CH 136

[Minotaur Labyrinth]

“Huh? He’s digging the bottom of the sea?”

Ophir let out a dumbfounded voice, and Shiva-san shrugged her shoulders, “Yes,” and continued, “it seems like he’s going to get into the village directly. He may even be planning to flood the whole place.”

“Damn, that’s a real downer… Even though we’ve made it in time…” Ophir slumped her shoulders. I smiled bitterly.

As she had said, we’d managed to reach the island earlier than Boreios, but when I’d had Shiva-san try to see where he was, it turned out he was digging.

This was a completely unexpected development. “So, how long will he take to reach the minotaur village?”

“I’m not sure, the visibility is kind of poor. But as one would expect from the ‘Axe’ Saint, I guess. He’s digging at a tremendous pace.”

“I see. Which means, it’d be difficult to target and attack him from a long distance…

“Hmm…” I knitted my brows and fell into thought.

Given the absence of Tirna, we couldn’t carelessly engage him in an underwater battle, and everything other than water attribute attack was practically useless underwater, to begin with.

And even taking the size and depth of the hole he’d dug into account, chasing after him from behind would be a bad idea.

“Here I was wishing we could keep the minotaurs out of this… But now there’s no way around it. Let’s go through the underground maze and head for the minotaur village. And after we evacuate them to the ground, Ophir and I are gonna beat him lickety-split!”

“Ou, can’t wait for it!”

“Yes, I’ve got it.”

Ophir and Shiva-san nodded, then we hurried to the minotaur village.

◇ ◇

“What the hell is thiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiissssssssssssss!?”

――Rumble rumble rumble rumble rumble!

While carrying the girls by my sides, I desperately ran to escape from the rolling giant stone behind us.

Given the fact that this place was called ‘Labyrinth’, I thought the inside would be a huge, maze-like dungeon of sorts, but it turned out to be a trap hell.

There might be a mechanism to disarm the traps somewhere, but needless to say, we had totally no clue where it might be, or even if it existed…

Well, being an immortal, the traps weren’t a big concern to me, but it was a different story in the girls’ case.

As such, I took the initiative to dive right into the traps.

“Wahaha! This’s gettin’ fun!”

“No, this is not a situation you can laugh about, though!?”

“I mean, wouldn’t it be faster if we fly?”

“Eh, ah, that’s right…”

Hearing Shiva-san’s retort, I turned into Vermillion Bird Form.

If we had flown from the start, we would have been spared the necessity to step on these strange traps, wouldn’t we…?

――Rumble!

“Phew, I’d never been so grateful I was able to fly…”

Anyway, while watching the big stone falling down into a huge hole, of which bottom couldn’t be seen, I patted my chest in relief.

Who would’ve thought that as soon as the road widened, a hall-sized hole would be waiting for us…

On top of that, traps were strewn all over the road itself, too…

I’d say, the minotaurs put too much effort to kill intruders…

“No wonder Boreios chose to get in directly…

“Haa…” I let out a small sigh.

Ophir then said in wonder, “But wouldn’t that ox old man know how to disarm them?”

“Yes, he would, most likely. But what if he hasn’t been back to the village for quite a while? There’s a good chance that new traps have been set up in the meantime, and disarming them plus the already existing ones one by one would be troublesome, don’t you agree?”

“Haha, that sounds troublesome, aight.” As Ophir smiled, we reached the bottom of the huge hole.

Other than the big stone that had fallen earlier, spears were closely packing the place with their tips facing up.

Well, they’re a thorough bunch, aren’t they…?

While admiring the minotaurs’ works, I asked Shiva-san, “So which direction is the village?”

“Let me see… that way. We’ve come down pretty deep, and I think we’ll arrive there soon.”

“Is that so? Then—”

At that time.

――BANG!

“““!”””

At that time, the sound of an impact rang out not far from our position, and we all went wide-eyed.

It seemed like Boreios was about to arrive, too.

“““——”””

Convinced of that, the three of us nodded, and then we flew through the maze to try reaching the village faster than him.