TTP
"Am I dead?" A bewildered boy asked as he started regaining his consciousness, "Is this Hell?"
The brown haired boy looked around the barren area, it had what appeared to be a large ribcage, boulders littered the entire area, with what looked like to be a lake.
"Where am I, did I go deeper into the labyrinth?" The boy tried to remember everything that happened that's led him to this place.
1 Day Ago
"Today I'll be taking you into the labyrinth for training. Remember everyone we'll be watching each other's backs down there." A man with black hair, a little beard growing under his chin, he wore what appeared to be a normal knights armor. This is Captain Meld our training supervisor.
"Don't worry, everyone, I'll put my all into protecting you." The brunette of the group shouted loudly which made everyone's mood increase significantly. This was Amanogawa Kouki, back home he was the popular guy that everyone loved and envied, here he was chosen as the hero to save everyone from the Demon King. He wore white and gold armor, with a long fluttering cape, a crown-looking gem in the middle wrapped around his head.
"I'm right there with you buddy." Ryutarou Sakagami replied. Ryutarou Sakagami is Amanogawa's best friend unlike him, he uses his fists instead of a sword. Ryutarou has a physique that is like a bear and he stands tall at about 190 cm. He has short trimmed hair and a gaze that appears both cheerful and stern.
Cliche right, it's your typical isekai book, but this story isn't about Kouki. It's about that guy, Kazuto Kirigaya.
Kazuto had straightened brown hair, green eyes, and white faired skin. He wore a blue shirt with a silver chest plate, black pants, with knee high boots, a black fluttering cloak, with a one handed sword on his back.
Kazuto was a bit hesitant when a hand was placed inside his. He looked over to his left and saw the priestess of the group.
Her name was Asuna Yuuki, she's the most popular girl in school everyone loved her and adored her. She had chestnut-brown hair, and wore a priestess uniform which was white and red.
"It'll be ok, as long as you stay close to me." She smiled brightly which made all Kazuto's nerves disappear. Off to the side there was someone who hated seeing the weak boy getting close to there goddess.
Floor 20
A skeleton with a sword and shield parried Kazuto's sword straight out of his hand knocking him onto the ground, when Kouki slashed him from the back.
"Thank you, Amanoegawa." He replied a bit bitterly to being saved by him.
"Kazuto, are you ok?" Asuna ran to the boys side.
"Yeah, I'm fine." He grabbed and quickly sheathed his sword.
"Kirigaya, I think you need to train a bit more, if I was you I'd spend every waking minute to honing my swordsmanship." Kouki lectured him, but Kazuto shrugged it off.
"Go easy on him, Kouki." A girl with purple hair, wearing a purple warriors uniform added. This is Yuki Konno, Asuna's best friend who defends anything Asuna says. Basically she's Luigi to Asuna's Mario.
"Hey Kazuto, can I have a word with you?" A guy with long brown hair, with a orange fur vest, beige shirt, with black pants and black boots. This was Daisuke Hiyama the guy who made his life a living hell.
Kazuto knew where this was going, Hiyama and his friends often bully him for how much attention Asuna gives him, "Yes?"
When no one was looking Hiyama punched him into the dirt, "How dare you. What gives you the right to treat Asuna like this?"
Kazuto didn't say anything and he knew it was pointless to fight back, "I'm sorry.."
Hiyama picked him up and pushed him into the wall, "Your sorry? Stop being a piece of shit."
"Hiyama, calm down." One of his friends said as he released his grip.
"Tch, whatever." Hiyama and his group walked away as the group started leaving for the next floor.
While they were walking Asuna spotted a crystal at the top right, "Whoa, it's so beautiful and shiny."
"If that's the case then I should get my hands on it." Hiyama stated and started climbing up the boulders.
"Those are mana crystals they supply mana to the environment and some people use them as engagement rings." Captain Meld explained as Hiyama reached the top of the boulders, "STOP, THOSE CRYSTALS HAVEN'T BEEN CHECKED SO WE DON'T KNOW WHAT THERE USED FOR!!"
Hiyama touched the crystal and it turned purple, teleporting everyone to another floor in the labyrinth.
Floor 65
A giant four-legged monster with two large horns, with what seemed like either rocks or boulders on his back appeared on a bridge, with skeletons appearing behind the group of hero's. Everyone quickly drew there weapons.
"Floor 65? What the hell?" Hiyama yelled out.
"No ones ever gotten this fair before, correct?" Kazuto asked
"Indeed, that's the behemoth." Captain Meld replied, "Knights we'll take on the behemoth, everyone else defeat the skeleton's as we distract the behemoth so we can escape." Captain Meld yelled out.
"No we'll come with you!" Kouki yelled defiantly. Kouki's sword turned bright yellow as he charged towards the behemoth, but his sword couldn't even put a dent in the behemoth's armor.
After minutes of trying to fight the behemoth, Kazuto noticed everyone completely exhausted and thought he'd have to save them. Slashing the head off the skeleton, he picked up the skeleton's sword and took of towards the bridge.
Captain Meld and the other hero's were completely exhausted, "Retreat!"
Everyone was running back to the group when Asuna tripped and fell, then she noticed the behemoth closing in on her. Kazuto quickly launched into her defense as he tried to block the behemoth's horn from hitting her.
"Ca-Captain Me-Meld, hurry and run with Asuna! I can't hold him for much longer." Kazuto stuttered as he tried to hold the behemoth back.
"Give us 30 seconds and I swear I'll come back for you." Captain Meld swore he'd come back.
"Hurry!" He responded as he could hear the sounds of departing footsteps, "30 seconds, huh? Let's see how long I can last, shall we?" The behemoth pushed him away and without hesitation Kazuto quickly rushed the monster uttering words he'd never used before. In a blinding bright light Kazuto's attire was changed into a black wyrm cloak, with grey lines running across the jacket, with a silver plate on the left side of his jacket and left arm, black V-necked shirt, black pants, black belt, black boots, and black fingerless gloves, and a sword sheathe on his back. Kazuto's eyes also turned a pure gold color.
"STARBURST STREAM!"
The first hit was a horizontal swing from left to right with the right sword, immediately followed by an uppercut with the left sword. Kazuto then jumps up and slashes the behemoth with both swords from left to right while spinning, twice. Kazuto lands facing the behemoth and slashes an X from top to bottom, before inversely slashing the X again from bottom to top, 'Faster.' Kazuto then leaps at the behemoth and makes two diagonal slashes from the same starting point, with the left sword heading from top to bottom to the left, while the right sword heads from bottom to top toward the right. Afterwards, Kazuto reverses his grip on the two swords and slashes another X with both swords from top to bottom, 'Gotta go faster.' Kazuto then does a barrel-roll like maneuver while slashing at the behemoth, like a corkscrew. Kazuto then slashes another two X's at the behemoth, first from top to bottom and then bottom to top. Kazuto then makes a diagonal slash with the right sword, top-right to bottom-left, then spins left and uses this momentum to deal a horizontal, right to left slash with the left sword. Kazuto then, at a very high speed, makes an uppercut with the right sword; then another with the left sword, a downward slash with the right sword, then a downward diagonal slash towards the right with the left sword, spins and repeats the previous attack, and thrusts the right-handed sword out. Upon landing the final attack the behemoth's horn is destroyed, while the skeleton's sword shattered leaving him distraught and bewildered. The behemoth roared in pain then pushed the boy backwards.
"Kazuto, Run!" Captain Meld yelled as he ran back towards his friends, "EVERYONE FIRE!"
Everyone started shooting magic at the behemoth to give Kazuto a chance to get away.
Kazuto ran as fast as he could seeing the magic his classmates were shooting, but then realized one of the streams of magic went off course and was heading towards him. Blasting the pathway in front of him, Kazuto ran across the rubble trying to make it back when another spell hit him straight in the chest blasting him into the depths of the abyss right along with the behemoth.
"KAZUTO!!!!" Asuna screamed as she watched her friend fall into the labyrinth.
"No, Asuna don't." Yuki grabbed hold of her friend from going over the collapsed bridge
"He's all alone, I can't leave him." Asuna cried harder for him.
To the Present
"So that explains how I got down here, someone wanted to kill me." Kazuto sighed in annoyance as he looked around then noticed his clothes went back to normal, "Hm, I wonder what happened to those clothes I had before."
"Where am I tho?" He looked around and saw a rabbit, "A rabbit? What's a rabbit doing down here?"
The rabbit vanished in a red flash when a wolf tried to attack it, when the Rabbit quickly sent a kick which sent out blue flying disc's at the wolf killing it on impact. Kazuto went wide eyed as the rabbit fed on his corpse.
"He ki-killed it." Then the Rabbit caught site of him and in a flash of red he was in front of him. Kazuto was scared beyond belief, he couldn't move at all, but then the rabbit quickly vanished when a bear appeared above him.
Three long claws appeared on the bears knuckles which sent out an attack which quickly beheaded the rabbit. The bear hopped over him and quickly started devouring the rabbits body. Kazuto was shaking with fear as he watched the bear eat the rabbit.
"My hunter quickly became the prey. I have to get away." Kazuto quickly got up and ran away, but the bear caught site of him and sent out an attack with his claws.
Using his sword he sliced through the attack, but upon doing that it shattered his sword. Leaving him scared, the bear slashed a deep wound into his chest. Kazuto couldn't do anything, but cough up a ton of blood. The bear licked the blood from his claws and wanted more. Kazuto backed away quickly until he hit the end of a Boulder, then thinking of his original job, "TRANSMUTE!" The back of his right hand turned into a crimson transmutation circle and quickly made a hole for him, then blocking the way for the bear, when the bear started slashing through it, "TRANSMUTE, TRANSMUTE, TRANSMUTE, TRANSMUTE!!!" He repeated the phrase over and over and over. Burrowing deeper into the boulder as the bear kept slashing through the rocks in his way. After getting deep enough he knew the bear was gone, but he was losing a lot of blood due to the wound on his chest.
He looked up to a faint blue glowing crystal, "A crystal? Down here? Dammit." His consciousness started fading, "This really is where I'm gonna die." After that he collapsed.
3 Hours Later
A droplet of water from the crystal ran down his face, another ran soon followed after, then another, and another. Trying to wake the boy, when surely he woke up due to the holy crystals effects.
"Where am I? Oh right bottom of the cave I made to escape the bear. I'm hungry and thirsty." Kazuto sat up and looked down to see a puddle of water near him, immediately he dove straight in, gulping it down at inhuman speeds, "Now that I have water, I should find some food to eat."
Outside there was two black wolves looking for some prey to feed on, when it caught site of Kazuto and quickly ran at him. Kazuto ran leading them back to his base when one of the wolves tried using purple lightning to hit him. Smiling darkly Kazuto ran back into his base and hopped over a giant hole when the two wolves fell in, "Sorry guys, but it was either you or me. And I chose me, TRANSMUTE! TRANSMUTE, TRANSMUTE, TRANSMUTE!" He replied burrying the wolves alive when he grabbed a sharp stick and ripped off one of the wolves limbs and ate it raw. When suddenly he could feel like his heart was stopping and a burning sensation was spreading in his stomach, "AH, WHAT THE HELL IS HAPPENING!!" He yelled out, "IT FEELS LIKE IT'S RIPPING ME APART!" Immediately he ran to the holy water puddle and gulped it down like it was no tomorrow, when suddenly his brown hair turned pure black, his green eyes turned pure black as well. His body became well toned and grew at least 3 inches taller than he originally was. His usual voice got a bit deeper.
"Ugh, that tasted like vomit." He wiped his mouth off when he got a glimpse of himself in the water. He saw his brown hair was now pure black to the roots, and his eyes we're black as well, "What happened to me? I look like a demon."
Then he took out his status plate he got when he got to this world.
Name: Kazuto Kirigaya
Age: 17
Sex: Male
Level: 10
Job: Synergist
Stats: ATK:200
DEF:100
VIT: 200
AGI: 200
MAG:300
RES: 200
Skills:
Transmutation
Mineral Appraisal
Magic Manipulation
Iron Stomach
Lightning Clad
Language Comprehension
"My status increased, and I got skills from eating those wolves." He took another bite from the wolfs corpse, "Maybe the more monsters I eat the more my stats increase." Then he noticed Lightning Clad, "Is it what those monsters used." He saw purple lightning erupting from his hand, "Awesome."
"With mineral appraisal I can identify the different types of rocks here and I can craft myself a stronger sword and I'll pay that bear back tenfold." Using his mineral appraisal skill he found a rock using taur ore and shtar ore.
Using his transmutation skill a pitch black sword with trims of gray was created. It has a black hilt connected to a hand guard that drops down on the right side. Attached to this elongated area of the hand-guard is part of black blade, so as to better aid him in retaining their grip on the sword when it is being used. The blade is completely black like the rest of the sword and the said blade is outlined in a light gray. In the design art, a small cross is emblazoned on the flat of the blade, just beneath the tip, "Looks like it worked." He picked up the sword and it was insanely heavy, but with the sword in his hand it felt good as if it was made for him, "Now for the other sword." Kazuto figured he should use two swords instead of one because it felt right when he used two swords against the behemoth.
Using the shtar ore, a one-handed straight sword that is slightly transparent. Its blade is white and slender, though not to the extent of a rapier. The grip is black, with a slight tinge of blue. Using the boulder's around his base he created two sheathes and wanted to test them out.
"Let's see what you two can do." Kazuto gripped the dark blue's sword tightly and felt how heavy it was and knew it was worth it.
Leaving his base he held the two swords in his hand and saw a pack of wolves surround him, "Looks like you guys want to die, that's fine with me. I'll slaughter you all."
The pack of wolves eyed him closely as the one on the left rushed him, seeing through this useless attack. With the black sword he swung it sideways decapitating the wolf, "Scared to move, huh. Don't be!" Then using both swords he started slashing the wolves like a knife slicing through bread.
He noticed a rabbit in the distance and saw it advancing on him. Closing his eyes, he felt the wind moving quickly around him and knew it was the rabbit tryna attack him when finally he opened his eyes, with the blue sword he slashed diagonally killing the rabbit in mere seconds. Slashing downwards the blood on his sword went splattering across the ground.
He walked over to the rabbit and tore through his corpse, devouring the raw meat. Grabbing more of his meat, he went back to his base.
He looked at his status plate and saw he leveled up again and gained three new skills, "Quick Step, Aerodynamic, and Dual Wielding. Dual Wielding? What's that?" He pulled up the skill and read it's description, "Dual Wielding is the technique of using two swords, one in each hand. Interesting. There's even combo's to the Dual Wielding skill. Let's see. Starburst Stream, Skill Connect, Deep Impact, Dead End, Radical Shine, Internal Rage, Crimson Slash, Nightmare Rain, Black Howling Assault, The Eclipse, and finally Nebular Empress. Interesting." Kazuto looked at each of there combo's and knew Nebular Empress was his strongest dual wielding skill.
"Let's make a few more items, but now that I know these swords work let's give them a name."
He looked at the long black sword and smiled, "You'll be Elucidator and you.." He thought of a few names before landing on one, "Dark Repulser."
Using the remaining ore he made a few throwing knives that were concealed around his body. He also created throwing needles which he hid on the back of his waist, "Now that, I've got this time to go see an old friend of mine."
Kazuto left his base to find the bear who gave him that scar on his chest. When he saw a giant white bear killing another rabbit.
"Hey there buddy, remember me?" Kazuto glared darkly at the bear as he drew the Elucidator, "I'll only need one sword to deal with you." Kazuto's attire quickly turned into the clothes he fought with the behemoth, "I'm gonna kill you and eat you."
With his sword drawn Kazuto rushed the bear and slashed the bears arm off and smiled darkly, "How's that?" He grabbed the bears arm and took a bite from it, "You taste horrible, but now it's time for you to die."
Kazuto rushed the bear as he sent out more slash marks, when Kazuto slashed through them like they were nothing and when he was within distance he decapitated the bear, "Heads up." He swirled his sword around and sheathed his sword. He grabbed one of his knives and started skinning the bear using his fur to craft a backpack while eating the meat. Using his transmutation skill he made a hideout so he can eat in peace.
Kingdom of Heiligh
"Captain Meld, Hero's, how did the assault on the labyrinth go?" The King named Ishtar exclaimed.
"My King, upon battling in the labyrinth we have made it to the 20th floor where we encountered a teleportation crystal where we all teleported to the 65th floor." Meld explained
"The 65th floor? That's the farthest anyone's ever made it too." The Bishop's replied
"Indeed, we encountered the 65th floor's boss, The Behemoth. He was too strong so we had to retreat, but in that moment one of the hero's used an unknown skill and took the behemoth head on when his sword broke. After that we started shooting magic at him so the boy can escape when one of the magic spells went haywire and hit him. Sending him and the behemoth into the dark abyss." Captain Meld explained the unknown skill Kazuto used then to him and the behemoth being sent to the bottom of the abyss.
"One of the hero's died?" King Ishtar was a bit shocked to find out that he died.
"Yes my Lord. His name was Kazuto Kirigaya." Captain Meld replied.
"That's too bad, but we can't sit around and wait. We need you guys to go back out there and defeat the demons." Ishtar argued.
"But one of my students died, they need time to process this and grieve." There teacher, Miss Aiko responded.
"I'm sorry, Miss Aiko, but they have no choice we need them to fight whether someone died or not." Ishtar decreed.
To Kazuto
"There seems be no way up, just down." He grumbled as he was packing up all the holy water down here, "I need to survive no matter what, and once I do I'll get home. If someone gets in my way.." Kazuto smiled darkly, "I'll kill them."
To be continued...