Return Journey and White Rabbit

"Not fun at all, not fun in the slightest!"

Walking through the narrow cave, Tiona complained incessantly, her hands clasped behind her head.

Having listened to her complaints all the way, Tione grew increasingly annoyed.

"You're so annoying! Just calm down a bit!"

Tione glared at her sister Tiona, trying to reason with her helplessly.

"No one could have predicted the attack by the New Species, after all, the Dungeon never allows adventurers to explore as they please. How can we fight without supplies!"

"Don't forget, your Great Dual Blades are gone. The weapon you're using now was projected by Shirou!"

Hearing the Amazon Sisters' conversation, Shirou Emiya chimed in with a playful jab.

"That's right, that's right! Those Great Dual Blades were worth one hundred and twenty million Valis! I wonder if Tiona has enough Valis to forge another one?"

Hearing Shirou's teasing, Tiona's sorrow returned.

"Can you guys please stop mentioning my Great Dual Blades? I'm already miserable enough!"

"Hahaha!"

Hearing Tiona's wail, everyone burst into laughter.

Bete laughed the most exaggeratedly, clutching his stomach and nearly collapsing.

"Bete, you jerk!"

Seeing Bete mocking her so cruelly, Tiona, burning with rage, charged at him.

"Bastard, you idiotic woman!"

"You're the bastard, you foul-mouthed wolfman!"

Listening to their bickering, Shirou Emiya couldn't help but smile knowingly.

Several days had passed since the attack by the New Species. After a day of damage control, Loki Familia had successfully begun their return to the surface.

Thanks to the damage control, Loki Familia had finally avoided losses on this expedition.

However, it was worth noting that while Shirou Emiya and the others were fighting on the fifty-first floor, they encountered traces of the New Species again.

This time, Shirou Emiya didn't use Unlimited Blade Works. Relying on his increasingly refined archery skills, he was able to suppress the attacks of the New Species.

In this battle, everyone, unwilling to be outdone, went on a rampage.

Tiona, in particular, ignored the pain from the corrosive liquid and directly reached into the monster's body to rip out its Magic Stone, a feat that was truly astonishing.

Her ferocious appearance made Shirou Emiya and the others secretly gasp.

That Magic Stone became the only Magic Stone related to the New Species that Loki Familia acquired.

"That's a really strange color!"

"Indeed! It's very strange!"

Glancing at the Magic Stone in Tione's hand, Shirou Emiya couldn't help but ponder.

The experience on the fiftieth floor this time was vastly different from the anime version of Sword Princess's Holy Tale.

This meant that more unexpected events might occur in the future. Therefore, he could only treat future events as a reference and not as a trump card.

Otherwise, he wouldn't even know how he died.

After all, who knew how many plot points the anime had cut!

Just as Shirou Emiya was contemplating future events, Loki Familia, who had entered a cavern, suddenly encountered an Abnormal Situation.

"Look, it's an Abnormal Situation!"

"Oh! It's a Minotaur!"

"There are quite a few of them? Are we surrounded?"

On the seventeenth floor of the Dungeon, Loki Familia, on their way back to Orario, encountered a pack of Minotaurs. However, the expressions of the Loki Familia members were very calm.

After all, this was only the seventeenth floor.

Facing monsters that were only Level 2, the elites of Loki Familia naturally wouldn't show any unusual expressions.

They weren't like those New Species monsters.

"Since we've encountered them, let's finish this quickly!"

"We're ready. We're just waiting for Finn's command."

Upon hearing Finn's order, Tiona and the others, who could no longer hold back, rushed into the Minotaur pack and began to slaughter them.

Before long, more than half of the Minotaurs were annihilated there.

And at this moment, perhaps sensing the overwhelming power, the Minotaurs actually felt fear. One Minotaur, facing Ais, turned and began to flee.

As a result, panic began to spread among the Minotaurs, and the remaining monsters also started to flee.

"Huh? Huh?"

"Hey, aren't you monsters!"

Faced with this scene, both Tiona and Bete were astonished.

The monsters were fleeing the cave in a tidal wave, rushing to escape into the depths of the passage.

Everyone was utterly surprised by this sight.

"Quick, pursue them! That's the passage to the sixteenth floor!"

Hearing Finn's command, everyone instantly grasped the severity of the danger.

With a Minotaur's strength, if it accidentally entered the upper floors, it would be a force capable of slaughtering indiscriminately.

If someone were to die by a Minotaur's hand because of this, the members of Loki Familia would surely regret it immensely.

Without any hesitation, everyone immediately charged out.

Shirou Emiya's figure was also among them, running swiftly towards the upper floors.

Although the Minotaurs' appearance was rather sudden, Shirou Emiya quickly accepted their existence.

Even though they had stayed an extra day on the fiftieth floor, the Loki Familia's return journey should be a bit faster than in the original story, thanks to the support of his weapons.

However, even so, encountering Minotaurs that would flee was an extremely rare occurrence.

Shirou Emiya, who already knew the Minotaurs would run, had no intention of stopping them.

This was because it was related to the birth of the original protagonist.

Bell Cranel, the true protagonist, was born during this battle.

Shirou Emiya held immense admiration for Bell Cranel; he could be called a true hero.

Like Shirou Emiya, he was someone who would risk his own life to save others.

Shirou Emiya had far too many reasons to facilitate the birth of Bell Cranel, the true protagonist.

Looking at the present, without Bell's existence, Shirou Emiya's understanding of this world would be shattered, and he would lose his advantage.

Another reason was to have Bell take on the gaze of the goddess Freya for him.

Although there were no actions taken yet, Shirou Emiya often felt eyes from above the Tower of Babel.

Honestly, he couldn't stand these eyes.

Therefore, he urgently needed someone to share the burden.

However, Bell, who had not experienced this event, would not attract Freya's attention. Even the great god Zeus, who raised Bell, had previously judged Bell as a child with no talent.

So, Shirou Emiya was absolutely supportive of this matter.

Looking further ahead, firstly, in the future, Bell would possess something Shirou Emiya needed.

The Hestia's Blade, a short sword personally forged by the goddess Hephaestus, which possessed divine craftsmanship without divine power.

That sword was extremely important to Shirou Emiya.

And then there was responsibility.

Shirou Emiya was not from this world. He had a target he wanted to save: Miyu Shizuki.

Therefore, to improve his strength, he needed to gain experience in different worlds and could not stay in one world for too long.

No one knew when he would return next time, nor what kind of world this would become by then.

Thus, this world needed that person to exist.