"The princess. Where the fuck is the princess?"
She was the key to the 3rd Floor. I had looked away for a few seconds, and someone had taken her without alerting either Emma or me.
If we couldn’t find her soon enough, we would without a doubt fail this challenge, and I would be stuck on this Floor forever, unable to challenge the Tower any further.
Such a thing couldn’t happen.
"Fuck."
The time was already going down. There were only about twelve hours left for the challenge. We still had plenty of time, especially if I carried the princess on my shoulders and ran as fast as I could, putting all my remaining stat points into Agility.
As long as it didn’t take ten hours to find her, everything would be fine.
However, there was yet another problem.
I had no idea where to find her. She had literally disappeared into thin air.
"Emma, we have to find her no matter what. She must not have gotten far." I took a deep breath, trying to calm myself down. "Let’s separate. You go in this direction, and I’ll go in that one."
***
[POV - Lea (Royal Princess)]
’Where am I?’
I tried opening my eyes, but there was only darkness.
I could only hear muffled sounds coming from various directions.
"They failed to capture her," a distant voice said.
"Those mercenaries guarding her were powerful. They killed them in less than two minutes."
"Good thing they were only a distraction for us. She will make the perfect sacrifice for our god. She has the purest blood in the whole world."
I could hear them walking closer to me, tearing at my clothes without care.
"W-What are you doing? Who are you?" I shouted.
I could feel my heart beating faster and faster.
They were tying me against some kind of stone. It was cold, very cold.
From their discussions, I had already understood who they were.
Demon worshippers, the ones who had been making trouble all over the continent. They were a small group, killing all kinds of people for their "god," the Demon King. My father had told me that they were crazy and that he didn’t exist. However, who knew... he might be real.
What if they succeeded in summoning him? Wouldn’t it be the end of the world?
"Oh... look who’s up. Perfect timing~!"
The man removed my blindfold, and I finally saw his disgusting smirk as he looked at my body with lust.
"To think your father would be so stupid, trusting some stupid mercenaries to protect you. Did he think we wouldn’t find you?" The man smirked. "Your knights are already ours."
"W-What happened to them?! Did you kill them?"
"Kill them?" He shook his head. "They immediately accepted to join us the moment we offered them some power."
"T-They betrayed us?"
I continued to talk with the man, trying my best to delay the inevitable.
’There’s no way they lost against them. That man was strong; they said it themselves. They killed all those knights in less than two minutes.’
I took a deep breath, glancing around.
I would try my best to buy them enough time to find me.
It was dark around us. There was no doubt we were underground. I didn’t want to scream; it would only make them accelerate this whole process. I needed to trust them. That man had seen through my knights right away.
’Just who is he? Where does he even come from? I’ve never seen anyone with abilities like him...’
***
[POV - Caliste]
I had been running all around the forest for the past hour. There was no sign of her anywhere. Whoever had taken her hadn’t left a single trace.
’How the fuck am I supposed to find her?’
I knew there was no impossible challenge. But... this was hard, much harder than I expected.
’Who could have kidnapped her?’
I tried to think, but nothing came to mind except for enemies of the king. However, I had no fucking idea how this world even worked.
In my past life, I had brought the princess to the Capital, and I had no idea what happened to her afterward. There hadn’t been anything like this.
Emma didn’t seem to have found anything either.
However, that was when it hit me.
If there were no traces above ground, then there was only one solution.
She had been brought underground.
It had to be close to the site of our previous fight.
I immediately returned to where Emma had killed the knights when I noticed something strange about them. All of their eyes had turned black, and foam was coming from their mouths.
’Those are signs of demonic humans...’ I frowned.
However, they hadn’t displayed any signs of demonic powers whatsoever.
’They must have recently been granted power...’
"Let’s see. There has to be a cave nearby..."
I looked around, and that was when I noticed a strangely shaped rock. It was very big; however, there was something strange about it. It seemed... fake. Not at first glance, but the more I looked at it, the more I thought something was wrong.
I approached it slowly, and as soon as I touched it, my eyes widened. The texture felt nothing like rock, and its weight was nothing similar either.
I pushed it away with a single flick of my fingers, revealing a small hidden cave below.
There was no doubt about it. That was where they had brought the princess.
I didn’t waste time calling for Emma. I would be taking care of this myself.
However, the moment I started going down, a loud alarm echoed throughout the whole cave.
—BEEP!
—BEEP!
—BEEP!
I didn’t know how many of them there were, but it seemed that I would be gaining a lot of EXP if I survived.
However, if there really were demonic humans down there, it wouldn’t be exactly easy. Those fuckers needed a lot to die.
’Let’s hope the princess isn’t in too rough of a shape...’