Opening the Dungeon (3)

An elf appeared. Short brown hair. Skin as white as jade. Pointed ears. It was the stereotypical beautiful elf girl I’d only ever seen in fantasy, and her golden eyes, which looked like they were inlaid with pure gold, were sparkling. I put aside my commentary on her appearance. My brain raced, frantically guessing the reason for this elf’s sudden appearance. She looked young, she didn’t fire an arrow even after seeing me, she seemed terrified, and above all, she looked weak. And she was trying to run away. A young elf must have been wandering the forest alone and run into me. 'Catch her.' I even had to be prepared to silence her permanently.

As soon as I lunged, the elf stumbled in a panic and fell from the tree branch. "Kyaaak!" With a rather cute scream, the elf slipped from the branch, barely managing to hook her legs onto it to avoid falling. Without even thinking that her skirt might be riding up, she tried to scramble up. But I had already sprinted with all my might. The distance to the elf was about thirty paces, but I covered it quickly, reaching her side before she could climb back up.

"...!!"

The elf saw me and hurriedly lifted her upper body. It looked like she intended to get back onto the branch and run away through the treetops. But she was too soft. "Lime!" I threw the Lime I was holding at the elf. The Lime, thrown with all my strength, flew like a basketball and struck the back of the elf’s head hard. Thwack!

"Kaa-ugh...!"

Taking the unexpected hit, the elf tumbled forward and fell from the branch. A green, amorphous object was stuck to the back of her light brown hair, and Lime was wriggling its body as if trying to consume the elf. "Lime, this isn't for you to eat." I peeled Lime off and placed it on my shoulder. The ears visible through her hair, which had become sticky with slime, looked sharp enough to pierce.

"Hii, hiiik...!"

The elf let out a shrill scream, trembling in terror. She seemed to feel fear at the weight of my dirt-caked feet pressing gently against her back. I poked Lime and pointed at the elf. "This is for me to eat."

Thud! With those words, I struck the back of the elf’s neck. The elf’s head dropped as she fainted, and I hoisted her onto my other shoulder. 'Was she alone? No. Something will definitely come looking for her.' No matter how much I tried to erase my tracks, I had come out to gather wood, not to kidnap an elf. But I had been discovered by chance, and if I let the elf go, elf hunters would definitely come to kill me. I wouldn't die easily, but I had no choice but to gamble on a stroke of luck. 'Let's just bolt to the dungeon.' I’d erase my tracks, take the elf and the wood into the dungeon, and hide. I still had room for prisoners, and even if something attacked, the situation would change if I could just summon my subordinates. 'Please, let no one notice, please!'

With a desperate heart, I carried the elf into the cave first and tied her up tightly with vines, then brought the logs into the dungeon as quickly as I could. "Ghaaa!" My whole body was drenched in sweat. My pants had been soaked through and smelled so ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠bad that I’d taken them off long ago. The inside of the dungeon was filled with the sour smell of slime and the scent of Eila and me, but now it would be filled with the smell of sweat, the scent of wood, and the sweet, peach-like fragrance of an elf. 'I need to build a ventilation system or something.' To do that, I needed labor first. I placed the log segments in a corner and then...

I had finished preparing to build the summoning facility. But how? Would the system do it for me if I just pressed a button? Or would some kind of helper appear to assist me? Sink or swim, I had to start the fire. I pressed the button with a "come what may" attitude.

The system was kind. A hologram-like image appeared before my eyes, and I moved it around inside the dungeon to check the site. 'Site or no site, there's no way to do anything here anyway.' What kind of interior design could I do in a single-room studio that didn't even have ventilation? I set the location for the summoning facility in the corner of the wall. A space large enough to fit two beds was temporarily designated, and I stacked 10 log segments in the specified shape. 'Now, the Magic Stone.' Since it was an item I got from killing the dungeon master, I hoped for a good result. I placed the Magic Stone on top of the log segments, and a new window popped up.

"What's with the question marks? It makes people anxious." No. Let's think positively. Isn't the golden rule of games these days that they give you resources to pull a gacha once at the start? Once the facility is built, maybe an item to summon monsters or a gacha ticket will appear. 'Anyway, one hour.' I had 7 logs left. I checked the materials needed for other construction facilities.

"I can't build anything but the bedroom for now." Even the bedroom was just a wooden platform, but I didn't have the techniques or tools to make such a smooth platform myself. I was just grateful to the system, and the system gobbled up five logs and knocked together a bed. It took 30 minutes to make the bed. In the meantime, I split the remaining two logs by hand and shaped them. I didn't have any tools, but at least I had the strength and fingernails to split logs. Crack! I used up all the remaining 2 logs to produce items that a dungeon should rightfully have in my mind. 'Traps to repel intruders.' I had lost the iron mace I was using. And I couldn't make the weapon I intended to use from now on here. Still, I needed a weapon to use temporarily, didn't I? I split the wood by hand, then sharpened it by grinding it with my fingernails. A sharp dagger to plunge into an intruder's throat.

Ryun was more nervous than ever. When she realized she had lost consciousness, she had already been kidnapped by a monster and trapped in a cave. 'How could something out of a fairy tale happen...!' It was horrible. Most of all, the green monster, naked and showing its back, was terrifying. The fact that it ran faster than an elf, the fact that it attacked her from afar, and above all, that thing dangling between its legs— 'It's barbaric!' How could it walk around with its genitals exposed? Even if it was a monster, there should be some minimum sense of shame—

- This is for me to eat.

A chill ran down Ryun's spine. Eat. It definitely said it would eat her. Ryun opened her eyes just a tiny bit and scanned the inside of the cave. Two mysterious magic circles were drawn, and the monster was in the middle, splitting a log by hand to make something. It was a long wooden skewer. There, Ryun was convinced. 'It's trying to eat me!' What the elders and adults had said since she was a child wasn't wrong. The ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠saying that green-skinned monsters would take you if you wandered alone in the forest wasn't just a story made up to put children to sleep. She couldn't die like this. The monster didn't notice that she was awake yet. As long as it was making a skewer, there must be an opportunity to escape—

"You're awake."

"......!!"

Ryun snapped her eyes shut. Pretending to be unconscious, pretending to have lost consciousness. She just hoped the monster would be fooled. Thud, thud. Thanks to her hearing, which was better than others', the sound of the monster's footsteps rang out like thunder. Ryun realized the monster was coming toward her and hoped it wouldn't notice. But such a sweet dream was a fate that couldn't be fulfilled from the moment she was captured. Ryun's body was lifted into the air.

"Hmm, is this that elf?"

The monster's sweaty voice washed over Ryun's face. Ryun was pretending to be limp, but she couldn't help but frown slightly, a physiological reaction. "To think I'd get to eat an elf, kuhahaha." The monster even smacked its lips and shook Ryun. "I know you're awake. Open your eyes by the time I count to three. One, two—"

"P-please, spare me..."

In the end, Ryun was the one to lower her tail first. Ryun begged the monster in a tearful voice. She couldn't bring herself to look at its face. "P-please don't eat me..."

"Khuph."

The monster gently stroked Ryun's hair. That hand, as big as a pot lid, was enough to grip Ryun's head in one go. "I'm not going to eat you." The monster wiped the corners of Ryun's eyes with its thumb and said, "I'm going to 'pluck' you."

"......?"

Ryun. Still a young elf. Not understanding what "pluck" meant, she interpreted it at a level she could understand and was horrified. "You're going to pluck my neck and eat me... Hwaaaaaaah!!"

Piss. Ryun was so terrified she wet herself.

The elf's name was Ryun. I tore off the vines that restrained her lower body and cleaned Ryun's underside, and Ryun said nothing out of shame. "So elves wet themselves too."

"......."

She wasn't even a child, yet she was so scared of ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠a person that she wet herself; I was a little hurt. But I was already used to such gazes in Forneus's dungeon, so I didn't care. "Hmm." Hadn't the system already checked her? I took advantage of the moment Ryun turned her head to check the status of the dungeon.

"As expected." It seemed that everyone I captured and restrained became a prisoner. Although I couldn't build a prisoner-only accommodation facility because I lacked iron, I had a bed. 'I can just tie her to the bed.' If the bed broke, I'd just sleep on the floor then. There was no other way until the facilities were equipped. I scanned Ryun's body from top to bottom. 'Barely safe.' Even if I was treated like a beast by my own kind for being a "human-lover," I wasn't trash who lusted after a child. In that sense, Ryun's body was just that of a woman with a slightly small frame. I touched her body here and there to read Ryun's status.

"D-don't...!"

"It'll be over soon." I touched everywhere except for the parts hidden by vines and sensitive areas, but the status window didn't appear. Just then, something strange that caught my eye wriggled. Twitch. The moment I touched the inside of her thigh, Ryun's ears twitched. The elf's characteristic long ears were about the length of my finger, and I found it fascinating, so I stroked the earlobe with my thumb.

"H-hnn...?"

Tension filled Ryun's whole body. Tension filled my whole body too.

'Jackpot.'