Try It Out - (2)
Arjen Academy was located in the Albus Territory, known as the "White Lake of the South." It was a neutral zone positioned with exquisite precision between the three nations of the southern continent—the Gallia Kingdom, the Arcana Republic, and the Holy Theocracy.
Even in this peaceful neutral zone, mana anomalies kept sprouting like mushrooms after rain. These were dungeons. They appeared without warning one day—abnormal dimensional phenomena that brought swarms of monsters and raw mana with them.
The place teemed with rare materials and peculiar magical beasts. Their scales varied wildly, of course. Some dungeons were barren wastelands, others overflowing with bounty. Some were easy, others brutally difficult. Yet no human could ever predict where or what kind of dungeon might emerge.
Devotees of the One Faith Church went so far as to claim that only the will of the Sun God could determine a dungeon’s contents. In short, it all came down to luck.
You could enter an already opened dungeon to measure and assess it, but no one could foresee what would appear next. For that reason, newly generated dungeons were treated as priceless assets by every nation.
On the southern continent claimed by the three great powers, undiscovered dungeons had become nearly impossible to find. Locations yielding truly rare materials were even rarer… except within this neutral zone designated by the Sun God.
Among those many untouched dungeons was one hidden with perfect precision beneath a rock in the academy forest. And toward that dungeon, a group now ran at full speed.
“Arty! Take the left!”
“Got it!”
Arty and Mave tore through the dense forest like a paired war chariot. Plain iron swords and shields filled their hands. Aria ran just behind them, while Lydia brought up the rear with Morgan riding on her back.
Thud. Thud.
Kikikik!
Kuwooo!
“!”
Mave heard the skin-crawling cry and shouted at once. Goblins possessed low intelligence; if they believed their trap would work, they simply could not hold back their laughter.
“Goblin ambush ahead—! Arty! I hear beast-type monsters too! They’re probably hiding on that dead tree up front!”
“Let’s charge straight through before they fire their poison needles!”
“Fine by me! I’ll show you how knights break through!”
Arty and Mave raised their shields to cover their upper bodies and shouted together.
“Break through!”
“Break through!”
Blue energy flowed from their bodies like mist. Like bulls charging scarecrows, they slammed straight into the dead tree.
BAAAANG—!
The old trunk exploded into splinters. Countless wooden shards scattered in every direction. Several goblins clutching poison-coated paralysis darts and rocks shot skyward as if struck by lightning.
The small wolf-type low-grade beast hiding behind the tree burst apart and died instantly.
“Kyaaaak?!”
“Kyak… ugh…!”
The stunned goblins spun helplessly as they fell. The party ignored them before they even hit the ground. In this dungeon, every second saved before the final zone meant greater profit. They simply passed the small fry.
“Nice—!” Mave roared, clearly thrilled by the exhilarating tactic. In maze-type dungeons you normally had to watch your every step, after all.
“That felt incredible! Let’s keep this pace!”
“Haha, not bad at all, Mave.”
“Hmph! You country bumpkin! This is how the knight order fights!”
“I like it!”
Aria called out to them in her refined, flowing tone.
“May I ask if either of you has sustained any injuries?”
“No! Saintess, we’re perfectly fine! Full of energy!”
“Let’s keep going like this—!”
Arty and Mave continued their relentless charge. Lydia, running at full tilt, glanced at Morgan on her back. The girl had been murmuring calculations nonstop.
“One, three, four… the symmetry of the inverse transformation…”
“…”
Morgan was sketching a simplified map while being carried. It was thanks to her advanced surveying magic, which calculated the shortest route through maze-type dungeons.
Lydia felt the sheer convenience of this “utility magic”—something the game had simply skipped over with text—in her very bones.
In the game, finding your way through a dungeon had been easy. But in reality, both navigation and measuring the dungeon’s scale could become obstacles in themselves. It was genuinely terrifying. I’m so glad I brought Morgan.
While she thought this, Morgan tucked the map away, wrapped her arms around Lydia’s neck to steady herself, and whispered.
“…Now we just take the right fork. Once we pass it, we’ll reach the final zone immediately. The mana condensation is increasing noticeably. It seems the dungeon master is generating right now, just as you predicted.”
“!”
This is too much. She’s so cute and clever… A high-performance self-navigating system that makes its own judgments.
Lydia felt deeply satisfied.
“Thank you. Your wisdom truly shines no matter the situation.”
“Hmph. Obviously.”
“I hope the materials we obtain today prove useful to you. The alchemy final exam for the magic department is coming up soon, isn’t it? Today’s star is you. Take as much as you want.”
“…”
Morgan couldn’t answer. She simply hung her head, face burning crimson.
“…Lydia.”
“Hm?”
“Th-thank…”
“…?”
After mumbling awkwardly, Morgan blurted out in a rush, cheeks still flaming.
“…The raw liquid of a forest slime may be inferior to the saliva of an upper-grade monster like ‘Gomaion,’ but it’s still better than trash. At least the results won’t be completely worthless.”
“Heh. I see.”
Lydia looked ahead and shouted.
“Right fork now! The boss is about to appear!”
As previously arranged, Arty, Mave, and Aria called back.
“Right!”
“Right!”
“Right!”
The moment they shouted, the party moved through the fork with magical precision, not a single misstep. Even as the paths themselves wriggled and shifted, no one fell behind.
Arty swallowed hard. He was beginning to understand just how useful this “simple call-and-response” truly was.
When Lydia first suggested it, I thought it seemed trivial. But when your head is spinning inside a dungeon, nothing helps you focus on the goal more. It’s convenient too—if one person misses the call, the others pass it along.
Just then Mave shouted urgently.
“There! An intermediate monster—a forest slime—is generating!”
“!”
Sure enough, something was wriggling in the middle of the forest. Far ahead in Arty’s vision, thick green mucus clung heavily to a sphere the size of a human torso. It resembled moss-covered starch, yet it was an acidic liquid capable of melting even the sturdiest knight.
“Forest slime…!”
Slimes were formidable no matter the variant. They possessed no elemental attacks and existed only to melt their foes… Even the weakest “forest slime” was classified as an intermediate monster on par with war wolves or trolls.
Swords and ordinary magic had no effect.
If something like this appeared in a village, the local lord would dispatch troops… Can we really handle it with just the five of us?
Yet Arty quickly steeled himself.
We can do this…!
The creature had only just been born. It was riddled with openings. Its weak point—the orb—was completely exposed.
It was exactly as Lydia had told them.
—They say a forest slime appears as the master of this dungeon.
—A slime?! Isn’t that too strong?
—No. We can do it. If we strike before the dungeon master fully forms, its weak point will be easy to exploit. We’ll have to run for two straight hours, though.
—But maze dungeons usually take three days, don’t they?
—We can do it. Because I have a genius mage for a friend.
Lydia never speaks empty words. For now, I’ll trust her.
Trust aside, Arty never stopped thinking for himself. He called to Mave.
“Left side again for me!”
“Understood.”
This time the two drew their swords. Blue energy surged from their bodies as they kicked off the ground and charged. In an instant they had leaped several meters.
Taat—!
They closed in on the slime like lightning.
“Haa!”
“Chaa!”
The forest slime’s core—the mossy orb—twitched before it could even finish forming its body. Though it tried to spray acid at them, it still lacked control. It simply wobbled in place.
“…!”
All it could do was express faint confusion with the tiny spark of consciousness it possessed as the dungeon master.
—Just how… are they this fast?
“Die—!”
Their swords did not hesitate. Mave’s strike used flexible power from a powerful waist rotation; Arty’s relied on raw, centered strength. The two blades, carrying different momenta, slashed toward the newly forming orb.
Slice!
The outer shell peeled away like watermelon rind. At its center shone a pure white core like luminous jade.
Arty and Mave cheered.
“We got it!”
“Now we just need to set it on fire…!”
A cold voice cut through their excitement.
“Step aside, you trash.”
“!”
“!”
"Trembling energy,"
"O crimson vibration—"
⟨ Burn ⟩
Ominous flames erupted around the slime’s white-jade core. The heat was so fierce that Arty and Mave instinctively stepped back.
Whoosh—!
The flames swelled, growing fiercer by the second. They swirled with enough power to incinerate a person whole, completely melting the slime’s core.
Roooar—!
The troublesome intermediate monster died at the exact moment of its birth. The dungeon and environment that should have protected it had been conquered by wisdom. It was a feat bordering on the extraordinary.
“…”
“…”
Arty and Mave stared in awe.
“Incredible…”
“That was ridiculously fast.”
Lydia watched the rising flames with a satisfied smile. Aria, on the other hand, could only offer a bitter little grin.
…Once again, I wasn’t any help at all.
The party collected the liquid that flowed from the forest slime’s core, filling every bottle they had. It was the essence and raw fluid expended along with the creature’s brief life. Since it had died the instant it was born, an enormous quantity poured out.
Arty’s hands shook as he held a bottle.
“S-so one bottle of this equals two months’ salary? You could eat kingdom special steak for every meal for a whole week?”
“…”
“And we got six whole bottles?”
“…”
Morgan gave him a sidelong glance and ignored him completely.
What a foolish man.
Undeterred by her reaction, Arty kept fussing. He turned urgently to Mave, who was casually scooping the liquid into bottles.
“Hey, hey?! Be careful! If you handle it that roughly, isn’t it a waste—?!”
“Kyaaak?!”
Mave’s slippery hand finally lost its grip. The bottle flipped, spilling its contents all over her.
The sticky liquid drenched her clothes.
“!”
The instant Lydia saw it, she covered Arty’s eyes.
Damn it… A cliché adult-game situation.
“Close your eyes, Arty.”
“Y-yes…? What?”
“Respect Mave’s dignity.”
“?”
When Lydia turned her head, she saw Mave’s clothes slowly melting away. The viscous slime essence greedily devoured the fabric and evaporated, gradually revealing the girl’s pale skin.
“Kyaaaaak?! Why is it only melting the clothes?!”
“Wh-what, what—?!”
Arty instinctively tried to open his eyes, but sensing Aria’s presence he quickly looked away. Aria gave him a troubled smile.
“…”
Fortunately Lydia had brought spare clothes, so Mave was able to preserve her dignity. Still, the loss of one precious bottle of slime essence left a rather gloomy atmosphere hanging over the group.
“…”
“…”
“…”
Lydia studied her companions and thought carefully.
Five bottles remain. One for Morgan’s exam materials, then one bottle’s worth for each of us. Not bad pay for a few hours of work. I can see why people here treat dungeons like slightly dangerous part-time jobs.
The party walked quietly through the shopping district, heading for the academy’s alchemy guild. Someone approached them—a freshman from the Holy Studies Department. She hurried to Aria.
“Saintess! You were here.”
“Yes?”
“His Eminence Cardinal Albert has summoned you urgently…”
“What do you mean…?”
“The examiners in charge of the Hero’s test will arrive in a few hours. He has ordered all students of the Holy Studies Department to assemble at once.”
“!”