Meanwhile, elsewhere.
A golden streak and a white blur raced through a branching passage on the Dungeon's fifth floor, hot on the heels of four Minotaurs charging ahead.
The golden-haired girl—Ais Wallenstein—moved as lightly as the wind. Her pure golden hair streamed behind her at high speed, forming a dazzling line of light.
Beside her ran Bete Loga, a young werewolf with short white hair and a pair of alert wolf ears standing upright atop his head. His legs were clad in gleaming metal greaves: Frostwelt.
Every time he pushed off, he left shallow dents in the hard rock floor, each footfall landing with a heavy thud! Thud!
His face was filled with impatience and fury.
"You trash! Stop right there!" Bete roared, suddenly accelerating!
His swift figure tore through the air in an instant, crashing into the Minotaur lagging behind with a sharp whistle of wind.
"Roar—!"
The bull-headed monster sensed the danger and clumsily tried to turn and defend itself.
But faced with Bete's overwhelming speed, its movements seemed frozen in place.
Bete's greaves ripped through the air, slamming with tremendous force into the Minotaur's back!
Bam!!!
A dull, heart-stopping boom erupted!
The tough body Bell had only managed to scorch after giving it everything he had burst apart beneath Bete's kick like fragile pottery!
It took just one strike!
The Minotaur turned into a cloud of black smoke, scattering in every direction. It couldn't even let out a full scream.
Only a fist-sized Magic Stone dropped to the ground with a clack.
"Ais!" Bete shouted without even looking at the results of his attack.
Ais remained silent, but moved as fast as lightning.
The slender rapier at her waist, the Sword of Despair, suddenly slid from its scabbard. A rapidly spinning blue-green wind enveloped its blade, which gave off a low hum.
Her figure blurred slightly, trailing a faint blue-green streak as she darted into the monsters as if she had teleported.
Swish! Swish!
Two faint yet razor-sharp cutting sounds rang out almost at the same time.
Like a precision paper cutter, the blue-green wind blade sliced effortlessly through the hard necks of two Minotaurs.
Two enormous bull heads flew into the air. Their massive bodies lurched forward a few more steps from sheer momentum before crashing to the ground and dissolving into black smoke, leaving two Magic Stones rolling across the floor.
Ais landed lightly, the pressure of the blue-green wind lifting the ends of her golden hair.
Her gaze was cool. She turned her wrist, smoothly pointing her rapier at the last remaining Minotaur, ready to deliver the finishing blow.
Rumble—!!!
Just then, a tremendous explosion suddenly erupted from deep within a dark passage to their left!
The deafening boom echoed again and again through the narrow labyrinthine passage, shaking loose rocks from the walls.
A violent wave of heat even surged from the junction, carrying the scorched scent of Stardust.
The last Minotaur was obviously startled by the sudden commotion, too.
It panted heavily, turning its blood-red eyes toward the dark passage from which the sound had come. Its nostrils flared, as if it had caught the scent of something—or someone—more interesting.
After hesitating for only a moment, it completely abandoned the powerful foes before it and its escape route. With a low, incomprehensible growl, it abruptly turned and charged into the passage where the explosion had come from, vanishing into the darkness!
"Hey, hey, hey! What the hell?!"
Bete irritably raked a hand through his white hair. The murderous glint in his eyes intensified as he ground a piece of loose rock beneath his greave.
"What are those stupid cows going crazy over? We chased them all the way from the seventeenth floor to the fifth, and now they're diving into some crappy hole! Ais, let's go after them! Don't let that one get away too!"
Before he had even finished speaking, he had already become a white blur, charging into the passage where the explosion had come from.
Meanwhile, Bell's battle had also reached a crisis.
The Minotaur's furious roar made the walls tremble. Its movements grew more and more savage, its huge fists whipping through the air like a whirlwind. Every strike narrowly missed Bell as it roared past him.
The boy's white figure blurred in the dim light. Again and again, the blast waves hurled him through the air and slammed him into the hard rock walls.
Blood spilled from his mouth, but he struggled back to his feet, panting as he fixed his red eyes on the monster.
He lowered his body once more, searching for an opening to strike!
Sweat, blood, and dust mingled, smearing half of Bell's face.
Every breath tasted of rust and came with a burning pain deep in his chest. The edges of his vision had even begun to darken.
It was so strong!
He had already lost count of how many times he'd used Star Burst.
He only knew that his body was growing heavier and heavier, and that each time he used magic, his brain throbbed as if pierced by needles.
But he still clenched his teeth, his gaze fixed on the spots where the Minotaur had been struck again and again by Star Burst—
Its side, its shoulder blades, and especially the outside of its knees, which supported its enormous weight.
The scorched marks were piling up!
Layer upon layer!
They seemed to be growing darker and thicker!
The monster was still moving with wild ferocity, but the repeated magical impacts were taking their toll. Especially around its knees, which it needed to keep its balance. Bell keenly noticed that the Minotaur's unstoppable charges seemed to have grown ever so slightly sluggish and stiff!
Those seemingly futile scorch marks hadn't been useless!
They were accumulating! They were working!
The chance to win lay within these countless exchanges, each one a fight for his life!
Thor calmly watched Bell and the Minotaur's brutal dance, a contest between wildly mismatched opponents.
The Minotaur was, after all, a monster from the seventeenth floor.
Its basic defense and vitality were an unbridgeable chasm compared to Bell, who was only Lv. 1.
The Steel Dagger in Bell's hand, worth 9,300 Valis, seemed laughably weak against the bull-headed monster's tough, iron-like hide.
Each futile stab failed to draw even a drop of blood, producing only a dull clang, clang as the blade scraped against it.
His only reliance was Star Burst, which had just awakened and required magic to use.
Each time Bell gritted his teeth and released the spell, his body groaned in pain. The dizziness brought on by his nearly depleted magic battered his will.
Thor slowly raised his right hand. Above his fingertips hovered the Stardust he had painstakingly condensed not long ago from a hundred Magic Stones.
It revolved slowly, like a miniature galactic core.
It was the only trump card Thor had at that moment that could instantly turn the tide of battle.
If Bell truly seemed about to die, Thor would crush the precious Stardust without hesitation.
The Stardust's annihilation would be enough to blast the Minotaur into its most fundamental particles in an instant.
As Thor's thoughts raced, the battle suddenly reached its boiling point!
Faced with the Minotaur's deadly fist crashing down toward him, the battered Bell didn't retreat. Instead, he summoned an even more astonishing strength of will.
Dragging a body as heavy as lead, he chose to meet the attack once again!
Bell was about to be struck head-on by the devastating fist. The gruesome end of flying flesh and blood seemed moments away!
"Crouch! Use Star Burst!" Thor's low, commanding voice exploded like thunder in the depths of Bell's muddled, exhausted consciousness!
The order came so abruptly, yet carried an authority that brooked no argument.
Bell's mind didn't even have time to think. His body reacted instinctively, relying on the trust and obedience toward Thor that he had developed over the past few days!
He abruptly dropped his center of gravity, ducking low until he was almost against the ground!
Whoosh!
The enormous fist, carrying the stench of death, swept past Bell's fluttering white hair by a hair's breadth!
The howling wind stung his cheeks!
He'd dodged it!
At the same instant, Bell's left hand, clenched around the magic of Star Burst, had already aimed ahead through sheer battle instinct.
At the outside of the Minotaur's knee, blackened by repeated blasts and even trembling slightly!
"Star—Burst!!!"
The starlight, charged with the boy's last reserves of will and magic, erupted against the monster's knee joint as he screamed hoarsely!
Boom—!!!
This explosion was especially muffled—and deadly!
The starlight no longer futilely scorched the surface. Instead, it pierced precisely into the already weakened internal structure!
Like the final straw that broke a mighty pillar!
Crack—!
The sound of breaking bone rang out clearly!
The Minotaur's right knee, which supported its massive body, snapped under the destruction of the internal starburst!
It let out a scream of agony unlike any before. Its enormous body could no longer support itself and toppled backward, crashing heavily to the ground!
Without the support of its right leg, it struggled and roared helplessly, but could no longer stand on one leg!
Bell gasped for breath, his chest heaving violently.
He stared at the fallen beast. His red eyes, unfocused from exhaustion, were filled with disbelief and a glimmer of delighted excitement.
I... I actually... did it?!
"Bell!" Thor's steady, powerful voice rang out again, pulling Bell from his brief shock and back into the brutal reality. "Give it the final blow! Complete your Great Feat!"
Thor's words ignited Bell's last reserves of resolve.
His gaze sharpened. He gripped the dagger in his hand, struggling but determined, ready to step forward and finish off the monster that had once filled him with such terror!
But then! A sudden change!
Just as Bell focused all his attention on the fallen prey before him, a violent roar and heavy, thunderous footsteps burst from the deep passage to their left!
A second Minotaur suddenly charged out like a vengeful fiend!
Its blood-red eyes immediately locked onto Thor, who stood closest to the passage and seemed completely unprepared!
The monster's target was unmistakable! It raised its arm high, bringing its huge fist crashing straight down toward Thor's head!
The blow was fierce enough to turn an ordinary person into a heap of flesh in an instant!
"Lord God—!!!" Bell noticed the danger!
He screamed in anguish, instinctively trying to rush over and save him.
But the hopeless distance between them stood in his way!
After the battle he had just endured, with both his magic and stamina utterly depleted, there was no way he could move faster than the Minotaur's deadly fist!
All he could do was watch as the shadow of death instantly swallowed Thor's calm figure!
At that critical moment—
Whoosh!
A faint whistle of wind, so slight it was almost impossible to hear, rang out!
At that same instant, a golden streak flashed behind the Minotaur that had charged out of the passage, moving faster than the eye could follow!
It was Ais Wallenstein!
When she heard Bell's terrified shout of "Lord God!", her cool golden eyes narrowed sharply, and she pushed off with all her strength!
In an instant, she overtook Bete, who was still behind her, cursing as he ran!
The moment her slender figure stepped out of the passage like a phantom, the extraordinary perception and reaction speed of a Lv. 5 adventurer made the world seem to slip into slow motion.
Everything around her became incomparably clear and slow.
The Minotaur's punching trajectory, the ripples in the air warped by its force, the tiny fragments of stone flying through the air... and the scene of the battle farther away.
Her eyes swept across the whole area in an instant.
Ahead, a Minotaur lay on the ground, its enormous body still struggling in vain.
Not far from the fallen monster, a white-haired, red-eyed boy clutched a short blade and panted heavily, his body covered in scrapes, scorch marks, and blood.
He had obviously just fought a fierce battle, and the fallen bull-headed monster had been his opponent.
Ais processed all this information in an instant, and a trace of indescribable astonishment followed!
The white-haired boy's equipment... It was the cheapest, most basic coarse-cloth beginner's outfit. The short knife in his hand was a common style among low-level adventurers, and he didn't even have proper armor.
He was undoubtedly a rookie adventurer who had only just registered, perhaps not even a week ago—a complete beginner!
And yet this beginner... had managed to defeat a Minotaur all by himself?!
In her efficient, detached mind, the surprise of that conclusion briefly overwhelmed even her instinct to lock onto her target.
Then her gaze shifted to the young man with hair as deep as a galaxy, and she froze.
In that fleeting instant—so brief it was almost negligible—the young man's gaze met hers with pinpoint precision.
That meant he could keep up with the speed of someone who was Lv. 5!
But something even more astonishing happened the next moment.
At the instant the Minotaur's cauldron-sized fist was about to strike the young man's head, Ais clearly saw his body slide backward about twenty centimeters without warning.
Boom!
The massive fist slammed down just past the tip of his nose, smashing a deep crater into the ground. Rocks flew everywhere, but not even the hem of his clothes was touched.
Ais's pupils contracted, but her body had already propelled her forward on instinct.
Splurt!
The Sword of Despair pierced the Minotaur's chest with pinpoint accuracy, passing through as easily as if slicing thin paper. The enormous bull-headed monster instantly dissolved into black smoke.
Meanwhile, on the other side!
The Minotaur Bell had knocked down and crippled by breaking one of its legs struggled through its pain and rage—and managed to stand up again on one leg!
It growled, its enormous body carrying a bloody stench as it prepared to pounce on Bell, who was only a short distance away and too exhausted to react quickly.
"Get lost, you trash!"
An angry roar exploded from the depths of the passage.
A white figure shot out like a cannonball!
It was Bete!
The cold metal of his greaves gleamed as he turned into a white streak and charged straight at the one-legged Minotaur.
BAM!!!
A deep, thunderous impact!
His metal-clad foot, carrying tremendous force, slammed hard into the Minotaur's upper body.
CRACK!
The sound of breaking bones rang out!
PFFT—!
Scalding, scarlet blood burst from the Minotaur's shattered chest and its mouth and nostrils, spraying out like a waterfall!
Bell had no time to dodge!
Scalding red bull's blood poured over his head in an instant, covering him from head to toe.
WHUM!
Amid the curtain of blood, Bell knelt on the ground and stared up in shock. Through his crimson-tinted vision, he met the gaze of the werewolf Bete, suspended in midair after delivering the fatal blow. Their eyes met for the briefest moment.
Bell's eyes were filled with utter disbelief.
That terrifying monster, which he had only managed to bring down after giving it everything he had... had just been taken out with a single kick by the adventurer before him?
Before you continue