Day 19
"Oh wow. There's a ton of people coming..." I opened up the map after
hearing Rokuko whisper that. By pulling the map back to look around the
general area, I could see information about the outside of the dungeon. It was
limited to a range about as far as I could see by just looking out the entrance
with my naked eyes, but inside that range, there were plenty of details. There
I saw that there was already a platoon of red enemy dots, advancing towards
our dungeon with a trained pace. It seemed that my peaceful days were
finally over. Or perhaps, peace was finally coming for the first time.
"Thirty people, huh? I guess they're finally here. Not sure if this is too
early or what..."
"They're finally here? You knew these people would be coming?"
"Yep. This is probably the squad sent to exterminate the bandits. Judging
from how organized their marching is, they're pretty well trained. I bet
they're knights. ...Yeah, the bandits are finished now. It'd be pretty great if
they actually managed to survive somehow, though."
The bandits noticed the knights too right after I finished saying that. I
opened up the monitor and started watching them. It really was convenient
that I could look into the dungeon from any angle, as if every room had
multiple security cameras placed within them. One of the boss's scouts had
just gotten back to the dungeon.
"Boss, we're in trouble! Knights are coming!"
"What the?! How'd they find us?! We killed everyone who saw us here!"
The boss of the bandits was panicking. He didn't seem to realize that it was
precisely because they had killed everyone who found them that knights had
eventually been dispatched to eliminate them.
"But hold on a second... Knights are humans. They ain't invincible, we
can kill them too. How many of them are there?"
"S-Sorry, I ran back here as soon as I saw their armor. There was at least,
uuuh, at least five of them!"
"Tch, alright... Guess it doesn't matter how many of them there are. We're
still gonna ambush'm here in this dungeon."
"We are?"
"Yeah. We can knock their numbers down with a surprise attack, and
either way, we'd be dead if they surrounded us outside."
"Oooh! Nice plan, boss! Alright! Didja hear that, everybody? We're
gonna ambush'm!"
"YEAH!" "HELL YEAH!" "LET'S DO IT!"
It looked like the bandits were ready to fight, and they were planning to
do so in the dungeon. Very convenient. I'm so glad I've been teaching the
boss how to use the hallways and doors to ambush people in the dungeon.
I'm so glad he's not smart enough to realize running away is the best option
here.
"So, do you think the bandits can win?"
"Well, it'll depend on how strong those knights are... But if they're at
least as strong as those three adventurers from before, the bandits are
definitely screwed. They'll all die."
It wouldn't be long before I could see the knights directly on the monitor.
I decided to watch the bandits get eliminated from start to finish. All this was
happening because of me, after all.
The bandits spread out, with eight of them staying in the entrance room,
eight hiding in the room halfway to the core room, and nine (including the
boss) camping out in the core room itself. Although there was strength in
numbers, they wouldn't be able to ambush the knights if they all stayed in
one room, though that would be physically impossible anyway. The knights
reached the entrance to the cave right after the bandits finished hiding.
"All soldiers, halt. Hm... Henry, is this the [Ordinary Cave]?"
"Yes. I believe this is where the bandits are hiding out. Please... avenge
Beck for me."
"You have my word. Thank you for your assistance. O Life, greet mine
wave with a hearty pulse—{Life Search}."
A knight covered head to toe in armor used a skill. Moments later, a clear
wave of energy spread out from him in all directions. Judging from its name,
it was a skill that could detect nearby life forms. It probably worked like
echolocation. But either way, I knew it would be enough to make the bandits'
ambush meaningless.
"Hm... It appears that there are indeed eight bandits inside. They're hiding
by the entrance, waiting to ambush us."
There certainly were eight bandits waiting in the first room. But there
were more elsewhere, obviously... Maybe the {Life Search} wave got
blocked off by the closed wooden doors, making it impossible for him to
detect the bandits behind them. Or was it just an area of effect that simply
didn't reach that far?
"That's how many the report said there would be."
"Stand at the ready, men. Our mission begins now. They might have
prisoners... For safety's sake, we'll start with the sleeping drug."
"Yes, sir!"
"Five of you will remain behind in case there are others lying in wait
outside. Everyone else, surround the entrance and finish off any bandits that
come running out."
"Understood." The knights surrounded the entrance to the cave and started
burning some kind of incense.
...Welp. That's pretty cheap. Though I don't blame them for not walking
right into a trap.
A few minutes after the incense started burning, the bandits started to
panic. They had all noticed the smell of the incense, and one of them had
passed out after being unable to resist his sleepiness.
"Ngh, this is... a sleeping drug! C-Crap, we gotta run deeper into the
cave!"
"No, we should go and attack them before we get knocked out! There
can't be many of them out there if they're pulling cheap tricks like this! Let's
go get'm!"
"The smoke won't get through the doors if we sh—ngh! Wh-What are
you doing...?!"
"Hmph. You just stay here, coward. I'll take care of everything myself!"
New Guy C, who had killed an adventure earlier and became the boss's
right hand man, headed out of the dungeon with five slaves. The only ones
left behind were the guy who had fallen asleep and the guy who had
recommended that they retreat. New Guy C had punched him in the stomach,
causing him to fall to his knees.
The six bandits who went outside, tired from the drug as they were, could
barely do anything as the knights surrounding the entrance cut them down.
Their chipped, dull blades bounced pathetically off the knights' armor. All
they could do was scream in pain and fear while dying like chumps.
The eighth bandit collapsed to the ground and fell unconscious, but not
before hearing his screaming allies and thinking "aaah, I was right..." to
himself. Though he didn't seem to realize that it had been the wrong call to
join the bandits in the first place.
The smoke from the incense began to fade, but the knight from before
waited until he was sure everyone still inside was asleep before casting {Life
Search} again.
"{Life Search}... Hm, it seems that two bandits are still inside."
"Alright... This hallway is certainly cramped. We'll go in rows of two.
Keep your guard up, men." The knights began to slowly infiltrate the
dungeon. Though... they had technically been "inside" the dungeon ever
since they circled the entrance. Yeah, expanding the dungeon outside a little
from the entrance was a good call. We woulda missed out on the DP from
those six dudes if I hadn't done that.
"...Alright, here's the two bandits. Finish them off."
"Should we really do that?"
"Even if they do have allies on the outside, they won't be coming to save
them now. That means our job is to eliminate all the bandits in this hideout.Once we crush the leader, we can leave any possible survivors to
adventurers... And just look. There's more rooms inside. The boss of these
lowlifes is likely in the room furthest inside... and if he's not, we can assume
he's one of these. Best to kill them all now."
"Understood." The two sleeping bandits had their throats slit, earning us
DP.
I felt my shirt being pulled and turned to see Rokuko looking at me with a
puzzled expression.
"Are you sure I shouldn't be absorbing the corpses? We're kinda losing a
lot of DP like this."
"...Don't even think about doing that. We won't be able to trick them if
you start absorbing those corpses."
"Trick them?"
"...If they learn that dungeons eat people, or at least, if they learn that a
beginner dungeon like ours is powering up by eating corpses, they might
view us as dangerous and try to destroy the Core. I do have a backup plan,
but..."
"Ngh... We'll die if the Core gets destroyed. Wait... a backup plan? You
didn't mention that before."
"...Remember that goblin room I made a while ago?"
"Oh, right! The one that's kinda far away from us! You were calling it a
dummy 'Ordinary Cave,' right?"
"Yeah. The maps here aren't so accurate, so there being another cave
nearby shouldn't arouse any suspicion... maybe. Hopefully, we'll be able to
trick them into thinking that the other cave is the actual 'Ordinary Cave,' and
then they'll leave us alone."
"Ohhhh, okay. I get it... Wait, um... What about the Dungeon Core?" In
truth, I wanted to place the dummy Core in the other cave and use the
castling function, but that wasn't gonna happen. Oh, by the way, the castling
function allowed one to swap the real Dungeon Core with a dummy Core. It
was a great tool, but it took 5,000 DP to use; we didn't have enough saved up
to use it. Not to mention, it was necessary to connect the dummy Core with
the real Core with a path, which meant it couldn't even be set up if intruders
were in the way.
"...Well, we used hallways and doors to separate the rooms on this floor,
so worst-case scenario, we can turn the Core room into an impregnable trap
fortress." It was possible to set traps on a floor with intruders by separating
rooms with doors and hallways. Though, of course, you couldn't set traps in
rooms with invaders in them.
"Um, but there's a bunch of bandits camping out in the Core room." ...Of
course, the bandits count as intruders.
"Yeaaah... In other words, all we can do right now is act like an innocent
dungeon and hope they leave us alone."
"I get it. So that's why you don't want me to absorb the corpses. But how
are you going to make sure they leave us alone?"
"...L-Let's just see what happens for now." I don't want to tell her that
there's actually nothing we can do right now.
I shifted my focus back to the knights.
"This must be their treasure room. The bed... ngh!"
"...I recognize this smell. They must have a woman with them. But this
smell is so intense, I imagine they aren't using {Purification} to clean up
much... or perhaps the smell is so intense it won't come out no matter how
many times they cast it." The knights had started to investigate the boss's
bedroom. By the way, the dog-eared girl was still underneath the bed. She
stared ahead with her dead eyes, not moving an inch. Eventually, the knights
advanced to the next room without finding her. That wouldn't have happened
if they had used {Life Search}, but they didn't for some reason. Maybe it
only had a limited number of uses. Or maybe the knights who had been
assigned to the search party just couldn't use it. The boss-type knight that had
used {Life Search} outside of the cave was still by the entrance, giving orders
to his subordinates.
Beyond the boss's room was the jail, which was also being used as a
storage room. All the loot that could help in battle had been taken to the Core
room on the opposite end of the dungeon, so there wasn't anything
worthwhile left. They had even taken the harpy herself with them.
"There's nothing good here, huh?"
"Do you think our timing was just bad? There might've been some more
valuables here if we got here sooner. There is a lot of food, though. Maybe if
we had gotten here later, there'd be m—"
"Hey, don't talk like that. But either way, I'm sure no one will mind if we
take some of this beer."
We had taken anything that looked even a little good into the Master
Room before the knights got there. That said, it's not like there was anything
good before we went through the stuff. Most of it was just moldy bread... The
only really useful thing was, er, a Light-enchanted magic item? It worked
kind of like a lantern.
The only things left for the knights were food and the shoddiest of the
bandits' treasure. Since the jail was a dead end, the knights carried the boxes
of food back outside. Once most of them were outside, the knights resumed
their investigation. One of them placed his hand on a door and made to open
it, but at that moment... A sword had sprouted from the door.
"Gah?!" A bandit had stabbed at the knight through the door itself in a
surprise attack. He then kicked down the door and started swinging.
"DIIIIIIEEEEEE!"
"Ngh?! Fall back, Ryan! Hyaaaah!" The wounded knight retreated and the
battle began.
"Curses! I told you they would likely be hiding behind the door, and yet
you still let your guard down... O Light, soothe the wounded sheep before
you—{Healing}!"
"S-Sorry, captain... ngh, nnn!" Magical light enveloped the hurt soldier
and began healing his wounds. The large gash on his chest closed up and
stopped bleeding. He was still visibly exhausted, but there was less chance of
him dying. ...Healing magic, huh? That's the first time I've seen it.
And before I knew it, the battle was over.
"Sorry, but Beggs got hurt in the fight as well. Could I ask you to heal
him?"
"Bloody hell, don't you know how exhausting it is to cast this spell? ...If I
pass out, you'll be the one taking charge in my stead. O Light, soothe the
wounded sheep before you—{Healing}."
"There's no use getting frustrated with me. You're the only one here who
knows how to cast Restoration Magic. Sheesh... Our lives would be a lot
easier if they would just give us more [{Healing} Scrolls]..."
"Restoration Magic scrolls are difficult enough to produce that they
simply don't have enough to do anything like that. The Church keeps most of
the scrolls to themselves for a reason." Hm. That's a nifty bit of information.
Let's see here... Seems like I can buy a [{Healing} Scroll] for 100,000 DP.
They really are rare... I could buy a weak dragon for that much DP, geez.
But, uh, dang. With healing magic like that, the bandits are definitelyscrewed. No way out of this one for them. All I can hope is that they take
down as many knights as possible while they're getting slaughtered.
"Alright. Next room. Be wary of any surprise attacks if you don't want to
end up like Ryan. Though... I had heard that this [Ordinary Cave] is an
extremely small dungeon. There are far more rooms than I expected here..."
"Captain. There are pickaxes lying on the ground. The bandits might have
dug out these rooms themselves."
"Hrm? But dungeon walls will simply regenerate no matter how much
you dig into them. Why would they do that?"
"I do not know... But you can see the pickaxe marks on these walls." I
glanced at Rokuko for confirmation.
"Uh-huh. Normally, any holes you dig will just close up. Humans are like
that too, aren't they?"
"So, you're saying it's like wounds healing over time." Rokuko responded
with a nod and a "that's right."
"Hm...? I wonder what's going on here. Though, thinking about it, taking
up residence in a dungeon is an extremely rare occurrence in the first place.
There might be a connection here."
"Are you suggesting that the leader of the bandits is the Dungeon Boss?"
"Hahaha! I've never heard of a human becoming a Dungeon Boss. Are
these bandits led by a dragon?"
"These rooms are too small for any dragon." The knights steadily
advanced farther into the dungeon while talking amongst themselves. Out of
all the bandits, only the nine hiding out in the Core room remained. That
wasn't counting the harpy slave, since she would likely be too weak to fight
well.
The knights proceeded so cautiously that it took them a lot of time just to
clear out of the seven-room dungeon, but eventually they reached the Core
room. Though, the knights themselves wouldn't realize it was the Core room
until they opened the door.
I shifted my gaze to the bandits. One of them had been crouching by the
door with his ear against it. I caught him right as he stood up to go report to
the boss.
"...Looks like they're here."
"Alright. Archers, get ready. And be quiet. Shoot them down right after
they open the door."
"Boss, are we gonna be alright?"
"Hmph. They should be pretty worn down by now. All we'll have to do is
finish them off with a final push." I wondered how they would react if I told
them that the knights had healed themselves and weren't worn down in the
least. That'd have to remain a mystery, though. I didn't want them to try and
destroy the Core as a final act of revenge.
The wooden door to the Core room creaked open. The boss signaled for
the archers to shoot the moment the door opened wide enough. Clang! Clang!
The arrows noisily bounced off all the knights' armor. Except for one. By
pure luck—good luck for the bandits, bad luck for the knights—one arrow
slipped through the eye slit on one of the knights' helmets and pierced his
brain. I saw our DP shoot up before my eyes. They had killed him in one
shot.
"Louie! Bloody hell, he's dead!"
"Tch...! We only got one of them!"
"Boss!"
"C'mon, boys! Aim for the joints! Our swords'll just bounce off their
armor!"
"You'll pay for this, bastards!" A knight charged forward. Seeing that, the
boss of the bandits put his sword against the harpy's neck.
"Hey, move another step and I'll slit this girl's neck."
"Ngh, a hostage?! Wait, look! It's a demihuman slave! Don't worry about
her, just kill the bandits!" The bandits got some blows in after the knights
briefly paused, but they didn't do much damage. The distraction tactic itself
was fine, the bandits were just too untrained. If they were better with their
blades, they probably would have been able to take down one of the knights
there.
"Tch, they figured it out! Fucking hell! C'mon, you bitch, charge at the
knights! Make them panic!"
"Ah, aaah!"
"Hmph, making a slave like that attack for you won't change a thing!"
The harpy slave tried to obey the boss's order, but her legs were too weak for
her to move very well. She was cut down in seconds. Our DP went up. Well...
at least she died in a single blow, without any unnecessary suffering.
"Wait a second! Aren't you Melon-Puke Waver?!"
"DON'T CALL ME BY THAT NAME!"
"Uwaaah!"
The boss of the bandits charged forward in a rage. The force of his first
blow knocked the armored knight to his knees, and the boss wasted no time
to drive his sword into a gap in the knight's armor. He then twisted his sword
around as hard as he could inside of the knight's body. Our DP went up
again. I don't wanna see what that guy looks like now... And what kinda
nickname is Melon-Puke, anyway?
"What?! This is the shameless fellow who puked up a melon while dining
with the princess?!"
"You'll pay for killing Louie and Eugene, vomit-face!"
"I only threw up because the melon had gone bad! It wasn't my fault!
Why'd she have to fucking put a bounty over my head?! FUUUCK!"
"Not only did you eat too much and throw up as a result, but you unjustly
blamed the chef for serving rotten food and killed him! Right in front of the
princess, too!"
"SHUT UP! He was just jealous because the princess had fallen in love
with me! I'd be the emperor right now if it weren't for him! Fucking damnit!"
Oh, thanks for explaining why he's called Melon-Puke. I more or less
guessed from the name, but still. That was a wild story.
After that, Melon-Puke got so mad he fought far better than I had ever
expected. He killed one more knight and wounded several others.
But that was as far as he got. His allies that had been assisting him from
the side were gradually cut down, and soon enough he was surrounded. In the
blink of an eye, a sword was thrust clean through his stomach.
"Fuuuck...! And things... were just getting started... for me..." Melon-Puke
collapsed onto his knees and then fell to the ground. One of the knights
grabbed on to his hair and pulled his head up.
"Alright, Melon-Puke. Do you have any more allies anywhere?"
"Tch... Nope, you already killed everyone, fuck... Why'd this happen? I
did everything... they said..."
His voice had gotten pretty raspy, but the knight still heard him loud and
clear. And so, the final bandit turned into DP just like all the others.
"Was there someone pulling the strings here? They might've gotten
away."
"He said this was everyone, but... We can't be sure. Oh. It looks like this
room has the Dungeon Core."
"Yeah? Huh... So that's a Dungeon Core. I've never seen one before."
"This was a pretty shallow dungeon, just like we heard. Only had one
floor."
One of the knights pointed his sword at the Dungeon Core sprouting out
of the wall.
"Alriiight. Time to destroy the Core." Destroy the Core. Hey, uh, what'd
you just say? You're gonna do what now? My mouth dried up. I felt a cold
shiver run down my spine. I watched through the monitor as the knight lifted
up his sword... and then brought it down.
"Gob!"
"Gobsuke?!"
Gobsuke jumped out of the Master Room. Neither I nor Rokuko could
stop him. It might have been his natural instincts as a dungeon monster to do
everything in his power to stop the Core from being destroyed.
"Woah?! Th-The hell?! Take this!"
"Gob... ngggh..." We watched as Gobsuke popped into the Core Room
and was immediately cut down. He was cut clean in half and died just like
that.
"Friggin' goblin, getting in my way... Let's try that again."
"Hey! What do you think you're doing, new guy?! This dungeon is under
our protection!" The captain stopped the knight after he rose his sword into
the air again.
"This is a low-tier dungeon that the Adventurer's Guild manages. It only
ever produces goblins and is as simple of a dungeon as can be."
"Oh, that's right... My apologies, captain." The knight lowered his sword
after being stopped by the captain.
"...Crap. I was so close to destroying a Dungeon Core and becoming a
Holy Paladin..."
"I understand how you feel, but our job here is done. And if you could
become a Holy Paladin through destroying the Core of a dungeon that
doesn't even have a Dungeon Boss, the capital would be overflowing with
Holy Paladins right now."
"Tch... Well, that's true. This Core only managed to summon a single
goblin to protect itself. No glory in killing this one..."
"Idiot. You're getting a pay cut."
"Whaaat? Come ooon!"
"Well, just think about it. Wouldn't it just be embarrassing to be knighted
as a Holy Paladin for destroying a weak dungeon like this?"
"...Thinking about it, Melon-Puke was more or less the Dungeon Boss. Do
you want them to say 'O Holy Paladin, who conquered the [Ordinary Cave]
and defeated Melon-Puke...' or something like that? You'll get destroyed,
man. People would call you the 'Melon-Puke Paladin' or 'The Holy Paladin
of the Ordinary Cave,' something like that."
"Aaah, I wouldn't want that... But still. I can't believe we lost Louie,
Eugene, and Thomas to a bunch of bandits."
"Melon-Puke was actually a pretty fearsome foe..." Although many of
them had died or been wounded, the knights were all relaxed. Their job was
done. I suddenly realized I hadn't been breathing and thus started gasping for
air. Whew... I thought I was gonna die. For the first time since I came to this
world, someone tried to kill me. I wasn't just watching someone else die on a
screen. I was watching someone try to kill me, personally. I almost peed
myself... Almost! I didn't actually do it, okay? My pants are clean. Though...
That guy said he could become a Paladin if he destroyed the Dungeon Core. I
wonder what's up with that.
"Uuu, uwaah... G-Gobsukeee..." Rokuko was crouched down on the floor,
crying. Goblin or not, we had spent the past few weeks together with
Gobsuke. We had tons of memories together... Okay, not really. The only
thing we did together was eat meals every now and again. I wonder if
Rokuko ever did anything with him while I was asleep.
"At least give back the [Jelly Rolls] I lent you before dyiiiing..." I guess
not. We were united only by food.
"Gobsuke... We really owe him a lot now. If not for him, the Core
probably woulda been destroyed and we'd be dead right now."
"Uuu, my [Jelly Rolls]..." Actually... This might just be her way of
grieving Gobsuke without looking weak. I opened the menu and bought a set
of six [Jelly Rolls] for Rokuko.
"Here, have some [Jelly Rolls]. Cheer up."
"Eh?! Really?! I'll cheer up, I'll cheer sooo up! So so so up!" Rokuko
cheered up so much that I thought light would start shining out of her eyes.
Oh, right. This girl's a monster that sent countless goblins to their deaths to
try and protect herself from adventurers.
"Wait, what is this stuff?! There's something dark and sweet inside of it!Ah, but it's really tasty too."
...Oh yeah. I never told her that I tricked her into thinking that [Red Bean
Paste Rolls] were [Jelly Rolls].
＊ ＊ ＊
The bandit corpses were piled up in the entrance room. It looked like the
knights would be taking their deceased allies back home with them. It was
honestly pretty disgusting, but I couldn't look away. I needed to stay focused
and look for an opportunity to score some extra DP. ...They're pouring oil on
them. I guess the plan is to burn the bodies. In the middle of the cave,
though...? Air flows through dungeons no matter how deep they get, so I
guess they may just not be aware that suffocating due to lack of oxygen is a
thing outside of water. After all, the bandits lit torches in our dungeon like it
was nothing.
"These scum don't even deserve to be offered up to the dungeon."
"Did you cover them all with enough oil? We'll only have more work to
do if any of them become ghouls later."
"I did. It's okay to burn everything here except the stuff we're taking
back, right?"
"Yes. Even if there are any survivors hiding out somewhere, they won't
get very far without any supplies." So he said, but there wasn't anything
really worth burning. The beds were about the most valuable thing there.
Their plan was to light the bodies in the entrance room on fire and let the
resulting blaze take care of everything else. That was convenient for me.
Once the fires rose up, I'd be able to absorb the bodies without any problems.
"Stand back, I'm lighting the fire. Dance, O Flames—{Ignition}."
{Ignition} seemed to be a spell that made small flames flicker from the
user's fingertips, like a lighter. Once those flames made contact with a trail of
oil, the flame began to spread like an uncoiling snake, and before long the
mountain of corpses within the cave was ablaze.
"Oh. Hey, should we do anything about that dog-eared slave?" By the
time Rokuko remembered that, flames had already burned down the door to
the boss's room and were fast approaching the bed under which the dogeared girl was hidden. Her dead eyes reflected that she had completely given
up. The deceased harpy slave had the same eyes before she died. Huh. I
didn't do anything to protect her from the bandits, but I get the feeling she'll
appear in my dreams if I don't save her here. Is it because she's just a kid? I
don't want to have nightmares about this... That'll get in the way of me
sleeping well. Not like there's any reason not to save her. She could actually
be a big asset if I can make her my pawn somehow. At the very least, I could
just keep using her as a maid. She'll be anything but useless.
"...Well, I guess it doesn't matter. She can just turn into DP for us."
"No, wait. We're gonna save her. Can we get her in here somehow?"
"Um, no. Do you want to go outside and try to get her yourself?
Everything's on fire out there. She'll be dead before you get there." Rokuko
was right. Since there was an intruder (the dog-eared girl) on the floor, we
could only enter and exit the Master Room through the Dungeon Core. And
outside of the Dungeon Core was a sea of fire. Physically saving her would
be beyond impossible.
"Plus, we can't 'withdraw' intruders or anything like that. She's not an
item." After hearing Rokuko say that, an idea struck me like lightning.
"No... What're you talking about, Rokuko? She is an item."
"Eh?!" I started to talk as if trying to convince both myself and Rokuko of
that.
"Slaves are tools. They belong to people. In other words, they're items.
Honestly, I've never seen her do anything on her own. She only ever obeyed
orders. And now her owner, the boss of the bandits, is dead. The owner of
that slave... that item is gone. When the owner of an item dies in a dungeon,
their items become the dungeon's items. Which means that girl is now an
item belonging to us. Right, Rokuko?"
"U-Um... But she's a living being with mana... Items aren't like that..."
"But when you think about it, we can place monsters wherever we want in
the dungeon as long as there aren't any intruders on the floor. That means we
move living beings in and out of the Core at will. Remember how we
withdrew that moldy bread earlier? Well, mold is a living being. We could
withdraw a treasure chest even if a mouse was inside of it, right? There's no
reason why we couldn't withdraw a living being like a human. We can't
because she has mana? That doesn't make sense. Magical items have mana.
We withdrew that Light-enchanted magic item, remember? Same deal! We
can do this too! WE CAN WITHDRAW HER!"
I glanced between the monitor and the map. The fire had reached the bedand started burning the sheets black. The map still displayed the dog-eared
girl as a red dot, signifying her as an invader. Crap, that still wasn't enough?!
I didn't convince Rokuko hard enough!
"B-But I'm telling you, slaves aren't items!"
"Then she's not even a slave! She's a dakimakura! It's a dakimakura! A
pillow in the shape of a super young dog-eared girl! Just look, it can fit under
the bed so we guys can hide it when the parents come home!" The only
option left for me was to use conditioning on myself. In other words,
hypnosis. And hypnosis is basically the same thing as sleeping. This is my
time to shine! That's a dakimakura, that's a dakimakura, that's a
dakimakura, that's a dakimakura...
I imagined it. That girl was a dakimakura. A dakimakura that'd feel
amazing to squeeze in bed. It had ears to tease and play with. It was shaped
like a human so one could dress it up with clothes and knee socks before
playing with it.
Wow... This is going pretty well. Yeah. I can't let a dakimakura that
amazing get burned up. It'd be a total waste. Aaah. I want to sleep with that
dakimakura. I could spend hours putting different kinds of knee socks on it. It
looks pretty nice and warm, too. I could use it as a makeshift heater when the
weather gets colder. Speaking of heaters, the boss of the bandits used
Rokuko's Core as a heater for his feet. Hahaha! Oh, I'm getting off subject a
little. Y'know, I wonder if that dakimakura is more expensive than a
[Heavenly Pillow]. A dark-skinned, dog-eared, little girl pillow must be
expensive. That's a high-grade item. To some people, that would be the most
[Heavenly Pillow] in the world. Oh... Crap, I just remembered something
nasty. Melon-Puke had been using it in the exact same way. Being used is a
major sticking point for any dakimakura, but eh, it'll be fine if I clean it
thoroughly. A thorough cleaning will make it clean as new. Yep, yep.
{Purification} sure is useful. I wonder how well it'll clean a dakimakura.
Either way, at least I don't have to worry about taking the cover off and
drying it outside where a neighbor might see it. Alriiight. Now I just need to
get my hands on that pillow and start cleaning it.
By that point, the dog-eared girl had turned entirely into a dakimakura in
my mind. I glanced at the map and saw that instead of a red invader dot, there
was a green dot indicating an item.
"Alright, it's a dakimakura. Withdraw!"
To sum it up: I did it.
＊ ＊ ＊
"Eeeeh...?! H-How did you withdraw her?! Invaders can't come into the
Master Room!"
"Huh? All I did was withdraw a dakimakura. Oh yeah, and be sure to
absorb the bandit corpses before they all burn up. But leave half of them
behind, just in case the knights come in to check up on them." Aaah, its hair
is a little burnt. What a waste of pretty black hair. Well, hair can grow back,
so no big deal. I'll just cut off the burnt parts. A short haircut would look
good on it.
I rubbed the soot off its squishy cheeks. Oh man, this thing feels really
nice.
"Eh? I think I get it... wait, wait, no I don't. She's an invader! How did
she get inside the Core?!"
"What're you talking about? Dakimakuras are items. Why wouldn't we be
able to withdraw one?"
"Y-Yeah...? Honestly, I think I'm somehow actually starting to believe
that..."
I tried casting {Purification} on the dakimakura. The {Purification} magic
formed a bubble-like shape like always and lowered itself through the
dakimakura from head to toe, thoroughly cleaning off all the filth that h—
"Aaah?!" ...The dakimakura let out a cute squeal. Whiiich reminded me.
Oh yeah. This is actually the dog-eared slave girl. Not a pillow. Whew. A bit
longer like that and I might never have snapped out of my own hypnosis...
"A-Alright, I'm back to my senses now. See? I told you we could
withdraw her."
"Oh, you're back to normal? Then explain how you did that!"
"Sure. It's pretty simple... I could do it because it was possible." You
thinking you couldn't do it was just an assumption on your part. Magic is
more free and less restrictive than you think... Though doing all that was
pretty tiring.
"You saw it, right? I withdrew a slave. Cause they're items."
"Wow... I had no idea you could withdraw slaves, but I guess you can."
Yeah, it should be smart to make Rokuko think that. I don't want to have tohypnotize myself again the next time we need to withdraw a slave. But
anyway. What should we do with this dog-eared girl? Should I actually start
using her as a dakimakura...?
"By the way, what's this girl's name? It's kind of hard to talk about her
without knowing her name."
"That's a good point... Er, do you have a name? Or at least, something
that people call you?"
"Ah... ah... People called... me and the others, Niku... Master..."
"Alright. You're Niku, then." Her response was pretty slow, but she did
answer me. Either way, the first thing to do was let her rest. I bought her a
futon and some food with DP to start things off. She didn't move at first, but
she ate the food and got into the futon after I ordered her to. I decided to
think more about what to do with Niku after the knights left. As long as they
were still around, we weren't safe.