I opened an adventurer's guild in another world.

"They're here!"

Upon hearing the commotion coming from the passage, the sea creatures guarding the second level immediately prepared to attack.

All the magical sea creatures' staffs glowed.

Meanwhile, the seventh-tier sea creatures who remained here stared wide-eyed at the passage.

Pfft!

The sound of flesh being cut by a sharp blade rang out.

The seventh-tier sea creature stared in disbelief at the blade piercing his chest from behind, wanting to turn around and see who it was.

But the next second, a face bug that appeared out of nowhere pounced on his face.

"Hmm~~~"

The sea creature let out a painful roar, then its eyes bulged out, and it collapsed to the ground, convulsing.

"The Zerg are truly terrifying!"

The black-robed figure behind the corpse sheathed his long dagger, looked at the sea creature corpse parasitized by the facehugger, and took a few steps back—an eighth-tier shadow mage from the Demon Realm.

"Really? This is the first time I've seen a mage doing the work of a thief. Are all mages in the demon realm melee fighters?"

The sea creatures, still reeling from the shock, looked up at the sound coming from above.

Then they saw a slender woman with eight steel limbs on her back hanging from the roof—the Zerg Tier 8 Blade Queen.

"Let's close the net!"

A strange cry came from the passageway.

Then a soft-bodied monster with eyes covering its tentacles crawled out of the passage—the eighth-tier Abyss Monster, Golanfen's Touch.

After landing, Golanfen stood still, and a magic circle appeared beneath her body.

Then a large number of small magic circles lit up in the hall on the second floor.

Three-meter-long tentacles emerged from the magic circle, constantly lashing out at and entwining the surrounding sea creatures.

The eyes on the tentacles can also emit rays as thick as a thumb, which can penetrate the bodies of these mid-level sea creatures without any hindrance.

The moment Golanfen's Touch was unleashed, it caused enormous losses to the remaining sea creature forces.

Next, a skeleton knight, covered in white bones, descended with ghouls and began slaughtering the sea creatures.

More high-ranking individuals then emerged from the passage.

In just one minute, the sea creatures on the second layer were completely cleaned up.

"These guys are all very strong."

In addition to fighting, the eighth-tier knight Isidor was also gathering intelligence on other people.

Although we are allies now, we will all be enemies once we get there.

Therefore, it's wise to gather more information.

It is worth mentioning that, in addition to the Discipline Temple from the Roland Empire, the Magic Sanctuary and Dark Shadow from the Kingdom of Nigal also sent representatives from the human temple forces.

The other three families did not bring any people with them.

However, the three factions of the Discipline Temple, the Magic Sanctuary, and the Dark Shadows cannot trust each other.

"If what lies deep within Hidden Dragon City is truly as rumored, it could potentially create a god. The temptation is too great; even one's own kind cannot be completely trusted."

Isidore glanced at the two houses in the distance, his brow furrowed.

At this point, even if one is willing to cooperate.

But who knows if the other two companies are willing to cooperate?

Even if they agree to cooperate, how can Isidor know if they are genuinely interested in cooperating or just pretending?

Even if I were willing to cooperate, and the other two companies also agreed to cooperate, I would still believe that their cooperation was genuine.

But how can I convince those two families that I am sincere?

Faced with sufficiently strong temptations, this "chain of suspicion" inevitably leads everyone to fight their own battles.

Even though they are both human!

Once all the high-ranking members left the hall, found the core area, and arrived at the third floor...

Several figures suddenly rushed out of the hall on the second floor.

The souls radiating orange, purple, and black light from all around merged into Anno's body.

One of them was a red, seventh-tier soul.

"Even though there's no experience to be gained, picking up souls is still pretty good."

Anno summoned his creatures again to move the corpse.

He then went with Liz and the others to find the corpse of the seventh-tier soul.

Soon, Anno discovered a corpse in the arena that had been parasitized by the Zerg.

Liz stared at the corpse, its chest and abdomen still heaving, and exclaimed, "The corpse is still moving! Is it not quite dead yet?"

"He's not completely dead."

Anno frowned as he looked at the information displayed by the [Observer] and said, "It's been parasitized. I reckon a troublesome guy will emerge from the corpse after the parasitism is complete."

Anno gave the pig-headed man Samoro a wink, and the latter immediately swung his meteor hammer at him.

The whistling meteor hammer struck the facehugger on the corpse's face with pinpoint accuracy.

Splat!

The smashed facehugger splattered green blood.

but......

"Hiss~~~"

After a slightly eerie scream, the corpse's abdomen was suddenly ripped open by sharp claws.

Then a small monster crawled out of it, stretched out its body, and transformed into an alien that was just over a meter tall.

After glancing at Anno, the alien fled into the distance at an extremely fast speed.

"I didn't expect such a small alien to be a fourth-tier creature. What will happen when it reaches maturity!"

Anno looked at the little alien's data with some surprise, then stopped Samoro, who was wielding a meteor hammer, and had Buck bring the little alien back.

The little alien that Buck had captured was still baring its teeth and claws and "attacking" Buck, but then Buck knocked it out with a big punch.

"I never expected to encounter an alien. This must be the work of that Queen of Blades!"

Looking back, Anno realized that only the woman from the Zerg was likely to have created the aliens.

"It has completely devoured this seventh-tier corpse, and I have no more sacrificial materials."

Anno looked at the corpse hollowed out by the alien, pondered for a while, and then had his summoned creatures move the surrounding corpses to his side, taking only the parts needed for the sacrifice.

Afterward, Anno threw the little alien into the pile of corpses.

The little alien didn't seem to understand the enemy's intentions.

But it knew that these corpses were fertilizer for it to draw nutrients from.

Aliens grow very quickly when there are nutrients available.

However, it won't be easy for Anno to cultivate it to the seventh rank.

So Anno summoned his shadow again.

Without saying a word, Shadow headed towards the third floor after emerging from the building.

Next, he will take over from Anno and continue to investigate the situation below.

According to Anno's speculation, the sea creatures left two groups of people to guard the first and second floors, and they probably won't leave a third group.

After all, there were only two thousand of them in total, and now only one thousand remain.

If enemies break in, and the remaining thousand men can hold them off, there is no need to set up a third checkpoint.

If neither of these two routes can stop them, that already says a lot.

as predicted.

When the shadow descended to the third level, it found no corpses and no signs of a battle.

Without a doubt, those high-level individuals who came down earlier have now entered the fourth level.

"The fourth floor? I've never been down there before!"

The shadow murmured something, then walked toward the core area leading to the fourth level.

Fifth floor lobby!

Led by the half-dragon statue, the sea creatures did not engage in battle with the guards of the fourth core area and successfully entered the fifth level.

However, the sea creature responsible for contacting the remaining personnel on the second level approached the Mermaid Princess and said, "The second level isn't responding!"

The eighth-tier seahorse warrior next to the Mermaid Princess frowned and said, "At least on the first floor, when we encountered enemies, they could send us intelligence. How come there's been no movement at all on the second floor? Have they not been wiped out?"

If they don't reply within this timeframe, it's almost certain that the second floor has been wiped out.

"It seems there are more people following us than we thought!"

Princess Rebecca, the mermaid, looked ahead and said in a deep voice, "We have no way out but to move forward!"

However, we're already on the fifth floor; there's only one more floor to go.

Let's go!