Adama was in love.

The blade whistled through the air and carved right through the chitinous armor of the Killer Ants. It couldn’t quite cut through stone like butter, but it was the next best thing. He danced with several seventh-floor monsters, and they could barely touch him. His increased stats were a big part of that, but they didn’t even compare to the increased lethality that his new sword provided for him. His Rippling Swords were more powerful, more substantial, easily enough to cut through the ants entirely.

Which was a mystery and a half, truth be told. His magic stat had increased, of course, which probably helped with the improvements. But he hadn’t heard of weapons that could increase the output of your magic without being imbued with a magic stone, which Hearthblade wasn’t. It got him thinking.

“Could it have something to do with aura?”

If there truly was sword aura in this world, yet no one could see it or easily manipulate it, that would explain why a sharper sword would generate a better Rippling Sword. Could it be that magic was just the manipulation of aura and madra by another name? Or perhaps this truly was a different energy system entirely, and that it merely functioned in a similar fashion to Cradle’s system by coincidence?

Definitive answers weren’t forthcoming, so he threw himself into his work. He got so good at killing the Killer Ants, he eventually decided to abuse their pheromone system. He would find a lone ant in a large room, cut it up such that it was within an inch of death, and wait. It would spend its last remaining minutes of life calling out to its kin for help, swarms of whom would answer the call. Only to find the Sword Sage waiting for them.

This strategy worked better than any bait or lure that he could buy from his specialty shop, and he spent a few days carving through mobs of the creatures. Enough of them would answer the calls for help that he would find himself in legitimate danger again, reminding him of his recent mishap, but he always made sure that antidotes were on hand. He also deliberately positioned himself close to an exit, so when they threatened to overwhelm him, he would beat a fighting retreat in no time.

Even playing it safe, though, he racked up a truly ridiculous number of kills and was growing at an outstanding rate. Or so he was informed. He didn’t care to measure up to others and, so far as he was concerned, he could do even better. He ratcheted things up a notch and disabled two different ants in a room at once, drawing a crowd twice as large as before. He kept his safeguards, but he pushed himself to the very edge, confident that he could at least retreat if things got too ugly.

Were any of the “gods” of Gekai to see this behavior, the ones unfriendly to Hestia would mock him as prideful or stupid. Or else, laugh with anticipation at his downfall. But that downfall never came. Nearly every living being in this world would have been flabbergasted at the sight of a newbie adventurer wading through an army of Killer Ants, a leather clad ball of sharp blades and deadly magic. He had a few close scrapes, but by and large he made a mockery of the seventh floor and common sense alike.

On the sixth day of using this strategy, though, something strange happened. He was having a bit of trouble finding Killer Ants. When he did see them, they were running away from him. He had heard that weaker monsters would run away from stronger adventurers, but he shouldn’t be anywhere near that strong yet. They were going somewhere, and he meant to find out where. His keen hearing picked up the sounds of hundreds of little ant feet scrabbling towards the lower portion of the floor. He followed that sound.

Eventually, he came to a large, wide-open room where an army of Killer Ants, in the hundreds, carpeted the floor. His sharp eyes spotted their objective immediately, a lone figure with its back against the wall on the other side of the room. The figure was small, and he couldn’t make out many details thanks to the dim lighting and the monsters in his way, but it almost looking like all these creatures had converged on a child who had somehow wandered into the Dungeon.

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Adama was no saint. Far from it, really. His mistakes, both moral and personal, could probably fill books. But something plucked at his heartstrings when he looked at that lone figured. There was no guarantee that even he could fight off this massive army of monsters. Then again, there was no guarantee that he couldn’t, either. Before he could really make up his mind on what he wanted to do, he had already sprung into action.

…

“Rippling Sword!”

A high, clear voice rang off the walls of the underground room, and the ant that was just about to turn her into shredded meat was cut neatly in two. As were two of its nearby allies.

Lilli blinked for a moment in surprise and disbelief, an emotion shared, for a split second, by the ants as well. they quickly came to their senses, though, and began attempting to determine the source of the interloper. Just as they did, a dark figure came flying overhead, shouting the same “Rippling Sword” mantra three times, and landing in the semicircle of open space around her. The ants directly around her had been dismantled by the magic, and the newcomer took the time he had bought them to straighten up and look back at her.

“You look like a dead dog on a bad road, girlie.”

She gaped at him in wonder and pure confusion, totally unsure of how to respond. The ants had begun to click in hostility again, though. The strange man was forced to dodge an attack or two, though he always severed the offending limb with ease, sending another Rippling Sword into the army that surrounded them with contempt.

“Well don’t I just feel like the handsomest guy at the dance? Wait a little while, ladies, I have something to say to the kid.”

He turned to look at her:

“Curl up in a ball and try not to die. Scream and bleed if you need help.”

And with that, the battle began in earnest.

…

The carpet of Killer Ants surged forwards towards Adama, but they were grouped together so tightly that his Rippling Sword scythed through them like wheat. It would often cut through multiple offenders before losing power, and it was the primary thing that kept both of them alive in the beginning moments of the battle.

After that, it was a long and slow grind. He remembered downing a Mind potion at one point, but beyond that, the whole of his focus was bent towards cutting through as many enemies as possible. He was very lucky that no moths had shown up, so he didn’t even need to distract himself by chugging an antidote as he cut and slashed his way through the endless horde.

Time itself seem to stretch out as his sword rose and fell, systematically destroying everything in his path. He took a litany of new cuts, but nothing too deep and nothing that would meaningfully inhibit his movement. His wounds couldn’t even distract him as he sank more thoroughly into that ocean of total focus and commitment. A blade sheared the hair on his scalp, and something pierced his left ear, but none of that meant anything to the Sage of the Endless Sword.

Then, just as suddenly as it began, it was all over. The tide that was so relentless and the enemies that had been so numerous now lay as stinking corpses on the Dungeon floor. It was only now that he noticed his fresh set of soon-to-be scars, as he realized that his armor was in tatters from the dozens of attacks he had been forced to accept. He probably looked half dead to any outside observers, but none of these wounds were overly serious, besides maybe a particularly close scrape right along his ribs. The pain wasn’t even that bad, by his standards, so he lazily yawned and unhurriedly withdrew a healing potion to sip on.

That was when he remembered that he actually did have an audience, this time.

Turning, he began to regard the strange person whom he had just saved. She was in a blouse that was red in the center and white on the edges, a red skirt, and black leggings over brown boots. Her clothes were beat up, but so was she. He saw that she was bruising terribly around her midriff and her throat, alongside half a dozen cuts on her body and face. Judging by how she moved, he guessed that she had at least one or two broken ribs. She gazed up at him in fear with chestnut color eyes and hair, and when he approached her, she flinched instinctively. Like she’d been abused. Which, apparently, she had.

He felt a slow kindling of anger in his stomach at that realization. What kind of psychopath abused a child and abandoned them in the Dungeon? What had happened with this girl? He took a swig of his health potion, leaving half of it remaining, and offered the rest of it to her. The red liquid sloshed as he held it out to the girl, and he made his voice as gentle as he could:

“Drink. Not poisoned, is it? Unless I’m immune to the poison, sure, but I don’t need squirrely trick like that to do you harm.”

He winced. That came out wrong.

“What I mean to say is-“

At that point, from a combination of sheer fear and total exhaustion, her eyes rolled back in her head as she passed out. Adama caught her before she hit the ground, carefully raising the potion to her lips, and dribbling the liquid down her throat. He shook his head.

“Suppose I’ll have to end the workday a little early, now, won’t I?” he muttered, a little grumpy at the prospect of carrying the tiny girl out of here. But it was what it was.

Saint or otherwise, he wouldn’t abandon her.