Following a mostly straight path, Pandora’s Actor was still far ahead of the group, humming as he led the way.

Having now reached the 5th floor, and climbing, the air became chilly. Without a trace of a cold wind, it felt like walking alongside a chain of freezing supermarket shelves in the dairy aisle.

Possessing the skill [cold resistance], Narberal was maintaining a distressed look at the flame in her hands.

Meanwhile, Lupusregina’s thick fur only provided so much cover.

With her arms crossed, she was rubbing her hands against her upper arms, heavily breathing out a thick mist.

“Say… I don’t really trust Pandora.”

Narberal looked at Lupi, but didn’t say a word yet.

“He doesn’t seem to be concerned at all about Solution and Entoma! Besides, where is he leading us? How does he know where to go?”

“Mhm… But we don’t have any other option. If we walked by ourselves, we’d be stuck in circles, waiting to be attacked. At the very least, we’re heading somewhere.”

Beta frowned, admitting inside that Narberal’s words made sense.

“Argh, fine! I’ll just ask him! Hey, Pandora-”

“We’re heeeere!”

Pandora stopped in front of a small stone door. Nonchalantly pushing it with one hand, the door opened, and bright sun rays shined through.

It unfolded to an open plains, with twisted woodlands to each side.

Upon closing the door, it seemed to dissolve into the landscape.

Beta gently touched the place where the door was. There was still something solid there.

Her touch formed a ripple that travelled in mid-air, on a plane perpendicular to the ground.

This entire landscape, which seemed to span over hundreds of miles, was the underground 6th floor of Nazarick - the Jungle, adjacent to floor 5, the Glacier.

A magical field surrounded the entire floor, creating the illusion of an endless space with an open sky above, which even simulated night and day.

The seasons, however, were stuck at spring, and the weather was always pleasant; slightly warm, with a refreshing breeze hitting from time to time.

“The Jungle? What are we doing here?”

Pandora placed his thumb and index on his chin, in the classic position of someone thinking intensely.

He was struggling to find a decent excuse.

“Ah, well, er, it should, any time now… I should answer… My answer will come any time now!”

“What??? What are you talking about-su? What’s up with you???”

Pandora placed his hand where a normal person’s heart would be, and his knees went soft.

“You… want to hear about my life? It’s… (sob)... It’s been so long since someone asked! Oh, how truly kind you are, Lupusregina-san!

Well, I was an innocent little boy(...)”

Lupusregina was already on the verge of snapping. This was the final stroke.

“WHO CARES ABOUT YOUR STORY!”

“Eh, you don’t?”

Both took a break to stare at each other, being utterly stupefied.

Suddenly, Pandora realised his acting just now wasn’t quite on par with Lupusregina’s dramatic cut.

He had to do a retake.

And so, he placed his index at his temple (he couldn’t separate his middle and ring fingers), and with an over-exaggerated ‘Gyaah!’, he fell flat on the grass.

“Pandora? (...) Pandora??? W… wait a moment-su! I’m sorry! I want to hear more! Just get up!!!”

No answer. He was ‘dead’, after all…

A few seconds later, the ground started shaking.

Nabe noted with a stern speech:

“It’s coming!”

Cracking its way through the dirt, a gargantuan fly emerged, blocking their way back.

This was the true form of the behemoth fly.

In the meantime, Pandora had apparently ‘resurrected’:

“Ah! I knew it would come any time now! In any case… RUN! Los! Los! Los!”

This was an action that Narberal and Beta took without thinking much.

Moments after they started sprinting, Nabe returned to her logical thinking:

“Why are we running??? We should stomp it right here and end its sad existence!”

“We can’t!”

Their looks were now fixated on Pandora. Narberal exclaimed furiously;

“Why is that???”

“We can’t beat it!”

“Okay, Pandora, this is your last chance!” - called out Beta after a few more running steps -

“You’d better start explaining yourself! Why can’t we beat it? How did it get into Nazarick in the first place?”

“Right, right…

Normally, you can’t kill Amon. He’ll always come back with 1 HP! At the end of their fight, Nishikirenai-sishou sealed Amon in a vessel. It’s been in the treasury all this time. The spirit possesses a host and changes its shape to its liking. It must’ve possessed this here behemoth fly.”

“Then how did that giant fly get there?”

“Oh… I let it!”

The other two replied in unison:

“WHAT???”

Before getting the chance to explain himself, a black tentacle formed from the fly’s body, encircling Pandora and lifting him off the ground.

Seeing this, Beta immediately shouted:

“Pandora!!!!”

“Don’t worry about me, Lupusregina-chan! Save yourself! I’ll see you on the other siiiide! Auf-wiederseheeeeen!!!!!”

“No, not that! What was that thing you told us to remind you about?”

“What thing?”

“That… the important one!!!”

“Ah, right!”

Some of the vowels in Pandora’s words were dragged out, as he was being swung from left to right:

“There IS a waaaay to defeat Amon! The spirit can oo-only be subdued by a greaaaater, purely chaotic, (...) downright destructive foooorce! Someone wh(...)”

As Pandora’s body was dragged into the fly behind the screen, Lupi didn’t hesitate a second, and placed her hands around her mouth to be sure her shout was heard:

“Thank youuuu!”

“Are you sure he’ll be fine?”

“I think so-su! More importantly, how do we get someone chaotic and destructive?”

Narberal threw a scornful look over her shoulder, thinking *You don’t really care about him, do you?(...)*

She decided to cast that thought away and urgently return to logical thinking:

“Both Ainz-sama and Demiurge-sama are of negative 500 - extremely evil alignment. However, I wouldn’t ever call them chaotic.

If we could somehow get to Shalltear or Albedo-sama…”

“How are we supposed to do that?”

Catching up from behind, the behemoth fly produced a terrifying roar:

“BLAAAAAAARGH!”

The Pleiades shouted at once:

“GYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

(...)

While running, both were trying their best to come up with a solution.

Thinking she had a good idea, Lupi spoke out:

“Try to scare it away!”

“What?”

“Show it your true form! See if you can frighten it!”

One of the innate skills of a doppelgänger was the ability to inflict fear - a condition that made enemies unable to move closer to the source of their fear.

“Mhm! Alright! I’ll give it a go!”

Narberal stopped in place, lifting tons of dust from the friction she had to apply to slow down.

With a smug smile and menacing eyes, she opened her arms widely, sort to say ‘take a good look at me’.

“Insignificant creature, behold my true form, and cower before me!”

The beast stopped for a second, giving both of them the hope that it was working.

Then, the shape of the fly changed into a monstrous visage of a demonic, unholy combination of a baby and a lovecraftian being.

Seeing this, Nabe’s confidence deflated like a balloon.

It was back to running.

(...)

“Wait, Narberal, why did that intimidate you??? You’re a doppelgänger! Aren’t you supposed to CAUSE fear?”

“Yes, I can! That doesn’t mean I’m immune to it!”

“That makes no sense! That’s like a basilisk not being immune to its own venom!

“But basilisks aren’t immune to their own venom!”

“What????”

“BLAAAAAAARGH!”

“GYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

(...)

Tired of running, they were both panting. At this rate, they would exhaust their energy without purpose.

“We don’t have a choice! We have to stall it and hope someone comes to help!”

Lupusregina made a swift turn, taking a wide battle stance, and aggressively drawing her oversized crosier, which was nearly long enough to scrape the ground.

Its greataxe-like blades emanated a crimson aura, and those with a keen sense of magical presence could see a translucent monstrous eye at the end of the crosier, scouring for prey.

At 5 meters to her right, Nabe instinctively cast [Fly] to get on the same fighting ground as her opponent.

She clapped her hands together, stretching an arch of lightning as she slowly distanced her arms.

They were each ready for combat, bearing a determined look in their eyes.

However, all of a sudden, Lupi’s eyes switched focus, directing her to lift her head up.

On the sky above the colosseum, a white trail of smoke was stumbling in a haphazard brownian motion.

“Narberal… What is that?”

[end of chapter 6]