The Hidden Dungeon
For a good thirty minutes after claiming Levatein, I poured out every last drop of emotion I had in me.
"Hahh... hahh..."
I was spent. Laughing like a madman and screaming my lungs out had left my gut and throat aching. And yet I grinned. One look at Levatein sitting beside me and I felt ready to do it all over again.
My precious baby.
I was planting kiss after kiss along the blade when the door slammed open.
A girl with long purple hair and sharp, intelligent eyes. Violet.
"What on earth is that sword?"
She asked it with a strangely hollow look on her face.
"This?"
I grinned and tossed the question right back at her.
"Never mind. You wouldn't tell me any—"
"It's Levatein."
She flinched adorably, clearly not expecting me to actually answer.
"Does it have a Levatein trait?"
Having gotten an answer once, she pressed on, a thread of hope in her voice.
"That's a secret."
Violet's face fell on the spot.
"So what the hell are you, anyway?"
I just kept grinning at her without a word. That was all it took. Violet started dumping everything out like she'd been holding it in for days.
"I mean—come on! Who just casually picks up a sword like that? Who awakens their mana in a matter of minutes and then blows past my total stats in a few days?!"
Yeah... hearing it laid out like that, I almost felt bad. I'd be pretty pissed too if I were her. But there was nothing I could do about it. As long as I was the Player, I had to become stronger than anyone. That was the only way to save this world.
"And that's why I couldn't even become class president like I planned, and now I'm stuck as secretary...! #@#@"
She'd started off talking about me, but it quickly devolved into a rant about how much she'd suffered these past few days. I sat there and let her talk it out. When she finally ran out of steam, she whipped around and glared at me.
"Do you get it?"
She was a completely different person from the composed, unhurried Violet I'd first met.
"Violet. You curious about me?"
I drawled it out, teasing her.
"Yes! I really am!"
She was shouting at me now, genuinely angry.
"The reason you're getting stronger so ridiculously fast! The reason there's zero information on you! The reason the Board suddenly recognized Swordsman as a class!"
She sucked in a breath and shouted again.
"All of it! I just want to know about you!"
"That so? You free this weekend, then?"
"Huh? Why the weekend all of a sudden...?"
I smiled at her blank, bewildered face.
"You said you wanted to know why I'm strong."
I strode over and held out my phone.
"Give me your number. So I can reach you."
"H-huh?"
Violet took the phone on autopilot and punched in her number.
"Okay. So you're coming, right? I'll text you the time and place."
"Are you actually going to tell me?"
She stared at me, still dazed.
"A man doesn't go back on his word~ Now go to class. You shouldn't be here right now."
I gave her stiff shoulders a gentle nudge and herded her out of the simulation room. The afternoon block was precious time for shooters and ability users to learn skills. It was still too early for Violet to be training in here.
Still, I hadn't expected things to fall into place this neatly. I'd already been planning to bring Violet along this weekend, and here she'd walked right up to me. Levatein and Violet, all in one day. Everything was just going my way.
I waved her off as she climbed the stairs, still glancing back at me with those suspicious eyes. Only after she'd vanished from sight did I turn to Angel, my heart already racing.
"Alright, Angel. Shall we get started?"
"Kyaaah! I'm so excited!"
Time to put this insane new weapon of mine through its paces. I hadn't even swung the thing yet and I already had goosebumps.
I worked the panel and summoned a test dummy into the simulation room.
Beep—!
A lifeless mechanical tone, and a scarecrow popped into existence.
"Hup!"
I drew a single breath and threw everything I had into one strike.
Saturday, ten in the morning.
That most languid hour, when five days of weekday intensity finally let go. I cracked my stiff joints and rummaged through the closet.
"Whoa. That's a lot of clothes."
I'd only ever worn the uniform and pajamas, so I'd never really looked. Turns out my My Room was packed. A question flickered through my mind. Had the original "me" who lived in this world before I arrived stocked all this? Or had it just... appeared the moment I showed up?
Violet's comment about there being zero information on me had prompted me to ask Angel when, exactly, "I" had existed in this world. She'd dodged it — said she couldn't go into detail — then added that the Board would handle everything, so I didn't need to worry about the "information" Violet had mentioned.
If the Angel who'd given me Levatein and Spirit Ground said so, that was good enough for me. My trust in her was maxed out.
I flipped through the hangers, picked something out, and got dressed. Flight jacket, sweatshirt, jeans.
"How do I look, Angel?"
She snapped a thumbs-up at me.
"Heartbreaker of the ladies, Player."
"Okay!"
Time to go greet my lovely ladies.
The heroines I'd gathered for the weekend: four of them. Bianca, Alice, Rebecca, and Violet. The plan for today was simple. Before Scenario 3 kicked off, I was going to power-level them as hard as I could.
Honestly, I'd gotten stupidly strong. Even on Hell Mode, grabbing an evolved weapon the second Scenario 2 ended put me at a level where I could probably take the entire first-year class at once. But those management-team bastards were going to go apeshit trying to squeeze Causality out of me now that I'd gotten this strong. Just like they'd thrown a Withered Ancient Tree and a Flame Oni at me during the Otherworld scenario, they'd slap some bullshit setting onto the next one and try to grind me down.
It was fucked, but I was confident I could clear it and survive somehow. The problem wasn't me. It was the heroines. If they got hit with a difficulty calibrated to me, they'd die or get badly hurt. Guaranteed.
Which meant it was time to abuse the Player's privilege. Cheese and lucky breaks. I needed to get them leveled up, fast.
Ding-dong!
A cheerful chime, followed by the sound of Alice punching in my front door code. We knew each other's door codes now. Heh.
I planted one hand against the wall and struck my most model-like pose in front of the door. It swung open, and there was Alice.
Oh, damn. My hand slipped right off the wall.
Alice had come to play today. She was easily one-and-a-half times prettier than usual. A light dusting of makeup. Lips that looked even glossier than usual. A touch of eyeliner that made those catlike eyes even more lethal. I couldn't look away.
"Well?"
She grinned at me, all coy.
I gave her the same thumbs-up Angel had given me.
"Heartbreaker of the gentlemen."
"I only want you looking at me, though."
Her follow-up nearly stopped my heart. I clutched my chest. Ah, fuck it. I couldn't hold back. I launched myself at her and pulled her into my arms.
"Kyaaah!"
She squealed with delight and melted right into me. She tipped her face up toward mine, and I dove in.
A peck. Just lips on lips. A bird kiss. I wanted to go deeper, but I wasn't about to wreck that killer makeup.
"Don't pay any attention to Violet today. Just me and the unnies."
She said it like a warning, still nestled in my arms. Ah. So that's why she'd gone all-out with the makeup.
"Y... yeah."
I trailed off and nodded. I hadn't told any of the girls where we were going this weekend, but I had given Alice, Bianca, and Rebecca a heads-up that Violet was coming. If Alice ran into Violet completely cold, I had a feeling I wouldn't survive the encounter. She'd come at me pretty hard about why we even needed Violet, but I'd managed to talk her down by saying it was connected to the future. Thank god.
"Let's get going."
"Okay."
The meetup point was in front of the school. From there, we'd all pile into Bianca's car. Alice and I arrived to find the other three already waiting.
Our all-purpose Student Council President — blonde, and stacked. Our Vice President — short blue hair, deadpan as ever. And our Class Secretary — long purple hair swaying as she glared at me like I'd personally offended her. Every last one of them was gorgeous.
"Jojun!"
The President spotted me and started waving — and with every wave, other things bounced right along. I beamed at that beautiful sight and waved right back.
"Hey, you!"
Violet came charging at me, already on the attack.
"What were you thinking, bringing this girl—"
She jabbed a finger at Alice beside me.
"And the Student Council President."
She pointed at Bianca. Our innocent President just smiled sweetly at the accusation.
"And even the Vice President."
Rebecca just stood there, expressionless.
"What on earth were you thinking, gathering all of them?"
"I already told you. You said you wanted to know why I'm strong."
"Don't tell me your secret is surrounding yourself with girls?!"
Violet recoiled in horror, putting some distance between us.
"You think I'd be that cheap?"
Violet was getting dumber by the minute, I swear.
"Then what is it? Why did you gather everyone here?"
"Hah."
I swept my hair back with a confident grin.
"Just come along and you'll see. President, what are we riding in?"
"This one~"
She pointed with a gentle gesture toward a car parked at the far end.
Oh, damn. Taking Bianca's car had been the right call. A limousine. I'd never ridden in one in my previous life. I walked right up to the President's car without a shred of shame and hopped in, then asked the driver up front to take us to a certain mountain in Gangwon Province.
"Would you just tell me already?!"
Violet clung to me, still firing off questions. I brushed her off with a "You'll find out when we get there~"
"Eeek!"
In the end, Violet climbed into the limousine just like I'd told her to.
She was going to lose her mind. I grinned to myself, already picturing it.
The number-one early-game must-run dungeon for any Ero Ability Shooters player. The hidden dungeon with the most generous rewards relative to the effort it took. I couldn't wait to see the look on Violet's face when we got there.
Probably something like—
"Y-you've been hogging this all to yourself? That's why you got so strong?!"
Yeah. That sounded about right.