Chapter 15:

Chapter 15:

Nightmare

"Mmmmmmmmm~"

["Ja! Cha-cha-cha! Ja!"]

I was nimbly shaking a frying pan while making chicken rice, a recipe I had researched on the Internet. My kitchen was equipped with an old-fashioned electric stove, not an induction stove. So there was no point in shaking the frying pan so much. But that was just a matter of my mood.

The recipe uses ice, eggs, chicken, and mixed vegetables. Salt, pepper, and ketchup are the seasonings. It's a recipe I can make with only what I have at home, which is a big help.

"Okay, it's ready. Let's eat. Itadakimas."

I eat the chicken rice straight from the frying pan, not on a plate.

Yes, it is easier to clean up afterward. I put the pan on the table and put the chicken rice in my mouth while listening to the TV and looking over the contents displayed on the communication terminal. This way, information is input from three channels simultaneously: the ears, the eyes, and the mouth.

I can examine the information entered into each channel without any problem, probably because I have grown in the dungeon. So maybe Prince Shotoku was a dungeon explorer.

Well, anyway, the world was moving without my knowledge.

"Wow, opening some dungeons to the public? That's quite a bold measure they've taken."

That was the news that reported the national policy. There were many conflicting opinions about dungeons.

There are a variety of opinions, but the extreme ones are those who support burying dungeons and those who say, let's bury the unexplainable things for now. Surprisingly, many people hold this kind of opinion. It is mainly older people who support this.

Next are those who support opening the dungeons, which is the exact opposite, and overwhelmingly young people support this. And everyone who advocates this seems to think they can become heroes. That's what I'm thinking, but if I were to ask where I belong, it would be that. I'm already diving.

The rest is really up for grabs.

Some say, "Let the Self-Defense Forces exterminate them all," others say, "Let it be a private enterprise". Anyway, one thing they all have in common is that they are all thinking only of their convenience. When I watch TV shows, I hear people talking about issues with no answers.

Similarly, if a goblin breathes fire, I, as a geek, can at least guess it is some small demon imp.

The important thing is to have a general idea of what kind of monsters are in the dungeon. That way, when I encounter them in the dungeon, I won't panic.

I was about to post on the internet that the crawling, half-melted, human-like monster was a giant slug, but decided against it. I was in the middle of writing it when I realized that it smelled so fake. It is a shock that people won't understand unless they see it.

"Ummmmmmmgo, go, gothe cockroaches are coming at me! Ha! (Boom!)"

I woke from my nightmare in the middle of the night. My whole body was drenched in sweat.

"Huhwhat a dream."

I dreamed I was fighting in a dungeon and was attacked by an impossibly giant cockroach. I went to the kitchen, drank some water, and came to bed, but I'm so scared, that I couldn't sleep. Then it occurred to me to search for "Cockroach Dreams" on the internet.

It says that cockroaches represent your stress, and the bigger they are, the more stressful it is.

"Mmmm, stress. Certainly, the mental load in the dungeon is great. But I have more mental strength because of it. But there is more to the story. What if a cockroach escapes in a dream, it means that the stress is not relieved, and if I can kill a big cockroach, it means that the stress is also relieved?"

I don't like cockroaches to begin with. That's why I had this weird dream. The first thing that comes to mind if I'm stressed out if my dream is about a giant slug, which is the creepiest monster of them all.

"Mmm, but thinking about it made me feel less and less sleepy. It's too hot to sleep, so I think I'll go to the front room of the dungeon and lie down."

I went to the refrigerator, opened the door, and stuck my head inside. Then the pitch blackness rippled, and the view of the front room of the dungeon spread out before my eyes. I crawled out of the pitch blackness and went to the simple base with just a cardboard floor with my bare feet.

["Blew! Blew!"]

I grabbed the baseball bat I had set up on the ground and swung it twice. The sound of the wind gave me a sense of certainty about its power and made me feel a little safer.

(Yes, I'm getting stronger. I'm not going to let some dungeon monster beat me.)

I lay down on the cardboard box with the bat under my arm and my arms crossed and just closed my eyes until sleepiness overtook me.