Chapter 72
Chapter 72
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 72
Chapter Title: Raphael
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“Raphael”
“How’s your core? Still dead?”
“…Yeah.”
Mar let out a deep sigh.
The ceiling he looked up at had a gaping hole punched through it.
“Coming down again.”
Rustle.
A centipede monster slipped through the gap in the hole and dropped down.
Thud!
It was just a regular monster, so dealing with it wasn’t hard.
Even though a Tier 2 Shard dropped as the monster vanished, the expressions of the two trapped in the pit remained grim.
“Are we gonna die now?”
“…I don’t know.”
“Sigh. Who’d have thought there’d be a burrow right at the entrance. Should’ve been more careful going in.”
Centipede Dungeon.
Pasha and her follower Mar, who had fallen into a pit dug near the dungeon entrance, couldn’t easily climb out.
For students who wanted to stay on the raid team even after dungeon training, growth was essential.
Monsters like Halibal or Aren had grown by rampaging through dungeons freely, but that method didn’t work for most students.
So the method students favored most was so-called entrance farming—safely hunting monsters that respawned every set time near the entrance to gather Shards.
Unless it was the Demon God’s Dungeon, the entrance wouldn’t get blocked, and there was no risk of running into the boss, making it highly efficient for students.
Pasha and Mar were among those students.
Lately, Pasha’s heart had been complicated.
The Mine she had ridiculed had overcome her dungeon phobia and was rising in status alongside Halibal.
It hadn’t just been Mine trapped in the past.
Pasha herself had been stuck in the past ever since her father’s death.
She couldn’t accept Mine—the one who had driven her father to his death—moving forward.
She had to move forward too.
Pasha convinced her follower Mar to go Shard farming.
They decided on one of the higher-tier dungeons, settling on the Centipede Dungeon.
But she had overlooked something.
Monsters respawned, but the dungeon’s terrain didn’t change.
That was basic dungeon common sense.
But a dungeon was an ecosystem.
Ecosystems always had exceptions.
Centipede-type monsters dug burrows to move around.
That was why new traps not on the map often appeared in the Centipede Dungeon.
Like the pit the two were trapped in now.
Rustle.
Another centipede monster fell into the hole.
“Damn it, again…!”
Mar spat a curse as he swung his spear.
He took care of the monster easily this time too, but his breath was coming right up to his limit.
“Tch. How many is that now?”
“Sorry, Mar. This is because I was stubborn.”
“What good is saying that now?”
Pasha bowed her head, unable to continue.
Her stamina was waning, and hunger was setting in.
Fatigue and sleepiness would come soon enough.
No one knew about their whereabouts.
What’s more, tomorrow was the weekend.
They couldn’t expect help from the academy.
She knew it.
In a situation like this, no one was coming to save them.
Just like with her father.
At that moment, another monster appeared above the pit.
“Huff, huff. I’m starting to get overwhelmed too…!”
No sooner had the words left his mouth than the monster charged at the two.
KABOOM!!
In that instant, a pure white orb flew in from somewhere and pierced the monster’s carapace.
The two looked up at the ceiling amid the successive explosions.
What entered Pasha’s eyes was someone she never could have expected.
“A-A-A-Are you okay?!!”
“…Huh?”
Mine, tears and snot streaming down her face in a state utterly unlike a Saintess, was firing off Holy Callings at the monster recklessly.
Pasha knew about Mine’s role-playing.
They said she projected herself as the mercenary Logia.
Changing her hairstyle, speech, and mannerisms made her seem utterly bizarre to onlookers.
But right now, her appearance was exactly the cowardly Saintess Pasha knew so well.
“You… how?”
“J-J-Just a second…!! I called for backup…!!”
“Did you come to save us?”
Mine started to nod.
Whoosh!
“Kyaa!”
A centipede tail appeared from somewhere, wrapped around her body, and threw her straight into the pit.
“…?”
“…You’re kidding, right?”
The two stared at the new guest in the pit, their faces blank with disbelief.
Mine swallowed hard and spoke to them.
“Ah… I-I think I got caught too…”
⁎⁎⁎
Having a large amount of holy power also meant being deeply connected to the Lord God.
That was why Mine, unlike true prophets, could receive minor oracles even if not full prophecies.
After class, while praying to the Lord God as usual, an oracle came to her.
‘Centipede Dungeon… Pasha is in danger…?’
She immediately contacted Halibal.
But he didn’t pick up.
Normally, she should contact the instructors and explain the situation.
The problem was the tram schedule to Anhel Plains.
The next tram left in 10 minutes. Miss it, and she’d have to wait nearly three hours for the one after.
How long would it take to contact an instructor, explain, and for them to prepare to move?
What’s more, oracles didn’t come down for trivial matters.
If an oracle had come, she might be too late if she didn’t move right now.
She checked her pouch—the one she carried Drowsyweed in—and it was empty.
Going back to the dorm for more would take time too.
In the end, she had no choice but to board the tram to Anhel Plains on impulse.
And now.
Now a new resident of the pit, Mine explained the situation to the two in a trembling voice.
Her sentences didn’t connect properly, but they got the gist.
‘Haliibal Belder is coming.’
At earliest, the next tram.
At latest, the one after that.
“We can trust Halibal.”
“Phew. Means we gotta hold out at least three hours?”
Mar sighed and scratched his head.
Pasha’s eyes were fixed on Mine, huddled in one corner of the pit.
Nails bitten to bits, body shaking.
The pit was pitch black.
Just like the Undead Dungeon that had traumatized Mine.
‘…Liar.’
What did she mean by coming to help?
She’d just gotten herself trapped too.
Seeing her like that, the rumors of overcoming her dungeon phobia were obviously all lies.
Rustle.
“Mar!”
Mar tried to swing his spear right away, but with Mine’s arrival making the pit cramped, he couldn’t swing it properly.
The moment the monster lunged at Pasha, Mar shoved her aside and took the attack instead.
“Urk!”
Clang!
Pasha’s follow-up attack felled the monster, but Mar’s arm was wounded.
A wound that would leave aftereffects if not treated immediately.
“Haa, haa…”
“Ah… Uh… N-No…”
Mine gathered holy power at her fingertips right away, but for some reason, it fizzled out with a pathetic sound.
Pasha supported the heavily breathing Mar.
Three hours ahead.
No end in sight.
“How long are you gonna sit there crying?! You said you came to save us! This is just sabotage, isn’t it?!”
Mine curled up even smaller at Pasha’s shout.
“You damn lying bitch!”
“Pasha, stop.”
“Out of the way, Mar! You know too, right? Because of her… because of her, our father…!”
She had pushed herself to come here in the first place because of Mine.
The hatred boiled over at the thought that the enemy who killed her father was now dragging them to their deaths too.
Pasha’s rage stabbed into Mine’s heart like a dagger.
‘Just sabotage.’
‘Because of you, our dad…!’
‘Liar.’
Pasha’s voice echoed especially loudly in the pit.
Over the past month, Mine had thought she had grown.
But no.
‘I haven’t grown at all.’
She had just walked a bit on the path Halibal opened for her, borrowing the power of Drowsyweed.
‘Still trapped in that dungeon from back then.’
Mercenary Logia was just a hollow suit of armor that only appeared with drug help.
In a true crisis, all that remained was the powerless Mine, who couldn’t even gather holy power from fear.
The light faded from Mine’s pupils.
That was when it happened.
Crunch! Crack!
An elite centipede monster appeared above the pit.
Ignoring Mine huddled in the corner, it charged straight at Pasha.
“Pasha!”
Mar tried to shove Pasha aside, but his injured body wouldn’t move as he willed.
In Mine’s eyes, the image of the middle-aged soldier dying bloodied overlapped with Pasha before her.
The stone door that had opened by her hand.
The skeletal giant that poured out.
The soldiers dying amid screams.
Even the nun’s final retreating figure.
Memories flooded in like a deluge.
And the memories went back to one night when she had overheard the nun and priest talking.
‘Was Father really a mercenary?’
‘Hee hee. No. He was a fisherman catching fish in Baran.’
‘Then why…?’
‘Because the children liked it.’
In truth, she had known long ago.
That the nun had been lying to her.
Even so, she had let herself be deceived.
Because that false story brought her peace.
‘Ah.’
And that was the same that day too.
Perhaps.
If she had overcome her fear and used her holy power.
Some of the soldiers might have survived.
She might have saved the nun too.
But she hadn’t.
Because deep down, there was the self whispering she was weak, trying to collapse.
‘From now on, live your real story.’
Her true guilt wasn’t the others dying before her eyes.
It was her own weakness, failing to save those she could have.
That was why she had kept deceiving herself.
I have dungeon phobia.
I’m a coward.
But she knew it well herself.
From the moment she stepped into the monster dungeon to see Halibal.
That the lies couldn’t go on forever.
‘…How could you tell such lies?’
Those words were really meant for herself.
To such a her, Halibal had said.
‘Just make it not a lie.’
At that moment.
In the monster dungeon, the boy standing tall with his sword had already shown her the way.
Not the path of the false mercenary Logia.
Not the path of the trembling Saintess Mine.
Her own path.
‘You’re my equal. Or more.’
Now it was time to move toward atonement.
She couldn’t let someone else die before her eyes anymore.
No more lies.
‘I’m not weak.’
“Raphael!!”
KABOOM!!
A blinding pure white flash swallowed the entire pit.
Creeeak!
Just as the monster’s jaws neared Pasha’s nose, someone emerged from the pillar of light and casually blocked the attack.
Where the light cleared stood an angel.
Long purple hair cascading down, holding a mace and rosary of light.
Pure white wings on her back scattered immense holy power throughout the entire dungeon.
Pasha and Mar stared at the sight, dumbfounded.
The angel’s face was the ideal mercenary Mine had imagined, longed for, and acted out over the past month.
Logia’s face.
And behind her, Mine appeared as well.
[Abyss Core - Raphael]’s ability was summoning.
Summoning an angel to assist in battle.