chapter 12

We entered the dungeon and pushed further in. We dealt with the monsters attacking us without any problems.

But I wondered about one thing.

…these enemies were too weak…

This dungeon had yet to be discovered by anyone, but it was strange that such a simple dungeon hadn’t been discovered.

“Aruto-san, what’s up?”

As I was lost in thought, Meryl took notice and tilted her head at me.

“…no, it’s nothing.”

My questions didn’t go away, but the only way to answer them was to go deeper.

We went forward…

A bit further in, a trap blocked our path. However, we were able to get past it without a problem.

Come to think of it, Meryl almost got caught in it.

After a while, we decided to take a short break. While catching our breath after making sure that there were no monsters around, Meryl offered a suggestion.

“Aruto-san. Since I’m getting tired out, I’ll explore deeper into the dungeon as a fairy instead!”

“Alright. If you run into danger, come back.”

“Okay!”

As I replied, Meryl took on the form of a fairy and fluttered off to the back of the room.

I saw her off and sat down… and that’s when it happened.

The stone wall behind me felt uncomfy, so I touched it.

A rock was then pushed into the wall like a switch, creating a vertical line in the wall that opened to the sides.

“A hidden door…?”

As the stone wall opened to the sides, I could see a door.

I didn’t know a hidden door this obscure would exist here…

Maybe I was driven by curiosity at the time.

But what could be behind the door…? I should’ve waited for Meryl to return, but…

I put my hand on the door and opened it. The door squeaked open, and behind it was an expanse of darkness.

I gasped and walked in. As I stepped inside, the lights in the room turned on and made the room become brighter.

I walked towards the center of the room while looking around.

No treasure chests. No traps either, come to speak of it.

What was there was just…

A huge puddle of poison. But at the end of the room was something I should never have found.

A skeleton… not a monster’s, but a human’s.

A corpse that’s already decayed into a skeleton…!?

“W-what is this place!?”

Did it get damaged by the poison…?

No, there’s no way someone would fall into this obvious huge puddle of poison.

So how…?

As signals for danger flared in my head, I was about to leave the room…

I looked towards the door, and with a loud thud, the door closed.

“Crap…!”

I quickly ran to the door and tried to open it, but it wouldn’t budge. Trapped, I looked behind myself to try finding another way out…

“…!?”

In front of me, there was a giant thing that wasn’t there until now.

This giant thing stared at me with its one big eye.

Just like a beast who’s found prey…

I gasped at its presence, slowly saying the name of the being in front of me…

“A Cyclops!?”

With its eye quivering, the Cyclops lets out a yell. The yell alone was enough to make me feel like I was being blown back.

Before the enemy moved, I brought something out from the Infinity Bag.

The Status Scope…

It allowed one to see a monster’s level, attributes, and affinities.

I raised my Status Scope and pointed it to the Cyclops in front of me. A monitor appeared, and a screen with the Cyclops’ status was displayed.

Looking at the status screen, I was at a loss for words.

Level 96…?!

What’s such a high-level monster doing in a dungeon like this…!?

Not caring about my confusion, the Cyclops swung its fist at me.

I dodged to the side, but the impact of the fist from scrape the ground was enough to blow me back. I rolled a few times and got up.

It actually had such great power even from just the impact…!

Immediately, I activated the condition bracelet to contact Meryl, but she was out of range.

Garuna told me about this, but I didn’t know I would actually not be able to reach her…!

Since it’s come to this…!

I brought out a ring-shaped object.

Escape Link…

If I held it up, and shouted ‘escape’, I would be warped to the entrance of the dungeon.

“Escape!”

…I should’ve been warped… but I didn’t teleport at all.

“Huh!? I can’t even use Escape?”

Does this room not allow you to escape!?

Then I realised.

Skeletons, dungeons that weren’t on the map…

These could only mean one thing.

“I see… It’s not that this dungeon was undiscovered! Even after discovering it, adventurers could not escape this room and became the Cyclops’ prey!”

I couldn’t stop sweating. I was terrified. In order to get out of this room, I had to defeat the Cyclops.

But this thing was level 96… That was an eighty level difference, way different from when I fought Seira Grundt…

“What should I do?” I thought. I didn’t have an answer.

Not caring about me, the Cyclops attacked…