The army of Metaslas surged from the corridor behind us.
I sprang into action immediately.
"Hinata-san! Re-cast your support magic!"
"R-right!"
The effect of Holy Bless was about to expire. I needed her to refresh my buffs.
Enough time had passed since the fight with Metakin that High Regeneration had brought my HP back to nearly full. I was ready to go on the offensive.
I circled around behind Ikegami-san and the others, positioning myself to intercept the Metasla horde.
"Mayurin-san! Let my attacks pass through the barrier! Can you do it!?" I shouted.
To clarify: we were currently protected inside a hemispherical dome created by Mayurin-san's Barrier Magic. Ordinarily, a barrier that keeps enemies out also keeps attacks in.
However, Mayurin-san’s magic—famed as a cheat skill—possessed a very specific property.
It was called "Selective Permeability."
Simply put, anything Mayurin-san willed to pass through could move through the barrier freely while the defense remained intact.
This allowed for a combat style where she could trap an enemy inside a barrier and then have her allies pelt them with attacks from the safety of the outside. Provided the level difference wasn't so great that she struggled to maintain the construct, it was an incredibly potent ability.
Needless to say, it was a massive cheat.
"—!! You got it! I’m ready when you are!!" Mayurin-san confirmed.
I activated my skills in rapid succession—Fighting Spirit, Sword Aura, Berserk, Mighty Blade, Asceticism, and Blue Sky Beyond the Clouds.
"Holy Bless!"
"HRAAAH!!"
The moment Hinata-san’s Holy Bless took effect, I unleashed a flurry of slashes.
—Mighty Blade Great Flying Blade: Explosive Blade.
—Three-fold.
Three massive shockwaves, each consuming 60 HP, flew forward and passed through the barrier.
The Explosive Blades streaked down the corridor and slammed into the center of the Metasla army.
A pale blue flash swelled into a roar.
Aura-fueled flames erupted.
A deafening boom echoed through the room, and the air displaced by the blast surged back like a shockwave, slamming into Mayurin-san’s barrier.
The ground groaned and shook. As the flames of the aura faded, I watched for the results. Since the third Explosive Blade had benefited from the first stage of Blood Vengeance, its power was significantly higher than the first two. I hoped I’d managed to thin their ranks, but—
"—You’re kidding."
"Hey, give me a break..."
"Is this a joke?"
"Even that didn't stop them? Seriously?"
Mayurin-san, Ikegami-san, Tamaki-san, and Ashitaba-san all muttered, their faces twitching with unease. My own expression was likely no better.
My attack had certainly obliterated dozens of them. I’d likely taken out somewhere between twenty and thirty Metaslas.
However, the gaps left by the evaporated slimes were immediately filled by the sheer weight of the numbers behind them. It didn't feel like I had made a dent. It was truly a drop in the ocean.
I’d expected this, of course. I had attacked anyway in the hope that the display of power might scare them off. Since I had deactivated Asceticism immediately after the strike, the Mark of Death shouldn't have been drawing them in.
Yet, the Metaslas showed none of the cowardice I had seen from their kind earlier; they simply kept pushing forward with single-minded focus.
Was Oishi controlling them?
The reason didn't really matter. What mattered was our survival.
"Mayurin-san, can the barrier hold against that many?"
"...I'll give you one minute."
One minute, huh...
I could keep thin the horde with Explosive Blade while Hinata-san healed me. Depending on her MP, it wasn't an impossible strategy.
The real problem was that Oishi wouldn't just stand there and watch us pick off his army.
But doing nothing was just waiting to die. We had to move.
I steeled my resolve and tightened my grip on my sword—but then something changed.
"Wait, the Metaslas!?"
"Tch, so that's the plan!"
The Metaslas didn't pounce on us.
As they poured into the boss room, they split to the left and right, flowing around us like a river around a stone. Their destination was the center of the room.
"We shall become one. We shall be strong."
Oishi spoke.
He began absorbing the Metaslas as they dove into him with the force of cannonballs. They vanished into his body as if his skin were the surface of a pond, sinking in without resistance.
Oishi began to bloat. His already massive frame grew even more gargantuan.
Seeing this, Ikegami-san whispered, "Wait... if they're all gathering in one spot, doesn't that actually make them easier to hit?"
He wasn't the only one who thought so. Honestly, being swarmed by hundreds of individual targets was the worst-case scenario. That was why everyone, myself included, hesitated for a moment as we watched the slimes merge.
However—
"—!?"
In that heartbeat, a chill raced down my spine. It was the guidance of "Sensei," my Danger Sense. I hadn't detected a specific attack, but my instincts were screaming about an existential threat.
I hurriedly activated Indomitable Spirit.
It was difficult to track because of the various buffs and multipliers, but my stats were skyrocketing. That only meant one thing—Oishi’s level was rising at a terrifying speed.
He surpassed the peak stats I’d seen during the Metakin fight and kept going.
Fusion Absorption doesn't usually grant level-ups. This had to be an unknown skill.
Based on the scaling from Indomitable Spirit, Oishi had already cleared Metakin's level 80 and was likely pushing past 90. And he wasn't stopping.
The hair on my arms stood up.
"This is bad!!"
This was beyond bad. This was a catastrophe.
I sprinted forward at full power.
"Takeo-kun!?"
I ignored Hinata-san’s cry and leaped outside the safety of the barrier.
I activated every buff I had. If I didn't kill him now, he would become an unstoppable god. I couldn't afford to worry about whether the seal on Lust Murder would break or what Mayurin-san and the others would think of my power.
I used everything.
Even the skill I’d just acquired and had never tested.
———————————————— 【Skill】 Brave Heart Lv.1 For 5 minutes after activation, add the final calculated value of Spirit to all stats except HP and MP. Upon activation, restore HP and MP to full once. All attacks gain a 2.0x damage multiplier. Cannot be reused for 120 hours after use. Using it two or more times within 30 days results in death. ————————————————
This was one of the three cheat skills I’d obtained through the Hero title.
It fully restored my resources and granted an unconditional double damage multiplier to everything I did. Furthermore, it added my total, buffed Spirit stat to every other attribute.
The "final calculated value" meant the number after all other skills and support magic had been applied.
Even at level 1, Brave Heart provided its maximum power. Leveling the skill would only reduce the cooldown and the lethal penalties.
I couldn't use the other two Hero skills yet. Silver Lightning Magic could be channeled through Magic Sword, but I hadn't practiced the spells or Magic Shroud enough to risk them in a live fight. Brave Heart, however, just required activation.
It was an absurd, game-breaking cheat. It felt like a developer oversight.
By the time I reached Oishi, my stats had reached these heights:
———————————————— HP: 350 / 350 MP: 132 / 132 Strength: 751 → 1044 Constitution: 664 → 957 Intelligence: 148 → 441 Spirit: 293 → 586 Agility: 673 → 966 Dexterity: 346 → 639 ————————————————
The numbers on the left were my stats with Asceticism and buffs active. The numbers on the right were the result of Brave Heart adding "293" to every single value.
Since my HP was now full, Blood Vengeance was inactive. Even so, my stats were higher now than they had been during the second stage of Blood Vengeance against the Metakin.
And it wasn't just the numbers.
"OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH!!!"
A golden aura erupted from my body, swirling together with the Sword Aura covering my blade. Enveloped in a tri-color radiance of Fighting Spirit, Sword Aura, and the golden light of the Hero, I swung.
—Mighty Great Blade: Explosive Blade.
A colossal sword was born, its blade stretching over seven meters long as the blue and golden auras bled into one another.
Slime Killer didn't apply here. However, because it was a direct melee strike, the Sword Aura multiplier applied, which was then doubled by Brave Heart.
The result was a 230.4x damage multiplier.
I slammed a slash that felt like it could cleave the world into Oishi's massive form. Perhaps it was a result of the extreme concentration, but I felt godlike in that moment. I manifested the Mighty Great Blade, drove it into Oishi’s bulk, stopped the physical swing halfway, and detached the aura blade to leave it embedded in his flesh. Then I swung again.
I repeated the motion five times in the span of a single heartbeat.
Even if I were asked to do it again, I doubt I could. It was a singular feat of martial perfection.
Five massive swords of aura were buried deep inside Oishi's grotesque, bloated body.
An instant later, I lost control of the energy, and they collapsed—
"Leveling Junkie Bro-kun!?"
"Takeo-kun!? What was that!?"
The moment I finished the slashes, I retreated back into Mayurin-san’s barrier. Both she and Ikegami-san stared at me in shock, likely wanting to interrogate me about the golden light.
But there was no time. I cut them off with a roar.
"Mayurin-san, I'm sorry!! Brace yourself with everything you've got!!"
"—Eh?"
THOOM!!
The boss room shuddered as if hit by a meteor.
A sphere of light centered on Oishi expanded outward. It consumed his massive frame in a heartbeat, swelling into a miniature sun. The radiance was so intense it was blinding.
Even as the explosion began, the remaining Metaslas continued to dive into the light. There was no hesitation. It was a bizarre, suicidal pilgrimage.
Before I could process the sight, the atmospheric pressure displaced by the blast hit us as a gargantuan shockwave.
CRACK!!
The sound was like a hammer hitting glass.
"—!?"
"Guh... ugh... AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!"
"Mayuri!?"
Fine cracks instantly spiderwebbed across the hemispherical barrier.
The expanding explosion hadn't actually reached the barrier yet; we were quite a distance from the epicenter. What was hitting us wasn't the fire, but the mere aftereffect of the blast. Yet even the residual shockwave was enough to threaten the barrier's integrity.
Mayurin-san screamed as she poured every drop of her MP into the barrier, desperately trying to reinforce, repair, and maintain the shield. She mended the cracks as fast as they appeared.
After several agonizing seconds, the light finally faded.
"Hah... huff... what... what was that power...!? I'm... I'm out of MP...!!"
The moment Mayurin-san finished her sentence, the barrier shattered like glass. Its work was done.
At the center of the room...
"Hey, you've got to be kidding..."
"It's huge..."
"That skill is just... that's too much..."
Ikegami-san, Tamaki-san, and Ashitaba-san stared in stunned silence.
A crater sat there, far larger than the one I’d made during the Metakin fight. In fact, the previous crater had been completely consumed by this new one. The floor of the pit was glowing red, shimmering like molten magma. Aura wasn't supposed to generate heat, but the sheer friction of the energy must have liquified the stone.
In the center of the pit sat what remained of Oishi.
He hadn't been vaporized like the Metakin. Instead, there was a massive, cracked metal lump, resembling a piece of slag pulled from a furnace.
It was motionless. Not a single Metasla remained in the room; they had either been disintegrated or absorbed into the metallic mass.
"A-At any rate," Ikegami-san managed to say. "I thought we were done for, but I'm glad we pulled through."
"Yeah... you can say that again..."
"That guy was a freak. I'm just glad the Leveling Junkie won."
They let out sighs of relief.
"—Takeo-kun?"
"Leveling Junkie Bro-kun?"
Hinata-san and Mayurin-san looked at me, confused by my lack of reaction.
I couldn't answer them. I was too busy.
I was frantically navigating the Status screen I’d kept open. I dumped the 120 Status Points I’d just earned and the 5 Skill Points I’d gained into my build. I wanted to sit down and think about the distribution, but I didn't have a second to spare.
"—!? No way!?"
They finally saw my desperation and looked back at the metal lump.
Crrr-crack.
Large fissures raced across the surface of the slag. With a violent boom, the metal shattered.
A figure stood atop the debris.
"Is that...?"
"Did he get... smaller?"
Standing there was a humanoid form of shimmering silver metal.
He was about 190 centimeters tall, with a lean, muscular physique. He wore no clothes, nor had he molded the metal to resemble any. He was completely nude, though his groin was perfectly smooth.
His head was the most disturbing part. He had no hair, no eyes, no nose, no mouth, and no ears. He was a faceless, featureless mannequin.
He was a genderless, silver doll.
It was a far simpler design than the previous Metal Oishi. At a glance, he looked weaker.
But everyone except Hinata-san felt a wave of primal terror. Every Japanese person is raised on a diet of manga and anime, and we know what this means.
Having finished my frantic stat adjustments, I stared at his new form and whispered, "An enemy growing huge only to shrink into a small, simple design... that's just Fr**za-sama all over again...!!"
In reality, the new Oishi was likely terrifyingly powerful.
I didn't need a stat sheet to know. My Indomitable Spirit increase was hard to calculate exactly with all the buffs and manual point entries, but the rate of growth and the time it had been active allowed me to make a grim estimate.
Oishi was likely somewhere between level 100 and 120.
Even the most optimistic guess wouldn't put him below 100. And a level 100 entity was a world apart from the level 80 Metakin. The stat growth per level increased exponentially at higher tiers.
He was something that had no business being on the 10th Floor. If he were a monster—and the fact that he didn't seem to be one was even stranger—the Dungeon Master had fundamentally broken the game's balance.
If this were a social game, the player base would be rioting.
I tried to use the idle thoughts as a shield against the reality of the situation, but time moved on.
A voice, perfectly flat and devoid of any origin point, drifted from the new Oishi.
He looked down from his pedestal of rubble and spoke.
"Thank you. Your work is finished. I have metamorphosed."