PROLOGUE

A MID-SPRING NIGHT’S DREAM

Her vision trembled.

A sound buzzed in her ears.

The moment she realized what had caused the shock and constant tremors in her body, the first thing she felt was nausea.

A murderous roar echoed around her as the sound of hundreds of thousands of feet shook the earth.

The world of stone and rock quivered along with that distant bellow. The blue sky and the light of the sun seemed so far, far away through the iron latticework of her small window. All she could smell in the cold, dank room that served as her prison was the stench of mold and rust.

Abandoned in a corner of the room sat her two cutlasses, blades clinking as she waited for her turn.

The scene changed.

Suddenly, her field of view shrank—she was wearing a mask. Before her stood an odious gate, light filtering through its bars. The moment she passed through it, leaving the darkness behind, she found herself enveloped in a thunderous cacophony of screams and shouts. All around her, spectators howled as she stepped into the arena.

She saw her enemies come charging from the opposite gate, and she rose to face them, weapon gripped tightly as she sprinted forward.

Each opponent was different from the last as they came one after another. First, a pack of white wolves, saliva dribbling from their mouths in great heavy globules; then, a cudgel-wielding gladiator; and after that, a chained dragon—finally, there was a girl just like her. Weapons collided, but in the end, it was she who was left standing.

As her fallen opponent lay at her feet, around her the arena erupted as the sun blazed overhead.

“—Se wehga! Se wehga! Se wehga!”

Shouts in a language that wasn’t Koine poured down on her.

The praises of her fellow female warriors engulfed her as the twilit sky trembled and shook.

Face turned up toward the heavens, she lost herself in that never-ending sea of red.

The scene changed. It always did.

She saw the blurred smile of a goddess.

Then a female warrior was looking down at her, beating her into the ground over and over. Laughter rang loudly in her ears.

Excitement mixed with rage in an endless frenzy.

Within those emotions was a mumbled scream and splattered blood.

On the gleaming surface of the weapon, she could see her own eyes blurring.

Still it repeated, over and over, as the world faded around her.

That was when she glanced down, only to see her own hands, stained the deepest red—

Then Tione woke up.

“…Great,” Tione murmured as she stared up at the ceiling of her room in Twilight Manor.

It was dark inside, and the world outside her window was still dim. Glancing in the direction of her clock, she saw that the short hand had only just passed four.

“Haven’t even gotten any decent rest since the expedition…”

She frowned, a crease rising to her brow as she continued to stare listlessly at the ceiling, eyes heavy.

All of a sudden—boof!

A pillow arced toward her.

She quickly snatched the cushion out of the air.

Sitting up without so much as a noise, Tione turned to where her sister currently slept soundly, spread-eagled on her own bed with the blanket kicked off. This was Tiona.

That innocent face, that unconscious pillow toss—Tione felt anger bubbling up inside her. She chucked the pillow back at her snoozing sister. But even in her sleep, the younger Amazon was able to deflect the shot with ease.

Tione clicked her tongue in annoyance as her projectile simply tumbled across the bedding.

“…She hasn’t changed at all,” she muttered, half in jealousy and half in irritation, as she glanced over at her sister’s serene face. “Guess I’ll take a shower or something…”

With a long sigh, she slid out of bed.

Then, grabbing a change of clothes and dressed in nothing but her undergarments, she made her way out of the room.

“Tioneeee…mmghh…”

Mere minutes later.

Tiona rolled over in bed, her sister’s name on her lips as the very same dream invaded her own thoughts.

CHAPTER 1

QUEST RESULTS & NEXT QUEST

Loki Familia’s expedition party had returned to Twilight Manor.

They’d collapsed into their beds and slept soundly their first night back, and their lips curled into smiles as they awoke to the light of the surface. They were home—free from the chill dark and far from the unceasing howls of monsters.

A certain elven maiden squinted her azure eyes as she peered through her window at the sun. Outside in the courtyard, a golden-haired, golden-eyed swordswoman had awoken for her early morning training regimen, already hours into her routine as she lost herself in the fragrant breeze and clear blue sky.

The late risers trickled out of their rooms one by one, eager to sate their appetites with the bread, hot soup, fried eggs, and meats they’d been deprived of for so long. The warm sunlight, the good weather, the fresh foods—all the pleasures of the surface they’d previously taken for granted soothed their weary bodies.

Before long, the manor was as lively as ever.

“All righty, then! I know we’ve got plenty of things to deal with…but how’s about we start off with yer Status updates, yeah?”

Loki announced her intentions amid all the renewed hustle and bustle.

And so, while the familia members who’d stayed behind were busy with organizing the resources, equipment, and spoils of war from the expedition—a task they’d been busy with since the night prior—the party members formed a long, snaking line leading to Loki’s chambers on the top floor of the manor’s central tower. Given how easy it had been for their Statuses to develop during the expedition, nearly everyone had to pay the goddess a visit, which meant there was no way to get through the whole throng on the same night they returned. Even Aiz had spent the evening merely resting, waiting until the next day to take her turn.

Updating the Statuses of more than thirty adventurers was no easy task, but Loki hopped to excitedly, as prompt and efficient as ever.

It was during this time that—

“Level Six!! I caught up to Aiz!!”

“Heh-HEH!”

Tiona’s and Bete’s exclamations echoed throughout the tower.

Both of them had leveled up. The high-grade excelia they’d obtained after their decisive battle in the Frontier had been enough to bump them from Level 5 to Level 6. Just as the phrase implied, leveling up involved pushing their Status past its current limit to reach even greater heights in terms of skills and abilities.

Tiona clutched in her hands the updated parchment she’d received from Loki, grinning as she jumped and skipped about. Even Bete cracked a smile for once, not caring who was watching as he let out a howl.

“Guess there’s no point in even asking you, hmm, Tione?”

“Heh. Well, you know. Anyway, what about you guys? Aki? Narfi?”

Tione asked the question while she tried her best to keep her own excitement in check after leveling up just like her sister.

“We still have a ways to go, it seems…” The catgirl and human responded with strained laughs, their shoulders slumped. It would seem Loki Familia’s alternates were stuck at Level 4, if Raul’s drooping head was any indication.

“Hey, Aiz! Look, look! Level Six!”

“Mmn…congratulations, Tiona.”

“Eh-heh-heh…I told ya I wasn’t gonna lose to you! Better watch out or I’ll blow right past ya!”

Tiona dashed forward to greet the swordswoman, still brimming with excitement as the group made its way down the tower steps and out into the courtyard. Aiz responded with a faint smile, spurring on the Amazon’s cheer.

Tiona launched herself onto Aiz’s back with a practically audible sproing! “What about you, Aiz, huh? You didn’t level up again, did you?!”

“Don’t be silly…”

That’s impossible. Aiz finished the thought privately as she glanced down at the parchment in her hands.

Her abilities had increased more than 230 points in total after she’d first embarked on the expedition—ever since the night of the black raid she’d weathered with Bell and Hestia, actually. From that point, she’d taken part in the attack on The Dragon’s Urn, then the life-and-death battle with the corrupted spirit, and even dueling with the Warlord, Ottar. Taking all these into account, it was no surprise that her gains were substantial, even if she was already Level 6.

The numbers made Aiz happy—relieved, almost. They were her reward for breaking her previous limits and reaching new heights. At Tiona’s urging (“Show me! Show me!”), she relinquished the parchment with her new Status. When the Amazon gave an “Ohhhh!” in approval, it brought smiles to both their faces.

Meanwhile, back upstairs where Lefiya was just now getting her own Status updated—

“Congrats, Lefiya! You should be able t’level up!”

Loki cried out triumphantly from behind the elf, whose clothes were undone to reveal the smooth curve of her back.

“…What?”

Lefiya froze, halfway through retrieving her clothes.

The crimson hieroglyphics on her back, which were not unlike an epitaph, pulsed with light at regular intervals.

It took her all of ten seconds before she was practically stumbling back toward the grinning goddess.

“L-l-l-level up? D-did you say…level up? M-me?!”

“That I did, little missy. To Level Four!”

“I…I did it!!”

Lefiya shouted, unable to contain herself. Even though she was still only half-dressed and covering herself with her discarded shirt, she wanted to jump for joy.

She’d certainly looked death in the face rather often recently, yet she had lived to tell the tale.

In fact, she’d been fully prepared to meet her end more times than she could count. As a Level 3, she’d already descended to the Dungeon’s depths—a place where even first-tier adventurers like Aiz and the others couldn’t be sure of victory—and returned in one piece. If the high-grade excelia Tiona and the others had earned was enough for them to level up, then it made sense that the quality of Lefiya’s excelia was worthy of a “feat.”

Desperate to catch up to Aiz and the others, she’d put her own life on the line to complete her adventure.

“Quite a few of you kids came back with all kinds’a new magic and skills…Seems like this expedition was well worth it.”

Loki was talking to herself, but Lefiya wasn’t listening, her face still flushed and her head dizzy.

She was beyond happy. Her heart was filled with the feeling that she’d truly grown stronger and that she might actually have a chance to catch up to Aiz and the others.

And that rabbit—yes, that rabbit.

—I did it! Did you see that, hmm? How’s that for size?

Pictured clearly in her mind was the boy she’d dubbed her rival for many reasons. She puffed her chest out with pride—on the inside.

Her rival had taken down a minotaur all by himself when he was only Level 1, earning him a chance to level up. Even though she had faltered when the boy’s accelerated growth led him to pull off his own feat, Lefiya was sure now that she hadn’t lost yet.

For the time being, at least, she was in the lead.

Still, I mustn’t let this go to my head. His level may be lower than mine at the moment, but he’s reckless to a fault and wields strange magic to boot. That’s why I have to take advantage of every bit of strength I have—with even greater effort than he uses—and widen the gap between us as much as possible…!

Lefiya began to settle down, practically tingling with energy. Loki could almost see the blazing flames emanating from behind the elf, but her expression soon turned confused.

“Hmm…y’know, Lefiya? This is just a tiny suggestion, but…could ya be patient for a little while longer? About leveling up, I mean.”

“Wh-whaaat?”

Lefiya came to a sudden halt again, a puzzled question escaping her lips. Her goddess’s “suggestion” had completely snuffed out the fiery sense of victory within her.

As she turned around, asking why with her eyes, Loki handed over the parchment with her updated Status.

No new skills, though her abilities had improved quite handily since before the expedition, in particular her endurance and magic.

Holding her clothes in one hand and the parchment in another, her gaze rose from the page.

“You get a good look? Then let me take you through it step-by-step, okay? Lefiya…what level was yer magic at when you went up to Level Three?”

“It was…S…”

“Right? Soooo…you can see why this time you don’t have quite enough, yeah? At least that’s what I was thinkin’. Don’t want you losin’ out to Riveria, huh? Gotta make you a ridiculous magic powerhouse.”

“R-ridiculous magic powerhouse…” A bead of sweat worked its way down Lefiya’s temple as the words hit home.

She knew what Loki was saying. That she still had room to grow as a Level 3.

Her Status had not exceeded the limits of her current “container” the way Aiz’s had when she leveled up.

“Now, if you were anyone else, I’d level you up as soon as I was able to. After all, the ability points of a higher level aren’t even comparable to the level below it.”

“Yes, this is…true…”

“I can’t stop you from focusin’ on numbers, numbers, numbers all the time, either. Maxin’ out an ability takes a lot of time and effort, and it’d be much easier to just up and at ’em to the next level. But…” Loki set herself down on the bed then continued. “Those eensy-weensy little numbers you’d be giving up on could prove fatal in a familia like mine.”

If two adventurers of the same level were to go head-to-head, how those figures matched up could mean the difference between victory and defeat. In other words, it was an ability gap. Acquiring more points at an earlier level could confer a distinct advantage, since it would be reflected in a person’s current level as “extra” power.

Of course, numbers weren’t the only determining factor when it came to victory and defeat. An adventurer’s expertise—their techniques, tactical finesse, magic, and skills—all played an important role, as well.

Still, it was a great advantage to have.

And it went without saying that the higher one’s level, the more excelia required to raise one’s numbers.

“Lucky for you, you’ve got Finn and the others who can help you get the experience you need. One more expedition like this and you’ll shoot right up, don’tcha think?”

“Ah…ha-ha…ha-ha-ha…”

The fact that other familias did prioritize leveling up was the problem.

In a departure from how Loki Familia operated with its legion of powerful elites, adventurers in less influential familias had to risk their lives in the Dungeon for any hope of leveling up. This made the level-ups themselves, along with the increase in fighting power they brought, absolutely essential. They didn’t exist in an environment where they could easily collect high-caliber excelia whenever and wherever they pleased.

Lefiya could only force a laugh as Loki shot her a somewhat sadistic smile.

“I know, I know…you may be thinkin’ life’s a little bit cruel right now, but…Lefiya, think about it. Your level-ups have been comin’ faster ever since you converted to my familia, yeah?”

“They have, yes…”

Lefiya’s first level-up had taken her three years to achieve. She’d been a mere eleven years old, still in the middle of her studies in the Education District.

After one more year in school, she’d joined Loki Familia, and after only another year’s time, she’d reached Level 3. Now, two years after that moment, she’d received the golden ticket that would accelerate her to Level 4.

Putting aside a certain white rabbit’s insane growth, Lefiya’s progress was nothing to scoff at, either. It was steady and sure, thanks to the strength of Finn, Aiz, and the others.

“I know it’s a lot of pressure hearin’ it again and again, but Finn, the other top spots, and I all want ya to follow in Riveria’s footsteps. Super Lefiya’s great, but Hyper Lefiya’s what we really want, no matter how much time ’n’ energy it takes,” Loki continued with a grin as Lefiya looked on quietly. “Remember what your last Level Two Status looked like? We want something like that again, yeah? Leavin’ yer magic at a B would be such a waste…so let’s get it up to a high A.”

“…”

“O’course, I’ll admit this isn’t really my decision to make. You should do whatever you feel is right. If you wanna level up right now, I won’t stop you. So…whaddaya think?”

Lefiya was silent for a moment.

Thinking.

Finally, she nodded.

“I understand. I’ll continue at this level for a while longer.”

There was pressure, just like Loki had said.

All these expectations from those around her made her timid to the point of shame.

But now she would rise to meet those expectations.

Being Riveria’s successor—that’s what she needed to be thinking about if she hoped to compete against her boy rival. If she hoped to lend her strength to Aiz and the others. And it was the expedition, and its intense battles, that had allowed her to do so.

Something in Lefiya had changed on that expedition, and even she had realized it.

“Thanks a million, Lefiya. Finn and the others already filled me in on everything that happened down there, and it’ll probably be a bit before we organize another. I know it might not feel great, but try and hold out till then, okay?”

“I will.”

As Loki smiled, Lefiya turned her head over her shoulder to look at the Status on her back, currently stuck in its arrested state of development. The glowing hieroglyphs affirmed that a level-up was possible at any time as long as her patron deity allowed it.

Once Loki had redone the lock and the light of her Status had faded, Lefiya redonned her garments and left the room behind her.

“Well, I’ll be. Still no Level Seven for ye?”

The mad rush of Status updates had just about ended when Gareth made his comment, arms folded as his fellow elites took their turns.

“Seems it wasn’t quite enough. Perhaps I should go to Ottar, hmm? Ask him for his secrets.”

Finn turned toward the dwarf from his spot outside Loki’s chambers, a wry grin on his face.

“Then there yet remain only two Level Sevens, the strongest in the world…” Riveria finished for them.

It would seem all three Loki Familia elites, updated Status parchments in hand, had to spend a bit more time as Level 6s. As they glanced out the window, down to the courtyard where their friends either celebrated or lamented various Status updates, the trio felt the undeniable sting of impatience as well.

“You guys are natural-born leaders. Fact is, I don’t think there’s anyone alive who could lead the three of you. Which is kinda the problem, yeah? I know it’s tough, but y’all still have a ways to go before you can match the big mom ’n’ pop, Zeus and Hera.”

Loki curled an arm behind her head as she explained.

For all the excelia it netted them, the three upper-class adventurers might as well have been floundering around in the Dungeon’s upper levels. The value of any experience points received from the floors they’d already cleared wasn’t very good. For Finn, Aiz, and the other first-tiers, this created a sort of wall, prohibiting any real growth.

Even the experience they’d earned from their fight against the expedition’s final boss, the spirit, had had to be divided up among the entire party—which was exactly what Loki was alluding to now.

“Aaanyway, that’s an issue for another time. I’m behind schedule! Y’all take care of tradin’ in the spoils, all right?”

“Of course. We’ve dropped well into the red thanks to this expedition. There’s the cost of the magic swords and Durandal weapons before we even left, plus all that poison-vermis antivenin we were forced to buy…”

“And the drop items, too, aye. We had to give ’em to Hephaistos Familia in exchange for their services…”

“Hnnnnngh, stop, stop, stop, please! Yer givin’ me a splittin’ headache!”

“Will we be holding a party tonight, then?”

“’Course we will! Gotta celebrate your homecomin’, after all!!”

The conversation continued as the Loki Familia elites discussed the day’s schedule with their patron deity.

Almost as they were done wrapping things up, though, Finn seemed to remember something. “Ah, right. There was something I forgot to tell you…about the incident with the minotaur down in the upper levels. Considering we were forced to face off against Ottar, it would seem the goddess Freya may have played a part in the attack.”

“…Hrmm?”

“I’m sure we’d be able to uncover evidence if we investigate. Though we avoided any casualties, Aiz in particular had to cross swords with him…so at the very least, we should report it to the Guild, yes?” Finn posed.

“Ah, right…It came up at Denatus, too. Whole thing got pretty much left up in the air, though…so diggin’ any further probably won’t do much good. Let’s just ignore it!”

“Are you sure?”

But Loki merely flapped her hand in nonchalant disregard. The unusually forgiving demeanor of their goddess was enough to draw questioning glances from all three elites.

Loki, however, simply ignored their looks.

“Anyways, I got somewhere to be! Meetin’ adjourned!”

She offhandedly dismissed them as she made to leave the room. On the inside, however, she was sweating up a storm.

Actually, Loki had a secret agreement she’d made with the goddess Freya.

Moreover, it hinged entirely on Loki’s own Achilles’ heel.

She wasn’t allowed to interfere in any of Freya’s doings. Naturally, she couldn’t talk about those things with her followers, either. It certainly felt like her dignity as a goddess (nonexistent though it might seem) had taken a hit.

As their patron deity scrambled out of the room, the remaining three adventurers could only stare at her back in disbelief.

“Somethin’ happen between the two of them, ye reckon…?”

“More drunken dealings? Really now…”

“Hmm, or perhaps something more like a debt.”

Followers could not lie to their god.

Similarly, Finn and the others were not about to be taken in by their goddess, either.

Their time together had been far, far too long for that.

Their Status updates completed, the members of Loki Familia made their way into the city to finish off their remaining expedition obligations—namely, the exchanging of loot for money.

Heaving bags on top of more bags, they set off from the manor en masse before dispersing into every corner of the city.

“Finn Deimne of Loki Familia. As relayed previously, my familia has returned from its expedition, and I’m here to trade in magic stones.”

“You got it! Misha Frot at your service! Welcome back! We’ve been waiting for you!”

“We encountered many unreported monsters down in the Dungeon’s depths. Though this will only apply to a small selection of familias, I’d like you to issue a warning for all floors below fifty. I’ve included further details in my report, along with a list of all our members who’ve leveled up.”

“Understood, sir! Now, let’s see…Whaaaaaa—?! Three Level Sixes?!?”

Some spread word about the fruits of their adventure, along with the new intel they’d gathered, before carting their haul of magic stones to the exchange room.

“I, uh…erm…Mr. President? You don’t, uh…think you could buy them for a bit…more…do you?”

“What do you mean, Raul? This is already a generous amount! Or are you saying you’re dissatisfied with my offer?”

“N-no, of course not, just…Well, this expedition left us…pretty deep in the red. So money would be greatly appreciated…”

“Oh, come on, Raul! Put some oomph into it! Pleeeeease, Mr. President! We’re desperate!”

Geez, Aki! What are you—some kind of devil in disguise?!

“Yes, we’re begging you, Mr. President, sir! You’ll be our go-to shop from now on! Think of all that business! Right, Leene?”

“E-exactly, Narfi! It’s just like the captain—like Braver’s always told us! That you have such a big heart! You’re truly a man worthy of respect!!…Or, you know, something like that.”

“Though I have to ask—you didn’t change your cologne, did you? That elegant scent, it’s almost…spellbinding. And I’m an elf. I should know! In fact…I must say, you practically look awe-inspiring today, Mr. President.”

“Is that so? Heh…heh-heh-heh…Well, I suppose I could raise my offer a bit. You are such valued customers, after all.”

““““Thank you, sir!!””””

“…Yeesh! W-women are so scary.”

Some threw themselves into heated episodes of haggling with the merchant familias, bringing out their drop items, ores, and other Dungeon finds.

“You here, Tsubaki?”

“Ohhhh!! Been waitin’ for ya, Gareth! Get yer butt in here!”

“No need t’rush, lass…Now then, the drop items from the depths, just like we agreed.”

“Aha! This is it, this is it! Dragon fangs…dragon scales!! Bwa-ha-ha!! The goods I can make with these babies…!! C’mon, don’t get cheap on me. I know you got more in there!”

“If we already promised these…then why does partin’ with ’em cut so deep?”

Some relinquished contractual payment to those who’d lent their aid during the expedition.

“Oh-ho? Bete Loga? On bag duty? A rare sight indeed!”

“Aw, can it! There weren’t enough people, so Gramps asked me. Make sure this gets to that smith woman, will ya?”

“And what’s this?”

“Money. For fixin’ up my Frosvirt. It’s not the whole amount, but…I’ll get her the rest soon.”

“Heh…you really haven’t changed, have you?”

Some repaid their debts via a certain goddess of the forge.

“Oh, Riveria! You’re back! And in one piece to boot.”

“All thanks to you, Lenoa. Though I need to apologize first, since I’ve gone and broken it again.”

“Whaaaaaaaaaaat?! A-are you cursed or something?!”

Others still took in their staves for repair, given that the magic stones adorning them had cracked.

“Amiiiid! Long time no see!”

“Shhhhh! Inside voices in the store, please!”

“Ha-ha-ha. Nice seeing you, Amid.”

“Hello again…Amid.”

“Welcome back, my friends. Miss Tiona, Miss Tione, Miss Lefiya, and…Miss Aiz.”

Lastly, a certain set of girls made their way to a certain clinic, where a certain friend awaited.

It was the clinic of Dian Cecht Familia, complete with emblem of herb and light, a facility they’d not visited in some time. Today, as always, its rooms were filled with upper-class adventurers. From within the hustle and bustle, the human girl Amid greeted Aiz and the others with a smile.

“Congratulations on the completion of your expedition. I had heard you ran into an Irregular and were forced to stay for some time on the eighteenth floor…Nothing too serious, I hope?”

“It was a formidable battleground to be sure…but thanks to your potions and elixirs, we were able to pull through by the skin of our teeth. Well, there was the antivenin, too, of course.”

“Your magic potion helped me a lot as well! I cannot thank you enough!”

After Tione spoke, Lefiya added her own thoughts.

“It brings me nothing but joy to hear that my medicines were able to assist you.”

The warmhearted healer answered with another smile, her long silver hair fluttering. Her delicate, doll-like features softened at the news that Aiz and the others had escaped unharmed.

Then, all of a sudden.

Her eyes turned toward Tione, almost as though she’d just noticed something.

“Miss Tione…is something wrong?”

“…You can tell?”

“I am a healer, after all.”

What with the countless sick and injured patients Amid had treated in the past, it was all too easy for her keen eyes to notice the change in the girl’s pallor. The fact that the rest of her friends had not noticed anything yet was further proof of Amid’s skills as a healer.

Tione brought a finger up to scratch lightly at her cheek. “It’s not really, you know, a big thing…I had a bad dream is all. You don’t have anything that might help me sleep better, do you?”

“I see. Perhaps I can recommend some Argelica Root, as it promotes restful sleep.”

“Thanks…Uh, would you mind keeping this from Aiz and the others? Especially that idiot?”

Tione spoke in a low voice while the girl behind the long counter responded with a kind smile.

“Whaaatcha guys doin’, huh?” The aforementioned idiot came bounding over when she noticed the two’s conversation.

“Merely discussing the details for an exchange of drop items,” Amid answered dutifully before moving on to a new topic. “I assume all of you are quite busy again today, yes?”

“Yup, yup! After this, I’m headin’ over to Goibniu Familia so I can get my Urga fixed up. You’re comin’, too, aren’t ya, Tione?”

“Yeah. I ran out of spares for my Zolas…and I could definitely use some more Filuka throwing knives.”

“Will you be going as well, Miss Aiz?”

“Yes, I need them to take a look at my Desperate…”

The first order of business was turning in magic stones and drop items, but the second would be repair (or replacement) of their weapons and armor. For as many times as they’d done it now, it still always felt like a mountain of things needed doing after they returned from an expedition. Even as Amid gathered materials and replenished the supply of items from across the counter, Aiz and the others were already focused on the great many other tasks they still had yet to do.

“Now that you mention it, didn’t Loki leave the manor with us, too? I wonder what she could be up to,” Tione mused, almost to herself.

“She said she had an errand to run, I believe…”

“Probably gettin’ the goods for the big bash tonight, yeah?”

Lefiya offered her own thoughts on the matter, as did the younger Amazon with an accompanying belly laugh. The conversation made Aiz think back to earlier that morning, when she’d seen Loki exit the manor before disappearing almost immediately.

It almost seemed like…something was wrong? she thought with a curious cock of her head, her gaze traveling nonchalantly toward the ceiling.

“Oh? All alone, are you?”

“Aizuu and the others are all busy settlin’ matters now that the expedition is over.”

The man who had been waiting for Loki inside the room had a regal demeanor about him, almost like the prince of some well-to-do nation. His elven servant accompanied him.

They were in a certain high-class establishment somewhere in the Shopping District. This bar and its soundproof room had become the “usual spot” for their secret talks.

Loki pulled out a chair from the round table before thumping herself down across from Dionysus.

“Where’s our mutual friend?”

“Not back yet, it seems. Rumor has it he was seen heading for the Dungeon…but he’s sent some of his followers in his stead.” Dionysus directed his gaze toward the wall where a young chienthrope girl stood. She responded with a nod and a stiff smile. Next to her, a sizable war tiger let out a sigh.

“He went to the Dungeon all right. Pushed himself on Finn and my guys on the eighteenth floor, too. Y’think he’s okay? He didn’t up and die down there, did he?”

“Well, seein’ as our blessing’s still alive and well, I know I’m not worrying…And even then, he’s always seemed like the type you can’t quite kill. Before I know it, he’ll be back, laughin’ all the way. Asfi’s with him, after all.”

The chienthrope, Lulune, spoke up from her spot by the wall, her voice trembling from hesitation and nervousness. Forced to join them in this meeting, she could only let out a string of strained chuckles as she expressed her (albeit questionable) faith in her patron deity.

Those in the room were already fully aware of Hermes and company’s unannounced sojourn upon Loki Familia’s base camp down on the eighteenth floor. What they didn’t know was why, despite the rest of the party returning to the surface the day prior, he and the others had chosen to stay behind.

“Now that you’re here, why don’t we move to the subject at hand?”

But Loki and the others had gathered for one thing and one thing only—to formulate a plan of attack to deal with the organization threatening their city. Namely, the remnants of the Evils, along with the vibrantly colored monsters and their strange “creature” friends that dwelled underground. It was to fight back against this city destroyer “Enyo,” the mysterious puppet master controlling the strings, that Loki, Dionysus, and Hermes had formed this alliance of theirs in the first place. They had plenty of reasons to sniff them out, too, from a thirst for revenge to debts in need of repayment.

And now that the core of Loki Familia’s strength had returned from their expedition, the alliance was ready to launch a full-scale attack.

“Well, whether we agree or not, our next course of action’s already been pretty much decided, yeah? We’ve gotta find it…the second entrance to the Dungeon.”

Their enemies’ movements left them with only one explanation: Another entrance to the Dungeon besides the one found within Babel Tower.

There was no doubt that there was a secret passage somewhere—a tunnel that would allow someone to transport monsters to the surface away from the prying eyes of the Guild and its adventurers.

“You are, of course, correct. But before we get to that…surely you were able to make some progress in your own investigation after your followers’ expedition, yes? They did descend to the Dungeon’s depths, which is where those delightfully colored monsters are known to spawn,” Dionysus pointed out.

Every eye in the room went to Loki.

The goddess remained quiet for a moment, narrow eyes widening ever so slightly as she surveyed the reactions of those around her, before she spoke.

“Seems like there was some sorta fallen spirit. Strong enough to give even my Finn and his crew a run for their money. And from what we can gather, our enemy apparently wants to summon this thing…to the surface.”

The “her” all the creatures kept referring to was none other than the corrupted spirit.

A messenger of the gods, devoured time and time again by the monsters of the depths but who continued to live, constantly changing its form. The crystal-orb fetuses were at the core of everything. They were products of “her,” just like the creatures, and they used the viola flowers as arms to collect magic stones in order to evolve into demi-spirits.

All with the main goal of eventually being summoned to the world above.

A gargantuan demi-spirit unleashed beneath the open sky, completely decimating the city of Orario—the Dungeon’s “lid.”

—“I will destroy Orario.”

That was what Olivas Act had proclaimed down in the pantry on the twenty-fourth floor. His words ran through the minds of Hermes’s and Dionysus’s followers who happened to be present for the current conversation. Lulune’s face paled, and something caught in her throat as the young war tiger’s eyes widened in surprise. Filvis glanced toward her patron deity, too, as she attempted to suppress her own feelings.

Dionysus brought his hand to his face with a quiet sigh as he digested the hypothetical scenario. He was silent for a moment, then raised his head, glass-like eyes distorting.

“Then we need to find it posthaste…not only the second entrance but this crystal orb as well,” he said slowly, the weighty timbre of his voice filling the ears of those in the room. The glow from the magic-stone lanterns reflected off the deep-purple wine atop the table, creating a bewitching display of light.

The other deities’ followers didn’t make a sound. Loki let her chair creak back and forth in a show of bad form as she began to respond.

“…Yeah, but…why do me ’n’ my guys have to take all the responsibility, huh? You’re givin’ us the hard stuff.”

“Ha-ha-ha, no worries. Have no fear, for I will lend my aid as well. But there is such a thing as ‘the right man in the right place,’ no?”

Dionysus replied with a laugh, forgetting his soberingly serious expression when he saw Loki’s eyes that seemed to say, Don’t bullshit me, and he met her half-lidded glare with a flash of sparkling pearly whites.

The thinly veiled battle between the will of two deities was enough to send a pang through Lulune’s stomach as she thought, Awww I wanna go hooome and tears welled in her eyes. Once again, the war tiger next to her sighed, present only because Lulune herself had tearfully begged him to accompany her.

Filvis, on the other hand, stood beside her god with her eyes closed, silently watching over the proceedings.

“…Well, whatever. Too far in to back out now, as the sayin’ goes. Where d’ya think we should start searchin’, huh? I mean, I know we’ll prolly end up havin’ to search everything with a fine-tooth comb, but there’s gotta be someplace that’s especially suspicious for us to start—”

“—I, erm…About that…Lord Hermes actually, uh, asked us to tell you all something after he came back from his trip…just in case he wasn’t able to make it to this meeting…”

Lulune suddenly butted in with a nervous raise of her hand.

Loki’s brows furrowed.

Not this again…

But even as the annoyed thought crossed Loki’s mind, Dionysus let out a laugh.

“I already know what you’re going to say, and don’t worry, Loki. I don’t believe this should be of any concern for you. In fact, you might find yourself pleasantly surprised.”

“?”

At Loki’s dubious look, Dionysus’s face hardened.

“There is, however, something you should be worried about. Loki, I’d like you to leave the search to us. In the meantime, I’d appreciate it if you would take care of another task.”

That night.

Around the time dusk began to blanket the sky, a strange commotion was working its way into every nook and cranny of the city.

News of Loki Familia’s post-expedition feat—Bete’s, Tiona’s, and Tione’s ascent to Level 6—was making the rounds. In their love of frivolity, the gods of Orario hadn’t even waited for the official Guild proclamation, disseminating the news across the entire city at blinding speed.

“I heard Loki Familia’s on par with Freya Familia and the Warlord now.”

“I heard they surpassed them.”

“Well, I heard they’re now the leading familia in all of Orario.”

The heated debate could be heard in every corner of every bar—arguments over which of Orario’s two leading familias was the strongest. Bards filled the streets with their songs—lyrics touting the feat of those brave first-tier adventurers. The gods naturally made merry with mirthful cries and loud laughter. The news also drew envious reactions from adventurers who could only dream and aspire to such greatness. Exuberant demi-human children ran about the streets in tattered capes and helmets fashioned from pots, pretending to be adventurers.

Loki Familia was the hot topic in Orario, the first ones to make it to the Dungeon’s fifty-ninth floor since the deities Zeus and Hera had so long ago. Once more, the blessed light of stars shone down on the city from above, the coveted seats of hero-hood beckoning the next generation of adventurers.

Gods, adventurers, and citizens alike celebrated the familia’s mighty deeds.

“Shall we toast, then? To another successful expedition—cheers!!”

Meanwhile, the familia in question was in the midst of its own celebration at a certain bar where their alcohol-loving patron deity had led them.

The Benevolent Mistress, to be specific—a little place down on West Main Street.

Its walls were filled to the brim with noisy patrons as a mighty clang of steins echoed through the air. Aiz raised her glass as well, though more like a skittish animal than anything else, quietly bringing the citrusy juice to her lips.

“Control yourself, Bete! You’re not getting drunk on my watch!” Riveria directed a warning look toward the werewolf.

“Hey, I’m always in control!” he shot back in annoyance.

“Lefiya! Mind if I have that meat you got over there?”

“O-of course, Miss Tiona! But…that’s your fifth piece already…”

“The food’s not showing any signs of stopping, so why worry? Ah, could I get a refill of this?”

Tiona was indulging even more than usual. Tione was helping herself freely to the food and drink as well while Lefiya simply shuddered.

“Heavens, Finn. We’ve not accounted for this kind of festivity in our budget.”

“Surely a party won’t break the bank, hmm? And if worse comes to worst, we can always appropriate a bit from Loki’s secret savings.”

As Gareth mused with a wary eye at all the revelry while nursing his large drink, Finn merely laughed.

“Hey! I heard that!…And I don’t give a damn! Hey, everyone! Everything’s on me tonight, so go wild!” Loki announced, face already a brilliant red.

“Yahooo!!” The celebratory cries from Raul and the other familia members practically shook the roof.

Obeying their goddess’s wishes, they continued to order more—frothy ales and the house’s specialty fruit wines—and drain every cask. The table was lined with colorful vegetables, cheesy quiches, baked fish, and thick steaks. Tiona’s tongue was restless as the waiters brought them out one after another. The waiters themselves, the cat people in particular, could only let out harried mewls as their eyes darted this way and that.

Loki Familia’s wild celebration was even attracting the attention of other patrons. Customers seated at neighboring tables showed curious astonishment as they watched the group.

Sensing the attention (and feeling very much like a beautiful flower drawing the interest of the surrounding bees), even the normally impassive Aiz found herself enjoying the party.

“Miss Aiz, would you like me to get you some food?”

“It’s fine, really…Thank you, Lefiya.”

“…Is…something wrong? You look as though you’ve got something on your mind.”

“?”

“You were staring off into space…B-but I apologize if my assumption is incorrect!”

Aiz found herself taken aback by Lefiya’s observation.

Her mind really had drifted somewhere else.

A cluster of voices rose up above the others from farther within the room.

“Syr! Lyu’s back!” “Lyu?!” “What are you girls yapping about? Get back to work!!”

As the owner and her waitresses shouted back and forth, Aiz’s thoughts, however, were focused on the information she’d received about Bell and his party only a short while ago.

Earlier, sometime between the start of the celebration and around the time she finished exchanging materials then dropping off her weapon for repair, Aiz had made the rounds, informing the few acquaintances she had outside the familia of her safe return from the expedition. Just as she’d been about to thank Lulune for the portable rations the girl had given her, she’d been updated on Hermes’s and the others’ return. Bell and his party had been with them.

She still didn’t know why he’d chosen to remain behind on the eighteenth floor and not join the rearguard on their return to the surface, but hearing that he’d made it back was enough to bring her relief. Unfortunately, however, it seemed that something had happened on their return trek, as he’d looked considerably worse for the wear upon appearing from Babel’s entrance.

Maybe I’ll…check up on him tomorrow…Ah, but I don’t even know where his familia’s home is…

Her brows furrowed in concern. Tiona’s and everyone’s raucous voices buzzed in her ear as the strange lack of any concrete information on Hestia Familia’s whereabouts weighed upon her mind.

“Oh, right! Tomorrow we’re gonna make a trip outside the city!” Loki suddenly declared, red-faced and ever so slightly unhinged.

“Oh? What’s all this out of the blue?”

Riveria, ever the voice of the whole familia, raised the question as she regarded their goddess suspiciously. Around her, the rest of the familia sported weak smirks and looks of exasperation.

Loki, however, just smiled complacently as she looked out across her followers.

“The expedition’s over, yeah? So I thought we could have ourselves a little vacation! You know, some R&R!”

“Huh? A trip? That sounds fun!” Tiona piped up, only for Bete to immediately shoot her down.

“You’re not seriously believing her, are you? Idiot…”

“What’d you call me?!”

The Amazon snapped back angrily, but it was just as the werewolf had said—Loki’s explanation was hard for any of them to swallow. While this wouldn’t be the first time their patron deity had made a similarly offhand proclamation, whenever she did, it usually signified something was about to happen.

This time, too, everyone was already bracing themselves for whatever it was the trickster goddess was planning. Finn, on the other hand, simply smiled, as if already aware of her true motives.

“Where in blazes are we goin’?” Gareth finally popped the question.

“Well…I’m not gonna go into too much detail here, but…” Loki prefaced with an upward quirk of her lips. “Let’s just say it’s right outside the city. Port Meren, to be exact.”

CHAPTER 2

PORT MEREN

Meren was a port city to the southwest of Orario.

With only about three kirlo between the two, it was no more than a hop, skip, and a jump from one city to the other. It served as Orario’s portal to the sea due to its proximity to the banks of Lolog Lake, a large brackish body of water that led to the ocean.

Day after day, countless ships from countries all over the world made port in the city’s harbor, dropping off their hefty loads of cargo. The majority of the goods would be further transported into Orario as imports. In fact, just about everything that eventually made its way to Orario’s marketplaces was first gathered together in Meren. The sea route’s ability to transport large quantities of goods was one of its key advantages, and Orario, too, was no stranger to using it for its own exports. The city had long made use of the port as its go-between for exchanging its world-renowned magic-stone goods for foreign imports.

Needless to say, Port Meren was an important point in Orario’s oceanic ventures.

“Wa-hah! I haven’t been here in forever!”

Just as Loki had informed them the night prior, Aiz and the others of Loki Familia had made their way to the port city. Tiona cried out boisterously from the middle of the great sloping street connecting the port with the bay. Though Aiz didn’t react as drastically, she also found herself rather in awe when looking past the crowds of people at the vast lake and countless ships moored there.

“Seriously. How many years has it been?”

A smile appeared on Tione’s face as she checked out the port.

“I don’t think I’ve been here since before I even started heading into the Dungeon!” Tiona responded with a happy laugh.

Much like how many goods made their way through the port city, quite a few people bound for Orario did as well. Those already on the continent could make their way to the Labyrinth City by traveling along its northern and eastern roads, but travelers from the Far East or various island and ocean nations first needed to pass through Meren. Tiona and Tione had made that very trip many years ago.

Only Aiz and a few others found themselves entranced by the surrounding scenery. Most of the group reacted similarly to Tiona and Tione—with a sort of nostalgic excitement.

“Check out this huge dodobass! I know they sell ’em in the city, too, but I’ve never seen one this big!” Tiona’s eager shouts continued as she spotted a gargantuan fish on display in one of the nearby shops. This one boasted a length of well over one meder.

“It seems fish undergo the same development as monsters…”

True to Lefiya’s words, the fish’s enormous warped scales certainly did make it look more like a monster than a fish. Most likely, it had evolved as such to ensure it didn’t become prey to those same monsters. Dodobass weren’t the only sea creatures available, either—shrimp, crab, and a whole assortment of other seafood could be seen for sale in shops, most so fresh they were still alive (something unseen outside of port cities).

The road lined with stone buildings was bustling with activity as foreigners, merchants, and fishermen milled about. Off to the side of the road were carpets laid out with rare fineries and tents lined with fish, snails, and other fresh seafood, all of them filled with the haggling voices of prospective buyers. This small snapshot of Meren—the bazaar-like atmosphere, the tanned skin of the fishermen and merchants, and the salty aroma wafting in on the breeze—was enough to make it clear that this was truly a seaside city.

“You came through here when you got to Orario, too, right, Lefiya?”

“I did, yes. Back when I was a student, my friends and I would come to this port often.”

“Really? Then you know any good restaurants? You gotta take us to one!”

Tiona latched onto the young elf’s back as she responded.

Despite Lefiya’s surprise at the sudden attack, she, too, felt a giddy excitement building inside her, as did the rest of the group. Bright smiles appeared on all their faces as they made their way down the road, eyes flitting back and forth around the environs and its endless distractions.

Aiz brought a hand to her chest.

I don’t remember this lake…nor this city…

Her own memories of ceaseless fighting with monsters were rusted with the blood of her many victims, so she couldn’t be sure whether she’d visited this city before or not. The Dungeon was everything she knew, leaving nothing behind but a vague feeling that she’d once been outside Orario.

…But this smell…I feel like I know it…

Somewhere in the back of her mind, the lake’s unique smell tickled her memories.

The humid breeze brushing past her was something she could never have felt when she was surrounded by the great walls of Orario. It had a gentle aroma, saltier than fresh water but not as strong as the sea, and it wrapped her in a warm embrace.

Her eyes narrowed instinctively as the wind played with the golden strands of her hair.

“Is something wrong, Aiz? You’re rather quiet over there, though you seem happy,” Riveria prodded her, the only one who’d noticed the Sword Princess’s spellbound expression.

“…Have you ever been to this city before, Riveria?”

“I have, yes.” The high elf nodded. “Once before I arrived in Orario and a few times after, as well. Though some believe the smell of this lake is trying on a forest elf’s nose…I’m actually quite fond of it. When I first laid eyes on this scenery, it seemed so different from the confining village in which I was raised—it was exhilarating.” A soft smile graced her lips as she looked out across the lake, toward the horizon and the glimmer of the far-off sea.

Hearing this, Aiz couldn’t help but think of everything she’d heard about Riveria’s past—how she’d left her elven home in hopes of broadening her world and discovering the unknown, similar to how Finn had hopes of restoring the pride of the prum race.

The first time she’d met Finn and the others was when she’d strong-armed her way into Loki Familia with such force, Loki herself had described it as “making a deal with the devil,” apparently leading to countless days of contention. Her journey to Orario had been far more than the “simple trip” she’d originally described it as.

All of this, however, would mean that Riveria, too, had experienced a great many wonders as she made her way to the city. Her longing to discover the unknown, her curious heart—everything about her had the makings of an adventurer, and today she was every bit a citizen of the great dungeon city of Orario. Having said that, even she herself had remarked at one point that she’d like to see it all again—to traverse the world a second time.

The sudden memory of this stole Aiz’s thoughts, her mind questioning what she would do if Riveria were to leave.

As improbable as it seemed, she found herself imagining what such a future would be like…and the resulting pang of heartache, like a child unwilling to leave her mother, brought an embarrassed flush to her cheeks.

“What’re y’all hangin’ about for, huh? C’mon! The sea is…I mean, the lake is callin’ us!” Loki shouted joyfully from her spot at the front of the group. This was in spite of the fact that she herself was contributing the most to this “hanging about.”

“Sometimes I really wonder about her…” Tione muttered wearily.

But continue behind her they did, and as Aiz watched her patron deity humming and strolling along in front of her, her thoughts drifted back to the night prior and the events that had led them here.

“We’ve gotta find that second entrance to the Dungeon, and the first place we’re gonna look is Port Meren,” Loki had announced from within Twilight Manor’s large dining hall once everyone had returned from the party.

“Meren’s that little port city just outside of town, isn’t it? How come we’re not searchin’ inside the city itself, huh?” Tiona questioned from her spot next to Aiz at one of the hall’s many tables.

Most of the other familia members, however, ignored her question, instead reacting as if they understood perfectly.

“Tiona, do you know how marine life-forms first emerged on the surface?” Finn turned toward the girl.

“Erm, well…from beneath…Babel?”

“And how are they going to do that? Grow legs and walk? You idiot!”

Tione immediately balked when her sister answered with a curious finger to her chin.

Riveria was much more amiable in her explanation.

“We’ve always been told that the hole directly beneath Babel was the only entrance to the Dungeon…but that’s not, in fact, correct. There exists another tunnel outside Orario—one that connects to the waterfront and through which the aquatic monsters of the deep can reach the surface.”

“And that’s…Meren,” Aiz finished the thought for her.

“There’s a hole that leads to the Dungeon’s lower levels right below our noses—in Lolog Lake. It’s how the water beasties make their way to the surface. Seems no one even knew it existed ere the gods’ descent,” Gareth added.

“Really? Whoa! I never knew!” Tiona exclaimed somewhat obtusely, garnering another look of disbelief from her sister.

“About fifteen years ago, the familias of Zeus and Hera worked together with Poseidon Familia to close up the hole at the bottom of the lake, making it impossible for any more monsters to use it as a path to the surface…or, at least, that’s what everyone thought,” Finn began as his green eyes turned toward Loki.

The recent activities of Levis and the Evils, however, strongly hinted that the hole may have been reopened. While it wasn’t a sure bet…the mere possibility that the violas and other vibrantly colored monsters were being transported via the hole at the bottom of the lake was one they couldn’t ignore.

“While investigating wouldn’t do any harm, I personally feel it’s a bit unwarranted…” Riveria added her thoughts on the matter, closing one of her eyes.

“Same. I’ve got two words—im-possible! You all saw those things on the twenty-fourth floor, right?” Bete piped up in agreement.

Next to him, Aiz and Lefiya exchanged glances, both of their thoughts traveling to the situation back in the twenty-fourth floor’s pantry.

It was there that they’d seen all those violas trapped in cages by the Evils’ remnants. While it certainly wouldn’t be impossible for associates of the Evils to transport them all the way down to the lower levels and release them into the water…it was still a bit far-fetched.

“I get what you’re tryin’ to say—I do! But accordin’ to Dionysus, some new, never-before-seen species of monster was just sighted off the coast of Meren…some kinda nasty snake thingie. Real ugly green color, too.”

The color drained from every face in the room at the news.

A “nasty snake thingie” and an “ugly green color”…That could mean only one thing—carnivorous violas.

As the group shared worried glances, Finn opened his mouth.

“In light of this news, I believe we’ve no choice but to investigate. If anything, we should be able to uncover some sort of clue.”

His proposition was met with unanimous support.

Thus, it was decided that Loki Familia would travel to Port Meren.

“But don’t we need permission from the Guild to go outside the city? The procedure is actually, uh, pretty annoying. Not sure we’d be able to finish things up in time to leave tomorrow.”

Tione was resting her chin somewhat dejectedly in her hands as she pointed this out.

Orario’s biggest fear or, in this case, the Guild’s biggest fear, was losing their first-tier adventurers. Aside from a few special cases, they weren’t allowed to leave the city whenever they pleased, and the process to obtain permission was nothing short of exasperating. Not only that, it could take as many as a few days for the paperwork to get finalized.

“Never fear! I already got permission!” Loki quickly asserted.

“…You’re kidding.”

“No, I’m serious! Delivered the form to ol’ Ouranos himself! Well, it’s mostly ’cause I made a big scene at the service counter. But I wrote specifically in hieroglyphics ‘We’re investigatin’ the violas. Don’t get in our way!’ so it’s all good.”

The goddess laughed triumphantly as Tione’s chin slid off her hands in disbelief.

At any rate, for whatever reason, whether barring them permission would raise suspicion or he actually wanted to use Loki Familia to solve this whole problem with the violas, the Guild leader had acquiesced to their request to leave the city.

As Loki proudly waved around the scroll with the Guild’s seal on it, even Finn found the corners of his lips curling upward.

“She must’ve obtained it earlier today after she left the mansion with us…”

“B-but still! Don’t you think this is all happening a little too quickly?”

Tiona offered her thoughts, and Lefiya was quick to respond.

“…You don’t trust her?” Aiz spoke up as well.

“It’s a little suspicious…” Tione finished. All four at the table felt a very real sense of foreboding sweep over them.

Everyone in the familia was more than used to their patron deity’s bizarre nature, but even as their caution rose, Loki never lost her wide smile.

“So! Will you and the other guys hold down the fort while we’re gone, Finn?”

“What?!”

“Aiz and the other gals plus little ol’ me want a few nights to ourselves. Wouldn’t want any men around to bother us, ya know.”

She continued rather teasingly, completely ignoring cries of injustice coming from Bete and the other men.

“What the hell?! You better have a damn good explanation for this!” Bete roared.

“What?” Loki shrugged him off. “We can’t just leave the manor unattended, can we? Who knows what could happen! But we already decided to go to Meren, sooooooo. Plus, I reassured the Guild that I’d leave at least half the familia behind.”

“That’s not what I’m askin’, you cow! Why do only the girls get to go, huh?!”

“Oh, right. Finn. I also want you to keep an eye on Dionysus and the others, okay? Always givin’ me the grunt work—would be nice if I had something to hold over him. Also, I don’t trust Hermes at all, sneakin’ around all the time.”

“LISTEN TO ME, WOMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN!!” Bete was practically fuming at this point. Raul and the others braced themselves while Finn could only sigh alongside his fellow elites as the familia’s women watched everything unfold in weary silence.

Aiz, Tiona, Tione, and Lefiya exchanged glances among themselves. It would seem their lady-only investigation in Port Meren was about to begin.

“We really were the only ones who got to come…Ughh, I wish the captain was here…” Tione grumbled to herself, surrounded by the hustle and bustle of Meren’s streets.

“Ah-ha-ha…” Lefiya forced a somewhat awkward laugh. True enough, the only ones allowed to join the investigation at the port had been Loki Familia’s women.

The womanizing goddess had invited her pride and joy—gorgeous elves, an elegant catgirl, an adorable human—making for a sight that attracted the notice of the surrounding crowd. Aiz and Riveria in particular garnered quite a lot of male attention with their beauty that rivaled even goddesses.

“Now then! We should be reaching the harbor right about now…”

Loki continued along aimlessly, still refusing to tell them exactly where they were going. The large pack on her back—a pack that she refused to allow anyone else to carry—was stuffed to the brim with an apparently “secret” item.

Under the dubious gazes of her followers, she finally cut through the crowd and made her way toward the harbor proper.

“Ah! It truly is a sight to behold!” Lefiya gasped in awe upon seeing the grand port up close. Its docks were bustling with sailors, their heads wrapped in towels for a truly “seaman” look, and all around them ships had laid anchor along the marina.

They bobbed and lilted in the pure breeze below a blue sky—sailboats of all shapes and sizes, more than they could count. And in the middle towered the merchant ships, so tall you had to crane your neck just to see them in their entirety. Every one of them found their gazes stolen by these seaworthy masterpieces, Aiz included.

“You’ve fallen in love with the ships, huh, Aiz?”

“Yes, they’re…amazing.”

Tiona asked her question with a laugh, arms behind her head. Aiz surveyed the breathtaking view, watching in fascination as one of the mighty vessels pulled out of the harbor.

The arc-shaped port city wrapped around the banks of the brackish lake was so alive with activity, it nearly put Orario to shame. Brawny seamen lugged crates and barrels down from their ships where horse-drawn carriages carted everything away to locations unknown. Passenger ships unloaded their cargo of people—everything from finely dressed elves to traveling animal people making their way down the wooden bridge connecting the ship’s deck with the dock below.

Beyond the dock itself, the wide expanse of Lolog Lake was a sight to behold. Big enough that its opposite bank remained hidden along the hazy horizon, it could easily have been mistaken for the sea itself, spread out beneath a swath of fluffy white clouds. As the radiant sun reflected off its surface, it glittered the same brilliant blue as Lefiya’s eyes.

Amid the scent of the water drifting in on the breeze, the seagulls cawing in the distance, and the cries of the sailors going about their business, even closing one’s eyes couldn’t diminish the feeling of standing on the threshold between land and sea. It was a different experience from the unknown discoveries they made deep within the Dungeon. As Aiz felt her mind and body grow calm, she found herself at a loss for words.

“Over here, y’all!”

Aiz and the others followed the sound of their patron deity’s voice toward the southern wharf.

Loki herself wove her way through the mountains of casks and cargo until she seemed to find what she was looking for—and raised her voice to meet the figure in her sights.

“Hey, Njörðr!”

“Hmm? Well, I’ll be. If it isn’t Loki!”

The god who turned around was a finely built specimen. His brown hair was pulled back in a ponytail that dangled from the back of his head, and the smile he gave the group exuded a sort of calming warmth despite the virile gallantry of his features. He was about the same height as Bete, and his upper half was bare, revealing a muscular chest and arms. His physique was one not often seen in the streets of Orario. For Aiz and the others, their first impression of him said that this fellow carrying a fishing net slung over his shoulder was unmistakably a man of the sea.

“Feels like just yesterday we last saw each other. How many years has it been? Or should I say, how many decades?”

“Well, considerin’ our scale of time, a few years feels like a blink of an eye. You forget to catch up and suddenly it’s been half a century. I really did mean to visit more often! On my honor!”

“You lie the same, too.”

Njörðr laughed as sweat glistened on his pearly white skin. The strange fact that no part of him was tanned proved he was a deity. His shorts stopped at the knees to reveal two shapely legs that looked as though the sea itself had washed them clean.

As he put down his fishing net and walked over to Loki with an amiable smile, the long-standing relationship the two shared was clear.

“Seems you’re doing fine, too, Riveria. Word of your fame reaches even beyond the walls of the city.” The carefree god shifted his attention to the nearby high elf.

“There’s no need for flattery, Njörðr. It does nothing but swell one’s pride.”

Riveria responded with a small smile.

“Lady Riveria, are you and this god acquaintances?” Lefiya asked somewhat timidly.

“He did much for me before I came to live in Orario. He’s a friend of Loki’s from the heavens. Surely you have heard of Njörðr Familia and their famed sea products, yourself?”

“Oh, yeah!”

“Now that you mention it…”

Tiona and Tione piped up as even Aiz’s face mellowed in realization.

Besides its important role in trade, the port of Meren was also famous for its fishing industry, with a fourth of its area devoted to the craft. The ones in charge of the business were none other than Njörðr Familia.

The familia itself was made up of a system of fisheries, prevalent mostly in cities along the coast. This included, of course, Lolog Lake but also the ocean it flowed into. The large catches Njörðr’s followers brought in from the water were sold not only in Meren’s shops but also in Orario, bringing a fresh taste of the sea to the city. Both Njörðr Familia and Demeter Familia, the latter with its rich agricultural industry, had long histories of supplying food to the Labyrinth City.

“What brings you here, then? You even brought the whole family along, though I see that Finn and Gareth are missing. Quite the bag you’ve got, too…” Njörðr shot Loki’s bulging backpack a dubious look as the fishermen around them continued their work.

Loki just grinned. “I’m actually on a bit of a treasure hunt. But I decided to have some fun while I’m at it. To that end, I was hopin’ I might ask ya a question or two.”

“And what might those questions be?”

“You’re pretty familiar with this area, yeah? I mean, obviously…”

The two deities continued their huddled chat, faces close. Aiz and the others standing nearby could catch only a few phrases here and there—“A ‘hidden gem’ kinda place,” “Somewhere nobody else knows about, yeah,” “A real paradise, if you know what I mean…!”

Njörðr threw a suspicious glance at Loki’s bag and her pack of followers, apparently inferring what the goddess was up to before leaning in to whisper in her ear.

Loki responded with a series of nods, the smile on her face growing with every word.

“Amazing! Thanks, Njörðr! I’ll tell ya all about it later, yeah?”

“You’re sure I can’t join you—?”

“No can do!” Loki promptly turned down the other god before spinning around to call out to her followers. “Got everything I needed to know! Let’s skedaddle!”

As the excitement in their patron deity’s voice neared its climax, so did the sense of foreboding everyone was feeling.

Following Njörðr’s recommendation, the group headed even farther south, putting distance between themselves and the city proper. They stopped when they reached a small alcove, hidden from sight in the shadows of the surrounding trees and rocks.

“Oh, wow! The sand is so white!”

“It’s a beautiful beach. And here I’d always thought the port was nothing but rocks and cliffs…”

“It’s gorgeous…”

Tiona, Tione, and Aiz couldn’t hide their wonder at the view of the sandy white hills spreading before their eyes.

It was a fairly sizable inlet just off the side of the lake’s banks, completely surrounded by towering trees and giant boulders. Cliffs scraped the sky to either side while the beach itself was devoid of life—a true “hidden gem” if they’d ever seen one.

The sound of gentle waves lapping at the sand drew them in like moths to a flame. None of them could keep the smiles off their faces as they took in the sight of the sculpted coastline.

“All righty then! I brought y’all a change of clothes!!”

The squawking voice of their goddess put a stop to their appreciation of the beauty.

She’d struck a strange pose, as if she’d been waiting for just this moment, and was now riffling through her pack and exposing its contents.

—Long, long ago, when the gods had first descended from the heavens, they’d brought with them culture and inventions to impart upon the peoples of the world below. Among those inventions was a set of things commonly referred to as the Three Sacred Treasures.

Despite “three” being included in their name, their numbers actually varied depending on the race or cultural sphere in question. They included everything from special ears one could wear to make one look like an animal person, elastic spats popular even among adventurers, bloomers, stockings, sailor uniforms…the list went on, oftentimes instigating debates over which of the inventions should actually be considered “sacred treasures” (and occasionally even resulting in bloodshed). Even to this day, the heated debate between those who sought the truth—people whose eyes had been opened after the desecration of a god—refused to die down.

There did, however, exist one treasure that not a single soul in all the world would deny.

And that was the bikini.

“So this is the real reason we came to Meren…”

Aki lamented, red-faced, as she used both her hands to cover her chest and belly, where the skin was bare thanks to the ridiculously skimpy bits of cloth her patron deity had forced her into.

The slender tail poking out from her rear lilted back and forth as she and her fellow familia members came out from behind some nearby rocks after all of them had changed into similar attire. They were now hiding themselves behind their hands. Aside from their chests and hip areas, every bit of the blushing maidens’ skin was exposed to the brilliant sun overhead.

“Even after all those baths we took down on the eighteenth floor…”

“…Somehow this is still more embarrassing!”

Lefiya and Leene awkwardly swayed back and forth.

The majority of them had been forced into two-piece suits, and the size of the bottom halves only added to their shame. Lefiya’s still-developing breasts formed a graceful valley that peeked out of her suit’s top, the lower half (complete with short miniskirt) snug against the smooth curves of her bottom.

“You carried that big bag of bikinis all the way here…?”

Alicia raised the question. She wore a one-piece suit that made her turn a brilliant shade of red that spread all the way to the tips of her long, pointed ears. Nearby, her patron deity was eyeing the elf’s fully developed body with a sense of satisfaction.

“Whoa! Wooow! This is amazing! Bodies glistening in the sun! Is this paradise?!”

The womanizing goddess’s excitement was reaching its peak. Though Loki had denied her true motives for investigating the lake, it was clear as day to her followers what was most important in her mind. Fist raised toward the sky in triumph, her bloodshot eyes examined every detail of the embarrassed and incredibly uncomfortable girls and their bodies.

“Hey! Where’s Riveria? Where’s my darling, adorable little Riveria, huh?!”

“She’s frozen behind that rock, still holding her suit…”

“Whaaaaat? C’mon, I need to see the goods! Hurry up or I’ll put that thing on for ya!”

“—You will do no such thing!!” “Stop right there!” “You’ll not defile Lady Riveria!!” The elves in the group were to their feet immediately, racing toward Loki as she dashed to the rock where Riveria was paralyzed. With Alicia in the lead, the elves sent the goddess facedown into the sand.

“Guwwagh!!” Loki yelped, though her cry of surprise quickly devolved into a bout of lascivious laughter at the sensation of naked skin pressing against her from all sides.

Meanwhile, just as Lefiya had described, Riveria remained as still as a statue behind the rocky outcrop, risqué outfit clutched between her hands.

…Th-they’re not lying…It really is embarrassing…Aiz thought, eyes traveling down the length of her bikini-clad body as she blushed.

It was a white two-piece, similar to the others aside from the long pareu-style skirt dangling from her bottom half.

She’d put up a fight, too, when Loki had first coerced her into wearing her standard battle attire, but even that didn’t hold a candle to the shameful bits of cloth she’d been forced into now—even if no one besides her familia was present.

Rubbing her naked arms uncomfortably, she mentally thanked no one in particular for the fact that the men hadn’t been allowed to join.

“M-M-M-M-Miss Aiz in a bikini…?!”

“Wooow!” “I knew she’d look good in that!” “Nice!” “I’m jealous!”

There were many compliments once Aiz emerged a few moments after the others. And not only from Lefiya, either—her smooth skin, slender frame, and shapely breasts left the group agape in awe.

It was also enough to make Little Aiz inside her, dressed in a tiny swimsuit, dizzy from the attention. As her cheeks grew redder, she found her eyes dropping toward the ground, unable to meet the gazes of her normally indifferent peers.

“You and your sister don’t feel the least bit embarrassed…do you?” Aki threw a glance in the direction of the two Amazonian sisters.

“Why would we? It’s not like it’s a big deal.”

“These aren’t even that different from what we usually wear!”

They responded nonchalantly. True to Tiona’s words, the blue bikinis they sported now showed no more skin than their normal battle gear. The feather-like cloth was so thin that it was practically see through, yet they felt no shame in baring copper-colored legs or ample chests.

Before long, Loki called out to them, having forsaken her quest to see Riveria suited up.

“All right, everybody! It’s time to put aside our work for a while and have some fun!! Instead of swimming in the ocean, swim in the lake! Some dearly needed relaxation for my battle-weary maidens!! Complete with wardrobe malfunctions, of course!!”

“As if!!”

The cry from the group of red-faced girls was unanimous.

No matter the reason behind it, the group of adventurers had certainly earned themselves some time in the sun, and they were going to take advantage of it.

“Mmm, salty! But I thought this wasn’t the ocean!” Tiona immediately took a running jump into the water. Shaking her head like a wet dog, she brought a hand up to wipe her bangs out of her eyes, clearly enjoying herself.

“M-Miss Tiona! How can you just jump in like that?”

“Easy peasy! Come on in, Lefiya!”

“I, well, here I goooooo!” Taken in by the innocent girl’s antics, the elf’s lips curled into a smile as she made her way across the white sand and into the water.

Though summer was a ways off and the water still had that mid-spring chill, the Dungeon-hardened adventurers rushed in en masse. They played in the waves and splashed one another, their laughing voices quickly filling the deserted inlet.

Jostling breasts, wriggling hips, hands reaching to fix bits of cloth that had gotten themselves wedged in a little too far—Loki, too, was having the time of her life as she watched the girls enjoying themselves in the lake waters.

“Beautiful. Just beautiful. I may not have the ocean, but I still got me a gaggle of bikini-clad girls to ogle…hee-hee-hee, the perfect combination!” She sighed.

“She really is a perverted old man…” Tione grumbled, not surprised in the least as she saw the drool bubbling out from between the goddess’s lips. She turned her eyes skyward. “I wonder if the southern kingdoms feel like this…” she murmured, her voice swallowed up by the never-ending sky.

It was almost as if the dazzling sun overhead was shining just for them and their private beach.

“…”

Meanwhile, Aiz had found herself a small corner of the beach and was currently idling about without much to do. Somehow, she looked less and less like the aloof Sword Princess and more like a small child hesitant to approach the white waves breaking on the sand.

“Miss Aiz! Would you like to join us?” Lefiya called out exuberantly once she noticed her seclusion.

“…Um…” Aiz’s gaze turned in the opposite direction of the sea-drenched elf.

Just past the beach, she could see the heads of the others in their group floating in the water. Even farther out, Tiona could be seen gliding cheerily back and forth among the waves.

It looked deep. Very deep.

“…I’m, uh…I’m fine…really…”

“?”

Lefiya cocked her head to the side in confusion at Aiz’s more hesitant than usual demeanor.

“Whassup, Aizuu? Don’t tell me you still can’t swim?” Loki approached the beached girl.

“Urk!” The goddess’s assumption was right on the money.

“…”

“You…can’t swim, Miss Aiz?!”

—This isn’t good!

Aiz’s behavior grew even more suspicious. The nervous flitting of her golden eyes gave away her secret.

Lefiya’s cry of surprise was enough to draw the attention of Tiona and Tione, who both made their way over, babbling excitedly. (“What is it? What is it?”) Their brows furrowed doubtfully upon first hearing Lefiya’s explanation but then softened in acute realization.

“You know, now that you mention it…”

“Even down in the Dungeon, she never got too close to the water…”

“And anytime it looked like she was about to fall into any, she’d just use her wind magic to kick herself off the surface…”

As Tiona and the others discussed the situation among themselves, Aiz gave a tiny gulp. Clasping her hands, she awkwardly rubbed her slender fingers against one another.

“…When I try to swim, I only…sink…” she finally uttered, red-faced and quiet as a mouse.

“Whaaaaaaaaaat? Really?!”

“You can’t be serious!”

“B-but you’ve never had a problem bathing in the Dungeon’s pools! Like down on the eighteenth floor, you seemed just fine…”

Tiona shouted with surprise, and Tione and Lefiya echoed her sentiment.

The reactions only increased Aiz’s discomfort. “I’m…fine if I can touch the floor…I just can’t…put my head under the water…” Her eyes fell to the ground as she felt shame well up inside her.

Lefiya couldn’t contain her shock. To think that the girl she’d adored for so long could have such a monumental weakness!

The Sword Princess, Aiz Wallenstein.

Sixteen years old…and a human anchor.

This was a result of her delving again and again into the Dungeon, focused on nothing but honing her combat skills.

“Heavens above! To think that ya still can’t swim. I woulda thought for sure you’d be able to by now after goin’ to the Dungeon’s beach floor so many times…Huh? Wait a second! This means—if I can get her in the water, I win! She’ll have no way to resist my advances when she’s struggling just to stay afloat! Prepare yourself, Aiz!” The boorish grin that accompanied Loki’s words was positively obscene. She promptly launched herself at the water-fearing girl—

“—gngh?!”

“Yeeeow!!”

—only for Aiz to respond in kind, her eyes glinting with sudden vehemence.

The full-force slap she inflicted upon her patron deity sent the goddess tumbling across the sand with an addled “Gwwuoooof?!”

Meanwhile, Tiona hurried over to Aiz’s side and grabbed her hands.

“How ’bout we teach you, then, Aiz?”

“Er, well…”

“Yeah! It’ll be a great opportunity for you to practice! It’ll only get worse if you keep putting it off, right?” Tione added with a smile.

“I—I will help as well, Miss Aiz!” Lefiya assured her enthusiastically.

“…Mmmmm…”

The pressure building, Aiz ultimately had no choice but to nod in agreement. And thus, though the heart of the girl in question was whirling in turmoil like a typhoon, the first-ever swimming lessons for the human anchor began.

“Why don’t we start by seeing just how bad you really are, hmm?”

“Could you walk just a little ways into the water for us, Aiz?”

“O-okay…” Voice trembling slightly, Aiz unwrapped the pareu from around her waist. Knowing that she had no choice but to accept her fate at this point, she set her jaw and tied her long golden hair up into a ponytail. With a sidelong glance at the other girls farther off who were now eyeing the situation curiously, she ever so slowly, ever so warily inched her way into the water until it reached the vicinity of her hips.

“If you just lie on your back, you’ll float. Give it a try, yeah?”

“…”

“Ohhh! She did it! She did it!”

“I knew you could, Miss Aiz!”

“There you go. See? It’s easy! Now let’s try putting your head in the water and using your arms and legs to move—”

“glug, glug, glug, glug…?!”

There was an almost inhuman noise as Aiz sank to the bottom of the lake.

“N-no way!!”

“That was so fast! She just disappeared!”

“T-Tiona, aren’t you going to save her?!” Tione asked fearfully as Lefiya and Tiona simply watched in shock.

That was enough to elicit the attention of the other familia members, causing everyone to rush into the lake with panicked screams. “Miss Aiz!!”

“It ain’t gonna work. The trauma from Riveria’s special training’s rooted too deep…”

“What did Riveria do to her?!”

Loki explained, having recovered but still boasting a leaf-shaped red mark on her cheek, and Tione responded with a shout forceful enough to send flecks of spit from her mouth.

The high elf in question, however, remained petrified behind her rock, still motionless with her hands on her suit.

“Talk to us, Aiz!” “Miss Aiz, are you all right?!”

“…I’m sorry…” Aiz mumbled as Tiona and Lefiya dragged her safely to shore. Her eyes spun, and her shoulders heaved with each breath.

Many of the other lower-level familia members had never seen their Sword Princess like this before, and the shocking scene was enough to elicit gulps of anxiety from the entire group.

They kept trying, having her attempt a few more back floats once she’d recovered, but nothing seemed to work. Every time she tried moving her feet, she sank straight to the bottom.

“This is even worse than I thought…” Tione bemoaned.

“But that’s exactly why she needs to practice!” Tiona this time.

“More than being afraid of the water…it’s almost like when the time comes for her to swim, she tenses up and completely loses it…”

“A reflex, then? Riveria really must have done a number on her…”

As the two Amazons lamented the situation, faces grim, Lefiya sympathetically rubbed Aiz’s back.

As for Aiz, her legs had given out beneath her, and she was currently supporting herself with both hands in the sand; she could only watch as Little Aiz inside her gurgled from deep below the water’s surface.

The other familia members who’d been watching the spectacle unfold began to gather around her.

“Hmm…how ’bout you practice with me, then, huh, Aiz? You can hold my hand!” Tiona suggested, reaching out to her.

“Um…okay…” If her friend was willing to do so much for her, then Aiz couldn’t just back down. Resolving herself, she took Tiona’s hand, and the two of them made their way back toward the water.

Tiona walked backward across the bottom of the lake, both hands clenched tightly in Aiz’s as she helped support the other girl in the water.

Slowly, slowly, with tiny little kicks like those of a small animal, Aiz began moving herself forward, determined to keep her head above water and remain afloat.

“No need to be so tense, Aiz. Yeah, yeah, there you go. That’s how you do it.”

“R-really?”

“Okay, I’m gonna let ya go now!”

“?!”

“One, two—”

“I’m not ready, I’m not ready, I’m not ready!”

“—three! Here you go!!”

“ghn?!”

The moment Tiona released her, Aiz began to writhe like a panicked rabbit. With a horrendous gurgling noise, she began to sink beneath the water.

Desperate now, she reached toward Tiona, somehow managing to clasp both arms tightly around the Amazon’s body. Pressed against her friend’s bosom, she simply trembled in fear, not unlike a frightened child.

So cute. Tiona couldn’t help but think this while she smiled.

“Sooooo cute.”

“Isn’t she adorable?”

“Absolutely precious.”

“Oh, Aizuu. You’re adorable even like that. So different from usual, you know?’

The sight prompted comments aplenty from the peanut gallery back on the beach (Loki included). The only one who wasn’t looking at Aiz was Lefiya. Her azure eyes were currently locked on Tiona as a jealous moan rumbled within the depths of her throat.

The beach party didn’t last long after that (and Aiz’s swimming problems remained unresolved). Having played to their hearts’ content, it was time to move on to the real focus of the trip—their investigation.

“If we’re supposed to examine the hole in the bottom of the lake…doesn’t that, erm, mean we need to venture down there?” Lefiya seemed somewhat fretful as she threw a glance in Aiz’s direction.

The Sword Princess flinched at the non-combat-related implication.

Then Aki turned to Loki. “Of course. You know where the hole is, don’t you, Loki?”

“Sure do! I did my homework! It’s in a ravine just a smidgen farther south. Tiona? Tione? I’m leaving it to you girls!”

“Got it!”

“This’ll be over in a snap!” The twins responded with identical winks.

While Lefiya and the others had been fully prepared to help (as inexperienced as they were with water combat), Loki had entrusted Tiona and Tione with the task of investigating the spot.

As the two stepped forward, Aiz’s head shot up with a snap.

“Those swimsuits…are they made from Undine cloth?”

What with all her drowning and bouts of shame, Aiz hadn’t had a chance to look at the two’s outfits until now.

The cloth was a deep shade of blue while the fabric itself was endowed with the divine protection of the spirits.

“’Course it is! Prepped ’em for the girls myself. Not about to send ’em on an underwater quest without it,” Loki broke in proudly.

The cloth, woven with the spirits’ magic and bestowed with specialized attributes, could outperform even the armor of the most advanced smiths. Undine cloth, in particular, boasted improved resistance when it came to water-element attacks and could even fend off intense heat waves, making it an integral asset to any adventurer’s wardrobe.

That being said, the only way to truly invoke its power was to wear it underwater.

Even the strongest adventurers’ movements were still heavily sluggish when trying to navigate underwater; however, by equipping Undine cloth, one could zoom back and forth with ease beneath the waves, greatly expanding one’s range of mobility. It boosted not only water resistance but movement and speed underwater, as well.

While it was pricey, it was an essential piece of equipment if one hoped to engage in any sort of underwater monster culling.

“But to desecrate the cloth of the spirits by turning it into a pair of bikinis…” Lefiya and the others warily eyed their patron deity, who ignored the condemning looks and simply continued talking.

“What’s more, my two lovely Amazons have the Dive ability. Fact is, they can already swim like the fishes! So equipping them with Undine cloth is like throwin’ wings on a tiger…or should I say, givin’ a halberd to an Amazon!”

“And just what is that supposed to mean?!” Tione shot the aphorism-spewing goddess a look of indignation.

The two Amazonian sisters had learned the Dive ability upon their recent level-up—an ability that carried with it the same basic effects as those provided by Undine cloth. The difference, then, was made up by an increase in attack power, making their underwater combat abilities that much stronger.

It was said that this ability was absolutely essential to all those in Poseidon Familia, what with their many endeavors in the wide-open sea.

“I thought that Dive was a fairly rare ability…?” Lefiya questioned.

“Though I’ve heard it’s much easier for members of more seaworthy familias to learn…” Aki pointed out.

“But then how did those two learn it…?” “Yeah, how is it possible…?”

As the dubious voices of their peers rose up around them, Tiona and Tione met them head-on.

“Before coming to Orario, we often accepted requests from fishing villages of the island nations to hunt monsters in the sea. It was how we obtained money for food.”

“Yeah, yeah! Sea monsters can be super hard to take down! But we spent so much time doing it that somehow we got really good at fighting underwater!”

The fact that neither of them liked to lose only spurred their abilities further, as they’d often compete against each other as to who could bag the most kills.

As Lefiya and the other familia members listened to all this with somewhat forced laughs, Loki began rummaging around in her giant bag before pulling something out and handing it to the two girls.

“Here ya go. Weapons! In case ya run into any of those nasty flower critters. These should give it to ’em!”

“And these are?”

“Corbel Edges! Had ’em custom-made by Goibniu Familia from under-coral and sea tiger fangs. Snatched ’em outta the manor’s storage.”

The two daggers were about the same length as Tione’s Kukri knives and surprisingly light, too; the blades resembled water crystal in their translucent marine-blue color. After receiving two each, the girls gave the daggers a few practice slashes before taking off down the beach with a “Be back soon!”

Cutting straight across the sand, they dove deftly into the lake.

“…You know…It might be too late to ask this, but if Misses Tiona and Tione are the only ones necessary for the investigation, why did all of us have to change into swimwear, too…?” Lefiya mumbled as she watched the bikini-clad sisters disappear into the water.

Loki, however, feigned ignorance. “Go, go, go! You can do it!” she shouted, completely disregarding the mage’s question.

The clear, brilliant blue of Lolog Lake was enough to rival even the waters of the south. Drainage from magic-stone production in Orario and Meren was purified via large distillation apparatuses, keeping the water in the lake so clear that people could see far beneath the surface. It was through this translucent blue world that Tiona and Tione swam now, making their way quickly away from the inlet where Aiz and the others had waved their good-byes and gripping their Corbel Edges in one hand.

“Bwuuaterssh’s swwhooaw bbbreeeeaaaar!” Tiona exclaimed with a burst of bubbles.

Tione just rolled her eyes in the other girl’s direction. How the hell am I supposed to know what you’re saying?

There was a peaceful tranquility down in this watery realm that was quite different from anything that could be found on land. Schools of green, blue, and gray fish swam past them as they continued farther and farther through the brine. Down below, seaweed poked up from among the scattered rocks and crags, undulating gently in the current.

Soon, clumps of driftwood and scattered remnants of a past shipwreck came into view. Swarms of dodobass scuttling from view, the two girls looked down silently on the vestiges of the once great ship, its hull eaten away by erosion and decay.

“!”

A strange light suddenly caught Tiona’s eye.

Something shone from deep within the shadows of the ship.

The moment they realized it was the glowing red eye of a giant monstrous fish, with the body easily equal in size to the two sisters’, the creature emerged abruptly from the darkness.

It was a raider fish, and likely the reason the ship had capsized in the first place.

Its red eyes darting back and forth, it zipped out with a swift jerk from a recess on the lake floor in hopes of catching this new prey.

“Whuuuuuuaaaahhhhh!!”

As the monster fish rocketed toward them, Tiona raised her right hand, the one not currently holding a weapon, in the air.

“!!”

“Guwah?!”

With a speed and intensity no less fierce than when on the surface, she brought her arm down on the fish with a watery bash.

Her iron-like fist shattered the creature’s face into dust. The would-be predator’s blood sprayed out in every direction as its body was sent careening toward the lake floor below, sending up a whirling cloud of silt.

We might not have done this for a while, but we certainly haven’t gotten rusty!

Well, the suits probably help.

Tione shrugged in Tiona’s direction, and the other girl rotated her arm to stretch.

The telepathic twins communicated with their gazes as they felt the power of the Undine cloth burgeoning their Dive ability.

How long you think you can hold your breath?

An hour or so easy.

And so they continued on, the information Loki had given them guiding their descent.

Deeper and deeper they dived, constantly surveying the area around them. They followed the sloping lake bottom as it curved downward, and the light of the sun from the water’s surface overhead grew fainter and fainter the farther they swam.

A short while later, and after they’d already taken care of more than a few of the brackish water’s denizens—

That must be it…

—they arrived.

The deepest part of Lolog Lake. In front of them, there was a lid so giant it was enough to take their breath away. It was a colossal circular seal, more than ten meders wide.

It appeared to be constructed of either seiros or varmath, and its white surface was so different from the surrounding rock, it looked like the entrance to some kind of sea temple. Though the lid seemed firmly closed atop the hole in the ground’s sloping surface, it was easily sizable enough that dragons and other large vermin could have passed through it in the past. In fact, countless aquatic monsters had made their way to the surface via this very tunnel ages ago in the Ancient Times.

Tiona and Tione sank toward the lake floor, looking up at the imperious form of the gargantuan lid.

What’s that thing…?

A monster fossil…? No, more like a drop item.

In the white stone of the lid was a jet-black figure.

It appeared to be some kind of giant skeleton—no, the leftover bones of something even larger. Its skull was sharp, like a dragon’s, but its spine was long, almost like a snake’s, and two mammoth fins protruded from its back like wings. The broken, cracked bones wound their way around the surface of the white stone like a coil, looking very much like the fossil of a creature long gone, just as Tione had said.

What was this thing? Knowing very little about this hole or the connecting tunnel, they found themselves momentarily at a loss until, finally, it came to them.

Leviathan…

The ancient beast who’d made its way to the surface long, long ago.

The monstrous sea calamity whose defeat was listed as one of the Three Great Quests of humanity, together with Behemoth and the One-Eyed Dragon, who had been brought down fifteen years ago by the party of adventurers led by Zeus and Hera.

I’ve heard that the scales of the Black Dragon can be used to ward off monsters…

Around a thousand years ago, the One-Eyed Dragon left Orario and scattered its black scales in every corner of the lower world. No monster in all the land would come close because of the ceaseless waves of power rolling off them, thanks to the King of the Beasts’ presence still alive inside. It was undeniable after a few indisputable instances of this.

The scales of this Leviathan were the same.

The divine will of Ouranos had barred passage to the surface for the monsters of the Dungeon. Even if any were to make their way through, the moment they saw the black bones, they’d hightail it back to the Dungeon. As trying to simply kill all of them would be impossible, this was the easiest way to ensure none got through.

Upon defeat of Leviathan, the familias of Zeus and Hera had brought back the beast’s skeleton, using it here on the tunnel’s lid to complete the seal.

The “Leviathan Seal,” as the Guild officially called it.

As Tiona and Tione looked out upon this unbreachable gate of contrasting black and white, they found themselves losing track of time completely.

…We should check to make sure there aren’t any gaps in the lid.

Turning their gazes away from the fossil’s empty eye sockets, the twins returned to the task at hand.

Searching the entirety of the great hole, they looked for any signs that a monster had passed through—anything that could serve as a secret path. Each taking a different side, they searched every nook and cranny of the mighty lid, including the surrounding rock.

Their efforts, however, seemed to be in vain.

Not a single scratch! Tiona floated upside down as she waved her arms back and forth in the water.

Yeah, there’s just no way a monster could have broken this seal, not that we didn’t already know…Doesn’t seem like anything even came close, and there aren’t any gaps around it, either…Tione threw a sidelong glance at her sister with a sigh.

Even the many monsters they’d had to tackle just to get to this spot had all but disappeared. The lid, with all its monster-warding properties, was intact and in good health.

Monsters don’t wanna get close, right? So maybe we should search a little farther out? Maybe they built another hole a ways away or somethin’, yeah?

I’m not too keen on scouring every inch of this place without even knowing where to look…

As always, the two sisters found themselves at an impasse. Sending bubbles toward the surface, they took another look around at their environs.

!

All of a sudden, Tione’s eyes grew as sharp as a hawk’s.

Far, far off in the distance, she caught sight of two long figures floating in the water.

Decidedly yellowish-green figures.

Tione!

That’s them, all right! Violas!!

They were off without a second thought, zooming through the water.

The two monsters were swimming not more than ten meders or so from the lake’s surface. And a great many ships were cutting through the water above. The two sisters swam as fast as they could to intercept the giant flowers.

!

Their heated pursuit sent intense ripples of water in the direction of the violas, who quickly became alerted to their presence.

Great buds opening with a snap, they revealed their ghastly fangs and jaws. Then, every one of their mighty tentacles came careening toward them.

“Bweyyh mreallwy mwarh ere!!” Tiona exclaimed unintelligibly as she glided out of the way of the incoming tendrils with grace and speed that could rival a mermaid’s. She used the opportunity to brandish the Corbel Edge in her hand before neatly severing the tentacles.

?!

As the tentacles scattered in the water, Tione dove forward.

She was at the beast’s stiff torso in a flash, marine-blue blade flashing as she neatly divided it in two, just as her sister had.

“Gnngh!”

hwwwuuaargh?!

The weapons, forged specifically for use in the water, cut through the normally impervious skin of the flowers with little resistance. And as the gracefully curving blue glint of the blade separated its head from its body, the flower itself quickly shriveled into nothing.

The remaining viola took one look before turning tail.

Crap! It’s getting away!

After all these years out of the water, the twins’ attacks didn’t cut quite as deep.

Severely injured, the giant flower quickly made its way to the water’s surface, almost as though seeking salvation in the light of the sun.

Tiona and Tione followed after it—until a new ship appeared from the direction of the ravine.

Shit!!

In a fit of rage, the viola shot its tentacles toward the ship’s hull.

“Loki!” Aiz shouted sharply.

She’d noticed it before anyone else, and her voice prompted the rest of her Loki Familia peers on the beach to look up at the situation forming in the middle of the lake.

“A boat?!”

“And there’s something wrapped around it!”

The galleon that had just appeared on the lake was currently grappling with a set of yellowish-green tentacles from within the brackish waters. Just when it appeared that the severed tentacles would bring the ship down, the viola itself reared its ugly head. The giant flower opened its jaws, fully prepared to sink the vessel with it.

“Holy hell! Aiz! Everyone! Get out there!” Loki shouted.

Immediately, Lefiya and the other mages up and down the beach began casting their spells as Aiz and her fellow frontliners found their footing in the sand and raced toward the ship.

Gnnghh?!

When all of a sudden.

A shadow jumped down from the galleon’s deck, delivering a blow straight to the viola’s head.

“What…?”

The beast’s giant head went tumbling through the air before plummeting into the water.

Not long after, the tentacles that had been gripping the ship separated themselves from the hull as the rest of the flower’s body sank back into the deep. Aiz and the others could do nothing but stare at the spectacle in shock.

“What just happened?!”

“Someone killed the viola?!”

Tiona and Tione, too, heads bursting out of the water a short distance away, were stunned into silence.

The giant flower, a creature that could give even first-tier adventurers a run for their money, had been slain.

As an excited clamor built up aboard the surrounding ships floating on the water, Tiona and her sister could only stare up in wonder at the giant vessel before them.

Then—THUD!

The dark shadow that had so readily ended the viola’s life landed atop a nearby fishing boat, scimitar flashing.

“Rjada ru jheeda…die Hyrute.”

Tiona reacted almost immediately to the non-Koine words—the words of her people. Spinning around with a jolt, she came face-to-face with the woman standing on the boat.

All eyes of the men on the boat were focused squarely on this newcomer and the copper skin laid bare by her revealing clothes. A silken neckerchief covered her mouth, hiding the lower half of her face.

She was watching Tiona silently, eyes staring out from beneath her sand-colored hair.

“Bache…”

First Tiona, then Tione went wide-eyed in wonder, unable to believe what they were seeing—when suddenly, a voice calling out from the galleon’s deck landed the final blow of surprise.

“Now there’s two faces I haven’t seen in a long while.”

“”

The sound of the not quite young, not quite old voice brought time to a screeching halt.

Their gazes moved upward to find an entire group of Amazonian soldiers staring down at them from the boat’s deck—along with a certain young goddess.

Her skin was the same copper hue as her followers’, bloodred hair billowing in the lake breeze. While her short stature may have given her the appearance of a child, the necklace of fake bones around her neck, the fanged mask over her face, and the two eyes glinting behind it projected nothing if not pure authority. Next to her stood an Amazon with hair the same color as the woman still behind them on the fishing boat.

As Aiz and the others watched the spectacle unfold from their spot on shore, Tione’s eyes flashed with a sudden fury. She screamed up at the group of women smiling down at them from above.

“Kaliiiiiiiiiiiii!!”

CHAPTER 3

KINGDOM OF THE AMAZONS

The enormous galleon pulled slowly into port.

From its anchor shaped like two swords, to its warrior-esque statue adorning the ship’s bow, to the towering mast protruding from the ship’s hold like a mighty halberd, it was every bit the ship of a tribe of warrior women—and it garnered the attention to match it as the troupe alighted to the land below.

Even the brawny fishermen littering the dock were immediately abuzz with excitement and confusion as the Amazonian women disembarked, led by their young, masked goddess.

“Kali!!” Tione shouted, still clad in her blue swimsuit. With Tiona on her heels, she made a beeline toward the incoming ship that, by chance, had pulled halfway into the city port. The gathering crowd quickly moved aside at the menacing aura radiating off the two sisters.

By the time Aiz and the others arrived, back in their normal attire, the air choking the wharf was liable to explode at a moment’s notice.

“What are you doing here?!”

“We haven’t seen each other in years and that’s the first thing you say to me?” the masked goddess, Kali, countered disenchantedly, indifferent to Tione’s rage.

“Answer me!!”

“A little sightseeing is all. Problem, Tione?” Kali posed before sending one of her girls to meet the highly flustered city official headed their way. Given they already had the proper port-entry permit, it did seem they’d made prior preparations for the trip.

“That’s bullshit…!!”

“No, it’s undeniable truth. Wanted a change in routine is all. A little stimulation, you know?” Kali’s lips curled upward coyly as the crease between Tione’s brows deepened. Behind her, Tiona kept quiet, unable to conceal her look of dubiety.

Aiz, on the other hand, couldn’t seem to keep her eyes off two different women in the group—the two sandy-haired Amazonian warriors next to the goddess, so alike there was no way they weren’t sisters.

—They’re strong.

The battle-hardened intuition of the Sword Princess told her as much. Both women before her could easily stand shoulder to shoulder with the best of their first-tier adventurers.

Level 5s maybe…? No, Level 6s?

A thought that, if true, was a little terrifying.

She was certain they belonged to a familia outside the city. And while Aiz herself didn’t know much about the world outside Orario and the Dungeon, she did know that leveling up outside the Labyrinth City was a difficult task. When taking that into account, these two sisters and the first-tier aura they were giving off seemed even more remarkable.

Aiz couldn’t help but wonder just what kind of training they’d undergone that would give them the ability to take out a viola with such ease.

And that one…she hasn’t taken her eyes off Tione this entire time.

Her gaze flitted to the woman who’d killed the viola, her face expressionless beneath her semi-long hair. The vibe around her suggested she was even more taciturn than Aiz herself.

The woman next to her, hair tied up in a ponytail that descended all the way to her waist, was currently eyeing the confrontation between Kali and Tione with a little smile.

As though feeling the pair of eyes on her, she threw a glance in Aiz’s direction.

Aiz’s muscles instinctively tensed at the almost reptilian way those two eyes bored through her.

“Aaaanyway! It’s been a long time…” the tiny goddess continued, looking up at Tione and making a rather lewd gesture toward her chest as her eyes traveled downward to stare pointedly at Tione’s breasts. “…You’ve grown.”

“And just where do you think you’re looking…?!”

A husky murmur escaped Kali’s lips as her eyes flicked toward Tiona.

“Meh…you haven’t changed at all,” she finished disinterestedly.

“What’re you lookin’ at, huh?!” Tiona barked back. As the girl began stomping her feet in indignation, Aiz stepped forward like always to hold her arms behind her back.

“I’ve heard of you guys before. Loki Familia, yes? Where’s your goddess?”

“I’m right here.” Loki stepped out from the crowd of people, walking past Tiona and her tantrum to face Kali head-on. The scarlet-haired goddess’s gaze was surly, her lips curled upward in a grin that exuded impertinence. “I thought somethin’ was goin’ on…Heh. No biggie. As you can see, these two kiddos are mine now. You need somethin’, runt number two?”

“Hmph. Our first time meeting and you’re already being a disobliging asshole. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have business with these two.”

“Oh-ho-ho! Pickin’ a fight, are we? On our first date? Come at me, you vertically challenged piece of trash!!” One provocation leading to another, Loki erupted—a magnificent first impression if ever they’d seen one.

“P-please calm down!”

“You’re making a scene!!”

Lefiya, Aki, and the others pleaded, moving forward to calm their raging goddess.

Kali, on the other hand, completely ignored the entire spectacle, turning, instead, toward where Tione was still glaring daggers in her direction.

“At any rate, we’re going to be here for a while. If you folks are doing the same, perhaps we’ll meet again.”

“Don’t make me laugh…”

“I’m sensing some animosity. Do you really hate me—and the rest of your tribe—so much?”

“I never wanted to see you again…ever!” Tione practically spit, both at Kali and at the rest of the Amazons behind her.

Kali’s eyes narrowed behind her mask.

Then she turned on her heel, taking the rest of her troupe with her.

“I couldn’t help but miss you, my beloved daughters,” she finished before she and her familia left the wharf behind them.

“Daughters…?” Lefiya murmured curiously as she watched the departing group and Tione, who remained stock-still on the dock. Ever so hesitantly, she turned toward Loki, whose peers were still restraining her. “Do Misses Tione and Tiona…know that goddess?”

“…Hnnnnggghh…Guess there’s no point hiding it…” Loki let out a disgruntled sigh, completely spent and breath ragged. Pulling away from her captors, she brought a hand to her head with a scratch. “That’s their old familia. Their very first one, too, from before they joined ours.”

Lefiya, Aiz, and the others sucked in their breath.

Tiona, however, simply gazed quietly at her sister’s back before turning her eyes toward the infuriatingly sunny sky above.

“Kali Familia consists of the goddess of Telskyura and her followers.”

Later that night.

They were in the room they’d reserved at a local inn—their home base for the length of their investigation—as Loki and Riveria explained the situation, everything about Tione and Tiona, and the deep connection they had with this Kali Familia.

“Telskyura…that’s a peninsular country far to Orario’s southeast, right?” Aki confirmed.

“It is,” Riveria continued. “A solitary island surrounded on all sides by sea and cliffs…known for belonging to no one but Amazons. I’m sure many of you have heard of it.”

“S’just like with Ares and Rakia. A nation-state familia or whatever you wanna call it. I mean, not that I think that tiny tramp’s fit to rule or anything…” Loki added. “It’s pointless! That brat and I’ll never get along! The only one who grinds my gears more than that pip-squeak is that Jyaga Maru midget tramp…And what’s with that creepy mask, huh? Ugh! Pisses me off!!”

Everyone withheld their comments as the goddess grumbled with increasing contempt before Riveria continued.

“It would seem the only men allowed on the island are slaves or those used for breeding.”

“From the little we learned about it in school, it seems to be a very savage country. Or, at least, that’s the impression I’ve always had…”

After Lefiya added her thoughts, Riveria explained further.

“You’d be correct. From what I’ve heard, a day there doesn’t go by without battle cries and cheering crowds filling the air, everyone devoting themselves to relentless combat. It is a nation of blood and war…the Holy Land of the Amazons. It’s one of the few world powers besides Orario, and they possess incredible capacity for war. And not only that, they’re completely isolated compared to other countries. Information about what goes on inside their borders is extremely limited…”

It was here that Riveria stopped.

Eyes traveling back and forth between Aiz and the other women seated on the sofa, she continued.

“There are rumors that their two captains, the sisters Argana and Bache, have both reached Level Six.”

There was a simultaneous gulp of dread from all those listening.

First-tier adventurers were rare enough already, even in Orario, but for them to be the same level as Riveria and the other elites was something else entirely. It was so easy to forget about the world outside the walls of the great Labyrinth City, and this piece of news was enough to leave them speechless.

“Riveria, how did they get that strong? Without the Dungeon…how were they able to level up?” Aiz asked, unable to wrap her thoughts around the perceived dilemma.

The group of Amazonian warriors they’d come face-to-face with earlier that day immediately sprang to her mind. It wasn’t just the two sisters in question, either—all of them seemed strong enough to hold their own against a top-tier adventurer. How could they possibly have grown that strong without the boon of the Dungeon?

Riveria was silent for a moment. Then…

“Through the rites they perform every day in the arena…ruthless fights to the death, not only against the monsters they capture but even against their fellow warriors.”

Once again, Aiz and the others found themselves at a loss for words.

“Yeah, some explorer wrote about it in his chronicle or whatnot. About how he snuck into Telskyura and barely made it out with his life…and the constant killing that took place day and night in those rites,” Loki explained.

“You mean the Curious Tales of Rastillo Furough?” asked Riveria.

“That’s the one! There’s a copy in the manor’s archives!” Loki replied with a fervent nod, reciting it for them now as though flipping through the pages then and there. “‘I, too, shall emulate their hymns. An Amazon of the land is a true warrior’…I can still remember that line.”

Silence settled over the room.

Whether they’d heard of Telskyura before, like Lefiya, or were just learning about it for the first time, like Aiz, they were all at a loss for words. But not because they’d learned the truth about the island of Amazons.

No, it was because they remembered that Tiona and Tione, too, had once been members of this Kali Familia, and the realization was enough to shake them to the core.

Lefiya was the first to speak, voice straining from her parched throat. “Then…Misses Tiona and Tione both…?”

“Born and raised in Telskyura. Least, that’s what they told me upon joining. So I can assume they went through the whole rigmarole, too…”

It had been five years since the two sisters had converted to Loki Familia. Loki leaned on the back of the sofa, eyes traveling toward the ceiling as though she was reliving that very day in her mind.

“We’ve killed so many of our brethren, and you still want us to join you?”

That was what Tione had asked when Loki had approached them with her invitation.

Riveria closed her eye in silent reflection. She’d been there, too, together with Finn and the rest of the elites.

Lefiya and the others could barely contain their shock.

There was no way they could have known that the eternally innocent Tiona and the lovestruck Tione constantly attempting to court the captain could have had such horrific pasts. Even hearing it now, they could barely believe their ears.

While, certainly, none of them had ever asked about the two girls’ history, neither Tiona nor Tione had ever shown signs that something darker resided within them.

I never knew…

Not even Aiz had known.

Back then, Aiz had been even less interested in matters aside from her training and had known only that they were getting some new members in the familia—nothing more. She didn’t start interacting with them until Tiona had approached her: Aiz, the inarticulate, flustered girl and Tiona, the ever-smiling, audacious Amazon.

Aiz knew it was due to—or perhaps “thanks to” would be the more appropriate phrase—the two sisters that she’d grown into the person she was today (“mellowed out,” as Tsubaki had put it). With not a shred of ulterior motive between them, they’d both played a big role in Aiz’s life.

“…”

The conversation coming to a close, Aiz turned her gaze toward the open window.

She could see Tione outside, standing on the wide balcony with her back to them.

“C’moooon, Tione. Let’s go back inside!”

With Tiona’s incessant pestering in her ear, Tione continued to stare out at the city beyond the balcony’s railing. The hotel they’d booked was a grand Southern-style inn right in the center of the city. And from the balcony on its fifth and highest floor, one could take in the entire port and its connecting bay in a single glance.

The lights from the anchored boats flickered like will-o’-the-wisps across the dark waters of the lake, and toward the east, the gleam of a lighthouse cut through the darkness.

“…Why did they come here?” Tione murmured through her fatigue, letting her eyes drop to the city below. It was a question aimed at a certain goddess and her followers, currently located somewhere within all that shadowy darkness.

“I know how you feel, but thinkin’ ’bout it’s not gonna do us any good. Maybe they really did just come to sightsee,” Tiona posed, acting no different from usual despite her sister’s melancholy. As she leaned over on the railing into Tione’s line of sight, Tione looked at her long and hard.

“Why are you acting like this is no big deal?! Kali, she—None of them would have any reason to go somewhere if there wasn’t fighting involved!”

“…”

“Do you even remember what they made us do? Do you?! If you do, then wipe that stupid grin off your face!!” Tione exploded.

The outburst was enough to spark Tiona’s rage, as well. “What’re we supposed to do, then, huh? Tell me what it is we can do! Just put our heads down and charge right in? Are you even listening to yourself?”

“That’s not what I’m saying, you idiot! Stop putting words in my mouth!”

“Then stop putting words in mine!!”

“Yeah, well, I couldn’t stand you acting all ‘la-di-da, nothing’s wrong’!”

“Oh, couldn’t you?!”

Aiz and the others in the room were listening in on them now, shocked into silence at the scene taking place on the balcony.

Having had enough, Tione turned her back on her sister with an angry jerk. She marched past Aiz and the others already gathered at the window, past Loki with her arms folded behind her head, and past Riveria with her one eye closed to make her way out of the room.

No one knew what to do for a moment. After throwing a glance at Tiona, shocked and silent on the balcony, Aiz raced out the door after Tione.

“Miss Tiona…are you all right?” Lefiya asked as she and the other girls drew around her once Aiz had left.

“Mmn…I’m fine…” Tiona nodded.

“…We, um…heard that…that you and Miss Tione used to belong to the familia of that Lady Kali we met today…” Lefiya continued cautiously.

“It’s true.” Tiona’s response came without hesitation. The elven mage—and the other girls around them—swallowed hard.

“Then…erm…well—”

“Sorry, I don’t really know if I should be talking for both of us if Tione isn’t here…” Tiona cut in before Lefiya could find the right words, her eyes dropping to the floor.

Silence wrapped itself around the room until, after turning her gaze skyward, Tiona spoke again.

“But…” she started, looking somewhere far off into the distance, “…I can say that we never wanted to see them again…ever.”

“Tione.”

There was a voice from behind her.

Tione turned away as Aiz ran to catch up with her, the bluish shadow of the corridor tinting the world around her.

“Isn’t this a sight, you chasing me? Usually it’s the other way around,” Tione muttered sarcastically, averting Aiz’s gaze.

“Because…because you and Tiona were…always the ones who helped me…whenever I caused trouble for everyone else…” Aiz spoke bit by bit, coming to a halt. Tione could tell she was trying to speak her mind, and the usually taciturn girl was selecting her words with the utmost of care.

But the warm support of her friend did nothing but irritate her now.

“Aiz, please. I want to be alone. I’ve…become something I didn’t want to become.”

“Tione…if there’s anything at all I can do—”

—let me know.

Or, at least, that’s what she would undoubtedly have said before Tione interrupted her.

“You have secrets, too, right? Things you don’t wanna tell us?”

“!”

“So don’t you think that’s a little unfair? Saying nothing about yourself but expecting everyone else to bare everything to you?!” Tione snapped, thrusting Aiz’s goodwill right back at her.

Aiz’s gaze fell.

“I’m sorry…”

The near-whisper seemed to echo in the corridor.

But it was Tione who was truly sorry at what had just transpired. Quickly, as though running away from the other girl, she hurried on ahead.

“What’s wrong with me…?” She cursed at herself, filled with self-loathing as she made her way not back to the common room but to an empty private room, yanking open the door and stepping inside. She let herself collapse onto the bed.

All of a sudden, she was overcome by an intense feeling of fatigue.

“Why…why did they have to be here…?” she moaned, hands clenched around the bedsheets.

As her eyelids grew as heavy as lead, her dreams called her to sleep.

Ever since she could open her eyes, Tione had been a part of that country.

The forsaken island of Telskyura.

A nation of female warriors, Amazons, whose ceaseless rituals of bloodshed had been continuing since their goddess had come into power. The first two things she could remember were a searing heat on her back and the sound of someone crying—she didn’t know if it was herself or someone else.

Falna. Since the moment they were born, Tione and the other girls of Telskyura had been christened as children of their goddess.

It was said that the Amazons of Telskyura knew how to kill a goblin before they even knew how to speak. What with their latent abilities unlocked by the Falna, along with their first baptism—being placed in front of a goblin child and forced to fend for themselves—by the time they could take their first steps, they were every bit a warrior. In fact, for as long as Tione could remember, her hand had been gripping a sword.

She didn’t know what the warmth of a mother’s hand felt like.

She wouldn’t know her parents if she saw them. She wouldn’t be able to pick out their voices.

She had no semblance of family save one—the girl she’d recognized instantly as her other half the moment they saw each other. And she was sure it had been the same for Tiona, too.

“They told me you’re the big sister and I’m the little sister!”

“Hmph.”

The word sisters had been nothing more than a word to the young twins, but it would grow to become a powerful bond.

To be respected in Telskyura, one had to be a true warrior.

Strength was everything in this holy land of the Amazons. It was truth. Those with strength were lauded, given status and prestige. Contrastingly, the weak, who were defeated in combat and denied even the honor of a noble death, were forced to serve their country and superiors as part of the labor force. Bloodshed was a means of attaining true warriorhood, a staircase, a time-honored national custom. Telskyura was an embodiment of Amazonian instinct in every way.

Enter the goddess Kali, who was every bit as fond of combat as the Amazons.

Her blessing further developed the Amazons’ abilities, making their battles all the more violent. The warriors revered this bringer of strength as their one and only god, and the perpetual fighting and bloodshed flourished.

Did Tione feel remorse for the endless days she’d been forced to fight? No.

Truthfully, she’d had no real problem with it.

Had she been unable to fight off the monsters coming at her, she’d have been killed. This was simply basic instinct. Above all, she was an Amazon—it was in her nature. Fighting gave her a natural high that got her blood pumping.

No, it wasn’t the days and nights she spent in combat, experiencing all that power, that filled her with such enmity. In fact, that was all she’d known back then. Defeat the monsters in the arena, then return to her large stone room with naught but the necessities of life—her days had consisted of nothing but this back-and-forth path. Her entire world had consisted of the zealous cries of her brethren and the cold, cold stones of the battlefield.

It was when she’d first had to face off against her own sisters that her days of fighting had begun to lose their appeal.

By the time the monsters in the arena had turned into her fellow Amazons, it had already been too late for Tione. Her peers, similar in age and height, had fought harder than the monsters she was so used to, and though it had been difficult at first, soon, she was picking them off as quickly as the monsters that had come before.

“Ahhh…”

The first time she’d heard one of her sisters’ dying cries, it had sounded so weak.

Though the same blood spilled from their veins as the monsters she’d slain, it seemed somehow even more vivid.

As she’d watched the life fade from the eyes of the girl beneath the mask she had to wear, Tione had felt her heart stir. It had been a strange feeling she couldn’t quite describe. Upon returning to her room of stone, she’d found her sister, Tiona, normally uncontainable in her excitement, simply staring off into space with the blood of her brethren staining her skin. That night, Tione had washed herself again and again and again in the icy cold water.

The number of girls she’d had to fight only grew from that day forth.

She cut them down with her weapons, bludgeoned them with her fists, wrung their necks using the skills she’d acquired. She’d practically been born on the battlefield, and she knew nothing of right from wrong. And yet, the stirring in her heart refused to be assuaged. She couldn’t understand why—why was this any different from the monsters she’d once slaughtered so easily? She could still feel the give of their skin beneath her fingers, the crunch of their bones against her fist. Even long after the battle was over, she could still hear their screams, those agonizing wails that escaped their lips mere moments before death.

The cheers from the women in the audience would go on and on and on when she won. They’d revered her, the devourer of the weak. This is right, their voices had said, as her goddess Kali sat on high, looking down at her with a smile on her face.

Maybe she’d just grown weary and learned to ignore the stirring in her heart, dulling it with apathy. Still, she began to yearn for the days when she’d had to fight nothing but monsters.

And yet, even in the darkest of times, light finds a way.

It had come in the form of another Amazon who was almost like a sister, generous and caring. Tione, Tiona, and the other girls, too, had all been quite fond of her. Every time Tione would return to their room after another battle, she’d been there to greet her with a warm smile. She’d been strong, too, the strongest of them all, always there waiting before anyone else.

Perhaps Tione even thought of her like a mother. Her hands had tended to her wounds, rough yet gentle. They’d all gathered around her, craving the warmth of another’s touch as they’d slept side by side on the floor. That room, that cold stone room, more like a prison than anything else, was the only “home” Tione had ever known.

The rites had a law that prohibited combat between Amazons of the same room—a law that the girls had begun to discover the longer they fought.

This law had been a breath of relief to Tione. She wouldn’t have to fight the girl who’d long taken care of her, nor the girls whose faces she knew so well, nor her own sister, Tiona. That place, the home she’d created, would never change.

That’s what she’d believed.

And then her fifth birthday had arrived, and she’d been summoned to the arena, the same as any other day…

“…”

Tione opened her eyes.

It felt like she hadn’t slept a wink thanks to the flashback that had served as her dream. It was the same way she’d felt upon waking for the last two days.

As she sat up and wiped the sweaty bangs from her eyes, she noticed someone else sleeping in the bed right next to hers.

Tiona.

Though Tione hadn’t returned to their shared room, Tiona had still found her and spent the night here next to her.

Tione was silent as she watched her sister sleep.

She’d always been like this, wanting to be by Tione’s side whenever something happened. She wouldn’t say anything, simply gravitating toward her, as though seeking out her other half.

Just like she’d done back then.

Before they’d joined Loki Familia.

When it had been just the two of them.

Giving her sister one last look, she quietly slipped out of the room.

“…”

Tiona’s eyelids flicked open the moment the door closed.

The next morning, Aiz and the others split up into groups before heading out into the city.

They needed to gather as much information as they could on the sudden appearance of the violas in the lake.

“A giant, man-eating flower? No idea. Weird stuff’s always coming up out of the lake and ocean around here.”

“If we’re countin’ hits to the hull, these ships are takin’ constant beatings from monsters and whatnot. That’s how we shipbuilders make a profit!”

“Haven’t had many casualties wound here lately. Mewen’s been pwetty peeshful.”

“Whenever beasties crop up, we just leave ’em to Njörðr Familia. Those fishermen are a lot stronger than your average adventurer. If things really got out of control, well, we’d simply contact the Guild and they’d send us help from Orario.”

Aiz, Lefiya, and the rest of the recon group went from person to person—a young human man managing an open-air shop, an elven ship captain (rare as they were), a tanned catgirl wandering around selling ice-cold juice, and a dwarven bar owner currently in his apprenticeship—asking for any info they could offer on violas or other monsters in the lake.

“It would seem no one knows anything about the violas.”

“Yeah, yesterday’s sighting must have been the first…”

Lefiya and Aiz looked out across the bustling crowd of the city’s main street from their vantage point in front of a small alleyway. They and the rest of their group were taking a much-needed respite from the sun’s rays.

“I guess that means…” Aiz continued with a murmur, “the lake and the sea are both safe…”

“It would seem that way…If those giant things really were appearing frequently, they’d be causing quite a lot of damage.”

If the violas were tough enough to give even first-tier adventurers a run for their money, frequent spawnings would be a cause for panic. From what they’d heard from the laymen of the area, however, the lake and its surrounding sea had been perfectly calm as of late.

Which meant they’d reached something of an impasse.

“Certainly there’s no way the violas are being killed before they’re able to cause any damage…right? Then what could possibly be going on?”

As Lefiya racked her brain next to her, Aiz simply stared off into the busy street.

“The drainage channel seems…in order.”

Aki and Leene were on their way back to Meren after checking out the river nearby that acted as Lolog Lake’s drain receptacle. The Guild had long been banging their heads against the wall at the raider fish and other monsters that used the river as a way to gain access to Orario’s sewer system, turning it into a cesspool for breeding. In fact, only a short while ago, Loki and Bete had even discovered a viola in the old sewers. Rather than using it as a way to travel from the lake to the city, it seemed more likely that the flower had been using the sewers as a way to return to the lake. Which was why Aki and the others were checking up on it now.

“The mythril grate seems firmly in place…”

“I’d heard they were going to fix it ever since those monsters did a number on it, but I didn’t know it was finished already.”

Drainage water gushed out in great, heavy deluges from behind the silver barricade at the hole to the main sewage pipe. They were a short ways to the northwest of Orario, having descended the gently sloping hill that led to the entrance of the city’s sewers.

True to Leene’s words, the drainage pipe, with its view of the city walls and their accompanying guard post, had been effectively sealed off thanks to the mythril grating covering its opening. Not only would it be able to hold back large monsters like the violas, it looked as though it would have no problem keeping out mid- and small-scale monsters like the raider fish, too. And it showed no signs of breakage.

The girls watched as the clean, purified water, free from its preprocessed stink, poured into the pool below.

“Then there’s no way those flowers could have reached the lake from here…unless it made the trek quite some time ago.” Aki followed this up with a grumble as she brought a hand to her slender chin in thought.

“Nasty-looking flower creatures, huh…? Come to think of it, we were pretty shocked by those things yesterday,” Njörðr mused in response to Loki’s question, a large sack hoisted up on his shoulder.

She was in Nóatún, Njörðr Familia’s home.

As Aiz and the rest of her followers went about on their investigative missions, Loki was off collecting information herself. Currently she was interrogating Njörðr, her old friend, in his home’s storehouse connected to the lake-facing port.

“You’re the main man around here, ain’t ya? You haven’t heard about any, you know, suspicious goings-on recently, have ya?”

“I’m afraid I’m only the ‘main man’ when it comes to matters of the fishing variety. I don’t dip my fingers into any other pots and have no delusions of becoming the next Poseidon,” he pointed out with a wry smile as he hefted his sack—“Alley-oop!”—into a corner of the storehouse. “I’m constantly up to my ears in fish. No room for talk of these ‘suspicious goings-on’ of yours.”

“Oh, gimme a break!” Loki shot back from behind him, seated cross-legged on a nearby crate.

“You’ll have to forgive me. I must admit I was quite surprised when I heard of your true intentions in coming to Meren…” he explained with a sigh as he rubbed the back of his neck.

Loki stared at his back in silence.

“Things have been peaceful here in Meren for many years now…at least, until what happened yesterday. Ask anyone around here and they’ll tell you the same.”

The violas’ attack on Kali Familia’s boat the day prior had been the first thing to rile up the port in quite some time. Though Tiona and Tione might have been the ones who forced the giant flowers to the water’s surface, the fact still remained that the violas had been there in the first place. To think they’d simply have stayed there on the lake floor, minding their own business and not attacking anyone was unreasonable…right? It seemed much more probable that some creature tamer had set them loose there—or, at least, that’s what Loki thought.

“That reminds me, you still on bad terms with the Guild?”

“Hmm? Ah…same old, same old, yes. Even though we aren’t adventurers, they still constantly try to bring us over to their side, and every time we refuse, they tax the hell out of our shipments of fish,” Njörðr explained none too enthusiastically.

This same practice had been going on since, or perhaps even before, Loki and the others had first come to Orario through Meren’s harbor.

“Not much we can do, unfortunately, given that Orario’s not only right next door but our biggest business partner to boot. They say it’s the general consensus from their side, but I know it’s a lie—more like a petty revenge tactic. I could see through it from the very beginning. Makes me jealous of Demeter Familia and the preferential treatment they get despite their different affiliation.”

“We’ve had troubles of our own, too.”

The “Guild” Njörðr spoke of that was making life miserable for him here in the lower world wasn’t the main Guild Headquarters in Orario.

There was another Guild here in Meren.

“Have you already gone to the Guild Branch Office?” Njörðr suddenly asked, returning to the business at hand.

“Yep,” Loki responded. “Riveria’s actually there right now.”

The stone lobby of the Guild Branch Office was considerably smaller than that of the main headquarters in Orario.

While it was a decent-size building in and of itself, the giant pantheon that was the lobby of the headquarters, bustling with activity day and night, was simply too big to make a proper comparison. Most of the relatively few uniformed attendants who worked there did so not at the front counter but, instead, performing routine office work such as filing port entry permits and checklists of commercial goods.

It was just one of the sub-branches the main Guild in Orario had established outside the city. While the roles of each branch varied depending on their location, this building in Meren acted as the gateway to the sea, directing all matters relating to the port and managing the import and export of goods—magic-stone commodities, for instance—for the city.

This atmosphere, so different from that of the main headquarters, currently surrounded Riveria as she stood alone before the front desk.

“Giant man-eating flowers…? Hmm…can’t say I know ’em!”

Riveria returned her attention to the man in front of her.

The attendant at the front desk was a long, oval-faced human man. Tall and skinny, he was almost what you could call lanky, and the features below his perfectly coiffed dark hair were expressing some impatience.

Rubart was his name.

The head of the branch and the one in charge.

“You’re quite sure?”

“You think I’d lie? We haven’t heard anything about this kind of new species, not even from the main headquarters in Orario,” Rubart retorted, clearly annoyed at having to respond to the same question three times.

It was puzzling. Even if the upper echelons of the Guild (Ouranos, in other words) were limiting information on the new monster species, for information not to be shared even within the organization—especially considering how many people had already witnessed the violas during the Monsterphilia and the event on the eighteenth floor—it wouldn’t make sense to try to cover things up.

Sure, there wasn’t any pressing reason to involve the branches outside the city, but still…

“And yet this monster was spotted. Does this not call for an investigation and preventative measures on your part?”

“We can just leave it to Njörðr Familia. Even if we did try to look into it, that lot’d likely tell us to mind our own business—that the waterfront is their jurisdiction. It’s the same every time,” Rubart spat out, his words evidence enough as to the shaky relationship the two groups shared.

As obvious as it may have seemed, there was no reason for the Guild to hold sway over familias outside Orario. And the fact that they had no legal right to force Njörðr Familia to do much of anything surely made them an annoying lump they’d rather be rid of.

Riveria, however, knew the fishermen would be no match for the violas—their strength was simply too great. Unfortunately, her words were getting her nowhere.

“What’s more important right now is that gaggle of Amazons that made port. We’d like you to do something about them.” Rubart’s brows arched in irritation.

What’s “more important right now”…? Riveria couldn’t believe what she was hearing. But even as she shot him a one-eyed look of disbelief, the branch manager continued.

“While they haven’t caused too much trouble yet, we’ve already been getting complaints from our citizens. Terribly hard to approach, it seems. Words just don’t get through to them! And apparently they’ve even been running off with merchandise without paying…”

“You are the ones who permitted them entry to the port, yes?”

“Well, yes…but…it’s a little more complicated than that,” Rubart continued somewhat ambiguously. “The city has an autonomous government that operates separately from the Guild.”

“And the city granted the Amazons their port entry permit?”

“Yes,” Rubart replied with a disgruntled nod. “Meren used to be nothing but a tiny fishing village constantly threatened by monsters. But after Poseidon Familia set up camp and Orario’s prosperity helped it develop, it really flourished into the ‘Gateway to the Dungeon City’ it is today.”

It was a well-known story—Poseidon Familia deciding to use Meren as its base—and it made sense considering how many aquatic monsters appeared offshore. They’d plugged up the hole in the bottom of the lake and, ever since, had been monitoring and maintaining the giant lid while upholding peace on the water’s surface. Then, once the Leviathan Seal had been put in place fifteen years ago, Poseidon and his followers had left the port city with the assurance that the seal could never be broken, off to quell the threat of sea creatures all over the world. Njörðr Familia stayed behind, supplying the city with their fish.

Though Riveria already knew much of what Rubart was telling her, she listened in all the same.

“The Guild invested in the city early, even going so far as to help it expand…but after all these generations, the head of Meren’s still never given up its autonomous government.”

Of course, what Rubart failed to mention was that any city would resist being commandeered if given the chance.

“You probably know this already, but Meren isn’t just a company under the Guild’s patronage. It’s also an entry point for people and communities all over the world, so there’s that to think about, too.”

“Yet this gives you no trouble with Orario?”

The neutrality of the large-scale port was one of its key factors. After all, a controlling government would only lead to decline. Though Meren focused the majority of its efforts toward Orario, there were still many ships that used the port as a relay point on their journeys to other destinations. There were also the shipments of cargo destined for its surrounding cities and towns to consider. If the Guild started being fastidious about who could use the port, their clientele would simply move their business elsewhere.

Even from an outsider’s perspective, preventing the Guild’s unilateral reign over Meren was in everyone’s favor.

“Well, a compromise was reached, and it was decided that the government would be split in two. To put things simply, all matters related to Orario, trade included, are to be handled by this branch office…”

“And everything else is taken care of by the city?”

“Exactly,” Rubart confirmed, face still sour.

At the time, the decision was heavily influenced by the support of Poseidon Familia, which still acted independently despite cooperating with Orario, and Njörðr Familia, which was acting as a good neighbor.

All in all, it was just as complicated a situation as the branch manager described.

“True, we didn’t actually raise any objections to Kali Familia being granted a permit, so I suppose we are partly responsible…but it was the city that fought tooth and nail to get them in here, thanks mostly to that bastard Murdock,” Rubart finished with a curse, a disgusted look on his face.

At the end of all things, Njörðr Familia was loyal to the city of Meren.

While the relationship between them and the Guild wouldn’t necessarily be called antagonistic, given the Guild branch’s history of conflict with the city, they certainly weren’t the best of friends. Riveria was already well aware of this, at least.

“At any rate…it feels like we’ve got some wild animal prowling around the city.”

“…”

“Which is why the Guild, as your administrative body, is asking for your cooperation.”

As Rubart laid down the law, Riveria could do nothing but sit in silence, one eye now almost perpetually closed.

“So please! We promise we’ve no ill intentions…If you’d be ever so kind as to hear us out!” Alicia pleaded, holding in her urge to cringe as she forced an ingratiating smile.

“Go away,” was the curt reply from the elderly gentleman in question.

They were in Meren’s west town, at a building that seemed to have been built to glower at the Guild Branch Office in the east—the Murdock estate, home to generation after generation of Meren’s governors.

Alicia and Narfi were there to collect information but hadn’t even made it inside; they were presently being barred entry at the door by a Mr. Borg Murdock, the current head of the family.

“I have nothing to say to you, Guild dogs.”

Borg was an aging human man with a tuft of white hair protruding from his chin. With no sign of a sagging belly, instead he boasted a physique that could rival any of the fishermen’s on the wharf. His eyes were sharp, and though he lacked hair on his head, by simply adding a cap to the picture, one could easily picture him as a ship captain from the old stories.

“Gods’ honest truth, we’re not here on Guild business. We’re here about the giant flower creatures that appeared in the lake yesterday…as part of an investigation. If you have any relevant information you could give us, we would be ever so appreciative,” Alicia pleaded.

“…”

Borg was silent.

Simply looking at the elf for a few moments in all her innocent sincerity, he finally opened his mouth.

“…Go away.”

He said nothing else.

Then he turned around and disappeared inside the manor. Alicia and Narfi could do nothing but make their own exit back through the gate, at a loss as to what to do.

“I’ll admit, I had higher expectations for that interaction, considering he’s the governor and all…but apparently that was asking too much,” Narfi mused, scratching at her cheek in dumbfounded astonishment.

Alicia sighed. “I’ve heard the city and Guild don’t exactly see eye to eye on things…but to think it was this bad! Guess we’re outta luck. No point in beating a dead horse.”

Faced with a feud that had been around longer than either of them had been alive, the girls had no choice but to leave the mansion behind.

“…”

From one of the windows of the mansion, Borg watched them leave, eyes narrowed with acrimony.

The sun, having reached its peak, had already started its afternoon descent toward the western horizon. Aiz, Lefiya, and the rest of the reconnaissance groups were making their way back toward the pier.

They didn’t have to go far past the commerce area with its trade ships, passenger ships, and fishermen’s dhows to reach Njörðr Familia’s fishing pier. The merchants and travelers dressed in their foreign clothes gave way to fishermen and women, all bustling about in their work. This rare type of familia—neither adventurers nor merchants—was still novel enough to the group of girls that they couldn’t help but scan their environs in wonder.

Most of the trawlers wore nothing over their broad chests or donned a set of short sleeves and long pants. Everyone was going about their own business, from the burly dwarf who passed by with an unbelievably large fish on his shoulder to the group of harpoon-wielding prums currently maneuvering their boat out to sea. Some were hard at work hauling great nets full of fresh and saltwater fish alike to shore—everything from giant dodobass to shiny red shrimp—while still others were grilling up their catches of fish and clams for an afternoon snack. The smell of salt and sound of popping oil were enough to draw in the eyes (and appetites) of Lefiya and the others as they walked along, none of them having taken their lunches yet.

And among all the crunching and the munching of seafolk ingesting their freshly caught fish, they caught sight of Tiona and Tione.

“M-Miss Tiona? What are you two…doing?” Lefiya asked, somewhat taken aback.

“Got hungry while asking these folks for info. They said we were free to have a bite, too, so long as we paid up, so…here we are!” Tiona responded, her mouth currently full of enough grilled fish to rival the surrounding workers’.

It would seem Tiona and Tione’s luck collecting info had been about as good as Aiz and everyone else’s. The others in their group, already having eaten their fill, were taking a load off nearby.

“…How is…Tione doing?” Aiz whispered discreetly as she threw a glance at the Amazon in question.

“Mmmn…still a little testy, but I think she’ll be fine. We made sure to keep away from Kali and crew this morning, and I kept an eye on her to make sure she didn’t get into any trouble.”

The atmosphere around Tione had been tense since the night prior, and the others in her group, hume bunny Rakuta included, had found it hard to truly relax. Currently, Tione was masking her irritation with food, asking for seconds, thirds, and fourths—“More”—with stern glares daunting enough to elicit stammers of surprise from their brawny mealtime companions.

“Usually it’s her keeping tabs on me…” Tiona laughed awkwardly. Even she could see the irony in the role reversal.

“What about you? Are you okay?” Aiz asked.

“Me? I’m fine! You know me—thinking’s not my strong suit,” the young Amazon responded with her usual smile, almost as though completely indifferent to the entire situation. Perhaps it was just Aiz’s imagination, but something about the innocent smile was different than usual—strained. But she wasn’t about to press any further.

“Geez…you girls can eat! Even for adventurers! I guess first-tiers really are in a class all their own,” one of the particularly strapping men gushed as he watched the two sisters stuff their faces together with the other fishermen around the grill. He was a human man nearly two meders tall with a crop of black hair above his jet-black eyes. “What about that skinny little thing over there, huh? The Sword Princess? Can she eat like you two?”

“Nah, she never eats as much as us. Really likes her Jyaga Maru Kun, though.”

“And you are…?” Aiz turned her eyes in the young man’s direction.

“Me? I’m Rod. The captain ’round these parts,” Rod boasted warmly.

Aiz was silent a moment as she formulated her words. “Mister Rod, then…do you and the others in your familia fish a lot?”

“That we do. S’bout all we’re good at, really. We fish the lake, a’course, but even all the way out to the sea, too. I’ve probably spent more of my life on the waves than here on land.”

Fishing was Njörðr Familia’s be-all and end-all. As burly as these men of the sea happened to be, neither they nor their patron deity had any delusions of grandeur or bones to pick with other familias.

In fact, they seemed more like an organization of fishermen than a true familia.

“Most men in this city grow up to be fishers. Guess it’s thanks to Skip Njörðr.”

“Are there any fishermen in the port who don’t belong to Njörðr Familia?” Lefiya asked curiously.

“You probably could if you wanted, but no one does. The Skip’s a great guy, and his blessing comes in real handy. Gives you more strength than the average trawler,” Rod replied, glancing toward one of the storehouses where a slender young human was lugging around a giant net all by himself. No doubt, a Status was carved into his back, as well.

“If your goal is just to make a livin’ with fishin’, you’ll do it a lot faster at the feet of the Skip. And even if it’s sailin’ on the high seas, you’ll have a much easier time with his blessin’, especially given how many monsters are lurkin’ out there,” the Njörðr Familia captain explained. In today’s day and age, even fishermen needed the power of the Falna, if only to give them a better chance at defending themselves. Out on the ocean and surrounded by water, a man had no one to rely on but himself. “And besides, well…we all love Skip Njörðr! He’s taken care of us since we were knee-high to a minnow…and he’s been protectin’ this city for centuries, all the way back to the time of our fathers, and even our fathers’ fathers, may they rest in peace.”

Njörðr had been in charge of the fishing in Meren for so long, no other familias had ever even tried to set up their own fishing gigs—which was one more reason why Njörðr Familia’s grip on the city’s fishing industry was so strong. The love, respect, and trust Rod and the other fishermen had for their patron deity was all too evident in the intrepid captain’s smile.

“Do you ever hunt monsters purposefully, Mister Rod?”

“Hmm? Ah…sometimes! Every once in a while we’ll get a request from the folks here in among the orders of fish.”

Then what the townsfolk had told them earlier had been correct.

The fishers here, what with the help of the Falna, would probably have no trouble taking care of the type of monsters that appeared on the surface—weakened from generations of breeding and never having stepped foot in the actual Dungeon. They were strong enough to take out their fair share of sea pirates, after all. Rod himself had already reached Level 2, what with his many years spent on the open ocean and the countless battles he’d seen. And from what Aiz could see, there were at least a few others in the group besides him whose strength could easily rival a low-level adventurer’s.

So long as things didn’t get too crazy, they’d be able to deal with any trouble themselves, meaning the times they were forced to send for help from Orario were few and far between.

“In all your experience on the lake and ocean, did you ever see…a large flower-type monster?”

“You mean that thing from yesterday? Didn’t get to see it myself, as I just pulled into port this morning, but…you sure that thing wasn’t an aqua serpent?” Rod asked, lacing his thick arms across each other.

Aiz and the others nodded.

The captain’s brows furrowed. Out of all the fishermen, he was easily the most acquainted with Meren’s waterfront. “I do have an idea. I’ve often seen it when I’m fishin’ in the lake and ocean. A real long thing, like a snake, almost…swimmin’ in the water below the ship…”

“…!”

“Even I thought it was an aqua serpent at first, but—” Rod started before cutting his words short and quickly raising his head. “This thing you’re talkin’ about’s never attacked us. Not even once!”

He looked around at the rest of his men, who all nodded in agreement, both at never having been attacked and never having gotten a good look at the creature in question.

Befuddlement crossed the faces of the group of girls.

“…? Hey, what’s that little bag hanging from your waist? I’ve noticed most of you fisher guys have one,” Tiona suddenly said.

True enough, there was a similar bag—a little bigger than a typical adventurer’s pouch—tied around the waist of every fisherman walking along the dock.

“Ho-ho! You’ve got good eyes, little missy.” Rod laughed. Grabbing ahold of the bag, he held it aloft for the group to see, almost like a child showing off his favorite toy. “This here’s magic dust! Sprinkle a little of this beauty on the water, and monsters won’t come close!” he announced proudly.

“What?!” Tiona (and the rest of the girls) blurted back in surprise. Bewildered as to what could be inside, she took the bag from the captain’s hand and worked the stubborn tie open.

“Hey, hey, careful now!”

“Huh—? Bwwwwwooooaaaagh, that stinks!” she cried out, reeling back and away from the pungent smell wafting out of the bag.

It was strong enough to elicit cries of disgust from Aiz, Lefiya, and the surrounding girls, all of them quickly bringing their hands to their noses.

“Why didn’t you say something?! What is this stuff?!” Tears forming in her eyes, Tiona attempted to peer into the bag. The others followed suit, doing their best to hold out against the overwhelming odor.

“Is it raw? Seems like a bunch of different things all ground up into powder…”

“And that color! Gives me the heebie-jeebies!”

Reds, yellows, blacks—all variety of different colored powders appeared to be mixed together, which almost looked like the crumbled remains of something dead when paired with the rancid smell. Tiona’s face curled in on itself like a dried prune as she surveyed the mysterious glittering dust.

“A dust that repels monsters…We don’t have anything like this in Orario, as far as I know,” Lefiya mused.

“You sure this doesn’t actually attract monsters? You know, mix it with some blood and meat and toss it over the side of the boat like bait to keep things from attacking the boat itself?” Tiona posed as the rest of the group exchanged similar thoughts behind her.

True to Lefiya’s words, this kind of convenient “monster repellant” certainly couldn’t be found in any stores in Orario. Aiz, however, knew of another item with remarkably similar properties. It was something she’d heard about from Bell, after he’d fled to the eighteenth floor during his escape from certain death. A “stink bag” that an apothecary from an ally familia had whipped up by chance. The bag and its terrific monster-repelling odor was what had helped him and his party make it all the way to the safety point with their lives.

Perhaps this powder in front of them now was one and the same.

Still…could this smell really keep even marine-type beasts at bay?

“But…we heard this thing was invented in Orario,” Rod mused as confusion crossed his and the other fishermen’s faces. “Yeah, you know! By that…that…Herseus…Persimmeus…oh, whatever her name is…”

“Perseus?”

“That’s it! She’s the one who invented it!”

While it certainly did seem like something the rare item maker could whip up…Lefiya and the others remained skeptical. They simply couldn’t understand why, if such an item truly existed, no one in Orario knew about it.

“Erm…from whom exactly did you receive this powder, Mister Rod?”

“From the big man, Papa Borg…head of the Murdock family. He bought it up in the city and gave it out to us free of charge. Not only to us fishermen but to all the boats that pass through Meren. It’s been forever now. That old man does a lot for us,” Rod explained. “Well…can’t say it’s perfect, as we do still get some raider fish attacks and such, but it’s certainly helped us avoid a lotta excess damage to our ships. Ships ’round here never sail without it!”

Could that be why Kali Familia’s ship got attacked yesterday…? Aiz immediately thought.

Every ship that docked in Meren, and even the passenger ships and sailing boats that often passed through, had these bags…but Kali Familia wouldn’t, given that this was their first time making port in the city. They wouldn’t have known that the powder even existed.

“…”

Aiz took the bag of powder from Tiona, reaching her hand inside.

She scooped up some of the colorful, sparkling dust with her fingers, letting it cascade down into her palm.

All the while, she watched, studying the tumbling, flowing particles.

“Speaking of…what’s going on between you guys and those Amazons, huh?”

“…Why? Did something happen?”

“Ah, no, no, just…us’n everyone else in the city are rightly pretty terrified of ’em. You can tell how strong they are just by lookin’! And then they march right through the middle of the street like they own the place…”

Rod explained as he scratched the back of his head. By strange coincidence, the conversation turned toward Kali Familia, similar to what had happened to Riveria during her visit to the Guild.

“Yeah, they’re scary!” “Savages, the whole lot of ’em!” the other fishermen were quick to add as Tiona grew quiet. The teary-eyed appeals from the burly men were enough to draw troubled looks from Aiz and the others.

“…”

Meanwhile, Tione was standing a short distance away from the group, focused in the direction of the city.

The conversation, however, didn’t last much longer.

“—Rod! We’ve got trouble!” an out-of-breath animal-person trawler shouted as he came running out onto the dock. Before anyone could so much as ask what the matter was, he continued his hysterical rant. “Those Amazonian ladies are causing a huge ruckus on the main road. One of ’em’s got ahold of Mark!”

All at once, the entire wharf plunged into panic.

As the color drained from Rod’s and the other fishermen’s faces, Aiz and her group found themselves thrown for a loop.

Amid the building clamor, however, Tiona was the only one who quickly scanned the area around them.

“Crap—!!” she hissed beneath her breath.

Mere moments later, Aiz, too, noticed the cause of her alarm.

“Miss Tiona, Miss Aiz, is…is something wrong?!” Lefiya inquired hesitantly.

“Tione’s gone.”

“She’s flown the coop!”

Aiz and Tiona responded in unison.

Before Lefiya and the other girls could register their surprise, the two were off, sprinting away from the pier.

“Lefiya! Get Loki! She should be in the storehouse nearby!”

“We’re going on ahead!”

The two first-tier adventurers called back as they raced as fast as their legs would take them. Even as the commotion built behind them, they kept their sights set straight on the city.

It was a gorgeous day.

Fluffy white clouds lingered lazily in the cerulean sky overlooking the city, and the gleam of the sun reflected a beautiful emerald green off the waters of the brackish lake below.

But despite the peaceful calm of the weather, the main street of Meren, normally filled with the hustle and bustle of passersby, was currently blanketed in a strange hush.

No one moved.

Or, more accurately, no one could move.

All eyes were glued to the middle of the street, where an Amazonian warrior was single-handedly holding one of the local fishermen aloft by his throat.

“Is there…problem?” she asked with a smile, her use of Koine maladroit at best.

Her long sandy hair was tied back in a ponytail that fell all the way down her back. The revealing clothing practically drawn on her copper skin was undeniably Amazonian, and around her waist she wore a belt not of fur but of scale—a drop item, perhaps, from some kind of dragon.

Despite her obvious beauty, between the glint in her eyes and the upward curve of her lips, she gave off an aura, purposeful or not, that reeked of reptilian malice. Far from what anyone would describe as “bewitching,” she looked more like a giant serpent anxious to gorge itself on its prey. Even her tongue seemed inhuman, impossibly long as it darted out to wet her lips.

The well-built young man currently in her clutches said nothing in response to her inquiry. A raspy, wheezing breath worked its way out of his mouth as his legs dangled uselessly in the air. The Amazon gripped his throat and held him aloft with one slender arm. Desperate for breath, he clawed at the fingers digging into his skin.

“P-please f-forgive…him…! Y-you were just so b-b-beautiful that he…couldn’t stop staring and…and didn’t watch where he was g-going, so p-please…!!” another fisherman nearby—his companion—pleaded.

The Amazon’s head turned toward the tear-stricken man with an almost audible creak.

“In my country, bumping into a warrior…is a challenge to fight to the death.”

The man’s face paled instantly.

Her grip on the fisherman’s neck tightened with a series of cracks, and the man’s body spasmed in response.

As frightened screams began erupting from the crowd, the woman’s companions, another group of Amazons, simply watched in amusement. Her sister, too, hair of the same sandy hue, merely stared out across the goings-on in apathy.

The man appeared to lose consciousness, his arms going limp, as his assailant narrowed her eyes in amusement.

Only then.

“Let him go.”

An arm reached out, the same copper color, and grabbed her wrist.

It was Tione.

“…Tione?”

“I said let him go, Argana.”

But the Amazon’s—Argana’s—smile never faltered, even at the bone-crushing grip on her arm. In fact, if anything, it deepened.

Finally, as Tione’s murderous glare continued, she released her grip on the fisherman’s neck with a shrug, almost as though having lost interest. The man’s body fell to the ground with a thud, and she shook off Tione’s hold on her arm.

“Where were you? We searched for you…you and Tiona.”

“I see you can speak Koine now. So fighting’s not the only thing in that monkey brain of yours.” Tione snorted, glaring daggers at the woman in front of her as the fisherman’s companion rushed forward to drag him out of the way.

Argana didn’t so much as flinch, her eyes filled with amusement.

“Kali taught it to me. She teaches us many things. The pleasure of growing stronger…and how to understand those who are different from us,” she added as her eyes passed over the crowd. “We wanted to know…what are our prey screaming? Are they angry? Are they begging for their lives?”

The naked sadism elicited a look of pure revulsion from Tione, who stuck her tongue out at her former comrade.

They were still the same as ever. Interested in nothing but power, bloodshed, combat.

Tione felt her blood begin to boil, face-to-face with the red thread of fate that connected the Amazons to their native country of Telskyura.

Her hand instinctively curled into a tight fist.

“Have you heard, Tione? How strong the outside world has gotten?”

“…”

“They have turned into snakes…just like us.”

“—No one’s the same as you, you evil witch!”

Something snapped inside Tione.

With an almost audible crack, all the years spent remedying her brash nature, her coarse tongue, came undone as her features lit up with rage.

Argana continued to smile that same crescent moon smile, head slowly twisting to the side.

“Then—shall we see just how strong you’ve become?”

For a single moment, no one so much as twitched along that wide road.

Then.

“Gnnngh!!”

The two women launched themselves at each other.

Argana’s left arm blocked Tione’s kick, and Tione’s left arm blocked Argana’s kick.

In less than an instant, the grand hand-to-hand duel had begun.

“Tione?!”

Tiona and Aiz arrived a second too late.

Screaming at the throng of onlookers to stay back, they made their way toward the center of the panicking crowd, where a barefoot battle of fist against fist was currently taking place. Long sandy hair tangled with jet-black as the two women exchanged punches and kicks that would leave an ordinary person crippled. The thick, dull sounds of the blocked blows thrummed in the ears of everyone present.

They seemed on par with each other. No, Tione was slightly—.

The skill with which they delivered their blows was nothing short of exemplary, and as Aiz watched them, she felt tiny prickles of apprehension stab at her heart.

When it came to weapons-free combat, Tione and Tiona were unquestionably the best in Loki Familia. Though Gareth might have been the strongest and Bete might have been the fastest, from a technical perspective, the Amazons’ unique style of martial arts was easily the fiercest. Aiz herself knew that, without a sword, she’d be out on her ass in five seconds flat.

But that same Tione now was slowly, ever so slowly, being “out-fierced” by Argana.

Those long limbs, almost like snakes, pecked away at her in ever-quickening strikes. And Argana’s ability to read her enemy’s next move was uncanny. Before Tione even began her attacks, Argana was already preparing for a counterstrike. There was no question as to her Level-6 rank, and she seemed to have the advantage when it came to Status, too.

Argana’s eyes flashed as Tione’s face twisted in frustration. That same frustration was quickly painted over with pure, concentrated rage as her unwillingness to lose spurred on her attacks at an even greater speed.

Aiz and Tiona sailed over the crowd of pushing, shoving onlookers, just about to put a stop to the fight, when—

“!”

Someone else stepped forward from the crowd to block their way.

It was the other sandy-haired Amazon, the one who shared the same blood as the woman in the brawl.

“Move, Bache!!” Tiona screamed.

“…rhu muu,” was the only reply from the stoic Amazon’s neckerchief.

Aiz couldn’t understand the words, but she could understand their meaning—that the woman had no intentions of letting them pass.

Tiona’s eyebrows positively bristled, and she charged toward the woman’s right side, fully prepared to push her way through, as Aiz zoomed forward at a similar breakneck speed on the woman’s immediate left. The very breaths of the two first-tier adventurers were perfectly in sync as they prepped for the combo technique they’d cultivated in the Dungeon’s depths—only for Bache to take on the two of them at the same time.

Catching Tiona’s iron fist in one hand, she let loose a simultaneous kick in Aiz’s direction.

““?!””

Despite being airborne, Tiona found herself instantly in the clutches of a circular throw, while Aiz, despite her speed, felt the Amazon’s kick slice through strands of her golden hair.

But there was no time for gawking. Hands slamming the ground, the two of them prepared to right themselves for the next onslaught. Bache, however, was already two steps ahead. Spinning like a chess piece, she let loose a rapid-fire barrage of blows and kicks to their heads, torsos, and legs, coming at them from every direction and striking both Aiz and Tiona at the same time.

—She’s fast!!

Aiz could barely believe her eyes at the sheer velocity of the attacks coming from the seemingly dispassionate warrior.

She knew right away that this wasn’t an opponent she’d be able to defeat without her sword. Pulling her backup sword out of its scabbard—Desperate was still in maintenance—she looked up to see the rest of the Amazonian warriors joining the battle.

“…!”

They must have felt Bache was at a disadvantage now that the two first-tier adventurers were fully prepared for battle, and they charged forward with weapons flashing.

Bache kept her focus on Tiona as the group of Amazons targeted Aiz, who quickly found herself drawn into her own free-for-all as the bare-fisted duel between the two Amazons intensified next to her.

“Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! You’ve changed, Tione! You’ve really changed!”

“Ggh—!”

Meanwhile, the battle between Argana and Tione continued, Argana’s laugh eliciting even deeper rage from the younger Amazon.

But it wasn’t just rage directed at her opponent. It was frustration at herself, too. The more damage she took, the more her combat power skyrocketed, and the more her fury bubbled, the more effective her Berserk skill became. And yet, despite the building power behind her each and every punch, Argana continued to fend them off with ease. Even the most powerful of attacks, enough to completely demolish an enemy, were useless if one couldn’t land them.

Argana’s techniques had the advantage when it came to polish, and she countered every one of Tione’s strikes like a mirror—the very same steps, the very same moves.

Which was natural, really.

Considering that the style of martial arts Tione practiced had been beat into her again and again at the hands of this very Amazon.

“Gnngh!!”

One of the kicks connected directly with Tione’s back, sending her sailing toward the side of the road in front of a nearby food stand.

Somehow, she’d been able to absorb the blow, and her arms tingled from the impact, but she shook it off, fully prepared to dash back into the fight when—she noticed it.

“Huh…?!”

A kid?!

Right behind her, a young human girl was crouched in fear.

What are you doing here?! she almost screamed, only to remember she was the one who’d lost her senses and recklessly begun fighting in the middle of a crowded street. No doubt, this girl simply hadn’t been able to run away in time.

Tione found herself at a loss for words as she stared down into the girl’s tear-stricken eyes, when all of a sudden, a shadow overtook them.

“”

It was Argana. And her laugh was enough to make Tione’s blood run cold as she held her fist aloft.

Tione would have just enough time to duck out of the way. But the girl wouldn’t be so lucky. Considering the incoming strike was powerful enough to send an entire carriage flying just by grazing it, the small body would be crushed. Even the resulting shock waves would be enough to snap her tiny limbs.

Argana, however, showed no concern. She had no reason to be concerned.

The only person in her eyes was Tione.

“ngh!!”

Tione yanked the girl out of the way, leaving herself wide open for Argana’s incoming fist.

“Tione?!”

There was a thunderous crash as Tione’s body was launched through the food stall, splintering it into pieces as she careened into the wall of the building behind it.

Tiona and Aiz forgot about their own battles, whirling around to see a giant cloud of dust billowing up from the nearby building.

“Gn—…ghnn…!” Tione grunted, spitting up blood. While she’d somehow been able to defend herself against the full force of the attack, the impact had still created a giant crack.

Argana, on the other hand, simply stood there blinking in silence, a strange look on her face.

“Did you really just…protect that girl?” She threw a glance at the girl in question, currently sprawled out on the ground and trembling in fear, before returning her eyes to Tione. “You really have changed, Tione…You’ve gotten stronger…and you’ve gotten weaker.” A look of pure, unadulterated disappointment crossed her face. “You are…no longer a warrior.”

Her body drooped, almost as though she had lost all will to fight.

There was the sound of weapons dropping from the direction of Aiz and Tiona, both of them still stopped where they stood, as Tione slowly staggered to her feet.

“The old you would never have protected garbage like that. I see now that you shouldn’t have left…You should have continued your battles in Telskyura…with us.”

“Are you…seriously saying that to me…?! Who would…who would ever want to stay in that place…?!” Tione hissed, glaring with deep-rooted resentment.

Argana’s eyes narrowed as a small smile formed on her lips.

“You still regret…killing Seldas, don’t you?”

In that instant, time seemed to stop.

“And yet, by killing her, you grew stronger, did you not?”

Tione’s eyes went red.

“NNNGGHH!!!”

An unintelligible roar erupted from the depths of her throat.

Forgetting herself, forgetting the pain, she let the madness take control and charged toward the other woman in an uncontrollable rage.

“That’s far enough!”

It came the moment before her fist hit its mark.

The sound of two short claps echoed throughout the street.

Though quiet, the voice that called out to them possessed a godlike sovereignty, and Tione’s body gave an instinctive shudder. Her tightly curled fist loosened as she returned to herself. Argana turned in the direction of the voice.

It was Loki, together with the rest of Loki Familia’s adventurers, including one very out of breath Lefiya.

“If things get any more heated ’round here, people are gonna get hurt. Not cool.” The goddess narrowed her eyes; she had only just arrived from the direction of the wharf but was already holding the battlefield in the palm of her hand. Rakuta, looking even more like a rabbit than usual, darted forward to grab the young girl, still sprawled out on the ground, and pull her out of harm’s way.

Tiona and Aiz lowered their fists and sword respectively, eyes directed toward their goddess.

“Argana. Bache. You two, too.”

The voice came from closer this time, from the opposite side of Loki and near where Tione and Argana had been fighting.

It was Kali, carting along a number of her followers.

“Apologies, Loki. Seems the outside world was a little too much for my girls.” She shook her head with a sigh and a (seemingly forced) grumble as her eyes met Loki’s. “Shall we share the blame? After all, your Sword Princess and her friends did a number on my girls, too.”

“Oh, whatever. Just scat, will ya? And I don’t wanna see you or any of your ‘girls’ again,” Loki scoffed, brushing her hand at them as though swatting at a bug.

While Bache had come out of her battle with Tiona unscathed, the group of Amazons Aiz had been fighting hadn’t fared so well and were in various states of injury. The girls in question were glaring daggers at Aiz and her sword while Aiz herself seemed none the worse for wear despite having been vastly outnumbered.

Kali simply smiled, then turned on her heel.

“Ta-ta, Tione.”

“…”

Argana and Bache walked past them, Bache as silent as ever and Argana throwing them a sidelong glance as they made their way first past Aiz and Tiona and then, finally, Tione. The rest of the Amazons, too, fell in line obediently behind their goddess and made their exit.

“M-Miss Aiz! Miss Tiona! Are you two all right?!” Lefiya immediately started for the two girls.

“I’m fine…thank you,” Aiz replied as she resheathed her sword, appreciative of the elf’s efforts in fetching Loki.

Tiona rubbed at her arm. “Yeeeouch…she really did a good one on me!” she hissed, and, indeed, bruises were already beginning to pop up all across her copper skin.

As much as she bemoaned the pain, however, there was something more important on her mind, and she threw a glance toward her sister.

“Miss Tione…” Lefiya and Aiz, too, noticed the direction of her gaze.

The girl in question was standing in the middle of the deserted road, her back to them.

Her eyes followed the retreating group of Amazons until they’d disappeared in the distance.

“Seems this is more serious than I thought…” Loki murmured, and the words caught on the breeze and circled their way toward Tione.

Tione brought a hand to her still-aching chest, oblivious to the blood that stained her mouth, as the wind played with her long black hair.

“Ngh…”

Seldas.

The name stirred in her heart—a name she’d kept buried for so, so long and, with it, the memories that haunted her. It was a piece of her past she didn’t want to remember.

She felt lost, confused, simply staring up at the sky overhead, as blue as the landscape of her memories.

The sky had been blue that day, too.

And it was stifling hot, baking the arena in the fiery heat of the sun overhead.

The ground of packed earth was already stained a brilliant red from the day’s fresh blood.

“Se wehga! Se wehga! Se wehga!”

The deafening roar surrounded her. Cheers. Cheers for her, Tione, standing her ground in the middle of the arena. Praise and adoration rained down on her tiny frame from every corner of the stands.

“Se wehga” was a phrase unique to the Amazons of Telskyura.

Translated roughly, it meant “Thou art the true warrior.”

She couldn’t make out anything over the thunderous ovation, her sense of hearing all but useless as she made her way toward the opponent in front of her. Hands shaking, she pulled the mask off the prone body—from the Amazon she’d killed—as the girl’s blood spilled out like a fountain onto the ground below.

She knew this face.

It was the face of the girl who’d tended to her wounds, who’d slept beside her so many nights, who’d breathed life back into her cold, dry heart.

The girl who’d been like a big sister to her, a mother to her, one of the most important figures in her life.

“Seldas…”

Though the name passed Tione’s trembling lips, Seldas’s eyes had already descended into darkness. Never again would they respond to her voice.

There had been a rule regarding who fought whom in the rites.

But Tione and the others had misunderstood that rule.

The reason they’d not yet had to fight any of the girls from their same room was simply that the right moment hadn’t come. As they strengthened the vessels of their flesh, so, too, did they strengthen their bonds with their roommates. They created friends, family for them to love.

And then, they were made to kill those loved ones.

This was their way of unleashing their anger. Of forcing them to overcome their grief. Of drying the tears from their eyes.

This was how they created “true warriors,” ones free from all manner of emotions and perfectly molded for combat.

Everything was part of this procedure for manufacturing warriors.

No…NO…

Something shattered. The world Tione had once known crumbled around her the moment she removed that mask.

For the very first time in her life, as she laid her hands upon the girl she’d loved, she knew how to differentiate right from wrong. She realized how twisted, how mistaken she’d been—cutting down her peers without so much as flinching, just as she’d killed the monsters before them.

On that day and in that place, the girl she’d so looked up to, the only mother she’d ever had, had taught her an important lesson—the agony of losing someone you loved.

She’d hurt her. No, her country, her goddess, these warrior-manufacturing traditions, her brethren had—

As tears of fury cascaded from her eyes, Tione turned toward the sky and roared.

“Se wehga! Se wehga! Se wehga!”

Thou art the true warrior. Thou art the true warrior. Thou art the true warrior.

The chant was deafening. Lauding the tiny girl in the arena, howling at the heavens. Christening her a warrior of old, having passed the test and now one step closer to the gods.

But to Tione, the words were nothing but a curse.

It was her fifth birthday. The day Tione had killed the one she loved…and advanced to Level 2.

Tione’s eyes would never see clearly again.

The moon in the sky overhead cast its light across the mountains, forest, and lake.

Night’s curtain had descended over Meren.

Off to the north, the great walls of Orario stood tall, visible from every corner of the small port city and its comparably undersized parapets. Not even the shadow of night masked the view. The glimmer of light from the city itself, hidden within its mighty walls, flooded out in harsh contrast to the surrounding darkness. Orario wasn’t called “the hottest city in the world” for nothing—one would almost think night never fell the way the sleepless city’s brilliant lights stained the sky. While the sight of the bustling city was old hat for the denizens of Meren, it was enough to stir the hearts and hopes of those for whom Orario was their journey’s end.

And while the nightlife of Meren couldn’t compare to that of its bigger sister, by no means was it going to go down without a fight.

Magic-stone lanterns hung from the port’s columns and buildings, bathing its main road in warm orange light. A festival-like atmosphere buzzed about the marketplace and its open-air stands, the whole street brimming with endless throngs of passersby. Travelers joined the ranks of shipwrights and fishermen, all of them solicited by the sounds and smells of freshly cooked seafood as they wandered from one tent to the next.

Needless to say, the port was a busy place—a true melting pot of foreigners.

In the bars, too, demi-humans and even a few gods mingled, hitting it off with all manner of new conversation partners.

“How’s Tione lookin’, Riveria?”

It was in one such bar—a little establishment not far from Loki Familia’s hotel—that Loki bided her time now. When the high elf appeared, she called out from her place at a small two-person table surrounded by the din of the enthused clientele.

“Even with Tiona and Aiz at her side…she isn’t faring well. She took quite the beating. Especially her heart,” Riveria explained as she pulled out the chair across from the goddess and sat down. “It doesn’t look good,” she added, guiltily almost, as though blaming herself for not having been at the scene of the fight. Still busy collecting information, by the time she, Alicia, and the others had rushed over upon hearing the commotion, all that was left was a deserted street and the girls of Loki Familia watching over a motionless Tione.

Once they’d finished repairing the storefronts they’d destroyed after apologizing to a very flustered Rubart and company, it was already evening. Since then, most of them had returned to the inn, which was exactly where Riveria had been prior to this meeting, doing her best to heal and soothe a broken Tione.

As Riveria sighed, Loki took a swig from her mug of ale.

“I know we’ve gotta continue this investigation, but…it’s startin’ to look like we might need to get Tione and her sister back to the city sooner rather than later.”

“Tiona should go quietly, but I doubt Tione will back down without a fight…”

“Hmm…You and I’ll talk to her.”

As concerned as they were for the two Amazonian sisters, however, they had a more important topic to discuss. The real reason they were meeting in this bar was to exchange the information they’d uncovered regarding their elusive violas.

And so, the goddess and vice captain of Loki Familia began their conference, away from the prying ears of the rest of their familia.

“All righty then, let’s go over everything we know first. We know that Tiona and Tione found nothin’ off-kilter on the lake bottom. The ol’ seal was tight as ever. While they didn’t probe every nook and cranny down there, I think it’s safe to say the second Dungeon entrance we’re lookin’ for isn’t in the lake…”

“Which would mean that however our flower fiends got there, they used a route on the surface.”

“’Zactly. If I had to guess, they’re in the sewers. And someone’s cartin’ them to the lake. We just need to look for somethin’ fishy…boxes or cages or somethin’…and then we’ll find the mastermind behind this whole thing.”

Riveria nodded.

The remnants of the Evils, and perhaps their one possible connection to the creatures, could well be somewhere within this very port.

“You learn anything new from your huntin’ today?”

“Mostly more of the same. Given how calm things have been on the waterfront lately, everyone’s more concerned about pirates than they are about any sort of monster. No one had even caught a glimpse of a viola before yesterday’s attack.”

“What about the folks at the Guild?”

“I was only able to speak with the branch manager—a human man named Rubart. Admittedly, I…have my suspicions,” the high elf conceded, one eye closing.

“Anything you can pinpoint?”

“There was just something unnatural about the whole conversation. The way he brought up the topic of Kali Familia, completely drawing my attention away from the violas…”

Loki wasn’t one to second-guess Riveria’s judgment.

While Finn may have been the brains and intuition of the group, Riveria was surely its all-seeing eye of perception. Her ability to discern others’ hearts could prove victorious even against Aiz’s defenses, much like a motherly sort of insight.

“What about Alicia and crew’s trip to see the gov? They learn anything?”

“Unfortunately, they were thrown out on suspicions of Guild involvement. Nigh unapproachable, it seems. The conversation itself was entirely one-sided.”

“Hmph…Involved with the Guild, sure, but we’re still not from around here,” Loki grumbled, bringing her mug to her lips.

Riveria was silent as the goddess picked at her food—a fish fillet with faintly greenish oil and sauce—before finally speaking up.

“And what of you? Were you able to acquire any new information? You went to see Njörðr, did you not?”

Loki grew even quieter.

Fork hand coming to a stop, she threw a quick glance up at the high elf.

“Hey…you don’t think Njörðr could be dirty, do ya?”

Surprise flashed in Riveria’s jade-colored eyes. “You really suspect Njörðr could have anything to do with this?”

“It was just a thought…”

“I find it difficult to believe, even absurd. While I may not have spent a great deal of time with him, the lengths he went to in order to help others like me when we first arrived on our journeys to Orario were extraordinary. He is, above all else, a man of character,” the high elf asserted, not a trace of doubt in her voice.

Loki scratched at her head awkwardly.

Having known the other god since their time in the upper world, this was something she knew all too well, herself. And yet, there was something she just couldn’t shake from their earlier exchange.

“Us gods have a hard time tellin’ when another god is lyin’. S’not like with you kids. Still…Njörðr, he…was never very good at it. At least from my perspective,” Loki explained, recalling the image of Njörðr with his back to her, avoiding eye contact.

It had been that moment that Loki knew.

“He’s hidin’ somethin’ from me. I know it.”

“…And that ‘something’ is related to the violas?”

“That I don’t know…but he’s certainly got a guilty conscience about something.”

Riveria shook her head. “I don’t believe it…”

As Loki sat there, her follower’s eye narrowed at her in disbelief, a strange feeling washed over her—one she’d never before felt. There was a flower-shaped shadow looming over this peaceful port town. And while it didn’t unsettle her, so to speak, it was still in sharp contradiction to everything Aiz and the others had uncovered today. That’s what bothered her. The fact that she just couldn’t figure it out.

Loki let her head fall.

“This whole thing might be bigger ’n all of us…or maybe more tangled would be the better way to put it.”

There were a number of characters she couldn’t bring herself to trust. Three, if she only included humans and gods.

Rubart at the Guild, Borg at the manor, and the patron deity of Njörðr Familia himself.

There was a good chance one of those three was the puppet master Loki was searching for.

“…What are we to do about Kali Familia?” Riveria finally asked, still mulling about Njörðr.

Loki grew quiet.

“Do you believe they’ve nothing to do with any of this?”

“As much as I worry ’bout Tione and her sister, they’re not high on my radar. Whether or not they’re completely innocent, though…” she trailed off, displeased with her vague answer. Finally, after another moment to think, she continued, trying to put her instinct into words. “…I can’t help but feel like there’s some sorta thread connecting ’em. It’s tiny, one you can’t see no matter how hard you squint…but a thread nonetheless,” she mused, almost to herself, as her eyes widened ever so slightly.

Riveria brought a hand to her chin in thought.

The din of the pub around them wove itself through their silence. Craving alcohol to lubricate the gears of her thoughts, Loki sought out her mug only to find it devoid of ale. She stuck out her tongue in displeasure before waving the empty stein high. “I need a top-up over here, old man!”

“Guzzlin’ them down tonight, I see, milady. Somethin’ on your mind?” the owner of the bar, an old raccoon, asked as he traded out the empty mug on her table for a new one full of ale.

“Oh, this and that. Lots to think about when my cute little kids are involved, you know? Only choice is to drown my troubles!”

“If you have any Alb Water, I’ll take that,” Riveria spoke up when it came her turn to order, never one to touch the drink herself.

“Come to think, you notice anything weird goin’ on lately, old man? Doesn’t have to be big. Just somethin’ you might have noticed in passin’,” Loki said nonchalantly, downing half her ale in one gulp.

“Anything weird, huh…?” the raccoon murmured. “You know, just so rightly there was somethin’! Amazons! Been seein’ ’em everywhere in the streets lately…”

“Amazons…?” Riveria inquired.

“The very same! From that one lady god’s familia,” he continued. “We might have our fair share of brothels on the backstreets, but these ain’t no ladies of Meren! Don’t recognize a one of ’em…Then again, could just be my mind playin’ tricks on me. After all, this town’s the gateway to Orario, so we get all sorts of folks comin’ through here from one day to the next…” he mused, head cocked to the side as though suddenly unsure of himself.

Loki and Riveria could only look at each other in silence.

Velvet curtains lined every wall in the magic-stone-lit room.

The velvet rug, the vases, the sofa—everything was dyed a deep crimson. There was something almost licentious about it as every corner oozed a brothel-like aura. It contained not a single window; the entirety of the room was underground. Inside, its walls were filled with Amazons of Kali Familia, clothed in warriors’ attire.

Argana, Bache, and others were lounging around the room, each one idling about on their own, as Kali lay sprawled out upon the couch, petite lips parting for a lethargic yawn.

“…”

Without warning, Bache, who was standing off by herself in silence, turned her eyes toward the entrance.

As if in response, the room’s sole door opened.

“—You’re all here. Perfect.”

The newcomer was a copper-skinned goddess.

Her body was adorned in gold, from the circlet around her head to her earrings, necklace, bracelets, and anklets. As far as clothing was concerned, she wore nothing but a loincloth and a few strips of fabric for a top, all of it tied together by a belt at her waist. Everything about her seemed molded to incite the lust of male eyes, from her ample chest and supple limbs to her salaciously curved hips. She was stunningly gorgeous. So much so that clothes would only hinder her beauty.

The Amazons of Telskyura, having known nothing but combat their whole lives, were taken with her immediately.

Even if the “femme fatales” they’d heard of only through word of mouth did, indeed, exist, something told them they’d still pale in the face of the beauty before them now. It didn’t matter that they were all women the same as she—the mouths of everyone in the room dropped in an entranced stupor, and their cheeks flushed a brilliant red. As Argana directed her eyes toward the newcomer in delighted curiosity, Bache furrowed her brows in an attempt to resist before turning her gaze away.

A fiendishly bewitching allure filled the room, strong enough to captivate men and women alike and liable to put even other gods in their place.

The goddess twirled a long kiseru pipe between her fingers as her eyes narrowed in provocation.

“Finally! We’ve been waiting for you!” Kali piped up with her usual smile of confidence as she rose from the sofa, the only one in the room unaffected by the newcomer’s charm.

As the goddess entered the room, a trail of women followed her. They, too, were Amazons, similar to Kali Familia. Every one of them boasted a monstrous body, practically mistakable for a two-meder-plus monster, yet stunningly beautiful with long legs.

There wasn’t one among them who was nothing short of a goddess herself, clad in combat garments that accentuated the cascading valleys between their breasts and the bare curves of their hips. And yet, even in spite of their beauty, it was clear from how they carried themselves, with not a single visible opening, that they were every bit living, breathing weapons of destruction.

Their beguiling patron deity took her seat on the sofa across from Kali.

Kali’s followers, in turn, took their places behind Kali, while their visitors did the same opposite them.

With the table in the center of the room between them, the two goddess-led factions faced each other.

“This may be a little off base this late into the game, but I just wanna confirm—you’re Ishtar, correct?”

“That I am,” the goddess Ishtar confirmed with a smile.

Ishtar Familia.

A large familia known for its superior combat prowess even among the familias of Orario.

Reigning over the Pleasure Quarter in the southeast, its enormous sphere of influence was said to be the greatest in the city, and its warrior courtesans, known as the “Berbera,” were easily strong enough to rival the most skilled first-tier adventurers.

Their patron deity was the goddess of beauty Ishtar.

A goddess whose enchanting guiles could ensnare the hearts of thousands—the very embodiment of beauty itself—and who kept the brothels of the city firmly under her thumb.

Kali, however, didn’t hesitate a moment in the face of Ishtar’s authority.

“You’re a bit of an odd duck, you know that? Sending a request to a far-off country like ours.”

“Which is why I explained my reasoning in great detail in the many letters we exchanged. I’m not afraid to use whatever means necessary.”

In fact, it was at Ishtar’s behest that Kali and the rest of her followers had journeyed to Meren in the first place—a certain request letter, signed by the goddess of beauty herself, had simply shown up on her doorstep one day.

“…I will bring down that woman—Freya,” Ishtar asserted, a dark flame burning in her amethyst eyes.

There was no one Ishtar despised more than Orario’s other twin head, and coincidentally the other “goddess of beauty,” Freya. It was jealousy that spurred her hatred—she envied the other goddess’s prestige, renown, and, most of all, the fact that she was considered the most beautiful goddess in all the world.

Ishtar refused to be known as simply the “Goddess of Jealousy,” deity of an envy so powerful, the gods had warned them it would upend the fate of humans and plunge the lower world into chaos.

No, Ishtar had pledged herself to bringing her rival down.

Which was exactly why she’d requested the help of Kali Familia in realizing her scheme now.

“I had no idea what to expect when that first secret message of yours came,” Kali remarked, thinking back to the first letter she’d received from Ishtar more than a year ago.

Freya Familia was easily the strongest in Orario, and Ishtar wasn’t stupid enough to think she could take them on herself. Her only option if she had any hopes of proving victorious was to request help from one of the world’s much smaller powers—Kali Familia, with its warriors that rivaled Orario’s first-tier adventurers. And so she’d felt them out time and time again, not only with her letters but through the observations her messenger Amazons brought back from the island nation.

Though Kali hadn’t believed the letters at first, after multiple envoys and tributes of Superior-grade armaments, she’d finally agreed to give Ishtar’s request some thought.

“All things considered, it didn’t take much to catch your interest.”

“It’s a great opportunity! To do battle with the famed Freya Familia…and really, you musta done your homework before comin’ to us. You knew this’d be right up our alley.”

The true reason Kali Familia had decided to heed Ishtar’s request, even going so far as to leave their own country, was because of the chance it offered—to fight against the irrefutably powerful Freya Familia, the strongest in a city already known for its capable factions.

This was an offer Kali and her combat-craving Amazons simply couldn’t refuse, and it was a serendipitous meeting of interests for the two goddesses.

Ishtar crossed her slender, tanned legs as she and the young goddess across the table exchanged smiles. Catching the sidelong glances of Kali’s followers eyeing her every move, she brought the tip of her kiseru pipe to her lips.

“I’ll only let you know my initial plan for now. Wouldn’t want you and your girls to run wild or anything, now would we?”

“What, you don’t trust us?” Kali scoffed.

“I’d watch my tongue if I were you, little Neanderthals.”

Ishtar’s warning was accompanied by a puff of purple smoke from between her lips.

Behind Kali, Argana and the other Kali Familia Amazons sported contentious smiles directed at Ishtar’s followers. The enormous women behind Ishtar responded in kind. Though the alliance had been formed, the atmosphere in the room seemed liable to combust at a moment’s notice.

“Samira,” Ishtar called out, slicing through the tension.

An ashen-haired Amazon approached the short-legged table between the two goddesses, unfolding a scroll atop its surface.

It was a map of Orario.

“Our territory is here—the Pleasure Quarter in the southeast. Freya Familia’s home, on the other hand, is located here, right in the middle of the Shopping District. To put things in perspective, Meren is located to Orario’s southwest,” Ishtar explained, her thin finger pointing out each location on the map.

“Hmmm…interesting. Then the enemy’s already nicely sandwiched between us,” Kali mused with a nod, leaning forward across the table. “A pincer attack, then?”

“Precisely,” Ishtar confirmed with a smile. “My familia will begin the attack, and while Freya and her followers have their full attention on us, you and your warriors will sneak in from behind.”

Ishtar had chosen an ally outside the city itself not only to ensure her plan’s secrecy but also to guarantee their attack would come as a complete surprise. Even the strongest familia in Orario wouldn’t expect an attack from outside the city’s walls. Even more so if the attackers boasted Level-6 combat power.

“And what’re we supposed to do about those crazy-high walls, huh? I’m sure they’ve got guards, yeah?”

“There’s a certain…company I’ve got wrapped around my finger—Albella. Simply come in by freight, and you should be able to pass by without an inspection. If you’d like, I can even open the gate for you myself the day prior,” Ishtar explained, the corners of her mouth curling upward as her irresistible charm did its work. “Once you’ve finished preparing, we’ll invade Freya’s territory…And once the fighting begins, that will be your sign to attack,” she finished. Her aura embodied callous ferocity despite her commanding allure.

Helping an outside force infiltrate the city was a serious crime, but Ishtar had no qualms about making enemies with the Guild. Such was the tenacity of one who’d spent too long ruminating on her own humiliation.

As Ishtar finished relaying her plan, Kali’s eyes narrowed.

“Heh. The jealousy of a goddess truly is a terrifying thing. A shame, really, that one so beautiful could have fallen so far,” she mused, chuckling at the irony. While her outward appearance and voice resembled a young girl’s, the bite behind her words and the way she stared daggers made it plain that she was no child.

Ishtar made her rebuke while she smiled.

“Say what you will, but I will do anything to bring that woman’s world crashing down around her.” As the goddess’s smile widened, her gorgeous features bordered on the demonic.

The sheer intensity exuding from her every pore had reached the point where it was overwhelming Kali’s followers.

“At any rate, that’s as much as I can tell you now. Even barbarians like you should be able to follow such simple instructions, yes?”

“Heh, charming as ever. But simple’s good. After all, this is our first time meetin’ face-to-face. Can’t expect too much, now, can we?” Kali agreed, playing off her opponent’s effrontery with congeniality. “What day we lookin’ at?”

“Preparations are taking longer than planned; however, feel free to use this inn as you like until the day arrives.”

“How generous.”

“I know. You should feel honored.”

Ishtar had taken care of everything since the Amazons’ arrival, from their port-entry permit to their lodgings, while her followers made constant treks in secret between Orario and Meren. In fact, the “Amazons” mentioned in a certain bar in another corner of the city were the Amazons of Ishtar Familia.

“Still, even with the lavish fineries, we’re still here just twiddlin’ our thumbs…My girls wanna get out there and fight, don’t you, Argana?” Kali leaned back against the sofa and glanced back to where Argana was currently standing behind her.

“We do,” the Amazon replied, a snakelike smile gracing her lips.

“That Warlord especially. Gotta see what he’s really made of.”

“That boaz is just one of many in Freya’s entourage. Don’t act out of turn,” Ishtar hissed, purple smoke escaping her teeth.

“I know, I know! We’ll wait like good little girls,” Kali responded with a wave of her hands, looking more and more like a mischievous child. “Speakin’ of, this your whole familia, Ishtar?”

“Are you really that imbecilic? My familia is equally as large as yours. I left most of them back in the city and brought only my top girls with me here. Why do you ask?” the goddess of beauty inquired with a tilt of her head.

“Just wondering if your girls here would be the only ones tackling the front end of the pincer attack, is all. Our friend the Warlord’s a Level Seven. He alone would be enough to take down my Argana and Bache. Just don’t want the whole thing to be over before it even starts,” Kali remarked none too delicately as she glanced at Ishtar’s entourage. She, too, had left the majority of her familia back in Telskyura. From her point of view, what with her party of mostly Level 5s and 6s, Ishtar Familia didn’t exactly seem the best choice for a frontal attack.

While Ishtar’s followers were quick to anger at the remark, Ishtar herself simply smiled.

“There’s no need to worry. I have something special up my sleeve,” she assured, throwing a glance at one of the women behind her.

The woman in question was the only one in the group of a different race.

Though her face was hidden by a pure-white veil of feathers covering her head, from the tail protruding from her hips, it was clear she was of animal-person descent. Her curves betrayed her femininity and, when coupled with her robes, gave off the impression of a priest or kazuki-adorned Shinto shrine maiden.

She didn’t respond to her patron deity’s knowing glance, remaining completely silent and apparently devoid of any sort of enthusiasm.

“…Hmm?” Kali eyed the girl curiously.

In return, she found a set of gorgeous green eyes staring back at her from behind her facial covering. Almost immediately, however, the long-legged woman next to her blocked her view, face stern as she hid the veiled girl behind her back.

“I’m basically serving you victory on a platter. Any leftovers are yours for the taking…Feel free to have a ball,” Ishtar offered, and her followers behind her responded with bestial smiles.

Kali’s followers couldn’t help but grin in return at the alluring proposition.

“While I’m not sure how I feel about this trump card of yours…I guess it’ll have to do. So long as I get the gist of it. For now, we’re just supposed to sit tight, yeah?”

“Exactly.”

“That bein’ the case, I’d like it if we finished this whole business of my compensation, then.”

Ishtar’s dark hair fluttered, glimpses of purple visible amid the rich obsidian. “I’d be glad to pay you as much as you’d like. Simply name your price, and I’ll—”

“Keep your money. I don’t need it anymore. I want somethin’ else.”

“Oh?”

“And I want it before all this goes down, too,” the miniature goddess asserted, the tiniest of trembles audible in her voice.

Ishtar scowled. Eyes sharpening like needles, she looked at the other goddess head-on. “…Go on.”

“Loki Familia’s currently here in this port. Don’t get me wrong—it’s got nothin’ to do with us. Just a coincidence, is all. Seems like they’re here huntin’ some kinda man-eating flower monster or whatsit.”

“Man-eating flower…? Ah yes. Those.” A disdainful smile crossed Ishtar’s lips as she made the connection in her mind. “And? Don’t tell me…?”

“You got it. I was hopin’ to go up against ’em.”

Ishtar’s eyebrows rose in identical arcs. “You can’t be serious. Going up against Freya and her followers is ludicrous enough. Loki Familia would be even more so. I can’t have you bloodied and bruised before the fight with Freya even begins!” she snapped, voice cracking.

Kali raised her hands in supplication. “Sorry, sorry…I wasn’t being clear. By ‘them’ I didn’t mean the whole familia…but two certain sisters within the familia.”

At the word sisters, Argana’s lips broke into a smile behind the goddess.

“You see, Loki’s gotten her hands on a few of my kids. Well, former kids, at least. I lost the two of ’em in a rather…unfortunate incident. Still tugs a bit at my heartstrings, you know?”

“…You speak of the two Amazonian twins?”

“One and the same! I’d very much like it if my Argana and Bache could go up against ’em.”

Ishtar tossed a puzzled glance at the two Amazons in question.

The two were sisters, the same sand-colored hair falling over their shoulders. While one wasn’t even trying to contain her mirth, the other remained stony and silent.

And yet, while their attitudes may have differed, both of them were imbued with the same carnal desire to fight.

“Two sisters who left…two sisters who stayed…Which ones turned out stronger, I wonder? Will the ones who come out on top break free of the vessel they’re trapped in? Will they reach new heights—a new level?” Kali mused, half to herself, as her eyes stared off in the distance. “I want to see that battle. The carnage. I want to witness for myself which choice was correct…in a shower of blood.”

With a quiet intensity, Kali’s voice grew more and more heated as she spoke.

Her eyes glinted beneath her mask, her throat trembling in imminent ecstasy.

This time, it was the Amazons on Ishtar’s side who shuddered, nerves on edge at their glimpse of the goddess of war, blood, and mayhem in all her glory. It was clear that the woman before them now sought not just combat but a brilliant fight to the death.

What gratified Kali the most, and what had been her sole purpose in descending to the lower world, had been nothing but war itself.

The fact that her true motivation focused solely on the taking of lives made her all the more detestable. But it was this simple purpose that had drawn Ishtar to her in the first place—somehow it made her seem more “manageable”…Still. Not even Ishtar could have calculated the true extent of the tiny goddess’s bloodlust, and faced with it now, she could only glower in disgust.

There was a gasp from the veiled beast woman behind her—fear, perhaps?

“But in order to make that happen, I need you folks to keep the rest of their familia at bay. We learned well enough today that they’ve got a number of girls in their ranks who’ll cause us trouble if we try again, their Sword Princess in particular. And I want this to be a fight between sisters only,” the petite goddess demanded haughtily.

Ishtar, however, would have none of that, and she was just about to tell her as such when—

“—Hee-hee-hee. Let them have their funnnn, Lady Ishtar.”

A certain giant of a woman who’d been silently watching the scene unfold from behind Ishtar finally opened her enormous mouth.

“Phryne…”

“It’s finnnne, isn’t it? A warm-up for the fight with Freya, if you will. Besidesssss, sooner or later even Orario will find out Kali and her followersssss are here in Meren. If they’re convinced their purpose in coming was to fight Loki Familia, there’s no chance of the Guild or Freya and her lot raising any suspicionsssss…” the Amazon explained.

While her limbs were strangely short, her bust size was substantial, and atop her large body and even larger head was a patch of short bobbed hair, the profile almost reminiscent of a toad’s. Her voice, too, hoarse and guttural, sounded as though it had been ripped straight from a frog, the husky croaking eliciting looks of disgust from both Kali’s and Ishtar’s entourages.

It was none other than Phryne Jamil, Ishtar Familia’s captain.

At Level 5, she was the strongest in the familia.

“I’ll take care of that Sword Princessssssss for them.”

Despite the good argument the toad woman had given, Ishtar still suspected she had ulterior motives, and, indeed, she didn’t miss the deep-rooted enmity burning in those giant ogling eyes the moment Phryne mentioned the Sword Princess.

She sighed, long and low, but finally recovered her earlier smile.

“All right, then. Phryne does make a good point. And I can’t say I’m all too fond of Loki and her merry men, either,” she finally agreed, her distaste for Freya Familia’s rivals all too obvious. “Having said that, if we find we’ve bitten off more than we can chew, I’m pulling my girls out, and you’ll have to handle the rest yourselves.”

“I’d assumed as much.” Kali nodded coolly. The inklings of a smile were finally beginning to show on the cherubic goddess’s face. “There’s nothing that excites me like the spray of blood, and nothing lights a fire in my gut like the cries of agony when some poor soul crosses over the line between life and death. There exists no greater thrill in all the world! And a treat my more frivolous brothers and sisters will never get to taste—real war, with real lives at stake. That…that is the true thrill of the lower world…and exactly what I seek.”

“…”

“The only truth my children know is that of fighting and bloodshed.”

From Ishtar’s point of view, as someone whose entire being revolved around love and sex, love was the true, unchanging universal truth, but since they would never see eye to eye on such things, she kept her mouth shut.

“—War is the future,” Kali continued caustically, her bloodred eyes narrowing within the empty sockets of her mask. “And I’m gonna be the first in line to see it.”

CHAPTER 4

SISTER & SISTER, DUSK & DAWN, SHADOW & LIGHT

Tiona remembered it all too well.

The look in her sister’s eyes. The moment she began to lose her way.

The day Tione reached Level 2, Tiona had leveled up, as well. It was by the same method—killing one of the girls in their shared chambers.

However, Tiona’s mind hadn’t been nearly as developed as her older sister’s, and even when she realized she’d killed one of her beloved roommates, she’d barely felt a thing.

Oh, poo. I killed someone again.

She liked to fight. Kali and the other Amazons had always congratulated her when she’d won. And yet, every time she was forced to kill one of her sisters, she got a funny feeling in her heart. Tiona had been too young to know how to put it into words, and so it had just built and built and built.

So long as she focused only on the excitement stirring in her blood, things would be fine. She could still be like the other Amazons. That’s what she’d believed. That’s what she’d understood innately. But the funny feeling in her heart brought all of that to a halt. As a young girl who acted on instinct rather than reason, the more her blood churned in excitement, the more she was troubled deep within her heart. The line between the two emotions was paper-thin at best.

When she returned to her stone room on the day of her fifth birthday, Tione had already been there. Alone in the corner, her weapon and mask tossed to the floor and her face buried in her knees.

“Who did you fight?”

“…Seldas.”

Tione didn’t even look up upon her approach, voice no more than a whisper.

Seldas.

Tiona, too, had thought warmly of her. Besides her sister, Seldas had been easily the most generous and kind of anyone she’d ever known. But the rites didn’t end until someone was dead. And both Tione and Seldas had had no choice but to fight to the death.

The funny feeling in Tiona’s heart grew even stronger.

“…Good.”

She replied. And the word had been genuine.

Tiona might not have been able to truly feel the connection in their blood, but that didn’t keep her from understanding that Tione was someone special to her. She was relieved that Seldas had died and Tione had lived.

I’m glad you’re alive. I’m glad you weren’t killed. That had been what Tiona had meant with her word.

But all she’d been met with was a fist.

It was heavy with unadulterated ferocity.

While the two sisters may have argued often, none of their fights had ever been this extreme; Tione was aiming to kill as she shattered Tiona’s jaw.

Pain flared across Tiona’s face. She saw red and, with an enraged howl, prepared to leap upon her sister…

…only to come to a stop at the sight in front of her.

Tione was crying.

Her body was shaking, her features contorted in a strange mix of rage and despair as giant tears rushed from her eyes.

Tiona’s fist loosened, her arm falling limply to her side.

And then she’d simply stood there, in silence, watching her sister weep.

Tione grew even wilder after that.

She’d never been the most eloquent of girls, but now her words had begun to border on the obscene. She became aggressive toward everyone and everything. Even her sister wasn’t an exception to her abuse. With every day that passed, her eyes grew more stagnant, more clouded, indicative of the turmoil in her heart.

Tione wasn’t the only one, either. Everyone in their room had felt it now that their numbers had dropped by more than half. Now that they fully understood the truth behind the rites, not a one of them spoke. Some feared forming any more of an emotional connection with their peers, while others worried about being killed themselves. There were also those who reached a sort of understanding, surrendering to their own instinct and awakening as the “warriors” their country so craved.

Their days of fighting sped by.

Those who survived the rites rose up in rank and were eventually selected, one by one, by their more senior Amazons. It was an acknowledgment of their own strength and abilities, and a binding relationship as teacher and student.

Tiona was chosen by Bache. And Tione was chosen by Argana.

The two sandy-haired sisters were ten years older than the five-year-old girls. As they were also twins, it could only be assumed they’d thought pairing up the two sets of siblings would lead to some sort of benefit. Argana was the older of the two, and both had already made quite the name for themselves. At the time, they were ranked high among the few candidates in the running for the familia’s next captains.

The training was grueling. Not a day went by where the young girls didn’t see blood in their vomit, and there were even times they left with broken bones. Merely surviving from one day to the next meant desperately stealing every move, every technique they could from the two Amazons deemed their instructors.

“…On your feet.”

As Bache looked down at her, icy and unfeeling, on the cold stone ground, Tiona felt fear for the first time in her life. It wasn’t until later, once they’d both escaped, that she’d learned Tione’s training under Argana had been even more arduous.

Between the rites and their training, the time they spent in their room inevitably grew less and less. As did their roommates. In fact, by the time they realized it, they were the only two left in their little stone room.

But they weren’t allowed time to despair. The constant training wore down their bodies and minds, their emotions all but dulled, and their only happiness came from their victories in battle. Tiona found herself lost, drifting aimlessly through her day-to-day routine—the same routine Telskyura had used already to mold most of its warriors, stripped of everything but their will to fight.

It was an entire year before she reached her turning point.

She’d been crawling about the empty arena like a cat, having stolen a moment’s peace before her training was to begin, when she’d found a balled-up scrap of paper that had been carelessly tossed away down one of the empty aisles—a piece of a story.

The epic.

“…”

Tiona opened her eyes.

The faint lapping of the lake’s waters and the cries of nearby seagulls pulled her out of her dream as reality came into focus.

Sentimental scenes of her past still hazy in her mind, she sat up in bed, glancing over at the mattress next to her.

It was empty.

“…She already left?” she moaned, her other half nowhere to be seen. Reaching her arms upward, she let out a long “Hnnggaaaaah…” as she stretched the sleep from her body.

“We’re tight’nin’ our search,” Loki proclaimed first thing once the group had gathered around the breakfast table that morning. “I wanna concentrate our efforts on three things: Njörðr Familia, the Guild, and the old Murdock estate. Now, we don’t want any of these folks to know we suspect anything, so we’re just gonna act like it’s a continuation of yesterday. Make it seem like we’ve still got nothin’ and secretly sniff around for anything suspicious.”

Hearing this, the residents of the hotel’s first-floor dining hall quickly descended into chaos.

Loki, however, simply continued.

“Having said that, ol’ Njörðr’ll know somethin’s up the moment we start pokin’ around, so I’ll handle that one myself. But y’all have to take care of the other two.”

“And what of Kali Familia?” Riveria inquired.

“Ignore ’em for now. But if they do try and stick their noses in where they aren’t wanted again, stay together. No heroics, ya hear?” Loki instructed, throwing a glance in Tiona and Tione’s direction. “Tiona, Tione, you’ll stick with Aiz and Riveria. Those two sisters of theirs are somethin’ fierce, but so long as you’re in pairs, you should be fine…even if they do pick a fight. By the way, I’m officially vetoing any right to object at this point,” she added before Tione could open her mouth to protest. “And unless y’all wanna get shipped back to Orario, I’d suggest you behave like good little girls, yeah?”

Tione scowled, sitting back in her chair with a huff.

Aiz and Riveria simply nodded, accepting their duty to watch over the twin Amazonian sisters with their deep connection to Kali Familia.

“All right, then! Any questions? No? Then y’all are dismissed!”

“I wonder if Tione’ll be all right…” Tiona murmured as she let her eyes turn skyward, taking in the ever-blue swath of sky spread out above the port.

She and Aiz were currently walking along a small alleyway away from the hustle and bustle of the main street, while the residents carted baskets of laundry and shopping bags nearby and children ran back and forth around them.

“I wouldn’t worry. Riveria is with her…” Aiz pointed out as she walked along beside her.

“I would if I could! But…eh, I do understand what Loki was thinking. The two of us together would be a perfect target,” Tiona mused slowly.

Try as she might to act normal, in her heart, she wished she was with Tione right now. Her mind was already coming up with all sorts of unlikely scenarios that could be playing out at that very moment. Still, she couldn’t help but notice that Aiz’s mind, too, seemed to be fixated on something.

“You’re worried about Old Man Murdock, aren’t you?” she asked, changing the topic of conversation.

“A little, yes…” Aiz nodded.

The two of them were on their way to the manor of the man in question, the Murdock estate, with plans to infiltrate the grounds. They needed to think of a way the two of them could get inside unnoticed in order to continue the investigation Lefiya and the others had started the previous day. Maybe, just maybe, they could find some clue.

Still ruminating on the matter, they found their walk brought to a sudden halt by a young animal girl stumbling across their path.

“Ah—!”

“Whoa there! You all right?”

The book she’d been carrying tumbled to the ground together with a handful of gold coins. Perhaps she was on her way home from shopping?

Aiz was quick to help the young girl to her feet. Tiona lent a hand, too, by gathering up her scattered possessions—that is, she was about to, until she saw the book’s title and immediately stopped in her tracks.

…Argonaut.

Her eyes were glued to the book’s cover—an image of a hero battling a mighty bull. It was a volume of the epic she was familiar with.

“U-um…Miss, could you…?”

“Oh! Sorry, sorry!” Tiona replied sheepishly as she handed the book and coins over to the teary-eyed girl.

The girl responded by hugging the book protectively to her chest.

“You just buy that?” Tiona inquired, bending down so she was at the girl’s level.

“Yeah, the—the man at the store, he…told me they got lots of new books from the ship…”

“…You like that old legend?”

“—Yeah!” The girl’s face lit up like a sunflower.

With a quick thank-you, she waved her hand before running off down the alley.

“Tiona…?” Aiz asked as Tiona continued to stare silently in the direction the girl had gone.

She stood there another moment, a soft smile playing on her lips.

“I liked them, too…back in Telskyura…” she murmured. The sight of that girl running away so happily, a great big grin on her face, joined the images from her dream that very morning—of the little girl who’d smiled the same exact way.

Bache had been training her that day, same as always, in the arena’s training room.

Her face covered in blood, Tiona rummaged for the paper she’d hidden in a corner of the room and held it out to the older Amazon with both hands. “Will you…read it to me?”

It was the same scrap she’d found in one of the arena’s aisles shortly before practice.

Though presumably dropped by one of her peers, it wasn’t of Telskyuran origin—she had never seen these Koine letters. Considering she didn’t even know how to read and write in the Amazonian language, the words on the paper were positively indecipherable, no matter how much interest she had in them.

Tiona would never forget the look Bache gave her.

The ever-taciturn Amazon was clearly taken by surprise.

Rather than respond with her typical emotionless apathy, she seemed deeply flustered, and after standing there for a good couple of moments, body swaying, she took the scrap of paper and left the room with nothing more than a “…G-give me some…time.”

It wasn’t until a few days later that Bache returned, and once their training for the day was over, she read the contents aloud.

She shouldn’t have given a second thought to the whims of an inquisitive child, and yet, somehow her pride wouldn’t let her move on. To think she and a girl ten years her junior would be on the same level, unable to read the same characters! It had been enough of a blow to her dignity that she’d gone to Kali herself, red-faced as she’d asked the goddess to teach her the meaning behind the words.

“I want to know…what it says…”

Though Kali had guffawed quite heartily at the request, she’d diligently translated the Koine words for her.

“Not realizing he was being deceived, the young man said to the king, ‘Understood, my liege. I will, without fail, save the princess being held captive deep within the labyrinth.’”

“What happens next? What happens next?”

Tiona urged Bache on beneath the torchlight, sometimes kneeling, sometimes sitting cross-legged on the cold stone floor and not even bothering to tend to her wounds. Bache herself seemed bewildered, this being her first time in this sort of position, but slowly she worked her way through the entire text, relaying the story bit by bit after each training session.

But like every story, this one eventually came to an end. Especially considering this was only a scrap torn from a larger book, the ending came all too quickly. Though this meant concluding their secret post-training story time, the “damage” had been done, and Tiona no longer saw Bache as the terrifying authoritarian she’d once been.

“Lead your enemy’s attacks. Draw them in until you can feel the wind against your skin, then parry.”

“Parry how?”

“…Just parry.”

The rigorous training sessions became more than mere pain and suffering. In fact they became almost…fun.

At the same time, the young Amazon who’d been taught to know nothing besides combat found herself dreaming of other, bigger things.

—She wanted to know how the story ended.

With every day that passed, her desire became stronger.

Then, one day.

Upon completing another rite, Kali happened to ask her if there was anything she wanted.

Tiona responded immediately.

“I want to know the end to this story.”

Her wish was granted, and a complete, undamaged book was sent for.

Tiona may have been an idiot at times, but she wasn’t stupid. And the pliable mind of a child was a powerful thing. Her interest sparked a flame inside her head, and soon, with Kali’s help, she was reading Koine with ease. She could still remember the looks Bache gave her—dejected, almost. In the cheerless world of the arena, she had discovered another type of excitement, one different from fighting, and Tiona found herself instantly enamored.

From then on, every time Tiona won a fight, she would ask for another book to add to her collection as a reward. It became a sort of bait, but also drew favor from Kali. And so, Tiona devoured more and more and more stories. She carted them back to her stone room, lost in their pages, rolling around in her bed as she pored over them late into the night by candlelight. With every day that passed, her collection grew larger, until Tione finally kicked the giant mountain over in a huff. This, of course, led to one of their habitual fights, and Tiona retaliated with her fists as tears welled up in her eyes.

The pieces of the story—the fragments of the epic—were changing her.

First and foremost, they acted as a catalyst for her idiocy and carefree optimism.

She began to laugh more.

Her laughter was childlike, imbued with bottomless joy.

She couldn’t even imagine how she must have looked in her sister’s eyes. It was probably just one more reason for Tione to be mad at her. After all, while Tione was slowly descending into her own personal hell, Tiona’s eyes were sparkling before the pages of books as she laughed and smiled like the village idiot.

Though raised under the same harsh conditions, the two sisters had diverged into light and dark—and all because of some story written on a little scrap of paper.

It was an abnormal thing for a happy-go-lucky soul to last long in this world of fighting and bloodshed. “Crazed warrior” indeed—before anyone had even realized it, the young girl was already taking full advantage of her title of “Berserker.” So much so that the other Amazons came to wonder if this emotionally stunted girl wasn’t touched in the head, far as that was from the truth.

Anytime anyone spoke to her, she laughed. In fact, she was always laughing.

She’d been saved by the power of the epic.

“…”

Aiz stared at the silent Amazon.

Tiona was completely motionless, watching the young girl disappear down the alley with her copy of the epic. Finally, she opened her mouth.

“You know, Aiz…”

“…Hmm?”

“You don’t think I’m…weird, do you? Laughing all the time?” she asked, bringing her hands up to lightly touch the sides of her cheeks.

Aiz was quiet for a moment.

Then she shook her head.

“It’s thanks to you that…I’m able to have as much fun as I do now.”

The words may have been few.

But they were enough to convey her message.

Tiona turned around with a smile, her cheeks flushed.

“Thanks, Aiz.”

And yet, despite her gratitude, something about her seemed off.

Rather than leap upon Aiz with her arms outstretched, she simply took off, continuing down the alley as though nothing had happened.

“…”

Aiz watched her friend walk away before finally falling into step behind her.

Around the same time that Aiz and Tiona were heading toward the Murdock estate, Lefiya and her small team were conducting a diligent investigation of their own.

If the Guild really is involved in this whole affair with the violas…we could be in for a mountain of trouble! Well, the same would be true for Njörðr Familia, I suppose…

The Guild here may have just been a branch, but it was still an administrative authority. If it was colluding with the remnants of the Evils, it’d be more than a problem—it’d be a catastrophe! Lefiya hadn’t been able to shake the feeling of dread in her stomach since Loki had announced them as one of their three targets that morning.

Despite her inner turmoil, she did her best to keep a straight face—Riveria and her beloved Aiz would do their best to get to the root of things—focusing, instead, on her current task of information gathering.

“…Hey, Miss?”

“?”

Lefiya turned around, only to find herself face-to-face with a young girl with light cocoa skin. Her immediate reaction was to brace herself—Kali Familia?!—but almost instantly, she relaxed her guard.

Having received the gods’ blessing herself, she knew not to let herself be lured into a sense of safety no matter how young or how small her enemy was, but the girl in front of her now didn’t have the aura of a familia member. She didn’t carry herself like someone with a Status on her back. There was no way she could have had anything to do with the adventurer or warrior professions.

Also there was the fact that the girl in front of her was decidedly human—not Amazonian. Height-wise, she came up to only about Lefiya’s abdomen, and from the lightweight clothes on her back, one could immediately recognize her as a resident of Meren.

Her shoulder-length black hair gave a tiny tremble as her dark tea-colored eyes gazed up in Lefiya’s direction.

“Are you an adventurer?…From Orario?”

“I am, yes. Is something the matter?”

No doubt, Loki Familia’s presence in the port town the last few days had made them a topic of conversation among the populace. As Lefiya bent over, the girl seemed to gather up her courage before leaning forward to whisper in Lefiya’s ear.

“I—I keep hearing this scary scream. In the place I like to play.”

“Scary scream…?”

“Yeah! It…it sounds just like those looooooong monsters that came outta the lake…”

“!”

Lefiya’s senses snapped into focus. “Long monsters” could only mean—the violas.

“I’m not supposed to tell any grown-ups. But…but I’m scared…”

“Where is it you heard the scary scream?”

“From…from over there…” she responded, finger pointing down the alley behind her.

“Rakuta! Elfie!” Lefiya called out, head snapping upward. The rest of her group, currently scattered about the area conducting their investigations, quickly gathered around her.

“You really think she…heard a monster?”

“It doesn’t seem to me like she’s lying…”

“It’s not like we have anything else to go on. Let’s see what we can find out.”

Lefiya listened to the Level-3 hume bunny and her human mage roommate back in Twilight Manor, then came to a decision. She glanced down the little back alleyway, quite a ways away from the main road, before returning her attention to the young girl.

“Do you think you could show us the way?”

The girl nodded.

“My name is Lefiya. What’s yours?”

“Chandie.”

And thus, the girl named Chandie began leading the group down the alley.

The tangled mix of throughways and byways behind the city proper was quite different from the main road, and Lefiya could imagine it would be all too easy to get lost if one wasn’t familiar with its twists and turns. Nevertheless, their young guide seemed well at home as she led the group along, navigating the narrow streets with ease.

“…?”

As Lefiya followed immediately behind the girl, her long, slender ears suddenly twitched, almost as if they’d picked up on a slight, faint tremor.

Someone’s…watching us?

No one else seemed to have noticed. And, in fact, had Lefiya not participated in various adventures with Aiz and the other first-tiers, Lefiya wouldn’t have, either.

Uncertain as to whether she should say something, Lefiya found that the girl responded first—almost as if picking up on her hesitation.

“Those Amazons are here…aren’t they?” she asked without even turning around.

What?

She asked, or at least she’d been about to ask, when.

From directly overhead, the mysterious presence landed behind her without a sound.

“”

She didn’t even have a chance to turn around.

With terrifying speed, the figure came at her with a dagger, slicing into the back of her neck with pinpoint accuracy.

“Lefiya?!”

The world around her shook, and a dizzying sense of vertigo overtook her. Knees crumpling, she slumped to the ground.

Rakuta’s and Elfie’s dissonant screams swirled around her as the sudden intense sounds of fighting pounded in her ears. The cobblestones in front of her spun and warped as she fought the urge to vomit, what was happening, what was happening—

Chandie’s voice cut through the confusion above her.

“—There are those among the gods capable of suppressing their divine will.”

Though the voice itself was still childlike, her manner of speaking was dignified, like someone much older.

Lefiya’s azure eyes widened with a surprised start, even as her vision clouded.

“Zeus and Odin and the other great kings of the gods are not the only ones. They disguise themselves as children, blending in among the populace unnoticed…reveling in their own versions of merriment in the lower world.”

With what little strength she had left, Lefiya raised her head, just in time to see the young girl remove her wig. From beneath her black hair cascaded a waterfall of crimson locks. And from within her clothes, she retrieved a demon-like mask adorned with two long fangs.

Lefiya gazed up into the two open holes of the mask, where the goddess’s eyes, the same bloodred color as her hair, stared back down at her.

“You learn something new every day, child of Loki.”

All too quickly, the tables had turned.

The girl had become the goddess, radiating an almighty authority, while Lefiya had become the child, unenlightened and ignorant.

Even as her consciousness began to fail her, she felt shame wash over her, and she cursed her ineptitude.

“I hope you don’t mind if I borrow that body of yours for a while. I won’t do anything…too uncouth with it.”

The sounds of fighting behind her had stopped. A sandy-haired warrior, Bache, stepped forward to stand beside Kali, completely unharmed. That was the last thing Lefiya remembered before she completely blacked out.

“Argana…!” Tione screamed.

The woman in question simply smiled, her lips curled upward in snakelike amusement.

They’d been on their way to the Guild Branch Office when the Amazonian warrior had appeared in front of them, and she clearly had no intention of letting them pass.

“Didn’t you have enough already…?!” Tione growled, fists clenched and liable to jump forward at a moment’s notice.

“Tione, fall back! Calm yourself!”

Riveria shouted the warning, stopping the enraged Amazon in her tracks. Her weapon was being worked on like Aiz’s and Tiona’s, so the magic user’s only equipment for offense was a substitute staff. Still, she stepped forward, unafraid to face the Amazon in the road, even as the rest of her group shrank back in fear.

“If there is something you want, then speak. Otherwise, you will step aside.”

“…”

Argana simply stared at the unflappable high elf.

Eyes narrowing, she tore her gaze somewhat reluctantly from the dauntless high elf to lock eyes with the Amazon behind her, still staring daggers in her direction.

“Rhada fa arhlo. Nahaak jhi deena, noy phæ garaahdo sol die Hyrute.”

“”

The words brought time to a screeching halt.

Riveria’s brows furrowed as the rest of the group looked around in confusion, none of them able to understand the words, but Tione snapped.

“And just what is that supposed to mean, huh?! Tell me!!” she shouted, unable to keep herself under control any longer.

Argana just kept smiling.

At any second, it seemed Tione would lose her cool completely, when suddenly…

“Lady Riveria!”

The shout came from the opposite direction.

Everyone turned around to see an out-of-breath elf running toward them.

“What is it?” Riveria inquired, a sense of foreboding washing over her.

“R-Rakuta and the others…Lefiya…They’re…!” the elf tried to explain, looking very much as though she’d just seen a ghost.

The color drained from their faces. Startled, Tione whirled back around, only to find that in that tenth of an instant, the sandy-haired Amazon in front of them had disappeared.

“…!!”

Tione’s eyes dropped immediately to the ground, where a certain something had been left in Argana’s place.

Snatching it up, she hurried after Riveria and the others, her body still shaking.

“…Whoa, what?”

Loki deadpanned at the sight in front of her—her followers, covered in cuts and bruises with blood staining their clothes.

“Sorry, Loki…They were too much for us.” Rakuta apologized, her voice hoarse.

Loki had practically sprinted from Njörðr Familia’s home the second she’d heard the news, arriving at the port’s entrance only to find her followers looking very much worse for wear.

None of them had escaped serious injuries. And the wounds were clearly from combat—almost as if fists hard as steel had bludgeoned them a hundred times over. They’d used bits of cloth to staunch the bleeding, but those were already stained a dark red.

Rakuta was the only one who was still conscious.

“Rod! Could you lend me a hand? Quickly!”

“Roger that! C’mon, you good-for-nothings! Get your asses in gear!”

Njörðr called his captain, who was quick to respond. Rod shouted to his men, spurring the temporarily stunned fishermen of Njörðr Familia into a flurry of action.

“Who did this?” Loki asked, her voice low.

“…Kali Familia…They just…suddenly attacked…”

No doubt they’d thought this group would be easy prey given its lack of first- and even second-tier adventurers. And from Rakuta’s tearful account of the events, it seemed Bache alone had been responsible for taking them down.

“They…they took Lefiya…!”

It was humiliating.

They had made a completely unexpected attack in broad daylight, rubbing dirt in their faces and making a complete fool of the normally peerless Loki Familia.

But it was the damage they’d done to her precious followers that really made Loki’s blood boil.

“That damn midget…Pickin’ a fight with me, is she?!”

Loki’s normal indifference had all but disappeared, and a fiery hot flush of unadulterated rage had taken its place. As the rest of the familia began gathering around the scene after hearing the news, even those who’d been with Loki the longest—Aki and Alicia, to name a few—found themselves fearfully hesitant in the face of this new side to their goddess.

“Hey, hey, let’s not start a war right in the middle of the city, shall we…?” Njörðr grimaced wearily. He knew all too well how dangerous Loki could be when she got this look on her face.

But his words fell on deaf ears. Despite the fury boiling within her, her eyes were as cold as ice. As she watched her followers being attended to, something caught her gaze, and her scarlet eyes narrowed.

The familia emblem had been torn off one of her followers’ clothes.

Tearing off the emblem…Is she declaring war here? But no, when they ran off with Lefiya, they would have…Ah. So that’s what’s goin’ on.

Loki scowled upon realizing just what it was her opponent was thinking—the atrocious, detestable plan Kali was currently concocting.

She raised her gaze toward her followers gathered around her.

“Get Tiona and Tione back here. We can’t let them out of our sight,” she ordered, though in the back of her mind, she feared she might already be too late.

“Is somethin’ happening?”

Around the time Loki was giving her order to find Tiona and Tione…

Tiona and Aiz were already on their way back from their infiltration mission at the Murdock estate. As soon as they heard that members of Loki Familia had been attacked, they took off, practically running full tilt the rest of the way to the pier.

“!!”

First Aiz, then Tiona shot past the trade pier, about to continue on to the fishing quarter, when…

“—Tiona. Over here.”

“Huh? Tione?!”

Tione appeared from out of nowhere, grabbing Tiona’s wrist and yanking her away.

She didn’t stop until the two of them were separated from Aiz and in a dark alleyway a short distance away, where Tiona finally shook off her sister’s grip.

“What the hell are you doin’, Tione?! Didn’t you hear? Somethin’ happened! We need to be out there seein’ if we can—!”

But Tione didn’t let her finish.

“Rhada fa arhlo. Nahaak jhi deena, noy phæ garaahdo sol die Hyrute.”

We’ve taken a hostage. If you want her back, you and your sister will come to the shipyard tonight—alone.

“!”

“That’s what Argana said to me earlier. Rakuta and the others were attacked and…Lefiya was taken hostage,” she explained.

Tiona’s eyes widened.

“Those…those bastards! Using the rest of our familia to lure us in…!” Tione hissed. She was having trouble holding back the tumult of emotions, both a relentless rage to rival her goddess’s and a sense of responsibility for involving her companions.

Tiona, however, kept her cool.

“…What are you gonna do?”

“You even have to ask?!”

Tione’s sharpened gaze met her sister’s honest one.

From far off, practically in a distant world, they could hear the commotion taking place on the pier.

“We’re going to settle this. Once and for all.”

To take responsibility for what they’d done and ensure this never happened again.

As Tione’s words swelled with unwavering conviction, Tiona remained silent. Finally, she looked away.

“Tione…”

“What is it?”

“Can’t we…ask for help? From Aiz and the others?”

“You—?! Just how thick can you possibly be?! It’s our fault that Lefiya and the others—”

“But we’re a familia, aren’t we?” Tiona raised her gaze, interrupting Tione’s tirade. “We’re different from how we used to be…aren’t we?”

Now it was Tione’s turn to squirm.

Brows furrowed, she bit down on her lip, masking her lack of response by chucking the item Argana had left behind at her sister.

“What’s this…?”

Tiona glanced down at the strip of cloth in her hand—the Loki Familia emblem.

The smiling face of their mascot, the Trickster, had four large gashes across it.

“It’s a warning. We’re to come alone. If we go to Aiz and the others…those guys will never leave us…and them…alone.”

“…”

One of the gashes was vertical while the rest were horizontal, laid out across it. It was a symbol of the rites they’d suffered day in and day out back in Telskyura, used to represent the monsters they’d faced over and over in battle during those competitions in the arena.

If they were to go to Aiz and the others for help and use their combined power to save Lefiya, Kali Familia would continue their attacks in that same way. They wouldn’t stop until they were once again able to reenact those rites—and have their showdown with Tione and her sister.

Tione understood all too well the warning they’d received.

“If we don’t go there and reenact the rite, they’re gonna keep on doing things like this. As many times as it takes. They won’t let anything get in the way of their little game.”

“…”

“We’re the only ones who can finish this. We can’t go to Aiz and the others…or the captain.”

Silence settled over the two sisters.

Tione knew she was being stubborn. Her aversion to involving the rest of the familia could very well be taken as a lack of faith in them.

But she wasn’t going to fold on this one.

This was something they had to do themselves, to sever their ties with Telskyura once and for all.

“…Okay.”

Had she gotten through to her?

Another moment, and then, ever so slowly, Tiona nodded.

“I don’t like hiding things from everyone, but…it really seems like we don’t have any other choice,” she agreed.

Tione turned her eyes downward at the sadness visible on Tiona’s face.

At length, the two of them began to walk, backs to the main street, away from the sounds of civilization.

Saying nothing to Loki, to Aiz and their companions, they simply vanished into the dark alley.

“It feels like before somehow…” Tiona murmured, staring upward at the shape of the sky formed between the rooftops above their heads. “Just the two of us.”

The words felt like a punch in her back.

Tione said nothing.

The sun had begun its descent toward the western horizon, disappearing from the sky overhead.

“Aiz, were you able to find them?”

“No…I looked everywhere…” Aiz replied, having just arrived back at the inn after a furtive search throughout the city. It was already growing late. She walked over toward Loki and Riveria and past the rest of her flustered companions restlessly pacing the first floor of the establishment. “I’m sorry. It’s all my fault…I was with Tiona…”

“Nonsense. If that was the case, I would be most at fault. I got so caught up in wanting to help Rakuta and the others that I forgot to keep my eyes on Tione…and, no doubt, she is the one who absconded with your Tiona, as well.” Riveria shook her head, eyes closed. She’d already accepted the blame for the entire situation, shame evident in the crooked arc of her brows. “However, pointing fingers will get us nowhere.”

Aiz agreed, imitating the high elf’s shift in focus and swallowing the rest of her apology.

“What about Rakuta and the others?”

“Leene and the other healers are looking after them. Certainly they won’t be up and moving again for a while, but it shouldn’t be long before their strength has returned.”

Aiz let out a sigh of relief before continuing. “And what about Kali Familia? Have there been any signs of them?”

Just as Tiona and Tione had disappeared right out from under them, the rest of Kali Familia, too, seemed to have vanished into thin air. Apparently not a single soul had caught sight of them after the attack on Lefiya, not even the residents of Meren.

“Aki and the other gals split up to go look for ’em…Speakin’ of, they should be comin’ back right about now.” Loki spoke up from her cross-legged spot atop the table, and, indeed, no sooner had the words left her mouth than the door opened to reveal Aki and Alicia back from their search.

“No good. The inn they were supposedly staying at until today was completely deserted. We snuck in but couldn’t find anything.”