His movements attracted the attention of the surviving adventurers.
They all stared blankly at the actions of this hostile faction's main god, their minds momentarily short-circuited.
What is he trying to do, this was the question in everyone's heart.
Only a few sharp people like Fron, Finn, and Asfi understood what he intended.
"If it's as I think… then it should be far easier than the plan the two of us had." Finn shrugged and let out a laugh.
At a moment where life and death hung in the balance, the Braver still had the mood to joke around. Fron couldn't help but admire him, he really was an old veteran, and his own experience simply couldn't compare.
When it came to surviving deadly trials, someone like Finn had lived through far more than Fron, something neither knowledge nor insight could make up for.
Beyond time, one needed both opportunity and conditions.
Yet looking across the entire Dungeon City, which Familia had the same conditions as the Loki Familia? Even the Freya Familia, the Levels they had reached in their expeditions were worlds apart.
Moreover… as far as Fron knew, the Freya Familia didn't seem to have any experience with large-scale expeditions; they usually only sent small teams of a few people.
From this alone, one could see how precious Finn's experience was. Only after such tempering could he display such composure.
Shaking his head and forcing himself not to overthink, Fron looked toward the Thanatos.
To say he wasn't hoping would be a lie, if the other party really did what he was thinking, then… the Familia and the remaining would gain an unexpected advantage.
And the enraged Thanatos, humiliated by being out maneuvered and determined to take revenge on Enyo, did indeed act exactly as Fron expected.
...
Time seemed to freeze in that moment.
Under the stunned gazes of Loki, Finn, Fron, the Amazon sisters, Gareth, and the others, Thanatos curled his lips upward, and without hesitation, stabbed the short sword straight into his own chest.
"Puh, "
With a muffled sound, divine blood overflowed from the corner of his lips.
The blade sank deeply into his chest.
This scene shocked even the seasoned adventurers.
Ignoring the speechless, wide-eyed, mind-shattered Loki and the others.
Thanatos unhesitatingly activated his arcanum, causing the lower world to tremble, so that his divine body would not die from the fatal wound.
"Cough… Go, Loki. This is my final gift to you all, from me, Thanatos."
Loki's eyes widened. She never expected Thanatos to take such an outrageous action, no, she simply didn't dare imagine it.
As far as she knew, ever since the gods descended from the heavens, none had ever done something so bold.
Every descent slot was unimaginably precious; no god would give it up lightly. After all, according to the contract, a god only had one chance in their entire life to descend.
Once forced back to the heavens, they would no longer be involved with anything in the lower world.
"Thanatos, you-"
She looked at him with a complicated expression. Thanatos only replied with a smile filled with resignation.
Immediately after, countless spheres of light wrapped around him, his silhouette blurring within the glow. Finally, he pointed a single finger toward the sky.
Then,
"BOOM!!"
Before the dumbfounded eyes of everyone on the surface,
A second ascending pillar of light pierced through the ceiling, shooting from the artificial dungeon straight toward the sky.
The violent surge, the pillar of light flowing upward,
The green flesh that had already invaded the hall recoiled as if afraid of the god's radiance, its assault weakening. The light from the pillar illuminated their stunned faces.
Next, because the giant light pillar rose into the sky, an escape route to the surface opened.
The abrupt, consecutive changes, combined with the pressure of life and death, left everyone who personally experienced it completely stunned.
Their emotions felt like going from hell to heaven and back again, over and over, draining their spirits dry.
"Don't just stand there, move!! Escape through that opening, hurry!!!"
As the light column thinned, Fron saw the huge hole forming in the ceiling.
At the same moment he gave the order, his order instantly spreading, the first-class adventurers and the captains of each Familia sprang into action.
They displayed the composure and strength of seasoned adventurers, bursting with potential as they shattered the stone, reacting at extreme speed to escape total annihilation.
Tiona, Tione, and Gareth instinctively picked up members with lower stats or injuries and leapt toward the large hole where the glowing fragments fell like snow.
"Loki!"
The other high-level adventurers discarded their weapons and followed.
Loki was grabbed by Fron, who became a black blur, and slung over his shoulder. With a light jump, he shot upward like a released bolt, moving with incredible speed.
Looking up, the end of their vision was the sky.
It was like the Dragon's Urn on the 52nd floor, an absurdly massive man-made shaft. No, it wasn't even a shaft. It was a hole. A tunnel straight upward.
Just as Fron left the ground and nimbly leapt onto the next floor,
The next instant, the tide of green flesh burst through the walls again, accelerating its assault, as if screaming "I won't let you escape!"
The illusion made Fron's skin crawl. Even though he'd seen it many times before, these derivatives of the "Fallen Spirits" still gave him a deep, instinctive revulsion.
"Move! Faster! Jump, jump, jump, aaaahhh!!"
Leaping nonstop, the adventurers shouted desperately.
Through the light pillar's "help", the tunnel connecting to the surface, they shot upward like lightning across each floor, aiming with everything they had at the glowing exit above, where twilight and stars could already be seen.
"Guhh…!!"
The tunnel shook with airflow, the wind roaring and vibrating, the pressure stinging their skin, the divine spectacle overwhelming their senses.
From the moment Loki was grabbed and slung over Fron's shoulder, her waist felt as though it would snap apart.
But in this dire urgency, Loki had no energy to complain. As an powerless person, she had no strength to spare to even feel the pain.