Third Floor, Labyrinth
Because the theme of this floor was "forest," most of the monsters inside were plant-type creatures.
Lillian ran through the map expressionlessly. He didn't bother fighting the mobs—at his level, killing them was meaningless. Against monsters that averaged level 15, even killing a hundred wouldn't level him up. Instead of wasting time, it was far more efficient to locate the boss room as quickly as possible, defeat the boss, and move on.
At present, the only way forward in this game was upward. There was no other escape. Kayaba had not yet appeared, so even if Lillian wanted to confront him, there was no way to do so.
With experience from clearing the first two floors, Lillian had become extremely efficient at map routing. His exploration rate shot up to eighty percent in no time. Kayaba probably never imagined a player would approach the game like this—under normal circumstances, even with dozens or hundreds of players, fully exploring a floor's labyrinth would take at least three days.
"Not bad."
Lillian stared at the massive door carved with reliefs in front of him. It had taken him less than three hours to find the boss room—without even reaching ninety-nine percent exploration.
There was no reason to hesitate. He pushed the door open and stepped inside.
Unlike the halls on the first and second floors, the boss chamber this time was an actual forest.
For a split second, Lillian thought he had entered the overworld. That thought vanished the moment he saw the massive tree ahead.
Creak—crack—crack…
The tree stood five to six meters tall, pitch black from trunk to branches. Its limbs rotated with grinding sounds. Red flames burned inside a hollow that resembled a head, and two thick branches rose like arms, emitting a low, eerie groan from somewhere within.
[Nerius the Evil Treant]
The gatekeeper of the third floor.
Lillian had no information on it. Despite being widely rumored to be a beta tester, he wasn't one. Argo's strategy guide hadn't been updated for the third floor yet either—it had only been unlocked for less than three days.
Facing a boss completely blind while soloing was, needless to say, extremely dangerous.
The battle began silently.
The instant the boss's HP bar appeared, Lillian dashed forward. The treant swept its branch-arms horizontally. He leapt back to evade, then searched for an opening to counterattack.
His greatsword struck the boss hard, dealing respectable damage—his level advantage clearly mattered. But he was still only one DPS. Whenever he had to dodge, he couldn't attack, and under those circumstances his total output over time might not even compare to that of ten level-15 players combined.
That was simply the price of going solo.
Lillian leapt high and brought his sword down in a heavy cleave.
Whoosh—!
Several thick vines suddenly burst from the ground beneath the treant. Their coverage was enormous—there was nowhere to dodge. Lillian was instantly entangled and slammed to the ground, unable to resist.
Damn it…
A "Bind" debuff appeared above his head. He couldn't move. Yet he still had a green anti-poison buff active—meaning the treant's poison was at Level 2, rendering his Level 1 potion useless.
Thrust.
A sharp branch pierced his shoulder, dropping his HP by one-fifth. The next second, another branch stabbed into his chest.
Countdown: 2… 1…
Just as the fourth branch was about to deplete his HP entirely, the bind finally wore off. Without hesitation, Lillian leapt backward and sprinted out the door within two seconds.
The battle ended.
The door closed.
The boss's HP reset.
Lillian looked at his HP bar, now deep in the red, and immediately chugged healing potions.
That was far too close.
He glanced at the sealed door, lingering fear still in his chest.
A bind-type debuff like that was brutally unfair to solo players. And Level 2 anti-poison potions weren't even sold on the first three floors.
Lillian looked down at his leather armor and silently thanked his luck. Its special effect had reduced the bind duration by half a second. Otherwise, he would have died there—no doubt about it.
Compared to the world of AOT, this one might seem less brutal, but the threat of death here was far greater. Of course, that was partly his own doing. If he had taken things slowly and played it safe, he would've been fine. But having chosen speedrunning, he had to accept the risks that came with it.
"Soloing isn't going to work… I can't leave my life up to luck."
He exhaled.
"I'll have to ask Kizmel for help."
It was almost ironic—a player unable to find companions to fight a boss with, forced to rely on an NPC instead. And he didn't even know whether NPCs could enter boss rooms. If not, he'd have to find another solution.
With that thought, he headed toward the labyrinth exit. Along the way, he encountered a small party farming monsters. The moment they saw him, their faces turned deathly pale, as if they had seen something terrifying.
Lillian ignored them and continued on his way.
The moment he left, the players hurriedly sent out a message:
{Target spotted on the third-floor labyrinth!}
Ding.
As Lillian neared the exit, another message notification popped up. After replying "It wasn't me" earlier, he hadn't checked his messages again. The other party had sent several more that he ignored. Now, two hours later, he decided to take a look.
The first message was from Terusuke:
{Was it really not you? If that's the case, you should confront Kibaou directly! As long as you expose flaws in his story, you can clear your name!}
After reading only the first message, Lillian closed the interface.
Although the suggestion was objectively sound, he simply didn't want to see words like that.
Then there was Argo's message.
After his reply of "It wasn't me," she had answered:
{Big sis believes you!}
"…"
That, at least, was something he could keep reading.
Scrolling down, he saw that Argo had sent several more messages.
{Even if I believe you, others won't. You have to find a way to expose Fang King's lies!}
{Where are you?}
{You're seriously not replying to your big sis?! Aaaahhh!!}
{You're in the labyrinth?! Don't come out yet! Seven guilds are already heading over to intercept you!!}
The last message had been sent just moments ago.
Lillian frowned slightly and instinctively glanced back over his shoulder.
So those players were the ones who tipped them off.
Irritation welled up inside him. The boss's mechanics were already giving him a headache, and now this bunch had to come stir things up too…
Do they really think I can stay rational forever?
He took a deep breath, forcibly suppressing the killing intent gathering in his chest.
He knew very well that if he truly lashed out and killed players, it would only play right into Kibaou's hands, as well as those who framed him.
But if he didn't fight back—was he supposed to just let himself be hunted endlessly?
"…Forget it. I'll go out and take a look."
He didn't follow Argo's advice to hide inside the labyrinth. There was no point.
Besides, he didn't believe that a pile of guilds could really do anything to him. And even if they could—if he couldn't win, couldn't he just run?
Calm and unhurried, Lillian walked out of the labyrinth.
They had arrived quickly. Over a hundred players were already gathered at the entrance, and more were still rushing in from the distance.
"Quite the spectacle," he muttered.
The moment the players saw him emerge, tension rippled through the crowd. Weapons were clutched tightly, every gaze fixed on him with extreme vigilance.
"You still won't confess?!"
"Where's your accomplice?!"
"Give up resisting!"
Some players who usually wouldn't dare provoke Lillian now grew bold under the protection of numbers, shouting righteously.
Yet when they saw the green marker above his head, no one dared to attack first.
Of course—if everyone rushed him together, they could kill him.
But whoever struck the killing blow on a green-name player would become orange-name permanently. Neither time nor cleansing quests could remove it.
That meant never entering towns again.
A life of wandering the wilds forever.
Who would volunteer for that?
No one.
So the plan was clear: first, force Lillian to turn orange.
They had already discussed it. A group would rush him, but some would merely pretend to attack. As long as Lillian struck back and hit even one of them, he would turn orange. After that, everyone could attack freely without consequence.
It was a solid plan.
Now all that remained was for the guild leaders to give the signal.
"Before you do anything irrational," Lillian said calmly, "can I talk to Kibaou first?"
The crowd exchanged looks, then unanimously turned toward Kibaou at the rear.
Kibaou stepped forward openly and stopped in front of Lillian.
"What do you want to talk about?" he said coldly, chin raised.
"We saw it with our own eyes—you and your companions ambushed us! You killed five of our members!"
"That's right!"
The other survivor stepped out as well, eyes bloodshot as he stared at Lillian.
"The straw hat! The greatsword! It was you!"
"..."
Lillian nodded slightly.
So that's how it is. Someone really did impersonate me—same appearance and everything. Interesting.
But fooling others was one thing. Kibaou had just seen him in the spider cave not long ago—could he really not tell it was an impostor?
Heh.
"So? Anything else to say?" Kibaou sneered.
"If you still have even a shred of conscience, hand over all your equipment, items, and secret intel! Then turn yourself in to the Black Iron Palace prison! If you do that, we might spare your life!"
"Is that so? How merciful of you."
"Of course!" Kibaou laughed smugly.
Lillian nodded, then looked at the other survivor—the young man with reddened eyes.
"You said… five of your companions died?"
"Yes!" the man roared.
"Five! You murderer!"
"…Then how about this," Lillian said calmly.
A flash of cold light.
Before anyone could react, Lillian's greatsword had already pierced straight through Kibaou's neck.
His voice was icy.
"Let's make it six."
What…?
Everyone froze—including Kibaou himself.
In that instant, the marker above Lillian's head turned orange.
"You thought I wouldn't strike first just to protect my green name," Lillian said with a gentle smile, watching Kibaou.
"So you felt safe enough to walk right up and slander me?"
He yanked the greatsword free and followed up with two ruthless slashes, completely emptying Kibaou's HP bar.
"Sorry," Lillian said softly.
"You guessed wrong."