Chapter Eleven: The Biological Elevator / Chapter Twelve: From the Liver...

It had been a close call, but only Nijika had taken a tumble. She had merely gotten some dust on her and wasn't injured.

The group looked toward the direction from which the enemy had attacked, but found no entrance like they had imagined. There was only an intact stone wall. If not for the rubble on the ground, Shiko would have thought it had all been an illusion.

"This monster didn't drop anything." Ichiri searched through the ashes several times, but found no special loot.

"Come to think of it, don't you feel like this place is too strange? We've been walking for so long, but we haven't seen a single fork in the path..." Shiko felt increasingly uneasy the more she thought about it.

An environment they had never seen before. A situation they had never encountered before. The group fell silent. Finally, Kita spoke first, her voice visibly trembling. "D-do we still continue?"

"...We continue." Although her voice held an uncontrollable tremor, Nijika still made the decision.

The road ahead grew steeper and steeper. To ease the tense atmosphere, Nijika began chatting about random things. Thanks to her efforts, the group relaxed a little. However, their pace still slowed considerably, because they no longer dared to walk with their hands against the walls. They could only watch their footing and slowly proceed down the center of the road.

"It's getting steeper. Be careful," Nijika warned.

Ryo, who was at the very front, suddenly stopped.

"What is it?"

"There's a vertical shaft ahead. There's a huge space beneath it. I can't sense how large it is, but once we go down, we definitely won't be able to come back up."

Everyone felt somewhat disappointed. They had run for so long without finding anything, and now they couldn't continue?

"Let's go take a look first." Shiko still didn't want to give up and resumed feeling her way forward.

The slope had become extremely steep, forcing them to hold onto the stone wall again. Shiko walked in front, constantly generating steps for everyone to use. The space also grew narrower and narrower, until it was barely wide enough for one person to pass.

"Is this it?" The group stopped. Shiko saw that the road ended ahead, with only the ground abruptly turning straight downward.

"See? I told you." Ryo's head emerged over Shiko's left shoulder.

"Eek!" Ryo was standing so close that her breath brushed Shiko's ear. Shiko instinctively shrank to the side, only to bump into Nijika's head as she leaned over. "Sorry... Why did you lean over?"

"If we put down the bags and squeeze together, two people can stand here." Nijika answered while peering down into the shaft below. Its depths were impossible to see.

This put Shiko in a difficult position. She couldn't move her head left or right, and if she went forward, she would probably fall.

Ichiri stood behind them, at a loss. "Um, um... You're standing too close..."

"What? Oh, we are standing too close to the edge. Let's move back a little. It's dangerous." Nijika waved behind her, signaling everyone to retreat.

Kita was standing at the very back. She turned around first, and when the firelight illuminated the area, she immediately noticed something wrong: the steps above them were gradually disappearing!

"Wu-san, did you make the stairs disappear?"

"What?" As the two people beside her moved back, Shiko had just relaxed when those words made her heart leap again. She turned around and saw that, without her noticing, the stone steps she had created were rapidly melting and returning to the original ground! The trend had already spread beneath her feet! At this slope, once the steps vanished, they could only roll into the shaft!

"Run!" she shouted, pushing the person in front of her uphill. Kita charged ahead, quickly throwing off her backpack. She was about to toss it away, but when she saw Ichiri and the others behind her, she obediently held it in her arms instead.

Shiko tried to generate the stone steps again, but failed. Kita had already climbed to the place where the steps had disappeared. It was slightly wider there, so she put down her backpack, grabbed the stone wall with both hands, and climbed upward. However, flames immediately burst from her palms, scorching the stone wall.

"What's wrong?" Nijika asked anxiously.

"This stone wall is seeping some slippery liquid! I can't get a grip! I can't dry it out! There's some on the ground too!" Kita tried harder and harder, but it didn't seem to help much.

"I can't control this liquid either..." Ichiri failed as well.

At that moment, everyone heard another rumble rising from deep within the earth. It wasn't caused by a monster. The cavern itself was trembling. The group lost their footing and fell backward one after another, pushing into each other as they rolled into a heap and tumbled into the enormous shaft behind them.

"Rumble, rumble, rumble, rumble—" The human ball slammed against the stone walls again and again, yet somehow they felt no pain, only dizziness.

"Waaah—!" The human ball fell from the roof of the cavern and scattered into five people.

There was only the sound of wind by their ears. Shiko barely opened her eyes, but the strong wind forced her to squint. They were flying through the air.

"Bang—bang—bang—" Shiko felt herself land on an air cushion. When she opened her eyes, she saw that Ryo was constantly plucking her strings, creating a layer of sound walls floating in the air to serve as a cushion. The sound wall vanished instantly, only for the next one to replace it, allowing them to descend little by little. Nijika hurriedly replenished Ryo's starlight and provided support.

Shiko shook her head and tried to stand, only to fall again in midair. There was no way to stand upright in a situation like this.

"Waaah, waaah, waaah! What's below us?" She heard Kita screaming. Shiko hurriedly looked down, and her pupils suddenly contracted.

They didn't need any light to see the "ocean" far below, because it was glowing. No matter how she looked at it, it was magma! Bubbling, glowing magma! The magma she had only ever seen in games before! They were slowly falling straight toward it!

Shiko looked around and saw stone walls not far away, with several cracks in them. Magma was pouring from those cracks and flowing into the magma pool below. Normally, the place should have been unbearably hot, but Shiko didn't feel uncomfortable at all. Could it not actually be magma? She tried throwing out an iron rod. It fell into the pool below and vanished without a sound.

Whether it was magma or not, it certainly wasn't something a living person could touch!

Ichiri tried to roll up a torrent and carry the five of them to the stone wall, but the water rapidly collapsed as soon as it touched the wall. Ryo's bass grew louder and louder, but Shiko could clearly feel the sound wall's power weakening! Nijika's light was also growing dimmer.

This place was weakening their abilities! They had to find a way out as quickly as possible!

An idea flashed through Shiko's mind. She remembered that the monster before seemed to have broken through the wall to get here. "Ryo-san! I'll put down a copper pillar next. We'll hold onto it, and you smash it into the stone wall! That thing managed to come in from outside, which means there might be space beyond the wall!"

"...That isn't necessarily the same place! If I let go over here, everyone will fall!"

"We can only try!" Shiko shouted even louder than the bass.

"...Fine!"

The next moment, a massive copper pillar appeared beside Shiko. Several iron chains extended from it, and the five of them each grabbed one and tied it around themselves. Ryo couldn't free her hands, so Nijika helped her. The copper pillar began shrinking the moment it appeared, but judging by its speed, they still had time!

"Here it comes!" Ryo swung with all her strength, exhausting every last bit of power as she struck the end of the copper pillar. The pillar dragged the five of them toward the stone wall!

At the instant the copper pillar collided with the wall, Shiko lost consciousness from the impact.

Chapter Eleven: The Biological Elevator

"...ko..."

"...Shiko!" Her vision had only just fallen into darkness when light returned. Shiko blinked, only to find herself in a completely different place.

Shiko reached around beside her and discovered that she was lying on hard rock. She tried to force herself upright, but couldn't summon any strength. Cold began to seep into her. With Kita's protection before, she hadn't noticed it, but now her body had begun to shiver. She was hungry and thirsty, and every part of her body hurt. She felt absolutely awful.

Nijika quickly held her down. "Don't move yet. Let me heal you first." Light swept over her, and Shiko felt herself rapidly return to her original condition. Soon, she opened her mouth and found that she could speak again.

"Is everyone all right?" Shiko's first words were an inquiry about their situation.

"The other three haven't woken up yet, but they should soon. You woke up the fastest. Look." Shiko tilted her head and saw Kita lying nearby. Two more heads lay farther away, along with the copper pillar, which had been driven diagonally into the stone wall. They were still underground, but had entered a much larger space. By Nijika's light, Shiko saw that Kita was covered in dust but showed no visible injuries. Seeing that Shiko had mostly recovered, Nijika concentrated her starlight on the remaining three. Her light was no longer weakened at all. The strange effect from before had disappeared.

Shiko forced herself to sit up and saw that she was covered in dirt as well. Using all her strength, she created a washbasin and a towel, then barely managed to clean her face and hands. Even creating such simple objects was exhausting now. Seeing that Nijika was also covered in dust, Shiko hesitated slightly before raising the towel and wiping Kita's face.

"(I want to help her a little, but wiping the face of someone who's awake really is too embarrassing! Still, wiping Kita's face is helping, and although it's embarrassing, at least she isn't awake...)" Shiko folded the towel into a thick wad to avoid feeling Kita's soft skin. Even so, she didn't dare look down and could only scrub by feel.

Nijika slowly treated the three people, but noticed that Kita's recovery was visibly slowing. She turned her head, and an urge to complain instantly rose within her. "Little Shiko, you're about to suffocate Little Kita to death..."

Shiko was startled by her words and hurriedly raised her hand. Kita coughed several times in her sleep and actually woke up before the others.

Kita opened her eyes to see Shiko sitting beside her with a deeply depressed expression. Once Kita was able to sit up, Shiko silently handed her a basin of clean water and a towel, then returned to her original spot and stared at the dark space. Kita turned her head and saw that Nijika had also looked away, her face full of guilt.

"What happened?" Kita couldn't stand the atmosphere and poked Shiko.

Shiko had held it in for a long time. Her voice came out choked with tears. "Because I'm too useless to help Nijika, and can only stand guard..."

"How could that be? We only escaped thanks to Wu-san!" Kita wanted to comfort Shiko, but had no idea why she had shut herself away.

Nijika could no longer endure it and pushed the basin toward Shiko. "You should go back to wiping everyone's faces! You're making me feel so guilty!"

After a while, Ryo also woke up, but Ichiri still showed no response.

"Ichiri's over there." Shiko, who had been watching outside, pointed into the air. Everyone focused their eyes and saw a translucent ghost wearing blue-and-yellow hair ornaments drifting over before sinking into Ichiri's body on the ground.

Ichiri blinked and woke up.

"..." Everyone decided not to mention it.

Everyone had more or less recovered enough to move. Nijika's light flickered, on the verge of going out. She struggled to maintain it, finally managing to produce a candle-like glow from her fingertips. Once the light stabilized, Nijika wiped away her sweat. Kita took the towel from Shiko and helped wipe Nijika's face. The group now sat on a small platform, with darkness and empty space on three sides. Leaning against the stone wall, they discussed what to do next. To see their surroundings clearly, Nijika strengthened the light as much as she could, while Kita added a few wisps of flame. Only then did Shiko see where they had ended up.

"Are we inside the body of some creature?" Shiko cried out in surprise. Only after standing farther away did she see the structure of the place they had passed through: the straight vertical shaft was like an esophagus; the enormous cavity with the "magma pool" was the stomach; and below them were layers of winding small and large intestines. Beside the stomach was a huge stone which, judging by its shape and position, looked like a liver. They had accidentally entered a giant's body!

The remaining people were somewhat surprised, but after examining the area carefully, they had no choice but to admit that this was the conclusion.

Then this place... Shiko ignored the danger and lay on the edge of the platform to look down. Centered around the stone pillar beside them, there were layer upon layer of neat platforms below, like warehouse shelves. "Is this the spine?"

Nijika also moved to the edge of the platform and looked up into the darkness. She couldn't see anything. How were they supposed to get up?

"Wu-san, can you make a hot-air balloon?" Kita suggested. "The balloon was destroyed inside the stomach before, but it should be fine here, right?"

Shiko observed the area and still shook her head. "It's too large. I can't create it right now, and this space is too small. Besides, if anything happened to the balloon, I wouldn't be able to respond immediately while sitting in the basket."

"Shiko, Nijika, come back." Ryo suddenly warned them. "Something's coming."

Everyone had only just recovered and had no strength to fight. The two hurried back beside the stone wall, and Nijika extinguished the light. Darkness returned before their eyes. Soon, not only Ryo but the others also heard something approaching. It drew closer and closer. Before the light had been turned off, it had still been at the edge of their vision, but now it seemed within arm's reach! Shiko could hear it moving, left and right, circling beside them. Her heart pounded furiously, and she didn't dare breathe loudly. Someone grabbed her left hand and squeezed it tighter and tighter. She could feel its owner trembling faintly as well.

They couldn't see anything and had no idea what was in front of them. The unknown was the greatest fear of all.

However, Shiko began to notice her vision slowly brightening. It felt different from Nijika turning on the light. It was as if she had drunk a night-vision potion. There was no light, yet she could see everything clearly. But at that moment, Shiko would rather have seen nothing at all.

"A grapevine." That was Shiko's first impression of the thing. She thought so because it really did look like a section of grapevine flying through the air. But upon closer inspection, the vine was a section of spine, the enormous leaves were flat wings of flesh, and the "grapes" were clusters of alveoli shaped like bunches of grapes... Shiko didn't want to think about why it could fly through the air, but she wasn't particularly disgusted either. Not one of the monsters they had encountered was normal. They had long since become numb to such indescribable forms.

The most important thing was that it was too close. It was close enough for her to count the sections of its body. Its wings of flesh flapped up and down, and at their closest, they nearly slapped Shiko in the face. She desperately leaned back and saw the blood vessels in the wings. She glanced at the person holding her hand. It was Kita. Kita was also staring intently at it, her other hand tightly covering her mouth to keep herself from making a sound.

A monster like this would have been no match for them at their peak, but now, it was enough to throw all of them into the dark abyss.

It continued swaying left and right. The five of them remained cautious and completely motionless. After who knew how long, the "grapevine" finally swayed away.

Shiko let out a long breath and relaxed instantly. Only then did she notice the cold sweat on her back.

"You can see, right?" Nijika asked the others in a whisper.

The others responded quietly. It seemed they had all gained night vision. They found no explanation for the source of this ability. The only change was that "Night Vision" had appeared in the [Additional] section of their panels.

"Whatever the case, let's eat something first. We don't have the strength to fight even that thing."

"I can't cook anymore. At most, I can create a piece of candy." Shiko looked around. The backpacks they had carried at the beginning had vanished somewhere, along with their rations and drinking water.

Nijika rummaged through her pockets and pulled out several packets of compressed biscuits. "I hid some supplies beforehand in case something like this happened."

Kita accepted them with tears of gratitude. "Without Ijichi-senpai, how would we survive..."

Relying on those reserves and the purified water Ichiri painstakingly produced, everyone gradually recovered their abilities.

"I think we could hang beneath that thing and let it carry us up!" Kita proposed a dangerous idea while eating!

Nijika froze for a moment. "(She must be joking, right?)" Kita occasionally said some shockingly ruthless things. But then Nijika saw Shiko seriously begin thinking it over.

"We can lure it back later and try tying a rock about as heavy as us to it. If it can support that, then we can go up too." Shiko proposed another dangerous idea!

"..." Nijika was Kessoku Band's drummer. She needed to sit at the back of the band, oversee everyone's every move, care for the socially anxious shut-in, keep an eye on the shameless one, restrain the bright and impulsive one, and become a steady, reliable leader.

"I don't mind." Ryo's voice was utterly calm.

"...Fine." Nijika suddenly felt tired. Even the most dependable straight man eventually ran out of things to say.

"What about Ichiri?" Nijika looked at the only person who hadn't spoken.

"(It's useless, Nijika. Ichiri could never refuse.)" Shiko lamented inwardly. "(When everyone else has already agreed to something, a social phobe will never voice an objection.)"

"I-I-I-I'm fine with anything..." Ichiri replied with a broken expression.

Shiko was overcome with guilt. "(I'll make it up to her properly once we get back.)"

"Th-then should we lure it back now?" Nijika was about to release her light.

Ryo suddenly grabbed her and put on a solemn expression. "Wait! After that last stunt, I'm still too scared to move!"

"Why are you so proud of that?" Nijika remembered that Ryo had always been the type who couldn't ride roller coasters.

"That's perfect, then. Let's rest a little too."

After resting sufficiently, Nijika released her light again, and the "grapevine" soon flew back.

"Ryo." Shiko threw out a length of iron chain. Pulled by Ryo's transformed sound waves, the chain and the massive rock it was tied to wrapped around the "grapevine's" spine. It immediately dropped lower, then quickly stabilized itself and thrashed up and down, but couldn't shake off the burden. Seeing that it worked, Shiko repeated the process, creating a similar chain and replacing the original rock with an iron cage large enough to support all five of them. The chain flew toward the monster. The original rock had vanished, but a new burden had been added. The monster struggled upward, carrying everyone in the cage with it.

"Careful!" Nijika shouted the moment the cage left the ground. The violent shaking nearly threw everyone out. This wasn't a Ferris wheel at an amusement park!

All six sides of the cage were packed with sponge. When Ryo's bass began to sound, the violent shaking finally lessened somewhat. "Ryo... pull the other end of the chain over here..." Shiko endured her nausea, took the chain they had thrown earlier, and locked it to the railing. This way, the monster shouldn't be able to shake them off. The "grapevine" had put on an overly heavy necklace and flew toward the heights.

Shiko clung to the railing and tried to look outside, but all she saw was the unchanging stone wall. She didn't dare look down. When she raised her head, however, she saw that the cavern roof, hidden in the darkness before, was already right in front of them!

"We're going to crash!" she cried. Before the others could react, the violent collision knocked them all down again.

Nijika began to feel weightless. The monster was diving downward with them! It fell in one direction at a speed even faster than before. Viscous blood splashed onto Nijika's hand. The "grapevine" was still struggling, dazedly crashing toward an area that remained pitch-black even through their night vision!

"(That's it!)" Nijika recognized the area. It was the liver! The strange substance in the giant's stomach had already been bad enough. Something even worse would surely happen on the liver! But it was too late. The monster slammed into it headfirst—if it even had a head!

With a tremendous boom, a cloud of dust exploded across the liver. Five people crawled out from within it. The iron cage had been twisted out of shape by the impact, and the "grapevine" had turned to ashes.

Chapter Twelve: From the Liver...

The five of them stood on solid ground again. Although they were slightly higher than they had been on the spine, they were still a hundred thousand miles from escaping. The liver beneath their feet gave off an ominous feeling at a glance. Somehow, it felt like they couldn't stay there for long.