The next day...
When a hazy light began to appear on the horizon, Leo was already up and had washed and groomed himself.
"This should do it, right?"
His sword stowed in its sheath on his left hip, the Emerald Staff stowed in its bag on his right hip, and two waist pouches that wouldn't get in the way of his movement hung at his back, Leo stood in front of the full-length mirror, sizing himself up in the glass, a sharp glint flickering in his eyes.
He wore a combat suit, its inner layer sewn with cushioning monster pelt, and over it a hooded robe whose inner side was etched with some mysterious patterns; one look told you it was no ordinary outfit.
The combat suit and robe were both custom-made, the former with no mean protective ability, the latter with the effect of weakening impact force, bought from a magic-item shop in Babel at a price equal to Third-Class armament, adding up to nearly a million valis in all for Leo.
To handle the hard fight ahead, Leo had made quite a few preparations. The combat suit and custom robe were nothing; it was the things in the two pouches at his back that were the expensive part.
One pouch held a full thirty Magic Potions, every one of them a custom high-grade product, each costing triple the price of an ordinary Magic Potion, the upside being that they restored more Mind and at a faster rate than ordinary Magic Potions, so Leo had spent nearly another million valis on these.
The other pouch held ten High Potions and four Elixirs, the former at thirty thousand valis apiece, the latter at five hundred thousand apiece, and along with twenty ordinary potions for restoring stamina, Leo had spent over two million valis on these.
This whole outfit of equipment and potions had squandered clean away every bit of the money Leo had earned over this stretch of constant adventuring, exploring the Dungeon hard day after day.
But there was no helping it. His opponent was a Floor Boss two whole Levels above him, and these preparations were nothing more than the basics of the basics; if he was stingy about spending the money, then his already-low odds of victory would probably drop straight to rock bottom.
Leo checked over his equipment and supplies once more, and only after confirming he hadn't forgotten or left out a single item did he walk out of his room, come to the corridor, and head downstairs.
Along the way, Leo didn't run into anyone, and he left the tower without a hitch and came to the courtyard.
He and Ais had agreed to meet here first thing this morning and head to the Dungeon together.
But when Leo reached the courtyard, he froze.
"Here he comes, here he comes! Leo's here!"
Tiona stood in the courtyard, waving her hand excitedly as she watched Leo come down from the tower.
"So you finally showed up."
Tione was right beside Tiona, arms folded, a smile in her eyes as she looked at Leo.
"You're here, Mr. Leo."
Line wasn't carrying the huge Supporter's pack she usually did, just a small bag slung over her shoulder and a staff in hand, as she greeted Leo shyly.
"Hmph."
Lefiya, a long staff gripped in her hand, gave a soft snort as she looked at the arriving Leo, her attitude as unfriendly as ever.
Last of all was Ais, who'd already changed into the outfit she wore when exploring the Dungeon, the Desperate hanging at her waist, surrounded and held in the very center by the group of girls, her face full of innocence.
"What are you all doing here?"
Leo looked at the girls who'd shown up uninvited, one after another, and stared dumbly for a good long while before he managed a startled word.
"Well? Surprised?" Tiona bounced forward, hands on her hips, and said with no end of swagger, "We cleared out our schedules specially to go along with you, you know."
"A Floor Boss, and a guy like you's planning to solo that kind of monster at Lv.2?" Tione sized Leo up. "Really can't figure out what's going on in your head."
"Don't get the wrong idea, it's not like I'm worried about you." Lefiya held her little head high and said with self-righteous conviction, "I'm here to keep Miss Ais company."
The three of them traded remark for remark, and it finally dawned on Leo a little what the situation was now.
So word that he was about to solo a Floor Boss had gotten out?
Leo turned to Ais, a flicker of inquiry in his eyes, only to be met with Ais shaking her head.
Clearly, she hadn't been the one to talk.
She'd only received Leo's invitation last night, and she hadn't left her room afterward, so naturally she wasn't the one who'd let it out.
"It... it wasn't me either!"
Seeing Leo turn his gaze on her, Line hurriedly waved her hands in denial.
Leo was only planning to go to Floor 17 today to challenge Goliath, with no intention of exploring the Dungeon, so yesterday he'd told Line she wouldn't need to accompany him today, and Line had therefore gotten some idea of Leo's plans for the day, and had voiced her worry over it too.
If it was her, she might just have let it slip by accident, but now she was denying it.
If it wasn't Line and it wasn't Ais, then how had Tiona and the other two found out about this?
Leo was thoroughly confused.
"It was Loki." Seeing this, Tione cleared up Leo's confusion directly. "She ran over to the captain's office last night and spilled the whole thing. I happened to be there at the time."
Mm... as for why she'd been there, Tione indicated there was absolutely no need to explain.
What need has a fierce Amazoness on a nighttime raid of someone to explain herself to others?
A pity that at that hour Finn hadn't even gone to sleep yet, and a certain fierce Amazoness's night-raid plan had ended in failure.
But Tione still wanted to point out that the trip hadn't been a waste; at the very least it wasn't a total loss, since she'd gotten an earful of the matter of Leo planning to solo a Floor Boss.
And once Tione knew about it, her twin sister, who came and went and shared a dorm with her, naturally knew too.
And once the big-mouthed Tiona knew, it was hardly strange that everyone else would know.
So the girls had passed a sleepless night, and in the end had all gotten up bright and early to come here together, met up with Ais who'd arrived as agreed, and finally waited out the tardy-arriving Leo.
"So you're all planning to come along with me?"
The astonishment on Leo's face hadn't faded at all.
Tiona, Tione, Lefiya... these three were all core members of the Familia.
Two Lv.5s, Lefiya, and Ais on top of that; wasn't the combat power of this lineup just a bit too high?
Compared with these four, even Line, a rare Healer, became a lot less of a presence.
"Can't help it, we're curious!" Tiona ran to Leo's side and, without a shred of reserve, hugged one of his arms, saying with a mix of delight and excitement, "This is challenging a Floor Boss across two whole Levels! How could we not come watch?"
"If it were anyone else, we definitely wouldn't have any interest, since that'd just be going to throw your life away, but you're different, aren't you?" Tione slowly walked up in front of Leo and clicked her tongue in wonder. "I don't really believe you can pull it off, but the captain seems pretty interested in this feat you're about to attempt, so of course I had to come witness it."
Lefiya said nothing at all, but in the eyes she fixed on Leo, emotions he couldn't read were shifting.
She actually thought the risk Leo was taking was simply too great.
Soloing a Floor Boss... for Lefiya, who got a little nervous even fighting monsters head-on, that was downright a fantasy out of the Arabian Nights.
She'd seen a Floor Boss before, and precisely because she'd seen one, she felt that kind of monster was simply not something an adventurer could handle alone.
Never mind anything else, just that oversized body, far larger than a large-category monster, capable of producing a sight that shook the earth and mountains with a single casual blow, Lefiya couldn't begin to imagine just what sort of person could face it alone.
An ant can bite an elephant to death, but only when swarming in numbers.
If there were only one ant, could it still bite an elephant to death?
The answer was, of course, no.
So when she first found out about this, Lefiya was very shocked, even very angry.
She felt this was recklessness on Leo's part, a kind of disrespect toward his own life.
Even ordinary monsters could kill a person, let alone something like a Floor Boss.
One slip... no, it should be said that in the face of the Level gap, there really was a very high chance Leo would die.
Lefiya's anger over this was, in truth, just worry.
She'd originally planned to charge straight to Leo's room, drag him out from under the covers, and give him a good talking-to, but Tiona and Tione had stopped her.
"He's already told Loki about it, and Loki's even agreed to it, so even if you go over to talk him out of it now, he's not going to give it up, is he?"
This was what the relatively steady, cool-headed Tione said in her normal state.
"It's soloing a Floor Boss! I want to watch! And anyway, I haven't even seen Leo fight yet!"
This was what the forever simple, little-angel Tiona said.
More than worry, the two of them were curious about why Leo dared to go solo a Floor Boss at Lv.2.
Had he gotten cocky from growing too fast, too smoothly?
If it were anyone else, Tiona and Tione might have thought so, but while they didn't know Leo all that well, they didn't know little of him either, and they could say for certain that Leo wasn't the type with that kind of personality.
If he were the type with that kind of personality, there was no way Loki would have agreed to his proposal, and Finn and the others would have stepped in to stop him long ago.
Riveria in particular, the vice-captain, was a fretful sort by nature, and if she'd thought Leo's mindset was off and that doing this was no different from throwing his life away, that it simply couldn't be done, she'd absolutely have already called Leo over for a good scolding.
Tiona and Tione had been part of Loki Familia for no short time, and while they perhaps didn't understand Leo very well, they understood their own goddess and the three Familia leaders extremely well.
They knew very well that since Loki and Finn and the others had all chosen to tacitly allow this, it most likely meant only one thing.
That thing was, Leo really might be able to subjugate a Floor Boss alone.
Otherwise, if there were truly no chance at all, there was no way the goddess and the three of them would ever have agreed to this.
This left the two sisters both surprised and curious.
They very much wanted to know just what was special about Leo, and just how strong his combat power was, that the Familia leaders would agree to let something this absurd happen.
On top of that, the impact caused by Leo rising from Lv.1 to Lv.2 in under a month hadn't fully faded yet, and Tiona and Tione very much wanted to know just how he'd managed to grow so fast, so after the two sisters put their heads together, they talked it over with Lefiya and settled on going to the Dungeon with Leo today.
As for Line, she was purely and simply unable to set her mind at ease, which was why she couldn't help coming along.
Her thinking was simple: even though she couldn't help Leo fight, if Leo got hurt, she could still heal him.
The four of them had gathered in the courtyard like this and met Ais, who'd been waiting here early, and the group of five had already been chatting for a while before Leo arrived; if Leo had been any later, they might have gone looking for him themselves.
"What? Don't tell me we're not allowed to go to the Dungeon?"
Seeing Leo standing there frozen, Lefiya said this in a fretful whine, which made Leo really want to say, tsundere's already out of meta, you really don't need to do all that.
This girl only acted like this when facing him, all huffy and prickly, while in front of others she was perfectly sweet and well-behaved.
Leo knew this Elf girl was actually worried about him in her heart too, only she wasn't willing to say it out loud, so naturally he had no reason to say it.
"I didn't say you all couldn't come." Seeing everyone looking at him, Leo could only give a wry smile. "As if I could even stop you?"
Not one of these women was an easy one to deal with; never mind him, even Finn and the others often got headaches over their acting on their own.
So Leo very wisely didn't get into discussing this.
The legs were on their bodies, after all, so what could he do even if he didn't agree?
Besides, having a few more big shots along to hold the line, other people wouldn't have time to be anything but glad.
Leo had no wish to be ungrateful.
"That's the spirit." Tiona, still hugging Leo's arm, said with no end of cheer, "Don't worry, we won't get in your way. Unless you're really about to die, we absolutely won't step in."
"You're a man, aren't you?" Tione went straight to needling him, laughing. "Since you dared to boast big about soloing a Floor Boss, then show us, or else you won't have the right to call yourself a member of Loki Familia."
"I'll be watching from the side." Lefiya stared fixedly at Leo, then turned her head away after a moment and said coldly, "Don't go making Miss Ais and Miss Tiona work hard to save you."
"I, I'll be keeping a close eye out at all times too." Seeing everyone speak up, Line hurriedly stated her position as well. "If things really do go badly, then I'll heal you, Mr. Leo."
As the girls spoke up one after another, it was the ever-silent Ais who started to look like she wanted to say something but held back.
She actually felt like sulking.
The person Leo had invited was her, so why had it ended up like this in the end?
The little Ais inside Ais's heart was even puffing her cheeks a bit.
But she'd never been good with words, and still less did she have any reason to stop everyone from coming along, so she could only stand there glumly and say nothing.
"Then let's get going."
Seeing the matter was a settled deal, Leo stopped fretting over it and just spoke up.
"It takes some time to get from the surface to Floor 17."
He had no wish to reach the battlefield and find his target had already been subjugated.
So it was more prudent to hurry over.
The girls naturally had no objection and nodded one after another.
The group set off in a grand procession, leaving the home base and heading for the Dungeon.
And after Leo and the others left, quite a few more people actually showed up at the home base one after another and left along with them.
This day was bound to be another extraordinary one.
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200 powerstones for the extra chapter
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