(The One That Defies God) Arifureta Novel X Male Oc

(Vol 2) Chapter 8: Return of the Behemoth (Clasmate Side)

I'm back~!

Sorry for the wait, as you may or may not know I'm still in school and today is the mid year-exams, yay. And it still is by the time I posted this chapter.

I've also been busy playing a few Pokemon games like ORAS and Ultra Sun. It was so much fun playing those games and I hope you understand why this chapter took so long to make.
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The day Hajime, Ryoko and Yue met, and survived their life of death struggle with the scorpion.

Kouki along with the rest of the heroes once again arrived at the (Orcus Great Dungeon) .  However, those who came were only Kouki's Hero group, a small group of rogues, and another group consisting of five boys and girls led by a bulky judo guy called Nagayama Jugo.

The reason was quite simple. Even if they didn't bring the subject, both Hajime and Ryoko's death had a casted a deep, heavy shadow over their hearts. If they couldn't face the reality of dying in battle, they wouldn't be able to fight properly. This was a type of psychological trauma.

Obviously the officials from the Saint's Church wasn't very sympathetic. They think that as long as the students experience actual combat incessantly, they should be able to fight again after some time, the repeatedly urge them to return to the battlefield everyday. However, there was a intense protester that was fighting against the Church. It was Aiko-sensei.

Aiko didn't participate in any of the expedition with the heroes at that time. However, due to the fact that her job was the special and extremely rare Agriculturist, rather than combat training, the church  hoped she would put her effort towards agricultural cultivation instead. As long as she was around, there's a high possibility that their provisions problem would be solved.

When Aiko heard Ryoko and Hajime's death, she was so shocked that she was left bedridden. She faced with the fact that two of her students died while she was just leisurely spending time within the safety zone, and the fact that it was no longer possible to bring all of her students back to Japan. Aiko, who had a strong sense of responsibility, suffered a powerful impact.

That's why, she absolutely wouldn't allow for her students who couldn't fight anymore to be sent to the battlefield. Aiko's class was an extremely rare case  which had the possibility of bringing about a complete change to the world's food issue. And that Aiko-sensei was protesting with unwavering determination against the students forced combat training. The church, which wanted to avoid worse ING their relationship accepted Aiko's objection.

In the end, only the Heroes, the rogues and Nagayama Jugo's party were willing to continued with the combat training. After training for a bit, they decided to challenge the (Great Great Dungeon) again. However this time, they were also accompanied by Commander Meld along with several knights.

Today was the sixth day of their dungeon exploration. They were  currently on the sixtieth level of the dungeon. It was just five levels before they reach the highest confirmed level. However, Kouki's party was currently stuck. Specifically, they were rather unable to advance forward, it was involuntary recollection of the nightmare they experienced from the past.

Despite being clearly different from that time, similar steep cliffs spreaded before their eyes. They must have cross a suspension bridge in order to advanced to the next level. This isn't much of a problem perse, but as expected, they couldn't help but recalling the events that transpired. Especially Kaori, as she stood there motionless, staring over the cliff into the darkness of the endless abyss.

"Kaori..."

Shizuku called out to her friend anxiously, Kaori who was looking down with a strong gaze, slowly shook her head and smiled towards Shizuku.