Episode 43 – The Name of the Strongest VIII
When Corvo arrived at the thirteenth room on the seventy-seventh floor, a fierce battle was already unfolding at the far end of the chamber.
At its center stood a monster he had never seen before.
A large creature clad in dull-colored armor—its bearing unmistakably that of a knight. Wielding countless weapons with masterful proficiency, it fought against four adventurers. Sometimes with a sword, sometimes with a spear, and against the Gift-user, it even attacked with a crossbow. The numerous broken weapons scattered across the floor spoke of how brutal the fight had been. Yet the monster’s armaments never diminished; each time, it replaced them with new ones and continued its assault.
It was truly a monster worthy of being called a one-man army.
So that’s… the rumored “Stray,” Corvo thought.
The adventurers fighting it were four: Nada, Reaon, Ameisha, and Ouro.
“What, you only got here now?”
While Corvo watched the battle nearby with a slight grin, Koroa—leaning his back against the wall to the right of the room’s entrance—spoke to him.
Arms folded, Koroa observed the fight with a tense expression.
“You’re the last one to arrive, Corvo—”
On the opposite wall to the left, Iris was sitting cross-legged. Her expression was one of clear displeasure.
Pouting her lips slightly, she too was watching the battle like Koroa.
“Looks like I really am the last one then—”
There was no sadness in Corvo’s voice.
Deep down, while soloing the dungeon of Tohe, he had already suspected it. He knew he likely wouldn’t be the first to reach this room—in fact, he expected to arrive later than the others.
Because Corvo had chosen rooms he had cleared before, yet somehow the monsters appearing today were different from usual, and more numerous, forcing him to endure “a slight bit of trouble.” His skill kept it from hindering his progress, but since they were stronger than usual, it took him longer to get here.
Still, Corvo hadn’t expected to be the latest among all seven.
“For the record, I got here just a bit earlier than you. I didn’t think I’d lose not only to Koroa-chan, but to all the juniors too—”
Iris clicked her tongue softly as she spoke.
Having known her a long time, Corvo could tell there was irritation boiling deep beneath her tone.
“Oh? So besides me, you were the slowest?”
Corvo said, eyes widening in genuine surprise.
Iris was a capable adventurer—exceptionally so—and excelled at speed.
Corvo had even believed that, individually, she would be the fastest to clear the dungeon among the seven.
“That’s right. Those kids must’ve handled their run ridiculously well. Meanwhile, I had to cut down knight after knight after knight swarming out of nowhere on my way here.”
“You struggled too?”
“Of course not. Don’t be ridiculous. I’ve soloed more times than I can count. Lately, I dive solo even more often. But there were just so many of them that it wasted time. I’m not good at wiping out large groups at once.”
“That’s true…”
Corvo recalled Iris’s traits.
She possessed both an Ability and a Gift—rare even in the academy—a Gemeos, a two-colored.
Her Ability was a support-type that strengthened her sword’s power.
As for her Gift… she bore a blessing from Athena, though even Corvo didn’t fully understand its exact nature.
Athena’s Gift was unusual.
It was almost unheard of even in this country, and unlike other Gifts, it granted “victory” to its bearer—an extraordinarily vague effect.
It could not wipe out hordes like a Fire Gift.
It offered no overwhelming destructive force like a Darkness Gift.
It did not reshape dungeon terrain like an Earth Gift.
Nor could it heal wounded adventurers like a Healing Gift.
It simply granted victory.
Thus, Iris had only one Gift she could use:
“Vitoria.”
Corvo had received it once himself. True, the strange heat that spread through his body was unmistakable, yet nothing about his physical condition actually changed.
Which was why Iris was not suited for sweeping through large numbers of enemies.
If fighting solo, she would’ve had to pick which monsters to cut down and run from the rest—but because of the nature of the Tohe dungeon, even that wasn’t possible, so all it did was eat up time.
“…I was still the fastest among the three of us, but I never imagined we’d lose to all four of our juniors,”
Koroa said, sounding dejected.
“So that’s how it is. I didn’t think even you would lose to the juniors, Koroa—”
Corvo laughed as he said it.
“That’s right. Even if I was caught off guard a few times because there were more monsters than usual in the dungeon, I thought not much time had passed and chose the safer route instead. That was my downfall. The juniors probably went all-in on speed-focused adventuring—”
“Koroa, let me ask you straight: who did you think you might lose to?”
“…Iris and you, Corvo. I figured Ouro would be fast too, but I didn’t think he’d be fast enough to beat me. And as for the others—I underestimated them. That is my failure.”
“So how are we supposed to react to this? Should we be glad our juniors are growing, or should we mourn the fact that, despite being praised as the academy’s strongest, we’re about to get overtaken by our juniors in actual skill—”
Corvo let out a sigh.
He never imagined that the festival he started would turn out like this. The juniors were supposed to just be spice for the competition, and Corvo had assumed his real rivals would be only Iris and Koroa.
He’d been thinking only of how to outpace those two.
But in reality, he hadn’t just lost to them—he’d lost to the juniors as well.
If it were only the arrival time here he had lost, he could’ve brushed it off, thinking there was still room to make up for it later.
Because—the Hundred-Armed Knight was strong.
Even four excellent adventurers still couldn’t bring it down. Corvo’s initial plan had been to let either Iris or Koroa take the first turn, but maybe that bit of complacency had brought about this outcome.
Corvo’s shoulders slumped.
“By the way, Koroa—when you arrived, what were they doing?”
Corvo motioned toward the four with his eyes.
“…They were already fighting. I don’t know what happened, but by the time I got here, the four of them were already—”
“I see. Well, we’ll ask the juniors later what possessed them to break the rules and start all this, but Iris, the fight in front of us is quite the spectacle.”
Corvo stroked his chin.
“Corvo, what do you mean?”
“Your direct juniors.”
“You mean Nada and Reaon?”
“That’s right. What happened with those two in Aghiya is well-known around the academy. I know about it, and Koroa knows too, don’t you?”
When Corvo glanced at Koroa, he silently nodded.
“And that matters because…?”
“Well, I just find it interesting. I thought those two didn’t get along. But look at them now—working together like perfectly synchronized partners—”
Corvo watched the two charge at the knight.
When Nada slashed at the knight head-on with his crescent blade to draw its attention, Reaon immediately aimed for the harder-to-spot legs from behind. Whenever a blade turned toward Reaon, Nada took the hit and held firm, letting Reaon disengage.
Attacks from angles Nada couldn’t see were avoided because Reaon clearly indicated where to move, and Nada followed without protesting.
Ouro and Ameisha were supporting them from the flanks, but it was obvious that the stars of this battle were Nada and Reaon. The two were glued to the knight, unleashing a relentless assault that gave it not even a second of rest.
Neither was above the other—each covered the other's weaknesses, both desperately reaching their blades for the knight’s neck.
“They’re good adventurers, aren’t they?”
Iris said with a pleased smile, almost as if she were bragging about herself.
“Yeah. They are. I’d say they’re one of the ideal forms of adventurers. Which is why—it’s strange. Why would Reaon let go of Nada, someone he could coordinate with that well? Why did Nada leave Aghiya without putting up any resistance? I heard that after defeating the gargoyle, Reaon tried to invite him back into Aghiya again, but Nada refused, didn’t he? Why didn’t they form the same party again?”
“That’s what’s strange to you, Corvo?”
Iris laughed, her expression charming.
“Yeah. Even I don’t have an adventurer I can move with like that. Minimal talking, signaling with just their eyes, covering the other’s weak points without needing to say a thing. You don’t build that kind of coordination overnight. You need mutual trust for that.”
“Of course. I taught them. Both Nada and Reaon. They were in the same year, joined around the same time, so it was easy to train them together. Getting them to that level took a lot of work.”
As Iris spoke with pride about Nada and Reaon, Koroa frowned and said:
“In that case, why did you allow Nada to leave the party? Did you think that the two of them would split up, grow on their own, and then—thanks to some twist of fate—end up together in the same party again?”
“No way. Those two probably won’t ever form an official party again. Not like in Aghiya—giving their group a name and going on long-term expeditions together.”
“And you’re fine with that?”
“You two just don’t get it. Nada and Reaon—even if they’re perfectly compatible as adventurers, as people, they’ll never mesh. Their way of life is completely different. That’s why they’ll each choose their own path. Even if someday they realize they’ll never find another partner like the other, those paths won’t converge again. …At best, one of them might use the other.”
Koroa listened, deep in thought, quietly observing Nada and Reaon fighting.
In Koroa’s eyes was both admiration and sorrow. If it were him, he would never let go of a partner that good. He wanted such a partner desperately—he still did, even now. And while he understood why those two had chosen to part ways, something inside him refused to accept it.
“Well, that’s enough about that. It seems something’s coming from deeper in—”
Iris had sensed heavy footsteps echoing from the massive staircase farther beyond the battlefield, deeper than where they stood and deeper than where Nada and the others were fighting.
That weight clearly wasn’t human.
Monsters.
“…I thought the number of monsters was unusually high during my run today, but I didn’t expect even more to show up here—”
Corvo voiced the doubt he’d been feeling.
“So, what will you two do? Koroa, Corvo? The competition we set up is already broken since the juniors are fighting together. We could jump in, steal the finishing blow on the knight, and declare ourselves the winners, or we could simply stand here and do nothing—either option wouldn’t be wrong.”
Iris stood and drew her rapier as she spoke.
“You’re right. Maybe giving the juniors who ruined the festival I arranged a proper scolding wouldn’t be a bad idea—”
Corvo unsheathed his sword, silently activated his ability—Ogre Slayer—and his right arm swelled grotesquely.
“What nonsense are you two spouting? I put a lot into this expedition. I’m disappointed that it ended up like this, and honestly, I still regret it. But interfering with the juniors? My heart won’t allow that.”
Koroa drew his sword too—but aimed his gaze not at the knight Nada and the others were fighting, but at the countless monsters deeper in the room.
“Is that so? You seem like the one who’s most hung up on this whole event. It’s fine, you know. You can go ahead and kill the knight right now if you want.”
Corvo said it in a provoking tone.
“What are you saying? Of course it’s true. I want Iris. I want her no matter what. This time is the perfect chance to obtain her. As the king, there’s no other choice I could make.”
“That’s true—”
There was no emotion in Iris’s voice.
Even if he chose that path, Iris believed she would never blame Koroa for it.
“—But, but still. I was born to become a king; that much is true. But I was also raised in this city as an adventurer. My blood, my body, even my heart—every part of me is an adventurer. And as an adventurer, how could I possibly interfere with those earnest juniors of ours? They must have been ready to risk their lives on this. And their opponent is someone they couldn’t defeat unless they fought together. I absolutely refuse to trample on the feelings of comrades like that. As an adventurer, I’ll never do that.”
Koroa declared firmly. As he said, he was using his Gift, heightening his power as far as it would go.
“Looks like our opinions line up, too. Alright then—how about we go deal with those guys, for the sake of our cute, cute juniors?”
“So, you two—do you need a Gift?”
Even when Iris asked, the two said nothing and simply walked forward. Their destination was the same.
Already brimming with killing intent, they were focusing on the monsters ahead. Iris smiled softly at their backs and spoke in a beautiful voice.
“O god, grant these heroes the glory known as victory—”
Her blessing wasn’t only for Corvo and Koroa, but also for the four juniors.
Perhaps it was a memory from the Aghiya days. Among them, Nada and Reaon—who had received this Gift more than anyone else—finally noticed Iris’s presence and looked her way.
Iris looked up the staircase, then smiled at the two and tapped twice, firmly, over the left side of her chest—her heart.
Reaon, thanks to his Ability, must have known what waited below the stairs; he instantly tore his gaze away from Iris and refocused on the knight.
Nada probably didn’t understand the meaning of her gesture, but he said nothing, only lifting the corner of his mouth slightly as he sank deeper into concentration to kill the knight.
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