Welf slid down the wall and sat on the floor the moment the immediate danger was gone.
Tsubaki walked over, crouched in front of him, and inspected the abrasions around his wrists, not bothering to ask permission.
"You're going back to Raul."
Welf looked toward the pit.
"I can still help. Those things were making me repair weapons for hours, and I saw more of what they're doing down here than most of you."
His voice was stubborn, but his body made the argument difficult to take seriously.
When he tried to push himself upright, his arms trembled so badly that he gave up before getting halfway.
Tsubaki did not mock him.
"You've already helped. You found the giant's weakness while half-dead against a wall. That's enough smithing heroics for one day."
Welf looked unhappy with the decision but did not waste energy fighting it.
Asfi was doing the same thing with Lulune.
The beastwoman had regained enough awareness to follow the conversation, though the amount of blood soaking her damaged clothes made any suggestion of continuing deeper ridiculous.
"I can still give you information before you drag me back."
Asfi tightened the fresh bandage around her shoulder.
"You can give it while sitting down, which is an improvement over your normal approach to intelligence gathering."
Lulune ignored the remark and looked toward the pit.
"The giant wasn't the one controlling them."
Rayleigh turned. The words had everyone's attention.
Lulune rested her head against the wall before continuing.
"The monsters followed the same routine while I was tied up. They brought in weapons, practiced with them, collected magic stones, then fed everything into the pit. But every time the routine changed, all of them stopped first."
Ais frowned slightly.
"Stopped doing what?"
"Everything."
Lulune touched one ear.
"They listened."
The chamber became quiet.
Asfi's hands paused against the bandage.
"What did you hear?"
"Something hitting stone from below. At first I thought it was another monster moving through the Dungeon walls, but the pattern kept changing. Sometimes three impacts. Sometimes five. Once there were two, a pause, then four."
She looked toward the darkness.
"Every time the pattern changed, the monsters changed what they were doing. They moved prisoners, switched which weapons they practiced with, or prepared for another attack."
Rayleigh studied the pit again. The giant's dissolving body had exposed what lay beneath it: a sloping passage descending from the bottom of the opening, its walls marked with the same repeated weapon damage they had seen throughout the upper tunnels.
The faint pull against his Zanpakutō still came from there.
Whatever had been drawing at their spiritual pressure had weakened after the giant died, but it hadn't disappeared.
"So there's something farther down directing them."
Asfi nodded.
"Possibly through vibration rather than speech. That would explain why the creatures appear coordinated even when separated by multiple tunnels."
Welf looked toward the crude furnaces.
"And whoever or whatever it is taught them more than fighting. Those monsters didn't figure all of that out just by copying sword swings."
Rayleigh followed his gaze.
The weapon racks, the furnaces, the harvested materials: all of it had bothered him from the moment they entered the chamber.
Enhanced Species learning through observation was already established, but repairing weapons, sorting usable metal, harvesting monster materials, and organizing a training ground required something beyond copying a strike.
They were being directed.
Perhaps taught.
A heavy sound rose from below.
Thud.
Nobody moved.
Two more followed.
Thud.
Thud.
Then silence.
Lulune's ears flattened.
"That."
Five impacts answered from somewhere even deeper.
Tsubaki's hand settled on Tobiume.
"I suppose asking it to come up here and explain itself would be too convenient."
Rayleigh looked toward the injured.
"We're not going after it yet."
Ais glanced at him. He continued before anyone could mistake that for abandoning the hunt.
"We came here to rescue Raul's expedition. We have Lulune and Welf back, Anakitty's leg is getting worse, and Raul still has fourteen injured people behind a barricade. We return first, hand the wounded over, then decide who is fit to continue."
It wasn't hesitation. It was the reason they had entered the Dungeon in the first place.
Asfi agreed at once.
"Lulune needs proper treatment within the next few hours, and Welf is in no condition for another fight. Anakitty has also been compensating for that leg long enough that continuing would risk turning a manageable injury into something serious."
Anakitty looked down at the dark blood spreading through her bandage.
For once, she did not argue.
"I know."
Rayleigh nodded.
"Tsubaki, help Welf. Asfi takes Lulune. I'll cover the rear with Ais."
Tsubaki resealed Tobiume and pulled Welf's arm over her shoulder. The young smith grimaced.
"I can walk if you give me a minute."
"You had several minutes."
"I was recovering."
"You were sitting."
"That is how recovering works."
Tsubaki simply lifted enough of his weight that his feet barely needed to cooperate. The argument died there.
Asfi used Talaria to reduce Lulune's weight rather than trying to carry her normally, while Anakitty followed beside them with her shield ready in case any surviving Enhanced Species appeared.
Rayleigh and Ais remained near the pit until everyone reached the passage.
Ais looked down once more, and Gonryōmaru gave a quiet pulse in her hand.
The sword had been unusually restless throughout the expedition.
The first monsters had drained its lightning, the next group had reproduced part of it, and the giant had carried that imitation farther, using stolen electricity through a body filled with metal.
Every time, Ais had been forced to change.
Shorter releases. More precise timing. Less reliance on overwhelming the target with lightning simply because Gonryōmaru could produce it.
Rayleigh had noticed, and he suspected Gonryōmaru had as well.
Ais lowered her voice.
"It keeps copying the lightning."
"Yes."
"Then I keep changing how I use it."
"That seems to be working."
She looked at the blade.
"Gonryōmaru likes it."
A faint crackle answered around the guard.
Rayleigh smiled slightly.
"Of course it does. Zanpakutō are troublesome like that. Give them a difficult fight and suddenly they're having the time of their lives."
Ais considered that with complete seriousness.
"Like Tsubaki."
Rayleigh looked back toward the half-dwarf carrying Welf.
"Exactly like Tsubaki."
...
The return to Raul's chamber took longer than the descent.
Lulune faded in and out of consciousness despite Asfi's efforts to keep her awake, while Welf's condition worsened once the adrenaline from the giant fight disappeared.
Anakitty managed to keep walking under her own power, though by the time the barricades finally came into view, she had stopped hiding how heavily she favored the injured leg.
The reaction from the survivors was immediate.
Raul saw Anakitty first. Then Lulune. Then Welf.
Relief crossed his face so strongly that he briefly forgot the pain in his ribs and tried to move too quickly.
Ardi stopped him with one hand against the shoulder.
"You're injured too."
Raul accepted the reminder and remained where he was. His eyes stayed on Anakitty until she reached the barricade.
"You came back."
She lowered herself beside him with a tired exhale.
"I said I would."
Neither of them needed to say more.
Lyra had already cleared space for the rescued adventurers, and Ardi moved directly to Lulune, using the healing supplies they had left behind rather than wasting Nejibana's spiritual pressure unnecessarily.
Tsubaki set Welf down beside another Hephaestus Familia smith.
The boy launched into explaining what they had found.
Raul listened without interrupting.
When Welf reached the part about the giant absorbing the techniques of smaller Enhanced Species, his expression became grim.
"So everything we showed the student eventually reached that thing."
"Probably."
Rayleigh leaned against the barricade long enough to check his own condition.
His spiritual pressure remained stable.
Asfi finished giving Lulune water and looked toward Rayleigh.
"If we're going deeper, the team should be smaller."
Before Rayleigh could respond, footsteps echoed from the upper passage, a lot of them.
Every survivor raised a weapon until Ais recognized the presence approaching.
"Finn."
The tension in the chamber dropped, and a few moments later, Loki Familia's main rescue force emerged through the damaged route.
Finn entered first, followed by Riveria, Gareth, and a mixed group of Loki and support personnel carrying healing supplies, stretchers, spare weapons, and enough equipment to move the wounded safely.
Finn's eyes swept across the chamber once.
He understood most of the situation before anyone started explaining.
"You found the missing two."
"Yes."
Raul gestured toward them.
"And unfortunately, what found us is much worse than the expedition report suggested."
Finn listened while Asfi delivered the shortest useful version of everything they had discovered: Enhanced Species consuming magic stones, learning through combat, practicing stolen techniques, capturing adventurers, transmitting what they learned into a larger creature, and an unknown signal continuing from deeper below.
Nobody interrupted her.
By the time she finished, Riveria's expression had become severe.
"If something deeper is organizing Enhanced Species and teaching them to use adventurer tactics, allowing it to continue would threaten every expedition that enters these floors."
Gareth looked toward the lower tunnel.
"Then we crush it."
Finn didn't agree right away. His gaze went first to the wounded.
"The rescue remains the priority. Gareth, take command of the return group. Escort every injured adventurer to the thirty-seventh floor and establish contact with the surface teams."
Gareth nodded without complaint.
"Leave it to me."
"Riveria, go with them until the route is secure. We don't know whether other Enhanced Species are still moving above us."
Riveria glanced toward Ais, the golden-haired girl was clearly preparing to continue.
Riveria knew better than to waste time trying to order her back when Loki Familia members were still threatened by something below.
"Do not force Gonryōmaru beyond what you can control."
Ais nodded.
"I won't."
Finn turned toward Rayleigh.
"You've fought these things longer than anyone in the rescue force. Who continues?"
Rayleigh looked over the available fighters.
"Me, Ais, Tsubaki, Asfi, Ardi, and Lyra. Six is enough. We've already learned how the absorption works, and bringing people who haven't fought these monsters yet only gives us more variables to protect."
Finn considered the answer.
Then he nodded.
"I'll remain here until the evacuation begins, then follow as far as the junction. If the route changes or the Dungeon cuts you off, I need to know where you entered."
Rayleigh had no objection.
Finn's plan kept the next team small while still leaving them support to fall back on.
Anakitty leaned back against the barricade.
"There's one more thing. The creatures we've fought so far copied what they saw, but the smarter ones still failed when we forced them into situations outside those patterns. If the thing below is actually teaching them instead of merely coordinating them, that weakness may disappear."
Rayleigh looked toward the lower passage.
"That is exactly what worries me."
The sounds from below came again.
This time, something answered much closer as every Zanpakutō in the chamber reacted.
Rayleigh felt the pull on all five of his swords strengthen at once.
Ais slowly stood, her attention fixed on the darkness.
The thing below had noticed them, and this time, whatever signal travelled through the Dungeon wall didn't call the monsters away.
It called something toward them.