss he would fight? Which would finally makes him reach level 6, allowing him to cure Bell's incurable disease.
And then finally, on chapter 25, that would be the first chapter into introducing Alfia. To be more precise, it would be the reveal on how she survived.
Lastly, on chapter 26, that would be her official debut into the fanfiction.
All of this would happen this week so stay tuned. Now I gotta rest so that I get the energy to write all this chapter this week hahahah.