81 – Team Rachel 2

Buelsar didn't let up and chased him, stabbing forward while A was just getting out of the crack.

A blurred to the side dodging, and was forced on the defensive as Buelsar continued to attack, seemingly keeping up with his speed.

After a while, A moved a large distance away into the air, and then something flew out from his sleeve into his hand, enlarging into a grey one-handed longsword. If one looked very closely at it, it would seem to have a slightly crystalline texture, but otherwise looked like patterned steel.

"Ignite, Lingering Sword!"

"Ooowwwwwoooooooowaaaa!" A ghostly wail came from the sword as Shinsoo currents gathered around it.

Then A charged towards Buelsar at a blistering speed, a grey aura enveloping the sword as he swung it.

Buelsar countered with a full force swing from his own weapon, and the two clashed with a shockwave that cracked the ground while fluttering their cloaks.

While continuing with several more similar exchanges, they seemed to be eventually matched, and A quickly assessed the situation.

'Non-lethal subdue doesn't look possible with only this avatar and fake Derf sword,' Kaleidus thought. 'He's faster, still has much stronger power in reserve, and the blood fusion special as a Mad Dog. His weapon is durable enough to handle Derf's Level 4 Sword Aura without much damage, and while his body might be more vulnerable it will be difficult to create an opening.'

In practice, although he could move his whole body at even higher speeds than now with Burstshift using just 1-2 MP per burst, his limbs couldn't move quite as fast, so against somebody actually skilled in close combat, the advantage was somewhat limited.

'If Buelsar is like this, Daniel might actually be strong enough to fight my true body evenly, never mind that monster Hoaqin,' Kaleidus concluded.

Daniel Hatchid was one of the team members who hadn't arrived yet, but whom Kaleidus knew from the story that he was the strongest, fastest, and most durable of their group, representing the peak of D-Rank Regular power, and probably even stronger than many C Ranks.

That was because the ranking system for Regulars was based on the tests passed, not necessarily their actual combat strength.

There were those who stayed within a certain Floor group for various reasons, and in the D-Rank one such attraction was the "Hell Train" which was an optional route that went from the 35th to the 44th Floor, and had many secrets aboard.

'Well, it's not like I expected anything different. The power scaling from this point onwards will become difficult to handle, even before I reach the limit of my canon knowledge. Indeed, that orange head's criticism of me is valid…tricks will only get me so far. I don't have the talent to quickly reach greater heights without special methods. But that's precisely why climbing with the 'good guys' with all their fated and born talent, would no longer be helpful to me.'

"Is this all you can do? After all that bluster, I wondered what cards you had up your sleeve to be so arrogant," said Buelsar with a grin, seemingly unstressed with their fight so far.

"Not at all, you should remember my goal is to just keep my mask on. This is just a little game, after all, I can't make it too difficult for you guys," said A, without an outward hint of his internal conclusion.

'Still, it's not like I have no options at all…I've been preparing for this a long time and learned many new things after all…let's test their limits and mine!'

"Hah, still acting like you've got everything under control. But who says we need to accept you into our team? At this rate, you might want to think about begging to join us, not the other way around!"

"Kuhuhu…in that case, why don't you show me my place? I could keep this up all day," said A, before flashing into the air. "Are you even capable of flying like your teammates?"

Buelsar scoffed. "So now you're just running away?"

"Tactics are also a form of strength. Why don't you guys just work together to take me down?"

But Buelsar just grinned again. "Don't celebrate yet, I don't need to be able to fly to get you."

Then he raised his hand and suddenly the entire space in the hall was surrounded by gigantic chains manifested from Shinsoo, which crisscrossed in a pattern through the air.

"Welcome to 'Hell in a Cell', the special ability my master granted me as a Mad Dog! These chains won't break until I die! You've got nowhere to go now!"

Segments of the chain tried to wrap around A, but they weren't very fast so he easily dodged.

However, Buelsar jumped onto the chains he made, and navigated through the air by running on them like paths.

The furious melee continued in the air, Buelsar putting more pressure on A by simultaneously controlling the chains to attack.

"Haven't you been looking down on us a little too much, with only this meagre strength?" Buelsar shouted while his attacks increased in both ferocity and speed.

Each strike was accompanied with a tremendous Shinsoo wind blast generated by his drill weapon, extending his attacks beyond his physical reach.

Then, one strike completely overwhelmed its opposing force from the 'Lingering Sword' and blew A's whole body away.

He smashed into a large chain segment, and was then quickly tied up by other smaller chains.

The fake Derf 'Lingering Sword' was still intact in his hand, as its magic aura cut through the Shinsoo blast, but it had proven insufficient to block the larger surface area of Buelsar's attack.

"It's over now that you're caught in my chains," said Buelsar, stepping on the big chain A was attached to, and kneeling down from above and behind A's head, reaching out. "Now let's see what's behind that mask, shall we?"

Suddenly A's body contorted unnaturally and some parts of the body even separated, allowing him to slip through the chains.

"…?!"

Green gasses erupted from the separated parts, obstructing sight.

Buelsar stepped back to avoid the fumes in case they were toxic or poisonous.

In that moment, A reformed the Avatar Body. This was possible because that was a body composed almost entirely of Beastiont/Armoriont biology, rather than an actual human body.

Its only true vital point was the Spirit Cluster Core that powered it.

"Did you really think it would be that easy?" A asked after flashing away and reappearing far away.

Buelsar chased once again, but then A retreated instead of engaging this time.

"I'm still faster than any of you, so unless I allow you to engage me on purpose, you can't catch me if you're not working as a team, let alone break through my defenses," A taunted while repeatedly moving away every time Buelsar got close. "These chains aren't nearly good enough to pin me down!"

"Annoying bastard!" Buelsar shouted. "Stop acting like you're winning while all you're doing is running away!"

"Is that what you think?" A asked. "Looks like you're still misunderstanding something."

'I ought to use this chance to teach Rachel and her overpowered arrogant team the value of actually being coordinated as a group,' thought Kaleidus.

Then the atmosphere seemed to change in a split second as A changed stances just as Buelsar reached him again, drill swinging with a torrent of Shinsoo.

When A disappeared yet again, flashing away, an energetic ball of Shinsoo was left behind, which immediately exploded on Buelsar.

The strength of that blast was unexpectedly weak however, so Buelsar warily observed for any other tricks hidden in the attack.

Then A went on the offensive again, except he didn't target Buelsar.

Instead, he reappeared behind Angel, who had just been watching from the side as she didn't want to interfere with her superior's fight after being called off earlier.

"Ahhh!" She screamed when the Lingering Sword slashed her back open.

"Hiiiiiehiiiiahehi!" The sword released a bizarre sound that somewhat resembled deranged laughter.

He disappeared yet again before Angel could respond, leaving behind another ball of Shinsoo as she furiously turned around, and then delivered another two slashes to her legs after reappearing on her other side, and finally disappeared again just as the ball exploded in her face while she collapsed towards the ground.

"Bastard, you're fighting me!" Buelsar yelled.

"Weren't you saying I couldn't defeat you? Here I am, allowing you guys to strategize and come as a group, but you wasted the opportunity!" A replied, escaping from Buelsar again.

'Isn't he supposed to have a ramp up power too as his opponent gets stronger? But nothing is happening, so it doesn't activate if he isn't personally being targeted? Or maybe because I am not strong enough to trigger it, so he's just unable to get to me.' Kaleidus analyzed.

"Damn! Mr. Cassano, please help Mr. Elliot!" Rachel shouted. "Michael, take Emily to go rendezvous with Apple, and keep an eye on that other guy!"

"You better come with me, man," Michael said to the Traveler.

"Wait, what are you guys trying to do with Emily?" The Traveler asked.

Michael ignored him however and simply grabbed his arm, running towards the exit.

Cassano jumped into the fray, powering up his left and right arms in a red and blue light respectively. 'I suppose now is as good a time as any to test out the complete devil's power,' he thought.

"That's more like it!" A shouted while narrowly escaping a large blast from Cassano's left arm that carved a trench into the ground.

Cassano's aura powered up even more and formed wings of light on his back.

With two fighters on him plus the still present chains from Buelsar, A had much less space to maneuver, and was occasionally forced to parry along with his evasive tactics as the two began to catch up and get more coordinated.

'Damn, this power is still unstable!' Cassano thought while trying to use the devil's power in his right arm simultaneously. 'I'll need time to get used to using both halves, it's not ready!'

Feeling that he was losing ground, A switched tactics again and materialized an Arms Inventory with racks full of ball capsules.

A quick gesture had multiple of them open and numerous creatures burst forth.

Screeches and roars abounded as an assortment of chimeric and strange creatures assaulted Cassano and Buelsar.

These were all experimental models intentionally different from the efficiently specialized monster Beastionts Sasha used, and incorporated a significant amount of local Shinheuh biology that Kaleidus encountered while climbing.

"An Anima…!" Rachel exclaimed. 'Who the hell is this guy? He's too strong, they won't win like this. Was he sent by a different Elder? The intel he has on us doesn't seem completely accurate though. The necromancer won't join us until later, and Apple is useless in a fight like this, so it wouldn't make any difference if I had a full team assembled or not. If I want to win this game, I need to do something now!'

A tentacled creature managed to wrap itself around Cassano while several other creatures bit down on his arms and legs, restricting his movement and his ability to generate force from his limbs to get out of the hold.

A winged draconic fish hurled a stream of liquid from its mouth against Buelsar's side while A clashed his sword against the Mad Dog's drill weapon.

"Fuck, what is this shit?! More bullshit tricks?!" Buelsar cursed as the liquid stuck to his clothes and weapon, substantially slowing him down, allowing the dragon fish to jump him. "You're the most annoying jackass I've faced in a long time!"

A ignored the insults and pressed the attack too now that Buelsar was inconvenienced while blocking the dragon fish.

Then a giant yellow Lighthouse Cube smashed him aside before he could land a strike.

"Angel, can you still fight?" Rachel asked, helping the other woman up while watching her Cube hit A.

"Arghh! Of course I can, he didn't get my arms, and I don't need my legs if I can just fly!" Angel growled. "I'll fucking show him who he's messing with!"

She grabbed tightly onto her Shinsoo trident and concentrated as her eyes began glowing a much brighter blue.

"Hraaah!" Buelsar screamed and a black smoking aura erupted from his body, pushing much of the goo off him as Shinsoo swirled.

The dragon fish roared and attacked savagely with its claws and jaw, but Buelsar with his new aura rapidly overwhelmed it.

A attempted to assist but was blocked by a triangular light screen constructed from 3 Light Cubes as the vertices, then boxed in by another 6 Cubes from beside and behind in a wide field that covered half the hall.

'9 Cubes at once already? Looks like she really did hone her own skills,' Kaleidus observed. 'This Shinsoo slow field is also tough to deal with too, I don't have enough resistance in this body to just ignore the effect, and I wouldn't even be able to counter this with my own inferior Lighthouse skills even if I could use any Cubes right now.'

"Hah! Die!" Angel yelled as she charged toward A, now sporting a halo over her head and glowing angel wings that expanded to twice the length of her height.

Her speed had dramatically increased as well, and when combined with the Lighthouse control field and the numerous chains still serving as obstacles for A, she easily caught up to him this time.

Instead of trying to evade, a conch-like Shinsoo cannon appeared right in front of A, launching an enormous blast wave of Shinsoo at Angel.

This blast was incomparably larger than anything anyone in the battle had unleashed so far, having used a potent stored charge that Kaleidus had prepared in it ahead of time using the power of the water spirits, rather than relying on the Avatar Body's or his own ability to form Baangs.

Angel crashed her similarly enlarged Shinsoo trident, which now glowed with a flaming aura, into the blast wave and was momentarily pushed back, and fought for dominance, pouring as much power into her manifested trident as she could. "Fuck! Why you…!"

Meanwhile, Cassano had finally stabilized enough of his unified power to unleash a tremendous burst of Shinsoo that tore apart the huge tentacle creature holding him and blasted away the other creatures.

He panted heavily after the act, and seemed barely able to continue fighting however. A message from his Pocket had him lumber towards Rachel to recover and take up a guard position instead of pursuing A further.

Next to him, Buelsar had critically wounded the dragon fish and had charged back towards A, who was barely holding off Angel and was still in a severely slowed state.

'This seems to be my limit for now, I can't use the White Steel Eel well with all these chains in the way blocking its movement. The conclusion of this match is clear. But even so…it would be unsightly not to continue until the end!'

More Shinheuh with the strength of E-Rank Regulars burst out of new capsule Bowls to meet Buelsar's charge. The big ones spewed more goo, acid, and opaque gases to obstruct the area while smaller creatures went to constrict him similar to the big one that had immobilized Cassano moments before.

Angel was finally blasted away, just barely overwhelmed by the Shinsoo wave.

A charged full speed in an attempt to get out of the slow field, while Rachel gestured with her hands to maneuver the field-generating Cubes alongside his charge, and recalled 3 of them.

She jumped on 1 of them to take flight while reserving the other two for physical combat.

Finally, the White Steel Eel burst out of the last capsule with a mighty screech.

It buckled against the numerous chains crisscrossing the area, but was flexible enough to get through the open spaces and powerful enough that the chains failed to completely stop its movement.

Rachel watched with shock and froze for several seconds, staring at the creature which shattered her dreams on the first floor which she hadn't dared to fight.

"Damn it…! I'm different now!" Rachels shouted to nobody in particular.

A climbed onto the Eel, which was completely uninhibited by the Shinsoo slow field, being used to much greater densities in its natural habitat, and used it as a vehicle to escape out of the field, rushing towards Rachel.

Cassano launched another Shinsoo punch beam into the steel eel's armored section, which briefly diverted its course, but otherwise failed to deal substantial damage.

After just barely escaping the control field, A jumped off the Eel just as Buelsar lost the other Shinheuh stalling him and manipulated the chains to constrict the Eel.

The White Steel Eel turned to face Buelsar, while A blitzed towards Rachel, getting past her desperate attempts to block him with her Cubes.

There was a loud clang as A's sword crashed into Cassano's left hand palm in defense mode, just barely intercepting him from striking Rachel. The Living Ignition Weapon grabbed tightly on the sword with both hands, preventing A from retracting it.

Simultaneously a huge Cube dropped directly on top of A, crushing him onto the ground leaving only his head uncovered, followed by several other cubes immediately getting in formation to generate another slow field concentrated on him.

Cassano finally collapsed, exhausted from the burden of his unstable power on his body.

Rachel rushed forward around Cassano with a determined expression and grabbed the trapped A's mask, ripping it off.

After a moment of confusion, her eyes widened as she recognized the unusually colored eyes and the face.

"Axion…?"

"Congratulations, you win Rachel. You've grown strong," Axion said with a satisfied smile.

Angel was groaning and had shrunk back to her normal size leaning against a wall in the distance.

Buelsar yelled incoherently while furiously continuing to fight the chained up White Steel Eel and beating it into the ground.

Rachel was surprised for a moment before quickly regaining her senses. "Wait, stop, Mr. Elliot! The game is over! We won!"

O O O

After the battle concluded, it took some time before everyone settled down.

During that time, Michael, the Traveler, and Apple had returned together and started treating their team's wounds. Apple was another Lightbearer who specialized in intelligence and logistics, who, like Michael, was one of the double agents that came with Rachel from Khun's team.

A had retrieved his Shinheuh into his Bowl too, and Buelsar's chains were released.

"So, you actually know that guy?" Buelsar asked, arms crossed leaning against the wall beside Angel, who was being looked at by Michael, who also served as the group's doctor.

"Yes. Although I didn't expect him to test us like that, he will be of great help after joining us," said Rachel.

"Whatever. As long as he doesn't mess up the plan," said Buelsar.

"Thanks for understanding, Mr. Elliot," said Rachel.

Meanwhile, Axion had treated Cassano a little with his own skills, and had received another data stick from him.

"Hmm, so the one from earlier was a fake?" Axion asked.

"Not quite. It was a small fraction of what I received from Ms. Sophia. Our deal didn't specify exactly what data to give you after all, and if you weren't genuinely Miss Rachel's friend then there was no need to give any more than the minimum. That was the true nature of our cooperation after all…I had no need of you as an actual guard," said Cassano.

"That's smart. And I probably wouldn't have found out. Even if the info was lacking, it would be reasonable to think Sophia withheld it at the source and there would be little I could do about it."

"It was Miss Rachel's idea, after hearing about it from me."

Apple was now working with her Lighthouse, doing something with Emily while the Traveler just watched.

Some time later, Axion and Rachel met alone in a different room of the castle.

"Was all that really necessary?" Rachel asked. "You could've warned me first."

"It was more fun that way. I was telling the truth, you know? Cassano is the one who asked me to come with him, I didn't plan to join you at this point," said Axion.

"So you really would've left if we didn't win the game?" Rachel asked with a frown.

"Yes. I was originally going to let you summon me on your own when you decided I was needed," said Axion, pointing at her neck. "With the catalyst. You weren't planning on calling for me so soon either, right?"

"Hmm," said Rachel, looking away. "I wasn't sure if you'd really come at all, so I made my plans with that in mind. This will change things."

"If it's inconvenient for you, I can leave and come back later. I need to spend some time analyzing this data anyways, so I might not have a lot of time to do whatever you guys are planning," said Axion.

Rachel shook her head. "No, come with us. You lost the game anyways, and we don't have that much to do until the 35th Floor," said Rachel. "That's when it'll get busy. By the way…"

She looked at him critically again. "How much were you holding back there?"

"What makes you think I didn't go all out? I thought I played it pretty convincingly."

"Obviously, you didn't use your real sword, or 'that power'. I know what you did when fighting that Ranker assassin, remember? My Ghost was there," said Rachel, referring to the entity assigned to her by Headon and who secretly assisted Axion at the final moment against Lo Po Bia Ren using Reverse Flow to freeze him in place when Derflinger's ultimate attack was launched.

"Haha, that's true. Well actually, there's a reason I couldn't use Derflinger's true power, even aside from hiding his presence or my trump cards," said Axion.

"This isn't my real sword, it's a substitute blade to avoid being recognized. Also our power is limited when acting without a summoner," said Derflinger, finally revealing his ability to actually talk. "Didn't you also hear us talk about that at the same battle?"

"So it's because that princess isn't here?" Rachel asked. "I didn't get all the specifics of it."

"Partially, yes."

"Can you make another contract with someone else?"

"I can. Why, are you interested?"

"Does making a new one mean breaking your old one?"

"Nope, I can make more than one. It doesn't have to be permanent either, it could just be for a single objective," said Axion.

"Then what happens if your summoners are enemies with each other?"

"I'll avoid doing anything that harms either or directly contradicts the other's commands, and if they insist on fighting, I'll either pick a side I like more or stay out of it for them to resolve it themselves," said Axion.

"I assume you're willing to contract with me, if you're explaining that much," said Rachel.

"It would be fairly difficult to move with your group otherwise, yes, unless you'd prefer someone else on your team to play that role. But they might not be qualified for it."

"No, it has to be me! But tell me everything I need to know about it first."

O O O

A/N: That's the last chapter of this arc. Originally intended to be one arc, I've split it into two since I reoriented around the Sasha plot. The next one will delve into further MC's Hell Train activities.
The Hell Train, Hidden Floor, and Floor of Death arcs were quite long in the canon, but I plan to just focus on the parts I found most interesting. One of the major things I looked forward to in the ToG segment is actually the Floor of Death arc, since it holds the possibility of very interesting interactions. That said, we might (as in, tbd) take a break from ToG before we get there, partly to manage the story length of being in one setting, and partly because it makes some sense for the MC to put off encountering much more powerful entities that start to feature in the canon storyline, now that MC has a method of managing planar time relative to his own.