The class watched in horror as the ground crumbled under Hajime’s feet and dropped him into the Abyss below. From where they stood, he looked small, helpless as he tumbled together with the thrashing Behemoth. The once terrifying beast was now tumbling with him to their mutual demise, the pale orange glow from its body provided the only light in the vast sea of darkness below him. His class stood there, silent, as there forms shrunk ever smaller, until both their shapes were consumed by the hungry void.

* * *

As the bridge collapsed around Hajime, Shizuku and Ryutaro had to hold back Kaori to keep her from jumping in after him. She yelled and screamed at them to let her go, that they should be helping her save him as she struggled with all her might. They both did their best to ignore what she said and keep her away from the edge, but had there been even the slightest hope of saving him they’d be right behind her.

They watched their friend’s last moments as his shrinking form tumbled into darkness and Kaori finally lost her strength. Her friends finally let go as the poor girl crumpled to her knees, crying.

No one said a word of comfort to her as they were too shocked by what happened themselves. Kouki, their once proud leader, stood rigid as he stared into the inky depths below. His expression was limp and pale, like he was terrified that it’d come up and swallow them too. Shizuku rubbed her eyes in an attempt to hide to fact that she herself was on the edge of tears. Ryutaro leaned down on one knee, placing his hand on Kaori’s shoulder and waited for her to calm down.

When she finally look back at him, he simply motioned his head toward the stairs without a word. Kaori reluctantly nodded, taking Shizuku’s outstretched hand to help herself up. Ryu snapped his fingers under Kouki’s nose to get his attention and motioned to the stairs. Kouki nodded back without a word and the four of them exited the room as the rest of the students started filing in behind.

* * *

The way back wasn’t difficult at all. They’d already killed everything on the upper floors, so nothing was left to try and attack them. Many of the students paranoid however.

The healers could barely give them first aid as many were wounded themselves. The front line warriors had trouble carrying their weapons as the fatigue of constant battles and the strain on their bodies from repeated damage and healing caught up with them. The mages were out of mana and restorative items. They were wounded, fragile, and it was only a matter of time before some of them started breaking down from the stress. Had their luck faltered, finding them in a situation where they had to fight, they would’ve lost with little effort on the monster’s part.

The journey felt like it took years. Everyone felt the heavy atmosphere that permeated the dungeon, it weighed them down like they were walking on the bottom of the ocean. Their footsteps gently echoed throughout the dungeon as it shifted and groaned under some unknown power. Almost inaudible squeaks and cracks, like the scrape of claws against stone, followed them wherever they went. Yet when they finally saw the light of the cave entrance and immerged blinking into the main hall, nothing could describe the relief they felt escaping that nightmare.

They walked out of the cave and turned in their status plates. The receptionist said something in a cheery voice, but Kaori’s group ignored her as they left the open double doors. Everyone made their way to the inn as the morning sun rose over the horizon, uncaring of their small world.

They reached the inn around noon-ish, the wounded were immediately rushed away by priests and healers. Many of the students followed, trying to stay with their wounded friends. Others just went to their rooms, too physically and emotionally drained to care.

Kouki went of who knows where with Meld after they arrived. Many of the students saw them talking, but hadn’t really been paying attention until he straight up disappeared. Shizuku overheard him saying something along the lines of “If only I was stronger”, so he was probably off doing something heroic.

Ryutaro left in the direction of town, he hadn’t said why but no one really stopped him. Everyone just moved out of the way when he walked near them.

Shizuku was left to take care of Kaori. She’d managed to get her to their room and sit her down on the bed, but otherwise she was completely unresponsive. It seemed the shock of it all had gotten to her more than anyone else, though that didn’t keep Shizuku from trying at least.

Yet try as she might, Kaori just sat there staring at the floor as if she could still see him falling in front of her. Eventually the day passed and with it came night.

* * *

*CREEEEEEEEEEECK*

Shizuku woke up with as start to the sound of rusty hinges.

The room around her was dark, so she had to wait a couple minutes for her eyes to adjust before looking around. The door to their room was rocking slowly on its hinges as it let in traces of moonlight from the hallway. Looking to her left, she saw the other bed was completely empty.

Shizuku calmly got out of bed and slipped on some sandals and a night gown. She walked out the door, closing it behind her with a tiny *click* as she looked around to make sure no one else was up. She walked quietly down the hall, careful to step lightly around the floorboards to muffle her footsteps.

Stopping in front of a familiar door, she carefully turned the doorknob and silently stepped into the moonlit room.

In front of her, Kaori lied awake on one of the beds wrapped in a blanket. Shizuku sat next to her on the bed and used her fingers to tuck a loose strand of hair behind Kaori’s ear.

“If he saw you right now, I bet even he’d be taken aback by how cute you look.”

“Yeah right. Knowing Hajime, he’d just get mad at me for sneaking around at night in a strange place.”

“Or possibly the fact that you snuck into his room while he was away?”

Kaori just blushed and hid her face under the covers while Shizuku smiled. Kaori wasn’t hiding anything from her unofficial sister anytime soon. Shizuku put her finger to her lips and stated.

“Don’t worry, this’ll just be our little secret.”

Kaori stuck out her head a little, the blanket coming to just under her eyes.

“Promise?”

“At least until he gets back.”

“HUH?”

At that Kaori sat up in the bed like she’d been tased by the pillow, her face getting bright red.

“No-No-No-No-No. You are not telling HIM about this.”

“Oh come on, what guy wouldn’t love to know a pretty girl wants to sleep in his bed?”

“That’s not… This isn’t… Shizuku!”

Kaori was practically having a panic attack as her friend continued to tease her. Shizuku just laughed, putting the back of her hand against her forehead in a dramatic way.

“By alas my lady, if you don’t make a move when our gallant hero comes a-ridding from his dungeon conquest, some other maiden will.”

Kaori crossed her arms and replied,

“I seriously doubt that. Hajime isn’t like Kouki, girls aren’t just going to start throwing themselves at him just because he saved them once.”

“Yeah, I was surprised when he started acting heroic out of nowhere. It really doesn’t fit him.”

“Hey! Hajime’s plenty heroic on his own!”

A sudden angry outburst Kaori caused Shizuku to jump a little. She raised her eyebrows as she replied.

“Jeez Kaori, simmer down before you wake everyone up.”

Kaori just crossed her arms and looked away.

“Iya. Kaori, I’m sorry. It was just a bad joke.”

“…It’s fine.”

Despite her words she still didn’t seem like she was in a forgiving mood. Shizuku just sighed, she really touched a nerve she shouldn’t have.

“Hey, Kaori, Have you told your little hero how the two of you met yet?”

That got her attention. Kaori’s face started getting red again as she broke out in a cold sweat.

“Uh-uhm, yep. Yep. Sure did.”

“Oh really? How did it go? What did you tell him?”

Kaori scratched the back of her head as she laughed nervously.

“Y-you know how he saved my grandmother and little bro when we went out on his birthday…”

“Huh? Wasn’t that like a Year after you started-“

“Oh-gee, Would-you-look-at the-time! It’s-time-for-bed! Sorry-gotta-go!”

While Shizuku was deciphering what her friend had said on fast-forward, Kaori zoomed out of the room and down the hall in the blink of an eye. Shizuku just giggled as she heard her friend’s frantic footsteps outside the door.

“You’re such a stalker sometimes Kaori.”

At that she left the room and followed after her fleet footed friend.

* * *

It was night in the town inside Harihi Kingdom’s walls. The gibbous moon cast a silvery glow over its streets like a great lamp in the cloudless sky. Kouki walked the city street, tired and depressed.

“Damnit Meld. There has to be a way down there, there’s always a way.”

He’d spent the entire afternoon arguing with Meld about saving Hajime. The knight commander was already convinced his friend was dead and that going in after him was a suicide mission. Kouki did his hardest to convince him otherwise, but the man just wouldn’t hear it. The both just ended up leaving, each frustrated at the other.

“I’ll just train doubly hard tomorrow to show him my resolve. He’ll see, next time we meet that thing I’m kicking its-Huh?”

While all the other stores were closed for the night, the library windows glowing an eerie green color. Thinking there may have been some kind of dark magic happening in front of him, Kouki drew his sword and crept slowly toward the library.

He rested his back against the door and, as he took in a deep breath, rushed through the door with a loud yell.

“Haaaaa!”

“Hey Kouki.”

Only to be greeted by Ryutaro in a room lit by green magic stone lamps. Unbeknownst to him, just draw his brilliant magic sword is enough to let everyone in a hundred meter radius know exactly where he is from the immense magic that flowed from it.

“Huh?”

Kouki stood there perplexed and slightly embarrassed as Ryutaro and the librarian continued sifting through piles of books on the desk in front of them. Awkwardly he tried to change the subject to something else.

“So what are you doing in the library Ryutaro? I didn’t think anyone from our class could read the language here.”

“I can’t either, I asked for the librarians help looking for old maps of the Orcus Dungeon.”

Kouki nodded his head. Shortly after arriving, many of the students discovered none of them could read the language or speak to most of the people. When they asked Meld about it during one of their training sessions, he’d explained to them that the church had developed a special magic for communicating with people of other worlds and that their languages were completely different to begin with.

“Why are you so interested in old maps? Meld and the king keep the most detailed and up to date ones, why not just ask him?”

“I don’t think Meld’ll be willing to help us. You heard yourself, He thinks the strongest summoned heroes in the world couldn’t make it down as far as he fell.”

Ryutaro motioned him to come closer. In a whispered voice so the librarian couldn’t hear.

“Yeah there’s this thing Hajime said that’s been bugging me. You know how he spent all his time in the kingdom library?”

Kouki nodded, He never understood why he liked this place so much if he needed a translator just to read.

“Well During our trip here I asked him about it. He called it “research” and said he was looking up the monsters and races that lived in his world and even found some stuff on the different dungeons.”

“Want did he find?”

Kouki blurted that out a little too loudly and almost scared the librarian guy half to death. Both he and Ryutaro glared at Kouki.

“Shhh. Are you trying to wake the neighborhood! I was getting to that! He said that around the time they summoned the so-called strongest heroes, they’d only summoned about 8 people who were in their college years. When they made the record for the deepest anyone had ever explored the dungeon they’d only trained for about a year before being sent in.”

“Huh? Then why didn’t they break the record later if they were that strong?”

“Dude, don’t you remember what Meld said? Only two of them survived the first time they went in. whether or not they were in the middle of a war at the time they still couldn’t risk losing more heroes.”

“What does any of this have to do with maps?”

Ryutaro face-palmed, He may not of been book-smart himself, but His time on the street had at least made him a quick learner.

“Think about it Kouki, We’ve got around thirty-four students in our class all with mega stats compared to any normal person and a leader with Uber-hero stats. Why did we break down near the 20th floor while 8 people could make it to the 65th floor?”

“They were a lot stronger and had more training than us right?”

Kouki asked, the question seemed kind of obvious to him.

“Better training possibly, but I’m not so sure about stronger. We’ve got more than four times as many people, even if they were all as strong as or even stronger than you, we’d win with numbers. So why’d they make it more than 3 times as deep as us?

Kouki scratched his head, he wasn’t sure where Ryu was going with all of this so he just played along.

“The answer is teamwork and experience dude. They had a lot less people to work with and they probably already knew each other, so compared to them our teamwork would be crap. Remember the Rockmounts? They had better mobility and every single one of them worked as part of a group.”

“Hmm.”

He remembered how the Rockmounts went around from behind to attack their mages, he still thought it was a tactic for cowards and none of it would have been a problem if their mages had also payed attention to close combat.

“Do you remember the requirements for the king’s royal guard? Every single one of them, Meld included, has made it to the 40th floor and back without any heroes helping them. Why is it that, even though your stats were almost as high as Melds, the 20th floor boss could kick your ass if it weren’t for your holy sword?”

At that, Kouki went red with rage and embarrassment. The Rockmount leader had taken him by complete surprise and forced him to use one of his swords strongest attacks just to get out of it.

“You still haven’t told me what this has to do with maps.”

Kouki’s face still burned with shame, he was somewhat desperate to turn the subject towards anything that didn’t involve how badly he screwed up.

“Think about it dude, we’ve played video games right? Why would there be a level 65 in a level 20 dungeon floor?”

Kouki thought about it and an idea came to his head.

“It was either an optional boss or-“

“Or a shortcut deeper down.”

The idea hit him like a sack of bricks.

“That means…”

“Yup. Hajime may have taken the express way to the deeper floors, but if we get everyone ready in time, we’ll be right behind him.”

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Author’s Note: Sorry for the monstrous wait I kind of got overloaded with real life so I need to inform you guys of a couple things.

!.) I was studying for my drivers exam so I had to delay this chapter for a while (sorry -_-‘).

2.) I WILL continue to update, but new chapters may be slower than before do to real life and a change of plans on how I’d go about updating.

My original plan was to just pump out as many chapters as possible one day and spend the next couple days proof-reading and fixing grammar.(I’m single-minded, I can’t write AND proofread at the same time) Thanks to the large number of people who jumped the gun before my first grammar-update (Making completely sure that they informed me that I was a talentless hack who was ripping of an amazing writers work for views.) I have realized that this was probably a stupid idea as otherwise all comments would be 90% hate, 1% people with constructive criticism I could use to get better, and 9% other.(P.S. If you didn’t already know, all the chapters out right now are grammar-updated)

That 1% was the entire reason I posted this to begin with. I’m not an expert writer, I fully realize this. I have a couple dream projects I would like to write in my lifetime, but if I’m not a good enough writer to actually make a good story out of them then there’s no point. I decided to work on a few small projects like this and use whatever constructive criticism I could get to improve my writing and make better stories later.