CHAPTER 100(Expedition Force Gathered)

Please read the author's notes. (Examples and explanation of moves and appearance+ Monster Sources)

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CHAPTER START---

---Floor 37, 3 days after Yang's Team...

Standing in Udaeus's throne room, Loki familia executives minus Tiona were looking at the damage done to the room with uneasy gazes.

Yang's team hadn't really taken time to pay attention to the state they left the room in. New passers-by however couldn't miss it, the massive swirling pattern that warps inward to the center of the room, to where the experienced adventures know Udaeus spawns and remains stationary.

"That's new," Finn states plainly.

"Aye, same attack from before?" Gareth questions.

"Hmm, pressure damage left shrapnel and small craters around, this looks like he tried to copy my magic instead," Riveria surmises, noting how the swirling pattern is a much more obvious version of the aftermath of her annihilation magic.

"So they really did kill it, if Tiona got hurt I'm gonna kill him..." Tione grumbles, flames in her eyes as she grinds her teeth.

"Tsubaki confirmed they were all fine before we entered the dungeon, I'm sure you've got nothing to worry about, Udaeus is the most dangerous thing Yang planned to encounter," Riveria tries to alleviate Tione's anger, her sisterly way of worrying.

Bete and Ais were simply staring out at the room. They weren't quite sure what to make of the scene, they'd expected to find Yang's team on floor 39, but this changes things.

Lefiya could only wonder just how powerful he was, how far ahead of her had he reached.

"Yeah, this is definitely Yang, the subtlety of a brick that one... wish I got to see it, must have been amazing to see their fight," Tsubaki muses with a wide smile.

"Well, the sooner we get to them the sooner we get details, lets go..." Finn orders as the adventurers begin marching onward.

---A few hours later...

Finn couldn't help but stare up at the large stone plateau in the 39th floor safe zone.

Nobody had to ask what made it as the Hephaestus symbol and what Tsubaki explained to be the 'Trifecta' symbols were on the side of it, large enough to be seen from quite far away.

"Yeah this is a bit much, even for me... but I can see how useful it'd be, and he even made stairs..." Tsubaki says as she points out the wide staircase.

"So this is what he meant by 'I'll have a nice camping spot set up', to use magic like this... incredible..." Riveria draws the attention of everyone as she points this out. Quite a few elves from her mage unit frown as she praises someone from outside their familia.

"Hmm, what he lacks in subtlety he definitely makes up for in practicality, don't suppose Hephaestus is willing to loan him out more often?" Finn asks Tsubaki.

"Ha, even if she did, not like he'd listen. He's a bit of a wayward brat when it comes to his adventures and all that..." she casually explains.

"That's too bad, he'd make our lives a lot easier, ALRIGHT EVERYONE MAKE CAMP!" Finn announces, everyone immediately begins unpacking the essentials to get a day of rest.

---49th floor, 6 Days After Yang's Team...

Loki's familia was not in a good mood.

Their trek through the more recent floors had been filled with annoyances. No real danger by virtue of their many first-class adventurers.

But they'd lost an entire cart to 'Environmental Hazards', a nicer way of what Gareth described as "horse shit luck!"

A flowing stream of molten rock formed under their feet, dividing the expedition force in two and igniting the resources.

Taking out their frustration on monsters and gathering whatever drop items they needed, the rest of the journey was uneventful.

Approaching the entrance to the 50th floor safe zone, the gleaming forest under the midday shine of the crystal ceiling invited them to a nice reprieve, at least until they got back to work.

Breaking the corner as they exit the tunnel, Finn takes a look around at the safe zone, everything was still. Not a single sound of battle or monsters, only the lush forest rests ahead of them.

"Looks like everything's quiet here..." he muses, looking over to the plateau much like the campsite they left at the previous safe zone.

"Wow... I've never been this far down before, I can't wait to see something interesting..." Tsubaki muses as she takes a breath of not smoldering air from the calm safe zone forest.

"Let's go find them," Tione wastes no time in marching off toward the safe zone, she wouldn't say it but she was seriously worried about her sister.

With a massive leap she jumps up to the top of the plateau, landing loudly with a small crouch, she looks around to see the two large tents set up in the back, glancing to her left she sees the Trifecta and her sister sitting at what appears to be a stone picnic table set up, eating lunch apparently.

"Tione!" The younger amazon immediately rushes over to hug her sister, receiving a scrutinizing look from Tione, checking her for any injuries.

"You guys get here in one piece?" Yang speaks up, earning a look from Tione, her eyes immediately taking time to look over the Trifecta as she'd ignored them before.

Yang was wearing swimming shorts, feet bare and shirtless exposing his well-built body, bandages around his forearms and palms like some sort of mummy.

Welf also had his hands in wraps, also looking as if he just got back from a swim.

Thalie was dressed in a long-sleeved shirt and combat pants that usually went under her armor, her feet bare on the ground just like her teammates, Tione's trained eyes could see the extra padding provided by the bandages on her side.

Taking a step back she ruffles Tiona's hair.

"Hey!" the girl whines.

Wet hair, they did go swimming...

"You ok?" Tione asks, looking right into her sister's eyes.

"Yeah we're fine, these guys are pretty fun actually, where's everyone else?"

"Right here," Finn calls out, stepping onto the top of the plateau as he brings up a few boxes in his arms, "we could use a hand when you're done Tione, lots of stairs..." he reminds her.

"ON IT CAPTAIN!" she immediately reverts to the love-struck schoolgirl as she makes to rush back and help.

"Wait! Let me..." Yang says as he gets up, walking over to the edge of the plateau. Seeing the Loki familia unloading boxes as some of them are already walking up the long stairs to the top, Yang takes a deep breath and calls out to them. "Everyone hold on!"

Focusing his magic, he pushes mana into the ground, reaching forward he grabs the air as if it were solid, pulling it upward and toward himself.

The area everyone is standing on rises diagonally, reaching up toward the plateau as if they were riding an escalator. Some people stumble for a moment, but they are adventurers, they can handle it.

In a few moments the massive amount of stone reaches the top, a large diagonal pillar left in the aftermath of his magic.

Everyone is silent for a moment, some are visibly happy at not having to deal with all the stairs while carrying their equipment.

With the motion of an uppercut to the air, a new set of stairs is formed at the side of the pillar all the way to the forest floor.

"Wow..." various murmuring of amazement flutter among the adventurers as Yang walks over to Tsubaki.

"Hey captain, nice trip to get here?"

"Nothing too exciting, considering you took care of Udaeus, guess it didn't go as well as you expected..." she nods to his bandages while dropping her backpack, beside Thalie's tent.

"Nah this was from beating Balor, I'm mostly healed up just a---what?" he stops as he looks up to see the shocked expression on her face, the entire plateau was silent as all eyes fell to him.

"Explain, NOW!" Tione charges up to him with the most hateful glare she could muster, Finn already at her side looking a bit miffed at the news.

"..." surprised by their reactions Yang wasn't sure what he did wrong and took a moment to consider what to say.

"Let's get unpacked first then we can catch up after..." Tsubaki comes to his rescue," I'm sure he has a lot to tell us," she fixes him with a curious look, no anger just genuine curiosity.

Walking back over to his team, Yang just sits back down and finishes his simple meal of roast meat and rice, it was his day to cook, and damn, he was a basic bitch at it.

As everyone gets set up, Bete walks over to the Trifecta and grunts, getting their attention.

"Main tent, now..." he rudely says before walking toward the command tent in the center of the camp.

With a bored sigh, Yang rises and follows Bete to the tent, leaving his team at the table.

Making their way to the tent he wordlessly follows Bete inside, within the tent all the executives of both familias are standing around some crates as Finn looks over sheets of paper laid out across them.

"Glad to see you're all ok," Yang greets them as he falls into place beside Tsubaki, all eyes immediately flick over to him.

"Right, let's begin then, I'll finish looking over the resources we lost en route after," Finn puts the papers aside as he turns to face Yang, "please enlighten us on what happened after we last saw you."

"Just the usual stuff, killing monsters and walking, for the record, by the way, we didn't have your sister help us against either monster rex," he addresses Tione directly, her shoulder loosen a bit as he speaks.

"Yeah, he wouldn't let me," Tiona grumbles as she folds her arms and pouts," was so cool and I couldn't even fight," she grumbles out.

"That's good to hear, if I knew you'd be doing something so reckless I may not of let you go as our vanguard, anything else?" Finn says.

"Nope, been here a few days and haven't left, I'm sure Tiona told you but she collected some of the Black Rhino horns when they came up from the lower floors yesterday, that's about it, oh, and Welf fixed up Urga," he shrugs.

"So you cleared both monster rexes and made it down here in a few days...I feel like I should have expected that," Gareth sighs as he joins the conversation.

"He hasn't disappointed yet when it comes to fighting," Riveria adds.

"Tsk," was Bete's only response as Ais silently observed, Lefiya standing at her side with a slight frown.

"Captain, I don't feel comfortable with Tiona being on his team in the future if he's gonna be reckless," Tione announces as she raises her hand.

"Never asked for the handout remember," Yang bites back, earning a hard nudge from Tsubaki to get him to not start a fight.

"I doubt we'll be in this situation again Tione so that's irrelevant. How injured is your team?" Finn asks Yang.

"Honestly the bandages are just to ease the soreness, for me at least, the others rather not fight seriously or bang an anvil for a bit longer, I'd rather not use too much magic," he shrugs.

"Then why lift us with the stone platform earlier?" Riveria asks as she hears his admittance.

"Wasn't much magic," he gives her a cocky smile.

"Right," Finn tries to get them back on topic, "You'll be under the command of Aki... Anakitty, she's a level four and very familiar with how we set up defenses at camp so you can trust her to hold our formations and make your life easier if monsters attack, everyone in here other than you will be heading out to finish some quests before we hit the 51st floor and below, if it's all the same to you, I'd still like you to join us for the deeper floors, we're trying to hit the 58th floor and below after all," Finn says with a small smile, hoping the idea of new adventures would entice Yang.

"Tempting... but when Tiona briefs you properly on how we fought on the way down you'll better understand why I'm trying not to fight around people that aren't my team, anything else?"

"Hmm, I suppose not, we won't be heading out until all our weapons are repaired so you've got time," Finn shrugs," you can head back to your team now if you'd like."

"Thanks," was Yang's simple reply as he immediately rushed out of the tent, everyone seemed a bit surprised that he actually left.

"Most people would be eager to join a meeting with our executives..." Riveria points out.

"Most people don't hate responsibility and paperwork as much as Yang, and WE don't fully trust you," Tsubaki says with a small smirk.

"Can't really blame you for that. And I've seen the paperwork our familia needs..." Gareth laments as he gives Finn a grateful look.

"Well then let's get to the fun stuff, whaddya need from me and my smiths?" Tsubaki graces them with a dazzling smile as she eagerly awaits weapon orders.

---1 Hour Later...

Walking over to the Trifecta, Tsubaki sees Yang holding his left hand over his right, palms facing each other with a rotating metal plate between them, hovering between his hands with purple lightning streaming into it from each palm.

Welf had his eyes glued on the process, pieces of armor on the table, small plates with cracks in them, some black and others silver. Thalie looked just as amazed as Welf, a wide smile on her face as she watches...whatever he's doing.

"So any reason you're putting on a show for everyone," Tsubaki says as she takes a seat beside Thalie, opposite the guys.

Looking up from the plate between his hands, Yang sees some people casting weird glances his way.

"Thalie needed a magnet, I'm making one, that's all."

"You're...making, a magnet?" Tsubaki was a bit dumbstruck at this, magnets were just natural minerals to her knowledge, rare too.

"I know right, pretty crazy," Welf adds in amazement.

"Miracle boy after all, apparently he can control metal with his magic...somehow," Thalie adds as she looks to the confused woman.

"Yeah...that makes sense...probably...after he explains...what?" Tsubaki had no answers either.

"It's because 'Lightning' is just a current. Just like 'Thunder' is just the sound caused by lightning heating up the air, run a controlled current and superheat metal and you get a magnet...I'm honestly more surprised you guys haven't made magnets yet."

"Well to be fair, most magic needs a chant, and can't be controlled as well as that," Welf points out.

"Uh-huh, guess you're all doing repairs and stuff," Tsubaki says while picking up one of the metal plates in front of Welf.

"So how was the 'Boring' meeting?" Thalie asks, casting a small nod toward the main tent Tsubaki just emerged from.

"Mostly Finn wishing he had Yang, he wouldn't say it but it was pretty obvious with the problems they're dealing with right now..."

"Problems?" Welf asks, taking back the metal plate to continue inspecting it.

"Lost more resources that he'd of liked on the way down, the new changes past the 40th floor is too much for the weaker members to protect that much cargo, lost some raw materials, weapon spares, herbal medicine, elixirs... other stuff like that. It cut how far they can try to clear."

"He was planning on going to floor 59?" Yang asks.

"Nah, this expedition is to get his familia used to fighting on the 40 to 49th floors. It's a big training thing for them, he was hoping to make one attempt for the frontier regions if they had enough resources after they do all their quests and get enough practice in, but---"

Yang cuts her off, "they lost so many resources he probably won't be able to spare any for an attempt, the dragon vase starts at floor 52, what about 51?"

"That's last on their list, they're also focusing on their quests mainly and working from the weaker floors all the way up. They can't just leave second-tier adventurers roaming about after the dungeon changes on these floors."

"Shouldn't they just hit the deepest floor quests first while they have resources?" Welf questions.

"Normally yes, but they can't afford to lose a weapon or something and stall the quests on the weaker floors, it's unlikely anything will hurt them in the 40s so they'll deal with that first. That means the main team won't all be leaving camp for a while, but when they do I get to go with em..." Tsubaki finishes with a small smile.

Yang stops the lightning from flowing to the plate as the burning hot magnet drops into his palm, "yeah have fun with that, while you're doing that we'll be here training, I've gotta master the basics of greatsword and Welf needs to learn to fly," he reaches forward and places the plate Welf is holding beside the magnet, the armor immediately moves and sticks to it.

"Did you say fly?" Welf says with slight fear at the idea of the training.

"Well...more like big jumps...and falling with style..." Yang gives him a devious grin.

END CHAPTER---

Chapter 100 without missing a single update...I'm pretty damn proud of that honestly. Love where this story is going and how even my plot notes have changed and evolved as I get deeper into how the characters think and what decisions they would make, Balor wasn't supposed to even be fought this arc but it just made sense that Yang wouldn't be satisfied after Udaeus was no real challenge.