Curses!

- The Plan -

The next day, the familias gathered for the Knossos mission with Finn as the overall general in charge. Realizing Enyo is a god, Loki and Dionysus would be going into the Knossos to protect the adventurers. Beyond Enyo, the primary targets were anticipated to be Revis and multiple demi spirits. The primary strategy was to force the enemy to use the jewel fetuses inside the Knossos, making it difficult to transport the transformed demi spirits to the surface.

The familia alliance believed that the most critical floors would be between 7 and 12. There were probably jewel fetuses and/or demi spirits close to the control room on the 9th floor. Thus the attack plan would be multi-prong. 4 groups would attack from Daedalius street, 3 groups would attack from the 12th floor entrance from the dungeon while the Xenos with Fels would attack from the 18th floor entrance. During the operation, the Ganesha familia would deploy at the Daedalius entrance area and the Babel entrance. Several Freya executives and support members would guard the 12th floor entrance from the dungeon side.

From the Daedalius street entrance, the 1st team consisted of Finn, Tione, Ray, Airmid, Loki and members of the Loki familia. The 2nd team consisted of Gareth, Lefiya, Filvis, Dionysus and the Dionysus familia. The 3rd team consisted of 2 Gulliver brothers, Ryuu and members of the Freya familia. The 4th team consisted of Tsubaki, Tiona, Raul and members of the Hephaestus familia. Teams 1 and 3 would travel together with team 1 leading the attack and team 3 mopping up. Teams 2 and 4 would also travel together with team 2 leading the attack and team 4 mopping up. The Hermes familia would also be involved at the Daedalius street entrance, though their role was not explained to the other teams.

The attack from the 12th floor entrance would be timed to start after the attacks from the surface had made substantial progress. The goal was to draw the enemy defense towards the surface before attacking the central area from the 12th floor entrance. The 5th team consisted of Bell, Ais, Ottar, Welf, Haruhime, members of the Freya familia and the Loki familia. The 6th team consisted of Riveria, the elf squad, Bete and members of the Loki familia. The 7th team consisted of Allen, 2 Gulliver brothers and members of the Freya familia. Teams 5 and 6 would lead the attacks, while team 7 would hold the area around the 12th floor entrance. Several Freya executives and additional support members would be ready for backup duty outside the 12th floor entrance.

The Xenos would attack from the 18th floor while traveling up to meet the teams at the 12th floor entrance.

- Start of Attack -

With the launch of the operation, Team 1 led by Finn and Team 2 led by Gareth entered the Knossos. Close behind were Team 3 and Team 4. Despite the previous operation, there were still a large number of Evilus in the Knossos. Evilus members were using suicide attacks, violas and various monsters to battle the attacking teams.

Even worse, Evilus members used cursed weapons to inflict an unhealable curse on some team members. Fortunately, Airmid went along with Finn's lead team and used Dia Fratel to continuously heal the cursed members.

After a couple hours, Finn's team 1 and Gareth's team 2 both reached the 5th floor. Following the plan, they were able to draw a lot of the defenders towards them to make the critical floors less well guarded.

- 2nd Stage of Attack -

After Finn and Gareth both reported reaching the 5th floor, the attack from the 12th floor and the 18th floor commenced.

On the 12th floor, Ais, Bell and Ottar led the 5th team into the Knossos using their copy of the Daedalius orb. Riveria and Bete then followed with the 6th team in another direction. However, Riveria soon sensed Revis using the magic circles of Rea Laevateinn.

With Revis being so dangerous and one of their 2 primary targets, team 5 circled back towards team 6 to encircle Revis.

On the 18th floor, Fels and the Xenos entered the Knossos. With the intense fighting near the surface, there were minimal defenders. Thus they made quick progress up the 15th floor with only monsters to battle along the way.

- In the Knossos Control Room -

Barca monitored the progress of the attack teams and was worried about the fast progress of the attack teams, which had already reached the 7th floor and the 8th floor.

Realizing it was time to use his huge trap, he walked to a circular room with a self-destruct control. The trap involved used a similar mechanism for opening doors to collapse a floor by removing its support pillars. His plan was to collapse the entire 7th floor when attackers reached the 8th floor.

- With the Hermes Familia -

However, before Barca could activate the self-destruct control, Asfi attacked him and forced him away from the device. Furthermore, other Hermes familia members removed their Hades Hats that made them visible. When Barca asked them how they knew so much, it turned out that they were able to force an Evilus member to talk using truth serum.

Furthermore, Lulune picked up Barca's copy of Daedalus' Journal, which the captured member indicated would make a fast attack possible. Barca finally realized that Finn's group was the decoy for sneaking in Hermes familia to take over the control room.

While they disabled the self destruct mechanism, Lulune read through the journal to discover the location of the 6 demi spirits on the 10th floor and the Evilus base on the 9th floor. That information was immediately relayed to all the teams via occulus devices.

- With Finn's Group -

Having received the information from Lulune, Finn dispersed his group to encircle the enemy on the 9th floor. He was surprised to hear that the 6 jewel fetuses were already transformed because it may not be simple to get the demi spirits to the surface...

- With Gareth's Group -

Gareth's team 2 also reached the 9th floor. They were also dispersing to encircle the enemy.

- With Bell, Ais and Ottar -

When team 5 reached team 6, they started chasing after Revis' location using Riveria's detection ability. While most defenders had gone to the higher floors to assist with the attacks from the surface, they still had to get through large numbers of violas and other monsters.

- With Fels and the Xenos -

The Xenos continued to make good progress up the Knossos. They have now reached the 13th floor.

- In the Control Room -

While the Hermes familia was busy defeating the self-destruct and communicating with other groups, Barca became devastated with his plans destroyed. At that point, Finn, Ray, Tione, Airmid and a few others arrived at the control room to interrogate Barca.

To protect Knossos, Barca suddenly stabbed himself with a cursed sword many times, turning his blood black. Then he pressed a spare jewel fetus against his chest to transform into a hideous human demi spirit. The black veins on Barca's right arm burst, spraying black blood on whoever that was close by...

- In the Thanatos Familia Room -

In a different location on the 9th floor, Thanatos told Ein that it was time to unleash the demi spirits, but Ein replied that Enyo had another plan and that Thanatos would be sacrificed. After Ein left, Thanatos started laughing out loud realizing he had been used.

- With Gareth' Group -

Gareth had Lefiya continue to search for Ein using the magic circles of Lefiya's Rea Laevateinn. Some how, Dionysus became separated from his body guard Filvis ...

- With Ais, Bell and Ottar -

As Bells group and Riveria's group encircled Revis' location, Haruhime used Uchide no Kozuchi to boost the level of Ottar, Bell and Ais.

Soon their group finally caught up with Revis, who was at the other side of a large room.

Seeing Revis, Bell went straight to charging argonaut with no limit. At the same time, Ottar and Ais charged towards Revis...