The seven of them tore through the monsters as they made their way to the dungeon.
Chrome drew all of the attacks towards him, and Yui and Mai hammered the enemies from the sides.
Aside from the fact that Maple's absence meant that they moved slowly, their party was perfectly complete.
"Oh, I can see it now."
Chrome pointed at the entrance to a cave up ahead.
"Well, let's hurry up and go then."
Kanade said as bookshelves rotated above his head.
"Yes, let's go."
And so the seven of them quickly went inside of the dungeon.
The dungeon was overflowing with monsters that were immune to physical attacks or had strong resistance to physical attacks.
The ones who merely had resistance could still be one-shotted by Yui and Mai, but the others could not. And so Kanade would have to occasionally step to the front and fight as they made their way through the dungeon.
Aside from Izu who generally did not fight, the others had explored so much of the 4th layer that they were used to fighting monsters with physical resistance.
Chrome was able to speedily guard the fire attacks of the familiar looking fireball monsters, and Kanade killed them.
If they took damage, Izu would heal them immediately with items.
Having some resistance did little to change the fact that they were just mobs.
And it was no surprise that they were no threat to this party, even with one member missing.
Their invasion continued, and they soon arrived at the boss room without any trouble.
"Okay, I'm going to open it."
Sally said as she turned around. The others all nodded silently and readied their weapons.
In the next instant, the door opened and they rushed inside.
What they saw in the back of the room was a large nine-tailed fox. It's glossy yellow tails swayed silently.
"Everyone, we go as planned!"
Sally ordered, and they all scattered.
Sally went to the front left, Kasumi and Kanade went to the front right.
The other four waited near the entrance with Chrome in the front.
While Sally and Kasumi were running, they used the items that they had been given.
They crushed the yellow crystals that were in their hands, and then their weapons began to crackle with yellow light.
This plan involved using a temporary paralysis effect on their weapons in order to paralyze the swift fox.
"Look over here!"
Sally slashed at the foxes front legs to get its attention. The fox bit and attacked with its claws. Its tails whipped at her, but Sally used her recently acquired 'Icicle' to avoid the attacks and counter.
Due to Sally's efforts, Kasumi and Kanade were able to move freely.
"'Paralyze Bomb'!"
"Fourth of the Blades. Whirlwind'!"
Kanade's paralysis magic and Kasumi's four attacks with a paralysis effect.
Kasumi was continuing to damage the fox so its attention didn't divert, and after some time, the fox finally stopped moving, just like they had expected.
It would be harder for paralysis to work again once it wore off, so this was their one chance.
Of course, they only needed one chance with Yui and Mai there.
Chrome had been protecting this ultimate weapon from the shock waves of the attacks, and now they went straight for the fox.
Their every step was a countdown to death.
"'Double Stamp'!"
"'Double Stamp'!"
Their great hammers had a long reach, and the successive attacks they pounded ignored the foxes second phase and sent it to its grave.
With these two, it was the norm to ignore everything. But if the guild master who was absent today was here, it would have been the norm for her to slowly crush her enemies one by one.
A few days passed after they had safely made it to the 5th layer. Maple came to the 4th layer guild home, but only Sally was there.
"Everyone went to the 5th layer already?"
"Yeah, do you want help? I don't have much time, but if we hurry..."
Maple was considerate of Sally, who was in a rush, and so thanked her but said that she could log out.
"Oh, one last thing...how was it? Was it strong?"
"Hmm... Well, I guess it's stronger than the monsters on this level?"
"Stronger...oh, really!? But...didn't you fight it by yourself?"
"...? No, all seven of us. Well, I'm sure that you will be able to do it alone..."
"I see, I see. You guys can do that now then."
Maple's face brightened as if those words had cheered her up.
"Huh? Yeah. I'm sorry that I can't go with you. If I was free..."
"It's fine! It's fine! I'll be okay! You said that I can do it. And now is the time that I can finally go."
And so Maple said goodbye to Sally and left the guild.
"Did she want to go right after her flu cleared up? Hmm? Oh, well. I better hurry!"
Sally quickly logged out so she would not be late for the matter that waited for her in the real world.
Maple ran straight towards her destination. Everyone else had gone ahead, and so she was determined to catch up with them.
"Okay, let's do this..."
Maple took in a deep breath and stepped into the room.
"Excuse me!"
"Ohh...? I did not expect a human to come."
The person who answered Maple was a tall and white Oni.
Maple was going to go against the 'strongest' on the 4th layer.
"Hehehe. I'm going to go to the 5th layer!"
Maple declared energetically to the Oni.