Chapter 84
“...Phew, we managed to clear out quite a bit of them.”
Taking advantage of the opening created when the rainbow slash cleanly cleared out one side of the rat swarm, I sent the golem and combat drones ahead and drove the rats deeper into the dungeon.
The number of rats had fallen considerably in the meantime, and whenever drones had their armor plates scratched by bat swarms, I called them over, used Repair, and swiftly serviced them.
Though the drones were agile, they weren't as durable as golems, so they had taken damage from the bats' body slams.
“The rift at the entrance wasn't very big... How are there endless rats coming out of it?”
I grumbled as I made my way through the darkness.
I had thought the size, color, and shape of a rift determined its difficulty, but apparently that wasn't the case.
The rift visible from outside this dungeon looked like an ordinary low-level dungeon, yet this was the result.
Perhaps it only measured the danger level of each individual monster inside.
A single rat wasn't very threatening, after all.
The moment I passed through the long, winding cave passage and entered a relatively large space, my experience told me that this was where the boss would be.
“...Light up every nook and cranny.”
Whir—!
The drones' lights carefully searched every corner of the large space, and soon illuminated a shadow in one corner.
“...Is that a person?”
At first, I thought it was a survivor trapped in the dungeon.
But on closer inspection, the silhouette wasn't human.
It was the height of an adult man, with a hunched back, gray fur covering its entire body, and a long, protruding snout.
“A beastman?”
It was a beastman in the shape of a giant rat standing on two legs.
It was a beastman, but its appearance was closer to that of an animal.
‘A new demi-human?’
Just as I was about to lower my guard, it spotted me and pointed a thin finger at me.
Sizzle—!
A black shadow flickered at its fingertip, and dozens of rats were summoned in midair, pouring down with shrieks.
“Oh no...!”
The drones and I reacted immediately.
Rat-a-tat—! Fwoosh—!
The combat drones' guns roared, while the tip of my spear pierced the rats in midair.
But they were clearly different from the rat swarm before.
They didn't charge mindlessly.
When we quickly counterattacked, they kept their distance and began threatening us.
The bipedal rat-man summoned swarms with a single gesture and controlled their movements with precision.
“Squeak!”
At its short cry, rats leaped out from my sides and behind me.
Then they began targeting the places my windbreaker couldn't cover.
“...Annoying.”
The rat swarm wasn't targeting my windbreaker.
Instead, they persistently attacked my exposed wrists between the ends of my sleeves, my ankles below my pant cuffs, and my exposed face.
From my perspective, it was the most irritating way they could have attacked.
“At this rate...”
The sniper drone aimed at the rat-man's body, but it was far more agile than I had expected.
It flattened itself against the ground at incredible speed and melted into the darkness, and although the drones pursued it with their lights, they couldn't keep up.
The space was so large that it was far too easy for it to hide in the darkness.
KABOOM—!
Meanwhile, the golem was using shells to hold off dozens of rat swarms charging at my ankles.
The longer the battle lasted, the more disadvantageous it became for us.
As I stood there watching, it seemed as though the rats were gradually piling up.
“Combat drone, aim at my chest!”
At my command, the combat drone hesitated.
It didn't seem keen on receiving an order to attack its master.
“It's fine, so fire!”
At my shout, the combat drone finally turned its muzzle toward me.
BANG—!
The round fired by the combat drone struck the very center of my shoulder.
As during the earlier test, the bullet failed to penetrate the windbreaker, but I felt a powerful impact, as though someone had hit my shoulder head-on with a hammer.
“Ow!”
Although it hadn't been pierced, it seemed the windbreaker couldn't eliminate physical impact completely.
But my intention had worked perfectly.
Whoosh—!
The windbreaker, having absorbed a large amount of energy, emitted rainbow light in every direction.
It softly illuminated the entire area that had been shrouded in darkness, allowing the drones to spot the rat-man without even needing to shine their lights.
“Now, attack!”
The silhouette of the rat-man hiding in the darkness was revealed clearly.
The drones weren't about to miss the moment it covered its eyes at the sudden flash of light.
BANG—!
The bullet from the sniper drone that had been waiting pierced the rat-man's thigh.
“Kieeeek!”
Thud!
The rat-man, having lost its mobility, rolled across the floor.
“Squeak!”
Perhaps to protect their master, the summoned rats screamed and formed a barrier around it, but this time, the golem didn't remain idle.
The golem twisted its body and finished taking aim.
Then, this time, it fired repeatedly.
Kwoooargh—! KABOOM—!
The golem's successive barrage reduced the rat swarm to rubble.
The rats were blown apart into chunks of flesh, and there was now nothing obstructing the space between the rat-man and me.
Thwack—!
I kicked off the floor and leaped.
The floor was slick with rat corpses, but I didn't lose my balance.
“Kieeeek!”
The rat-man hurriedly raised a hand, but I had no intention of showing mercy.
It shouldn't have attacked me first.
Splat—!
The tip of my spear, striking down from the air, pierced the rat-man's throat precisely and embedded itself in the floor.
Its body convulsed and went limp without even managing to utter a death cry.
“...”
I coldly pulled out my spear and shook the blood from it.
My windbreaker was still blinking with a faint rainbow glow.
Thanks to my self-luminous clothes, I could see the rat-man's corpse disappearing even without any lighting, along with the loot and mana stones glowing beautifully.
“...Let's collect them and get out.”
The drones and golem began collecting the loot in front of it.
***
The cleanup after clearing this dungeon was quite an arduous chore as well.
Relying only on the drones' narrow lights to collect the loot and carry it out through the pitch-black darkness was no easy task.
In the end, I had no choice but to tap the windbreaker with my fist or the shaft of my spear to make use of its faint glow.
“Maybe because they're small, they don't give much in the way of mana stones.”
Though I hadn't counted them, even after wiping out hundreds or thousands of rats, the amount of mana stones I had harvested fell far short of my expectations.
Fortunately, loot such as bat wings and rat hides poured out in quantities large enough to fill my inventory.
Could I make something with these too?
As I gathered the loot and was about to leave the dungeon entrance, familiar message windows appeared one after another in midair.
[The Eye That Gazes Down Upon the World is satisfied with your truly dazzling performance.]
[The Interdimensional Collector sponsors a pair of sunglasses.]
[Several Constellations express their favor.]
“...Yeah, well. If they had fun....”
I pressed a hand to my forehead and let out a deep sigh.
Of course they'd enjoy it. Who wears a windbreaker like this to fight?
Even though I had become a laughingstock for the Constellations, I had removed a major threat hiding around the safe zone and obtained a great deal of monster material, so it was still worthwhile.
When I safely returned to the train, Ms. Ha-seon, who had been using her laptop in the cockpit, gave me an oddly amused smile.
“Good work. I watched you put on quite a show.”
“You watched me? Ah... You saw it through the drone cameras?”
When I tilted my head, Ha-seon silently showed me the laptop screen.
What she had brought up wasn't the board for human users, but the Constellation-only board that had been unlocked earlier.
---
[Title: A Toy That Glows When Hit]
(Photo)
Check it out.
[Comments]
Hammer Warrior: What the hell is that?
Nameless Swordsman: LOL, what are you doing?
Glutton: LOL. Still, that's an excellent piece of armor.
---
“...Now even the way they talk is just...”
Some of the titles and comments had quite a distinct Gallery flavor to them.
I didn't know how they had managed it, but the Constellations seemed to have been watching me in real time, even taking pictures of me.
Whether it was really a photograph or how they had uploaded it to the Gallery were both complete mysteries.
Seeing the picture of my windbreaker flashing, even I found it so absurd that a hollow laugh escaped me.
“So this is what I looked like from the side...”
To hide my embarrassment, I cleared my throat and took my smartphone from my pocket.
I intended to access the Survivor Gallery and look through the other posts as well.
But then.
“Huh?”
The moment I accessed the Gallery, a notification at the very top of the screen seized my attention.
It was a message.
That one, too, was from the Yeouido Safe Zone.
---
[Title: Notice of Changes to the Yeouido Election Schedule]
To respond to the rapidly changing circumstances within the Administration Bureau and the increasing influx of survivors,
we have unanimously agreed to hold the election at 1:00 a.m. tomorrow, earlier than originally scheduled.
Officials are asked to come to the Administration Bureau headquarters by noon tomorrow, while voters are asked to participate at the polling stations inside the Yeouido Safe Zone from 1:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.
---
“The election's been moved up? To tomorrow already?”
My mouth fell open as I read down through the post.
It seemed the election had been moved up.
The reason became apparent as soon as I read the message.
“...It must be because the two Administration Bureau candidates went missing.”
With the Administration Bureau and everyone else thrown into confusion, they must have been unable to postpone the election any longer.
The board was in an uproar, so it seemed the message hadn't been sent only to me.
“Sowon... This... We should go right away, shouldn't we?”
Ms. Ha-seon was looking at me with a tense expression as well.
I nodded with a bitter smile.