Thud thud, thud…
After walking, fighting, resting a bit, and then walking and fighting again for a whopping five hours…
Ding ding ding…
The exploration of this underground floor was finally complete.
“Whooo… It must be getting dark outside…”
Bolton muttered as he wiped the beads of sweat off his forehead in front of the entrance to the third floor.
You could clearly see he was exhausted; it must have been his first time battling for so long.
“…It’s wider than I thought.”
Amy’s voice echoed with fatigue as she replied.
Sure, warriors turn into corpses without their stamina, but was it a bit tough for priests and wizards to handle this relentless march?
Both of them looked like they had hit their limit.
“Let’s call it a day here and investigate the third floor tomorrow.”
Time to rest.
If I dragged the two tired souls down into the third underground floor, we’d probably be stumbling over our own feet and getting ourselves in trouble instead of clearing it faster.
If luck was really bad, one of us might even end up dead.
I’ve heard that if you try to rush ahead, you might end up fifty years ahead instead. It’s not just a saying for driving.
“Sounds good.”
“Agreed. I have very few spells left I can use.”
Bolton and Amy sighed in relief, as if they’d been waiting for this moment. Their relieved expressions showed that they’d been holding back their desire to just take a break.
“I’m the only one who brought a sleeping bag?!”
Kikel sounded just a bit disappointed. He wasn’t tired yet, but everyone else was preparing for camp.
Chuckling…
It was a little funny. That guy looked like he’d need a choice between hibernation and permanent rest if someone took his cloak away.
“We need to rest. The first floor was easy to pass, but this one was a hassle, right? The third floor is going to be even trickier.”
I explained to Kikel.
“So, we should be fully prepared just in case.”
Usually, the deeper you go in a dungeon, the harder it gets, and this place was no exception.
Before going down another level, it’s common sense to have a sufficient rest.
—
So, with the entrance to the third underground floor in front of us, we began to prepare camp.
Preparing camp didn’t mean anything fancy; just tidying up the area, eating some rations, and using our cloaks as makeshift sleeping bags. That was about it.
If it were a long-term or outdoor mission, people would bring proper sleeping bags, but not so much for a dungeon mission like this.
It’s all about minimizing the burden.
If you lugged around cooking utensils, rations, and a sleeping bag, it was no different from carrying a backpack… who would fight better, the one with a full pack or the one without?
The weight of the burden isn’t terrible, but just having something strapped to your back feels super inconvenient during a fight.
Therefore, for adventurers, sleeping bags were nothing but luxury items.
There are ‘porters’ who take on that burden…
But since I know this world is straight out of a story, the job of a porter is the top thing I want to avoid.
Why?
Because I’m a former hero party member!
A hero’s party member and a porter? That combo just screams “danger” the moment you hear it.
I can’t afford to feel scared and hire one of those.
A porter in a hero’s party could just as well be carrying a brainwashing app around.
If I let such a character into the party, I’d be in for an experience that you couldn’t even describe in works for all ages.
…So, yeah, that’s why I avoided porters.
That meant it was really rare for me to end up lying down in a sleeping bag, but… it wasn’t something to feel too bad about since other adventurers were in a similar position.
“Hey, am I the only one who brought a sleeping bag?”
“Oh, I have one too. It’s a bit old though.”
Of course, that was just a story limited to warriors, where speed and stamina are life or death.
For priests or wizards who just shoot spells from the back, a heavier load didn’t matter, and they always packed their stuff thoroughly.
…Why suffer being a warrior then?
—
After munching on some dried meat, we chose a corner in the dungeon corridor to set up our sleeping area.
“How are we taking turns watching…?”
“No need. We’ve got Alarm Magic. Just set it up before we sleep, and it’ll last until morning.”
Amy demonstrated the brilliance of being a wizard.
Alarm Magic.
One of the reasons wizards are adored, it eliminates the need for a watchman and guarantees a comfy sleep.
“But we’ll be fine, but Kikel is the issue… should we make a campfire?”
Bolton, laying out his sleeping bag, glanced at Kikel with a look that said he was worried he might freeze to death while sleeping.
“Here? That’s a tricky suggestion.”
“I can just burn some shields or spear parts for firewood… but managing it so it doesn’t go out could be a pain.”
Because a campfire won’t just burn for six hours straight like it does in a game.
“It’s fine!”
Kikel shook his head.
“I can just cuddle up to Bolton to stay warm!”
That was a bizarre solution he just proposed.
“…Huh?”
Bolton responded, his face bewildered.
“What the…?”
His expression was like that of a pope who just had his heliocentric theory debunked.
—
After much back and forth, Bolton and Kikel dramatically agreed to sleep close together instead of hugging.
Bolton was left with no choice.
If he lit a campfire, a third of their sleeping time would go up in flames managing it, and it was against his conscience as a priest to just leave Kikel out in the cold.
Moreover, even if he was a lizard, he was still a male; he couldn’t just ask a woman like me or Amy to cuddle instead.
So what could he do? Just grit his teeth and make the sacrifice.
“Whooo….”
Bolton, looking like Jesus climbing Golgotha, walked over to Kikel, laid down his sleeping bag beside him, and lay down obediently.
“Come here. It’ll be warmer!”
Kikel, lying on his stomach, suggested sliding in under his fur cloak.
It would indeed be warmer if they could outlast the grossness.
“…Well, no thanks. I’ll pass.”
Bolton rejected Kikel’s kind offer with a disgusted tone.
Lying next to him was already uncomfortable; did he really have to share a blanket too?
I sat near Amy and watched the spectacle, leaning against the wall with my cloak draped over me like a blanket.
“Are you really going to sleep like that?”
Amy remarked with disbelief as she was tucked inside her sleeping bag.
After all, who wouldn’t find it uncomfortable not even taking off their armor or helmet and trying to sit up to sleep?
“This is comfy.”
From my perspective, this was a much better position.
Lying on the ground with a helmet on would leave me restless and unable to sleep.
Plus, should the need arise, I could spring right up in defense.
Sure, when I head back to the inn and take off my armor to sleep in a bed, but when camping, I can’t afford to take off my helmet, so sitting up to sleep was the best I could do.
“I guess that’s comfortable too. If you don’t want to sleep on the bare floor, do you want to borrow my sleeping bag? It’s roomy enough for two.”
Amy chuckled a little, slightly opening her sleeping bag. She was suggesting that we could sleep together if I wanted.
It wasn’t the first time I heard that suggestion.
Almost all the female adventurers I met until now proposed the same thing when they witnessed me sleeping.
Women seemed completely unbothered by sharing a sleeping bag. Unlike guys like Bolton and Kikel who would be horrified at even the thought.
Maybe it’s just their species; they even go to the bathroom holding hands together!
For someone like me who used to be a guy, that mindset was hard to comprehend.
“I’ll take your sentiment.”
Of course, I never accepted any of those proposals.
It wouldn’t be right for me, who holds male thoughts, to take advantage of the friendliness shown by those who see me as a woman…
…Not that I had such sentimental reasons.
“It’s just that if I take off my armor and helmet, I can’t really sleep due to the tension.”
If I were to try and sleep together in the same sleeping bag, I’d inevitably have to take off my armor. So it was a proposal I just couldn’t accept.
At least not until the knight Brunhilde fades into the public’s memory completely.
“How much suffering have you endured…?”
Was my excuse for avoiding sharing well received?
Amy looked at me with the face of a hungry puppy, letting out a faint sigh as she tightened her sleeping bag.
So we fell asleep. For roughly around seven hours.
No need to wake up in between and it wasn’t that cold, so it was quite a pleasant sleep for camping.
“…No, Kikel. Don’t stick so close…!”
Snore… Snore…
“Elianell, why must you put me through such trials…!”
…Was that not right?
—
The next morning.
After having our rations for breakfast and finishing an individual tune-up… including handling ‘physiological phenomena,’ we finally stepped into the third underground level.
“The flow of magical energy has thickened… I thought it would be about level five, but it’s surprisingly shallower.”
After looking around, Amy declared with assurance. This dungeon would end at the third floor.
That was a welcome sound amidst all this.
Krah… Nariik….
…But five minutes later, the guests that arrived were less than welcome.
Kao Lahrk…!
Monsters that were crawling lazily, not having spotted us yet.
Unlike the skeletons that made you exclaim in awe, these guys looked sickening the moment you laid eyes on them.
Half-rotten skin swarming with maggots.
Their jaws were so unhinged that the top half had practically slipped behind their necks, revealing a gaping throat that housed a massive slug, wriggling around.
Their arms extended and twisted like grasshoppers, supporting a ribcage exposed from rotting flesh, while their legs merged into one, curled like a scorpion’s tail.
The sight of them crawling on the floor with their hands was grotesque beyond words.
“…Is that a Wight?”
“Looks like it…”
Amy nodded her head.
“Wow, we’re seeing Wights here…”
I let out a deep sigh.
To encounter a Wight right from the entrance, it looked like the road to hardship had just been laid out before us.
