Unexpected.
Uncertain and unsettling.
With that weighing on us, we teleported from Etrenze to Hyzein.
Hyzein. It had been a while.
I gazed out through the window projected in the living room.
Normal. Nothing had changed.
Ships came and went, and the market was as bustling as ever.
The sheer lack of change was almost deflating.
"—From what I can see... it doesn't look like anything happened."
I'd been expecting something like the greatest crisis Hyzein had ever faced.
Axe scratched his cheek and spoke.
"Oh, I forgot to mention. The Night King thing. Only dungeons have appeared, and they haven't been opened to the public yet."
"So nothing's actually happened to Hyzein itself, right?"
"I suppose that's a good thing, in its own way."
"I see..."
So dungeons still hadn't been made public.
Right. If it was only a dungeon problem, it could be handled quietly.
That was very good news.
"—So, are we diving straight into a dungeon?"
Shesh-san asked in a somewhat piercing tone.
Incidentally, she was sitting sloppily on the sofa with her feet up on the table.
As always, this was the kind of delinquent behavior you'd never guess belonged to a ducal daughter.
"No. There's someone we need to meet first."
"Huh? Hey. Who is it, Rel?"
"The head of the Zen Zela family."
"Seiran-san, I suppose..."
That made sense.
The Zen Zela family was the largest sponsor of dungeon development.
There was no way we could skip reporting to them.
"Tch, that's something you handle as our representative, Rel."
"Me?"
"You're the only one here who can deal with that kind of thing politely."
"Huh? What about me?"
"You're a visual scam."
She glared at me.
"That's terrible! But yeah, now that you mention it, Rel really is the one for this."
"Got it. I'll handle it."
"I-I'm sorry about this."
I bowed my head to Rel-san.
Rel raised her glasses with a little push.
"I don't mind. I expected it would come to this."
So she did.
Come to think of it, speaking of Tassan always gives me this feeling like there's a small bone stuck in my throat.
Why is that? Oh, wait.
"Oh — by any chance, has the outsider thing been found out?"
"It seems they knew from the start, apparently."
"Huh, they knew?"
I was taken aback by Hoss's words.
"I don't know the details of what it is, but I could tell there was something going on."
"Is that so."
"I understand why you kept quiet, so I didn't ask, and I didn't say anything."
"..........."
I felt a little guilty about it all.
Perhaps sensing how I felt, Shesh re-crossed his legs at the table and spoke up.
"Wof's judgment wasn't wrong or anything. Stuff like this — if it got out, a war could've broken out, easy."
"Yeah. I thought the same thing."
"Me too."
"Same here."
"Yeah. I'd want it even if I had to steal it."
"I-I wouldn't go that far…"
Ms. Syu. Please stop looking at me like that. You're too pretty when you do that, and it's scary.
"And besides, you could misuse it for just about anything, you know~"
The way Shesh said that, practically licking her lips, sent the Banish Blaster flashing through my mind.
"…Yeah, I suppose…"
"Well, it's pretty funny that you're all using something like that as a carriage substitute, though."
"There's not really any other use for it."
"That's so like you."
"I think it's fine."
"Same here."
"Me too. Very Wof-like."
"Yup. I don't think it's bad either. People will like you for it."
"Th-thank you."
Somehow I didn't really feel like I'd been complimented.
But was it more dangerous than I'd thought? Hmm. This was a problem.
Especially that I absolutely could not hand it over to anyone else.
That was something I had to stop no matter what.
Even if it meant killing.
"Though honestly, who'd be stupid enough to mess with the witch's apprentice? And did you forget? The House Tasan is your guardian too, you know."
Shesh flashed a mischievous grin.
Right. There was that.
"Ah, thank you."
"Well, I'm not going to tell you to trust me completely or anything, but I at least wanted you to pass something like this along through the witch if it came up."
"S-sorry."
On that front, I really should have consulted someone.
I guess I had a tendency to draw extreme lines between family and everyone else.
"Shall we head down to Heizen now?"
Those words came from Munieka as she descended from the second floor.
"Right. Let's head straight to the dungeon."
"Hold on."
Hoss cut in.
"Hoss?"
"First, we eat. Let's go to the Belk cafeteria."
"The cafeteria?"
"Sorry, Wof. I ran for my life, so I'm starving."
Axe said with a wry smile.
"Come to think of it, we haven't eaten yet."
"You showed up right when we were thinking about getting food, after all."
Shesh and Syu nodded in agreement.
Then it was settled.
"Beep-beep... beep... anomalous singularity... detected... ——— beep-beep"
"..."
"......"
"..."
"..."
"......"
"..."
"..."
Everyone fell silent.
"Then let's be off."
"Y-yes."
"O-oh."
"Right."
"Yeah."
"Let's go."
"U-uh-huh."
It was decided.
We disembarked in front of Heizen's hideout.
After parting ways with Rel, who was heading to the Zenzera residence, the rest of us headed for the Berk eatery.
The eatery had already passed its lunch rush, and a "resting" sign hung on the door.
Hoss-san pushed the door open without hesitation.
The sound drew Sumarni-san to poke her head out, and she looked surprised to see Shesh-san and Syu-san.
Hoss-san chatted with Luma-san for a bit, then headed into the kitchen, and we sat down at a table.
Sumarni-san didn't seem to know about the dungeon.
"Huh! So then, Ennea is safe?"
"Ennea?"
"Ennea…?"
Shesh-san and Syu-san tilted their heads.
Ennea… Oh right!!
"Ennea-san! She's the Guild Master of the Delvers' Guild!"
I'd completely forgotten since she'd just been a figurine.
"Huh? Oh, right, that's how it is."
"Is that so?"
"Yeah, but if that guy's the Guild Master, she's probably just sleeping at the Guild. She's basically a tuck-away tanuki."
"That Guild is inside the dungeon."
"Huh? In the dungeon?"
"Why on earth is it in a place like that?"
"We thought about convenience."
"Well, it is convenient, I guess."
"Exactly. Even if the Guild Master is a tuck-away tanuki, I'd still worry about a situation like that."
Come to think of it, Ennea. She's Samaniya's little sister.
Ennea Tassan. Tanuki beastkin. Rank II delver.
The Tassan sisters were all beauties or cuties, so she was no exception.
A gentle beauty, a sleeping bust queen… she's known by the nickname "Bust Queen."
That bust once nearly crushed Juicy to death.
She's always sleeping.
Plenty capable and always sleeping. Never gets in the way. A living decoration.
For those reasons, plus a whole tangle of complicated benefits, she ended up as Guild Master.
It only worked out because all she cared about was being able to sleep.
What a sordid adult story.
"That one's no problem."
"Ennea? Nothing to worry about."
Shesh and Sphyu answered with perfect confidence.
She was Rank II, and if these two said so, then that was probably the case.
Samaniya nodded in acceptance, looked at Munieka, and the two bowed to each other.
"Oh, by the way… I can tell the maid is yours, but that pink sphere…?"
She looked up at the Afterlife Vision System β with an indescribable expression.
She could tell the maid was mine… expected of a duke's daughter.
The Afterlife Vision System β was floating behind me at an angle, bobbing gently.
A pink object hovering in the middle of an ordinary tavern was remarkably conspicuous.
"Beep... beep... beeep...—beep..."
"Ah... well, don't worry about it. I'm a first-class delver, you know."
"Huh... a delver? And first-class, at that..."
"Yeah. That's right."
"So it is."
"Beep... singularity... singularity... detected... detecting... beep..."
"Singularity?"
"Ah... don't worry about it, don't worry about it."
That system thing really does make it hard to get serious about anything.