Max
The mattress groaned in protest as he collapsed on his back. He didn't even have the energy to unlace his boots. He just lay there, staring up at the ceiling, letting the silence of the room settle over him.
Kairu slid off his armor and hit the blankets with a soft thump.
"That was a hell of a meeting, eh, buddy?" Max mumbled.
Ki! Ki! Kairu chirped, shuffling closer, bumping affectionately against his arm.
A grin spread across his face before he noticed it. The physical exhaustion was crushing, but the vindication cut right through it. His contracts worked. Not in theory, not on paper, but exactly the way he built them. Though he didn't expect everyone who used them to get a big boost, that was a welcome surprise.
First, Lili shattered her limits and leveled up in a single run. Now, his contracts pushed all the Executives in their strongest stat straight through the ceiling into SS territory. Canonically, hitting those numbers was a miracle reserved for freaks of nature like Bell.
Now, Max held the blueprint to manufacture his own army of rule-breakers aka Bells.
"Zehahahahaha!" He let out a full-chested laugh, reveling in the absurdity.
Wiping a stray tear from his eye, Max pushed himself up on his elbows. He reached out with his magic, tugging on a familiar mental link.
Rimuru appeared in the chair by the desk. The merchant looked unbothered by the sudden summons, leaning back and throwing up a casual wave. "Yo, boss."
Max sat up properly and rolled his neck, trying to work out the phantom tension he'd been holding in his shoulders for hours. The grin faded as he looked at Rimuru. His thoughts shifted to the people he wanted to protect.
"How's Astraea and the rest?"
"They're fine," Rimuru began. "That annoying catgirl was very thrilled about the assignment and took it upon herself to keep an eye on them. She just told me the goddess came back with Loki and a bunch of Loki Familia members from Babel. All women."
Max raised an eyebrow at that. All women. So Loki's children, not the whole Familia — made sense they'd bunk at the manor, with their home a fresh crater. He filed the details away and moved on.
"And Alise? Ryuu?"
Rimuru made a so-so gesture with his hand. "Rattled, but safe. They didn't join any combat."
Max let that settle for a second, feeling the knot in his chest loosen. The Astraea Familia were his priority, and the fact that they were surprised but unharmed was the best outcome he could have asked for. Kairu, sensing the shift, jiggled halfway onto Max's lap and stayed there.
"And what about Twilight Manor itself? How's the cleanup? I heard the Dis sisters and Valletta got away."
"They did." Rimuru crossed his arms, leaning forward slightly. "They slipped into the sewers. It got too complicated to follow them down there with the complex layout, but I'm sure they dragged themselves back to Knossos."
The mention of the sewers clicked into place with Max's earlier frustrations. A sharp cackle tore out of Max's throat before he could stop it. He fell back onto the mattress, rolling onto his side as the image of Gojo's punishment formed in his head.
Rimuru sweatdropped, watching his creator laugh like a lunatic on the bed. The clone often thought Max called Gojo an oddball entirely to deflect from his own unhinged tendencies. He tapped a finger on the armrest and waited.
Max finally ran out of breath. He sat up, wiping his eyes with his hand. "I was searching for a way to punish that self-centered bastard for his lack of reporting."
That got Rimuru's attention. A gleam of mischief entered his golden eyes, and he leaned forward in the chair. "What did he do?"
As soon as he heard the question, Max launched into a rant. Lili's level-up. Promotion to Vice-Captain. Gojo acting like the Honored One and skipping the reporting entirely, not bothering to pass a single detail of that massive change back to the main body. By the time he finished, Rimuru had already started laughing, one hand pressed to his face as he remembered exactly how much Gojo's smug independence had cost them in operational headaches.
"So," Max continued, a vindictive smile settling on his face. "Now I have the perfect punishment. Once I level up tomorrow, he's going to scour the entire sewage network looking for Evilus tracks and bases. And just to make him extra repentant, I will make his nose hyper-sensitive. Bwahahahaha!"
Rimuru winced. As someone with enhanced senses, he knew exactly how bad standard adventurers smelled due to the lack of hygiene standards, especially after a dungeon dive. Case in point, he looked at Max with a head shake. And he couldn't begin to imagine the foul stench of the city sewers amplified by a sensitive nose.
Good thing we aren't Shadow Clones, Rimuru thought in deep relief.
Max let the laughter fade, taking a slow breath before shifting gears. "How's everything coming along at PAL?"
Rimuru let out a heavy sigh, his posture slumping in the chair. "All good for now, but I'm still mad at you for dumping Chloe on me. She is a handful."
Max tilted his head. "How bad?"
"When you told her she was running the demo room, she squeaked like you'd given her a palace." Rimuru shook his head. "She spent the first hour showing off to every customer who walked in, puffing up like she owned the place. Half of them bought more rings than they want just because she wouldn't stop talking about how amazing they are."
Max snorted. "That sounds like good marketing to me."
"It is, until she tries to 'demonstrate' the anti-theft gates by daring people to run through them." Rimuru pouted, then gave a resigned shrug. "I guess that's the fun of running a shop. Good thing I can use magic."
He flashed a smug smirk but didn't elaborate. Max decided it was safer not to press for details on how exactly the slime was keeping the assassin catgirl in line.
"Anyway," Max said, steering them back on track. "How is the public teleportation network holding up? Are you able to maintain the anchors with your current reserves?"
"Of course," Rimuru scoffed. "Who do you take me for? I have a high Level 2 magic capacity. That's plenty to maintain the network since only small parties of 5-10 are passing through at a time. If a massive expedition tries to cross, I'll need to focus on the load, but managing two circles is fine."
He leaned forward, resting his chin on his hand. "Also, did you know Rehmer got a pay raise?"
Max blinked. "Really?"
"Yeah. He dragged himself to the Guild, looked half-dead, and told me he got a ten percent bump plus a hazard bonus. They permanently posted him at PAL with an assistant of his own when he wants one."
Max leaned back against the headboard, satisfied. "That's good news. The poor guy worked himself into the ground yesterday. I'm glad they recognized it."
"I gave him a comms bracelet for himself," Rimuru added, flicking his own wrist to show the band glinting there. "In addition to that, I also made an employee group channel for the four of us. Me, Lili, Chloe, and Rehmer."
Max nodded. "That's great. Once my status update is done and Gojo has repented enough in the sewers, he can tap into the group chat too."
Rimuru agreed with a lazy thumbs-up.
The room went quiet for a moment. Max looked down at Kairu, who had flattened comfortably across the bed, his core dimming into a restful pulse.
A twinge of guilt surfaced. If anything, the little guy earned this rest more than Max. Kairu was busier than him for 2 days — hauling through the Executives' dive at full sprint, then turning around and diving straight into his own mess right after.
But this has to be done tonight, before the status update, or everything the clones went through would have to wait till next level up.
Reluctantly, Max called on him, keeping his voice low and gentle. "Kairu. Sorry, buddy. I know you just settled in."
A groggy Ki? rose from the pile of gel.
Max's resolve firmed. "I know buddy, this shouldn’t take long." Max said and turned to Rimuru. "The main reason I brought you here is the update. I want Kairu to merge with all of his active clones. When he gets his status updated tomorrow, it should cover whatever experience the clones went through as well."
Rimuru nodded, understanding the mechanics.
Max focused his intent on the magical connection between the physical slime clone and the Rimuru projection. With a sharp mental tug, he severed the link.
Rimuru instantly turned translucent. The physical weight of the projection vanished, leaving a spectral entity sitting in the chair. He stayed seated, watching the process with interest.
"Alright, buddy," Max said, gesturing to the empty body on the floor. "Absorb the clone and the other clone you made. Once you're merged, make another body for this gentleman. Give it stronger specs. Level 3 stats and magic capacity."
At that, Kairu jumped into action with an eager Ki!
The original slime enveloped the empty clone on the floor. A heartbeat later, the second clone bounced off the desk and splashed straight into him.
A few moments passed like that.
Then it hit him.
A sudden burst of warmth spread through Max's chest and spilled out into his limbs — except it wasn't heat, wasn't temperature at all, nothing like a fire or a bath. It was warmth the way a memory of sunlight was warm. And riding along with it came a weight he knew intimately: Lux Tenebris blooming to life across his back, that familiar pressure unfurling as if the skill simply woke up and stretched.
Max's breath caught. What—
Gone.
The feeling cut out clean, one heartbeat there and the next vanished, leaving nothing behind but a faint echo and a roomful of questions. He didn't even get his mouth open before Kairu's mass shuddered violently, and instead of settling, the slime abruptly launched into the air, pinging off the walls and the bedpost with wet smacks, moving as if he swallowed a live wire.
Max ducked, feeling the wind as a blue blur shot just inches past his ear as he leaned back against the headboard, tracking the chaos. Rather than a controlled magical fusion he expected, his familiar looked exactly like a toddler fighting off a massive sugar rush. Max kept a wary eye on the bedside lamp, fully expecting Kairu to shatter something, but the slime miraculously avoided the furniture during his manic laps across the ceiling.
After a few minutes of non-stop bouncing, Kairu finally burned off the erratic energy and dropped to the center of the rug with a heavy squelch. His mass bubbled and pushed upward, slowly smoothing out until a new humanoid body rested on the floor. It perfectly mirrored Rimuru, requiring no physical adjustments from Max.
The Devil was taken aback by the jump in proficiency from the last time to now. Before he could speak, words began to form on Kairu's surface, spelling out the new vessel's parameters.
Master, this is a Level 3 body made from Green Dragon flesh and scales with High Level 3 Magic Capacity.
Max's eyes widened. "Dragon flesh?"
"Woah, he became another Makoto," Rimuru said, impressed by the upgrade.
Max nodded slowly, processing the implications of a dragon-hide merchant. "Well, hop in. Let me know how it feels."
Rimuru walked up to the prone body and stepped into it.
A familiar click echoed in Max's mind, like a latch seating itself somewhere behind his sternum — and then the drain came. For the last few minutes, he just barely began to feel the comfortable fullness of his replenished reserves settling in his chest. The second Rimuru merged with the vessel, that feeling was wiped out, scooped clean in a single breath, like a bucket drawn out of a well that had only just refilled.
It wasn't as brutal as the first time he used Complex Protocol, but it was still a sizable chunk of his magic gone. He let out a sigh as the wave of vertigo passed, gripping the headboard until the room stopped tilting. Down on the rug, Kairu's core pulsed once, bright, then settled back to its dim restful glow.
Rimuru sat up, flexing his new fingers. He rolled his shoulders, testing the weight and density of the dragon-hide body.
"Perfect fit," Rimuru announced, looking up with a satisfied grin. "The magic pathways are much wider this time and senses sharper. It feels good. Definitely better than the last one."
Max offered a tired smile. "Glad to hear it. Try not to blow this one up."
"No promises," Rimuru shot back with a mischievous smirk. A moment later, his expression shifted, as if he just remembered a random detail.
"Oh yeah. I forgot to mention," Rimuru said, pointing at Kairu. "I picked up three of those metal contraptions from the zombies. Fished them out before the Guild swept the courtyard."
Max's head snapped up. "Wait. What metal contraptions?"
Rimuru raised an eyebrow. "The thick metal restraints bolted into the jaws of the Evilus Zombies. That must have been the sugar rush you just saw Kairu go through."
Max stared at him. He pulled the memory from the shared link, confirming exactly what Rimuru meant. A big grin broke across his face.
"You actually grabbed them?" Max asked, laughing. "I asked Ottar about those after the meeting, but nobody brought them back from the manor. I figured they were buried under a mountain of rubble by now or robbed by some lucky idiot."
Rimuru blinked, looking surprised. "You were looking for them?"
"Yes! I saw what Kairu could do with that kind of metal in the Dungeon. But I didn't tell you to get them." Max pointed a finger at the clone, his grin turning accusing. "You went back for them on your own. You little loot goblin."
Rimuru crossed his arms, looking defensive. "I was not looting."
"You definitely were."
"I was securing potentially dangerous Evilus hardware before the Guild arrived to clear the courtyard."
"You went back to a crime scene to strip the bodies of shiny parts," Max corrected, delighted. "Just admit it. We share the exact same sensibilities when it comes to free loot."
Rimuru grumbled, looking away. "I was being tactically efficient."
"Uh-huh." Max leaned back, very pleased. "Tactical efficiency. Sure."
He nodded, running a hand through his hair. Having Kairu absorb Evilus metal was a minor risk, but the slime had handled it well, digesting the metal instead of letting it poison him. The fact that Rimuru had the same scavenger instinct just proved the clone was a perfect extension of Max's own mind.
Max rubbed his eyes, the fatigue catching up to him now that the excitement of the loot had settled. "Alright. Is that all?"
Rimuru gave him an awkward nod. "One last thing. The Guild already received requests from several Familias asking for their own private teleportation circles. Rehmer wants to know if you have specific requirements, or if the Guild should approve them based on their own criteria. He also needs a pricing structure."
Max waved a tired hand. "Tell him we will let them know tomorrow. I'll deal with it after I level up."
Throwing a crisp salute, the merchant teleported.
Max realized belatedly that he had forgotten to ask where Rimuru was actually sleeping, but figured the slime was smart enough to arrange his own accommodations. He stripped off his armor, dropped his clothes in the hamper, and took a scalding shower, standing under the spray until the dungeon grime swirled down the drain and his shoulders finally unknotted.
That fleeting feeling flickered at the edge of his thoughts once, halfway through his bath but he was too tired to chase it.
Stepping out into the cool air of his suite, he collapsed on his bed. The excitement had cooled to a satisfied ache in his chest and the moment his head hit the pillow, he was gone.
-◈ -
Freya
She did not sleep that night.
How could she, when the impossible growth her executives had just displayed refused to leave her mind?
When Hogni first showed an explosive surge in his stats weeks ago, she quietly chalked it up to a one-off anomaly—a byproduct of his constant proximity to Max. But witnessing that same leap replicate across her entire executive line tonight was a revelation. It upended a fundamental law of the lower world.
Standing by the glass of her sanctum, watching dawn break over Orario, she traced the implications. For as long as the Falna existed, the stat cap was absolute. The letter S was the ceiling. Adventurers eventually learned that truth, which was exactly why so many stopped pushing once they reached the first-class ranks.
The Falna was a strict judge, demanding excelia of only the highest quality. To squeeze out a single point at Level 5 or 6, her warriors had to plunge into the risky Lower or Deep Floors. Without teleportation, just reaching those floors was a three-day ordeal of rationing supplies and fighting through mid-tier trash before they even saw a foe that mattered. Then, to level up, they needed a feat. Something undeniable. Which almost always meant risking everything against a Monster Rex, or worse.
The sheer exhaustion of that cycle was why Mia had ultimately walked away. The dwarven woman didn't lose her strength; she simply lost the desire to march into hell over and over for diminishing returns.
Freya's lips curved faintly.
Ironically, Mia looked more alive recently, and it was fully Max's doing. He visited the Hostess often to discuss business, selling the dwarven woman pristine monster meat harvested by Kairu. By treating the Dungeon like a pantry, he managed to reignite her spark.
But more importantly, through those same contracts, Freya now held a cheat that broke the system's chains. Her warriors could bypass the old limits, building foundations before they leveled that would eclipse any adventurer in history.
Naturally, that realization summoned a ghost.
Max's impossible pace reminded Freya of her. A woman's face flashed across her mind—cold eyes, a quiet figure standing alongside her fellow monsters. While most adventurers found themselves exhausted and broken by the grind of the first-class ranks, to that woman, they had been a mere stepping stone. She was the true monster, an anomaly who blew through the levels as easily as breathing.
Thinking of her inevitably brought back the suffocating shadow of the twin familias. To the vanguard of Zeus and Hera, Level 5 had been a joke. Those monsters had treated Level 6 as a starting line barely worth noticing. It was only at Level 7 and beyond that their top fighters truly stood.
Freya's fingers tightened on the velvet drape. For one heartbeat, she wanted Hera back in Orario. She wanted the exiled goddess to stand in this room just long enough to see that her era had ended, and that Freya's warriors would become undeniably stronger than Hera's legendary monsters.
She shook herself from the thoughts, forcing the ghosts away. In truth, their absence was her fortune. If Max had walked into this city while Zeus and Hera still held court, that tyrant would have snatched him up before Freya even had a chance to look. And Hera did not share.
Fortunately for her, the past was long gone, and she had far better things to anticipate today.
As if summoned by the thought, the heavy doors to her chamber clicked open. Max stepped inside, his face fresh and full of its usual enthusiasm, with Kairu resting comfortably on his shoulder. Beneath his casual posture, Freya's senses picked up a thrumming vibration in his soul—like a chord tuned just past its breaking point.
"Morning, my lady," Max greeted easily, walking into the room. "Are you excited?"
Freya turned from the window, a genuine smile curving her lips. "Of course. I have been waiting for this for two weeks, after all."
Max offered a sheepish smile, rubbing the back of his neck. "I know. Honestly, I don't know why I was so adamant about waiting to kill a Monster Rex for this level up." He shrugged it off a second later. "I'll make sure the next one is faster."
Freya raised an eyebrow. The only Monster Rex that could possibly challenge him next was Udaeus, and the skeletal king wouldn't spawn for another two months. But she discarded the thought just as quickly. The timeline didn't matter right now.
She gestured toward the bed.
Kairu cheerfully bounced off his shoulder, landing on the mattress with a soft squelch. Max slipped his shirt over his head, tossed it aside, and lay down on his stomach across the duvet, while the blue slime settled loyally at his right side.
Freya climbed onto the mattress and knelt gracefully over him. "Are you ready?"
"Always," he replied, his voice brimming with easy confidence.
"Let us hope you do not accidentally unleash your Destruction this time," she mused, a teasing lilt in her voice as she recalled the sheer chaos of his previous update.
Max chuckled against the mattress. "That's actually one of the reasons Kairu is sitting right here this time. Trust me."
Freya nodded. Taking a silver needle from the nightstand, she pricked her thumb. She let a bead of ichor swell to the surface before pressing it directly to his back.
"Let's get started."
The Falna flared to life instantly, its black script racing across his skin in thick, chaotic lines. She had to blink as the intensity of the light struck her. Usually, an adventurer's excelia trickled through their soul like a river. Max's was a storm-tossed ocean. And churning within that turbulent sea were three distinct maelstroms of light, each so bright and dense, as if they were trying to entice her to go through them first.
Three separate feats. Three guaranteed chances to level up.
Her pulse quickened. Wanting to savor the journey rather than drown in it all at once, she focused her sight on the dimmest knot first, and let the memory pull her in.
Cold hit her first. The damp air of Floor 27, a white sheet of raging river ahead of them.
She felt her shoulders tighten before the memory even formed, bracing herself the instant his soul yielded beneath her hands. Kairu erupted off Max's shoulder, expanding into a towering wall of ice to seal the shoreline. Then the Amphisbaena charged. Yet, beneath the reflex of fear she expected to feel watching him face a Monster Rex, she felt his own emotion instead—calculating, narrow, and already past the danger, arriving seamlessly at the solution.
He planted his feet and dragged everything his core could give into his arm.
Freya recognized the cadence of the gathering power. He used a lower-tiered variant of this magic when he first traversed this floor with Hogni. Clearly, he had upgraded.
Hadō #88.
The lightning cannon tore through the dragon's chest and plunged into the lake. For a hundred meters around, the water became a conductive field. Hundreds of lurking monsters died instantly, while the Rex convulsed in the very element that should have protected it.
She tasted his deep satisfaction at having walked into the fight with a plan, not a gamble. Something in her chest answered that quiet pride—a fierce, possessive warmth entirely separate from awe. Good boy.
He pinned the half-dead beast beneath five gigantic iron pillars, and Freya went still inside the memory.
She knew those pillars. She saw their counterparts once before, pinning the Goliath, though she never asked him how he summoned them. At the time, she wondered if it was simply brute force dressed as magic. It wasn't. It was gravity itself, bent to his will and driven downward like a fist.
Gravity magic. She turned the realization over slowly in her mind. Destruction. Fire. Water that answered him like an old friend. Lightning thrown without a chant. And now an entirely new school of magic, surfacing as casually as a craftsman reaching for a familiar tool.
How many more are you hiding? she wondered, unable to decide if the question frightened or delighted her more.
He crushed the Amphisbaena under that bent gravity until it finally broke.
Withdrawing slowly from the knot, Freya let out a soft breath. Her hands rested flat against his warm skin. This was the "weakest" of the three feats by raw brightness, yet most adventurers would have written lifelong sagas about a kill like that.
It was no wonder the other two burned brighter. Letting her awareness drift to the second light, she slipped in before she could fully brace herself.
Ash and bone. The deafening roar of monsters tearing each other apart in the Colosseum on Floor 37. Her pulse spiked, matching the rattling impact of his landing.
Max didn't draw his rapier.
Sōren Sōkatsui.
Twin pillars of blue fire turned the charging Spartoi into screaming ash, and the entire arena went dead still. Wolves dropped their kills. Barbarians froze mid-swing. Hundreds of eyes fixed on the sole intruder who had just announced himself with high-level magic.
Freya felt the crushing weight of that collective hostility settle onto his shoulders. It made her own stomach tighten, but she felt his answering thrill: a feral, reckless excitement.
Time to test my limits.
From there, the memory blurred into violent motion. Water whips, pinned skulls, ice shattering poison needles, purple fire answering in kind—a live-fire test run of his own defenses without a single flinch. When the horde proved too persistent, he reached for something larger. Pulling a flood from the damp cavern air itself, he turned the arena into an electric grave a heartbeat later.
The Dungeon did not like that. The floor shuddered beneath his boots as he pushed further, erasing a full line of monsters only to watch the arena instantly refill. His answer to that defiance was absolute: if a beam couldn't clear the board, a meteor would.
Explosion.
The impact rocked the entire floor. Her breath caught in sympathy. The Colosseum's lower tiers ceased to exist, and that endless war finally went truly quiet.
Beneath the lingering awe, she tasted a sudden stab of fear—not of death, but of what the Dungeon might send in retaliation if he kept breaking its architecture this way. Practical madness, she thought. Only someone like him would treat the Colosseum as a laboratory and live to say the experiment was a success.
Breathing slightly harder than the stillness of her bedroom warranted, she pulled herself free of the second knot.
Only the brightest one remained. The earliest.
Floor 28. The Under Garden. A duel with Hedin.
She hesitated. Something about its brightness, sitting apart from the raw destruction of the other two, warned her this feat wasn't forged by power alone. She stepped into it carefully, the way one might enter a room that already smelled of blood.
Lightning struck first. Then a wind sharp enough to cut. Steel met steel, spell met spell. The two traded blows in a space too compressed to fully unleash what they carried. She felt Hedin's precision in every strike—controlled, deliberate, the same iron discipline she had spent years cultivating in him. And she felt Max meet it blow for blow, not with equal precision, but with an unyielding tenacity, holding ground he had no earthly right to hold.
Then, the rhythm of the battle broke.
Freya could clearly see the blunder Hedin made in the middle of this duel. He froze, just for a second, as if an epiphany had struck him.
That fleeting distraction was the only opening Max needed.
He vanished, bypassing the defensive lightning entirely. Freya's breath caught as he reappeared directly in front of the elf, engulfed in a shroud of crimson-black erasure. The magic swallowed the lightning, covering Max completely and leaving only the fierce focus of his eyes.
Max brought his rapier down in a heavy arc. Though Hedin raised his staff to catch the blade, the true danger wasn't the steel. The dense erasure erupted off the edge directly into Hedin's face, breaking his concentration. The rapier slid past the guard and bit into his shoulder, the sheer force driving a Level 5 to the floor on one knee.
Yet her commander refused to yield. Driven by wounded pride, Hedin poured the last remnants of his Mind into a point-blank charge of Varian Hildr. The blue light gathered between them, a desperate bid to obliterate everything at zero range.
It lasted only two seconds.
Freya watched in fascination as the erasure simply ate it. Every spark, every thread of charged magic was pulled apart and consumed before it could manifest. The dark aura didn't flinch under the strain. It devoured her commander's spell.
The thunder died. The cavern exhaled.
Amidst the scorched ruins, Hedin Selland knelt bleeding. His magic smothered. His mind spent. For the first time in decades, her Chief Strategist could not find the next move, left staring at the silver tip of Max's rapier resting against his throat.
He was defeated.
They both walked away eventually. But the excelia burned into the Falna never lied; it told her exactly who had walked away with more.
She withdrew from the memory, gasping softly, but her hand did not reach for the parchment.
Why?
The question lodged in her chest like a hook. Hedin did not spar to the point of losing against a Level 3. Something had provoked this. The memory had given her the duel, every blow of it, but not the reason it began—and Max's soul held no answer for that either. The possibilities flooded her mind, twisting rapidly into threats.
Was this a test? Perhaps to see how far Max had come? That was almost forgivable. Then a more insidious thought surfaced. Was he envious of Max's growth and made a reason to draw a blade on the Devil she claimed?
In the middle of that frantic spiral, she became acutely aware of her hands. Her palms lay flat against Max's back. It was an ordinary position. Yet the kiss they shared weeks ago still sat between them, unmentioned, leaving a fragile distance in its wake. She thought that distance was finally closing today. She told herself that the easy way he laid before her meant something had healed.
Now, straddling him with her mind racing through reasons he might have fought for his life against her own commander, the old doubt clawed its way up. Was this closeness real? Or simply permitted? Did he let her near because he wanted her there, or because refusing her cost him more? She never asked, terrified of an answer she couldn't survive hearing.
She pushed the insecurity down, forcing her thoughts back to the fight—a fear she could at least investigate. Has Max provoked it? Gambled with an executive's temper the same careless way he gambled with Monster Rexes? It stopped being admirable the instant it threatened her.
Or worst of all: had he simply kept it from her? Filed it away as something not worth mentioning? She had believed patience would eventually earn her his truth. She didn't consider that patience meant learning things only after he almost died.
She ran through every version, finding no comfort. Her thoughts spun faster, tangling her pride, her fear, and that ugly, rising doubt about his trust. Somewhere in that maze, the sting arrived before she even understood what it was.
A single tear broke loose, sliding hot down her cheek.
It fell, landing with a near-silent splash against his back.
Instantly, the muscles beneath her hands went rigid.
Max moved. Pushing himself up, he shifted his body in one fluid motion, the unfinished update forgotten. Freya gasped softly as his hands caught her arms, drawing her up as he turned on the mattress until they knelt facing each other.
He held her shoulders gently, his eyes wide in alarm as he took in her trembling breath, the wet track on her cheek, and the red rimming her eyes.
"Freya?" he breathed, his voice tight. "What happened?"
She watched his face cycle in the span of a single heartbeat—shock at seeing her cry, uncertainty at what he had done wrong, and then, a dark flash of righteous fury aimed at whatever had hurt her.
Seeing that uncalculated, pure protective reaction.
Seeing the walls he usually kept so casually raised completely dropped for her sake—shattered the last of her pristine control. The goddess of beauty cracked.
She finally let go of the mask, her voice trembling as she asked the question tearing her apart.
"What happened with Hedin?"
--> Devil in a Dungeon <--
AN:
Absolute Cinema! The chapter went from Max chilling with Rimuru to Freya tearing up. Hope you liked the surprise, heh.
Coming to the first half, I know it might a bit confusing when you read both Max's and Rimuru's thoughts when the Pov says Max, but I thought since both of them are Max, I can integrate their thoughts to make the scene better. Same goes to any future clones Max makes in general.
Let me know if you are confused about how the memory transfer with Complex Protocol works, I have a whole mechanics set up if you want.
Also for any wondering why Freya didn't know about the duel from Hedin's update, she doesn't go through their Excelia as she does for Max and she only skims for Kairu. Unless the executives were on an expedition and show extraordinary growth, she ignores it as she already came across the monsters and floors.
And no, she didn't go through their excelia in the recent update, only checked Ottar's to see if they did anything extraordinary only to find nothing new.
The next chapter will be Hedin's reckoning ;)
Do share how you felt the chapter was. Was it good or did you feel it was a bit forced? Please share your feedback/suggestions on how to improve the story in a comment/review.
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Next update will be on Friday.
Ben, Out.
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