The Blood Ring
Simon's group set out on their journey once more.
They crossed steep hills again and again until they reached the deep heart of the mountain range. The number of monsters was steadily increasing.
"Hey, so."
Meilin muttered, rubbing the back of her neck.
"Am I the only one creeped out by that?"
Behind the three walking abreast, Hector trailed along at a distance, moving at a deliberately slow pace.
"...It makes me nervous. It's weird enough that that maniac is quietly following us. What if he suddenly snaps and hits us from behind?" Toto chimed in.
"C'mon, it'll probably be fine. There's an Observer hovering overhead, and we're all wearing our recording artifacts."
Simon agreed, glancing back over his shoulder.
"Hector! Since we're cooperating anyway, let's talk about how we're going to handle things from here on out!"
"Are you insane?! Don't!"
Meilin slapped frantically at Simon's arm in horror. Hector's face twisted up as well.
"Don't give me orders! Simon Polentia!"
Yep, there it is. Simon smiled quietly.
"...What are you smirking at?"
Scowling, Hector began striding toward them with heavy steps. Meilin and Toto yelped and immediately dropped into combat stances.
"Hey, Hector. Before we move up to second year—"
Hector stopped mid-stride at Simon's words.
"Want to have a private match? Not a ranked duel. Just to see who's stronger."
"..."
Hector's mouth pressed into a flat line.
"That's what I wanted to say."
Thud.
Flaring his jet-black power, Hector appeared at Simon's side in an instant and spoke in a low voice.
"Come at me."
Simon grinned, while Meilin and Toto stared back and forth between the two of them, somewhat stunned.
"First, let's pool what we've learned so far..."
Simon and Hector rapidly exchanged information.
Then they discussed what tactics they would use against the Dungeon Lord. Hector readily volunteered to take the front line.
"...Sometimes I swear boys' intelligence stopped evolving in the Stone Age."
Meilin whispered to Toto.
Rumble-rumble-rumble!
Just then, shards of rock came tumbling down toward the four of them. Everyone looked up.
There were people standing atop the high hill.
"Well met! Simon Polentia!!"
Mwahahaha! A laugh like a cartoon villain rang out.
From that height it was hard to make out faces, but the white uniform draped over her shoulders made it certain — Special Admission No. 7, Elisa. Behind her stood her three party members.
"Brace yourselves!"
She raised her hand, face lit with glee.
"Because a rockslide caused by pure coincidence upon coincidence is about to begin!"
At the top of the cliff, two Ghost Ships could be seen floating. Apparently the plan was to bombard the rock face and bring the cliff down on them.
"Th-that's cowardly! What kind of move is that?!" Toto protested, his face gone stiff.
"Elisa Celine."
At that moment, Hector cut in.
Only then noticing his voice and recognizing him, Elisa's mouth fell wide open.
"H-Hector? Why are you with Simon—?!"
"Hey there~"
Beside him, Meilin waved cheerfully.
"Then I guess I can also coincidentally burn your ship to a crisp?"
The two people Elisa feared most in the world, standing right there.
"Elisa."
Then Simon stepped forward.
"We know where the Dungeon Lord is."
Her eyes went wide.
"...You know the Dungeon Lord's location?"
"Yeah. Rather than fighting it out here, wouldn't it be better to take down the Dungeon Lord with us and advance to second year with good scores?"
"..."
"Your call."
Her party members, too, looked at Elisa as if to say the decision was hers.
Elisa chewed on her thumbnail, lost in thought.
"Elisa Celine is a politician to her marrow."
Hector said in a low voice.
"She weighs justification against profit. She won't refuse."
Just as Hector had predicted — Elisa agreed to join the Dungeon Lord hunt.
"On one condition, though!"
Having come down from the hill, she thrust out her hand.
"Leader position is mine—!"
"You've got to be kidding me! I'm the leader!"
Meilin flared up and pushed forward.
"We'd be doing you a favor just letting you tag along after you begged us on your knees, and you want what exactly? You really think we'd hand power to a politician?"
Hector frowned too.
"What are you talking about? The leader would obviously be me."
"Where did you even come from?!"
Necromancers and their egos. Watching them squabble over who would lead, Simon let out a sigh.
I need to mediate before this blows up.
"Guys, hear me out for a second. First of all—"
Woooooooong!
Simon's words died in his throat. The voices of the three squabbling students cut off as well.
The surrounding landscape bled red. The boulders, the cliffs, the earth itself — everything scorched crimson, as though a blood-red sunset were raining down from above.
Everyone looked up at the sky.
"What... is that?"
A ring hung in the dungeon's sky. A colossal ring of blood, its size beyond description.
Undulating and flowing like liquid, it stood barring the dungeon's entrance, looking down at every student from the heavens.
"Did someone trigger the dungeon's mechanism?"
"I guess the boss monster's coming out now!"
The other students assumed this was simply how the dungeon worked and readied for battle — but Simon was not among them.
A terribly ominous premonition welled up inside him. Cold sweat ran down his spine, the back of his neck went rigid, and his mouth turned dry.
Every one of his senses was screaming danger.
That thing... I've heard about it somewhere...
Simon raked through his memories. And one memory sunk deep in the bedrock of his unconsciousness rose to the surface.
It was a story Lorraine had told him.
— The dungeon's entrance is sealed with a dark spell called the 'Blood Ring.' Anyone unauthorized who approaches it will have the blood in their entire body boil until they die.
— It's said that because of its total impenetrability — no army or law enforcement can get in or out — it becomes a den of criminals, an abyss of evil.
That was it. Her answer, back during the After-School BMAT, when Simon had asked where Professor Silage had gone.
He had said, without a doubt, that Professor Silage had left to undo this very Blood Ring.
Then why is it here, in this dungeon?
"Kyaaaaaah!"
"Huaaaagh!"
Startled out of his thoughts, Simon whipped his head around.
Thump—! Thump—! Thump—! Thump—!
Heartbeats pounded deafeningly from every direction. It should have been impossible to hear other people's heartbeats like this.
"My—my body...!"
Meilin and Toto. Hector and Elisa too.
Every student except Simon was beginning to glow red-hot, like molten steel pouring out of a blast furnace. Strange, vessel-like veins spread outward from their hearts in creeping lines.
The phenomenon was spreading from their chests, down their legs and up into their heads.
The students shrieked. It was utter pandemonium.
What is this? What on earth—!
"Simon!"
Simon spun around. Even Meilin's transformation had spread to her legs and was now crawling up her face.
"I...!"
Crackle—
She couldn't finish her sentence. She froze mid-word, turned to stone. Simon's heart lurched as he scanned his surroundings.
"Toto! Hector!"
The other students, too, were completely shrouded in furnace-red light.
Everyone who had been clamoring moments ago fell silent, as if it had never happened.
Thump— thump— thump— thump—
Only the beating of hearts remained. Simon rushed over and gripped Meilin's shoulder.
"Guh!"
Scorching.
This was not heat a human body could produce.
It really is that ring in the sky, isn't it?
Pop. Pop. Pop.
Even the Observers that should have been floating overhead were glowing scarlet with heat, raining down from the sky like hailstones.
But then why am I the only one untouched?
Thump!
At that moment, Simon felt his own heart begin to race erratically.
Clutching his chest, he staggered. The heat in his body flared all at once.
He was starting to transform, just like the other students.
Damn it!
He instantly dropped into a cross-legged position and closed his eyes, activating a magic circle across his body to invoke Blood Poison.
Hold out with the Toxicology resistance system!
He channeled the jet-black power stored in his core throughout his body, converting his blood into Blood Poison.
The moment it transformed, his blood roiled as if violently rejecting the change — as if trying to force the Blood Poison state to release itself.
Suppose that ring in the sky was a kind of ultra-wide-area hemomancy curse — specifically, one that corrupted the blood.
Then I counter with a resistance system that blocks the corruption of blood itself.
Eyes still closed, Simon pulled a detox kit out of his subspace, selected ingredients by feel alone, and chewed them in his mouth.
Hold! Hold! Hold!
Thump—
Thump—
He needed to summon skeletons in case monsters attacked, but he had no room for it.
Lost to time, Simon kept his focus, his whole body drenched in sweat, until the resistance system was finally complete.
And at last.
"Haaaah."
Slowly, the heat inside Simon's body began to subside.
Simon opened his eyes, his expression hard.
...Thank you, Professor Byulya.
Feeling the state release, Simon rose to his feet. He moved his body lightly and confirmed that he was himself again.
Woooooooong!
The Blood Ring was still turning.
He looked around.
The students remained exactly as before, as though submerged in a crimson furnace — every activity halted, only their hearts beating on, unnaturally and violently.
It was as if their bodies had petrified, leaving only their hearts alive.
Can they be woken again?
"If this is just a curse..."
Holy power might be able to resolve it.
Simon surveyed the area, then made his way first to Hector — the sturdiest-looking body here.
The moment he laid both hands on him, the heat seared as if it would burn him, but Simon gritted his teeth and endured.
"I can do anything."
Muttering the self-suggestion like a mantra, Simon's eyes snapped open.
⟨ Cure ⟩
FLASH!
A white burst of light erupted from Simon's palm.
Cure — the white magic that dispels curses and poisons. To a necromancer it was practically taboo, but given the circumstances, he had no choice.
"...Damn it."
But nothing changed in Hector's body.
If it were a curse, something should have reacted — yet there was no reaction at all.
It's not a simple curse.
Simon exhaled slowly and closed his eyes. With everyone's lives hanging in the balance, keeping his composure was anything but easy.
After a long, agonizing deliberation—
"Pier, Herseba. Come out, please."
Simon brought out his main summons. From the super-sized subspace, Pier burst forth; from the smaller one, Herseba.
[Kuh-huh! Will you be alright, boy?]
Pier, the Doom Greatsword resting on his shoulder, strode over, cape billowing.
"The Observer and my recording artifacts have all been disabled anyway, so it's fine."
Crack! Snap!
Simon's artifact necklace had already been neutralized the instant the Blood Ring activated. Pier sliced it off with the Doom Greatsword and let it drop to the ground.
"This is no time to worry about the Legion being exposed. This is an emergency."
[Understood!]
Simon donned Pier's Bone Armour, and together with Herseba, raced off at speed.
BOOM! BOOM!
Using Pier's power to bound swiftly over the rocky mountains, Simon sank deep into thought.
At this point, the only option is to clear the dungeon as fast as humanly possible!
He pushed his pace even harder. Every so often he spotted students who had made it this far — every one of them turned blood-red.
"...Chatel, too."
A massive stone figure came into view, and he realized it was Chatel Maer, the half-giant.
That even a powerhouse of that caliber had fallen left only one explanation worth considering.
The Hematopoiesis Injection.
A curse that changed the blood. And Simon alone had been slow to show symptoms.
Putting those facts together, the culprit was not hard to guess. Simon's teeth clenched with a crack.
[Boy! We've arrived!]
"Yes."
As he mindlessly crested the mountaintop, a narrow gorge came into view — the only entrance leading inside.
[...Ugh! Horrifying.]
Herseba shuddered.
The monsters guarding the gorge that led to the Dungeon Lord lay sprawled everywhere, drenched in blood.
So he would have had to fight through all of them to reach the Dungeon Lord — dizzying to imagine, though right now an even worse situation was far more likely.
Simon crossed the gorge of corpses without resistance, taking it without a fight.
[The traces of a barrier, boy!]
Along the path to the Dungeon Lord's chamber, they saw a barrier that had been utterly shattered to pieces. Someone had blown the dungeon's defenses wide open.
Simon strode over the ruined barrier and at last stepped into the Dungeon Lord's domain.
A wide basin, walled in on all sides by towering rock mountains.
And there, inside it—
Ah.
The Dungeon Lord.
A pure-white monster, deer-like, waving thousands upon thousands of white tentacles — its chest pierced through by a blood-red spear.
Someone had already slain the Dungeon Lord.
"I was waiting for you."
And there, standing before the Dungeon Lord, was a man.
Brown hair like autumn leaves, bespectacled, an intellectual air about him — the instant Simon laid eyes on him, a great fury rippled through his chest.
"Professor Walter—!"
"That name is retired."
Walter took off his glasses and let them fall to the floor, smiling darkly.
"Call me Professor Silage."