Chapter 28
MIRA FINISHED DEVOURING her hot pot, getting eyefuls of naked adventurers all the while. Once she’d finished cleaning up, she relaxed with an all-season au lait and a good book. Namely, the Encyclopedia of Skills.
In the meantime, the fourth pair finished, and the fifth and final duo entered the shower room. One was an elven woman dressed in magical-girl attire, arousing a sense of affinity in Mira. She stared at the underwear and robes left in front of the shower room. Her gaze was lewd, but nobody was present to notice.
Twenty minutes later, the shower room door opened, and the women came out refreshed. They quickly dressed, paid with magic stones, thanked Mira profusely, and left to return to their friends.
“Now then…”
After seeing off the last pair, Mira stood, grabbed, the hem of her skirt, and threw off the whole dress. Indeed, it was finally her turn. It was late now, but she didn’t regret showering last. In fact, she headed to the shower room with excited steps. Before she could enter, there was a knock at the door.
Hrmm? There shouldn’t be anyone else…
Before Mira could do anything, a voice came from beyond the door. “Sorry! I forgot something.” It was the elf woman whom Mira had taken a liking to.
“I see. Wait a moment, please.” Mira quickly searched around the shower room. Then, she found it: a small pair of cute panties.
Bwah?! This is…!
Though shocked by the unexpected item, an evil desire burned within her. Mira was used to seeing girls’ underwear—those of girls she knew, at least. But when it came to a stranger’s underwear? That was different. She had to calm down, however. After all, she was a fellow woman.
Certain lechers would consider this a treasure. However, Mira did her best to “casually” pick it up and feign innocence as she headed to the door. They weren’t warm—it had been some time since the girl had taken them off—but Mira still desperately held on to that imaginary sensation.
“Here. These are yours, yes?” She gallantly opened the door and held the panties out to the elf girl, doing her best to feign disinterest.
However, something was off. When the elf saw Mira, she looked confused and astonished.
“Ehhh…?!”
What was going on? Could she tell that her underwear had excited Mira? Would the summoner be branded a pervert? She thought she’d concealed her feelings well. How had she been exposed?! Can it be? Can she read minds? Mira panicked, maintaining a poker face all the while.
A few seconds later, the elf girl jumped at Mira. “Look away!” she screamed, oddly desperate.
Mira did as she was told and looked away as the elf pushed her back. However, she heard a different voice.
“Sorry!” That was a man’s voice. “I didn’t expect her to come out looking like…that. I didn’t see anything! Not a thing!” And he was close—not that the “mansion” was particularly large to begin with.
Mira managed to turn her head toward the door as the elf covered the rest of her. She spotted a man, who’d turned away and was frantically repeating excuses. Big, empty containers were in both his hands; it seemed he was here for more water.
“Mira, you shouldn’t answer the door so shamelessly!” The elf girl sounded a touch angry but mostly concerned.
“Ah…right. Apologies.” The dots finally connected. Mira had taken off her dress and was only in her underwear. The elf girl’s sudden tackle had saved her virtue.
Eventually, Mira handed over the forgotten undies. Before leaving, the elf girl reminded her not to brazenly answer the door like that again.
Due to all the naked women who’d been in her room, she’d let her guard down. Mira apologized for her lack of self-awareness, reflecting on her mistakes.
***
Mira finally got into the shower room and took a deep breath.
Twelve girls, two at a time, in this tiny space… I can only imagine! As a raging pervert, Mira let her fantasies run wild as she inhaled the lingering scent and grinned lasciviously. Her brain was full of thoughts of women loving women.
In the midst of her delusions, she began washing herself and thought idly about what it meant to have self-awareness as a woman.
I’ve never really considered it embarrassing…
After all, Mira was proud of her body. The elf was right, though. She’d simply reminded Mira of what was normal. What did women do when seen in their underwear? Mira put all of her mediocre knowledge to work, trying to recall the scenes she’d often seen on TV.
With the most stilted performance ever seen, Mira covered her chest and crotch with her hands and said, “Eek! You perv!” This brought something else to mind. “The Birth of Venus…”
Despite the hot shower water raining on her, she felt a cold chill.
***
In the end, Mira left the shower with no greater understanding of femininity. She immediately put on a dress instead of lazing around in her underwear, obeying the elf woman. A cute girl had scolded her. It was natural for her to obey.
After that, she took out the Encyclopedia of Skills and a notepad to begin her daily skill check. She noted the skills she wanted to learn and the ones that she believed she could learn in her current state.
Soon, she could no longer defy the draw of sleep. She put away her book and notes, took off the uncomfortable dress, and crawled into her sleeping bag.
***
The next morning, Mira woke up at a reasonable time, did her morning business, and sat idly for a while until her brain had woken up.
“Hrmm… First things first: breakfast.”
Ten minutes and a change of clothes later, she shuffled over and made breakfast…though, all she really did was take out a yellow fruit, the size of an apple. Though its appearance wasn’t very striking, it was more than met the eye; it was an energizing fruit, made by Martel.
“Mm, delicious!”
Well, of course, it was delicious.
The sublime sweetness, outstanding flavor, and perfect level of sourness all came together to make another ultimate fruit that transcended all others. It was also highly nutritious and extremely nourishing. No breakfast could surpass this.
After being revitalized to the fullest, by a single fruit, Mira maintained her momentum by getting ready for the day, leaving the mansion spirit, and dismissing it. Just as she started to make her way to the seventh level, she stopped.
Right. While I’m at it… Mira caught sight of the party to which Colette and Etty—the pair who’d first used her shower—belonged. They were preparing to leave for the day, but the sudden disappearance of the mansion drew their attention, leading them to make eye contact with her.
Mira waved and greeted them. “How was last night? Did you sleep well?” she asked Colette and Etty.
“It’s been a long time since I slept that soundly.”
“What an awesome morning!”
Both wore big smiles.
“I’m glad,” Mira said, grinning. Then, she remembered last night’s dinner. Just a single herb had changed everything. “By the way, that aminica herb you gave me was astounding. I’ve never cooked a hot pot that delicious.”
When Mira conveyed her shock, Colette smiled gleefully. “Right?! I’m glad you liked it.”
Mira asked Colette if she could tell her any other, similar recipes she knew.
Last night’s hot pot had astounded her, to the point that she wanted to experiment with other herbs, but she was still just an amateur chef. As such, she wanted to learn the types of and uses for herbs from an expert first. However, these were recipes. If Colette had devised them on her own, she would treasure them. They weren’t something one could just ask for, let alone presume to own.
“You liked it that much? Sure! I’ll teach you some!”
There were roughly two kinds of chefs in the world: those who pursued cooking as a business, and those who simply wanted people to eat delicious food. It seemed Colette was of the latter. Just hearing that Mira had liked her recipe made her happy.
Mira learned more recipes that would bring forth dramatic changes, like last night’s hot pot. After storing them all in her notepad, she thanked Colette and gave her an armful of fresh fruit she’d gathered in the sixth level.
“Whoa, can I really have this many?! Thanks!” Colette gleefully accepted them. When her party looked to her with greedy eyes, she sighed and began divvying up the fruit. However, it was fun to share delicious things. Despite her complaints, she bore a big smile from start to finish.
Ah… Oh, no. That fruit…
As Mira watched her evenly divide the fruit, she saw it. She’d given Colette many fruits that tasted good and had potent effects, but some of them had…quirks. The fruit with the biggest quirk of all had been in the bunch that she’d so flippantly handed over: a fruit that looked just like the treasured Queen of Hearts, despite tasting quite the opposite. It did increase mana regeneration speed, however, so it could be put to good use by the mages.
What should she do? After a moment’s worry, Mira decided that she shouldn’t give away a fruit that tasted like a dare. She opened her mouth to warn Colette.
However, she stopped as she saw what Colette was doing. She shared the fruit with each party member, one by one. When she finally took the problematic, red fruit in hand, she stopped, picked out a different fruit, and gave it to Etty. Then, she went to the next person—Bardon, the one who’d proposed to Mira, out of nowhere—and put the red fruit in his hand. She wasn’t the party’s chef for nothing. Colette knew the nameless fruit already.
If Bardon was the victim, then there would be no problem. Mira decided not to take the fruit back.
She wisely kept the fruits from Martel for herself.
***
Mira left the pleasant group. Hearing goodbyes from all the other groups as she left, she opened the Great Temple door and proceeded inside.
The seventh level of the Ancient Underground City was clearly unlike the others.
The levels she’d come through so far were vast ruined cities, noble mansions, majestic places filled with towers, and a Kowloon Walled City lookalike. Each one was enormous, despite being underground, and overflowed with fantastical elements and adventure. The seventh level was different, though. It was as if the flow from the first to sixth levels had been cut off entirely, bewildering those who set foot within it for the first time.
As I remember, they called this “the fallout shelter,” “secret lab,” and other such things. Always reminded me of a colonization spaceship, in mid-construction.
The metallic ceilings, walls, and floors were all white, with built-in light sources that illuminated the long corridor. The metal doors along the way had no knobs; they were made to open and close automatically using authentication keys. The way the many-layered, metal doors moved, so mechanically, made this seem like a completely different world from the rest of the city so far.
Indeed, the seventh floor went from high fantasy to science fantasy. The cold, inorganic place felt more touched by human hands than anywhere else in the dungeon. Mira remembered a certain spaceship movie’s interior and compared it to this one as she checked her map.
The seventh level had many corridors and rooms, but its layout was simple and well-organized. The problem was the doors dividing each area. Different authentication keys were needed for each security level. It would take days for someone to collect all five authentication keys, but there was one difference here, compared to prior levels.
The authentication keys were obtained as items. Mira, who’d cleared the dungeon before, already had them. As such, she wasted no time and beelined to the end.
However, this was also true of her target, Soul Howl. One would assume that he’d go the shortest route possible, so it was likely that he’d already reached the end.
Still, how does he plan to deal with the Machina Guardian?
In order to enter the final room, with the Chalk Orb, one would have to eliminate the boss of this dungeon, the Machina Guardian.
The Machina Guardian was classified as a raid boss, but the one here was among the strongest, having been given the distinction of Guardian. It was normal for top players to fight it in groups of several dozen; it would be reckless for even a Wise Man to try to fight it solo. Even together, as a group of nine, they would struggle and need to work together to overcome their foe.
Did Soul Howl have allies? Mira had wondered about this before, but none of the witnesses had noted any companions, so she concluded that it was unlikely.
I hope he’s not planning to use what I think he is…
If the battle with the Machina Guardian was interrupted and some time passed without fighting, the boss would begin repairing itself. This in itself was not rare; almost all raid bosses began healing themselves if ten minutes passed without any fighting. That meant that if a raid wiped, they would have to start over again against a fully healed boss.
However, there was one loophole. It could be brute-forced, and anyone could do it. The method was to simply continue the battle. As long as there was a hostile presence in the arena, the boss wouldn’t start healing. In other words, someone could simply stay there and prevent it from healing until their allies returned.
Back in the game, there were people who’d made this a business. They were often called Alarms, since they kept the bosses from healing—sleeping, essentially. They often worked in groups of two or three. Alarms could be individuals, too, as long as the individual happened to be a summoner, medium, or necromancer.
Other raid bosses are one thing. But the Machina Guardian?
Sure, it would stop the boss from healing, if things went well, but that didn’t mean the fight would be easy. The Machina Guardian’s attacks were extremely powerful, so an Alarm could be obliterated in the blink of an eye if he tried to cut corners. Anything that could survive the guardian for a significant amount of time would cost much more mana, making it difficult to rest and recover.
Moreover, the Machina Guardian’s most notable feature was its durability. It was tough, even among raid bosses. Eizenfald’s full-power attacks wouldn’t even shave off a tenth of its health.
In other words, even if all went well, it would take a very long time for Soul Howl to defeat it on his own. The fight might even last weeks, and nobody could continuously focus for that long. Human limits would cause him to lose focus at a fatal moment.
Still, I doubt he would just run in without a plan.
Common sense dictated that a solo fight against a Machina Guardian was foolish. However, the Nine Wise Men had attempted and succeeded at countless foolish endeavors.
To solo a raid boss, one needed mental stability, more than anything. Plenty of mana needed to be poured into their Alarm, and one had to recover that mana with potions, in order to gain ample time to rest.
With enough money and patience, anything was possible. It was reckless, but maybe the shift to reality was an advantage in this case. Certain that she’d find out when she arrived, Mira quickly began her clear of the seventh level.
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