Somewhere deep within the 78th floor, there was an octagonal room with exits on four sides. There was also a concealed room that existed on one side, in between two of the exits. It wasn't terribly large, but it made for a great hiding spot.
Hayama and the others were currently cooped up inside, taking a short break. They had been running for hours without resting. Their expressions were dark despite being only eight floors away from the teleportation circle they found on the 70th floor that connected to the 30th floor.
Normally this would be where Hayama roused his companions with one of his characteristically charismatic speeches. However, the situation was far too grim for him to come up with anything worthwhile. He silently sat against the wall, his lips utterly sealed.
One single demon was all it took to wreck their fantasy of an adventure in which they were the heroes of the story. They were being hunted like rats.
Clicking his tongue, Hayama stood up with a scowl.
"We need to get going."
The ragged breaths of most students indicated that they were far from rested but they couldn't stay still much longer. It was game over the moment their chasers found them. They couldn't afford to lose more time.
No one said anything as they continued their run towards the surface. Ooka's spell had worn off hours ago, hence their footsteps could be heard echoing through the walls of the dark dungeon.
Toaru Addenda
There was a loud thud as the shimmering outline of a gigantic humanoid monster with horse heads smashed against the magic circle that connected to the 30th floor.
Cattleya was just a few meters behind them. She had figured out that the heroes were going to rush straight for the room with the teleportation circle, so she directly destroyed the array while planning to wait for them in this room as the stairs were right next to it.
She hadn't found any of them while going up but she knew for a fact that they hadn't been able to escape either. The heroes must have been hiding somewhere. All she needed to do was to wait for them for the time being.
There always was the option of searching the floors completely one by one, but it would take much longer. She didn't think that the spoiled brats would prefer to starve to death anyway.
What she didn't expect at all was someone teleporting from the 30th floor as lines of magic started flowing into the broken pieces of the former array. It appeared to be that destroying one of the dual arrays didn't prevent the other side from sending backup.
There was a short silence as all her minions returned to their invisible state while closely guarding her.
A single figure equipped with bulking metallic objects materialized shortly after.
"Tch... Just one of them, huh...?" She flicked back her bangs and stared at the new arrival.
He had some sort of antennas that slowly moved back and forth as he met her eyes.
The moment their eyes locked, shivers ran down her spine. Which confused her. The man was clearly a mere human but she was feeling threatened by his presence.
Chasing away those thoughts, she readied for battle. There was no way that a single man would be able to defeat her, especially without being able to see the hidden monsters.
"Kill him." She pointed at the human, ordering her monsters to attack.
Unnerved, he simply pointed forward his metal staff and pulled a small lever.
One of the loudest sounds she ever heard assaulted her ears for a split second as everything went silent. Her sense of hearing had been damaged by whatever the human did.
Opening the eyes she had inadvertently closed, she saw Ahatod, her strongest monster, thrashing wildly on the ground as it lost copious amounts of blood from a gaping hole in its chest.
Flashes of light appeared one after another from the metal staff and corpses were left in its wake.
Most of them with their heads blown away slumped on the ground, dead.
"H-How did he know..." Cattleya could not hide her surprise as he killed her supposedly invisible minions.
Hachiman just switched to his shotgun and continued to shoot when the monsters closed on him. They didn't seem to ever harm him as he effortlessly kept all of them at an arm's length away.
The fight was too one-sided to be called a battle. It was a slaughter. She couldn't believe how easily her monsters were being killed.
Heedless of anything but their orders, the monsters continued attacking in waves. Had they not been mind-controlled, they likely would have fled.
A few black cats got behind Hachiman and tried to launch their tentacles from his blind spot. However, he just spun around and decapitated all of them with an insanely powerful kick.
His power, dexterity, and agility were out of this world.
Next, a pack of four-eyed wolves surrounded Hachiman from two sides. And yet, he discarded his empty magazines and immediately reloaded before mowing down the wolves leaping at him. The reinforced bullets fired from practically point-blank ranged destroyed not only the wolves' skulls but their bodies as well.
Another cat leaped on top of a Chimera and used the Chimera's camouflage to launch a barrage of invisible tentacles. Still, none of them reached their mark. Hachiman was simply too fast. Dodging, he dropped the Chimera along with the black cat with an axe kick.
Two Bulltaurs moved to flank him. Their maces tore through the air with great force. Hachiman simply ducked out of the way and tripped the Bulltaurs while he was at it.
"Guh!?" Both of them let out a surprised shout as they crashed into each other. While the two of them were hugging each other, Hachiman had fired off another volley of bullets. The Bulltaurs died in each other's arms.
Another eight cats leaped into the air, trying to hit him with a synchronized attack. This time they relied on their claws rather than their tentacles.
Hachiman's two arms moved independently of each other. With his right, he mowed down the enemies in from of him, while with his left, he shot down everything behind him.
Each and every bullet would meet its mark without fail. This was the result of Hachiman's superhuman reflexes. To his perception, he was fighting targets moving in slow motion.
He fluidly moved to a corner of the room that was easy to defend, then took down his enemies with lethal precision. Every single one of his moves linked perfectly to the next. They were backed by a level of experience that only the oldest M.A.R.S rankers were able to match.
A smile played about Hachiman's lips. It wasn't that he was deriving pleasure from sampling his enemies. It was just the adrenaline rush that came with injecting himself with the serum.
Having his physical attributes multiplied exponentially along with squashing bugs reminded him of experiences he didn't know he missed.
Just as he ran out of ammo again, another wave of monsters charged.
Hachiman leaped a few meters into the air, did a somersault, and reloaded while upside-down. He moved so fart that the Chimeras and four-eyed wolves lost sight of him for a second. While they were still looking around in confusion, Hachiman dealt them all with finishing blows.
Blood and flesh flew everywhere. A Bultaur charged, hoping to take advantage of the moment Hachiman landed.
But he never did. By transmuting the air, he launched himself further into the air. He took aim and decimated not only the Bulltaur but many of the Chimeras and wolves waiting behind them as well. One after another, the charging monsters fell dead, their inertia carrying them into a massive pile of corpses growing directly below Hachiman.
He landed gracefully atop the devastation he had wrought. He once again paused momentarily to reload. And just as he finished, one of the monsters let out a strange screech.
Hachiman turned to see Absod, a giant turtle, staring at him, with its mouth opened wide. A sphere of white light was growing inside its mouth.
It absorbed mana from the surroundings and fired. The light cut through the ground as it traveled towards Hachiman, carving out a huge groove in the rock.
Hachiman calmly watched it happen and nonchalantly waited for the light to strike. There was a distortion in the space it was heading to and was easily deflected.
The walls behind him were vaporized but he was unscathed. Transmutation magic truly was broken beyond comprehension.
The demon, finally out of her reverie, started desperately to chant an unknown spell. Hachiman just pulled the trigger. White feathers rained down around her.
The raven that had been resting on her until now had been killed.
Absod didn't even have time to react before supersonic bullets had consigned it to the void.
The raven had also been decimated in an instant, without ever realizing what had hit it.
The shockwave from the pellets had been strong enough to throw Cattleya off-balance. She tumbled to the ground and absentmindedly touched her cheek. It was splattered with the raven's blood, and it stung to the touch. The friction and heat had been enough to burn her cheek.
If her head had been just a few inches closer to the raven, she would have died then and there.
Still, even though she was still alive, it was already over for her. Her supposedly invincible monster army was being steamrolled with unbelievable ease. She knew that he could kill her whenever he chose to. Her life was utterly and completely in the palm of his head. Until now she'd had great pride in her unbreakable warrior's spirit. Faced with Hachiman's overwhelming strength, however, that spirit was crumbling. Nothing she did would be able to scratch this devil in a human's skin.
What the hell is he? How does someone like him even exist? And how am I going to survive against him? Questions whirled around inside the demon's hand, but no answers presented themselves.
Many of the same questions were going through Hayama's and the other's minds too. They had been attracted to the commotion and were astonished by what was happening.
