Volume 7, 1: A New Dragon Eater

Volume 7, Chapter 1: A New Dragon Eater

Part 1

The humans had built a base for themselves in the world of Ground’s Nir. They called it the inn town. The town was only a temporary place built from the necessities people needed for their lives and to prepare for their adventures. For better or for worse, it was a stateless place. All of the humans from Earth gathered in this one place to explore the Labyrinth and their ideas of a fantasy world differed.

“Those people are so wrong.”

The girls’ clothing had some minor changes from new equipment meant to boost their Parameters.

Inside a pub with an inn plopped on top like a second scoop of ice cream, White Witch Philinnion, a young woman with glasses and fluffy blonde hair, was already complaining in the middle of the day. All of her clothing was white, from her pointed witch’s hat and split cape to the sweater that contained large boobs squeezed between her suspenders, but she had no issue with twirling some spaghetti and meat sauce on her fork.

“We gather up whatever we need and the result can look strange when we try to reproduce something from Earth using Ground’s Nir’s materials. I get that. But what is with those people!? Are they obsessed with nostalgia or are they fundamentalists of some sort? I don’t even know what to call them and I’m not interested in finding out, but they need to shut up about how no one bathed or used detergent to wash their dishes during the real middle ages!! We didn’t come to this world to use it as a giant ren faire, so quit trying to force that gross stuff on the rest of us! A complete stranger started taking issue with my glasses!!”

“Slurp, slurp. Slurrrrrrp?”

“And, Hermelina, why are you eating like that while staring in shock!?”

Philinnion bristled and shouted, but the Fighter Priest with short green hair and a priest’s robe with a tight skirt (and a boob window despite her flatness) did not seem bothered.

“Because you’re supposed to slurp curry udon, silly.”

“It’s splattering everywhere. I’m working so hard to stay clean with this meat sauce, but here I am getting hit by tons of stray shots from across the table!”

“Slurp. Hey, barkeep! Get me another cold barley tea. The curry here has too harsh a spiciness, so you need to mix it with a little more mentsuyu!”

“If all this is allowed, why do I have to be accosted by those sweaty freaks out on the side of the road? Am I just producing too many sexy pheromones???”

“Don’t get your panties in a bunch over their nonsense. We’re talking about those outdoor sh*tting enthusiasts that don’t even care about going on adventures, right? Nothing those freaks say about you while taking a dump on the side of the road can change a thing about what the world at large thinks, so don’t let it bother you.”

“Okay, that’s over the line no matter where you’re from! I’m trying to eat!!”

Miss Meat Sauce had started to lose her appetite, but Miss Curry Udon was made of tougher stuff. That big and strong priest may have been the type who would do quite well in a girl’s school.

Then Holy Swordswoman Beatrice arrived in her red armor and white miniskirt. She also wore a tattered gray cloth as a cloak as she approached Philinnion and Hermelina’s table.

“Barkeeper, I’ll have a chai tea.”

“Hey, Beatrice, the spices here aren’t that great. This curry udon is pretty disappointing.”

“It’s the same everywhere right now. I had no luck no matter where I went. The Shocking Tingle Peppers are sold out everywhere. I guess everyone is after the same thing. Okay.”

“Whoa.”

“Dbwah!?”

Beatrice pulled out a chair at the same table, Hermelina politely lowered her head, and Philinnion’s slow reaction speed got her whacked on the back of the head with a Shining Weapon that looked like a log or a steel beam.

The Holy Swordswoman’s partner was no longer a rapier. The Shining Weapon she now carried on her back was the giant blunt weapon beloved by the Iberian Orc, but…

“Hey, Beatrice, are you still not used to that giant thing? You swing it around on your back every time you bend over or turn around!”

“…”

“Oh, sorry, sorry. Philinnion, are you okay? You’re just kind of twitching there with your face in a plate full of meat sauce. You’re a girl, so you shouldn’t scarf down carbs quite that greedily.”

“Bwah!! Pant, pant. B-Beatrice, I will not hold a grudge because I am a beautiful, kind, smart, fancy, all-around capable, and entirely perfect young woman, but you have been making far too many horizontal swings lately! This is the 59th time!”

“That’s a pretty precise number for someone who claims not to hold a grudge…”

Now was not the time to call her an elegant White Witch with immaculate white hat, cape, and skin-exposing sweater. Philinnion’s entire face looked like a comedian’s after a pie-throwing gag and the lenses of her glasses were both quite amusing.

Beatrice removed the weapon (which rivalled her in height) from her back and leaned it against the wall. She began speaking while glancing over at Philinnion who was wiping her face off with a wet towel since she was not the type to let appearances get in the way of necessity.

“So. What should we do about the Shocking Tingle Peppers?”

“There’s no point in going to the Labyrinth without those. The info we got about needing it to summon the Legendary Dragon seems legit.”

You must not forget.

Beatrice, Philinnion, Hermelina, and all the other humans from Earth continued to accept the many risks of adventuring in Ground’s Nir so they could repeatedly explore the Labyrinth, defeat the clockwork Gimmicks which were based on actual plants and animals, gather Treasure from chests, and earn various Experience Points to learn new Magic. They wanted technology beyond the capabilities of Earth’s science to cause a revolution in cutting edge fields like semiconductors or genetics to reign supreme within the intense technological competition. …Then again, these three were more interested in stopping the new technologies that would lead humanity to destruction than they were in following along with the chaotically overheating competition.

With the Underworld Lord and the red Iberian Orcs, they had overcome several threats that could easily have wiped out all life in Ground’s Nir and even the 7 billion humans back on Earth, but history had not stopped afterwards. Humans still lived true to their desires and, whether they wanted to come out ahead or obstruct progress, they could not afford to be left behind by the times.

“One week,” said Beatrice while toying with the edge of her gray cloak. “Even if we take a longer estimate, we need to get some Shocking Tingle Peppers and defeat the Legendary Dragon in one week.”

“Sigh. It’s no longer looking like we can sit around and wait for things to improve.”

“Yeah, but how exactly are we going to tackle this issue?”

The red and silver haired girl took her cup of chai tea that a flirty Maid Waitress carried over on a tray, sniffed at it, and then tasted it by licking the surface with the tip of her tongue.

“I see… The pepper is definitely old. It doesn’t give much of a tingle.”

“Even though people are only trying to get Shocking Tingle Peppers. It seems the prices of completely unrelated spices have gone up along with it. Maybe someone is spreading lies about all food ingredients drying up and maybe the chefs are starting to buy them up as a replacement for Shocking Tingle Peppers. …Plus, it’s affecting my Mixing ingredients too, so Recovery Potions could become a target of investment before long.”

The black hole forming around the popular but scarce Shocking Tingle Peppers was swallowing up other spices and herbs to the point that it might affect the life-or-death healing methods used in the Labyrinth. It was no laughing matter at this point.

Beatrice returned the cup of bland chai tea to the saucer.

“We can’t just sit around. We have one week. We have to find some way to get our hands on a Legendary Dragon claw in that time.”

“There’s no sign of its fangs showing up on the market. If someone had already gotten to it, I’d expect that to be the main thing sold for an exorbitant price in the Real Money Trade.” Flat boob window Hermelina sounded exasperated and took a sip of her cold barley tea. “The method for summoning the Legendary Dragon has been confirmed through Screenshots and video. I had a subordinate analyze them and they aren’t fake.”

“So we know how to summon it, but everyone who already tried ahead of us was beaten and had to make a hasty retreat?”

Surviving to fight another day against a powerful enemy you had no data on was a sign of experience. But that knowledge felt wasted to Beatrice since they could not find any of the Shocking Tingle Peppers they needed to attempt the challenge. She was willing to pay with the gears they used as currency, so she wanted whoever had them to sell her some instead of needlessly hoarding them. Although she knew saying so would only start a fight.

“You can’t get Shocking Tingle Peppers in the forest like usual, right?”

“It grew normally enough not too long ago, but it was so badly overharvested that the plant Break News got pissed and started hunting down the plant hunters. Carelessly heading out to pick some right now would be suicide if you ask me.”

…Now, Philinnion (whose suspenders accentuated the lines of her chest and whose shorts accentuated the lines of her butt) knew how to defeat that greatest Mandragora, but since she made no attempt to do so, she must not have expected to find any Shocking Tingle Peppers even if she did take care of Ileana.

Beatrice responded while resting her head in her hand with her elbow rudely on the table, which was something she would never be allowed to do in Tokyo’s Detached Magic Palace.

“Then can we only keep searching here in the inn town?”

“But we’ve already gone around to all the shops, haven’t we? Yet we have no Shocking Tingle Peppers to show for it.”

Hermelina sounded exasperated, but Beatrice raised her other hand’s index finger and winked.

“Then we’ll just have to look outside the normal shops, won’t we? There is one last resort that none of us wanted to try because it’s such a pain in the butt.”

“Ugh. You mean we have to use that place? I really, really wanted to save that for last.”

White Witch Philinnion was a healing specialist who went through a lot of Mixing ingredients, so this had to be an awful place if it made her go pale.

But the Holy Swordswoman was generally fearless, so she gave the answer.

“The Flea Market Maze. Let’s head to the inn town’s black market that has spread so chaotically that no one knows it’s full scope☆”

Part 2

The Flea Market Maze.

It had begun with merchants and peddlers hawking out their wares on the side of the road because they lacked the money to set up an actual shop. Everyone casually spread out a cloth and did business there. If things were looking bad, they could quickly snatch up their things and leave, so shoddy products and stolen goods were common. The entire market would expand and contract like an amoeba when volunteer vigilantes tried to put a stop to it, so there was no fixed location for any specific shop. All of this had resulted in one of the inn town’s shadiest and most dangerous areas.

It generally covered the northeast outskirts of the inn town, but…

“Hyah!? Wh-wh-why is there a big muscular Minotaur and Cyclops walking around the safe inn town!?”

“Those are familiars tamed by a Summoner or Tamer. They can handle automated sales without their master around, so the human can make tons of money without lifting a finger.”

Hermelina sounded exasperated as she watched the Nonhumans cutting by ahead of them.

They had also heard that Fairy Queen Strigona, one of the Break News, would use how she was visually indistinguishable from a human girl to nonchalantly visit the inn town, walk around eating human-made snacks, and enjoy the entertainment there, but she was an extreme outlier.

Beatrice had also heard that familiar trading was not all that trustworthy. It was great as long as repeating the same process turned a hefty profit, but if the situation changed at all and the previous equations no longer applied, the familiar would continue making pointless deals and you would be left deep in the red.

Also, they could hear some kind of giant bird crying overhead. The Harpy resting on the top of a spire had forgotten all about its given quest and let its wild instincts take over once more.

The Flea Market Maze was still a part of the inn town, but no one knew an accurate layout and it was filled with half-wild, half-urbanized nonhuman life. The level of danger was more like the Labyrinth than anything.

All the doors and windows on the stone buildings bordering this street were boarded up and rough-looking peddlers were hawking their wares on the cloths they had spread out along the roadside. A wide variety of products were for sale, but there were no price tags to be seen and you never knew how many gears would be taken from you once you were trapped in the vortex of conversation.

“Ugh. It’s even worse than I’d heard.”

Bespectacled White Witch Philinnion trembled and shrank down to hide behind Hermelina. The large breasts held tightly between her suspenders were pressed against the flat person’s back, but she was oblivious to how much that was pissing off the Fighter Priest.

Beatrice placed a hand on her hip and sighed while carrying around a blunt weapon taller than she was.

“So we’re here, but it doesn’t look like anyone’s going to tell us anything for free. Do we need to give hints that we might buy something?”

“Wait, Beatrice. You’ve grown up around far too much money, so I don’t trust your instincts. If you try to pull off a straw millionaire style of Trading Sequence here, you’ll only be taken for everything you own. Leave this to me.”

“Ugh… I don’t think we can trust a police officer who uses the fact that this is another world to spend all day in the casino. W-we aren’t going to find ourselves up on a stage being auctioned off tomorrow, are we?”

“You have quite the imagination, Philinnion. Is your menstrual cycle out of whack or something?”

“Bff!?”

“And who said anything about building relationships up from scratch? I’ve already got someone from my police team here. Let’s start by speaking with them.”

Part 3

“Ch-ch-chief? You can’t just walk up to me like this!”

The pink twintailed girl seated on a vividly colored sheet in a very girly way frantically waved her hands back and forth. She was Alchemist Cheerleader Huldra. Her sleeveless top left her shoulders and navel bare and her pleated miniskirt left her thighs exposed nearly to the base. Her appearance in this world was so overdone that her flirty behavior seemed somehow artificial.

Huldra led the three girls to the gap between two stone buildings before saying anything more.

“C’mon, what are you doing here in the middle of my undercover work? Is this a surprise inspection because you were worried your subordinate was flirting with corruption while undercover?”

“You figure out where you want to draw the line there. We’re not officially part of the police, after all. …I just want some info. Finding Shocking Tingle Peppers on the normal market is a fool’s errand, but what about here? Have you heard of anywhere selling them?”

“Oh, there are tons of rumors, but you’ll probably end up with some weeds someone ripped up from the ground around here.”

Huldra hid her lower face behind her pompoms and gave them an upturned glance. She had a tendency toward that kind of flirty behavior that a real girl would never actually do.

“I haven’t seen any Shocking Tingle Peppers in the Flea Market Maze. But that might actually be an important hint.”

“What do you mean by-…wait, don’t tell me.” Red-armored and white-miniskirted Beatrice started to say something but stopped. “Someone’s cutting off the supply.”

Huldra winked at her.

“It’s the same as not playing your card to trouble the other players in a game of Sevens. I imagine someone has bought up all the Shocking Tingle Peppers to drive up the price. There’s clearly something going on when you can’t find any in the inn town’s normal or black markets or in the forests around the town. Isn’t it best to assume someone set it up this way?”

…Of course, misreading this situation could lead to inventing a nonexistent conspiracy theory and growing to hate an enemy that never existed in the first place, but Hermelina and Huldra were professional special investigators. Beatrice decided to trust their senses this time.

And if that was the case, the situation might not improve after waiting a week or even a whole month.

Which meant…

“We need to get whoever is hoarding it to open up the tap. We need a Legendary Dragon claw, so this isn’t the time to play along with someone’s get-rich-quick scheme.”

“But, Beatrice, how do we do that? We have no idea who this person is.”

“I doubt this greedy person would respond even if we agreed to pay the current asking price. They can wait and the price will double, so that’s what they’ll do. Until the very moment the price starts to slip, that is. If we played along, our one week limit would be over before we knew it.”

Beating them up and taking the peppers was always an option in this world, but they set that aside since they did not know how powerful this person was. You could never take the Real Money Trade lightly. In Ground’s Nir, it was often the case that an intelligence agency with several top-rate Level Cappers was up to something in order to gather foreign currency. Plus, they could not negotiate or fight until they knew who this person was. They had no time to sit around.

Beatrice toyed with her gray cloak and gathered her thoughts.

“Remember when something like his happened before, Hermelina? Some dumb auctioneer who dreamed of being a billionaire gathered all the special disposable keys needed to open the crystal treasure chests in the Labyrinth’s Crystal Jail 99. Remember how we dealt with that?”

“That wasn’t very nice of us, was it?”

Hermelina breathed an exasperated sigh, but the look on her face showed she was enjoying this. She decided to help out with the look of a small child who had thought up a good prank.

“Then we have three days until the effects show themselves, right?”

“Three days…”

They had a week, so that was effectively half their time.

The time would not be wasted, but…

“Those three days are necessary and we’ll lose the whole week if we don’t do this. Plus, we have nothing else to do while we wait for the effects to spread, so we should head back to Earth and rebuild our strength.”

Part 4

The Detached Magic Palace of Roppongi, Tokyo, was in the finest area, but the kilometers of land had been bought up and the giant residence built for a single girl. Some would call it the ultimate luxury and others would call it a fancy prison.

There was a gazebo in the very center of the neatly-maintained lawn. After leaving the Gate, a black twintail girl in a red dress gave in to the exhaustion bearing down on her and threw herself into the open-air bath covered by the roof there.

She did not remove any of her clothing and she did not care if her glossy hair got wet.

“Milady, welcome ba- gyaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh!? Your dress, your jewelry, your hair - oh, where am I even supposed to begin!?”

“Hi, Haruka. I’m back. Bubble bubble bubble.”

“Right, lecturing you comes first. Stop that, milady! Blowing bubbles is rude!! You aren’t a naughty child drinking from a straw!!”

The girl getting after her was the youngest of the three maid sisters and her small size did not provide much intensity.

A dull light was reflected at the red dress girl’s chest.

This was not her hard key modeled after a rapier.

It was more crudely designed.

“There’s nothing at all to do.”

She floated on her back in the round bath that was designed for bubbles and jets and she spoke lazily while her clothes grew quite see-through.

“For three whole days. Being surprised with a long weekend is a problem in its own way. You just have too much time.”

Staying in Ground’s Nir long term gradually caused problems with your internal clock and autonomic nerves, so lying around in bed was plenty useful for returning yourself to neutral. But that did not help the boredom issue! Teenage girls generally had packed schedules and they grew antsy when they had to stay put.

The better behaved girl placed a finger on her slender chin.

“Oh, I know. If you don’t have anything to do, why not do some paperwork? Iroka Onee-chan does as much as she can, but there is a fair bit that needs you to look through and sign it.”

“Ugh, Guhh, buhh.”

Her rebuttal left the bounds of human language.

While that might be the logical and clever thing to do, no one wanted to use up their long weekend that way.

That was when a light electronic jingle sounded. It came from the waterproof phone floating in the bath along with the red dress girl. Still floating like a jellyfish, she quickly typed something out with the keyboard.

“Oh, how unusual. Rusalka? It isn’t often you contact me.”

“I’m in Tokyo right now.”

That really was unusual.

Rusalka was nearly inseparable from Gruagach, but she did not often get to see that beloved older girl in the real world since she lived in a rural area and Gruagach lived in Tokyo. That was why she wanted to make sure she enjoyed her time with Gruagach while in Ground’s Nir.

Then she sent the following message to Beatrice.

“I know this really isn’t the time for it, but I’m on a school trip. I’m sick of all the strictly chaperoned group activities, so I’m spending my free time with Onee-sama. Anyway, can we visit you there? The government doesn’t let you leave, right?”

With that, the situation changed in less than 15 minutes.

“S-sob. Milady finally has some friends her own age…”

“…”

The youngest of the three maid sisters was too emotional to let go of her handkerchief, but the red dress girl kept her emotions under control and swore to herself to get back at the girl later for assuming she was friendless. For one thing, she had thought of Haruka herself as a friend with whom she had shared both good times and bad. Also, this seemed to be labelling the blonde swirly glasses shrine maiden and tight skirted glasses woman as too old to be “her own age”, so the comment was devastating for everyone involved.

She had three visitors including Rusalka. The other two were Gruagach, a classy girl with long wavy chestnut hair, and Wildefrau, a black-haired Japanese doll of a girl with a punk-style outfit that included an eyepatch. Those two were more often seen around Police Officer Hermelina. …The red dress girl had not had much opportunity to meet them in Tokyo, so she still had trouble matching the names to their faces. The names still brought their Ground’s Nir appearances to mind first and foremost.

As for Rusalka herself…

“Wh-what? I can’t help it I’m so little. And I’m here on a school trip, so, um, I’m in my uniform.”

She was smaller than expected.

She wore a plain sailor uniform that looked unmodified outside of shortening the skirt a little. The girl’s reddish brown hair was forcibly pulled back to form a bun.

In Ground’s Nir, she had the rare Job of Noble Dancer, she was a Level Capper who specialized in wind, and she wore a leotard with silver armor and boots added in places. She apparently had a body perfect for gymnastics on Earth as well.

She started off with some strange excuses, but that may have been because she was not used to seeing the red dress girl here on Earth. Or maybe she was overwhelmed by the scale of the Detached Magic Palace. Unlike Gruagach who was born into wealth and Wildefrau who had spent dirty money like water thanks to the patron supporting her, Rusalka had the financial senses of a normal student.

Meanwhile, the Japanese doll girl put a hand on her skinny hip and sighed from her small nose.

“Hm, looks like this cost more than that TV station we saw earlier.”

“Wait, can’t you see the Tokyo sights any time you want?”

“When you live here, you never really have a chance to go to that broadcast tower or dome stadium. No one wants to waste their free time taking a tour of the National Diet Building or the Supreme Court.”

Was that how it worked? It was hard for the red dress girl to know since she could not leave the Detached Magic Palace at all.

Haruka must have been very excited indeed because she began preparing some cold tea and crackers in the garden. The tea set was actually clattering as she carried it.

It was the wavy chestnut hair Student Council President whose eyes widened when she tasted the tea.

“Oh? This is very good. I could learn from this.”

“Is it, Onee-sama? Hm, I can’t tell the difference between these fancy tea leaves and normal ones…”

“Don’t worry. You shouldn’t notice a difference because there isn’t one. The tea leaves and tea set can be bought at imported food stores and online stores. You could say all of that is neutral.”

“Neutral?”

“Yes.” The Student Council President elegantly laughed while explaining to the small gymnast girl. “By using expensive ingredients like caviar, foie gras, shark fin, or Iberian pork, you can make your food seem fancy enough. Even if you are only making gyudon or hamburgers. But using entirely neutral ingredients and tools yet producing a much more special flavor is the proof of true skill. Also, we can feel more at ease if we are served normal ingredients. That would be her way of showing friendship.”

“Ohh.”

“When serving a guest, it is polite to let them enjoy their food or drink. You cannot frighten them with something that seems too fancy or make it seem like you would be angry if they do not compliment the flavor.”

“You mean the maids here are more incredible than they look, Onee-sama?”

“No, Rusalka, I am saying they are exactly as incredible as they look.”

“Y-you flatter me,” said Haruka while growing bashful over all the compliments.

The Japanese doll girl seemed more interested in the crackers than the tea, so she started eating them after loading them up with cheese and small fish cooked in oil.

“Come to think of it, I heard a certain Break News was seen inside the inn town again.”

One of the red dress girl’s eyebrows twitched upwards at that.

“…Well, that isn’t too surprising. The Fairies seem like they would use the morning dew and flower nectar for sustenance, so she’s probably hooked on all those human luxuries.”

“Hm? But, Onee-sama, I know that queen looks human, but can she really buy things like us? That doesn’t seem to make sense…”

Iced tea felt less proper and formal than hot tea, but the girls all enjoyed it in different ways.

The Student Council President shut her eyes as she sipped at it, the Japanese doll needed a straw to drink it, and the gymnast girl was more interested in the different varieties of sugar cube than in the tea itself. Lastly, the red dress girl just drank from her glass like normal.

“Sigh. I can’t help but relax once I get back in the usual routine,” said the red dress girl when she removed the rim of the clear glass from her lips. The comment almost seemed to slip out when she let her guard down. “Even though this really isn’t the time.”

Part 5

Meanwhile in Ground’s Nir.

There was a bulletin board on the wall of a pub in the human inn town.

“Okay, that’s 100 of them. That sounds like a good place to stop.”

“I have to say, that is a shocking Mixing recipe. Even if it is completely made up.”

The White Witch with a pointy hat and glasses and Fighter Priest with a flaaat boob window were discussing the flier they had created.

Beatrice, Philinnion, and Hermelina needed the Legendary Dragon, one of the clockwork Gimmicks found wandering the vast Labyrinth, but that elusive enemy could not be encountered by normal means.

They needed some Shocking Tingle Peppers to lure it out, but someone had apparently predicted this demand and bought them all up.

With nowhere else to obtain them, those three had to target the Shocking Tingle Peppers that Individual X was hoarding. And since they did not know who that individual was, they had to get that person to let go of their supply instead of just going and stealing them.

But how could they do that?

They only had to spread the following information:

The Shocking Tingle Peppers are no longer necessary.

A new way of luring out the Legendary Dragon has been discovered. There is a simpler way to meet the Encounter Requirements!!

“It’s kind of amazing that this is entirely made up.”

“Right? Well, it requires Mixing an unlikely variety of ingredients arranged in something of a puzzle ring where putting one thing in order moves something else out of order, so I doubt anyone will have a finished product they can test in the Labyrinth anytime soon.”

They only needed to buy some time.

As long as the disinformation caused the market price of Shocking Tingle Peppers to crash.

“Shocking Tingle Peppers only gathered attention recently, but it had to have cost a lot of gears to buy them all up. And you only pay 1000 gears to hoard them because you assume you can get 10,000 back.”

“Once they see the price falling and their return could fall to 100, 10, or even 1…well, they’ll see their bankruptcy coming☆ The more they invested in that commodity assuming they would make a huge return, the more debt they’ll find themselves in.”

“So it’s obvious how they’ll react: They’ll want to dump the Shocking Tingle Peppers before the price falls any further. To reduce their debt as much as possible. They’re going to open up the tap before long.”

“Chieeef,” called an overly sweet voice. It was accompanied by pink twintails, a sleeveless top that left the shoulders and navel bare, and a miniskirt. Alchemist Cheerleader Huldra was approaching with a different bundle of fliers in hand.

“I handed out those purchase ads you made. ‘Wanted: Shocking Tingle Peppers at a price of 200 Topaz Gears each.’ …Are you sure about that? That isn’t even 1/50 of the highest price I’ve seen.”

“It’s fine, it’s fine. Honestly, it’s too high a price. Shocking Tingle Peppers are about to be as risky as bonds for a government that’s locking down bank accounts. Whoever has them will leap at the chance when they see someone willing to buy.”

Hermelina and Huldra used their skills as professional special investigators to spread the information, but it was still amusing how quickly word got around. The experienced Level Cappers probably realized the Mixing recipe was fake, but they still helped spread the story because they wanted to get back at whoever was hoarding the Shocking Tingle Peppers.

Bespectacled Philinnion’s eyes were glittering like a mischievous child.

“Hee hee. I don’t know if they saw it as an investment fund or a source of foreign currency, but whoever was hoarding the Shocking Tingle Peppers must be sobbing about now. Oh, how I wish I could see the look on their face while they say-”

But what came next was more than just an impression.

In fact, someone else cut her off entirely.

“Nwohhh!? At this rate, the Shocking Tingle Peppers bubble is going to burst and I’ll lose everythiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiing!!!”

The surprised Level Cappers looked around and found someone at a table by the wall who looked far too small to be in a pub. The girl had a tiny frame, a youthful face, and long silver hair. Her undeveloped body lines were hidden only by a decorative flower and a black ribbon dress. (And yes, that means she was not wearing anything below that.)

She was Fairy Queen Strigona.

As small as she was, she was still one of the paradoxes with a soul known as the Break News.

Hermelina and Philinnion looked dumbfounded.

“You…”

“I had heard you would pretend to be human to eat snacks and play with toys here, but I get it now. Something changed, didn’t it? I was wondering how you got the gears we use as currency, but this explains it!”

The peppers had continued to be overharvested even after Ileana got mad and tried to stop it. Not even the Level Cappers could slip past her attacks to get their hands on the plant. It made sense that another Break News would be behind it, but those Break News generally did not shop in the human inn town. It would cause a panic if they did.

So who was the one culprit who could do both things?

“Y-you mean…”

Strigona seemed to realize what was going on. Her eyes trembled with tears as she viewed the two different fliers held by Hermelina and Huldra.

“You mean it was all of you who tore down all my hard worrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrk!!!???”

“Oh, shut up! We were only bringing the price down to normal after you drove it up!”

The noisy argument did not end there. Philinnion, who knew a lot about herbs, let out a sweet sigh before joining in.

“So how about you sell us what we need for an appropriate price? Before the Legendary Dragon started trending, it was seen as nothing more than a weed.”

“Yeah, it’s about as cheap as can be, so would a single Wooden Gear be about right? …Really, you’re lucky to get that much. You would normally have to pay someone to take it off your hands.”

Strigona fell silent with a lopsided frown on her face. She may have known that her voice would be shaking if she did say anything.

Police Officer Hermelina gave a devilish smile and pointed down at the floor.

“But if you sob and beg, we might just be willing to pay you the 200 Topaz Gears.”

Part 6

They now had some Shocking Tingle Peppers from an unexpected source.

The long weekend was over for Beatrice’s party.

It was finally time to start exploring the Labyrinth in search of the Legendary Dragon.

(Four more days.)

They had acquired the Shocking Tingle Peppers easily enough.

But given the overall time limit, they needed to hurry up. After all, they had never seen the Legendary Dragon before. They were mostly certain the info they had was accurate, but they could not stop a hint of unease from seeping into that logical decision.

The red-armored and white-miniskirted Holy Swordswoman let her tattered gray cloak flutter behind her as she used Fire Magic to light the hair extending from the top of her head as a light source.

“Its hunting ground is supposed to be around Stair Pyramid 71, right? Although there is a lot of conflicting information out there right now.”

“Don’t worry so much. We have tons of Shocking Tingle Peppers, so we can throw some out to check anywhere that seems suspicious.”

It took some time to reach the stone mountain covered in stairs. Given the round trip time, they could only stay at Stair Pyramid 71 for about a day. Their position as Level Cappers was irrelevant there, so they tried to keep any other enemies from noticing them.

It took a day to get there, they would spend a day exploring there, and it would take another day to get back.

That would use up most of the four days they had remaining. Screw this up and there would be no second chance.

Still, bare-navel Philinnion spoke with emotion in her voice.

“Here we are exploring the Labyrinth. It’s a gradual process, but we’re finally getting back into the swing of things.”

“…”

After walking across a floor made from long hallways and large rooms, they descended a few stairs, took small breaks long the way, and continued toward their destination.

The Labyrinth had originally been part of the armory meant to build Ultimate Weapon Abyss. Any living creature that entered it would be tested by a variety of mazes, traps, and enemies. How they overcame those trials would be observed and used to determine what kind of biological structure Abyss should take.

The armory had lost its purpose once Abyss was actually released.

However, the humans continued to explore the Labyrinth. The armory was only its purpose for this world. It was irrelevant to the benefits and obligations that sent the Earth humans there. It was still possible the humans would make new discoveries and continue on their own path to ruin.

“There it is,” said also bare-navel Hermelina. “That’s Stair Pyramid 71.”

It was a wide open space. The ceiling was so high up it was easy to forget this was deep underground. Stairways of various sizes snaked along an artificial mountain made of stacked stone blocks.

The Labyrinth’s shape changed at uneven intervals.

Stair Pyramid 71 would not be here forever.

“…”

The Holy Swordswoman tossed out some of the Shocking Tingle Peppers they had gone to such lengths to obtain.

Immediately, a gust of wind battered her hair despite being deep underground. She looked up to the top of the stone temple and saw something there.

Where had that thing been hiding in the Labyrinth until now?

It could only move freely here because the space was so large.

That dragon-like clockwork creature was easily more than 50m long. And Beatrice licked her lips when faced with that gold-glowing giant. She pulled the blunt weapon from her back. She had customized it with a hole in the huge grip so a human could wield it.

It just barely functioned as a weapon for her.

“The ‘legendary’ title had me curious…but I guess it wouldn’t be fair to compare it to a Break News.”

The creature had made its appearance.

That changed how they moved inside the Labyrinth.

“We have nothing against it, but let’s get this hunt started, Philinnion, Hermelina. Keep an eye on our movement count! Don’t forget to take the whole Party into account!”

Part 7

Battles in the Labyrinth functioned under different rules than the ones on the surface. The clockwork Gimmicks were modeled after the structures of plants and animals and they would move based on their opponent’s movements. If Beatrice took a step, so would the Gimmick. But if she did not move, neither would it. You had unlimited time to think, so people generally viewed it like a chess problem and chose their positions carefully to keep their opponent from acting.

In this case, the relationship between the hallway and the big room was most important.

“What exactly do we do? Stay at the hallway’s entrance so it can only attack us from one direction!?”

“We outnumber it, so it would be faster to surround it in an open area and beat the snot out of it.”

“Umm, are you including me in that 3-against-1 scenario? I’m a healer, so I’m supposed to stay in the back! I’m not a ridiculously strong Damage Dealer or a stupidly tough Tank!!”

“If you can complain that much, you’ll be just fine. To the front line with you.”

“She can recover from anything that doesn’t insta-kill her, so she’s a lot tougher than she looks.”

They were interrupted by the loud roar of something beating on the air. The Legendary Dragon had slowly floated up from the top of the pyramid while it stared down at them.

And its maw remained open.

It did not seem to be breathing fire or using some other kind of projectile attack. Would it use its giant body to drop down and crush them like a meteor?

“This is our chance!!”

Just as their opponent picked up speed, Beatrice moved her fingers to give her party members instructions and ran toward the colossal pyramid.

And she drew the rapier at her hip as if showing it off.

When they moved, so would the enemy. The enemy could not move while they stopped to think.

But strictly speaking, battles in the Labyrinth were not turn based. In the single second it took for Beatrice to perform a single action, the Gimmick could move two or three times. And if she stopped just before the enemy’s raised claws hit her, it would temporarily stop there. Think of it like a metal bat. That was the difference between a full swing meant to hit a home run and the light tap of a bunt.

Magical attacks were preferred in the Labyrinth because they were more like powerful projectile weapons than the physical attacks which needed a large swing to build up momentum. You needed to work out which stance would allow you to produce the most powerful strike even if you were stopped just before hitting.

And the Legendary Dragon had begun descending from the top of the tall pyramid. It was more than 70m above them. Even if it had giant wings, it could not purposefully stop that action now that it was descending like a meteor.

Yes.

That meant they were free to move for the time being. Until it had completed the “one move” that ended with crashing into the ground.

Would it only take an instant? Or a few seconds?

No.

As the name suggested, Stair Pyramid 71 was a pyramid structure covered in countless stairs arranged like a cluster of snakes, but Beatrice did not even bother following those paths. A glowing magic circle appeared behind her, flame wings burst from there, and she raced up the blocks which were taller than she was. She could not help but feel excited about this.

She slipped directly below the giant falling mass.

She raised the Shining Weapon rapier overhead in her right hand and shouted.

“Metal Jet!!”

Beams of light rushed out. A total of eight scorching orange beams flew vertically and stabbed into the 50m monster’s gut. The Legendary Dragon’s meteoric fall toward the ground was slightly diverted. It hopped straight up.

The golden dragon was a clockwork creature bound by gravity. Since it could not stop in midair, its single action would continue until it reached the ground.

Which meant…

“We can do whatever we want for as long as we want as long as we don’t let it reach the ground! Hermelina!!”

She had hit the Legendary Dragon from below while it dropped diagonally down like a meteor. Since it could not stay in the air, it would simply fly off in a different direction.

Which was why the green-haired Fighter Priest, who had gone for a boob window despite being flat, swung her ball and chain around on the ground. Physical attacks that required a large motion were poorly suited for the Labyrinth where battles were fought in short bursts of movement, but things were different now.

“Let’s do this! Your mistake was giving any time to a beautiful brawler like me, you hunk of junk!!”

After building up plenty of centrifugal force, she released the ball and chain.

The attack crashed right into the Legendary Dragon’s nose. The head-on collision completely negated the golden dragon’s vector, causing it to remain floating in the air.

They would not let it fall.

After jumping down a few blocks of the pyramid without using the stairs, Beatrice checked her position and sent more explosive flames straight up at the Legendary Dragon’s round belly.

This time, the repeated explosions pushed up on the golden dragon, causing it to float up. It frantically spread its wings, but it was too late. Beatrice kept that 50m colossus in the air while Hermelina occasionally hit it from the sides to correct its position when it shifted out of place. They had trapped it in the air so they could wear it down all they wanted.

“Wh-whew. So we got it in a Midair Infinite Combo.”

“Well, that’s usually how it works with the big bads seated all alone in their thrones. A big room full of small fries is a lot more annoying.”

Of course, this strategy only worked with Level Cappers who could continually use powerful Fire Magic with the intensity of a Gatling gun without running out of gas. It had helped a lot that they avoided as many battles as possible on the long journey here. A normal human would have run out of gas almost immediately. In fact, they would probably have failed to lift that giant thing at all and been crushed beneath. Non-combat-oriented Philinnion breathed a sigh of relief that produced a bounce of the chest squeezed between her suspenders.

“Th-thank goodness… Looks like you can defeat that thing without throwing me out onto the front line. As long as we get one of the Legendary Dragon’s claws…”

That was when something happened.

It was hard to see through the many crimson explosions blossoming above, but the three girls definitely heard a roar distinct from the fiery explosions.

“Um, Beatrice?”

“Wh-wh-what is it, Hermelina? Now really isn’t the time for comments like that.”

“You did it again, didn’t you?”

“That is a bad omen! Your words are going to bring misfortune upon us!! You are familiar with the concept of Kotodama, aren’t you!?”

Something else happened before they could receive a helpful lecture from the girl who was a shrine maiden back in reality.

They had lifted the dragon up too far.

It had crashed into the ceiling, spun itself around, dug its claws into the ceiling, and used that as a foothold while it glared down at them.

Its single action did not end when it fell.

It ended when it landed.

With a gust of wind like when a train passed through a subway tunnel, the Legendary Dragon gathered strength in its body and lunged straight down at them.

At Beatrice in particular.

The red-armored and white-miniskirted Holy Swordswoman’s Magic was extremely powerful, but since she had been able to lift up the golden dragon by hitting it with several blasts, her Magic was clearly not enough to obliterate the creature in a single blow. And that did not really matter to the Legendary Dragon. Even if its nose was crushed or wings were torn off, it could crush the slender human as long as gravity carried it down.

They had given this mission three days of their four day limit.

There was no second chance if they screwed up here.

They had to defeat this Legendary Dragon this one time no matter what.

“!?”

She put up a pointless resistance. She launched some sporadic Fire Magic, but it was not enough to stop the golden dragon’s momentum after it kicked off the ceiling.

It was over in the blink of an eye.

The Legendary Dragon crashed down on a point partway up the pyramid, sending a violent shockwave and dust in every direction. The entire pyramid collapsed and the stone blocks formed an avalanche.

But.

However.

“Mirage: cancel.”

A beautiful and merciless voice was heard.

Beatrice’s tattered gray cloak fluttered behind her as she stood at the top of the half-crumbled pyramid. She had not teleported there. She never had stopped partway up the pyramid and she had passed right by the Legendary Dragon.

The obvious image seen until now was a false one. It was only a mirage created from heat and light. Magic was a projectile, but it was not a bullet bound by the laws of physics. Its trajectory could be bent along the way and its launch point could be shifted from the user’s location.

And it was too late by the time the dragon realized the truth.

“Hermelina.”

“You really shouldn’t trick your own party members like that, but understood!!”

The Legendary Dragon belatedly tried to get back up, but after crashing down into the pyramid and creating a crater there, the avalanche of stone blocks was falling on its own head. It excelled at rapid descents, but that was nothing to fear if you kept it from jumping up above you.

“Sorry, Legendary Dragon.”

The girl lightly spun the log or steel beam of a Shining Weapon around in one hand and supported it with her right hand using the hole in the grip and with her left gauntlet which she had enlarged by using Magic on some slag she had gathered. Then she rudely licked her lips.

Yes.

Her weapon was no longer a rapier.

“I inherited this thing, so I’m a Dragon Eater now!!”

She did not even let it stand back up.

She sent out a fiery explosion and a powerful blow.

This time, the destruction of a slowly falling suspended ceiling was directed toward the Legendary Dragon.

Part 8

The Legendary Dragon still lasted three hours, so its strength lived up to its name. If they had been unable to stop its movement and forced to reckon with its giant maw, claws, and tail throughout, who could say how much greater the damage would have been. It had even been clever enough to try to play dead and attack once they let their guard down.

“Pant, pant. Hey, Beatrice, you’ve cooked that thing through I hope.”

“Don’t worry. Where are its claws? I hope I didn’t roast those as well…”

“Gasp, pant, gasp.”

The glasses cow had not done any real fighting, but she was more out of breath than any of them when she finally climbed to the top of the half-crumbled pyramid. The stairs had all collapsed during the fighting, but this still meant she was out of shape.

However, they had not brought her along simply as a healer meant for insurance. Yes, White Witch Philinnion was a Mixing expert. So much of one that she had sacrificed her actual combat power for it. That meant she knew what to look for in ingredients.

The pervert using her suspenders for a bit of self-bondage stroked a finger along the side of her glasses as she spoke.

“From the look of things…well, it gets a passing grade. The surface is a little scorched thanks to a couple of violent people I could mention, but we only want the tough tip.”

“Meaning?”

“We have the final ingredient.”

When Beatrice placed a hand on her hip, let her tattered gray cloak flutter behind her, winked, and asked for an answer, the recovery expert nodded.

“We finally have what we need to save Boo Boo.”

Part 9

She never could have forgotten.

Not for a moment.

And Beatrice was not the only one.

There was a single reason why the Level Cappers had been venturing into the Labyrinth, traveling across the island to gather ingredients, and frequenting auctions in the inn town.

“Boo Boo…”

After returning from the deep, deep Labyrinth, Beatrice walked partway up a mountain. The hill there had been his favorite spot. And now his 4m body was in a large hole and covered in dirt to form a mound there. It was marked with only a roughly hewn log with no religious meaning.

However.

This was not the end.

Ultimate Weapon Abyss had said something back at his house:

Abyss// I will not allow it to end here.

Abyss// Now, let us review the answers.

“It took us three idle days to find the Shocking Tingle Peppers which had grown so rare in the inn town. It took another week to track down Strigona and then explore the Labyrinth. It’s been 10 days since then, so is Boo Boo really okay in there?”

Flat boob window Hermelina, who knew no recovery techniques despite being a priest, was viewing the dirt grave. Yes, a grave. Boo Boo was indeed buried there.

She was answered by her subordinate, pink twintailed Alchemist Cheerleader Huldra.

“Um, I think Abyss’s reasoning is sound.”

“And we were out of ideas, so what choice do we have but to trust that humanoid simulator?”

In what may have been a fundamental personality flaw, Ice Waterfall Princess Wildefrau could not help but speak in a sharper tone than necessary. But to truly understand her personality, you had to look past her words and consider all the time she spent gathering ingredients at the inn town auctions.

Gruagach, the mourning clothes girl with her long blonde braid forming a large circle, placed her index finger on her slender chin.

“Um, let’s review the checklist one last time: King Kraken ink, Millennium Slumber Flower pollen, high purity Electrosplit Stone ore, and a Legendary Dragon claw. Is there anything else we need?”

“Be careful when using a reagent to test them. If you bought the item and the reagent from the same merchant, the reagent might be a fake too. Always purchase the reagent through a different route! That way you can trust the result.”

That warning came from Rusalka, the girl in a skintight leotard with silver armor, and her words carried weight since she had once fallen victim to an imitation recovery potion deep in the Labyrinth.

Philinnion responded to that with her breasts held tightly between her suspenders.

“Heh heh. You only have to worry about those things if you take the easy route and buy things. A reagent? Why not just Mix everything yourself? Hwa ha ha! Then you can have absolute trust it is legitimate! No one can fool this White Witch!!”

They could let Philinnion and Huldra handle the actual potions.

Beatrice looked to Boo Boo’s grave once more.

Saying it had been far too long might earn a scoff from the Sage who had gone so far for the Iberian Orcs in her own way.

She recalled what Abyss had said through that Shining Weapon that resembled a log or steel beam:

“Once Boo Boo decided to save you, a combination of electrical burns and nerve transmission malfunctions damaged his entire body. His life functions will shut down before you can heal each and every injury with recovery potions.”

Abyss’s words were cold and mechanical, but they still contained a slight warmth.

“However, the Iberian Orcs are life forms that continued to evolve in order to oppose me. Their self-healing ability is quite powerful. Place him in an extreme environment to trigger that function. Given the current level of civilization on the island, I believe it would be best to bury him to create a hypoxic environment that will place just enough of a burden on his brain.”

It was all for this.

The roughly hewn log that looked like a grave marker was essentially a snorkel. To make sure he did not suffocate but to also reduce the influx of air to the absolute minimum, that lifeline had been very carefully pierced down the center.

“…”

Beatrice once more checked what they had gathered. Huldra had acquired some Adult Cocoa fruit at the Flea Market Maze, Hermelina carried a mining hammer she could swing down with both hands, and Wildefrau had an Electric Manta frozen in ice.

And finally…

They had the sharp and powerful Legendary Dragon claw which was hollow on the inside and they had a cardiotonic made by mixing various medicinal ingredients.

She had known.

She had known it was necessary, but digging a hole, throwing Boo Boo’s giant body inside, and covering it with dirt had squeezed at her heart so very tightly.

And after that agony which felt like exposing her soul to the fires of hell, she had finally snatched up this one last chance at changing everything.

“Yes, that’s everything. We can start at any time, Beatrice!”

“I know.”

She nodded.

She did not know if she had done the right thing, but she wanted to make sure she had not done anything she regretted.

“We can’t let this end here. We will save Boo Boo ourselves!!”

Part 10

After fighting to prevent the Red-afflicted Iberian Orcs from crossing between worlds and destroying Earth, Beatrice’s Shining Weapon rapier had been destroyed.

Humans could not return to Earth without that and they could only live in this other world for a few days at a time.

Beatrice had been gradually weakening, so waiting for death had been her only option.

But Boo Boo had tried to change that fate.

He had taken the log or steel beam of a Shining Weapon from his hip and rewritten the settings profile so he could give it to her. His body had incorporated the strong points of all life forms and that apparently included the traits of an electric fish. By forcibly using that imperfect power for too long, he had badly electrified and damaged himself.

And.

So.

By burying him and using the log like a snorkel, they had created just the right hypoxic environment.

Boo Boo’s injured body was slowly but surely being healed by an Iberian Orc’s powerful self-healing ability.

But there was a bigger problem.

“He cannot keep his body temperature from falling,” Abyss had said. “This can be temporarily prevented by choosing a sunny location or lighting a fire above the dirt covering him, but while he lies dormant, he is incapable of acquiring nutrients even as his self-healing ability continues to consume energy. It is best to assume his body temperature regulation is not functioning properly. Thus, a hypoxic environment is useful for drawing out his self-healing ability, but that is not enough on its own. You must induce the necessary self-healing before he crosses the point of no return, but you must also quickly dig him back up and resuscitate him once the self-healing has been switched on.”

Hermelina made an exasperated comment while transforming her Shining Weapon into a shovel.

“So is he like a chrysalis that can’t get out of the dirt on his own? Are you sure now is the time, Philinnion? If we dig him up and the self-healing hasn’t started yet, we don’t get a second chance!”

“If anything, we’re running behind schedule because a certain dumb fairy was hoarding the Shocking Tingle Peppers. With the three days spent wandering around the inn town and the week it took to get the peppers and then complete the hunt in the Labyrinth, it’s been ten days. We definitely aren’t doing this too soon!!”

That was why Beatrice, Huldra, and Rusalka were shoving their shovels into the dirt even though Boo Boo was lying below there. They were short on time. Plus, carelessly pushing the shovel too far was not going to injure that mass of muscle and fat.

“I see him!”

Wildefrau had been using an ice shovel while a blue glowing magic circle appeared at the center of her cross-shaped sword which meant the center of her chest, but she spoke up when she saw some gray skin through the dark soil.

Gruagach tilted her head with the large circle of her braid behind her.

“Is that his right arm? Then this must be his shoulder and his wrist would be over here… Yes, I can make out his general silhouette. Be careful, everyone.”

“Phew. Were you saying something, Onee-sama?”

“Rusalka, that is Boo Boo’s face you are sitting on! Be more careful!!”

Once the Iberian Orc’s self-healing had been unleashed, the hypoxic environment was no longer necessary. Beatrice crawled along and used her hands to remove the dirt from Boo Boo’s face.

It was covered with mud and the eyes were shut, but it was definitely that familiar face.

She thoughtfully spoke under her breath.

“…Boo Boo.”

“W-wait, is this for real? Doesn’t he look less pale thane before we buried him? And those injuries and burns are gone.”

Yes.

It was too soon for boo Boo’s eternal slumber. He had spent more than ten days battling his own limits below the cold dirt.

“Here!”

White Witch Philinnion pulled a triangular flask from her Shining Weapon first aid kit and sprinkled the contents around.

Of course, that was not enough to wake Boo Boo when he was on death’s door.

The potion instantly vaporized and turned to steam, so it actually affected the eyes of Beatrice and the others gathered around him.

A digital counter appeared above Boo Boo’s large head.

That displayed his odds of survival. All of those present could see it there.

0%.

“Kh.”

Beatrice gasped at the cruel value produced by the diagnostic potion, but now was not the time to feel dizzy. They had work to do. With each step, that value would increase until it reached 100%.

“Let’s get started. Help me out, everyone!”

They could not let the flame of life be extinguished.

Seeing his face and right hand was enough to know his general location and position. They did not need to dig up every last part of his nearly-4m body. Nor did they have the time. They simply worked to remove the dirt from directly on top of him.

The rise and fall of his chest was so shallow it was hard to believe he was alive. It looked like his breathing could stop at any moment.

In her tattered gray cloak, Beatrice bit her lip but did not hesitate. She removed the large Shining Weapon from her back, and…

“Fire Storm.”

Orange flames erupted from his exposed skin. But Beatrice had not gone mad. It only lasted a moment.

“The primary sterilization with fire and heat is complete! Philinnion, Huldra!! Take care of the secondary sterilization with alcohol and herbs!!”

“Intense flames, herbs, and fruit… Man, this is reminding me of some trendy French fruit dish!”

Alchemist Cheerleader Huldra grew pale and shouted, but this was far from over.

Philinnion gave further instructions while her shorts strained.

“We need to forcibly increase his blood flow. Hermelina, ready your hammer!”

“Really!? This isn’t something to use on someone who’s half dead!”

She was hesitant, but the Fighter Priest produced a green magic circle while raising a mining hammer in both hands. Hermelina specialized in physical attacks and her Shining Weapon could transform into various shapes.

Philinnion wrote some numbered Xs on Boo Boo’s body.

“Go ahead!!”

“Okay, fine!!”

The blows were just like those in a mine.

She swung the hammer down on his right thigh, left thigh, lower stomach, and chest in that order. It was somehow reminiscent of squeezing the bottom of a mayonnaise or toothpaste tube to get the last bit out. Come to think of it, wasn’t the biggest risk of blackout for fighter pilots when the inertial force sent the blood down to their feet and kept it from returning to their head?

The digital counter above Boo Boo’s head clearly shot up. It rose from the merciless 0% to a value hovering between 20% and 30%.

The value was now above 1%.

That alone nearly loosened Beatrice’s tear ducts, but this was not over yet. If they relaxed now, the possibility they had worked so hard for would slip from their fingers.

Ice Waterfall Princess Wildefrau interrupted with a shout.

“The Electric Manta is ready!

“Once it’s thawed, use it on Boo Boo’s chest. Stand back, everyone!!”

It was a bathtub-sized cube made of clear ice. Wildefrau placed it on Boo Boo’s chest and released her control over the ice. Water poured down on his upper body like someone had overturned a bucket and the flat marine creature trapped within woke up.

The sparks were intense enough to see and that nearly-4m body clearly jerked up.

Mourning clothes Gruagach sounded a little worried.

“W-was that too strong?”

“No, it wasn’t strong enough!”

Meanwhile, the White Witch remained as tense as ever.

The counter had jumped to 60%, but it did not stick. Instead of stopping there, it dropped right back down.

Before it dropped below 40%, pointed witch hat Philinnion took action.

“Wildefrau, remove the Electric Manta. Gruagach and Rusalka, you two take this handkerchief! It contains Adult Cocoa fruit.”

“Hm? Chocolate?”

Leotard and armor wearing Rusalka looked skeptical, but…

“It is known as a candy ingredient now, but cocoa was originally a heart medicine. But don’t have him eat it; letting him smell it would be about right!”

The two of them pressed the white handkerchief over his distinctive nose instead of his large mouth.

And the value…did not stop!!

It was still dropping!?

“Beatrice, you have to do it now!!’

“I know that!!”

If possible, she had wanted the value at 70% before doing this, but this was her only chance. And if she hesitated now, his odds of survival would only continue to drop like water from a bucket with a hole in the bottom.

She needed to act while the odds were as high as possible.

She could not waste the chance they had won here.

She forced her trembling fingers to move and she tightly grasped the final item.

Everything else had been in preparation for this.

If their final gamble did not succeed, it was all for naught.

“!!”

She lightly caught something that Philinnion tossed her way. King Kraken ink, Millennium Slumber Flower pollen, and high purity Electrosplit Stone ore. The cylinder the size of a relay baton was a special cardiotonic inside a syringe.

Of course.

This Iberian Orc had beaten up a 1000-meter dragon. Given the thick layer of muscle and fat, no normal needle could pierce his chest.

That was why they had needed that one Treasure so badly.

The Legendary Dragon claw.

That needle was needed to pierce Boo Boo’s chest and reach his heart.

(What was all this for? I never could have forgotten. Not for a moment.)

Beatrice adjusted her grip on the cylindrical stake far too thick to call a syringe.

(Even when faced with the ordinary routine and a world that kept moving despite my personal feelings, I never did lose sight of this!!)

Because she had wanted to bring back that voice, that innocent smile, and the time she had spent with him.

So.

“Wake up! Boo Booooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!”

She gathered all her strength.

She used all her weight to send the Legendary Dragon claw into the center of his chest so it would slip through a gap in his thick muscle fibers and between his ribs and sternum.

She heard a dull sound.

She felt the resistance in her wrists.

After sensing it had reached his heart, she injected something at such a high concentration that it would have made a human bleed from every pore and die.

Their calculations had been correct.

They had been delayed by the Shocking Tingle Peppers, but the limit had not yet passed. Or so she hoped.

An uncomfortable silence surrounded them.

What about the counter?

Beatrice quickly looked up toward Boo Boo’s face, but Philinnion’s diagnostic potion must have worn off. The digital value displayed in her vision was gone.

Had it reached 100%?

Or had it plummeted instead?

Beatrice had not taken the drug herself, but her heart was still pounding.

She waited.

That was all she could do.

And.

And.

And.

The value had not stopped.

It was falling!?

“…!!”

Doing this to a human might have killed them instantly. But the girl bet on her partner’s sturdy body. She was barely thinking at this point. With the long claw still piercing him, she exposed it and her own arms to a Magic explosion.

She sent a direct blow to his heart.

This was really and truly a last resort!!

“Bwah!! Bshh, bshhhh!?”

It was like a spring-loaded trap. Just as his giant body shook, his upper body sprang up, bringing the surrounding dirt with it. Beatrice was dragged along with him. Since the dragon claw was stabbed into his chest, she quickly let go of the giant cylinder.

That naturally led her to cling to Boo Boo’s raised chest.

His bestial odor was as strong as ever and she would have choked if she let her guard down, but she kept her cheek there for a while with her eyes closed.

“Boo Boo…”

She spoke his voice under her breath.

But then the red-armored and white-miniskirted Holy Swordswoman raised her voice with countless emotions contained within.

And that voice was also somewhat distorted by sobs.

“You dumb sleepyhead! How long were you going to worry me like that!?”

His vision was blurred.

At first, Boo Boo did not realize that the sound in his ears was his own weak breathing.

Where was he?

Why was he still conscious?

He had only wanted to save Beatrice. Even if that meant paying for her life with his own. He had just wanted happiness for that precious girl who had been by his side for so long.

But.

However.

She rubbed her muddy face against his chest. The tools scattered around them made it clear how hard she had worked for this. She looked utterly exhausted and her voice was filled with emotion, so there was no sign of the kind and reliable young woman she normally was for him. Her usual personality had been utterly destroyed. Boo Boo finally realized what he had forced onto her. He had not brought her happiness.

He would not throw away his life again.

He would not run away like that again.

He weakly reached out a hand and held the head of the girl pressed against his chest.

And he made that silent decision.