Time is running.

Shichika entered the Pantheon, holding a letter in his hands. This morning an owl with different colored eyes brought him to the windows of his room. For many months now, Fels has been sending messages about urgent tasks in this way. A 13-year-old teenager walked to one of the counters. Surprisingly, an unfamiliar face was waiting for him behind it. Half-elf with brown hair.

- Hello! My name is Eina Tulle. Can I help you?

- Nice to meet you, Eina. My name is Yasuri Shichika, you can call me by my name. Could you give this letter to Royman? You can say it's from me.

- I understand you, but I won't pass on the letter. This is contrary to the instructions for workers, - for the first time the adventurer met such a principled worker, even Rose at the right moments ignored the rules in order to complete urgent matters. Although he couldn't say that he liked it, the girl deserved respect for such an approach to business.

- Then can you call someone else?

- Listen! You're not the only one here, don't hold up the line.

- Eina, why are you so noisy? - a pink-haired pallum approached the counter.

- Shichika!

- Misha? - it seems the two crossed paths at some point.

- Do you know each other?

- I wouldn't say that... Do you remember the moment when I had accumulated a lot of student debt in my academic quarter and was deciding who to expel because of limited funds at that time? 

- Then I helped you with your studies, you weren't in any danger.

- But others was! That's when he showed up and offered to pay for each student's tuition for the year.

- So he was the benefactor you told me about...

- Exactly! So give me the letter here, I can handle it myself.

- No. I was very rude in my behavior, take a stand, I will hand it over to the head myself.

*Knock Knock*

The office door opened and Eina walked inside. Royman Mardeel was sitting at his desk. Seeing the girl come in, his face contorted.

- What do you need, Eina! Don't you see, I'm busy, - unexpected anger poured out on the new worker, all because she's a half-elf.

The Guild Pig hated half-elves and considered them a disgrace to his race. A truly absurd situation.

- I was asked to give you a letter...

- I don't remember that I had any unexpected tasks assigned to me. Get back to work!

- But...

- No "Buts", get out of the office.

- The person who handed it over called himself Shichika, - the pen that Royman was using fell on the table.

- Shichika... This is where you should have started, give the papers here! And take him to a distant corridor, - the name seemed to evoke emotions of fear in the head of the Guild.

After Eina left, the old elf's body trembled a little for a while. It's all about memories of a banking scandal, then he received a personal reprimand from Ouranos, and the guy's further banking transactions were classified. From that moment on, his account was handled by a separate person appointed as the patron god of the Guild.

On the 26th floor of the dungeon, a human silhouette is swimming at great speed in one of the streams.

As Fels said, on this floor there was one of the strengthened species, Aqua Serpent to be more precise. He was reported by the only survivor of a small group of adventurers who were the first to be attacked. The Guild immediately sent a request to its agent. Initially, he planned to go down with his family's expedition to explore the floors after the 33rd, but now he has been swimming in the water for the second day in search of the monster.

Around this time, his family should be somewhere between the 24th and 28th floors. Everything depended on Finn's decision. It was now night, so most likely they had chosen a place to spend the night and would continue on their way as soon as the dungeon crystals began to illuminate again.

At that moment, the desired target appeared in the deep pool. Unlike the 10 meter tall individuals of its kind and light green scales, the monster in front of the adventurer was 17 meters long and had emerald scales. Right now, Aqua Serpent was sitting at the bottom and looking at the path, the only one that people can walk along in this place. By eating magic stones, in addition to strength, the intelligence of the species also increases. And now he was sitting in ambush. Sensing an extraneous presence, the monster began to move.

Shichika could go two ways: crawl to the surface, and knowing about the ambush, sharply counter-attack the monster when it leaves its position. Or swim up to him from a blind spot and strike, before it reacts. Preferably, attack should be fatal, but if the strength of the body is higher than expected, then it is necessary to make it bleed.

..........

- In the oceans of my homeland there was a special type of fish, it looked like a piranha, but only hundreds of times larger and lives in splendid isolation. They wasn't particularly fast or strong, and didn't have any magical abilities. Do you know why no one liked them?

- Why?

- They felt blood. Hundreds of kilometers away. And therefore, if you did not manage to complete the hunt within the golden 5 minutes after the victim was wounded, a meat grinder with dozens, in the worst case, hundreds of these creatures awaited you. We called them "Sniffers". Out of curiosity, what did you understand from my story?

- Fish smell blood very well?

- Amazing.

..........

So the choice was obvious. Swimming up to the monster, the adventurer's hands danced around the junction of the head and neck, in an attempt to sever its muscles. As expected, the creature is too large and strong. The jaw will not be able to fully use, but it remains alive. Shichika began to descend down the snake-like body, drawing bloody lines.

The teenager who attacked first hurriedly clung to the bottom and flew out of the red cloud, observing the situation. Dozens of monsters began to emerge from all the streams connected to the pool, each arrival piercing open wounds. Periodically, when Serpent was distracted by another child of the dungeon, the adventurer would float by, attacking tangentially, and then disappear again. The act is not of a warrior, but of a hunter. For the next ten minutes, the water in this place was seething with activity occurring at the bottom.

When everything calmed down, the strengthened species died from numerous wounds, and weaker monsters were withered by Shichika's aura.

The hunt is over. This means he can return to the surface for a reward.

- The sound came from here!

- Bete, are you sure? - voices familiar to the teenager were heard in the passage, the first team of the Loki family walked to the place indicated by the werewolf, they held magic lamps in their hands.

- Yes, I am sure! Come and check, if I'm not mistaken, here the streams connect to form a deep reservoir,- not so long ago he and Ais reached the 4th levels.

- Stop, I`ll do it myself, - as the strongest among all, Gareth decided to take the risk of being attacked. When they brought the lamp to the water, they saw only red color.

- Blood. Back everyone, prepare for battle.

Somewhere in the darkness the sound of someone crawling out of the water was heard.

- In position!

- Gareth? Bete? Ais? What are you doing here? - a young man familiar to everyone came out of the darkness.

- Shichika?! In such a situation, you ask us what are WE doing here? - the werewolf's surprise knew no bounds.

- I think you're right. I have another order from the Guild, it was necessary to destroy strengthened species. You see the consequences.

- Got it. This time we decided to move at night, up to the 28th floor. We will set up camp there and rest, - the dwarf told his companion about the plan.

- Then I think I'll go with you. I was going back to the dungeon after completing the task.

- *Hahaha* That's even better, let's go to the main group, everyone will be glad to see you.

- Even considering that I take 30% of the profit from half of them?

- They themselves agreed to this.

The 28th floor was another safe zone. Even in such places, with a descent, the dungeon became less welcoming. The ceiling no longer tried to look like the sky; crystals emitting light only occasionally stuck out in the rock. The surface of the floor was covered with dense jungle thickets; giant tree trunks grew everywhere in different directions, causing a feeling of constraint. However, during the day, in places where there are no plants, there was enough light to feel comfortable.

But since not everyone can get here, there was no settlement similar to Rivira here. Families who stop here for a break set up tent camps on the hills. In addition to natural protection, a guard is on duty. 

When he got here for the first time, Shichika found himself a recess in one of the walls, behind the entrance to the next floor. Gradually he arranged a comfortable place to rest. An improvised bed, a fire pit, dungeon fruit boxes, and a deep well became a good place to take a bath. For protection, he placed a symbol on the ground, provided by Belphie. Its only function was Sloth-style protection. The closer the uninvited guests got to the shelter, the more drowsy they felt, and when they fell asleep, they did not wake up. Never. A terrible and at the same time painless death.

For obvious reasons, Shichika did not bring his friends to shelter. So now he decided to stay in the family's camp.

- You can go and rest, I'll watch, - a hand lay on the shoulder of one of the watchmen posted for the night.

- Shichika? Sorry, but I can't. Finn strictly forbade me to leave my post.

- I'm not going to sleep anyway. If anything happens, I'll talk to the captain.

Having sent the almost falling asleep guy back to camp, the young man sat down on the edge of the cliff. During the conversation, it was decided that he would give the magic stone with Aqua Serpent for safekeeping to the family, and, having reached the 30th floor, he would go his own way. In fact, he was going to take food for the xenos, in those places they have another settlement.

For the rest of the night, Shichika sat on top of the steep wall and periodically said monosyllable phrases

- Let go. - Fall. - Push off.

The monsters that climbed up in the form of small monkeys with red fur and long tails, took turns falling down, getting injured. This species was one of the few that could be harmed by falling from such a height. They are assigned level 3 because they live in large tree communities. The packs consisted of several dozen individuals, led by leaders. Those, in turn, were one and a half times larger and had a brighter color. Depending on the wording of the words, the effect of the orders could differ.

So, in the first case, the creatures could re-grasp and climb up again. In the second option, there was no possibility of rescue; the limbs of the primates were paralyzed until the moment they collided with the ground. The third was the best in terms of cost/benefit ratio; after pushing off from the rock, none of them had enough arm length to return to a safe position.