Chapter 14
“All right! Shall we get moving?”
The underachiever set down her empty lunchbox and shouted energetically.
“……Yeah, let’s go.”
I set down the lunchbox I had barely eaten half of and struggled to my feet. Only Ellie, quick to notice, approached and asked cautiously.
“A-are you all right?”
“Ah… yeah, I’m fine. Don’t worry too much.”
To be honest, I was nowhere near fine. Even after all that trouble last night, I’d only slept a little over two hours.
Mana isn’t recovered only through sleep, but it’s true that recovery is far more efficient while sleeping.
I might have barely recovered half the mana I’d expended yesterday. A heavy fatigue was now pressing down on my entire mind.
“Yaaawn… All right, everyone, over here.”
Unable to hold back the yawn that burst out, I wiped at the corners of my eyes and gestured.
Julia and the underachiever came scampering over at once. I squeezed my heavy eyelids shut, opened them again, and began explaining the next task.
“The fourth test will definitely be dungeon exploration.”
“Dungeon exploration?”
Julia asked in return. I nodded and answered.
“Yes, since the third hint pointed to the cave in the east.”
The one about the crown and whatnot.
“The format of the clues in the treasure hunt changes every time, but ‘dungeon exploration’ is included without fail. The fifth test will clearly be the final one, so this is the only time dungeon exploration could appear.”
“Hmm, I see.”
Julia nodded. This time, Ellie asked,
“Th-then it’ll take quite a while, won’t it?”
“Yeah, it will. Dungeon exploration is also one of the areas the teachers consider particularly important.”
Graduates with middling grades who couldn’t enter the Ministry of Magic almost always became adventurers or joined a knightly order.
So dungeon exploration was effectively a test directly tied to the career paths of most Luminus students. Of course, elites like me were an exception.
“Then we should aim for a high score here.”
Julia said.
“That’s right. Or we could find the ‘gimmick.’”
“Gimmick? What’s that?”
The underachiever asked brightly.
Yes, of course she’d ask exactly that. I nodded and turned to her.
“Simply put, it’s a secret passage the ancients hid away. They usually built one near the entrance.”
“A secret passage that leads straight to the deepest part of the dungeon…?”
“That’s right. Of course, most of them are hidden so cleverly that they’re practically impossible to find.”
There were several theories about the purpose of dungeons, but the most widely accepted one at present was that they were secret storehouses built by the ancients.
In other words, the gimmick was presumed to be a shortcut the owner of that storehouse used when going to retrieve something.
“Of course, there are also dungeons out there with no gimmicks at all, but this dungeon was artificially created by the instructors, so naturally, a gimmick will be hidden inside. And finding it always earns extra points.”
“Oh-ho, I see!”
The underachiever nodded as though she understood completely.
“If there are no more questions, let’s set out right away.”
Once everyone understood, there was no reason to delay. I immediately led them toward the cave due east and set off.
After about an hour and a half,
“W-we’re finally here.”
Ellie wiped the sweat from her forehead while panting.
“Haa… Yeah, we are.”
I, too, braced my hands against my waist and breathed heavily. Seriously, what the hell made this path so rough?
“Wow, it’s pitch-black!”
“It certainly is.”
The underachiever and Julia, on the other hand, didn’t look particularly tired.
The underachiever peered into the cave and cheerfully called out, “Hello!” Her voice echoed hollowly through the cave.
“Let’s rest for five minutes, then go in.”
What was she, a little kid? I let out a hollow laugh and sat down, leaning against the wall beside the cave entrance. Ellie quietly closed her eyes and sat down beside me as well.
“Are you in touch with Randy?”
“Ah… yes.”
Ellie answered without opening her eyes. I watched her from the corner of my eye and steadied my breathing.
How long had it been? Ellie suddenly opened her mouth.
“Whaaaat?”
“……?”
It was an unusually flustered voice for Ellie. Julia and the underachiever, who had been examining the inside of the cave near the entrance, were startled and turned toward us.
“What is it?”
I turned to Ellie and asked as well. Ellie’s eyes flew open, and she looked at me in disbelief.
“Th-the thing is, Randy says….”
“Yeah.”
“That group from yesterday has already passed the fourth stage!”
“……Huh?”
What on earth did that mean…? The statement was so sudden that I could only tilt my head in confusion. A brief silence followed.
Julia asked back, deliberately putting on a serious expression.
“Then are they already heading to the fifth stage, the final test site?”
“Y-yes! The golems came and put up a veil for them…!”
Sure enough, the rules required them to travel under a transparent veil during the final test to prevent the location from being exposed.
In other words, just as I had expected, the fifth stage was definitely the last one.
‘No, no, that’s not what matters right now…!’
I bit my thumbnail without realizing it. Forcing my tired mind to work, I retraced the path we had taken so far.
‘Even if they found the gimmick… could they really move that fast?’
I turned back to Ellie.
“What exactly did Randy say? How did they pass the fourth stage?”
“They came back out five minutes after entering the dungeon! It was an abandoned four-story building in the west.”
“……”
How on earth had they hidden the gimmick to make this possible…?
“Th-then shouldn’t we hurry inside too?”
The underachiever started fretting, stamping her feet.
“That’s right. We should get through the dungeon as soon as possible too.”
Julia also nodded in agreement.
“……No.”
But that would be too late.
If they had passed through the dungeon by finding the ‘gimmick’ in the first place, then even if we found it, the best we could hope for would be a tie.
And in the event of a tie, naturally, those who had reached the fifth stage first would receive the higher score.
No matter how exemplary our passage through the first, second, and third stages had been, being several hours behind first place made it meaningless. Following the ordinary route from here would be tantamount to defeat.
“Cartographia!”
I pressed the tip of my wand to the ground and shouted. A three-dimensional map of the entire mountain rose above the sandy ground in front of the cave.
“Ms. Rene?”
Ellie tilted her head, looking puzzled. Without a word, I closed my eyes and activated mana detection.
At full output, too—the maximum output Rene possessed.
“……Ugh.”
Mana was sucked out of me at an astonishing rate, and dizziness washed over me.
“R-Rene!”
The underachiever jumped in surprise and supported my shoulder.
“I’m… I’m fine….”
This level of consumption was within the range I’d expected. Besides, that detection had allowed me to determine the exact locations of every group.
I pulled free of the underachiever’s support and planted my wand against the ground. I began marking each group’s location on the map with dots.
“Are these… the locations of each group?”
Julia quickly grasped the situation and asked. I nodded and turned to Ellie.
“Ellie, where was the last place Randy spotted Martin’s group?”
“Um… it was… over here.”
Ellie pointed to the empty space in the west where no dot had been marked.
I placed a dot where Ellie was pointing. Then I marked our location, the spot Ellie had identified as Martin’s last known location, and Kairos’s position, where I had sensed unusually powerful mana, with stars.
“Nexus… Signum….”
Next, I overlaid the routes taken by the other groups, which I had recorded separately yesterday, onto the map.
The map grew complicated in an instant. Even so, a clear pattern emerged.
Based on that pattern, I erased all the dots belonging to groups that were highly unlikely to have reached the ‘fourth stage’ yet.
Finally, I erased yesterday’s records as well, leaving roughly ten dots on the map.
I drew a small circle that passed perfectly through those dots—especially the three stars from earlier—and turned to the other three.
“The final test site is at the center of this circle.”
“Whaaat?”
“……What?”
The underachiever and Ellie stared at me as though I’d said something absurd.
“Ah.”
But Julia seemed to have realized something. She stared blankly at me and asked,
“So it’s to ensure that the order of arrival at the final test site isn’t disadvantaged by the location of the fourth-stage clue… for the sake of fairness?”
“Yes, exactly.”
I nodded and looked at Ellie and the underachiever.
“Suppose I passed the fourth stage in first place. Then Kairos passed it an hour later in second. But the final test site is three hours away for me, while Kairos is only an hour away, right? What would happen in the final test?”
“Ah…!”
The two of them nodded as though they had only just understood.
“But… how did you know the locations of every group, Ms. Rene…?”
Julia, meanwhile, still looked astonished as she asked.
“I have my ways. I’ll tell you the details later.”
Now was no time to leisurely explain my custom detection magic, MK.11. I erased the map, tucked my wand into my robe, and looked southwest—the center of the circle.
“Then let’s set out right away. If we hurry, we should still arrive around the same time.”
But just as I was about to set off….
“W-wait a moment.”
Ellie startled and grabbed me by the hem of my robe.
When I turned around, she moved her lips nervously and glanced sideways at the cave entrance.
“B-but this is cheating… We’ll definitely be disqualified.”
It was an understandable concern. I had essentially declared that we would skip the fourth test itself.
“Don’t worry.”
But that was not a concern at all.
I raised the corner of my mouth slightly and asked her,
“Do you remember our school’s motto?”
“O-our motto?”
Ellie’s shoulders flinched in bewilderment.
“Lux in Angulis Infinitis Reflectitur (light is reflected at infinite angles)….”
Julia recited it quietly. I nodded and asked again,
“Then what does that motto mean?”
“T-there isn’t just one correct answer….”
Ellie muttered blankly, then her eyes widened as though she finally understood everything.
“The answer.”
No further explanation seemed necessary.
I smiled lightly and immediately began walking southwest.