Chapter 149 Labyrinth [3]

"Take this!" Spene bellowed as he shoved his sword deep into a spider's head. Pushing it even further, he finally chopped off its head in half— blood splattered all over the ground.

Without wasting any time he quickly turned to his side, he was just about in time before a spider jumped on him from the wall.

He held his sword straight, the spider sprayed its web on Spene, but he didn't flinch. He swung his sword diagonally and cut the spider in two parts before it could land on the ground.

Realizing that there weren't many spiders around anymore, he took a breath of relief and relaxed his body a bit and provided it with some oxygen. He wiped the blood off his face that had splashed there when he was slashing the monstrous spiders.

"How are things on your side?" he asked loudly.

Xara and Favian weren't that far from him, but even so he asked without turning around because he couldn't afford to let his guard down and look in a different direction—who knows when more monsters might come?

"Their numbers are decreasing," Favian replied at the same time when he released an arrow, and it dug itself deep inside a spider's eye.

"Oh! There's one more," he murmured as he shot another arrow; this one was targeted at the ceiling right above my head.

"Careful, Ichigo," he warned.

Following his advice I looked up and then stepped aside, soon a corpse of a spider came crashing down on the ground at the place where I was standing a few seconds ago.

"Thanks."

"Ah, don't mention it; protecting you is our job, after all."

"Quit with the chit-chat and assist me! I'm getting out of mana here—thanks to a certain someone," Xara interjected and glanced at Spene with the edge of her eye.

She was constantly using her spells, and it was not strange if she was running out of mana at this point. It was understandable, we were—or rather they were, fighting for about half an hour now.

Yeah, the spiders didn't stop coming, hence almost all three of them were tired by now. I was observing, and both Favian and Spene's movements had gotten slower in the last 10 minutes. Xara's spells were also less efficient now—maybe because she was trying to not use much mana.

"Ahhh! Fuck you, you insects!" Xara cursed, aiming three fireballs at the single spider in front of her. At the same time, Favian shot three other spiders to death that were also before her.

With this, there weren't any spiders left anymore.

"Are they gone?" Spene asked; he still wasn't moving from his position, since he was in charge of guarding both my rear and left side.

"I think so," Favian responded.

"This sure took a while."

"It did," Favian looked around, scanning the area for any other spiders if there were any left. "It did, indeed," he repeated.

It was confirmed that this was all of them. It took them a while, but there weren't any more monsters left on the first floor of the labyrinth... probably.

Coming to the labyrinth, by the way, the area in which we were standing right now was a mess. Mountains of monster corpses were lying all over the ground and the walls were coated in spiderweb.

It also smelt bad due to all the spiders Xara had burned to death; it was the smell of burned meat. And it stinks, honestly.

"Sigh... finally it ended. I think I need just a bit of... rest," Xara trailed off and all of a sudden, she fell to the ground.

"Xara!" Favian ran toward her instantly, sat down, and put her head in his lap.

"She's knocked out," he clarified.

"Maybe it's because of mana exhaustion," I said as I moved toward her while carefully avoiding stepping on the corpses.

"Agh, it's my mistake then, because of me she'd to use that powerful spell," Spene claimed as he came running toward Xara.

'That was a powerful spell? Well, maybe according to their standard it was.'

"Don't blame yourself Spene, maybe she's just tired due to continuous fighting like us. It was probably a bit hard on her, probably that's why she fainted," Favian demurred.

"But..." It looked like Spene still wanted to say something, but decided otherwise in the end.

"Let's let her rest and recover first, the exploring can wait for later," I implied.

Of course, I normally wouldn't have stopped for something like this. But she was still alive and can be of use. It's always better to have 3 than 2, after all.

"I'm very thankful to you for that," said Favian as he laid Xara on the ground carefully and put her stuff away.

1 hour later,

We were still waiting for Xara to wake up. Favian was sitting next to her in case she needed anything—which I don't know how it can be possible; I mean she was unconscious right now!

While Spene and I were sitting in a corner where there weren't any corpses—Challes was at a distance from me.

"It's strange, isn't it?" Spene implored; maybe he caught me staring at them, which I was doing for a few minutes now. I mean, I was curious. That guy was just sitting beside her, just sitting, nothing else.

"No, well... I guess it is," I replied.

"But that's just how it is... that's how love is," he asserted.

'Love, huh? This brings back nostalgic feelings, and not good ones.'

"Wait! You mean, they are in a relationship?!" I asked hurriedly, as if I was interested in the topic.

"I'll let you in on a secret; as they are, even though they won't admit it," he revealed, from the looks of his face it seems like he was having fun telling me this.

And it wasn't like I was interested in this or anything, but I won't miss an opportunity to grab extra information. He started this conversation to get a reaction out of me—probably because he was bored, and I was just giving him that reaction; encouraging him to tell me more as the result.

"So, what you're saying is that they both like each other but won't say it?"

"Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying. Funny, isn't it? I mean, if you like each other, then simply say so. The worst that'll happen is that you'll get rejected—which won't happen in their case. But that's it. I've been rejected more times than I can count."

"That's some complicated shit," I commented.

"It is, indeed."

I just found something interesting. They were in love, partners. If so, then... this can help me in the future. I'm sure the results will be better than what they would've been, if I didn't know about this.