Excuse Me for Intruding!*4
“Gyaooooooohhh!”
“Waaaaah! This thing just won’t dieeeee!”
“Asuma-sama, stay hidden!”
“I got it! I took out its eye! The right side’s a blind spot now! Aim from there!”
And so, the dragon subjugation began in high spirits.
… Listen, I did properly bring a portable poison gas generator with me.
Simply put, it’s a “Do Not Mix” kind of thing. Liquids are inconvenient to carry around, so I made it a solid-and-liquid setup instead.
In other words, I was fully prepared to generate chlorine gas.
And the conditions were perfect. This final room was sealed, and not all that big either.
…And yet, the dragon was just too strong.
Its blood is red, so I figured it was an oxygen-breathing lifeform, which should mean chlorine would do it in, but it just wouldn’t die. Seen through the gas mask, the dragon was rampaging around energetically. Dragons are insane. What, is this fantasy power too? What even is this…?
Meanwhile, the thing gradually wearing the dragon down was also fantasy power.
… Namely, Mishisia-san and Lisas-san were holding their own against it.
You know, those fantasy moves the holy knights pulled off.
The ones where they leap huge distances in full plate armor and all that.
Those “are you kidding me” moves, but apparently in this world, it’s more like, “Yeah, if you’ve got body-enhancement magic, plenty of people can do that.” Absolutely unbelievable.
… And if such magic exists, then naturally it should be possible to reproduce it.
In that regard, Laperesiana-sama had given me some medicinal herbs with body-enhancement effects. I concentrated them using the slime concentration method and turned them into potions.
The result was a mysterious potion that massively boosts physical ability when consumed.
I’m thinking of naming it Doping Consommé Soup.
So, while Mishisia-san and Lisas-san were fighting energetically, doped to the gills… I wasn’t just hiding behind fantasy power either.
To oppose stubborn fantasy, you need science. I am a disciple of science!
“Loading complete!”
I set a special-made “arrow,” carefully wrapped and brought along, into my crossbow.
Even a powerless elementary-schooler body can use a crossbow, that’s the beauty of it.
“Here we go! Fire!”
The moment I pulled the trigger, the arrow flew, and struck near the dragon’s neck.
At the same time, ignition. Explosion.
I mean, hey! I tried making it with gasoline, sugar, aluminum powder, and concentrated sulfuric acid, and it worked! So I deployed it in real combat!
“This is the power of science! Hyahhaa!”
… I did consider making a gun, but my own fear, “Can an elementary-schooler body handle the recoil!?”, led to this setup instead. It only explodes after impact.
Actually, since there’s a fair chance of accidental detonation, this might be a bit more dangerous than a gun.
“Asuma-sama! It’s working! Aim for the head now! You might be able to knock it out!”
“Impossible! Aiming is impossibleeee!”
… On top of that, this requires sniping skill. Which I really don’t have.
Hmm, thinking about it, maybe the optimal solution was a tetsuhau.
Just throw it and let it explode.
But then you run into the issue of how many meters an elementary-schooler body can throw a softball… yeah, not great.
Then a catapult…? But the power to operate one… mobile suit…?
Anyway, while I was thinking all that, the chlorine finally started taking effect, weakening the dragon, and before long, Lisas-san severed its head.
“Th-that was close…”
“No, it wasn’t really that dangerous…?”
“Defeating a dragon with just three people, and almost without injuries, is a remarkable feat…”
From my perspective, it was more like, “The dragon isn’t dying! Aaaah!”
But to Mishisia-san and Lisas-san, it apparently felt like a fairly safe fight.
Is my sense of danger warped…?
“Still, Mishisia-san, you’ve got great skill. Taking out its eye early really helped.”
“Hehe, thanks! See, the World Tree branch bow really feels good! Lisas-san, great work too!”
“It’s been a while since I moved like that. I’m quite rusty in places. If I don’t retrain, Laperesiana-sama might scold me.”
… Yeah, their sense of normal really feels off.
After defeating the dragon, we immediately began exploring the area.
We want to take the dragon’s corpse with us, so we’ll do our best there, but first comes checking the surroundings for safety.
“Ah! Hey! There’s a hidden passage here!”
“Seriously!? Whoa, you’re right! How did you even find this!?”
“Hehe. I thought the airflow felt a little strange!”
Since Mishisia-san quickly found a hidden passage, we went to investigate it right away.
… Hmm.
“… I’ve got a really strong feeling that ‘it’s in there.’”
“Huh? What is!?”
“I don’t know… but I think the true endpoint of this dungeon is beyond this.”
It’s supposed to be someone else’s place, but I get this sense of ‘Ah, I know this’ coming from deeper within…
… What is this feeling?
Well, I can kind of guess, but still…
There’s no helping it unless we see it, so all of us proceed deeper into the passage.
“… The mana is dense.”
“Ah, so it really is that kind of place.”
“Yes… It must feel different to you, Asuma-sama.”
“Yeah. I wonder…”
Inside me, this vague, indescribable sensation keeps swirling.
If I had to compare it, it’s like living in one of many identical prefab houses, then stepping into your neighbor’s place and finding the layout exactly the same, giving you intense déjà vu and discomfort.
“What does it feel like?”
“Like… I know it but I don’t, and I don’t know it but I do… something like that.”
“I see… So other dungeons feel kind of familiar to you too, Asuma-sama?”
“That might be what this is.”
It’s my first time experiencing this, this sensation.
Let’s just say I’m glad I got to experience it.
We continued down the passage, deeper and deeper…
And finally, we reached its end.
Then—
A vast room. A high ceiling. And…
“… Isn’t this the same thing that’s in Asuma-sama’s dungeon…?”
“Yeah… I think it’s probably the same.”
… Above us was a crack in the ceiling.
And from it poured down light, something this world calls mana.
And the source of that mana is likely information.
“It’s beautiful… This is just like the room where we planted the World Tree…”
… I only know two dungeons in this world so far. Just two.
But… both of them had this.
“The deepest part of a dungeon is probably connected to another world.”
Whether the place connected to this crack is the world I came from, or yet another different world, I don’t know.
But even so… I might have figured out, just a little, what a “dungeon” really is.
“A dungeon… could it be a place that connects to other worlds…!?”
The moment I thought that, another question immediately arose.
“Then why is this dungeon so weak?”
It doesn’t make sense. No matter how you look at it.
If this dungeon, and possibly all dungeons, contain rifts to other worlds, then why are they doing things in such an inefficient way?
This dungeon was far too simple.
Monsters appear, you defeat them, and that’s it.
There was a dragon at the end, sure, but once the dragon is defeated, it’s over.
If I were this dungeon’s master, I wouldn’t design it like this.
I wouldn’t create a system that puts my own life at risk, and I’d come up with a way to gain more mana.
The result of that thinking is Panis Village as it is now.
… So until now, I’d just assumed, “Other dungeons must be so short on mana that they can’t do anything large-scale like Panis Village’s dungeon.”
But the situation had changed.
At least for the Lark Town Dungeon, there was undeniably a “rift connected to another world,” and mana was pouring in.
I’ve never precisely measured how much mana flows from such a rift…
But it’s enough for a World Tree to grow healthily.
So if that mana exists, why is this dungeon so weak? That doesn’t add up.
… Because, you see.
The master of the dungeon awaits…
Could it be… someone from another world?
If that’s the case, then maybe someone like me exists here too.
And if so, why were we able to reach the deepest part so easily?
“Could it be… a trap!?”
The moment I realized that, there was a clatter from deeper within…
“Uuuupaaaaaruuuuupaaaaaahhh!?”
There stood a creature about the size of a cat.
An axolotl.
An axolotl was there.
… An axolotl!? WHY!?
What do you think about this chapter?
