The Sahagins we'd wiped out had been a great haul.
Agaro dropped a Sahagin corpse into the plunge pool and spoke.
"...Nobody told me Sahagins would be attacking."
"For this many, it's within the margin of error."
"That's not how it works, though."
For the record, Sahagins were inedible whether you grilled them or boiled them.
They had no parts worth skinning, and even if you brought back a kill trophy, you'd get peanuts for it.
And apparently, there were several kinds of equally useless dungeon monsters like that.
"But they were weaklings."
"Sure, but still."
"Is something wrong?"
I asked the two of them.
Agaro scratched his cheek.
"Wof. You. What do you make of this swarm of Sahagins?"
"I'm thinking the workers and their escort might have been attacked."
A horde like this. If they'd been caught in it, they wouldn't have made it out in one piece.
"Yeah, but those guys aren't the type to go down to something like this."
"The escort — they're a party?"
"That's right. A four-person team. Third-rank, the 'Lid of Tartarus.'"
That's quite the impressive party name.
Third-rank, so the same as Torquetam.
I knew there were several third-rank parties out there.
But I didn't know the details. I didn't know much about fourth-rank or second-rank either.
"Hmm. Anyway, shouldn't we head to the ruins?"
"Right."
"Um — Woof. Yes."
"Why did you just bark?"
"Woof?"
Standing around here wasn't going to accomplish anything.
We went inside the ruins.
There was nothing inside the ruins. Surprisingly, absolutely nothing.
The ground was dirt, too.
It felt like a cardboard facade — grand on the outside, hollow within.
"What's with this half-heartedness? How disappointing."
Narcissus was let down.
Agaro said, in a tone that suggested he was used to this.
"They don't exactly reproduce artificial objects faithfully, do they?"
Artificial objects found in dungeons are reproductions of things that originally existed on the surface.
But they weren't perfect reproductions.
It still feels like the inside of a lazy open-world game.
"Um, um, um, Agaro-san. Where are we heading?"
"There was that dome-like thing, right? Over there."
Just then, a countless number of red dots appeared deep within the ruins on my Danger Discernment.
And just to be sure, I used the Wheel of Fortune. I saw a yellow light.
Moreover, that light overlapped with the red dots. The enemy has something. Anyway.
"It's an enemy."
"Oh, good."
"Saehagin again?"
"I can't tell that far."
Danger Discernment only discerns danger. The details of the red dots are unclear.
"Um, um, I sense an enemy presence."
It's too dark deeper in to tell. I aimed the light ball over there.
"That thing really is convenient, huh."
"We'll be selling Hiyarn products next time."
"Wh— I definitely have to buy that!"
"Na!"
Well, Dagaa doesn't need to buy one.
"Is that light ball really that desirable?"
Narsess tilted her head.
"Hey, as a delver... that's not really first-class dialogue, is it?"
That was beside the point.
I shone the light a bit further in and spotted something moving.
What. What was approaching slowly on two legs was—delvers... zombies.
Parts of their faces and bodies showed rotting flesh and bone. They stank of decay.
Shuffling along, there were over ten of them. Again with this.
"Ewgh..."
Narsess groaned.
Juicy made a disgusted face, nocking an arrow and raising her bow.
The tips of her arrows glowed faintly.
I asked Agaro something I'd been hesitating to bring up.
"Do you recognize any of them?"
"Can't say I do, but I sure as hell can't check every single one."
I drew Flametongue.
"I'm taking them down."
"Yeah, that works."
"Um, uh, okay, I'm firing!"
"Go for it."
"Can arrows even take down undead?"
"No need to worry about that."
Juicy's arrow hit the female delver zombie in front.
The moment it did, the female delver zombie vanished in a flash of light.
"What was that?!"
"Um, wanh. It's an Elixir Bow."
"Elixir...?"
"Well, it's anti-undead."
"Huh. Fine, I guess."
Narciss transformed Banish into a mace.
A translucent, spiky, nasty-looking thing.
Could her Relic be—right. I pulled a small bottle from my pouch.
I applied it to the thick, slightly curved kukri knife.
The kukri knife turned pure white. Now I had an anti-undead knife.
Juicy took down several, and Narciss engaged the enemy.
The Banish mace sent zombies disappearing one after another.
Agaro heated Flametongue into a heat sword and sliced through zombies with it.
The power was outstanding. The only downside was the smell of charred rot.
They'd probably finish them before anything reached me, but that glowing yellow zombie caught my eye.
I readied my Elixir kukri knife and started cutting through the zombies from the nearest ones.
Each cut spread purification through their bodies.
Even so, this really is overkill. The zombie horde was down to just a few more.
Well, sure, with two Rank Is on the team, that's to be expected.
What's more, there are two people carrying Pseudo-Deification Relics.
Agaro can go into that form of his, and Narcissus — well, who knows.
I suddenly remember that party made up entirely of Rank Is — the Witch, Alexander, and the rest.
There were monsters that could push even those Rank Is not just to a hard fight, but to the brink of death.
Treasure-class — and beyond that, beings so powerful and transcendent they're called gods.
The gods are by no means simply Treasure-class monsters.
Ah, but if someone told me the Goddess of Knives was a Treasure-class monster, I'd probably just nod along.
As a result, the Witch ended up changing the world just a little, same as me.
And even now, someone might be changing the world just a little, for all I know.
—This is it. Finishing blow!
Narcissus crushed the upper body of the hulking zombie wielding a greatsword with her Banish mace.
Ah, there it was. When the big zombie fell, a yellow light spilled out.
—Done cleaning up?
—One at a time's boring, but a whole crowd of them makes for a decent way to pass the time.
Narcissus murmured what sounded like a hack-and-slash game review.
In truth, the entire expedition was probably just a way for her to kill time.
As expected of someone with the mindset of a reborn god.
—Um, um um um, woof! I feel all refreshed too!
Juicy agreed as well.
Its ears and tail were wagging away. Like a dog back home that just finished its walk.
"Why did you bark just now?"
"Woof?"
I picked up whatever had fallen from the big male zombie.
Agaro looked down at the big male zombie and tilted his head.
Most of his face was covered in burn scars, and he was shaven-headed. He practically screamed "bad guy."
"You know him?"
"...Well, 'know him' is a stretch, I guess. This guy was the boss of a bandit gang. See those burn scars on his face? I gave him those. What the hell is he doing turning into a zombie in a place like this?"
Apparently, Agaro had dealt him a fatal wound, but the guy had managed to escape, and that was several years ago.
There was apparently a decent bounty on his head, too. I looked at the thing I'd picked up.
It was a small silver rectangle emitting a yellow glow.
It felt metallic.
"What is that?"
"A... accessory, maybe?"
It didn't look impossible.
But somehow, it reminded me of memory plates from my past life.
Oh well. I'd take it. Agaro muttered, still tilting his head.
"...Why is this guy in a place like this... are the others... safe?"
"Were any of your acquaintances among the zombies?"
"I checked. It's only this guy."
"Hey, aren't you going to go ahead?"
"Right."
After that, we fought through several more zombies and sahuagin.
What was a little strange was that the sahuagin and zombies were hostile to each other.
Well, either way, they were still enemies. We fought them off like that and made it safely to the dome.
The dome was a semispherical space with nothing but a pedestal. On the pedestal was a console that looked familiar.
"It, it looks like the lab!"
"Yeah. It's like Rabbit's place."
"Lab? Rabbit?"
So Narcissus didn't know about it.
Oh well. I stepped up to the pedestal and touched the console. A window popped up.
I sort of understood it. Maybe memories from my past life. I tried operating it.
"Hmm, hmm. Seems like there are no anomalies."
No errors, no malfunctioning parts. The purification device and water reserves were both normal.
Agaro asked.
"Hey. Can you actually read this?"
"I studied at Hiyarn's place."
I lied. Agaro seemed to accept that and nodded.
"Wof, you can understand even this kind of thing?"
"I-I-I-I mean, as expected of Lord Wof!"
Na!
Being complimented made me shy. Even though it was all thanks to memories from my past life that I didn't even understand.
But what era were these ruins from? Were they the same as Hayane's lab?
I noticed a slot on the pedestal. The size looked about right for what I'd just picked up.
Sure enough, it was a memory plate. I tried inserting it.
Another window appeared, showing something like a blueprint... no, a map.
Where was this? The map had red circles and X marks on it.
"This is a treasure map, isn't it?"
At Narcissus's confident declaration, I had to agree.