Chapter 28 – Clear: C-Class Dungeon (I)
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Together with her, I went through the garden cluttered with stone towers. According to Dungeon Seekers, this dungeon has four floors in total. I thought the depth of the dungeons would increase the higher their class, but apparently that’s not the case either.
Going by Satoha’s explanation, the number of traps significantly shoots up from C-Class upwards. She thinks I could easily break through them with my current armament, but told me that she’d like me to experience it first.
At present, she’s being attacked by the dungeon’s defense mechanism. The small stone towers, which I considered to simply be decoration, came flying our way like missiles after being launched from the ground. I don’t know anything about the underlying principle behind those, but she casually dealt with them as if they were no biggie. Or to be more precise, her floating arms automatically intercepted the stone missiles without her having to move a single finger.
“These sorts of unexpected defense mechanisms increase in the higher dungeons. This feature gets suddenly implemented from C-Class onward, in other words.”
Her hammer, which was rotating in the air, pulverized the stone towers. The spears repelled them while the swords cut through them. Those floating weapons didn’t possess abilities as specialized as Dragon Eater, but they were doubtlessly outstanding weapons.
“Hiro, thanks to talking with me, you should have gained access to dungeon information that is not available otherwise. Umm, because it has been set as confidential.”
“Which reminds me…I feel like I’ve seen those 「Undisclosed due to lack of authorization」 messages at some points.”
I destroyed a stone tower, which flew at us from behind, by feeding it to Dragon Eater. 『Intuition』 had allowed me to notice its approach.
“…That’s right. I will deal with them all, so please watch me do it on the first floor.”
Before the stone towers, which came at us successively, could even reach a level you might call saturation attacks, only golden trails by the armaments were left in the places where the towers had been.
It seemed to me as though her armaments’ sharpness went up by one level. The weapons which had previously floated around peacefully, now actively hunted down the stone towers. I opened the dungeon information screen with the crushing of stones as background music, and checked the mysterious text written beneath the dungeon description for the 8th Labyrinth.
C-Class: Branch vortex 15 / 326 – elimination recommended
Even though I possess the right to access it now, I don’t really get what it’s saying.
“Hiro, you mentioned that you wish to suppress all the dungeons in Sendai, right?”
I nodded at her who was looking at me with a sidelong glance.
“I will teach you the concrete method to do so. First off, previously I told you that the most plausible theory to achieve this dictates to destroy the vortexes, which are military bases of the Inner World, because the Inner World wants to steal the mana possessed by our world,” she continued while raising her index.
Oh, the golden spear tore a stone tower to pieces. At first it startled me, but I’ve already gotten used to the noise of the stone towers cutting through the air. Just, how long are they going to come at us? Or rather, is this an automatic interception system…like Satoha’s armament? No, Satoha is operating all the arms, isn’t she…?
“We don’t know the structure behind it, but…the vortexes are like roots that absorb nutrients and water to gather mana or leaves which grow out across a wide area to bask in light,” Satoha explained dispassionately.
Her sword repelled a tower in our back. Yet she didn’t pay any attention to it as if it was only natural.
“Us Occult Slayers have likened them to the branches of a tree. For example, our current vortex is called a branch vortex.”
“…I see?”
“Dungeon vortexes are structured like a tree. If you cut its base, the trunk, everything will fall apart, and if you cut its large branches, the foliage beyond withers away.”
She stopped walking and looked my way. The waves of stone towers, which had been persistently assaulting us, temporarily stopped.
With the crimson sky in her back, she said, “If you translate the classes established by Dungeon Seekers into the terminology of us Occult Slayers…A-Class is a trunk vortex, B-Class is a large branch vortex, C-Class is a branch vortex, D-Class is regarded as twig, and E- as well as D-Class are both seen as switches. All of them branch out, starting from the trunk…and, in order to suppress all dungeons in Sendai, you need to clear the A-Class dungeons which make up the foundation of all dungeons in the area.”
It was clearly palpable from the nuances in her intonation that she didn’t consider this as possible.
｡ ₊°༺🫀༻°₊ ｡
Leaving the cemetery with the stone towers, we descended stone stairs. The second floor once again had a crimson sky. Even though it should have been an underground layer after going downstairs, we encountered the same sky as above.
Satoha continued to talk while walking straight down a footpath between fields. The second floor consisted of nothing but this path and the fields, but this time monsters with rotten bodies, similar to zombies, crawled out of the ground. Goblins, orcs, insectoid monsters, and weird bi-pedal creatures with elephant trunks, all of them with extremely grotesque appearances, were staggering our way.
Satoha and I fought them off together on the dim path underneath the crimson sky. Because the enemy’s attention was focused on her, I could deal with the monsters normally.
Piercing the head of a humanoid monster with a spear in its hand, she continued to indifferently explain things to me. Her golden spear was dyed crimson as blood gushed out of the skull, before the monster turned into embers and burst apart. The chunks of flesh clinging to the spear also turned into ash and scattered.
A normal girl would have likely screamed and cried at this point, but she wasn’t perturbed by all of this. Even I felt troubled how to react when she continued to speak while orc heads were lopped off, dog monsters got crushed by the hammer, and flesh ruptured. She kept talking about vortexes and dungeons while all of this was going on.
Summarizing what she said, there apparently exists one A-Class dungeon in Sendai as a trunk. Furthermore, there are five B-Class dungeons connected to the trunk, four C-Class dungeons to each larger branch, and three D-Class dungeons to each branch…meaning, it really looks like it’s set up like a tree diagram. Lastly, two E-Classes grow out of a D-Class, and one F-Class extends from an E-Class.
If you add up all of those branches, 326 dungeons exist in Sendai. And although I said I want to suppress them all, that’s quite a lot…
Satoha continued her explanation, “Connected means that you can also destroy the fifteen vortexes connected to this C-Class dungeon, if you manage to clear it.”
She blew away an eagle monster with a spear that had appeared out of thin air.
“As such, the Inner World’s defense measures will become stronger, the higher in class the vortexes you attack, making the clearing a lot more complicated and difficult. The vortexes can easily restore D-Class vortexes and below, but it takes time for a C-Class to recover. When it comes to large branches, you might as well say it’s impossible to revive them. And if you cut the trunk, all the vortexes connected to it perish.”
“…Say, Satoha.”
“What is it, Hiro?”
“It’s just an idea, but…going by what I’ve heard from you up until now, wouldn’t it be possible to negotiate with the Inner World? Like, offering them to pass on energy in exchange for technology and items?”
“Ah, this is something we know from the various documents we picked up in dungeons, but the intelligent lifeforms of the Inner World treat us as demons so terrible that they’ve forbidden any contact with us. In reality, the monsters we’re facing aren’t them…
There apparently was a movement several hundred years ago, suggesting to talk it over, but all of it ended in failure.”
I swung Dragon Eater, slashing apart a skeleton swordsman who had sneaked up on us inside a thicket with bad visibility.
“Okay, so you already tried this method, huh?”
“Yes. We’re soon going to pass the second floor. The real show starts from here. Brace yourself, Hiro.”
“Sure.”
I fired myself up once more as this clear had been proceeding in a relaxed manner so far. A stage I never experienced was waiting for me beyond this point. Satoha is here with me, but I mustn’t allow myself to be negligent.
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