Chương 21: Diamond Mages

'So this is a dungeon...'

Walking into a giant stone ruin followed by Luck, Asta and Noelle. Grim took in a deep breath as he felt the mana flowing through the stone constructs.

"This place is huge..."

Seeing the look on his face, Luck walked up next to him. "It's held up together by magic."

Nodding his head, Grim activated Breath of the Beast and used his enhanced senssory abilities to feel a large gathering of mana running through everything.

"This place is amazing!" Asta exclaimed while looking around.

"So much mana..." Noelle muttered.

Running around the area like a headless chicken, Asta checked over everything while taking in the sights.

Still using Breath of the Beast, Grim's danger senses suddenly went off as his attention was drawn to the area Asta was heading in.

"ASTA STO-

*BANG!!*

Before he could finish his sentence, Asta had accidentally stepped on one of the magic traps placed by the people of the ancient civilization.

"Eh?!"

Seeing the glowing light appear beneath his feet, Asta's eyes went wide as iron spikes shot out of the ground and struck towards him.

*SWOOSH!!*

Pulling his sword out at the last minute, he barely managed to cut down the spikes before they could impale him. Jumping back, a small bead of sweat rolled down the side of his face as he realized just how close to dying he was.

"What the hell was that?!" He asked with a hurried breath.

"A magic trap." Luck walked over to him with a smile on his face before pushing him forward and causing him to step on another trap.

---

"WHAT WAS THAT FOR!!"

"It was fun." Luck smiled before turning to look at Grim. "You sensed it didn't you?"

"Yeah." Grim grinned and nodded.

"Erm... What are you two talking about?" Noelle asked.

After using his Breath of the Beast's senssory abilities, he had long since sensed multiple different mana signatures coming from the upper levels. It was a shame that he was too far away to guess how strong they were or if they posed any threat to him. Thinking that he had discovered them before the others, he had planned to slip away from his group while they were treasure hunting in order to confront the unknown group. Unfortunately, it seemed like Luck's senssory abilities were nothing to laugh at as he had also discovered them.

"Race you."

[Lightning Creation Magic: Thunder God's Boots]

Clading his feet in lightning magic, he grinned at Grim before running into the distance.

Not wanting Luck to get ahead of him, Grim focused power into his feet as he used the physical enhancements he recieved from Breath of the Beast to chase after him.

Watching the two of them run off to an unknown location, Asta and Noelle stood stunned not knowing what to do.

"...I guess we should look around..."

---

"Ahahahaha, I'm gonna win!" Luck's voice echoed throughout the vast ruin as he kept increasing the distance between him and Grim.

Gritting his teeth, Grim did his best to push himself in order to keep up with Luck's insane speed. But while he may have adapted to Luck's speed during combat, it was too far fetched to say that he could keep up with him in terms of pure speed.

"Woah! There's loads of guys here." Luck's voice reverberated through the hall and into Grim's ear.

'Damn it!'

Following the trail Luck had left behind, Grim eventually took a sharp left and came into a large area surrounded by ankle high water and 4 different mages dressed in weird clothes and sporting the Diamond kingdom insignia.

"DIBS!!" Luck's voice rang out from above as he dropped down from the sky.

"Eh?! Clover kingdom mages." Surprised by the sudden appearance of the two boys, the diamond mages nodded at each other before getting into a battle formation.

"Ants..." From the amount of mana that he could sense from them, Grim determined that these guys posed no significant threat to either him or Luck. But since he was slightly pissed over reaching this place behind Luck, he couldn't help the creepy smile that was slowly etching its way onto his face as he found something to take his frustrations out on.

*BOOM!!*

Releasing an absurb surge of magic power that caused the ankle high water to go into disaray, the two beast swords materialized in his hands radiating soft gray light.

Being slightly pushed back by the sudden magic release, the mages of the diamond kingdom felt their bodies tense up as a primial sense of danger seemed to be emitting from the black haired boy's figure.

"Going all out from the start huh? Bet I can take out more of them than you can." Luck's cheery voice sounded out.

Looking at Luck and then back at the diamond kingdom mages, the smile on Grim's face deepend.

"You're on."

Focusing all of his attention on his right foot, Grim burst forward and charged towards the nervous mages.

"THATS THE SPIRIT!" Luck yelled and followed.

"DIAMOND FORMATION 1!" One of the enemy mages shouted before sending a wall of earth at the approaching Grim.

Watching the square shaped wall of earth getting closer, instead of slowing down or changing breaths in order to intercept the attack, Grim increased his speed and charged towards it before doing something that no one expected.

"What the hell!!"

"Nice one Grim!!" Luck laughed from behind.

The moment he was seconds away from clashing head on with the wall, the beast swords in his hand de-materialized as Grim jumped into the air and performed an amazing step B twist vault over the wall.

Twisting in the air, the beast swords materialized back in his hands as he focused his attention on the distant diamond kingdom mages. Taking advantage of the twisting momentum he had gained from vaulting over the wall, Grim used [Sudden Throwing Strike] to throw the swords in a rotating fashion across the long distance before lodging themselves into the chests of two surprised diamond mages.

"Huh?" Surprised by his actions, it took a minute for the diamond mages that had his swords sticking out of them to react.

"....AAARRRGGGHHHHHHHHHH!!!!"

"CHRISTOPHER!!" One of the diamond mages shouted when he saw one of his friends collapse.

"My turn!" Zooming past Grim, Luck appeared in front of the last two standing diamond mages. "Down you go."

By the time Luck had finished electrocuting them, Grim had appeared by his side and the two of them stood shoulder to shoulder looking at weird black haired man wearing a similar outfit to the diamond kingdom mages that they had just taken care of.

"Now would you look at that, two boys brimming with such youthful energy... How frightening."