Ok. I"m done for now. Next chapter will be tomorrow afternoon/night sometime. If I finish anything up before that I"ll still probably wait until then to post them.
Also, this is one of those chapters where I question the use of "reincarnated people" vs "reincarnations" as how Al terms them. Most of the reincarnated people start off using "reborn" but Al usually prefers the term "reincarnations" though for ease I"ve always just used "reincarnated people". Just think that "reincarnations" is a "cooler" word for every time that has come up until now.
Year 7444, Month 5, Day 28
".."
Shiina who has finished confirming her equipment is watching me with a serious face while I"m remaining silent.
"It"s not like I intend to blame you for anything. If you want to keep it a secret then I won"t tell anyone, I just found it strange. If you don"t want to say then that"s fine."
Shiina quietly said that. And,
"But, that you won"t trust me is a bit..that is..lonely...since 16 years have already pa.s.sed since then, I guess it"s not unreasonable though. But, I just remembered a moment ago. That"s why I can remember it like yesterday. I was on my way to my appointment with s.e.xton Company when a train drove into the bus I was riding. But, I can remember the events like it was yesterday."
She said that and made a sad smile.
"..Ha..I guess it"s fine if it"s you..It can"t be helped, I"ll reveal the trick. Promise that you won"t tell anyone."
I scratch my cheek and said that and Shiina"s face suddenly got cheerful.
"Of course. It"s a secret between just the two of us. Yeah, I won"t tell anyone."
That"s certainly true but..when you say it, it just feels unpleasant right. I look at Shiina in the eyes while saying.
"It"s called Magic Acquisition. Quite literally it helps learn magi"Supposedly people who can calmly tell lies have psychopathic tendencies. Who do you think I am? Please don"t think that I the Dark Elf, "Rank 1 warrior cla.s.s", Shiina Junko, no, "Miduchi the Silent" would fall for such a simple strategy."
! This girl..after all I thought it was strange that she was entering the dungeon alone but she"s no longer just a simple person, I guess that"s what this mean? Though I don"t really get "Rank 1 warrior cla.s.s" or "Miduchithesilent"...but, psychopath, you...Though I don"t feel like it"s all that incorrect. The first time my heart got a bit disarrayed but I explained it away by saying it was for Myun"s sake and I didn"t hesitate at all when I killed everyone from {Bright Blade} the other day.
Well if I was bothered by something like that then I wouldn"t even be able to get involved with a single war from here on out. I already know. In the first place, if you say that then all of the heroes in the world would be psychopaths after all. I"m aiming for that as well. Whether it be Orth or Earth the people who can calmly kill living creatures or monsters that have arms, legs, a head and walk upright is messed up in the head somewhere. That goes the same for you too, Shiina. Since you"re inside the dungeon after all.
".."
".."
The silence continues for a few seconds.
"Why can you say that"s a lie? Is there some sort of merit for me to lie to yo"There are merits, a lot of them. Also, I"ll say it any number of times but please don"t think that I don"t know much about Kawasaki-san. Please don"t underestimate me. How many times do you think I accompanied you during sales? When Kawasaki-san tells lies while doing sales, he always makes sure to properly look at the other person"s eyes. Didn"t you previously say it before? "When you tell lies you need to fortify your resolve so even if it"s just for that time you"re even lying to yourself." like that."
...
"I was always working by your* side for eight years. I was always watching you. Even if you try to deceive me it"s pointless. If I combine Shiina Junko"s feelings and the 16 years I spend as a dark elf training my skills of observation and discernment then I can almost perfectly see through the lies. It"s fine if you decide not to tell me as well but please do not tell me any lies. I also do not intend to, no, to only you I will absolutely never tell any lies."
..Anata*, huh?
How long has it been since I was called that?
I suddenly remembered Miki.
"I"m sorry. Seeing through them is probably limited to only you. But, it seems I already confessed my feelings to you just now. I remembered what I said and did after running out of mana last night and since it was so embarra.s.sing my tension went up that high and became like that though...
Kawasaki-san, about you but..I love you. These 16 years since I was reborn I can"t do anything about the fact that I forgot it, but I really love you. Since I understood we were reborn as a result of that accident..I was able to say it because I knew that your wife is no longer around..that"s why I can say it. I"ve always loved you since many years ago. Please at least...at least don"t lie to a woman like this. I"m begging you."
...
"Why are you remaining silent? You already realized my feelings since a long time ago right?"
"I already knew. Obviously...There"s no way I wouldn"t realize right?"
We were both adults after all, I was married and had my own family. There"s no way it"s something that could be said and I had no intention of confirming it either.
After hearing my words Shiina raised her face up a bit and shed some tears.
"Thank goodness...So they were conveyed. Just a bit..this is..something I"m happy about."
She said that while looking at me.
I can"t lie to you right.
I kept company with her without thinking in terms of advantages or disadvantages.
Of course it wasn"t the relationship of a man and woman though.
I took a deep breath and then opened my mouth.
"It would be better if you don"t learn the name of the ability. I"ll explain it later but I"m pa.s.sing it with other reincarnated people as Magic Acquisition. Since I"m sure you"ve already met G.o.d so I think you know though."
After I said that far and Shiina,
"Reincarnated people! Somehow that"s a cool name~ Well if you say it like that then it"s certainly strange*. Also, I"m sorry. It"s true I met G.o.d but as a matter of fact I don"t really remember much from that time...All I remember is that the people who died in the accident were reborn on Orth and the method to use my Unique Ability, also that I was carrying some kind of large problem and it seems G.o.d lent me a bit of a hand in doing something about that. Incidentally I think that this large problem is probably referring to my memory loss."
Said that.
"I see. If you don"t remember then that can"t be helped but the growth rate of reincarnated people is higher than that of normal people. This is"Ah..I somehow was able to remember that."
Ah, I see.
"..When your body level increases things like your mana increase but the degree of those increases is high, is basically what it means."
"Body level?"
"It"s fine so remain quiet for a bit and listen. I won"t teach you about it."
"Excuse me."
Shiina who was nodding with a ho~ ho~ while listening suddenly apologized with a shun~
"In any case, in order to increase this body level you need to gain various experiences...Like killing living creatures. Almost certainly when a certain amount of that is acc.u.mulated you level up. My Unique Ability is like a bonus to increases how easy it for these level ups to occur and right now I can probably grow at about three times the speed of other people."
".."
What, is with that expression? Could it be you"re doubting me? I swear I haven"t said any lies.
".."
I look back at Shiina.
"..And?"
s.h.i.t.
"About what?"
Since it"s a bit amusing I think I"ll try to pretend to have forgotten.
"It can"t be explained with just that right? There"s a continuation right?"
That"s an expression that says she won"t forgive evading the question. Ah, the eyes of a Dark Elf are just like an Elves her eyes are slightly slanted like Toris. I change my tone of voice a bit while saying."
"Ah, really. You"re as troublesome as usual. But you know, if you hear this then you won"t be able to go back anymore, I won"t let you. I won"t forgive betrayal and I won"t forgive telling others. Think that you"ll be tied to me for the rest of your life."
After hearing that Shiina shed some more tears from her eyes and opened her mouth. And, that face was smiling.
"Aha, what are you saying? Do you think I would say anything that would inconvenience Kawasaki-san?"
...
"Something like that doesn"t matter at this point. But, after hearing that I wanted to know even more. That means I can stay by your side for the rest of my life right? Or else does Kawasaki-san think that I will betray?"
...
"How about it? Please respond to me."
"..I don"t think so."
Just a bit, I"m feeling a bit annoyed that I was able to reconfirm once again that I trusted this girl this much. Shiina was happy after hearing my response.
"Then, even if I were to go somewhere you won"t think I"ve betrayed you right?"
I thought about it for a bit before saying my reply.
"..I probably won"t think so. I think I"d probably just think there was some kind of reason for it and I"m sure you wouldn"t expose the secret on your own."
"I might end up revealing it after being tortured?"
"That can"t be helped."
"We haven"t met for 16 whole years. Is it okay to trust me that far?"
"Is it no good?"
"There"s no way it"s not good! That can"t be..Trusting me so easily..Aren"t you an idiot?"
"I"m sure I"m an idiot."
"Indeed an idiot."
"Yeah, an idiot."
"I love you."
The idiot is you. Don"t cry.
"I don"t love you, unfortunately."
I said it while smiling.
"I already knew that..But, even if you don"t say it right now.."
I let out a large sigh and opened my mouth. It"s about time to finish things up.
"I saved a kid during the accident on the train. I received that kids Unique Ability as well. You don"t need to remember the name of this one either. Just remember them all as Magic Acquisition...The reality of this one is a power that can see through the true nature of things. It"s something that"s close to an expansion on Status Open. That"s why I know that your name is Mizweritt.Chizumagurol, your body level is 10, your elemental magic skills are all level 4, void magic is level 5, and I even know your experience points. Let alone your Strength and Speed, I can see things like HP and MP which are vitality and mana turned into numerical values. In addition saying it and I can see the specific details of Unit Organization {Party-zation} as well. The fact that you still have some bruising remaining as well."
I finally confessed it. Shiina quietly listened to my conversation but her expression gradually turned to shock I knew like a high speed photograph. Right now her face is making three Os with her mouth and eyes open.
"What"s that? Amazing, or not, it"s creepy, Unfair. Cruel."
"..I thought you would say that. It"s completely something like cheating after all."
"But my name isn"t Mizweritto. It"s "Midu~ritto". Please stress the accent not on the Du but on the Mi."
The Zu"s and Du"s are p.r.o.nounced vaguely different in the {Common Language} but, ah, I see.
"Yes-yes, "Midu~ritt" right. Is "Mili" fine? Or is "Rizu" better?"
"If possible I"d like you to call me "Miduchi". Also, please teach me Kawasaki-san"s name."
I forgot.
"It"s Greed. Alan.Greed."
"Then, is it "Al"?"
"That"s right but.."
"What is it?"
"Being called my nickname by you is somehow.."
"Don"t mind the small details. You won"t be able to rise up in the world like that."
".."
"I"ve confirmed all of the things I wanted to confirm in a hurry. After this please slowly let me hear various things once we confirm our safety."
"..Yeah."
I somehow don"t feel satisfied with this.
"Please relax easy. If you saw my skill levels then you should already know but I"m strong. My power level is 530,000. We will definitely be able to get out."
"Ah, I see."
I can still transform about three more times though.
"Then, please excuse me for a bit."
Miduchi said that and touched my cheek. For an instant I felt like Miduchi suddenly appeared really close to me but I"m sure it was just my imagination. However, I guess this is Unit Organization. I somehow or other feel like Miduchi is close by me.
"..Thank goodness. It went well. Al..If I was hated then it would have failed."
Idiot.
"My heart is vast. No matter what happens there"s no way I"d hate you right? Let"s go."
"Yes!"
The two of us stood up and started walking.
Heading towards the surface.
...........
It was good that we got enthusiastic as we started walking off but the room is far too wide and I can only light up about 30-40m with {Light}. Let alone something like an entrance to a pa.s.sage, I still can"t find a single wall. We keep walking and walking but it"s just this plain dull and dry ground stretching out.
"It"s suspicious if we"re even following straight ahead."
After I said that and,
"Certainly that"s true. Should we split into two groups for a bit?"
Miduchi said that and crouched down to put up a stone and used {Light} on it. We both turned around with our backs facing and we can see the same light from over our shoulders so we know we"re moving in an almost 90 degree angle in a different direction, we can also tell the approximate distance and direction thanks to Unit Organization. It will split up our combat power but it can"t be helped.
We hold on to our rocks with {Light} cast on them and the two of us split up in two different directions.
...............
Around the time I had walked for about 12 minutes the words "gather" and "don"t hurry" appeared inside of my head. There"s already a considerable amount of distance between myself and Miduchi. The reason I was able to know it was 12 minutes was nothing more than a guess based on the duration of {Light}. She must have either found something or something must have happened. I can see a small light far into the distance. According to Unit Organization there"s a distance of around 420m to that light, Miduchi. Since were both remaining reasonably careful of traps our speed is around 30m/minute. If I were to compare it to how fast we proceed through the pa.s.sages of the dungeon then it"s quite a fast pace because I feel a bit impatient to escape as soon as possible.
I changed my direction straight towards the light Miduchi is holding. It would normally be faster and safer if I ran straight towards her down the path I originally took but I didn"t have the confidence I couldn"t follow the same path back. Since she sent the order "don"t hurry" it"s probably not an enemy attack so it should be fine if I slowly make sure it"s safe as I walk over.
I was able to safely make it to Miduchi but there was just some normal chain-mail that wasn"t strange at all and a single long sword inside of a crumbling scabbard laying around. The values on both of them aren"t anything special they"re pretty common goods.
"Al-san. Here, look at this."
Yeah, I"m looking at it. I Identified it as well. However, I don"t think it"s something make an uproar over in this situation. If we were to bring the chain-mail back it would probably have a value of over 1 gold coin so you could say it"s a lot of money but it"s not a good idea to carry a lot of things back when it"s just the two of us in this situation.
"What about this?"
"The sword wasn"t drawn. Just from what I can tell the chain-mail has only pa.s.sed time as well and there"s no holes in it either. I think it"s only rusted because of the corpse of the person who died. There"s nothing that could be called damage on it so it seems they weren"t killed from combat."
That"s certainly true. In that case, what was the cause of death?
"Most likely wasn"t it starvation? Since this room is so large. If they can"t use magic then it"s even possible they would just keep wandering around in circles."
That"s true.
"I thought about it in regards to that but I"ll use an attack spell from the flame or fire type. If I use it normally then it can go about 60 meters or so and if I change the angle I could try and figure out if there"s a wall with 60 meters. I called Al-san because I didn"t want to surprise you be suddenly using attack magic."
I gave up on using attack spells to investigating taking into consideration the possibility it might carelessly call some monsters but I guess it"s true it"s the same for the light. I only decided to go with her suggestions because in the worst case if a monster comes then we can throw the stone with {Light} on it up in the air as high as we can can then run away as fast as possible.
"Yeah, if you"ve prepared yourself for it, then I"ll do it. The range of my magic is farther than yours. And..look."
I create a {Flame Javelin} and added a {Missile} to it then sent it flying. It"s the place to show my Void Magic Lv. MAX. I can do the same thing with 10x more efficient use of MP. Of course it"s just for the void magic portion of it so it doesn"t raise the amount of damage it does. It"s common for {Flame Javelin Missile} to use 9 MP for the level 3 fire magic and level 6 void magic but in my case I can do the same thing for 3.6 MP. If I use the same 9 MP then in terms of speed(acceleration power) I can increase it by 5 times and I can increase the range by 5 times as well. Of course the void magic remains 0.6 MP like that, it"s fine to just make the size of the warhead bigger and raise the power of it. This time rather raising the power, the range is more important though. I thought it would be a bit strange to increase the range too far so I just decided to go with an adequate 3-4 times farther.
I have it doing a lap around us at about 200m in the surroundings. After we were unable to see the {Flame Javelin} once I had it turn back around. At the very least there"s nothing about 200m in our surroundings. Once it returned back in front of us I released the guidance and sent it flying ahead of us. It continued flying another several tens of meters from the inertia and then fell to the ground. I think it probably flew around 250m?
"Mi..Missile..And it even had extensions to it"s range..the level of your magic must be considerably high..I had confidence in my mana and magic skill levels as well but..this is..somehow."
Miduchi is surprised. That"s only obvious. Extending the range itself is fine if you just put in two or three times the MP but since Missile requires a void magic of at least level 6 to use after all. That"s why sister surprised everyone when she took the exam for the knight group and was able to pa.s.s just from the level of her magic skills.
"It should be quite better than just sending it flying right. Also, we definitely won"t end up circling the same area. We just need to do this."
I poured even more mana into the {Light} on the rock in my hand this time I didn"t increase it with continuation this time but extension. Increasing the duration with continuation has far better MP efficiency in comparison but it"s troublesome if you intend to use a different spell during that time. There"s no change to the way the light itself looks. I used 100 times the normal amount of mana, used 100 MP to increase the duration of the effect by 10 times (Other than attack spells the effect doesn"t increase proportionate to the amount of MP you add to it. It increases with a square root.) With this it will last for 50 minutes.
"This {Light} will last 10 times longer than a normal one. And, just like this."
I used a normal {Fire Ball}. I sent it flying about 100m and it went a bit further thanks to the inertia and then fell to the ground and exploded. Burning stones glowing red were send flying around. I"m sure we"ll still be able to see the light for about 10 minutes or so.
"Let"s go to there and leave a {Light} rock once more. If we just keep proceeding like that then at the very least for 50 minutes or so we should be able to proceed in a straight line. After that I just need to use {Light} again before the duration of the effect disappears."
I said that and started advancing forward.
"..Ha~ I"ll lose my confidence, really. Exactly how much leeway do you have in your mana?"
"Easily more than 10 times yours. That"s why it"s fine for you to relax and come with me."
"Ten..Ten times..Exactly how much is that? My mana is said to be reasonably high though.."
Miduchi"s shoulder dropped down. It was then.
"Ah..sorry~ I feel like I need to take a s.h.i.t."
"..Really~ It can"t be helped. I"ll face this direction so please do it quickly."
I"m not Ralpha but it"s best to say things honestly. It"s been a good amount of time since I ate lunch after all, so it can"t be helped I"m sure. I quickly left everything out that I could and used water magic to wash my a.s.s and then dried it before pulling my armor back up and putting my protectors on. The period of time it took a mere three minutes. I"m sure a trick like this is impossible with plate-mail or splint-mail. Incidentally I buried the s.h.i.t that came out with dirt.
"Sorry for the wait, now let"s go."
"..That was fast. Pla, no, so that is rubber armor.."
"Yeah, it"s light and durable, it"s easy to take off and put on and to clean as well. It"s nice right?"
"Ha~"
"What? Do you have no interest?"
"That isn"t the case. But, our first priority right now is to escape from here."
"Well, I guess that"s true. By the way, are you fine?"
"About what?"
"Toilet."
"While Al-san was sleeping I went in a place a bit of distance away."
"I see."
There"s no need to be careful around her anymore than Ralpha. She"s something like a wife in a different way than Miki.
...........
I wonder if around one hour has pa.s.sed? We just dropped the third and fourth rocks with {Long Duration Light} on them. We"ve probably advanced about 2Km while shooting {Fire b.a.l.l.s} in a random direction I guess? My MP has cut around 6,800. Since we found another person who starved there doesn"t seem to be any monsters at all so I"m talking with Miduchi about various things. Like our lives after we reincarnated, the topics for conversation have no end.
We"ve finally started to become able to see the wall ahead of us. The wall is stretching out slightly slanted even further on both the right and left sides. Now then, what should we do?
"Hey, dungeon beginner. We won"t follow along the wall. There"s not much that I can think of judging from this width though. It"s might first time seeing a room this big but I know of one room that"s this cla.s.s. It was round in a shape. Can you guess what I"m worrying about?"
"That"s only obvious. The fact that an entire floor of the dungeon has become one giant room right?"
"That"s right. Then do you know what way we should move?"
"There should be a teleport crystal in the center of the dungeon. If the wall is in a circle then if we follow straight along a right angle we should be able to arrive there."
"That"s right. Although, there"s still plenty of possibility remaining that the entire floor of the dungeon isn"t a perfect circle. If we can"t find anything by the time we arrive at the wall on the other side then this time we"ll need to walk along the wall."
"I understand."
I was about to start walking off with my back to wall but if this wall is really the outer circ.u.mference then it should be a diameter of about 10Km and the circ.u.mference should be about 31.4Km. In order to check if it"s really perpendicular I had Miduchi back up about 200m from the wall. When facing the wall I used the spell {Lightning Bolt} towards the wall. The lightning went straight towards the wall and rebounded.
If it accurately comes back at me then it"s okay to think that it"s perfectly perpendicular. If I use the spell {Lightning Bolt} normally then it has a range of about 80m and I can extend that up to 800m but as expected that"s too far. It should be fine at 5 times the range. Even with this while it normally costs 12 MP to use it only costs me 10.
I try shooting it several times while making small adjustments to the angle...This should be fine. The {Lightning Bolt} splendid reflected back to right in front of me. So it"s this point huh? I used {Fire Wall} towards the wall from the same point. I didn"t increase the range this time. I just increased the duration. With this it should last for about 100 seconds. However, with this I was able to draw almost a straight line from the wall. If we place some {Long Duration Lights} along here then even after the flame disappears thanks to the {Long Duration Lights} we"ll still know that we"re heading in straight line from the wall.
...........
Just as we predicted, I don"t know what floor this is but it"s basically one entire floor made into a giant room. While carrying our hungry stomachs we continued walking for close to three hours before we finally ran into something like a large cylinder shaped outer wall. There were several pieces of equipment from people who starved in the past along the way to here. In order to go all the way around it in worst case we"ll need to walk another 300m or more.
We continued to take small breaks with the wall to our back while adjusting the direction we were moving.
"I wonder if the teleport crystal is on the other side of this wall?"
Miduchi asked anxiously.
"Yeah, probably. If there isn"t then you and I are already...Since we can somehow do something about water, we"ll last about a week. We"ll need to find a method to do something during that period."
"I"ve started to get hungry right."
"..Since we"ve only had water to drink after all.."
"Since it"s just the two of us after all.."
"That"s true."
I regret throwing my bag down at this late point.
"I want some proteins."
Miduchi licks her lips illuminated by the light. It was an obscene movement that sent a shiver down my spine.
"Sure I want to eat some meat as well."
"Al-san can let out some proteins right?"
She"s just sticking the end of her forked tongue out of her lips and moving it like small scissors. That"s quite skillful.
"Huh?"
"You can let some out right?"
I don"t know a spell like that.
"I don"t know a spell that conveni ah...you b.a.s.t.a.r.d~ I"ll kill you, shut up. Rather~ you"ve changed quite a bit. Or else is this how it really is?"
"Didn"t I just say a slightly {adult} joke? I was just trying to make the mood more cheerful."
Don"t say it so disappointingly. I hit the wall that"s towering over my back with the palm of my hand while,
"It"s about time we head off. There should be some place on this that will let us inside."
"Yes~~ So the break is already over..Ha~"
Don"t get sulky with that creepy skin color.
"It should be plenty to rest for five minutes. Don"t complain."