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ShangriLa Frontier Chapter 538 Part 1

ShangriLa Frontier Chapter 538: An Orchestra Just For You PART 18 Part 1

It’s only a matter of human nature that once you have received new toys, you will want to test them out and play with them right away. I wanted to do that right away, but before I was going to do it, I decided to change my course a little bit. And therefore I was now arriving at the base of the Conquest Dolls where the Orchestra was dwelling, only to find upon my arrival here a thing that was most peculiar.

「And what the hell is that thing supposed to be?」

A blackboard? But why a blackboard? What is a thing like that even doing here in the first place?

「Hey there, fellas.」

「Magical Girl Wannabe? Fancy meeting you here.」

「The thing you see here is the amalgamation of various people’s testimonies and opinions that come to us all the time now…… And sorting through it all is not the easiest job out there to do, especially if you have to do this by yourself.」

Her words make it sound as if it was a whole lot of hard work to do and she was not managing at all, but I am more than sure that even if the Heavens themselves were to come crumbling down onto our heads she would still be doing her job better than anyone else and without a word of complaint. As for the looks of the Conquest Dolls base…… I knew that it was technically their base of operations in this land, but for some reason that base looked more like a typical classroom rather than anything else.

You can see that here and there are some people who wear armor and weapons, but the vast majority of them were the academic-looking type, walking between the blackboards and sometimes comparing notes or conversing with other people, looking all excited. Yes, the whole place all of a sudden was starting to give a rather intelligent kind of vibe.

「So far we have been able to confirm that there are six kinds of beings that are being reproduced. But is this a process that happens completely at random?」

「No, as far as we have managed to uncover, the process seems to not be completely randomized. But then, it would not explain the reason why the boss monsters from the Old Continent tend to show up more often than those from the New Continent.」

「One of the bosses that appear quite often is the Labirintiatus, but oddly enough when he appears there is no Usurper Dragon to follow. And their combat threat level is about the same. Also, it’s probable that the monsters here receive a tremendous boost in power when compared to their original versions.」

「It may just be that they are stronger here by default. However, there is another theory stating that it might very well be the doing of the Orchestra’s “song”.」

「…… I don’t think that it’s about a mere power boost here. Say, in Mirei’s case the first one to appear was always the Usurper Dragon, right? It would be a good thing if others were able to verify it in some way. But unfortunately, we are severely understaffed and there is nothing we can do to counteract this. This is really troublesome.」

「I see, so maybe that’s it! Maybe the monsters that appear before the players are the ones that the players struggled the most against!? If we were to assume that theory as truth, the lyrics of the songs would also start to make a whole lot more sense!」

「Yes, it might be so, but we will still need to verify this nonetheless. By the way, how is Mirei-chan’s battle against the “Scarred Red” going?」

「I wonder if the results here are influenced by the battles in which the player suffered defeat? Currently, the only ones that show up are the non-Unique Monsters, but that might actually change with the increased numbers of attempts. So we would need someone here who has challenged the Unique Monsters and run some tests to see the data from them. Maybe someone who got defeated by the Nightprowler Luukan? There should be more than enough specimens for that, right?」

「Yes, but before we do that, let’s wait to see what the results of Mire-chan will be. We can always add that to our calculations later.」

「I also believe that it will be in our best interest to see to it that the number of “invitations” being sent is increased. Are there any players who wished to challenge the Orchestra about the same time as the Leviathan appeared on the surface?」

「There you go talking nonsense again. Don’t you remember what the condition for receiving the invitation was? Making contact with the Conquest Dolls? Besides, it’s not so simple, this is not some dating sim where you just stumble upon girls by accident. Mirei-chan is the only one who happened to do that completely by accident, but that’s one singular example, with no other occurrences like that to back it up.」

「So? Where is this Mirei-san right now? The one that Remi-chan made contact with? I can’t see here anywhere.」

「She said she was going towards the beverage dispenser to try and break apart her taste buds…… or something like that. I don’t really know. And I don’t know if I really want to know.」

「…… So, a tea break, huh?」

「I don’t know why, but there is something about her character that seems to be rejecting people quite a lot. Weird, isn’t it?」

「I knew it would be a good idea to learn English while I had the chance. Then we would have a much broader space to seek help and aid from, don’t you think?」

Because of the Magical Girl Wannabe I failed to notice that at first, but now it was all coming clear to me: this space must have been remodeled to house some members of the Library for them to gather information and discuss their findings with one another. So in a sense, was that space actually “Library’s” branch office?

「Gee, I thought we were going to give that idea a rest already?」

「No, I am fairly sure that there must be at least one person who managed to make contact with the Conquest Dolls before anyone else.」

…… Tsk, so the time has finally come, huh? I would have to decide whether or not to reveal what I know to the Library. However, I do not wish to disclose to them that I have managed to arrive here before everyone else. Partially because I wanted to keep the information about my pseudo “flying” skills using Critical Speed plus Levin Trigger Disaster Hand a secret, and partially because disclosing that would mean a whole mountain load of other questions that I would like not to answer if I could help it.

「…… So what? Does that mean that in the current situation defeating that monster might prove extremely difficult? Or maybe even impossible to achieve?」

「No, it’s way too fast to decide such a thing, for crying out loud! We are not the only ones struggling here, after all! …… Oh well, our purpose here is not simply “win”, mind you. We also want to discover its nature, the laws and rules that govern its behavior. This is the most exciting part! …… That is why we are having those discussions in the first place. To share our opinions with one another.」