Chapter 11: Abyss!

"Grahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!" The Behemoth roared, making the room shudder.

Its sharp horns spat fire as it glared furiously at its opponents. It didn't wait for the others to start their magical chanting as it shot out towards the heroes. When he was within twenty yards of them, he bent down and leaped skyward with the intention of landing on them.

The heroes' eyes reflected pure despair. Seeing this, their trainers chanted different kinds of spells. At least they should repel the Behemoth back.

But suddenly, their eyes caught a tiny silhouette that appeared out of nowhere like a ghost in front of the huge Behemoth.

The silhouette took a few turns in the air. Its body twisted and sent a kick that collided with the Behemoth's hard armor.

*Booooom!

*Crack!

A furious shockwave was followed by the two terrifying sounds that overlapped each other. Those present recoiled backward from the furious air that had hit them.

The eyes of everyone present almost popped out of their orbits. They saw the huge Behemoth that had caused them so much trouble being flung across the bridge like a kite. And that was caused by a person!

The silhouette did somersaults in the air and gently descended to the ground.

Then, several thick white chains materialized around him and moved through the air towards the direction of the Behemoth. The chains twisted around his body and coiled him up before pinning him against the cave wall.

Naturally, the figure was Nader.

He turned around and looked towards Shizuku, who was staring at him dumbfounded.

"Long time no see, Shizuku," Nader greeted her with a smile and waved his hands at her.

Shizuku snapped out of her initial stupor and exclaimed in surprise, "Huh!? Nader-Kun!?".

Nader's eyes twitched at the strange honorific Shizuku gave him, but then he simply shrugged.

"N-Nader? How are you alive?! That's impossible, the King already reported that you were already dead!".

Nader's eyes followed the shout and found Captain Meld, who was looking at him with a pale expression.

Without waiting for even a second, Shizuku walked towards him as Captain Meld's desperate cry rang out again, "Don't go, he's dangerous!".

Shizuku gave Captain Meld a sidelong glance and ignored him as she continued walking towards Nader.

"W-wait Shizuku. Listen to Captain Meld!" Kouki shouted as he ran alongside Ryutarou to try and stop her.

Kouki grabbed Shizuku's arm but Shizuku gave him an annoyed look, "Let go of me, Kouki. I have something important to discuss with him."

"No! I won't allow you to get close to someone like him!".

Captain Meld, along with the other instructors who were fighting the skeletons, nodded to each other and began to position themselves towards the front to protect the heroes.

Most of the heroes defending against the skeletons had terrified expressions, especially the girls, not because of the skeletons, but because of Nader. Although not all the girls were terrified, as some had flushed faces as they looked at Nader...

"Come back here, Shizuku! You had already heard what Pope Ishtar and the King had said! Listen to me as your Captain!" Captain Meld ordered. His disappointed gaze was fixed on Nader's figure.

"Shizuku-chan... Please don't go!" Shizuku's best friend Kaori shouted as she ran towards her, ignoring the skeletons coming from all sides.

With an impatient expression, Shizuku shook her arm and pulled it out of Kouki's grasp.

"Don't stop me!" She said with a piercing look at them as she started to run.

By the time they pulled themselves together, Shizuku had already arrived next to Nader.

Captain Meld knew he couldn't stop her, he also knew he couldn't face Nader. The only thing he could do at that point was to pray for the best.

While Captain Meld was in his thoughts, Shizuku stood a few inches away from Nader and raised her face upward. Her eyes fixed on the heterochromatic eyes of Nader.

Although Shizuku's face was serious, her heart was beating anxiously. She hoped it was all a lie.

"Is it true what you've done?" She said ambiguously. Even though she knew it was a lie, she wanted to hear the truth from Nader's mouth.

For a moment, Nader's expression looked confused before he smiled and replied, "If I told you 'Yes,' would you believe me?"

Nader had thought that Shizuku was referring to all the warriors and mages he had slaughtered on his way to the labyrinth. However, he felt that wasn't what she was referring to.

On the other hand, Shizuku, who was watching carefully to catch the slightest change in Nader's expression, caught a glimpse of the slight confusion on his face.

That was enough, enough to make her earlier worries fade away and let her anxious heart calm down.

"I see. As I imagined, you have no idea what's going on, do you?". She said with a sigh of relief.

Nader shrugged, even if he knew, he probably wouldn't care.

"Shizuku..." Kouki muttered with a dark expression before continuing, "Nader-san, please let her go! Also, come with us to the capital. I'm sure if you explain things and apologize to Ishtar-san and the King we can work things out." Kouki said with a bright smile.

"Jé, why should I come with you? Idiot." Nader scoffed.

"Why? That's because I'm a hero, and as a hero, I must fulfill my role and take you again." Kouki said as he tapped the breastplate of his shining armor.

Hearing Kouki's words, Captain Meld, who was cutting down the skeletons, had the strong urge to slap his face as he started sweating bullets, 'Damn it, you idiot. I hope you didn't piss him off.'

"A hero, you must be joking, right?" said Nader as he gave him a strange look, "A hero does not filter everything he sees through blind vision and selfish thoughts, but one who recreates in his mind all the possible scene and acts outside of it. What you say and do is completely different from the behavior of a hero".

'Although people will always see beings with this type of personality as true heroes,' Nader added in his mind.

"But I'll still take you with us," Kouki said with a determined look.

A bulging, throbbing vein appeared on Nader's forehead, 'This kid didn't even listen to what I said'.

Besides, no one in their right mind would attack a person who had kicked like a ball at the Behemoth, that even all of them together couldn't even scratch its shell.

"Excuse me Nader-san for what I'm about to do, but you need to come with us." He continued as he activated his Limit Break ability and launched himself at full speed towards Nader.

"Don't do it you idiot!" shouted Captain Meld as he also lunged forward with a pale face. He chanted a magic spell and soon his body was surrounded by wind magic, which increased his speed by a large margin.

He had no choice but to intervene. After all, Kouki was the hero, he couldn't let anything serious happen to him. From the King's descriptions, Captain Meld knew that Nader was quite reckless and didn't care about the lives of others.

"Nader-san, excuse me!" Kouki shouted and, under Shizuku's dumbfounded eyes, Kouki swung his sword towards Nader to strike him.

*Booom*

Along with the sound of an explosion, Kouki was repelled backward at a much faster speed than he came. His sacred sword was in Nader's hand.

Captain Meld's eyes widened as he saw that his student was about to collide with him. He dropped his weapon and opened his arms to stop him. But instead of stopping him, they were both pushed back as the concrete of the bridge shattered under Captain Meld's feet. Only after a few seconds, Captain Meld steadied himself in front of the other heroes.

Captain Meld let out a choked grunt as he spat out a mouthful of blood.

Oblivious to his condition, he checked Kouki's condition and let out a sigh of relief. Kouki was only unconscious.

"Kouki-Kun!" shouted some people as Kaori ran towards them while casting a healing spell.

"Here, take it back," Nader muttered as, with a wave of his hand, Kouki's holy sword shot out towards them.

Under the pale expression of Captain Meld and Kaori, the great sword stuck right in front of their feet.

"I don't know if your childhood friend is too brave or too dumb," Nader sneered as he ignored the looks of terror at him.

"A-ah, well, it's probably the latter," Shizuku said, snapping out of her daze. It didn't matter to her that Nader had hit Kouki, as she was angry at him for trying to hit him and force him to come back.

Nader saw out of the corner of his eye that the instructors were conjuring some kind of spell.

"Damn, I think they're all fools," Nader muttered as he clicked his tongue in annoyance.

Nader waved his hands and in the next instant, several white, crabby chains whipped through the air before shifting and corralling all the people in it, including the students. Because they were screaming, Nader controlled the chain and covered their mouths.

He had also materialized the sharp pellets that killed the approaching skeletons. He then materialized a spear and threw it towards the magic circle to destroy it.

Having removed all the nuisances, Nader turned around to look at a stunned Shizuku.

"Well, what exactly happened?" Nader asked as he patted his hands.

"Ah, yes..."

From what Shizuku explained, it had all happened this morning: the King had gathered the citizens in fear because of the massacre that had occurred in the night and announced that Nader was to blame for this.

He had also labeled him as a heretic since he disobeyed the rules of his God. Obviously, they had hidden the fact that Nader was one of those summoned so that the citizens would not fear the other heroes.

That had not been all, for they had also announced in a voice of regret that they had found several girls rap*d in the library, where Nader had been reading.

Of course, the girls who had supposedly been rap*d were there, sobbing. This made the public sympathize with them.

They also announced that the Holy Church had taken care of Nader, which had greatly reassured the citizens as they were grateful for the benevolence of their God.

And as for suspecting the king's words? That had never crossed the minds of the citizens. This was because, from their points of view, the King and the Pope were like messengers of God Ehit. It was completely natural for them to believe every word spoken by those who had a higher status than them.

All the time he had listened to Shizuku's explanation, Nader's expression remained unchanged. Naturally, he was already quite used to the nasty labels that had hung around his neck throughout his past life, so this is just another addition to the same label he already had.

But he found it odd that they announced that he was already dead. This led him to think that the being who had pursued him had not informed the Holy Church or the Kingdom that he had managed to escape. To him, this meant that the being probably had a higher status than the King and the Pope combined.

'But who could it be, perhaps the Emperor? No, he shouldn't be that strong either. A being from another world...maybe?' Nader thought to himself.

"So that's what it's like," Nader muttered with a nod of understanding.

He had also realized why the girls were more afraid of him than they were of the boys.

"So, you haven't suspected me?" Nader said with a smile.

Shizuku lowered her head and said, "U-um, I don't know. I was pretty lost at first. I knew you weren't that kind of person, but still, I was hoping to talk to you again to verify it."

Nader smiled warmly towards her as he rubbed her head. It was a pity that Shizuku hadn't seen his smile that could be considered true.

Shizuku lifted her slightly flushed face and asked, "So, what are you going to do from now on?".

"Mm? What do you mean by that?".

"I mean that when you leave this place, both the Holy Church and the Kingdom will be looking for you day and night. You will no longer have peace of mind." She said with a worried expression.

She was sure that Captain Meld would leak the information that Nader was not dead as they imagined.

"Oh, don't worry about that. I have ways to deal with them" he said, smiling as he gently patted Shizuku's head.

Nader had had the intention of faking his death in this place so they wouldn't look for him in this maze. But they had already thought that he had already died at the hands of the Holy Church or, in this case, the being that had persecuted him.

'Since the being who had persecuted me had not revealed that I am still alive, I will take advantage of this and make the Pope and the King live comfortably until my return.'

'He doesn't seem to be angry with them...'. Shizuku looked at Nader's calm face.

"Alright, let's get to work". Nader said and started walking towards the people who were bound with their chains while looking at the two of them.

"What will you do?" Shizuku asked curiously and followed him.

"Since the King and the Pope think I'm dead, then I might as well stay that way until I return to the surface. And for that I will have to erase and replace the memories of your instructors and your companions since they, had seen me alive," Nader explained while touching Captain Meld's head as he looked at him with anger shining in his eyes.

"Is something like that possible?" Shizuku's red eyes widened in surprise.

"Yes. By the way..." Nader turned his face towards her before continuing, "I've used this technique to get inside your mind to extract information."

"W-what! You did what?!" Shizuku interrupted with a desperate cry as she grabbed Nader's arm and shook it.

'Wawawa, this can't be' she panicked inwardly. Her face was red with embarrassment.

'Don't worry, I didn't check your secrets. I just observed the information in your world." He said as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

"B-but still...that's embarrassing," she said in a lastimal voice.

"Yes, I know. I'm sorry about that." He apologized awkwardly as he rubbed Shizuku's cheek. He had never found himself in a similar situation before.

He would normally never tell someone what he had done. But he conceived Shizuku as someone close to him, so he decided to reveal the truth without hiding it. After all, for him, truth and sincerity were the main basis for building a good relationship.

"Humph," Shizuku let out an annoyed snort as he puffed out his cheeks in a cute pout only to be crushed by Nader.

"Fine, let me finish my work." He shrugged and turned back to Captain Meld.

Shizuku just grumbled instead as she looked at him curiously.

Nader poked his senses into Captain Meld's mind using his [Memory Stealing] ability, except this time, he would not read his memories, but erase them and replace them with something else.

Seconds later, piles of filaments connected to different memory fragments appeared in Nader's consciousness. He rummaged around for a while to find the most recent scenes stored in Captain Meld's memory.

He then cut those filaments connecting the memory fragments to replace them with different memory.

Captain Meld's body shuddered as his eyes slowly went out of focus before he completely lost consciousness.

Basically, Nader implanted a new memory into his memory. In these new memories, he would not appear to save their asses. Instead, the Behemoth would fall off the bridge due to the cooperation of all the instructors and heroes with their respective spells.

This way, they would all still think he was dead. Although he could implant in his memories that he had fallen into the abyss to deceive the being that had chased him, he chose not to do so, as he believed that beings would not be fooled so easily.

After a few minutes, he finally finished replacing the memories.

Under Shizuku's interested gaze, Nader moved from one person to another to change his memories. This went on for a full hour before he could finish it.

"Phew! That was hard." Nader sighed as he wiped the imaginary sweat from his face.

Shizuku walked over to him and looked at the unconscious faces of his companions who were lying on the ground, "When will they wake up?"

"Well, maybe in a few hours. It also depends on their mental defenses, so there will be someone who wakes up faster or slower."

"I see. won't they find it strange when they wake up and find the others lying on the floor?".

"No. They will only remember that after the Behemoth fell, a magic circle had appeared that had teleported them to another floor and they had been knocked unconscious in the process. For that, I will take them to the fiftieth floor," Nader explained.

He then explained to Shizuku about their new memories so that she would adapt to their behaviors after they were asked how they had managed to escape the Behemoth.

With all she had to do, she had the white chains wrapped around the unconscious bodies again and levitated them into the air.

"Let's go." He left and Shizuku followed.

The bodies of the others were floating behind them as they made their way into the floor above.

-----------------------

About twenty minutes later, Nader lowered all the unconscious people to the floor of the 50th floor, where he had previously stayed to learn his absorption skill.

"Thank you, Nader-Kun." Shizuku thanked him.

She was aware that Nader had done this just for her, otherwise, he would have simply left them to their fate. For that reason, she was extremely grateful to him, plus she felt a warm feeling covering her heart.

Nader just shook his head before pointing out, "You know, Shizuku...Can you just call me Nader? My name sounds rather strange with that honorific."

Shizuku averted her gaze before nodding sheepishly, "Nader..."

After that, the two started talking about random things, or rather, Shizuku had asked him quite a few things from his previous world, so he was responding to her.

But then Nader sensed that one of the people was about to wake up. He looked in their direction and saw a bespectacled girl who was fluttering her eyelids.

"I think it's time for me to go. See you later, Shizuku."

Instantly Shizuku felt discouraged, but still, she reluctantly nodded. She liked spending time talking to him, but she knew he would have to go.

"Okay, see ya." She said with a bright smile.

Nader smiled as well and rubbed his head before walking past her.

Shizuku looked at Nader's back, which was slowly getting smaller and smaller until he disappeared completely.

What she didn't know was that earlier Nader had put a protective shield around her mind, as he distrusted people and knew that there was someone powerful who was allied with the Holy Church.

Shizuku then lay down on the ground while pretending to sleep soundly to deceive them.

-----------------------------

"Well, let's see how this ability works," Nader muttered as he placed his hand on the head of the huge Behemoth.

After separating from Shizuku, he had headed straight for this floor before killing him with a sharp spear that pierced the armor of his head.

"Absorb."

Under Nader's command, the black, opaque rune that was engraved on his soul lit up with a dark 'light' before spinning as a black hole.

Consequently, the Behemoth's body was surrounded by the same black light before the huge body was turned into blackish particles that were absorbed by Nader's pores. As the particles entered his interior, the small black hole absorbed them and then pumped as it expelled the energy throughout his body.

[You have acquired [Stats]:

Strength: +3

Vitality: +4

Defense: +7

Agility: +2

---------------

You have acquired [Skill Information]:

- Fire Sparks: Creates a spark of fire that increases the damage of your hits].

"Although the stats aren't much, it's enough for a monster of this level. And the fire spark ability doesn't suit me much. But it should be enough to use it as a catalyst to awaken the Fire Element." He muttered to himself.

Stopping to think, he went to the edge of the bridge and looked down as he wondered if he should go down the normal stairs or go down into this abyss.

Normally, one would choose the normal, familiar path, but Nader, who was looking for something new, found this chasm more interesting.

"Maybe there are better things in this hole." He muttered before kicking the bridge hard and destroying it in half.

Soon after, he, along with the debris of the bridge, was swallowed by the mouth of the chasm.

Nader continued to climb down on rubble as he looked into the deep abyss. Although small waterfalls were pouring out of the openings in the walls, without a doubt, if someone fell from the bridge, they would die. Unless they were quite lucky and got swept down the waterfall to the bottom.

When he caught a faint glimpse of the bottom of the chasm, he used his Law of Space and teleported into the small river of about five meters created from the water cascades that flowed like slides from the walls of the chasm.

Although the cave was a bit dark even with the green stones dimly illuminating the surroundings, Nader had no difficulty seeing the contours of the surroundings.

He climbed out of the water and looked down at his clothes, which were all wet. Before he shrugged, all his clothes dried, leaving him surprised.

"Huh? Did my clothes have this function?" With that thought, he looked at his clothes and executed his system's [Inspection] option.

[Regenerative Clothing.

Grade: Gold.

Description: A clothing that can regenerate to its normal state.

- Does not protect or regenerate the wearer's body].

"As expected of a Goddess?". Nader said with a wry smile. He thought that with these clothes, he wouldn't need to change clothes every time the battle ends.