The Weight of Sacrifice
The white-haired Spriggan, Seori, slowly opened his eyes. A warm, comforting heat filled the air around him. The savory aroma of delicious food drifted through the gentle currents of warm air.
‘This place… Am I… still alive?’
Seori clenched and unclenched his hand in disbelief. It felt like he was dreaming. But no matter how many times he checked, he was undeniably alive.
The door opened, and Chief Yuri appeared.
“You’re awake?”
“Chief.”
Yuri handed him a bowl of steaming soup. The moment the scent hit him, his appetite surged. Seori lifted the spoon to his mouth, then froze.
“...”
Floating among the fragrant grains were brown mushrooms bobbing gently in the broth.
Seori shot Yuri a pointed look.
“I-I didn’t have a choice. The underground was completely overrun with fungal bodies. At least the mushrooms grow well, so I picked some.”
“Still… mushrooms are a bit…”
“If you don’t want to eat it, then don’t.”
“No. I’ll enjoy it, thank you.”
Seori practically inhaled the soup. Hunger truly was the best seasoning. Even though he couldn’t stand the sight of mushrooms, once he started eating, they tasted surprisingly good.
After cleanly emptying the bowl, Seori asked in a calm voice.
“It seems we won.”
“Yeah. We won.”
Despite speaking of victory, Yuri’s voice was heavy with sorrow. Seori noticed her mood and fell silent.
The price of that victory had been far too great. The village’s guardian deity, the Sage of the Boulder, had thrown himself into the fray, and countless Spriggan warriors had given their lives. In the end, they had gained nothing. The only thing they’d earned was freedom from the greedy fungal entities that sought to devour every living thing.
“The Sage…”
“He has passed on.”
Yuri spoke plainly as she turned away. No matter how heartbreaking the dead might be, the living had to keep moving forward. As the village chief, she had far too many responsibilities to tend to.
“Seori. I’m glad at least you survived.”
With those words, Yuri closed the door behind her.
A faint smile lingered on Seori’s lips. He was happy that his survival seemed to bring her some comfort.
“...I’m sleepy.”
Seori began to doze off again, his head nodding.
We stayed in the village for a while and helped out with whatever needed doing. We could have just taken the money and left, but the party members were so strongly against it that it became impossible.
“Kyahaha!”
“Ahahaha!”
The Spriggan children, small as pebbles, ran around the village as if the world was theirs to play in. If the adults caught them, they’d get a good scolding. Alma bounced a ball on the ground while surrounded by the little Spriggans. The kids spun around her with their natural agility. It looked like a full-blown game of [Teasing Alma] was underway.
Alma mercilessly slammed the ball into the back of a fleeing child’s head.
“Kyaaak!”
CRITICAL HIT!
“...”
They even counted that as a critical hit? The child who had been struck by Alma’s critical hit stood gloomily against the wall with a dejected expression. The other kids picked up the ball and handed it back to her. Alma tossed it up and caught it while scanning for her next target. The children laughed with delight and began running again.
That was when it happened.
“Haaap!”
With a spirited shout, Alma suddenly looked straight at me.
…Shit.
The ball came hurtling toward my face with a whoosh. I barely managed to deflect it.
“Hey, what the hell? What are you doing?”
“Can’t you tell? We’re playing ball.”
Alma answered with a smug grin. At that moment, one of the little kids came toddling over and tugged on my sleeve.
“Hm?”
He pointed at the wall.
“...”
What? I got hit, so now I have to stand over there? This was ridiculous. Still, I did as I was told.
As I stood there lined up with the kids, someone called out to me.
“Hajun oppa?”
It was Roa, who happened to be passing by. She looked back and forth between Alma, who was completely absorbed in the game, and me standing against the wall. After grasping the situation, she shook her head with a sigh.
…It’s not like I wanted to be here either.
“What is it, Roa?”
“The chief says she has something to tell you. She asked me to bring you over.”
So that’s what this was about. She had come to fetch the party leader. Alma playfully tossed the ball at Roa. Without even glancing in Alma’s direction, Roa simply tilted her head slightly and dodged it. A Guardian’s sharp senses were truly impressive.
“Come over once you’re done playing.”
“Wait! Roa! It’s not playing, it’s—”
Whether she heard me or not, Alma continued enthusiastically throwing the ball and “outing” the children. The wide smile on her face showed she was enjoying herself more than ever.
After playing with the kids for a while, Alma wrapped up the game without dragging it out too long. Even in that short time, she had grown quite close to them. She hugged each and every one of the children who clung to her.
She really does like kids more than I expected.
“You’re really popular.”
“Heh. Of course I am.”
Alma let out a small chuckle.
“I have a lot of younger siblings at home, so I’m used to playing with kids.”
“How many?”
“Six. I’m the eldest daughter.”
So including Alma, that made seven siblings? That was an incredible number. Her mother must be an extraordinary woman.
Alma watched with complicated eyes as the children headed home in small groups, chattering among themselves.
“Those kids… they’re pitiful too.”
“The situation is pretty bad.”
Alma nodded heavily.
“They still don’t know anything. How many people fought to protect the village. How many sacrificed themselves.”
Of course they didn’t. They were just children.
“They don’t need to know.”
“I don’t want them to. Any adult who forces children to bear that kind of burden is pathetic.”
Those children would probably only remember the battle against the fungal entities as ‘the scary days when we couldn’t go outside.’ Only when they grew older and finally understood what had truly happened would they become adults.
After the game ended, I went to find Yuri. I was told she wasn’t at home but at the cemetery.
In the center of the village, in a basin-like depression, a new monument had appeared. It was a memorial tablet dedicated to the warriors who had sacrificed themselves fighting the fungal entities.
Originally they should have created a proper graveyard, but since I had used all the corpses, they could only erect a memorial tablet instead. They said once the Fantasy Heat Stone was restored, they would transfer the names there.
Yuri stood before the warriors’ monument with her hands clasped in prayer.
“O merciful Mother of the Earth. Your children return to the soil. Please grant them the blessing of rest. May your great hand reach even the lowest of places.”
Then those large eyes turned to look at me.
“You worked hard, Necromancer.”
“You called for me…?”
“I have something to tell you. And there’s also someone who wants to say goodbye.”
The Spriggan standing beside Yuri waved his hand. It was the white-haired Seori. He was leaning on a cane I hadn’t seen before, suggesting his body was still weak.
“I heard the story. You saved me with some surface-world medicine, right?”
“Well… medicine is medicine, I suppose.”
It was just a basic antidote potion. I almost corrected him but held my tongue. Before returning to the village, Noman had asked me to cure Seori’s status conditions. Since I only had potions, I gave him an antidote. Even as I did, I was only half-convinced it would work. At the time, Seori had been about ninety percent a corpse. He was in a state where Animate Dead might have actually brought him back. Whether it was his natural vitality or sheer dumb luck, Seori had come back from the brink of death. He had been unconscious throughout the entire battle and somehow survived.
“The high priest told me I’ll never be able to hold a weapon again.”
“Just be grateful you’re still breathing.”
“Yeah. I know that.”
Seori smiled bitterly. Not only had the fungus spread through him, but mushrooms had literally sprouted in his lungs. The fact that he could even walk around was strange in itself.
“Separate from the fact that you saved me…”
Seori stared at me for a moment.
“Using the dead warriors and the Sage of the Boulder as tools… that’s hard for me to understand.”
“I know. I am one of the Grave Defilers, after all.”
It was one of the nicknames attached to the Necromancer class. Grave Defiler. Necromancers who used death itself as a resource for magic were not only on bad terms with other classes, but with most people in the world.
“…But without your magic, we wouldn’t have been able to defeat those mushroom monsters.”
I grinned at Seori.
“I know that too. You could say I practically saved the village.”
Seori scrunched up his face and grumbled quietly.
“If only you weren’t so good with words…”
Yuri spoke to me.
“As promised, I’ll give you the gem. You explorers fight for that thing, right? Or is there something else you want?”
“Well…”
Without realizing it, my hand went to the necklace around my neck. In Dungeon Overseer, the Underground Fairy’s Necklace always came from the village chief. There were three main ways explorers could obtain it.
First, complete a quest from the chief and receive the necklace as a reward. It was the safest method, but it relied on luck. The quest might not even appear.
The second was more certain: stealing it. That was what I had been planning when I entered the dungeon.
And the last was the most certain of all: kill the chief and take the necklace by force. Well, that was only possible because it was a game.
I’d probably get it through the first method… but I was worried Yuri might refuse. Just because it worked in the game didn’t mean it would work here.
Yuri didn’t miss my gesture.
“That necklace is a family heirloom.”
“Ah. Yes.”
“Do you want it?”
“Would you give it to me if I asked?”
Yuri nodded.
“There’s no reason I couldn’t. But there is one condition.”
She slowly wrapped her arms around my neck. With a soft click, she unfastened the necklace. Then she whispered into my ear, her voice half playful, half serious.
“You have to live here with me.”
“…That’s a pretty harsh joke.”
“I’m not joking.”
I looked at Yuri’s face. Her dark brown skin, those large golden eyes, the mysterious green hair unique to Spriggans, her delicate features and beautifully curved figure. It wasn’t for nothing that they were called the elves of the underground.
Surprisingly, Yuri looked at me with a gentle, smiling gaze. Compared to her usual expressionless face, it was an incredibly rare sight.
“If you live with me, the necklace is yours. But Hajun, other humans always tried every trick in the book just to sleep with me once. Am I not good enough for you?”
“No, that’s not…”
I only need the necklace. It’s an artifact, you know.
Seori clicked his tongue.
“Chief. Humans can’t be raised underground anyway. Unlike us, they get depressed and die if they don’t see sunlight.”
Raised? What am I, a pet?
Yuri answered casually, as if it were perfectly normal.
“It’s fine. I’ll send him up to the surface once a week. And wouldn’t it be helpful to have someone like Hajun stay in the village?”
The two Spriggans were deep in this conversation when—
“Sir Seori! You’re awake!”
A young man came running toward us with a bright smile. It was none other than the Dungeon Seeker, Noman.
“Hey there, brave explorer. You survived too, I see.”
“Of course! I’m not the kind of person who dies in a place like this!”
Surprisingly, Noman had been present during the fight against the Fungal Queen. The problem was that he had done nothing but stand there the entire time. Still, he seemed to be assigning some kind of meaning to his own actions.
Behind Noman, a group of Spriggans with gloomy expressions trudged forward. They were the village shamans. After the disgrace they had shown in front of Noman and Seori, they had been assigned to the task of restoring the Fantasy Heat Stone as punishment. If the Spriggans had lost, they might have fled to the surface, but since they had won, they had no choice but to obey. They would tamp down the earth, haul stones, and recreate the Fantasy Heat Stone.
Noman had gone to observe the site as both a supervisor and a student.
“By the way, what were you all doing here?”
“Well, the chief was…”
At that moment, Yuri cleared her throat loudly.
“We were talking about compensation. Explorer, you did a great service as well. I’ll give you some gems later, so take them with you.”
“R-really? Oh my goodness! Gems! I wonder how much that would be in money…”
“Who knows. I had the chance to learn about human economics, but unfortunately it fell through.”
With that, Yuri spun around.
“Hajun. I have something for you. Follow me.”
I followed Yuri to the chief’s house.
“Um… about what you said earlier…”
“If my offer doesn’t appeal to you, you can return to the surface.”
Yuri looked at me with narrowed eyes.
“But if you come back later, I’ll chase you away. Spriggans have forbidden humans from entering.”
I didn’t answer her proposal. Yuri let out a small sigh, as if she had expected this.
“Take the necklace.”
“Really?”
“…You only answer at times like this. It’s kind of annoying.”
Yuri nodded and continued.
“The village owes you a great debt. My parents would understand.”
“Thank you, Yuri.”
She opened a black box and took out a small map.
“What’s this?”
“I heard from Noman. You explorers plan to explore the Underworld someday, right?”
The Underworld. That was what the Spriggans called the ruins of the ancient kingdom.
“This is a map of the Underworld that our ancestors have kept for a very long time.”
I carefully unfolded the old map. The moment I saw it, I could barely calm my trembling heart. It was exactly the same as the one I had seen countless times in Dungeon Overseer. It depicted the dungeons of the game’s latter half—the true appearance of the underground world.