In the depths of the dungeon, on floor 69, the Titans, including Rodan, Baragon, Nagoraiar, King Kong and Godzilla, along with Athena, Twilight, Beowulf, Duke and Alice are fighting a forty meters tall, six headed Hydra.
The entire floor is covered in water, about a meter deep.
"Wait until he fires his breath attack! His stomach will be vulnerable when he vents the heat through those glowing creases." Alice says as she draws the attention of two heads on the right by launching dozens of condensed blood projectiles at them, causing wounds that instantly regenerate.
Kong and Godzilla are both in their Titan forms, standing at 10 meters tall. Godzilla and Nagoraiar keep firing short blasts of atomic breath to preserve their energy. Meanwhile Kong uses his agility to evade the attacks of the Hydra while drawing most of its attention.
Rodan fires magma balls at it while he flies overhead, while Baragon rolls up into a ball and tanks the Hydra's attacks while tackling it at every chance he gets.
Meanwhile, the werewolves fight off the water drakes the Hydra keeps summoning.
After a while the creases along the Hydra's body start to glow purple, indicating it's about to fire a breath attack.
The light starts at its stomach and goes up its heads slowly as the intensity increases.
The Hydra rears it's heads back and launches them all forward, firing six powerful, purple beams of fire.
Kong, Godzilla, Baragon and Nagoraiar take the fire blasts head on while Rodan evades it skillfully in mid-air. Meanwhile, Alice forms a powerful bloodshield for the others.
When the fire blasts end, the creases along the Hydra's body remain glowing as smoke and vapor seeps out as a sort of cooling mechanism.
"Now! Target the body!" Alice yells as she holds her hands at her side while a large amount of blood-red energy gathers between her palms.
Godzilla and Nagoraiar gather a large amount of nuclear energy in their bodies to fire their atomic breath attacks.
Rodan's body starts glowing red as he gathers geo-thermal energy to fire a condensed beam of lava.
As everyone with a ranged attack has prepared and gathered their energy, they all fire at the same time. The combined force of all their attacks causes an enormous explosion.
Tremors of the explosion are felt throughout the dungeon and even in Orario.
As the dust settles, the Hydra has been blown to pieces. Two of its heads still remain writhing on the ground, refusing to die. The Hydra's feet and lower body are still mostly intact, but a very large crystal core is exposed, sticking out of its flesh.
Alice holds her hands forward as two blood spears manifest in front of her and immediately launch at the crystal.
The spears penetrate the crystal seemingly without much resistance as they pass right through it, imbedding themselves in the dungeon wall behind the Hydra.
Cracks start to form all over the crystal untill it snaps into dozens of pieces. The Hydra's corpse immediately disappears into black smoke, leaving behind one large purple crystal the size of a football, the kind of crystal that usually drops from a monster, and one smaller golden crystal the size of a fist.
"Twilight, can you identify this golden crystal?" Alice says as she hands Twilight the item.
"Sure." She answers as she takes it and looks at it intently for a second. "A Monster Summoning Crystal (Gold) 0/10. Hold the Crystal in one hand and crush a monster drop crystal with the other hand and you'll be able to summon the monster that dropped the crystal. Maximum capacity is ten monsters."
"Should we use it on the Hydra's crystal?" Beowulf asks.
"No, we should take it to Fenris and let him study it. He might be able to copy its effects and craft items capable of containing and summoning monsters." Alice says as she puts the crystal in Beowulf's huge backpack.
"Alright, now that we've defeated the boss, let's return to the surface." Alice says as she takes out a phone made of Cosmic Crystal and calls Fenris.
----
Earlier on the surface in the Tower of Babel.
"Fenrir versus the other five Gods. A fight to the death, winner takes all." Astraea reads out loud, causing a few gasps among the Gods in the room and everyone starts discussing the insanity of the situation and who they think will win.
Freya and Loki both look nervously around the room before they start whispering to each other. After a few seconds of back and forth, they appear to come to a decision.
"Silence!" Freya says loudly, silencing the room. "May we select someone to fight in our stead?"
"What? You already outnumber him five to one and now you want more advantage?!" Hephaestus yells furiously. "You really are a shameless slu.."
"I don't mind." I interrupt Hephaestus. "But only two among you may select a champion to fight on your behalf. And if they lose, so do you. You may not die, but you will return to heaven... permanently! Deal?"
"Yes! Yes, it's a deal." Freya says, both relieved she won't have to fight and excited she can increase her chance for success by choosing the right champions.
"Then the fight will take place one week from now. Until then, prepare. Freya, Loki, I'll need the names of your champions no later than two days before the fight." Astraea says before we continue the regular Denatus.
----
As I walk down the Tower of Babel, my Cosmic Crystal phone goes off. "Hi honey, how's the dungeon?"
"It's good. We just defeated the Monster Rex, which turned our to be a Hydra, on the 69th floor and we're coming back up to the surface." Alice says cheerfully. "How did the Denatus go?"
"It went well, we discussed the declining death rates in the dungeon and the economical consequences. I challenged five Gods to a fight to the death, oh, and we also discussed the new titles for the adventurers that leveled up. You'll be pleased to know I managed to let you keep your title 'Blood Queen'." I say, trying to brush over the part about the challenge.
"What was that?" Alice asks.
'Damn.'
"Uhm... you're still the 'Blood Queen'?"
"No no, before that."
"The declining death rates?"
"After that."
"... I challenged five Gods to a fight to the death?"
"Whhhyyy? Why would you do that?"
"Well, three of them are in Evilus and the other two seem fully intent on pissing me off at every chance they get. Although I did acquiesce to their request to have two other gods fight in their stead." I say as I walk into the control room on the 23rd floor. "So I'd say, all in all I did it because... they suck."
*sigh* "When is this fight?" Alice asks after letting out an exasperated sigh.
"Seven days from now. And in five days I'll hear who'll be fighting for Loki and Freya." I explain.
----
A day after the Denatus.
30 kilometers west of Orario, on the outskirts of the nation of Rakia, Loki is escorted by a short, stout looking man with a beard, carrying a large axe, a blonde Pallum, carrying a spear and a pretty, green haired Elf, carrying a silver staff.
They are approaching a tent, surrounded by dozens of soldiers.
"Gareth, Riveria, wait outside. Finn, you come with me." Loki says as she enters the tent under the scrutinizing gaze of the soldiers.
"What do you want Loki? I got a lot of shit to do, so let's skip the niceties and get to business." A tall, blonde god, wearing red armor says as he's sitting on a throne.
"I want you to fight on my behalf in a wargame against Fenrir." Loki says, getting to the point as requested.
"You want me to fight? Not my Familia? I thought wargames were fought between Familia members." The god asks confused.
"Yes, normally it is. This one is a little different. It's a God versus God, fight to the death. Five Gods against Fenrir. The others are Thanatos, God of Death, Apate, Goddess of Deception, Rudra, God of the Storms, Freya and then myself. But Freya and I are allowed to choose a champion to fight on our behalf. I'd like you to be my champion." Loki explains.
"What will I get in return?" The god asks.
"Well, there's five of you against Fenrir so realistically, the risk shouldn't be that high. Nevertheless, should you succeed in killing Fenrir, you will be allowed to have up to fifty of your Familia members inside the dungeon at any given time and we will no longer bar your nation from trade with Orario." Loki says before approaching the god. "Do we have an accord?" She holds out her hand.
"Hahaha! Yes! I, Ares, God of War, will fight and kill Fenrir." Ares proclaims jovially.
Loki and Finn leave the tent and once Loki and her escorts are on the road, Finn speaks up. "I have a bad feeling about all of this. My thumb has been twitching like crazy since you returned from that Denatus."
"I don't like it either. Why do you think Freya and I negotiated to have someone fight on our behalf." Loki says.
In a tree, close to Ares' tent, a black raven was watching and listening in. "Gotta report this to the Master." Huginn says before disappearing into the shadows.
----
In a dimly lit, luxurious bedroom, Freya is lying naked on top of an extremely tall and muscular god with long, red hair and a red, fiery tribal tattoo across his torso.
"That was fantastic." The god says with a smile on his face.
"Yes. Yes, it was." Freya says, eyes closed as she's resting her head on the God's chest.
"Is this how you usually seal your deals?" The god asks, jokingly.
"Only with strong, brave Gods, willing to risk their life for me." Freya answers.
*pfft* "I've slain unkillable beasts before. I'll just be adding one more to the list."
"Hercules, you need to be careful. This guy isn't normal. He's unpredictable, often seemingly irrational and extremely confident. He's not just a God of Beasts, he carries himself like a predator. Do not underestimate him." Freya says in a serious tone, looking Hercules in the eye.
"Alright. But I doubt he's strong enough to take me on if I were alone, let alone accompanied by four other gods. I mean, what's he gonna do, summon a stampede of elephants and rhinos? Hahaha!
Now, how about we go another round?" Hercules asks before grabbing Freya and getting on top of her.
Outside the window, a black raven was watching and listening. "Gotta report this to the Master." Muninn says before disappearing into the shadows.