Chapter 83
"What is this supposed to be...?"
The moment he witnessed the mysterious phenomenon unfolding before him, Kagami felt an odd sense of disquiet. He knew this feeling—as though things had been arranged to happen this way.
"I don't know, but no matter how much we dig, it keeps regenerating. It's almost as if it's telling us we can't go any farther..."
"I can see that much, but how is it doing that? What's making it work like this?"
"How should I know? It must be some kind of magic we can't understand... or something along those lines."
"Magic, huh..."
But Kagami hadn't felt any magical energy when the ground swelled up. Still, there was no other way to explain it. To him, it was as if something were forcing him to accept it as simply 'the way things are,' just like the existence of status windows. The thought left him feeling a little sick.
"If I could sell this dirt, I could get rich... But I don't have any use for it."
"And there's no way we're taking it all back with us... But would this happen anywhere we dug, once we reached this depth?"
"No, it wouldn't. I once dug a pit deeper than this to take down a huge monster whose level was higher than mine. It worked, but it was so inefficient I swore I'd never do it again."
"A pitfall to defeat an enemy... Was the difference in your levels really that great?"
"No, it was only one level. But you get experience when your opponent is higher level... I was still a low-level Villager back then, too. And I was alone."
Seeing Kagami's expression grow darker, as if he'd remembered something unpleasant, Menou looked away.
But what Kagami had said also meant that a special mechanism was at work here and nowhere else. That convinced them both there was something beyond this point.
"But there's no point if we can't get through... If it's refusing entry like this, there must be some other way inside."
"So it won't allow us to enter the dungeon by any other means..."
Even though they now knew something was here, it was no use if they couldn't reach it. The two sighed, realizing they'd gone to all that trouble for nothing.
Even so, though he knew it was pointless, Kagami kept searching for a way through, digging with his shovel in a different spot from the one Menou had dug earlier. But it made no difference. The dirt he'd dug gradually swelled back up, filling the hole until the ground was as it had been before.
"...Huh?"
But Kagami didn't stop the pointless process.
Even though he knew it was useless, Kagami kept trying to dig through the ground as it regenerated again and again.
"It's no use, Kagami-dono... Give up and let's head back to town for now—Kagami-dono?"
Menou murmured with a look of complete resignation, but Kagami kept digging without giving up, as if he'd realized something.
Only when the endlessly regenerating dirt had piled up enough to cover Kagami's feet did Menou finally notice the change.
"This stuff regenerates incredibly fast, but it looks like we can make some progress if we dig even faster."
The ground couldn't regenerate as fast as Kagami could dig. But while he stopped to say that, the dirt he'd dug up began to swell back into place.
"It does seem that way... But what are you going to do?"
"It'd be a shame to come all this way and just turn back. Besides, I'm curious about what's beyond... I think I'll try digging through, even if it's a little reckless."
"Reckless...? What are you planning to do, Kagami-dono?"
"If there's something nasty waiting for us when we get through, you protect me, okay? I'm counting on you."
"W-wait—"
As Kagami said that and flashed Menou a smile, a white aura poured out of his body.
Kagami considered the possibility that what lay beyond might be an outrageous dungeon filled with nothing but high-level monsters. Even so, he activated Release Limit, a Skill that temporarily unlocked 70% of his power for three minutes, though he could normally only bring out about 30% by his own will.
Using this Skill would leave him unable to move for an entire day once the three minutes were up. Activating it when he had no idea what lay ahead was nothing short of foolish, but Kagami did it anyway, fully aware of the risk.
His sheer curiosity about what existed beyond this point made him do it.
"Let's go, Menou... Don't stray from me! Make sure you keep up!"
"H-hey! Kagami-dono, wait—!"
"Here we go!"
Seeing Kagami activate the Skill, Menou hurriedly grabbed him around the waist, knowing there was no stopping him now. Immediately afterward, Kagami threw all his strength into a punch aimed at the ground.
The instant Kagami's fist struck the earth, an impact like an explosion erupted. The clods of dirt around them were caught up in it, and the earth where he'd punched was blasted away.
"Here I go...!"
After confirming that the impact had blown away about a meter of dirt beneath them, Kagami moved the shovel at a speed too fast for the eye to follow, flinging the clods of earth beneath his feet high into the air.
"Ugh... M-my head's spinning..."
Like a drill boring into the ground, Kagami spun at incredible speed as he kept shoveling away the dirt beneath his feet. Menou spun right behind him, clinging tightly to his back.
The two sank down, pushing against the dirt as it tried to swell back up, and slowly made their way deeper and deeper. Their situation changed after they'd been digging for two minutes.
"Uoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooh! ...Huh?"
"K-Kagami-dono!? Th-this is... W-we're faaaall—!"
After they'd dug about eight meters deeper, the ground suddenly collapsed with a pop, and the two were enveloped by a sensation of weightlessness. But it lasted only a few seconds before they crashed into the ground.
"Ow... Menou and I sure do end up falling together a lot."
"Kagami-dono... You're h-heavy."
"Oh, sorry. No wonder that didn't hurt as much as I expected."
Perhaps because they hadn't fallen from very high, the two got up almost immediately and looked around.
Despite the lack of any light reaching it, the space had a sacred quality, bathed in a faint blue-green glow. It was so strange that they couldn't even tell whether it was a dungeon.
The place they'd fallen into was a wide, circular chamber, with no passageways—just dirt glowing blue-green all around them. At its center stood a spiral staircase made of similarly glowing blue-green stone, leading farther down.
"What is this room...?"
As Kagami murmured and looked up at the spot where they'd fallen from, he saw that the hole was already gone, completely sealed shut.
"Ugh... It closed up."
"So... there really was a dungeon in the Holy Forest. Does that mean the Dark Dragon is here?"
"Looks like it. I never imagined there'd be a dungeon in such a strange place."
"The hole's closed, so we can't go back the way we came... There might be another way out farther in. We don't know what lies ahead, but let's keep going, Kagami-dono. Carefully... Be very cautious."
Menou murmured this with a grave expression. Kagami answered, "Yeah," and turned his gaze toward the spiral staircase in the center of the room.
Three seconds later, the effect of the Release Limit Skill wore off, and Kagami collapsed face-first onto the ground.