The clearing group had already reached the end of the stairs leading to the Fifty-Fifth Floor boss room.
At present, five players had stepped forward. They would enter and scout the inside.
Even if this floor was the Ninety-Ninth Floor, and any random monster inside could instantly kill them, the five of them had already made their decision.
One member came from The Army, one each from the Knights of the Blood and the Divine Dragon Alliance, and the final two were guildless players.
One of those guildless players was Argo.
Argo would serve as the leader of this squad.
"Argo—"
"Enough. If you keep talking, I really might get scared and back out."
"Then don't go."
"But if I don't, we'll never know what's happening on this floor. You don't know either, do you?"
Argo's words made Asuna fall silent.
Argo had not pressed Asuna about Commander Heathcliff being Akihiko Kayaba, nor about the possibility that the so-called NPC was actually a real person. That meant Asuna did not have to answer.
But Asuna clearly did not know what was happening inside either. She was just as anxious. If they simply waited like this, who knew how long it would take?
And so, a squad that might as well have been made up of dead men walking was formed.
"Take this."
"What is this?"
Asuna stared in surprise at the unfamiliar crystal item Argo handed her.
"It's an image transmission crystal. I have one too. When the time comes, you'll be able to see whatever the one in my hand records."
Argo had obtained this item from a special quest.
It was currently the only image crystal on the entire server, and it could only be used once.
Aside from that crystal, the squad had also brought the highest-grade crystals available: mana recovery crystals, stamina recovery crystals, teleport crystals, and corridor crystals.
The latter two, teleport crystals and corridor crystals, were tradable crystals.
A teleport crystal, when used, would instantly transfer a person away.
A corridor crystal was more like a teleport gate. It opened a screen of light and allowed a certain number of players to transfer on a larger scale.
Both types of transfer crystals had already been tested on the Ninety-Ninth Floor. They could freely transfer users to any pre-marked coordinate on all cleared floors.
However, the test had only been conducted at the doorway.
Once they crossed the broken bridge to the other side, if they accidentally encountered something unusual, it might render the teleport crystal unusable.
"I'm sorry. I really want to go with you too, Argo."
"Enough. Don't say any more."
Argo cut Asuna off.
She could tell that Asuna was not refusing to go because she lacked courage. Rather, if Asuna went in and something happened to her, it might also cause something to happen to that NPC.
It looked as if Asuna's life and that NPC's life were bound together.
If something happened to Asuna, the other party might disappear.
In other words, the NPC who had invaded this world was likely using Asuna's helmet in reality as his entry point.
That meant if Asuna died, her helmet would automatically burn out, and the intrusion would fail.
"Be careful!"
"Yeah. See you later."
Leaving those words behind, Argo stepped through the doorway with an easy, carefree stride.
Once she crossed the gate, what entered her vision was a sheer cliff.
Looking more closely at the door, it seemed to be located at the edge of the floor itself. To reach the other side, they could only cross by using the chain suspension bridge.
The problem was that the chain suspension bridge had already been destroyed.
Of course, they had considered how to get across before coming here.
Gliders.
"I'll go first."
The dark-skinned middle-aged man, Agil, who ran an item shop, immediately took out a glider and sprinted forward.
The instant he flew off the cliff, the glider slid several meters downward at an angle before beginning to rise, carried by the upward air current surging from the cliff below.
They had tested this earlier by pushing a wooden mannequin the size and weight of an adult while it was attached to a glider. The mannequin had successfully flown across.
In theory, that meant a person should also be able to pilot one across.
Even so, before Agil reached the other side, Argo and the others watched tensely.
"Whew. He made it over safely. Then I'm second."
Argo immediately grabbed her own glider and ran forward.
"Time to fly."
The sudden feeling of weightlessness made her a little tense despite herself.
With the support of the rising air current, the glider successfully carried her across.
She would have liked to keep flying through the air. The view from above was excellent. The problem was that if she encountered a flying monster while airborne, she would be in real trouble.
So after she crossed over, Argo began steering the glider down.
Five minutes later, all five of them had gathered on the other side.
They looked at the cave entrance beneath the rock wall ahead of them. All kinds of strange noises kept echoing from within.
The cave did not seem very deep. It was only around ten meters long, and they could see the far end of the passage.
Unfortunately, the light on the other side seemed too bright, making it impossible to see what lay beyond.
"My skill isn't detecting anything inside this tunnel, but that might be because my skill level isn't high enough to work on high-level monsters. Everyone, keep your teleport crystals ready."
After giving that warning, Argo took the lead and began moving forward.
As an information broker, she possessed a special stealth skill that paired with her cloak. Once she used it, she could blend into her surroundings like a chameleon.
As long as the target was not a special monster, it would ignore her regardless of level.
The drawback was that she could not move while using it. She could only wait for the monster to leave.
However, accidents could still happen. If a monster happened to wander over and accidentally touch her, then it would be over.
The ten-meter distance felt like a ten-kilometer tunnel, impossibly far.
When Argo became the first to reach the edge of the cave entrance and stepped out, her vision was pierced by harsh light, as if she were looking straight into the sun.
After her eyes adjusted, the scene before her left her frozen.
"Are... are those monster corpses?"
"They haven't disappeared?"
"Don't tell me they're still alive."
Those words made all five of them tense up.
Looking carefully, the monsters did appear to be dead. Even their bones had vanished.
The shapes of those monsters alone made it clear how dangerous they were. Each was hideous and ferocious, like something from hell.
Every one of them seemed to have a prototype in myth, whether a monster or a demon, all infamous embodiments of disaster.
Each one looked like it could wreak havoc upon the mortal world, stirring up unimaginable storms and bringing immeasurable catastrophe.
Even now, reduced to corpses, they still brought the five-person squad an overwhelming sense of pressure.
"I found him."
Argo murmured as she looked through a telescope.
Roughly one kilometer away, there was a battle.
She could see all kinds of terrifying monsters attacking something.
Judging from the destruction caused by their attacks, those things could really kill any of them instantly with a single touch.
And the person fighting those monsters was even more absurd.
Argo carefully looked around.
The Ninety-Ninth Floor did not seem very large.
That made sense. The higher one went, the smaller the floors became, and the Ninety-Ninth Floor looked like an enormous arena.
Then should they get closer?
To do that, they would have to pass through the monster corpses in front of them. If even one of those monsters was not truly dead, it would be more than the five of them could handle.
Argo once again focused on the battlefield.
After observing for a while, her expression grew serious.
The monsters appeared to be spawning endlessly, giving him no time to breathe at all.
That meant that after entering this floor, he probably had not stopped fighting once.
How long had this gone on?
Almost eighteen hours.
And the countdown in the sky had six hours remaining.
Once it ended, what would happen?
Would this floor be cleared?
"Hm?"
"What's going on? The countdown suddenly hit zero."
"The monsters are disappearing."
"Did he clear it?"
Every monster corpse vanished. Even the monsters fighting at the front suddenly disappeared.
Argo immediately noticed something descending from the sky.
Rumble, rumble, rumble!
Heaven and earth shook.
Everyone struggled to keep their footing, and for a moment, they had the illusion that the Ninety-Ninth Floor might be smashed apart.
The object slammed heavily into the ground directly in front of that person, as though it had missed crushing him by only a single meter.
After the violent tremors faded, Argo was the first to regain her footing.
Her eyes widened in shock as she stared at the thing that had fallen.
During the official promotional period, footage of the Hundredth Floor had been shown before.
The palace that had fallen before them was—
"The Ruby Palace."
Her voice trembled slightly.
Because this was also the Hundredth Floor.
Aincrad's final floor.
(End of Chapter)
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