At the foot of the stone steps lay the Grand Hall.
It was a gargantuan space, just as it had been during my previous visit, but it had clearly entered a state of high alert. The Magic Circle in the center glowed with a brilliant, blood-red light. Every time the patterns of the circle pulsed, a low, drawn-out, and grating hum vibrated through the air, making the very atmosphere tremble.
"Not exactly a warm welcome..."
The crimson glow intensified, and the flickering grew more frantic.
A moment later, monsters began phasing through the floors and walls. Unlike before, they came in a wide variety of shapes: four-legged beast-types, distorted humanoids, and even winged bird-types.
All of them bared their fangs, dripping saliva as they lunged toward me with guttural roars.
In game terms, these are all about as strong as the early mid-game enemies—around level thirty. Does the Labyrinth really think this is enough to stop me? Or is this simply all it can manage to summon for now?
I kept my eyes on the encroaching horde, my mind racing through the possibilities.
In the game, the first Labyrinth Conquest Battle was essentially a tutorial. Because it was the first mission, the preparation period was shorter than others, the path inside was almost entirely linear, and the combat was broken up by tutorials on basic controls and party coordination.
The Alertness Level only truly began to bare its fangs from the second conquest onward. In other words, there was no precedent for the Labyrinth’s defenses being cranked to the maximum from the very beginning. Even for me, this was uncharted territory.
It reminds me of the first time I played CHOICE//MAZE.
Unknown patterns. Unexpected reactions.
I remembered the feeling of gripping the controller without the help of a walkthrough or any knowledge of the optimal builds. In my previous life, I wasn't the type to challenge a boss at the developer's recommended level. I was the type who would grind relentlessly until I could steamroll every enemy and gimmick in one go before finally proceeding with the story.
To put it simply, I hated losing.
Because of that habit, my Alertness Level hit the cap almost immediately during my second playthrough... I could only laugh at how broken the scaling felt back then.
While reflecting on those memories, I moved to intercept the monsters.
I dodged a beast-type monster’s flaming bite with a last-second leap. Then, using a fist reinforced by a Strength Boost I had cast the moment I landed, I drove a punch into its flank.
The creature coughed up a spray of reddish-black ichor and was sent tumbling back, dragging the rest of the pack down with it.
Without missing a beat, I pivoted to water magic. I thrust my right hand toward the crowd, letting mana condense before my palm before releasing it all at once. A massive deluge, heavy as a literal waterfall, slammed into the path ahead.
The roar of the current drowned out the monsters' cries as it gouged the floor, swallowing the remaining pack and erasing them from existence.
A bird-type monster circled overhead, shrieking as it unleashed a Wind Blade—
"Too slow."
I kicked off the ground and vaulted into the air. Closing the distance in an instant, I twisted my body mid-flight and drove a lightning-clad elbow into the creature. The bolt scorched its feathers instantly, and the blackened corpse plummeted to the ground.
"...Is that it?"
I landed and began walking boldly toward the center of the hall.
The way forward lay through one of the countless stone doors arranged in a semi-circle—specifically, the Central Door. A fresh swarm of monsters gathered to block my path, but I didn't slow down.
"Move."
Extending my left hand, I invoked my magic once more.
Just like last time, I used an area-of-effect attack magic of wind to scatter the monsters, but then I layered a fire spell over it. A searing vortex of flame swept across the room, incinerating the monsters in mid-air and turning their screams into ash.
Silence followed. No more grating roars, no more flapping wings, no more gnashing fangs.
"...They've stopped."
I scanned the room. Despite my flashy display and the total annihilation of the garrison, the next wave didn't appear immediately. However, the Magic Circle in the center was still pulsing with a deep crimson light, meaning the alert hadn't been lifted.
Just as the thought crossed my mind, the air grew heavy again.
A vibration like high-pitched tinnitus filled the room as red light bled across the floor. The center of the Magic Circle warped and distorted, and the fabric of space tore open directly in front of the Central Door. Red-black flames erupted, pale frost swirled, and golden lightning crackled as a massive, four-legged form slunk out from the rift.
"I see. If quantity won't work, you'll try to win with quality."
The creature that had torn its way into reality was on an entirely different level than the beast-types from before. Its physique was twice the size of the others, and it possessed three heads, each crowned with a mane of fire, frost, or lightning. Its eyes glowed like molten iron as it glared at me.
It was the quintessential hellhound.
All three heads turned to fixate on me, letting out a synchronized, earth-shaking growl.
"A Hell Cerberus, huh..."
I let out a soft sigh.
The monster roaring in front of me was a mid-boss that usually appeared at the very end of the game's middle act. It was a notorious "wall" meant to challenge players who had survived several conquests and were starting to get comfortable with the game's mechanics.
It was absolutely not something that belonged at the Labyrinth Entrance.
"You really don't want me here, do you?"
The Hell Cerberus answered my dry smile with a menacing snarl.
Radiating a pressure befitting its name, the three heads opened their maws in sequence. One spat a stream of pure fire, another released a white fog of freezing cold, and the third unleashed a black smoke laced with lightning.
The three breaths converged on me simultaneously.
The flames incinerated the path ahead, the frost froze the floor as it spread, and the lightning tore through the air with a deafening crack.
But—
"A shame. You can't reach me."
The moment I invoked my light magic, a translucent Light Wall deployed in front of me.
It was a glowing shield etched with geometric patterns. In the game, this was a defensive spell that merely halved damage from magical and elemental attacks. In reality, the performance was on a different scale.
In this world, the power of a spell isn't a fixed stat. The output and durability depend entirely on the caster. If an average mage used it, the wall would shatter under a heavy blow or be pierced by a high-tier monster.
But in my case?
Bolstered by my abnormal mana capacity and precise control, the Light Wall was no longer a mere reduction spell. It was, for all intents and purposes, the ultimate shield.
The three elemental breaths slammed into the Light Wall with a roar.
The shield didn't so much as wobble. It didn't even creak. The moment the attacks touched the light, they were repelled, dispersed, and erased—as if the wall were denying their very existence.
The flames guttered out, the frost vanished, and the lightning scattered into nothing.
When the air cleared, I stood there completely unharmed. The Hell Cerberus stared at me, its three sets of eyes wide with what looked like shock. The heads let out low, uncertain whimpers. It was clearly shaken.
"What's the matter, boy?" I asked, taking a step forward. "Is that all you've got?"
The Hell Cerberus lunged, its three heads snapping at me from three different angles.
It was too slow.
I gave my right hand a sharp flick.
The air shivered as I compressed the wind in front of my palm into crescent blades. I sent them flying in a single straight line toward the monster's throats. The Wind Blades tore through the atmosphere and cleanly severed the beast's three heads in one effortless motion.
The massive, headless body slumped to the ground. The residual force of the wind blades continued past the corpse, gouging deep, jagged scars into the stone frame of the Central Door as if it had been clawed by a titan.
"...That was underwhelming."
I watched as the remains of the Hell Cerberus dissolved into black particles. I remembered struggling against this thing dozens of times through a screen, but facing it in person, the fight had ended almost instantly.
Under normal circumstances, a party would need to coordinate, exploit its elemental weaknesses, and carefully cycle their roles to chip away its health. It was a boss that could wipe a party if they made a single mistake.
And I had just crushed it solo, head-on, without taking a single hit.
I’m a total cheat. Even I have to admit it.
"I can't really blame the Labyrinth for being desperate to keep me out," I muttered with a wry smile.
But I wasn't going to stop. My job was to be the decoy—to cause as much chaos as possible and draw the Labyrinth’s eyes toward me so that the other students had a chance to survive.
I stepped over the scorched floor and entered the darkness beyond the Central Door. Behind me, the Magic Circle began to pulse with that same ominous, rhythmic beat.
The welcome, it seemed, was only just beginning.