(Jamie)

"Do you sense anything?" I ask Light, sensing something in the distance, from all sides of us.

"In the distance," he confirms. "A lot of power, in all directions. Whatever it is that's the Final Floor's challenge, and it's coming towards us."

"Estimated arrival time?"

"Probably two minutes, unless it speeds up, which it very well might."

"Alright," I say. "So it looks like the System concealed the two items' names with random letters. One of them is the Sword of Divine Retribution, and the other is the Shield of Enlightened Will. Do you know them?"

"No," he answers.

"Alright," I say, then try to use Identify on them. "Seems Level 7 Identify isn't high enough for them."

It's high enough to identify my Enduring Vines, though. The sword and shield are truly powerful. The name could be considered to say that, except for the fact that sometimes, names are deceiving.

Light's already given me the gist of the Hellbreaker Class, so I move on to looking at my new Skill.

Ultra Rainbow of Love Level 1 Active Creates a spherical rainbow around the caster that explodes outwards with the force and power of the caster's love for those dear to him and his passion for his desires and goals. Cost: 4,500 Mana

Holy shit. I'm not even sure how a spherical rainbow looks, but that power… it's an area-of-effect spell with a huge force behind it, if one's love and passion are strong enough. And my passion is definitely powerful.

The question I'm facing is 'is it powerful enough', though. I'm still only Orange Rating, too. Though I do know that that Rating itself isn't 'truly' accurate, it's still a huge difference gap. Even Light, with his Indigo Rating, might not be able to handle this out here.

Wait. Why is he the one protecting Cole?

"Hey, Light?" I say.

"They're so ugly."

I look in the distance. What's approaching is a horde of… abominations. Some are humanoid, others are more beastlike, but they're all grotesque, some of them actually oozing as they charge towards us.

Ultra Rainbow of Love it is, then. But only once the horde reaches us.

"Be prepared to kill anything that survives this," I tell him. "Odds are, it'll probably just weaken them."

"Alright?" Light gives me a curious look. "They're getting pretty close. What are you doing?"

"My new Skill," I tell him. "And I'm protecting Cole. You're stronger and better-able to fight hordes of monsters."

"Oh, right!" He exclaims, turning back to the incoming horde. "Bring it on, boys!"

Once the horde is only twenty feet away, I cast the Ultra Rainbow of love.

Immediately, in a ten-foot radius around me, a sphere of colors forms, ringed with rainbows. It lingers where it formed for a second, then explodes outwards, rapidly expanding until it's almost two hundred yards in diameter.

As it passes through the horde of monsters, their bodies explode into showers of light, only the ones at its furthest reaches managing to survive, but even then, they still take damage. Some of them lost limbs, eyes, flesh, ooze… stuff.

"That was most of my Mana," I tell Light as the horde approaches. "And I don't see a damn end to the horde."

I down a Mana Potion as Light starts kicking ass from a distance, the horde continuing to draw near us. With two more potions down and my Mana back up, I cast the Ultra Rainbow of Love again just before the horde reaches us.

It deals devastating damage, but most of the monsters remain alive.

Shit! They get stronger the further back they are! In other words, the more we kill, the stronger we'll be faced with. Light manages to protect us as I rapidly down more potions, then recast the spell, managing to wipe out around half of the monsters in its range.

"This is fun!" Light exclaims as he slams into the ground with his spear, back into his true form, death spreading out from the impact. "I still don't see an end!"

I sigh, downing more Mana Potions, casting the spell again, though after that, I feel a headache coming on. Seems I need to switch to fighting without magic for awhile, until the headache clears out. If we survive that long.

Taking a deep breath, I switch my usual sword for the new one. The Sword of Divine Retribution is pure-white, save for the crimson fuller and a crimson gem embedded in the crosspiece and the pommel, but otherwise looking completely plain. The Shield of Enlightened Will is light green with golden runes covering it.

I attack any of the monsters that make it past Light and near us while Cole does his best to avoid being struck. He's already established he can't hurt any of them.

SDR seems capable of slicing through the monsters with relative ease, while SEW block the attacks so completely, it doesn't even feel like they're connecting.

The horde continues to rush us, Light and I fighting our asses off as Cole does his best to not be killed.

"We have a problem!" Light yells, landing by me after I cast Ultra Rainbow of Love again.

"What?" I ask.

"I'm not healing!"

He's not… healing? I notice a cut on his cheek. A minor thing, but a huge one, nonetheless.

Shit. Our Species Ultimate Skills are disabled.

"Health Potion," I toss him one and he downs it, then returns to the fray.

I need to rest, and Light seems to understand that, working extra hard. As I rest, I watch the fight. Cole seems to be able to handle the speed of the horde just fine, which means that the speed of the monsters isn't actually all that high. Their difficulty comes from their toughness, strength, and magical power – for the ones that do have magic.

Yet even after more than two hours of fighting, the horde doesn't seem to be stopping, with no end still in sight. Which means there has to be something else we need to do.

"Light!" I holler. "Jump and boost!"

Light unleashes a powerful area-of-effect flame spell around us, a ring that rips through the monsters nearby. As soon as it's launched, he flips backwards and lands by us, then uses High Jump. I do the same thing, and he catches my foot, boosting me up as I use High Jump again, granting me added height.

Looking around, I determine that the ground is slightly-sloped down, but it spans out miles in all directions, until it reaches the 'edge'. It seems to be a series of portals that the monsters are pouring out through, the portals rimmed with a white light. In nine different locations, I can spot a stone platform similar to ours, though there's a white light coming from the center of those.

I take all that in before my peak completes, then I drop back down.

"Light, cover Cole!" I make a snap decision. "I'm heading out!"

Light's better-suited to protecting Cole. He might be more powerful than me, and able to get to those platforms better, but his raw power combined with his age and experience means he has a lot more stamina than me, and so can last here better.

I pull a series of potions out and down them one after another. One to restore my missing stamina and energy, one to boost my speed, and one to heighten my recovery of stamina and energy for a period of time.

Mixing potions with duration effects isn't a good idea, and will probably reduce their durations and have a negative effect once they wear off, but that doesn't matter. The monsters seem to be avoiding stepping onto those platforms, and now that I've had a chance to assess the situation… I realize that they aren't stepping on ours.

"What are you doing?" Light exclaims as I feel the world around me slow.

Or rather, I speed up. I adjust my mental state for a moment to slow myself back down.

"They can't step onto the platform," I tell him. "It might be a time-restricted thing. Rest if you need to. I'm heading out. I think I know how to end this."

With that, I let the potions overtake me again, and then take off, using High Jump to jump both high and far, landing on a monster and jumping again, running and jumping as much as possible to move as fast as possible, killing only when I absolutely need to fight. It takes me almost a full minute to reach the first of the platforms, and once I'm on it, I determine that it's identical to the one we started on, with one difference.

There's a stone pedestal in the center, a glowing white stone resting atop it. I try to remove it, but it fails to budge. When all else fails…

I smash the stone several times with my fist, cracking it on the sixth time, then I grip it and trigger Iron Grip, shattering the stone.

The pedestal then sinks into the ground, and the cracks and the glow around the portals change from white to red… and the portals grow a foot. They were at ten feet in height before, now standing at eleven. Up-close, I realize that the portals also pretty much touch each other. It's basically a wall of portals, and when I walk to the edge of the platform interrupting them, I find myself met with a wall.

It looks like the fields continues past, yet it's nothing more than a wall. Impressive magical illusion.

The monsters are probably getting stronger, and I have less time to work with this, and so take off, barely stopping to break the second stone. Red turns orange, and the portals grow a foot taller, the monsters just a bit more dangerous. I continue on, pushing my body as hard and as fast as it can go.

The effects of my potions fade as I smash the final stone, the black lights fading away. I'm covered in injuries that made it past my defenses, and can feel the effects of potion poisoning hitting me. Really shouldn't have taken those extra potions for the extra strength boost and recovery.

"Die of Mystery," I gasp as my body gives out under me. "Something good."

The die rolls out of my hand, spinning as blackness begins to fill my vision.

Then I wake to find myself staring up at Light's and Cole's concerned faces.

"You're alive!" Light exclaims.

"Duh!" Cole smacks him in the back of the head. "I told you that! He was still breathing."

"Guys," I sit up, groaning from the fire that floods through my body. "What happened?"

"The monsters kept getting tougher and tougher," Light tells me with a serious expression on his Fairy face, which I didn't think was possible. "Then eventually, they stopped coming, though they were really big at the end. I fought and fought and fought, and barely managed to survive. Then we went looking for you. Cole used his Die of Mystery after a few minutes, and it teleported us right to you."

"Any notification?" I sit up, looking around. The portals are gone, though it looks as if we're at the top of a slope. "Back at the start?"

"We were automatically returned here," Light shrugs. "And no, there wasn't."

So the Stage isn't done yet? And why didn't I receive a notification for Die of Mystery? They don't time-out, so I should've had one in my vision.

"How long was I out?" I stand, stretching and wincing from the pain.

"We actually got to you, got teleported, and then you woke up," he answers. "So I dunno? The lights stopped glowing probably forty minutes ago?"

So I passed out forty minutes ago, if Light's sense of time is accurate. Which it might not be, since it's Light. It could've been forty hours ago. Or days.

Though I think Cole would've corrected him on either of those fronts.

So what's the next part of the Stage, then? And why hasn't it begun?

Unless…

Closing my eyes, I focus on my ears, listening intently to the world around me, attempting to hear if there's any noise around us, any of the abominations hiding out.

"Light?" I open my eyes.

"Yeah?" He asks.

"See that hill?" I point at a hill we can barely see in the distance.

"Yeah."

"Throw your spear at it."

"Why?"

"Just do it."

He frowns, but summons his spear and throws it up into the air. It whistles down, slamming into the hill, leaving a crater where it once stood.

The Horrendous Dungeon Final Floor Stage 1 Has Been Cleared! All energies restored. All status effects removed. Health is restored to full.

The moment that notification appears, my Health returns to full, my body healing, my mind clearing up. I feel refreshed, like I just had a good sleep, my stamina back at full.

"Uh," Light says. "I don't like this. What happened?"

Right. Only Party Leaders receive that notice.

"We finished the stage," I tell him. "Retrieve your spear."

I dismiss the notification. It didn't give me a timer for the next stage's beginning, which means that we need to move fast.

Light disappears in a burst of speed, returning less than a minute with later his spear. Our thousand-plus speed stat is really damn useful sometimes. And without any monsters here, there's nothing in our way.

The moment Light returns to us, another notification appears in my vision.

The Horrendous Dungeon Final Floor Stage 2 Has Begun! Good luck with this wave!

Shit. More monsters.

"What is it?" Cole asks.

"Uh," I say. "I think we're about to get more monsters."