Chapter 4
The sound of two sets of footsteps echoed across the stone floor, which had once formed the bottom of a tower.
Seonghyeon pressed on, keeping an ear out for Suyeon’s footsteps behind him.
The Labyrinth was dangerous anywhere, anytime, so they had to stay on high alert and watch the way ahead as they went.
Random spawns happened now and then, but they weren’t all that common on the surface levels. And they weren’t malicious enough to pop up right in the middle of a crowd, either.
Seonghyeon had never seen a random spawn, not even when he’d reached the middle levels.
According to witnesses, something like clay rose up and slowly took shape?
Seonghyeon recalled what he’d learned from the Adventurers’ Guild.
Besides, this was the uppermost floor of the surface levels.
There was hardly any point in watching their backs, really.
Seonghyeon had a Threat Detection skill, so he could sense everything nearby without keeping watch, but he still paid attention to obstacles and rough terrain as he walked.
For about an hour, the two of them pressed on in silence.
As they continued walking straight ahead, Suyeon spoke up in an exhausted voice.
“Hey… Seonghyeon… hey.”
“What is it, Yeon?”
“Let’s… take… a break.”
When Seonghyeon turned around, Suyeon’s face was deathly pale.
She didn’t seem as tired as before, but she looked awful.
“What’s wrong? Are you sick?”
“Uh… My chest, right here… My solar plexus feels so tight.”
“You ate that much earlier. Did you get indigestion?”
“M-maybe…”
Suyeon pursed her lips as if embarrassed, then turned her head away.
That expression looked strangely like Kim Suyeon as Seonghyeon remembered her, making it hit home all over again that this was his friend.
Unfortunately, indigestion wasn’t an illness or injury, so healing magic couldn’t fix it.
He’d heard priests had magic that could even cure something like that, but Seonghyeon was a combat-oriented Cleric, so there was nothing he could do to help.
Then Seonghyeon suddenly remembered an old-fashioned remedy.
“Want me to prick your finger?”
“That… It’s a superstition. I don’t believe in superstitions.”
“Superstition or not, this isn’t the world you knew anymore.”
“Still… I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“I’m a Cleric, so I get a bonus when it comes to superstitions. Leave it to me.”
“Where are you going to get a needle?”
“I always carry one. If a wound splits open, I have to stitch it up and cast healing magic.”
“Ugh… Seriously?”
“Of course.”
Seonghyeon had once saved someone by stitching up a wound so severe their insides had spilled out, but he didn’t tell Suyeon the whole story. Her nerves were already frayed, and she’d become especially squeamish.
It had happened to a former party member who’d taken a direct hit from a minotaur, so Seonghyeon remembered it vividly.
You’d think seeing a badly wounded or dying person would give someone PTSD…
But perhaps because becoming a Cleric in this other world had boosted his Mental Fortitude to 10, Seonghyeon hadn’t suffered any lasting psychological damage.
Anyway, he laid out a mat, sat Suyeon down, and took her hand.
Her hand was painfully thin, with chains around her wrist. The scrawny girl’s hand looked absolutely pitiful.
Seonghyeon took a needle out of his travel pack.
Suyeon flinched, but Seonghyeon grinned and teased her.
“I’m going to prick it, so look away if you’re squeamish.”
“Ah~ I’m a guy too, you know. I can handle it.”
“Sure.”
“Aaaaah!”
As Suyeon let out a scream, Seonghyeon pricked her ring finger, and her blood, a distinctive shade of purple, welled up.
It occurred to Seonghyeon that elf blood was used as an ingredient in elixirs.
He wasn’t entertaining some mad scientist fantasy about hooking his friend up to a blood-draining machine, but he did take out a little potion bottle and collect some of Suyeon’s blood.
“What are you doing?”
“I heard elf blood sells well.”
Suyeon narrowed her eyes at Seonghyeon’s words and seemed to mull something over for a while.
Then, as if she’d made up her mind, she spoke to Seonghyeon with a determined expression.
“Fine. If that can help pay off my debt, then do it.”
“What were you thinking?
“You’re going to draw my blood and sell it, aren’t you?”
“I just collected it in case. Besides, this is rotten blood.”
“There’s no such thing as rotten blood. That’s fresh blood from my capillaries, you know?”
Seonghyeon didn’t feel like arguing over common sense.
This was a world where the common sense he’d known no longer applied.
Instead of answering, Seonghyeon finished reciting the healing spell he’d left unfinished earlier over the small wound from the needle.
Suyeon’s body began to glow faintly green, and her complexion improved considerably.
“W-what was that?”
“What?”
“I feel better. Does this really work?”
“Who knows? This is a world where superstitions come true.”
“Wow… You’re amazing.”
“Yeah, I am pretty amazing.”
“Can’t you just take a compliment gracefully?”
“Mm-hmm~ Now get up, you useless Sorcerer who can’t even use magic~”
It must have restored some of her stamina, too.
Suyeon stuck out her lower lip, but Seonghyeon showed no mercy.
He helped her up by the hand, then started walking ahead again.
“Are monsters actually going to show up today?”
“We need to get at least one magic stone. I usually hunt around the middle levels, around the twelfth floor, and I generally have to stay in there for over a week once I go in.”
“Ugh… So we’ll have to camp here?”
“Want me to hold you tight while we sleep?”
“Fuck… No thanks. It’d be disgusting, two guys sleeping together.”
Aside from the fact that the voice saying that belonged to an unbearably cute girl, this was definitely the Suyeon he’d known since they were kids.
Seonghyeon wasn’t particularly interested in romance, as Suyeon seemed to think.
It wasn’t as though he felt any romantic affection for his friend. He only felt a sense of responsibility toward her.
He could swear that on his Cleric class.
“It’s fine. We’ll head back when the bell rings today.”
“Is this a school? They ring a bell?”
“I just mean we’ll go back even if we don’t earn anything.”
“Okay.”
He was making pointless small talk for Suyeon’s sake.
If she realized Seonghyeon was more impressive than she thought, their relationship might really turn into one between a master and a slave.
Seonghyeon didn’t want that.
That was why he’d never activate the slave mark in earnest.
Though… he might fiddle with it now and then as a joke.
The two of them reached a section of collapsed passageway.
Going down through here would take them to the second floor, and a little farther on was the area known as the first-floor monster hunting grounds.
Maybe because it was on the surface, there were a lot of people gathered here.
“Oh~ It’s Mr. Raine!”
“What, Mr. Raine? Going solo again today?”
“Why don’t you come with us? Oh, who’s that beside you?”
“Wait, you brought a slave? That’s unusual. I didn’t expect someone like you to have a slave, Mr. Raine.”
“Well, everyone. It’s nice to see you, but if you crowd around her like that, you’ll scare her.”
Seonghyeon gently kept the adventurers who’d approached at a distance as they called him by his alias, ‘Raine.’
Until now, Suyeon had been playing along with Seonghyeon and acting fairly bold, but when she found herself in front of all those people, she visibly shrank back.
She hadn’t used to be like that, but maybe what the slave trader had put her through had really shaken her.
And it wasn’t just a little. Her status window actually showed a [Denial of Reality] debuff.
“Ah, you haven’t had her long, have you?”
“She’s an elf? She’s so cute. Don’t worry, big sis won’t bully you. Heh heh~”
Seonghyeon grinned wickedly and grabbed the witch by the ear, dragging her away from Suyeon.
The witch laughed as she was dragged along by Seonghyeon.
“Ow, ow! Mr. Raine, what’s this for? We’ve seen everything there is to see of each other~”
“My slave is afraid of people. She hasn’t even learned the human language properly yet. Of course she’d be scared if you all talked to her like that in a language she doesn’t understand, right?”
“Oh~ She hasn’t learned human speech yet?”
“I suppose that could be it. Hmm…”
The adventurers all nodded and gave Suyeon some space.
Only then did Suyeon finally breathe a sigh of relief, moving a little farther away from them to catch her breath.
Seonghyeon kept Suyeon in mind, but he couldn’t ignore the warrior who’d come over to him.
That warrior was the party leader who’d first invited Seonghyeon to join his party when he’d been lost a year ago, and even carried him through the levels.
“So, Mr. Raine. We’re thinking of taking on the middle-level boss next time and heading down to the lower levels. What level are you now? You’ve been soloing a lot lately. You’d level up faster and have a great time if you joined a party.”
“No, I’m planning to work with that slave of mine.”
“What’s your slave’s class? With your skills, Mr. Raine, we could bring one more along.”
What the warrior party leader meant was that since Seonghyeon was a Cleric, it wouldn’t hurt to carry one more deadweight through the dungeon.
But Seonghyeon had lived through thick and thin with Suyeon, and he thought she wouldn’t be able to keep up with the way they operated just yet, so he politely declined.
“No, I’m only level 8, and I’d just be a burden to you all.”
“You wouldn’t be a burden. Just putting buffs on us would be enough.”
“No. I’ll get a little better first, then join you. But thanks for the offer.”
Seonghyeon bowed politely, then left them and went to look for Suyeon.
Fortunately, Suyeon wasn’t an actual child, so he found her not far away.
“Suyeon.”
“…What?”
“Were you scared? Chicken?”
“Hey… I wasn’t scared.”
“Then let’s go hunting. The hunting grounds are right next door.”
“…Those people were trying to recruit you into their party, weren’t they? I can understand the gist even if I don’t know human speech.”
“Oh? You’re smart.”
“I know.”
“Then can you read the Fireball book by intuition and cast Fireball, too?”
“That’s a bit much.”
“It’s fine. I’m not going to betray you. If I’d wanted to join that party, I would’ve locked you up at the inn and left you behind. Don’t you want to make a name for yourself in a world like this? It’s every man’s dream.”
Seonghyeon grinned and held out his hand. Suyeon sighed, then took it.
“…Why do you try so hard to look cool?”
“Because I am cool.”
“Bullshit.”