184 CHAPTER 184(Chasing Ottar)

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

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CHAPTER START---

Exiting the elevator and stepping into Babel plaza the Trifecta immediately walks over to the dungeon entrance.

"Holy shit, what truck ran you guys over?" Yang chuckles as he sees Freya, completely ignoring her pronounced scowl and choosing to tease Allen and Hedin who stand beside her.

Both men were bandaged up but still carrying their weapons, always dutifully protecting their goddess.

"Truck?" Freya asks, not sure what he means.

"Uh, never mind, but yeah what happened?" Yang asks. Both Welf and Thalie stand beside him, Thalie and Yang with their new swords, and Welf with Mosoka on his back.

"Ottar happened," Allen bites out.

Thalie raises a brow at this, "how'd you piss him off?"

"They didn't," Freya says. "They were trying to enforce my orders, orders that only apply to him."

"Why only him?"

"Because he's the only one in my familia that would actually have a chance at killing Balor solo."

"Oh," Yang immediately realizes what's going on. "So he went after Balor because I'm guessing he's feeling stagnant at level-seven."

"Exactly, last time he did this he barely crawled back to Rivera on floor-18 and didn't even half kill Balor, he's going to get himself killed," Freya says.

"Gotcha, but um," Yang nods before rubbing the back of his head, "why is this my problem?"

"I need you to go stop him from getting himself killed, that's all. You're the only person who can," she says.

"Yeah yeah, I figured out that much but again, why would I do that? He's a big boy, he can make his own choices," Yang says.

"Because I'm asking you to help me," Freya says. She takes a step forward and gets a bit closer to him, barely standing a foot away as she tilts her head up to look at him. "Because I don't want him to die, because my familia needs him for us to stay on top...second. To stay in second after your team. And because I can't stand people defying me no matter the results," she gently cups his face and does her best quivering lip, "can you please help me?"

"Sigh, fine I'll go find him," Yang relents. Freya immediately tiptoes and kisses him before they separate.

"I knew I could count on you for this, I'll be waiting at Folkvangr for him," she says, taking her adventurers and running off to prepare for Ottar.

"Well this was a big waste of time," Welf says. Arms crossed over his chest as he shakes his head. "I'll just go wait for my merchant and double-check the gear for our expedition tomorrow."

"Sounds good, this shouldn't take long," Yang says as Welf begins walking back to the elevator.

"Do you want me to go handle it?" Thalie asks, "I can just deal with this if you wanna relax today."

"Uh, no." Yang gives her an amused look, "if I send you Freya's gonna get a corpse in return, don't want that happening. But you're coming with me, let's go..."

---2 Hours Later, Floor-47...

"Loki? Seriously?" Thalie asks as she slashes a Flame Rock in half, shattering the obsidian body of the lava monster and continuing their mad dash down into the dungeon. Beside her Yang does the exact same with his new sword, neither adventurer spare the loot a second glance, only focused on finding Ottar.

With so many pathways and floors larger than Orario the best place to find Ottar was to simply wait at Balor's room.

"Yeah, what's wrong with Loki?" he asks.

"She's annoying, and perverted, and flat," Thalie says.

"Yeah, but, well, look. I can't explain it ok," he admits as they barrel through another horde of monsters.

"I always assumed you had a thing for Elves, don't you?"

Yang gives her a curious look. "what? Why would you think that?"

"From Lefiya to Freya, I mean Elves are supposed to be divine beauties in mortal flesh and you went from sleeping with an Elf to sleeping with a goddess of beauty," she points out as they clear another line of monsters.

"I'm not with Freya for looks."

"Why else would you be with her, you know she's a vindictive scheming woman right?" Thalie asks.

"Not when she's with me at least. And she's good company."

"And sex, right?"

"Well, she's a goddess, I assume they're all like that."

"When Welf gets his you two can compare notes," she cackles.

"Yeah, when they finally get their heads out of their asses."

"Oooh, is that why you think Loki is hot? Because she has a nice a---"

"No, it's not."

"Oh, well..." Thalie thinks it over for a bit as they fight through a horde of Fomoire, massive men with the head and legs of goats. "Maybe it's a dominance thing?"

Yang pauses for a moment and stares at her, "excuse me?"

"Well it makes sense right, Loki familia is always annoying us because they think they're the heroes of Orario or whatever. You already wanna punch Finn in the face, if you fuck his goddess it would be super disrespectful, and he can't do anything to even the playing field since Hephaestus only wants Welf in her," she says.

Yang gives her a concerned look. "Oh my god, why would you even think that, I just can't explain why I think Loki's hot, it's not that deep."

"But you're already sleeping with their beloved Riveria right, so why not the goddess too?"

Yang immediately stops fighting, with a wave of his hand a torrent of flame clears the horde. On the suddenly empty battlefield, both adventurers look at each other in confusion.

"What?" Thalie asks.

"Why do you think I'm sleeping with Riveria?"

"You're not?"

"No, I'm not."

"Ohh, I just assumed you three were a thing, at the party, it just seemed like you three were a thing," she shrugs.

"How did you get that impression?" he asks as they continue running down the dungeon.

"Because Riveria looked like she wanted to crawl onto your lap and was fighting herself not to, because Freya was teasing her as if she wanted her to, because I can speak Elvish and heard what they were saying," Thalie says.

"You were eavesdropping from two tables away?"

"Yeah, duh."

"Well, what did they say?"

"Well, it wasn't what they said more like how they said it. I think Freya was just teasing her and egging her on. Like she was inviting her to make a move, knowing Freya she probably gets wet from playing power games like that," Thalie says.

"True, she does, but I was honestly lost for most of that conversation. Didn't even notice..."

"Yeah well good thing I did, honestly just assumed you were keeping the fact that Riveria shares a bed with you two a secret because her familia worships her...also, she's the princess of all Elves so that too, it all seems like a headache to me," She admits.

"It is a headache," Yang says. "That's why when I stopped her from kissing me I left it at that and buried it. I assumed if Freya ever found out she'd kill her."

"Oh so she does want you, and yeah Freya would, she's done much worse for far less before," Thalie says. "But for some reason she doesn't mind Riveria eyeing her man, you building a harem in the future?"

"Ha, gods no! One partner is enough, you want me to add another one, I'd rather fight a hundred dragons than do that shit!" he cackles like a madman as they enter the next floor.

"Can't relate. Perks of not having any kind of sexual or romantic desire is I just get to say hell no to all that drama."

"Yeah, sounds like a nice quiet life, must be nice."

"And it's super-efficient," Thalie says.

After another few minutes of running they both come to one of the smaller chambers of floor-48, unlike the other rooms the monsters here were already dead, and Ottar was standing in the middle of it all with his sword on his back.

The tree adventurers stare at each other for a moment before Yang casually puts his sword away and walks up to the man. With the man standing an entire foot taller than him, unlike most men he isn't intimidated at all by the level seven adventurer, nor is his partner.

"Lady Freya sent you to get me?" Ottar asks, already knowing exactly why they're here.

"Your goddess is worried," Yang says casually, putting his hands in his pockets as he looks at the man.

Beside him, Thalie puts her blades away and gives them some space.

"I disobeyed her. But, it was necessary."

"Mhm, you wanna solo Balor and level up to eight right, be one of the only three people to ever hit level eight. Get everyone to see you as the king again instead of me? Get Freya to put you back on the pedestal?" Yang taunts.

Ottar only narrows his eyes at the man, "yes. All I care about is my goddess's pride in me. When the world looks up to me, to our familia as the strongest, that's when she is most proud of me. That's all I want," he admits.

"Mhm," Yang narrows his eyes at Ottar, "and what if I can't allow that. Maybe I like being the strongest, nobody to bother me at the top, no real competition. What then?" he gives Ottar a sinister smile, "gonna try to fight me and level up like that?"

With a small frown Ottar considers it for a moment before speaking. "Can I win?"

"Against me, not a chance. Against Thalie, I'd bet on her but it's pretty close," Ottar's eyes wides, shifting to stare at the woman before flicking back to Yang's smiling face. "But we'll keep that between us, honestly the guild knows what we're capable of so they'll stay out of our way. I'd rather have the public looking at you than me anyway so this works out. I just need to make sure you understand what you're doing."

"Wait, you're going to let me fight Balor?"

"Obviously," Yang says. "I don't care about you or your adventure. If you want to go die then be my guest, I just rather make sure you understand the risks since Freya asked me to come down here and find you."

"Die or ascend, those are the only options I will accept," Ottar says.

"Perfect, I just had to get to you in case you need healing after the fight, assuming you win of course."

"Lady Freya may be upset with you too for this."

"Yeah she will be, but she's my girlfriend, not my boss. Honestly, my boss is Hephaestus and she can barely tell me what to do, Freya should have seen this coming, she'll get over it, now get going before I change my mind."

"Thank you," Ottar says as he begins cutting his way toward Balor.

As Thalie and Yang watch the man walk off he gives the woman a curious look. "You don't seem surprised?"

"Why would I be?" Thalie asks. "All you care about is your adventure right. Why would you stop his when it doesn't bother yours?"

"Hmm, yeah, adventurers should die however they want. That's the only acceptable outcome."

"Yeah, Freya is gonna be really mad at you for this," Thalie says.

"Yeah well, it's a good thing our Expedition starts tomorrow then, it'll give her a few weeks to cool off," he jokes as they follow behind Ottar.

"Mhm, you know, you're a pretty cool step-dad," Thalie says.

"Ugh, you know I can't stand those jokes," Yang groans and frowns at her. "And besides Ottar is like thirty-four, double my age."

"Yeah, and Freya is however many billion but you still blew the dust off and got busy..."

Minutes later the three adventurers find themselves at the entrance to Balor's room.

Standing in the obsidian cave they look down into the cylindrical chamber, the demon-like monster sits on its throne, the both of a man and head of a goat. A fire sword in its right hand and a lightning sword in its left, waiting for a challenger.

Reaching a hand out Ottar feels the heat of the chamber, "half-hour at best," he says, knowing how long he can last fighting in what may as well be the heart of a volcano.

"Not our problem," Yang says. "I'm only here for the aftermath, either giving you an Elixir so you don't die or taking your corpse back to Freya, good luck," he gives Ottar a pat on the back the throws the man over the edge and into the boss room.

Tumbling in the air Ottar easily lands on his feet and draws his sword, the monster rises from its throne, two kings ready for a glorious battle.

As Ottar and Balor charge each other Yang looks over to Thalie, "so, care to explain why you've been killing people all over Orario?"

END CHAPTER---

Sorry for the delay Wifi was out.

Loki was the woman Yang was talking about when he was on vacation with Freya :)