[You have arrived on the SECOND FLOOR, the Crucible of Twin-faced Hope]

As the Host Guide announced the strange name of the new Floor, Arlosse hardly registered it in his head. His mind was a bit preoccupied trying to reconcile that he was back in a place like this, the home of death, its emissaries and victims, all of whom raged senselessly – recklessly – as though possessed by devils.

Blood spilled every which way the Incarnate looked. Bones crunched under the feet of whinnying horses and tamed, berserk canine beasts he didn’t recognise. Flesh squelched, torn open for all to see the unsightly beauty it hid.

The scorching orange sun above, merciless and uncompromising, seemed determined to make all the thousands of corpses lying about look as insignificant, shameful and irrelevant as possible by arousing the stink within them, summoning flies and starved critters in the dry, rocky desert.

Human men and women with assortments of armour roared, their steel clashing against that of enemies. Their bodies blazed with silvery-blue Spirit Essences that coated their swords, spears and bows.

The same was true for their enemies.

Arlosse’s eyes widened at the sight of said enemies; his skin twitched and wriggled madly.

He drank in the sight of a creature twice the size of the average man, adorned in thick hides, crude metal bands and animal skulls. It roared like a bear, raised its battle axe and swung with such immense power that it cut through six human warriors at once, splitting them at their torsos.

The creature had an ugly face; leathery blue skin with fat warts sagged over it along with four dark eyes and a thick nose like that of a bull. It was flanked and assaulted from the back by armoured human enemies, but a slender figure, similarly inhuman, stabbed the assailants in the eyes while moving like the wind, leaving them screeching and writhing. The odd slender ally grinned; its face which was not too dissimilar to that of a large, red-skinned lizard, widened. It absorbed a sort of savage glee from watching the humans suffering.

Arlosse gulped.

He needed no assistance to be able to tell just what these two creatures were.

‘Demons,’ he thought.

He could tell.

These were his kin, in a way.

Tens of thousands of them were running amok, slaughtering humans while wielding bizarre weapons, some more murdery and far less dignified than those the humans used. Some rode great beasts that Arlosse had never seen before, (of course he hadn’t) urging them to speed around at absurd speeds and chomp on the flesh of man before both them and their riders were at times obliterated by equally competent human warriors.

And indeed, there were competent humans among the thousands that Arlosse saw, contending on equal ground with enemies twice their size or more.

He saw a valiant figure wielding a golden lance skewering tens of demons while charging forth and using their free hand to fling even more of them high into the air mysteriously with but a flick of their fingers.

He saw another, likely female (he couldn’t see her face because she wore a helmet), wielding a thick turquoise whip that when sent hurtling like the wind, turned invisible and quite literally smashed open its victims upon crisp, deafening contact.

Arlosse flinched. He could feel his three hearts beating louder and louder especially vividly with his hand still pressed on his chest.

Seeing the two human warriors startled him. They were in a different league.

However, compared to the figure he saw next, those two might as well have been amateurs.

A hulking man in a bright silver berserker armour made hundreds of demons retreat with his mighty charge. A greyish kind of Spirit Essence bounded from him, sending chills down the demons’ spines. In each hand, he wielded large, white, ghostly sabres that hissed like serpents.

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Arlosse didn’t see him swing them even once, but wherever he passed, whooshing past like lightning, tens of demons of many varieties were left without heads topping their torsos!

Blood splashed from their necks and stained the hulking warrior and his steed. Indeed, his steed.

The hulking warrior rode quite a unique creature.

It was a horse, but Arlosse had never seen one so large and thick in his life. It was nearly three meters tall and was more like a buffalo in its build than anything else. It was pristine white in colour, its long blue tail, sharp and serrated, like a collection of long daggers taking lives whenever it swished.

The creature neighed hoarsely and cold frost issued from its mouth which was full of sharp, jagged teeth. As its rider urged it on, it hissed out a great plume of cold that froze his enemies, encasing them in blocks of solid, flaky ice and creating footholds for its leaps across the battlefield.

Arlosse couldn’t pry his eyes off the horse, but soon, he was forced to.

Just when he glimpsed a powerful demon enemy rising to confront the hulking warrior astride his equally hulking steed, he heard a cry from behind him and his skin tensed in warning.

A man in a dull silver armour shuttled towards Arlosse with his spear, silvery-blue Spirit Essence gathering around its sharp end. It was only then that Arlosse reminded himself that he was a participant and not a spectator, and that less than ten seconds had passed since he arrived on his Floor.

With nimbleness that shocked even him, Arlosse avoided the incoming spear with a simple, brisk step to the side. When his enemy, helmetless so that his gnashed teeth were more than obvious to see, swiped again with all his might, hoping to slash open the Incarnate’s head, Arlosse merely ducked.

‘This is so… simple,’ he thought, a smile breaking on his face.

Casually, he stowed away the Valiant Subject’s Ward, leaving his hand free. Then, with a sharp rise, Arlosse gripped the man’s neck and squeezed.

Before he could even relish the stunned look in the man’s eyes, his neck broke and was reduced to something akin to a thin, pulpy sausage. The man died instantly.

“Demon!” Arlosse heard from behind him. Another human leaped and was soon upon him, his sword raised. Without turning to the enemy, the Demonling sent his balled hand swiping backward as a lightning-quick fist that sank into the enemy’s face. Brains exploded from the back of the poor man’s head.

Right after, Arlosse felt once again his skin tumble like boiling water, warning him of a slightly more dangerous attack from the side. The Hollow Demonling felt a surge of Spirit Essence from the distance, and immediately he knew this was the activation of a Kanva – an Acquired Ability.

Thus, he moved quickly, his icy blue eyes rushing to identify this dangerous enemy amid the tens of humans who were rushing his way with murderous intent.

After catching a glimpse of a long-faced man with a stronger presence of Spirit Essence than most nearby, Arlosse shuttled his way at full speed. The ground beneath the Incarnate exploded with a bang, cocking up dust and dirt.

However, to his surprise, just as he launched himself forth, the enemy he had hoped to catch was already a few inches from his nose.

Arlosse was bewildered, but so was the enemy. His eyes went round, his face pale. Unfortunately for him, he didn’t react to the odd situation faster than Arlosse. The Demonling pushed forward his elbow as he sped and watched it sink into the man’s nose and smash his face into a mess.

As the man gurgled and made a graceless attempt at screeching in pain, the Host Guide helped Arlosse understand what had happened just now.

[Well done! You have matched ‘Enni’ against his ‘Quick Steps’!]

[You have received ‘Light Birr!]

Arlosse was pleasantly surprised.

‘So, he had a Kanva that increased his speed?’ Arlosse thought. ‘We must have charged at the same time and met in the middle.’

BAAM!

Before he could think on this for a second more, a fierce force blasted Arlosse from his side and sent him flying through the air and then crashing into several human soldiers.

Arlosse was alarmed. He didn’t know what just hit him. His keen skin didn’t even get to warn him.

Be that as it may, however, Arlosse was mostly unharmed. His Endurance was a lot higher now, even moreso than his other physical attributes. Furthermore, he still managed to keep Reform running on his chest, which he was most glad for.

“Rod, kill it if you can! I’ll flank it!” Arlosse heard someone scream.

Tens of human soldiers were rushing towards him. Some were already upon him by the time he rose, landing their blows. The Incarnate dodged a sword aimed at his head, but failed to react when a rather plump warrior grabbed his free arm and pulled, putting every bit of the dreadful weight he had on it.

Arlosse could have simply flung the man away, albeit with some difficulty, but before he could, a hammer smashed into the back of his head causing his mind to spin. A dagger then attempted to pierce into his shoulder while a scorching red flame blasted into the Incarnate’s torso from his front.

‘Urgh!’

Before he knew it, Arlosse was swarmed by at least twenty human enemies, and some of their weapons were dangerously close to doing lethal damage to him.

…

A spark like Arlosse had never known was ignited within him right then.

As he was now…

As strong he was…

What business did these frail enemies have trying to take his life?

What right did they have to even manage an attempt?

Arlosse’s icy blue eyes gleamed ferociously, and without thinking much about it, he opened the Hermetic Vault…