Chapter 558: The Last Gift from a Friend
Chapter 558: The Last Gift from a Friend
After Silvia regained consciousness, we decided to head back to town for the time being.
It had already been seventeen days since we first entered the dungeon.
Our original plan was to leave after we had fully explored the ice cave.
We ended up spending far more time in the dungeon than we’d expected.
Well, we did manage to find the entrance to the 4.5th Floor, so I guess it all worked out.
In any case, now that we’d decided to return, we had two options.
One was to go back up through the ice cave, exit to the 3rd Floor, and return to town from there.
The other was to proceed directly to the 4th Floor and head back to town from there.
In terms of safety, returning via the 3rd Floor was obviously the easier choice, but in terms of time, going through the 4th Floor would be faster.
Even considering the higher level of the monsters.
I know it took me a long time to get there when I was stranded, which might give the impression that the 4th Floor town is far away, but the situation is completely different now.
Back then, I drifted away in my sleep several times, and since I was fighting monsters all by myself, I had to spend a lot of time managing my mana and life force. All of that slowed me down considerably.
Most importantly, I hadn't revealed the map back then.
But now that I've been to the 4th Floor town once, I can just look at the map and take the shortest route back.
“If possible, I’d like to go back through the 4th Floor.”
I stated my opinion, looking at the girls.
“But that means we’ll have to fight our way through the 4th Floor monsters, right?”
“That’s nothing at this point. You probably think that because you didn’t see me fight when I was on my own, but I can make short work of all of them by myself.”
“Guwon.”
As I answered so casually, Leia called my name with a serious expression.
“Hm? Yes, my angel.”
“If you get careless and hurt yourself again, I’m going to scold you.”
She raised a clenched fist next to her face, flicked her wrist, and spoke in a scolding tone.
What was that gesture? Was she pretending to hit me? To me, it just looked like she was imitating a cat.
Isn't my angel just the cutest?
To be that cute with such a mature and beautiful face… It’s just unfair.
Seeing that, I had no choice but to apologize immediately.
“I’m sorry.”
“Really… You’re being so half-hearted again…”
No, I can’t help this dopey smile.
Any man would end up like this the moment he started talking to Leia.
“Anyway, I want to go back through the 4th Floor. I’d also like for us to try reaching the 4th Floor town with our own strength.”
“Gasp! Y-You…”
As I said that, Diana flinched.
Just as I thought. It seemed Diana was regretting her decision.
Her decision to tell us we should only use a floor’s teleportation magic circle after reaching its town on our own.
Diana has already registered the teleportation magic circles for every floor.
So, as members of the same clan, we could have borrowed her power to register all of them for ourselves.
But in the past, Diana had refused to register the circles for us, telling us to strive to do it with our own strength.
But if she had registered them for us beforehand, I would have been able to return to town much faster when I was stranded.
And it was only after I got stranded that Diana came to regret that decision.
Besides, we all ended up registering the 4th Floor’s teleportation magic circle that way in the end.
But that’s just speaking in hindsight, and personally, I think Diana’s judgment was correct.
If you don’t have the strength to reach the town with the teleportation magic circle, you shouldn’t use it.
There’s nothing more dangerous than a weak person wandering around in a place above their level.
It might be a different story if Diana had her pre-reincarnation abilities and could save us all from any crisis, but that’s not the case, which makes it even more true.
If Diana had registered the circle for us, we might have gotten ahead of ourselves and started exploring the depths of the 4th Floor, leading to a crisis far worse than me getting stranded—like a party wipe, for example.
“I made it to the teleportation magic circle on my own, but you guys didn’t, right? Things like that should be registered with your own strength.”
So, partly as a way to validate Diana, who was probably feeling guilty, I thought returning via the 4th Floor was the right choice.
“Why are you saying that so proudly? You just got stranded.”
“But it’s true that I swam all the way there on my own, isn’t it? Right?”
“Yeees… it is…”
Matilda retorted in a bewildered tone, but when I grabbed her by the chin and asked again, she immediately agreed.
Mhm. Honesty is the best policy.
“You idiot. Don’t use the curse like that!”
Seeing me, Sara sighed and lightly pinched my side.
“So, are you against it too, Sara?”
“Not particularly… I don’t mind either way.”
“Anyone else?”
“I-I don’t mind either.”
Diana said, clinging tightly to my waist.
It seemed she understood why I was so insistent on going to the 4th Floor.
Yeah, yeah. There's no one else like me, right?
“Leia?”
“…Let me just confirm one thing. Guwon, are you sure you’ll be okay on the 4th Floor?”
“Of course.”
“Really and truly?”
“Really and truly.”
“In that case, I agree too.”
My angel only gave her approval after worrying and checking on my condition several times.
I’ve told her so many times that I’m not that delicate, yet she still reacts like this. My angel. I love you.
“Alright, shall we go?”
With the decision made, we immediately set off to return to town via the 4th Floor.
What about Silvia and Matilda’s opinions, you ask?
There’s no way those two would oppose me, right?
Matilda might have under normal circumstances, but she’s in her pink mode right now, and Silvia still hasn’t recovered from the aftereffects of our earlier kiss.
It might actually be better for both of them to go to a more dangerous place like the 4th Floor and feel the tension of combat.
And so, returning to the 4th Floor after several days, we looked at the map and began swimming straight for the town.
Seeing Silvia and Matilda keeping up with us showed that their training hadn’t been in vain.
Especially since they were both wearing heavy armor.
Well, they’re both high-ranking individuals, so their armor is probably high-quality and weighs less than it looks.
Silvia had always worn heavy armor, but Matilda had also completely changed her equipment after her class change to Paladin.
From her intricate cardinal’s robes to a magnificent suit of armor that truly suited the title of Paladin.
I heard it was the same armor she wore back when she was the captain of the Holy Knights.
She also switched her weapon from a staff to a mace.
The trope of religious figures not using bladed weapons is pretty common, but seeing Matilda, with a figure second only to Leia’s, decked out in heavy armor and holding a mace was honestly super awkward at first.
Besides, that mace is still a cleric’s weapon, right?
Could that also be made from a penis? I’m too scared to ask.
I mean, think about it. A staff is usually used for support, but you swing a mace to deal direct damage, right?
Getting beaten with a weapon made from a penis… If I were a monster, I’d cry.
Anyway, as we were swimming along, Sara suddenly stopped, took a stance, and drew her bowstring.
I followed her gaze, but all I could see was an endless expanse of water.
“Sara?”
She didn’t respond to my call, simply pulling the bowstring taut.
An arrow of pure ki shot from her bow like a laser.
“Let’s go.”
Then, as if nothing had happened, Sara started swimming again.
What in the world was that?
The question was answered only after we swam forward for a few more minutes.
The corpse of a shark, a large hole pierced through its body, was floating there, bleeding.
Attracted by the scent of blood, three other sharks of a different species were circling the corpse.
Well, not that there was anything to be afraid of.
Alright. Shall I test the power of the Moon Shadow Warrior?
First, a surprise attack on the closest one…!
The moment I had that thought, holes were simultaneously pierced through the bodies of all three sharks.
As I stared at Sara, speechless, she slung her bow back over her shoulder and gave me a cool smile that, for the first time in a while, perfectly matched her looks.
“Who was it that said we hadn’t seen him fight?”
“I apologize for getting cocky.”
How did she just do that?
The three of them weren’t even lined up, but they all died at the same time.
Did she fire three arrows at once?
And that first one that was already dead. Sara got that one too, right?
Just how far away was she when she shot it?
She fought normally in the ice cave, so I didn’t really notice, but damn, Sara has gotten incredibly strong.
No wonder Diana, who would normally conserve her mana to prepare for emergencies, had been using her wind magic so freely without a care in the world.
She had someone she could count on.
Meaning there was no possibility of an emergency happening in the first place.
What the hell. This Hero is so damn reliable.
Thanks to the efforts of the newly-strengthened Sara, we were able to just swim without doing almost anything.
No, not almost… we literally did nothing.
I mean, Sara killed every monster before it could even get close, so there was nothing for us to do.
Why didn’t she fight like this in the ice cave?
Was she trying to save my pride?
Or maybe, since this was the 4th Floor where I got stranded, she was trying extra hard to make sure nothing happened to me?
In any case, even though all we did was swim, it still took us several days to reach the town.
Still, it was much faster than if we had gone back through the 3rd Floor.
“Alright. We should reach the town in another hour or two. Let’s keep it up, everyone.”
After finishing what would probably be our last meal on this dungeon trip, I looked at everyone and spoke like a proper party leader.
Diana gives the overall advice, and Sara handles the actual combat. I feel like my duties as a leader are slowly disappearing, but still, I’m the leader.
As I said that and stood up, something familiar caught the corner of my eye.
The moment I identified what it was, I felt my body start to tremble uncontrollably.
“Ah, ah, ahh… Pau…”
“Guwon? What’s wrong?”
Perhaps because she’d seen me perfectly fine on the 4th Floor for the past few days, Leia no longer seemed as worried as before. She tilted her head and bent down slightly to peer at my face.
But despite my angel’s lovely gesture, I was in no state to pay attention to her.
“Paulsooooon!”
I shot out of the air bubble Diana had created for our meal and swam desperately toward my friend in the distance.
But there was a shadow that reached Paulson a step faster than I did.
It was a piranha-type monster.
“Noooooo! Paulsooooon!”
My anguished cry was in vain. Paulson was torn apart by the piranha’s sharp teeth and burst with a pop.
The next moment, Sara’s arrow pierced the piranha’s body, but it was already too late.
“I’m sorry… I’m sorry, Paulson… Sob… sob…”
A single hot tear streamed down my cheek, melting into the cold water of the 4th Floor and adding to its volume.