Come With Me to the Dungeon
After class, as always, we gathered at the café for a bit of idle chatter.
It had become routine by now — a settled part of our daily lives.
Ever since the study group was formed, Chloe had us spending time here under her leadership.
The official reasoning went something like this: since this lineup would be moving together from now on, we needed to meet often and learn to work in sync.
Apparently, letting things get sloppy just because the practical assessment was over was unacceptable.
Not that she was wrong.
"Haaah... hehe, Chloe, let me go! I have to go home and play my game, I'm telling you!"
"Oh come on, Eva. Just push through for today?"
"Nooo, hehe, Chloe, you liar! How many times have you said that already?! After everything I've endured to put up with you, this is—"
The truth of the matter was the Hikikomori Eva Rehabilitation Program.
It was Chloe's tearful, valiant effort to drag her out into the fresh air by force.
"Just bear with it, just for today. You know the dungeon practical is coming up soon. We need to discuss it."
"Th-the dungeon practical? Is... is it somewhere different from the place we went before?"
"The instructor explained it roughly during class. Don't tell me you missed it?"
"Ahahaha..."
Eva looked off into the distance, dodging Chloe's question.
Apparently she didn't have the courage to answer while meeting her eyes.
"Coming from the girl who plays games on her phone every single minute of class — how would you have heard anything?"
"Whyyy..."
When I struck true, like a monster on its last legs taking a finishing blow, Eva deflated like a punctured balloon.
The pattern of failing to focus in class and getting scolded by Chloe — the familiar scene from the early chapters of the novel brought a smile to my face without my even noticing.
"Chloe said so. She said Solis is no better. That you're in no position to criticize anyone."
"I'm fine. Even when I'm not focusing, I at least keep one ear open. Unlike Eva, who loses the important stuff entirely."
"Oh. So that's why you don't get scolded by Chloe. Unlike Eva."
"Hnngh..."
Eva was getting pummeled.
With her defense mechanism triggered, she curled herself into a ball like an armadillo.
The girl can't keep her wits about her under a barrage from everyone around her.
Guess I should help her out.
"Still, I might be better off than someone who listens hard and still doesn't understand. At least Eva has a path to redemption — she actually listens when people talk to her."
"Solis, take a hit."
"Pfft, hahaha!"
Target changed.
Firing commenced.
Marin, made the target, was spurred by the sudden spark of fire and lunged at me.
A vicious fist came flying like a boxer's jab.
An attack fast enough to leave an afterimage.
Threatening, sure, but all I had to do was not get hit.
Whish!
"Aiku."
I tilted my head and leaned back, dodging it with ease.
"Sorry, Marin, not a chance. My mana's back now — I could block that with my eyes closed."
"Solis, mean."
Marin filled her mouth with air.
She'd been doing that a lot more often lately.
I knew how to deal with it now, so it was fine.
"Sorry. It was just a joke — I was only playing around because I wanted to have fun with you."
I offered a sincere apology and placed my hand on her head.
Gently stroking it, like petting a dog's fur.
"I didn't mean anything bad by it. I just teased you a little because I wanted to play."
"Really?"
"How could I ever lie to you? You're my most precious friend."
"Okay, I forgive you."
The air trapped in her mouth escaped between the lips I was holding shut, and the usual Marin returned.
Mm-hm. Easy. Too easy.
"You two."
"What is it, Chloe?"
"Nothing. Never mind."
Chloe gave us a single sweeping look, then withdrew her gaze in silence.
Eyes full of suspicion.
Judging by that half-doubting air, she'd picked up on the strange atmosphere between us.
'Would it kill her to just tell me honestly?'
I was curious how we looked to other people, too.
Whether what I suspected was mere conjecture — or a fact with evidence behind it.
If Marin did like me, that would complicate things in all sorts of ways.
And it wasn't exactly easy to just ask her, because if the answer ever turned out to be yes...
"Solis, what are you thinking about?"
"Nothing much. Just thinking that life is hard."
I let my words trail off deliberately.
So that Marin wouldn't catch me on the details.
Right at that perfect moment, she opened the door of our private room and stepped inside.
"Here are the drinks you ordered."
It was Arlan, bright and full of energy, carrying a tray laden with coffee as she entered the room.
Ever since our first meeting in the training hall, we'd traded training sessions together and kept up frequent meetings after.
Once the practical assessment ended, we'd shared drinks together, mixed and mingled, and built up our friendship.
Before any of us realized it, she had settled naturally into our little group.
"Marin, yours is the chocolate latte, right?"
"Yeah. The sweetest one you have."
"Solis-nim, here's your Americano."
"Thanks, I'll enjoy it. I was going to grab them myself — sorry for making you work without meaning to."
"Oh, no, it's something I wanted to do."
Arlan beamed at me, flashing her white teeth.
Armed with positivity, she had a definite insider's knack — in a different sense than Chloe.
Where Chloe led people with charisma and leadership, Arlan was the type to close the distance and melt away wariness with her particular warmth and smile.
"Eva, have this one too — it'll perk you up."
"Um... th-thanks."
A friendliness capable of winning over even Eva, who rarely let strangers get close.
Ahh, what a beautiful sight this was.
"Solis, are you crying?"
"No, just something in my eye."
A scene that never even appeared in the original story.
The bright, lively Arlan before me was, in the novel, someone who doubted her own existence and shunned all contact with others.
Right up until second year, she did little more than trail along in Eva's shadow.
Only later did she make her first friend in Eva and gradually begin connecting with others, Chloe included.
—If only I'd taken one step forward. If only I'd gathered my courage and stepped out.
—I regret that I couldn't. If I'd known this sooner, would anything have changed?
When the incident erupted, she was placed at a crossroads of choice.
In the end, to keep the promise she'd made to the benefactor of her childhood, she saved Eva at the cost of her own life.
She never cried, but the aftershock was severe enough that I had to put the novel down for a while.
Even if it was a sacrifice forced by the story's progression, losing my favorite character burned me up inside.
So one of the resolves I'd made when I was pulled into the world of Academy Yuri Princess was this:
I would make Arlan rise, without fail, as Eva's heroine.
I would save her from the tragic fate awaiting her and give her a happy life.
That was exactly why, the instant I found her in the training hall, I'd dragged her straight to Eva without a second's hesitation.
A single push on the back, so she could take one step forward.
Because I knew that step alone was enough to change her.
'Sniff... so beautiful!'
My eyes are getting misty.
Is this what a father feels like, watching his daughter grow up strong and healthy?
It might be a slightly odd analogy, but in being unable to contain the swelling emotion, it was exactly the same.
Anyway, the ordered coffees arrived and everyone settled into their seats.
Chloe wet her lips with coffee and began explaining things to Eva step by step.
"The place we visited last time was an artificial dungeon — a guaranteed-safe practice ground created for the field training of Purity Academy students."
"S-so that means, the place we're going next is...?"
"A real dungeon, swarming with monsters."
"HUAAAH! N-no way, absolutely not, I'm not going, no!"
"Wait, Eva!"
Eva shot up from her seat and bolted desperately toward the door.
Her back, fleeing for her life, unable to accept the reality before her eyes.
"You're not going anywhere until you hear the whole story!"
"Whyyy!"
I knew this development all too well.
It was a scene from the original, too.
I'd anticipated her escape, which is why I'd grabbed her by the collar and hauled her back.
"Eva, there's no need to be so scared. Senior guardians from the Academy who are active guardians will be attached as protectors, and above all, we're going into a dungeon that's already been cleared."
"C-cleared?"
"A dungeon whose guardian — the so-called dungeon master — has already been defeated. In short, a tiger's den with no tiger in it."
"Ahh, o-okay... if that's all it is."
My added explanation seemed to have eased her mind, and Eva let out a sigh of relief.
Expecting a corner-dwelling gamer who just wants to play her games in peace to be tossed, out of nowhere, into the middle of a monster-infested dungeon — that reaction was the normal one.
Even if, by the later arcs, she'd turn into a monster who bombed everything, monsters included, into ash with magic.
"So, about that. Eva, why don't you come with me into the dungeon?"
"Haha, together? Weren't all the students going at once anyway..?"
"You experienced it in the artificial dungeon too, but once you enter a dungeon, there's no telling where you'll be dropped. You can use the Binding Magic to move together, but there's a limit to how many people it can hold."
Two Academy students and three guardians.
That was the maximum number that could be bound together by Binding Magic during the dungeon practical.
Binding anything beyond that number was magically impossible.
'So Chloe wants to go with Eva, just the two of them.'
In the original, Chloe had also entered the dungeon as Eva's partner.
Back then she'd had no choice but her, but even now, with plenty more acquaintances around, Eva would choose Chloe all the same.
Because that pairing was the true one.
"Um, you see..."
Fidgeting fingers.
Eva, stammering.
After a long stretch of hemming and hawing, her lips finally parted.
"C-couldn't I... go with someone else?"
An unexpected bombshell sent the room into an uproar.
Everyone was struck speechless by the surprise choice that had come out of Eva's mouth. And then—
"Ah..."
That day, Chloe's world collapsed.