Chapter 274

We had now walked through the tunnel that was an odd combination of stone and wood for several minutes. Due to the layout, we were able to reach the floor where the humans were before encountering any monsters. Still, if any of them had Presence Detection, they would know we were coming…

“Maybe we should knock first.”

“Monsters wouldn’t knock, so they’d know it was a human coming.”

I thought as we looked at the door that would surely lead to these humans. It would be nice if they would just open it from the other side.

We played rock, paper, scissors to decide who would hit the door. Daniela did rock. So did Manager. And Lemon. I did scissors. By the way, apparently it was some Hero who had popularized this little game in the world.

I glared angrily at my scissors and then adjusted the sword at my belt. I wanted to be prepared in case I was attacked.

“Alright, I’ll go then…”

“Be careful. We do not know what will come out of there.”

“Then why don’t you come too?”

“I will watch over you from here.”

“…”

Daniela sent me off with a cool smile. And so I stomped purposefully towards the door. That was when I heard something on the other side. I paused for a second, but there was no point in stopping now. Would it be a snake or a demon…? I sighed, stood in front of the door, and knocked.

“Hello.”

Nothing.

“We felt a human presence nearby, and so we came to see. We have no intention of fighting.”

Still, there was no answer. What to do…

“…Asagi?”

“Hmm?”

I turned around to look at the three others, but they looked puzzled. Apparently, none of them had called to me. Just then, the door in front of me slowly opened. The person on the other side was a man with reddish-brown hair. He looked a lot older than when I had last seen him…

“So it is you, Asagi!”

“Rex! Ah, it’s been a while!”

Rex was the Adventurer I had said goodbye to in Spiris. He’d been the leader of a party I encountered while in the woods. They had been trying to hunt a wyvern. Tank and Danny had been taken down by its breath, and the party was in terrible shape. I helped them and we became friends.

“Ah, wait. There are monsters nearby. We should be quiet.”

“Yes, we’ve been running away from them. Is Daniela with you? Anyway, you should come inside.”

Rex quickly scanned the area. Then he waved towards Daniela and the others and gestured for them to come. Daniela seemed relieved when she saw Rex’s face, but Manager and Lemon still looked cautious.

“It is fine, we know him. An old Adventurer friend.”

“Ah, you are pretty! I’m Rex. An old friend of Asagi.”

“Hmm… Rindo. Nice to meet you.”

“Lemonfrost. Pleased to make your acquaintance!”

They introduced themselves briskly as they entered the room. There was one woman who looked like an Adventurer and two men who looked like civilians. Maybe merchants. So, Danny and Darius weren’t here.

“And you’re as radiant as ever, Daniela.”

“I am glad to see that you are well, Rex. But where are the others?”

“Ahh…”

Daniela had been wondering the same thing, and so she asked him. Rex started to scratch his cheek uncomfortably. I noticed there was a scar there that hadn’t been there before. It suggested a terrible fight. Perhaps they…

“I split up from them. …You can say, we weren’t quite compatible…”

“Compatible…”

It made me think of a rock band.

“I didn’t want to fight wyverns and giants monsters anymore. You understand that, don’t you? You saw what Danny looked like after… And so I suggested we mainly go to dungeons, where the survival rate is a little higher. But they insisted that Adventurers had to hunt large monsters. They said it was every Adventurer’s dream. The last fight only made them more determined. But I was scared. No, I’m not suggesting that dungeon crawling is easy, alright? But it’s not grand battles against giants that I want. I would rather carefully disarm traps and fill out my map…”

I understood how he felt. The sight of Danny’s blood had made me panic. I had never seen someone wounded like that before, and I could still hear Rex’s scream in my ears. Danny would have been dead without Wesley’s potions or Darius’s strength. And if I hadn’t been there… Well, I didn’t want to think about it, but they would have all been dead.

And if you considered challenging the wyvern to be the root of all of that, then it would be harder to repeat it. They say that you must not confuse bravery with recklessness. This just meant that Rex was not reckless enough to challenge monsters that were above him. And he had the courage to choose a steadier path. On the other hand, perhaps Danny and the others were not so reckless as to suddenly change the path they had been on up until now. And while it was different from Rex, it was still brave as well. Who knew which side was right. But they were clearly unable to continue together.

“…Well, that’s why I’m here. I mainly travel through dungeons now. I found a few smaller ones first to get me started and help me learn. So now I’ve come here to Reserentrible to stretch my feet a little. Life sure is strange…”

So he’s had quite an adventure too… Well, he was involved in a disaster now.

“That must have been tough.”

“Aye. Ah, but this is no time for such talk. Allow me to explain to you what has happened.”

I nodded. Rex now looked very serious. Just like he had during the fight against the wyvern. I turned to the others. They were also ready.

“These are the people that I helped after the disaster occurred. Rerik the weapon merchant and Lime, a food merchant.”

“Hello.”

“Nice to meet you.”

Rerik was thin and had slanted eyes. Lime was much older and quite wide.

“Do you know that residents here are responsible for their own safety once the evacuation order has been sent? I knew about it, but I still couldn’t abandon them. And so we’ve been traveling together and searching for the exit. But then we encountered a most horrible monster.”

“So, you’re currently hiding from this monster?”

“Aye. You’ll recognize it easily. It has very long legs. Eight of them. And poisonous fangs. Yes. This poison even melts through floors. To be frank, it’s a poisonous spider. But there is half a human body coming out from the spider’s back. It made my skin crawl… What? Man or woman? Uh, it was a woman.”

Yes.

“But what is most dangerous is its movements. The webs allow it to move in every direction above the floor. And its attacks are tricky. It’s particularly bad because the passage up ahead is wider. That is its domain.”

“I think I understand. So there is a crazy spider monster in the way and preventing your escape.”

“Yes.”

I also understood that Rex was terrible at explaining things. I understood that it was dangerous, but that was about it. But it made sense now. There were so many people here making noise, but it hadn’t come for us because it was protecting its nest.

And to think that I would finally encounter a female Arachne in this dungeon. Maybe it was fate. I had never thought I would actually meet a half-human girl monster in real life.

“By the way, I remember that you left some book about that at the shop once.”

“Shhh!”

Manager, some things were best left unsaid!