Chapter 3 : Great Dungeon of Raisen?
A heap of corpses.
Those words fit the current spectacle inside the Raisen Grand Canyon’s ravine. Some demonic beasts had their heads smashed, along with the ground. While some demonic beasts had theirs pulverized, furthermore some demonic beasts had their body carbonized, although there were various killing methods, all of them died in one attack.
Naturally, inside this hell, the place that was feared as an execution ground by people, there were…
“One hit certain kill~!”
ZUGANn!!
“… … Hindrance”
GOBANn!!
“Shut up”
DOPANn!!
It was the trio of Hajime, Yue, and Shia. After Hajime and his party got out from the town of Brook (with Yue and Shia’s fans seeing them off), using the magic-driven two-wheeler, they passed through the entrance of “Raisen Grand Canyon”. Currently, after advancing further and camping along the way, they had already passed through the cave concealing the path to “Orcus Great Dungeon”, furthermore two days had passed since then.
Inside “Raisen Grand Canyon”, the demonic beasts kept attacking them just as usual.
Shia’s Sledgehammer, swung with immense force smashed demonic beasts, it was literally a one hit certain kill. The demonic beasts were crushed to death with a normal attack that far exceed their defense. Even the mochi pounding moon rabbit’s destructive power paled in comparison to this.
Yue closed in on the demonic beasts, then slaughtered them with magic that she instantly invoked with magical power from her equipment. Although Yue herself has enormous magical power, equipped with magical power stored inside the accessories called magic crystallization stone series, it became even more enormous. Her attack could be compared to endless bombing. Even if magical power was disintegrated in the ravine, thus the time to invoke magic became longer and the distance became shorter, she invoked ultra high temperature flames in no time and demonic beasts were killed while being carbonized without exception.
Hajime, needless to say, was sniping the heads with Donner while driving the magic-driven two-wheeler. Although it was consuming his magic to use “Lightning-clad” and driving the magic-driven two-wheeler at the same time, there is no sign of magic depletion.
The hell beasts that dominate the ravine were completely treated as small fish. The annihilation was treated as a side job while they searched for a sign of the Great Dungeon. The demonic beasts’ corpses overflowed on their way.
“Haa~, even though it should be somewhere inside the Raisen, it was too vast after all”
They moved while examining if there were caves. Even though they made thorough observations, not even one was found. Hajime could only inadvertently complain.
“Well, because no matter what happens we’ll reach the Big Volcanic Mountain, it’s okay to not find it at all. There might be some clues in the Big Volcanic Mountain after all”
“Well, even if that’s so…”
“Nn… … but, those demonic beasts made it gloomy”
“A~, Yue-san also dislikes this place~”
While complaining and being disgusted by the demonic beasts that keep coming, they had kept traveling for three days. There are no results today and the dark had already set in. The beautiful shine of the crescent moon could be seen if you looked up, therefore Hajime and his party started to prepare their camp. After taking out the tent, they prepared dinner with ingredients and seasoning bought in the town. The tent and cooking utensils were artifacts Hajime made.
The tent was created using Creation magic, with “heating stone” and “cooling stone” installed, it’s always kept at a comfortable temperature. It’s also equipped with “refrigerator” and “freezer” made with cooling stone. Furthermore, the metal frame was imbued with “sign interception” from the “mind-severing stone” so that it wouldn’t be found easily by enemies.
For cooking utensils, there was a frying pan and kettle with an adjustable flame that was proportionate with the amount of magic used, and a kitchen knife endowed with “wind claw” in its sharp edge that could be activated by pouring in magic. There was also a steam cleaner-like thing. They were Hajime’s beloved children that help provide the meals on their travel. Moreover, because it could only be used using direct magic manipulation, it could be said that there was a crime prevention system.
“Age of gods magic is truly a convenient one”
Those were the words that Hajime said when he made the cooking utensil artifacts and the tent installed with a heating and cooling system. It’s just like a useless technology, that wasn’t that useless, that he uselessly refined.
By the way, today’s dinner was kururu chicken simmered in tomato. Kururu chicken was a chicken that was capable of flying in the sky. Its meat’s quality and taste was just like chicken, a popular type of chicken meat of this world. It was a dish where the meat was cut into bite size pieces and floured. after that it was sautéd, then boiled along with various vegetables in a tomato soup. It has the right flavor of butter and meat juice inside the meat, you could feel the tomato’s sourness permeate in your nose when you smell it, when you put it into your mouth, the flavors will spread through. The meat will ‘horohoro’, crumble inside your mouth, ‘hokuhoku’ the potato(fake) that’s completely soaked inside the tomato soup, while carrot(fake)’s and onion(fake)’s sweetness transmitted to your tongue. To have bread melt and soften after dipping it inside the delicious soup truly made it more delicious.
Dinner was finished with full satisfaction. and while immersed in the lingering taste, Hajime and his party chatted just like they always do. Inside the tent, they could leisurely chat because the mind-severing stone was activate, which made it so that demonic beasts do not approach them. Although sometimes there were demonic beasts that came near, Hajime only needed to stick his hand out the window that installed, and shoot it. Moreover, when time for sleep, the three rotated the lookout duty until morning came.
Today, it was about time for Yue and Shia to start preparing to sleep. The first on look out was Hajime. Because there were fluffy futons inside the tent, they could sleep comfortably despite it being a camp. Also, Shia went outside the tent before getting into the futon.
To Hajime who was dubious of what happened, Shia said with a calm face.
“For a while, I wanted to pick flowers”
“There are no flowers inside the ravine, you know?”
“Ha-ji-me-sa~n!”
Hajime’s words that lacked delicacy destroyed Shia’s calm face, she angrily stared at him. Hajime who obviously knew what those words meant said, “My bad my bad”, with a wryly smiling face that didn’t show any remorse. Shia hurriedly went to the tent’s side in anger, after a while…
“Ha-Hajime-sa~n! Yue-sa~n! It’s an emergency! Please come he~re!”
Was what Shia shouted out, forgetting the possibility of demonic beasts hearing it. Wondering what happened, Hajime and Yue, who came from the tent, looked at each other then dashed out at the same time.
When they arrived at the origin of Shia’s voice, they saw that there was a huge monolith that leaned on the ravine’s wall after it fell, and a space was revealed between the monolith and the wall. Shia was inside that space seeing something unbelievable! Being colored in excitement all the while.
“Here, over here! I found it!”
“I understand, for the time being get out of there. It looks like you used full body strengthening. Aren’t you too excited?”
“… … annoying”
The frolicking Shia was pulled out by Hajime and Yue’s hands, when Hajime pulled her he got a feel, while Yue gloomily frowned because of that. Guided by Shia into the crevice between the rocks, when they entered the wall’s side had a hollow interior, and it was wider than expected. Having entered that space, Shia silently, with a proud expression ‘bishi’, pointed her finger at the wall.
Hajime and Yue looked at the place pointed by that finger, then they inadvertently let out “Ha?”, while blinking their eyes in surprise.
In front of the two, in that place, there was a splendid rectangular signboard that was made with cuts in the wall, and strangely woman-like characters were carved there.
“Please come in! Into Miledi Raisen’s thrilling Great Dungeon?”
The mark “!” and “?” felt strangely irritating.
“… … the heck is this”
“… … what is this”
Hajime and Yue’s voice came out in succession. “I am seeing something unbelievable right now!”, were the exact presentations of their expressions. The two of them, blankly looked at the signboard inside the hellish ravine.
“To ask what, it is the entrance! Great Dungeon’s! It was found by chance when I went to-… …cough, to pick flowers. Well~, it was real, there is a Great Dungeon inside Raisen Grand Canyon”
While Shia’s slaphappy voice resounded, maybe because Hajime and Yue was finally able to get out of their surprise, they wore indescribable expressions, then looked at each other in perplexion.
“… … Yue. Do you think it’s real?”
“… … … … … … … … … … Nn”
“That’s a long pause there. Your basis?”
“… … Miledi( …)”
“It was that after all…”
“Miledi”, it was the first name of Raisen that appeared on Oscar’s memorandum. Although the name Raisen was conveyed and known by the world, the first name was unknown. Therefore, the chance that a place with its name signed in was the Great Dungeon of Raisen is very high.
But, no matter what, what they were honestly unable to believe was…
“Why must it be this character…”
There was a reason for saying that. Hajime was considering the desperate fights that happened inside the Orcus Great Dungeon, and surely the other dungeons would also be along that line, that’s why the light-heartedness of this made him lose his strength. Yue also understood well the severity of a Great Dungeon, that’s why, her expression said that she still thought maybe it was someone’s prank.
“But, the entrance-like place couldn’t be seen, right? The interior was a dead end…”
Not noticing what happened in Hajime and Yue’s minds, Shia thought, I wonder where the entrance is? And was looking around the surrounding, then she ‘peshipeshi’, hit the hollow part of the wall.
“Oi, Shia. Don’t…”
GAKONn!
“Fukya!?”
“Don’t carelessly move around,” were the words Hajime was unable to finish when part of the wall that Shia touched ‘GURUNn’, suddenly rotated, and Shia disappeared to the other side of the wall. It was like a door mechanism inside a ninja’s house.
“”… …””
The credibility of that signboard miraculously increased with the finding of the entrance of the Great Dungeon. The Great Dungeon of Raisen was here after all. Even though they had a mountain of complaints such as, “Is this really okay for a Great Dungeon?” and “Give me my seriousness from Orcus back”, something like that after seeing that amusement-like invitation. Hajime and Yue who saw Shia silently disappear behind the rotating door, once more, looked at each other then let out sighs, and put their hands onto the rotating door just like Shia.
Having activated the door, Hajime and Yue were sent to the other side just like Shia. The inside was pitch black, and the door was ‘gururi’, rotated back to its former position. And, at that time,
Hyu Hyu Hyu!
Sounds of something coming flying at them resounded, while they couldn’t see anything inside the darkness. Hajime immediately used “Night Vision” and discovered what they were. They were arrows. Countless arrows painted jet black so as to not reflect light, and they came flying to remove any intruders that entered.
Hajime, with Donner in his right hand, used his left hand to beat down those flying jet black arrows. ‘Kan Kan Kan’, the sound of metal knocking metal came out, without missing even one arrow.
When counted, there were 20 arrows. Jet black arrows made of metal and didn’t reflect any light scattered on the ground, when the last arrow was knocked down, silence returned.
At the same time, the surrounding walls began to shine. The area Hajime and his party were in was a room with a length of 10 meters in every direction, and straight ahead, a passage into the interior appeared. In addition, there was a lithograph inside the room with words with the same characters as the signboard carved on it.
“Did you get scared? Hey, did this scare you? Then you’re a kid, Niya Niya”
“Or, were you injured? Or did someone die? … … bufu—”
“” … …””
Hajime and Yue couldn’t think of anything but one thing. That was “How annoying~”. Also, the “Niya Niya” and “bufu-” part that were carved with emphasis as if to provoke them, made them even more irritated. Especially, if someone in their party truly died, then surely the survivor would curse the heaven.
Hajime and Yue were so irritated that many veins popped out on their heads. Then, suddenly, Yue muttered something she just remembered.
“… … Shia?”
“Ah.”
Having heard Yue’s mutter, Hajime finally remembered, then looked back at the rotating door in panic. Because the door only did one rotation at a time, for her to not be here means the possibility that she got out at the same time Hajime and Yue entered were high. It made him feel something unpleasant because even though a lot of time had passed she didn’t enter, so Hajime immediately activated the rotating door.
Shia was… … there as expected. Her form sewn on the rotating door.
“Uu, sob, Hajime-san… … please don’t look~, but, I want you to take these out. Hic, please do it without looking at me~”
It truly was a pitiful appearance. Shia, although unable to see the arrows that came flying, she probably used her natural search ability to somehow manage to dodge them from the sound. However it seemed it was truly last second, with her clothes pierced here and there, she made a pictogram similar to those that were drawn on emergency exits. Her rabbit ears bent into something similar to a lightning bolt to avoid the arrows, because she knew that she had done something impossible, her body still twitched even now. Most of all, Shia didn’t cry out of fear of death. The cause was… … her feet were magnificently wet.
“Now that I remember, you are going to pick some flowers… … well, what to say. You only did the necessary…”
“Wrong! Uu~, just why didn’t you finish that, the past me~!!”
It was an appearance that you’d never want to show as a woman, even more so for Shia who cried because she had shown it to the man she fell for. Her rabbit ears completely hung down. First of all, even if it was a chance to encounter love after 100 years, Hajime thought it was already too late. That’s why, without looking away he stared at her in amazement. And, that hollowed Shia’s heart even more.
“… … Don’t move”
Maybe because she was also a woman, Yue’s expressionlessness contained sympathy and she released Shia from the crucifixion.
“… … I’ll do something about it. You’re still a novice”
“I am ashamed~. Sob”
“… … Hajime, change of clothes”
“Here”
Shia’s change of clothes were pulled out from the “Treasure Box”, then she did a quick change while blushing.
Finally, Shia’s preparations are finished, “It’s time to conquer the Dungeon!”, was the enthusiastic shout that she let out, only to notice the lithograph.
She looked down and her hair concealed her expression. Shia was silent for a while, then she slowly took out Doryukken, and struck the lithograph with all of her might. ‘Gogya’, was the sound that resounded accompanied with the destruction of the lithograph.
Maybe because she was unable to endure it anymore, she magnificently swung Doryukken many many times as if attacking the enemy of her parents.
Then, in the place of the broken lithograph, characters were carved on the ground, it said…
“Sorr~y? This lithograph will automatically be repaired after some time~ Pu-kusukusu!!”
“Mukii— —!!”
Shia was truly enraged and started to swing Doryukken more intensely. The small room was shaken as if a small earthquake happened, the sound of extraordinary impacts were resounding many times.
Watching Shia with a skeptical gaze, Hajime frankly muttered.
“Miledi Raisen, rather than a member of the “Liberators,” she is unquestionably the enemy of humanity”
“… … I absolutely agree on that”
Apparently, the Great Dungeon of Raisen would be a difficult place in a different way than the Orcus Great Dungeon.