The oldest Labyrinth in the world, Dragon God's Hole.
Floor 1544.
This floor was marked by a very specific set of characteristics. In fact, it belonged to an ecosystem that had been repeating itself ever since Floor 1201.
From Floor 601 to 1200, the Labyrinth's environment had been entirely aquatic and maritime in theme.
This new one was made up of vast floating islands suspended beneath an endless blue sky. White clouds, scattered far apart, were everywhere as well, sometimes drifting at the same level as the islands, creating a scene that was strange and, honestly, very beautiful.
The islands themselves varied, but the ones on this floor were heavily covered in trees with red leaves.
Even so, the terrain was rugged, and rivers of golden-yellow sand flowed everywhere, even through the air, completely disregarding the most basic laws of physics.
There was something serene about it all. The islands gave off a sense of wholeness and tranquility, with red leaves constantly drifting through the air, as though that place existed in a balance all its own, isolated from the rest of the world.
Unfortunately, a large part of that breathtaking scenery was infested with terrible, monstrous creatures.
They were beings similar to harpies, but each one was around ten meters tall, covered in green and red scales.
Every one of those creatures was a monstrous hunter. Ordinary strikes, even from an extremely high-level warrior, could not even pierce their scales, much less wound them fatally.
Even so, at that moment, several harpies were flying and racing through the trees at astonishing speeds, letting out grotesque screeches as they tore through everything in their path to catch their target.
"GRUAAAAAHCK!"
"HHHHHAAAAACHUAK!"
Their pursuit was driven by an inexhaustible thirst for blood.
Meanwhile, Eris was running even faster than the monsters.
Her movements, just like the harpies', warped the terrain around her. She moved through the forest with agile precision, weaving, leaping, and tearing through the space between the trees with pure speed, her ponytail streaming behind her.
Then, for a brief moment, her Foresight Eye glowed.
Eris smiled.
In the next instant, she finally turned and skidded across the ground, leaving behind two deep furrows as she assumed the draw stance of the Sword God Style.
Her cape and hair whipped violently from the momentum she had built up, and the moment she stopped running, the Harpy Beasts screeched madly and hurled themselves toward her in a savage, bloodthirsty rush.
Eris took a deep breath.
She was not running because she was in danger.
She had been running to find the right angle. She wanted to kill every single one of those harpies in a single strike.
So she remained where she was, motionless, as more than twenty Harpy monsters came at her from every direction, competing to see which one would tear her apart first.
Twenty meters.
Ten meters.
Five meters.
Meanwhile, a faint crimson glow emerged from the sheathed blade of the Sword God. The air trembled beneath the buildup of mana.
And then, opening her eyes, she unleashed her strike.
A strike that, if Gall Farion were to see it, he would find very similar to one of his own.
And yet, at the same time, profoundly different.
"Crimson Heavenly Rupture!"
She swung her blade in an instant.
At that moment, sound disappeared for a brief second.
And then, a massive crescent swept away everything in front of the Red Lioness in a single motion, leaving no chance to react.
The forest was split horizontally in two, the upper half blown away as though a storm had ripped it from the earth. And, naturally, the roughly twenty Harpy Beasts were cut cleanly in half with masterful precision.
Their tough scales meant nothing before Eris.
Strange organs, flesh, and bone were all severed in a single motion, while pieces of the creatures' bodies slammed into the devastated forest, scattering the aftermath of the attack everywhere.
All dead at the same time.
Of course they were.
After all, Eris had calculated the exact moment when all of them would be cut down by a single attack, using the Foresight Demon Eye.
A moment later, Eris took a deep breath and, completely ignoring the large-scale destruction she had caused, sheathed her blade and skipped back to where Rygar was.
That little execution had not taken more than three minutes.
Even with her hair tied back, Eris still found herself in awe when she looked at the enormous archipelago of floating islands around her.
Even after so many floors, that kind of sight still managed to catch her attention. Soon enough, however, she found Rygar.
He was standing before a huge mural, trying to solve the riddle of that floor.
But when Eris approached, she was surprised to see that the bridge to the next floor was already visible.
Even so, Rygar seemed distracted, staring at the Magic Word in his hand.
"Did something happen out there?"
she asked, a trace of doubt in her voice.
Rygar seemed distracted, but he still answered. His brows were furrowed.
"Something did happen... we're going to have to speed up even more."
"Ah? Was it really that serious?"
Concern appeared on Eris's face immediately. Her greatest fear in following Rygar on this descent into the labyrinth was leaving the rest of the family unprotected.
Even if she did not show it too openly, she cared deeply about her family.
Rygar reassured her.
"For now, nothing outside. But we may have problems in here."
He looked upward.
They were always descending through the floors, but each one was isolated. The severe spatial barriers prevented Rygar from using his supernatural senses to observe the full extent of the Labyrinth.
Even so, he had a bad feeling.
Before Eris could ask more, Rygar summed it up:
"In short, Hitogami is planning something big in Begaritt, and Nina was being used by Vita as a spy without even knowing it... I'd love to believe otherwise, but I have a feeling our location may already have leaked."
Eris's eyes widened.
"What?! Wait, Nina? How did that happen?! Does that mean..."
Rygar cut her off.
He took Eris by the chin and squeezed her cheeks with one hand, drawing an immediate blush from her along with an irritated glare.
Then he spoke calmly, smiling:
"Don't worry... Eris.
His smile deepened slightly as he put away the communication device.
"There's good news and bad news. Apparently, the apostles aren't targeting the Kingdom of Gaia, even though they know we're not there. The bad news... is that they're probably targeting us instead. We'll have company soon."
When Rygar stopped squeezing her cheeks, Eris still looked worried.
"Is that really okay...?"
Rygar sat down on a rock and answered honestly:
"Of course not. I'm confident I can defeat all of Hitogami's apostles individually, but the outcome of a fight at a disadvantage is uncertain, even with Skollvindr and Doomsday."
He looked toward the entrance to the next floor.
"But we still have the advantage in time. As long as we can conquer this Labyrinth before they catch up to us, we win. If they catch us first... then I'll have to figure something out... it'll work out somehow, I'm sure of it!"
Eris fell silent when she heard that.
Rygar did not even need to explain. She knew perfectly well that if Hitogami's apostles were exploring that labyrinth, they would probably be faster than the two of them for two reasons.
The first, and most important, was that Hitogami could simply whisper all the answers and riddles of each floor to them.
The second was that the monsters on each floor did not respawn instantly.
Some of the more troublesome monsters Rygar and Eris had faced would not even still be in their pursuers' way, because they were still dead.
But then Rygar smiled.
"Even so, Hitogami is mobilizing on a massive scale. If he's coming this far, then this was a huge gamble. That's also a good sign. It means this is his last meaningful move. He's been pushed to the absolute brink. For him, right now, it's success or death... come on, Eris. Let's conquer this Labyrinth. From here on out, things are going to get pretty turbulent."
Rygar stood up.
And Eris, without hesitation, followed him toward the next floor.
----
A few days before those events, in front of the entrance to the enormous Dragon God's Hole Labyrinth, a Six-Armed Immortal Demon and a white-haired man with dragon wings stood there, gazing at the vast dark crater.
Behind the two figures lay hundreds of dead Red Dragons.
The overwhelming majority of them had been killed in a single blow. A lethal stab or slash. The result left across the battlefield was the clearest possible proof of the attacker's martial skill.
Badigadi looked at the crater and laughed loudly.
"Bwahahaha! What a bunch of lunatics! They really jumped in there?! That's kind of terrifying!"
His companion, Technique God Laplace, remained serious and expressionless.
The iris that should normally have been golden had a touch of darkness within it as he replied without changing expression:
"I can't disagree with that. I've been to the bottom of the Inferno Labyrinth before, but standing before this place, I feel as though I'm throwing myself into the jaws of a beast. It doesn't make much sense."
Of course, this was actually Vita.
The original Laplace was far more spirited and curious than that.
Badigadi turned serious for a moment, considering Vita's words.
Just as Aisha and Rygar had predicted, their course of action had already leaked to Hitogami.
The moment that was discovered, Hitogami had two choices.
The first was to invade and completely weaken the Kingdom of Gaia, potentially destroying it.
The second was to seize the opportunity while Rygar was alone and cornered... and kill him once and for all.
There was no conventional way to leave that Labyrinth. Not even by teleportation. The only way out was to conquer it.
That meant this was a unique opportunity. An opportunity they had not had in the last five years. A chance to finally kill the greatest thorn lodged in the Man-God's side.
Of course, this directly conflicted with their plans in Begaritt.
Driven mad with rage at having yet another plan interrupted, Hitogami cursed Rygar's powerful destiny and instincts. But with Geese's counsel, Hitogami finally made a firm decision.
As long as Rygar Adoldia died, half of Hitogami's problems would disappear.
In fact, potentially as much as sixty or seventy percent.
Hitogami's desire to see the Apocalypse Beast with its head on a spike outweighed everything else. After that, there would still be obstacles, but the main source of instability would be gone.
That was why, even though it left his position in Begaritt vulnerable, he still mobilized his two strongest fighters to eliminate Rygar once and for all, without hesitation.
Badigadi spoke again, and his thunderous laughter returned in full force:
"BWAHAHAHA! Then let's get going! Rygar might actually kill me this time! It's been many years since I've had a fight this exciting! Let's go!"
At the same moment, Badigadi did not hesitate for even another second.
He walked over to the Golden Armor that was resting nearby.
And the instant he touched it, the armor adjusted itself completely to his body, as though it had always belonged to him.
The Fighter God appeared in the world once more.
A mysterious golden aura constantly emanated from his body, covering his figure completely.
Vita, in Laplace's body, grew even more serious as he took a long silver spear into his right hand.
Without saying another word, he leapt toward the crater, still expressionless.
Badigadi, still laughing heartily, leapt high right after him.
And so, two more formidable warriors were willingly swallowed by the enormous entity that had been there for tens of thousands of years.
As he descended, Vita reviewed the information Hitogami had given him about the Labyrinth.
The moment they entered, they would see the First World, the Beast World.
From the first floor to the six-hundredth, wild environments would be everywhere.
And so on after that.
The Sea World, with aquatic environments.
The Celestial World, with aerial environments.
The Demon World, with rotting environments.
And finally...
The Dragon World.
With a truly unique ecosystem.
Each of them occupied 600 floors, for a total of 3000. And at the end of each "world," there would be a final boss representing that world's Fallen God.
The first three worlds would be relatively simple.
But from the fourth world onward — the Demon World — the difficulty would be lethal even for Laplace's body.
And the Dragon World...
Vita shuddered just thinking about the exact descriptions of the Final Boss of the Dragon God's Hole Labyrinth.
Even as a Slime, unable to fully understand the human emotions behind such a decision, he deeply admired Rygar Adoldia's courage in choosing to face such a monstrosity alone.
Either he was a lunatic.
Or he was simply audacious to the extreme.
Pushing aside distracting thoughts, the two of them finally vanished into the darkness.
Badigadi's booming laughter gradually faded, echoing deeper and deeper until it was lost in the center of the world.
----
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