Adventure Start! (Pending)

As the rice ripens, the stalks bow their heads. They say the same is true for demons—the heavier their sins, the lower they hang their heads. If that’s the case, just how terrible a crime must this particular demon have committed to be pressing his forehead almost all the way into the ground?

Oh. Fantasy ant discovered.

Here he is, holding a near-perfect plank position and exchanging greetings with the wooden floor: one demon. A survivor from a ruined world. The living embodiment of a bum. The crow-headed weirdo (not) recently known to the public as the crazy demon or the demon of terror. That’s me.

And standing in front of me with her arms crossed in an obnoxiously confident pose was a red-haired brat.

“Looking pretty rough there, Crow oppa♡”

The hot-blooded, food-obsessed demon senior Croma, whose sardonic smirk went disgustingly well with her ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠crimson hair. Her hair, which had been tied up on both sides, was now loose—probably because she’d just rolled out of bed. The slightly disheveled look actually gave her an unexpectedly pure charm.

But that outfit… Hmm. Wolf pajamas in a medieval fantasy world. I have no idea what kind of cosmic joke produced this combination. The hood was literally a wolf’s head, tongue lolling out, eyes rolled back white. The sheer grotesqueness of it was off the charts. It was the kind of demonic fashion that made you fear that any sign of resistance would get you stuffed into crow pajamas instead.

Which is why I was currently following the orders of Kkachi—the genius of survival—by keeping my body as low to the ground as possible in a posture of total submission. It was the only way I’d managed to stay alive this long. It felt a little empty without the warm gray cat that usually heated my back, but Sion and my contractor were still groaning upstairs with hangovers. I was the only one who’d been dragged down here.

How fragile they are.

“So what you’re saying, Crow oppa, is that you were practicing the power of fear you’re going to use for the boss and caused all this chaos from dawn onward. That about right?”

“Exactly.”

So please forgive me for firing an insanely loud revolver inside a room with terrible soundproofing and flooding the neighborhood with complaints since the crack of dawn.

Hmm. Yeah, even I have to admit this was a bit much.

I really hadn’t expected it to be that loud.

Why the hell does filling it with fear mean loading it with ridiculously loud fear blanks, you cursed revolver? And I only used one point of mana. Does that mean if I dumped ten thousand in it I could bring down a building?

Hmm. Not bad at all.

My eyes sparkled at the endless possibilities of the Plague Doctor’s exclusive weapon that I had written off as garbage—until a cold voice spoke from above my head.

Oh, right. I was in the middle of getting chewed out.

“Crow oppa. What exactly were you planning to do to my contractor? Hmm? Were you trying to teach her the fear of death or something? Or have you actually gone insane like the rumors say?”

“....”

“Raven. I think I understand the emotion of fear now. Yeah, that’s right. I probably won’t need your help anymore….”

At some point Noir had stepped up behind Croma, resting her chin on that red hair and gently massaging her shoulders as if to soothe her anger. Her face remained expressionless as always, but her eyes looked uneasy. It seemed she really didn’t trust me at all.

But.

“That won’t do.”

I can’t pass up the free lodging voucher at a famous tavern and a secret gift from my demon senior. One night of making my contractor sleep in a dust pit is more than enough.

So please, just give me one more chance. I’ll go practice my skills in the dungeon. I’m begging you.

Maybe my desperation got through. The icy look Croma had been giving me softened just a fraction.

“Hmm. All right, fine. But no loud fear like this morning. Use safe fear that won’t risk hurting the contractor, okay? Otherwise I might get angry♡”

“Croma. I’m the one who’s involved here. Why are you the one answering?”

“Stupid boss, just trust me and stay locked up in the kitchen! How long are you going to keep chopping vegetables until you lose a finger? Hmm? Don’t you know how important the emotion of fear is to a mortal like you?”

It was true. For a cook who handled fire and bladed tools like kitchen knives, fear was an absolutely essential emotion. Actually, not just for cooks—for every living being. Fear acts like a vaccine, helping you learn danger and respond to it instinctively.

Looking at it that way, the demon of terror really was a beneficial demon.

“So that’s why Croma gave me these gloves, right? Thanks to them, it doesn’t hurt anymore.”

“Sigh…”

Noir awkwardly lifted the corners of her mouth at Croma’s fierce reaction and began stroking the red hair again, trying to calm her. Croma’s face, which had flushed bright red as if she were about to explode, gradually returned to its original pure white.

They really are like fire and ice.

I thought they ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠made a perfect pair. So what does that make me and my contractor? A cosplayer duo? At least we had the edge in style and romance.

“Ugh, that’s not the problem! Aaaah, just shut your mouth and go to the kitchen first, boss. I’ll take care of it!”

“Yeah. Come back quickly, Croma. There’s still a lot of onions left.”

“What?”

Croma’s red eyes narrowed in disbelief.

“…That wasn’t the end of it yesterday?”

“Yeah. There should be about two more sacks left? Yeah, that’s right.”

“Ah. If only it had all burned up……”

Croma’s face began turning red again. Her crimson hair started to float upward strand by strand, ignoring gravity entirely.

This was bad. Time to escape before any sparks flew my way.

“Then I should probably get up now—”

“If you want to go back to the demon world, try standing up♡”

“Shit.”

Too late.

That day, they say there was one extra chair in the Rainbow Cup until Sion and my contractor came downstairs for breakfast.

A very black, very ominous chair.

“Soft newbies! Do you remember the precautions I mentioned yesterday nyang!”

Sion stood with her hands clasped behind her back like a drill instructor, chest puffed out proudly. At her energetic question that rang through the cavern, my contractor—who had been kneeling obediently—answered immediately, as if she’d been waiting for it.

“No solo actions, no preemptive strikes against anomalies, and immediate retreat upon encountering freaks.”

“So she says.”

“The adventurer is exactly right nyang! So exact it gives me goosebumps nyang! What an amazing memory nyang!”

“Ahem. It’s nothing special.”

My contractor shrugged her small shoulders, unable to hide how pleased she was with Sion’s enthusiastic praise. She lowered her head, trying to hold back her laughter, but the trembling in her shoulders wouldn’t stop. Maybe it was puberty, but she couldn’t seem to be honest about her own feelings.

“All right then, let’s go beg for some food, you brats!”

“Ooooh! The captain’s full of energy today!”

“Let’s gooooo!!!”

“Bomb fly bastards, prepare yourselves nyang! I’ll rip every last one of you apart nyang!”

The cavern was filled with noise. The adventurers’ lively voices wove between Sion’s constant nyangs.

The place where we currently stood was a secluded corner roughly fifty paces away from the entrance of the dungeon known to the public as the ‘Black Hole.’ Here, Sion—the guild-certified dungeon guide and Sherpa—was giving me and my contractor a safety lecture.

Wongnyang. Wongnyangnyang.

The content was so incredibly useful that it made me want to yawn. However, there was a reason I—the one called the demon of microsleep—could endure this long lecture without dozing off.

It was ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠because the patch notes were still available!

If this wasn’t the goddess’s grace, what was?

Like a student who opens his ethics textbook only to secretly read a comic inside it, I skimmed through the patch notes while hiding from Teacher Sion.

The theme of this page was the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠always-active skills known as ‘Passive Skills.’ When you consider that passive skills are sometimes called ‘Traits’ depending on the game, it was astonishing to realize that my precious fifty-five traits had been brutally reduced.

Hmm.

But only amateurs get disappointed here. Even if the quantity dropped, if the quality improved by the same margin, wasn’t that fine? Quality over quantity—that’s the way.

If someone asked whether they seemed better than before, I could only answer that I still wasn’t sure. Unlike the active skills, which had been written with at least some understandable explanation, these passive skills had incredibly unfriendly descriptions right from the start.

- Substitution.

- Conversion.

- Mutation.

- Disruption.

With only those two-word destructive summaries at the bottom, I could roughly guess the effects, but I couldn’t know for certain.

Therefore…

I have no choice but to test them one by one in actual combat.

In this unknown place called a dungeon, I would roll around with my contractor and the rogue, figuring these skills out one at a time!

There were still many unread pages in the patch notes, but I’d have to look at those later. There was simply too much content and it was overwhelming.

Well, with that said.

“Safety training ends here nyang! Thank you everyone for listening so well nyang! Now then, let’s head into the dungeon nyang! Follow me nyang!”

“Yes!”

“This should be fun.”

Now it was truly the start of the adventure.