“I heard you guys won. Way to go!”
After the exploration team was done on layer seventy-nine, Tsutomu and the others returned to the Clan House, with all the commotion outside telling them that Daryl’s team had managed to score their win on layer seventy.
In response to Tsutomu’s congratulation, Daryl bowed deeply, while Diniel gave her usual nonchalant reply.
Xeno was not here right now, as Pico had dragged him away from the Guild as soon as he returned from the Dungeon. Korinna was already stuffing her face with the appetizers of her fancy dinner that Ollie had prepared to celebrate the team’s victory.
“Good. I would’ve beaten you up if you didn’t win.”
“Congrats!”
“Thank you!”
Amira and Hannah congratulated Daryl in particular. Tsutomu, having heard that ‘the Channeler’ had performed particularly well, gave extra compliments to Korinna, who then stopped eating to bow repeatedly, thankful for all the praise she was receiving.
“I also had the opportunity to spectate your activities today. And I must say… please do not push yourself too hard.”
“Um, ah, yes. I’ll try.”
Ollie, unable to say anything too intrusive, expressed her concern with a forced smile as she handed the dishes to Daryl. Daryl, feeling sorry for worrying her, had his tail down.
Noticing the change in Ollie’s mood, Tsutomu reached into his pocket to take out the sphere-form Undine and place it on the table, then walked over to talk to the two of them.
“On the other hand… me and my team didn’t get to watch you guys. How about you tell us about the fight?”
“Ooh! I wanna listen, too!”
And so, during dinner, the mission team started talking about their activities, with Daryl leading the discussion, summarizing what they had gone through. A little concerned about Diniel’s silence, Daryl tried to keep his recount inoffensive as the meal went on.
Daryl had noticed Diniel starting to cut corners during the fight, but in the end, he considered that she had done an adequate job nonetheless — and in fact, a better job than he had. As such, Daryl could not bring himself to say anything to Diniel, not to mention the fact that Diniel herself did not particularly care about that either.
Korinna also had low self-esteem and was not at all the confrontational type, so she was somewhat reserved when it came to talking about Daryl and Diniel. As such, she refrained from saying how Daryl would push himself too hard at times, and how Diniel had held back.
“…And that pretty much sums it up.”
“Hmm, I see. Honestly, though, I didn’t expect you to win on your first try. That was great, really.”
Tsutomu, sensing the awkward atmosphere among the three of them, turned to Diniel — who had said almost nothing so far throughout the meal. When Diniel tilted her head, Tsutomu briefly chuckled and then turned to the kitchen, where Ollie was.
“Since you got to see them, Miss Ollie, how were they?”
“…I’m still new to all this Dungeon exploration business, so I don’t think it’s a good idea for me to make comments.”
“That’s not true — I’ve heard that you’ve been watching the Pedestals a fair bit recently. If there was anything that stuck out to you, could you let us know?”
“…I understand. Please give me a moment — I will bring the documents.”
Once Ollie finished filling the sink and leaving her apprentice to wash the dishes, she trotted up the stairs. After a while, she returned with a stack of documents… the size of which surprised everyone.
“This is a set of documents prepared by a Dungeon Maniac, which details what she has observed. If I were to make an evaluation based on this, I would say that the victory on layer seventy was a spectacular success. It was not without issues, however. First of all, Mister Daryl.”
“Y-yes.”
“You have obviously pushed yourself too hard. Make one wrong move, and you would have been killed… Considering how aware of the situation you were, you should have been able to work together with Mister Xeno more effectively. I do not understand why you seemed so insistent on carrying out the Tank role all by yourself.”
“I’m sorry…”
Unlike before, Ollie now gave her unconstrained opinions, prompting Daryl to apologize for his recklessness. Then, when Diniel yawned, she redirected her assault to her.
“This is not the time to be yawning, Miss Diniel. You obviously started holding back after Mister Xeno and Sir Melchor died. Why did you do that?”
“Why not? I thought it was hopeless at that point, so I tried to save on arrows.”
“You were supposed to let your party members know what you were doing. It is inexcusable to abandon your job just because you want to.”
“……”
Diniel fell silent, but she was still scowling at Ollie, showing that she had no intention of backing down. Tsutomu looked on, quite invested now that Ollie had gone through the trouble of retrieving a stack of documents to provide her opinions. The others, as if to not displease her further, slid away from the dining table.
“What about Korinna?” Tsutomu asked.
“Miss Korinna did not show bad performance in any particular aspect, I think. Would you like to take a look at these documents?”
“Ah… yes, please.”
“…I’mma leave before I’m roped into that.”
“…Aye-yup, time to retreat!”
Tsutomu, receiving the stack of documents from Ollie, immediately devoured his way through its contents. Seeing that, Hannah and Amira promptly put their dishes in the sink and evacuated upstairs, with Leleia following shortly after… and the Undine, witnessing everything unfold, was trembling quite hard.
After that, the three were given a full-on critique session by Ollie and Tsutomu, the flow of events turning it into an evaluation meeting of sorts.
―▽▽―
“Aooohhh…” Diniel moaned, startled by how different her distinctively long Elf ears felt after she put on her specially-knit wool mufflers.
Having gained resistance to coldness thanks to Korinna’s <<Adventuring Deity’s Protection>>, she was now able to exert her usual strength as long as she wore appropriate winter clothes.
“Hmm? Is something wrong, you two? You don’t look well at all!”
“…Mm-hm.”
Daryl and Korinna, having been forced into an evaluation meeting by Ollie and Tsutomu last night, had looks full of indecisiveness on their faces as they thought about what they should do going forward. Basically, Daryl had been told not to focus so much on breaking his limits, and Korinna had been assigned with learning to better understand skills’ appropriate rotation patterns and their durations.
It seemed as if Ollie had turned into a different person yesterday, her aura so unopposable that Daryl could do nothing but shake his head. Korinna had been praised by Tsutomu for her ability to foresee death, but was then reminded to keep up her basics as a Channeler.
And Xeno, despite apparently being in a good mood, had had to sit through a sermon from Pico last night, so he was not exactly carefree now, either. All of them — except Diniel — were worried because they wanted to be stronger. Looking on at them and feeling their determination, Melchor could not help but smile.
Now that they were past layer seventy, the mission team was able to proceed onward, exploring their way through the Snow Field layers uninterrupted. Since Tsutomu could provide the mission team with a wealth of information on the Snow Field layers that he had noted down with the exploration team, the mission team did not need to search as much for the Black Gates.
Moreover, since the Snow Fields’ sceneries were mostly white, the Black Gates were relatively easy to detect. Environmental effects could be mitigated by Korinna’s skill, so the coldness was not an issue, either.
The monsters here, however, were notably threatening due to their higher tendency to attack in groups — though they could be dealt with relative ease if the combatants were to know what to expect. Diniel, wanting to quickly get used to moving quickly in the Snow Field layers, took the active role in hunting the monsters, so there had been no particularly difficult battles so far.
The mid-boss of the Snow Field layers was similar to the Bolseyer, but this time, it was a random encounter and would not always be there to guard the layer’s Black Gate. Luckily, the mission team ended up not encountering it the first time through.
All things considered, their progression was quite smooth, going at the pace of one layer every two days due to the occasional monster attacks. In the end, they managed to reach layer eighty after about three weeks.
In front of the Black Gate that led down to layer eighty, Melchor nodded to everyone and expressed his gratitude.
“Good work. You all have my thanks for fulfilling this old man’s selfish request.”
“You have our thanks as well, sir, for your wisdom and guidance.”
Daryl had learned from Ollie about Melchor’s possibly deliberate death on layer seventy. If that had not happened, perhaps Daryl would not have been able to push himself to his limits. Understanding that, Daryl felt inclined to express his thanks as well.
Melchor then said a few words to each one of them, and then he went down to the eightieth layer so that he could give the fight a go — and be killed so that he could be sent back to the surface quickly. This was just a test drive, as he intended to challenge the boss seriously after preparing appropriate countermeasures against snow storms and securing enough magic stones to fuel his Magic Fist techniques.
And so, a total of two months had passed since Absolute Helix divided itself into two teams. After Melchor’s request was fulfilled, they went back to being one party. And now, two people arrived, knocking on the door of the Clan House…
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