Chapter 42

Since it's a hot spring, if you open your eyes and dive in, it stings your eyes quite a bit. No matter how much you train your body, this kind of pain never goes away. I understand that pain is a danger signal for the body and shouldn't disappear.

Moreover, I had been cooling the surface with ice, but perhaps the melted ice hadn't reached this far, and I started to feel the heat gradually increasing.

If I kept diving straight down, I could see a horizontal cave. It took about 40 seconds to get here. Since I could probably stay underwater for another minute, I decided to take a look inside the horizontal cave.

— Light was leaking through?

A faint light. It seemed the monkeys had come from there.

Straining my eyes, I could see a slight current of water.

When I used the detection skill, there were no monsters.

The heat was gradually increasing.

I made up my mind and entered the horizontal cave.

There was a hole in the upper part of the cave, leading to an underground cavern.

"...I'm surprised... I didn't expect such a magnificent place to be underground."

What spread out there was an orchard. Trees were laden with bananas and papayas.

The walls and ceiling emitted a faint light, so the plants were probably photosynthesizing using that light.

There were also pipe-like structures around the trees. They were likely used to transport hot water and regulate the temperature.

Even in the tropics, it's not that warm for bananas to grow naturally.

Did the monkeys live here?

"Puchi Wind—"

I used wind magic to knock down a coconut, opened it with a bear knife, and took a sip.

It was coconut juice.

"Puchi Ice"

I used ice magic to freeze the surface a little and drank it. It was cold and delicious.

Still, what exactly is this place?

The iron pipes are clearly artificial, but the walls and ceiling look like a dungeon.

However, there's no sign of monsters, which is unusual for a dungeon.

Despite the mystery, it should be safe to call Caro.

I took off my soaking wet clothes and put them in my item bag, then changed into new clothes and cast "My World."

※※※

"These bananas are amazing, very easy to eat."

Caro put a long, thick object in her mouth and chewed.

If this were a movie, this scene might be repeated over and over. I can't show this to anyone.

While thinking such silly thoughts, I ate a mango.

I tried all the fruits and gave the seeds to Pione.

When I explained the greenhouse-like system here, Pione said, "If that's the case, we can probably do it here too," and seemed excited. Maybe Pione actually likes inventing and crafting?

"Where does this hot water come from?"

"Don't touch it, it's so hot it could do more than just burn you."

"Hot enough to burn means it's just hot, right?"

While having this silly conversation,

"Maybe they're circulating the hot spring water. If that's the case, there might be a boiler somewhere."

I thought it was a natural hot spring, but it might be artificial.

Since the dungeon was originally a device to gather and purify miasma, the possibility that this is a dungeon has increased.

However, the lack of monsters is still strange.

"What do you think, Caro?"

"At least there's no sign that anyone has entered for nearly ten years. Normally, the church's dungeon knights would come regularly to purify the dungeon on an island like this, but perhaps the monkeys have been defeating the monsters in this dungeon."

Caro said that the overflow of monsters from a dungeon happens when the miasma inside overflows, and since there are no monsters here, the monkeys are not the dungeon's monsters.

"Maybe the monkeys were trapped. It would be impossible to swim back to the surface in the hot spring before it was cooled with ice..."

"That's right. There are no leftovers or excrement from the monsters, so they must have been absorbed by the dungeon."

Ah, in that sense, the dungeon is convenient. There's no risk of oxygen deprivation because the fruit trees are photosynthesizing. It might be ideal for a hermit, though not as much as my "My World."

"The monkeys didn't seem very strong, so if they can defeat the monsters, there's no need to worry. I plan to investigate further, but what about you, Caro?"

If there's a boiler, I want to take it back. Then I can create a hot spring in my "My World."

"Caro will accompany you."

"Alright, let's go then."

"We need to find out why you were forcibly teleported here."

...Ah, right, I came here to investigate that.

I had forgotten because I was so excited about the hot spring.

※※※

There were no monsters in the dungeon.

Moreover, unlike the previous dungeons, which had a layered structure, this one spread out horizontally.

"...There's nothing here."

"Yeah. Is this the end of this long corridor?"

Caro drew a map of the dungeon.

It's like mapping a dungeon on graph paper in an old RPG game.

Actually, this kind of mapping is still done in dungeons without maps.

"Until now, we've relied on Haru's sense of smell."

That's true. With Haru's nose, we could immediately tell if we had been to a place before or if many people had passed through, so there was no need to map it.

"Looking at the map, there seems to be an unnatural space in this area."

"There might be a hidden door or something."

Caro doesn't know, but when I went to save Norn, there was a hidden door. It looked like a normal wall, but it felt like a hologram when touched.

There might be something similar here.

Since there's no boss room, there might be stairs or a boss room in this unnatural space.

Thinking that, I decided to investigate the long corridor.

—Clank!

A wall appeared at the end of the corridor. Not just there, but when I turned around, there was a wall where we had entered.

"We're trapped!?"

When I thought that, the walls started to close in.

And at a considerable speed.

"Lord Ichi, this—"

"Damn it, I'll break the wall!"

I pulled out a steel sword from my item bag and shouted,

"Slash!"

But—

"Lie, not even a scratch. I was confident I could shatter rock."

"Lord Ichi, you can't break the walls of a dungeon!"

"Right, I forgot!"

I quickly placed the sword horizontally as a brace.

I also took out other long items from my item bag.

The walls stopped about 50 centimeters away. No, they were still moving slowly, but the steel sword was acting as a brace.

"Damn, it's tight—Caro, are you okay?"

"...I'm fine... There's nothing to brace against."

Caro touched her chest and said, sounding a bit disappointed.

"No, the size of your chest doesn't matter right now... More importantly, the walls! Give it up already! Isn't there a system like an elevator or train door that opens automatically when something gets stuck?"

As I shouted, the steel sword couldn't withstand the pressure from the walls and—broke.

"..."

※※※

The next moment, the walls almost touched, leaving only a small gap.

When the walls returned to their original position, there was no one left in that corridor.