Chapter 41

“First, we have to climb down this hole, huh?”

Three days after the briefing at Bent’s manor, having completed our respective preparations, we gathered in the valleys of the Qua region at the mouth of a massive pit leading to the Labyrinth of the Earth.

Eni was the one who spoke, her face pulled into a look of sheer reluctance.

“Incredible. I can’t even see the bottom.”

Henya peered into the pitch-black abyss, looking strangely delighted.

Since we were challenging a dungeon from which we couldn’t return, everyone had brought a fair amount of luggage.

Brad was the sole exception. Between his greatsword and that massive iron chest he carried, he probably didn’t have the capacity for anything else.

“The shaft itself winds and branches off several times. Apparently, we have to descend while keeping our eyes glued to the map to ensure we don’t get lost.”

As he spoke, Hunt cast a glance toward Mora.

Surprisingly, Hunt was joining us in the dungeon as a sort of overseer.

Even more surprising was that no one objected. It might have been because his mentor, Brad, had guaranteed his skill, saying, “Even if the party faces a crisis, he’s at least talented enough to escape on his own.”

“Well, my lot dug this shaft. I’ll take the lead and guide us down.”

Responding to the gaze, Mora shrugged, pulled out a lantern, and stepped to the front.

“Let’s move.”

With Mora as our guide, we began the descent. It soon became clear that without her, this would have been an immense ordeal.

Descending a pitch-black hole is nerve-wracking enough, but the path twisted constantly and branched into countless offshoots.

If a person got lost once—setting aside a professional like Mora—an amateur would never find their way out. Of course, there were maps indicating the route to the dungeon proper to prevent such a thing.

I had one of those maps myself. Or rather, I’d bought one. Apparently, the Treasure family owned the distribution rights for them. I wasn’t sure whether to be impressed or annoyed.

We had been descending for nearly an hour.

“We’re here.”

Midway down the shaft, Mora let out a sigh of relief.

Wait, where?

To my eyes, we were just at another random point in the same dark tunnel.

“There.”

I followed Jin’s pointing finger, squinting until I saw a flat section illuminated by the faint glow of the lantern. Its texture was different from the surrounding earth. It looked like there was a breach in the surface.

That was it.

“I’ll go first.”

No sooner had she spoken than Mora dropped her petite frame into the crack.

The opening was just barely wide enough for someone of her size to squeeze through.

“Brings back memories.”

With a distant look in his eyes, Brad shoved his greatsword and iron chest through the breach. Then, folding his massive frame in ways that seemed physically impossible, he slid inside as well.

Impressive.

Feeling genuine admiration, I followed after them.

Once inside, I could see our surroundings more clearly than in the shaft; it seemed the inner walls themselves emitted a faint, pale luminescence.

Watch—who might have been even taller than Brad—and the burly Jin both managed to slip their bodies through.

And so, we had all made it to the other side of the wall.

“Hah… This is a disaster.”

I silently agreed with Henya’s murmur.

It didn’t feel like a dungeon. The inner walls were spiderwebbed with cracks, and dirt and stones had spilled deep into the interior.

“This is it.”

Shirona spoke softly, crouching down. At her feet lay a cracked crystal. Based on its size and shape, there was no mistaking it: it was a Return Stone.

“This… it’s definitely broken, right?”

I asked, just to be sure.

“Can’t you tell just by looking?” Eni shot me a look of pure condescension.

“No, I mean, Return Stones are Holy Relics. They aren’t supposed to be breakable, right?”

I felt a surge of unease as I spoke.

“There is certainly no record of a Return Stone ever being destroyed,” Hunt agreed gracefully, maintaining his poise even in this eerie place.

“Exactly. So we don’t actually know how much damage it takes for one to stop functioning. For all we know, it might still work in this state.”

“Urgh…”

Eni bit her lip, looking frustrated that I’d pushed back.

“It’s broken, alright.”

Jin gave the shattered stone a sharp kick.

“If you’re so worried, why don’t you sync with it and try to return right now?”

“Well, you’re probably right. I was just asking for safety’s sake.”

Even as I said that, I touched the Return Stone and attempted to activate a return. As expected, nothing happened.

“Thought so.”

As I nodded to myself, Brad spoke up.

“By the way, you two detectives.”

He was addressing both me and Kijiitsu, but Kijiitsu gave no reaction whatsoever.

“Yes?”

“You two have some skill, sure, but you’re detectives. You aren’t pure combat personnel. So, I have a proposal: why don’t you act as our porters? In exchange, the rest of us will form a defensive perimeter around you while we explore. How about it?”

“Sounds great.”

What a brilliant idea.

While Kijiitsu remained unresponsive, I agreed without a second thought. I would have been happy to carry everything myself if it meant staying safe.

Because Return Stones didn’t work, most of the group had brought a massive amount of consumables, making their packs heavy. At this rate, their combat effectiveness would be cut in half.

It made perfect sense for someone to manage the luggage collectively—and more importantly, it meant I wouldn’t have to do the heavy fighting. Total luck.

“Let’s go with that.”

“Oh? You’re on board?”

Ignoring Kijiitsu entirely, Brad and I finalized the plan. No one else seemed to have any objections.

“There’s a camp on the seventh basement floor. We’ll aim for that first.”

Brad, the only one among us who had been down to the tenth floor, took command. He was incredibly reliable.

Maybe this will actually go smoothly without any trouble, I thought, letting a spark of optimism cross my mind.

Then I saw them: a group of oversized lizards I recognized.

“Poison Lizards. Their raw combat ability isn’t much, but their venom can kill a human in seconds, if I recall correctly.”

Henya, seemingly fascinated by his first dungeon experience, spoke as several Poison Lizards lunged at him.

It wasn’t even worth shouting a warning.

With only the sharp ting of a sword guard echoing in the air, the lunge was over. Before anyone could even register him drawing the blade at his waist, the leaping lizard’s head went rolling across the floor, severed cleanly from its body.

“I hate these things,” Brad muttered.

He retreated with a level of caution that bordered on cowardice. Given his brute-force combat style—which usually involved ignoring minor wounds to crush his foes—a venomous opponent was a terrible matchup for him.

Despite the massive iron chest on his back, he remained hyper-vigilant of his rear, pressing his spine against the wall as he moved.

Kijiitsu, meanwhile, didn’t bother carrying any luggage, yet showed no intention of fighting either. He just stood there blankly next to me.

“Ah, crap!”

Eni, who had been incinerating enemies with what looked like gunpowder, leaped backward with a start. She was clutching her right elbow.

“You got hit.”

The moment she retreated, Shirona was already at her side.

She plunged a metal, syringe-like tool into Eni’s arm to deliver medicine while simultaneously weaving some kind of spell.

“You’ll be fine now.”

“Swift work. A common doctor couldn’t pull that off. A scratch from a Poison Lizard usually means death—or at best, being paralyzed for hours,” Watch remarked.

He spoke while threading his long spear through several lizards with effortless grace, skewering them in a single motion.

“But really, Poison Lizards on the very first floor? This is definitely a maximum-difficulty dungeon.”

“Tell me about it,” Hunt grunted, with Jin nodding in agreement.

The two of them kept their swords ready, neither overextending nor retreating. They systematically picked off the lizards one by one with practiced efficiency.

It was incredibly reassuring.

I focused on maintaining my physical reinforcement while clutching the luggage, feeling a strange sense of security in my role.

“And… hup, hup, hup!”

Mora finished off the last few stragglers by caveman-hammering them with her pickaxe. It was a bit gruesome.

As we cleared the monsters and pressed deeper, we came across a familiar, glass-like barrier.

“Ah, a one-way wall? They have these on the first floor too?” I couldn’t help but be impressed.

Gimmicks like one-way walls usually don’t appear until the final stages of beginner or intermediate dungeons. Their presence makes a maze exponentially more complex. Finding one this early—combined with the high-level monsters—confirmed the sheer insanity of this place.

“This doesn’t mean we can never return to the surface once we pass through, does it?” Henya asked, his face souring.

“If that were the case, I wouldn’t have made it back alive the first time. There are proper one-way walls for the return trip too,” Brad answered dismissively. We stepped through.

“Hey! Don’t get behind me!”

As we walked, Eni tried to naturally shift her position in the formation, causing Brad to practically jump out of his skin and level his weapon.

“Whoops! Sorry, I forgot.”

Since we started, Brad had been skillfully keeping his back to the walls, but Eni had accidentally stepped into his blind spot.

I could understand being wary of enemies, but refusing to show your back even to allies—while lugging that massive iron box—went beyond “cautious” or “cowardly.” It was pathological.

“Holy… look at this.”

Meanwhile, Jin’s sharp eyes had spotted a treasure chest. He was currently inspecting the contents.

He held a handful of gems, looking more terrified than happy.

“I’ve never heard of a dungeon, no matter the difficulty, giving up loot like this right at the entrance. Just what is this place…?”

As Jin groaned, Hunt remained composed.

“Now you see why my father is so obsessed with it.”

I had just started to feel safe, but seeing a veteran like Jin sense danger made my anxiety flare up again.

Despite my nerves, our party descended without any major setbacks, reaching the fifth floor after Shirona patched a few people up.

From there, the monster variety shifted. The combination of Black Slimes and Poison Lizards was replaced by Black Slimes and Metal Crabs.

Metal Crabs are crustacean monstrosities encased in shells harder than iron. They aren’t venomous, but they are incredibly sturdy.

“Metal Crabs have higher raw combat power, though Poison Lizards are far more annoying,” Jin noted.

“Hahaha!”

Brad moved to the front with glee, swinging his greatsword. He didn’t seem to care even when sharp pincers pierced his arms or legs; he just slaughtered the crabs by smashing through their shells entirely.

“Here, have some!”

Iron shells meant nothing to Eni’s flames. The Metal Crabs ended up boiled alongside the slimes in the intense heat.

Watch, Jin, and Hunt continued to take down enemies with steady precision. Kijiitsu still did nothing, and Henya retreated to the back, swapping places with Brad while grumbling that the crabs would “chip his blade.”

Finally, we reached the seventh floor.

We arrived at the camp.

“Let’s drop any luggage we won’t need immediately here. We’re spending the night, anyway,” Jin directed as soon as we realized the monsters had stopped spawning in this wide hall.

“It’s a pity to keep making them play porter. They’ve got some skill; it’s about time they started fighting,” Jin added, glancing at me with a smirk that didn’t reach his eyes.

“Ugh.” I shrugged.

By now, everyone was essentially ignoring Kijiitsu. It wasn’t so much out of spite as it was fear—it’s hard to trust someone when you have no idea what they’re thinking.

“Wait… Watch is gone,” Hunt muttered, sheathing his sword and frowning.

Now that he mentioned it, the tall man with the spear was nowhere to be seen.

“Gone?!”

Henya’s reaction was explosive. Despite being in a safe camp, he gripped the hilt of his sword. It was obvious there was some serious history between him and Watch, likely stemming from their shared homeland of Isu.

“I have returned.”

Watch reappeared, carrying his massive spear in one hand as if it weighed nothing. For me, it would take max physical reinforcement and both hands just to lift the thing.

The man’s strength was monstrous. I’d seen him not only thrusting through distant enemies but also crushing a Metal Crab that had gotten too close by simply swinging the shaft of the spear like a club. He was a terrifying mix of technique and raw power.

“Where were you?” Eni asked, her eyes on Watch while she refilled her pouches with powders and liquids.

“I was checking the path ahead. There is nothing but a descending staircase.”

“I would prefer it if you didn’t act on your own,” Hunt warned. Watch bowed his head in silent acknowledgment.

“Is anyone else injured? Show me even the smallest scratch. Infection or venom can take hold from the tiniest wound,” Shirona called out in her small but clear voice, setting out her medical supplies.

“I’m fine,” Brad said. Even in camp, he stayed away from the group, leaning against a far wall by himself.

In a way, he was more alienated than Kijiitsu. It was bizarre to see someone so openly refuse to trust others, but since nobody else seemed surprised, I assumed this was just the “normal” Brad.

Man, what a weirdo.

Then again, the whole group was full of them.