Chapter 109
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 109
It felt as if his eyeballs were about to burst. At the same time, a splitting headache crashed over him.
Clutching his head, Ar sagged onto the sofa, groaning in agony. He inhaled sharply, his gaze falling to the floor.
The floor was black. He couldn't remember when it had turned black, but it was black now. A darkness devoid of a single shred of light—an abyss, a bottomless pit.
Sinking.
Forever.
Into the blackness.
Where am I? What’s happening? My body… what’s happening to my body?
He was being devoured. Something unknown was consuming him. The recurring agony shattered his train of thought, making him feel as if he were about to fall into an eternal slumber.
He remained like that for what felt like an eternity—or perhaps, only a fleeting moment.
“…Cap… tain… wake…”
From within the darkness, a voice called out to him. It echoed from all directions, growing louder and louder until it resonated from thousands, tens of thousands of places at once. It felt as if his eardrums would burst.
“Pull… your… self… together!”
The voice grew clearer.
“Captain! Pull yourself together! Captain!”
His vision flashed white.
“Gasp… gasp… gasp…”
Only then did Ar regain his senses and lift his head. He was sprawled on the floor. The voice belonged to Garot.
She had entered the office and was shaking him, trying to wake him up.
“Are… you… really… okay… Captain?” Garot’s words came out slow and strained as she struggled to support him.
He felt a pang of guilt, but the lingering aftereffects of the hallucination made her voice sound bizarre and distorted.
“Captain?” she asked, her voice laced with concern.
Ar pushed himself up from the floor. He couldn't find his voice, so he spoke in his mind.
Garot, why are you looking at me like that? I’m perfectly fine. I just had a brief, inexplicable hallucination. It was only for a moment…
Cough.
He coughed up blood. No, he poured it out. It wasn't a simple cough; blood erupted from his body, thick and strangely viscous.
And above all…
The blood was black.
Only then did Ar Edelbreas Galf Rivisten, Deputy of the Imperial Dungeon Subjugation Headquarters, realize the truth.
Swallow hadn't spared him.
…He had merely delayed the inevitable.
Simply.
Simply to inflict more pain.
Six months left.
Epilogue 1
An old woman, her face a roadmap of deep wrinkles, soaked a cloth in a basin of water.
“The world is going to ruin. Utter ruin.”
Her calm voice slowly filled the quiet house. Speaking in a weary tone, she wrung out the cloth, water trickling from her grip.
“They say another ancient monster went on a rampage. A whole city just vanished into thin air, they say… What on earth is happening? When I was a girl, things like this almost never happened.”
Though her arms were frail, they moved with the practiced skill of decades. Only after squeezing out every last drop of moisture did the old woman lift the cloth.
“I wonder what’s going on…”
Holding the damp cloth, she began to wipe the face of the young man sitting before her.
“How are your wounds feeling?”
The blonde youth, his expression dark, gave a small nod.
“You were so terribly emaciated when we first found you. Seeing you healthy like this is a wonderful sight. It’s a relief, a real relief.”
The old woman let out a weak, gentle chuckle.
When they had first found the young man in the mountains, he had been half-dead. The village couple who discovered him had assumed he was a corpse and brought him back merely to give him a proper burial in a sunny spot.
“But I suppose there’s no helping this.”
The old woman carefully washed the youth’s face. As she wiped, a clear fluid seeped onto the cloth.
Half of the blonde youth’s face was a ruin of scar tissue. While his other minor wounds had healed in an instant without any treatment, the scar on his face was the sole injury that refused to fade.
No matter what medicinal herbs they applied, nothing worked.
“…Thank you.”
As the old woman gently wiped the fluid from his face, the blonde youth offered a quiet, barely audible word of thanks and stood up.
He left the old woman, who merely chuckled warmly at his cold response, and stepped out of the shabby cottage.
The pouring sunlight greeted him. It was a small, simple village where such minor things brought joy.
“Ah!”
As he walked down a quiet path, an energetic voice called out from behind. The youth turned to see a petite girl, who looked a bit younger than him, hurrying toward him.
“You just came back from getting treated again, didn't you? Did you thank her properly?”
Her voice, loud and bordering on irritable, pierced his ears. The youth gave a small nod.
The girl, whose long yellow hair was a slightly darker shade than his, continued, “I didn’t come looking for you for nothing. Even if you have a reason, don’t you dare leave the village today. The elders said a troll is roaming around nearby.”
“…”
“You dummy, answer me! …Anyway, the villagers are setting up barricades and waiting for a subjugation squad, so you absolutely cannot go outside!”
The youth stared at her for a moment before turning away. Behind him, he heard her noisy complaints. “He’s ignoring me again! Ugh, so annoying!”
He kept walking, ignoring her. She was a busybody; a half-hearted reply would only give her another excuse to follow him.
He walked for a long time. Only when he was completely alone did her words come back to him.
“The Primordial Core…”
To the residents of this secluded village, a dungeon like that meant nothing. But the youth was different.
The blonde youth whose face was half-covered in scars—Niphrim—was different.
…His body throbbed with phantom pain, and his face grimaced involuntarily.
His body, slaughtered by Patrick, still vividly remembered the agony.
Even the alchemically-forged body and its blessing of regeneration couldn't erase the scars on his mind. No matter how many months had passed, no matter how numb his heart had become, a chill still ran down his spine whenever he recalled that skeleton’s voice.
…The Empire.
He recalled the horrific days of being experimented on multiple times a day.
When he had somehow survived Patrick, Niphrim thought the Empire's ‘Third Eye’ would retrieve him. Yet, for some reason, they never came.
Thinking about it now, they probably assumed his squad had been wiped out, or they were simply too preoccupied with the advent of the ‘Black Disaster’ in Riaze to care.
Regardless, Niphrim had survived.
Though his body was breaking down, he had unintentionally broken free from the Empire's shackles.
The comrades who had promised to conquer the dungeon together and escape the clutches of the ‘Third Eye’ were all dead—but Niphrim had survived.
Mulling over his memories, Niphrim stopped walking.
A foul, musty stench filled the air.
Looking up, he saw the very troll the village girl had mentioned.
In truth, Niphrim had been tracking it. With a stench this pungent, it was impossible to miss.
“Krawaaaaaa!”
The troll roared. Niphrim drew a dagger he had hidden in his shirt.
Clutching the spear in its hand, the troll leaped toward him. Niphrim stood his ground, simply gripping his dagger. Amidst the beast's roars, the two clashed.
Thud!
With a single strike, the massive troll crashed to the ground. After hacking at it a few more times, Niphrim pulled the dagger from its heart and wiped the blade clean.
‘Niphrim, the test subject created by the Third Eye’ was dead.
The only one here was a blonde youth living in a quiet countryside village.
Had they said Knecht had fallen?
Had they said Swallow's movements were unusual?
None of it mattered.
Now, whatever happened to the Primordial Core, whatever the Empire did, he wanted nothing more to do with it.
Epilogue 2
The Primordial Core, Room 3.
“Oh, it’s moving perfectly.”
A broad smile bloomed on Patrick's face as he admired the imposing Golem standing tall in the center of the room.
Swallow, slumped like a corpse in a corner, watched the scene with indifferent eyes.
“I’ve hidden the magic crystals that serve as its power source inside the dungeon walls… Wow, this is great. Once we get the environment set up, this thing will be able to ward off most humans.”
“…Are you really that happy about it?”
“Of course I am. It’s been a while since we got a decent monster. Besides, to think ‘that boss’ actually did his job properly for once.”
“Ah, right.”
At this point, Swallow honestly wasn't sure who the actual boss of the dungeon was. Why don’t you just be the boss instead… There was so much he wanted to say, but in the end, Swallow forced the words back down.
“It was well worth destroying Knecht. You brought back a truly excellent monster.”
That was Patrick's assessment.
However, his skeletal finger wasn't pointing at the Golem, but at the monster dog playing with Melju in the distance.
After a brief meeting, Melju had been assigned to Room 4.
Since Room 4 was vast enough to accommodate the Demon King's army with room to spare, Patrick was even considering building Melju's Demon King Castle right inside it.
“It’s a bit of an overkill, really. Honestly, we could just assign that monster dog to a room and it would be perfectly fine.”
“But I didn’t bring that thing here.”
“Melju brought him, you said?”
“I think his name was 2 Ounce or something.”
“What a dreadful naming sense.”
Patrick smacked his lips in disappointment. If 2 Ounce hadn’t been so attached to Melju, he would have assigned them to separate rooms. That was how highly he rated the monster dog.
“If winning over subordinates is a quality of a Demon King, then Melju is far more capable than I thought.”
Concluding his remarks in a bright but serious tone, Patrick naturally shifted the subject.
“And Rene is in much better shape than expected, too.”
“Yeah, it seems what we were worried about won’t happen.”
Given Rene's track record from a few months ago, they had been cautious about how to handle her. Yet she had faithfully executed her orders in Knecht to ‘destroy the Hub and eliminate any approaching humans.’
It didn’t seem like she would require constant supervision anymore.
“Excellent.”
As Patrick spoke as if wrapping things up, Swallow responded with silence.
He deliberately avoided Patrick’s gaze. Having dealt with this exact situation countless times, he had grown quick-witted.
“So, Boss.”
“No.”
“I haven’t even explained yet.”
“I don’t care what it is, I’m not doing it. Absolutely not. I don’t care if things get out of hand, I’m not going out. You guys handle it. Send Rene. I’m going to rest. I am absolutely not stepping one foot outside.”
“Yes. That is exactly what I was going to say.”
“Huh?”
“I was actually going to ask you to not leave the dungeon this time.”
“…What’s your angle?”
“An angle? Boss, you wound me. I may play with words, but have I ever lied to you?”
“…What brought this on all of a sudden?”
Swallow, who had just been adamantly refusing to leave, now found himself asking questions. Chuckling at the reversal, Patrick continued.
“Riaze was ruined, and you had a clash with Erebos. And this time, you completely destroyed a city.”
The Great Evil Caves didn’t exactly get along. They tended to view each other as rivals, if not outright enemies, so it was only natural for them to monitor each other’s movements.
The clash between you and Erebos was something the other Great Evil Caves, who were already keeping an eye on him, would have easily noticed.
Not to mention the destruction of Riaze and Knecht.
There was no way those incidents, which had spread like wildfire throughout the Empire, wouldn’t reach the ears of the other Great Evil Caves.
“In short, the other Great Evil Caves are viewing the Primordial Core with deep suspicion.”
“You can basically assume everything has gone awry. I’m not holding you responsible for Knecht’s disappearance, Boss, but we can’t just ignore the aftermath.”
An ancient monster, whose activity had previously been limited to minor movements once every few decades, had suddenly gone on a rampage.
He had even clashed with another Great Evil Cave.
Unless they were Bathory, who had witnessed the entire sequence of events firsthand, the other dungeons had every reason to feel anxious.
Swallow, who had been listening quietly, finally spoke.
“So what are they going to do? Come find me?”
“Yes. That’s what they said.”
“Huh?”
“It seems the other Great Evil Caves have something to say to you, Boss. Apparently, they’ve been in contact with Bathory as well. They said they’re all dragging their precious selves directly to the Primordial Core.”
Anxious thoughts flashed through Swallow’s mind, quickly replaced by a string of curses.
Unlike the Primordial Core, which damnably ‘existed to protect,’ the bosses of the other Great Evil Caves were the center of their armies and the dungeons themselves. There was nothing stopping them from roaming around. Furthermore, if Bathory was the source, the information was almost certainly true.
He had finally finished all his work, and now uninvited guests were on their way.
It was a bolt from the blue.
“Wow, damn it…” Swallow sighed and asked a question. Patrick immediately replied.
“…When are they coming?”
“Tomorrow.”
“What, you bastard?”