The clatter of frantic footsteps echoed through the dim, winding corridors of the Dungeon's 9th floor. Crates clinked, sacks flailed, and sweat poured from the brow of a lone merchant, his breath ragged as he stumbled through the shadows. Behind him, snarling monsters, fangs bared and claws dripping with venom, raced after him with bloodlust in their eyes. These were no mere beasts; Level 2 threats, swift and savage, born outside of the Dungeon.
He tripped, skidding against the cold stone, and the monsters pounced. But just as the claws descended, the air cracked, heat surged like a tidal wave. A blinding flare ignited the darkness, bathing the Dungeon in a furious red glow.
From the smoke and fire, a figure strode forward, calm, confident, burning like the sun itself.
"Step back," Kazuya said, voice low and fierce. "I'll handle this."
With a wave of his hand, flames erupted around him, wild and alive. The Mera Mera no mi's power roared to life, turning the tide in a heartbeat.
"Divine Fire: Unknown Fire!" Kazuya shouted.
Kazuya hurls long lances made out of fire. The lances have the combined effect of simultaneously burning the monsters while piercing them. Hitting 2 bear-like monsters, the rest kept on pursuing the man, those are the hellhounds he first encountered.
The man shrieked as he tried to run again, but he took a bad step and sprained his ankles, tripping down and grabbed his injured feet. The hellhounds' mouths sparked with flames, indicating their attack.
"Oh no you wont," Kazuya stated as he faces his palms towards the hellhounds. "Firefly Light: Fire Daruma!"
Kazuya creates many small, glowing greenish-yellow fireballs that float around both the hellhounds. Just then, after using Firefly Light to send the fireballs floating around in proximity with the enemy, Kazuya sends them all flying into the hellhounds all at once, burning them to ashes in the process.
All the monsters in the area has been killed by Kazuya. He sighed and quickly went to the injured man.
"Hey old man, are you alright?" Kazuya asked. 'Okay, the man has clearly hurt his ankle... That was awkward.'
"J-Just a sprain, but that's nothing to what would've happened to me if you haven't saved me. Thank you so much, kind sir." The man said, trying to ignore the pain just to thank Kazuya.
Kazuya immediately supported the man, carrying him on his back. This old man is clearly somewhere around 60, so even if it's just a sprain, it is a really bad one.
"Don't worry sir, I'm glad I made it in time to rescue you," Kazuya replied with a smile, he then asked a question. "It might seemed weird, but I'm kinda lost right now, if you don't mind telling me, is there a village or settlement nearby?"
Kazuya, who was transported to this world 2 days ago, was wandering aimlessly the entire time. Using his flame ability, he managed to get by camping and eating fruits and fishes on nearby river or lake.
"Lost... you're lost? I thought you were an adventurer that was happened to be nearby," The old man replied with a surprised tone. "After all, we are close to the City of Orario."
"Orario..." Kazuya said with a long pause.
This was certainly a surprise for him, this place, this whole world is around the anime he have read a lot and followed well thoroughly. Watching the anime is not that great as reading the Light Novel.
City of Orario, the great dungeon, center of the whole world. Kazuya subconsciously smiles remembering the moments when he read those stories.
"Orario huh, I wasn't expecting like that, but I expected the unexpected so it doesn't count." Kazuya said with a smile. "Oh right, old man, I forgot to ask, what happened actually? Why were you being chased by monsters, and why are you here in some dense forest?"
"Tsk, as much as I hate it, I had to use this route to get back to Orario as fast as I can. I hired some mercenaries from a mercenary familia, but those level 1 bastards went running of just because we were surrounded." The old man said, dismayed by the betrayal. "one of those assholes even suggested using me as bait just so they can run away, when I heard that, I immediately ran away, leaving the goods I bought for my family. I had to run fast to escape."
"Damn, I'm sorry to hear that, luckily I found you before you became some fried geezer meal in Hellhound's hot wings special." Kazuya said while laughing.
The old man wasn't amused by his words, but wasn't offended either. It was just a bad pun in general.
"Well, luckily as well, just ahead is where I came from. We might be able to find my goods there, and hopefully those bastards didn't loot it." The old man said as he pointed forward.
Kazuya, after receiving the direction he needed to go, he just smiled and started speeding up, carrying the old man in his back. His swift movements while jumping from trees to trees are quite impressive.
After a while, Kazuya jumped out of the last tree and landed right at the ground. In front of them was a carriage where the old man kept his stuff, but just as Kazuya landed, his eyes were fixated on the people in the said cart.
"Y-YOU BASTARDS! YOU GUYS TRIED TO USE ME AS BAIT, NOW YOU'RE TAKING MY HARD EARNED ITEMS?!" The old man immediately shouted as he points to the man in plated armor.
There were 3 people there and they were already on the move to steal the cart and run away. What probably happened was, after the old man ran away, having many monsters ran after him, these 3 adventurers managed to kill the rest of the monsters, and decided to just take the pay and the old man's cart and go.
"Ho? You managed to survive those monsters, old man? I thought they would've eaten you alive," Said by the man sitting on the coach seat, ready to move the horses away. "Well, you survived and that's that, but I can't have you speaking about this... After all, we need to have our record spotless."
Just then, 2 of the adventurers jumped out of the cart, one of them uses a bow and arrow, while the other one was using a katana. The person in the coach seat was probably their leader as he just sat there and watch with a smile on his face.
"Y-You, what are you planning to do!" The old man demanded.
"Our plans huh, well, It was quite simple. First we planned to just kill you right in the middle of the forest and bury your body somewhere, after all, who wouldn't wanna get their hands on these bad boys." He said as he pointed to the barrels in the cart. "Quite the blacksmith you are, these are quite in excellent quality."
Apparently, the old man was a blacksmith, those barrels and boxes in the cart was his handmade creation and they were planning on taking it with them. As the one with the katana unsheathed his weapon, Kazuya steps in and hid the old man behind him.
"Huh, who the hell are you?" said by the man with the katana.
"I'm nobody, but even so, blatantly doing a crime right in front of me? Heck, it seems like you've forgotten my existence and just yaps your mouth at the old man just to mock him." Kazuya said in a mocking tone
The one with the katana snarled at him, then he immediately moved and slashes his sword to Kazuya. With the swift movement of the sword, Kazuya, who doesn't have a blessing of a god in this world, didn't have the chance to evade the incoming strike.
But it's not like he has to evade it at all. After the swift strike by the katana, the man was surprised when he saw the part where blood supposed to be gushing out, but all that remains where flames.
"That won't work on me," Kazuya said as he attacks with his legs, flaming with the use of his flame ability. "I'm a Logia, not that you know what that is!"
He then kicked the man away, but his kick was not that strong to blast the man, instead, his flames just burns him when his kick landed.
"W-What the! Is he a battle mage?! He just went and created that fire out of nowhere!" The man with the bow said. "What do we do?!"
"Tch, seems like a troublesome one has appeared, no change in plans, we are killing them both and get the hell out of here." The leader ordered as he also jumps out and unsheathed his sword.
The archer aims his boy right at Kazuya. Kazuya then rushed towards the man who was rolling in the ground to put out the fire. But the difference with people with blessing of a god and normal people are significant, as the leader appears right in front of Kazuya and strikes him right at his chest.
"W-What the hell... Are you..." The man said in a horrified voice.
He stabbed Kazuya clearly, but just like earlier, the wound that was supposed to be there was replaced with the sight of fire coating the sword, not only that, but Kazuya's no change in reaction, but smirked in response.
Kazuya then grabbed the man and quickly clings to him.
"Flame Commandment: Flame Pillar!" Kazuya shouted.
Kazuya amasses a large amount of flames around his body. Used following Flame Commandment. Kazuya shoots the collected flames straight upward, burning the man along with him.
The other person with the bow swiftly aim and shot an arrow towards Kazuya, but it went right through him and hits the leader instead. Kazuya made sure to stun the leader for a while with his flames to take care of the archer.
Kazuya crosses both his index finger and aimed at the archer. After steadying his aim, he prepares his attack, but just before he released it, the archer ran and hid behind a tree to block the attack.
"That's useless! Cross Fire!" Kazuya shouted, after crossing his fingers, a cross-shaped ray of light can be seen emanating from the fingers at the tree followed by the column of fire.
The beam of the fire was strong enough to destroy the tree and hit the man behind it, burning right through and blasting the man, back. This time, he was sure that it will do some damage as a long range fighter cant have that much defense on their stats.
The leader, who was still in a burning state, chooses to ignore the burning sensation for now and just attack in frustration. The man with the katana manages to put out the fire in him and prepares to attack as well.
But Kazuya wasn't worried, not one bit. He just punched the man with fire coated fist and started striking him again and again. While his punches is strong enough to damage the man, it wasn't enough to completely knock him out.
'Looks like if I wanna finish this soon, I will have to resort to Ace's best attack, Fire Fist. But that level of power will surely destroy them and majority of the trees nearby... Gah, why do I care, there are probably just monsters around here anyways.' Kazuya thought.
But Kazuya still couldn't do it. His best way of finishing this is just to knock them out and get away, he doesn't want to kill one of them, or worse, all of them.
'Tch, human till the end.' He chuckles at himself with the thought.
Kazuya kicked the man to jump away and create distance, while flying then the air, he turns his legs to fire to boost a little longer and landed in a distance not too far from them. The man with the katana and the leader prepares to strike at the same time, but Kazuya wont let them take even one step.
"Fire Bullets." He, using his index finger, shoots out a bullet-formed fire right out of his hands, aiming right at the two. "Next and final! Fire Fist!"
A fist shaped fire burst right out of his right hand and hits their leader straight away, this move was strong enough to kill a Level 2 monster, and he adjusted it just right to make sure to not kill the man.
"And Rook Check!" Kazuya shoots a stream of flame with his left fist that travels sideward towards the man with the katana. He couldn't dodge the fire attack as he was still in shock about what just happened.
Both of them now were now knocked out conscious by the force of the attack. Why didn't Kazuya just did it earlier? His power was easily enough for these three. But of course his eyes laid back to the old man, standing there, staring at the quick fight that just happened.
Kazuya was being careful as the archer was on the other side of the cart, having the cart on the way of the archer, Kazuya couldn't just throw attacks randomly, along with the leader who was sitting at the coach seat, with the horses right in front of him.
"Quick thinking on the spot is a great skill to master ya know. It's not everyday that life will just throw things at you so fast that you don't even know what you're doing anymore." He said in a smirk as he gathered the fire from the three.
Freely controlling fire, along with the fire he generated himself, went back at him, leaving the three mercenaries lying on the ground, unconscious. Kazuya turns his head back to the old man and just gave a wide smile at him.
"Problem solved, though, would you mind if I crash at your cart for now?" He said with a smile on his face.
Author's note:
How was the fight scene, I tried making it as detailed as possible, and I did my best... I hope that it was up to your standards. Good night