Back to the Labyrinth
Satou here. No matter how careful you are about staying out of trouble, sometimes trouble has a way of finding you. It’s not just about how you avoid it but how you recover from it with minimal damage, I think.
“Shoot, it’s getting away! Lulu! Mia!”
Arisa pointed up at the fleeing moss crab bee, her lilac hair blowing in every direction.
She was wearing adorable equipment that made her look like a magical girl, but thanks to her mannerisms, she seemed more like a valiant little knight.
As the bee flew away, one of its legs suddenly snapped unnaturally and gushed green blood.
Arisa must have used Space Magic without a chant.
“I’ll shoot it down!”
Decked out in battle-maid armor, Lulu readied her sniper-rifle-style Fireburst Gun and switched it into rapid-fire mode.
The glowing bullets that shot out of the long muzzle lit up the darkness of the labyrinth, the light reflecting off the crystal pillars that dotted the enormous chamber.
Lulu’s long, straight black hair shone against the light, casting a glow on her beautiful features.
“KWHAAAAANYWEEEEE!”
The moss crab bee created a shield with Ice Magic in an attempt to protect itself from the flaming bullets.
The shield managed to deflect a few of the shots, but it finally splintered apart with a light clattering noise, allowing the remaining bullets to rain over the bee’s body.
Before long, its wings had suffered so many direct hits that its flight became unstable.
“ ? High Wind Kyoufuu.”
Mia gripped her staff in both hands and held it aloft as she cast Spirit Magic.
A powerful wind similar in strength to the Wind Magic spell Air Hammer sent the struggling moss crab bee hurtling to the ground.
The blast blew Mia’s light-green pigtails backward, revealing a glimpse of her slightly pointed ears—the telltale sign of an elf.
…And that wasn’t all that the wind sent flying.
The High Wind spell also blew up the girls’ skirts, putting their colorful pairs of underwear on full display.
Arisa struck a Marilyn Monroe pose and exclaimed “Oh nooo!” while peeping in my direction, but I decided to ignore her.
“You coward! Decide whether you’re a bee or a hornet, I request!”
Shouting with her usual expressionless face was Nana the homunculus, a girl who appeared to be a busty blond beauty but was in reality less than a year old.
Her words were actually part of her “Taunt” skill, which made the moss crab bee spread its tattered wings and attempt to drag itself toward her.
“Wing Slasher…?”
With her short white hair, cat ears, and cat tail, Tama jumped in from the monster’s blind spot and sliced up its wings with her twin short swords, both equipped with “Spellblade.”
Then she charged the blades with magic to attack again.
“This is our chance, sir.”
Pochi, who sported a brown bob, as well as dog ears and a tail, used the “Blink” skill to charge the moss crab bee from the front and attempt to cut off its head.
She was probably hoping to deliver the finishing blow.
Her Magic Sword, also equipped with “Spellblade,” left a red line of light in the air as it swung.
“Pochi, watch out!”
My warning came too late. The dying bee flicked its remaining wing to quickly zip to one side and send Pochi flying.
Its charge also sent Tama tumbling to the ground as she attempted to attack it from behind.
From the corner of my eye, I saw Lulu rushing over to save Pochi.
“Let’s finish this thing.”
“Mm.”
Arisa and Mia began chanting attack magic.
Normally they might use paralysis or some kind of binding spell to keep the enemy in place before attacking, but since this one was a lower level, they were planning to simply crush it as quickly as possible instead.
“‘Blink’!”
Her crimson hair fluttering through the air, Liza of the orangescale tribe used the “Blink” skill to leap forward with “Spellblade” on her Magic Spear.
She closed in on the moss crab bee at top speed and drove her spear right into the center of its six compound eyes.
The glowing red light drew circles in the air.
“‘Triple Helix Spear Attack’!”
The swirling red light around the Magic Spear formed a helix shape as it sliced through the bee’s head.
The last remaining third of the monster’s HP bar depleted immediately.
“KWHAAANYNYMYNYWE.”
Finally, it let out a dying cry before the light left the moss crab bee’s eyes, and its part-bee-part-hornet body fell lifelessly to the ground with a loud crash.
“Awww, man. Liza got the finishing blow again.”
“Mrrr. Too bad.”
Canceling their attack spells, Arisa and Mia shrugged and started using detection spells instead.
They were probably checking to see if any new monsters were approaching.
As Arisa mentioned, Liza’s attacks had been standing out among the vanguard lately. Part of it was that she was the only one with anything resembling a finishing move, but I think it was also because her “Spellblade” had become more efficient than the other girls’ as of late.
“Pochi seems to be all right.”
Lulu, who had rushed over to check on Pochi after the bee’s attack sent her flying, reported back with relief.
Pochi’s head poked out from behind the wreckage of a broken crystal. Even though I knew from my menu’s information that she was fine, it was still a relief to see her looking safe.
“Don’t let your guard dooown?”
Tama appeared at Pochi’s side.
“Sorry to worry you, sir.”
“You’re bleeeeding?”
“This is nothing, sir.”
She appeared to have cut herself on a crystal shard.
Tama used a magic potion she had on hand to heal her.
I should probably make them armor that would cover their entire body sometime soon, instead of light armor that left parts exposed.
“Master, should we break down the moss crab bee?”
“This one doesn’t have any flowers, and we’ve got plenty of moss and crab meat, so we’ll just store it as is.”
“Yes, sir!”
I touched the giant bee monster’s corpse to put it away in Storage.
The moss on the backs of moss crab bees was an ingredient commonly used in lesser stamina recovery potions, and the small flowers that occasionally bloomed in the moss could be used to make medicine to treat various illnesses.
The crab meat tended to be a little tough and bland, but it was popular with the kids because of its faint honey-like sweetness.
The monster’s carapace was tough and sturdy, so it would likely make decent equipment. It wasn’t as strong as the armor my party already had equipped, though; it really could be used only for making crab hot pot.
Incidentally, I’d heard that the wings were useful as a catalyst for Wind Magic.
The wings of the ones that used Ice Magic also possessed ice properties. If infused with magical energy, they would give off a decent bit of coolness, and if I made fans from these wings, they’d probably be ideal for cooling off in the summer.
“Satou.”
Abruptly, Mia started clinging to my waist.
I looked down and saw a satisfied smile on her face.
“Went up.”
She probably meant that she had leveled up.
Because Mia required about twice as much experience as the other girls to level up, progress took a little longer.
“Praise.”
“Congratulations, Mia.”
After I responded to her blunt request, the other kids all gathered around to congratulate her, too.
“That means we’re all level thirty-eight.” Arisa looked at me challengingly. “Perhaps we could finally fight an areamaster now?”
“Not yet. Maybe once you defeat their spawn.”
Monsters with the Areamaster title were always at least level 50, so it was still too soon for the rest of my group to face one.
Their spawn tended to be around level 40. It’d be better to start there.
As I patted the impatient Arisa on the head, I looked around at the others.
“This seems like a good place to end this round of labyrinth exploration, I think.”
“Awww, already?”
“Yeah, there aren’t any enemies left in this area.”
There were still some small fries with levels in the single digits, but they were too weak to be effective training fodder.
During this trip into the labyrinth, we had thoroughly overhunted section 6 as planned, so there weren’t many powerful monsters left who might be useful experiencewise.
My kids had all worked very hard in this round of labyrinth exploration.
Before this time, we had been busy starting up an orphanage for the homeless kids in Labyrinth City, cleaning up the plunderer problem in the labyrinth, helping young women we had rescued from a fire downtown get back on their feet, and so on. In light of all that, we hadn’t been in the labyrinth in quite a while.
I think they might have been motivated by the fact that they hadn’t been able to keep up with the yellow intermediate demon we’d fought, as well as the plunderers outside the west guild who had been turned into demons.
Following that incident, we learned that the green-clad noble, Counselor Poputema, had actually been brainwashed by a green greater demon and that the incidents in Labyrinth City were part of this demon’s plan to revive a demon lord. Although I guess I’d crushed those plans without even realizing it…
Then I’d destroyed one of the avatars the green greater demon left behind, mostly to vent my anger and to put a marker on the other one before letting him go free.
Prior to this round of labyrinth exploration, I’d noted that the avatar that had been in the northernmost city of the royal territory when I first marked it had passed through Zetts County and was now moving through Lessau County.
Seiryuu County was north of Lessau County, but the avatar’s destination seemed to be Vistall Duchy to the northwest, so it looked like Zena and my other friends in Seiryuu City were safe for the time being.
“Okay, let’s wrap things up with our usual treasure hunt.”
Arisa’s words brought me back to the present, and I opened my map.
Previously, we’d entrusted sniffing out treasure to Tama, but this time we had decided to start searching for loot all together after clearing out the monsters.
We learned in the rookie explorers’ class that treasure chests were often hidden in the shadows of rocks, under piles of dust, beneath spiderwebs, and so on, so we prioritized those kinds of areas as we searched.
This seemed to do the trick, and we managed to find between one and three treasure chests per area.
None of them had anything too remarkable inside, but we sometimes found magical equipment, cursed armor, expired magic potions, and things like that.
“Sparklyyy…”
“It’s a souvenir, sir!”
Tama and Pochi were picking crystals off the ground and putting them into their Fairy Packs.
“Master, I would be happy to collect more crystals if you wish,” Liza offered.
“It’s okay. I grabbed a really big one earlier.”
I had collected around ten tons each of transparent and purple crystals, though the latter wasn’t as popular because of its color. I picked up a few tons of the more sought-after aqua- and cyan-colored crystals as well.
None of these crystals was especially valuable, but I thought they could be useful in creating honest work for the people we’d rescued from the plunderers.
My idea was for them to use small fragments of the crystals to make talisman accessories by carving them with runes like Luck, Good Health, Romantic Success, Heroism, and so on. They would probably be popular with the citizens of Labyrinth City.
“Ah! I found one!”
“Nice one, Pochiii?”
I followed the sounds of Pochi’s and Tama’s voices until I found a huge hornet’s nest in a hollow of the rock wall. What she had found wasn’t a treasure chest but a moss crab bee nest.
The nest of the local areamaster, the queen forest cancer hornet, was only the size of a fortress, so this must be a relatively young hive.
Many of the queen hornet’s body parts were quite valuable as materials, but the best acquisition was the wind pearl crystals I got from her eight pairs of wings.
Those were even better than the huge amounts of honey and wax I got from the colossal nest.
“Sweeeet?”
“So yummy, sir!”
Tama and Pochi scooped up drops of honey from the moss crab bee nest with their fingers and closed their eyes in bliss as they sampled it.
The flavor wasn’t as rich as regular honey, but it was just as sweet. It would likely be useful for cooking and making sweet beverages.
“Looks like this batch hasn’t fermented into mead.”
About a third of the honey I got in the queen’s nest was now mead.
We already had more crab-bee honey than we could possibly use up, but since Pochi seemed so proud of her find, I decided we could take this batch with us as well.
“L-look!”
“It’s a treasure chest.”
Once I stored away the hive, we found a golden treasure chest sitting in its place.
The bees must have built their home right on top of it.
“No traaaps?”
“That’s unusual.”
When my “Trap Detection” skill didn’t find anything, either, I used “Spellblade” on my fingertip to sever the lock and open the chest.
“Looks like a booklet, a scroll, and a vial.”
According to my AR, the vial contained a Cure-All Potion , and the recipe for it was on the scroll.
The booklet contained Earth Magic spells related to making golems.
I relayed this information to my party.
“Ooooh, that’s a pretty good find, huh?”
“Yeah…”
…Wait, huh?
“What is it?”
“Looks like this cure-all recipe is missing half.”
Maybe the other half was hidden in a different treasure chest. Either way, that was a pretty mean trick.
I already knew the elves’ recipe, so I thought I would be able to fill in the blanks from there, but this recipe half wouldn’t be much help on its own.
Maybe this was the beginning of a recipe-fragment-gathering quest or something.
“Too baaad?”
“So sad, sir.”
“These things happen.”
The golem-making spell collection and the vial of cure-all were treasures enough in their own right.
We continued our treasure hunt, stored the excess cores in the warehouse of our vacation home, and headed out to find maze frogs in section 8 to acquire some meat for the orphanage kids.
“Is it very far?”
“It’s around a two-hour walk.”
“Geh!”
“Geeeh?”
“Geh-geh, sir.”
Tama and Pochi imitated Arisa’s groan.
“Arisa, don’t make such strange noises,” Lulu scolded her.
“Sowwyyyy.”
“Sowwy…”
“Sorry, sir.”
Tama and Pochi mimicked Arisa’s apologetic pose, too. I guess they were just at the age of liking to play copycat.
“Mew?”
Just then, the pair’s ears twitched.
“I hear fightiiing?”
“Lots of fighty noises, sir.”
About five minutes after Tama and Pochi gave this warning, we arrived in a vast cavern where several large groups of explorers were locked in combat with monsters.
Despite the size of the cavern, it was tough to see what was in the distance thanks to a sea of weeds that grew to chest height and a curtain that hung from the cavern ceiling. The latter was made up of the dusty remains of the kind of spiderwebs we’d seen in various other caves and corridors.
“Hmm? They’re fighting mantises, not frogs.”
“This area is primarily bug-type monsters. The frogs only live in one corner.”
The explorers were doing battle with mantis- and grasshopper-like monsters and had cut away patches of weeds to set up encampments.
There were several large groups of them, ranging from ten to twenty people, and all were led by garnet-badge explorers; the majority of the groups consisted of a few main members above level 20 and supporting members closer to level 10.
Most of them were warriors, but each group had a few healers or mages.
Mantis monster parts were worth a lot of money, which meant the bigger groups with better equipment were battling them.
We didn’t want to get in the way, so we took a roundabout route that skirted the edges of the cavern.
“Sparklyyy?”
“It’s shiny, sir.”
Tama and Pochi pointed at a group of people wearing shiny silver armor.
According to my AR display, they were a party called Silverlight , which consisted solely of noblewomen.
Four heavily armored warriors served as the tanks, while the mid-guards in chain mail attacked from behind the tanks with spears and polearms.
“Master, aren’t those girls the ones we rescued from the rampaging maze ants before?”
Two familiar-looking women were breaking down a previously defeated mantis behind the armored group.
“Oh yeah. The Lovely Wings.”
Evidently, the garnet-badge expedition party they had mentioned joining last time I saw them in Labyrinth City was this Silverlight party.
As they were working, a level-5 maze hopper flew toward their group.
“Danger.”
“No need to worry, I declare,” Nana reassured Mia, who’d turned around.
Two shield-bearing women who were guarding the group turned to fight the creature.
Seeing this, the girls who were breaking down the dead mantis reached for their weapons, too, but their armored supervisor stopped them and had them get back to work.
The disassembly team looked a little frustrated.
“That one shield girl kinda seems like a scrub, though.”
One of the shield-bearing women was a veteran, but the one Arisa was pointing at was awkward and clumsy.
“I believe that is the same young woman we saw at the rookie explorers’ class. It appears she has yet to grow used to battle in the labyrinth,” Liza said, prompting me to remember her.
She was Sir Darrel’s daughter. Gina, I think her name was.
“Hey, you lot! Unless you have business with Silverlight, keep moving!”
An armored lookout brandished her halberd at us and shouted threateningly.
Oh right. In the labyrinth, you had to be cautious, even of other explorer parties. I thought we’d be all right, since we were so far away from them, but I guess we put them on guard because we were just standing there and staring.
After apologizing, we left the cavern.
From what I could tell as we left, it seemed like all the parties kept some of their people on reserve instead of having their entire forces fight at once.
This was probably a measure against monsters or plunderers who might try to attack while the group was exhausted or any ill-mannered explorer parties who could try to steal their weakened prey.
Of course, I guess it might have just been in case of emergency or the appearance of more monsters, too.
“I smell blood, sir!”
When we were about halfway through the main passage between the site of Silverlight’s fight and the next major cavern, we came upon a few corpses being eaten by monsters.
The monsters were flat, bug-like black creatures.
“Wait!”
As the rest of the group started to run over, Tama called out sharply.
She pointed at the archway, which was dripping with a dark-red liquid.
Blood.
A centipede-like monster dropped down from the shadows of the arch.
It was only level 15, but its head was the size of a pillow, and its body must have been fifteen feet long.
“I’ll use Space Magic to check our surroundings… Be careful. There are still two more maze centipedes up on the ceiling.”
As Arisa was using chant-less magic to investigate, the monster that had already dropped to the floor charged at us to attack.
“Centipede! Do not think that having more legs makes you more important, I declare!”
…I don’t think the centipede actually thinks that.
Nana blocked the charging centipede with her shield.
The creature used its momentum to climb over the shield and try to attack Nana, but she pierced its head with her Magic Sword.
Then, as the creature stopped moving, Pochi’s sword quickly cut through its joints.
“The monsters around here sure are weak,” Arisa remarked.
As we watched, the electricity from Lulu’s Thunder Rod rifle dropped the other two centipedes to the floor, and Liza quickly finished them off with her spear.
“Guard’s dooown?”
Tama, the only one who hadn’t joined the fight with the centipedes, struck down a demi-goblin assassin that was sneaking up on Arisa from behind.
“Geh! Th-thanks, Tama.”
“Don’t worry, be happy…”
Demi-goblin assassins use narrow passages to approach their targets from the shadows and often attack explorers from behind if they let their guard down.
With our random encounters taken care of, we went to deal with the monsters gathered around the corpses.
…Ew.
I knew that shape looked a little too familiar—it was a giant cockroach.
I definitely didn’t want to battle that thing up close.
“Master, if you lure it away from the bodies, I can light it up.”
“All right.”
I used Remote Stun to catch the maze cockroach’s attention and draw it toward us, and Arisa’s Fire Ball burned it to a crisp.
I guess they were particularly weak to fire.
“Maybe these poor souls were fighting the cockroach when the centipedes dropped down on them?”
Arisa cast a mournful glance at the half-eaten remains while Liza recovered bronze badges and identifying locks of hair from the deceased.
“Affirmative. The children should look away, I advise.”
The centipedes had dragged the wounded into hollows in the arch, so I went up with “Skyrunning” and brought the remaining bodies down to the ground. It looked like they had been a five-person party.
“I’ll cremate the remains.”
“Thanks.”
Arisa used the Fire Magic spell Flamethrower to cremate the bodies.
If bodies were left alone in the labyrinth, they could become coreless or cursed undead monsters. The proper course of action was to recover identification from and then burn any corpses one came across.
“I don’t suppose there were any survivors?”
“I’ll check…”
I opened my map, but I didn’t see any explorers moving in small groups around here.
If we turned left at the four-way crossroads up ahead, we’d find a large group of twenty or so on standby in a large cavern, and there were a few other explorers farther down that passageway acting on their own, but they were probably scouts for the big party, not survivors of this one.
“Doesn’t look like it.”
Just as I was about to close the map, I noticed something unusual.
The scouting group in question had apparently failed at drawing away a lone monster or two, and now they were running back toward the large cavern with several dozen monsters chasing them.
As I watched, the number of monsters increased, and soon it grew into a horde of fifty or sixty.
“Uh-oh. Looks like a chain rampage.”
“Oh my. Haven’t seen one of those in a while.”
Like Arisa said, we hadn’t seen a monster chain rampage since the plunderers led one, kamikaze-style, toward the labyrinth army encampment.
I guess we’d run into one the first time we entered the Celivera Labyrinth, too.
“Think it’ll be okay?”
“Well, we’re safe…”
The problem was the big party in the cavern.
They were outnumbered, and worse, their levels weren’t terribly high overall.
There were about five core members who were above level 20, but the other fifteen or so were only in the levels 5 to 10 range, so they weren’t likely to fare well against the monsters around here. To put it bluntly, they were screwed.
Even the maze cockroach and maze centipedes my party had just easily defeated against ranged from levels 9 to 15.
Regardless of whether the party got completely wiped out, there would likely be huge casualties among all the non-core members.
We weren’t obligated to help them, of course, but I would feel guilty if I left them be.
My girls could probably win without getting hurt; perhaps we should go poke our heads in.
“Mind if we take a little detour?”
The rest of my party enthusiastically agreed.
“Outta the waaay!”
“If you block our path, we’ll cut you down!”
Just as we arrived at the crossroads, two men with unsheathed swords came running from the direction of the large cavern.
Both of them were covered in sweat and blood, and their panicked expressions suggested that they really would attack us if we weren’t careful.
I prefer to avoid danger if I can help it, so we stepped aside and let them pass.
“Besso! Troy and the newbies aren’t following us!”
“Bah, leave those idiots! If they’re getting eaten, that oughtta slow the monsters down enough for us to get outta here.”
“R-right. You got it, Besso!”
I heard the men’s voices as they ran the other way.
I guess they’d abandoned their comrades.
There was quite a long distance from here to the labyrinth exit. I wasn’t sure if they’d make it there on their own, but that wasn’t really my problem, and I swiftly erased them from my mind.
“Those were the same guys we saw in that other chain rampage.”
“Were they?”
“Yes, master. No doubt about it.”
Arisa and Liza recognized the men from the maze ant chain rampage.
“Master, enemies approaching from ahead, I report.”
I didn’t really want to save those jerks, but they were heading in the direction of the bee chamber, so I decided to defeat the monsters chasing them for the safety of our hunting grounds.
On my command, Lulu’s Fireburst Gun, Mia’s Spirit Magic spell Sharp Wind, and Arisa’s Fire Magic spell Chain Fire Shot blasted the approaching monsters to bits in seconds.
“…Well, this doesn’t look great.”
While the explorers were at a clear disadvantage, their front lines hadn’t fallen apart yet.
Their leader must be an exceptional commander.
That said, they were being driven into a corner of the cavern. As soon as one part of their ranks broke down, they could all get wiped out at any moment.
The explorers were surrounded by cockroach monsters.
We were coming in to attack from the opposite side.
“Mia, when I give the signal, light up the room with Spirit Magic. As soon as she does that, Arisa, you send a chant-less Fire Ball into the middle of the monsters. When it hits, I’ll draw them away from the explorers so the vanguard can attack and destroy the cockroaches. Lulu, you protect Arisa and Mia, please.”
As I relayed the battle plan, I cast Enchant: Physical Protection on the group.
Incidentally, since Lulu’s Fireburst Gun was too strong, I told her not to use it.
I also had the vanguard refrain from using “Spellblade” and Foundation techniques and Arisa from using other chant-less magic or Space Magic. These restrictions weren’t some kind of gamelike handicap—they were for the sake of secrecy.
“All right, here comes the cavalry!”
“Wait a second, Arisa.” I grabbed her by the collar before she could rush ahead. “Let’s greet them before we charge in to save them.”
“Oh, good point. I’d hate for them to think we were plunderers and attack us.”
The Silverlight group seemed wary of other explorers, and since these ones were already in a panic, they might assume we were here to take advantage of their plight.
“This is the explorer party Pendragon! We’re here to help!”
“Thank ya kindly! If we get out of here alive, we’ll treat ya to all the beer you can drink!”
I had been braced for hostility, but the group’s leader accepted our help immediately. I guess they really were in a tight spot.
“Mia, now!”
“ ? Sun Light Youkou.”
First, Mia’s Spirit Magic lit up the battlefield from the area of the ceiling.
Immediately, Arisa’s Fire Ball exploded into the center of the group of cockroaches.
The monsters it hit burst into flames, and the fire spread to those around it as well.
Slipping in amid the dust and flames, I used my go-to Practical Magic spell Magic Hand—basically a kind of magical psychokinesis—to toss the cockroaches away from the group of cornered explorers.
“Ew, gross!”
“Mrrr.”
I understood Arisa’s and Mia’s disgust all too well. I felt the same way. Leave it to the worst insects ever to be able to adjust themselves in midair and take flight.
“Let’s go.”
“Tallyhooo?”
“Chaaarge, sir.”
“Commence extermination. No mercy, I declare.”
The four vanguard fighters charged into battle with their Magic Swords and Spears aglow.
…It was an absolute slaughter.
Pochi drove her sword into a cockroach up to the hilt, depleting its health in a flash.
Tama’s twin blades danced, slicing away the cockroaches’ health without leaving them a window to counterattack.
Nana cut down the cockroaches on the ground with her Magic Sword and crushed the ones that flew down to attack her with a Shield Bash. It was a very dynamic fighting style.
And Liza darted among the cockroaches, her spear piercing them one after the other with attacks faster than the eye could follow.
Talk about an overwhelming victory.
“Damn…they’re slicin’ through those tough shells like nothin’.”
“Tch, I could do that, too, if I had magic weapons.”
“Nooo, I don’t think sooo. My Mantis Sword’s a Magic Sword too, y’know, but, well, you’ve seen what it can dooo…”
My “Keen Hearing” skill picked up the explorer party’s voices.
I was using Magic Hand to control the paths of the cockroaches so that the explorers didn’t get attacked by more than they could handle at once, so I guess they had enough energy to spare now for a conversation.
I’d made Mantis Swords before, but I didn’t think simply using parts from a soldier mantis was enough to call it a Magic Sword. It took a lot of extra work to turn monster parts into a true magical weapon, after all.
Besides, unlike Liza’s Magic Cricket Spear, that guy’s sword wasn’t glowing red.
Of course, it wasn’t only the vanguard who were bringing the heat. The rear guard was hard at work, too.
“Bwa-ha-ha! The cockroaches are like garbage…” Arisa was getting a little carried away. “Boy, they sure burn easily. I think I’ll try out Fire Circle next!”
Still, at least she was using the chants each time and being careful to aim away from the vanguard or members of the other party.
“Master, above you!”
Lulu pointed up at a maze centipede crawling along the ceiling.
I had covertly tossed it away with Magic Hand, but I guess it had come back.
“Go ahead and shoot it, Lulu.”
“Yes, sir!”
A fireball from Lulu’s Fire Rod Gun brought the centipede down.
Unlike the rifle-style Fireburst Gun, this was a kind of rod with a rifle-like silhouette. When the trigger was pulled, it absorbed some of the wielder’s magic and shot a small fireball out of the fire stone at the tip of the “muzzle.”
Lulu didn’t have as much magic power as Arisa or Mia, but now that she was level 38, she had more than enough to use the Fire Rod Gun for a while without running out.
As the centipede tumbled to the ground, I finished it off with my fairy sword.
Then I left Lulu to guard Arisa and went over to the explorers with Mia, who was now wearing a red nurse’s armband. It should go without saying that Arisa was the one who had made this cosplay accessory.
“We’ll heal you! Please gather the wounded here.”
Arisa and the others cleared a space for me to make my way over to the explorers.
“Go ahead, Mia.”
“Mm. Okay.”
Mia used Water Magic spells like Water Heal and Remove Poison to cure the explorers’ injuries and afflictions, while I took the role of her guardian and manager.
“The pain’s wearing off.”
“Ooh, my wounds are healing! I feel like I can keep fightin’ now.”
“Whoa, the feeling came back to my arms and legs.”
“Me too.”
“Thanks, little mage girl!”
Because Mia was wearing a hood, the explorers didn’t notice that she was an elf, but they must have assumed she was a young girl from her petite figure.
“Mm.”
Mia nodded shyly.
Thanks to her healing, the explorers who had been down for the count were gradually able to return to battle. Soon, their front lines restabilized. Even the low-level explorers teamed up to take down cockroaches one at a time.
As the battle turned overwhelmingly in their favor, the explorers started chatting among themselves.
“That bastard Besso. Prime hunting spot, my ass.”
“He told us that stray maze cockroaches would wander in here alone, so we could safely hunt as much as we wanted.”
“Yeah, he claimed he was an expert at luring monsters, and look how that turned out.”
Apparently, the pair we had seen running away had suggested this hunting spot.
“Where are those two anyway?”
“Maybe they got eaten by monsters?”
“Serves ’em right.”
They didn’t seem to be very well-liked.
“Satou.”
Finished with her healing, Mia tugged on my sleeve for instruction.
“Looks like the battle will be over soon. Let’s just keep an eye on things from here.”
“Mm. Together.”
We sat down on a craggy rock and watched the fight, supporting them with the occasional tossed stone or healing spell.
Within less than an hour, the fight was finished.
“Thanks for saving us, Sir Noble.”
“Not at all. I’m just glad we made it in time.”
Mr. Koshin, the garnet-badge explorer who seemed to be in charge of the large party, had come over to thank me.
His party, Ivory Mane, had only four veterans. The rest were trial members he had recruited.
“So about your reward—”
Koshin looked hesitant, but I interrupted him.
“That won’t be necessary.”
“But…”
“If you happen to run into any explorers in trouble in the future, please lend them a hand.”
“Uhhh…you sure that’s enough? Doesn’t seem like much…”
“Koshin, you don’t know much outside of exploring, do you?” the man in glasses standing next to Koshin interrupted. “He means ‘passing on a favor,’ right, Sir Noble?”
“Passing on a favor”? I guess the Shiga Kingdom has a concept like “paying it forward,” too.
I nodded at the man, who explained the concept in detail to Koshin.
As he did so, some other explorers came over to give their report.
“Koshin! That bastard Besso is nowhere to be seen.”
“We found the two newbies he brought with him dead in the corridor near the nest.”
There must have been some casualties before we got here.
“We found that Troy guy! He was sleeping behind a rock!”
Judging by what I’d heard, this Troy person was a member of Besso’s party.
The person who had shouted dragged Troy over to be interrogated by Koshin.
According to him, they had attempted to gather a rare ingredient called “bewitching slime” from the maze cockroach nest and failed, causing a chain rampage of monsters.
“Master, I’ve collected the cores from the monsters we defeated. Would you like us to start gathering the other materials as well?”
“No, it’s all right. They’re too bulky.”
Centipede meat was poisonous, and maze cockroaches were probably riddled with germs, so I didn’t want anything to do with that.
“…What?” Overhearing this, Koshin stopped mid-interrogation and spun around to stare at me. “Are you serious, Sir Noble?”
He explained that centipede shells were a popular material for shields and armor, and the wings and carapaces of the cockroaches were valuable for making light armor for scouts.
Even the centipedes’ poison sacs and the cockroaches’ stink glands could be sold to alchemy guilds or on the black market.
“Please feel free to sell them yourselves, then.”
We already had more labyrinth materials than we knew what to do with.
Taking all that as a reward for rescuing them seemed silly to me.
“Mr. Koshin, we collected all the cores. ’Cept the ones that belong to Mr. Noble’s little ladies, of course. Should we start breaking down the materials?”
“Uh…yeah. Go ahead.”
Mr. Koshin accepted a sack of cores from the blood-drenched man, then turned to me.
“Mr. Noble, we’ll gratefully accept those materials. So at least take the cores with ya.”
It would be awkward to keep declining all his offers. I relented, accepting the bag of cores from him.
“Well, we’ll be on our way now.”
“Sir Noble! Once we get back aboveground, let us treat ya to some drinks like we promised!”
“Of course. I’m looking forward to it.”
Waving to Koshin and company, we left the cockroach disassembly site.
“No frooogs?”
“Lots of explorers and Mr. Flies, sir.”
When we finally arrived at the frog area, which was about the size of a school ground, there were hardly any maze frogs. The few that remained were already fighting other explorers.
There were a couple rotten-smelling pits in the uneven ground of the area, full of discarded maze-frog innards and such.
The puppy-size maze corpse flies Pochi had pointed out seemed to be feeding on them.
Since they appeared to have plenty to eat, they didn’t attack people as long as you didn’t interfere with their meal.
“There really are quite a few people here,” Liza observed.
There were nearly ten different parties in the area, including some I recognized. Among them was a group of about eight of the female explorers I had rescued from the plunderers, led by their big-sister figure, Sumina.
Normally they hunted in the areas appropriate for lower-level explorers, with the potatoes and beans and so on, but today it looked like they were on an expedition here with just their higher-level members.
“Master, aren’t there any frogs anywhere?”
“Yes, in there.”
I pointed at a muddy pond in the center of the large area.
Explorers with long-range attacks or the “Taunt” skill were gathered around its banks, waiting for frogs to emerge from the water. Some had even tied ropes around maze corpse flies and tossed them into the lake in an attempt to lure the frogs out.
“This reminds me of camping a rare-monster spawn point in an MMORPG.”
“Yeah, it’s pretty brutal,” I agreed.
I took my group over to an area with less people.
“Fishing.”
“Master, there are fishermen, I report.”
Riding on Nana’s shoulders, Mia pointed at some fishermen on the bank.
They were probably explorers, but they looked like fishermen to me.
I went a little closer and spoke to them. “Any bites?”
“Nothin’ but eyeless fish today. Can’t even fish up a single rock cray.”
The friendly fisherman explained that rock crays were lobster-size crayfish that disguised themselves as rocks.
“Yummyyy?”
“Rock crays and eyeless fish both sell for a lot, but they taste a little too muddy in my opinion, bein’ from a port town and all.”
So they cook them without even washing out the mud?
Though he said they sold for a lot, the postings I saw at the labyrinth gate later said eyeless fish were worth two copper coins each, and rock crays were worth one large copper coin.
“What’re you guys here to fish?”
“We’re frog fishing, sir.”
“Huh?”
At Pochi’s response, the fisherman looked up from the water’s surface to stare at us in disbelief. After a moment, he sighed and explained.
“The frogs don’t come over here. See those red flowers there? They hate the smell, so they stay away from ’em.”
He nodded toward the red lotus-like flowers floating on the water’s surface.
What a nice person.
“If you wanna wait for frogs on the edge of the lake, you’re better off going over there, past those rocks.”
“Just don’t space out at the water’s edge. Otherwise…”
As another fisherman started to warn us, we saw one of the explorers near the rocks in question get dragged into the water with a splash.
The rest of his group panicked and hurriedly pulled him back up with a rope he appeared to be using as a lifeline.
I was going to go over to help, but I guess that wouldn’t be necessary.
I thanked the fishermen, and we headed over to the rocks in question.
“All right, shall we fish up some frogs?”
“I’ll tryyy?”
“I’ll open my saucers like eyes, sir.”
Other way around, Pochi.
“This could be tough…”
“It’ll be fine.”
I used my radar to locate the area with the most maze frogs, then the See Through spell to pinpoint their location.
Then I produced a harpoon from my Garage Bag, tied a rope to it, and threw it at one of the frogs underwater.
“GWELOROOOON.”
The harpoon pierced the flesh of a maze frog, which bellowed in rage and came up to the surface.
Although the frog was probably over six hundred pounds, it was only level 13, so we finished it off easily. The frogs in this area seemed to be a little smaller than the ones we’d fought before.
“Hey there, youngster. Can ya spare some bones and cartilage? I’ll throw out the innards for ye.”
“Give us the skin, too, if’n you don’t need it. We can even break it down, quick as ye like.”
As I watched Liza and the others breaking down the frog, a couple of explorers came up behind me with large baskets on their backs. I noted that both of them had the title Looter.
“No need for that. I’m happy to give you the bones and skin in exchange for disposing of the garbage, but we’re keeping the cartilage.”
Fried maze frog cartilage was one of the guildmaster’s favorite foods.
“Say, what do you use the skin for anyway?” Arisa asked curiously.
“We sell it to workshops.”
They told us that maze frog skin was used for waterproof bags, rain gear for watery areas, and so on.
I had recipes for some of those things in my documents, but they didn’t seem terribly effective, so I didn’t intend to make them.
Saving time by letting the looters dispose of the garbage for us, we fished up two more frogs and defeated them easily, acquiring enough frog meat to feed the orphanage kids.
Sumina and some of the other explorers asked about my trick for finding frogs underwater, but I couldn’t very well tell them the truth. I used my “Fabrication” skill to make up an arbitrary answer. “Just trusting my gut and keeping an eye out for bubbles on the water’s surface, I guess.”
“There is a group in red up ahead, I report.”
“Mrrr. In the way.”
Once we finished our frog hunt, we returned to the first room in section 1.
All we had to do now was ascend the long staircase and return to Labyrinth City, but there was a problem: A group of explorers in matching red armor had formed a line in front of the staircase.
They were apparently heading to the middle stratum.
“Hmm? If it isn’t Sir Pendragon.”
“Hello, Mr. Kinkuri.”
The foxfolk general from the labyrinth army greeted me.
I didn’t see the captain who was usually with him. Instead, someone else was at his side.
“Good to see you again, Sir Jelil. Are you on your way to defeat the floormaster?”
“That’s right. I intend to bring it down with this flaming Magic Sword you lent me.”
Mr. Jelil, a garnet-badge explorer, hefted a bronze sword.
It was one of the prototypes for a third-generation Magic Sword I had created. I’d wound up lending it to him at the viceroy’s wife’s tea party.
I could easily mass-produce them with help from Arisa and Mia, but since they were chock-full of secret technology, I was reluctant to hand them out freely.
“But we have to dispose of the monsters in the Chamber of Trials before we can summon the floormaster, so it’ll probably be half a month before we can actually fight the damn thing.”
“Well, I have no doubt you’ll succeed, Sir Jelil.”
It sounded pretty tough, but at least they weren’t on a ridiculously tight schedule or anything.
I learned later from the guildmaster that the floormaster appeared only if you placed the core of an areamaster on an altar in the Chamber of Trials.
“Jelil!”
“If you’ll excuse me, one of my comrades is calling.”
“Of course. May fortune be with you.”
“Good luck…”
As the foxfolk man and I encouraged him, Jelil turned and left, his red cape flowing behind him.
I bid the foxfolk officer farewell, and we headed back aboveground.
“Looks like the recovery efforts are almost finished.”
As we passed the west gate of Labyrinth City and cut across the plaza, Arisa looked around.
It felt rather warm, maybe because we’d been in the cool underground for so long. The rest of my group looked sweaty, too.
“Yeah. Seems like all that’s left now is rebuilding the tower of the west guild.”
It had been less than half a month since the Plunderer King Ludaman had turned into an intermediate demon and rampaged in front of the west guild.
The speediness of the repairs was likely thanks to the machinelike golems and the architectural magic of the earth mages.
“Hey, young master! Wanna try some of our new takoyaki?”
Neru, a high school–age girl with red hair, called out to us from one of the stalls. She was wearing a tank top and no bra, likely due to the heat of the flat-top grill she was working with. I wasn’t sure where to look.
She was one of the girls I’d rescued from burning to death in the fire downtown.
These girls, as well as the girls we’d saved from the plunderers, now worked at food stalls and similar places to eke out a livelihood, all under the protection of my alias Kuro.
“Sure, thanks. What’ll it cost to get enough for the whole group?”
“Oh, we can’t take money from you, young master.”
Neru tried to decline, but I insisted on paying her.
Watching fondly as the girls blew on their piping-hot takoyaki, I took a bite of my own.
“Delicious. Is this maze octopus?”
“Heh-heh, not quite.” Neru grinned proudly. “It’s octopus kraken meat that Lord Kuro acquired for us.”
While my group was staying in the labyrinth, I had gone back aboveground as Kuro and brought some of my excess stock of octopus kraken and sea serpent to the tenement houses where Neru and the others were staying. I’d also sold some wholesale to a few big companies.
“Wow, that’s impressive.”
“Aw, man. That’s not the reaction I was hoping for.”
Neru pouted. I guess my surprised expression wasn’t convincing enough.
“How are sales going?”
“So-so… Oh, Miss Tama! Can you draw a takoyaki signboard for us like the other stalls?”
“Okey-dokeyyy?”
Tama agreed without a fuss. She had already drawn similar boards for the girls’ other stalls: DANCING CROQUETTES, WINNING SKEWERS, and FLYING FRIED POTATOES.
All of them were amazingly lifelike for pictures of food and easily stimulated the appetites of anyone who saw them.
“Want some croquettes, young master?”
“These skewers are freshly made, too.”
“How about some salted fried potatoes for a snack?”
The salesgirls at the other three stalls, who had been serving customers, joined in on our conversation. They were all dressed as lightly as Neru.
Though the stalls were successful enough that others had started selling imitations of their products, they still weren’t popular enough to have long lines of customers.
“Ahem, ahem.”
Hearing a very deliberate throat-clearing, I turned around to see a familiar noble boy.
If I remembered correctly, this kid was Luram, the second son of Baron Tokey. He was one of the boys who usually followed around Gerits, the third son of Labyrinth City’s viceroy.
“Hello, Sir Luram.”
“I-indeed, Sir Pendragon. I am glad to see you in good health.”
I understood that kids his age sometimes tried to seem mature, but the croquettes and skewers he clutched in both hands dampened the effect somewhat.
The girls who ran the stalls said he was a regular customer.
“Are you doing market research today?”
It would probably hurt the young boy’s pride if I asked if he was snacking, so I decided to make it sound more professional.
“Market…? Erm, yes. Yes, indeed. Market research, no doubt about it. Research is very important. My pa— I mean, my esteemed father, Baron Tokey, is in charge of supervising the market stalls, you see. So I’m market researching whether the food is still good quality and keeping an eye out for changes in the cost—er, market price.”
It confused him at first, but Luram seemed to quickly take a liking to the phrase.
He always seemed timid when he was with Gerits, but today he was making a show of using difficult words. Maybe he was just trying to show off and seem more grown-up.
“…Oh, it’s Mary-Ann.”
Immediately, Luram went back to his usual sheepish tone.
Following his gaze, I saw another of Gerits’s crew: Mary-Ann, the daughter of Baronet Dyukeli. She was talking to some explorers admiringly.
“Her father forbade her from exploring the labyrinth, but I guess she still hasn’t given up…,” Luram murmured to no one in particular.
From the sound of things, her parents had probably banned her from entering the labyrinth after she, Gerits, and their friends all went exploring and had their lives endangered by the former acting viceroy Sokell and his schemes.
I wasn’t particularly close with these kids, and I worried that they’d ask me to take them into the labyrinth if I talked to them too much. I made sure we left at the first opportunity.
“Welcome home, young master.”
“““Welcome home!”””
After taking a horse-drawn carriage back to the mansion, we were greeted by the head maid, Miss Miteruna; the senior maids, Rosie and Annie; and the young maids-in-training.
“Thank you. Miteruna, did anything happen while we were gone?”
I handed my coat to a maid as I spoke.
“Just after you left for the labyrinth, a messenger came from Viscount Siemmen.”
Miss Miteruna handed me a package.
They must have finished the scrolls I ordered.
My requests this time:
Pixie Light, which I thought might be profitable for the viscount like the Fireworks spells.
Mist Control and Paralyze Water Hold, which I had made during our seafaring journey on the sugar route.
And Flash Grenade, Stun Grenade, and Dimension Cutter, which seemed useful for labyrinth exploring.
Of these, Mist Control and Flash Grenade were for obscuring enemies’ fields of vision, Paralyze Water Hold and Stun Grenade were for suppressing enemies without killing them, and Dimension Cutter was for defeating monsters without damaging the meat.
“I also passed along your additional requests for Viscount Siemmen.”
“Great. Thank you very much.”
The additional scrolls I had ordered were original spells of mine to work with magic tools and my Menu ability.
They were an intermediary for output from technological spells I’d made previously, like Picture Recorder, Sound Recorder, Standard Out, and Graphic View, and even included the ability to input data on an imaginary keyboard.
The scrolls’ names were Virtual Keyboard, Data Input, and Data Output.
They were all lesser Practical Magic spells, so they should be completed within ten days or so.
“I sorted any other letters you received by the sender.”
“Thanks, Miteruna.”
The letters were arranged in a box on the desk in my study.
I sat down on the hard chair and sifted through it, looking at the wax seals of the senders.
Most of them were from Labyrinth City nobles like the viceroy’s wife, but there were a few belonging to noble acquaintances of mine from the Ougoch Duchy.
According to Miss Miteruna, I had also received letters and parcels from merchants, craftsmen, temples, and so on.
The letters from the director of the private orphanage contained the résumés of newly hired personnel.
“Do you have a lot of work to do, master?”
“No, none of it seems too urgent.”
“Then can we deliver the meat to the orphanage now?”
I nodded at Arisa and the others, closed my letter box, and stood up.
“You must put strength into your little finger when you form a fist, young one.”
“Like this?”
“Yes, now there’s a good lad.”
In the open field by the mansion, the Saga Empire samurai Mr. Kajiro was teaching some kids how to swing a sword.
The other samurai, Miss Ayaume, was patrolling the grounds. She was probably doing it alone because it would be difficult for Mr. Kajiro, who had lost a leg in the labyrinth.
“So can we be explorers now, mister?”
“You have a long way to go yet, you young fools.”
Mr. Kajiro ruffled the impatient child’s hair and grinned.
“Dang it, but I wanna eat meat every day like Pochi and Tama…”
Oh, I remember this now.
These were the kids who had vowed, back at the hamburg steak party we threw at the orphanage, to become explorers when they grew up.
I guess they were actually working toward that goal.
“Good evening, Sir Kajiro.”
“I am glad to see you safely returned, Sir Knight.”
“Thank you.”
As we spoke, I saw Tama and Pochi come running over from the back door of the mansion.
Excusing myself, I headed to the orphanage with them.
“Meeeat?”
“We brought gifts, sir!”
Hefting the hundred-plus pounds of meat, Tama and Pochi charged through the gates to the orphanage. Liza and Nana were carrying the rest with carts.
I had already requested that Miss Miteruna distribute some to the neighbors.
“Hooraaaay!”
“It’s meat!”
“Oh, it’s been so long!”
“Welcome home, Miss Tama.”
“Are you hurt at all, Miss Pochi?”
“Not at aaaall?”
“Pochi is amazingly unbeatable, so we’re fine, sir.”
“Larvae, please surround me and praise my efforts as well, I request.”
“Ha-ha, Nana, you’re so weird…”
“Nana! Pick me up!”
There were smiles all around as kids ran over to welcome us back with open arms.
“Allow me to offer my congratulations on your safe return, Sir Knight.”
“Thank you.”
I greeted the director and the staff members who came to welcome me.
The newly hired personnel all seemed like good people who would do well with kids, to my relief.
“We’re having a grilling party today! Eat till your bellies are full to bursting, everyone!”
“““Yaaaay!”””
That evening, we enjoyed a meat-grilling party with the orphanage kids.
Partway through, we ran out of meat, and I produced more from Storage while no one was looking.
Growing kids sure have impressive appetites.
Or so I thought…
“Yummyyyy?”
“Pochi can still eat lots of meat, sir!”
“You children took such small helpings. You must eat more to grow big and strong, you know.”
…but I guess it was my kids who had the biggest appetites of all.
Pochi’s and Tama’s bellies swelled up visibly, but the real question was where Liza was packing away all that meat on her slender frame.
The world is truly full of mysteries.
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