Under that azure sky and above the desolate plains of the fifth floor, the three girls stopped and waited in bated caution. Rose swerved her head over the surroundings as the group of dungeoneers approached closer, taking their time. The distance between them grew shorter, and her eyes rolled over their strutting forms. Inspecting them as if they were newly discovered creatures.
'So it's her. . .' She thought, surprised. 'Leading her own team? She didn't seem like the type.'
The first person she noticed was the girl that they had once met, the individual who had once stood beside the man named Victor—dressed identical to before—was now leading her own team with short steps. At the very least, that was the impression that the situation gave to Rose.
Behind her walked another, shorter girl with a rather lanky frame that spoke of agility. A beastman with twitching cat ears and a tail; both matching her head of short, ruffled, orange hair. She wore a hoodie and jeans of blue, and a pair of silver bracelets around her ankles and, though the girl seemed to be grinning at them with fangs in plain view, Rose was instead drawn to the lack of shoes on the person's feet and the lightning bolt under her left eye.
Then there was the last individual, the man beside that catgirl who stared at them with a hint of tension on his face. An average height and an average build, he was dressed in nothing more than a rather sporty looking attire of a black shirt and shorts that stuck close to his form. He seemed young and his ruddy head of brunette hair shadowed his eyes. In his grasp was a single suitcase of silver that reflected the sun's light.
'Where's his weapon?' Rose tilted her head slightly. He didn't have a weapon on him like the sword the lavender-haired girl had at her waist, nor did he seem like someone who fought with his body like she surmised the catgirl did. In the end, she stared, brows furrowed at his suitcase. 'What's that? Why is he lugging that around a dungeon of all places?' If he wanted to carry extra supplies, he would have brought a backpack or a satchel like they did, she thought, so the item was likely for something else.
"Holy shit, is that a fucking mech?!" Elsa's elated voice rang besides her. Her eyes were glued onto the silver suitcase. She seemed to have disregarded everything else but it.
"That's a mech?" Rose asked, entirely dubious.
"Yes." Elsa grinned, giddy. She coughed. "Well, that's if I'm right though."
Lilias nodded. "You're likely correct. It's most probably a compact mech designed more for easy transportation than for prolonged or high-intensive combat. It's no wonder he doesn't carry any other weapon with him. . .with the size of the suitcase, it should only have room for himself and the bare minimum of mech magitech."
Her crimson eyes blinked.
"Still," She paused as she assessed, "It must have sent him back quite the sizable fortune. Even the cheapest of compact mechs cost 2 million lixels while the most expensive could send you over 50 million."
Rose raised a brow at that wide a range in price. It seemed nonsensical to her.
"That means he's a mage as well, then," She muttered. Though she hardly knew anything about the mechanical side of magitech, she at least knew that only a person able to control mana could connect to the core of a mechsuit. Anyone else wouldn't even be able to move the weapon, much less fight with it.
The conversation reminded her of the first time Elsa entered the mecha she had managed to fix, and the first time she battled with it. Even when it was so-called "old tech", it was an effective weapon that could mow through normal individuals. It was a shame they had not been able to take it with them and had instead left it in the hands of Mare and the two dark-elven siblings. You couldn't simply walk into a city with a mech without authorization nor a mech license.
By the time Rose thought through all of this, the two groups stood less than three feet before each other. The lavender-haired girl before Lilias. The catgirl before Elsa. And the male before Rose.
"So it's you three," Crea Lancelot stated as her purple eyes finished a round of inspection.
They met again under the sun's rays. Once, they had stood beneath glass floors. And now they stood within a dungeon, watching each other with careful eyes. It seemed as if both teams were trying to judge the strengths and weaknesses of the other. In the end, it was something impossible to do by merely standing about.
"Somehow, this feels kinda tense?" The catgirl suddenly said.
"Right?" Elsa nodded. "Why don't we just say our names first?"
"Bingo, I was thinking the same exact thing you know?"
Though both teams almost rolled their eyes at both girls, in the end, everyone was in silent agreement. If there was something she didn't like doing often, it was standing about and doing nothing, so Rose took the liberty of going first.
"Rose Ausra," She stated plainly.
"Lilias Aunbren." Lilias nodded with a light smile directed at the leader of the other team.
"Elsa Mont." Elsa grinned.
An homunculus. A dragonian. And a human. Finishing their introductions, the other team did the same.
"Crea Lancelot," The lavender-haired girl stated.
"Flare Shun." The catgirl smiled.
"David Bowman." The male nodded.
There was a moment of awkwardness right after. A feeling in the air. A palpable discomfort they all felt. Though they now knew one another, each individual save for two still seemed to wish to walk upon eggshells around one another. Judging. Waiting for something.
Rose, a mind already upon completing this floor of the dungeon, anticipating her further training in magic, and a question she would soon ask Elsa, spoke up and popped the bubble mercilessly.
"We're going now, then," She said, nodding as she turned around and began walking.
"Huh?" Elsa blinked her eyes while Rose passed her by.
As Lilias shrugged and followed after her, a voice spoke up.
"Are you three looking for the floor's guardian?"
"Hmm?"
Rose paused her steps and glanced back, spotting Crea's eyes borrowing questioning into her own.
"Yes, we are," She replied, "Is something wrong?"
"Don't bother," Crea shook her head, "We've been stuck here for half a day. We've trekked around, and we haven't found the guardian or the door. Just bloody scuffles with mana beasts."
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She then looked them over.
"You guys seem in good shape."
Elsa shrugged. "We just got here not too long ago."
"So your information will be useless?" The girl raised a brow, disappointment etching her face.
"Why you. . ." Elsa's lips twitched. She felt like punching her.
"How did you find us?" Rose asked.
"Mostly coincidence," The girl said, then pointed a finger behind her at a low mountain top. "But, Flare climbed that to look for the guardian but, instead, we spotted you three."
"And you came here for?" Lilias smiled knowingly.
Crea narrowed her eyes.
"Partnership."
Rose fully turned back around as Flare shrugged.
"Sounds like as best a thing we've got as any," The girl said.
Rose, however, asked, "Why should we partner up with you?"
"Hmm?" Crea Lancelot furrowed her brows. Here she was, outstretching a hand, and this girl asked that? "Are you looking down on me and my team?"
Rose shook her head.
"Then what? Do you not get it or are all three of you idiots?" Crea asked. "We should work together so we can find the guardian or door much faster. Isn't that simple to understand? We link our pads and call each other depending on who finds them first."
"Yes, I understand that, but why should we partner up with you three?" Rose tilted her head as she asked once more. "Even if its the case that it would be far faster to search together, why should we partner up? Strictly speaking, I do not trust you three and would rather work independent of you."
Rose had become careful with whom she aligned herself with. Past mistakes and decisions had already proven that, though it wasn't viable to live distrusting everyone, she couldn't outright simply trust anyone either. There was the case with S.O.S, who tried to capture and sell her. The case with Paul Walker, who used her in a slum war and still failed. The case with her creator, Bianca Idris Blake, who turned out to be far different from what she had expected, and far more manipulative and destructive to her freedom. And, now, not a day prior, Shana Striker had brought her information that marked Rose's suspicion upon Mare, that little info broker who had seemed so innocent and yet also seemed to have played a role in guiding most of Rose's movements within the slums. With all that to the forefront of her mind, there was no way Rose would simply and easily trust another person, much less another group of people.
Crea, on the other hand, stared at her blankly. Her mind swimming with thoughts. Did this girl think they trusted them, either? Of course they didn't trust them, but wasn't working together still the best solution in the end? Or did they think themselves so good that they didn't need help?
"You three. . ." She began.
Yet, Lilias intruded before she could speak again.
"Why are you leading a team either way?" Lilias asked. "Please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm quite certain Vanguard doesn't let beginners lead teams, right?"
Though she agreed and sided with Rose, Lilias was still curious about the other team. Before they parted ways, she didn't mind drawing some information out of them. After all, in the future, there still remained a possibility that they may clash with the opposing team or Vanguard itself. While Rose was just beginning to build her understanding of people and their motives, Lilias already knew the nature of conflict.
"I'm being tested," Crea scoffed. Though she appeared haughty, the shake in her voice spoke of displeasure. "After all, Victor ended up getting only the third-best dungeoneer out of the last batch of applicants. Isn't that a shame? And now, I'm to climb to the 89th floor with this team within a month or we'll all be kicked out of the guild."
She gripped the longsword at her hip and drew it, her teammates raised a brow at her, the silver color of her blade shining under the sun as its tip touched the ground.
"You know what? I change my mind. Working together? I was foolish enough to ask in the first place. I should have gone with my guts first."
She pointed her sword at them, her lavender eyes narrowing.
"Honestly, I don't have time for this. The dungeon probably wants us to kill each other. The last team left standing gets to advance. That seems a reasonable enough of an assumption, right? Why else would the floor be so desolate? It might as well be a battle of attrition."
David bowman frowned.
"That's quite a leap in logic," He muttered, "I wouldn't exactly call it a reasonable assumption."
Crea shrugged. "The dungeon's an enigma. Something no one fully understands. But what we do know is that it's a bloody show at the end of the day. Amongst the memories that are kept, we know there are times when killing others is necessary to survive and needed to progress. And this is one of those times."
Flare laughed. She neither disagreed nor agreed with Crea. She stared at the taller girl with a hint of a smirk.
"And if you're wrong, leader?" She asked.
Crea frowned. Then shook the frown off her face. It wouldn't be the first time she had killed before.
"We'll wipe our hands clean and carry on. There would be nothing to it as long as neither of you two go out of your way to yap," She affirmed. "There are no laws in the dungeon and no way for Alos to resolve crimes within even if there were. This is practically legalized murder."
"The hell is wrong with you three?" Elsa spoke up at that moment, fury in her eyes as sparks danced on her fists. "Because we refused to partner up, you wanna kill us just to test a fucking theory?"
A cough rang.
She turned her eyes to the single male.
"Look, I disagree with these two psychos," David said, "But. . ."
"But?" Elsa almost fumed at the word.
"But a job's a job and we really don't have all the time in the world to wait and stay here." He disagreed quite a bit with Crea's logic but, David already knew that at some point or another, dungeoneers would clash. It was simply part of the job so, in the end, wasn't it worth it to test a theory than to waste their time on the floor?
Elsa turned to the catgirl. "What about you?"
"Sorry, I kinda have to follow the team leader on this one, alright? It's in my contract man," Flare Shun shrugged, "As long as it's in the dungeon, and it eint being suicidal, I gotta do what she says."
"Stop wasting your breath with them, Elsa."
A chuckle rang as Lilias gripped her twin swords.
"I think we should kill them, as well, since they seem to want it so badly," She said. The first time they had met, Crea was almost giddy to attack them. Now, in their second meeting, she wanted to kill them? Lilias thought it partly amusing. "What do you think, Rose?"
If Rose was to be truthful, she had no moral aversion to killing them. Whether or not it was a good thing, she had no sense of 'wrong' when she sliced through people that stood in her way, be they human or homunculi. Right now, she was simply allowing the conversation to continue so she could take the time to form her own conclusions about the 5th floor. If killing was required, she would do so, but she wasn't a killing machine. She wouldn't kill without a need, and she had yet to find compelling evidence of that need on this floor.
As her thoughts spun, she spoke.
"If we were to remove the option that we must kill each other," She said, "What makes the most sense, right now, is that the dungeon truly begins when two teams are within at the same time and, perhaps, when they make contact with each other as well."
In the past floors, there had been challenges, and there had been ways to solve them. If you didn't wish to fight the first floor's guardian, you simply had to distract and go around it. The second floor was a series of challenges onto itself, while the third and fourth, though more straightforward than the others, involved tracking down their hidden guardians. If trying to find the guardian had proven to take the other team half a day with no clues, then that was quite possibly not the way to go, especially given that this was the first floor with two sets of dungeoneers meeting. It was a far too special occasion for merely finding a monster together.
She paused as she glanced at their surroundings.
"A requirement of being in proximity with other dungeoneers does not equate to a need to kill them. If I was to put my finger on it, the dungeon wants us to work together. And if that's true, then our challenge will be something that requires at least this many people to accomplish."
"What the heck is it now?" Elsa said.
Flare blinked her eyes as her head swerved. "Oh oh. . .yo, leader. We've got trouble."
Crea and David both frowned as they turned to their surroundings and their eyes widened.
"Well then, it seems your hypothesis was correct," Lilias smiled. She seemed elated at a chance for all out battle.
"Goddammit, Rose. . ." Elsa grimaced.
Rose shrugged. "It's not my fault."
In the midst of their arguing, they had become surrounded by an ever approaching horde of beasts. The ground shook, louder and louder with the thundering stampede of monsters and the sky was filled with flapping wings of differing colors. In mere moments, they would have to fight.
Rose counted them all. There were exactly 100 creatures. Some she had seen before, others she was seeing for the first time. Either way, a respectable number for 6 people to deal with. Within that storm of beasts, she expected, the floor's guardian would reside.
"It's as if all the scattered monsters from around the floor suddenly decided to rush here," Crea muttered as her eyes rolled over the place.
Rose agreed with her, her weapon burning brighter as the surrounding encirclement tightened around them. She gripped the golden hilt of her blade tighter.
"The floor's guardian might be the one that brought them together," She replied as she took a step forward, then another, and then she was jogging. "The dungeon wants us to work together or die trying."
The first creature came, lunging at her as teeth bared.
"So, I'll take care of this side!"
Rose slashed her blade upwards and flames exploded.