Chapter 26
BY AROUND NINE at night, Mira had successfully obtained the third symbol and arrived at the Great Temple in the center of the level.
“Goodness, it’s big,” she murmured as she looked up at the Great Temple.
There was a Great Temple on each level, and for the most part, they all shared the same size and design. The sixth level was different. Because the final, seventh level had no Great Temple, this was the last one. And it was three times bigger than the others.
The differences didn’t end there either. The interior was naturally bigger. The chapel alone was about the size of a small stadium. The ceiling soared overhead. Anyone who saw it for the first time would be taken aback by its sheer immensity.
What was really special was the interior decoration, though. All of the Great Temples, to this point, looked dilapidated, with only the shape of the temples remaining. This one was different. Finely detailed workmanship could still be seen on every wall and pillar, and the image of paradise painted on the ceiling was still vivid and striking. The near-palpable divinity that made this temple a temple still flowed through this place, even after so many long years.
There are some around here too. Mira surveyed the chapel and spotted a few adventurer groups resting here and there.
Their eyes found her in return too. They seemed curious. Perhaps that was to be expected; a single little girl had come to the sixth level, one designated for B-rank adventurers, all alone. These people knew the difficulty of this level well; they couldn’t not be curious about her.
Hrmm… Well, I suppose that group will work for a start.
Mira approached the closest group, which included a man who stared at her a little too openly. They were quite balanced, with three warriors and three mages, two of whom were women.
“I’ve a question for you six. May I?”
When Mira called out to them, the man who’d stared at her abruptly stood. He was uncommonly tall, and he had a tough-looking form. Anyone could tell that he was skilled at a glance but calling him attractive wouldn’t exactly be truthful. He stepped out to meet Mira, gazing at the summoner, who stood firm despite his advance.
He abruptly thrust out his right hand and loudly introduced himself. “The name’s Bardon. Good to be with ya!”
“R-right. I’m Mira. Good to…be with you too?”
She was taken aback by the abruptness of his introduction, but she reconsidered the situation and realized that introductions would be ideal before she started interrogating them. So, she shook his hand.
He clasped both hands around Mira’s and flashed a big smile. “Woohoo! Thanks!”
“Eh?”
What was he thanking her for? What was he so happy about? Mira cocked her head in confusion at the man, who’d begun tearing up.
Just as Mira started to get creeped out by Bardon’s emotional instability and mutterings of “thank you, God,” one of his friends—the lone male mage in the party—came over, seized his hand, and literally threw the big man back to his party.
“Sorry,” the mage apologized. “Don’t mind him.”
“Ooh. That was Ethereal Arts, wasn’t it? You’re not bad.”
The man dressed as a mage was only a little shorter than Bardon, but almost as bulky. He was clearly a powerful mage, and he’d constructed the spell that had thrown Bardon brilliantly.
“If you came here alone, I’m clearly nothing compared to you. I sensed another powerful being with you, until a moment ago. Laborer class?”
“Exactly right. I’m a summoner,” Mira answered confidently.
The adventurers who’d watched from afar began to whisper to each other with a mixture of surprise, doubt, ridicule, and admiration.
“A summoner, huh? I’ve never heard of any of you being strong, but I guess there’s all kinds out there.” The mage looked Mira up and down, searchingly.
Behind him, a male voice screamed, “Don’t leer at my wife like that!”
“What in the world is his deal?”
Mira turned her eyes toward the bizarre shout and found Bardon throwing a tantrum. Several people were holding him back.
“There he goes again, just when we thought he’d finally calmed down. We keep telling him not to propose to people the second he meets them. I mean, how does that work anyway, Bardon? You think a handshake means you’re married? Pathetic!” he scolded.
It was then that Mira connected the dots. When he’d said, “Good to be with you,” he’d meant it in a romantic sense.
“Don’t worry about it,” the exasperated mage said. “It just flares up sometimes. He’s been getting better lately, but you’re cute, so I guess he got excited.”
“Stop trying to seduce my wife!” Bardon roared, practically foaming at the mouth.
“He’s been like that ever since he learned his childhood friend got married.”
Bardon had always wanted to propose to his childhood friend when he grew up, but he never mustered the courage to confess. As a result, she ended up getting married to someone else, which had led to this. Now, he confessed to women the moment he met them.
As they conversed, Bardon continued to spew nonsensical remarks.
“Sorry about him. Really,” the mage apologized again.
“No, no. I’m sure it’s harder for your party. I can sympathize.” Mira spoke from the depths of her heart. And while it wasn’t really an excuse, according to the mage, Bardon was genuinely a respectable person and a strong adventurer—when he wasn’t doing this, at least.
“So, er, you said you wanted to ask us something?”
“Ah! Right, right.” Mira nodded in recollection. Bardon’s sudden rampage had taken her aback, but she gathered herself and faced the mage. “My name is Mira. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“I’m Hans. My pleasure.”
Mira and Hans introduced themselves more normally. After glancing and chuckling at Bardon, who was being forced to cool his head, Mira finally asked her question.
“I’m looking for someone at the moment. Have you seen a necromancer riding a Bicorn with a broken right horn anywhere on this floor? He probably wore a black cloak with magic circles all over it, as well as fingerless gloves.”
She described Soul Howl fully. The sixth floor had many narrow and complex passages, so it may have been easier for him to dismiss Bicorn and walk on foot. Knowing that, she added a few more characteristics of his clothing that she remembered from their gaming days, minus any features of his Wise Man’s Robes, as he might have taken them off to conceal his identity. Assuming his tastes hadn’t changed too much, he probably still wore the cloak and gloves.
Immediately after hearing Mira’s question, Hans asked in return, “I haven’t seen any Bicorns, but does that guy you’re looking for wear a black eyepatch over his right eye?”
An eyepatch on his right eye—Soul Howl hadn’t worn anything like that before, but knowing his personality, it was more than likely. However, the fact that Hans had asked her that at all was telling.
“Are you saying you’ve seen him?”
“Yeah, I remember him. It was last night, around this time,” Hans recalled.
It had been around this time, here in the Great Temple. Adventurers were resting after a hard day’s work when he appeared with multiple golems in tow. He went straight through the temple and into the seventh level, without pause. “When I saw you, I was surprised to see a second solo mage coming through. Maybe that’s why it hit me right away.”
Even if Soul Howl had golems with him, a single mage clearing the dungeon on their own would naturally seem unusual to the average adventurer party. Then, Mira had come along the next night. “I thought you might have been related,” Hans noted with a laugh. Eccentric adventurers always seemed to find one another, after all.
When Mira had described the man’s striking features, he’d been certain.
“That black cloak you mentioned was really striking,” Hans continued. “And his black eyepatch had a similar design. At the time, I thought he looked really weird. I couldn’t see his hands, though, so I can’t confirm if he was wearing gloves.”
“No, I think that’s an ample resemblance. I’m almost certain he’s the one I’m looking for.”
Soul Howl loved the undead to a fault, and he was often accused of having an eighth-grader’s sense of style. He also happened to prioritize form over function. Though he hadn’t worn a black eyepatch when Mira knew him, it sounded like just the kind of stupid thing he would do.
As two kindred spirits, he and Wallenstein had often teamed up and made dramatic appearances together during the war.
“Thank you for the information. Here, a token of my gratitude.” Mira thanked him, picked out a few fruits from her Item Box, and handed them to Hans.
“Fresh fruit? On the sixth level? This is a huge help. Thank you!”
“I’m just happy that you’re happy.”
The Ancient Underground City was an enormous dungeon. Normal adventurer parties took over three weeks to get to the sixth level. As such, they mostly brought nonperishable food. The only fresh food they could get was whatever was hidden in the still-operating facilities scattered here and there.
These facilities were all in difficult-to-reach places too. Going through all that extra effort was inefficient and unsafe. As such, Hans was happier about the fresh fruit than Mira had expected.
“Goodbye, then. Safe travels.”
“Yeah, you too. If you’re following that guy, it means you’re going down, right? You look strong enough, but the seventh level is real tough. Be careful down there.”
“Of course. I’ll keep that in mind.”
The seventh level was an A-rank dungeon, but it was among the harder ones, so it was recommended for A-rank adventurers to travel in parties. It was still far below Mira’s level, but letting her guard down was still dangerous. She knew this well, so she took Hans’s warning to heart.
“By the way, it’s more dangerous at night. Are you going straight down, like he did?” Hans asked as Mira walked away.
After the fourth level, the Ancient Underground City became much more difficult at night—even more so than other dungeons. The skeletons grew more active and more powerful after sunset, after all.
The adventurers who made a living here typically returned to the shrines or Great Temples before nighttime. As such, they couldn’t go too far to farm during the day. That was why their hunting grounds weren’t as spread out as one might expect, despite the number of adventurers in the city. No facilities operated in their effective hunting grounds either, so fresh fruit was even more valuable.
The video game allowed you to log out, so you could just go somewhere else if there were other parties competing with you for space. That was no longer an option.
“Today’s been tiring. I plan to rest here for the night,” Mira replied. She looked around the chapel. It was over a hundred meters from end to end. Then, a devilish grin spread across her face, and she said rather loudly, “I think I’ll take a nice, relaxing shower.”
“Shower? I wish. Good luck finding one.”
The sixth level of the city didn’t have any water sources, so one couldn’t get water unless they brought it with them or used Ethereal Arts. However, Item Boxes could only hold limited volumes of water, and the water-generating Ethereal Arts consumed a lot of mana. Just making a cup of water cost as much mana as an intermediate spell.
Most mages didn’t have mana recovery. Generating water would affect their next day’s farming capabilities.
There were sorcerer spells that allowed them to produce large quantities of water with less mana consumption than Ethereal Arts. But there was another difference: sorcerers’ water would disappear after a short time, while that of Ethereal Arts would remain. As such, it couldn’t be substituted with sorcerer water…unless one was ready to take serious damage.
Due to all of these factors, everyone knew that it was impossible to shower here.
“No, it’s quite easy for me,” Mira confidently replied. “For I am a summoner!”
There was never a bad time for marketing.
Hans seemed to notice this. “Oh, I get it,” he muttered. “Summoners can summon water spirits. Yeah, that does sound believable.” One could ask a water spirit to make a shower for them, and summoners could summon them at any time, if they had a contract. This also cost less than Ethereal Arts, making it easy to shower as much as one wanted. “So, summoning can be used like that, huh?” he said, impressed.
It was then that the two female mages pushed Hans aside and closed in on Mira, desperation clear on their faces.
“You can shower?!”
“Really?! Really?!”
“A-ah, er, yes. It’s easy with my summoning.” Though overwhelmed by their pushiness, Mira once again puffed out her chest.
“Let me take a shower, too, please! My cleaning wipes ran out, and I’m at my wit’s end!”
“Me too! I know you understand!”
They really seemed desperate. And they were correct; Mira understood.
They are a little stinky…
According to the girls, who introduced themselves as Etty and Colette, their party had been staying here in the Ancient Underground City for nearly two months now. As such, their Item Boxes were taken up by food, drink, and various tools and medicines necessary for their adventuring. They had no space for other sundries.
One such everyday item was the cleaning wipe, an item sold at Dinoire Trading for 5,000 ducats per ten-pack. They could be used to clean both one’s body and hair. After usage, they could even serve as kindling. Unfortunately, the girls had run out of stock a week ago.
Incidentally, men also had cleaning towels, but they were only meant for minimum cleaning. Though they were reusable, nobody would dare share them.
Women often had to forego feminine comforts when they became adventurers, so these two had expected this. But when faced with the cruel reality, their resolve wavered. It was so bad that even they could feel their remaining feminine sensibilities slowly dying.
And their party would be here for another three days.
“Very well. My summons are quite tolerant, so shower as much as you please!” Mira sympathized with the plights of the everyday adventurer, but at the same time, this was an opportunity. She smirked. They’d drawn the attention and curiosity of other adventurer parties, thanks to their volume.
The adventurers in this Great Temple were all powerful enough to get this far down. Mira would later learn that Bardon himself was an A-rank and had a special title. If these people learned just how strong and capable summoning was, it would help her mission to restore the art.
“This is a rare opportunity to shower. I’m sure you’d like a place where you can take your time, in private, no?” Mira said enticingly to the women, who wholeheartedly rejoiced.
“Yeah! It’d be a little weird out here…”
“If we go up those stairs, we can go to the room we usually use to wipe ourselves down!”
They agreed and began to run off. Mira stopped them. “There is no reason to leave.” The women looked at her curiously, as did the other adventurers.
In the midst of it all, Mira leisurely walked over to an open corner of the chapel and fixed her gaze on just the right spot.
“Summoning can even do…this!”
Picking the perfect moment, she activated her magic: Home Sweet Home. A large magic circle ran across the ground and shone brightly before gathering into shape. When the light faded, a building stood, where there had been nothing but empty space before.
“Huh? What is this?!”
“A tiny house?”
A fancy-looking mansion, the size of a shed, had appeared before their eyes. Etty and Colette were bewildered by the mysterious spectacle, and those watching were visibly confused.
“It’s still small now, but I assure you that it’ll get bigger.”
Standing around outside would not convey the mansion spirit’s charms. Remembering her own first impression of it, Mira smiled and opened the door.
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