PICK ME UP, ANOTHER LOBBY!

My comrades jerked their eyes toward me.

"Loro? But the city was in ruins back on the ninth floor!"

Trudy questioned.

"Serafina has a point though. The roads are arranged like the map Norn drew us."

Darius said as he eyed the paved streets.

"The layout of this place does resemble Loro's inner wall district."

Shanny recalled the sketch of the city.

"But how does the city still stand? Didn't Serafina say it had fallen years ago?"

Jonah asked.

I shook my head upon his remark.

"Remember, the forged land is founded by laws different to our world. Including the trials. It could be we just travelled back in time before the city fell."

I told my comrades.

They seemed to accept my explanation though the confusion still lingered.

"At any rate, this is a trial that will have its own objective to fulfill. We need to regroup with the others as soon as we can while the mission window hasn't appeared yet."

I said as I placed my fingers on the back of my ear.

"Zecht, Jyrgil! Can you two hear me?"

I called the party leaders through the communication blessing.

[Serafina?]

Zecht's voice appeared in my head.

[Hey, what's going on here?!]

Jyrgil the next.

Fortunately, both of them were still within range and sounded unhurt.

It would be troublesome if we were separated as far as ten kilochoro after all.

"Where are your parties now?"

I asked.

Jyrgil was the first to report.

[All of us in Party 3 are in some city packed with scaredy-cats. It's strange. They can't see or hear us even though we bumped into them and screamed at their ears!]

[Party 2 as well, except the screaming. Serafina, Norn just said something weird. She said we're in Loro.]

They were here in the city with us. Thank the goddesses.

"We are in Loro."

[What?! How?!]

[Didn't the city got destroyed by the monsters more than a decade ago?]

"I know it's confusing. But for now, I want you all to come to the central square in the inner wall district. Party 1 will head over there as well."

I told them.

[Sure.]

[Urgh, fine.]

I released my fingers from my ear and stared to my comrades.

"Let's go to the central square."

We all then made our way through the packed street.

People were flooding through the paved path toward the western gate.

If we did not study the map of Loro, we would have a hard time navigating through the sea of people.

After going through a few blocks, we found ourselves in a vast square with a five-storied city hall placed on the center.

The fleeing people did not bother to go this way since the streets provided quicker routes to the western gate and the square was surrounded by buildings with narrow passages in between.

There was no sign of Party 2 or 3 yet.

They were probably deployed somewhere in the outer wall district.

As my party walked toward the center of the square I spotted a familiar sight waiting for us in front of the large city hall.

Jonah and Shanny were squinting their eyes toward the same direction. They too found the sight familiar.

Once we arrived in front of the city hall, we discovered the human-sized statue of two winged-maidens embracing each other.

The statue of the Twin Goddesses.

The sculpture was placed at the top of the grand staircase leading into the city hall.

"Didn't we encounter one of this on the fifth floor?"

Shanny said, pointing the statue.

"That's right. We were running toward it back then."

Jonah confirmed. 

"On the fifth floor, the trial was completed once we reached the statue. But now nothing seems to be happening even if we get close to it."

I said.

The mission window had not appeared yet.

It was odd. It usually did not take this long to appear.

We still did not know what we were supposed to do in this Quintal Trial.

Yes. We were inside a Quintal Trial.

Nothing was going to be normal from this experience.

"While we wait for the other parties, let's go up the city hall and scout the land beyond the walls."

I instructed my comrades.

We all climbed the stairs, past the statue, and entered the building.

There were more people inside. The city officials and some guards.

All of them were so terrified that some crouched in corners, mumbling depressing words, while the rest had faces as pale as snow as they walked through the corridors.

Through more staircases did our party reach a turret at the top of the building which oversaw the entire city and beyond.

"What in Dunia?"

I heard someone gasped as we saw what laid beyond the outer walls.

To the east, an ocean of goblins numbering in thousands. They filled the grand valley of Surga Pass till the eastern horizon.

They were all gathering not that far from the outer wall. Lining up in a semi-circle as if they were about to perform a siege. They were.

Ogres could be seen sticking out here and there from within the goblins' ranks.

They were pushing siege towers that could easily reach the top of Loro's high walls.

[Goblin Lv.??? x7437]

[Ogre Lv.17 x326]

Meanwhile on the southern side of the city, to the vast plains which stretched all the way to the southern side of the pass, more goblins and ogres had positioned themselves.

Equipped with more siege towers, the monsters on that side seemed ready to storm the city as well.

[Goblin Lv.??? x3598]

[Ogre Lv.17 x171]

The monsters had formed their invasion forces through the eastern and the southern side of the city.

None was on the northern side since that region was already up in the rugged mountains.

I also noticed the garrison of the ninth floor way up along the peaks of the northern range.

Meanwhile to the west, the people of Loro were trailing out of the city. Fleeing.

We discovered soldiers of Loro had formed a barricade along the eastern to the southern side to block the monsters from proceeding into the city or having them pursue the fleeing people to the west.

Unfortunately, the soldiers were not as many as the monsters.

They did not even make up a fourth of the monsters' forces.

[Human Soldier Lv.??? x1141]

[Human Soldier Lv.??? x519]

About a thousand along the eastern side and less than half of that on the southern side.

My comrades eyed the soldiers with pity. They also knew the humans did not stand a chance against the giant horde of monsters.

The sight of this reminded me of the book which recounted the fall of Loro, among many other cities.

That being said, I remembered reading the ogres were supposed to be numbered among thousands in this invasion.

If there was anything that the Quintal Trial failed to replicate accurately of the fall of Loro, I was certain it would be the number of ogres, unless the book reported wrongly.

Though I did not actually mind the inaccuracy at all.

As we were observing the land beyond the city, I saw Party 2 entering the square from the direction of the eastern gate of the inner wall, while Party 3 from the west.

The two parties had noticed us atop the city hall turret as well.

Good.

We managed to reunite before the mission window appeared.

We could start planning a strategy from what we had gathered so far from the trial.

But I wondered what we were supposed to do.

The fifth floor's mission was 'escape.'

Back then we were meant to flee the enemies throughout the field and reach the designated point.

If the tenth floor had the same mission, then it would probably be easier since we had more parties by our side.

The enemies might had doubled since then. But now, there were the human soldiers that could distract the monsters for us.

If we were supposed to escape to the west along with the people of Loro, we could definitely clear this Quintal Trial without casualties.

But fate was hesitant to act that kind to us.

Once Party 2 and 3 reached the goddesses statue below, the black rectangle we now had recognized as the mission window finally appeared in front of each of us.

We all slightly tilted our heads down to read what the window was dictating us to do in this second Quintal Trial.

[Floor 10]

[Mission Type – Defend]

[Objective – Prevent the fall of the city!]