Asfi had to maintain a delicate equilibrium—far enough away to avoid detection from the Freya Familia's freakishly perceptive monsters, yet close enough not to lose them.
After all, Aiden's group was moving blazingly fast. If she couldn't fly, she never would have been able to keep up.
Moreover, tracking at this distance drained far more mental energy than simply flying.
"Asfi, get a little closer. Come on, closer! We're going to lose them."
Hermes wriggled restlessly in her grip, trying to crane his neck like a giraffe struggling to peek out of a cage.
Having just witnessed Aiden execute a Lumina Slash to obliterate a Floor Boss, Hermes was thoroughly ecstatic and couldn't wait to see how things unfolded.
"Lord Hermes, please keep quiet. Any closer and Hildr will notice us."
Asfi warned in a low whisper, tightening her grip slightly.
Right then, Asfi's gaze abruptly sharpened.
In an intersecting tunnel below, a somewhat familiar figure flashed past.
It was an adventurer entirely concealed beneath a voluminous green cloak. Judging by the slender height and build, it was likely a woman.
That back...
"Ryuu...?" Asfi frowned, subconsciously murmuring the name.
As her close friend, she almost immediately recognized the back of the cloaked figure hurrying down into the deeper floors. It was the "Gale"—Ryuu Lion.
What is she doing here?
Meanwhile, in the tunnel below, Ryuu Lion pulled her hood down hard, hiding her face even deeper into the shadows.
Her pace was rapid, practically a jog.
Along the way, she kept catching fragmented but terrifying snippets of conversation from the panicked adventurers fleeing desperately toward the upper floors.
"...Water Capital... terrifying battle..."
"...sounds like the Loki Familia is in a death match with some monster..."
"...the whole floor collapsed, and the monsters have all gone berserk!"
The more she heard, the darker Ryuu's expression grew, and beneath that darkness hid an irrepressible trace of pure terror.
Her mind involuntarily flashed back to that night four years ago—a night soaked in despair and blood.
The deafening roars, the claws that tore her companions apart, the pitch-black, hideous silhouette that refused to die no matter how many times it was struck...
Ryuu's breathing grew ragged. She leaned against the freezing wall and whispered softly. "Is that monster... appearing again?"
"Alise... what should I do..."
Confusion, fear, and a bone-deep hatred she had violently suppressed for four years intertwined and churned in her eyes before finally solidifying into unwavering resolve.
She tightly gripped the unadorned wooden sword at her waist, Alv's Lumina.
No matter what, she had to go down there.
It wasn't just because she knew that a massive structural collapse could very well force the Dungeon to birth the Juggernaut—the exact monster that nearly wiped out her Astrea Familia.
More importantly, there was another reason she couldn't ignore.
Not long ago, while wiping tables at the Hostess of Fertility, she had accidentally overheard a drunken conversation between several veteran adventurers.
They mentioned seeing a figure in the deep floors that looked strikingly similar to the "Crimson Flower of Justice" from years ago.
Those adventurers were all Level 3 or higher—"old timers" who had survived the era when the Astrea Familia was still active in Orario.
They all knew Alise Lovell.
They had brushed it off as a mere coincidence, figuring they just saw someone who looked similar or had hallucinated from the high-pressure environment of the Dungeon. They eventually laughed it off as drunken bragging.
But for Ryuu, the name "Alise" was not something she could just let go.
Whether it was a trap or a hallucination, as long as it involved Alise, she had to see it for herself.
Even though she knew better than anyone else that Alise was dead.
It was impossible for her to reappear, because Ryuu was the one who had personally ended Alise's life.
To let Ryuu escape, Alise had used her own body to desperately pin down the monster known as the Juggernaut.
Then, she ordered Ryuu to use magic, engulfing both her and the monster in destructive light.
That scene was a nightmare Ryuu could never escape.
Therefore, no matter what, she couldn't turn a blind eye to this.
That was why she had stepped into the Dungeon alone today.
But she never expected to encounter another floor collapse.
She knew exactly how that monster was born.
When a floor suffered massive destruction over a short period—damage that exceeded the Dungeon's self-repair limits—the Dungeon would activate its "self-defense mechanism."
Once a floor suffered structural damage spanning more than two levels, the Juggernaut would be forcibly spawned by the Dungeon.
Its sole purpose was to hunt down and slaughter every adventurer who had damaged the floor.
It was a monster born purely for combat—the Dungeon's "white blood cell."
Its strength rivaled the horrifying horrors of the deep floors, and it possessed a slew of specialized abilities specifically designed to kill adventurers.
Ryuu knew exactly how horrifying a massacre it would cause once born.
If left unchecked, every adventurer in the middle and lower floors would be hunted down one by one and mercilessly butchered.
Because that monster possessed a near-unsolvable tracking ability.
As long as an adventurer was inside the Dungeon, there was absolutely no escaping its pursuit.
After surviving that despair-inducing battle, Ryuu had been secretly investigating everything she could about the Juggernaut.
Her knowledge of the monster probably surpassed even the Guild's archives.
So she knew better than anyone else... just what kind of hopeless monster it was.
Even First-Class Adventurers had a ninety percent chance of dying if they encountered it alone.
Only the handful of individuals standing at the very apex of the city had the power to fight a Juggernaut spawned in the middle or lower floors.
So, whether it was for the Alise the adventurers spoke of, or for the last remnants of justice in her heart, she could not remain indifferent.
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