Mushoku Tensei: Reincarnated as the weakest Sword God

After discovering the circle leading to the fourth floor, we finished thoroughly mapping the third. Obviously, there was no sign of Zenith, so we decided to move on.

The walls of the fourth floor were made of a type of stone that looked familiar to me.

They resembled the ruins we had accessed to teleport here from the northern territories, perhaps they were similar structures except this one had been turned into a labyrinth.

"Gesse, what is it?" Paul asked,

"Hmm? Well, it seems we're doing well" he replied.

"Great, then let's explore the fourth level a bit before we return to the surface," Paul said coldly looking in my direction as I examined our surroundings.

"Gino, enemies," Elinalise said.

I looked up and found two four-armed armored monsters approaching, these monsters are considered undead by the way.

With a simple longsword of light, the two rusty armors were cut in half like butter, Paul and the others hadn't even noticed the enemies, and they were already finished.

After I killed several armored warriors, we started back to the surface. The route up took us approximately five hours on foot.

This search was going to take us a while.

We were in a good moment, keeping this pace would benefit us the most.

...

We all gathered for a meeting as soon as we arrived in the city.

There were several items we would need for our next adventure, so we set about collecting them.

Gesse bought some chemicals that were supposed to be effective on armored monsters.

He informed us that, if aimed well, this material would wrap around the creatures' joints and slow down their movement.

Paul and Elinalise set out to search for weapons. Apparently, they were trying to find a second-hand sword for Elinalise. The one she was currently using (her rapier) was a magic item. When she brandished it, it unleashed a blast of vacuum, which was not the most appropriate for fighting armored warriors. I could understand why she wanted a different weapon.

Elinalise bought a single gladius, one that apparently had the ability to emit a shockwave when pushed forward, it didn't do much damage, but it allowed its wielder to gain some distance from his opponent, sending him flying backwards.

That made it quite useful, so it cost a good amount of money, but Elinalise just grabbed a round crystal from her pocket and made the purchase.

That night Roxy and Talhand, the latter invited me saying "It doesn't matter if you're not of age, no one will judge you here" he said

that was true, but I never liked alcohol, but I had nothing to do so I went with them.

It was supposed to be a meeting between two magicians and a swordsman, but after a while the "professor" Talhand started giving us a lecture on "what makes a man a real man...".

According to him, men must have muscles, and magnificent muscles meant a magnificent spirit. It wasn't a conversation for everyone, but he was right: men must be muscular and strong.

Roxy just sat next to me sleepily, it was clear that she couldn't be less interested, although I couldn't blame her.

The next day, Lilia said goodbye to us as we dove back into the labyrinth.

...

Our journey to the fourth floor was uneventful, this was partly due to our elaborate preparations and the shifting of gears, but we were also lucky.

It was basically a straight shot up here, time-wise it only took us three hours, and we didn't have any run-ins with monsters either.

Once there, we continued on to the map of the fourth level instead of moving on, but to the surprise of everyone but me, Zenith was nowhere to be seen.

As our supplies were still good, we went down to begin conquering the fifth floor. On this level, the armored warriors were joined by the devouring demons.

But the devouring demons climbed up to the ceiling so only Roxy and I could do anything about them.

"Very well, it's time for our secret weapon," Gesse said.

There was an innovative countermeasure for these pests recorded in the pages of "An Exploratory Account of the Teleportation Labyrinth"

The roots of the Talfro tree were sold for consumption, but if you burned them as incense, the devouring demons would come down from the ceiling, they hated the smell.

And so in the blink of an eye, we made it past the fifth floor, unable to locate the circle leading to the next floor, we were forced to wander around a bit, but our goal wasn't to explore the place, we were here to find Zenith, everything was going well, in fact, we were doing great.

Finally, we reached the sixth floor.

"So, Gesse?" Paul asked

"Can we move on?" Gesse replied

We had barely used our provisions, so we were well prepared, we were on a roll.

"Okay, there's no turning back, let's keep going then" Paul replied.

"Yeah," we all replied in unison.

There was no need to go back, as we had provisions and were prepared, our search would continue.

The sixth floor was covered in devouring devils.

The armored warriors disappeared completely, leaving only the annoying crawlers on the ceiling, the fights went off without a hitch thanks to the incense, but there were still too many of them, so many in fact that one wondered.

Why are there so many of them here?

The reason became clear when we entered the deeper parts of the sixth floor.

There, in the room leading to the next magic circle, there was a nest.

A swarm of beasts crowded inside it, and countless eggs were found at the edges of the area.

They were dark, oblong shapes covered in liquid, like the cockroaches from my old world, it gave me the creeps just looking at them.

If you're wondering, these damn bugs as well as those in the other labyrinths feed only on mana.

Suddenly I felt someone pulling on the sleeve of my shirt, I turned to the side and it was Roxy.

"Help me destroy these eggs as we find them, they'll be a thorn in our side next time we come back," she said so I followed her and we started impaling the eggs.

Anyway, so the monsters produced eggs... I wonder if the armored warriors also had offspring, I imagine a miniature version of them as big as a felt doll, carrying a toy sword and waddling around.

The other three rooms attached to this one were also filled with the stuff, there was no sign of any of them being about to hatch.

Our cleanup ended without a hitch after that.

Finally, we reached the depths of the labyrinth, the same place spoken of in the last pages of our book, it was a square and spacious room built out of stone.

There were three magic circles near one of the walls facing away from the entrance to the room.

I knew these places lead to nothing, but I couldn't just discover the secret wall.

"It's the guardian," Elinalise said.

"It does give that feeling," Paul agreed.

"Gino, don't lose your cool," Roxy warned.

The three of them kept their weapons close as they talked, maybe it was common for the room preceding the guardian's lair to have an eerie vibe.

"Well, what are you going to do?" Gesse said holding the book in one hand as he investigated each circle, everyone else stood by the entrance waiting.

Me, for my part, I returned to the place where we had been, this is where the secret staircase was, but I couldn't tell yet.

But for some reason, Roxy slipped behind me.

"What's wrong?" She asked.

"Nothing, just that those circles give me a bad feeling, they don't seem like the way to the guardian," I said

Roxy blinked several times while looking at me bewildered.

"How are you so sure about that?" she asked.

"Well... let's say that this structure is very familiar to me..." I muttered and Roxy tried to look at my expression but blushed and looked away.

"W-what do you mean by that?..." she muttered.

"These ruins look very familiar to me with others I've already been to, the ones I used to get back here so quickly..." I muttered

"Ruins?..." she said bewildered.

"Yes, ruins, in those ruins, there were four rooms the first three were empty and the fourth was a staircase down that led to a teleportation circle," I said pointing around.

As expected Roxy immediately understood what I was saying and opened her eyes wide.

"You... used" she tried to speak but I motioned for her to be quiet and she listened to me.

I knelt down and put my head sideways on the ground, I took out my small sword and with the handle, I started hitting the ground.

(tack!, tack!, tack!, plack!)

I started hitting the ground until I heard a hollow part.

I quickly stood up with a smile while Roxy looked at me.

I approached her and stood behind her.

"Can you please throw a stone bullet in that direction?" I said as I took her arm and made her point in the desired direction

She flinched at my touch but nodded.

The stone bullet quickly embedded itself in the ground leaving a huge hole and the remains of the rubble began to fall.

"You were right..." she muttered.

"What the hell was that?!" Paul shouted as he came in alarmed along with the others.

"Paul, I discovered another teleportation circle," I said pointing at the hole in the wall.

"Huh?!, let me see..." Gesse said as he peeked in.

"Hahahaha!, that's right, it's amazing boss!" Gesse shouted excitedly as he began to remove the rubble.

It didn't take long for the cavity to widen, transforming it into a square-shaped opening, beneath it, a staircase cascaded down towards a pink magic circle.

"Okay!, everyone the boss has found a hidden staircase!" Gesse shouted and the others came closer to us.

"Gahahahaha!, I knew you would!" Talhand burst out laughing giving me a hard slap on the back making me stumble forward.

"Good job kid!" Paul said out loud following Talhand's example.

"This makes sense, I seem to remember that the ruins of the teleportation circle looked similar," Elinalise said giving me a hard slap on the back.

"Urgh....." I muttered in pain.

"Don't get too nervous boss" Gesse said

At the same time, I felt someone pull my arm.

I looked to my side and it was Roxy with her small hand raised in the air, our eyes met, and her hand gently stopped on my back, caressing me.

"You've done a good job..." she murmured totally blushing.

I took her hand and kissed it.

"No problem, let's go," I said

"Ah...ah...." She stuttered blushing and when I turned around, Paul had his eyes rolled back and Elinalise was holding back a smile.

"Alright, let's get going, stay alert, everyone," Gesse said

"Yeah!" they all said in unison.

Up until this point, all the teleportation circles had emitted a pale light, but this one was red, a color that indicated danger.

The words "red zone" came to my mind.

"It's here, beyond this point" Paul muttered.

"What is it, Paul? We still have supplies, but we can turn around for now if you want" Gesse said.

"No, let's move on, everyone check your equipment" Paul said.

"Understood" I said.

Hearing Paul's decision, we all dropped to the ground and began to examine our equipment.

I sat down on the ground and Roxy quickly sat next to me checking her equipment.

"Hey... I have some advanced magic scrolls, do you want some?" she asked.

"Uh... do you have any healing scrolls? I'd like some of those please" I said.

Roxy handed me three and I folded them and put them in my robe, if I didn't end up using them, I could return them later.

"I have no idea what kind of guardian we're up against, but we have plenty of firepower, I'll work as hard as I can to support you so you don't have to use any of those scrolls" Roxy said snuggling up next to me.

"Thank you so much, and the same goes for you" I replied.

"Roxy, take this" Elinalise said as she handed a mana crystal to Roxy.

"Use it in case you run out of mana, if you don't use it you give it back to me" she said.

"Oh.. sure, understood" she replied.

"Alright, is everyone ready?" Paul said.

Upon hearing his voice we all stood up, I looked at everyone and even Roxy had a tense face.

"Alright! Let's go then!" He said

We exchanged glances with each other and jumped into the circle all at the same time

======

Hello! It seems that we only needed 40 power stones to reach 1000 .-.

Let's get to 100+ today! Please help me with that!!