After multiple hours of basking in the pure delight and excruciating pain that came hand in hand with their freedom.
They finally decided to get moving; with Azrael's minor regeneration and Olivia's natural healing, they were more than ready to get moving onto the next floors.
Because even though the pain they experienced was the most intense feeling either of them had ever gone through, strangely enough, it didn't seem to affect their bodies in any negative way.
If anything, that pain was more of a gift to them than they realized.
Slowly rising to their feet, they couldn't even look each other in the eye. Between the bite, the kiss, the system, and their freedom, they came to a silent mutual agreement not to discuss any of it.
At least not until they escaped this frozen hell of a dungeon.
With that settled, they began to move further down the dungeon onto the next deadly floors.
With the floor boss dead, it would be way easier to descend the next nine floors with only the regular rabbits getting in their way.
And it was just as they expected; they moved quickly through the nine floors, slaughtering any rabbits who got too close.
They couldn't afford any more distractions; after all, they were determined to get out of this snowy wasteland. They had just gotten their freedom and didn't want to waste it down here freezing to death.
Eventually, they reached the last of the ten floors infested with rabbits and moved on to the next ten floors quickly and smoothly.
As they moved through the first new floor, they held their weapons tight while scanning the area for any danger or movement but only found more snow—just a long stretch of pure white snow complemented by the blue of the mana stones embedded within the ceiling and covered with a thin layer of ice.
The entirety of the floor had not a single sign of life, just snow and ice; the same thing went on for the next four floors after that.
This only went on to make the two of them more and more cautious and suspicious.
There was no way that five floors in a row had no mana beasts.
One was odd, Two was weird, Three was suspicious, Four was definitely a cause for concern but five!
Five was like the dungeon itself was waving danger flags directly in front of their very eyes, screaming at them that it was a trap.
But even so, they still had to press on, continuing their descent no matter what.
The sixth floor was empty as well, which only served to heighten their cautiousness even more.
But arriving on the seventh floor they were surprised to see that this floor wasn't just inhabited by the snow alone.
No
While there were still wasn't any signs of life, they found hundreds of scales littered throughout the floor.
Some are lying on top of the snow, others are embedded within it
Crouching to pick one up, Olivia examined the scale curiously within her grip.
It was a tough, thin blue scale that had frozen blood decorating its narrow tip which appeared to be just as sharp as a knife.
The scale appeared to shine in many different shades of blue as Oliva held it up towards the mana stones embedded within the sealing.
As she continued to examine the small scale in her hand she began to pick up more comparing them all to each other "Interesting, weird but definitely interesting, they all seem to have blood on them, some way more then others.." she said her voice even as her eyes looked over to the patches of snow dyed crimson with blood.
Which held the most scales
"What do you think Az?" she said, finally showing some emotion within her voice as she looked back towards him.
Azreal who had been slowly following her through the scale-infested snow as she examined them took one more Quick Look over their surroundings taking in the thicket patches of crimson snow and the scales that piled on top of them before saying his voice steady.
"Am…am not sure, it looks like a fight happened here…and by the looks of it the things with the scales where the mana beasts that were supposed to be protecting this floor no not just this floor they were most likely supposed to be protecting the five floors above us as well if am not wrong"
"but they most certainly lost to whatever ransacked this floor and I suspect that it did the same for the five floors above us and the three below"
She paused for a second taking the time to examine him and analyze his answer before she replied
"Az am not sure but, that just seemed a little too intricate for something you're not sure about, didn't it?" She said softly as a smile found itself onto her face
"How did you even get so much from the little we have anyway, like how do you get all of that from just some snow, scales, blood, and empty dungeon floors?" She asked as she began to giggle a little.
"I don't know but let's get moving, see if we find anything else on the next floor" he replied quickly walking past her to avoid seeing her cute mocking face as she laughed at him.
"Oh ok we can go as long as you're sure" she said quickly walking up to walk beside him while lightly laughing.
The next two floors were the same as the seventh with some small differences
The further they descended the more scales they came across in the snow and the more they saw bigger and bigger patches of crimson snow littering the floors.
Until eventually the two found themselves on the last of the ten floors, and even now they still hadn't found a single trace of any life be it a sentient mana beast or actual people.
But in what looked to be the middle of the floor they found the body of a gigantic snake, its scales a deep reflective rainbow color unlike any of the scales they had found so far.
This had to be the boss of the ten floors but they could hardly even focus on that as their eyes were completely locked onto the head or at least what used to be the head of the snake
As right now that thing could be considered anything other than a head, as it was completely crushed, the eyes were dug out, the head scales looked to be completely drained of their vibrant rainbow colors and some parts of it even seemed to be completely melted as if it was dropped into a vat of acid.
As they were examining it, taking in its full grotesque horror a sound found its way deep within their minds.
Echoing from the walls to within their heads the sound was like listening to a drowning child as their lungs filled up with water.
"Huh, what is tha….."
Azreal couldn't even finish his sentence before he was hit with a deep primordial feeling of fear.
His heart was beating harder and harder from within his chest going so fast it began to make him think it was about to pop.
What he felt permeate throughout his body was a deep, sinking, primordial fear it was as if he knew death was near, no it worse than that.
For he wasn't afraid of death, he had never been afraid of death
No this was far deeper then simple fear
This was dread pure primordial dread.
And it was warning him that a fate far worse than death was approaching.
NO IT WASN'T APPROACHING, IT WAS ALREADY THERE!!!
Suddenly He felt it a cold, rotten breath brush across his cheek before.