I truly felt sorry for Araya-san.
I never thought it would come to something like this.
When I get back, I'll report to the Poor Man's Club.
"She seemed like someone you knew."
Ambrosius asked gently.
"Yeah. She was a good person."
I think she was someone who valued courtesy.
Among a crowd of rough people, she was able to look at things calmly and make sound judgments.
"That must be rough."
"…Yeah."
This world is harsh, human life is cheap, and death is always close by.
I hadn't forgotten that, but this drove it home all over again.
Mineha sighed too.
"What's going on? Last time I entered the forest, there wasn't anything this dangerous."
"Really?"
"Seriously. If there had been, I'd have made sure to let you know."
"That's true. You're smart like that."
"I'm definitely smarter than you."
A twenty-four-year-old who lost to a ten-year-old.
It's all the more complicated because she doesn't look the part.
"— Wof, is that really the case?"
"— Yes, Megadia. There were hordes of spider women and such, but nothing like this worm. Besides, the mechanisms were the same as what I encountered."
"— Worms that emerge from red gems, I see. Having them one after another like that would be a nightmare."
"— If we find one, let's destroy it first thing."
"— Yes... right."
After that, we find three red gems and destroy them.
We also wipe out the worms. Some of the subjugators who turned undead from the worms are put down too.
We've been making sure to kill them without letting them get close, keeping things from getting too bad.
What bothers me is that sometimes a whole cluster of red dots underground just vanishes.
They disappear without any warning, so I thought the system had bugged out.
For detection, I made full use of the Ring of Fortune.
I did a search and they showed up, but... I went "whoa." I went "wow."
"— What the hell is this! What the hell is this!"
"— Ugh, it's like some kind of trap."
"— Honestly, this is getting really unpleasant."
Indeed, that's exactly what they were. Traps, placed at regular intervals.
Having dangerous worms scattered around like that would be a disaster.
Even Ambrosius wore a wry smile, like he was taken aback.
But something didn't add up.
"...Something's definitely off. It wasn't like this last time I came."
This wasn't something that spawned naturally.
I'd wondered if it was an EVENT, but EVENTS reproduce things that already exist.
So that left only one possibility.
Someone had set this up. But who? And why?
— ...Hey, what's that?
Mineha said something. We all looked.
That was... you've got to be kidding me, an ant? A giant red ant.
From any angle, it was unmistakably an ant, and a huge one at that. About human-sized.
A monster.
Ambrosius immediately piped up.
— That's a Red Ant.
On-the-nose naming, that.
Wait. Ants, which meant... I checked my Danger Discernment.
Tons of red dots. What a headache. After spiders, now ants?
"Gichigichigichigichigichi"
"Gichigichi"
"Giichigichigichigijji"
"Gichigichigichigichi"
"Giichigiichigiichigiichi"
The Red Ants lined up in a row, chirping and clicking.
They carried crude red spears and swords in their hands.
They had a very handmade feel to them. Could something like that really work as weapons?
While I was thinking that, someone on our side burst forward.
The first to charge in was, of course, Narcissus.
She sliced through the Red Ants head-on with the Banish scythe.
Her momentum reminded me of the squad leaders who led the charge against the Zoku in my past life.
Following her was Megadia, scattering them with black spheres, and Mineha pierced them with ‘Stars’.
“…That’s impressive.”
The women were too strong; I barely had a chance to do anything.
I just watched alongside Ambrosius, relaxed.
“—Ants and worms. Talk about a mess.”
“What is?”
“I was just thinking what a terrible sight it was.”
“…Piles of corpses.”
The Red Ants were completely wiped out.
There was no way they could win against those three.
“Phew. That felt a little better.”
“Yeah.”
“Just the right kind of stress relief.”
The three of them casually dropped something terrifying.
Oh, and not that it matters, but I noticed something.
This party — isn't the Edda ratio kind of high? Three out of five are Edda.
Not that it means anything, of course.
We pressed on, heading deep into the vast, unknowable forest.
After that, we encountered worms and ants over and over again.
Were there no animal-type monsters around?
With that feeling, we finally arrived at our destination: Finger Rock — the Subjugation Village.
We approached the Subjugation Village with caution… Danger Discernment showed nothing abnormal.
I unlocked the door to the village's large inn and went inside.
The entrance hall was spacious. Might be a nice place.
"Finally, some rest… I want a drink."
Megadia sighed as she muttered.
"I've received permission to use everything here."
Same as when we dealt with the dungeon's anomaly.
"Then we're going to the bath! Come on, Mineha."
"E-eh?"
Narcissus grabbed Mineha by the arm and looked at me.
"Wof. Where's the bath?"
"Uh…"
I looked at the reception counter and spotted an info board.
The bath was to the left at the end of the first floor.
"Left at the end of that hallway."
"Got it! Right, then!"
She didn't understand a thing.
Well, I'd leave it to Mineha.
Megadia headed to the tavern she'd been frequenting.
Ambrosius said he'd go for a walk and stepped outside.
"Everyone just does whatever they want, huh…"
As for me, yeah. I'd make something in the kitchen.
The next day.
We arrived at the Forbidden Land.
We used the hidden teleportation circle Galad had once set up.
But it wasn't the Forbidden Land I knew.
"What is this, an ant empire?"
Narcissus murmured.
We watched from the shadows a short distance away.
They shouldn't be able to find us here.
The Forbidden Land was a stone city that bore some resemblance to Heizen.
A great number of buildings were crammed together.
The grand building at the very back was the temple, and within it slept Nekia in her spider form.
I'd heard there was a treasure hall beside the temple. That pure-white rectangular building, perhaps.
Nekia's offering tablets were stored in that building.
The Rank-Up Relic Plate we were looking for had to be in there.
No, no. The real objective was the dungeon core.
I'd been told it was in the temple. I had been told, though.
"……"
"……"
What was with this number of ants. What on earth was this swarm of red ants?
Every direction I looked, nothing but red ants. It was so thick with them you'd think this was their nest.
"So, what do we do?"
"What should we do?"
"That's obvious. Annihilate them."
"No, but there are several hundred at least."
"This is a bit too much for us to handle."
"We pick our moments for reckless charges, right?"
That about summed it up.
Even the ever-confident Narcissus backed down once everyone told her so.
But seriously, what were we going to do? Hm? What was that? Something was making a commotion.
Black— ah, that black spider woman from before was being chased by the Red Ants.
"She got caught!"
She was being seized and dragged off somewhere.
"Let's go after her!"
"Huh? Narcissus?!"
She was already gone.
She's nothing if not decisive, though.
"Oh well."
"Hey. Shouldn't we put a collar on that thing by now?"
Mineha muttered with half-lidded eyes, following after Megadia.
I agreed with that. Let's put a bell on it too.
"Let's go too... Ambrosius?"
Ambrosius was nowhere to be seen.
I frantically looked around, but she was gone.
Come on, every single one of them just does whatever they want! This ad hoc wolf pack!