Chapter 276
Rex joined us, and I had to tell him about the inefficiency of hogging prey and the importance of everyone gaining experience, as Manager and the others carved up the Arachne . To be honest, I didn’t want to carve up a monster that looked that close to a human . Which is rich, coming from the guy who killed it…
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“Finished . ”
“Hmm…okay . So, Rex . We’ll be leaving then . Even though you have a map now, be careful . ”
“Aye . I’m sure we won’t get lost, yet we’ll still have to be wary of monsters . I still can’t thank you enough for killing the monster for us… You be careful out there . ”
Rex raised his fist and I bumped mine against it .
“Who do you think I am?”
“Haha . See you in the capital!”
“Yeah, in the capital!”
It reminded me of another parting . But this wasn’t as hopeless a situation . I was quite sure we would meet again as I watched them head for the exit .
So, we would continue on our journey then… Hmm?
“What’s that?”
“Huh?”
Daniela looked towards where I was pointing . The webs had all been frozen by my magic . They were all harmless now, and behind one section, the floor seemed to have peeled off .
Whatever it was, it wasn’t stone, wood or concrete . A surface that was black and shining . I went closer to get a better look . The others followed me .
The frozen webs shattered easily as I moved through them . I could see it clearly now . There was a shining line drawn on the material that looked like black stone . And there was a light blinking as it moved along the line from the right to the left . As if it was heading somewhere .
“What the hell?”
Manager scratched her head . I could practically see the question mark floating above Lemon . Daniela held her chin and stared at it with concentration . Like she had seen it before…maybe . However, I was the only one that was certain .
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“I found something just like this before by accident . It was when I was exploring through an ancient ruin . ”
“You what…?”
“Surely…”
Manager and Daniela seemed shocked . Lemon looked at me and waited for me to continue .
“It was an ancient elven ruin . ”
It had been bugging me all of this time . The dungeon being inverted . The lower floors rising .
Why should the most important part, the heart of the dungeon, rise to the top?
Usually, the deepest part would have the best security . Even with a labyrinth such as this . Traps would make sense . But inverting the layers? That didn’t seem right . Why would they move what they wanted to protect the most to the top?
“So this place…it is an ancient elven ruin too . ”
“No… So this center that we are headed to, it’s not the real core?”
“It must be a trap . ”
Once the dungeon is conquered, it inverts as part of a disaster . And then people are sent to solve it . And then when they reach the core and touch it, the real trap would activate… Considering this possibility, it felt like we were on a road to hell . The others must have been thinking the same thing because they now looked at the continuing passage with fear in their eyes .
“Perhaps there will be a guardian protecting it . ”
Daniela said .
“Considering how grand all of this is . It would not be off if there was a guardian or some kind of warden up there . ”
“Yes… I doubt it can all be automated magic . ”
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That being said, if this was an ancient elven ruin, then it was over a thousand years old . Even though it was intact, the elves themselves were long dead .
“Can elves live for a thousand years?”
“Who knows? I have certainly not lived that long…and I have never met one who did . But I once met an elder who was over seven-hundred years old . ”
Rachel had reincarnated eight-hundred years ago . But in human years, that was probably like a ten-year difference .
“Perhaps it is some kind of artificial intelligence…”
Manager muttered . I see . Yes, that seemed possible as well . It was an age of highly advanced magic tools . While it may be hard to have automated magic spells, it was a little different with machinery with independent features .
“Well, we still have to go forward . But not down this path . We go…”
I stared at the light on the floor .
“Just like before . Down . ”
Pretend that it’s inverted and hide everything below . I wasn’t sure of it, but it was clear that we shouldn’t continue on to the center . In that case, we should go deep down, where no one could see . The ruin in Replant had been similar . There was a structure on the surface that hid the real thing underground… Though, that place didn’t have a core . But then again, there might have been a lower layer that I missed . There was no confirming it now .
No one disagreed with me, and so we decided to head downward . However, there was still only one route ahead . Manager suggested that the center might have means of going to the lower levels, but there was also the possibility of traps . I really didn’t want to go to the center… But it seemed like we had no choice for now .
We would go to the center in order to reach the bottom . By the time we made this decision, it was so late that no more light leaked into the dungeon from the outside .
If the upper layers and lower layers inverted, the weaker monsters would be in the lower layers . Well, that was what seemed obvious to me before we came here . Not only me, but the rest of the party thought so too .
However, we soon realized that it wasn’t the case .
“Daniela . It went over there!”
“Got it!”
We reached the center without much trouble . There were some typical dungeon monsters like Minotaurs and golems, but they went down easily . It was my first time seeing a golem . Daniela and Manager killed it before I saw much, though . Apparently, there was a trick to doing it .
“Ahhh!”
“Lemon! I’m coming!”
Like that, we killed the monsters, advanced, became annoyed as they kept coming, and then finally reached the center . It was a large hollow chamber with a door on the far side . The whole thing seemed to scream ‘here is the way to the core . ’ However, things were not so simple . A giant centipede was lying in front of it .
Clearly, it was a guardian .
“Hah!”
It was dark now that the sun had gone down . And I was in a hurry . I rushed past the others and cut the centipede in half . And then it became two . This might sound confusing, but I understood it . Damn it . This was going to be troublesome .
I cut again and they multiplied . Soon there were twenty of them . Even though I know I shouldn’t, I couldn’t help it when Lemon was in danger . I wanted to freeze them all with magic, but…look, I’m not saying I used up a lot of magic while showing off and freezing the entire room earlier…
“Can’t you do something!?”
“We only have swords! Maybe with a blunt weapon…!”
“Blunt!? Like a great hammer!?”
“Yes!”
I see . Crush instead of cut . It was so simple I don’t know how I missed it . But we’d never fought monsters like these before .
Still, that made things easier . And so I made a hammer with ice magic . It was a simple weapon in design . But it had a decent weight that my current status and level were able to manage . I made four of them .
“Use these!”
“Good!”
“It-it’s so…heavy . ”
It seemed like it was a little much for Lemon . And so I made another one that was closer to a sledgehammer and gave it to her . While she was still a little shaky, she seemed alright with it .
“Crush their heads!”
The others nodded and scattered . As we were four people in a square room, we each took a corner . I picked up my hammer and ran to my side . Seeing the writhing centipedes made my skin crawl, but I wasn’t particularly scared of bugs . You know, I quite liked tarantulas and whip spiders . But nevermind that… I swung down on the first centipede that caught my eye . The floor didn’t break . The hammer didn’t break . The centipedes head exploded in a wet mess . As the hammer was quite large, it partially crushed a nearby centipede as well . Thankfully, it stayed intact and did not multiply .
And so I raised the hammer again in order to finish it off, but the barely intact centipede was faster . I gave up, let go of the hammer and lept forward while creating a sledgehammer in one hand . Then I swung down and crushed it . The sledgehammer was much easier to swing . However, it did require a little more precision .
I looked over to Lemon to see how she was doing . She must have been good with her hands because she was adeptly killing centipede after centipede . I sighed . Still, I wasn’t going to get any better by doing that . What I could do was use Jack of all Trades, Master of None and try and copy her movements . It was easy to do that if you had the basics down . I see . Yes . It’s all in the waist, huh? Interesting . This might affect how I swing with a sword as well . I felt like I just gained a level .
After learning this, I continued on my centipede squashing rampage . They didn’t breathe poisonous fumes or use magic . They just multiplied . This might have been hard if I was alone, but thankfully, I had friends to help me .
Once I was done, I returned the hammer to mana and looked around the room . The others were also finished and leaning on their hammers while they rested . No one was injured . That was pretty great, considering this thing had been a guardian .
We rested for a while after that, and then I suggested we gather the proofs of the hunt . However, that dream was crushed, just like the heads . There were no fangs to be recovered . And no one wanted to spend time gathering the legs .
“Perhaps…the carapaces . It can probably be used as materials for something . ”
“Hmm… Yes, since it is so late, we should just take them and then rest for the day . ”
Daniela suggested . And so I flipped over the centipede at my feet and slid Ashikirimaru in between the stomach and back . Needless to say, it was a horrible experience, but it came off rather cleanly . I tried tapping it my sword and it seemed quite hard . They hadn’t put up much of a fight against my hammer and sword, but to be honest, mine were better than your average weapons . You couldn’t just go to a weapon store and buy them . But that was what it took to cut through these . And since there was a lot, they could fetch a decent price . Maybe they would become armor for some newcomer Adventurer .
“Alright, let’s take the undamaged ones!”
“And then we can have dinner . ”
“Leave the corpses in a single corner when you are done . I do not want them close to the tent . ”
I got my hollow bag from Lemon and slung it over my shoulder . We would need the tent soon, and I felt bad for making her carry it all this time . We then split up again and began to carve out the materials . After all, while it wouldn’t happen immediately, the corpses would eventually turn into mana and disappear…