Just wanted to throw this out here real quick, at the moment of this chapter going live, I'm also going live on my Twitch channel at Project_Armament .tv/project_armament! The past few days I've been doing VR games, but today I'm going back to writing live! So if you're interested or simply wanna talk fanfics, make sure you stop by and say hi! Enjoy this extra long chapter!


[Quest]

[Normal Quest: Collect Heavenly Souls! (Part 1)]

The Heavenly Palace is filled with Angelic beings. Hunt them down and collect their souls for special rewards.

Quest Completion Requirement:

- 10,000 Heavenly Souls.

Rewards:

- 1. Item of your choosing from the Store

- 2. +20 Bonus Stats

- 3. Hidden Reward

"Ten thousand?!" Izuku scratched at his head, "School's off for the next seven days, but will that even be enough? I've expanded my army pretty substantially, but still… ten thousand." He looked behind him, a smile crossing his face as he saw all 121 Shadow Warriors kneeled, ready for his command. "Well, I guess we're only wasting time here, let's get going."

Strolling down the hallway, an army at his back, Izuku felt like he could take on the world, which wasn't all that dissimilar from the number he had to match. And when he shoved open the doors at the end of that hallway, he began wondering if he really was here to take on the world.

The entirety of Tokyo was stretched out before him, its gray and bland architecture replaced by the most blinding white marble structures he had ever seen. Ethereal figures floated around these buildings, high in the sky, peacefully going about their business. Or at least, they were until Izuku stepped one foot out of the hallway.

All at once, a cacophony of screams that sounded closer to musical instruments erupted across the city and the beating of hundreds of wings filled the air.

[Item: Juggled Blades]

Item Class: S

Item Type: Dagger

+150 Attack

This Dagger can duplicate up to eight times and its trajectory when thrown can be controlled mentally.

[Skill: Sprint Lv. 3 has activated.]

With the explosive leap in movement speed, Izuku blurred forwards, leaping into the air, onyx daggers in hand to take the first kill. His body collided with the first angel, the ornate daggers plunging into its pure white and featureless form.

[You defeated a low-grade angel.]

[Collected Heavenly Souls: 1/10000]

Izuku flicked his wrists, duplicating the dagger so that four rested in each hand. As the other faceless angels swiftly approached, he launched all eight, finding that the telekinetic control was closer to Dominator's Touch than he had expected.

[Collected Heavenly Souls: 9/10000]

[Collected Heavenly Souls: 39/10000]

[Collected Heavenly Souls: 52/10000]

Izuku looked around, surprised to see that even his basic infantry was slashing through the angels with abandon, a stark contrast to the battle with the High Orcs. "Which means these things are really weak… it's not even worth Extracting their Shadows."

Scratching at his head, all the while directing around the daggers, Izuku found himself wondering why the key had even been ranked at S-Rank. "I figured it meant the Dungeon itself was S-Rank, but these guys are barely even D-Rank. It's gotta get harder the longer the fight goes on… right? Or maybe I just got too strong before challenging this place." Izuku shook his head, "There's no way that's the case. I'm sure I'll find my fill of danger by the end of the day."

[Collected Heavenly Souls: 111/10000]

"And at this rate, I can just sit back and watch them get torn to shreds!" Izuku shouted out loud, happy to see the fruits of his labor. "But I think that'd get boring before long… so!" Jumping back into the fray, he became the angel's boogeyman.


Ryukyu growled into her pillow as her phone buzzed on her dresser. It was less of a draconic roar and more of a cute grumble. Slamming her palm down on the dresser nearly hard enough to break it in two, her fingers felt around for the device, eventually finding it and raising it to her face. Its light felt like it was enough to blind her permanently, but she bravely pressed answer and pulled it close, "Hrm… Hello?"

"What's up Ryukyu?!" Hawks cried out from the end of the other line, "Sorry to disturb your rest, but the ten have been called to action."

"W-What?" Hawks' no-nonsense tone and answer pulled Ryukyu out of her exhaustion.

"Turns out our timetable's been moved up. Jeju Island's first Nomu made landfall about thirty minutes ago."

"Has it been dealt with?"

"It killed twelve men and women before snatching up a child and flying back to the island with her in tow."

"WHAT?!" Ryukyu shouted, "And you didn't stop it?!"

"Hey hey! I was nowhere near the incident, and none of the other Heroes nearby had the flight capabilities to stop it. That's why we're pushing forwards for the raid to happen now."

"R-Right… okay."

"One more thing before you head over," Hawks began, "All Might and Miruko keep asking around about some kid, Izuku Midoriya. Know anything about him?"

"Why are they looking for him?" Ryukyu asked, pushing aside Hawks' question.

"All Might said something about needing him for… Thirteen? Whatever that means. And Miruko just said that he smelled normal."

To anyone else, that sentence might've sounded crazy, but Ryukyu had known Miruko for quite some time. In her entire life, Miruko had never once encountered someone that smelled even remotely good. Her acute Mana sense had severely affected her olfactory sense and forced everyone to smell, as Miruko put it, "Like a wet dog dipped in sewage." If she smelled someone good for once, it made sense that she'd be at the very least curious about why.

"Haven't seen him since the UA Sports Festival. But I'll keep my eyes open."

"Alright," Hawks chirped, his normal cheery self back, "Then get down here as fast as you can."

"We'll be right down."

Hawks paused, "We?"

Ryukyu cursed under her breath.

"Ryukyu, who's w-" Ryukyu hung up, unable to think up an answer on the spot.

"Sounds like the chicken is jealous," Dabi drawled out, running a finger down Ryukyu's cold back. She shivered in response. Being cold-blooded, someone with flames like Dabi's could make her feel completely relaxed with just a single touch. But she managed to push him off and pull herself out of bed.

"Well the chicken also needs me, and any other S-Ranks would be welcome."

Dabi scoffed, "At Jeju Island? No thank you."

"Don't start acting all selfish again with that weird persona of yours."

"Hey, I love you and all that, but I also love life, I'd rather not lose it to that damned island."

Ryukyu rolled her eyes at his less than genuine declaration of affection, "You've never even been there."

"Seen enough footage to know that it's someplace I'd rather not go."

"So you're scared of a simple Raid?"

Dabi raised one arm from behind his head and pointed his index at her, "You're not getting me with that kindergarten baiting tactic. It's an S-Rank, no one could blame me for not going."

"Hmm… stooping low enough to try and kill a kid and then too chicken to even join me for a Raid." Ryukyu shrugged on her Hero uniform, as Dabi's expression remained unchanged and she sighed, "Come with me and I'll find an excuse for you to punch Endeavor."

Before she could even finish her sentence, he was up and throwing on a shirt, "Jeez, no need to twist my arm like that, Kyu!"


Izuku threw a right hook, taking off the head of an intermediate angel like it was nothing.

[Collected Heavenly Souls: 2479/10000]

"They've gotten to about high C-Rank, which means I was right about their power increasing as the floors went on." After defeating a certain number of angels, Izuku was given a dropped item.

[Item: Entry Permit]

Item Class: ?

Type: ?

A Permit to enter the 2nd floor of the Heavenly Palace. Usable in floor movement magic circle on 1st floor.

By now, Izuku had received the 49th floor's permit to move onto the 50th floor. At first he figured every ten or so floors would show him some sort of crazy Boss monster, but then he passed the first ten floors with no problem, then the next twenty-five, then the thirtieth.

Apprehension became replaced with boredom as Izuku's army tore through floor after floor at a frightening pace.

[You have Leveled-Up!]

[Dominator's Touch Skill Level has Risen.]

Izuku had only seen those two messages as he continued to make his way to the massive pillar of light that signified the floor movement magic. It was only the second time he had Leveled-up since entering the Gate.

A full two days had passed and he was seeming to make some decent progress, but if there were truly one-hundred floors to this Dungeon and if he didn't increase his pace of soul collection, he wouldn't be able to finish the Quest within the next five days.

"If the 50th floor doesn't have something special, then I know this Dungeon is just kinda a joke… maybe the Quest rewards are the real goal here, not the completion of the tower."

Izuku's belief was cast away, however, as he entered the 49th floor's magic circle and was introduced to the 50th floor.

[The Ruler of Lower Floors, Charitous Cherub Cray]

"That's a mouthful," Izuku said as he looked to the massive creature a couple of hundred meters away.

Sitting lazily on a throne was a humanoid figure with a body like a lions. Thick fur covered its body and its hands and feet ended in talons and claws as long as Izuku was tall. Unlike the previous angels Izuku had encountered, this one had a face of some sort, a golden ring of light hovering above it. He described it as a face of "some sort" because for whatever reason, Izuku couldn't pin down any features. He knew it had the distinguishing qualities of a face, but everytime the memory attempted to enter his mind, the Cherub's face morphed and whatever he had seen was lost. Standing up, two sets of eagle-like wings spread from its back and flicking its wrist, a whip of fiery light appeared in his hand.

[Cray's Guards have discovered an intruder.]

High-Leveled Angels rushed Izuku and his army, gleaming white armor adorning their body.

"These ones are probably closer to B-Rank, but it still doesn't matter. Even if my Level hasn't been rising all that much, the Level of my Shadows has been increasing at a decent rate. They'll take care of these guys like they're nothing and then we can focus the big bad."

Igris, Hyo, and Tank did just that, slashing through seven of "elite" guards before the rest of the Shadow Soldiers even had a chance to attack.

Activating Stealth, Izuku prepared himself to face the Cherub head on and buy time for his soldiers to join him. But oddly enough, the hybrid angel seemingly refused to move, completely emotionless to the slaughtering of his forces.

"Then maybe I'll just wait until the rest of the guards are-"

Cray's idly beating wings suddenly flapped with enough force to topple a building, expelling a mass of white flames.

"Tank!"

[The attack's power is too high. Skill: Defender has failed.]

"TUSK!"

The High Orc Sorcerer's Hymn of Protection appeared just in front of Izuku, shielding him and Igris from the enormous waves of heat. Unfortunately, the rest of his forces were wiped out with that singular blow. Obviously, they could regenerate, but such a huge blow was not ideal.

[Mana: 5342/8485]

[Charitous Cherub Cray's Skill: Periodic Cleansing is on cooldown.]

"It looks like his Skill avoided all of the other Angels, which means I can't wait for him to wipe out his own forces…" Izuku turned around to face Tusk, who was still holding up the barrier, waiting for his Liege's next command. "And I don't know how long the cooldown is for that Skill, so I've gotta finish this now. Inventory."

[Item: Orb of Avarice]

Item Class: S

Item Type: Artifact

The strength of all Magic is doubled when held.

As Izuku handed the blood-red orb to Tusk, he called back all of his Shadows, thankful that they didn't need to run to him to fade back into his Shadow. Instead, they simply disappeared in whatever position they were in, leaving the other angels to stumble forward, wondering where their opponents had gone.

With Tusk behind Izuku, and Igris the only other Shadow remaining, Izuku smirked, "You know what to do Tusk."

[Hymn of Frenzy, Hymn of Strengthening, Hymn of Giants, and Hymn of Combustion have activated.]

With all those buffs, Tusk increased his damage with Frenzy, Combustion, and Strengthening. And by increasing his size, he was effectively upping the area-of-effect for when he used…

[Hymn of Blazing Fire has activated.]

Tusk mirrored Cray's explosive blast of fire, scorching the earth and swallowing every single angel in an orange inferno, leaving just the Boss. However, he would not go down without a fight. The fiery attack had obscured Izuku's view, so he was unable to see the light whip fly through the air and slice off Tusk's head in one motion.

"Hey!" Izuku yelled to the Boss as the fire faded, "He's new!"

[Sprint Lv. 3 has activated.]

Appearing just in front of the Cherub's impossible face, Izuku clenched his fist and threw a punch, "Give him a break!"

As Tusk regenerated, Cray went flying backwards, crashing through at least three buildings as he did so. Standing back up, he emitted a high-pitched warbling noise and thrashed its arm, causing its whip to move like a snake and launch its head for Izuku.

"Tank." Izuku said calmly, calling back his army from his Shadow. The white whip collided with the Nomu, but instead of cutting through him like it did with Tusk, it stopped short, gripped in his arms.

[Passive Skill: Shock Absorption. Shadow Nomu will take 99% reduced damage from blunt attacks and 50% reduced damage from any magic type attacks.]

"Thanks! Now just hold onto that for me!" Izuku shot past Tank, Igris and Hyo running alongside him. Tank did one better and used his massive strength to rip the whip out of Cray's hands altogether.

Flicking forwards the eight knives, Izuku pinned the Cherub's wings against the building behind him, hoping that it would prevent his flame ability from activating. Hyo formed two massive ice blades in his hand, and Igris wielded his Shadow sword, throwing the Angel's Demonic Wing sword to Izuku, rearming him. Feeling himself grow bigger and stronger, he knew that Tusk was buffing the trio.

Cray tugged against the daggers still pinning him. Normally, they'd break off from the building behind him from such extreme force, but Izuku was using Dominator's Touch and the telekinetic control of the daggers to keep him pinned. As he noticed the three approaching, his warble became more of a roar and reaching behind himself, he tore away his own wings, a spray of white life force spurting from his back. Izuku's eyes widened in amazement at Cray's pain tolerance, but just because he respected the angel didn't mean he'd stop.

The Cherub's palm flew forwards, intending to squish Izuku under it, but Igris jumped in front of his Liege, using his Shadow sword to bisect the limb completely, racing up it like he would a mild slope. Hyo followed closely behind, throwing both ice swords into the place on Cray's face where you would find eyes, drawing another roar of pain from the angel. Its free hand went to slap at where it saw Hyo last, but Igris vaulted off his right arm, slashing through the left at the tricep and effectively crippling it for Izuku to make the perfect stab, piercing its heart.

[The 50th Floor's Boss has been slain.]

[Collected Heavenly Souls: 3021/10000]

"I guess Cray counted as more than one soul."

[You have Leveled-Up!]

[You have Leveled-Up!]

[You have Leveled-Up!]

Cray's body slumped back into the building he had been pinned against, white light leaking from his body as blood.

Izuku pulled his sword from the angel's heart and lobbed the weapon back to Igris, who accepted it gratefully. At the same time, he noticed a few pillars of light behind him, "Oh! Some new items!"

[You obtained Item: Olympian Chestplate.]

"Finally! Some armor! I've been missing these things since I lost my Shadowsteel set."

[You obtained Item: Cray's Tail.]

Izuku held out the whip in his right hand with an apprehensive gaze, "Uh… I'm not even sure I know how to use one of these." Shrugging his shoulders, Izuku did his best to mimic Cray's arm movement and accidentally sent the whip flying through a building, cutting it completely in half. "...Maybe I'll just leave that in my inventory for now."

[You obtained Cray's Wings.]

"Just a simple material drop."

[You obtained Ingredient Item: World Tree's Fragment.]

[Item: World Tree's Fragment]

Item Class: ?

Item Type: Ingredient

A piece of wood extracted from the wooden grip of Cray's Whip, which was created from the World Tree's Branch. Woods from the World Tree contain powerful magic and thus are used as ingredients for magic items of the highest quality.

"Highest quality huh? Guess I'll save it until I can find something to do with it." Izuku turned to look at Tusk, who was still gazing at the Orb of Avarice like it was solid gold. "Speaking of highest quality, that thing sure does work… Magic-Type Hunters would lose it over something like that… I could probably buy a mansion selling that thing." He pushed the thought to the back of his mind, deciding instead to focus on his other new item.

[Item: Olympian Chestplate]

Item Class: S

Item Type: Armor

+50 Strength

+35 Vitality

Set Effect will activate if this item is equipped along with:

Olympian Armor pieces.

Set Effect 1: (Locked)

Set Effect 2: (Locked)

Set Effect 3: (Locked)

"Well well… It looks like the Shadowsteel armor has met its match. Fifty Strength is crazy."

Level: 91

Strength: 209

Vitality: 146

Agility: 142

Intelligence: 161

Sense: 123

[Mana: 9065/9065]

[HP: 34982/34982]

[Shadows able to be extracted: 184]

[Shadows able to be saved: 143]

"Nine Levels away from 100… I wonder if I'll stop growing at that point. Oh well… only one more thing to do now." He walked back to the corpse of Cray, pausing just in front of it, "Arise."

[Extraction has failed. You have 2 attempts remaining.]

"Arise."

[Extraction has failed. You have 1 attempt remaining.]

"Tch. Is it because he was stronger than me? I did need Igris, Hyo, and the doubled buff from Tusk to beat him after all…" Izuku sighed, "Okay… one more time, with feeling!" He held his hand out to Cray, "Arise!"

[Extraction has failed. The soul will no longer be able to be Extracted.]

"Seriously?!" He shook his head, "I guess it is the first time an Extraction has failed, so I should be grateful it took me this long to encounter it."

The rest of the angel guards were still pretty weak in comparison to his other Shadows, so Izuku decided to take only ten of them instead of filling up his remaining slots. Instead of the normal blue and black of most of his Shadows, the angel Shadows, like the High Orcs, had a different color scheme. Theirs was one of black and white. By now, Izuku had a total of 131 Shadows, with 12 spare save slots.

Yawning and stretching his arms high into the air, Izuku realized he had basically been fighting for two days straight. Opening his inventory he pulled out a small sleeping bag. "Guard me while I sleep. If there's anything you can't handle, wake me." The army kneeled to him, their heads bowed as he passed into unconsciousness, certain that he'd be completely fine.

Upon waking, Izuku had found that his Soul count had risen from three-thousand to nearly four-thousand. "You guys must've been busy! Sorry for troubling you!"

Igris shook his head, saying nothing out loud, but by this point, Izuku could practically hear his thoughts, "No my Liege! It is our honor to be trusted with your safety!"

Izuku clapped Igris on the shoulder and hopped onto Smokey's back, "Alright team! We've got the Floor permit! Let's move out!" The Shadow Bear shot forwards, far surpassing the speed of any commercial vehicle as he rushed towards the pillar of light that signified the next Floor.


Another day and a half had passed by the point Izuku reached Floor 75. His Soul count had surpassed nine-thousand as the difficulty and number of angels steadily increased. The growth had been exponential, which explained why he gained so much progress with so few floors compared to the first 50. The only growth that hadn't been exponential was his Level count, which had stopped just after ticking over to Level 92 on Floor 64.

After Floor 57, Izuku had actually decided to experiment with Igris's weapons and took the Angel's Demonic Wing off of him in exchange for Cray's Tail. The effect was immediately noticeable. Now he had a bit of range to him with the whip, but still had his Shadow sword for close combat.

[Item: Cray's Tail]

Item Class: S

Item Type: Whip

+200 Attack

Forged from concentrated light and the branch of the World Tree, this whip is capable of slicing through nearly anything. +50 Attack when dealing with undead creatures.

Emerging from the light of the 74th Floor's Magic circle, Izuku had a sense of deja vu as he looked over a massive Boss Villain. However, unlike Cray, this one was not humanoid.

[Seiryu, The Divine Dragon of the Upper Floors.]

The "dragon" was actually a brilliant white wyrm. Unlike typical dragons or wyverns, a wyrm had no wings and instead undulated through the air like a serpent. It was nearly as long as an office building was tall and had four legs, each with their own set of razor sharp talons that could cut through solid steel.

"Nice big target," Izuku remarked as a few hundred angels materialized around it and started rushing the Shadow army. "Tusk. Clear a path."

[Hymn of the Fire Dragon]

A burning red draconic head appeared just above Tusk's head, opening its mouth to spit out a long stream of heat. It tore through the sky, searing dozens of the angels every second before they caught on and split up into every conceivable direction to avoid the blast.

Just like the fight with Cray, Izuku, Igris, and Hyo were rushing the Boss, allowing the rest of the army to handle the minions. Although, this time, they had Tank running with them.

Seiryu seemingly had no problem facing the four of them alone however and the angels overhead continued to ignore them. The reason for this was revealed moments later when its mouth pulled open, revealing several dozen rows of teeth and an unending void of light at the back of its throat.

"Hyo!"

An ice mountain, stretching towards the heavens, appeared out of nowhere, far surpassing the height and width of the surrounding buildings. Hyo's cryokinetic abilities seemed to grow in strength alongside his Level. Unfortunately, it still was nothing next to the Boss's attack.

As if it was some sort of solid structure, the light flowing from Seriyu's mouth shattered the ice wall instead of melting through it.

"SCATTER!" Izuku yelled, turning on his Stealth and disappearing into the alleyways of one of the buildings, Seiryu's blast tracing towards him. As he continued to stampede through the all too clean gap in buildings, Izuku began to feel a bit of heat licking at his back. Knowing that the attack was gaining on him, despite him being hidden, he started vaulting off the walls, getting higher and higher. Eventually, instead of touching the wall, his feet made contact with the gravel on one of the roofs. From there he could see the whole situation.

Seiryu's beam attack had stopped after receiving a lash to the cheek from Igris's new whip. Though its description said it could cut through almost anything, Izuku was still shocked by the fact that it had gouged such a deep crevice into the wyrm's face.

In a rage, its tail swung around, slapping at the area Igris was in. Not only did it completely ravage his body with its scales, but it continued onwards, carrying him into a building that crumbled like sand under Seiryu's weight.

[Hymn of the Fire Dragon]

Seiryu flinched back as a long-range fire beam struck the center of its body. Tusk had noticed the battle going poorly and did his best to aim for the head, but the distance was too far and the angels attacking him were simply too numerous to get a good shot. Of course, for the wyrm, the distance was no problem and light began to escape its maw as it aimed for the High Orc.

Thankfully, Tank and Izuku were in perfect sync. While Igris and Tusk had kept their opponent occupied, Tank and Izuku had run along the rooftops, getting as close as possible before vaulting off the roof, each with a fist aimed straight for its jaw.

The immense force shut its jaw like a pneumatic press, the light exploding inside the enclosed space, nearly shaking off Izuku, who had kept himself latched on by jamming the Angel's Demonic Wing into the flesh of its chin.

Smoke rose from its burnt mouth and it was too busy trying to clear the annoyance from its eyes to notice Izuku scaling his way up the mouth. Using the Juggled Blades, he created foot and handholds along its face.

Once on its neck (?) back (?) He stored the Juggled Blades in the Inventory and pulled back out the longsword, raising it high and stabbing into the space just above the eyes, presumably into the brain.

Seiryu obviously didn't like that and Izuku could tell its serpent-like body was about to start bucking all over the place. Hyo wasn't about to let that happen and for the second time, he sent a wall of ice racing to smother most of the wyrm's body, freezing it in place for Izuku.

Silently thanking the autonomous nature of his Shadows, Izuku heaved as hard as he could against the longsword, dragging it across Seiryu's back, cutting open a street-wide gash that spilled light-blood like a river. As it grew weak from "blood" loss, it raised its head for one last blast of light, but Igris was in a bit of a bad mood after being slammed into a building.

Leaping from the wreckage, he flicked the light whip, splitting the scaly face down the middle, killing it instantly.

[The Floor Boss has been slain!]

[You have Leveled-Up!]

[You have Leveled-Up!]

[Heavenly Souls stored in the belly of Seiryu have been discovered.]

[You received x220 Heavenly Souls.]

[You obtained Item: Olympian Leggings.]

[You obtained Ingredient Item: Spring Water of the Echoing Forest.]

[Item: Olympian Leggings]

Item Class: S

Item Type: Armor

+35 Agility

Set Effect will activate if this item is equipped along with:

Olympian Armor pieces.

Set Effect 1: +5 All Stats

Set Effect 2: (Locked)

Set Effect 3: (Locked)

[Collected Heavenly Souls: 10001/10000]

[Normal Quest: Collect Heavenly Souls (Part 1) has been completed!]

Izuku nodded to himself, "I'll look you over in one second, I've got something important to do." Placing both of his palms on the cold dead scales of Seriyu he whispered, "Arise."

The ice lining its body shuddered and cracked as dark energies leaked from its body and a Shadow began to form in the sky above the corpse.

"Well how about that?" Izuku said with a smile, "It looks like I've got my very own Dragon."


Thanks for reading! I apologize for taking so long to get this chapter out, but homework, among other things, have kept me relatively busy and I wanted to post this on a day I could stream! As such, I decided to go all out and make this chapter far longer than I usually make them! Hope to see you next time! And don't forget, if you want to, come on by my Twitch and say hi, we're streaming right now at Project_Armament!