Chapter 178 - Doppelgänger (3)

Darkness without a single ray of light.

Raven cast her light-orb spell.

"Riate."

I reflexively shut my eyes before the glare could blind me.

Raven asked, "Mr. Jandel, what are you doing?"

I cautiously opened my eyes and saw a light orb giving off a faint, gentle glow, unlike usual.

So she could adjust the brightness, too.

"Nothing."

I brushed aside my embarrassment and made an excuse, earning a scolding from Raven.

"Anyway, please warn us before you do something like that. You startled me."

"She's right. What if the guards arrest you when we get out, nyah?"

"I'll just have to pay a fine."

"Surely you're not planning to use team fu—"

"It was for the team."

At my firm declaration, Raven let out a deep sigh, but said nothing more.

It wasn't as though I was wrong.

And that wasn't what mattered right now.

"Isn't this strange? Starting in the Dark Region?"

"It's not just the Dark Region. Do you see that?"

In response to Mister Bear's muttering, Raven pointed to a monument by one wall.

Time to get down to business.

"A floor monument. Do you know how this happened?"

"I think it's dimensional instability."

"... What's that?"

"Portals are a form of dimensional magic, after all. I've heard this happens sometimes. There's an error in the entry coordinates."

"... So this is just a coincidence?"

"I'm not sure. There are observation records indicating that dimensional instability becomes more likely just before a portal disappears."

Huh, that sounded like a book I'd read, too.

I felt an urge to chime in, but kept my mouth shut.

She was going to explain everything anyway. Why butt in and arouse suspicion?

"Bjorn, this is like that time..."

At a look from me, Misha clamped her mouth shut. Then she moved over beside Aynar to prevent any possible slips of the tongue.

Okay, that took care of that.

"Hmm, so you're saying it's because we barely made it in?"

The corners of Mister Bear's mouth rose slightly. Explorer that he was, he seemed to have realized just how broken this EXP duplication bug was.

Raven, however, shook her head.

"That's a little less clear."

Huh? What was?

Unable to hold back, I joined the conversation.

"What do you mean, less clear?"

"Even with an error in the coordinates, you wouldn't end up this far out on the perimeter. If you did, everyone would enter late. Why would anyone bother entering early?"

Hmm, she had a point.

Actually, I'd wondered about that myself. A surprising number of people knew about dimensional instability. So why wasn't anyone exploiting this sweet bug?

"Dimensional instability became widely known 130 years ago. A major problem developed in the dimensional magic circle around then, and its frequency increased exponentially."

"And?"

"The royal family commissioned the Magic Tower to repair the dimensional magic circle. Once the stabilization work was complete, instances of instability became extremely rare again."

In short, entering late hadn't let anyone use the EXP duplication bug for a hundred years.

"Then how do you explain this?"

"... Maybe it's due for repairs again?"

After offering that plausible guess, Raven cautiously added a suggestion.

"With that in mind, let's keep what happened today a secret."

"Explain."

"It seems no one knows there's a problem with the dimensional magic circle yet. But as time passes and the phenomenon worsens, other explorers will start experiencing it, too."

Mister Bear, who had been listening quietly, nodded.

"So until then, we keep it to ourselves and take advantage of it."

"Exactly. Shorter travel times and more merit score. What's not to like?"

I cut in.

"Wait. Isn't merit score useless to mages?"

Mages couldn't absorb Essences, so gaining EXP did them no good.

Why was she so enthusiastic about this?

Raven answered with a little chuckle.

"I'm personally intrigued. By the untouched floor monument, too. On that note, may I open it?"

"Go ahead."

As soon as I gave permission, Raven placed her hand on the monument.

WHOOOOM!

A portal opened, radiating multicolored light.

Raven closed her eyes as though concentrating on the sensation in her fingertips and the flow of mana through the air.

Then she murmured, "What an extraordinary feeling."

As a barbarian with zero talent for mana, it was a sensation I would never understand.

Still, even I could definitely feel one thing.

「You have opened a portal for the first time. EXP +2」

Ah, that's the stuff.

That feeling of getting something for nothing.

* * *

「You have entered the second floor, Beasts' Lair.」

「You have entered the first floor, Crystal Cave.」

* * *

We went up just to set foot there, then immediately returned to the first floor.

We weren't equipped to deal with the Beasts' Lair. There were so many branching paths that without a Scout on Rotmiller's level, we'd only waste time.

'Even Rotmiller said we were better off giving up on the Beasts' Lair.'

With a Guide, it wasn't as if we'd be completely unable to find our way. But there was no reason to go through here when another route was faster.

"Let's get moving, then."

I took out a compass and held it in one hand as I found our way.

First, we left the Dark Region, then headed northwest. We didn't get lost all that often. Rotmiller had thoroughly taught me how to navigate the first floor, after all.

Of course, I was still inexperienced...

"Avman, where's the portal?"

"That way."

"Then we can just head north from here."

Having a Guide on the team let us take the optimal route with nothing but a compass.

Essentially, I was using a cheat to make up for my lack of skill.

About three hours after we entered the Labyrinth...

"Halt."

For the first time on our journey from one stretch of the perimeter to another, we encountered people: a knight with the royal crest on his chest, accompanied by four soldiers.

"Do you have identification tags?"

The knight who had stopped us kept his question brief. Their weapons and armor were bloodstained, as though they had already fought several battles.

It wasn't monster blood. No monster on the first floor bled red.

"I'll ask one last time. Your identification tags?"

"Ah, here. The rest of you, get yours out, too."

After briefly faltering under the knight's intimidating presence, everyone took out the identification tags they'd received in the city and showed them.

The knight stepped aside, even offering a word of advice.

"Be careful not to have them stolen. It seems a few quick-witted ones are already prowling around looking for tags."

Right. Of course.

They weren't idiots. They must have realized that was their only way to survive.

As I passed him, I asked something that had occurred to me.

"Is there any way to identify stolen tags?"

"No."

"Then why don't you suspect us?"

Had my question annoyed him a little?

The knight frowned slightly, but answered anyway.

"Blood."

"...?"

"If you'd stolen them, you'd have human blood on you. More importantly, I recognize your face."

Huh?

"I'm a knight of House Ferdehilt."

Ah, he'd seen me at the banquet.

Speaking of which, I had no idea what that count was up to. He'd made that meaningful remark about summoning me privately when preparations were complete, but I still hadn't heard from him.

Well, as far as I was concerned, no news was good news.

"Hmm, traveling with a celebrity certainly is convenient."

"Don't tease me."

"What? I'm not teasing you."

Honestly, did she really think I was a barbarian?

"How about you stop grinning first?"

"... You really are too sharp for your own good."

"Anyway, let's pick up the pace. Say something if you get tired."

"What will you do if I do?"

"Aynar will carry you on her back."

"Huh? Me?"

Neither Aynar nor Raven looked happy about it, but there was no helping it. The faster we got upstairs, the fewer people we'd run into.

"... Aynar, would you carry me, please?"

Had it been about thirty minutes since we sped up?

Raven, our homebody mage, abandoned her pride and opted for a piggyback ride.

As a bonus, we could move considerably faster.

Apparently bored with simply being carried, Raven began squeezing Aynar here and there.

"D-don't touch me!"

"Wow, you're softer than I expected, Aynar."

"... Are you making fun of me? Get off if you're going to do that!"

Aynar shuddered violently in protest.

Just as I was considering telling Raven to knock it off, I spotted something blocking our way and stopped.

"Bjorn, why are you stopping, nyah?"

"Bodies."

Five bodies in all. Four men and one woman.

They were practically naked, apparently stripped of all their equipment. Judging by the state of the blood, quite some time had passed.

"Aynar, could you put me down?"

Raven dismounted from her ride and examined the bodies, too.

"It doesn't look like a knight did this."

"Why?"

"The wounds. One was killed with a blunt weapon, another with arrows. The rest were burned. It doesn't look like magic, so probably an Ability."

Knights used swords, since those were the best weapons for making use of Aura.

Yet there wasn't a single sword wound...

"Maybe they were explorers from Noark? Other explorers saw they didn't have tags and killed them, nyah."

Raven gave a bitter smile at Misha's suggestion.

"It could be the other way around."

"The other way around, nyah?"

Mister Bear answered.

"Remember what that knight said? They might have targeted other explorers to get their tags."

"Oh..."

"Besides, their faces have been made unrecognizable. Normally, there wouldn't be any need for that, would there?"

Of course, we couldn't know the truth.

Still, the bodies put all of us on our guard. These were explorers who had reached the perimeter of the first floor this early, after all. They must have been capable of speedrunning.

And yet, within mere hours of the Labyrinth opening, they'd died like this on the first floor.

"... We really need to stay on our toes."

"Jandel, it looks like their killers headed toward the Goblin Forest. Wouldn't it be better to go somewhere else?"

"It won't make any difference which way we go."

"Whew. True enough."

In the end, we continued toward the Goblin Forest without changing our plans.

How much time passed after that?

We reached the portal to the second floor.

[06 : 47]

We'd arrived incomparably faster than on our previous expedition. It was only thirty minutes off the time I'd clocked with Rotmiller on our timed run.

"Mr. Jandel, you really could switch careers and become a Scout now."

"Nyaha! A barbarian Scout. Nobody would believe it, nyah!"

"Bjorn is the hope of the barbarians!"

Everyone checked the time and showered me with praise, but I couldn't really claim it was thanks to my skill.

We'd started from a different point on this expedition. Traveling from one part of the perimeter to another was bound to save us much more time.

"... Enough. Let's just head up."

I brushed them off and stood before the portal.

"He's embarrassed."

"Yep, yep, he is, nyah."

What were these people talking about?

* * *

「You have entered the second floor, Goblin Forest.」

「You have entered the third floor, Pilgrim's Passage.」

「You have entered the fourth floor, Sky Tower.」

* * *

The morning of day seven.

We reached the fourth floor a full day earlier than we had with Rotmiller.

'At this rate, we must be among the explorers in the lead.'

This was the result of combining our Guide's Ability with my rapidly improving navigation skills.

In fact, we'd barely encountered any explorers along the way. Two clans traveling in large groups, and perhaps ten five-person teams?

Every time, we'd kept our weapons trained on each other, checked tags from a distance, and parted ways.

Whew. The atmosphere in the Labyrinth really had turned vicious.

"Raven, any results?"

"Nothing."

Mindful of the masked-man incident last time, we'd spent about an hour repeatedly casting search magic as soon as we cleared the first stage.

'Seriously, why do we have to do this because of those bastards?'

The more I thought about it, the more irritated I became, but what could we do?

Given the circumstances, we'd just have to watch out for ourselves.

「You have selected the Stairs of Wisdom.」

Naturally, our first choice was the trial of wisdom: a maze full of traps and monsters.

This was the part Rotmiller had trained me in most extensively, so we'd cut about forty minutes off our clear time.

"Raven, how long did that take?"

"One hour and fifty-eight minutes."

Considering it had taken five hours the first time, we'd become ridiculously fast.

「You have selected the Stairs of Wisdom.」

「You have selected the Stairs of Courage.」

「You have selected the Stairs of Wisdom.」

「You have selected the Stairs of Courage.」

We continued focusing on clearing trials and climbing the tower.

By the time day seven was drawing to a close...

'Twenty-seven stages on the first day...'

We'd effectively cleared a quarter of the tower in a single day. That pace would have been impossible without getting the Stairs of Wisdom several times in a row.

"It's a little early, but let's turn in."

The Stairs of Courage we'd just cleared required a four-hour wait before we could open the next door, so we simply prepared to camp.

"What about the night watch?"

"I don't think we'll need one."

We didn't assign a watch. We'd been using detection magic regularly throughout the day's exploration without detecting any other explorers.

"True, even if someone is hiding, a watch wouldn't do much good. If detection magic can't find them, what difference would it make?"

"Exactly what I was going to say."

"Then shall we eat before bed?"

"Sounds good."

We gathered to cook a simple meal, then went to our respective spots and lay down.

A comfortable night's sleep, the kind you could only get on the fourth floor.

Well, that was how it should have been...