nOpening?

n

nIt was decided that Rokuko could use her tip however she wanted… It wouldn’t be funny if I incurred Haku-san’s wrath by using Rokuko’s tip.

n“By the way, how much did you get?”

n“… Around 100,000 DP.”

n… Wouldn’t it have been fine to have just been a little? My heart just skipped a beat there.

nThe number of gold coins given to the inn is sixty-five. Worth 650,000 DP when bought with DP, it would become 65,000 DP if I converted it into DP. We just got a massive amount, so I should just give up on Rokuko’s portion.

nI wouldn’t hesitate if Rokuko used it for the dungeon’s sake though.

nIf push comes to shove I’ll have her loan me some, let’s go with that.

nWell, that egg is a phoenix or something, but—

n“—Come to think of it, can we try and see if the egg can really revive?”

nHopping aboard Rokuko’s proposal, we decided to break it then heat it up with a torch.

n… Come to think of it, I wonder if anyone here knows the Vietnamese food called hot vit lon?

nThe boiled duck egg variety.

nHowever, the contents of the egg contains a baby chick just before it hatches. It’s classified as a strange food.

nWeeell, it’s somewhat of a curiosity to me since neither eggs nor chicken meat are considered strange food but a mix of the two is, haha.

nEscapism aside, this phoenix egg had that kind of feeling.

nLooks like I started thinking about something else for a moment there before this is unpleasant…

nWell, burning its body needed a bit of a guro warning. After that, particles of light gathered up around it and it revived back as an egg in place.

nFurthermore, its carcass remained. It was so small.

nAccording to Haku-san, it revives by forcibly gathering ambient mana.

nLet’s try a second time to make sure… Yep, it takes less than a second to revive after being burned, fast. And gross.

n“Haku Ane-sama said this guy is delicious to eat right?”

n“… Rokuko is considerably mentally strong. My respect.”

n“Eh? Ah, un, thanks?”

nAny, now to make some hot vit lon… not. Since a phoenix egg Needs to be inside a fire to hatch, we decided to place it on one of the Mysterious Torches that Somehow Don’t Burn Out that lit the dungeon. This should be an easy way to care for it so it’s fine. It revived even when we dropped and smashed it.

nThough a phoenix egg and even its carcass can be turned into medicine and some raw materials… it’s worth 0 DP if you try to exchange it as a treasure. It would’ve been worth so many points if we just kept breaking it though… I think I would’ve made a golem that automatically kept breaking the egg if it was worth anything.

nAlso, since she’d probably get fired up about it, I kept Ichika from seeing (= eating) it.

nThe egg would properly revive even if we trampled it. It wouldn’t get us any DP though.

n

n*

n

nSeveral days after forgetting about the flag.

nTwo avera~ge E-Rank adventurers who came to conquer the dungeon stayed at the hotel and managed to hunt goblins on the first floor. Since they were weary of the ton of traps, their progress was slow.

nMeanwhile, while I was sleeping and using Meat as a hug pillow as usual, Rokuko jumped in.

n“Bad news, Kehma! The tunnel made it through!”

n“Fuoh? Finally… wait, hold up, it didn’t make it to the other side of the mountain.”

n“T-that’s why this isn’t a time to sleep—!”

nRokuko’s never woken me up from my sleep. This is the first time. Honestly, she’s been diligent about me telling her to not wake me up unless it’s a state of emergency.

nLooking at the dungeon map, we dug up a cave somewhere.

nWhen I opened the monitor to see directly from the menu, it was a red cave that spread out.

n“Hey, Rokuko… this is…”

n“… … A dungeon that’s not ours. What should we do?”

nIt’s probably the Flame Cavern. A single red lizard is as big as a medium-sized dog, its red tongue is definitely something you don’t want to pick a fight with. Mm, dangerous for golems and eyes.

n“Withdraw! Seal the hole!”

n“I’ll spend DP to make a wall!”

nAh, sorry for the intrusion~. As though to say that, we pulled the golem back and started making a wall.

nRed lizards started rushing towards it instantly… the wall made it just in time.

nBang! Bang! The door started being beaten.

n“… Oh crap oh crap, it would’ve been a fight if we were even a little slower.”

n“Kehma. No matter how I look at it, the fight already started.”

nThat’s right, we avoided it but the fight did start. It won’t be funny when the wall gets broken.

n“We’ll prepare to intercept them while buying time. Deploy traps in the passage.”

n“Bottomless Swamps and Spear Ceilings then.”

nThe red lizards broke through the wall, diving towards the interception retrofitted golems that were installing the traps. However, the red lizards fell into the Bottomless Swamp. But that monitor lizard, while emitting a lot of hissing steam, just forced its way out without paying it any attention.

nWhile the golems held them back, the Spear Ceiling dropped from above, skewering the lizards and submerging them in the marsh. Good, they stopped moving this time.

n“… Alright, let’s repair the wall now.”

n“Y-yeah.”

nTo remake the wall, we destroyed about five meters of ceiling and released it from our dungeon rule.

nIt should be fine with this… wait, what’s that sound?

nA loud bang came from the other side of the collapsed passage. Breathing fire, a large mass of red, larger than the red lizards from a moment ago, appeared. It was about half the size of the passage, which itself was around wide enough for two wagons to be able to just pass each other… A wagon-sized monitor lizard clad in flames burst through.

nWhile I was thinking, it dried out the Bottomless Swamp and blew away the Spear Ceiling with fire, running over and crushing the golems.

nUoooaaah! Where aaaare yooou!?

nA salamander.

n… Wait, could that be the dungeon core?

nHe talks with a deep yakuza voice.

nFor now, let’s try making contact.

nSince he was inside our dungeon’s passage, I could forward my voice to him. I called him using that function.

n“Stop! Dungeon Core No. 112!”

nOoouuu!? What, you know who I am you son of a biiiitch!? … Mm? What’s this, now that I take a better look this is a dungeon isn’t it! The ** are you!?

nWhen I called out his name, the salamander slammed on his brakes.

nYep, looks like we’ve met the dungeon core.

n“Hiiii—!? N-No. 112—… w-why d-do—! You want to know!?”

nThis meager voice, No. 695 huh!? That’s my line! The ** would you tunnel into my dungeon fooor!? “Allow me to explain. It was an unfortunate accident, sorry, I apologize.”

nO-ou? Meek aren’t you!? Bastard, who’re you, the dungeon master!? Show yourself!

nSince he knows we’re the dungeon core and master, even though he probably wouldn’t suddenly kill us, let’s send a golem just instead just in case.

nAah!? So you’re the dungeon master huh!? Wait, you’re a golem! “Yeah, sorry, I didn’t intend to invade your dungeon even if that’s what it looks like.”

nReveal your real body so I can kill you! No. 695 is a human type, how could a golem be her master… hmm? No, maybe it’s because even the golem is human type? No no, golems are too stupid to be masters!

nI thought I might be able to trick him for a bit, but looks like that didn’t work.

nIt looks like I could lead the conversation on… he didn’t suddenly destroy the golem either, so he probably won’t suddenly kill me without reason.

nIf it looks dangerous I’ll just have Rokuko collect me whenever she thinks she should.

nSo I resolved myself. On foot. It couldn’t be helped, I couldn’t teleport there since he was treated as an intruder.

nThough it was just a long passage with nothing in it, it took a while to walk down it. I was able to exit one hundred meters from it because that’s where the goblin room is, so I was able to get there relatively easily.

n“… So, how’re you going to settle this!?”

nThe salamander roared. Well, I really was in the wrong here.

nMore or less like how monsters can directly leave the dungeon core, a dungeon master can directly set up traps and facilities inside the dungeon. They’d die if they let down their guard since the range is just around five meters though.

n“Right, I’ll apologize. To be specific… I’ll patch the hole. Also… right, do you know about Dogeza?”

n“… O-ou? Dogeza huh, of course! It’s when you bow your head while in Seiza! Why did you ask?”

n“Ah, our talk will go faster since you know it. There’s another level that exceeds it, have you heard of the Dogene apology?” 1

n“Hoou, this is my first time hearing that. So what kind of apology is it?”

nAh, I might be able to deceive him here.

nI don’t particularly mind lowering my head, but just doing that might become a problem in the future, so let’s try and trick him.

nThough it’s like I’m picking a fight here, we got information from Haku-san about the Flame Cavern in advance. It’s fine if I just stall for now.

n“Although the Dogeza shows apology through bowing one’s head, the Dogene apologizes by lowering one’s whole body.”

nI layed a futon out on the cave’s ground while giving a suitable explanation.

n“Oi, what’re you doing there?”

n“Hmm? The Dogene apology. It’s a polite apology that takes time to prepare. It’s polite to bring lots of food in preparation you know?”

n“Food? I don’t get what you’re saying!”

n“… ‘Prepare lots of traps to bring down your prey,’ get what I’m saying by preparations now?”

n“I see! I get it.”

nI then got into the futon, then spoke.

n“This is the Dogene !”

n“O-ooh! Certainly, apart from your head everything is covered…”

nFrom what it looks like, this salamander seems to believe me.

nThis guy is… simple.

nLet’s push it one step further.

n“From here on, I will do the Dogene for seven days, five hours a day… no, I’ll do it for eight!”

n“W-what!? Eight hours!?”

n“Is that not enough!? Twelve hours then! Twelve hours, in other words, I will spend half of the day in this posture! With that, I hope that you can forgive me…”

n“U-understood! Kuh—, it couldn’t be helped. There’s no way I couldn’t with you doing that, huh… heh, I wondered what kind of person No. 695’s master was, to think you’re so rational…! However, I’m the one saying it, but seven days, twelve hours every day… you’ll seriously do it!? Great!!”

n“Yeah. I understand.”

nThen, the salamander returned in satisfaction.

n… I don’t know when he’ll come back, but until then why don’t I just continue this Dogene? In my room, that is.

n

nFootnotes:

nPlay on words. Changed the last syllable of Dogeza into 寢 (ne — sleep).

n