Chapter 158
Chapter 158
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 158
Chapter Title: Part 2 Chapter 21
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A dome-shaped dungeon entrance had suddenly appeared, and from it poured out spiders covered in fur made of water.
[lv. 54] Surprised Rowlider
[lv. 50] Angry Rowlider
Monsters around level 50, tricky ones to deal with.
"Your Majesty, the aura of these emerging monsters feels off."
Grand Mage Heail, who had been holed up in his room doing research, drew a flame shower magic circle while staying on high alert.
If even the grunt monsters had this much presence, the boss would be even tougher.
As Heail panicked at the unexpectedly strong monsters, he extended his hand toward the dungeon entrance.
"For now, please fall back, Dun!"
He didn't know about Prim, but Dun seemed a bit at risk.
He'd heard Dun had the ability to summon monsters, but it looked like summoning would take some time.
He needed to protect him until then.
Crunch.
"So, what exactly are you planning to investigate in detail?"
Dun casually stomped the approaching monsters to death and strode into the dungeon.
"I'm just trying to collect things from this dungeon that formed a bit faster than usual. I think it'll help with my research on how dungeons operate and why they form."
Dun killed the supposedly tricky monsters with ease, as if it were nothing new, and Prim followed behind without much reaction.
"Uh... Were these monsters always that easy to kill...?"
Heail stared in bewilderment at the Rowliders that had been crushed so effortlessly and followed Dun into the dungeon.
* * *
Damp floors and ceilings. The unpleasant smell of monster bodily fluids.
The dungeon, formed a little faster because of Prim, didn't seem much different from others.
Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.
Dun leisurely dispatched the monsters as he advanced.
"But isn't the reason dungeons form just the monster boss's simple world domination scheme?"
"Eek! Aaaah!"
"I thought so too until recently. That they mass-produced monsters to sweep away humans and take over the world."
"Aaah!"
"Huh? There's another reason? No, seriously, you—"
Heail, skilled only in research and struggling in combat, kept screaming, halting the conversation.
Dun, wanting to hear the rest, frowned and pulled Heail between himself and Prim.
A Rowlider lunged toward Heail, who looked the weakest. Dun slapped the flying Rowlider away.
Splat!
A casual gesture produced a massive impact, bursting the Rowlider.
"Behave yourself."
"Th-thank you...."
Dun resumed speaking.
"Go on. You said you thought it was about taking over the world through dungeons."
"Lately, I've started thinking that's not the goal. It could be one objective, but not the ultimate one."
"Why not?"
"Isn't it suspicious that regular monsters don't grow in ability?"
Come to think of it, yes.
The monsters under Dun's control leveled up over time, but regular ones stayed fixed from birth to death.
"If he wanted to devour the world with monsters, he'd have made regular ones grow and acquire abilities too. That would be an easier path to his goal. But he didn't."
"Definitely suspicious."
If monsters could grow, conquering the world—that childish dream—would be faster.
Raiculin hadn't leveled up until Dun dominated and raised it.
"There must be some major purpose behind constantly creating dungeons and monsters.... Regular dungeons have limits in info, so I wondered what linked ones would differ, but hmm. Quite disappointing."
Prim scanned the dungeon, his lips curling downward.
The fast-formed dungeon was just generated ahead of its scheduled time, no real differences from others.
"What's that?"
Dun, walking silently through the dungeon, suddenly spotted a stone scattered on the floor.
It was an oddly shaped stone.
It didn't have a clear form, but it felt solid like a crystal when touched.
Like someone had trapped light in a small glass pebble, though the light was faint, making it look like an ordinary rock at a glance.
Dun picked up the strange crystal and checked its info.
[Unique] Emotion Stone (Joy)
Description: An emotion stone extracted solely with joy.
"Prim, do you know what emotion stones are used for?"
"Emotion stones? I'm not sure about the uses of something that doesn't exist."
Emotion stones often appeared in ancient myths of the Licht Empire.
Many said they were just concepts or metaphors, mentioned only in legends, not real objects.
At Prim's words that they didn't exist, Dun stared at the emotion stone in his hand.
"Why don't they exist?"
"No one's ever sighted one, and no traces have been found, so they're considered nonexistent."
While Prim's focus slipped as he slew a Rowlider, Heail earnestly answered Dun's question.
"But why are you suddenly curious about emotion stones?"
Heail, hoping to appeal through info sharing since it wasn't combat-useful, spoke up.
Dun scratched his head and thrust the emotion stone toward Heail.
"Well, I think I picked it up off the floor earlier."
"???"
"???"
Prim, mid-fight, turned to look at Dun's extended hand.
"Prim, check it with your ki. It'll say emotion stone."
Dun tossed the emotion stone to Prim. Prim caught it, gripped the stone, and summoned his ki (record parchment) as Dun said.
{Rare} Emotion Stone (Joy)
Info: An emotion stone extracted solely with joy.
-Memory stone creation impossible.
"What is this...."
Prim's eyes widened at the crystal's info from Dun. It really was an emotion stone!
The legendary substance actually existed.
The fast dungeon expedition had low yields, so he'd been gloomily slaying monsters, but suddenly something huge appeared.
"Heail, you've got another thing to research. Seems like a real emotion stone."
"A real one... it really exists.... Wow.... So... so moving...."
Like monkeys finding a banana, the two started jumping around excitedly. Dun chuckled dryly at their joy.
"So, what exactly is this thing?"
Heail adjusted his glasses, nose flaring, and spoke.
"I'll explain. Have you heard of soul stones?"
"Ah. Yeah, I've heard of those."
"Yes. Soul stones are said to be one form of soul created by the gods to easily handle immaterial souls in the material world."
Heail shared info he'd dug up from the imperial secret library.
"And those soul stones are composed of memory stones and emotion stones. I thought it was just conceptual, but they actually exist. There was more explanation, but it was from a long time ago, so I don't remember well. I'll need to take it and study."
"Anything else besides this? Looks like more if we search around here."
"While you two handle the monsters, I'll scour the floor diligently!"
As Heail inspected the ground, treating normal pebbles as suspects, Dun also looked around for more emotion stones.
Come to think of it, there was a side passage connected to where he'd found the first one, and similar stones were scattered along the way.
"Seems like more over there."
Dun pointed to a dimly visible side path.
Dun strode ahead, bent down, picked up another emotion stone, and tossed it to Prim.
"Dun, you really have sharp eyes."
"Comes with being young."
Deeper into the side path, the sporadically visible emotion stones grew more numerous.
Dun straightened and carefully observed the space at the path's end.
'Monster spawning zone.'
Typically where young monsters were raised or new ones generated.
[Unique] Emotion Stone (Panic)
Description: An emotion stone extracted solely with panic.
-Memory stone creation impossible.
Emotion stones were irregularly scattered on the floor.
As he reached to pick them up without much thought,
The previously still emotion stones suddenly vibrated on their own, absorbing nearby organic matter in small amounts.
Then, around the crystals, muscle fibers, bones, and skin formed, birthing new grunt monsters.
[lv. 54] Panicked Rowlider
The newborn stared at Dun, instinctively drawing sharp claws.
But it shrank back slightly under the indifferent gaze looking down with arms crossed.
[lv. 54] Tense Rowlider
The uncollected emotion stones began wriggling one by one, turning into monsters.
Some took the form of Rowlider eggs.
"Oh...."
Dun let out a low exclamation at the novel sight.
He'd visited monster spawning zones many times, but never seen monsters form this way.
Usually, they just popped into existence in midair.
"Dun, even with your keen eyes, you saw it? Monsters spawning from what look like emotion stones."
"Yeah. But is spawning from emotion stones a Rowlider trait? Other monsters just appear simply."
"Fast-formed dungeons lose some functions, it says. Could be a side effect. Need to check records to know."
As emotion stones turned into monsters one by one, Heail grimaced but busily salvaged what he could.
Many had already transformed, so fewer salvageable than expected.
While regretfully scouring the floor, a scream suddenly echoed from outside.
"Eeeeek! H-help!!"
At the scream, the Rowliders eyeing Dun and Prim in the spawning zone whipped their heads around.
Judging the screamer farther away easier prey than the strong duo, they gnashed their teeth.
Grind. Graaaind.
Their eight legs crossed walls and ceilings rapidly.
"Someone's been swept into the dungeon!"
Prim, stowing emotion stones in his inventory, hurriedly ran toward the scream.
Rowliders had pinned a person to the floor with webs, baring teeth to devour.
Dun, following Prim, grabbed a few stones and hurled them at the Rowliders' heads.
Boom!
So fast it looked like their heads exploded spontaneously.
The victim, saved at death's door, prostrated before the arriving Prim.
"Y-Your Majesty!! Why are you here.... Thank you!! But my friend is surrounded by these monsters right now, in danger... please help...."
"Thank my friend behind me. You, head to the dungeon evacuation zone and rest. I'll send your friend soon."
Prim drew a teleport magic circle on the dazed man's hand, sending him to the Sabak territory's evacuation zone.
Learning the friend was threatened outside, Prim rushed out of the dungeon.
Outside, Prim's pink mana visualization field spread before them.
"Aaah.... Eeeek.... H-hel.... p...."
The man, on the brink of death, bled and barely spoke.
His mana was slowly sucked into the Rowlider's mouth, accelerating as his breaths weakened.
Their heads burst in an instant.
Bam-bam!
With sharp blasts, the Rowliders biting him died simultaneously.
Blue-blooded stones rolled near the dead Rowliders.
"Hang in there just a bit longer!"
Prim dashed to the dying man, drawing a heal magic circle to staunch the bleeding.
Unconscious but breathing—thankfully.
After pouring recovery potion into his mouth, Prim teleported him to the evacuation shelter with his friend.
As long as he was breathing, the shelter would fully heal him.
With the fires put out, Prim sat on the floor and sighed deeply in relief.
"I wanted to explore more, but I should kill the boss to normalize the dungeon and hand it to the adventurers."
Once handed to the dungeon management agency for adventurers, they'd assign hunters to curb monster outbreaks.
But then, no slow, exploratory research.
Leaving it unmanaged or under imperial control would fail proper oversight, leading to more incidents like before.
"Killing the boss normalizes dungeon functions? Then no more emotion stones like earlier?"
"According to Heail's rapid-generation theory, yes. Boss death triggers re-inspection, fixing issues from hasty formation. Shall we go hunt the boss, Dun?"
"Wait a sec."
He felt like he had a clue on the monster boss, and letting it go felt wasteful.
'Can I convert this dungeon to open gate form?'
Gates and dungeons were similar but differed.
Gates could be closed to block monster entry, and boss monster cores extracted.
Dungeons couldn't close; monsters respawned after time post-boss kill, and no cores found no matter what.
Extracting and destroying the boss's core would stop grunt spawns for smooth research, but impossible in dungeons.
'Maybe not this one.'
With emotion stones rolling around, perhaps a boss core here.
The vibe from those stones resembled cores.
Good hunch.
If found, could keep it as open gate form.
Prim's rebellion confirmed same mastermind behind gates and dungeons, so similar structures.
Destroy boss core, stop endless respawns and headaches.
"Dun? What are you thinking so deeply about?"
"If it works, I can block monster respawns and make it research-friendly."
"Seriously???"
Dun checked his ability utilization.
[Ability Utilization: 57%]
Down from before, but enough.
Time to reactivate monster core location sense from converting gates to open gates.
He'd earned much praise for precise core extractions before.
Dun clenched and unclenched his fist.
"I can do anything."
* * *
[Rowlider Respawn in 7 days, 2 hours, 21 minutes]
Core extraction, my foot.
He'd excitedly killed it by mistake upon spotting something core-like.
"Um.... Dun? The dungeon seems to have entered respawn mode....?"
"Didn't you say there's nothing you can't do?"
Dun smirked, gripping the boss's head.