I woke slowly, not moving until my bearings were regained, and when I had felt sufficiently aware, I sat up, blinked a bit, then yawned and stretched, seeing the date to be 18 February. Absently, I noted the glowing lettering on my left arm.

The LEV, a tattoo that represented the strength of the person it was on, granted via supernatural means to the majority of human beings across the world. I noted the number beneath it to be a nice 64.

It has been a month since I, Arthur Clive, strongest Adventurer of America and King of Camelot (at least, King of all five of the ‘citizens’) had slain the second Demon Lord, Ignus, within the Dungeon connecting the human world to Hell… where he lived…

Chronos, the new ruler of Hell who killed over a billion humans in only twelve effective hours worldwide, and the reason I could be considered an orphan now… I hated him…

Sure, he provided us with the LEV’s as well as doing some strange miscellaneous things which assisted us with our lives (such as fixing the climate and water problems we’d been having, though how was a mystery) in some manner, he had been very open in explaining that he had only done so because ‘If my enemies died from a supply problem, and not because my men or I killed them, that would be boring.’

So yes, he’s an insane warmonger who has committed genocide and I, and just about every being that has the capacity to understand what he is, wants him dead. And he loves it apparently.

“Meow.” I blinked at the noise before I looked to my right, seeing a small two-tailed black cat, a Cait Sith Demon that was my familiar, known as Sidhe… Sidhe pawed absently at my leg then looked at my face… oh, cheering me up I would guess… smart cat.

“Right… right… time to get up I guess.” I psyched myself up as I picked up the precocious feline and swung my legs off the bed, unfurling my blankets onto the floor… I sighed, remembering that I’d have to make up my bed again… why did I have to clean something only for it to get dirty again? Oh the torture.

“Arthur! Wake your ass up! The car will be arriving in an hour!” I heard the loud voice and sighed once more… I feel as if each sigh was me getting older or something.

After showering in my private bathroom, then getting dressed into a semi-formal wear (a button up shirt, slacks and sneakers) I walked into the hallway.

At current, I, along with my fellow Dungeon-goers on my team known as Caliburn (part of the Kingdom known as Camelot) were staying at a small building owned by the government (it was one of the things I requested in exchange for agreeing to work for them)

The building itself had a very old feel to it due to having redbrick walls on the outside and very rustic insides… in addition, it had three floors, the first floor was our lounge and meeting room(s) along with kitchens and dining rooms.

The second floor has our training rooms where we practice our skills against either dummies or in sparring matches (most didn’t like battling me because of my Lightning element magic which bypassed most defences) so it was in frequent use.

As for the third floor, it was where our rooms were. The guys (of which there are four including me) bunked in one section of the third floor while the girls were on the other side. We didn’t have any real rules on not going near the others areas, but we usually found very little need to unless to wake said person.

“Yo Arthur.” I tilted my head towards the voice to see the tall defender of my team, Matt Jacobson… much like me, he was wearing something semi-formal, though the fact that he also wore sneakers wasn’t a surprise.

“Hey Matt… how many days since a slip?” I asked absently as I waited for Matt to take the stairs first for the very thing I questioned him on.

“Hm… well, after one week of trying I haven’t gotten it wrong yet. Wish me luck.” He said solemnly, putting on a glove as I stood and waited for a moment.

See, we didn’t have a lift in the house, but it wasn’t that much of a problem when the stairs were actually rarely used. Also the stairs had rails, very slippery, shiny rails.

Now what do you think a grown man-child would do upon needing to go down?

“Butt-grind!” I ignored the random shout (last time I was witness to this he had shouted something about disco fever, it was random) as Matt sat on the rail and slid down at high speed.

This particular rail also happened to actually turn between the third and first floor (namely, it made a zigzag shape between the three floors, left to right, right to left, and back again… you get it.) so most would expect Matt to fall off there.

For the first week of his attempts, he had, and we hadn’t stopped him because it wasn’t as if he would get hurt from doing this (not when one had as high a defence as his) so we just watched, waiting for the failure. A week after trying, we got disappointed because the failures stopped.

“Yes, perfect turn!” the turn in the rail had a curve, not an angular turn, so Matt hooked the gloved hand into that curve, and somehow used his momentum to actually lift off the rail for a moment with only his hand keeping him from flying off… then when the turn was done, he pulled himself back into position to sit.

…the fact that this is normal is proof of how abnormal our world has gotten due to the advent of semi-super powered humans. Normal humans would never get such a manoeuvre correct, but with LEV’s we could.

The strength we gained from LEV’s was three pieces essentially. The first was our Anima, our own soul given form as a weapon or ability to assist us. They grew as we grew as well, and they couldn’t be replaced and on the off chance they broke, they repaired depending on how durable it was actually. The more durable, the longer it took to repair apparently. My own Nameless Dagger (if that wasn’t an Oxymoron I’d bite my tongue) was near unbreakable when it came to durability.

The second was skills, which was basically as you’d guess, giving us a skill that we could do better than we could before having the skill. Some were abstract with slight benefits to obscure things (such as my Tactician Skill which boosted Wisdom and made plans slightly better) and others had very noticeable effects (such as the Blade Wielding skill)

And, as a reference to the ‘Wisdom’ that I just mentioned, stats. Stats were basically the abilities of a person in six different categories, quantified. These are from basic Role Playing Game (RPG) stats, namely- Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence, Wisdom, Constitution and Vitality.

“Add another day without accident to that board!” I faintly heard Michael, my best friend and second-in-command to my team calls out from the bottom…

That board was originally a joke but at some point I think it became serious…

I slowly plodded down the stairs, feeling very tired thinking about what had to be done today… but before I even got halfway down the stairs between the third floor and the second, I heard some footsteps behind me and turned my head back.

When I saw the long blonde hair, I think a small smile came over my face as I looked into the nice blue eyes of the person in question.

“Ah, good morning Emilia. I see you’re looking dressed up for today.” I remembered my manners as the woman in the one-piece sundress nodded with a smile… despite the simple look of the outfit, she pulled it off wonderfully, and as a bit of a secret, I kind of liked that, when a woman didn’t even need to go overboard to feel beautiful.

Then again, Emilia was already beautiful so much so that I wonder every once in a while why she and I are friends actually…

It gets really awkward when I can hear people whispering to each other about ‘why is such a beautiful girl with a guy like that’ when I look average really…

Way to damage my self-esteem, onlookers.

“Oh, good morning Arthur… and thanks by the way. I think you look nice too.” She gave an equally polite greeting as she took a step down the stairs while I waited for her to be at equal height to me before we both continued down.

“I wonder… I don’t really feel as if I look neat or anything… I mean, I like the formal look but I never feel like I can pull it off right honestly… I always feel too awkward.” I admitted even as I resisted the urge to pull at my tie.

If it weren’t for the fact that my pants were almost too comfortable and I was wearing sneakers, I think I’d die of embarrassment for even trying.

“Well, I personally think you look good, so that should be enough… or isn’t it?” I heard the subtle threat and shook my head very quickly.

“No, that’s enough, thanks!” I replied quickly for the sake of my health and a rather faux innocent smile appeared on her face afterwards even as we continued down the stairs.

Honestly… despite my role as leader of this team and technically being one of the highest levelled (Much like Video Games, our LEV’s represented Levels. As mentioned earlier, mine was 64, everyone else on my team was at 62) in the entire world, I wasn’t that brilliant compared to my peers honestly.

The main things I had going for me was my ability with magic and the regeneration I had there (due to Wisdom which enhances magic regeneration, and growth of currently held skills. It has another facet, but I’m keeping that a secret) as well as my ability to plan.

Other than that, well, compared to other Adventurers (as we were being called now, some were also called Agents if they worked directly for the government) I had lower damage output due to my Anima (the oxymoronic Nameless Dagger) being so weak, thus making my main source of damage either magic or another weapon which means dual wielding.

As for my defence, well… let’s just say that Matt can get knocked over by a rhino at this point and feel nothing. As for me? Well… I’d probably die or at least break a few bones.

My only real advantage in the defensive area is that I rarely get hit and that when I do I heal very quickly due to having a good Vitality stat.

Now with all this knowledge, understand the fact that Emilia is technically within that top ten Damage Dealers in pure output within the entire world…

Yeah, I’m sure I have a reasonably healthy fear of Emilia at any point wishing me harm, even jokingly… because if it ever happened as a joke I might still get hurt.

“Good… I’d hate my escort to think he wasn’t worthy of being in my presence.” …I struggled to hold in my laughter, and then I heard Emilia giggle and we both burst.

The down-to-earth and surprisingly humble for her looks Emilia talking like that always made both of us laugh, even if a while back I was pretty much a near automaton that just moved around in patterns.

“…Ah, that was hilarious… oh, I see you’re wearing that necklace.” I noted as a small blush appeared on Emilia’s face as she touched the very thin chain around her neck, a tiny ornament attached to it that was pretty unidentifiable, but Emilia and I both understood it to be a tiny shield.

When I remembered that bit, I blushed a bit myself… really, we’re friends but I ended up doing something like that… even if she had implied at one point she’d consider being more…

“Well… of course I’d wear it. The only time I don’t is when I sleep.” See, now that made me smile a bit, even if I looked away as I did it.

See, it was actually Emilia’s birthday two weeks ago, her birthday was the fifth of February and on that day I gave her the necklace as a gift.

Of course, being the kind of guy I am, the necklace was more than a necklace, but was in fact an Enchanted item. In this case, I enchanted it with one of the Metal-element aligned spells designed for increasing your defence…

I was hoping to one day learn how to create an item that would keep you alive while it broke, but at this point I couldn’t do that.

Nonetheless, I created it myself from metals I kept from the Dungeon (the bridge between Hell and Earth, and at the bottom Chronos waits for challengers. It also happens to be the Tower of Babel, thus allowing people to communicate freely within the Tower.) and I chose its shape symbolically.

During the International Incident that occurred a month ago, Emilia had nearly died due to an attack from the Demon Lord Ignus… ‘luckily’ I had reached level 50 just before then, and had gained the ability to teleport in short ranges (known as Blink to the standard World of Warcraft fan)

I never wanted her to be in danger if I wasn’t there to help, so I made the necklace… to protect her, and I stated as much when I gave the necklace to her in private… that was actually kind of embarrassing when we realized that everyone else was watching though… I’ll never be able to keep a straight face remembering John whispering ‘giggity giggity’.

I actually think my Sanity took a hit. I solved puzzles for the rest of that night to get it back.

“O…Oh… I see.” Well, there I went and made the conversation kind of awkward again… I guess my luck with girls was kind of strange as usual… I could actually be friends with them if I tried, but if I actually liked the girl (and I honestly did like Emilia… I just didn’t want a relationship due to the fact that our jobs literally required fighting to possible death) then occasionally I’d do stupidly awkward things or say them.

Luckily the stairs were done and we entered the hub of the first floor, and I turned and noticed someone walking up with a yawn. Then he saw Emilia and I and grinned.

“Oh… well then, where’s my camera, this scene is giving me inspiration!” Ah, John. I mentioned him just now, but he was the Healer of my team, and, in his own words- ‘The Token Black Teammate, you racist bastards!’

His… brand of humour was kind of dangerous in public, especially considering the fact that we lived in America where that could easily be taken as actual offence by just about any bystander… when in fact he meant it as a joke and usually didn’t even care if we did make any racist joke in return. Case in point-

“Maybe you’ll look in the mirror and get inspiration at night, if you could see yourself that is.” I replied easily and naturally… then realized how rude it was but didn’t show any of that part of my thoughts on my face as John nodded with a look of ‘I’m impressed’ on his face.

“Good one, bit classic though… eh, I’ll accept it, you need more material though. At least you don’t do the classic- they only like watermelon, they can’t swim, KFC or cookouts are their main meals, etcetera. You try your own brand and it works… for now.”

…it was strange, but that’s just how our friendship works as I took his hand in greeting (not a typical handshake, but one of those easy ones that went quickly between friends) and he moved past, though I noticed the cup in his hands and turned to Emilia.

“Seems Alice is already in the kitchen, let’s go.” I said as Emilia nodded in agreement (she likely pieced it together herself, but I liked affirming with everyone on anything slightly miss able… at times, it did annoy them though.)

As we entered the kitchen, I saw the two last members of my team I hadn’t greeted this morning, the Grave siblings (and I disliked thinking about their surname for how ominous it was… then again, their family seemed to be filled with weapons experts or military, sometimes the family member was both...) Michael and Alice Grave.

As mentioned before, Michael was my second-in-command and best friend, he also happened to be the Archer for our team and he was usually my source of emotional support (although these days everyone on my team occasionally counted there… I’m human, not God after all. I’m not perfect.)

Michael also happened to be really competent in just about anything… he was good with animals, was tall, could easily strike up a conversation with people he didn’t even know, could fight really well, even did housework well (cleaning happened near automatically) and while he had very little in the way of recipes, he could cook when he tried.

He could even pick up girls easily… though his one shortcoming seemed to be the fact that if he did get a girlfriend, she’d likely have some issue in the next month or so that caused them to break up (very rarely was it actually an issue on his front, so I guess he’d actually be a good boyfriend too...)

In other words, the guy was absurdly perfect and made many assume that he dragged me around everywhere… they’d probably be right, if it weren’t for the fact that there were many times where I ended up getting him from one place to another.

“Ah, good morning you two. Morning drinks are just about done, though Alice was waiting for your order Arthur.” Michael said as I gave a small wave as we walked over to the kitchen table (which resembled a bar honestly) and sat down.

On the other side of the table was Alice, Michael’s younger sister, and our other damage dealer in my team (silently acknowledged was the fact that the people in our team most capable of hurting anything were the two females... I’m also reasonably sure they’ve noticed too.)

Alice was the shortest member of our team (at the lower end of the 1.6 metre range) and honestly the most unassuming. That is, until one was informed that she probably had the highest Strength stat in the entire team.

Alice was a reliable member of the team in that we could give her a target and there was a high chance she could get rid of it for us, though she’d joke around and play pranks every once in a while, we’d mostly gotten used to it by now…

I remember once getting up in the middle of the night to go to the kitchen only to see her with a knife saying ‘I’ve been expecting you.’… I promptly ignored her and got some water. She complained the next morning that I knew her idea of a prank too much to get scared or surprised.

She tried it again on John the next day and it worked apparently, judging from the surprisingly girly scream that woke us all up. John would never admit that it was him though, even when we entered the Kitchen and found him breathing heavily in a corner while Alice was laughing.

“Ah, there you two are. Here Emilia, your tea. Arthur, would you like coffee or tea for today?” Alice asked as I thought about what I’d be doing today.

“Tea please… I don’t think coffee would help much tension wise.” I responded quickly thinking about the nonsense I’d be subjected to later today.

“Alright, coming up shortly.” Alice was the one who usually made our drinks in the morning (though occasionally either Michael or I would do so, she made it in a much more efficient, and honestly better tasting, manner)

“So… today’s the day huh? They really took their time with this though.” Michael, as usual, complained a bit about the government as I sighed at his words… they were kind of true though.

“Let’s just leave it… at least they are fixing this at all, and besides… we’ve met the guy at the top. He has his own worries.” Indeed we had, especially when considering our pay-checks come straight from the big man himself, President Clayton of the United States of America.

The man was quite reasonable and treated me as an equal due to my position amongst Adventurers, and was surprisingly reasonable. I did feel sorry for him at times though, seeing as I’ve heard him complain about how people say it’s his fault things go wrong when most times it was a snag in the command structure itself that was the issue.

Plus… he was a major enthusiast for anything Dungeon related in spite of (or maybe because of) his own lack of a LEV… considering only 20-30% of the world couldn’t use them, it was a shame that someone so likeable didn’t have one. I have no doubt he’d enter the Dungeon himself if it weren’t for that… then again, I’m sure many would worry about our country if our President did that.

“Still… that incident a month ago, where we, and five teams from different countries ended up meeting each other in the Dungeon… you’d think they’d try to solve the issues caused by that meeting before we could possibly meet another Demon Lord… instead, they only get it done a week after another has been defeated.”

…See, which was why I admitted that his complaint was kind of fair. That incident (called the Babel Incident by those in the know, due to our new knowledge gained by it) did bring up quite a few issues (such as distribution of loot, who gets to fight the Demon Lord, etc.)

Even if we managed to work together, it was honestly just barely (none of the people that had worked together with me had really cared for my commands other than that one guy from South Africa who kept mentioning cars and Forza.) and it probably wouldn’t work another time… maybe, but there would be lots of issues to be worked through.

So we made an agreement during our distribution of loot that the next Demon Lord would be fought by whoever got there first. My team had arrived only to find Team Osobyy (the Russian word for Special I believe) waiting, and Team… ahem, the Japanese Team (I can’t even think of their team name before wanting to burst into laughter) was already fighting the Demon Lord apparently.

Well… I kind of expected it honestly. The leaders of both teams were level 63 by now, possibly even 64 like me. And unlike me, their entire team was at that same level…

My team was weaker than I was level wise, but that was due to me doing something stupid the day before Christmas which catapulted my position above my teammates… then, with the assistance of my Dagger that grants bonus experience, I maintained that lead.

This was slowly but surely becoming an issue, but I didn’t know how to resolve it beyond having us enter the Dungeon separately… but I feel that it would not be necessary at this point, as we work well enough together to stay safe and secure in our movements in the Dungeon.

“Well, even if it’s only our six teams that are that far ahead of the rest it doesn’t mean only those six countries exist you know? The others also have schedules and they had to coordinate to get this meeting to happen in the first place.” I added on as Michael frowned, taking a sip of his coffee… to his side, I saw a massive, empty bowl… going by what I know of Michael, I’d say cereal… he really liked the stuff, all of them… though I wish he’d quit with the ‘cereal killer’ joke.

“Listen, I’m not saying they aren’t wrong, but they aren’t right either… sometimes in life there isn’t anyone in the wrong, just the situation itself.” Wow, that was deep. I should record that somewhere…

Just after that, Emilia and I both had our cups of tea and I sighed in relaxation while I sipped on the slightly hot beverage (I couldn’t deal with piping hot) and debated on breakfast...

“Michael, set me up with some cereal man… something already kind of sweet, so I don’t need to add sugar.” I added and he nodded and moved away to his ‘collection’. I have no doubt he’d get a good one. I’m pretty sure that he dislikes making cereal for anyone but himself, so I make sure to ask rarely.

By the time I had finished my tea, everyone was congregating in the kitchen, and I was busy on my breakfast and I listened in on the conversations while I was ‘out of commission’…

There was Matt who was talking to Michael about getting new fuel injectors for his car, and changing the gearbox since it was getting worn out… Matt drove a Nissan Fair-lady Z, and he drove seriously fast… surprisingly safely for someone going that fast.

John, Emilia and Alice were discussing certain things about the dungeon (like Emilia had gotten a very weak life-steal effect to her knives now, so if he saw her stabbing away at something, he could heal her afterwards, and so on).

I was finally finished with my cereal and stood up, depositing it in the sink and I looked at the Diesel watch I wore on my right arm to check the time and nodded, looking up and clapping to get the attention of the group.

The watch itself was a present from my father on my eighteenth birthday, it was an old age custom to give a wristwatch to your son when he came of age apparently, and I was surprised to know my father actually followed such a trend.

As for which arm I wore it on, I understood it was typically worn on the left, but I wore mine on the right, again, like my father, who was left-handed and also figured out that people trying to rob you typically look to your left wrist for your watch, not your right…

Small things make the whole, and it was small things like that which I gained from my family that shaped me into the person I was today…

“Alright, we’re slightly early, but rather early than late, so let’s go. Who’s driving with whom?” I asked, knowing we had two cars (Matt’s was a two-seat though) and I knew we’d have Matt driving his, Michael or Emilia driving her BMW.

“Uh, I think I’ll die of driving with Matt, so I’m in the M3 for sure.” I heard John and we chuckled a bit at his response.

“Hm… I’ll drive with, been a while.” Alice spoke up, so Matt’s car was filled, everyone else would be in the M3. The question of who was driving was answered when Emilia kept the keys instead of tossing them to Michael, who looked slightly depressed at the information… The man loved those cars and was saving up to get one, though he’d be able to afford one pretty soon.

The seating arrangements were easy too… I’d be sitting in the back for sure. Sitting up front always felt stifling unless I was the one driving (and I rarely drove cars, much as I liked them, my Suzuki Hayabusa was enough for me, rarely did I need anything else) so at the back I’d sit. Michael normally sat at the front too, though he seemed to want to sit at the back today so I just ignored that.

With that we left our home (base, whatever we felt like calling it) and I sighed… seriously, waking up this early (it was only around six, we normally left for the Dungeon around ten or nine) to drive to the U.N building when we weren’t even politicians was unfair…

I felt my pocket twitch for a moment and looked down to see Sidhe reaching into said pocket, to get at my phone likely… because it rang soon after I noticed Sidhe. Thing was damn near precognitive.

… hey… is this why John was sitting in front and Michael was sitting at the back with me? His rivalry with Sidhe was near legendary to those who knew both… or fear of Sidhe... either worked to explain John’s relationship with the Cait Sith.

I held the phone to my ear after seeing the number and motioned a ‘keep quiet’ to Michael who nodded, everyone going silent as I answered the phone.

“Hello, Arthur Clive speaking.” I answered formally, and was greeted just as formally in return by the Strongest Agent of America.

“Hello Clive, this is Shaun. Are you en-route to the building?” he asked and I had to stop myself from physically nodding… I hated talking over phones…

“Yes, we left just five minutes ago, the building isn’t too far away so we should get there shortly.” I explained in concise terms for the man who, despite how he sometimes sounded, was surprisingly professional.

“Good. When you get here I’ll be there to walk you through everything that should happen today. Is the rest of your team coming as well?” he asked and I heard a faint yawn through the phone… as I said, despite how he sounds, he’s professional.

“Yes, we’ll be arriving in two cars, a white BMW M3 and a Nissan Fair-lady Z in gunmetal grey.” The fact that there was a colour name gunmetal was something I always found interesting, pretty much lacking any general importance, it just happened to be interesting.

“Alright, we’ll be waiting.” Without bothering to do any type of awkward greeting like I would have, Shaun instead just opted to end the call there… ass.

“Well, this should be fun…” I sighed, and I ended up leaning over against the car door, absently playing with Sidhe with one hand while the other kept my head up… I was way too tired to even consider removing my hand and sitting straight up.

Within ten minutes of the phone call we pulled up in the parking lot of the U.N Building and I looked around in curiosity…

I absently noted that Matt and Alice got here before us, considering they were comfortably parked and talking to Agent Dante, Shaun, and Jason… seems the Agents are here.

Noticing us, the group moved towards our car as we got out, and I noted the U.N building looked a lot like in movies… except not deserted, bombed up, or broken in some other manner… hey… a lot of movies I watch seem to be messed up… figures.

“Hello Clive… come on, President Clayton and the other leaders are all in different sections, we’ll head to ours.” Agent Shaun said as I nodded, and we began to move while following.

All the Agents were in suits, and for once Agent Shaun looked to actually be wearing a tie and have his shirt tucked, which was surprising for me. The man usually looked as if he woke up in his suits or something to the effect.

Agent Shaun, the strongest Agent in America, he was, quite bluntly put, my ‘back-up’ were I to die in the Dungeon… we were very similar too, and we get told that constantly. We both hate that fact to our cores though.

I didn’t quite get it, but according to Michael- ‘You’re both very calculating and are both good at seeing the qualities of people you meet, then acting on it… plus, you’re both short.’

…yeah, he was just slightly taller than me and it pissed me off when he smirked at me when he noticed me getting annoyed with said fact.

“Ah, hello Shaun… rough morning?” as I was glaring at Shaun who glared right back over his shoulder, I turned to the second-in-command of the Agents, Agent Dante and my expression did a 180 into a small smile.

“Kind of, we don’t normally wake up this early… though you seem to be taking it in a stride.” I mentioned to the Agent who chuckled, patting my shoulder heavily making me stagger a bit as we walked.

Agent Dante Vasquez was built like a body-builder which made his suit sit on him as if he were a bouncer (if you dumb down his job…) and with his short cut hair he looked dangerous… though he isn’t actually that bad, he was usually cheery and approachable, easy to get along with, unlike his boss…

Another fact that makes us (Shaun and I) similar is apparently the fact that we easily get along with the same people, who can’t understand why we just don’t like each other. Said people include Agent Dante, Michael, Alice and Matt.

“Well, I used to wake up early to take trains back in High School, plus, my sister wakes up early to get to work… some people go in very early.” Dante explained and I got the idea… hard to picture him in High School…

“Ah, how is Danielle by the way? I mean, she was transferred for a while right?” it was very noticeable when the snarky girl who usually dealt with my team when we entered and left the dungeon was replaced with a mountain of a man who was very… ahem, let’s just say pink.

I have nothing against men who like other men, but that was a shock the first time. Paul (or Pauline as he wishes to be called) was actually an alright guy, after we agreed that none of the guys in my team were interested and he accepted that. People like him were typically very ‘vibrant’ and attention catching, talking to them was funny in its own way.

“Ah… She’s alright… still trying to terrorize me… she should be transferring back soon, and Mrs Pauline will be returning… she kept laughing whenever I said that though…” …poor guy… just from his words I could gather that she hadn’t mentioned that ‘Mrs Pauline’ was actually a man…

Danielle was kind of quiet and calm with us… but that’s with people she interacts with due to her job. She’s apparently very snarky and terrorizes Dante. I find it sad kind of… Shaun just said that he approved though.

“Hey, no greeting for me? Come on man…” Ah… Agent Grey, or as I know him, Jason Grey, one of my friends from school alongside Michael, the three of us were best friends…

Then Jason decided to run around doing stupid things and wasted away his life for quite a bit. Apparently in the time I hadn’t seen him he had been to Quantico and was in training to be an FBI agent before Red Sky Day (the day Chronos killed 1.7 Billion people)

After everyone received their Anima and LEV two days after, Jason’s Anima was deemed exceptional amongst the selection and he was drafted to be one of eighteen agents who would work directly under the command of the President himself.

Of course, Jason was the youngest of the Agents, so despite being considered the third ranked amongst them all, he was still pretty much a gofer for the other Agents who frequently called him newbie, rookie, or recruit.

“Hey Jason… there, I greeted you, now wait while other people talk.” I replied with some apathy as he faked crying in the background as we walked. The inside of the U.N building seemed to have been split into different sections for different countries, before the big room used for actual meetings…

So we followed Agent Shaun who apparently knew the layout of the place, as I absently noted some countries as we went past them, including Germany, China, Russia, Britain-

“I told you! Do not call me Head Agent, I am Hokage George!” I think, no, I’m sure, we all pulled brakes in our minds as we heard someone say that with no laughter in his voice, and I turned my head to the British area.

Within the small section were three people, one of which was Jade, the leader of the British Team, who was looking very confused and trying to find a way out of her situation, and a man who was likely a British Agent (he was tall with his hair cut short on the sides and the top was long and slicked back) laughing out-loud at her expression, so it was clearly the last person who had said such strange things…

The man had short hair, and was slightly taller than I was (wasn’t everyone…) and wearing a suit, designating him as either an Agent or a President, and considering I hadn’t seen him before, I’d say Agent… but his suit wasn’t black it was red-

“Heathen! My suit is not red! Correct your internal narrative to represent the true greatness of cardinal red! Do not disrespect the cardinal!” …I think he has mind reading.

“No I don’t. I can, however, read narratives and books. By the way…” his explanation still hadn’t explained everything… but he looked me over before nodding with a smirk.

“Ah, excellent, nice to meet you Arthur Clive, main-character of this story.” Uh… thanks? “You’re welcome.”

… “What, confused? I appear to have that effect on most people. Right, well, you have heard my name, but I must introduce myself properly, for the audience of course.” What audience… this guy…

“Right, I am Hokage, or if you are boring and uncivilized you may call me Head Agent, George Clements. My level is 60 and my Anima is Reader, it lets me read things. Including the life-story of people I meet. Yours is amongst the most interesting I’ve ever seen by the way.” This guy must be insane… and that power sounds unfair, knowing everything about a person by looking at them?

“No, that’s not my power, I read their life story. It requires actual reading, and it’s very disturbing when looking at new people. By the way, book one seems interesting, I’ll have to read it later. Though from the looks of things, this is book two chapter one.” …this is seriously confusing.

“That makes one of us, to me what I’m saying makes perfect sense. Oh, hello frequently ignored characters!” the guy made a 180 in his facial expression from serious, to looking ready to burst into laughter as he looked at the rest of the people I was walking with, before stopping at Shaun.

“Ah… Agent Shaun. Now that is interesting… you seem to be the writer.” What he just said seemed very strange and Shaun also seemed confused as he raised an eyebrow.

“No, I mean… even for me this is confusing… you’re Shaun but also not Shaun… no, you are a piece of something beyond us. How peculiar. I’ll stop now.” He looked disturbed…

Looks like I’m not the only one that finds Shaun disturbing… though for a clearly different reason apparently. Once again, the man spun his expression from disturbed back to happy, maybe that was his default expression? As he shook my hand he grinned.

“Well, while that… thing is there, I’ll tone down my antics. You’re almost as disturbing as he is by the way, so don’t gloat.” I think by now I’ll just think he can read minds. “If that keeps you sane, do so.” Thanks.

“Right, right… so sorry about that, our Head Agent wasn’t always like that but uh… with his Anima giving him powers like that, and his Class being Prophet, he’s changed a lot.” The other Agent walked over and stuck out a hand as he spoke, Agent George walking away… I looked at the hand before shaking it.

“Nice to meet you, my name is Mike, I’m second-in-command of our Agents. Agent George is a childhood friend of mine, so I’d hope you don’t hold what he just did against him. He used to be very different before all the issues involving LEV’s and Chronos occurred.” Mike admitted as I blinked at his words… that guy was very different?

“How was he different?” I asked curiously as Mike held a hand to the back of his head and looked sheepish.

“Oh, he was still uh, loud, but only occasionally. Used to have anger issues and was very ruthless on missions too, I was usually the one who had to help keep him calm and focused on missions. After we got our LEV’s though, he went insane for a few days, going on about ‘seeing the end’ and a few other strange things… I’ve since learnt that when he says crazy things, it actually makes more sense than you’d think.”

Wow… so that guy was much more serious and with anger issues? Red Sky Day and the Anima really changed him… changed everyone really…

“Oh, you guys should get going, the meeting will start soon.” Mike waved us off as I nodded to Jade who gave a small smile and wave before we walked off.

“So, you’re a thing now, eh Shaun?” I ribbed at the Agent as he glared at me before he rolled his eyes and walked on. I faintly heard the word hypocrite though.

“That was weird though… that guy seems to have a very messed up power.” Alice said and I had to agree, the power to know everything about anyone with enough time spent ‘reading’ them, would likely drive anyone insane…

I mean, knowing yourself is already difficult in this day and age, knowing everyone you look at would be damaging… and that guy got away with just being strange, instead of going into hiding… I revised my initial opinion of Agent George… he was strong, not sure about physically, but in strength of will for sure.

Within a minute we’d reached our area, and I greeted President Clayton with a smile and a handshake.

“Nice to see you again Arthur, I hope the earliness didn’t bother you too much?” he joked as I waved it off.

President Clayton was a burly man with tanned skin and dark eyes, and I always met him while he was wearing some semblance of a suit… then again, the President was to always look professional. The man himself was surprisingly jolly and friendly with me, and treated my team and I as equals, much as he did to Agent Shaun.

President Clayton looked to Shaun and frowned, noting that Shaun looked vaguely disturbed. The president gave a subtle upward nod to Shaun who caught it and sighed.

“It’s nothing sir… just the words of another Agent… they disturbed me quite a bit.” I frowned… and then I sucked it up, walked over and patted his shoulder as he looked at me with a glare, and I kept my face as passive as possible.

“I’m sorry for ribbing you about that. Didn’t know it disturbed you that much, I won’t do it again.” There, I apologized, though everyone seemed a bit surprised and I took my hand away.

Lucky for me, Shaun caught it for what it was, and just nodded in return. We disliked each other and found each other disturbing, but that didn’t mean we wanted to actually hurt the other in any form.

“Well… ahem, I hope you get better soon… the meeting is starting in five minutes. We actually have to enter and get seated now.” And so we moved again, though this time everyone on my team bar Michael stayed back.

Apparently they had decided that having second-in-commands of teams around would be acceptable, but only if they weren’t in the main area of the room and instead around the edges.

The rest of the team would watch the meeting through screens set up around the area, and inside, news crews from all over the world would be broadcasting live so as to get the full idea of what was really happening around the world when it came to Dungeon’s and Politics involving it.

We were soon within the room and I held my breath for a moment as I noted that the room was much bigger than on a screen, and I just ended up following Clayton who’d direct me to my seat… which I was surprised to find to be on his right.

We were seated and waiting for everything to be orderly, as Presidents, Agents, and Strongest Adventurer in ‘insert country here’ all entered the room.

When everyone was seated (I noted Albert, Ichiro, Jade, Loyiso and Sheikh, all seated quite a bit away from each other, including me) the meeting was to be called, and President Clayton stood…

I often forgot with how casual he was around me, but he was the President of the leading superpower of the world. He was much more important than he made himself out to be in my presence…

“Greetings, my fellow Presidents. I’m sure we don’t need any nudging around the topic, so I’ll just bluntly say it. We are no longer as important as we once were.” I was surprised at his words (I noted Shaun to my left was palming his face while Dante standing behind him was looking worried) as the room went silent, before it had a quiet murmur of questions and answers… now it was truly quiet.

“Yes… that is true. We are Presidents of almost two hundred countries, and we have manpower and resources… but considering the advent of the Dungeon, our importance has changed quite a bit.” I could not recall his name, but I believe that was the President of France.

“Yes, we can be considered the representatives of our countries, as always… but are we still the representatives of the people who enter the Dungeon? For some, that is true, but others refuse to listen to us.” The President of China frowned at his own words, the Adventurer on his right seemed a bit quiet, she was also young, only fourteen… but considering that even six year olds could enter the dungeon in some countries, this was actually fine… I think.

“Well, that depends… though we have many who agree to work in union with us, that doesn’t mean all of them would find that idea appealing…” the President of Mexico added.

“Well, I speak for the United States of America when I say we have decided to create an organization to monitor and assist the ‘Adventurers’ as we call them. It is the intent of our nation to have this organization be in every country, and be attached to none.” Again, President Clayton dropped a bomb when he spoke, and at this point I was sure Dante was paling more than his tan should have allowed.

“An organization to monitor and assist people who enter the Dungeon, tentatively known as Adventurers?” asked the Prime Minister of Japan as Ichiro seemed to be smiling at his side, even as the Agent next to him seemed to be ribbing him (literally) to stop smiling to widely.

“Indeed, I got the idea from some popular reading material from Japan actually. A ‘Guild’, which assists the trading of Dungeon gained materials and items, can assist in the building of teams for those without teams, and provide them with tasks to retrieve necessary materials, for a price of course.” President Clayton added before he placed his hands on the table in front of him, he was still the only one standing, still showing that he was the main voice speaking for now.

“Economically speaking, the Dungeon is a blessing for most, as it provides new resources such as metals and new materials like the Soul Gems.” He looked around again.

“More than that, it provides a method to earn money, an entirely new form of employment, which could theoretically completely erase unemployment. My idea involving the Guild would provide even more jobs for those incapable of fighting within the Dungeon still.” President Clayton stood straight, taking his hands off the table, looking at everyone.

“This is my proposal. We create the Guild much like the Department of Peace Keeping, connected to all members of the United Nations, but a near autonomous body.” He sat down after finishing his speech, as I nodded to him, even as Shaun sighed.

It would have been said, either by us or, but the place where the idea actually originated… case in point-

“Japan was actually going to propose the same idea, so of course we’ll agree with it.” The Minister said with a sigh, even as Ichiro seemed to beam at his words.

The Prime Minister of Britain agreed and with that, it was put to a vote, most countries agreeing with the creation of the group… that was only one part of this meeting though…

“Alright, now that the creation of the Guild is assured… now we deal with the Adventurers… or to be more precise, the strongest Adventurers.” Russia’s president looked around.

“Yes… the Guild will end up monitoring Adventurers, but we believe that having their own internal body being managed by other Adventurers would be for the best.” Clayton said as he motioned to Shaun who sighed and stood up, getting attention quickly.

“Ahem, I am the Head Agent for the USA, Agent Shaun Fife. I was the one who proposed this, and President Clayton believed that I should have said this in person… but I believe that there should be three separate councils as heads of the Guilds.” He claimed, making me blink as I listened intently… wonder what he wanted to say?

“For the most part, the Guild will be under the jurisdiction of the Government Officials, so a committee of elected workers in the Guild, the heads of the Guilds within different countries, would be one council.” Okay, that was obvious, it’s not like Adventurers would be in the Guild at all times, then they wouldn’t be Adventurers anymore technically.

“For the second council, the Adventurers would be head by the strongest Adventurers of a country. These people can represent the other Adventurers in their concerns involving the Guild and help mediate between the two parties.” Huh… hey, that would be my role if this kept going on as it was… I don’t think I want that position though…

“And as for the final council, that would be us, the Agents of the different Countries. We Agents would represent the will of the countries themselves.” Oh… hey that could work…

The agents would represent the countries themselves, the Adventurers would represent us, and the heads of the Guilds would represent both the Guild and those who didn’t go into the Dungeon, thus making it a good way to deal with all three.

“The only issue with this plan is the concern that some would attempt to stop the other councils plans, though this is easily corrected by the fact that all decisions are to be made fairly and that the Agents are to be there to disrupt conflicts between groups… oh, and some might be able to fit into more than one council, but that is easily solved by only being allowed into one.” I easily caught Shaun’s small smirk in the direction of the Russians, and how Albert glared back at that… oh yeah, he’s technically an Agent and an Adventurer, so that idea was put out there with people like him in mind.

“Hm… sound plan, and it’s simple, I’m sure we can agree on that… but still, the Adventurers must speak at some point. So with that in mind… could the Strongest Adventurers of Russia, Japan, the USA, South Africa, Saudi Arabia, and Britain stand?” Clayton, the ass… I stood with a small blush at the attention we were getting, though Ichiro seemed to be basking in it judging from how his eyes seemed to sparkle as he looked around.

“The main reason this meeting was called was because these six all encountered one another in the Dungeon during the fight with the second Demon Lord, Ignus. We believe that these six are the closest to killing Chronos.”

I kept myself from flinching when I heard murmuring and a few pointed at me or the others, but otherwise, they were still talking, Clayton continued from where he stopped.

“We trust you six can introduce yourselves?” Clayton joked as he ribbed me and I nodded… looks like I speak first… how annoying…

“I am Arthur Clive, level 64, my Class is Smith.” That was all I really needed to say, though I was worried when Sidhe jumped from somewhere to sit on my shoulder as I rubbed her head, getting a cute meow from her.

“Ah, I’m Kazuto Ichiro! Uh… Ichiro Kazuto in English… Level 64, Class is Swordsman.” He said, though I noticed his pronunciation was quite a bit choppier than it was in the Dungeon.

“Albert Ivanov, level 63, my Class is Wizard.” Albert was short and to the point, as he seemed to hate revealing anything about himself to anyone.

“Jade Ainsworth, level 63, my Class is Rogue…” Jade seemed a bit embarrassed at her class, but said it nonetheless, and she glanced at me and I nodded… she blushed a bit more though…

“Loyiso Nanda. Level 64, my Class is Healer.” Loyiso said quietly, but the deepness of his voice carried it far, so that we all heard it, and he seemed to not want to be here… much like Albert and I… and he was surprisingly level 64.

“Sheikh. I am not saying more than that. Level 63, my class is Guardian.” He said easily… some expressed their annoyance at him not saying his name, but even the President next to him was shaking his head with a sigh.

“Right… now, let’s ignore a bit of propriety and be honest here, we all have information on these six, whether or not we knew their names before now. At current, the only ones to have slain a Demon Lord at all are Ichiro, who has slain the third Demon Lord known as The Dark-”

Indeed, the third Demon Lord, The Dark, was unable to speak unlike the previous two, and was a giant thing the size of an elephant that could control shadows to keep you still for a moment to kill you.

Of course, considering I control lightning and that means light, I fought it easily. It was really disturbing, looked like a giant komodo-dragon kind of, but more grotesque.

“And the other is Arthur, who had slain the first Demon Lord, Blade, and the second, Ignus. From this knowledge, we can agree that Arthur and Ichiro are the closest to killing Chronos. They, along with the other four, are the Chosen of our countries, and the strongest so far.” President Clayton laid out the facts and some seemed surprised that I had killed two Demon Lords…

“Now at current, these six teams are all either on the thirty-third floor, or the thirty-forth.” Well, I was on the thirty-third floor… I had already guessed where the stairs were though.

“So we can all agree that, should a team reach a Demon Lord first, they are to find some way to inform the others of that and then get first chance to fight said Demon Lord… or fight them straight away, up to you. But we can all agree no interfering between teams during Demon Lord fights. We fight Demons and Chronos, not each other.” President Clayton added and everyone in the room agreed with what he had just said, and then he clapped his hands and quite a few jumped a bit in surprise.

“Okay, so this meeting is just about done! Just one thing left… we all know what this fight is really for… what do you six plan on doing with the spoils of war?” he was being vague enough to hide the truth, yet open enough that if you had even a bit of information you’d understand what he meant, and I gulped a bit in surprise…

It was a good question… in its simplest form, Clayton was asking what one would do as the King of Hell… the new Ruler of a place filled with new resources which our planet was slowly running out of.

“I plan on providing the resources primarily to my homeland, and from there trade with the other countries.” Albert said straight out, and I found that to be surprisingly kind considering who said it.

“Ah, I haven’t decided yet, but I don’t want to do anything bad, that’s for sure.” And Ichiro was surprisingly simple there… then again, it was a big question actually.

“I will destroy the place. The entire place is vile and should be destroyed.” And Sheikh seemed to dislike it outright… well it was Hell…

“I wish to study the place. The centre of all evil… being able to see something like that would be a strange experience.” And Loyiso seemed to just want be a tourist… didn’t expect that honestly.

“I… I’d probably just share everything. I mean, our world needs it.” And Jade was doing the ‘right’ thing, but it kind of felt artificial… she herself likely wasn’t sure what she really wanted to do.

They turned to me and I thought a bit… really focused on my answer… before I looked ahead.

“I just want to kill that bastard Chronos. I hadn’t thought about what I’d do after that. But if that place really is Hell and people die and get sent there… I want to just look for my parents. After they died on Red Sky Day… If they aren’t there, that’s a good thing… if they are there… then I’d help them.”

It only occurred to me recently, but if people died, they’d either go to Hell or Heaven (according to most religious texts) so if my parents weren’t there… they’d be in heaven. That would be a good thing, right?

“…” most of the people in the room were quiet for a moment, considering what the six people most likely to rule Hell wished to do…

I caught Ichiro nodding at me, looking uncharacteristically serious while Albert seemed to have lost a bit of his glare… I guess I was kind of pitiful… all of what Hell could be, and I was just a child chasing after his family in the end…

But that was me, and I wouldn’t be ashamed of being me, not when it was something that important.

“…Well, now we know. We know what to expect, should one of them kill Chronos. We should end this meeting now. We’ll convene next month as we should have done since December… anything to add, Arthur?” he asked me and I was surprised… and then I just looked to everyone.

“No sir… I can only say that I don’t mind who finally finishes the Dungeon, only that I hope we, as humanity, succeed.” I admitted and Clayton smiled… I might have said the right thing.

“Excellent words. Meeting adjourned.” And with that, we all stood, and moved around, leaving the room, though I greeted the other Chosen…

I would find this out tomorrow, but most News agencies now had a few new terms flying around… for one, The Big Six, the countries who had the Strongest Adventurers, who would be the Six Chosen…

And I would be ‘Arthur Clive, the Strongest Chosen’.