Sora, as expected, had been the one to open the platinum door of the first sublevel, thus allowing Stark to access the spiral stairs.
She hadn't opened the door to floor 0 though as she was waiting for Stark, yes, she was confident Stark would win, no matter if it's a 2v1, or they had overpowered skills/rewards.
[A participant has been slain by another player]
[A participant has been slain by another player]
It seemed like only one among the three remained.
Who knows? Maybe Stark actually died and the one of the remaining persons betrayed the other?
"..."
~STEP, STEP, STEP~
Suddenly, she heard footsteps from below.
And after a few minutes...
~STEP... STEP... STEP!~
She usually had a neutral expression to everything around her, and even her friends and family considered her to be emotionless by standards since she NEVER showed any kind of expressions on her beautiful face.
And yet... she actually let out a small smile, barely visible compared to her normal face, but it was still there.
"Hey," she greeted him, her voice still emotionless though.
"Yo," while walking toward her, Stark put the [Healing Spring] around his neck and activated it, giving him back his full health and stamina.
"..." She got up as she has been sitting against the dark walls of the hallway leading to yet another platinum door.
"I guess that's floor 0..." Stark mumbled.
"I was just waiting for someone as I didn't want to fight the warden alone," she shrugged calmly.
"Makes sense," Stark nodded, "But you're awfully chatty all of a sudden, what happened?" she had not said even a word in front of the others, yet here she was speaking like it was a common occurrence.
"Didn't want to waste my saliva on pointless matters, but now that everybody is gone and it's just the two of us, we might as well try our best," she headed toward the door to finally open it, "I hope you're ready," right as she was about to reach her arm for her palm to touch it, she turned around and looked at Stark.
"Always ready," Stark shrugged, "We might as well get this over with."
"..." she just nodded as she put her palm against the platinum door, and after glowing for a few seconds it opened.
~CRANG~
Slowly but surely, the door opened, and once it was fully opened...
Beyond it was nothing but darkness.
"...?"
"Huh," Stark turned his head toward Sora again, who raised her eyebrows, "Since when did your voice sound so manly Sora...?"
"I thought you were the one who spoke, though?" she tilted her head, still as emotionless as ever.
And once the two of them looked at one another, they realized something: neither of them talked.
"Surprised?" the manly voice came from behind them, and once they looked back...
They finally saw IT.
[Warden, The Prisoner Killer]
It was peeking its head from beyond the darkness, completely covered in a dark blue armor with an oval hole in the middle that let them see how it looked like: it had blue skin, sharp teeth and pitch black eyes.
Its body was covered in that same cool-looking and sturdy armor, and it also had two sculk horns on both sides of its head.
Its arms' and legs' edges also had some sort of 'skull' protection on them made out of human bones.
But the most important part of it all... was the black hole in the warden's chest, and there seemed to be blue glowing spheres visible in the middle of its torso, right at the spot where the void was.
There were three spheres, each around the same size, and around them were some sharp bones (ribs) that came out directly from the armor, shielding them yet still allowing Stark and Sora to see them because of the powerful light they emitted.
That was all for the general appearance of the Warden, who looked extremely powerful.
But before Stark could even look at its weapons.
"Goodbye, prisoners," the warden lifted its [Sculk Hammer] and swung it sideways in the direction of Stark and Sora.
"FLOWER BARRIER!" Sora calmly lifted one of her arms, and vines came out of the ground, three white flowers appearing instantly like shields and blocking the blow.
And right after that... the warden disappeared into the darkness again.
It almost felt like it was using [Soulayer's] skill, except instead of mist it was just pure darkness.
"You should watch out," Sora spoke to Stark as she looked around, analyzing her surroundings.
"Yeah yeah, it can be anywhere," Stark sighed as he activated his aura and got ready to finally fight the final boss of this trial.
But unbeknownst to him...
"Prisoner..." it was already behind him, its hammer lifted higher than its head, and its pitch black eyes emitting a powerful aura, stronger than anything he had ever seen before.
[FIGHT!]
And so... the warden swung down its hammer at Stark, who didn't even realize where it was yet since it could freely navigate in the darkness without being noticed.
Since the moment they left the safety of the hallway with the stairs and passed through the platinum door into the darkness... they were already in its territory.
Stark and Sora vs the Warden, the final boss of the trial.