Chapter 39:
What Emerges from the Dusk

Special thanks to Pritchard, known as 'Reed Writes SFW (Reed_Writes)' here on AO3 for the beta work on this chapter.

The air on the third floor prickled and bit away at my skin, as a ghastly breeze constantly flowed past the six of us traversing around bathed in the bubble of blue light. The wind made me question why there was airflow this deep down in the labyrinth, to begin with, but asking questions that didn't have answers was a stupid prospect. It was eerily quiet, and we hadn't come across anything yet. It was a sharp contrast to the second floor, which didn't need to be restated.

In any case, I was glad I wasn't coming face-to-face with nightmarish creatures. Although, ironically, the absence of them was also creeping me out.

"Where are all of the monsters? This is seriously disappointing…" Ares groaned.

"Don't let down your guard, Ares," Alek said. "For all we know—"

"They could be stalking us right now, I get it," Ares cut him off, somehow finishing his sentence. "But I wish they'd show themselves already."

"You're quite courageous for someone of your age, Ares," Elinalise said. "I'm sure you'll grow into a valiant, strong—" I heard Talhand kick her in the leg.

"Cut it out, would you? Surely even someone like you has limits," Talhand growled.

Hm? Am I missing something?

"You two, there are children here. I know it's hard to resist, but do I really need to remind you that we're also in the bowels of a spider-infested labyrinth?" Roxas sighed. I giggled at the implication that this bickering had started long before we'd reunited.

There were times when I caught Elinalise engaging in playful banter with Roxas, which was never as bad as the relationship between her and Talhand. But it also told me something else. Elinalise was a little… too interested in Roxas for it to be regarded in a purely platonic light. But that was just me looking for something to entertain myself with during the drudgingly boring search for items and the next floor, most likely.

I stared out into the dimly lit hallway that we were entering and caught sight of something glimmering in the dark. For a moment, I thought that whatever it was lurking in the shadows, it would be some sort of new monster we hadn't seen yet. One exclusive to the last floor, maybe? But my worries went away the moment we drew closer and noticed what it was.

"Woah.. this room…" I began in disbelief.

"It's full of magical items!" Ares shouted, charging in.

Like he'd said, the room was scattered with magical implements. Some of them were physically enchanted, which shone with a brilliant ochre in the dark. There were so many that it honestly looked like a treasure room.

With the money from this, I can laze around for weeks on end screwing around with my magic! Woohoo!

As I was celebrating internally, I caught both Alek and Roxas standing oddly still in my peripheral vision. What's up with them? I left Ares to his own devices when I heard a cry.

"Watch out! It's a trap!" a distinctly masculine voice yelled—Alek's.

My entire body tensed the second I heard those words, and I scrambled to get back outside of the room. Ares leaped almost instantly out of it, with a few glimmering items in his hand. Soon after, the floor of the room dropped, revealing a rather stereotypical subfloor full of arrows pointing up.

"So there's traps now?" Ares groaned.

"I was anticipating one," Roxas said. "In any case, I suppose we'll have to be a little more vigilant."

"You sure know everything about this sort of stuff, don't you," Ares bit back sarcastically.

"I-" Roxas stammered, scratching the back of his head as if unsure how to react to that.

That wasn't called for. I studied Ares's facial expression, trying to figure out where he was coming from. I have no idea where to start in figuring out what his problem with Roxas is, either. As far as I know, they don't have any history. Though, I guess I could always ask him. Hm. They do say that communication is the best way to resolve things, so I guess I should follow that advice.

So, I decided to ask him later. I had a lot of things in my backlog, I was noticing. First of all, I had that duel with Ares that I needed to make good on. Then, I had to sell a few of my figures that I was still keeping lying around in my backpack—I was surprised that they survived being crushed. Plus, I had to explain my Curse Magic to Roxas, and maybe do some research into it. And now this was just another addition to that list.

I've got three whole months. I just hope I don't forget some of this. I sighed under my breath. Now, the most pressing issue was figuring out what was wrong with the party dynamic. Like Alek had said, even the smallest mistake could lead to our entire party being caught between a rock and a hard place. Didn't seem so appealing to me, at least.

But then, Ares's expression suddenly twisted into confusion, as if his intentions faded away into something else entirely.

"Then, you should know what that black fog is, right?" He asked, pointing at something behind me.

As he said, there was a distinct black fog rapidly approaching us. It was tinted black in the dark, but it might've been due to the blue light—either way, it was all too noticeable. What the hell was down here that could make that sort of thing happen?

"Get down!" Alek yelled. "It's Lagrima gas from a…!"

But his words were cut down as the haze approached us, filling the whole hallway and leaving no room to escape. I groped at the ground, trying desperately to find something to place my hand on and get up, but I couldn't muster the strength. I heaved a breath, and then my consciousness abruptly cut out.

Ares

We were thrown off course.

That was the very first thought in my mind when I came to, lying atop the stupidly harsh ground of this damn labyrinth. Oh, what I'd do to get out of this place, I told myself. Instead of moping any longer, I forced my body to sit upright to check out what had happened.

In my immediate surroundings were the trapped treasure room, Alek, and two of that blue-haired kid's companions. Whatever had happened, it looked like we were left where we were before. The blue spirit light was hovering above my head as if having urged me to wake up.

Then why had I been knocked out if nothing was going to happen? Couldn't I have at least been dragged into a room full of monsters? At least that'd be something interesting.

"Hey, kid. You alright?" the gruff-looking dwarf called out to me. I was decently sure his name was Talhand if my memory was competent whatsoever. Not like I was any good with names to begin with, but I'd like to think I was getting better.

"Yeah, I'm fine," I replied, checking my side for my sword and relaxing when I felt the rough leather of the sheath along my fingertips. "Any clue as to what happened?"

"I've seen this happen before. The Lagrima gas secreted by a Collapsi is easily one of the most dangerous things for a party to encounter," Alek said as if I had any idea what those fancy words meant. But he got the message across.

"Why's that? It's not poisonous, or anything," I said. If it were poisonous, I wouldn't have woken up. In that case, I didn't see why the gas was such a big deal to Alek.

"It's because of how a Collapsi takes advantage of the gas's ability to cut someone's consciousness for a while," Alek explained. "It uses tendrils to grab onto party members and drags them to its nest, never to be seen again."

Scary. I don't think I could've handled something like that, I thought, feeling relieved. And then the feeling of having missed something vital to me crept up my spine like a heightened awareness. I surveyed my surroundings again, to get my bearings. When I finally realized it, I got off of my rear and stood.

"Ah, where is Lumina and that blue-haired boy?" I asked.

"..."

I was met with silence from all four of them. They wore weary expressions as if they were unsure how to proceed from here. But what was unanimously left unspoken was clear to me.

"They've been taken, haven't they?" I said. "Then don't we have something to do?"

There was absolutely zero chance I was going to let Lumina potentially die, even if I knew that Lumina would probably still live despite it all. That's just in her nature. It'd take one hell of a hit for her to put her down now that she wasn't the careless adventurer she once was. But, she was still Lumina. She makes mistakes all the time, and if she slips up in that sort of situation…

I hadn't come all this way for nothing. And I doubted she had too; she had her family to reunite with.

And… I don't want to witness the aftermath if she dies. I can't lose her. No matter what.

With that, I stared fixedly at the three before me with an expectant look on their face. Alek's smile tugged at his mouth as he gave me a pat on the shoulder.

"Yes, we do," he said.

But I had a feeling the other two weren't as enthusiastic about things. Even though, yes, Lumina made the last call to come down here, couldn't they be a little more determined about this? I'd heard that they were good friends with Lumina's parents, after all.

"This is why I voted to leave. Preventing this shoulda been our number one objective," the boorish dwarf mused.

"Don't get like that, Tally. She's just a child," the elf said, placing her hands on her hips, offended.

"But she ought to know better, don'tcha think?" the dwarf grunted.

" She ought to know better" my ass! I didn't know why the dwarf seemed so pissy, but he clearly didn't know what Lumina was capable of doing.

I pointed at the elf lady. "You realize she and I voted to go too, right? It wasn't just Lumina, you know!"

"We don't have the time to be arguing right now," Alek interjected. "We can discuss this once we've located Lumina and Roxas."

Argh, he's got a point. I'll give this guy a piece of my mind later. I promised myself.

"Wait," I paused. "You said Lumina and Roxas?"

Alek looked at me as if I had six heads, then answered me. "That's right, Ares."

I did nothing but hum in response. In total honesty, it slipped my mind that they'd be taken together. While it should've given me some consolation because Lumina wasn't alone, something nagged at me. That guy put me off, for some reason.

He was Lumina's teacher. She'd first told me about him a few days after she bought—ahem, saved me from the slave market all the way back in Rikarisu, and she talked awfully highly of him. I honestly didn't know what to think of him. But from the way Lumina had praised him, I'd be lying if I said I didn't have a high bar for him to live up to, even if it was unfair. But when I met the guy, he was just lukewarm. He looked about our age, too, which didn't line up. Lumina said that Roxas looked like a 14-year-old, yet he still looked that way to me, six years later. Maybe there was something I wasn't told, but it was still off to me. Too many things I didn't know about the guy.

And he was way too close with Lumina. I understood that they were childhood friends, but there's gotta be a limit to these things, right? It's not like they were dating, or anything. I think. They couldn't be, anyway. A student-teacher relationship was a no-go zone, as far as I'd been taught. God knows I wouldn't so much as touch Auber.

I shuddered when that thought crossed my mind. As much as I respected the guy for practically hand-crafting my fighting style that I still carry to this day, there were some lines even I wouldn't cross.

Not like I was crossing many lines nowadays, to begin with. Something about sneaking up on Lumina while she was changing felt dull now. Or maybe Alek's lectures each time I was caught were finally catching up to me. I felt like it would be so much more rewarding if she'd voluntarily let me see what was under her robe that covered all of her shapely features…

In the end, I concluded that I wanted to be the one to be at Lumina's side. Not some other kid. She'd have to ask for permission if she wanted that. After all, I'd worked my butt off for it. No way was I getting shown up if I could help it.

I might even go as far as to say that she's mine.

Is that too far? I feel like that's too far. Well, it doesn't matter. Not like I'd say something that embarrassing to her myself.

"Enough dawdling. Are we going or what?" Talhand said to all of us, staring at us expectantly as if beckoning us to hurry up.

"We've got it. Come on, now," Alek said, walking forward in the direction that the gas plume had been expelled from.

"Hmph," I said, begrudgingly listening to Alek if it meant not listening to that dwarf.

The thing that came to my mind the first time I killed a monster was the feeling of making a mark in the world. There weren't very many monsters near Ars, which was to be expected. Ars was this grand, majestic city, devoid of anything remotely monstrous. Or rather, that was the mask it wore. In my mind, Ars is tainted with an inky tar, all thanks to the true nature of the nobles that I'd spent so much time idolizing and hoping to one day become.

But even while I was growing up, I felt an impending sense of not being able to make a name for myself, that I had no manner in which to carve my name into the world. Certainly, I was the next in the succession order for the Boreas line of the massive family of Greyrat, which by itself held a lot of glory and honor. But in reality, my father, the head of the Boreas, was struggling to keep appearances. I wasn't the perfect heir he wanted, especially during the months leading up to my escape in Roa. I knew that he was running out of options, and quickly.

The Boreas family had very few monopolies to their name. As opposed to the other Greyrats who enjoyed luxuries beyond my grandest desires, and equipped entire neighborhoods of the wealthy district of Ars, the main branch of the Boreas family had a measly 12 mansions to their name.

The only thing we had a secure foothold in was the Fittoa Region and the ludicrously popular cash crop known as the Vatrius flower. It was one of the few things that kept the Boreas relevant in discussions. But one of the Great Families of the Anemoi couldn't possibly die out, or could it? It was clearly stressful for everyone involved.

So James, my father, was getting desperate. And I did not want to stick around to see the man he'd become due to his last-ditch efforts to expand, expand, and expand. My father wasn't the worst noble around, but I saw signs of him becoming more and more like the scum that surrounded me. He called himself my father, but never once did he try to be my dad. And that's why, even though I feel bad for the other members of the Boreas who are undoubtedly going through it now with what's happened to the Fittoa Region, I have no regrets about leaving.

Auber, the only reason why I managed to hold on for so long, was the odd one out. In fact, the only reason we'd been able to contract Auber was because of an unfortunate incident when I was 8 years old. I'd attempted to use a sword scabbard to attack a bug monster that had snuck its way into the castle gardens, which backfired on me spectacularly. By some twist of fate, Auber had been silently watching me like the ninja he was and saved me. I'd mentioned that my hair color was particularly unique amongst nobles, but Auber later mentioned that he was drawn to my eyes more than anything. Whatever that's supposed to mean.

But one thing that's stuck with me to this day is the way he prepared me for the real world. One day, back when I was eleven, he brought me out of Ars for a few days to properly hunt monsters. And for the first time in a truly long while, I felt alive. In that field with no cities or towns in sight, I didn't have to put on a mask to appease anyone. I let loose, cleaved through flesh, and lost myself in the moment. When I cut down a monster, I changed the world. Damned be if that mark was small, it was my own. That was the day I realized I wanted to be a swordsman, no matter what.

If this labyrinth was my trial for becoming a swordsman, if not progressing to Advanced class for years was my obstacle, if protecting Lumina became a goal bigger than it, then so be it.

...

"Ares, behind you!" Alek yelled.

I pivoted and wasted no time to slam my sword into the side of a mandible so sharp it might as well have been metal. It dragged against the side of my sword, creating an unpleasant noise that assaulted my eardrums. Now that it wasn't charging at me, I got a good look at the thing. And, god, was it a monstrosity.

The thing was easily twice my height. Its head was tucked inside of a massive coating of what looked to be ice and bloodied flesh. The head was disproportionately tiny to its hulking body, which extended into several spikes of pale blue and teal. It had eight legs that were all the size of my body and extended away from the body just as far. What I had mistaken for its mandibles was a pair of pincers that jutted out from the space between the tiny mandibles and their massive legs.

I digested all of that information in moments as a battle cry from Talhand roared out behind me, with him seemingly invested in his own battle. I ducked as its pincers re-attempted to snip me in two and dashed to the side toward its legs. I leapt to the rear of the creature, wedging my sword into its back to get a grasp on the thing as it tried spinning to face me.

Hurting this thing from the front where it was the most vulnerable was going to be a challenge with its stupidly nimble pincers. If I could slice them off, it would be good. But I wouldn't be able to get close enough for that before being rendered headless. While the icy coating made for a less-than-favorable place to climb up, it had to work somehow.

Now that I was at a vantage point, I had a clear view of the spider's legs and the connective bone that attached it to the main body. This spider was a curious little fucker, and only had four legs instead of 8. That meant that if I cut one off, it would be infinitely harder for the spider to continue attacking. I wobbled on the top of the spider's abdomen as it thrashed around in futile attempts to shove me off and tried to get a stable footing. And then, I lunged with my sword in both arms.

"SKRIIIIIEECHK!" the spider cried, purple blood flooding from the spider's brand-new and shiniest orifice. That one's courtesy of me, thank you very much.

As I was grinning at the spider that struggled to get up, I caught wind of the rest of the party handling their own creatures. Talhand in particular was having a rough time with a particularly slimy-looking spider. I momentarily returned to my own prey to very " delicately" rip off a second leg, just to hammer in its uselessness. When I heard a scuttling behind me, I wasted no time in pivoting and brandishing my sword, slashing behind me preemptively.

"Hnggh!" the creature grunted at me, using its scythe-like arms to parry my sword. But there was something different about this creature in particular. I wasn't a stranger to humanoid monsters, but this was a whole different story. It was a human—or what looked like one, what with its sickly, pale yellow skin standing out in the dark—mounted, no, transitioning to black, shiny skin. It was a spider with the torso of a humanoid directly where its head and upper abdomen should've been.

An abomination. Something that needed to be erased from this world.

I locked eyes with the thing's almost scaly, shiny black neck. It was the one place that didn't look too heavily protected by the armored skin of the spider woven into the humanoid body. There. I would aim there.

"GRAHH!" the creature groaned, struggling to keep up with my movements. I was at its front, trying to manipulate it into turning its back and, therefore, leaving its neck exposed. But thanks to the spider-human-thing's many legs, it had annoyingly adept maneuverability. Its arm-scythes seemed to be salivating at the prospect of cutting off my neck, too, so I couldn't go in too recklessly. So, at the crucial moment when I'd finally got it to move to the side, I was rudely interrupted.

In my peripheral vision, I noticed an immense, bulky mass of icy-blue skin hastily approaching me. When I glanced at it, it charged. That fucking thing can charge with two legs? Bullshit!

I ducked to avoid a hand-scythe from the spider-human-abomination and rolled out of the way of the larger threat's charge. The spider-abomination lurched at me, its empty maw opening so wide it looked like its entire damn jaw was unhinged. I had to take advantage of it before the other spider had the opportunity to recover from its charge.

"CRACK!"

I slammed my sword into the skull of the spider abomination, finding relief in the sound of its head impacting the wall and landing on the floor with a defined crunch. One nuisance down.

I heard several screeches coming to my left as I caught wind of the many monsters attacking the rest of the party. Elinalise, Alek, and Talhand seemed to have joined up in a formation. While I would have loved to go with them, I was now busy with a little something on my end that came in the form of growls to my right.

"This shit never ends, does it?" I spat out, eyeing the recovering icy spider and now a cluster of spiders salivating all over their eerily human teeth. An Ambusher launched itself at me, its legs open wide enough to ensnare my head had I been careless enough to ever let it close the distance. With a single slice, I tore through the thing and watched with a grin as it fell, its oblong body cracking open right in front of my new assailants. These things were dumber than rocks, but surely they understood that they weren't shit in the face of me and my sword.

Yeah. This is who you're dealing with now, I thought, wiping the spotted, purple blood off my cheek.

And just as I was adjusting my grip on my sword, white-hot pain sprouted out from my back. Whatever had caused it was blunt, the strike clearing having been muffled by the leather armor that Lumina'd once picked out for me. Even though my body armor was thick, the strike still felt like it'd bruised my back. It was an aching, searing pain.

I shuffled my feet, taking care to not turn my back to the spiders that were eerily staying still, to look at what had attacked me. At that moment, something in my body screamed at me to act, so I flipped up my right eye's eyepatch.

A slash to your neck.

I ducked immediately, with my Foresight's prediction coming to pass the moment I'd gotten out of harm's way. My breath hitched as my eyes took in the full view of the monstrosity in front of me. It reminded me of the spider-human thing I'd fought before, but this thing had so many more legs and tan skin that looked harder than diamonds. It had a massive, straight line of black hair that extended vertically from its forehead to its neck. Each strand of hair looked as thick as nails.

And this was my opponent. And its eyes—

"Don't let your guard down in this place. You never know what things might be crawling around in here," a voice said.

"Yeah, yeah. I don't have to worry much to begin with. You're here, anyway."

"I won't be with you forever, you know?"
"You'll be here long enough, teacher. Now stop worrying about me already!"

"...Teacher, huh? What's made you call me that all of a sudden?"

"I felt like you've earned it. Now let's just go!"

"Hmph."

I was broken out of the reverie with a start, being shoved aside.

"Ares! Don't lock eyes with it!" Elinalise's voice cried out, brandishing her estoc and standing in front of me.

"What was that?" I asked. "And where is everyone else?"

I was brought back to a memory I'd had no recollection of experiencing. I'd never called Alek my teacher, not even once. I was hesitant to do so, even as far back as the day I became his disciple. Ever since I'd just been calling him Alek. But why did…

Why did it feel so real?

"Alek and Talhand are still fighting off another one of these things. They told me to come help you. If you meet its gaze, it'll put you into a trance!" Elinalise explained rushedly.

My injury felt so much more apparent to me when I tried to turn around and felt the same sharp pain in my back. It wasn't debilitating, but it'd make things so much harder for me. Damn it, if only Lumina were here. I relied on her more than I wanted to admit most of the time, and it showed.

We needed to get past this thing if we wanted any chance at saving Lumina. I wasn't expecting something like this to be playing mind games with us, and it only made me more concerned about what sort of things the creature that took Lumina was capable of.

The creature swings at Elinalise.

"Elinalise! Watch out!" I yelled, pushing myself in front of her and parrying the strike with my sword. The creature's hand scythes were so much more forceful than the other variants' attacks, a hindrance that was only made worse because I had to avoid looking at its face. I focused my vision onto its completely obsidian-black chest and hitched a breath, trying to ignore the dull pain in my back. I clenched my teeth and swung my sword directly at the creature's neck, just like how I'd defeated the lesser version of the thing.

The creature dodges the attack and strikes your head. Light consumes the world.

With a split-second of foresight, I followed through with my attack and ducked immediately after I had recovered from the force of my body turning to strike. A split second later, its sword cleaved through the air directly where my eyes once were mere moments ago.

That light… was that supposed to be foresight of my death?

I swallowed down my internal panic and braced myself, distancing myself from the creature.

"Elinalise! You handle the spiders to our left! Don't let them disturb me!" I yelled, hoping she would comply.

"Understood!" she responded. I refocused my eyes on the creature's figure as the echoes of her footsteps shifted away to her opponents.

I leaped to my feet and backed away, watching the creature's movements closely. It moved like a regular spider, which worked both for and against my favor. While it was clearly not simply a spider, parts of it definitely were vital for the creature's life.

It didn't matter that the skin of the humanoid body looked impenetrable. For all intents and purposes, as long as I could attack it where it hurt, I'd win this fight.

North God Technique… I recited a mantra in my mind. Blitz!

I kicked off the ground, pumping as much air into my lungs as I possibly could. I scanned the ground for any potential distractions and bolted forward, circling the creature faster than even its thousand legs could keep up with. Without a second's hesitation, I bore down on the creature, cutting into and slicing its abdomen as many times as I could to possibly inflict more damage.

This is it… That was the right choice!

And then, in the blink of an eye, the creature spun its head backwards, in a move that had to have broken its neck. Somehow, still, it howled at me with a livid fury in its voice. I kept swinging, unaffected by the creature, even despite my unbearable inclination to flee as quickly as possible. This creature was something I needed to rid the world of.

I felt my vision close in directly onto the thing's abdomen, now stained in mottled violet blood. I needed to kill it, and this wasn't nearly enough. If I wanted to ever prove myself, if I couldn't at least do this much… it wasn't enough. I needed to slice deeper, strike harder, ignore the growing pain in my back, and attack. For a moment, it felt like it was just me and my clear enemy.

And then, in the blink of an eye, I learned just how quickly the tides could turn against me. In my state of focus, I'd lost sight of the advantage given to me by the Demon Eye. The creature turned its entire body and swept me off my feet, leaving me defenseless as I lost my footing and felt my entire body collapse backward.

Darkness overwhelms you.

The last thing I heard was Elinalise's cry of alarm as she undoubtedly noticed me, accompanied shortly after by the reverberating slam around my skull as my vision snapped to nothingness.

Lumina

My eyelids fluttered open in discomfort, the sensation of being forcibly stirred awake being acknowledged by my whole body. Damn, what's going on?

"Lumi. Lumi, ya have to wake up!"

I sat up and gingerly wiped the sleep from my eyes. When I blinked, the blurry figure of my teacher, Roxas, cleared up significantly.

"Whaddya doing in my room, mister? Finally trying to reenact that doujin scene… from…" I was halfway through babbling some incoherent nonsense when my mind snapped into its place. "Ah! Mister! You're okay!"

"Of course I'm okay. But there's something a little more… ya know… pertinent to the matter at hand," Roxas said, hitching his thumb in the direction of something behind me.

"Huh? What is…" I began and left my words hanging in the air as my blood ran cold. "O-oh."

The gravity of the situation hit me all at once. We were sat in a nest made entirely of ragged cloth, mismatched and inconsistent. It was as if the fabric was directly ripped off several adventurers' bodies and woven into a bowl-shaped nest. But, more importantly, we weren't alone in this nest. There were eggs, massive eggs the size of my entire body, if not bigger. And there were sizable cracks on the slate-colored exterior of almost every single one of them.

How did things escalate so fast? I thought to myself, clamming up and eyeing the eggs all around us.

"Where's everyone else?" I said, craning my neck to try to see over the eggs to locate them. "They are here, right?"

"I've got some bad news, Lumi. I hardly have a clue what's going on myself. I only woke up something like three minutes ago," Roxas said apologetically. "From the looks of it, we've been separated from the rest of the party."

"I-" If I had known this was going to happen…! What was I thinking? No one else can use healing magic, and now they're on the third floor of this thing! There are traps! Monsters we've probably never seen before! I wanted to kick myself.

I wanted to believe it was going to be okay, that Alek would be able to protect them all. But mistakes always happen. One slip up and someone could lose their life. Damn it, how could I let this happen? Of all of the things I could've done, why did I decide to go through with going forward? How could I—

"Lumi, don't have that look on your face," Roxas's reassuring voice brought me out of my hazy thoughts. "It's not your fault. Even if we'd gone back and taken a rest, the source of all of this wouldn't go anywhere. I know you, Lumi. Don't blame yourself for this."

"I… thank you, Mister," I responded weakly, digesting his words. Even though I appreciated the words, there was an unpleasant part of me that didn't want to believe I wasn't at fault. No matter how hard I tried to push it down, it sprang back up at me. So, the only solution that came to me was to try to take my mind off of things.

"Well… we should try to find them, don't you think?" I suggested.

"That'd be a good idea," Roxas looked around, "if we weren't surrounded by eggs that look like they'd hatch if something so much as brushed past them," he pursed his lips.

"Hmm," I hummed, narrowing my eyes at them. "They're just eggs, right?"

"'Just eggs? What are you getting at?" he questioned.

"They shouldn't pose much of a threat, right?" I asked. Of course, if they hatch, that's a different story. But if we're sneaky about it? I doubt we'll cause them to do anything, anyway.

"Spiders are especially sensitive to sound. And considering we were placed here deliberately by something, I don't doubt that our purpose was to serve as food for these things when they hatch," Roxas said.

"Let's just hope we don't meet Mom, then," I muttered bitterly.

A snapping and crunching noise rang out in the relative silence of our vicinity. I hesitantly peered backward, toward the source of the sound. It sounded like something desperately crawling, swiping at something to break free. Which, in other terms, meant we were royally fucked if we didn't book it.

"They must've been even more sensitive than I thought," Roxas hurriedly said. The nest was shaped like an oblong fishbowl, our only light source being the opening at the top—which was hardly anything. Either we needed to get out that way, or we had to make our own exit. And unless we could magically learn how to fly, we only had one option.

"Roxas, I'm burning a hole through this thing. Once I do, we need to get out immediately. The whole nest's gonna go up in flames," I told Roxas with a firm voice. I had no idea how big the space was outside the nest, but I had to take a shot in the dark regardless if we wanted to get out of this alive. Surely we had enough room to get away unscathed.

"Make a hole big enough to get out of and leave it at that! I know what you're capable of, ya know!?" Roxas exclaimed over the increasingly loud scurrying and crawling.

"I've got it!" I spoke, as though to reassure myself as well as him.

Now, what spell to use? Exodus Flame would just scorch us all to death, 'I go down you go down with me' style. Flamethrower makes too much of a mess for me to be able to use it how I need to right now. Something that could make a clean, precise… Ah, I know just the thing.

I retrieved Tailwind Zephyr from the strap on my backpack and pointed it where there were a minimal amount of eggs. I sucked in air as I delicately threaded my mana together—tightly, so as not to create a massive impact, and released my spell.

Flame Slice!

A crescent-shaped expulsion shot from the tip of my staff, closing the distance between it and the nest's wall in moments. It tore through the fabric effortlessly, leaving the edges of the initial strike smoldering and readily consuming the available fuel all around it. The embers' light revealed a portion of what looked to be a sizable space, which was a relief. The wide open space meant there wouldn't be much risk of carbon monoxide poisoning. My leap of faith paid off. Now we just needed to get out in one piece and we'd be free to find everyone else.

I leaped, my feet propelled forward by the force of a subtle, controlled Wind Blast at my feet. The feeling of the air flowing through my hair was usually pleasant when I used this maneuver anywhere else, but the damp air made it feel off. At least my sweating skin got a second of momentary relief.

A few moments after I heard the thudding of Roxas's feet on the now visibly massive enclosure next to me, I felt a wave of heat cover my back. I crinkled my nose when I peered behind me and saw the smoldering mess I'd left behind. Sorry, Roxas!

"I think I went a little overboard…" I trailed off, turning toward Roxas and locking eyes with his faintly narrowed eyes.

"Ya think?!" he exclaimed, holding his forehead and releasing a sigh. "The upside is that whatever was supposed to be hatching in that thing was rendered to ashes."
I shot a smirk at him. "That's good. I've had enough of these spiders already. Let alone their kids."

Roxas's eyebrows softened inexplicably. He looked me up and down a few times before deciding to speak up. "You really don't act your age, do ya?"

I froze up when I heard those words. "What do you mean?" I asked, even though it was crystal clear in my mind what he was talking about.

"If I had to say, it'd have to be the way you react to things. I'm well aware you're not a normal 11-year-old, but you're still a child. But you behave like everything that happens is something you personally have to deal with. And that's not mentioning how ya talk like someone much, much older.

"I'm just speaking purely on conjecture here, mind you. I could be babbling on some nonsense right now, but it's how I'm seeing this. Like, for example, when we left the final decision of continuing down or leaving the labyrinth up to you—which in hindsight, I'm sorry for—you looked like you wanted to be anywhere else in the world but there. Or, like just now. It's something I've seen too much of on your face. You're blaming yourself for things that are out of your control. That's never going to end well no matter what, I'm sure you know."

I looked at him with a wavering gaze. The more I thought over his words, the more I realized how deep the pit in my stomach was. There was a sinking fear of being too slow to rescue my mother and a sense of uneasiness at the prospect of being judged by my party members. It only deepened when my mind flashed with memories I'd pushed down into the recess of my mind that was brought up once more.

It was complicated, all too complicated. My head was a mess of stirred emotions with no rhyme or reason to them. And in a place like this labyrinth? That wasn't going to go over well in the slightest.

Roxas eyed my expression carefully as if examining my reaction to his words. Something must have put him off because, unexpectedly, he backed off.

"I'm sorry if that was a little confrontational–"

"No, not at all," I interrupted, taking a step toward him. "I trust you, so don't worry about it." And those words wore a shade of honesty I hardly achieved when I told people things. Roxas, ever the observant man, was still keeping an eye out for me even long after I graduated from his tutelage.

Roxas smiled and ruffled my hair, drawing me in close for an embrace. In that moment, in his arms alone in the massive expanse of that cave, I decided that I would confide in him one day when everything that plagued my mind right now was long gone. He was my teacher, the one who'd stuck with me when I was still learning the ins and outs of living in this new world. Roxas deserved to know the true extent of everything, at least when I was ready.

"Gah, okay, let's go look for Ares and the others," I said, pulling away from his hug.

"'Ares and the others' and not 'everyone else'?" Roxas teased.

Oh… I really said that? I thought, refusing the thought that I'd subconsciously prioritize Ares. Damn it, that's what I'm doing, isn't it?

"Jeez, Mister!" I said, furrowing my eyebrows in mock annoyance. "How come you can see something like that but you can't see the way Miss Elinalise looks at you?"

I didn't mean to deflect, oops. I thought it was excessively strange that Elinalise was clearly into Roxas yet he seemed to be blissfully unaware. Ah, wait… could it be…

I hadn't considered the possibility that my teacher could be a homosexual. I mean, this world didn't have any prejudices against them as far as I knew, and…

"She's not my type," Roxas said, shutting down my train of thought immediately. But still, that was surprising. What's not to like about someone like her?

"Really? Why's that?" I asked. Roxas pursed his lips and a chuckle escaped his lips.

"...I'll tell you that when we're not in the bowels of a dungeon," Roxas said.

"Oh," I said, looking around at the exceedingly drab environment. "You make a good point, you know?"

We both laughed, filling up the otherwise eerie silence mottled with the faint scent of smoldering embers with the lively ambiance that a light-hearted conversation brought.

If there was anything that caught my attention in this massive crevasse-like space, it was that it was awfully dark for even something like the labyrinth. Most of the tunnels on the first and second floors had occasional lighting in the forms of lanterns, plus, there was always some sort of visible light aside from the light spirits that I had floating above my head—which, on that topic, were missing in action. We'd paid an awful amount of cash for those things just for them to disappear on us whenever they felt like it.

But it was eerily pitch-black. I had a sense of unease that wasn't going away, even though I was walking side-by-side with Roxas. It felt like we were wading into deeper waters somehow, despite just trying to find a way out.

I unfastened my backpack and took it off, reaching into it and groping around to find the light scrolls. After brushing my fingers over several items that I didn't recognize in the dim lighting, I felt the cold, cylindrical holding container of the light scrolls and clasped onto it, adjusting my wrist to get a better grip, and pulled it out. I removed the cap of the container, plucking a scroll from inside and screwing the cap back on. After I'd plopped the container back into my backpack, I unfurled a new light scroll. I sent a minuscule pulse of mana into it, eliciting no reaction from me other than a tingling sensation on the tips of my cream-colored fingers.

The sight of the blue sprites of light erupting from the decaying magic circle inscribed onto the parchment and floating up into the air snatched my attention. Now properly being able to see better in this environment, the first thing I noticed was how expansive this place really was. The ceiling was so towering that I had to squint even to see the faint blue light on the surface of it. There were so many branching tunnels and open surfaces all over the place that it was clear that we'd entered into a massive commune where the tunnels all lead.

"I've been thinking about this the whole time, but this only piques my curiosity," Roxas said, breaking the silence, "I think these tunnels were all built centuries ago."

"Centuries?" I had practically no idea what the history of this world was beyond some small details like the first Human-Demon War and the Laplace War. It didn't surprise me that Roxas knew a lot more about it than I did.

"Yes. This labyrinth is set directly between the Great Forest and the Demon Continent, and at the time, there was a large mage drought. During that era, a plague hit this area, and there weren't nearly enough healers to sustain the civilization of races living here. That's all I was taught, though. They called it the Old Zant Port Collapse," Roxas explained.

"Where are you going with this, Mister?" I asked, comprehending what he was saying but wondering what it had to do with the tunnels.

"The point is that there were dwarven and elven survivors of this plague, despite it being extremely lethal and contained to such a small area—And lots of them, enough to begin rebuilding the neglected city from the ground up. It was an amount that couldn't nearly have been justified by just saying 'they were treated by healers,' if ya get me. And that's always been a point of contention between scholars. But what if, instead of a sizable group of capable and healthy survivors sprouting up from out of nowhere, the residents of Old Zant Port had taken preventative measures in the early stages of the plague? Something like… taking to the underground to quarantine themselves from infected individuals?" Roxas proposed.

"And no scholar has considered this before?" I asked. I mean, it was centuries ago. I wouldn't be too surprised if they simply missed this possibility. Not to mention that since the survivors weren't humans, there are many other possibilities as to what happened.

"I don't think many people have truly delved deeper into what the history of these labyrinths are. It's a pretty undeveloped field, come to think of it," Roxas said. "Talk about getting off track. Sorry, the time I spent studying in Ranoa is still engraved into my mind, haha," he laughed.

"No, it's fine," I said. His talking like this only further deepened the fact that my teacher was walking here by my side after we'd spent this long apart. "Feels like you'd be a good professor if you pushed for it if anything."

"That's how you see it? I can't say I was expecting that," Roxas said.

"Well, I still want to go to Ranoa one day. It'd be a big help if you were my professor there, you know?" I suggested.

"Hahaha, I don't think I could handle the stress. But I like the idea of it, kid," Roxas grinned.

"Hey, would you look at that? Sometimes you act your age too," I joked.

"Hah?" he looked at me in mock offense. "What are you trying to say?"

"Heheh. It's nothing, nothing at all, Mister," I bit back a laugh. "Hey… on that topic. How old are you, Mister?"

His mood visibly dampened as if someone had thrown a bucket of water onto his face. I knew it was usually impolite to ask a lady how old she was, but that was a cultural thing. So maybe it was impolite to ask a Migurd how old they were? Either way, I knew I'd probably stepped on a landmine with that question.

"Err, I'm sorry. Let's–"

"I'm 45 years old. We usually live up to 200 on average, unless some disease kills us first," Roxas sighed. 45… That's the same amount of years I've lived in total, counting both of my lives! It was an odd coincidence, but I found some sort of comfort in the fact that someone around my mental age was this easy to get along with. Maybe it was the fact we were so close in age that made that happen, now that I'm thinking about it.

Oh… didn't I say I'd make Roxas my husband one day? I bit back a chuckle again. Let's not bring that up.

"I see. I've just been wondering for a while now."

"You're not taken aback?" Roxas asked.

"Why would I be?" I asked. Then I realized Roxas didn't know that Alek had filled me in a little about the Migurds. "Oh, right, I heard that you stop maturing at an early age."

"No, I meant…" Roxas trailed off.

"Hm?" I hummed.

"It's nothing. C'mon, let's focus on finding a way out of here. Not that it's going to be a fun time," he grimaced.

Now that it was easy to see that there were a ton of different ways to go, I realized that we were going to have a hell of a time trying to find everyone who was missing. But, if my guess that this was some sort of mass intersection was right, that meant that they'd eventually end up here. As I was weighing the pros and cons of staying here until they found their way to us rather than the opposite, that sense of something being off returned.

Then, I realized what was causing all these compounding sensations. A prickle echoed in the back of my neck, and my neck hairs stood up straight enough for me to vaguely feel them. There was a faint pit in my stomach, one that wasn't characterized by blunt force trauma or emotional distress. Rather, I noticed that something, or someone, was watching us.

"There's something off," I whispered.

"Your Demon Eye, keep it activated," Roxas said, glancing around in our general vicinity. He noticed it too?

"Already on it," I responded.

Dazzling figures of warm, red light filled my vision. And then, a striking golden yellow shine forced me to shut my eyes when I turned my eyes toward it. It was so blinding that I felt my feet slipping from where I stood stationary.

"Ack!" I cried.

"Lumina! What happened?" Roxas frantically asked, rushing to my aid and propping me up using his arms. I deactivated my Demon Eye and narrowed my eyes toward the general direction of the light. And then, I noticed it. It was dull, but it was visible as long as you were looking for it. A sputtering purple light.

"It's the labyrinth's magic crystal!" I exclaimed. That had to be it. It felt like the mana exuding from the crystal had just as if not more refined energy than Tailwind Zephyr's magic stone. For what it was worth, Tailwind Zephyr's would probably fetch us the equivalent of nearly fifty Asuran Gold Coins, if that. And since this crystal seemed even more valuable…

That meant that as long as we had that, we'd be set for the rest of the entire journey.

"We're rich!" I exclaimed gleefully.

You know what they say about how the ends justify the means? Err… well, some terrible things have been written away with someone saying that, but in this specific case, I think us getting set back a little was worth getting this crystal. We'll go in, grab the crystal, and find everyone else. Then, I can finally have my vacation. I don't know what to tell you if you don't think someone like me needs downtime.

"That's odd… shouldn't there be…" I managed to hear Roxas whisper under his breath.

I whipped my head toward him and my heart skipped a beat. That's a death flag if I've ever heard one.

" Crkssshhaaa…"

That's right. There was supposed to be a boss guarding the labyrinth crystal. Of all the things to slip my mind, it just had to be this one. A chill enveloped my body in a near-petrifying bitter cold. I tried to swallow up my fear, but it only worsened the lump in my throat. I wasn't this much of a wimp—I knew that for sure. But something was messing with my mind, jumbling around my emotions like a windstorm. Something… unnatural.

I hesitantly reached a hand to my back, brandishing my staff with two stiff, slightly shaking hands.

" Hurrruaahhh…"

And it came into view. An atrocity that looked like it was produced from the most repressed of nightmares and the worst that the imagination could come up with. It trudged into the room with its pale-white and bony hands on the floor, a motion so immense that it caused an audible crunch of the ground every time it moved.

The thing was easily ten meters tall, towering over Roxas and I even from this distance. It had two extremely long legs dotted with sickly black pores and an ashy-colored body. Its neck and head were covered by rotting, diseased-looking skin that looked like it was hanging right off of its body.

And, worse of all, instead of having a proper face… It wore six pulsating sockets on its head, aligned in two rows of three vertically. Each one of them looked like they were peering into my skin, and made me want to pry my eyes away from it. But I was petrified.

After a few moments of my mind going blank, I managed to compose myself and think straight. I noticed that even though the two of us were in the middle of the clearing with no obstructions between us and it, it hadn't even so much as noticed.

It must be blind… or have bad vision. We'll have to work with that. I thought in a desperate attempt to keep my thoughts straight.

For as long as we didn't provoke it, we were more likely than not going to be in the clear. But I was left in a conflict. Sure, if we didn't provoke it, we wouldn't have to face it. But if we were going to get that crystal—which was probably the most glaring reason as to why we decided to go down here, to begin with—we were going to have to make noise. Not to mention that I had no idea if the creature could detect mana or not. If it had so much as a mote of sensitivity to mana, it'd without a doubt notice the fountain of magic in the middle of the room being displaced.

Just as I was piecing my thoughts together, the thing raised its head. For the love of—

It spent a few moments grunting at the air, for some reason. While it was busy… doing whatever it was doing, I glanced over to Roxas to see him similarly unwilling to move. After a few failed attempts to get his attention without making a sound, I decided to start waving my arms around. After a few painfully long moments, he finally turned my way and locked eyes with me.

" Don't move," I mouthed, not willing to risk speaking and alerting the monster. He nodded slightly at me, his expression clearly tense.

I remained frozen, ignoring the ice in my chest, and stared ahead at the grotesque creature in front of the two of us. It seemed to sniff the air, its bulbous, empty eye sockets twitching slightly as if searching for something. It wasn't on the prowl, at the very least, which gave me some breathing room.

I need to… I glanced over to Roxas, who seemed to be examining the creature instead of standing petrified of it, … distract it.

A spell that will make the biggest noise… huh? God, I feel like I've been really wracking my brain for these spells today. Fireball might work if I can make it explode mid-air, but something tells me that's only a temporary solution. I need something that persists.

Persist… There were only a few spells in my roster that fell into that category. Earth Wall, Earth Hedgehog, Ice Fortress, and Ice Pillar, to name a few, but none of them worked. Then I realized that I did have a spell that would work perfectly, but it might make my life a little harder. Well, anything's better than being killed and eaten by that thing.

Of course, we could always just turn tail and scurry away into one of the tunnels, but I didn't want to run with the assumption that the monster was slow enough for it to not catch up to us. Plus, that crystal was very attractive to me. It was a dangerous thought, but I kept my mind off it by telling myself it wasn't enough to risk my life over it. I had an idea, and it needed to work.

If this spell was going to work in my favor, I had to make sure it wouldn't just backfire on me immediately. So, I activated my Demon Eye and conjured a minuscule amount of dust on the tip of my fingernail. I braced myself and flicked the dirt into my eye.

"..."

I winced, biting my tongue to not make any sound or accidentally move my feet. I fluttered my eyelashes several times in an attempt to clear the faint stinging of my eyes.

I need to stop harming myself just to try out magic spells, sheesh. It's honestly scary how little hesitation I have for this sorta stuff. I snuffed that thought in my mind and noticed that the dirt I had flicked into my eye wasn't nearly as painful as it usually was, considering everything else. But that meant my hunch that the Demon Eye was at least a bit more resistant to outside damage was right. As long as I could see, it would work.

I raised the staff in my hands and let my mana trickle into the body of the staff, vaguely sensing the flow into the crystal. When I had finished wordlessly and meticulously managing the amount of mana I needed, I released the spell.

Dust Storm!

A spherical mess of dirt and grime accumulated steadily seemingly out of nothing at the tip of my staff. It spewed out from its stationary form, guided by a breeze that conjured itself around the dust. The breeze flared up, suddenly transitioning into a gale and scattering the dirt everywhere.

I caught a glimpse of the monster turning its colossal head toward the spell and spared no further dwelling on it, bursting into a wind magic-assisted sprint and leaping toward Roxas's direction before the spell would make me lose him in the dust. I clasped onto his shoulders the moment the dust overtook the entire space, forcing my left eye shut and enduring the discomfort of dust prickling my eyes.

"Roxas!" I screamed through the storm, pressing my lips to his ear to ensure he heard me and to reduce the dust that would get into my mouth. "Let's go for that mana crystal and get out of here!"

"Ya could've given me some sort of warning!" he yelled back at me.

"Quickly, while we still have the chance!" I took his hand and activated my Eye, gaining some sense of navigation through the storm. There it was, directly in front of us. Maybe twenty or so meters of distance separated us, and there was a convenient tunnel several meters away from it. It was like the stars had aligned for this to work.

At that moment, I realized how much of a bad idea it was to try to sprint in a duststorm. The only reason that I reached Roxas, to begin with, was that I was still riding off the breath I'd taken from before. In the split second that I'd stopped to cover my mouth and use wind magic as a substitute for an air filter, I'd let my guard down. I had thought I was fine, that the monster would be so overwhelmed by the sounds of the wind blowing and dust hitting it that it wouldn't be able to detect our presence. But, before I knew it, it struck me how much I was underestimating the thing.

My heart lurched when I was snatched from the ground, the feeling of my lungs and body being compressed by bony, firm appendages eliciting a gasp from between my two lips.

"Gah…!" I wheezed, finding it difficult to breathe. It turned me around in its cold, uncompassionate hands and made me face it. All six of its appendages pulsed in acknowledgment of me, and it horrified me. Each of them was easily large enough to swallow me whole, and the creature's unfeeling and expressionless face forced me to consider the fact that it could kill me at any moment it wanted, but it was just examining me.

Then, one of its sockets puffed a plume of the same gas from before. I immediately panicked, connecting the two in an instant. I couldn't breathe it in at all costs. If I passed out now, everything would be over. But my lungs were already being tightly crushed, and the little oxygen I had was running thin. Against everything my mind told it to do, my body disobeyed. I heaved a breath, easily inhaling more than enough gas to knock me out.

I desperately banged at the creature's hands, but it stayed put. I had to do something, anything. I cast a Detoxification spell on me, but it did nothing. I felt my movements growing sluggish until the last thing my mind could think of was…

I forced the air out of my lungs, replacing it with new, fresh, and uncontaminated air. I regained the energy I was losing and gritted my teeth at how close it was.

I'm lucky as hell that my arms were free.

"Lumi! Hang in there!" I heard Roxas belt out somewhere behind me. The dust storm had begun dying down, a response to the lack of mana the spell needed to continue blowing. He began to mutter an incantation, but I was too far away to hear the spell.

Damn it, strong spells' incantations can take up to a minute to fully chant! I don't think I have that time! I eyed its stocky arms, realizing that it didn't have sinewy arms but rather had a sort of protective skin covering them. That was to be expected of higher-tier monsters, and I wouldn't be surprised if the thing was S-rank. But the only issue was that the covering was formed by the decaying, disfigured bodies of people, assimilated so much that they were discolored and blended into its ash-colored skin.

Urged by a sense of desperation, I tried Rot on the monster's fingers, in an attempt to set myself free from its cage-like grasp. But it had no effect.

Undead?! This is a horrible match-up for me! I thought. Even though my staff was lying on the ground somewhere, I still could cast powerful spells. It only amplified my power, which didn't limit my access to any spell.

Scatter Shards!

I fired off several thin, sharpened boulders directly at the creature's head. I poured as much mana through my arms as I could manage, making them as lethal as possible. It took the brunt of them, with a resonating crunch with every impact.

But it only seemed to make it angry. Now marked with several wounds dotting its face, it abruptly opened its fingers, dropping me to the harsh ground a meter away. I slammed my head against it, not harshly enough to knock me out but enough to cover my vision with dark speckles of nothingness. I forced air into my lungs and covered the back of my head with my palm, casting a quick spell to ward off the pain. After I blinked away my spotty vision, I scrambled to find my staff, still eyeing Roxas who continued to chant despite the change in circumstances.

I grasped my staff, pivoting and keeping the creature in my view. It held its face in its hands, as if anguished.

The hell is it doing…

A moment after that thought passed through my mind, it howled and slammed its hands back onto the ground, revealing a brand-new addition to its freshly bloodied face. Slick, black worms erupted from the eye sockets, thrashing around frantically and chaotically. It did not hesitate to begin closing the distance between us, slamming its hands and its hind legs onto the ground toward us while screeching.

I held my staff in front of me and gritted my teeth, funneling mana into it.

"Blizzard Storm!" Roxas yelled, his staff glowing a brilliant icy blue. The spell shot out a barrage of meter-long arrowhead-shaped ice shards toward the advancing creature. A stray few met their mark, crashing into the body and head of the creature. Still, the monster had out-maneuvered the majority of the crystals. My lip trembled as I noticed the only damage the spell had done was sever a few of the worms on its face, causing it to howl in anger.

I sent pulses of mana through my staff, my mind tripping over itself in trying to find a spell that would do enough damage to slow it down. But there wasn't enough time, I couldn't find a single spell strong enough that I could cast quickly. My unsteady hands struggled to keep grasping my staff. It was too close, advancing faster than I'd ever expected. I couldn't, I just couldn't—

But I could. In that one moment of clarity, I remembered a principle I had first discovered talking to my mother in the early years of my childhood here. High-class Recovery Magic could create poison. If a detoxification spell that was too under-classed was pushed to its magical limits via mana overflow, its effects would reverse and contaminate wounds in a fast-spreading poison—or rather, an infection.

With the creature being undead, it no doubt was a breeding ground for bacteria. With that sort of environment, a rapidly multiplying infection would be extremely effective. It was perfect. I just needed to contain it in an easily deployable container, like a bullet, and shoot it. Something like… a Stone Cannon.

A pinwheel of yellow light surrounded my staff's crystal, shifting colors to green, blue, and finally, white. I released the spell when my mana screamed at me to let go, and watched in anticipation dripping with dread as the biological weapon I'd unleashed shot toward the creature.

It slammed into the creature's head, having made an impact in the blink of an eye. My breath hitched in horror as I realized the Stone Cannon had shot cleanly into the creature, tearing a hole directly into, through, and out of its head. It hadn't stayed in one place like I'd thought, which could easily have made contact with the poison last so little time that it was practically benign. Putting too much mana into the speed of the Cannon had made it an entirely pointless action. And now, I was going to see exactly how much that mistake would cost me.

The monster, with one of its head sockets torn through yet still undeterred, grabbed ahold of me, its grip much less forgiving than before. I hacked and coughed as I felt my lungs being crushed, with the sounds of my bones popping ringing in my ears. My mind was completely shutting down, the only thing I was able to do was send a continuous mending spell down my body, trying to minimize what damage I could to delay my fate.

If I can't break free, it's going to make my ribs rupture my lungs…!

"Lumina!" Roxas's cry pierced my cloudy mind, forcing me to open my eyes and face one of the worm-like appendages that seemed drawn to my body. The one reaching for me abruptly stiffened, then sagged back into the bulbous eye socket as if it were retreating.

The monster's eye sockets pulsated, with all of the worms stiffening and squirming around, grasping for something that wasn't there. The monster reared up, lifting me high up into the ground and causing my vision to fill with darkness. Then, it hurled me down to the ground. In the split second before my body hit the ground, I squeezed out the mana I could muster while having been completely immobilized moments ago, cushioning the fall. Yet, I still wailed in agony as I felt several of my limbs light aflame with pain, my neck surging with my pulse.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck…" Tears flooded the corners of my eyes.

It had broken several of my bones. In this state, I was going to bleed out if I didn't do something immediately. My ears were overwhelmed with the sound of the creature roaring; in anger or otherwise, I couldn't tell. My adrenaline-soaked mind forced me to put everything I had into healing my injuries, even though I should've been rapidly losing energy from the fall. I trembled as I felt my bones pop into place, the aching soreness in my entire lower spine dissipating.

I can't lie in place, the thought echoed through my mind.

Roxas couldn't heal himself like how I had if he was hurt, and the time I spent recovering was a luxury that Roxas wouldn't have if he was cornered. I wiped the sweat off of my forehead and forced my aching legs to get up. But what I was met with was not what I was expecting.

"SHAAAHHHhhh…" the creature howled, clawing at its head. As I struggled to understand why, I involuntarily exhaled a breath of relief, the tips of my lips curling upwards. The creature's face had begun to peel and blemish, a clear indicator that my weapon from before had, indeed, worked.

I chuckled despite it all, laughing at the state it was in. Maybe it wasn't such a bad matchup for me after all. I should remember this.

"Lumina!" Roxas yelled at me, now standing a few meters away from it. "I need you to hold this thing in place with your Paralysis Spell! Think you could do that for me!?"

"Huh?!" I exclaimed.

You mean something like this!? I had never even so much as imagined holding a monster of this caliber under my spell for long. I had only managed to hold an A-rank monster in place for a minute, but this was a whole different story. But… I had no idea if the monster was going to go for one last stand before the infection took over it. If I could prevent something like that, it was for the better.

"I'll try my best!" I responded. The monster was wounded, and my adrenaline tank was still pumping through my body. My mana reserves remained intact, somewhere near 60% of its full capacity. Under these circumstances, I was at an advantage. I could pull it off.

Roxas nodded at me in acknowledgment, pointing his staff at the center of the creature's head. I extended my bare hand out, my staff still lying on the ground somewhere near, and began to cast the spell. Paralysis was a spell that required every single bit of my concentration to construct correctly. And it was by far the most mana-exhaustive spell I had in my arsenal. So, I prayed that Roxas would make the time I stalled for him count.

Curse Magic—Paralysis! The spell wrapped around the creature's body like chains binding a prisoner, represented entirely by an intense yellow-orange light in my Eye's vision. Then, Roxas began to chant his spell.

"I admonish every opponent that stands before me now. No force in this world can oppose the fury of whom I call upon."

I felt my grip on the spell's bindings loosen as the creature noticed what was going on. Its worms burst from its sockets once more, yet found themselves petrified.

"Siphon and harness thy energy, Great Serpent of the Heavens. Forgive me, for I pray that a vortex of thy tailwinds may reach a mere fledgling such as I."

The creature was getting desperate now, trying everything it could to move forward. It strained me, forcing me to draw heavy breaths.

"May thy strength become a whirlpool of war, a blessing to all steadfast enough to utter thy name."

It managed to lift a finger, then two. I could tell Roxas's incantation was coming to an end, but I prayed that he'd wrap it up quickly. It was going to break out, and the moment it did, all of this effort would be rendered useless. I just had to hold out, I told myself.

"Thy illustrious roar, thy peerless power, crash and fuse! I ask for a vestige of thy grace here and now, the conclusion of a tireless conflict shall be your doing—Maelstrom Raze!"

In an instant, the world became a foggy haze of mist. The air of the room, previously still, became gales nearly strong enough to shove me off my feet. I felt the control of my spell slipping as a brilliant shine permeated the fog like a lighthouse. As my vision refocused on the light, I noticed it was the tip of Roxas's spell. Like some sort of vacuum, the crystal sucked up all of the mist in the air and the gusts of air, bubbling up in one grand mass. They spiraled around each other like a hurricane, then exploded in an elegant, colorless fireworks display. The spell directed itself to the monster, acting as an unavoidable attack. The winds were far too fierce and sharp to do anything.

Chunks of still-bleeding flesh were shot out of the spell's range, with the howls and wails of the creature within hardly audible over the violent storm. After a few wordless moments, I felt a hand on my shoulder. With that, the storm stelled down, revealing a stripped, lifeless body; merely a frame of what it used to be.

We'd survived.

"It's over," I groaned, letting myself go against gravity and dropping to the ground. I stared down at my blood-stained hands, surely a result of being tossed around as I had. I felt a bit dizzy, but I hadn't lost so much blood that I'd pass out. I moved to wipe my hands off using my robe, but I stopped when I realized that the robe wasn't even stained. At most, it was scratched in a few areas. But still, my robe shone the same pristine white it had the day I'd bought it.

It was truly resilient and beautiful. It reminded me of a familiar face that I was working hard to be able to one day see again.

"Hey, Lumi. You did good," Roxas said, sitting down next to me and hanging his head down. "But… I, uh… I'm a little tired. I think that spell took a lot out of me."

"That's okay," I responded. He wasn't blessed with such an endless mana pool, yet, he was still powerful. It was the very first time I'd seen him in action—And yet, he was still humble about it. "You're strong, Mister."

"You think so?" he chuckled, brushing his azure bangs out of his eyes and meeting my gaze. "Thank you. I'm glad to see my student has grown up to be just as scary as I thought you were going to be."

"Scary?!" I poked him in the forehead. "If anything, this is your fault. I wouldn't be here if it weren't for you."

Roxas paused for a moment then smiled at me. "You know, I wouldn't have learned that fancy spell that I used just then if I hadn't tutored you."

"Glad we've made a positive impact on each other, then," I remarked, grinning.

"Hahaha, you could say that," Roxas breathily chuckled, reaching up to groggily wipe his eyes. "You're relatively young, so I think ya still have a long road ahead of you, kid."

"Well, you'll be here to see it, won't you?" I said.

"We'll see," Roxas said, his head drooping. "We'll… see."

His head fell onto my lap, rustling my robe. I fixed his hat snugly onto his blue head and leaned back. I exhaled a puff of air, softly groaning as I stretched out my tired muscles. For a moment, I relished the feeling of being so close to my teacher. I smiled, thinking about how absurd the idea of being in this situation would have been to me just two weeks ago.

While we hadn't cleared the labyrinth so to speak, Roxas and I had gotten rid of the boss. That had to say something about how well we operated together, even after six years of separation. Not to mention that we had the rest of the party to help us, too. I had a feeling that this new Dragon King's Odyssey was going to be an extremely powerful party. Of course, it was already going to be powerful with Alek along for the ride, but something told me that our combined synergy was going to improve dramatically as we settled into our roles in the party.

No matter how much I gripe about our time in the Demon Continent, I still hold those memories pretty close to my chest. There was just so much we had done, and we were only just beginning the second leg of our journey. Meeting Roxas was such a relief beyond words. If anything, he only reinforced the fact that I needed to find my family. Because if I could find my teacher of all people, I could find everyone else. And now I had more than the means to do it.

I only hoped that we could meet up with my father soon.

Author's Notes:

Hey again. So, as you can tell, it's been nearly two months since the last update. I'm sure at least some of you were thinking that I'd dropped the story or had 'lost the spark' as you would say. But, I'm proud to announce that I'm still here! This chapter has been delayed for so long for a lot of reasons, but I'll narrow it down to three.

I originally wanted the labyrinth chapter to be... just a chapter long. But as you can imagine, that's a lot to ask for one, 7000-word chapter. I'd have to really cut it down into pieces if I wanted to do that. So, I opted to make it a two-parter. But that's where the major source of delay came from: My own stubbornness to split it into three chapters to make the releases more consistent. While I very much had the opportunity to do so, I was in the interest of 'keeping it paced' and that 'three chapters would drag it on for too long' but now I see that was a poor decision. So, instead of having two chapters that are the normal length, you have this super long one.

Then, came my time restraints. School's been doing what it always does to younger writers, which is to say demolishing free time. But that's a relatively minor reason compared to the thing that might affect the speed at which I write going forward. Right before Valentine's Day, I met someone that I wish to spend a lot more time with, so please do be patient for releases. I have a lot of passion for this project, and I hope to see it out to fruition.

I do not plan on making chapters these long after this! This was a specific circumstance that frankly was a bit hard (but fun) to write. So expect the regular-sized, easily digestible six-ish thousand-word chapters.

Onto the next announcement, I am currently working on chapter two of the Crossover Omake with Beta Orionis! If you haven't checked it out via the last chapter's author's notes, I implore you to do so. It's great writing and I'm excited to see what comes up next (and hope you are too.

Ah, one last thing. Special thanks to Pritchard, better known here as Reed_Writes SFW, for the proofreading and polishing work he did for this chapter. Check his stuff on Archive of Our Own out! It's fairly underrated, and the one work he's done for Mushoku Tensei is a phenomenal piece of writing that manages to snatch your attention in less than 5 thousand words.

I know I said last time that I was 'glad to be into the groove of things again' and then left y'all hanging for two months, but hopefully this time I can settle back into a schedule. The next chapter is going to be a lot simpler and focused on character interactions between the new main cast. Look forward to the spar between Lumi and Ares! Both they and I have been putting it off, haha.

Chapter title is: Rest and a Whisper of Something New

Of course, I would hate to make a false promise for the release date of the next chapter, but do look forward to it. I don't plan on spending more than two weeks, and I've already made a start on it. I hope you enjoyed this chapter and if you did, feel free to leave a comment down below! It does wonders for my motivation, and I would just appreciate it overall.

Thank you to everyone in #mushoku-fanfic in the official Discord server for all of your support, and all of you guys too. I'll see y'all again soon!