A Trip Gone Wrong

Lancell, along with Aerym, moved towards the Teleportation Circle at a leisurely walking pace. They had been constantly on the move for who-knows how many hours, and it was inevitable that the tension would whittle at their willpower. Well, Lancell was fine, but Aerym was clearly not.

Her face was a bit pale, and she was breathing a bit faster than usual. Her eyes had bags beneath them, and her movements were clumsier than usual.

She was tired.

Lancell took the opportunity to relax her nerves, as the fact that they were leaving also helped calm her nerves down.

She was starting to settle down, but Lancell had a lot of things in his mind. He still hadn't found any clues regarding the monster spawns, and he had no idea how and who killed the guardian of this dungeon. Also, the weird vibes inside the castle was for some reason starting to bother him.

"Anything wrong?" a voice came from beside him, "you're frowning."

Lancell shifted his gaze to her, and asked, "I am?"

"Yeah," she affirmed, "and a bit angry too."

"Angry?" Lancell was a bit confused, "how do I look angry?"

"You just look really scary."

Lancell frowned for real this time. He was angry? At what? He thought for a while, until finally, he sighed.

'As expected, thinking isn't my strong suit.'

Thinking wasn't his strong suit, so he just have to do things in a way he was good at. Slicing things apart.

'Yeah, I'll do that.' And he would. After all, it was all he could do.

Ignoring Aerym's occasional pointless talks, they soon reached the Teleportation Circle, and stood in front of it.

Aerym sighed as she stretched her body, "Aaahh...Finally," she spoke in a relieved tone, "I can leave this stinking dark hole."

However, unlike her, Lancell didn't say anything and just kept staring at the magic circle. He observed it for a while, and spoke, "Wait," he said in a wary tone, "something isn't right."

But Aerym ignored his warning as she complained, "Nope, I'm not waiting," she said, "I'm tired and I want to go home already."

She then walked towards the teleportation circle, as Lancell grabbed her arm in order to pull her out however...

"Hey! Let go!" she jerked backward, and pulled Lancell along as she was actually strengthening her body with mana, "I'm not going along with your stupid acts!"

Lancell had underestimated her imagination, and paid a dear price for it. And so, light covered the two of them, and they then vanished.

◇ ◇ ◇

When Lancell came to his senses, his instincts immediately screamed at him as he instantly materialized Arkenvalle, and swinging it around him.

It was a slash empowered by mana, so it did its job well, making a tiny rain of blood all around them.

Lancell checked his surroundings, and his eyes instantly widened as a deep sense of alarm washed over him.

They were surrounded by countless monsters.

Lancell gripped Arkenvalle tighter as his mana circulated around his body. His body felt lighter, and a feeling of strength surge in his arms. His senses then sharpened as he knew he had no choice.

The next instant, Lancell vanished on his spot...

...as another rain of blood fell from the dark place they were in.

Screeches and roars then shook the place, reverberating as they collided the walls, giving Lancell the idea that they were inside a not so large room. Lancell estimated the size as he jumped up.

'About 400 meters in square, huh?'

It was indeed not too large, but it was full of monsters, and each one was at least in the Level 50s of the First Step, with the strongest at being in the later 30s of the Second Steps. Most of the monsters were insect-like monsters, as well as a mix of wolf-like monsters with horns.

Lancell was confident that he could easily survive this horde, but he was far from confident of being able to protect Aerym. So instead of wreaking havoc, Lancell just kept the monsters at bay as Arkenvalle absorbed the mana from the corpses of the dead monsters.

Lancell glanced as Aerym, and it looks like she was still stunned from the sudden mental assault from the concentrated bloodlust of countless monsters.

However, that brief distraction made Lancell miss out a few monsters, letting them pass through. In alarm, Lancell tried to wake up Aerym.

"Hey!" he called out, "wake up, idiot!" He had shouted along with strong bloodlust of his own, so Aerym flinched the moment she heard his voice.

She then snapped out of her stupor as she shakenly took out her sword as she began to slash at some of the monsters that came across her.

Lancell heaved a small sigh of relief, as he then continued his slaughter.

◇ ◇ ◇

Lancell didn't know how long he fought, but all he knew was that he was fighting. His mind was once again getting muddled by the sea of killing intent in the atmosphere, but he took hold of his own mind. After all, losing himself to slaughter was not a good idea if he was near an ally.

He did not want to do the same mistake as he did in his past life.

After countless usage, Void Slash finally advanced from an 8th Grade Spellblade, into 7th Grade. Because of that, his void-cutting abilities went up a notch as the range of his space-transcending slash increased further.

And the Severing Blade, finally progressed into Level 9. It was nearing into completion, so Lancell would finally be able to improve it further. In order to go past the barrier of the Second Step to the Third. After all, the Third Step was different from the First and Second. It was the final step to Transcendence.

Lancell easily evaded combined assault from another incoming group of monsters, as he then slashed at them with Void Slash. The slash went through space-time, and cut the monsters apart without touching them.

And so, after an unknown more time, the last monster was decapitated, and the fight finally ended.