Chapter 548: Secret Room (1)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 548: Secret Room (1)
On our eighty-seventh day in the labyrinth, I was going through my morning routine when Amelia came to me with an interesting piece of news.
A ghost...
She said that she wasn't able to find anything when she checked, but since there were quite a few witnesses, we couldn't just ignore the reports either.
Amelia told me that excluding her, every other member of the security team had seen a ghost at least once during their watch, so I called them all together for a short meeting.
"I felt a chill and turned to look in that direction, and something with white hair was looking back at me."
Starting with Mihail Lectus, the man who had been part of the palace's investigation department, I heard everyone's ghostly testimonies, but surprisingly, it seemed everyone saw a different one.
"What I saw was a beast-type monster with protruding fangs..."
"Mine was a little different... It was a man who looked to be wearing rags. His eyes were completely black and he was crying tears of blood and staring daggers into me."
"The thing I saw looked just like a slime. It was oozing on the ground like it had melted onto it, and it was slowly crawling toward me in the dark. But when I rubbed my eyes, it disappeared. I honestly thought I hallucinated it from exhaustion."
Each of them had seen vastly different things. However, there was one similarity between all of them: the second they took their eyes off of them for even a moment, the ghosts all disappeared without a trace.
"Did this all happen yesterday?"
"No, everyone saw them on different days. Lectus alerted me after his watch last night, so I asked around and found out that everyone except me saw something similar at least once."
I see. In that case...
As I scratched my chin in thought, I heard a grinding sound next to me.
Creak, crack, clatter!
When I turned to look, I noticed that the sound was coming from Ainar's jaw. Barbarians tended to grind their teeth when they were afraid.
"A g-ghost... I-Isn't this dangerous...?"
Now that I thought about it, Ainar had been terrified of stuff like this for as long as I'd known her. No, in truth, most barbarians were the same way. They felt an instinctive aversion to spirit-type monsters, and a few of them were even flat-out afraid of them like she was.
At one point, I was fascinated by this trait and asked Raven about it, and she gave me this explanation: it's in the barbarians' blood.
In other words, they might have had information about a natural predator impervious to physical attack encoded in their very genes. Considering barbarians relied so heavily on their instincts, she said that could be the reason the trait was seen in so many different people.
Well, that didn't actually matter right now.
"This is fishy," I mumbled to myself.
"Hmm? Fishy?" Ainar looked around, sniffing. "Fishy like meat...?"
Was her desire for meat stronger than her fear of ghosts?
I'd never understand her, but I decided to let it go. That wasn't what I meant by fishy, anyway.
Meat is good too... but there were some things out there that were even tastier than meat.
And what I was smelling was one of those things.
A hidden element.
Any self-respecting Dungeon and Stone player had a gut instinct for these things, so when I heard about these ghosts, I caught a whiff of it right away.
Gulp.
The sweet, honeyed scent of a hidden element. And a strong scent at that.
***
In this world, hidden elements were called the Achievements of Gabrielius. As someone who had found quite a few hidden elements over the years, I immediately got to work. What I needed right now was information—a lot of information that I could consolidate into tangible data.
"...Time?"
"It was around one in the morning."
"I was on first watch... so it was around eleven at night."
When I asked the people who had seen the ghost, they all cited seeing it anywhere between eleven at night and three in the morning.
Was that just a coincidence?
Not a chance.
So the ghost of the library appeared between eleven and three in the morning.
"There! Over there. It was looking at me from there."
"I saw mine above the bookshelf..."
"I saw one on the stairs leading outside."
And the location seemed random.
Hmm, I guess it's not so much that it's random as it is that it has free range of the entire library.
"Mister, do you think that that ghost might be an Achievement of Gabrielius?" Erwen asked, face full of curiosity as my thorough investigation commenced. She wasn't the only one either.
"Yeah, for now."
The eyes of all the adventurers around us began to shine.
"An Achievement of Gabrielius!"
"It's true!"
The members of the Armin Adventurer Group, who were pros at looking for hidden elements, and the members of the Hektz Clan all lit up excitedly.
I mean, what adventurer could restrain themself at a moment like this?
"So... if we find that ghost, we'll be able to get the treasure? I heard that everyone who finds an achievement ends up rich." Even Ainar, who was afraid of ghosts, let a bit of her true feelings shine through.
That wasn't to say everyone was consumed by greed, though.
One person wasn't. And they were the only ones to approach me and express concern.
"Yandel, I think it'd be dangerous to assume this is a positive.."
It was Amelia Rainwales, my companion through time itself.
"Dangerous?"
"Yes. I think you're being uncharacteristically optimistic about all this."
Ah, I could understand what she meant. In truth, it did occur to me when I first heard about this ghost that it was maybe some sort of fly on the wall sent here by someone and that we had only ended up noticing it by chance.
The village chief, for example.
After all, on the first day of our return to Library Island, we had the captain of the Silver Lion Clan use Emergency Escape on us.
Blindly treating the existence of this ghost as a good thing wasn't in any way smart. Even if it wasn't connected to the chief, there was no guarantee that it was at all "good" for us.
A hidden element.
Any self-respecting Dungeon and Stone player had a gut instinct for these things, so when I heard about these ghosts, I caught a whiff of it right away.
Gulp.
The sweet, honeyed scent of a hidden element. And a strong scent at that.
***
In this world, hidden elements were called the Achievements of Gabrielius. As someone who had found quite a few hidden elements over the years, I immediately got to work. What I needed right now was information—a lot of information that I could consolidate into tangible data.
"...Time?"
"It was around one in the morning."
"I was on first watch... so it was around eleven at night."
When I asked the people who had seen the ghost, they all cited seeing it anywhere between eleven at night and three in the morning.
Was that just a coincidence?
Not a chance.
So the ghost of the library appeared between eleven and three in the morning.
"There! Over there. It was looking at me from there."
"I saw mine above the bookshelf..."
"I saw one on the stairs leading outside."
And the location seemed random.
Hmm, I guess it's not so much that it's random as it is that it has free range of the entire library.
"Mister, do you think that that ghost might be an Achievement of Gabrielius?" Erwen asked, face full of curiosity as my thorough investigation commenced. She wasn't the only one either.
"Yeah, for now."
The eyes of all the adventurers around us began to shine.
"An Achievement of Gabrielius!"
"It's true!"
The members of the Armin Adventurer Group, who were pros at looking for hidden elements, and the members of the Hektz Clan all lit up excitedly.
I mean, what adventurer could restrain themself at a moment like this?
"So... if we find that ghost, we'll be able to get the treasure? I heard that everyone who finds an achievement ends up rich." Even Ainar, who was afraid of ghosts, let a bit of her true feelings shine through.
That wasn't to say everyone was consumed by greed, though.
One person wasn't. And they were the only ones to approach me and express concern.
"Yandel, I think it'd be dangerous to assume this is a positive.."
It was Amelia Rainwales, my companion through time itself.
"Dangerous?"
"Yes. I think you're being uncharacteristically optimistic about all this."
Ah, I could understand what she meant. In truth, it did occur to me when I first heard about this ghost that it was maybe some sort of fly on the wall sent here by someone and that we had only ended up noticing it by chance.
The village chief, for example.
After all, on the first day of our return to Library Island, we had the captain of the Silver Lion Clan use Emergency Escape on us.
Blindly treating the existence of this ghost as a good thing wasn't in any way smart. Even if it wasn't connected to the chief, there was no guarantee that it was at all "good" for us.
"Emily, I understand what you're trying to say. But I'm being pretty cautious, so don't worry about it."
"...If you say so. Got it."
"Yeah. Thanks for talking to me."
My gut feeling still said that this ghost was connected to a hidden element, but I decided to heed Amelia's warning and be a little bit more cautious. It was always best to be prepared for the worst-case scenario.
And by nightfall... I'll know what scenario we're dealing with.
After coming to that conclusion, I got back to business and spent the day summoning and killing monsters. We rested only as much as we needed to, but unfortunately, we didn't get anything good today.
Just one rank-four essence that we can't even use...
Usually, something like that would've been considered valuable enough to put into a magic vial, but we were now at the point where we couldn't be satisfied with little wins like this.
Tsk.
The biggest shame was that we were lucky enough to find and kill two more Bellarios, but neither dropped an essence. Still, at our current pace, I'd definitely be able to get one before I left the basement. The higher up the shelves we got, the more books we could get our hands on.
In any case, what do I do with the last remaining essence slot?
I had two empty essence slots. One of them was reserved for the Bellarios's essence, and since I planned to use a Hipramajent essence to replace my Orc Hero essence later on, that one didn't count.
I took my time pondering what my last essence should be.
In truth, the last slot wouldn't stay filled for long. I just felt that having the maximum number of essences I could help in my fight against the village chief, but it wasn't like I could get any of my endgame essences right now. Unless another Guardian of the Rift from the eighth floor like Milayel spawned down here again, no matter what I took, it would have to be erased in a few months.
...I'll keep it in the back of my mind when new essences drop. It's not like I need to make a decision right away.
It would've been a different issue if I hadn't obtained Wall of Aegis, but since I now had my endgame shield, facing the village chief didn't seem nearly as worrying a prospect. I tabled that train of thought there.
Tick, tock.
The day was over, and we began to set up camp in the library as usual.
[23:00]
Night had come. Usually by eleven at night, everyone except our squadron's hand-picked security team would be asleep recharging their energy, but a lot more people were awake tonight.
"An Achievement of the Great Sage..."
"Do you think it really is one?"
"Even if it isn't, I'm curious. It could be a clue to help us get out of this place."
The other adventurers were awake and talking like school children excited for a field trip the next day.
Hey, just go to sleep.
"Stop talking and shut your eyes! It might not show up if too many people are awake!"
I then went around telling off the ones who were still awake, and the library quickly quieted. Ah, of course, that only meant that they stopped talking. They were far from silent.
Snore!
Honk, shoo, honk.
Dozens of adventurers were snoring at various volumes.
"Emily, I understand what you're trying to say. But I'm being pretty cautious, so don't worry about it."
"...If you say so. Got it."
"Yeah. Thanks for talking to me."
My gut feeling still said that this ghost was connected to a hidden element, but I decided to heed Amelia's warning and be a little bit more cautious. It was always best to be prepared for the worst-case scenario.
And by nightfall... I'll know what scenario we're dealing with.
After coming to that conclusion, I got back to business and spent the day summoning and killing monsters. We rested only as much as we needed to, but unfortunately, we didn't get anything good today.
Just one rank-four essence that we can't even use...
Usually, something like that would've been considered valuable enough to put into a magic vial, but we were now at the point where we couldn't be satisfied with little wins like this.
Tsk.
The biggest shame was that we were lucky enough to find and kill two more Bellarios, but neither dropped an essence. Still, at our current pace, I'd definitely be able to get one before I left the basement. The higher up the shelves we got, the more books we could get our hands on.
In any case, what do I do with the last remaining essence slot?
I had two empty essence slots. One of them was reserved for the Bellarios's essence, and since I planned to use a Hipramajent essence to replace my Orc Hero essence later on, that one didn't count.
I took my time pondering what my last essence should be.
In truth, the last slot wouldn't stay filled for long. I just felt that having the maximum number of essences I could help in my fight against the village chief, but it wasn't like I could get any of my endgame essences right now. Unless another Guardian of the Rift from the eighth floor like Milayel spawned down here again, no matter what I took, it would have to be erased in a few months.
...I'll keep it in the back of my mind when new essences drop. It's not like I need to make a decision right away.
It would've been a different issue if I hadn't obtained Wall of Aegis, but since I now had my endgame shield, facing the village chief didn't seem nearly as worrying a prospect. I tabled that train of thought there.
Tick, tock.
The day was over, and we began to set up camp in the library as usual.
[23:00]
Night had come. Usually by eleven at night, everyone except our squadron's hand-picked security team would be asleep recharging their energy, but a lot more people were awake tonight.
"An Achievement of the Great Sage..."
"Do you think it really is one?"
"Even if it isn't, I'm curious. It could be a clue to help us get out of this place."
The other adventurers were awake and talking like school children excited for a field trip the next day.
Hey, just go to sleep.
"Stop talking and shut your eyes! It might not show up if too many people are awake!"
I then went around telling off the ones who were still awake, and the library quickly quieted. Ah, of course, that only meant that they stopped talking. They were far from silent.
Snore!
Honk, shoo, honk.
Dozens of adventurers were snoring at various volumes.
"Everyone seems to be asleep."
"So, what will you do now?"
"There's only one thing to do. Look around and try to find it."
After checking that everyone was asleep, I grabbed Amelia and Versyl and patrolled the area.
"So... we need to keep doing this until three in the morning?" Versyl asked after an hour of us walking around without finding anything. But I didn't get the sense she was asking because she had a problem with being stuck on patrol. "How have you been these days, Mr. Yandel?"
Instead, it was just that she was getting bored of walking around in silence. Since I was thinking along the same lines, I accepted her attempt at small talk.
"What do you mean by 'these days?'" I asked.
"Just in general. Everyone else is curious too."
"What are they curious about?"
Versyl glanced at Amelia, who was patrolling alone a short distance away, before whispering, "So, who is it?"
"A little more context, please."
"Jeez... you already know what I'm talking about."
Well, that was true. I wasn't completely clueless.
I smirked and answered, "No one."
"What? Really? I don't know about the others, but I thought you were dating Ms. Raines."
"No way. We're just comrades."
"Heh... is that so?" Versyl said, her tone hinting that she didn't believe me before she offered up another name. "Then what about Ms. Karlstein? I noticed that the amount of time you two spend together has increased a lot recently."
"Not at all." It was just that things between us were finally getting less awkward. That was why recently, the amount of time we spent talking to each other had gone up. They were mostly trivial conversations, though, like ones about how the food tasted and her insisting that I needed to eat more vegetables.
"Everyone's been watching pretty closely, I guess. She's the famous Lord Baron's only ex, after all."
Huh. After being in the labyrinth for so long, it seemed everyone was entertained by even the smallest of things.
I initially welcomed some small talk to help pass our patrol, but I didn't want to talk about such a tense subject, so I ended things there. "Let's quiet down. Everyone is still sleeping." We had hard work to do tomorrow too, so we needed to let our precious fighters rest as much as they could.
A heavy silence ensued. What the...? Why isn't she saying anything? Is she mad because I told her to shut up?
"...Mr. Yandel."
I turned back toward Versyl to find that she was no longer right behind me and had instead stopped in her tracks a few feet away. When she spoke, she barely moved her lips, almost like a ventriloquist. "There," she whispered. "Over there." She was facing me head-on, her eyes just barely twitching to the side to tell me the direction. In turn, I kept my body just as still and only moved my eyes to look.
"R-Right?" she stammered. "Th-that's the ghost night watch was talking about."
"Hmm, I'm not really sure, but I guess it's worth checking out."
"...It's pretty scary. No one mentioned it would look so terrifying."
I couldn't help but tilt my head at those words.
Looks terrifying...?
It seemed that Versyl and I were seeing two completely different things.
That's interesting.
All I saw was a little mouse.
***
The mysterious creature that lived in the library appeared between eleven at night and three in the morning, and everyone who saw it saw something different. While it was an enigma in many ways, capturing it wasn't particularly difficult.
[You have cast Eye of the Storm. By the authority of the transcendental body, the potential inherent in this skill is now unlocked.]
It flew straight toward me with one grab attack.
Squeak? S-Squeak!
It was so small that I could hold it in one hand without even using Giantization.
Squick! Squee! Squeak!
As the mouse squirmed in my grip, squeaking frantically, it started to turn transparent. I nearly dropped it in surprise.
[Versyl Gowland has cast the rank-eight curse spell Materialization.]
However, thanks to some quick thinking from Versyl, the mouse's body returned to normal.
"What was that sound...?" Amelia rushed over, alerted by the commotion, before frowning at the sight of me. "Yandel, what are you holding in your hand?"
"Well, what does it look like to you?"
"...It's something that looks very soft and disgusting."
"Really? What about you, Versyl?"
"It's a man who's covered in filth... He looks suspiciously like someone I know."
"Someone you know...?"
"You wouldn't know him."
Hmm, I see...
S-Squeak! Squeak! Squeak!
I glanced back down at the thing in my hand. No matter how I looked at it, it was an ordinary mouse. Or, well, if I were to describe it, I'd say it looked a lot like a hamster standing on two legs. The only difference was that it was pretty big compared to an Earth hamster. This thing made a regular hamster look like a dwarf comparatively.
Squeak! Squeak! Squeeeak!
It was also kind of cute as it struggled, but I brushed the thought aside. We had things to do.
"For now, we should wake up... Oh, everyone."
It seemed most of the group had been woken up by the noise and were now looking in my direction.
"...Is that the ghost?"
"It's as terrifying as they said."
"If I saw that thing in the middle of the night by myself, I would've had a heart attack..."
Ignoring their diverse range of reactions, I walked over to the center of the library with the mouse-slash-hamster in hand.
Tap.
I then set the mouse on top of the altar we had been putting our summoning books on.
"...I guess this isn't it?"
Unfortunately, the altar didn't react at all.
Squ—Squeak! Squeak! Squeeeak!
That meant I had two options left.
One: just kill it.
Two: cast distortion magic on it and kill it.
Which option should I test out?
Since we only had one ghost to work with, this was an important decision.
Squeak! Squeak! Squeeeak!
I let my thoughts wander as I began to tie the mouse to the altar like the lab rat it was.
"(Y-You wicked creature! Let me go already! Let me go!)"
But then, the mouse started to talk.
"Everyone seems to be asleep."
"So, what will you do now?"
"There's only one thing to do. Look around and try to find it."
After checking that everyone was asleep, I grabbed Amelia and Versyl and patrolled the area.
"So... we need to keep doing this until three in the morning?" Versyl asked after an hour of us walking around without finding anything. But I didn't get the sense she was asking because she had a problem with being stuck on patrol. "How have you been these days, Mr. Yandel?"
Instead, it was just that she was getting bored of walking around in silence. Since I was thinking along the same lines, I accepted her attempt at small talk.
"What do you mean by 'these days?'" I asked.
"Just in general. Everyone else is curious too."
"What are they curious about?"
Versyl glanced at Amelia, who was patrolling alone a short distance away, before whispering, "So, who is it?"
"A little more context, please."
"Jeez... you already know what I'm talking about."
Well, that was true. I wasn't completely clueless.
I smirked and answered, "No one."
"What? Really? I don't know about the others, but I thought you were dating Ms. Raines."
"No way. We're just comrades."
"Heh... is that so?" Versyl said, her tone hinting that she didn't believe me before she offered up another name. "Then what about Ms. Karlstein? I noticed that the amount of time you two spend together has increased a lot recently."
"Not at all." It was just that things between us were finally getting less awkward. That was why recently, the amount of time we spent talking to each other had gone up. They were mostly trivial conversations, though, like ones about how the food tasted and her insisting that I needed to eat more vegetables.
"Everyone's been watching pretty closely, I guess. She's the famous Lord Baron's only ex, after all."
Huh. After being in the labyrinth for so long, it seemed everyone was entertained by even the smallest of things.
I initially welcomed some small talk to help pass our patrol, but I didn't want to talk about such a tense subject, so I ended things there. "Let's quiet down. Everyone is still sleeping." We had hard work to do tomorrow too, so we needed to let our precious fighters rest as much as they could.
A heavy silence ensued. What the...? Why isn't she saying anything? Is she mad because I told her to shut up?
"...Mr. Yandel."
I turned back toward Versyl to find that she was no longer right behind me and had instead stopped in her tracks a few feet away. When she spoke, she barely moved her lips, almost like a ventriloquist. "There," she whispered. "Over there." She was facing me head-on, her eyes just barely twitching to the side to tell me the direction. In turn, I kept my body just as still and only moved my eyes to look.
"R-Right?" she stammered. "Th-that's the ghost night watch was talking about."
"Hmm, I'm not really sure, but I guess it's worth checking out."
"...It's pretty scary. No one mentioned it would look so terrifying."
I couldn't help but tilt my head at those words.
Looks terrifying...?
It seemed that Versyl and I were seeing two completely different things.
That's interesting.
All I saw was a little mouse.
***
The mysterious creature that lived in the library appeared between eleven at night and three in the morning, and everyone who saw it saw something different. While it was an enigma in many ways, capturing it wasn't particularly difficult.
[You have cast Eye of the Storm. By the authority of the transcendental body, the potential inherent in this skill is now unlocked.]
It flew straight toward me with one grab attack.
Squeak? S-Squeak!
It was so small that I could hold it in one hand without even using Giantization.
Squick! Squee! Squeak!
As the mouse squirmed in my grip, squeaking frantically, it started to turn transparent. I nearly dropped it in surprise.
[Versyl Gowland has cast the rank-eight curse spell Materialization.]
However, thanks to some quick thinking from Versyl, the mouse's body returned to normal.
"What was that sound...?" Amelia rushed over, alerted by the commotion, before frowning at the sight of me. "Yandel, what are you holding in your hand?"
"Well, what does it look like to you?"
"...It's something that looks very soft and disgusting."
"Really? What about you, Versyl?"
"It's a man who's covered in filth... He looks suspiciously like someone I know."
"Someone you know...?"
"You wouldn't know him."
Hmm, I see...
S-Squeak! Squeak! Squeak!
I glanced back down at the thing in my hand. No matter how I looked at it, it was an ordinary mouse. Or, well, if I were to describe it, I'd say it looked a lot like a hamster standing on two legs. The only difference was that it was pretty big compared to an Earth hamster. This thing made a regular hamster look like a dwarf comparatively.
Squeak! Squeak! Squeeeak!
It was also kind of cute as it struggled, but I brushed the thought aside. We had things to do.
"For now, we should wake up... Oh, everyone."
It seemed most of the group had been woken up by the noise and were now looking in my direction.
"...Is that the ghost?"
"It's as terrifying as they said."
"If I saw that thing in the middle of the night by myself, I would've had a heart attack..."
Ignoring their diverse range of reactions, I walked over to the center of the library with the mouse-slash-hamster in hand.
Tap.
I then set the mouse on top of the altar we had been putting our summoning books on.
"...I guess this isn't it?"
Unfortunately, the altar didn't react at all.
Squ—Squeak! Squeak! Squeeeak!
That meant I had two options left.
One: just kill it.
Two: cast distortion magic on it and kill it.
Which option should I test out?
Since we only had one ghost to work with, this was an important decision.
Squeak! Squeak! Squeeeak!
I let my thoughts wander as I began to tie the mouse to the altar like the lab rat it was.
"(Y-You wicked creature! Let me go already! Let me go!)"
But then, the mouse started to talk.