“Lydon! Cover the rear!”

“Hmph, Lumen thinks my mana is infinite? But alas, the seal is still intact.”

“……Then don’t get in the way and just stay in the corner.”

So far, the red hourglass had turned over five times, and they’d fended off five attacks from different types of monsters. In those long, grueling hours, Lumen and Lydon were becoming aware of their shallow teamwork.

“You’re trying to sword-slash a ranged monster? Pathetic, Lumen! Ranged is supposed to be ranged. Who’s going to catch it if I’m stuck in the corner?”

“I really want to kill you.”

When all the red sand fell, blue sand appeared and communication with Cadel was possible. The time limit was about 3 minutes. Through a total of four conversations that took place, they were able to infer some facts.

First, the more stages they passed, the stronger the monsters that appeared.

Second, each room has a different type and number of monsters.

Third, the amount of red sand is getting smaller and smaller.

Putting these pieces of information together, the mercenary corps came to one conclusion.

The trial lasted until all the ‘red sand’ in the hourglass was gone. In the meantime, they must survive the repeated battles to succeed.

The failure condition, assumed, was the inability to destroy the monsters within the time limit. Nothing was certain, but it was the opinion of the mercenary corps that the trial would end on its own if they fought frantically enough.

That was why Lumen was willing to join forces with the noisy fairy.

“Keep being so uncooperative. Your head will be blown off before the red sand is gone.”

“Ahaha! Do you think that’s possible? Do you want to try killing it? I’d love to see the results!”

He was a man with no common sense. Lumen was going through a lot of trouble to break his seal in the first place. Lumen almost starting to admire Cadel, who handled him as easily as he would handle a child.

“Please shut the f*ck up and get back to the monster……!”

The moment Lumen looked back at Lydon with a murderous look in his eyes, being pushed to the limit.

Swoosh!

A long, white thread wrapped around Lumen’s thighs, catching him off guard. The pull on his leg shook him to his core. Quickly drawing his sword, he severed the thread.

“Damn it!”

Another thread, flying from the other side, wrapped around his arm.

The creature that attacked Lumen was known as the ‘White Spider’. It was a dangerous monster that shot out a wire-like, tough, flexible thread that captured and dragged its prey to its feet, then used its enormous jaws to shred its prey.

Lumen strained his entire body to keep from being dragged away by the White Spider. The more he did so, the harder the threads dug into his flesh, leaving droplets of blood on it. His eyes narrowed in agony.

“Hurry up and cut it off!”

“Seriously, how many times have I told you not to tell me what to do, Lumen has a terrible memory?”

With a grunt, the icy spear cut through the threads binding his arm. The pressure on his thighs intensified as the dispersed force naturally became more concentrated. At this rate, his leg would be mortally wounded.

When Lumen gave up trying to hold on, he let go and the White Spider began to reel in the thread. He remained low as he was dragged along at a fast pace. And when he was in front of the White Spider’s gaping jaws.

Swoosh!

He sliced through its mandible. The rounded head slid along a slanted vein, and only then did Lumen, who had cut the threads that bound his legs, click his tongue and straighten his back.

“This is what I get for paying attention to useless things.”

His forearms and thighs ached where the threads had dug in. Brow furrowed, he turned around to see Lydon driving an ice spear into the White Spider’s eyeball.

Lumen wished he hadn’t had to fight like that in the first place. He would have felt more at ease alone. Ferociously slashing at the hard threads that flew at him, he diligently dispatched the remaining monsters.

When they had thus disposed of every monster in the room, only a very small amount of sand remained at the top of the hourglass. Lumen’s expression darkened when he saw that.

‘Time is getting tighter. My chemistry with that guy is awful, so I can’t even try anything.’

Rather, it seemed that only fatigue was increasing. Lumen let go of Lydon, who was sitting on top of the dead monster, and swiped the blood-soaked sword. He had to save even a little bit of his stamina until the next monster came out.

Finding an empty spot on the floor, he sat down and used the torn cloth to tourniquet his thigh and arm. He tied a neat knot and was about to shift his position to get comfortable when he felt a disturbing movement at the edge of his vision.

“……What’s that?”

Lumen looked down at the body of a dead White Spider. Something the size of a grain of rice was writhing in a swarm.

Lydon made a bewildered expression at the gaze staring down at him. The mischievous impulse to ask where Lumen was looking was stopped by the strange presence that followed.

Crack. Crack. Crack.

Beneath the monster he sat upon, a disturbing movement blossomed. When he looked down and looked at the floor, what he saw was baby spiders that had just hatched. Lydon’s face crumpled at the sight of freshly hatched spiderlings, clustered together in a swarm that at first glance looked like spilled rice.

“Gross.”

Almost reflexively, he drew on his mana to freeze the young spiders, but before his attack could reach them.

“……Huh?”

The time limit expired, and the huddled baby spiders were gone.

* * *

“What’s going on here?”

When the time limit expired, the blue hourglass did not appear. Instead, the red hourglass flipped again, signaling the arrival of the next monster. There was no short break.

That alone was enough to make his head hurt, but that wasn’t the only problem.

“Commander, the spiders are getting bigger!”

“No, the walls aren’t even open, where did these come from? Get back!”

A swarm of baby spiders appeared out of nowhere. Appearing before the wall had even opened, the young monsters were growing rapidly, spinning threads everywhere.

Cadel fired a fireball straight at the group, but their movements were too quick. He aimed for ten, but only four burned. The rest scattered in all directions, dragging their swollen bodies with them.

“They’re like cockroaches……!”

It was a ridiculous growth rate. At this rate, it would take less than five minutes for them to reach adulthood.

‘Were they White Spiders? I don’t know how many there are, but it’s difficult when they come in groups like this.’

Van followed up with a sword strike, but they dodged it, keeping the damage to the minimum. Narrowing his brow in annoyance, Van’s gaze turned to the wall in front of him.

Beyond the wall, which was largely open, a new monster was emerging.

“That’s…….”

Van’s face contorted in horror as he realized the monster’s identity.

Armor Ogre.

In the not-so-distant past, it was the monster that had beaten Cadel and him to a pulp. A total of three Armor Ogres swung their clubs with fierce force. The dull crack brought back vivid memories of the day.

Van said to Cadel, who looked at the Armor Ogres with a fed-up face.

“I’ll take care of the Armor Ogres, and Commander, you take care of those spiders.”

“Okay, but if you feel like you’re getting tired, call me. We don’t know when the trial will end, so let’s preserve our stamina as much as possible.”

It was an unexpected and neat permission. Van didn’t have to rattle off a long list of reasons why he deserved to be in charge of the Armor Ogres. For a moment, he stared at Cadel in disbelief, and Cadel raised an eyebrow as if to ask what he was looking at. He even urged Van to leave.

Van turned his head in a slow, languid motion. The corners of his mouth, which had stiffened at the sight of the monsters, drew into a shy arc.

“Yes. I’ll keep that in mind, Commander.”

It was the trust Van craved more than anything else. His unhesitating approval, his deep voice, echoed pleasantly in Van’s ears like an angel’s trumpet.

I will never disappoint him. A sharper aura surrounded Van and was fired forward. And Cadel, who was raising his mana behind him, couldn’t hide his absurdity at the sudden appearance of the system window.