Is it wrong to try to meet someone in a dungeon?

"Yes. There's no entrance, and it looks beautiful, but it's quite sturdy. If you spend too much time breaking through the tower walls, you'll definitely be surrounded by enemy troops swarming in from all sides. However, once you get inside..."

"Then all we have to do is charge towards the royal walls?"

Hearing Bell say that, the short man (Lily) smiled and nodded.

"I bet the enemy will have mages deployed along the sky corridor, ready for anything. Please?"

"Well, leave it to me."

Upon hearing that the short man (Lily) had entrusted Bell to him, Welf readily agreed.

She left the two with a smile, and the dwarves parted ways with them. Apart from the spectators (Olario), her true identity had not yet been exposed. Now she was going to return to the city to cause more chaos, preventing the enemy from sending troops to pursue Bell and his companions.

"Let's go."

"Um!"

With the skywalk in sight, Bell, dressed in his newly crafted light armor, and Welf, carrying a large sword on his shoulder, quickened their pace.

"Hey, what's going on?! Report to me right now!"

Seeing the rapidly changing battle situation, Daphne shouted sharply from inside the throne tower.

"The city walls have been breached, that goes without saying! The important question is, why are there only so few troops left inside the city!?"

She yelled at the top of her lungs, making her short hair sway, and widened her phoenix eyes.

Looking out the tower window at the badly damaged eastern city wall, she sternly questioned the messenger who had come to deliver the order.

Daphne and her group were in the walled city, at the aerial walkway connecting to the city, with only nine members including her.

"Yes, Luan said that Hyacinthus personally ordered everyone to go outside the city to attack..."

"Huh!? That man didn't give that instruction! I'm right here and I didn't hear it!"

He was assigned to guard the throne tower, and the words spoken by the general (Hyacinthus) who stayed in the throne room, without his permission, would not reach the ears of the other members.

Daphne's angry appearance terrified the elf members who came to deliver the message.

"Could it be that Lu An betrayed us...?"

Possibly. Daphne, unaware of the truth, suspected her companions had betrayed the chief god (Apollo). Biting her lip, she quickly and concisely ascertained the situation.

"Where are the squad leader (Lisos) and the others?"

"It seems they've all been defeated. The enemy has cast magic in the fortress, and many people are unable to move. We don't know how many troops are still able to move."

The intelligence was taking so long to arrive, apparently due to Luan's actions, but there was an even bigger reason: the enemy's attack was too fast, a fact that left her speechless. Less than thirty minutes had passed since the war game began, and their offensive had been truly unstoppable.

Daphne couldn't help but curse the general (Hycintos) for underestimating the enemy before the battle even began and only wanting to sit back and watch the fight, as well as for her own hesitation when the city walls were bombarded.

"Daphne, the enemy is here! There are two humans... they're enemy generals (rookie generals)!"

"...I will hold them off here. Aldo, report this to Hyacintos. I need to request the Throne Hall to send reinforcements to ensure the complete defeat of Bel Crannie."

Upon hearing her arriving companions report that the enemy was approaching, Daphne gave instructions. After hearing this, the messenger spirit, saying "Understood!", disappeared into the depths of the tower.

Daphne, having deployed troops in the sky corridor, prepared to halt Bell's advance. The corridor was so wide that ten large men lined up in a row wouldn't be able to reach its edge, and it was also incredibly long. A long, one-way aisle, surrounded by walls, windows, and a ceiling, was covered with a tattered red carpet, stretching from one end to the other. Daphne immediately ordered the mages to begin chanting.

Soon after, Bell and his companions appeared in the distance on this aerial corridor.

"Archers, advance! They have nowhere to run, shoot them however you like! When I give the signal, mages, cast your spells at once!"

The long, open aerial corridor, devoid of cover, is perfect for sniping enemies before they get close. And if it's a wide-area attack spell, there's nowhere to escape.

Daphne deployed her intercepting force in front of her and drew her short sword, pointing it at Bell and his men who were charging straight at her.

The archers drew their bows, and the mages finished their incantations.

"—Let's go!"

At the same time, the man carrying the large sword—Welf—let out a loud roar.

The white-haired boy leaned forward and rushed past him, who had been running side by side.

"Fire the arrows!!"

At Daphne's command, just as the arrow was about to be released and the magic was about to be activated...

Welf stretched out his left arm straight.

"Burn away completely, external practices."

A very short lyric poem.

In an instant, the yang flames released from his hand surged forward silently like a flood.

Yang Yan enveloped Bell's leading body from behind, and rushed towards Daphne and the others.

“——”

Just as Daphne felt her vision distort, Yang Yan was sucked into the mage.

The next instant, their bodies emitted a fiery red glow from the inside.

Self-destruct.

"What!?"

Large bursts of flame erupted.

Before Daphne's eyes, the mages' magic failed to activate—forcing them to accidentally detonate their magic.

—Turn the mage into a bomb!?

It was Welf's antimagic fire. A chain reaction of explosions erupted in the center of the attack team, blasting the archers to the left and right. Needless to say, the mage girls, spewing black smoke, were all rendered incapacitated.

The glass windows above the corridor shattered with a deafening roar, and the carpet burst into flames. In a moment of panic, Daphne ducked to weather the impact, the fierce blast wave whipping up a giant tidal wave before her eyes.

Just as she gasped and trembled with fear, in the blink of an eye, the white-haired boy burst out of the smoke and dust of the explosion.

「!?」

The boy dashed past her in the blink of an eye, breaking through the battle line, as fast as a rabbit.

Oh no! Daphne hurriedly tried to give chase, but a loud scream stopped her.

Turning around abruptly, he saw the archer, who had been fatally wounded, collapse to the ground, and then a man walked forward across the burning carpet.

Welf, his black kimono casual clothes swaying, stood frozen in front of Daphne—with a "thud"...

He planted the large sword he was carrying into the ground.

"Since we're adventurers, let's fight with weapons (like these), hmm?"

Daphne's eyes began to waver as she faced the blacksmith's bold, smiling face.

●

Welf and Daphne engaged in a fierce battle.

His image of attacking the trembling girl with his greatsword was reflected in the "mirror," and Loki smiled with satisfaction.

"Feifei's kids are pretty good too."

"Oh, thank you for the compliment."

This is the assembly hall of the Tower of Babel. Hephaestus smiled as she heard her companion praise Welf.

"That ridiculously powerful 'demon sword' was also forged by that blacksmith's son, right? Is it alright to let him just leave like that?"

“Well…”

Hephaestus simply smiled at Loki, who was asking questions with ill intent, and seemed to be in a good mood.

In a different location, on the street directly below the Tower of Babel, completely unaware of the goddesses' conversation arose, creating a commotion unlike the one before.

"Hey, this is bad, if this continues..."

"Could it be, could it really be..."

A slightly uneasy atmosphere permeated the tavern among the adventurers.

Seeing Bell's solitary figure sprinting away in the "mirror," the usually serious-faced adventurers suddenly began hurling insults at the boy, such as "Die!!" At the same time, they cheered and shouted encouragement to the Apollo Familia, yelling things like "Don't lose!!" The adventurers, who had staked their fortunes on the Apollo faction, were shouting with the most fervor of the day in every tavern.

"Go for it, kid! Smash them, meow!"

"This guy hasn't learned his lesson yet, he's gambling again..."

"It's already good enough that we didn't gamble on the [Apollo Familia], meow..."

The tavern "The Abundant Mistress" is located next to West Street.

In the packed restaurant, Chloe abandoned her work and started shouting, while Lunova and Anya watched her coldly.

"..."

Beside them, Seele also stopped what she was doing and looked at Belle reflected in the "mirror".

Her pale gray eyes seemed to be pleading for something as she followed closely behind the boy's running figure.

"—Wow, that's amazing, Ais!? They really stormed the enemy camp!"

"Um."

And at the northern end of the city.

The same applies to the Loki Familia headquarters, which is located far from these places.

The unstoppable advance of the Hestia Familia in the "mirror" made Tiona's eyes light up.

Beside her, Ais's golden eyes were also fixed on the boy's figure.

"It was a beautiful fight, no doubt... but they didn't need to beat around the bush. Wouldn't they have won if they'd just let the masked men with their 'demon swords' storm into the city?"

Ais and the others stood in front of the "mirror" and Tione asked a question from behind them.

"That's exactly the kind of thinking an Amazonian would have..."

"Hmm—to put it simply, if you throw the floor master (Goliath) into a hundred-man army (team), do you think it will win?"

"...We can't win."

"Besides, two 'demon swords' alone are not enough to take down the fortress. The organization's strength is definitely superior to theirs, and they probably wouldn't want to see a chaotic battle between the two sides."

Grace, Finn, and Riveria, all at a loss for words regarding Tione's question, spoke up one after another.

The Lv.3 leader (Hyacinthus) leads the highly trained Apollo Familia, which once successfully defeated the floor master (Goliath) using only the elite of its own faction.

Just as the faction leaders were calmly conducting an objective analysis...

"It has nothing to do with these things."

Bert spoke up.

"It's just that dead rabbit trying to outdo that pervert."

In the headquarters meeting room where other members were still gathered, several "divine mirrors" set up by Loki were activated in mid-air, and the werewolf youth leaned against the wall, gazing at the boy's profile from afar.

"That guy is a man (male)."

His amber eyes narrowed, as if he saw through only this one point.

"Do you know anything?"

"...You'd be a fool to know that."

When faced with Riveria's question, Bert answered dismissively and turned his face away.

"We can win! We've come this far, we're bound to win!"

Ignoring their conversation, Tiona was still yelling and screaming at Ais in front of the "mirror." She swayed from side to side, waved her arms up and down, and kept shouting, ignoring her older sister (Tiona) and Bert's annoyed expressions. She clenched her fists at the unexpected development that was beginning to take shape. Her cheeks flushed with excitement, she called out to the boy on the other side of the "mirror."

"Charge! Argonauts, little hero!"

◆

Bell entered the tower from the sky corridor and followed the path Lily had told him beforehand.

The throne tower was quite spacious. Old carpets covered the stone floors everywhere, and even paintings covered in a layer of dust hung on the walls of the passageways. It was as if one had mistakenly entered a noble castle that had lost its master.

"call out!"

"!"

Bell calmly dealt with the orc attack that suddenly leaped out from the shadows.

He dodged his opponent's blades twice, deflecting the weapon with counterattacks, and then unleashed a high kick. Bell's left foot sank into his opponent's cheek, who let out an "Ouch!" as he was sent flying and rolled to the ground.