Chapter 121
Chapter 121
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 121
Chapter Title: 37. Magatia (1)
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5.
After ten minutes, El Pam's choice was simple: enter.
"I'm going in."
Of course, it wasn't some agonizing internal debate.
El Pam wasn't the type to agonize like that for ten minutes anyway.
He knew such worries—whether ten minutes or a hundred—never yielded proper answers.
What El Pam had done in those ten minutes was investigate.
He'd scouted the surrounding traces more thoroughly.
"Twenty-seven, most likely. They're skilled, but not overwhelmingly so. We have a solid chance of winning."
Once he reached that conclusion, El Pam entered without hesitation.
And he was the first.
"Ugh, you went in."
Dibo was second.
"Good thing."
"Ah, you went in. Tsk."
Ralph followed.
Miner appeared next.
Kirri was last.
"That's a relief."
The first words out of Kirri's mouth upon entering were a sigh of relief.
"Yeah, it is. A few of us might not have made it."
All five had entered successfully.
After the sigh of relief, what the El Pam party saw next was surprise.
"Boss, you're amazing. You nailed it."
Just as El Pam had said, with twenty-eight or fewer entering this place, all five could get in.
Figuring out the exact number of adventurers from mere traces was a skill no one had ever seen.
Of course, to El Pam, it was nothing special.
Not really a skill at all.
Just something he'd naturally picked up while surviving.
And now, it wasn't even particularly important.
"Start scouting."
"Got it."
Their top priority was to get a firmer grasp on these intruders who'd come in here.
"The area's an oasis, for now."
The visible scenery on the first floor was an oasis.
An ordinary sight.
And a favorable one.
"Footprints here."
Traces stuck out plainly in a place like an oasis.
Most adventurers in Mystic Gates didn't bother hiding them anyway.
They were usually convinced no one was chasing them.
This time was no different.
"They're moving out in the open."
Traces of movement were everywhere, and that made Dibo and the others' expressions harden.
They weren't hiding traces, sure—but parading like this was another story.
"Definitely not ordinary."
Ordinary folks moved cautiously to avoid monster threats.
Strutting around like this meant they were confident they could hunt whatever came at them.
And that meaning soon revealed itself.
Battle traces appeared.
"This is..."
"Sand moles."
Sand moles.
Monsters that lived in the Nihal Desert, moles that burrowed through sand, just as the name implied.
They might sound like regular moles, but to Nihal Desert adventurers, they were nightmare fuel.
"These things are a real pain."
They moved freely underground like true moles, making them incredibly hard to hunt.
No matter how powerful the magic, spear, or bullet, piercing the earth wasn't easy.
And the sand moles' claws and strength, which shredded tough ground effortlessly, surpassed what adventurers imagined.
The toughness of their bodies, enduring immense underground pressure, defied comparison to other monsters.
That wasn't all.
"Encountering them here collapses the ground."
Worst of all, their burrowing weakened the earth below until it caved in.
Sudden sinkholes left adventurers panicked and injured.
It was a headache in every way, and the danger skyrocketed with numbers.
That was why the El Pam party's faces were grim.
"But look, piles of their corpses here."
Hundreds of sand mole bodies littered the area around them.
"No adventurer bodies."
They'd taken down this insane number without a single casualty.
"Wonder how they did it."
The hunt itself was unimaginable.
El Pam was different.
He'd known the answer before even seeing the bodies.
"Poison."
How they'd hunted the sand moles.
"Poison?"
"The Red Scorpion Guild's poison."
"What?"
He'd even identified who wielded it.
Not difficult.
"You can tell that much?"
"Poison-attribute magic alone couldn't achieve this. Means they prepared it separately. Few groups have poison this effective against sand moles. Especially looking at the corpses—they didn't die instantly from poison but collapsed from organ failure, finished off with follow-up attacks. A hallmark of scorpion venom."
All signs pointed overwhelmingly to the Red Scorpion Guild.
"They probably sent a green scorpion for a place like this."
"Green scorpion?"
"The adventurer in the Red Scorpion Guild best at clearing green-grade Mystic Gates."
And the guild would've sent their surest bet.
"My god."
His comrades looked stunned at the explanation.
No one had expected the Red Scorpion Guild here.
El Pam wasn't surprised.
'Oz overheard my conversation with them, but they wouldn't have had much time to form a party.'
El Pam had rushed the raid faster than ever. Without recruiting extras.
For those who'd learned of his talk with Oz via spy, time was short.
In that scenario, hiring the Red Scorpion Guild was a rational move.
'They must've paid a fortune.'
The guild weren't fools; they wouldn't budge for peanuts.
'Whoever they are.'
The real question was who hired them. They were the culprits.
His thoughts stopped there.
El Pam didn't dwell further on the backers.
"This won't be easy."
What mattered now was facing the Red Scorpion Guild.
"If it's the Green Scorpion..."
A truly fearsome foe.
"Name's Kimar, right?"
Green Scorpion Kimar.
Naturally, a 5th Circle mage.
"Active in the Nihal Desert for thirty years."
But what made him more terrifying was his vast experience.
Before Mystic Gates, he'd been a core Red Scorpion member for ages.
A battle-hardened veteran like no other.
"Ruthless, from what I hear."
And infamous for cruelty over those long years.
A tough enemy in every sense.
"So you think so too, Boss?"
That was why.
"We're lucky."
"Right? Super lucky, yeah?"
El Pam calling it luck.
"W-What? What'd you say?"
"What kinda nonsense is that?"
His comrades couldn't even fathom it.
"Lucky to face a monster like that?"
El Pam explained calmly.
"I'll clear them easily."
"Huh?"
"Green Scorpion Kimar? No problem. We just follow."
"Oh."
Only then did his comrades get it.
What he meant by luck.
Of course, El Pam knew.
"The issue is the fourth floor."
"Fourth floor?"
"Can't say who died here, but they weren't weaker than the Green Scorpion, at least."
Something beyond common sense awaited on the fourth.
"So we help them out."
"Huh?"
That was the plan.
"To properly scout what's on that fourth floor, the Green Scorpion needs full strength."
El Pam started moving.
6.
No adventurer alive didn't know how vast a single circle gap could be.
"Between 4th and 5th Circle, the difference is beyond comparison."
Everyone knew 4th and 5th Circle were worlds apart.
"Beyond even circles."
But in truth, the gap was greater than anyone imagined.
Simple reason.
"Most 5th Circle adventurers stay there till they die. Yeah, put simply: among 5th Circles, ten years' experience barely gets you in the door."
Plenty of 5th Circles had experience on another level.
Green Scorpion Kimar was one.
Sixty-one this year, wrinkled like an old prune, he looked frail enough to topple any second.
But at sixteen, he'd opened his 1st Circle; by thirty-one, his 5th. Once hailed a genius in the Nihal Desert.
And for thirty years after, he'd held his fame in that brutal desert.
Not just any fame.
In the Red Scorpion Guild—lawless scourges of Nihal—he'd never let another adventurer take his life amid endless grudges and death threats.
Some hunters were even 6th Circle.
"It's simple."
His survival secret? Poison.
"Inject lethal poison."
He crafted the guild's deadliest brews.
But crafting it meant nothing without delivery.
As he said, injection was key.
That was Green Scorpion Kimar's secret.
"With these arrows."
He had archery skills to hit anything in sight.
No exaggeration.
If he saw it, he hit it.
What made him deadlier.
In vast deserts, his range terrified.
Victims might as well be shot by ghosts.
"My disciples aren't quite at my level, but they're damn good."
Even scarier: he traveled with many disciples.
Few monsters survived Kimar and his poison-arrow crew.
That was his scariest trait.
"They can't match my eye for clues yet."
Tap, tap!
He pointed to a tiny mark on a wooden pillar.
"Hard skill to teach on the spot."
Even shown, it was too faint to call a trace.
Looked natural, like he was insisting it was one.
"Impressive."
The middle-aged man listening believed him.
Had to.
"No blood spilled to get here."
Reaching the third floor of a green-grade Mystic Gate—questionable if clearable—with zero sacrifices or injuries.
Doubting that skill would be the real oddity.
"You won't regret hiring me."
"Hardly."
For the man, money well spent.
By now, he wondered about the Green Scorpion's motives.
He'd amassed wealth as a guild vet.
Not moving for cash alone.
"Kimar, I'll make sure Queen Areda hears of your exploits."
"Yes, please convey my regards to Queen Areda."
What moved him? Queen Areda, thought long dead.
Queen Areda had proposed.
"If I become Red Scorpion leader, it'll greatly aid Queen Areda."
Help her, and she'd make him Green into Red.
Sweeter than anything for Kimar. He accepted eagerly.
Now, more desperate than ever.
"Expect great things."
It appeared before them.
"The portal to the fourth floor!"
Entrance to the fourth—the green-grade Mystic Gate's final floor.
"My eyes were right. Following the traces got us here fast."
Kimar's smile brimmed with unprecedented confidence.
"Let's wrap this up."
No hesitation.
Brimming with assurance, they stepped through to the fourth.
"Huh?"
"What is this?"
They saw it.
"Underground lab?"
A landscape identical to Magatia's underground lab.
"Did we exit? We were on the third floor, though—why outside?"
Confusion was inevitable.
Fourth floor expected, not the outside.
But it didn't last.
No time for it.
Creak, creak!
It appeared before them.
"R-Royce!"
Royce, the robot monster seen only in Magatia's underground lab.