How many hours had passed since they began the march toward the Floor Boss? Who knew—time inside a Fissure was strange. Maybe it had been two hours, maybe three, or an entire day.

  The atmosphere shifted once they reached the heart of the domain. The ground had turned into a putrid swamp that swallowed their boots with a wet, slurping sound. Colossal trees rose like pilrs of a profane temple, their trunks covered in metallic vines that pulsed with a sickly glow, as if they were breathing. The humidity was suffocating, carrying the stench of rust and rotting sap.

  “Hey, brat.” Makina’s dry voice pulled her out of her thoughts.

  Nene straightened her back like a rookie caught scking.

  “Y-Yes, ma’am?”

  “Are you really so weak that even E-rank Ethereals could kill you? I thought that was a joke, but after what happened earlier…”

  Silence struck her first. Nene pressed her lips together, but in the end the truth slipped out in a whisper.

  “…Yes. It’s not a joke. I’m F- Rank.”

  Makina clicked her tongue.

  “Then the hell are you doin' here? You should find yourself a job that won’t get you killed on your first day.”

  Nene lowered her gaze to the muddy footprints her teammates left ahead of her—far ahead, as if they wanted distance from her.

  That was why the sudden conversation with Makina caught her off guard.

  She thought for a moment longer before giving an answer.

  “I need money. Being a Hunter pays just enough, even for someone like me. I combine it with other jobs to scrape by. As soon as I can, I pn to… retire. Today was supposed to be my final test. My heart can’t take all this anymore. So in the meantime, I just want to make enough money.”

  That was the truth. Or at least part of it. Nene didn’t really like being a Hunter, but tely a thought had been gnawing at her, body and soul.

  She wanted… she wanted to prove that she could be strong. Even just a little. But that was far too embarrassing to admit aloud.

  The sniper gnced at her from the corner of her eye. Her tone softened just enough to avoid sounding like a knife.

  “I see. Then stay close to me. I’m a Sniper, so I’m always in the rear. If you follow me, you won’t die. Then you take your cut and leave. With what we’ll make, plus the Floor Boss’s core, you should have enough to walk away from this life. Maybe find a decent job in some company or something like that. Start a restaurant, maybe.”

  Nene hesitated.

  “Oh, I don’t think so.”

  “Eh?”

  “I’ll only be taking one percent of the total,” she said matter-of-factly, raising her index finger while scratching the back of her neck with her other hand.

  The silence grew heavy. Makina stopped dead in her tracks, turning toward her with her pink eyes bzing.

  “Are you an idiot or what?”

  Nene gave a nervous smile, almost like an apology.

  “Heh…”

  “You think this is funny? You’re F- Rank! Anything here could kill you.”

  “I’m sorry…” She lowered her head even more. “I wasn’t joking. It’s just… it’s what my manager told me.”

  The sniper ground her teeth, incredulous.

  “If you need money, why accept a pathetic one percent? Don’t you know math?” She drove her point home by pressing a finger against Nene’s forehead, as if to shove the lesson inside by force.

  “It’s just…” Nene swallowed hard. At first, she hadn’t felt confident enough to talk to her. But now, maybe she could.

  Now that they were speaking more directly, without the usual sharp remarks, Nene realized that Miss Linx and Makina were a little alike. In a strange way, they really were.

  She felt that Makina was genuinely upset over the matter of her pay—so that had to mean she was a kind person, right?

  “I thought that if I joined, I might level up, maybe get a Role… then being a Hunter would make sense. If I can’t do anything against this Floor Boss, I’ll just stick to E-rank Fissures until I can retire.”

  Makina closed her eyes for a moment, taking a deep breath. Then she muttered venomously,

  “…Damn Jorgen. He took advantage of you being an idiot. I’m going to kill him.”

  “Hey, you two!” Maik’s voice cut in from up ahead. “Enough chit-chat. Pay attention—we’re here.”

  The group gathered around the Hunter, who was waiting beside a tree with bck bark and roots like cws. In front of him, some cotton-like shrubs concealed something. Maik raised his hand, invoking his Resonance.

  [Porized Field (Seven people (Five meters))].

  A faint glow ran over their bodies, wrapping them in a translucent veil.

  “There. With this, the bastard won’t see us.” Maik handed a pair of binocurs to Makina. “Take a look.”

  She took them, and the instant she looked, her expression twisted in disgust.

  “Tch… revolting.”

  The creature before them looked like an aberration torn straight from an entomological nightmare. The size of a tram car, it was a grotesque blend of fly and dragonfly. Its body was covered in dark purple chitin, and its translucent, vibrating wings shimmered with oily colors. Four red eyes scanned everything with unnatural calm, while oversized jaws chewed at something invisible.

  “Revolting? Mortefi looks like a giant multicolored butterfly—I thought you liked those?”

  “…Butterfly? That thing looks like a mutant fly. They disgust me, and you know it.”

  “She’s right, Cap. That thing’s a repulsive fly,” Marge confirmed. At her side, Nail and Luka nodded as well.

  “Wow! What the hell did you just say?”

  “Here, look yourself. I don’t want to keep staring at that abomination. Just tell me when to shoot.” Makina shoved the binocurs back at Jorgen with obvious revulsion.

  The warrior shrugged.

  “The fuck? That’s Lorelley. That fly is the Floor 6 Boss. It’s not supposed to be here…”

  “W-What does that mean?” Nene, standing behind Makina, stammered out.

  “Mmm… not sure.” Jorgen fell silent for a moment, then smiled as if recalling something delightful. “Still, this is good news!”

  “How is that good? T-That’s bad news! How can a Floor 6 Boss be down here!?”

  “Yeah, it shouldn’t be here. But it’s a golden opportunity, literally. If we kill it, we’ll make a fortune. Even you, Miss F- with your one percent cut, would walk away with a hefty share. So, let’s do it.”

  The group fell silent for a moment before the man standing beside Nail spoke up.

  “I don’t know, Jorgen. Don’t you think it’s weird for that thing to be two floors lower? Plus, Final Bosses are tough as hell—I don’t think we can take it.”

  “Don’t worry. It’s just an overgrown fly. I’ve already killed it in another Fissure. There’s nothing special about it. We just have to blind it. Come on, Maki, shoot. It’s a dumb beast, it won’t know where we are as long as the Porized Field holds.”

  "Okay-okay…" Makina sighed and rested her rifle against the tree trunk.

  The weapon was an extension of herself: warm, polished wood on the stock, matte bck steel on the body, a long barrel with a suppressor that radiated surgical coldness. She pressed her eye close to the precision scope.

  "Which one do you want, Nail?"

  "Well, whatever. If we don’t have another choice, then at least let it be fun. Top right one," the man ughed, as if the floor boss were nothing but a bad joke.

  Makina took aim. Her body began to glow with a magenta shimmer—the sign of her Resonance. Nene watched in silence, wondering what kind of hidden power dwelled inside her.

  "What’s wrong, Maki? Scared of a bug?" the blonde in the group yelled when she noticed her teammate taking too long to shoot.

  "S-Sir Jorgen, please… could I borrow the binocurs?"

  "Mm. Here. Don’t hurt yourself," he replied, condescending as always.

  Nene took the binocurs. She was curious to see what Lorelley looked like.

  She could never hope to see a Final Boss, so even though she was afraid, she wanted to look. It might make a good story to tell Linx when she came back.

  But she quickly regretted it.

  What she saw made her blood run cold. Lorelley’s eyes… they moved. One left, one right, both shifting in their direction.

  “D-Damn, that scared me…” she whispered to herself, stepping back on instinct. She hated this feeling of being watched…

  Watched?

  “…W-Why do I feel like I’m being watched?”

  In a rush, Nene raised the binocurs back to her eyes—and saw it.

  Those eyes were moving. But not randomly. When she stepped a bit to the right for a better angle, the upper right eye followed her. It really did.

  From the corner of her vision, she noticed Marge move closer to Marina, just to pester her, and when she did, the lower eye of that thing also shifted. Only a little, very subtly—but it did. She knew it by the way the light refracted across its compound surface. Thanks to her Resonance, she had grown extremely sensitive to changes in color.

  “I-Is it looking at us?” Nene muttered under her breath, but quickly dismissed the idea.

  It couldn’t be. The Porized Field should’ve kept them hidden. And yet… she could feel its gaze stabbing into her skin like needles.

  A bead of cold sweat slid down her neck. Doubt spread like venom.

  “Quiet, Marge, and watch.” Makina’s voice cut through the tension.

  [Deployment: Sniper Technique II—

  But Nene couldn’t look away. Lorelley was still. Too still. Not hunting, not patrolling, not roaring. Just… watching.

  It was too easy. Even she could hit something that big and unmoving.

  And that was what unsettled her. It felt just like that time one of those insectoid Ethereal Beasts had lured her in, pretending to flee, only to drag her into its nest and nearly devour her alive in an ambush. That hollow feeling in her gut came rushing back.

  Could Lorelley really not see them?

  Then a faint glow flickered in its eyes. For the briefest moment, she saw a pale pink-and-blue aura ripple across its body. Subtle, but undeniable. It was preparing a Technique.

  Precision Shot; Connect: [Bang-Bang! (9x39mm Cartridge)]] (15 P.R)

  With that, she squeezed the trigger.

  That thing… it was watching them. Even if it should’ve been impossible. So many times, Nene had seen insects dodge the snares she set to catch them for cores. She’d always thought it was just instinct, or her own fault for tying the traps wrong. But… what if it wasn’t luck?

  Adaptation.

  That word struck deep in her mind. Time slowed—Makina’s suppressed gunshot crawled through the air like mosses.

  She once asked Bender how such things were possible. The burly man had expined that when animals were pushed to their limits by the world, they had two choices: adapt and evolve, or die.

  That was why the insectoids, hunted again and again, might have adapted their eyes to see what shouldn’t be seen.

  What if the weakest creatures, those so frail that anything could crush them, were forced to survive in ways no one expected after being hunted over and over?

  If you killed an Ethereal insect with a trap, somehow, the swarm would never fall for the same trick twice. She knew from experience.

  So… what about a Floor Boss insect like Lorelley? One who’d been defeated countless times, as Jorgen cimed?

  Wouldn’t it develop new mechanisms to sharpen its natural traits? Just like those Ethereals avoiding her snares.

  Big eyes, so big they swallowed most of its skull—that allowed it to see far better. Then… just how far could a creature with two pairs of independently moving eyes see?

  Couldn’t it catch the slightest reflections—the faintest light glinting off the taut threads of her traps?

  Lorelley… how far could it really see? Wasn’t it possible that it could even perceive light itself in ways no human could? Perhaps even bend it, like those porized visors Linx always told her to buy someday. If so, could it have nullified Maik’s ability from the very start?

  It was a crazy theory. It had to be impossible!

  And yet, in a blink, Lorelley’s twisted body fred with a cold blue glow and—

  The soft crack of Makina’s shot finally reached her ears, snapping her from her thoughts.

  “Huh? It’s gone?”

  The disbelief in Makina’s voice confirmed the fear eating away at the youngest Hunter.

  “MOVE!” Nene screamed, throwing herself against Makina just as a projectile of sizzling acid exploded where she’d been perched.

  “What the hell…?”

  Makina tried to shove her off, but Marge’s roar cut her short.

  “Above us!”

  So that was why Lorelley had been so still. It was waiting to confirm who to eliminate first.

  It had been a trap all along. Just to confuse them, just to target the greatest threat.

  The floor boss loomed overhead, wings fring like holographic bdes. Acid dripped from its jaws, hissing as it rained down in a poisonous shower.

  Makina pressed the medal on her chest; her clothes shattered into light, repced by gray assault armor. Jorgen was already brandishing his greatsword, eyes burning with rage.

  “It doesn’t matter! We’ll finish this thing off!”

  But before they could advance, all four of Lorelley’s eyes lit up at once. A blue beam burst forth, washing over the entire group.

  For an instant, everything froze. No pain, no explosion, no screams. Just that cold light, wrapping around them as if measuring every inch of their bodies. Then, with a single beat of its wings, the insect lifted into the air, circling the zone with a bone-rattling hum.

  “W-What did it just do…?” one of the squires asked, his voice trembling.

  “I don’t know,” Jorgen muttered, scowling. “But it’s just an E-rank floor boss. I’ve killed it before. Follow my orders, and we’ll bring it down!”