Finally, huh…?

Continuing at my own pace traversing this labyrinth, I arrived at another set of stairs going up. Bringing my right foot on the first step, I was immediately assaulted with arrows.

A trap, huh…?

Thankfully, since my body was only bones, the arrows were of no danger to my HP. The only thing damaged with the barrage of arrows was my robe.

I continued on my way upwards while being alert for any signs of traps. After climbing for another five minutes, I arrived at a passage similar to the one I entered last. Along the way, I was greeted by arrow barrages at the middle, and at the top of the flight of stairs. Strange as there were no traps in the last flight of stairs I went through.

Now then… Next is another huge monster huh…?

Grasping the situation in my head, I speculated that the next room I enter will have another monster on par with the huge monster I fought earlier. If I am correct, I think it was called a Minatour in that book.

I wonder what kind of monster will appear this time…

Grasping the scythe in my hands, I slowly crept along the dark passageway so long as to not create any sounds. Since some monsters have hearing that could hear very clearly even when far away, I have to do this much just to avoid unnecesary battles that may whittle down my HP. I don’t want my vacation to end just because of my mistake.

I arrived at the room where light gathered, and strangely, there was a corpse of a huge monster here. It had a shape of a giant humanoid pig. It had yellow skin and a huge protruding belly.

An Orc General…

I looked around to see anything that could have killed this monster, but none were present at the moment.

Because I didn’t see anyone come in my direction… It could have gone further… Probably ascending this labyrinth…

I checked the corpse of the Orc General, and there was nothing worth looting as a valuable or weapon.

The ones who killed this monster probably already took everything worth of value, huh…

Seeing as there was nothing for me to do here, I continue on my way. Minutes later, I encountered humanoid pigs, albeit smaller than the corpse at the bright room.

Orcs…

Because I learned that when one goes deeper inside a labyrinth, monsters gets stronger according to the floor they are on, monsters on shallow floors are weak. Because this is one floor higher, then the orcs must be weaker than those oversized cats. What was the name again? Felios?

Anyway, they were in a group of three. On the lower floors, the dogs and cats were mostly alone, I wonder why that is? I held my scythe with two hands and went into a pose that would make it easier for me to swing my scythe horizontally.

The three orcs were just talking amongst themselves with no particular sense of danger. One was even laughing through its nose.

I dashed in with quick movements, and that’s when the orcs noticed my presence.

Too late…

I swung my scythe, bisecting an orc horizontally. Its innards spilled out and blood scattered on the floor. Its face had a look like it was stunned at its sudden death.

I didn’t stop there. I continued with the momentum of the swing to rotate around and deliver another swing towards the orc beside it. Its reaction was just on time as it lifted up its giant mace to block my swing. Sadly, what the orc blocked was just the handle, not the blade as the blade reached its head, piercing through it skull.

Brain matter flew out because of the force and landed on the nearby orc. Seeing that its comrades were killed in a flash, it tried to escape.

You won’t escape…

Blood gushed out of my scythe and formed into numerous sharp spears. It then shot towards the desperately running orc with speed that could be impossible to see with the naked eye, and pierced its body mercilessly. A particular blood spear pierced through the back of its head and protruded out of its left eye socket, causing the left eye to pop out and roll on the floor.

With the life of the orc suddenly cut off, the momentum carrying its run caused the body tumbling over. Bones were snapped while some limbs bent in the wrong direction, although slightly.

This is truly a dreadfull skill with a blood absorbing weapon…

I walked towards the orc which was penetrated with blood spears and turned into a hedgehog, and dragged it back to where I killed the other two orcs with my scythe. Naturally, with these course of events, I let my scythe absorbed all of the blood from the corpses.

In a few seconds, the orcs became shrivelled up bodies that could turn into dust any second.

I checked their bodies next for any valuables, but all they had were maces that I know will break when I swing them, leather armor that is too huge for me, loincloths which are too dirty, and meat, probably food.

Nothing here…

I left the three corpses and continued walking along the dark path for who knows how long.

<><><><><><><><>

~ Third Person POV ~

“Thank you all for gathering here my fellow adventurers.”

Andreas spoke out on a platform while grabbing in front of numerous adventurers. These adventurers were known as high-class adventurers with ranks from B – A ranks. At the moment, they are adventurers who are known to have traversed the labyrinth until the 19th floor in Rockhound, making them well known throughout the town and country.

Andreas gave a stern glare at the adventurers while giving out the contents of the emergency quest he submitted.

“Know that this quest might take the lives of some of you standing right here. For those who have no confidence with their strength, I will not hold you back in leaving right now.”

As none of the adventurers even had the intent of leaving, all of them stifled a laugh.

“Seriously guildmaster? You do know that we reached these heights because of giving it our best with our acquired strength right?”

“That’s right!”

“Like hell are we gonna pass up this rewarding request.”

The adventurers within the halls burst out into laughter while reprimanding Andreas thinking that they might leave because of a dangerous quest.

“Very well, I have received your resolve.”

The adventurers began to quiet down as Andreas gave them another stern look.

“The reason why this request was made was because of two parties going missing or annihilated.”

The atmosphere within the hall tensed up the moment Andreas went into serious mode.

“The Crowstorm has been reported as being missing while the party of Lius was annihilated.”

At the instant Andreas spoke out the reason for the emergency request, the hall became noisy.

“What!?”

“Linda was!?”

“Even Lius!?”

“Silence!!!”

Andreas shouted at the top of his lungs causing the air to tremble at the sheer force of it. The adventurers quickly clammed up when Andreas glared at them.

“That is why I made a request to investigate the middle floors where the incidents happened. Seeing that they were wiped out, it must be a new monster, or a new trap. Anyway, we won’t know unless we head out there and investigate. I will also be coming along.”

“What!?”

“The legendary warrior…”

“Andreas!!!!”

While the adventurers were cheering at the legend being back in action, the doors burst open and revealed a panicking guild clerk.

“G-Guildmaster!! New information about the incidents regarding the two parties have arrived!!”

“!! Bring the ones who brought the information right here now!!”

“R- Right away!!!”

With a command, the guild clerk hurriedly ran back and brought three exhausted adventurers.

“!? Grizelda!? Locky!? And Hower!?”

A red haired girl and two men were covered in sweat while panting heavily.

“G-Guildmaster… A new monster… Has appeared…”

“Calm down for a while. Rest until you get your breath back.”

“Y-Yes…”

Andreas waited while the trio struggled to get their breath back in order. After a few minutes of resting, Hower and his group were finally able to regain their strength.

“Guildmaster, a new monster has appeared within the 7th floor.”

“Tell me more about it.”

Andreas took three chairs and let Hower and his party to sit down. He also didn’t forget to get one himself while he told the remaining adventurers to take it easy for a while, while he receives the information about the possible monster they would battle.

“It had the appearance of a pitch black skeleton, while wearing pitch black robes.”

“Skeleton? What makes this one new? Is it just because of its color?”

“No, its strength was abnormal.”

“How so?”

The next words of Hower made everyone’s faces in the room pale.

“It defeated the 7th floor guardian alone and barehanded.”