Chapter 43: Could You Be the Sword Demon!?
Suddenly appearing, the Maze Lone King shook the entire floor. The moment anyone saw that gigantic creature, every person present felt a tremendous shock.
Even Shirou, who had already killed many Maze Lone Kings before, couldn't remain too calm when facing such a monster again.
After all, the Maze Lone King is a special monster unique to each floor, whose strength is worlds apart from ordinary monsters.
Each one is extremely dangerous and possesses special abilities.
It's worth mentioning that no Maze Lone Kings appeared in the areas before the tenth floor.
Of course, it's possible there were Maze Lone Kings in the first ten floors, but their power was so average that high-level adventurers passing by easily disposed of them.
Once a Maze Lone King is killed, it is difficult for it to reappear.
Unlike common monsters that reappear in less than a day, Maze Lone Kings take at least two to three months to naturally reincarnate somewhere in the dungeon, so once a Maze Lone King is eliminated in the first ten floors, it immediately disappears, making encounters with them rare.
It's only after the tenth floor, when the maze suddenly becomes enormous and the paths increase, that finding a Maze Lone King becomes difficult, allowing the newly born Maze Lone Kings to survive longer instead of being instantly killed.
The Maze Lone King's power is absolutely unbeatable among monsters on the same floor.
If a whole adventurer party encounters one, they still have some chance to fight back, but a lone adventurer who accidentally meets the king of the maze will be swallowed up completely.
"That guy's potion actually attracted the Maze Lone King? Is that even possible?" Lili's face was full of disbelief as she saw the huge monster appear.
She knew the adventurer's potion just now could attract monsters, but never expected it to even lure a Maze Lone King. Generally, Maze Lone Kings don't appear casually and require special methods to be found.
Besides that, there's another way to attract a Maze Lone King, but ordinary people cannot use it, because that method involves a god using divine power inside the dungeon.
Though few know about it, there is indeed a rumor that 'if divine power is used inside the dungeon, it will attract Maze Lone Kings, or even more terrifying beings.'
In any case, Lili could not imagine a Maze Lone King actually appearing.
Seeing that enormous monster, she felt utter despair.
"Cough, cough…" As the massive creature approached, Bell struggled to get up from the ground.
Though Bell had been knocked to his knees by the Soma Familia adventurers earlier, he hadn't suffered a fatal injury and naturally wanted to help Shirou fight.
"Don't push yourself." Shirou said quietly, seeing Bell's state, telling him to keep resting.
But Bell clearly couldn't lie still and nervously spoke, "No, even you, Shirou, probably can't just casually kill a Maze Lone King, right? I'm not strong, but I can still be of some help."
"No need." Shirou shook his head. "More than helping me, what you need to do is watch over this girl and make sure she doesn't run away."
"This…" Bell hesitated.
"Can't you even handle such a small task?" Shirou asked doubtfully.
Hearing Shirou's tone, Bell dared not argue and spoke with a complicated expression, "I understand. I will watch over Lili."
Despite Shirou's vigilance, Lili's expression was one of despair as she said, "Even if you're alert, it won't help. A Maze Lone King isn't something ordinary adventurers can fight. We'll all die here."
"Are you afraid to die?" Shirou curiously asked Lili in this critical moment, as if unaware of the Maze Lone King's arrival.
"Of course." Lili instinctively answered. "Who in this world isn't afraid of death?"
"Really? But those Soma Familia companions of yours just now didn't seem afraid of death at all." Shirou still remembered the madness of that adventurer before he died, who seemed willing to die on the spot as long as he could drink the divine wine.
"That's because…" Lili hesitated, surprised at Shirou's keen observation.
Meanwhile, the huge Maze Lone King had already arrived from afar.
Boom!
It was a monster nearly ten meters long, its head almost touching the dungeon ceiling. Every step it took caused a massive shock to the narrow tenth-floor maze.
The monster looked like a half-orc, with purplish-red skin, strange armor, and wielding an iron hammer bigger than a human — as if it were a mutated ordinary half-orc.
Notably, when a Maze Lone King appeared, the entire dungeon emitted a shocking sound.
"——Ooooohhhhhhh!"
A strange, sharp noise like a mournful cry, similar to the pain cry of childbirth, echoed throughout the dungeon.
"!!!"
Seeing the Maze Lone King so close, Bell and Lili stood frozen in fear, completely paralyzed by the monster's overwhelming presence, gripped by terrible despair.
In contrast, Shirou remained calm, quietly observing the Maze Lone King. Comparing it to the lone kings he'd encountered before, he realized this one was completely different — as if the dungeon created something new each time.
'This dungeon seems to hold a great secret…' Shirou thought.
During his last dungeon exploration, he hadn't thought much of it.
But now, after seeing the surface world, learning about the Labyrinth City Orarie and the gods, he was deeply puzzled about the dungeon.
What kind of place is this? Why was it created? Who made it? And what is the true purpose of this dungeon?
The more he understood the world, the more curious he became about this dungeon he had first encountered.
He vaguely sensed that the underground world held the truth to all these questions, including why he came to this world.
Roar—!!!!
As Shirou was thinking, the enormous Maze Lone King was now just a few steps away.
It seemed displeased with Shirou's calm attitude, angry at this overly composed human, and decisively raised its iron hammer, smashing toward Shirou.
Bang!
In an instant, a terrifying storm swept everything.
Ignoring Shirou in the center of the vortex, Bell and Lili were almost instantly slammed away, hitting the surrounding walls before barely landing on the ground.
"Shirou!!" Bell shouted in panic, worried for Shirou's safety.
Lili said nothing, convinced Shirou was already dead from the attack.
Soon, she too would die here, in this forgotten corner.
For a moment, she recalled Shirou's words just now.
Why was she, unlike the others of the Soma Familia, still afraid and terrified of death?
Lili didn't understand either. Like the others, she was immersed in the divine wine's sweetness, willing to pay anything just to taste it again.
But she always felt something in her heart was more important than the divine wine...
While lost in thought and doubting her own feelings, she suddenly saw something unbelievable.
Clatter!
The fierce storm rippled at the center of the battlefield.
The Maze Lone King's blow was like a falling sword from the sky, its power unshakable!
Ordinary people would surely have been crushed.
But in Lili's eyes, Shirou's figure was not flattened by the attack. Instead, he blocked the king's blow with one hand using the sword Lili had previously given Bell!
"How is that possible?"
Before Lili could fully comprehend, the sword in Shirou's hand suddenly shattered from the middle as if it had reached its limit.
"Even with Reinforcement, this is the best it can do," Shirou said, looking at the broken blade without regret and throwing it away.
At the same time, the Maze Lone King on this floor seemed unwilling to allow this human to live, launching a renewed assault on Shirou.
Having lost his weapon, no one could believe Shirou could still block the king's attacks.
Shirou himself had no intention of enduring the king's attacks head-on. He took a deep breath and silently raised both hands—
"Trace On!"
As he spoke, two swords—one black and one white—appeared out of thin air in Shirou's hands.
He naturally picked up the two short swords, crossing them, and directly faced the monster's hammer attack!
Boom!!!
With a shockwave that echoed almost throughout the maze.
The intense impact created a huge crater in the ground.
Yet even such a terrifying attack did not make Shirou step back. He simply blocked the Maze Lone King's full-strength blow and suddenly pushed forward with both hands!
Clack! Clack!
Against Shirou's strength, the tenth-floor Maze Lone King could not resist. Its huge body was forced to stagger back like a clumsy child.
Shirou did not miss the opportunity. As the king retreated, he quickly charged forward, swinging his twin swords and slashing the king's body at lightning speed!
But as the lord of the entire floor, the Maze Lone King was not only huge but possessed extremely powerful regeneration. Even with wounds, it healed rapidly, and as long as the core was intact, it was difficult to kill completely.
This is why adventurers need to form parties to fight Maze Lone Kings: the battle is inevitably long and grueling.
Without a group of well-coordinated adventurers of different classes, gradually exhausting the Maze Lone King bit by bit, it's nearly impossible to kill the terrifying king thoroughly.
However, this was only the usual case. For Shirou, the Maze Lone King's regeneration was nothing.
Because for Shirou, no matter how exaggerated the king's regeneration was, if he could unleash enough overwhelming firepower, no monster was impossible to defeat!
"Projection, start!"
"Full-Scale Projection activated!"
While the Maze Lone King had not fully recovered, Shirou suddenly spread his arms.
In an instant, countless swords appeared behind him, covering the Maze Lone King from all directions. Before the monster could regain its footing, they stabbed straight into its body!
Bang! Bang! Bang!
This was almost unimaginable for ordinary people.
The sky filled with swords floating behind Shirou, dazzlingly blooming like raindrops, repeatedly stabbing the Maze Lone King until its body looked like a hornet's nest.
It became like a hedgehog pierced with swords, covered with wounds everywhere, and even the central magic stone showed cracks.
Such exaggerated injuries were beyond the Maze Lone King's ability to fully heal.
Finally, after struggling in pain for a moment, the king completely lost strength and collapsed helplessly.
Snap—
With the giant monster's body dissolving into a strange blue smoke, the battle between man and the monster king ended.
Clatter!
The next moment, a huge amount of unseen Excelia suddenly poured into Shirou's body, though it didn't bring much improvement, obviously because Shirou's current strength made it difficult to gain much from a single Maze Lone King.
"Did he really kill the Maze Lone King all by himself?"
Seeing this result, both Bell and Lili were stunned.
Especially Lili, who looked at this astonishing battle and recalled a recent rumor in Maze City Orarie. She exclaimed in surprise:
"To have the ability to kill a Maze Lone King single-handedly, plus that magic to conjure swords out of thin air... Could you be the legendary Sword Demon? The man who crawled out of the abyss underground!?"