The Cemetery of Deceit
"How did you know?"
With Miri's help, the identity verification was settled without further fuss.
"Th-the ID card is genuine. I saw it being issued myself."
"I'm sorry, you saw it? That was twenty years ago."
"Just take my word for it!"
When the industry's top star flared up in outright anger, the mere receptionist could hardly keep pushing back. Watching Miri storm off in a temper, she spoke with fear in her eyes.
"Understood. I'll process your request, Mr. Ethel. It may take some time to match you with a location and support appropriate to your level — will that be all right?"
"That's fine."
Time was the one thing he had to spare. Ethel settled onto a sofa in the Ether Management Bureau, crossed his legs, and waited at his leisure.
Meanwhile, the receptionist and her colleagues struggled through the paperwork. With the internet down, everything took an eternity — and of all the pending cases, Ethel's took the longest. He was bumped down the queue behind people who had arrived after him, and by the time he came to his senses, it was already five in the afternoon.
"I sincerely apologize!"
The moment Ethel's request was finally resolved, the receptionist bowed her head in apology.
"There is one dungeon that appeared recently, though we have very little information on it. It's presumed to be low-tier, but we can't say for certain."
"All new dungeons are like that. The greater the risk, the bigger the payout."
The receptionist felt guilty for taking so long to find him a money-making opportunity that might turn dangerous, but Ethel was entirely unbothered.
"I can't enter a dungeon like that alone, can I."
"Correct — especially not you, Mr. Ethel, being a Supporter. To prevent loss of life, you must be accompanied by other Incarnations."
"I know that rule well. Probably better than you do."
The party-size restrictions existed to keep Incarnations from recklessly challenging dungeons and dying for it. That was precisely why finding suitable companions had taken Ethel longer than anyone.
"Allow me to make an introduction. This is Lee Han-seong."
The man in question looked as though life had chewed him up and spat him out — a middle-aged civil servant with tired eyes and patchy stubble. He extended a hand toward Ethel.
"Lee Han-seong, Support Coordinator with the Ether Management Bureau. A pleasure to meet you."
He wasn't a freelancer but a civil servant, directly on the government payroll.
"As you may already know, my job is to assist Incarnations who need party members — people in your situation, Mr. Ethel."
"Your position?"
"Dealer. There were no freelance Dealers left, so I came in their place."
"Am I to assume you're the only companion being assigned?"
"A freelance Tanker will be joining us separately."
Simple, but he conveyed everything that mattered. For all his worn-out appearance, the man was quite competent.
A short while later—
"Ah, sorry I'm late!"
The Tanker they'd been waiting for finally arrived, and her face was a familiar one: a streamer with curly brown hair, dressed head to toe in Jirai-kei fashion.
Wait — that's the girl from yesterday?!
It was Hwang Nari, the streamer Ethel had saved with his sponsorship just the day before. To run into her by pure coincidence like this — even the great Ethel was caught off guard, and Nari was no less stunned.
"Whoa, he's freaking gorgeous!!"
Not that she'd recognized who he really was. She was simply floored by a handsome face on a never-seen-before level.
"Are you a model? Or a movie star?"
"If I were a movie star, would I be standing here?"
Ethel, who had zero desire to reunite with her, turned a sour look on Han-seong.
"She's the Tanker? I've seen her stream once, and Tanker wasn't her job then."
"That was true before, but yesterday she received a powerful defense skill from a Constellation and switched to Tanker on the spot. Testing has since confirmed the skill is the real deal."
So her level was low, but she'd been called in for the Tanker role regardless — and Ethel's mood soured further still.
She re-rolled as a Tanker over that one little gift? Did she forget there are level restrictions? What exactly is she planning to do past level 30?
It worried him, but he'd already decided it was no longer his problem, so there was nothing to be done. It was her life; all he could do was trust her to live it.
"I'll drive everyone to the dungeon. Hop in."
"Fine by me."
"Okay~!"
And so, with one deeply unreliable companion in tow, Ethel followed Han-seong toward the dungeon.
The party arrived by car at a vacant, abandoned lot. Aside from a bit of scattered trash there was nothing at all — and yet, in the middle of that emptiness stood something utterly out of place: the entrance to an ossuary. Nowhere a grave ought to be, and yet there it was, the entrance sitting all alone.
"No matter how I look at it, that's a dungeon. Thank you for the refreshingly obvious presentation."
"And who, exactly, are you thanking?"
Han-seong regarded Nari — who was spouting nonsense at the entrance — the way one looks at an idiot.
"The dungeon itself, if not a Constellation? It's nice that you can tell it's a dungeon at a glance."
"...Well, I'll admit the obviousness has its conveniences."
Dungeons surfaced haphazardly in sparsely populated areas, with no discernible pattern to them. There had even been a case that looked, for all the world, like an ordinary supermarket.
"At least there's no chance of some civilian wandering in by mistake and getting killed. ...Speaking of which, what do you suppose those letters above the entrance say?"
Han-seong studied the unfamiliar script carved above the entrance.
"Writing like that is usually tied to the dungeon's gimmick. If we could translate it, we might learn something useful."
"It looks sort of like English, but something's off about it. Should we try a translation app?"
Just as Han-seong and Nari were leaning in to examine the entrance—
"Cemetery of Deceit."
Ethel said flatly.
"That's Latin. Translated literally, it means roughly 'Cemetery of Deceit.'"
"...How do you know Latin?"
"Because I wasn't born here."
Ethel answered with perfect composure. It was an abridged version of the truth — but not a lie.
"Oh, right, you're a foreigner! So of course you'd know foreign languages."
Latin is a dead language in practically every country on earth unless there's a very special reason for it...
Nari swallowed the explanation without a second thought, but Han-seong, who possessed at least a smattering of knowledge, felt a strange unease creep over him. Narrowing his eyes at Ethel, he asked:
"If that's true, what sort of dungeon does that make this one? It's a graveyard, so undead-type?"
"Hard to say. Before I'd commit to anything, the word 'deceit' gives me pause."
As he mulled it over, Ethel's expression abruptly shifted to one of realization.
"Could it be...?"
"What is it?"
"...Hey. Among the supplies you brought — is there anything in there that works on golems?"
Ethel asked, eyeing the backpack Han-seong had carried in. Han-seong nodded at once.
"Yes, I have a few Corrosion Potions. They're effective against golems."
"Keep those at the ready. We may end up needing them."
"Is this a golem dungeon?"
"No idea. It seems likely, but we won't know until we're inside."
Han-seong didn't follow the logic, but he did as he was told. With the offensive potions readied, the party ran through a few final checks before entering.
"Nari, you do know where a Tanker is supposed to stand, right?"
"Front and center, obviously! Every other position falls in behind. Supporters like you, Mr. Ethel, and Healers take up the very rear!"
Han-seong had asked just to be safe, but thankfully Nari wasn't a complete noob.
"Don't you worry! I've engraved the Tanker's mission upon my heart — I will hold the front line with my very life!"
"There's no need to go that far. And while we're at it — no streaming. You're not doing this alone this time; there are other people involved. That would be a flagrant violation of portrait rights."
"O-of course I know that!"
Nari stuffed her camera equipment back into her bag.
And so they entered the dungeon in single file — Nari, then Han-seong, then Ethel. The passage was narrow at first, but it soon opened into a vast chamber.
Inside the ossuary lay a graveyard of its own — one that stretched all the way up to a sky. It was terrain that defied the laws of physics, but in dungeons, that was par for the course.
Before long, the attendants came out to receive their guests.
"Skeletons."
Nari murmured, watching the animated bones rising up out of the graves.
"I never needed to attack in the first place, but at this rate nothing of mine will work at all. My skills are all disease-attribute — they don't affect undead that are already dead."
"I know."
Han-seong returned the Corrosion Potion he'd been about to draw and pulled out something else instead.
"So it really is an undead dungeon after all — I was overcomplicating things. Nari, I'll give you holy water. Sprinkle it over them. Low-tier undead like these won't need more than that."
"Okay~!"
There was no need for the Dealer to step forward and break a sweat. Nari agreed and reached out to take the holy water when—
"No — the one you just stowed, take it back out!"
Ethel barked.
"Did you not hear what I said earlier?"
"But those are undead, not golems—"
"I'll take full responsibility, so just humor me and try it once."
Ethel wouldn't let it go, and in the end Han-seong reluctantly fished the Corrosion Potion back out. He passed it to Nari, and she plunged into the fray, soaking up the enemies' attacks with nothing but her own body as she wedged herself between them and splashed the potion across their bones.
The skeletons dropped all at once — crumpling like marionettes with their strings cut.
"Huh?"
"What the—!"
Nari and Han-seong were both floored. And to the two of them, faces frozen in pure incomprehension, Ethel laid the trick bare.
"No need to overthink it. Ones made of stone are Stone Golems, ones made of iron are Iron Golems — and these are simply Bone Golems, golems built out of human bones."
Skeletons in appearance only. In truth, every last one of them had been a golem.
"They deliberately built the place around a graveyard backdrop and sent out monsters dressed up as undead to fool people. This entire dungeon is one giant con."
"What is this, a monster bait-and-switch? That's fraud!"
"That's why it's the dungeon of deceit. It happens all the time, so quit whining and get back to work."
Ethel answered the aggrieved Nari with perfect cool. Then, sweeping his gaze over the vanishing skeletons, he confirmed they had left nothing behind.
"No drops. So this is the type where the boss monopolizes all the rewards? The real boss is probably deeper in. Let's move."
Having sized up the situation at a single glance, Ethel urged the party onward.
"..."
And Han-seong, for reasons he couldn't quite name, watched him with a strangely searching look in his eyes.