87. Survival Rule #4: An Escape Route Is Essential (End)
87. Survival Rule #4: An Escape Route Is Essential (End)
"Here! A towel!"
"Thank you."
I wiped my face and hands with the towel Millia handed me. I wasn't some construction-site laborer, and I had no intention of eating while covered in filth. After carefully wiping the dirt from my hands and face, I activated my Skill.
"Craft."
A suitably sized dining table and chairs appeared in an instant. I placed a lamp in the middle of the table to provide enough light.
My ability really was the ultimate Skill for maintaining work-life balance. The problem was that it wasn't all that useful in combat unless I wrung every last possibility out of it. Grumbling about my Skill as usual, I untied the cloth wrapped around the lunch boxes.
A five-tier lunchbox today, huh.
It looked like they'd heeded my request to increase the portions—the meal was more generous than yesterday's.
"Heehee, food, food~"
"Ughaa, finally... fooood..."
"Good work."
"Uugh... my back hurts..."
"Lunch, lunch, lunch~ Today it's a salad with sweet apple dressing, steak cut into easy-to-eat pieces, soft bread, and beef soup!"
A seriously protein-heavy meal. I began separating the lunch boxes and setting them out one by one. Even Sif, who had collapsed from exhaustion, lifted her head at the appetizing smell, sniffed the air, and pushed herself upright.
"Looks delicious..."
"Yohan! Sif! Here are forks and spoons!"
"Thank you."
"Than...ks..."
We took the utensils Millia had tucked against her chest and attacked the meal. The lunch boxes covering the table were emptied in an instant. We tidied the spotless containers and sprawled across our chairs.
Giving our bodies, worn out by hard labor, a chance to rest.
"I'm so full~"
"Uugh... I feel bad for my little sisters..."
There was no need to feel guilty about eating. I patted Sif's shoulder comfortingly.
"You can just treat your sisters to a meal, can't you?"
"Oh, right... I earned... a lot of money... so... fuhehehehehehe..."
She had completely lost it. I looked away from Sif as she laughed limply like a slime and spread the map across the table. We had completed roughly thirty percent in three days. The work was proceeding extremely smoothly. At a leisurely pace, I marked the finished sections with X's.
"Yohan! What're you looking at?"
"I'm checking our progress."
"Hmm, I can't make out a thing."
Of course she couldn't understand it. To anyone else, it probably looked like a collection of roughly drawn lines. Once I finished checking, I carefully rolled up the map and shoved it into a pouch. We had some time to rest now, so I decided to get a little sleep.
But first, I needed to change the atmosphere a little.
"Sif, get up for a moment. Dismantle. Craft."
I dismantled the table and made a suitable brazier in its place. Sleeping in this chilly, damp space as it was would have been an excellent way to catch a cold, so the measure was necessary. I took firewood and a fire-starting magic tool from the cart and lit the brazier.
Magical tools really were the best.
Warm firelight sprang to life in the chilly tunnel.
"Fire is so goooood..."
At that rate, she was going to end up as roast cat. I used my Skill to make a reasonably long bench and laid Sif down on it. As if to prove she was a cat, Sif curled up on the bench and immediately fell asleep. Her back was bent at practically a right angle, but she slept soundly.
Were all cat beastkin like that?
"Thaaanks..."
I decided to get some sleep too. I settled comfortably into a chair and closed my eyes.
"Yohan, are you going to sleep?"
"I plan to rest my eyes for a bit."
"Then what do I do?"
At Millia's question, I opened my eyes and looked at her. She was pouting. What was she upset about? I had no idea. Since it was Millia, she'd probably taken offense at something trivial—perhaps because I was sleeping instead of playing with her.
With my mind half asleep, I dredged up a suitable answer and voiced it.
"How about riding your scooter for a while? You need to deliver the lunch containers back to Dawn Hall anyway."
Millia puffed out her cheeks, clearly dissatisfied. Had I chosen the wrong answer? As though to make her displeasure known, the Dullahan who loved being spoiled approached me with louder steps than usual and made a demand.
"I want to sleep too! Give me a lap pillow!"
"Wouldn't it be better to sleep in a bed?"
She wasn't even a child.
...Though her behavior was unmistakably childlike.
"I'm going to rest here too before I go."
"...If that's what you want. Craft."
I extended the chair into a bench. The moment it was finished, Millia spread a cloth over it and lay down with my lap as her pillow. Because she was a Dullahan whose head moved independently, the band connecting her head and body stretched taut in a precarious-looking line, but Sif was asleep anyway, so it probably didn't matter.
I gave in to the drowsiness washing over me without resisting.
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"Yohan... are you asleep?"
In the stillness broken only by the crackling of firewood, Millia stared blankly up at Yohan. Yohan, exhausted from the morning's hard labor, had passed out in an instant. She had no intention of closing her eyes.
She hadn't been sleepy to begin with.
"...Heehee."
She rubbed her face against Yohan's thigh, spending what was, in her own way, a rewarding moment. Given how muscular he was, his thigh was hard rather than soft, making it feel like she was resting her head on a rock, but she didn't care.
Because none of that mattered in the slightest.
"Hm~ hm~ hm~"
A small melody echoed through the quiet tunnel. It was one of the few songs that remained in her memory. Although the memory had faded, a couple of phrases of the melody still lingered in her mind.
"...I'm bored."
She could have slept too, but she didn't want to. That was only natural, since she'd slept to her heart's content before coming here. She decided to play with Yohan instead. She fiddled with his hand, placed it on her head to make him stroke her hair, then casually popped her head off and rolled it around on his legs.
But nothing was more boring than playing without getting a reaction. Millia quickly lost interest, returned her head to its proper place, and pulled the band up to secure it. In an instant, the Dullahan looked human again.
"When will he wake up...?"
She sat up and adjusted her position. Leaning against Yohan, she wrapped both arms around his arm and closed her eyes. The smell of earth mixed with sweat was unpleasant, but she did not care.
Because she genuinely liked Yohan.
A living sacrifice loved by no one.
A girl who had yearned for love.
The man who had reached out his hand to her.
That alone made Yohan a parent, sibling, and friend to Millia. And she wanted something even more.
Because only then could she be loved forever.
"Heehee, together forever..."
The unheard words caught fire like another piece of wood thrown onto the campfire.
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"I'm dying! I'm seriously dying!"
"We're in the final stretch, so just hang in there a little longer."
We were almost done—just the finishing touches remained—and here she was flopping down again. How hard could it be to just pull a cart around? I was the one digging up hundreds of tons of dirt.
"You know that's the sixth time you've said that, right? I'm really going to die from overwork! We've already been working for fourteen hours!"
"Five gold coins."
"No matter how much money you give me, no means no!"
"Six."
"...Seven."
She had some nerve. I glared at Sif as she sprawled across the neatly finished stone floor. She was trying to negotiate even now. Did she really love money that much? It felt like this bitch had already pocketed roughly three percent of the budget I'd received.
I had no intention of arguing with a worker brazen enough to negotiate in this situation. I met her eyes and immediately delivered an ultimatum.
"Would you like seven coins and to be fired?"
"I-I was just joking!"
True to form for Sif, whose calculations around money were terrifyingly swift, she sprang up like a coiled spring and grabbed the cart's handles.
Ah, so that was why everyone wanted to be the employer. The taste of tormenting a subordinate was sweeter than I'd imagined. From Sif's perspective, I probably felt like an exploitative boss, but considering the money I'd given her, it was enough for an average commoner family to live on for about five years. I wasn't a bad guy.
"Ugh, I'm exhausted..."
"There really isn't much left, so hang in there."
"R-really?"
"I mean it."
"Mreow..."
Was she trying to remind me that she was a cat beastkin? I looked away from Sif, who was meowing as she hung limply over the cart, and turned toward the final tunnel.
The main passage work was finished, and this was the final tunnel I'd dug. I touched the stone wall at the end of the tunnel I'd made and sank into thought.
'As expected, there was a dungeon here.'
The dungeon beneath the academy. In the game, it was a place that couldn't be entered without a special event. Naturally, that event would be the final exam—a desperate struggle in which the protagonist and their companions would fight to survive after someone's scheme forcibly transported them into the dungeon.
It would be the first event where humanity's hostile forces properly appeared, so I needed to prepare. With Karina weakened, I couldn't guarantee that the protagonist's party—assuming they even existed—would survive.
This wasn't a world where drinking a potion instantly healed a serious injury the way it did in a game.
...In any case, I needed to confirm whether the protagonist existed.
"...The suspension of classes will be lifted soon, so I can look into it then."
Making inquiries could draw unnecessary suspicion, so for now, I had no choice but to wait and see.
In any case, the protagonist's name would start spreading rapidly around the time of the final exam.
I turned around and crawled out of the small tunnel. There was no need for any particular work here. I just needed to hide it for now. It would be at least a month before I opened this tunnel again.
"Craft."
"...Why are you closing it?"
"Dug the wrong way."
I fobbed her off with a suitable excuse and looked at the now-seamlessly sealed wall. Just in case, I'd made the wall a full five meters thick to block it, so no one but me would be able to find it.
"Nyang?! Then we have to do more?!"
"No. Endex—no, let's finish here. The emergency-passage work is done."
Why had military jargon slipped out? Feeling oddly unsettled, I led Sif out of the tunnel.
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"What? It's done? Is that true?"
"That... is correct."
"Are you joking with me? It's only been ten days!"
The Principal's reaction was exactly what I had expected. Careful not to let the corners of my mouth rise, I answered.
"You may send an inspector right away."
"Huhh..."
The Principal stared at my face for a long time, apparently searching for signs that I was lying. Being scrutinized by an old man for that long was not an experience I particularly wanted.
"Understood. I will send an inspector immediately, so you may go."
"Understood."
If he said go, I'd go. Dragging my tired body, I left the Principal's office. As I opened the door and stepped out, a soft, plush sensation naturally wrapped around my arm.
"Heehee, is work all done?"
"Yeah."
Maybe because I hadn't been able to play with her much lately, Millia stuck even closer than usual, rubbing her cheek against my arm. She was a Dullahan in name only; this was pure puppy behavior. I chuckled and hastened my steps toward Dawn Hall.
Now that the tunnel was dug, it was time to begin preparations in earnest.
I hurried toward Dawn Hall while considering what tools I could make in the workshop.