Chapter 7
Chapter 7
Drip, drip, drip.
I hear the sound of water dripping.
The dungeon-type Labyrinth in the lower floors was humid everywhere, but the 7th Floor was especially damp. The ceiling bulged as if it were about to pour water, and droplets fell from it little by little.
And as is the case with any damp place, the 7th Floor had an atmosphere that made people feel unpleasant.
"Wrap it up quickly."
"Wait. I'm wrapping it, so why the fuck are you bitching?"
A party that clearly looked injured and exhausted.
Someone was covered in bandages on both arms, and someone else had lost an eye. The rough-looking man urged him on, and the man wrapping the bandages retorted bluntly.
The look of it, this was a party that had been driven to the brink of total annihilation.
They were covered in wounds that would likely prevent them from ever returning to the Labyrinth until they paid the expensive healing fees at the Temple.
However, the peculiar thing about this party was.
At the very back of the procession, there were two people who looked quite fine. One archer and one warrior.
It was Hera and me, the two of us.
"They're in worse shape than I thought."
"Yeah."
At the time of departure, it was a fairly large party that consisted of 11 people, including the two of us here.
But now, as the conquest was almost over, 3 had died and 8 remained.
Even then, the remaining 3 had suffered injuries that severely impaired their combat ability, so they were just moving around and couldn't do anything properly. The Explorers staggering or limping along looked like their lives were as good as ruined.
What money would Explorers running the lower floors have to go to the Temple? They'll probably have to live with permanent disabilities.
'What kind of confidence makes them... hmm.'
I understood.
In the end, if you just kill time here and there in the lower floors, you'll just wither away. They must have wanted to go up to the higher floors a little bit, to earn money a little faster.
But as the saying goes, the more haste, the less speed; the more urgent you are, the more you need to build a foundation before going up. Just like my stocks back when the KOSPI was skyrocketing, where I jumped in shouting 'Is it now?' only to get hit by the Iran war and crash.
Well, that's that.
"That guy won't make it."
"Hmm."
Hera's words as she glanced toward the front.
I nodded.
The 7th Floor of the Labyrinth is a place where people die like that for them, but for Explorers like Hera and me, it wasn't that difficult. In terms of absolute difficulty, the 7th Floor of the Labyrinth was easier than the 1st Floor Treasure Room.
Of course, this is generally because the Treasure Rooms on each floor have a difficulty of about +10 floors.
Even in such a place, this party struggled.
But even if they struggled, if only the Healer had been a decent guy, there would have been no need for three people to die. At most, only one person would have died.
It was a quite disappointing performance.
That's true from the perspective of a basic Healer's capability, but it was even more so from the perspective of someone who came to scout.
"It's a real manpower shortage. How is a kid like that a prospect..."
"Can't be helped. He's a Healer."
While we were chatting, the treatment seemed to have finished, and everyone stood up and dusted themselves off. Someone pressed down on their aching legs, and someone else hid their trembling hands behind their back while keeping an eye on the surroundings.
And the Guide slowly moved from the front row, holding a torch and starting to scout the surroundings.
It was a similar speed to before.
A speed filled with the determination not to be ambushed again, after having been ambushed so many times.
However, that sight didn't seem to please someone.
"No, seriously... we're already... we're here. We just need to escape, so why are you dilly-dallying like that?!"
"Quiet. He's finding the way."
The voice of a party member who seemed terrified.
The fear that had been building up while defending against annoying ambushes for days (though it was actually nothing) seemed to be bursting out as it was time to leave. He impatiently shook the Guide and spat out, "Find it quickly."
"The more you act like this, you fucker, the slower it is to find the way!"
"Fu... fuck, at this point, *hic*, it would be faster if I looked for it myself."
The guy shouting like that had bandages wrapped around his head, covering half of one eye. Perhaps because of the many bandages, his helmet wasn't on properly, and only his exhausted and terrified eyes shone intensely.
"You crazy bastard. Stop acting up and get to the back."
"I, just... we're at the exit now, so please, let's just go quickly!"
With a haggard face, the Bandaged Man took out his torch and lit it. The corridor became much brighter due to the two torches.
The Bandaged Man took a few more steps forward with the torch and said,
"See, I'm right. We can just go now! You said it was right in front!"
"No, fuck... just going straight like this doesn't mean it's the exit. We have to go much further to get to the exit."
"Sob, ugh."
At the Guide's annoyed voice, the Bandaged Man hung his head. He seemed desperate at the fact that they still had a long way to go. Even so, a grown man's tears are a bit pathetic.
"Calm down and come back to the back."
"Mom, I want to go home quickly..."
Perhaps because of a breeze, the Bandaged Man's torch suddenly flickered and the flame grew weak.
And with a strange thud, the Bandaged Man dropped the torch to the floor. As it fell, the torch illuminated the area brightly for a moment.
Everyone thought he had fainted from fear, but that wasn't it.
The cause was elsewhere.
"Gasp, it's a spider!!"
Reflected in the last flame of the torch, spiders had approached in droves before anyone knew it.
On the ceiling, the floor, the walls, and so on.
One had landed on the Bandaged Man's helmet, piercing his neck with its eight legs. That must have been the source of the thud earlier.
As the Bandaged Man collapsed, spells poured out from behind.
"Repelle!!"
"You crazy bastard!"
Typical of a crappy party, the mage in the center of the formation just fired spells without knowing friend from foe.
As power was released in front of the swung staff, the spiders hesitated, but the other party members standing in the front line were also shaken. In the meantime, the rushing spiders clung to the Explorers and attacked them with sharp legs and teeth.
"Shoot arrows!!"
"Where??"
"Back there!"
The front line somehow maintained their formation and swung their weapons in the midst of it, but they were already entangled with monsters and couldn't receive support. At the command of the gritting-teeth Party Leader, the ranged attackers fired at the spiders approaching from behind, not the front line.
The clicking spider cries and human shouts mixed together.
It was a sight I couldn't bear to watch.
"Are you going to help? I told you not to help."
"We can't just let them all die. It'll be troublesome when we go back, too."
I grabbed throwing axes from my waist and threw them.
The three axes that flew like arrows burst the spiders that were about to cling to each of the three people.
As a momentary gap was created, the front line somehow shook off the spiders and created distance, and finally, attacks poured out toward the front.
But I didn't stop there; I pushed through the Explorers and moved further forward.
"Move."
I passed the Party Leader, who had said it was fine to follow but not to participate in the conquest. He had already injured his arm in the previous battle and couldn't fight properly. The look in his eyes that seemed to want to say something eventually dropped, and I stood behind the front line and drew my sword.
A vivid ash-gray light illuminated the corridor.
"Get out of the way!"
Hearing that, the front line scrambled back as if burned. The spiders seemed to hesitate slightly upon seeing me.
After briefly reciting a prayer starting with "Oh, Valtern...", I gripped the sword tightly, took a large step forward with my left foot, and thrust into the empty air in the center of the corridor.
As if a giant's arm had filled the corridor and shot out.
A massive pressure of force swept through the corridor.
The corridor expanded as if I had fired a ki blast. The spiders were crushed by that force, exploded, or were blown away and disintegrated into pieces. There were still some living spiders, but they staggered, clicked a little more, and then scattered into dust.
What remained in the corridor were a few bricks that had fallen from the walls, and the dust and Magic Stones left behind as the monsters scattered.
* * *
A few hours later.
"... Good work."
Whether that was the last wave, nothing much happened after that. After coming out of the Labyrinth, the Party Leader greeted us with a voice that clearly showed he was gritting his teeth, and his party members followed behind with the air of defeated soldiers.
"What's with him?"
"It's probably because I took care of that last wave."
I have no intention of yielding on that part. Because it's true that I caught them. However, the Party Leader seemed to be hurting a lot, so he didn't even show the minimum courtesy towards a veteran Explorer.
Still, well, it was fine.
Anyway, a guy like that will die on the street within a year. Because the Labyrinth is a place where mutual respect is necessary to climb high.
"Ah... that must be because he couldn't even get his allowance. That scout allowance. Didn't he take us along aiming for that?"
"Oh, right."
At Hera's words, I recalled that fact.
In lower-floor parties, member changes inevitably happen continuously. Members are replaced for various reasons: dying, getting injured, leaving, and so on.
However, even if they can tolerate those things, Explorers couldn't stand 'the guy who left our party goes to another party and succeeds'.
I don't know the reason. Is it jealousy?
Or maybe it's 'we worked hard to grow together, and someone else is snatching up what we raised'?
Anyway, ever since lower-floor parties blew up dozens or hundreds of times like that, a custom emerged where if a veteran Explorer scouts an Explorer from a lower-floor party, they pay a scout fee to that party. The amount isn't exactly fixed, but it was customary to pay the Party Leader roughly 1 to 3 months' worth of that party's income.
"And well, if they had let us intervene from the start, there wouldn't have been 3 people dying like that~"
"That's why they're playing around in the lower floors. Life is the most precious thing, but they think about money first."
"You were like that in the past, too."
"When was I?"
Ignoring the absurd spreading of rumors.
Returning to the 「Silver Needle Guild」 and telling them about what happened over the past few days, Ray showed a troubled expression.
It seemed she genuinely thought that Explorer was okay.
"The performance was good, and when I actually investigated, there were many evaluations that he was a prospect..."
"Prospect, my foot. He couldn't even properly follow Triage."
Triage.
To explain it simply, 'treatment priority'.
It's one of the most important abilities Healers must possess.
When many people are injured, the number of people you can save changes depending on who you treat first and who you put on the back burner.
"What's Triage?"
"There's such a thing."
That emergency healer guy clearly didn't have the proper judgment ability at a glance. In my view, there were at least two people who died even though they could have been saved.
You can make up for a lack of experience, but you can't make up for a lack of sense. That was also the reason why talent is important in everything.
"Then there are no more decent Healers in the lower floors at the 「Silver Needle Guild」 now. I haven't heard much about that from other Explorer guilds over there either..."
"That's a big problem."
"How about looking for one from an existing party?"
A useless suggestion. While I was worrying, ignoring Ray's words, Hera stroked the back of Ray's head. It was a very ominous movement.
"For now, let's look for people as much as possible while saving up money."
"Saving up money? Are you saying we should run a one-day party again?"
"What are you talking about? Is that the only way to save money? We can just look around while doing other requests."
The only thing that appeared in the game was the Labyrinth (actually, I've never played the game, so I just saw the introduction and guessed roughly), but the world I actually entered was much wider than that. In this world, there are ordinary nations, things commonly called 'city-states', religious nations, and all sorts of things.
And as you can infer from the fact that I lived outside the Labyrinth and came to this city, those places were also all real. The Labyrinth City is just the place where people with nothing to do flock the most, and there were plenty of places in the world that needed manpower.
"Ah! If that's the case, by any chance, there is a request that has come in for Explorers right now..."
"What is it?"
"If you are going to an outside city, I thought you might want to consider it as travel expenses!"
Ray said that and ran quickly to her seat. Perhaps missing the hand that was stroking the back of her head, Hera smacked her lips slightly and withdrew her hand. She was a truly dangerous woman.
"Here, this one, it came to us a while ago... the departure is the day after tomorrow, you see?"
"Let's see."
The destination is Arcanum.
It's a city with a 'Magic Tower', which is common in this kind of worldview. The work to be done is, hmm.
"It's transporting goods."
"Yes!"
It doesn't pay much.
At a glance, it was the level of money that lower-floor Explorers, who have gained some skill but are now afraid to risk their lives entering the Labyrinth, would receive.
But anyway, if we want to go to Arcanum, we have to pay for a carriage rental, or if we want to walk, we have to find people to go with, and there were many things to consider. If you think about all that, this is actually earning quite a bit.
"Well, going to Arcanum and catching some Rookies there is also a method."
"If they get caught, that is."
It's not a city that left a very good impression.
Because there were quite a lot of incidents there.
But well, just staying here without going wouldn't solve the reality that there's no Healer right now.
"Ray, then tell them we accept this."
"Understood!"
Ray ran off with a bright smile. Watching her back, I tapped my fingers on the table. It seemed there were some things I needed to prepare before leaving.