The lot of us headed to Damian's study.
Today was unusual—Novem, Aria, Miranda, Poyopoyo, and even Clara had tagged along.
The reason I brought Clara was that the Third Generation had strongly insisted on it.
In the study, Damian examined Porter, then activated it to see how it performed. Today's objective was to get the opinion of Damian, the Automaton Master, regarding the puppet.
We wanted to confirm whether it was suitable to serve as both pack mule and party tank.
Our party's weakness was that we had no tank during combat. At the same time, carrying a heavy load of luggage made it impossible to move freely.
When I first considered using puppets to compensate for our lack of manpower, the question that came to mind was whether they had to be humanoid.
Damian looked at Porter and turned to me for his thoughts.
Usually, the three Automatons—[Unit One], [Unit Two], and [Unit Three]—that cleaned Damian's study were, for some reason, standing by near their master. Their gazes kept drifting toward Novem.
"Are you still planning to change this?"
I nodded.
"I tested it a few times in the dungeon, but I think it could stand to be bigger."
Porter was still a prototype.
I had run it through the dungeon repeatedly, identifying areas for improvement. This was being done because Poyopoyo had strongly insisted on it.
"For a prototype, I'd say this is pretty good. But it's really specialized for the Aramsass Dungeon. Whether it'd work anywhere else is questionable."
Dungeons varied greatly depending on location. The Aramsass Dungeon, with its relatively flat floors, was something of a rarity.
However, this time our goal was to break through floor thirty of the Aramsass Dungeon. I figured Porter would be fine for that.
If further improvements were needed, we could always add them later.
"I'm thinking of going with a specialized type. So, what's your impression after moving it around?"
Damian pushed his glasses up with his index finger as he operated Porter in the spacious study.
"Someone like you or me wouldn't have any trouble. I think it would be fine as support for a mid-tier adventurer or above... but the number of people who could actually use it would be vanishingly small."
Damian said the size was the problem.
If it was fine when I used it, I thought that should be enough—but.
A voice came from within the Jewel.
The Fourth Generation, sounding frustrated.
*Tch, I'll need to revise the plan. If Porter had worked out, the Golem magic would've surged in popularity all at once... Looks like there's a problem.*
Right.
The Fourth Generation had been cheerfully drawing up plans to make money.
That was why I had asked whether other adventurers could use it too.
"That girl from the library over there..."
Damian's gaze fell on Clara.
But—
"...No, probably not. If I attach a shield to her, the weight goes up. Well, it might just barely work..."
Damian fell into thought.
Then Novem spoke up.
"Why don't you teach Clara how to use the Golem magic? She may have the aptitude for it."
Would it really be that simple to teach?
I thought as much, but Damian did as suggested.
"Good idea. It'll be faster to just try it. Library girl, I'm going to teach you, so give it a shot."
—That was the kind of guy he was.
Clara let out a sigh.
"Haa... I never imagined I'd end up being taught like this."
Once taught, Clara used Porter on the spot.
Seeing that, Poyopoyo—
"Oh, Porter... it's the love child of me and that Chicken!"
She launched into a one-woman performance, so I left her to it. Then Miranda offered her impression.
"Looks pretty good to me. For a first try, it seems to be working quite well."
Damian agreed.
"Yeah, like that woman over there said, she's got talent."
Hearing that, Aria turned to Damian.
"'That woman over there'... Miranda used to be your student, you know."
Damian looked at Miranda. Then—
"Was she? Huh? I feel like I might know you, but also might not... Someone like you seems like she'd leave an impression. Strange."
Damian tilted his head in puzzlement, and Miranda smiled at him.
"How cruel, Professor. But I suppose that's exactly like you—it puts me at ease."
A voice came from the Jewel.
The Fifth Generation.
*She got a lot more eye-catching all of a sudden. She must draw people's attention now. She resembles Mireia... though her personality is a bit different.*
Apparently her personality differed, but she had come to resemble our ancestor Mireia even more.
Clara gave her impression.
"I can move it, but the legs, maybe? Using this makes it feel heavy. For an average person, I think it'd be fine, though."
Damian nodded upon hearing that.
"I remember your abilities, but your support role was at a mid-tier level, right? If it's barely cutting it for someone at this level, then for ordinary people we'd need to make it significantly smaller. If you want to reduce mana consumption, there are still plenty of points to improve. But the wheels are excellent."
Damian was praising it.
Poyopoyo glanced at the three Automatons and grinned.
The three wore frustrated expressions. You could really only call them masterfully detailed.
Damian delivered his conclusion.
"For ordinary adventurers, something more compact would be better. For stairs... I'd shorten the legs and have it crawl? That way it wouldn't move much."
When it came to golems and puppets, Damian really did have the best insights.
Miranda spoke up.
"So that means, for the time being, it's back to sequestering yourself in the warehouse for more Porter improvements?"
I nodded, but before that, I had a few things lined up.
"I'll keep improving it, but we're heading into the dungeon soon. If we go too long without moving as a party, I might start forgetting I'm an adventurer."
Recently, I had been earning pocket money inside the dungeon.
When I spotted adventurers trudging along under heavy loads in order to dive deeper, I used Porter—unloaded—to carry their baggage down to floor five. In return, I received silver coins, and on the way back up, I picked up adventurers heading for the surface. More silver coins there.
The Fourth Generation had worked out a rate based on what adventurers could afford to pay, and we ran it as a business—so many silver coins on the way down, and so many on the way back.
I had been approached more than once by adventurers who seriously offered gold coins if I would follow them as support.
It was from that that the Fourth Generation conceived of commercializing Porter.
Damian looked at Porter and spoke.
"I've gotten a fresh burst of inspiration. Lyle, you really are interesting. Oh, right... about that boss's armor—it turns out the whole set was still intact. You're buying it, right? He said if the school takes what's left, since it just gets in the way, he'd sell it cheap."
I had been told that as long as enough was left for research purposes, he had no further use for it.
I had already reached out to Damian to purchase the massive haul of floor-forty boss armor.
The purchase had been decided, but if it could be had for cheaper, that was a welcome bonus.
Novem said, "Lyle-sama has been earning quite a bit lately, so he should be fine to a certain extent."
I watched Novem giggle and wanted to protest, but held back.
The money-grubbing gremlin of a Fourth Generation had been issuing the instructions, so I had no choice but to carry them out. All I wanted was to test Porter—and if that worked, I was happy.
The Fourth Generation said, *We're still early on, but if Porter is going to get improvements, maybe we suspend operations for a while... We've just started building up a clientele.*
I was impressed by the Fourth Generation's business acumen, but I was an adventurer. This sort of side income felt iffy, and the idea of commercializing Porter had never even crossed my mind.
*(I'll need to talk to them about this later.)*
Thinking that, I continued discussing Porter and the dungeon with Damian.
Miranda and Aria, meanwhile, had started talking about recent events.
"Aria, your vibe's changed a bit lately, hasn't it?"
"I-It has? I mean, I suppose as an adventurer I—"
"You've gotten more manly."
Aria replied to the smiling Miranda: "...You seemed like a nice person. I hadn't realized."
Miranda, all smiles, and Aria, radiating hostility, glared at each other. Meanwhile, Novem, Poyopoyo, and the three Automatons—
"Um, is there something wrong?"
Four Automatons staring at her, Novem tilted her head. I thought it looked incredibly cute.
Poyopoyo said, "This vixen... performing adorable little gestures..."
Units One through Three declared: "Calculated! She's definitely doing it all on purpose!"
"What is this? To harbor such rivalry—! Just who are you?!"
"No match for us against a half-witted Poyopoyo? Very well, we shall take you on!"
The three Automatons struck their poses, and Poyopoyo shrieked: "Who are you calling half-witted?! The only one allowed to call me that is that Chicken! I'll turn you all into scrap!"
I don't know where she pulled it from, but she had produced a drill and was entering combat stance.
Come to think of it, while she was building Porter, she had been saying things like "Drills and robots are romantic."
*(It's a madhouse.)*
The study had descended into chaos, and I sat there thinking that.
Then Clara—
"Um... Am I going along with joining the party at this point? People keep casually inviting me, but I'm basically a solo adventurer and temporary party member... Is anyone listening?"
Late at night.
I appeared inside the Jewel and asked about something that had been bothering me for a while.
It was the answer I had arrived at.
To conquer the Aramsass Dungeon, I had deployed a golem to compensate for our shortage of manpower and shore up the party's weakness—our lack of a tank.
I had heard that the ancestors called this different from their own answer.
So I asked my ancestors what their intentions had been.
The result—
"So that was it all along... There had been several possible approaches from the start? And you deliberately kept quiet?"
When I said that, the Second Generation nodded and explained.
*That's right. My choice was simply to spend time building up our foundations while finding trustworthy companions. That Clara girl would be a good target. I didn't exactly keep quiet... I was wondering whether you'd notice, but you didn't, Lyle.*
The Third Generation had been fond of Clara.
*She's great, isn't she, Clara-chan? A walking library. She must be brimming with knowledge. Ah, in my case, I would have tagged along with another party just to take down the boss. The issue was whether I could meet a party trustworthy enough for that, but I could have just asked Clara-chan.*
The Fourth Generation's opinion was quite something.
*Hiring people for money would have worked too. Request an escort down to floor thirty. In my view, I'd have allowed using Skills while watching other adventurers up close. That alone would have been enough.*
That was what I had lacked.
The Fourth Generation said just realizing it would have been enough. No—more precisely, I should have learned what I could under conditions where I couldn't use Skills.
The Fifth Generation's answer was closest to mine.
*I was thinking of using golems to compensate for the lack of manpower. Prepare just a tank—just a shield—and deploy it when combat begins so you can fight safely. The strategy of building an improvised defensive fortification inside the dungeon. Simple, but reliable, right?*
Hearing it laid out, I had to nod in agreement.
It didn't sound like advice from an adventurer, but it was effective. I filed it away.
The Sixth Generation's idea was similar.
*Same here. I was thinking of preparing simple, easy-to-control puppets to make up for numbers. Beyond that—hiring people with money.*
The last one, the Seventh Generation, said:
*I was watching to see how you would tackle the challenge and what you would do once you noticed the problem... I'm serious, by the way. My answer, incidentally, was to issue a quest to defeat the floor-thirty boss. I had considered using golems as well.*
I shot back at that.
"No, but the whole point was about communication with companions, making me realize other things!"
That was what I had thought, but the ancestors all grinned.
The Second Generation said: *We wanted to see how you would clear the challenge we gave you. It was good watching you take it seriously.*
The Third Generation: *Lyle, broaden your perspective. I did steer you in the direction you were thinking, but the challenge we set was 'Defeat the floor-thirty boss under Skill restrictions and return.' At the end of the day... you could have fought the boss yourself and left the hired adventurers to handle the rest, then returned to the surface.*
The Third Generation burst out laughing.
When they had imposed the Skill restriction, saying it was too dangerous to keep going as-is—what had that been all about? While I fumed, the Fourth Generation spoke.
*Don't get angry. We genuinely wanted to see how you would handle the challenge, and you noticed more problems than we expected. Besides, you came up with a new way to use golems, didn't you? If you'd only asked us, Porter would never have been born.*
It seemed the ancestors had wanted to see how I thought and acted. In the end, I had produced an answer that satisfied them.
Not that I was satisfied.
The Fifth Generation, looking more cheerful than usual, said to me:
*Good thinking. Realizing the importance of a tank was also good. If you break through floor thirty safely, you pass.*
If I broke through safely.
Which meant I still hadn't passed yet.
The Sixth Generation addressed my frustration: *Lyle, there's never just one way to solve a problem. Taking your time to build up everyone's foundation is a perfectly valid choice. It's just that hiring people is equally valid. Well, I may have nudged you toward making that mistake on purpose.*
The Seventh Generation apologized:
*I know it was rough, but the world is full of shortcuts. There are times when a straightforward approach won't cut it. And besides—*
The Second Generation picked up the explanation:
*The moment you noticed the problem and decided to improve it, we'd achieved our goal. If you hadn't noticed, we would have simply given you a different challenge.*
Seeing that I still wasn't convinced, the ancestors laughed.
The Fifth Generation said: *You recognized your own shortcomings and worked to improve them. You also relied on Clara to find an answer to a problem we hadn't noticed. The only issue was that you relied a bit too much, but that's not wrong either.*
I asked the lot of them.
"So... any method would have been fine? Even if I hadn't noticed the current problem and ignored it all while still clearing the challenge?"
The Third Generation nodded.
*That's right. To put it extremely, even that would have been fine—as long as you had the strength to not even dignify that level of problem with a thought.*
But the Sixth Generation said:
*However, if you had strayed from the path, you would never have been allowed to use Skills again. Lyle, you took our challenge seriously and produced a convincing answer. Now all that's left is to put it into practice and show your strength.*
There were parts I could accept, and parts I couldn't.
"Were you not worried I might push myself too hard and fail?"
The Second Generation spoke to me with a serious expression:
*If you died from something like this, then that's all you were. Your talent, your companions, your environment... if you couldn't handle this, you'd have hit a wall eventually and been wiped out no matter how far you progressed.*
I fell silent under the Second Generation's intensity, and the Third Generation came to my rescue:
*Relax. Everyone here was looking forward to seeing how you'd clear the challenge. We set the challenge because we believed you could do it. If we thought you couldn't, we wouldn't have had any expectations for you in the first place.*
No—that wasn't a rescue at all.
These guys were ganging up on me today.
What on earth had I done?
Finally, the Fifth Generation scratched his head and said:
*Every last one of you... Lyle, it's your life. You're the only one who can give the answer. What you feel, how you respond—only you can decide.*
The Fifth Generation's words made me recall what the First Generation had said.
**Lyle... have you decided on your goal?**
A sharp pain pricked my heart.
*(My answer...)*