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The Four Eastern Stars Ventures into the Labyrinth, While the Masked Boy Leaves – Part 04

There was one Rank A adventurer party and two Rank B parties. Rank C and D parties were scheduled to arrive later, but Jillarte believed the A and B teams would be the primary contenders. Seeing Selyse, whom Jillarte also knew, was a pleasant surprise. Selyse possessed both the skills and the character.

However, in this largely uncharted dungeon, Jillarte could only speculate about the enemies that lurked within. The best she could do was bid them farewell at the labyrinth’s entrance.

I hate this. Jillarte clenched both fists. I wish he was here.

Jillarte held this person in even higher regard than Selyse. He was an object of her admiration and affection, almost reaching a point of worship. Silver Face.

Not a day went by without her wishing he was around. He had played an active role during the conflict between the Theocracy of Bios and the Confederacy of Einbiest, and exhibited tremendous skill in the underground pit. Even the Pope, the head of the Church, knew nothing of his current whereabouts or activities.

Would Silver Face… Would Hikaru solve this problem right away?

She knew that thinking about someone who wasn’t around wouldn’t change anything, but she couldn’t help herself. Such was the significance he held for Jillarte.

She believed that Silver Face helped lift the curse on her people, the Half Dragons, a race of people covered in dull scales. Afterward, she met him in the dungeon on Southleaf Island, and learned of his identity as the adventurer Hikaru.

She knew it was too much to hope for his intervention whenever she faced trouble. This great labyrinth matter was a problem she had to solve on her own.

Jillarte turned away from the labyrinth entrance on the sinister mountain’s slope and headed toward the distant Einbiest encampment.

A breeze swept in from behind, a strange wind that seemed to carry the presence of Silver Face. But when Jillarte turned around, all she found was the empty entrance to the dungeon.

“…”

Without another glance back, Jillarte walked towards the camp.

---

Whether this was the actual Great Labyrinth of Runay-aas was currently unknown. The dungeon was vast, giving a sense of its colossal size. The caverns seemed carved into the natural mountain. The surface was bare rock, but the deliberate shaping into circular passages suggested the touch of human hands.

“…”

Gazing up at a passage wide enough to accommodate a dump truck, Serika of the Four Eastern Stars mused to herself.

How was this dug out? In Japan, they use massive drills for tunneling, but the rough rock face suggests otherwise. Well, there’s no such technology in this world for giant drills anyway. They usually rely on magic for everything.

Serika stopped in her tracks.

Magic, huh… What if this dungeon was crafted using magic? It’d require an immense amount of magical energy to carve out such a massive tunnel. Even the most skilled mage would likely progress only a few meters in a day. We’ve been walking for thirty minutes from the entrance to here. It’d take nearly a year just to dig this far. But then again, I’m built different. No one else possesses as much mana as I do, and I doubt there’s anyone who’s better than me at elemental magic.

It might have sounded like arrogance, but Serika’s assessment was accurate. From what Hikaru saw on her Soul Board, Serika boasted a skill level of 5 in all categories of elemental magic: Fire, Wind, Earth, and Water. Few individuals—less than fifty, to be precise—in the entire capital of Ponsonia possessed a skill level of 5 in even one type of magic, let alone for all four elements. Only Serika had this much mastery.

Moreover, she had a whopping level 19 on Mana Capacity. Typically, even skilled mages or clerics ranged between levels 5 and 8.

Although Serika couldn’t perceive Soul Boards, she had gleaned insights into other mages’ abilities through her interactions with adventurers. The spells they found difficult to cast, Serika could effortlessly unleash multiple times.

Was this passage carved out by a mage on my level? No, it’d still take days to reach this depth. Besides, this place has multiple floors.

Noticing Serika’s pause, Sara glanced back.

“What’s up?”

“Oh, uh, it’s nothing! Just pondering a bit!”

Since Serika had only spent about a year in this world, her fluency in the common language was still developing, and her tone tended to be assertive. Plus, her time back in Japan just made it harder.

“Really? Well, hurry it up. We’re running a bit late. The entrance seems to be ahead.”

“Entrance?!”

Didn’t we pass through the entrance earlier, the one with the weird monument?

“Hmm. Can’t you feel the breeze? There’s a huge cavern up ahead, which seems to be the dungeon’s entrance.”

“Whaaat?!”

They hadn’t even stepped into the dungeon yet, despite covering such a distance.

Just how vast was this dungeon? How was it even excavated? Did a mage more powerful than Serika have a hand in it? Pondering these questions, Serika couldn’t help but feel the dungeon’s evident strangeness, its wonder, and its threat.

Sara called it a huge cavern. That was the only way to describe it.

Emerging from the tunnel felt like stepping into a nocturnal realm. The ceiling stretched impossibly high, vanishing into darkness. A pitch-black domain. The magic lamps held by Azure Blade Nebula and Selyse’s group barely illuminated their path.

But the far end of the cavern, the opposite wall, was unmistakable. A large number “1” was inscribed on the wall, radiating a soft bluish-white glow, likely enchanted by magic.

As they walked, the clearly visible “1” loomed larger and larger, seemingly endless. Unable to gauge the distance, fear gripped them. Finally they reached the wall. To behold the colossal “1” in its entirety, one had to crane their neck to look up.

“It appears this is our entrance, Selyse,” said Marius of the Azure Blade Nebula.

Sure enough, below the number was a passage about half the size of the tunnel they had just traversed. Serika couldn’t help but feel relieved. Now this felt like the proper size for a dungeon.

“There were no signs of combat along the way,” Selyse said.

“And we didn’t miss anything. It was a straight path, I suppose. But who knows what’s ahead from here,” Marius replied. “The mapping is quite crude. Maybe we should’ve brought that Beastman along.”

“You mean the one who returned for their routine report? He hadn’t recovered enough to go back into the dungeon.”

“They mentioned following the ‘scent,’ but that’s not really an option for us.”

“What about the Beastman in your party?”

“He said he’d give it a shot, but not to count on it. Looks like we’ll just have to go with this rough sketch the Beastman made.”

Marius casually brandished a piece of paper.

While Gerhardt’s advance party had likely done some mapping, Beastmen were generally not adept at such meticulous tasks. Moreover, they only provided a minimal version of the map to the messenger. So although the crude map featured the first to sixth floors, Marius harbored doubts about its reliability.

Case in point: the map skipped from the stone monument straight to this grand cavern.

“Let’s get moving, Boss. No amount of discussion will change our mission,” said a member of the Azure Blade Nebula.

“Agreed,” Marius replied, then turned to Selyse. “We’ll lead the way, then. Feel free to set the pace however you prefer.”

“Thank you.”

Without hesitation, Marius and his group ventured into the passage beneath the “1”.

“…”

“Selyse!”

“Whoa, you scared me. What’s on your mind, Serika?”

Selyse didn’t seem too startled.

“I’ve been wondering for a while now. What’s the deal between you and that Marius guy?!”

“What do you mean? We’re just fellow adventurers from the same city.”

“I don’t know, it just feels different! You’ve interacted with other parties, but… yeah! It seems like Marius is thoughtful of you!”

“Maybe because I’m much younger than him, he feels he should keep an eye out for me,” Selyse deflected somewhat.

While it was true that Marius cared about her, what Serika wanted to know was why Marius was so attentive to Selyse. It felt like Marius had a closer bond with Selyse than with the leaders of other parties.

Sure, Selyse maintained a certain distance from leaders like Kinga of Kinga Wolf, but Selyse had enough interactions with various party leaders. So, while it wouldn’t be unusual if she had connections with them, somehow Serika felt like Marius and Selyse had known each other for a while. And Selyse seemed intent on keeping that under wraps.

Will she ever tell me the truth?