In a library, Arima was staring with widened eyes at a book"I never really looked up for it before but I thought I knew what was awaiting me, but h.e.l.l, it"s freaking huge" He exclaimed and Night also agreed when he looked at the book from Arima"s shoulder "This Main Land has a superficies of more than a hundred and fifty million square kilometers. No wonder, they would call it Main" Arima said "At this rate; my falcons will finish to scan this continent in two days or so" He put the book back in its shelf and then started looking for some books that could interest him.
"Are you looking for something?" A staff member asked when she saw Arima surfing the t.i.tles of every book he pa.s.sed by.
"Oh" Arima turned around "Well, if you can tell me what could be interesting in this continent, that would be good" He said
"Interesting?" The staff member mumbled, she then observed Arima "Are you a mercenary?" She asked
"Yeah, I just arrived in the Main Land" Arima answered
"I see, it"s quite rare to see someone travel that far" The woman nodded "Then, for a mercenary, apart from the HQ of the guild, the thing that attracts adventurers a lot are the dungeons" She said
"Dungeons, huh?" Arima repeated "Dungeons, dungeons …" He then started mumbling "Dungeons? That dungeon? Like, dungeons?" He began to speak strangely "Hey, dungeon. She said dungeon, right? Why did I never hear about dungeons?" He asked toward Night
"Yes, she said dungeon, stop saying dungeon, and I don"t know about dungeons" Night quickly responded
The staff woman smiled "If you want to look for information about dungeons, you can follow me" She said and turned to head toward a different section of the library. Arima obviously followed her "Here" She stopped at a certain shelf and said to Arima.
"Thanks" The latter started looking into it immediately. The woman smiled, she slightly bowed and left. Arima then looked into the content of the books here.
From what he read, a dungeon was an artificial structure created by humans. The dungeon itself can be compared to an artificial creature or something like a homunculus. Dungeons are capable of attracting monsters, princ.i.p.ally, by liberating a type of mana they like and also by baiting them with different methods.
Once they are inside, they can"t leave unless they"re strong enough, the dungeon stops them from going out once they"re in. So, in the end, they become some kind of training ground for people who wants to fight. But it"s also true that dungeons need to be "cleaned" often, if too much monsters enter in it, they will be able to destroy it together and then unite to attack a nearby human settlement.
Killing the monsters in these dungeons is one of the main jobs of this continent"s mercenaries. Arima thought a bit about it then took another book with the emplacement of every dungeon in the Main Land. Apparently, they could build one every decade and they started doing it around five hundred years ago, so you could find approximately fifty of them on the whole continent.
There were some that were more dangerous than others and always kept in check, some that are too dangerous and were only visited by the strongest mercenaries or the army, and you could also find dungeons that were specially used as training grounds for soldiers or students.
Arima closed the book and put it back "Well, let"s go to Center City after that, the largest city on this planet" He said "If the HQ of the guild is there then I"ll pa.s.s by before going to a dungeon"
"So, what are you going to do?" Night asked "Your falcons will finish in two days you said"
"Well, by tomorrow I"m sure they will finish scanning until Center City at least, as for what I"m going to do while waiting, of course" Arima grinned and Night gulped "Try the sweets of this town" Arima said and left the library while Night sighed deeply.
Six hours later, it was late in the afternoon, Arima was silently eating in a restaurant with Night on his shoulder, he then felt something happen in his dimension and was a bit surprised "Oh, Lanya broke through the ninth level already" He exclaimed and chewed on piece of cake.
Night jumped on the table in front of Arima and licked a part of the cake too "By the way, you never really explained what you said when you met Lanya" He suddenly asked
"What did I say?"
"You said that you looked alike, at that time I couldn"t understand it at all and just ignored it but now I"m curious" Night said and sat down.
"Ah" Arima exclaimed and remembered "That"s exactly what it means, at that moment, when I looked at her, I felt like she looked like me when I was younger" He then smiled wryly "Much younger" He added
Night tilted his head "I"m not sure I understand" He said
Arima laughed "What I saw in her was not only hate, but a certain feeling to be exact" He said and Night didn"t say anything "That feeling you have when you killed your parent" He said in a gloomy voice and Night"s expression darkened a bit.
Arima patted him "Don"t mind, I got over it since" He said and smiled, he continued to pet Night.
It wasn"t long before the latter brushed away Arima"s hand "Stop petting me"
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Eighteen hours later, Lanya and Lilis left the dimension. Lanya had only reached the mid cla.s.s of the ninth level, Arima could keep the dimension active longer since he had more mana than before, but he still told them to stop the training for now.
They spent the night in the town they were and directly left the next day, when Arima"s falcons finished scanning Center City.
Arima first transferred above the city to observe it with his own eyes "That"s huge too after all" He commented after looking at the view.
"As expected of the biggest city in the planet" Lilis said
If you looked at it from afar, the size and the "colors" of this city could be compared to a modern city. But even if you look closer, the building and the houses looked really clean and if it wasn"t for the streets, they would be very similar to modern habitations. Even those "motorized vehicles" were present.
Arima could also see four huge buildings from where he was, one was a church, another was a ma.s.sive castle in the middle of the city, the third one was a clean stone building that also owned a big domain and the last one seemed to be the HQ of the guild, a grandiose wooden building.
"Let"s go" Arima said and teleported his group at one of the city"s gates. Like before, Arima gave his silver-gold card to a soldier and the latter bowed before letting him pa.s.s.
Inside, Arima observed his surroundings and then, when he started hearing the conversations of the people on the streets, he suddenly thought of something "Lilis, the fact that I"m able to understand this world"s language, is it thanks to that old man?" He asked
"Oh, right. I didn"t tell you" Lilis exclaimed "Azes actually didn"t make you learn the language or anything, he actually imparted with you the G.o.d"s language" She said
"The G.o.d"s language?" Arima frowned
"Yes, our tongue is something universal, you"ll understand every other language and everyone will understand you. That"s also why you can understand the meaning of others" chants. And when you write something, the G.o.d"s language makes you write the right words unconsciously. The reason why you understand everything in English is because it was specifically that language that was overwritten by the G.o.d"s tongue. And finally, the reason why people can"t understand your incantations, is because yourself is thinking and talking in a different language than actual English, which was replaced by G.o.d"s language" She explained while they were walking.
"So, that"s what it was" Arima nodded "It makes sense now" He said
Lilis smiled "Well, in this world there"s actually only two different languages that are commonly spoken. Then you have all the runic tongues that are used for chants. So, you can"t really use our language to it"s full potential" She said
While they were talking, they arrived at some point where they pa.s.sed by the church they had seen before. Arima glanced at it, the façade was extremely beautiful, with carvings and stained gla.s.s, but he felt something really uncomfortable emanating from it.
When Arima pa.s.sed just in front of the church, its steeple vibrated and in a second, the bell started ringing. The sound echoed strongly in the area, even Arima unconsciously put his hand on his ear, after that, a huge amount of Light aura gathered around the steeple.
A golden light gathered really quickly and became a threatening pillar that directly fell down, aiming at Arima. The latter had an even more unsettled expression as the golden light was falling on him. The strange impression he felt before was growing in intensity and his head was starting to hurt.
He then became illuminated by the pillar and every person on the streets moved away from him, except his group.
"Hey, Arima!" Night shouted because it seemed Arima wasn"t concentrating on the pillar of light descending. Lilis and Lanya were already preparing to intercept it.
At Night"s shout, Arima took an annoyed expression and stared at the gathering of golden light, his sigil made a turn and the pillar disappeared at the same time. It was only after that, that Lanya and Lilis relaxed. And internally praised Arima"s dimensional connection, they understood that it was a really useful magic, although to just transfer that strong Light, Arima had to use a ma.s.sive part of his mana. Because transferring humans was a lot easier than transferring pure magic energy.
After the light vanished, Arima shook his head "s.h.i.t" He cursed and called Karma, he was annoyed to the point he wanted to destroy that church.
"Wait! Please!" When he was about to unsheathe Karma and destroy the building in front of him. A panicked voice, coming from the church in question, made him stop. An old man in a white robe appeared with flash at the entrance of the church with a difficult expression "I don"t know why the sacred bell attacked you, but if you overcame it, then your power is impressive. Please, to prove your sincerity, that the bell made a mistake, don"t release your anger here" The old man said with a really wise and respectful voice.
Arima was so surprised by the att.i.tude that man showed that he got rid of his irritation in an instant. He sighed and called back Karma "…That"s fine; I won"t do it, I think it"s my fault after all" Arima said shortly, he began to leave the church"s area and Night jumped back on his shoulder.
The old man in the white robe also sighed in relief, he perfectly realized that if he hadn"t stopped Arima, his church would have been destroyed. He looked around and saw a lot of people looking from afar "Please have a good day" He bowed to them and said. He then disappeared with a flash.
After that incident, Arima directly headed to the guild HQ. When he entered, he recognized the usual structure of the guild, a lot of administrative receptions in the lower floors, the actual restaurants and placards were higher and finally, the master"s floor at the top with, in this city, the SSS and Z rank missions.
When Arima showed his card at the first floor, someone hastily brought him to the master"s floor and led him in a certain room along with Lanya and Lilis, and of course Night who was a no brainer since he"s always on been on Arima"s shoulder since the moment he had this form.
"Welcome, Arimane, the Kind Demon" Inside the luxury room, a burly middle-aged man greeted Arima and the latter furrowed at the mention of his t.i.tle "Please sit" The master pointed at the big couch in the room for Arima"s group to sit.
The men sat down in front of them and smiled "What brings a Z rank like you here?" He asked while serving some drinks and appetizers. Night jumped on the table to eat some while the two girls didn"t restrain themselves. Arima just took out a lollipop and didn"t touch anything on the table.
"Well, I"m here to visit the Main Land and I was looking for something fun to do, then I thought that maybe there was some interesting dungeons that I could visit right now. So, I came here" Arima answered casually.
The master smiled wryly "Sorry, but there"s no dungeon that needs someone as strong as you right now" He said
"Then, do you have something interesting to do? Like stopping a war in another continent or killing a strong monster" Arima said after some thought.
The guild master wondered for a bit then he suddenly got an idea "I have something that could be interesting, they specified that only SS rank or higher could take it, but for now, no one has accepted it, and I"m in a bad position to refuse the request" He said while taking out a folder and handing it to Arima.
Arima took it and looked at the first page for a few seconds. The first lines he saw were "Future"s Dream Academy".
Arima frowned "Ah?" And exclaimed