Artemia: Journey To The Thirtieth Floor

8. Floor One

"We're off to Khrysheira now," Blake said in a casual way as he walked towards the stairs.

A moment ago, he was just getting comfortable around me, cuddling with me and all. We remained that way for some time, just enjoying each other's comfort. It's not something I expected from myself after all that bickering with him a few days ago. Honestly, I thought my life would be full of arguments with him for as long as we're here.

When Freya and Dylan saw us, they gave me a puzzled look, which I returned to them. I also don't understand what's going on in that guy's mind, but all we can do is follow him now. It's about time we took the challenge along with the other players. Plenty of them would take today's battle schedule because some people already fell out of the ranks yesterday.

I'm not really sure if we can do this, but Blake seemed to have a ton of confidence in us. Earlier, he just stood up and told me that we were going to explore the tower. I couldn't speak at first, but he just laughed at me after seeing my expression. I knew we were going to Khrysheira, but I didn't realize that we were really going there today! That was supposed to be a joke at first!

"Are you sure that we can do this now?" Dylan asked as he subtly glared at Blake.

Blake returned his glare. "If you don't believe me, then you can go back to the inn."

I sighed and walked between the two of them. "Shut up, you two. We're going to teleport in ten seconds, so hold each other's hands," I said.

According to the instructions given to the players, there should be a button placed outside every inn. If we press that, we're automatically going to teleport towards Khrysheira, which is quite fascinating! Honestly, I was hesitant about going after hearing that people died yesterday. But I know that there's no point in stalling either. We'll go there sooner or later.

Ah, whatever!

Just as I was about to hold Freya's hand, Blake got in between us and held my hand tightly. Dylan also held my hand from the left, so I couldn't take Freya's hand at all. I looked at the two of them, but they were busy looking ahead. Ah, these two. I looked down, slightly shaking my head. Even though I was distracted by how big their hands were, I was able to check on Freya.

I gave Freya an apologetic look, but she only shook her head. "The audacity..." she murmured as she forcefully held Blake's hand.

"Ow..." he grumbled.

Blake looked at me like he was asking for help, but I ignored him. It was his fault for getting between us anyway, so he should suffer. Freya gave him a chance earlier by taking Dylan away, but he stopped Freya from holding my hand. Anyway, everyone started counting until we got warped towards the tower. We immediately closed our eyes because we'd get dizzy if we kept them open.

When I felt like we had finally reached our destination, I slowly opened my eyes. My mouth went agape as I looked up at the building, amazed by how beautiful it looked. Damn, it's as if we can no longer see the top because of how tall the building was. They really went through their way to make this, huh...

"It's beautiful..." I murmured.

"I think so too," Blake said. I looked back at him, so he turned to the building. "Anyway, it's not beautiful on the inside. Remember the monsters we met at Mount Leona? We're going to meet them again. But this time, a little bigger."

Right, he's seen them all before...

I looked around and saw players fidgeting around the building. Ah, we're all here in order to survive, huh? But I doubt everyone would get even get out of this building alive. At least that's what Blake told us. Besides, the kings said that a certain number of groups of people would be eliminated whenever the floors opened. I think everyone was already aware of that since the beginning.

He told us that there would be illusions leading us to our doom, so we had to stick together literally until we found the floor's boss. According to Blake, it's a giant goblin with the speed of the small ones, which made us feel extremely alarmed. Only half of the ones who came here yesterday were able to survive, which means it would be difficult even for us.

It's not like we had some sort of intense training that would allow us to get through this easily. Sure, Blake can do it without breaking a sweat. But if he has to do it with the three of us, he would inevitably be held back. I mean, we're a bit strong...probably just enough to allow us to survive on the first floor.

I subconsciously looked at Blake, and he gave me a sweet smile. Freya caught my eye and did the same. She even gave me a thumbs-up to assure me that everything was going to be fine. Dylan held my hand and squeezed it a little, which helped me calm down. Everyone was nervous because this was our first time taking the challenge, but I think we'll get through this just fine.

Alright, we can do this. I took a deep breath as the door slowly opened. Everyone started running inside, and the four of us waited until there were only a few of us were outside to avoid getting caught in a stampede. The four of us held hands with each other while entering. We must not get lost in this maze of a floor, even with Blake. That's why we need to remain together at all times.

"We'll go straight ahead. I'll give directions and orders so we can avoid getting caught up in the traps. Is that okay?" Blake asked while we were walking.

"Yes," we answered in unison.

He smirked and sped up while giving instructions on what to do. Whether it's to duck, jump, or run faster. So far, so good, we haven't triggered any traps, nor have we encountered enemies. However, we've been hearing screams and cries of help everywhere. Blake told us to ignore them because they may only be trying to lure us in. And even if they were real humans like us, it's not like we can save them. We had to keep moving forward even though hearing all those cries made us feel guilty.

Some guy was running near us, who suddenly triggered a trap! A couple of goblins and human-like boars came running in our direction. Blake groaned and killed all of them in one fell swoop before running forward again. The guy who activated the trap fell on the ground and probably lost his consciousness. I felt bad for the poor man, but I couldn't do anything about it.

My senses tingled as it felt like we were approaching something, and I felt goosebumps all over my body. Blake's grip on my hand tightened a bit, and he became serious. This should be a piece of cake for him, but he's still going to take it seriously, which somehow looked attractive to me. I tried so hard to stop myself from staring at his serious face.

"Everyone, focus. We're meeting the floor one's boss," he said.

I swallowed the lump on my throat as I watched people getting flung out of a huge door. Oh, gosh. Could there be some sort of enormous monster in there? We slowly walked towards the door to see what was going on and saw a huge goblin stomping humans flat while some were already injured while trying to kill the beast.

"Disgusting..." I muttered as I stared at it.

Blake looked at Dylan and me. "Follow me! We're going to cut the beast's hands and feet. Freya is going to assist us and fire spells at the goblin to weaken it. Once it stumbles down, put all your strength into your hands. We're going to cut the head off in one swoop."

We nodded and followed him as we walked inside of the room where the goblin was going on a rampage. I looked at Freya and smiled at her. She returned the smile and hid behind the pile of bodies as she fired her spells at the giant. She should be fine as long as the damned goblin can't see her.

I looked at Freya, a bit worried for her safety. "Hey, are you sure that you're fine with being left here?" I whispered.

She nodded. "No problem. Don't worry about me and do your part," she said as she smiled at me.

"Okay. Take care..." I murmured one last time before going to my position.

Anyway, Dylan took the left side, Blake attacked from the center, and I took the right side. It was a good thing that there were a few dents on the walls, which allowed me to jump from there and fly around. The goblin hasn't noticed us yet because it was busy playing around with the people on the ground. But it doesn't seem like it would see me if I hid on the wall, so I didn't worry about it.

But I turned pale when I saw the way it grabbed a guy and waved him around, preparing to throw him out of the door. The poor guy was screaming at the top of his lungs, but no one dared to help him. I snorted as I prepared to attack it. Before it could do what it intended to do, I jumped with as much force as I could and cut its hand off. As two hands fell, a growl echoed through the room like some sort of siren. I had to cover my ears because it felt like I could go deaf any minute.

I looked at the goblin and saw that it was screaming while looking at its hands. There was a huge scar on its tummy, which was probably Blake's doing. Its HP diminished greatly, but still not enough. Blake looked at me and pointed at the right foot. Right, we should do it while the goblin isn't attacking yet. My ears are still ringing because of the way it screamed, but I had to strike it while it was weak.

I gave him a nod and ran towards the beast's right foot at top speed. My hands were pointed behind as I started gaining momentum to get enough force to cut its thick skin. Just as it was about to stand up, I sliced its feet off. Dylan also cut its other foot, which made it stumble once again. He was screaming once again, but I created something to cover my ears with ice in the meantime.

"Now!" Blake shouted.

I felt Freya's enhancement spell, which allowed all of us to move midair. We flew and gathered our strength in one place as we sliced the goblin's neck off. As it screamed at the top of its lungs, the HP started going down until it turned into a zero. Our bodies glowed, and when the four of us have gathered, a menu screen appeared in front of us.

>PROCEED TO THE NEXT FLOOR

>SAVE PROGRESS AND LEAVE

>LEAVE WITHOUT SAVING PROGRESS

"Ivory..." they called me when they saw it.

I already knew what they wanted, so I took a deep breath and clicked the first option, which made the four of them smirk. I guess we were all thinking of the same thing. The difficulty of the floor doubles every time you advance. We are aware of that! But we leveled up at least six times after the fight with the goblin back in Mount Leona. And now our levels have doubled. Heck, we can even reach floor three at this rate.

The ones who lived after that fight were also given the same option, but the majority of them decided to leave first. I mean, I understand that they were exhausted after that fight, but they hardly did anything. There are only three teams who chose to go to the next floor. Ah, I somehow feel refreshed even though it was a tough fight.

"Here we are..." Blake murmured. "It's easy to find the boss because it likes to run around. But you have to be careful not to get struck by its poison. That s**t can kill you in an instant."

The boss of Floor Two is a scorpion, and it's extremely fast! I was afraid of insects, so I didn't think I'd want to see it, but we didn't have a choice. If you get struck by its poison, you will die within ten minutes unless you miraculously beat it and get the antidote from inside its body. But Blake taught us about the attack patterns of the bosses of floor one until floor ten, so we can predict it. Unless they made adjustments.

My eyes caught the silhouette of the girl from the other team that we saw earlier. I guess that team is also strong, so I won't worry about them anymore. There should only be ten to twenty teams on this floor today because plenty of them are resting or are already slain by the scorpion. I didn't want to hear people's screams anymore, but I don't think that's possible.

I swallowed hard when I heard a faint voice begging for help. We'll end up like that if we're not being careful, so we have to be on our guard. All of a sudden, the two teams that we met on floor one were running beside us. What if they're illusions?! I held onto the hilt of my sword in case they did something I didn't like.

"They're allies," Blake said simply and proceeded to run.

All of us stopped when we saw the life-sized scorpion stabbing people as if it was enjoying what it was doing. That thing was acting like killing people is the funniest thing it has ever done, and it made me want to make it suffer for as long as it can. The person beneath it was no longer alive, but the scorpion didn't stop there.

I gritted my teeth. "What the hell..."

Blake hushed me. "There's nothing we can do about that, but if we can kill it, we can avenge them."

I knew that he was just saying that to reassure me, but the desire to kill the scorpion within me was strong. The way it was hurting other people for its happiness sparked something within me. It wasn't just anger but also a feeling that I couldn't...pinpoint. As I stared at the scorpion, I felt that it would also be difficult to defeat it. I swallowed the lump on my throat as I tightly held onto my katanas. This one is extremely dangerous...