Walking forward in the open space of clouds, I could see the space distorting in the distance.
"Where are my minions?" I asked no one in particular as only our part had entered.
"They are considered to be a part of Hell, and so they are sealed, they cannot accompany you here, we will have to rely on just this team," said Vendir.
"Well, it doesn't matter, we can do well with just us," I said as moved forward.
"I hope that this cloud made floor won't drop," said Haruka "It looks risky"
"Just be careful, and watch where you move. This is a heavenly dungeon, I guess encountering a Divine here would not be impossible, everyone should remain careful," I said.
Everyone looked a bit tensed at me mentioning a Divine showing up here. After all, this is their domain.
We headed toward the space distortions in space. Nemu seemed to be a good mean to close the distance as we rode on top of him.
However, no matter how far we move, the distortions only seem to get further away.
"Illusion?" I asked
"I believe so, but I can't detect any magic signals." Said Vendir.
"Hold up, do you guys hear that?" said Shara who was listening carefully.
"Hmm, there is a sound in the background… a singing? Something is singing?" I said
"Oh, heavenly sirens." Said Vendir as he plugged his ears with something
"Much better," he said
"What are those?" I asked
Then he signaled me with his hands that he can't hear me but still answered
"Those are creatures that resemble the mermaids of the sea, they lure fishermen into listening to their songs then will drown them for a taste of their flesh, these ones are an upgrade, their voice is so strong it can cause hallucinations." He said "Thankfully we were not exposed long enough for it to take effect plug your ears and try to locate the source," he said
"Everyone plug your ears," I said
Using pieces of cloth or other items we managed to shut down the sound. Nemu's ears, however, were a problem
"Don't worry about me," he said as scales grew to cover a side of his head fully blocking sound from entering whatever I presume to be Nemu's ears.
The moment my ears were plugged the scenery changed from that of a place filled with clouds to a mountainous area where a cliff just a few meters before us was looking upon a ginormous bottomless abyss. There was a huge chasm before us, and we were flying atop it. If we were walking I presume that we would have fallen without even noticing it.
The illusions that the sound of the Sirens made managed to create an entire fake domain that we were unable to see the truth behind it.
Vendir then pointed forward, it seems that he located the sound's origin.
It capped on Nemu's back and without even needing to say anything we moved forward.
There was a woman laying on the ground, with ears of great length, while she was naked, her lower body was that of a snake.
'A medusa?' I thought to myself then inspected her
Heavenly Siren.
Level 1200
A Divine creation made to lure the wanderers into listening to her voice while she leads them to their end. Rare are those that figure out her schemes, and rarer are those that survive to tell the tale.
Oh, a level 1200 just off the bat. Before we even went deeper a high leveled creature shows up, and this is not even a mini-boss.
Once the serpent woman noticed us. She looked at us with interest at first. Then immediately dug herself into the ground.
Probably understanding that her voice was not reaching us and she was unable to defeat us alone…
I guess she either went away and hid, or went to call for reinforcements.
The distortions in space that we saw before were now visible, they were huge floating dark spheres that hovered around an enormous mountain.
Nemu didn't need me to say anything as he adjusted his course to go directly towards the mountain.
Once we reached the mountain I saw several thousand of people that would walk mindlessly around the mountain.
'what are they doing?' and are these humans?
Inspecting one of them
Linda Suver
Worshipper of the Snake god
Level 20
Rewarded for his worship this one was granted the honor to serve his deity in the afterlife.
So a dead person? That woman looked however apathetic, void and lifeless as if she had given up a long time ago. She looks like the people I saw in hell, the ones that were doomed to walk the never-ending path…
And her level is low, but what the hell? They worshiped a deity their entire lives than once they die they would continue to do so for all eternity? Punishment? Reward? Absurdities. They are tricked to follow the Divine in their lives, and instead of being freed from this, they are forced to undergo the same thing after they passed away?
Though the conditions are not the same as in Hell, they are still in a shitty situation.
Tapping on Nemu's back I asked him to get down.
Once down I went forward and tapped on the woman's back.
Once she turned her face froze for a moment, but then she ignored me and kept walking.
"Hey, you!" I said as I remove the cloth from my ears. Thankfully there was no singing in the background.
"Let me be! I must continue my hundredth circle around the mountain lest the snake God is angered"
"Why are you doing this?" I said as I walked next to her.
"This is… this is our reward for worshipping this being, being granted freedom…" she said a bit fanatically
"Do you believe this to be free?" I said
"Don't say blasphemous words lest you will be sent to the scorching gorge?" she said as she walked
"What is this gorge you speak of?"
"You don't know? She said you must be new here. That is the place that our Lord resides in if one of his followers misbehaves they get sent there… every time they do, they come back… less than who they were, look there" she said as I looked where she pointed
"Going too many times to the gorge will change you until you become like those"
Where I looked there were people, wearing nothing but rags. They were harmless, and unmoving and dull, their eyes were white as milk while their bodies were scrawny. They were… hollow.
"I already went there twice, I don't want to go there another time, please let me continue my pilgrimage," she said and ignored me as she walked forward.
Surprisingly, the appearance of Nemu didn't phase anyone, no, they were rather too scared to even bother with whatever came here, they only wanted to finish their tasks. And do it once again.
I went back to my party and asked them to remove the plugs, once I told them the happenings, most of them looked disgusted.
"This is the lowest floor, rules by Oroboros, lord of snakes," said Shara.
"Ah I forgot you are an angel, you should know about these places," I said
"I was an Archangel." She said correcting me "Anyway, this is the domain of the snake lord, he is indeed powerful. And these people are supposed to be his servants both in the lower realms and here. This is mostly the case for every divine ruler of the seven floors of heaven. Each floor is ruled by a Divine, they act like dungeon guardians, only slaying them or convincing them to let you access higher floors can get you from one circle to another." She said
"This scene right here, you will probably see something like it every other floor, different but the same. The Lords elate those that have the strongest beliefs in them to become their servants in their afterlife. This is considered better than the alternative where they rot in hell."
"Hang on," said Misaka "You mean that only the ones with the strongest beliefe are here? What about those that have a shaken will? Or not fully devoted?" she said.
Shara sighed for a moment and spoke after a minute of silence.
"They are all in Hell. They consider them unworthy, so they are thrown into the second circle of hell out of consideration."
"The second circle?" I said "The Unending path? The circle ruled By the Demonic Duke God Abigor?" I said
"Indeed, the circle of Blasphemy, where everyone is thrown there due to their shaken creed," she said
Sigh…
With this system, you are screwed, good or evil no matter what you do you will get screwed over. Happiness? Everlasting rest? Bullcrap, you only get sent to work harder if you are lucky and get sent to hell if you don't have a firm belief. What a load of horseshit.
This only served to get me angrier at the rules made by the Divine. With that much power on their hands, they force others to bow down to them without fear of anyone pointing their finger at their ludicrous actions.
A moment later the snake that we saw before emerged nearby and release a howl of an extremely high pitch.
This served to alert many of the people walking around the mountain. They all began to run away like mad.
The floating dark orbs then congregated near each other and descended.
From them ten armored knights showed up, they were all wearing pitch black armor with a silver lining.
"Wow! What a cool looking armor set!" said Haru.
Once I looked at him I remembered. Haru and Shara don't have a proper armor set. The girls have the dragon set while I have the Herald set. Haru still has the Yeti leather armor while Shara is wearing simple grabs.
Vendir doesn't need an armor set due to him being a mage and I will have a hard time convincing him of wearing one.
"Hmm, actually their armor looks rather nice. Time to get an upgrade for your armor Haru, show me your best" I said as three of the armored knights walked forward, brandishing their swords.
Serpent Knight
Level 1800
A solemn devotee that gave his essence and flesh to the Snake Lord, protecting and applicating order.
Be wary of servants that fear not death itself to safeguard the domain of their lord.
This is just the first level and High-grade Knights are already showing up.
The three knights stood in challenge, while the other seven remained standing.
Who wants to go first?
"Let me have a try," said Haru
"They are level 1800, almost doubling your level, are you sure you want to fight against one of them? I said
"Level is not everything, I think I can manage. Though I doubt I have the same fighting experience, I still learned many things from the Archdevil Beelzebub.
Haru walked forward, and one f the three knights moved.
Haru brandished his Hammer and shield while the knight poised himself, he had a dark pike shield and a pitch black long broadsword.
It looked like a two-handed sword but the knight was effortlessly moving it forward. Without words, the knight moved.
Haru held up his shield forward blocking the attack. With the passive of the increased poise, the sword bounced a bit off. However, the knight soon followed up with a kick to the shield that destabilized Haru. Then soon followed up with a sword swing that got his shield removed from his guarding position.
Haru seemed to already be in a bad spot and the fight just started. Should I probably stop them?
However, Haru grinned a bit as he saw an incoming sword pierce to his chest and instantly bashed away with his shield.
The momentum carried out and the Knight was destabilized.
Without pause, Haru brought down his hammer, the knight hastily pulled his shield up but his hand was crushed under the weight.
Losing mobility in his left hand the knight tried to retaliate with stabbing Haru's left leg. Yet Haru didn't bother defending as he rolled sideways dodging the strick and appearing instantly behind the destabilized knight.
With a kick to the back knee the Knight bent down, and Haru brought the hammer with its full strength down on his head.
This was Haru's victory as the Knight remained limply on the ground without moving a single inch.
The two other knights nodded toward Haru and nodded.
"Huh? I got a notification saying if I should Join the serpent Knights?" said Haru
"Nah sorry I am not interested," said Haru as he grabbed his loot. It seems that the knight dropped a pair of gauntlets before his corpse disappeared.
"Loot!" he said as he grabbed the gauntlets. Who's next?" said Haru with all excitement"
"When did you become so proficient in fighting?" I said to Haru raising my brow as I was honestly surprised.
"Well you see, me and Beelzebub were talking one day, and interestingly he knew a lot about games from our world, especially that dark themed game where you die, and die and die again and again…" Haru then shuddered remembering some awful past…
"Its main character reminds me a lot of you, anyway, using backstabs and critical hits counting shields has become easy for me.on a one vs one fight if the opponent is not monstrously strong I believe using that game's tactics will work wonders"
Sigh…
"Anyway, I think the other knights will be warier of your tactics you should be wary." Once Haru moved forward, this time two knights moved.
"Oh… I guess they don't want to play fair" said Haru a bit tensed.
Shara then moved forward.
"Let's give them what they are looking for then," she said as she moved next to Haru.
The knight brandished their swords and moved as one, each going to fight one of their opponents.
And this game of duels continued…