When the cockroaches finally caught up to their group, all of them targeted Michael, who was by far the slowest person on the team.  It wasn’t that he could move quickly, “Stop being so ridiculous and just run!  You could even fly if you wanted to!”

Talia was infuriated by the ‘Tank’ who refused to move faster than a brisk walk.  He complained “No fuckin way!  Running is dangerous!  Besides, I’ll probably get insta-killed if I try to fly!  Just go, all of you don’t worry about me!  These giant roaches can’t even get close to me without disintegrating, so I’ll be fine!  All of you need to make it into the Boss-Room safely first!  I’m gonna take my time and carefully make it past the traps!”

Even if he was normally extremely reckless, when he was actually ‘serious,’ his cautiousness was on the level of a hypochondriac shut-in.  Elina managed to actually heal Inari’s leg, and even regrow it, with a single critical ‘Flash-Heal.’

Meanwhile, the Huntress had the Longbow of Wind gripped tightly in her left hand, as she carried the Priestess with her right arm.  Talia was still so fast that she was easily able to avoid the various traps, and was extremely far ahead of the mounted cat-girl.

Alice roared “Grah~!  I fucking~, hate~, running~!  Damn it, I need some stims, or maybe a bit of speed?!  Rawl~!  Shit, I need to make some pills~!” as her three-meter tall body, slowly sprinted past a giant saw-blade.  She tried to block it with her right arm, but it was easily hacked off and if it weren’t for an Arcane Orb, smacking her in the back, she would have been sliced in half.

Crimson blood was spewing out of the wound and her HP was dropping rapidly, but utilizing her ‘Water Manipulation,’ and plenty of mana, the wound somehow sealed up.  Not only did her ability to control water increase, she also gained a new skill: “Aqua’s Mercy Level 1: The caster channels mana into their target’s wounds, sealing them and preventing further blood-loss.  After that, they continue to stimulate the cells and force them to rapidly regenerate the lost tissues.  The caster must be in physical contact with the target.  Heals 1 HP, per Aura points, per second.  Costs 1 mana per second.”

Along with her health, even the missing limb was rapidly being regenerated.  Alice laughed hysterically, yelling “Thank you Goddess~!” as she struggled to jump past a large pitfall.

Michael shouted “You’re fucking welcome!” while grabbing the Arcane Orb that had saved her life, in his upper left hand.  The ‘Aegis of Light’ spell was constantly incinerating hordes of gigantic unranked cockroaches, but he was outside of the Boss’ attack range.

However, once a few minutes passed, and the briskly walking Nephilim had reached the midpoint of the ridiculously long and spacious hallway, Andrew shrieked loudly.  He had finally managed to squeeze through the gateway, and had begun sprinting towards that four-armed angelic demon.

That monstrous Ancient Scorpion Centaur easily passed over the pitfalls, but it received thousands of damage from the arrows, circular-saw traps and pendulum blades.  Michael grumbled “Damn it, fine, guess it’s time to start moving a bit faster… Hmm~, I guess the point of this gauntlet is to weaken the Boss enough for us to be able to kill him.  Aside from that, he has that annoying-ass super-vomit ability, so I can’t really ‘Tank’ him now anyway.”

His long black hair turned silver, serpentine-eyes became golden, and his skin gained a porcelain tone, though the pitch-black veins were still visible.  Those claws and talons from his ‘Darkening’ made the armor on his fingers and feet transform a bit, making them appear less noble and more sinister.

He suddenly began sprinting forward, flapping his massive wings violently, and almost immediately catching up with Alice.  With his giant sword floating above his body, the Chaotic Nephilim managed to carry the three-meter tall, four-hundred pound dragon-girl with his four arms.

Michael wasn’t able to fly under those conditions, but running was surprisingly easy and slightly exhilarating, considering how much he usually disdained it.  The terrified woman looked behind him and roared “Go faster!  Grah~!  Watch out!”

However, since his body was technically in third-person mode, he could obviously see that giant claw attempting to slam down on them.  Bending down a bit, he used his crystalline gauntlet to activate Arcane Pull and reduce her weight dramatically, before increasing his speed just enough to avoid being crushed.

It was possible that he might have been able to withstand the attack if he used his shields to block, but the dragoness would have certainly died.  The right sleeve of her red-robe was mostly sliced off, and the rest of her was dyed green with Goblin blood and torn apart in various places.  

If he had been watching from his own eyes, he definitely would have gotten distracted by her slightly exposed left nipple and fallen into a pit of deadly spikes.  Fortunately, he was able to see behind and in front of him at the same time, from far enough above, that it was similar to playing a ‘platformer’ video-game.

Even after all of that running and fighting, his Stamina was still above eighty-percent.  Andrew screamed “Hyahahahaha~!  I’m~ gonna~ catch~ you~!” in a shrill voice, as he attempted to grab the two of them with his pincers.

Michael picked up the pace, yelling “Oh no you fucking won’t!” The rest of his team had already been waiting at the end of the hallway for almost a minute, when the Nephilim hurriedly entered inside.

As soon as he made it in, he muttered “What the fuck?”  A greyish stone door fell from the ceiling, slamming down behind him and stopping the giant scorpion monster from chasing him.

He looked around as he set Alice down, “It’s a goddamn coliseum… Shit, this is part of the gauntlet!”  In the stands, there were thousands of ‘spectators,’ but all of them were skeletons and ancient corpses.

There were three stone sarcophaguses standing upright, near the other end of the arena, and each of them began opening the moment the door fell.  Talia yelled “Michael, what are your orders?!”

After glancing between those enemies, he flapped his wings a few times and jumped a dozen meters forward, followed by a few more leaps until he made it to the center of the room.  The ceiling had an artificial sun, so it was actually fairly hot, but instead of sand, there was nothing but bonedust.

The Guardian’s pure-white snake-like tail waved back and forth, as he commanded “Burst down the Healer first, then the Mage and the Tank goes last!”

“Charles, Level-20 Ancient Undead Human Gladiator, Rank-E, Ultra-Elite,” charged towards them the moment that his mummified body had fallen out of the sarcophagus.  He was two-meters tall, with a steel gladius in his right hand, and a spiked buckler in his left.  His armor only included some sandals, leather tassels and a golden belt.

That nearly skeletal man was surprisingly limber, considering that his muscles had withered and dried up, hundreds or thousands of years prior.  His eyes were made out of blue crystal, and his scraggly white hair was almost completely gone.

Michael roared “Attack me you pruny cuntbags!” while swinging his huge sword against the Gladiator’s body.  He deftly blocked with his shield, but was blown away by the ridiculous amount of force, and the massive difference in leverage.  After that, the Guardian threw his Arcane Siegeblade and Orb at the other two enemies.

“Kara, Level-20 Ancient Undead High-Elf Sorceress, Rank-E, Ultra-Elite,” was attempting to cast a powerful spell at him, but was interrupted when a glowing ball smacked into her forehead.  Arcane Push, caused that frail mummified woman to be sent soaring away, smacking into the stone wall behind her.

On the other side, “Aria, Level-20 Ancient Undead Human High-Priestess, Rank-E, Ultra-Elite,” had a massive sword impaled through her abdomen.  Somehow, her HP was only dropped to 2644/3000, even with such a severe injury.

However, he left the sword stabbed through her grey robe and used both of his left hands to swiftly block the rapid flurry of gladius thrusts.  That undead man was the same height as Michael, but the difference in power was fairly extreme.

As long as he blocked the attack, he wouldn’t even receive any damage.  The Chaotic Nephilim suddenly utilized all four arms at the same time and grabbed Charles’ wrists and throat.

The Sorceress cast a colossal ‘Firebomb’ spell, and he used her Companion as a shield.  Apparently, ‘Friendly-Fire Prevention’ didn’t seem to exist among Dungeon monsters, because the attack dealt over six-hundred damage to the Gladiator and even burned Michael for two-hundred.

Elina used ‘Flash-Heal’ and at the same time, the smoldering mummy turned into dust and rematerialized in front of that defenseless cat-girl.  Almost instantly, the Nephilim teleported between the two of them and started using all four fists to pummel the enemy, while roaring “Get the fuck away from her, you bony piece of shit!”

After knocking him onto the ground, the demonic angel continued smashing apart the ‘Tank’ with his gauntlets.  He didn’t even need to stop punching, because he used Arcane Pull on both the orb and siegeblade at the same time.

As that was happening, Sarah was using a pitch-black tanto and serpentine dagger to rapidly perforate the body of that squishy High-Priestess.  Talia managed to get off a few ‘Arrows of Wind,’ which exploded against the undead woman’s face.

By the time the two mummies reached Michael, the Healer was already dead, and before that Sorceress managed to cast another spell, she had been completely dismantled as well.  Their health was extremely high, but their Defense Rating was not; thus, all three of those ‘Ultra-Elites’ were summarily executed by the three of them.

Alice was still panting and exhausted from running, so she didn’t have a chance to fight.  Inari was similarly worn-out, while Jasmine was happily reloading her two pistols.

The Chaotic Nephilim breathed out a long sigh, as he looked down at the pulverized pile of bonemeal, grumbling “Ugh, since we defeated the mini-boss… Now we have to kill the real thing.  Welp, this is probably gonna suck.”