The Sniper
The White Zone. Walls and floors of pale gray, completely covered in a softly glowing pure white moss. Countless tiny motes of unidentified light that scatter and flutter like a swarm of grasshoppers the moment they sense any presence. No matter which way you turned your head—up, down, left, or right—the world was blindingly white, enough to drive a person insane. This place was the White Zone. It was the only safe area within a dungeon teeming with unknown threats.
But just because it was labeled a safe zone didn’t mean you could let your guard down. It simply meant that bizarre entities didn’t spawn naturally here, and there were fewer violent magical creatures compared to other regions. That was all. If someone decided to stab you in the back, you’d still die just the same.
“So even in the White Zone, you can’t let your guard down, nyang. You must always stay alert and watch your surroundings, nyang. Got it, nyang?”
“Yes!”
“Kkyu!”
The little chicks of Kkachi’s class answered with sparkling eyes, taking Sion’s bone-deep, flesh-deep advice to heart. I simply gave a small nod. Opening my mouth felt like too much effort. Some might wonder what the point was of nodding behind someone’s back, but sincerity is what matters in these things.
Listening to the children chirping like baby birds in response to Sion’s cat-like speech, I walked at a leisurely pace for about ten minutes.
Oh. Found a fantasy lizard.
I happened to spot a single lizard clinging to the wall, camouflaged as white moss. Or rather, given how flat it was and the suction pads on its feet, maybe it was a gecko instead of a lizard?
“Nyang? Crow, what’s wrong, nyang?”
Sion had been walking ahead, yet she somehow noticed the moment I stopped. She tilted her head once, then slowly approached me.
“Thief, can you see this?”
“Nyang?”
Sion’s gaze followed the tip of my finger. It wandered among the moss for a moment before finally locating the hidden reptile friend.
“Oh, isn’t that a White Moss Gecko, nyang?”
“Hoo?”
Since she called it a gecko, it really must be one. White moss gecko. The name was suspiciously straightforward. I couldn’t help but suspect the humans who named the plaza in front of the dungeon had something to do with it.
“Is something there?”
The contractor, with a crow perched on her shoulder, came trotting over with eyes full of curiosity. Sion and I pointed at the gecko on the wall at the same time.
“Oh.”
“Kkyu?”
The contractor wore a rather intrigued expression, while Kkachi couldn’t take its eyes off the gecko, tilting its head in confusion with a one-second delay. I watched with a pounding heart, worried Kkachi might swallow the poor thing whole. The contractor, who had been stroking her chin and squinting as if analyzing it, finally spoke.
“Sion, can we catch that and sell it?”
“Nyang?”
Good grief… Was this truly something a middle schooler should be saying? Instead of thinking the cute, adorable, squishy-looking gecko would make a wonderful pet, her first thought was to sell it. Her greed was so monstrous that even the Demon of Greed would shake his head, lose control of his speed, and spin away like a helicopter.
“Tsk… Can we sell that thing, nyang…?”
Sion scratched her head with a look of utter disbelief after hearing the contractor. She pondered it quite seriously before answering.
“Hmm, I think I heard that a street stall near the plaza in front of the dungeon buys them for one dallant per ten, nyang. Other than that, even I don’t know much, nyang.”
A street stall near the plaza in front of the dungeon?
“…You don’t mean those skewers?”
It seemed I had accidentally learned the raw ingredient for those one-dallant lizard skewers.
“….”
Before long, the contractor’s eyes as she stared at the gecko grew troubled.
“Sluuurp.”
Troubled? Then why was she suddenly drooling? As I watched the contractor smack her lips while gazing at the gecko with a fed-up expression, Sion’s voice came from beside me.
“By the way, those things with their eyes closed are almost identical to the glowing moss, so they’re really hard to spot. How did you manage to find it so easily, nyang?”
Ah, that? “I sensed a faint trace of fear.”
“Fear?”
A scent that was fishy yet strangely sweet had drawn my attention. When I checked, there was only the gecko. Thanks to that, I gained an unexpected harvest: my passive skill Fear Eater worked on life forms other than humans as well.
“Nyaang, this is the first time I’ve learned that a demon can taste emotions from life forms other than the human race, nyang.”
“Hmm….”
The contractor, who had been listening to our conversation, thought deeply for a moment. Then her eyes sparkled as if she had come to a great realization.
“Ah! Then if we catch as many of them as possible and raise them, wouldn’t that help Raven-nim obtain the emotion of fear?”
“….”
“….”
At the contractor’s terrifying statement—treating living beings as mere tools—both Sion and I were momentarily speechless. Suddenly, I worried that if we didn’t raise the contractor properly, she might become a disaster for Bastion in the distant future.
Somehow we managed to persuade the contractor, and her terrifying plan to capture hundreds of geckos, raise them, and create a fear farm for infinite fear extraction was successfully thwarted.
After that, we wandered around the tenth floor of the White Zone for roughly thirty minutes. We walked without rest, and before long the wide cavern ended, giving way to a sharply narrowing canyon terrain that stretched out before us.
“That’s the neck of White Zone’s tenth floor, nyang. Think of it as the passage from the head to the torso, nyang.”
“The neck, huh. So that’s why the path suddenly got so narrow.”
“Exactly, nyang. From here on, there’s a fairly high chance of encountering bizarre entities, so be careful, nyang. Once we cross that canyon, we’ll be right at the entrance to the Green Zone, nyang.”
“Hmm? Wasn’t the tenth floor supposed to be entirely White Zone?”
“The tenth floor is White Zone only from the head to the neck. Everything beyond that is Green Zone, nyang.”
“I thought the Green Zone started from the eleventh floor.”
According to Sion, the neck sections of each floor were narrow with little cover, making them quite dangerous areas. I’d have to be extra cautious here.
Hm?
I was about to raise my vigilance and start walking again when a familiar sweetness touched the tip of my tongue. At the same time, Sion raised one hand to stop us. After twitching her ears a few times, she spoke in a low voice.
“Everyone, hide your presence and get behind that rock up ahead, nyang. It seems there’s another party nearby, nyang.”
Following her instructions, we hid behind the rock. The scent of fear grew thicker with every passing second.
“Nyang nyang.”
Sion closed her eyes and sniffed hard. She wrinkled the tip of her nose slightly, then quietly said,
“I smell a faint trace of blood, nyang….”
“Did someone get hurt?”
“In the White Zone, it’s more common to get hurt by fellow adventurers than by bizarre entities or magical creatures that wandered in by chance, nyang.”
“Which means….”
“There might have been an accident, nyang. But don’t worry too much, nyang. This is the neck of White Zone’s tenth floor, close to the entrance of the Green Zone. It could be an adventurer party that got injured by a bizarre entity near the Green Zone entrance and is retreating, nyang.”
“That does make sense.”
I nodded at Sion’s words and was about to heighten my guard when—
“Uwaaaaah! Mother!”
“Damn it, damn it, damn iiiiiit!!!”
“I don’t want to die like this!!!”
“The White Zone is just a little farther! Everyone keep running until the guardian arrives!”
Along with those sweet screams echoing from between the canyon walls came the sounds.
Scrape, scrape, scrape.
Tap, tap-tap.
Slither, slither.
The sound of countless footsteps scraping against the ground. It seemed Sion was right—there really was an adventurer party retreating from the Green Zone. The problem was that they had one, or perhaps several, very strange things following behind them.
“Have those bastards gone mad, nyang?! Dragging bizarre entities into the White Zone?! What if the beginners nearby get hurt, nyang!!!”
Sion’s eyes widened in shock. Panic and rage leaked through her clenched teeth. Judging from her reaction, it seemed their behavior violated the dungeon’s unwritten rules of etiquette. Well, dragging high-level monsters into a low-level area was indeed bad manners. Especially since inexperienced novice adventurers could get hurt because of it.
“Haa.”
Our highly responsible cat guide let out a deep sigh, apparently heated up by the adventurers’ so-called thoughtless behavior. Sion chewed on her lip while staring beyond the canyon, then spoke in a calm voice as if she had made up her mind.
“Soft newbies. Looks like an accident happened, nyang. This 5T adventurer will go sort it out quickly, so everyone wait here, nyang.”
Her voice had sunk low, completely different from her usual shrill tone. Her golden eyes, mixed with anger and a sense of duty, were fixed between the canyon walls and refused to move. Crack, crackle! She lightly loosened her neck and waist, then crouched down as if ready to dash out at any moment. I gently grabbed her tail.
Squeeze.
“Nya-nyaaaang!!!”
Sion jumped in fright and swiftly yanked her tail out of my hand. Having returned to her usual self, she yelled at me.
“C-Crow!!! Are you actually crazy, nyang!!! How can you joke around in a situation like this, nyang!!!”
I spoke seriously to the red-faced Sion, who seemed genuinely angry.
“Thief, I’ll help too.”
“Nyang? What are you saying, nyang! Crow, you have to protect the contractor adventurer!”
“Kkachi is with the contractor, so it’s fine.”
“Kkyu!”
Kkachi answered proudly from the contractor’s shoulder, as if saying to leave it to him.
“That’s right, Sion. I have Kkachi-nim with me, so don’t worry and take Raven-nim with you.”
The contractor’s permission had been granted.
“Well, if Crow comes along it would certainly be reassuring, but….”
Even so, Sion hesitated and wouldn’t easily give permission.
“Are you that worried about the contractor?”
“O-Of course, nyang! The adventurer is still a beginner who hasn’t even reached 1T yet, nyang! If we leave her alone and she gets hit in the head by a slime that fell from the Slime Lord and collapses, what then, nyang!”
“…Sion, I’m not that weak.”
I had no idea just how strong this cat’s sense of professional duty was. In that case, I had no choice but to change my approach.
“Then I’ll provide support from here.”
“…From here, nyang?”
“Don’t demons usually take the rear support role?”
“That’s true, but… weren’t you a demon who fights in close quarters with a sword, nyang?”
“Close quarters, huh.”
It was true that I enjoyed close combat. There was a certain pleasure in cutting and tearing things apart myself. However—
“I am a sniper.”