| Skill,『Sun’s Divine Protection』was activated. 【Golden Flame】⋅⋅⋅⋅⋅⋅Improves physical ability. Further effects for a limited time. |
The goddess’ power wraps around my body. I blocked the sahagin’s three-pronged trident with my short sword.
Sparks flew. Behind me, the woman who was being attacked lets out a sharp gasp.
“Uuh”
Relying on brute force, I knock the weapon upward. The sahagin’s torso is left wide open, and my sword slices across it. A clean line is carved into its scale-covered chest, then a dark blue blood gushes out from it in a burst.
“Gi…gi…”
With a dying groan, the sahagin crumbles into ash.
“Are you alright!?”
When I turn around, the woman’s face is deathly pale. She’s looking at me, yet her eyes aren’t really focusing on anything. It somehow reminds me of how my mother looked when she was completely worn down.
『This is awful…..』
Solana’s voice trembles as if she’s biting her lip. I feel exactly the same.
“They kept you locked up in a place like this….?”
The dim room held five other captives. All of them had their hands tied behind their backs and were huddled against the walls. This was the outermost ring of the Flocia Dungeon. A hidden area that circled the dungeon like a belt.
I’d never imagined slave traders would turn such a place into their base.
But now…. it was all painfully clear.
“It’s done on my side.”
Nils raised his sword, signaling the end of the fight outside the room. Battles had been breaking out even beyond this chamber. I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding. The monsters hadn’t spawned inside the captives’ chamber. Most likely, monsters that appeared in the corridor forced their way in.
That small delay… that tiny margin of time…
It was the reason rescue arrived before the captives were killed.
The room itself wasn’t more than ten meters across, but the ceiling stretched unnaturally high. Somewhere, it must have connected to the waterway. Thin streams of water trickled down the walls and drained into grooves in the floor. Wooden plates lay scattered on the ground, the kind used to serve meals.
Every one of them was empty.
The prisoners—each with a gaunt, hollow-cheeked face— turned their eyes to me and asked,
“Wh–who are you…?”
The one who spoke was the woman I had just rescued.
“Where….where are we?”
Her next question twisted painfully in my chest. Of course they couldn’t possibly know they had been dragged inside a dungeon. The lake had hidden entrances scattered everywhere. River bandits could raid a village, abduct people, and secretly ferry them here without anyone realizing.
My thoughts grew darker and darker, and I forced myself to pull them back.
“We—we came to save you. You’re safe now.”
I smiled to be reassuring, but it probably looked a little strained. Even so, the captives finally widened their eyes. Men and women, boys and girls alike—all of them stared at us with tears beginning to swell.
“I promise we’ll get you home.”
Warriors and adventurers began gathering at the entrance of the chamber. More than twenty rescuers had arrived, and the people who’d been held captive bowed their heads again and again in gratitude.
Felix-san stepped forward.
“Alright, let’s do as planned. We’ll form an escort party for them.”
Those selected were five adventurers, joined by one member of the Raven Warrior corps—six in total. We handed them one of the magic keys and had them head toward the exit of the hidden area.
Once they reached the regular section of the dungeon, they would pass the rescued captives over to the party currently sweeping the monsters there, then return to us.
We were on the fourth layer now. If the escort team tried to go all the way to the surface and back, it would take far too long. The ones who had entered this hidden area were among the best adventurers Flocia had to offer. Many were adventurers the Raven Warrior corps had hired before. We wanted them to stay here and support the rescue efforts in the hidden area as much as possible.
“Felix-san, should we call for reinforcements from the parties outside?”
Felix-san thought for a moment, then shook his head.
“For now, it isn’t necessary. We’ll keep moving forward and look for any other victims. We still don’t know how long the hidden door will remain open. And with only a limited number of magic keys, bringing in too many people would just hinder our movements.”
The warrior corps operated with strict discipline. But among the adventurers, things could be more complicated. In fact, there were adventurers who had traded with slave traders and even brought in titan ashes, the very substance that lures monsters.
“Ugh..”
They still crouched at our feet, groaning. They’d probably been coaxed by the slave traders into sneaking into the hidden area. Judging by the situation, they must have scattered the ash nearby.
I gave them recovery potions, so they should regain their strength before long.
Before too much time passed, the five men and women finally came to.
“Uhm—”
“Hey!”
I started to speak, but Mia-san cut me off.
She narrowed her eyes dangerously and prodded one of them with the tip of her axe.
“You lot. You’re the ones who took a magic key and that weird ash, right?”
The adventurers froze, their faces tightening as they began to tremble.
“N-No way…”
“We didn’t really believe there’d be actual people down here…”
Mia-san clicked her tongue sharply.
Perhaps they didn’t take the information about someone being held captive seriously and instead prioritized the exploration.
Mia-san raked her fingers through her red hair and glared at them.
“Hand over what they gave you.”
The adventurers reluctantly took out the magic key (a slightly soot-stained piece of metal one) to the hidden area and a pouch filled with red-black ash. Several of the other pouches were empty. They had clearly already scattered their contents.
“T-they told us that if we spread this ash, the dungeon’s seal would loosen even more, so we…. we just…”
A bitter taste rose in my mouth.
That was the same logic Gideon had used back in the royal capital.
“Did it never cross your minds that you’d be putting civilians in danger if anyone was actually being held captive?”
“Uh… t-that… we didn’t think there are captives.”
“Even if you got magic stones or relics out of it, that wouldn’t mean anything compared to someone’s life.”
The adventurers jerked their heads up, as if stunned awake.
“Was there anyone else who entered the hidden area?”
“There was one more group ahead of us. We dunno about the rest….”
At least one more group, then.
Felix-san tapped his staff against the floor. His gaze were stern. The adventurers shrank back under his gaze.
“The hidden area, the ash that weakens its seals—all of this have been explained to you above ground. And since you still chose this path, then you must bear the responsibility.”
After the speech at the guild, we’d gone over the details: the procedures, the boats, everything. The existence of the hidden area, the danger of the ash that raised the dungeon’s difficulty and summoned monsters—those warnings should have reached many of the adventurers.
The mining town of Alvis would never create titan ashes again.
But this dungeon still held leftover ashes, and if they were used, the deeper layers especially would become far more dangerous. That was why our party wanted to descend the floors ahead of everyone else. Only the deep layers—the truly lethal zones—were something we could not entrust to the volunteers.
But even with that, at least 20 people still managed to sneak up on us.
『It seems our enemy this time is well-versed in human nature.』
I nodded at Sigris’ words.
Felix-san sighed and gestured in the direction we had come from.
“Take their weapons and bring them back to the surface.”
“Understood. Stay safe.”
The warriors nodded and took the adventurer and the captured person with them.
Mia-san exhaled.
“…I knew it would be busy, but it is very hectic.”
As we gazed ahead, the corridor curved gently. It was a wide road, wide enough for a carriage to pass through. The walls and ceiling were made of smooth stone, a stark difference from the cave-like floors we’d reached so far.
The sound of water echoed faintly in the silence.
Felix-san cleared his throat.
“Even at this stage, there is some good news. The enemy could have laid far more elaborate traps, but they haven’t. For now, it seems the captives are safe.”
A chill ran down my spine.
I didn’t want to speak it aloud, yet the words slipped out.
“There is a possibility that they could have been killed.…”
Felix-san closed his eyes and pressed a finger to the small coronet on his head.
“They may have chosen to weaken us, the ones who decided to help, deliberately. Not to stop the rescue, but to allow it, draining our strength in the process….”
Nils-san struck the wall. The impact from a first-rate adventurer made the stone tremble.
“Let’s hurry.”
A sharp, gleaming look in his eyes.
Nils-san took a necklace from his pocket. He was gripping it tightly—no doubt it was something his kidnapped sister had left behind.
She could very well be somewhere in this dungeon.
“Yes!”
I took the lead, running down the long corridor once more. It curved gently, and my earlier guess that this passage circled the dungeon seemed correct. Occasionally, I noticed small waterfalls. The sound of water trickling from inside the walls reached our ears.
Along the way, doors were spaced out every few dozen meters, sometimes clustered together. Every time we saw one, we checked inside. Curiously, each door consistently led to the right—toward the outside of the dungeon.
The thick doors were heavy. Even without locks, anyone who wasn’t an adventurer would have struggled to open them.
“Nothing here. No one’s in this room.”
“How about over there?”
“Same here!”
Each of us broke the locks and pushed inside. Almost all the rooms were storage rooms for weapons or provisions. Occasionally, a door was left wide open—likely by adventurers who had gone ahead on their own, or by river bandits.
I handed the lead to another adventurer. Using magic to detect life was draining, so we needed to take breaks. The effect of the Golden Flame had already worn off.
Then, a cool voice came from my right.
“I see…”
Running beside me was the transport-support member of the warrior corps. The lid of her backpack was slightly open, and a round, curious eyes peeked out.
“Fufu~n? Just as I thought, there is a mechanism to be triggered somewhere.”
The dwarf blacksmith, Safi, muttered. Apparently having figured out the structure of the hidden area.
This is translated by Yume Neiji. Kindly read at yumeineijiworks.wordpress.com.
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