PROLOGUE
◆

I MUST REPORT WHAT I’VE WITNESSED on the frontier—everything I’ve seen on the city streets—to the Church.

“But I do not know if I…”

The frontier was a hell controlled by monsters at the very edge of the world, a wasteland incessantly ravaged by demons. I never imagined I’d return from such a place alive. We clergy had not expected the people of the frontier to forgive us. No, we never imagined that a realm consigned to tragedy and destruction would bully us and treat our sins as trivial.

“Deliciousness is justice!”

“Come on, Arianna-san! Eat up, everyone!”

“Leveling up makes you hungry, doesn’t it?”

“Oh yeah, the tastiness of leveling up and an empty stomach.”

Jiggle jiggle!

These people had wiped out the monsters of the frontier, as well as the tragedies that went along with them. The teachings of God held no sway here; these black-haired individuals were kind out of the goodness of their hearts. In the Theocracy, we called him the Black-Haired Clown Commander. The minstrels sang of him before jeering crowds that laughed at his foolishness. However, he was peerlessly heroic, proud, and gentle, as were the rest of these foreigners.

“Come on, you guys!” an orphan chimed in. “Thanks for all the food!”

Wiggle wiggle!

They were a taboo people: a defiled race, one blackened by evil. Only, their reviled visages were beautiful and clean. The people we had scorned were kind and honorable. More so than even the smiles of the orphans, these black-haired people taught us of the kindness of this place.

“Who are you thanking for the food?” I inquired.

“All the plants and animals that became food for us!”

“Oh, and the monsters that became money for food and sweets and clothes and accessories.”

“We’ll have plenty more tomorrow, too!”

They had no need to pray to any god. All of this had been gotten with their own strength.

“This burly buffet is giving a whole new meaning to buff-et! Just look at those b—huh?! You’re back already?!”

“Seconds, please!”

“Look, I know eating big portions of nutritious, wholesome meals is good for you, but I think it’s hell to get dolesome problems from inefficient deals!”

Jiggle jiggle?

All I and my fellow brothers and sisters of the Church had ever known were silent, dour dining hours. We were shocked by the chaos and laughter. It was a merry feast overflowing with the gratitude found in that simple phrase: Thanks for the food.

“Another serving!”

“So good!”

“Re: Seconds!”

“Hey, save some for us!”

“Good boys let a lady go first!”

“That’s the biggest hunk of meat right there!”

“Yeah, I may have been actually right in calling this a buff-et?”

“Thanks for all the food!”

“Yeah, I was definitely right to call this a buff-et!”

They ate and grew stronger. They did it to protect the happiness of others, so that all could live in tranquility. The prayer, the promise contained in the echo of their words resonated… However, I couldn’t eat anymore. But it’s so good! My poor, pious restraint… I could weep!

DAY 92
NOON

Idiots besides the idiots haven’t been discovered yet, so long as it’s not some new species of idiots, any idiots are always going to be the idiots each and every time.

OMUI CITY

I REGARDED MISS SISTER: a devious trap the Church had set against me. She was a sexy church cleric who was deviously disguised as a sexy church cleric! She wore a hood and an ankle-length tunic with long sleeves, just like a real cleric or nun would. Even in the outfit, I could tell—the fabric hugged her curvaceous figure. Beneath her clean, composed face lay the absolute motherload of a dynamite body threatening to explode at any moment!

If the old god dude had sent her my way, maybe I would let him off with only a light beating the next time I ran into him.

“Haruka, wait!” Mr. Meridad was fussing about something. “I have a request for you. Please, give me a second of your time. I know you’re upset, and I understand what you want to say. If you could wait just the slightest moment, there is something that I’d really like to tell you.”

He was always making a fuss about nothing, so I ignored him. I mean, if it was of real importance, then the advisor would tell me. The advisor wasn’t here, though, so it must not have actually been all that important. Every time Mr. Meridad told me it was something important before, I had always ended up listening to a monologue about massage chairs!

More importantly, I’d made eye contact with Miss Sexy Sister. I concentrated all my heart, soul, and sex appeal and mustered up a single, sparkling, shimmering smile!

“Please stop bullying her,” Mr. Meridad huffed. “I know she’s with the Theocracy, but she opposed the war. She even sent medical corps to the frontier. So she’s—well, I suppose any guarantee from me is meaningless in your eyes. However, sneering and glaring at her like that is terrifying, frankly, so please don’t!”

She fainted.

“Ah, it’s too late!” cried Mr. Meridad. “She had no immunity and couldn’t withstand the terror, I see…”

“H-hang on, I just gave her a totally ordinary smile!” I protested. “A spectacularly appealing, sparkling grin! A regular ole smile full of wholesome, appealing, happy feelings?”

Shake shake.

Pout pout.

Boink boink.

What? Was it bad? All three of them were looking at me with “There he goes again!” faces.

“Wait a sec!” I protested. “That was, like, my special smile! You know, the activate-star-shine, smile-boosting smile. It’s so wholesome and healthy and innocent that flowers should’ve started blossoming behind me. So why is she unconscious?! And holy hell is she hot!”

Yeah, the two mountains on her chest were a true sight to behold. A fainting to behold! One worth beholding and holding! But because of her long tunic, the only skin I caught a glimpse of was her calf. The rumor that there was a long slit in a cleric’s tunic that would reveal a knife strapped to their thigh was only an urban legend, sadly.

Well, she couldn’t move. I could technically move her skirt to check out those thighs, but any teenage boy caught rolling up the skirt of a sexy, unconscious cleric had no chance of ever getting back his sex appeal. Merely having the thought caused a wave of glares to shoot my way. Yeah, it’s wiser to pass on this opportunity… But, oh lord, do I want to see!

When she woke up, she apologized. “I understand the depths of your rage. We are members of the Church, and therefore have no right to bequest your restraint. It is only a natural conclusion to come to after daring to look you in the eye. We, who could not halt the violence committed against this land, can only bow our heads and apologize yet again.”

“Please accept our humblest apologies!”

They’d done something bad, I guess? To be honest, I’d let that sexy sister do all sorts of things to me, no matter how bad. She could be red flag levels of bad to me. I’d happily take refuge in her cave, let her throw big and round objects in my direction, and soak her with my liquid. But with twenty-six furious glares on me, I’d better halt this red flag fantasy.

“Greetings, fellow classmates! Whatever could it be? Were your tummies so empty that you wandered your way over to the castle? I thought you all had a delicious breakfast! If you eat too much, you’ll have to one-more-set so hard that you harass, harangue, and harness herculean horrors to send this teenage boy to a hermit bootcamp so difficult it’ll even make Sergeant Billy cry! Plus, there’s plenty of food at the inn? Even the idiots shouldn’t have been able to eat it all… Keyword being shouldn’t.”

“Breakfast is too dangerous! And we didn’t come here because we were hungry!”

“What kinda workout would make Billy Blanks run away?! He’d be unstoppable!”

“He’d never abandon us like you!”

“No way!”

Sergeant Billy didn’t hightail it outta there?

“Okay, forget about the workout video guy. Why’d you just leave us on the damn mountain?!”

“That’s right! The provincial police would never be able to handle Sergeant Billy!”

“We barely had anything for breakfast, and we’re not wandering!”

“We heard that representatives from the Theocracy had, like, totally come, so we wanted to make sure you were, like, totally still alive!”

“Seriously, what’s for breakfast? You’re saying there’s food at the inn?!”

“Uh, so, fancy beef hotpot with beef-ish meat and cabbage that’s kinda like napa cabbage served up in a spicy stew,” I replied. “The meatheads were holding the pots like bowls and scarfing them down.”

“Emergency rations! Emergency arrangements for emergency preparations for an emergency departure to secure emergency hotpot before emergency jocks make the emergency meat go emergextinct!”

“Er…”

“Hang on! The rice is in the traditional wooden rice pots Haruka-kun made. They could’ve taken all of those, too!”

“Oh, I bet they did! Why did you have to fulfill the hot girls’ dreams of hot pot today of all days?!”

“Use magic to create an emergency seal! Seize Kakizaki-kun’s group. And seize Sergeant Billy while you’re at it, too!”

“But what’ll we do if Kakizaki-kun’s group went with Billy to train in the mountains?!”

“We’ll have no choice but to let Class Rep handle the hostage negotiations without a wire.”

“She can’t get our rice back from them if it’s one-on-six!”

“Sorry…”

Uh, I think I’ll have to recreate wireless communication in this world before we worry about that.

“Is this ‘hot pot’ really that good? I’ve never heard of it,” commented one of the knights.

“Beef sukiyaki hot pot is a first-rate dish back where we come from,” explained Book Club President.

“Imperial Guard, assemble! Hot pot recovery mission, commence!”

“The frontier army will back you up!” a knight shouted. “We’ll form an unbreakable line of defense to protect the hot pot once it’s been recovered!”

“Uh, hellloooo?”

As it turned out, it wasn’t the provincial police but the frontier army that was getting involved?

“You see, given the circumstances surrounding the highly limited supply of beef, it’s precariously unclear when the next delicious supply of delectable beef will be imported in these quantities! Only in these mysterious, delirious circumstances will the resulting delight of sukiyaki manifest. At least you won’t be deceived by the supposed saying of the ‘pheasant not getting caught but for its cries’ since its cries won’t deceive you by saying, ‘I’d be happy if this were the last thing I ever ate.’ That’s just how dangerous the deception—”

“Listen—to—meeeee! Why won’t you stop talking?!”

The screams of Miss Sexy Sister! Oh boy, those are R-rated. I mean, simply calling her “Sister” felt naughty somehow. A secret tickling resonance that PG-13 couldn’t contain, never mind a sixteen-year-old boy’s heart. The big problem was that I didn’t have the composure to check if the website was free of charge after smashing that age confirmation button in front of a sexy cleric, much less make any of the confirmations required to get into that treasure trove.

“Listen to me! Listen to me! He’s not listening at all, is he?”

Oh my! Now Miss Sexy Sister was shouting? Yes, shout away! I was all about accepting the (head)banging from a heavy metal sexy sister’s (head)banging body! Where to accept her, of course, was the problem faced by any teenage boy ever. I’m fully capable of and fully engaged in countless directions!

“I offer my sincerest apologies,” she continued. “As a member of the Church, I am in no position to offer you anything, but each of us must at least attempt an apology. While we do not believe that simple apologies will be enough to spare us from what we deserve, every disciple must do what we can: profess sorrow for our sins and bow our heads in deep regret. Therefore, that is exactly what I shall endeavor to do. I belong to a long-standing faction of the Church, after all.”

“I wondered why ‘idiots’ pinged on my presence sensing! ’Cause, yeah, that’s what they’re registered as. And there they are, appearing in my range? It just says ‘idiots.’ I have no way of differentiating one idiot from another idiot, but the idiots have been spotted. As long as they aren’t some new species of idiot, any idiots are fungible with any other idiots and will be idiots in perpetuity!”

“Emergency assemblage! For hot pot!”

S(super)-O(outrageously)-S(starving)?

“Look, even if I save you guys, I’ll just be surrounded by carnivorous teenage girls, and they’ve got mercilessly soft flesh and gobbling mouths! Getting caught and tasted by those wet tongues, then swallowed and digested—there’ll be no saving me from those thot throats! Thank goodness! Wait, no. Uh…Spare me? Oh yeah, I also made udon. You can include them in udon hot pot, but warning: I’m not going to try to escape my slurping fate! Not that I could escape. So, yeah. Eat up and stuff?”

“Sukiyaki udon!” everyone shouted.

“Why does your description of eating have to be so perverted?”

“I only came to apologize, and I’m fully aware there is nothing I can do in order to be granted forgiveness, but I did not expect that I would be ignored entirely…” the sexy cleric lady said, weeping.

“Don’t you feel bad for her?! At least listen to what she has to say! And give me food!”

Hang on, I thought Miss Sexy Sister was the one shouting. Was it Merimeri’s turn? This was a whole show of shouting. Now we were getting the Merimeri spinoff! You could expect a major limited-edition box set of a hit series like this. I didn’t know where sukiyaki’s popularity would stop, but I sure wished I had tofu. Oh, and shirataki noodles?

“First things first. Sukiyaki!”

Okay, so that was the agenda? The people from the Church had already gone all in on their apologies, probably ready to accept whatever punishment the frontier would dish out. But since we had an emotion-sensing elf on our side, we could tell they weren’t trying to deceive us. If Elf Girl took their side, then we’d all take their side. So I wasn’t about to let them apologize or torment themselves any longer.

Our entire class had no doubt mastered the art of jumbled banter. Everyone was talking over one another—a giant mountain of unmatched, jumbled banter. Where did they learn to do that, I wonder? Is it a skill?

DAY 92
NOON

Beautiful hands covered my mouth, so I licked them, and they got mad at me. I glared at them, and they told me off!

WHITE LOSER INN

THE MEATHEADS SEIZED the opportunity to stuff their faces with meat while nobody was looking. We finally cornered them and punished them by forcing them to eat the meatless cabbage dish. The idiots stared mournfully at their buckets full of cabbage, completely forlorn. Come on, guys. The cabbage is tasty?

The nerds practically turned into stone when Miss Sexy Sister smiled at them. They’re in the process of grinding themselves into a fine powder as we speak. They hadn’t contracted an ailment; their very existence was an ailment! It was the only thing I knew about those dorks, for sure.

“Thank you for the meal. It is the most delicious dish I’ve ever tasted.”

“Isn’t it?”

“We came to apologize, yet you treat us with such kindness. This is almost too much…”

“Don’t feel too bad. If you weren’t here, the carnivorous teenage girls would’ve kept eating till their skirts were too tight and then had dessert on top of it. They’d scarf so much food down that it’d burst their armor! Seriously, don’t fret it, forget it! They can always just one-more-set it? The problem isn’t solved despite all the one-more-sets, but the meal’s a real premium deal. It comes with those one-more-set, body-dynamiting seshes led by one tight-waisted DDR master, plus jiggle seshes from Master Slime? Yup, I’ve got some dessert right here!”

Jiggle jiggle!

Miss Sexy Sister seemed nervous about joining in on the sukiyaki fray but did so all the same. She’d come to offer apologies on behalf of the Church but had gotten caught up in the atmosphere and was swept away in the billowing waves of teenage girls. I know you can’t overpower them firsthand.

“Dessert! Are those smoothies?!”

“Why are there ten different types?”

“Come oooon! How can you do this to us!” (Weeping.)

“What? It’s so you guys can decide which one you want! You’re the ones who always insist on getting all the flavors! The fun part is normally picking which one you want, not trying to win a flavor conquest!”

“Thanks for the offer, but we refuse! We need to have all of them!”

They rejected my offer?! Even Miss Sexy Sister was freaking out over the ten types of smoothies lined up in front of her. I supposed it was those mushroom bentos I’d supplied her party with that gave them the energy for this in the first place. The priests and clerics were exhausted; they had needed those mushroom bentos. The journey here was a long and tiring one, and given their religious attire, it must’ve been psychologically exhausting to pass through nominal-enemy territory.

Hence, the need for a nice, tasty smoothie-fest. When they opened their mouths to apologize, we drowned them out in our jumble of banter. The girls swept them along, and they were soon all fast friends. Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl watched them, laughing. Yup, the two of them had gotten swallowed up by the group the same way.

Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl had once been monsters and slaves, so they had tried to distance themselves from the others at first. The force of the teenage girl frolic was too overwhelming, though. Next thing they knew, they were fast friends. Seeing the same thing happen to someone else was nostalgic and brought smiles to their faces.

The current target, Miss Sexy Sister, hadn’t yet grasped what was happening. She guzzled down the smoothies, eyes widening in surprise as she tried out the different flavors. I had made sure to sweeten them and added plenty of restoration mushrooms. These smoothies were a special concoction that eliminated physical and psychological fatigue. I chugged them every day myself?

“Daddy—I mean, Duke Meropapa has a message for you. Uh, here it goes.”

“Yo, Merimeri Inc.?”

“Don’t interrupt me!” she shouted. “If you must interrupt, at least remember my name, for heaven’s sake! And don’t start a corporation in my name—not that name, I mean! Ahem! Sister Arianna has visited us from the Theocracy as a special envoy. You must not give her a weird nickname! That includes calling her Ariari or something like that! Now, Sister Arianna and her companions are members of the oldest faction of the Church, known as the Originalists. Far from holding ill will toward the frontier, they, in fact, offered aid and support, the only faction of the Theocracy to do so. Furthermore, they staunchly oppose the discrimination of beastfolk. They are good people, so you must not bully them. Do not threaten them with creepy smiles or terrify them to the point of unconsciousness, either.”

“Wait a second!” I shouted. “That’s quite an assault on my honor, if you please! I merely exaggerated my ordinary, pleasant, appealing smile! I filled it with kindliness, friendliness, and loveliness! Why is everyone looking away all of a sudden? And why do I hear a whole lot of whistling?! What in the world? Is that harmonizing on a whistled Valkyrie war melody? We’re not about to ride into battle! And nobody is crying, so why are you all patting her on the back and comforting her? Miss Armor Rep? Dancer Girl? Even you, Slimey?! You traitors! Most importantly, why did Miss Sister over here faint out of shock when she saw my wholesome, friendly, appealing smile? How could it have been so shockingly bad that it struck her like a bolt of lightning on a clear day? Honestly, the shocked one should’ve been me!”

I can’t believe this, I thought. This is the treatment I get for smiling! Glaring got me lectures, and smiling got me attacked. I supposed I had to become one of those cool, aloof characters? Class Rep warned me that being expressionless would make everyone else think I was scheming something nasty, though. What was I supposed to do? She suggested I smile, and this was the result. An honest smile had straight-up knocked the cleric out! Back to glaring for me.

“Anyone who isn’t used to cursed, evil-looking eyes like yours will obviously burst into tears when seeing them for the first time! Just look normal! Oh, wait. Is that your normal face?”

“Don’t insult my face like that!”

“Arianna-san, it’s nice to meet you!”

Now they’re ignoring me?! They slid past me so fast they may as well have been going down a waterslide. This Antarctic-level cold shoulder would freeze over the whole resort unless I made some major renovations!

My classmates used their teenage girl might to overpower Sister Girl’s attempts to apologize with their barrage of questions. So why were Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl covering my mouth? What I needed covered were my eyes! No can do! Then, all of a sudden, my mouth was covered, all properly and firmly? I tried licking them, but they still wouldn’t let go! So I ramped up the Sensitivity-Boost on the lovely hands covering my lips and spelled some words out with my tongue, licking them all over.

“Ah—urgh!”

“Mmmaagh!”

Gasps of pleasure escaped between labored breaths. I activated plenty of sticky liquid, thoroughly coating their palms and the gaps between their fingers with my tongue. They arched their backs, trembling from head to toe and leaning in as if to cling to me. Thighs trembled as they shuddered. I painstakingly drew the tip of my tongue across the backs of their fingers. Unable to bear it, they stroked their hands down across their ears and necks as they gasped for air. Their own tongues began to freeze up, choking on silence. Their bodies eventually stiffened, and the tips of their fingers found their inner thighs and traced upward.

“Aaaaagh!”

“Mmmk!”

Their expressions said that they had surrendered to the seduction, their eyes tearing up under my gaze, making their bodies quake and quiver. A sweet scent rose from their electric, tingling skin. Their warm bodies rubbed on me from the left and right…

“What kind of inappropriate mouth-covering is going on here?!”

“Stop getting dirty in public! Arianna-san isn’t immune like the rest of us! Look at her. She’s overheating!”

“No PDA!”

“But I’m so bored? I’m just sitting here with my mouth covered. I’ve been left so alone and out of things that it’s practically bullying! I was just whiling away the time with some—mrrrmf!”

They covered my mouth again. If I took things to the next level, they might not be able to breathe, so I sat there in rare silence. Let’s try making it a glare silence? Glaaaaaare.

“Didn’t we tell you that you can’t glare like that when Arianna-san’s around?” the girls shouted. “Why do your eyes look blacker than the pits of hell?!”

It was just a glare…? Scolded to cinders over a look! If I was going to be left out of things, I’d rather catch up on my side jobs back in my room. Instead, they were intent on covering my eyes and mouth. Worst of all, I couldn’t even lick! I wonder how the lolly-licking old dude’s doing, by the way. Not that I care.

After sitting there doing nothing but listening, I learned that Sister Girl was part of a rebel faction or offshoot faction. Basically, it was some group that’d been cast out by the Church. Originalists.

Fundamentalist-types were typically nutjobs who tried to push the teachings of some bygone era onto others. In this case, however, they were just trying to promote the original word of God. The other, newer factions within the Church twisted the word of God to suit their own wants and needs as well as to gain more followers.

I mean, it made sense that people who updated the word of God on an annual basis were kinda scary. If you could do something like that…then those people were basically the gods themselves, right? Whoever kept updating the word of God obviously had more power than God himself in this scenario.

So, in the Theocracy’s current society, the Originalists who obeyed the original teachings of God and interpreted them accordingly and whatnot had become total outsiders or whatever. The rest of the Church used the name of God for the sake of profit.

Everything was upside down. All nations and races should have been working together, expanding the powers of magic, sorcery, and skills to make the world a wealthy place. They should have been helping the frontier. Instead, the Church promoted discrimination against beastfolk, supported the slave trade, and sought a monopoly on skills. Thus, they had fallen into chaos when the region that had the firmest grip on the world’s spellstones—the frontier—actually stabilized.

After kinda-sorta half-listening to all of that, the girls took Sister Girl and her clerics off to the bath.

Ah, those screams really take me back. I’ll never forget the look on Royal Girl’s face?

DAY 92
NIGHT

You’ll see soon enough. Everybody knows that teenage boys tend to do a whole lot of extreme deed surpassing.

WHITE LOSER INN

THE GIRLS DID A GROUP BATH SESH. Yup, including that sexy-ass Sister Girl, Royal Girl, Maid Girl, and Merimeri. Naturally, this teenage body had a whole lot of interest in a bubbly Sister Girl body, but I would never dare take a peek.

I had a different unseemly problem—the Death Guardian’s drop item: “Abyss Orb: Clairvoyance. Wisdom Eye. X-ray Vision. Understanding. Mega Kill.” I tried adding it into Jupiter Eye, which worked. Of course, I needed to test out my new X-ray Vision. What teenage boy wouldn’t?!

“It’s hard to focus, but…whoa, whoa! I’m starting to see through things! It makes objects, ya know, see-through! I can just see straight through! It’s an all-you-can-see!”

Not only was it all available to the eyes of this teenage boy, there was no way to hide!

“Wow, there’s so much to look at! I don’t know what to put my eyes on first! I suppose I’ll just have to look at every single thing one at a time and record it all. Wow! This really takes in all the details. What is this, composite layering?”

It looked like I didn’t even have to choose a magic circle layer to see through—the power automatically combined the many penetrated background layers into one view. I was planning on using it to see through my swords to build them out, but I hadn’t thought the versatility would be this impressive. This seriously expanded the scope of what I could do at my side job. Fantastic! I’m gonna use X-ray Vision on swords!

I could see straight through to the spellstones buried within them and use Appraisal to examine the imbued effects. I was looking for magic circles, but those were rare among most weapons and armor. Simply being able to tell which pieces of equipment had magic circles was a huge leap forward for my craft.

I borrowed Miss Armor Rep’s and Dancer Girl’s equipment and used X-ray Vision to examine their construction. I couldn’t make anything on this level, and they had a lot of unknown components. X-ray Vision didn’t just teach me about magic circles—it revealed their structure and craftsmanship. Everybody knew that teenage boys tended to go above and beyond, so you know I used X-ray Vision to its full potential. (Lol, JK?)

“They’re using countless layers of ultra-thin, effect-imbued steel. I suppose I’ll just have to try pasting layers together myself?”

If I gathered enough information, I could then use Wisdom to lead me to the most accurate interpretation of the data. It was best to learn by doing. I had plenty of metal, and manufacturing was simple. Reading the composite layers turned out to be really hard, though?

“So I need to add in a material that’s softer and more flexible than steel in order to absorb and distribute impacts?”

I needed to test everything out. I didn’t have enough pure iron to use for the layers. The sharpest, hardest material I had at the moment was a compound of iron and steel. It was heavy, though, so I only used it for the tips of blades and spears aside from the meatheads’ Wrathful Zweihänders.

“Maybe I can try making a foil with the iron alloy and then coating armor and shields with it? Sheesh. That’d be a level of craftsmanship on par with national treasures!”

Even a thin layer of foil would considerably boost hardness. It made the items heavier too, but it repelled attacks effectively. My classmates’ level 100+ stats should be enough to handle the extra load. This meant I’d need to do a whole new round of updates to my classmates’ armor, which would lead to another round of invoicing for said updates. I was starting to feel like a shady merchant, though, so I decided not to.

I mean, the girls were totally bankrupt. They had thought they wouldn’t be able to see the orphans on a regular basis anymore, so the girls had spoiled them like crazy, buying them all sorts of sweets and clothes. Then they’d gotten the orphans even more stuff at the festival.

“All those festival booths had rip-off prices ten times what I’d charge them for the same stuff at the inn.”

I took all the new drop items and equipment I had found and divided them up into items for sale and for testing. The drop items and weapons from monsters could all go straight to market, but I wouldn’t be sure of the potential properties of a lot of items we’d gotten from hidden rooms until I tried upgrading them with mithril.

I had already borrowed Miss Armor Rep’s Platinum Armor and all, so I might as well see what happened after upgrading it with mithril. It was already so incredibly high-grade and valuable that it legitimately seemed impossible to upgrade any further. The amount of mithril required was draining my MP like crazy.

After I applied the last coating of iron, I took a look using Appraisal. The original “Platinum Armor: Cursed. Absorbs the wearer’s flesh and blood. Perfect Invincibility, Max Power-up, Guardian, ?, ?, ?” had turned into “Sacred Platinum Armor: Total +50%. Perfect Invincibility. Max Power-up. Perfect Resistances. Skill Guardian. God’s Techniques. Phantom. ?, ?, Blessing. Complete automatic restoration to wearer. +Attack +Defense.” It was stronger, and I had activated a few new effects. The new question marks suggested that there were still more skills I could activate, but I needed to ask the owner what’d work best for her first.

Next up, I did a mithril upgrade and iron foil coating on Dancer Girl’s “Mythological Coffin: Weaponization. Perfect Invincibility. Auto Defense. Auto Repair. Total Strengthening. Magic Sword Flurry. ?, ?, ? +Attack, +Defense.” My mithril supply was pouring down the drain!

“Looks like I’ll probably be able to just about finish everything, but I really need to get some more mithril.”

Dancer Girl specialized in evasion, but at the same time, she used her shield as her primary weapon. This Mythological Coffin functioned as both her shield and her armor, which made it essential to her combat. Not only was I running low on mithril at this point, I was almost out of MP. I downed some MP restoration shrooms and potions while I worked, and finished the “Sacred Mythological Coffin: Weaponization. Total +50%. Perfect Invincibility. Max Power-up. Perfect Resistances. Automatic Defense. Automatic Restoration. Automatic Recovery. Demon Swords Dance. Magic Equipment. ? ? ? +Attack +Defense.” The foil had given it extra defense, and she now had built-in recovery.

“I’m dizzy…But feeling dizzy while nibbling on mushrooms? That’ll look a little filthier than a health issue.”

I’d used a ton of mithril and MP, and it left me feeling leaden. I stir-fried some mushrooms in soy sauce for a snack, but I still felt like crap. I was the one who insisted on going to dangerous dungeons every day, though. Upgrading everybody’s stuff was the least I could do to ensure my companions’ safety. By combining a mithril upgrade with an iron foil coating, I had given the upgraded armor the ‘sacred’ classification along with impact dispersal and absorption capabilities. They both had Restoration now. That ‘sacred’ label should help resist Darkness, too. Thank goodness it wasn’t a ‘sexy’ label! I was kinda worried it might happen since someone with the title Sex God was upgrading the items?

I’d overdone it, but the results were better than I could’ve hoped. I got out what I put in, for sure, but I never got used to the feeling of using up all my MP. A deficiency was rough. Running out plain hurt.

“Looks like Revival activated, so I guess that was pretty dangerous. Well, I better lie down. I can’t do any more side jobs today.”

I lay down on my bed. This was probably the most prized, specially constructed bed in this whole fantasy world: a king-sized bed with inimitable flexibility and structure, enabling it to shift forms and restore itself back to its original shape. I put this shape-shifting potential to practical use in building out armor today, but bragging about it just got me glares? Come on, look at all the new technique involved!

“One weakness of constructing with hard materials is that the item can shatter and break, whereas something with a more flexible construction might add some extra weight but can also handle a heavier load. I drew on all of my skills to create the ultimate bed capable of handling outbursts from two dungeon emperors…and all I got was glares?”

I recovered my MP bit by bit, and the exhaustion that my status didn’t account for was beginning to fade. Still, running out of MP resulted in a tepid languor and a weariness that was difficult to overcome, so I was flickering in and out of consciousness. I’d just wanted to make sure everyone’s armor had been boosted with the iron foil. Now, I couldn’t recover properly. It felt like my brain was melting.

The people from the Church had taken a pretty big risk by coming here so defenseless, so I’d wanted to give them equipment. It was too late—even Wisdom couldn’t stop my consciousness from fading away. I stripped off my heavy equipment one item after another, and in the midst of my listlessness, everything went black. I could hardly be vigilant with the world appearing to me in nothing more than flashes.

They appeared in only bath towels, hair still wet, drops of water clinging to their limbs.

“We let. Our guard down! We must always be alert!”

“No matter how strong. Weaknesses. Always present. Must be constantly. Ready.”

They must’ve sensed my consciousness fading while they were in the bath. When they realized I had passed out, they had raced into my room.

“My guardians dashed in so speedily. So why do I get the sense that you’re not here to defend but attack me?!”

I knew they had no intention of protecting me. The thrill of victory lit their eyes. They took a quick, happy glance at their newly completed equipment before returning their eyes— and tongues—to me.

Their faces were like works of art. Red tongues emerged from their full lips, licking slowly. Chills ran down my spine. A beastly licking session commenced. These chicks are carnivorous!

“He’s all out of MP.”

“We were. So negligent!”

“Wh-why are you attacking me, then?!”

I was coming to my senses, and my MP was finally starting to fill back up. My clothes and equipment were totally off already, leaving me defenseless as I lay on my bed, looking at the one and only Dancer Girl in nothing but a single bath towel as she straddled my chest. Miss Armor Rep, wrapped in a bath towel of her own, sat on my knees. I couldn’t move!

Dancer Girl looked down at me with a sweet smile, pulling my knees open and moving her hips in a circular motion. Bending over unfolded her bath towel and revealed amber thighs. They spread wider and wider to create a gap until the riskiest gap of all risked an appearance!

“I can’t look, I can’t look! I can totally see, but seeing is a teenage-boy trigger for an activation that would put Miss Armor Rep in a predicament! Although, she’s already posed and prepared for it! Those thick thighs are like bait dangling in front of me. I resist with my spirit of self-denial inevitably hurtling toward the end of celibacy! No, stop! Don’t sell out my celibacy! You’ve gone too far, so I might as well embrace it all! Do your worst!”

Even if they tried to distract me with their cheap moves, I could still see through them with Jupiter Eye. Dancer Girl and Miss Armor Rep slowly inched their fingers toward my lap, creeping closer and closer, reaching for the very root?!

“At this rate, there won’t be self-denial any longer! I’m trying to subdue the awakening danger by memorizing more digits of pi, but Wisdom teaches me them all instantly, so it’s not actually distracting! Damn. Those numbers just keep going and going! Where’s the end?!”

As soon as they’d spotted I was out of MP, they had become Siamese cats, licking their chops at a mouse caught in a trap. They took their sweet, sweet time with me while making sure I couldn’t restore my MP any further.

The cornered rat bites the cat, and curiosity kills the cat later. Well, the teenage boy gets ready, loads, and fires! I just needed to wait until I got the right MP load to launch my sweet counterattack. Running out of MP had made matters worse than expected, but this cycle of revenge was a daily occurrence around here. Hope for the best, prepare for the worst, as they say! In my case, hope for sex, prepare for sex!

I just needed a tiny bit. Just a small load of MP. But how many times would my load get swallowed up by those tongues? It took a while, but finally I hit the amount I needed.

It was hardly anything. Not even a half percent of my total MP. Ordinarily, I couldn’t strike back with this alone. But they had let their guard down. They didn’t have any equipment on. I didn’t have my cloak, gloves, or boots. And I could hardly equip my staff, much less shoulder guards, in this condition. My item bag was too far away to reach. And my clothes, necklaces, and rings had all been scattered. Hence, their confident, alluring smiles and insistence on taking their sweet, sweet time.

This item was new as of yesterday, so it wasn’t a surprise that they had overlooked my anklet: “100-Poisons Anklet: Speed, Dexterity +40%. Power Word Kill. Toxic. Status Ailment Infliction (all types). Slippery Ground.” Sensitivity-Boost counted as status ailments, so after a minor activation of Lascivious with Random Fire to lower their defenses, my counterattack commenced!

“Yes, they were so concerned about my tentacles and taking my cloak away. They even remembered to watch out for the rings. But they didn’t know that, after upgrading the 100-Poisons Anklet with mithril, I got the ‘1000-Drugs Anklet: [Can insert three.] Speed, Dexterity +50%. Automatic Healing. Automatic Regeneration. Status Ailment Infliction (all types). Power Word Kill. Toxic. Slippery Ground.’ That’s right! Your lack of knowledge will be your downfall!”

Those two poor, beautiful girls didn’t realize they had been exposed to my ailments the entire time they’d been licking me. Yup, and I put in plenty of ailments!

“Aaaagh! What the? How did you—ah, ahh, waaaaaaaah!”

If I couldn’t get back at them with a sudden burst of Sensitivity-Boost, I could just use a whole bunch of Magic Thread to retaliate against their retaliation.

“So! I’m thinking it’s about time to try out a triple-layered, sticky-fluid Sensitivity-Boost. Don’t expect me to hold back on Grotesquemorphosis, Perversion, or Alteration, either!”

“Aaaaaah! Mmmmaaagh!”

Two beautiful voices rang out all night long. They seemed to enjoy the song they sang at the time, but they only had glares for me by morning! What’s up with that?

DAY 93
MORNING

Integrated circulation and preservation are required for mass purchasing and mass production, with the cost cuts coming from my personal personnel expense.

WHITE LOSER INN

I HEARD EVERYTHING FROM THE SPIRITS of the dead throughout the night with my skill Spirit Whisper. The countless souls of the dead clamored all night long. When I took a look, their spirits scattered.

The frontier was full of spirits and magical substances. It was an ever-accumulating horror: a mountain of souls. These souls were attracted to and gathered around the intense pulses of magic here. More specifically, they were attracted by squeals of joy and pleasure as well as the undulations of magic energy. It drew them here nightly…I guess they were used to it?

“So. The Dungeon Destroyer may not be a myth after all. Someone capable of doing all of that—not to mention this and that…Even a dungeon king wouldn’t last more than a few seconds!”

It made me curious as to what methods were actually effective in the slaying of dungeon kings, but there was no doubting the magical power’s abnormality. And routinely employed! Night after night!

“Spirits descended gently over the inn each night. Could they simply like watching?”

Every night, a sexually muddied stream of magic burst forth. The spirits drifted down over me, whispering goings-on in minute detail. I was grateful that they appeared to me, but the things they told me made it hard for me to sleep or focus. They described goings-on in real time…The frontier is the realm of the demon king, after all! A dense forest of tentacles, a hundred-headed sexual snake, a merry-go-round of madness…Kerplunk.

It was the mysterious Lord Haruka. He was feared and loved by Duke Omui as a ‘calamity’ and adored by the common people of the city. Orphans flocked to and clung to him, and he was surrounded by companions with such gentle gazes. He did not put on airs of any sort, and he treated me as a completely ordinary human being.

It was he who lay at the heart of the rumors that surrounded the frontier. His disposition was the exact opposite of that of the ‘black-haired commander’ in the play. He did not command the black-haired beauties so much as get dragged along by them. He even prepared their meals. His slender frame could not differ more from the image of the burly, man-eating Dungeon Destroyer. He was even farther from his reputation as the black-haired grand merchant who controlled the frontier’s economic affairs with an iron fist. He seemed more apt to wander the frontier like a lost sheep.

None of the disparate rumors surrounding this individual hit the mark. As a student and member of the Church, I had traveled across the land and interacted with many races and people of countless occupations. He resembled no one else in the world. His countenance, words, and deeds made it impossible to imagine what it was he might do next. I had never met such a person before; he was singular. Even if you asked his intentions, you would fail to learn them. His next act was nothing short of impossible to predict.

Of the many rumors, the truest was his reputation for aiding the needy.

His smile was impossible to describe, but the frontier knew it as well as they knew the color of the sky. That smile revealed his true self. It was free of all deception. It contained neither hypocrisy nor scorn nor obsequiousness. No ill-intentions, no hidden intentions—indeed, no intention at all. That was the smile of the frontier folk. Their smiles contained their strength and pride, as well as their kind and thoughtful natures. And he was the reason why they smiled like that.

He was foreign to this land, but he was the representative of the frontier. He had come from elsewhere—and may very well go elsewhere in the future—but his gaze suggested that it was as natural for him to stay as it was to roam far off into the sunset. Everyone’s gaze looked forward as they walked down the street. His looked far beyond that.

Those eyes that looked as if they’d glimpsed the very depths of hell had penetrated nothing short of my entire consciousness. With a mere glance, he wiped away everything, even my consciousness itself. He did so without anger or abuse. He simply wanted to see what kind of person I was. Yet, he did not even remember my name.

“Uh, what was your name? Ari-Bari-Anna-Banana-Fee-Fi-Fo-Fana Girl?”

“Her name is Arianna!” came a chorus of shouts. “That’s way too long for a nickname! And it sounds absolutely ridiculous!”

“Lord Haruka,” I said, “my name is Arianna. I have told you fifty times already.”

His sharp gaze was the scariest I had ever encountered, but at the same time, it was uniquely gentle. His eyes were as dark as the midnight sky—what world was reflected in those eyes?

“I get it. You’re An R-Rated Ari-All-Night-Long Sister Girl. I feel you? So, about breakfast tomorrow,” he said. “The orphans are requesting okonomiyaki. You can’t question why teenage girls are joining in on the orphans’ breakfast, but if you want to join in, too, it’s my heartfelt okonomiyaki and stuff? Ya feel? Ya vibe? Are there certain foods you guys can’t eat for god-type reasons? Like god dudes and baldies and beardies?”

“Forget the Church’s dietary restrictions. Why are you adding god dudes, baldies, and beardies into our breakfast?! The church would have a much bigger problem if God was a potential breakfast dish!”

“And why are you adding all sorts of inappropriate things to Arianna-san’s name?”

“It is the principle of the Church that people should express gratitude toward all things, so we have no restrictions placed on our diets. I’d like to refrain from eating anything overly luxurious, especially after the lavishness of last night’s meal. Thank you for that wonderful meal, by the way! But, yes, I’m more than content with the same food as the orphans. We are unworthy of your hospitality.”

“Yeah, that’ll be the same as last night’s stuff?”

“A-are you suggesting that the orphans eat such sumptuous meals daily?”

“Huh? Well, we’ve got more meat at the orphanage, so the meals over there will actually be a lot more luxurious than—hey, guys, cut it out with the glares, will ya? If I don’t keep the meat stock over there, then we’ll have a bit of a complicated (one-more-set-session) situation on our hands here! The inn’s got more volume. The orphanage has got higher quality. I mean, all the orphans were such good boys and girls, having their one smoothie. Then the big kids busted in and launched an assault on the free-refills soft-drink bar? Hey! Did you all just look away and start whistling innocently?! And how did you all just start harmonizing ‘Pomp and Circumstance?’ Have you been practicing or what?! That song doesn’t even fit the situation! Pick something more fitting!”

The okonomiyaki was indeed delicious. Unbelievably delicious. They claimed it was a common dish in their native land. It was hard to believe a nation that regularly ate such food existed. Straining under the concept that this was a cheap, readily available dish, my mind wandered as I ate.

Being here broke my sense of reality. I was liable to forget all concepts of modesty with such sumptuous food available so inexpensively. When I inquired about the ingredients, I found they were—besides eggs—cheap, readily available produce. Furthermore, large-scale poultry farming had developed on the frontier, meaning eggs were available here at low prices. The delicious sauces were handmade and humble in their origins.

“This delightful dish is cheaper than the meals of honorable poverty designated by the Church!”

“Hey, even if it’s cheap, ya gotta recognize the possibilities of profits and stomachs when enough gets eatte—er, nothing! I’m not saying anything!”

The group even saw me off to the duke’s castle on their way to plunder dungeons. Such young boys and girls went off to face deadly monsters as if it were ordinary!

I had nearly forgotten that this was still the frontier, given the wealth, peace, and deliciousness. It was surrounded by a forest that spawned infinite monsters, and dungeons gnawed away at this domain day after day. The group of laughing kids descended into the deepest depths of hell at the very edge of the world. This was a land of nightmares.

These people were beautiful, kind, gentle, and fun. Starting first thing in the morning, they played and ate with the orphans. Then, they equipped themselves in armor, slung swords and other weapons on their backs, and departed. Peace and happiness vanished as if it were all a dream. They were as bold and undaunted as the heroes of myth.

No, that was not quite right. Surely, these young men and women battled monsters to ensure this peace and happiness didn’t die like a brief dream. Merely thinning out the monsters was a dangerous task. It was beyond heartening that such sweet people risked their lives to ensure the happiness of the frontier. They were coarse and uneducated, but they were such fun-loving, generous young men and women. Here was the domain of monsters, where such people had to spend all their days risking their lives.

“Lord Duke, why are the black-haired foreigners so kind? And why do they put themselves through such horrific, dangerous battles? If they could live normal lives, they would be blessed with such happiness. Yet, they test their safety in the flame!”

“It is a puzzle that perplexes us all,” the duke responded. “They have no reason to protect the frontier—they are from a foreign land and seem to have no reason to be here at all. Yet, they do all this with neither pride nor extravagance, and seek neither gratitude nor glory nor power. All they strive for is a normal life. They wield the strength to seize this frontier, seize the very kingdom. Yet, they do not. Instead, they clear the monster forest and destroy the dungeons. We are bewildered. If they demanded that we worship them and pay them everything we had, we would gladly hand over our valuables. Instead, they hate to stand out and claim that they don’t need anything, save the profits from their merchandise and their dungeon-raiding. They live the lives of ordinary commoners.”

To give and gain only by the sweat of their own brow; to demand neither fame nor glory as recompense. It was just as written in the holy scripture. People who were the very embodiment of God’s will would be labeled as enemies and targeted by the Church. By official edict, they were labeled as criminals and treated as enemies of God.

To oppose the black-haired boys and girls whom even Wise King Dialleces of Diorelle resolutely rejected any punishment of; the scripture had indeed manifested.

“I hear that you intend on forgiving the Church’s blunder of demanding an execution of Lord Haruka and his companions,” I said. “And they have reaffirmed them all as supreme enemies of God. There is no doubt that this will place political pressure on your domain and Diorelle alike. We wish we had the power to stop this foolish undertaking, but at this time, all we can do is share information. I have heard that the Theocracy is summoning new troops to protect their current authority.”

“King Dialleces will not be cowed by such plans,” Duke Omui said. “Nor will I. We will not—nay, dare not accept the lies of the Church. What do you think will happen if we follow its word? To mete divine punishment upon a slayer of dungeons? Even God Himself could not dispense punishment on the boy! If God descended from heaven…Perhaps even God could not survive. You can imagine what is more powerful here—the teachings of miracles brought about by God, or the destruction of the Ultimate Dungeon and the outbreak of happiness on this frontier? We would have to see what would happen after God descended to this land, if your Church could even summon Him in the first place…Do not bring your complaints to Diorelle. Appeal to your God in heaven.”

Duke Omui spoke with a smile, but I had tempted his wrath. Humor may have tinged his tone, but this was a dark proclamation. He had declared his intention to oppose God. He would fight back against anyone who laid a hand on these black-haired foreigners, even God. Neither side would back down; conflict was inevitable. Worse, I lacked the power to stop it! My words would change nothing.

“The Church…They are on the verge of resorting to a taboo of antiquity,” I warned. “This weapon has been banned since ancient times—sealed by God Himself. They will use it despite the rumor that it holds the power to lead the entire Church into darkness. It is said that humans cannot handle its might, hence its long slumber. Yet, they are considering returning it to the light and unleashing powers unheard of since long bygone days. If we do not act, disaster could befall the world.”

“I am used to disaster here. Those of us born on the frontier have lived through one disaster after another. We are experts on the subject. Even we have been unable to comprehend the blessings we have witnessed in these few short months, though—if there is an evil greater than the calamity of happiness that we have seen here, witnessing it would be a grand way to exit the world.”

A duke willing to lose everything, and his people, all of whom backed him up. His conviction was unmatched. Of course, the blame was on the side of the Theocracy; I could not expect to even appeal to them for negotiations with Diorelle or Omui. I needed to stop the rash behavior of the Church nonetheless, or disaster would surely befall us all. The ones who would suffer the most would be innocent civilians.

“I do not believe the outcome you fear will come to pass,” Duke Omui continued. “No matter how disastrous you expect the situation to be, a much more awful disaster will smash it to pieces. Even if you believe everything and everyone is at risk, that disaster will be swallowed by something beyond your comprehension. This is why we have no believers in the Church here. You should fear that fact more than you know. Woe would only befall you if I handed over the kingdom. I pity you for the damage that would follow. Why do you think the boys and girls capable of destroying such dungeons have not laid a hand upon the Theocracy? If the Theocracy held a power greater than that of these dungeons, then they would have targeted you first. They could have acquired spellstones and the faith. If you consider why they did not take such action, you will understand that they do not want to be your enemy.”

The Theocracy’s official ambassador to Diorelle had refused to apologize. Instead, he convicted them of crimes and stipulated oppressive conditions for peace: the safe return of the cardinal, apologies and recompense from the kingdom, the spellstone profits from Omui, the transfer of various authorities from Diorelle to the Theocracy. Last and most onerous of these demands was handing over the black-haired boys and beauties. Torture and rape euphemistically called “inquisition” were sure to follow. It was hard to even look these people in the eyes knowing that such shameful, heinous deeds were being plotted in the name of God! Yet, the upper ranks of the Church had too much at stake and had already lost too much to back down—they would do anything if it meant remaining in power, even dragging everyone into chaos and all the way to the brink of death right along with them.

I must warn them. I would not care if those lovely, gentle people punished me, punched me, kicked me, and despised me! I must report the true state of the Church to them…I had never imagined the thought of being despised by such kind people would be this heartbreaking. I would not be able to live with myself if I made them face the oncoming danger unawares. I must tell the truth as a member of the faith about the danger of my Church.

Here is the terrible truth: it had all fallen to rot and ruin.

DAY 93
MORNING

It’s a dangerous dungeon that seems like it’s going to inspire a whole new genre of sexy tongue action.

DUNGEON
76TH FLOOR

FIRST, WE SPLIT UP ON THE MAZE FLOOR. The level 76 Hide Chameleons disguised their breathing, concealed their presence, blended into the surroundings, and snuck up on us to attack. And we cut them all down.

Yup. The moment it was my turn to fight on a maze floor, it was just a bunch of chameleons climbing around and blending into the walls. They didn’t even twitch. They were just stuck there, waiting. They kept looking at me but never made a move. We stared at each other until I just sliced them apart.

“Uh, if you can see me, then move, damn it! Fight! This just looks like a one-sided, bullying reptile massacre, which is not the best for my flagging sex appeal. I’m a sensitive teenage boy who’s susceptible to sensory stimulation, so you’re really censoring my will to fight? This is just murder!”

Since when were monsters so stubborn? I could see them, but they insisted on acting like I couldn’t. I even reached out and petted them. I told them I could see them. They still didn’t move!

I just walked around stabbing them. To test things out, I tried pretending that I couldn’t see one and walked past it. Sure enough, its giant tongue lashed out like a whip to slice me to bits. Boy, did that chameleon have a smug-ass grin on its face!

“Ugh. That ‘Aha, gotcha!’ face sure is pissing me off!”

Even worse, I tried to explain that I was just pretending to not notice it, but it didn’t believe me! So, I averted my eyes and skewered that chameleon the same way that chameleon had averted its eyes from reality. If I hadn’t seen them, they might’ve been dangerous with their Paralysis and Bind, but I could see them plain as day.

“Yeah, the guild warned us about you guys and your tongues. ‘Invisible monster. Affixes itself to the wall and waits for prey to come before attacking. Requires special attention.’ They kept going on and on about being completely covered in shields with a line of spears at the ready as you move through the dungeon and how you can use area effect magic to exterminate everything within that radius. There was no information on what to do if you could see them!”

The chameleons didn’t know what to do in that case, either. In the end, they were just lizards that never even moved. What exactly was it about these guys that required special attention? The special attention was required from them, not me! Well, I’d already wiped them all out, so any attention was a bit too late at this point.

“Sorry for the wait. I’m not too late, am I? They were just a bunch of literal lizards, so doing a cool pose didn’t make things more fun. I feel like I should’ve been plenty fast this time?”

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

Jiggle jiggle!

Slimey was in top spirits, jiggling all over the place. So much bopping and hopping and rapping and clapping you’d think he’d start rapping. He must’ve been able to see the chameleons, too, because he ate his fill.

The 77th floor was a group battle against level 77 Shock Wolves. They were giant gray wolves that coordinated to send blasting attacks from mid-range as separate units charged in for the kill. On the other side was our Square One, which sounds like a movie, but in reality, was a simple rhombus formation ready to charge. Jolly old Slimey was in front with me on the right and Dancer Girl on the left. Miss Armor Rep brought up the rear.

Chains whipped out from the left and my Magic Thread slung out from the right, cornering the wolves in the center of the room. Miss Armor Rep unleashed a wind cutter attack to knock them down, then Slimey swept in and gobbled them up.

It was unusual for Miss Armor Rep to attack with magic, but she Entangled wind magic into her sword’s Flash Attack that shot out countless blades of wind with every swipe. She managed to incorporate a long-ranged wind magic attack into her swordplay—and looked cool doing it! I gotta learn that move myself!

DAY 93
NOON

I don’t think dogs and wolves can do shadow puppetry.

DUNGEON
76TH FLOOR

LONG SHADOWS EXTENDED down the 78th floor. They split into pieces and wriggled as they formed into a line of standing soldiers. Monsters surrounded us on all sides in an instant.

“Good!” I cackled. “Lose your way amid my inviting shadows! Unleash my secret power, Shadow Incarnate!”

I faced the monsters with layers of jet-black shadows of my own. Yup, I tried making shadow pigeons?

“Shadow crows have emerged out of the blackness,” I said. “I guess it’s fitting for crows of darkness to swoop around an evil dungeon.”

I looked like a badass, but the monsters ignored me completely! Miss Armor Rep and the others didn’t even give me a second glance. I suppose I was just making shadows move anyhow. No biggie. Peep peep.

“What am I supposed to do? What’s impressive? Here, a fox! Sneak sneak!”

This was a pretty good fox, if you asked me, ignoring that you couldn’t tell a shadow puppet fox apart from a shadow puppet dog or wolf. Not that anybody was asking? Despite the teenage boy playing around with shadow puppets in the dungeon, the monsters were getting exterminated without even taking a moment to enjoy the show.

“Hey, here’s a crab? Please look! Oh, wait, you’re dead?”

I wanted to try out all sorts of things after all my work getting the “Shadow Cloak: Speed, Dexterity +30%. Shadow Crows. Shadow Incarnation. Shadow Manipulation. Shadow Manifestation. Shadow Magic. Shadow Scowl. Presence Isolation,” but all it did was move shadows around. Totally useless. I couldn’t do anything about that, so I made the shadows move in all sorts of artistic ways, but nobody was even looking.

“Look, a rabbit? Hop hop? Is that what rabbits say?”

Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl had spent all morning staring at their equipment, examining every piece before putting it on with great care, which meant they really liked it. They liked it so much that they were going all out, leaving me no time to shine. I was playing shadow puppets all by my teenage-boy lonesome.

The level 78 Hammer Apes were being nice and playing with my shadows, trying to bite them. Then they all got stabbed from the side before my shadows could bite them back. All my poor little shadows were left hanging, mouths wide open.

I even gathered all my shadow puppets together for a grand performance: “Rock Soup and the Seven Musicians of Hamelin, Shadow-Style! The rooster and cat of Bremen depart from the group due to musical differences! A new, unbeatable collaboration with the rat-scaring Pied Piper! Oh, and don’t forget the donkey! Yeah, it’s kind of a mess. I mean, I released it to rave reviews, but nobody watched? I even made preparations to screen part two: The cat’s too evil, so the rat did a heel-face turn! Bremen’s Revenge! There’s a whole trilogy, but I don’t even have a single audience member. I wasn’t sure whether to complete the set with the counterattack of the donkey or the rooster, but nobody’s going to watch either way? Look, now the crab’s joined in! And stuff?”

The popularity of shadow puppeteers really didn’t hold up in a fantasy world. I’d have to hold off upgrading the Shadow Cloak with mithril for now. Then we all went downstairs… Wait. Was something concealing itself?

I sensed something bad and immediately leaped away. We were already surrounded—all paths were cut off and our escape routes crushed. Miss Armor Rep and the others were behind me. They’d have a chance to escape, but the unpleasant sensation assaulting them hindered their judgment. Retreat was the only option, yet we couldn’t withdraw. Attacking would be suicide. We all knew the peril we faced.

“It saw through our attack and cut off our retreat?”

Nod nod!

Rattle rattle!

Jiggle jiggle!

An unbreakable wall wriggled behind us. Ugh, gross! No way! We’d figure it out somehow, but what we faced was disgusting, gross, and hella numerous. Enormous, wriggling slugs filled the entire floor: “Web Slugs. Lv: 79.” What’s worse, they seemed to be intelligent. At the very least, they had the ability to hide their presence, cooperate, and surround us. They were wrapped in water magic, pouring in on us like a tsunami, a deluge of slugs. Maybe if I chucked some salt at them, they’d turn into the ocean? So gross!

I jumped up into the air before I could get sucked into the slug tsunami and started weaving Magic Thread through the room. Miss Armor Rep and the others leaped up onto the thread to stand above a sea of slugs that raged fiercely enough to threaten to swallow us, even as close to the ceiling as we were. These squirming, wriggling, intestine-like behemoths even had warts. They were truly one of the nastiest creations a dungeon ever managed to produce!

“Go, Salty Storm! AKA, just spreading salt with wind magic? I do love getting my salt bae on, but sprinkling salt on slugs is no fun. Hurry up and die, please? I am a fan of sticky fluid and all but not from slugs! You’re disgusting!”

Nod nod!

Rattle rattle!

Wiggle wiggle!

I decided to pretend I didn’t see the resemblance to my tentacles from last night’s activities and kept on slinging the salt. For some reason, Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl glared at me. I wasn’t with the slugs! As for the resemblance to the perverted sticky fluids and substances spurting, trampling, and violating their bodies last night…I pretended I did not see it. Their glaring eyes are starting to get teary!

The slugs eventually started to writhe and twitch as the salt kept dousing them. They ran wild, wriggling all over the floor, ceiling, and walls in agony.

“Can you not glare at me? I didn’t chuck salt at your naked bodies or anything! That wriggling has nothing to do with me! Their stickiness has nothing in common with my sticky tentacles whatsoever! I’m better off not thinking about the resemblance, and it’s better not to think about Grotesquemorphosis in general. It definitely mixed in some insectoid stuff last night?”

Including what I learned from the slugs into the scope of Grotesquemorphosis was certainly on the table, but that seemed like it’d be a little too grotesque. It wasn’t worth the kind of study I’d have to undertake. The déjà vu of these wriggling slugs and the way my sticky tentacles squirmed and swept and frolicked all over their entrancing, naked bodies, perversely transforming and secreting fluids everywhere they went…Oh God, those glares! Those were teary-eyed glares—99 percent tears! The actual glare proportion was less than 1 percent now. They were wearing armor head to toe, but their faces were completely red. What were they thinking, anyway?!

“L-look, those weren’t slugs, per se. They were just friendly, slug-like tentacles slugging their way across your bodies. Yeah, they were Grotesquefying a bit here and there to resemble living things, but they’re just transforming, morphing, perverting tentacles. Nothing more, ya know? You sure seemed to like them last night when you were screaming and weeping with joy and moaning and drooling and shouting for me to not stop? You didn’t even mind the tentacles in your mouths! See, I’m nothing like the slugs! Ya know?”

The ridiculous slug-related rumors about my tentacles threatened my reputation. I supposed they did have some similarities—more like exactitudes, to be honest—in the way they wriggled and romped all over their bodies, squirmy and squirting, writhing and frothing immodestly all the way. Don’t worry, though! Magic Hands was just a manifestation of magical power. It was all magic! To be honest, there had been a lot that had worried me about their expressions by the end of the night. They blurted out all sorts of stuff, but there was definitely no need to worry? This was a nightly routine, after all.

“All right, 80th floor dungeon boss time! I really gotta fight! And why do teary-eyed glares always intrude into the plot? That’s some 18+ material. It’s not appropriate for this time bloc!”

I wanted to do something, anything to change the mood here. The newly upgraded Sacred Platinum Armor and Sacred Mythological Coffin didn’t have any scratches yet, so I wasn’t sure about the quality of the new effects. Although, now that I thought about it, they hadn’t had any scratches before I had upgraded them either. Still, if I tossed them into the sea of slugs, I wouldn’t get off with a mere beating. Oh, no.

“I’d never do that, so stop the teary-eyed glares, ’kay? Don’t want anyone getting a ‘Don’t push me, don’t push me!’ skill or something. If you still got pushed after developing that, you’d be in real trouble.”

I used Presence Sensing to look for the 80th floor boss. I only spotted three things, and two of them were still teary-eyed and glaring!

“I don’t think the big slugs got inside your armor. If they did…the two of you would’ve gone so wild the whole frontier would be at risk of destruction!”

The damage wouldn’t stop at this dungeon, and it certainly wouldn’t end with me. Seriously, I didn’t even push them, so why do they still look like they wanna kill me?!

Miss Armor Rep slashed apart the tentacles that came from every direction, leaving twinkling afterimages in her wake. Zigzagging like a bolt of lightning, Dancer Girl whirled with her greatshield, shredding the tentacles to bits. The tentacles couldn’t keep up with their sublime movements or their limber and peerless pace. The enemy found themselves cut, torn, and sliced. I felt a twinge of regret. Oh God, stop glaring at me already! Just because I sported tentacles of my own didn’t mean I was on the side of the enemy!

The 80th floor boss was a “Sucker Tentacles. Lv: 80.” Great. Thanks to this dipshit floor boss, I got more glares. The moment we got past the slug problem, we had a sucker tentacle crisis. More déjà vu? They didn’t display a shred of sympathy and subjected the poor floor boss to a merciless beating. I almost felt sorry for it?

“This monster may not be an octopus, but it sure is getting treated like an octopus at a sushi restaurant…How can they be beating up the monster while glaring at me with tear-filled eyes?! I have nothing to do with the monster! It’s not my friend! I’m not spurring it on or anything!” I paused. “Hey! I was so close to getting in a hit—no, never mind, nothing!”

“Bad monster! Destroy bad monster!”

“The suckers. Are our enemies. If we don’t cut them off…we’ll get sucked!”

Their eyes are glazed over. How terrifying! I thought I heard evil laughter from them as they kept wailing on it. Did they have trauma from suction cups or something? They must’ve gone through a lot…Oh yeah! I’d been the one to put them through it!

I was freaked out, so I grabbed the drop items and spellstones and ran off to the 81st floor. I activated Magic Entanglement to power up my body and spin it into a vortex of magic that smashed across the floor.

“I’m not getting in the middle of that! Mostly because I’m scared of those two? Yeah, their eyes are completely dead! That’s scary! So just, ya know, please vanish, monsters? Otherwise, I’ll get slowed down, and they’ll catch me? They’re fighting more monsters and still glaring at me!”

This floor had a long hallway with level 81 Arrow Bugs shooting out of holes in the walls. They were long, skinny insects that changed trajectory to shoot right at you. I had Clairvoyance to project those ruffians’ trajectory, so I knocked them out of the air with ease. I cut down the barrage of rocketing arrow bugs with Magic Thread. I didn’t need to slice through them, just divert their direction and knock them away. Even if I snatched them out of the air or cut them apart, they could spawn an unlimited number of times. I used a powerful concentration of earth magic to seal up all the holes, then smashed them with all my might, eradicating the entire swarm

“Looks like they were weak to bludgeon attacks. They may have been lightning-fast Pierce-equipped monsters with unlimited range and trajectory, but without Clairvoyance, it was like a butterfly net fighting a baseball bat. Not sure if the girls could’ve handled this one.”

The three of them were standing behind me. They’d managed to just burst through the infinite storm of arrow bugs and kill them all without doing anything special? I’d had to overclock my speed, run as fast as I possibly could, and clog all the holes… Yet, here they were, having aced the corridor, no problem.

They had energy to spare, too. I knew ’cause I had sure felt the barrage of arrow glares shooting at me right alongside the barrage of arrow bugs. To control the Magic Thread, I needed to activate Slow Motion and Teleport, restraining my micro-teleportation speed-boosting. I’d been pretty slow.

“I guess I’m sorta weak until something tests my limits after all?”

“You mess with your body. I’m against. No different from hurting yourself.”

“Perversion. Control places a burden on you. Getting larger.”

They didn’t think it was a good idea. Not that I was expecting them to agree with Perversion, but they didn’t even want me to test it out. It was certainly true that it was unclear how exactly to control my new form after manipulating my body, so there were a lot of downsides. If I lost control of one of these new forms, I could suffer a fatal injury. And even I wasn’t a fan of Grotesquemorphosis!

“Yeah, those don’t just pervert or transform the human body. They mock the very concept of humanity! Sluggification or bugamorphosis need to be registered as red-alert threats to my sex appeal.”

Still, I think I could’ve used those skills when the Church had me completely paralyzed. I wanted to at least have them as options. I knew I was rushing a bit, but I still wanted to improve my choices while in combat. Sister Girl and the others were in danger…well, because of their own recklessness. The Theocracy had probably kept them under strict watch and tight control, otherwise they probably would’ve come to the frontier a long time ago.

The current church leaders thought they were dangerous heretics, with a perspective so different it made the two groups enemies. The Originalists provided support for the common people, making them way more popular than the top brass, which made them even more of a threat. Since Sister Girl’s group was influential, the leaders kept them under close watch and careful control, yet they had somehow managed to break out and make it here regardless. This meant the Church would try to kill them.

Just as Sister Girl’s group had said, they had come to the frontier prepared to lose their lives. They decided that their last act would be to warn the frontier of the Theocracy’s plans and had rushed here, convinced that we were on the brink of war. If they went back to the Theocracy afterward, the likelihood that they would be purged was high. They thought the frontier was in danger and had laid everything on the line in order to warn us. The church was now their enemy.

“Miss Armor Rep—or should I say, Sergeant Armor Rep, Captain Dance Girl, Captain Slimey—are we really about to boot camp those priests?”

Nod nod!

Rattle rattle!

Jiggle jiggle!

Yup, that was the plan. A hellscape lay before Sister Girl. Death would be better, right? I didn’t necessarily not un-disagree with that?

“I suppose that even if it’s a fate worse than death, then they live?”

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

Jiggle jiggle.

In order to not get killed, they’d need the power to not die. It was bonk or be bonked in this cruel, grim world wherever there was a threat of bonking.

Now. Time to get this dungeon over with.

DAY 93
NOON

Assuming the king is admirable is just a tradition.

DUNGEON
90TH FLOOR

WE MADE IT TO THE 90th floor and drew lots. When we decided on our formation with rock-paper-scissors, I kept losing somehow despite my LUK LvMax (Over Limit).

I wasn’t expecting any factor besides luck to be at play there. When I used Jupiter Eye to see through their choices, they changed them at ultra-high speeds at the last second. It was a high-stakes guessing game of feints, reading the opponents, and superspeed hand movements. I didn’t stand a chance! I was facing off against dungeon-emperor-class opponents here!

I tried using Magic Entanglement on my finger to tie my rock-paper-scissor decision to the response Jupiter Eye registered, but my finger cramped up. I’d had leg and arm cramps before, but this was the first time I ever got a damn finger cramp! That rock-paper-scissors match nearly tore my middle finger off. I rolled all over the dungeon, moaning in pain!

Of course, I revenged that sleight of hand by inflicting cramps from head to toe and moans and groans and gasps and cries all morning long. Perversion did work. My revenge later got avenged, but still!

This was just a typical lottery, not some sort of king game. Because if I’d entered a world where you had to obey every word of two peerless beauties, I had no chance of escaping!

“That’s more of an emperor game than a king game. A king is nothing in that world. I’ve got the title Sex God, and I’m still sure I’d be at the bottom of the ladder!”

The giant across the room unleashed its wrath, a display of pure, untarnished violence. Even the hard-as-steel dungeon floor couldn’t take the overwhelming display of force. This floor boss would be well-suited for demolition, but I saw a better use for its talents.

“’Cause it’s a frigging MITHRIL CYCLOOOOOOOOOPS!”

It was only a single giant made of mithril, but I’d take every scrap of that I could get. I poured magical power into its body, activating Alchemy in order to alchemically separate the mithril from its frame, extract it, and shove it into my item bag. The cyclops gradually grew smaller and smaller—I mean I was only taking a bit. He could just be a big guy looking at me with his big eyes—oops, eye. It’s teary, and he’s super upset?

“Well, I’m actually gonna take all the mithril, so I don’t blame him if he can’t look at me with a kind eye.”

Wiggle wiggle?

He was too strong for my tentacles to restrain. I couldn’t cut him apart, or I might lose precious mithril. Slimey and Dancer Girl were also holding him back with tentacles and chains respectively, but he was throwing a fit, which made it harder to extract the mithril. Level 90 with a Power stat of 1300 was just nuts. But I’m still gonna take what’s mine!

I didn’t think I’d ever see a rampaging cyclops shrink and grow cuter and cuter. Eventually, it lost all its mithril, too. It was just a mini cyclops at this point, but I didn’t intend to leave any resources untouched. I was in dire need of mithril, so this was a big opportunity. Bummer that there was only one of them.

“I pluck, and I plunder! Let’s polish this off?”

Wiggle wiggle.

The monster’s surface was made of pure mithril, but a regular cyclops lay underneath. I gave it a bonk, and it turned into a spellstone that probably wasn’t worth much since I had already taken all the mithril off. If that’s the case, though, has Slimey been lowering the value of all the spellstones by eating the monsters’ skills first? Wow, disassembling monsters really is a science.

“Now I can increase my number of G*ndam funnels.”

Jiggle jiggle.

The shoulder pads were surprisingly useful. I had trouble controlling them, so I had originally limited myself to six. I had gotten used to using them, though, so I figured I could give more a shot. I didn’t have any elbow pads, so I could use the extra shoulder pads to cover my elbows. I had a whole lot of other equipment that needed a mithril upgrade too. I wanted to boost the quality of my classmates’ equipment, and then work on Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl’s, if I had extra. I could take it easy on my own stuff since the latest upgrades to my equipment had made everything so powerful that my body had started self-destructing again. Mr. Perversion didn’t need any mithril. Yeah, the last thing that ability needs is more power!

I was sensing some glares aimed in my direction. How could you not appreciate the power of mithril?! Their scorn made me feel a bit lonely, but not as pathetic as the poor baby-doll eyes of the cyclops as I took its mithril away. The metal just fell to the floor. I was picking it up under the finders-keepers principle! Well…I guess I did rip it off first?

Taking the mithril would’ve been easy with Dancer Girl’s Prometheus God Chains, but the item had been loaned to my classmates for some reason. I’d tried using it once, and it was crazy hard to control. Plus, it consumed an insane amount of MP. I wonder if the girls are doing all right.

“The hidden rooms are nothing special, but we’ve gotten four good items so far, so I’d like to get those over to our classmates. Running into that mithril was a big break, but I can already tell that it’s not gonna be enough. I guess I gotta go mining after all?”

The hooligans who hadn’t been able to hooliganize on the 90th floor got their hooligan activities out of their systems on the next four floors. No time in the sun for me. I couldn’t keep up with them no matter how far I shot out my Magic Thread and G*ndam funnels; all the monsters were dead by the time I got there. It went without saying that I was the only one trying out any cool poses. That was the reason I fell so far behind, but…ya know?

The 95th floor was the final one in this dungeon. There didn’t seem to be any 90-floor dungeons left after this one, but with the evolution of the dungeons around here, I couldn’t let my guard down. The army had gotten exponentially stronger lately, so they were scouting for any new dungeons. If the deepening of dungeons was some temporary occurrence, we were in good shape. If it continued, we’d never get a break.

The dungeon king was a “Spear Centipede. Lv: 95,” a centipede armed with a hundred spears for legs. Or at least I assumed it was a hundred since centipedes had a hundred legs. Didn’t have time to count, though.

“Waaaaagh! I’m threading the needle with my thread, but it’s all red, bled dead! Ya knoooooow? How about a bonk?”

Jiggle jiggle!

Finding my rhythm was difficult beyond all expectations. I composed the rhythm in my head, then forced my body to fall into the invented cadence. Yeah, this was a pain? The rhythm isn’t working, so how about I go superfast instead? I changed gears, speeding up, up, up, up, up and awaaaaay!

“No good. No good! You’re just fast! And you don’t need. To dance!”

“No interval. Is problem. Will get used. To pure speed.”

“Well, because of two unnamed individuals, I’ve been feeling a bit drowsy since this morning. Leaves me wondering why said two individuals have got clear skin and are in perfect shape—and are sticking their tongues out at me? Now you’re just being seductive with those tongue movements. Cut it out! That’s creating a whole new genre of :P emoji! Wh-what?! Even faster tongue technique?! And it’s still sexual?!”

Of course it was sensual when girls that hot stuck out their tongues, and that tongue work had been put into practice just this morning. I really wished they’d cut it out. Is it just me, or are their tongues longer? Is that Perversion at work?

Those spear arms—or legs, or whatever—the centipede shot out went pretty far, so even with my footwork, I nearly got stabbed. I kept speeding myself up till I fell into a good groove and gave the monster a bonk, but the others just got mad at me. I wanted books in this world, but the popularization of music would also be nice. Just how long did I need to wait before a bookstore popped up here?

“Well, y’all are the ones calling the hundred legs gross and staying away, leaving more work for me to do? And don’t just dismiss everything by sticking your tongues out!”

The hundred legs were imbued with every possible toxin and ailment. Did that mean it also had Sensitivity-Boost and Lascivious? God save us?

“It sure is having a tough time moving around on the slippery floor with those spear legs, though,” I said. “It’s got a few normal ones in the back, but it’d be a lot stronger if it just had regular legs.”

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

Jiggle jiggle.

The monster-naming problem was as severe as ever. Not sure what you’d do with a Fifty-Spear-Legged-and-Fifty-Normal-Legged Centipede, though. The drop item was gonna be poison-type, so I didn’t need it, but I couldn’t sell it, either. I used my “100-Poisons Anklet: Speed, Dexterity +40%. Power Word Kill. Toxic. Status Ailment Infliction (all types). Slippery Ground.” This item was frightfully dangerous with its ailment inflicting properties. Combined with my gauntlets and necklace, the Sensitivity-Boosting potential was off the charts. I really didn’t need to boost that again…As I considered my options, I felt a strong gaze from behind me. I put on the anklet, and Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl instantly ran away. Given how quickly they fled the scene, they were surprisingly prepared to attempt their revenge!

Slippery Ground was the ability to make the ground as slippery as ice. I gave it a shot in this battle, but it was pretty useless, to be honest. Trying to run around sent you sliding in straight lines that were easy to target, so I didn’t see any real use for the ability.

“I guess the only way to use this is to sexualize the entire body with inflicted ailments, making sticky, wet, dripping, sopping, spurting—whoops, they ran away again?”

“We demand equipment removal! Actually going to die! Everything went white! Consciousness wouldn’t come back!”

“Please! Don’t use equipment! I can’t take it. It’s more than I can handle! Promise!”

“Really? Pretty sure you guys got your revenge on me this morning a hundredfold. ’Cause my Limit Break somehow went up another level…Oh, and now you’re smirking?! You should be reflecting on your mistakes, not beating your chests! Although, some chest action would be nice, and I could be a fan of such an occasion, and now that I’m taking a hard stare, they’re quite big?”

In the current situation, going without equipment would leave me completely vulnerable and exposed to being trampled. I didn’t stand a chance. I had more skills at my disposal, but I was both outnumbered and far behind in terms of my power stat. Once they had me pinned down, they could do anything they wanted to me. Anything. I could overwhelm them with unlimited Perversion once I had my equipment, though. Knowing all their weak points, I could brave a hundred battles with a hundred victories for a hundred years. Now that would be a beautiful scene.

Even given that we posed such dangers to each other, they still sauntered up to me in minidresses last night, stripped me, and conquered me? No teenage boy could fight back against such seduction!

They knew that they could use some means of seduction to get my equipment off. With whatever clothes they had and the magnificent contents underneath, they had unlimited methods of stealing my clothes, my heart, even my very soul. Their perfect traps that exposed my weaknesses were works of art. Although, now that I thought about it, I had made all those traps with my own two hands. Of course they had access to all my weaknesses!

“Man is always his own worst enemy,” I sighed, quoting the French philosopher Emile Chartier, also known as Alain. “Know thy self, know thy enemy,” I added, as the ancient Roman poet and philosopher Lucius Annaeus Seneca first said. “The worst enemy you can meet will always be yourself,” I concluded, quoting Friedrich Nietzsche, German philosopher. Hang on—it’s actually my own fault?

“Well, we finished early, but I’m not sure if we have enough time to do another. How about we go back to town, hijack some cash from the general store and armory, and let your greed unfurl to your hearts’ content?”

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

Jiggle jiggle.

I sold off the equipment I didn’t need at the armory, took every ele the old dude had, and skipped off to the general store. That armory old dude was busy for a forger—and not to mention bald-bearded.

The bustling general store had at some point expanded even more at some point. The general store lady and the salesgirls were wearing yukata to promote the new items, and the store was filled with customers trying them on.

“Having my classmates wear them at the festival was a huge break, a huge hit, a huge profit pumper!” I cried. “Once I make the materials for the yukata, the sewing just requires a cutting in a straight line and a straight stitch, so it’s possible to mass-produce them at a factory and sell them all the ding-dong day.”

“Oh, young sir, please help! We’ve been packed all day with customers in search of the clothing called yukata! Help us sell, fold, and put them on!”

“Er, a teenage boy helping these women put on their yukatas is bad in more than a few ways?”

I had to politely decline this opportunity, especially ’cause the store was full of middle-aged women? If there were beautiful young ladies, then I’d have to work my very hardest to put those yukata on them and take them off with a variety of tentacular assistants…But these were middle-aged moms. Ah, the sting of reality.

The moment the occasional young woman showed up, Miss Armor Rep, Dancer Girl, and Slimey zoomed off to assist them at lightning speed, leaving me surrounded by middle-aged ladies. Well, folding and selling did the trick, so I stuck to that.

“It’s not like I mind or anything, but when did you learn how to put a yukata on, Slimey? You’re too good at it!”

Jiggle jiggle!

I used my unlimited tentacles to fly around the store, restocking and folding yukata at top speed before distributing them to customers. The general store lady explained they had lowered the yukata’s price as a promotion. Drawn in by the cheap yukata, everyone ended up buying the full set, which included the sash, sandals, and hairpins. They were selling like crazy, meaning the profit margins were considerable at the end of the day even with the discount.

I helped out until evening, then hijacked goods from the store to provide Miss Armor Rep, Dancer Girl, and Slimey their salary for the day. They had helped, too, but this was getting expensive! Doing part-time work at the general store pulled in a higher salary than doing quests from the adventurer’s guild. I had no problem ripping the three of them off.

The happy pair marched out of the general store, arms full of clothes. Slimey bounced and jiggled, a huge stack of snacks on his head. Why aren’t they falling over?! Just how good is Slimey’s balance?!

DAY 93
EVENING

Ari-can-ya or Ari-can’t-ya-san gave me a tough time, but I don’t mind some persecution.

WE HEARD THAT THE AMBASSADOR from the Theocracy went over to the pimpin’ king and demanded an apology, so negotiations ended with threats from both sides. The Theocracy pissed me off, but I wasn’t exactly a fan of the pimpin’ king either. He was such a player! I mean, three wives? And five at his peak!

“I don’t think you’re mad about the right part of this!”

“I can’t believe they want us to return the cardinal as well as offer an official apology and compensation to the Theocracy.”

“How can they be so shameless?”

So, the pimpin’ king and ambassador hollered abuses at each other for a while. He hadn’t let the official party from the Theocracy come to the frontier, but he had greeted Sister Girl’s unofficial party. He’d even provided a guard to show them the way here.

“I’m so sorry.”

“Arianna-san, you don’t need to apologize!”

“You’re a sexy cleric, so of course the pimpin’ king would prioritize you. He took one look at you and thought he could Ari-can-ya. That’s why he’s fighting with the ambassador, no doubt! Such a player!”

“First off, her name is Arianna-san. Second, don’t mutter filthy scenarios like that in front of her!”

So that wasn’t what happened? Was I muttering?

“I heard that they were getting into it before, but I thought there were only old dudes on the scene. Getting into it wasn’t very fun for me to imagine?”

Given the strong support for Sister Girl’s faction, I figured that even the Theocracy would know enough to say something like “Release Ari-can-ya and her party at once!” But they even demanded that we hand over Dancer Girl and the Ultimate Dungeon treasure! Another condition was to turn over the black-haired princess knights to their inquisition?

“So, basically, send them two dungeon emperors with a bunch of high school girls on top of it…Are they trying to die?!”

“What are you trying to say?” the girls shouted.

“This is the reality of our corrupt Church,” Ari-can-ya said. “As someone affiliated with them, I am prepared for whatever punishment you must dispense upon me. I will never forget the kindness you have shown me. Thank you so, so much.”

Sheesh. So she was ready to submit that hot little body for any kind of punishment to be dispensed on her? I-it’s a trap! Not only to lure out a response from the enemy but also to bring out those morning stars that whistled as they swung through the air straight at my head!

“Damn, that Shadow Incarnate ability of his is better than I thought!”

“We can’t even hit it with ranged attacks!”

“And when we miss, the shadow crows caw like they’re taunting us! That pisses me off!”

“Is his physical body even there? I haven’t felt anything a single time!”

“I don’t know if his physical body is there, but I, like, toootally know his sexual body is always lurking nearby, so give that a tug, hmm?”

“Hang on. Just because I’m using Incarnate doesn’t mean my body vanishes or something! If all I had was a sexual body, then I’d just be an ordinary pervert! Yeah, that’d be my new title? Pervert?”

Using Incarnate risked turning my physical body into a sexual body. Look, my skills are difficult to describe!

“There are just so many different functions of my body. You know, special characteristics? How do I put this? Like from changing shape, size, and color to growing unique features that work together in diligent application to spurt fluid, rigorously labor to restrain, rub, cling, and crawl all over flesh. And wholeheartedly rub and squeeze in a complete collective of peerless teamwork… Yeah, you can’t just pigeonhole my skills like that! They’ll shapeshift right out of whatever description you give them?”

“If you can use all those big words to describe your skills, why can’t you remember my name?!”

“Why do you refuse to punish me?” interjected Sister Girl. “I am a member of the Church, which has now fallen to such heretical deeds as bringing an unjust inquisition against an innocent land! If you must do something, I… I…”

Oh, yeah. They wanted us to hand over the ‘enemy of God?’ Has somebody been bullying old god dude?

The girls sighed. “If we hand him over, the inquisitors are in for nothing but a world of torment.”

“They’re not heretical so much as incompetent.”

“Not wise for a bunch of heretical god fanatics to face off against the King of Unlawful Road Construction.”

“Yeah, they don’t know what they’re up against.”

“Talk about punishment. The Sex God’s dispensed a horrifying world of it.”

“Uh, guys?” I said. “TBH, I’m not trying to get erotically inquisitioned or tortured or anything like that. I’m not trying to dispense any sexy punishment or get some moans outta a bunch of old dudes, either. That’s the last sight I wanna see. I’ll mega-pass!”

But…What about the off chance that the inquisition squad was entirely made up of sexy clerics? Sounds like I’ll need to learn more about the specific ambassador situation from one pimpin’ king.

“Why is everything they demanded so dangerous to them?”

“Last time, we handed him over to the crown prince, and the guy we handed over caused tons of destruction.”

“They’re just incompetent. Everything they demand is the worst possible option for them…”

“I mean, asking for us was bad enough.”

“Do they want Slimey, too, so they have the full set?”

“Torturing those four…Do they have a death wish?”

“I don’t want them to be punished, but we’d be sending them the top expert in punishment.”

“They’re basically asking us to hand over the worst possible punishment for them to punish. They’re way too confident in their punishing abilities!”

“It’s kinda hard to believe anyone who says the Church is scary at this point.”

“Yeah, we live with true fear every day,” said Class Rep. “True fear is currently making us dinner, but that’s beside the point.”

Sheesh, the Church was awful! And why was my appeal with the opposite sex so low today?

“And how could we possibly be mad at you, Arianna-san? None of this is your fault.”

“Yeah, thanks for telling us.”

“Even if we belong to different factions, I am still a member of the Church. Given that I was unable to stop them, I am just as culpable and deserve the same treatment.”

“That doesn’t make any sense!”

“Yeah, if that were the case, it means we should be lumped in with someone responsible for way more horrific sins!”

“We’re not responsible for what he does! Stopping his mistakes is flat-out impossible!”

“Let’s quit the guilt-by-association talk!”

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

Jiggle jiggle!

Sounded like there were villains afoot. The frontier sure was dangerous.

“They also asked for the frontier’s spellstones even though we’ve got someone walking around with a nuclear bomb’s worth of spellstones in his bag.”

“Yeah, we’d practically be nuking them.”

“The Theocracy is in danger on a molecular level!”

“Hang on, I only caused a nuclear reaction that one time!” I protested. “Some not-particularly-smart-supposedly-smart guy once said, ‘If it’s just one shot, then it might be a mistake,’ right? So gimme a break? Let it be a mistake! I’ve also heard it implied that shooting off some random saturation attacks has the potential to crush most of the problems in this world into tiny pieces? And stuff?”

“Implied? What about that was implied?”

“We were unable to protect the most valuable teachings of our Lord,” said Sister Girl, “and have taken His name in vain to conduct spurious dealings. I was unable to stop it—unable to stand up to their power—making me guilty of all of our worst crimes. I am an enemy of the frontier…”

No matter how much good she tried to do, the Theocracy just used her as a cover-up for their wrongdoings. If she’d pointed her sword at them instead, they would’ve crushed her in an instant. In fact, if she had come to us with the opposite perspective—“I tried to help you guys, so I didn’t do anything wrong”—then my classmates would’ve ignored her.

Instead, she had accepted her guilt and taken responsibility. There was no way the girls could be mad at her. I do love punishing sexy chicks, but everyone around here still had their morning stars out and everything.

“Look, if you insist on apologizing and crap, don’t apologize to us. We all already thought that religion was garbage. You don’t need to act like it’s such a tragedy. In our world, there’s a concept called ‘product liability.’ It’s a legal concept that means that whoever is responsible for making something is also responsible for any damage that thing causes. But God and religion and royalty are kinda exempt from those regulations? So I’m saying that we really don’t mind ’cause we all know that dealing with God and religion and royalty is as lawless as it gets? They’re always tangled up in unpleasant business, as far as I know?”

“Is that really how religion and God works?!”

“Hang on, I can’t believe any organization would refuse to take responsibility for their own actions, even a religious institution! If they’re not following any laws or regulations, then they’re just criminals!”

She was right on that account. Disobeying human laws to cause tragedy? That was just evil.

“Please wait a moment,” Sister Girl said. “The Church is corrupt, but our Lord God…”

“If God is just ignoring everything the Church does, then we’re either dealing with a powerless god or a piece-of-crap god who doesn’t care,” I replied. “It’s one or the other. At this point, god may as well not exist at all.”

“No, that cannot be! God, our Lord… Why…? How could…?”

“Isn’t it weird to attribute the things you do and say to God in the first place? Have you ever met God? Talked to him? Partied with him? No, you haven’t. You don’t know him. And it’s dangerous to listen to whatever someone you don’t know and haven’t even met tells you to do. Would you listen to a complete stranger? Somebody left some books behind. You don’t know jack about who they were, though. All those things are worthless if you don’t get the chance to meet them and find out what they’re like for yourself. What do you really think the Church is? You should know by now that it’s got nothing to do with God.”

Demolition. We had to obliterate the brainwashing. Socratic dialogue was supposedly a good approach for undoing brainwashing, but psychological circles didn’t recommend it. Not that it didn’t work—it worked too well. No matter how severe the brainwashing, being able to undo it all at once like that leaves the subject with intense, overpowering discomfort. The technique was even capable of undoing the brainwashing of common sense. While powerful enough to even free individuals from common sense, having what people previously assumed to be obviously dismantled could seriously disrupt their daily lives.

“But it’s the word of God…”

“Did you ask him?”

“B-but, the legends have been passed down—”

“Did God write those legends? Do you know who wrote them?”

“No. But, still. Since long ago—”

“And were the people back then good people? Do you know them?”

“Well, yes, of course they were.”

“And who told you that? Have you met them?”

“N-no, but… But…”

She needed to think. Not just listen.

“Don’t overdo it,” said Miss Armor Rep.

“Human heart. Is not strong,” said Dancer Girl.

“Relax. I don’t think Sister Girl’s bad or that she believes in evil things. I’m not trying to break her.”

Still, assumptions were the most dangerous of convictions. Believing something just because someone you never even met said so? That was too low to even be considered a thought from an intelligent life-form. Above all else, it was cowardly. Freeing yourself from the responsibility of thinking and putting it all on God was an act of cowardice. Only idiots and non-intelligent life-forms, resorted to thinking that way. We could only be responsible for ourselves. She was being stupid, so I had to make her think. Not understand. She needed to think for herself.

“When you don’t think things through to their logical end on your own, you end up on a dead-end street, believing there’s nothing you can do about whatever’s happening. It’s abandoning responsibility.”

If she wanted to say she was sorry, I’d listen to an apology spoken in her own words. Not anything about God—I couldn’t care less about that. Modern people have mostly accepted God as an illusion used to justify countless historical horrors. It was hardly surprising that the Church here had grown corrupt and fell to such acts. And Sister Girl wouldn’t forgive that.

Religion used the name of God to swindle others, after all. If I met God, I’d give him one heck of a bonking.

DAY 93
EVENING

From the flow of the convo, since when was the problo that Royal Girlo went from no-show to go-go?

GIRLS MEETING

ONE MORE SET: facing off against our limit, surpassing it, honing our spirits, and burning off excess fat in a fiery maiden frenzy. Ever since we surpassed level 100, we started being able to dodge Angelica-san when she used only her hands, and even keep up with Nefertiri-san’s movements for a while. It was more of an actual match than it used to be, but the result was unchanged: a pile of bonked girls with Xs-for-eyes. I could feel myself growing stronger in the dungeons every day, but true martial arts technique was on a different level from combat strength. We went down without being able to show off our skills.

“Aaagh, I came up with a new technique, but she saw through it!”

“See through skills. Game over. If you use. Must be able to finish.”

Angelica-san and Nefertiri-san were over the moon about their upgraded equipment, so they were stricter than usual. They fought as if verifying every effect, every quality, every potential to protect what they wanted to safekeep. The only problem was we couldn’t land so much as a scratch on them. Yup, both sets of armor were completely unscratched!

“What kind of cheat armor can perfectly block a spell from a level-100+, magic-using attacker?!”

“And I’m just missing over here, so the result’s the same.”

“Magic is. Waste of time if seen through. Only attack when enemy can’t dodge.”

They had mastered their new equipment. The rest of us hadn’t yet—it was our equipment that was protecting us more than anything else. It made sense. We didn’t level up and get all this equipment by our own efforts. Haruka-kun had given it to us for our protection. And protect us it did. That was all.

“Thank you for today!”

Jiggle jiggle.

We popped by the orphanage to invite Arianna-san, who was playing with the orphans, to join us for a bath. The kids already loved her. They had known she was a good person from a single glance. She spoiled the orphans and made them feel at ease. I knew she was a good, kind person because she’d made up her mind to come here—to the cursed land of monsters at the edge of the world. She had listened to what Haruka-kun told her and was contemplating it all.

She had planned on coming here to sacrifice her life in order to atone for the sins of the Church. Haruka-kun would never let that happen.

Sacrificing yourself doesn’t save anyone. You won’t gain anything by doing it. From his perspective, it was better to cheat, swindle, and rip people off if you were trying to gain something. The rest of us couldn’t do that, but he always used trickery to flip a hopeless situation where death seemed the only outcome into pure profit. That was how he managed to get back here alive with Angelica-san, Slimey, and Nefertiri-san.

When Haruka-kun did get mad, it was scary, though. We decided to cheer up Arianna-san with some healing, bubbly body soap. Shalliceres-san, who was covered in bubbles, clung to Arianna-san and washed her head to toe. For a princess, Shalliceres-san has really mastered washing.

At twenty-eight, she had a slim, noble face and the fully developed body of a grown woman.

“Cheer up. He wasn’t actually mad, just mean.”

“Uh, why would he be mean if he wasn’t mad?”

“Yeah, it was a bullying session by the name of questioning religion.”

“Well, maybe he wanted to bully you, but he wasn’t mad. He just wanted you to think more carefully before using the name of God…I hope…”

“He may have technically been bullying God back there.”

Sister Girl was in a state of confusion after losing her faith, so we were cheering her up. Not that there was much we could do. I agreed—it was unfair to just delegate everything to the will of God. We had actually met God back in that white room and even talked to him, if only a little. I knew for sure that he had nothing to do with the foul, evil actions of the Church. In fact, he was a lovely old man, stern but overflowing with love and kindness.

I did get the sense that someone capable of bullying and lecturing God to the brink of tears was a heck of a lot worse than the foul, evil church, but I wasn’t going to mention that to Arianna-san.

“I always thought it was blasphemous to try to question the word of God. I thought that, because of God, there had to be some reason for everything. Now, I wonder if that’s even true to begin with.”

“Haruka-kun is just asking you to think about all that for yourself. He’s totally just being all, like, ‘Heeeey, you gotta think about that on your own!’ And you’re just being all, like ‘It’s God’s doing.’ Right?”

For some reason, Vice Rep B’s point sounded a lot deeper than Haruka-kun’s had. Either way, it took real conviction to question and discard what you once thought to be true.

“If God really did it, then it was his doing. But if it’s something that someone only claimed that God said…then it’s really that person’s doing instead, right?” Vice Rep A said.

“Yeah, just think about it for yourself. Don’t be a blind believer. I think that’s what he wanted to say.”

“Although, Haruka-kun’s the one who’s always screaming, ‘It’s that old dude’s fault,’ isn’t he?”

“He’s a hypocrite!”

I did think that Haruka-kun’s approach was unfairly harsh on poor Arianna-san. On the other hand, if she were reaching out to the frontier on behalf of God or apologizing on God’s behalf, then it wasn’t a real apology—just more faith. Faith always pointed one toward a god, never directly to other people. Arianna-san apologized properly to us and to the people of the frontier. None of us wanted that to just be faith. I wanted to look Arianna-san in the eye without God in between us.

To be fair, the moment she looked to God, our resident hypocritical believer burst in with a lecture. He wasn’t just reaching out a helping hand out of pure, selfish pride—he was going to beat her down with his helping hand till she was helped whether she had wanted that help in the first place or not.

“There’s no need to rush,” I said. “You can’t come up with an answer on the spot. Take your time to think it over.”

“Hurting someone and saying that God told you to do it doesn’t make sense. From the other person’s perspective, you’re the one responsible. Not God.”

“Er, about the people responsible for the attack on the domain…I’m pretty sure they were the only ones who ended up hurt.”

“Oh, yeah. The convicted culprit in this case was the one blaming God, saying he was sending them straight to the old dude’s white room?”

“He did say that! And he did it, too!”

“Rulers will always be crazed believers without the separation of church and state.”

“They’ve forgotten how to think for themselves. They’re just puppets that do whatever the Church tells them.”

“You’re right,” said Sister Girl. “I never thought about things for myself before. Even when I felt like I wanted to contemplate something deeply rather than investigate for myself, I ended up falling in line with the beliefs I had been taught. And yet…Ahem, Your Highness, I’m happy to wash myself, so—ah! Not there! Ah! Aaaaahh!”

Arianna-san sunk into a pile of bubbles. Now she was arching her back. Was she all right?

“But didn’t the king say we were going to hand over the stuff to them? And Duke Omui…Does this mean Haruka-kun is going to go over there?”

“No, nothing good can come of giving in to their demands!”

“Negotiations are a war of words,” said Book Club President. “It’s all threats and retreats. Even if things are guaranteed to end without resolution, there’s often a reason to simply accept the terms.”

“But if we hand over Haruka-kun and the dungeon emperors, then there’ll be no leeway to negotiate. It’ll be an onslaught of never-ending violence with one side completely ignoring the other!”

“So the pimpin’ king does know what he’s doing!”

“Yup, if the other side gets what they want, they’re dead!”

Handing Haruka-kun over would be the most aggressive attack possible. It’d be the equivalent of dropping a bomb on them. Demanding the enemy hand over a walking calamity was tantamount to suicide, and yet, that was what they had insisted.

“How can all of you go on fighting without faith?” Arianna-san asked, having finally escaped Shalliceres-san’s washing and hiding in the tub. “You go through bitter days, suffer, agonize, risk your lives in battle…How can you still smile like this?”

“Huh? Because we’re having a good time.”

“Yeah, we’re just trying to enjoy ourselves. We’ve got a fun life here.”

“Satisfying meals are definitely a core pillar of that!”

“Though, the meals have been getting too satisfying lately… We really need to exercise more.” (Weep.)

“It’s not so much fighting as turning monsters into spellstones for tasty meals and cute clothes.”

“It’s because we’re alive,” said Book Club President. “No matter how much we hurt, suffer, and risk our lives, we’re still alive. We need it—good food, I mean—to live this life, of course.”

“You nailed it!”

I couldn’t agree more.

“We want to fight,” said Shield Girl. “We want to protect, not be protected.”

“Someone else is dealing with even more pain and suffering than us. We need to be able to shoulder our own pain. Otherwise, how would we have the right to eat all this delish food?!”

“Yeah, he says we don’t need to push ourselves even when he’s beaten to a pulp. How could we stand by and watch in a situation like that?”

“We know our own pain and suffering isn’t much in comparison.”

“That’s why we’ve decided that we’ll become able to protect ourselves and others.”

“Exactly!”

None of us wanted to be cowards, content with being protected and never fighting on our own. At the very least, we wanted to be brave.

“I have faith,” I said. “I have faith in him—the guy who breaks his body every day, risking his life for our smiles. I suppose I’m a blind believer.”

Despite Haruka-kun and his sharp criticisms of religion, we were all blind believers in our own way. If Haruka-kun doubted God, then God was our enemy. If the world was Haruka-kun’s enemy, then we’d protect him from the world. Yup, we were blind believers. We’d follow him to the very end.

Of course, we didn’t believe a word he said, doubted everything he did, and believed that he was the culprit behind all the problems we’d had right from the start. Even if it wasn’t true, we still believed it was him. As for his incomprehensible drivel…uh, no comment. Even that pushed the limits of our faith in him.

All this was the result of much thought and consideration, a responsibility that I—no, that we had decided on together. We were blind believers because we chose to be. It was the least you could do for someone willing to sacrifice his life for you. Without our blind belief, he could have been dead already, and that’d be our just deserts. As for his desserts…they were just so damn good!

DAY 93
NIGHT

When you face someone and chuck something at them and they start getting kinda pissed at you, just change their name!

WHITE LOSER INN

THE ONLY REAL REWARD from today’s dungeon was the dungeon king’s drop item. Most of the monsters didn’t have weapons, and the dungeon hardly had any hidden rooms. So why did such a crappy dungeon have such an over-the-top boss? A crystal gargoyle? Seriously?

“The boss scattered glittering orbs all over the room, enveloping the dungeon in sparkling lights. We just had to smash and slash and shatter and clatter and crush and smush it in a shiny lights-show battle?”

It didn’t have any real dangerous skills, and it didn’t have Darkness, either. It was strong, of course, but I had just powered up those armor sets and fed Slimey some holy silver forged from mithril, as well as my remaining black gold, boosting his defenses and resistances. No wonder we bonked it dead in a matter of seconds.

“I dunno if you guys were annoyed that I was fighting alone on the other floors or something, but that was one serious walloping of a whooping-sesh?”

Rumors persisted that they had been venting their anger from my revenge last night, but while I was reflecting on the beauteous scenes that had transpired like wondrous dreams late into the night, all of the crystals were smashed into fragments, which shot in my direction. The gargoyle was in tiny pieces everywhere, and attacks rocketed in at lightning speeds! I couldn’t imagine it was just a coincidence.

I let them handle the dungeon king, but I ended up having to deal with dodging more deadly shard attacks. Observing the battle turned out to be more dangerous than joining it!

“You guys were definitely timing that perfectly, aiming those high-speed crystal fragment attacks at me like they were billiards shots. Even Slimey joined in, didn’t you, Slimey?”

Ji-jiggly?

I observed the shards shooting in my direction, mapped their trajectories with Clairvoyant, and dodged them. It was only thanks to those high-speed calculations that I was able to get out alive.

“I would’ve been way better off just fighting the dungeon king!”

Wiggle wiggle.

Perhaps I shouldn’t have triple-layered the Sensitivity-Boosts on those sensitive bodies, mobbing them with those morphing, endorphin-laced tentacles that scurried in haste, morphing into repulsive, repeating shapes that were auditorily, physically, and visually fearsome. Fluid-spurting, corrupting appendages drenched them, gargantuan grotesqueries grabbing and gripping and slithering up and down, toying with their bodies to the brink of madness. They lost consciousness at that point, but their bodies still twitched. Apparently, that had a long-term twitch-and-writhe imbued effect. They hadn’t even recovered by morning!

There was a high risk of revenge tonight. Not just high—I didn’t see any other outcome! Considering just how badly I had broken them yesterday, tonight’s revenge was going to be nothing less than spectacularly sexy!

“I’ve been trying to save up on MP all day to prepare for the onslaught, but I’ve got to see the nerds off tomorrow. What a drag. They’re finally leaving the frontier. I suppose this is the beginning of the nerds’ mating pilgrimage.”

Jiggle jiggle.

I wanted to let the nerds handle foreign trade. Plus, the Beast Kingdom’s defenses intrigued me. The Merchant Kingdom was in the midst of a pretty spectacular breakdown, so they weren’t able to lay a hand on the Beast Kingdom at the moment.

The biggest problem was that the Theocracy, which had lost its monopoly over spellstones, might turn to the slave trade to shore up its income. Now that the Merchant Kingdom, their rival in the slave trade, was out of commission, it was likely that they would make a move. The Theocracy had magic items at its disposal, so I needed the nerds in particular to be equipped to counter that.

The meatheads were headed off to the capital in the east. In other words, they were off to meet the macho chicks. The lolly-lickin’ old dude in the capital could respond to surprise attacks and assassination attempts, but he could still be overwhelmed by numbers.

“The meatheads don’t count as people. Can you call what they do ‘helping?’”

Even the side with an advantage in quality could normally be overrun by sheer numbers. That was why a large-scale attack was so worrying. Still…

“They’d lose to those meatheads, but only because they can’t count past five. Six and ten thousand are basically the same to them?”

For the nerds, I prepared jungle and seafaring equipment; for the meatheads, gear for indoor skirmishes. Still, those guys had such strong preferences, opposing my self-destructing armor and all. I insisted they just give it a try, but they still didn’t like it. None of them blew up in the end. Sigh.

“Read the damn room! This is an emergency!”

Jiggle jiggle.

In the end, I made the meatheads combat armor for close-range duels and some light everyday wear ideal for concealing weapons. If I made them anything too complex, they’d just end up chucking the weapons like boomerangs. I handed them some hand grenades and land mines, just in case, but they started chucking the landmines like Frisbees! They even chased after them? Wow, those guys were stupid?

The bigger problem was the nerds’ jungle wear. The types of offenses and defenses they needed changed quite a bit. Defense was still the priority. They could use stealth for offenses.

“A magic bazooka should do the trick? Whenever you run up against an enemy in this world, just shoot a friggin’ bazooka at them a bajillion times till they’re paste and can’t be anyone’s enemy anymore. Yep, that’s a confirmed natural law, so I can just equip them with a long-range, magic-annihilating missile launcher. They already have the hand grenades and land mines. That should be more than enough?”

As much as the nerds had longed for a world of swords and magic, their fighting style was much better suited to modern weaponry.

“They really aren’t a good match for this world,” I said. “But could they fit in anywhere at all? Maybe an illiterate world, given how bad they are at reading the room.”

Wiggle wiggle.

I made some item bags sufficient to carry huge loads of destructive weaponry and marked them for the nerds and meatheads respectively. Well, I just wrote “Nerds” and “Meatheads” on each of the bags. At least they couldn’t get that mixed up.

“This should be enough for the nerds to confidently take on any military invasion, and the meatheads are stupid, so they should be okay?”

Events never proceeded according to my calculations in this fantasy world, even though there were things like skills and stats. Battles were fought old-school here. Magic was used for long-range attacks, and heavy infantry was used in close combat, which made the unorthodox meatheads a walking cheat code. Old-school battle tactics were up against modern warfare. To be honest, the meatheads just charged in arbitrarily, but still. We were at a huge advantage. I know they’re not thinking about jack shit!

“The nerds work together, at least. But the way they use magic…They totally ignore the rules and just try to imitate anime and video games. At least it works?”

Jiggle jiggle.

For now, I built large-scale, mass-destruction-style specialized equipment for defensive stands and wars of attrition, complete with built-in healing properties, Automatic Regeneration, and improved defenses.

“Yeah, the amount of explosive material in here…If they tossed it all at the Theocracy, maybe that’d solve all our problems? The missiles don’t need to be able to travel across the whole continent, either. If I do a quick Airwalk over there and chuck them all down at the ground, I could probably take out their main chapel?”

Jiggle jiggle!

That’d waste resources, though. I could create a vacuum bomb without any spellstones at all and make an air-fueled explosive. If that was possible, imagine what I could do with a bit of magic.

“The problem of purifying the ethylene oxide and propylene oxide is problematic. If I could somehow find natural gas, I could use heat magic to warm it up to 162 degrees Celsius and then freeze it to create liquid natural gas. Yeah, that would enable a whole wave of explosive attacks and send them flying straight out of our way?”

Reaching an ultra-high pressure of twelve atmospheres and three thousand degrees should overpower both skills and stats. None of the buildings would survive.

“Mass-produced explosives, huh? If I start casually chucking them at people, I wouldn’t be surprised if the girls got mad at me, and then sad at me, and then just nabbed the whole stash from me! Some of Sister Girls’ companions are still there, too, so if I start chucking bombs around, they’ll definitely get upset?”

Yeah, they would. This approach was so easy, though. It rendered battle totally unnecessary—one-sided annihilation was the most efficient method by far. I had to admit that I didn’t like the general idea of mass-producing explosives, though.

“Maybe everyone’ll get on board if I rename them something quaint. You know, ‘God Dude Gratitude White Room Accompanied Transport Plus Weapons of Mass Destruction’ maybe?”

Wiggle wiggle.

Yeah, like a free ticket to the white room. Wouldn’t they want a free pass to chill with their god dude? Whether I used natural gas or petroleum, a propylene oxide or ethylene oxide vacuum bomb was liable to cause major environmental pollution and tons of damage. The Theocracy could make things a lot easier if they just blew themselves up in some sort of ‘Self-Assisted God Dude Gratitude White Room Transport by Church.’ But no. Those rotten sods just had to trod on with God.

What a drag! I didn’t need to make the equipment as strong as stuff built to handle the frontier’s dungeons. Fighting humans was a whole lot safer than going up against countless types of monsters with super-strong skills. Plus, I had already circulated appropriate weapons for human warfare throughout the kingdom. The current line of products was more than enough for floor boss fights. The real danger was if a battle broke out when they were still in civilian clothes, but there was nothing fun about making outfits for dudes! Taking detailed measurements was even worse! No thank you!

I just made some rough estimates and sewed the gear up. Sister Girl’s group didn’t seem to realize it, but they were actually in the most danger right now. Not in terms of going into battle or anything. Their everyday lives posed the risks for them. Battle equipment wouldn’t help. What they needed was bootcamp. Higher levels and better self-defense meant they wouldn’t die as soon as they stepped foot in the Theocracy. Yup, boot camp city, baby!

“At this point, what they really need is a complete set: upped levels, boosted combat strength, raised fighting prowess, higher stats, and less dieability! Not to mention, the dynamite body side effects. There’s literally no downside!”

They needed to raise their levels in order to use better equipment for a start. Even the orphans had hit double-digits in terms of level. After our little leveling field trip, they were one mean group of casualty-causing orphans?

“Basic equipment here on the frontier is considered top-class in other places. Plus, they just need defense, not offense. This could be pretty simple?”

Jiggle jiggle.

The hardest part about making the orphans’ equipment was shrinking the built-in, multiple-warhead, fusion-type, no-recoil, annihilation diffusion backpack. While it was pretty low-quality for frontier gear, it was still military-grade equipment. It was also a ridiculously expensive product that required massive amounts of ultra-rare materials. Ultimately, an orphan missile launcher with a hundred of those suckers raining down on the Theocracy could be enough to wipe them out. Then nobody would attempt any kidnappings. You never knew when a monster stampede would break out here, so those backpacks were an essential precaution.

“If they’re dealing with the Theocracy, then some lightweight defensive equipment should do the trick. Just disguise it as religious garments?”

Meanwhile, I was trying to figure out what to do with the trio of drop items left behind by the crystal gargoyle: a crystal sword, crystal armor, and crystal shield. Nice. I didn’t know what to make of the effects, though. The uses seemed awfully limited, but one effect in particular that was worthy of mention was the truly marvelous Transparency!

“Marvelous! This armor is as clear as glass. What a wonder! You can be protected while wearing absolutely nothing underneath! Yes, I think this masterpiece of armor would go perfectly with some sexy, red-and-black lingerie!”

Jiggle jiggle!

The crystal sword and shield had over-the-top, video-game-style designs, but I wasn’t interested in that right now. I was all about the armor!

In order to imbue it with the auto-adjusting effect, I needed to upgrade it with mithril first.

“I have precious little mithril left, but an auto-adjusting effect can make it skin-tight. That’s absolutely indispensable for this gear! More transparency! I can’t get enough of it! Let the orders pour in!”

Wiggle wiggle!

This might be the best imbued effect I had encountered so far. It had the ultimate version of reflective properties, the layers upon layers of Perfect Reflection. I also added layers upon layers of Sensitivity-Boosting research in a meticulous blossom last night, with my two targets blooming, buckling, bending, and breaking. What deep layers we achieved! My precious research subjects sacrificed themselves to the cause and endured much arching, writhing, and moaning…But they liked it, so it was all good?

“The crystal armor isn’t suited for battle for various reasons, but it sure has some contexts in which it can’t be beat?”

Jiggle jiggle.

It could reflect any attack directed at it, so I couldn’t hand it over lightly. This was my first discovery of crystal properties to begin with. Given it was completely see-through, however, I didn’t see a clear path for its use. Still, I’ll protect it with my life!

With Slimey at my side, I advanced through my side jobs without too much frustration. I felt like he usually got sleepy after eating a lot of monsters. Maybe there was some other explanation for his energy levels. I didn’t want him to go hungry, though, so I gave him some sweets. He started jiggling with joy after I fed him leftover candied apples from the festival.

By the time I wrapped things up with the nerds’ explosives and implemented my new techniques into the crystal gear, I was fresh out of MP. Crap! And today of all days! I knew that a maelstrom of vengeance was coming for me tonight; I needed to be an impregnable wall ready to weather any and all attacks, but I’d gotten so distracted by the see-through armor that I’d lost track of things and ended up using all my MP!

The door opened. Two alluring beauties sauntered in. The look in their eyes said it all.

“WAAAAGH! Wait, wait! Spare mmfff—”

Squeeze.

“Just give me one second. I mean, I’m your master, right?”

Stroke.

“Justaaaaaaannngh—”

Slurp.

“No, wait!”

Smooch, smooch!

“—Aaamf! Help!”

Slurp, splash.

“Just, pffffaaaah…”

The enemy had sensed that my MP preservation had not gone according to plan. (Don’t) Save me!

DAY 94
MORNING

If you keep going forever, that breaks the whole turn-based system and turns it into real-time strategy!

WHITE LOSER INN

IT WAS ONE DARK MORNING—or, actually, the late night before the early morning. You know, the early rising time a little bit before daybreak? To be perfectly honest, I woke up early to attempt my revenge only to find Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl fully awake and intent on overcoming my coming. A life-or-death battle commenced!

“Just going in order, it was my turn for revenge, given that I was subjected to such a merciless rain of sensual attacks last night that I couldn’t even lose consciousness! Now it’s my turn for a revenge of gratitude. I’ve been rightfully assuming, and bragging, that it’s my rightful turn, and I’ve been charging up all night to unleash it. It’s my turn! Come on!”

“No! We refuse! It’s always! Our turn!”

I got most of my MP back, and I put my equipment on. I was facing off against dungeon emperors. I tried to hold them down on the bed, our bodies tangling together in a procession of unlimited tentacles that they quickly shook off. We dove into a high-speed world of intricate entanglement. If they cut off my movements for even a second, I’d be done for! Done all morning long!

“You can’t refuse! Have my classmates been influencing you too much? If you keep going forever, that breaks the whole turn-based system and makes it real-time strategy! This teenage boy over here has the morning urge equipped to his fully charged revenge apparatus, so let me take my turn!”

Only dungeon emperors could overcome the grip of so many Magic Hands. They could read my moves and always put their bodies in the most favorable position possible, constantly gaining the upper hand and then making their move on me. We kept each other constantly in check, enveloping and releasing each other in an ultra-close-range fight of flesh. With my numbers disadvantage, they overwhelmed me physically. Of course getting bombarded by thick thighs at ultra-close range is gonna be my downfall!

No holding back. I should be able to win if I break them down with a fully powered, triple-layered Sensitivity-Boost, and attack with waves of tentacles. I didn’t know if I had enough MP to pull it off. Whoever couldn’t completely overwhelm the other was in line for a series of serious experiences, a merry, marriage-disqualifying barrage! I should know. I’d experienced it just a few hours ago!

“Look, you’re trying so hard to be wriggling friends with the wiggling tentacles. Just open your hearts up to them! And your legs?”

I was just at that sexing age, ya know? The teenage boy age!

Hence, I broke through! In one stroke, I unleashed a maelstrom of tentacles Entangled with triple-layered Sensitivity-Boost, an infinite, inimitable attack of irrefutable irregularities!

“Not that! That’s too! Much!”

My tentacles snatched their limbs, ensnaring white and amber arms and legs, and suspended them as if on crosses, opening their limbs wide to expose their bodies for an onslaught of Grotesquemorphosis-ified tentacles. One tentacle soaked them in sticky fluid. Another tentacle covered with thousands of fine, quivering hairs crawled over their skin. A different tentacle bristled like a brush as it pulled across their bodies. A thousand tentacular variations! Ten thousand nerve stimulations to make them writhe and moan and gasp and cry!

“No! Too much! Aaaaaahhh!”

Engulfed in a river of perversions, shaking white hands and quivering brown legs drowned in the sea of tentacles, their gasps turning to screams. Wow, this is epic.

“Against the rules! Not allowed!”

“Banned taboo prohibited forbidden matter! Oh my! Aaaaaahm!”

As always, it was a lurid finish. A hard-working teenage boy had been subjected to an endless, forever, all-night, eternal, calamitous punishment by the name of sensual, soft, smooth skin. Sexual servicing!

“Ah, yes. The resounding screams that represent the proverb that even the prosperous inevitably decay! And stuff?”

Through the gaps of an infinite variety of grotesque tentacular formations, white and brown flesh drenched in sticky fluid quivered, held in complete bondage by aquatic limbs that romped freely across their bodies. All of the psychical sensations were sent straight to me, allowing me to revel in a clear, refreshing morning of pleasure and paradise.

The world plunged into slow motion, making the battle feel like it lasted forever. The end, in particular, took an eternity. Thunderbolts of stimulation and pleasure crashed against my nerves like waves. It made me only further increase the current of stimulation lancing into their bodies, which I bolstered with a supply of Recovery and Revival, so I could keep up the stimulation all morning long. To put it in plain vernacular, it was a tentacular sparring spectacular. AKA twitching?

“As y’all know, the nerds will scatter forth today, released from the frontier. So we’ll be launching a dungeon study tour of the current available lots while adding in some dungeon experience power-leveling with the Church squad. Unfortunately, the busty bus guides and their busty bus tour that stoked the flames of generations of teenage boys doesn’t seem like it’s going to happen ’cause those two just can’t get out of bed…The dungeon trip travel activation depends on the busty bustle-ability, so I’ll just handle one or two or a few more dungeons myself. ’Kay?”

The chapter of the nerds’ exodus had begun. I’d love to have joined them, but things were busy on the frontier. I was jealous and resentful, so I decided to sink their ship after sending them off. I made some torpedo prototypes at my side-job last night for that very purpose. Plus, I’d whipped up a multiple-round-equipped, sorcery oxygen torpedo. The right tool for the job. A send-off to hell, ya know?

“Uh, you’re demanding that we buy some miso like you’re trying to make us run household errands for you,” said Nerd A.

“And is that a torpedo you’re holding?! Hang on. Does that say ‘Exclusive Purpose: Nerd Send-Off to Hell’?!”

“Yeah, you’re not trying to see us off. You’re trying to send us to the underworld!”

Well, let’s just ignore them for now. I can always sink them later.

I was pretty sure the Theocracy was going to target Sister Girls’ group. Her faction was assertive about the problems with the Church’s current doctrine, making them a danger to the main theocratic faction. They had been kept under watch and were even banned from keeping magical items or weapons on them.

“I agree about power-leveling Arianna-san and her companions, but not with the person currently in charge of the job.”

“Well, Angelica-san and Nefertiri-san are there too, so…Wait, did Haruka-kun say they got hurt in a battle this morning? Are they okay?!”

If the Theocracy found out Sister Girl’s squad had made contact with the frontier and were now armed, the Church would try to kill them. Sending them off to the frontier had been an assassination attempt in its own right, given that they had no fighting abilities to begin with.

The real sinker here was Sister Girl—probably because she was an elite, sexy church babe—got propositioned to be a leading old dude’s lover and turned him down. If she went back to the Theocracy, the pig would immediately target her. The moment the old pig caught a glimpse of the sexy, curvy-bodied cleric babe, the only future in store was attack city. I didn’t have the leeway to be worried about the damn nerds when revenge was on that guy’s mind!

“I shouldn’t be worrying. I should be hurrying to light the fuse on this torpedo for nerd seizure, no sighting required, ’cause they’re nerding and idioting right in front of me. I don’t really want to sink the ship after all the renovations I made to The Sinker, though, so just come back with miso, got it? I’ve equipped you guys with enough heavy infantry gear to destroy the Beast Kingdom if they’re against giving a bunch of nerds miso, so no excuses? Seriously, you can blow up everyone as long as you bring back miso?”

“Why would we destroy the Beast Kingdom just to get you miso?!”

“We’ll bring you some, so don’t sink our ship! And if you want miso that badly, why are you trying to sink us in the first place?!”

“And don’t just name our ship The Sinker! That’s definitely an unlucky name for a ship! You’re being too obvious about your intention to sink us!”

“If you want to hide it, you need to start by stashing the torpedo in your hand! No, put it away!”

Oh, those nerds. Nerding so much over a simple miso request. Going over to the Beast Kingdom to buy some miso is a My First Errand level of a fantasy world task. Act your age, nerds!

“See you guys!” the girls called. “We’re counting on you for miso!”

“We’ll get you some, so hold Haruka-kun off!” the nerds shouted. “He looks ready to launch the torpedo!”

“We’ll be back, brosef!” called the meatheads. “The food ain’t great over in the capital.”

I was overflowing with jealousy about them going to meet the furry girls and macho chicks, but the girls confiscated my multiple-round-equipped sorcery oxygen torpedo from the river port. I guess miso was just that important.

They departed quietly down the river. The nerds waved like crazy from atop the ship’s metal frame…probably to block the missiles I ended up launching at them? I knew a torpedo wouldn’t be enough. I should’ve filled the port with sea mines.

“Stop shooting at them, for heaven’s sake! Just how envious are you?!”

I mean, the beast girls were fluffy, and the macho chicks were meaty?

“E-envious? No, I’m not envious. I just resent the nerds and have an inferiority complex about the meatheads, so I just loaded all my grudges and sublime fury into the parting (missile) sorrow (launcher) and fired ’em? Ya know?”

“In what world does parting equal missile, and sorrow equal launcher?!”

“Sorrow at parting doesn’t turn into total attack of random fire! That’s too much emotion!”

“We’re heading off now. You three take care of Arianna-san, okay?”

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

Jiggle jiggle.

“Uh, three?” I asked. “You seem to have forgotten a certain individual there. It’s almost as if you can’t rely on me to take care of her?”

“That’s exactly what we mean! We’re implying it, stating it, and proclaiming it!”

All righty then. It wouldn’t do any good to only train Sister Girl, so I took her whole team and headed off to the duke’s palace. If I just dragged them along and dumped them into some dungeon, they’d probably end up getting stronger on their own. I could save the detailed explanation for later?

DAY 94
NOON

They didn’t understand the surefire, guaranteed promise of fantasy world dungeons, so I gave it a go.

DUNGEON

DUNGEONS: THE INTRICATE, maze-like, underground caverns filled to the brim with monsters. Hello, dungeon.

“First off, Sister Girl’s squad! Get inside these big, spiky, steel balls, please?”

“Eek!”

“It’s so dark.”

“I can’t see anything.”

“I’m frightened!”

“And now, I’ll chuck ’em at the monsters?”

“Waaaaagh!”

“See, that was easy. Level up! And stuff?”

“Eeeeeeek!”

A maze-style floor of a dungeon was perfect for an iron-ball-crushing session. Even the monsters were having a great time, scampering away and running around and getting squashed and stuff. Regular balls were sufficient for the priests, but I had wanted to use some transparent ones for the clerics. They’d refused. What a bummer. It was a lot safer and more fun to be able to see inside. I guess today wasn’t about my fun, though.

They gained a lot of levels just rolling around the first floor. Maybe they were getting used to it, because they weren’t screaming as much. Now, they were getting pretty far away. Are they all right?

“W-we are all very happy that you were concerned enough about us to want to level us up,” called the distant voice of Sister Girl. “But is shoving us into a spiky ball and sending us rolling at monsters really demonstrating any concern for our safety? I mean, I’ve leveled up more than I ever could have imagined, but something about this feels wrong!”

The spike balls were more effective than anticipated. It wasn’t an exaggeration to say the demolition demonstration equaled full elation. Yup, ’cause they were glaring at me! Glaring at me in tumbling circles as they rolled around everywhere. I just needed to shove some mushrooms in their mouths. That’d shut them up. Wow, a day of sister squad glares!

“C’mon, everybody. Check your stats. Look how much you leveled up! This powerful pushing of powerful iron balls ironed out your power leveling to balls-to-the-wall levels! But Ari-can-ya, Ari-can’t-ya spin even more than that?”

“No, I do not think I can. I feel like I am about to faint, in fact! I feel dizzy as can be. Although, it is true that my level has—Oh my goodness! I’m already past level 30! That’s on par with the Theocracy knights!”

Dang, they had low levels over there. To be fair, though, they had already out-leveled me. All it’d taken was going down to the mid-floors, weakening the monsters, and sending the spike balls rolling over the monsters for easy leveling. Why hadn’t anyone come up with this before? There were inspirational morning stars all over the place, but fantasy worlds just weren’t very innovative.

“Still, the monsters are getting pretty strong now. Almost enough to break the spike balls. Should we go to a different dungeon and start fighting on the first floor? I’m sure you guys are sick of rolling around. Plus, there aren’t any gutters, so I’m only getting spares or strikes. Not very interesting, to be honest. But if there were gutters, and they fell, it’d be a pain to have to go fish them out.”

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

Jiggle jiggle.

Not just gutters. I’d love to hear some guttural groans and take off some gaudy gowns.

They were over level 30 now and could fight until around the 20th floor wearing some basic equipment. Or so I hoped. It was their first time—first dungeon and first spike balls—so I couldn’t overdo things. I supposed I’d better drag my three companions back to earth for now. They were having just a little too much fun.

“The spike balls are rolling on their own! Oh wow. Are they running on the inside like hamsters?!”

Jiggle jiggle!

Looks fun to me! Especially the objects that were potentially shaking inside! Who knew that big balls could have such significance to a teenage boy!

Thanks to our little warm-up, the sister squad gained some fat stats, so it was time for bootcamp. Well, after the instructors finished having their own fun rolling around the dungeon. I want a turn! Once inside the cramped space of the ball, I could shift gears into all sorts of very special rotational exercise activities!

“No sex gods allowed inside! Still haven’t recovered! From this morning!”

“Fully equipped sex god in this narrow space! Way more dangerous than dungeon king!”

Boink boink!

Aw, they wouldn’t let me in! I wouldn’t do anything bad! Probably? I wouldn’t! My Magic Hands might slip, sure, but a teenage boy couldn’t stop that.

We went up via the gate and moved to another dungeon on my carriage. The plan was to start on the first floor and build up combat experience. I called in the demon scythes for additional backup, but they hadn’t finished up their logging yet. We’d resume after lunch.

“Thanks for the food.”

“Thank you for the food,” echoed the rest of the squad.

Yup, sister squad was thanking the food that sustained their life instead of giving thanks to an old god dude who didn’t do anything. You couldn’t eat god! And I didn’t want to!

The demon scythes joined us for dessert. Were they getting enough nutrition—as in iron content—from that? Well, sweets were a cheap price to pay for all the logging they did for me. The monster forest constantly accumulated magical substance. When the trees sucked up too much of it, they grew too hard to cut down. If there were too many trees, then the forest expanded. Cue the vicious cycle. Cutting down the trees required MP, but everyone equipped with a lot of MP was busy fighting dungeons. We didn’t have the leeway to turn top adventurers and elite soldiers into lumberjacks.

“Unless I develop some MP axes for mass production, the demon scythes are going to stay busy,” I said. “But even if I make MP axes, the lumberjacks will still end up having to fight the monsters in the forest. We really need more manpower. How is that possible, given how many old dudes there are around here?”

Fighting with a higher level and no real experience was dangerous. That was why we needed bootcamp. It was a lot easier for the local old dudes than the sister squad. The locals were already pretty brutal, but these priests and clerics weren’t exactly suited for battle.

“I supposed Shield Girl o’ Shield Rep was originally the same way. Now, she’s all about swinging her morning star around and protecting everybody she can. Actual combat is the best training. You get used to killing monsters pretty quickly, regardless of skills or personality.”

“W-we’ll do our best!”

So they had the motivation. The sergeant and instructors nodded. Good luck everyone?

“Raaaaaah!”

“W-wait, Haruka, what are you—?”

“Eeeeeeeeeek!”

They had to learn form. They could learn by imitation, so first, I just had them practice correct fighting form. Brandish, swing! It all started there. We may have been in a fantasy world, but as long as gravity and the human body didn’t change, neither did fighting stances. They needed to master the form and technique for swinging downward in the most optimized and efficient movements possible adapted to each of their bodies.

Although each individual body had countless differences—minute, divergent possibilities in the habits and structures of the human form—they still were all human in the end. They could all master brandishing a weapon and swinging it downward. First, their hands had to grip the sword and shift the center of gravity to the tip. Then they had to use their entire body to swing it down like a whip. That utilized centrifugal force, tugging the entirety of the body along, forcing correct posture and positioning. I had them repeat the motion again and again, imbuing it to muscle memory and teaching them the core lesson of ‘if you can stab the monsters, they’ll die’ in the process.

They may have just been swinging their swords around, but the monsters went down one after the next. The experience resulting in a successful kill also became a part of their muscle memory. Yeah, this really was a spectacularly efficient, simple method of instruction?

“How is this trainiiiiiiiing?!”

“Heeeeeeey!”

“Waaaaaaaaaaah!”

Miss Armor Rep and the others had glared at me at first, but now, they seemed to approve of both the logic and supreme efficiency of my methods. I was dual-wielding, as in swinging two people at once, holding two feet in each hand as I swung them to and fro. Slimey handled six of them with his tentacles, mowing down monsters with the trainees as if wielding a chainsaw. Holding them horizontally like that looked weird, but it worked wonders.

“Well, there is still some throwing involved, but it’s fine so long as they stab the monsters? Slimey is really taking the lead with his sextuple wielding!”

Wiggle wiggle!

“Heeeeelp meeeeee!”

“Stoooooop aaalllreeaadyyy!”

“W-w-w-w-waaaaiiiiiit!”

We swung around the sister squad all the way down to the 20th floor, by which point all the light had vanished from their eyes. Did they want to fight the monsters on their own now? Yeah, it was hard to imagine, but their expressions made it look like they almost wanted to run away from us into the monsters, which made all of the instructors nod and rattle and jiggle in approval and respect. Our little birds are already flying the nest!

The results of some friendly, polite, cordial instruction down to the 30th floor were…interesting?

“Die die die die die die die die die die die die die!”

“Get down on your hands and knees you BEEP! Go BEEP in a BEEEEP and suck a BEEP, and don’t come back till you BEEP, you BEEPing BEEPers! Go BEEP in a BEEEP, and never come back!”

“Now look at all of you! This is your true potential!”

“You’ll never get away! Die! Die! Get over here and die!”

We were all very impressed with our pupils’ growth, the direction of which involved screaming, bellowing, and hollering as they smashed the monsters to a pulp.

“Still, not sure if you church gals and guys should be going all beep and beep?” I commented. “Who taught you such terrible manners?”

“Mwahahaha! You think you’re not a hamburger, mincemeat monster? Just wait till I BEEPing BEEP the BEEP outta you!”

“Bwahaha!”

“Oh, are you taking inspiration from Sergeant Hartman? Guess I can’t do anything about that.”

I was only thinking about Sergeant Billy in terms of bootcamp, but there was also the Sergeant Hartman approach!

“Yup, if it’s Hartman we’re talking, then this makes perfect sense. Just judging by his name, that man had one hard heart. I’ve got no problem here?”

“Still alive, are you? Then you better DIE!”

“I do not fear you, puny monsters! Now you’ll learn the meaning of fear!”

“Perish! Just die already! You BEEPers!”

“Hiyaaaaah!”

They rampaged across the floor, their faces totally expressionless as they slayed and slaughtered the monsters. Once we hit the dungeon’s mid-floors, I needed to tie up the monsters with Magic Thread. The enemies had some pretty tough skills and finishing moves, so it was for the best. Still, the Church squad charged right in and stabbed the monsters to death, swinging their swords in fits of madness.

I mean, I had only taught them one move. Swinging their swords straight down was all they knew, so that’s what they did over and over again. They repeated it, refined it, reflected on it, reformed their technique, and revamped their precision. They fiercely cut apart the high defenses of the mid-floor monsters. Yeah, their eyes are low-key terrifying?

“Hiyaaaah!”

They all hit level 40, so I upgraded their equipment and taught them variations on the sword swing. Overwhelming the awaiting monsters, the Church squad followed my Magic Thread and listened to the guidance of Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl until we reached the final floor. The dungeon king was a level 43 Stone Giant. The squad knocked it apart into a pile of pebbles without even giving it a chance to show off its stony defenses.

The clerics didn’t seem to mind, so for the sake of easy movement (and out of the deep, deeply cut consideration of my deep soul) I added deep slits to their habits. No more of that loose clothing that just got in the way. It was now skin-tight, stretchy, meaty, miraculous, and marvelous. I could learn a thing or two by watching them!

In one step, they took deep breaths, and used their entire bodies to bring down their swords. A brutal severing attack unleashed in time with a powerful step. Their backs tensed, then relaxed, revealing prominent thigh protuberance, unleashing jiggles and wiggles, and shook and swayed and bounced. Oh, concentrated sword technique, uniting movement and breathing into a singular motion! What marvelous inner (thigh) secrets you reveal!

“Lord Haruka, we have fulfilled your (murder)orders!”

Now they were all standing at the ready? With that upright position, I was getting some serious bootcamp vibes, but putting their booties to camp really couldn’t be on the agenda today. Or on any future agendas for that matter.

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

Jiggle jiggle.

My three companions observed the growth of their disciples, and—wait a second! This is no time to agree with them? I mean, just look at their eyes! Foreboding, pitch-black eyes that lacked even a hint of luster were sternly aimed in my direction, leering smiles on their faces?

I began suspecting that the suspicious vibes that surrounded me currently needed to be surreptitiously eliminated. Still, there was no denying that priests and clerics got stronger without so much as a scratch, so I didn’t do anything wrong? Yup, that was it. The girls couldn’t accuse me of anything! I was scared, but all was well!

The clothes were nun-style outfits, so they could wear them daily. Storage was even imbued for stashing their swords and shields. I also endowed them with high status ailment resistances. So what was with this abnormal glint in their eyes? Dungeons are truly full of mysteries.

DAY 94
EVENING

Being able to instantly slaughter your enemies is obviously the simplest, most basic defensive mechanism. I don’t get what the big deal is.

WHITE LOSER INN

“A BUNCH OF GLARES AWAITED ME beyond the door.” Haruka-kun sighed. “Yeah, the inn hasn’t changed at all?”

“Why did you roll Arianna-san and all her companions?!”

“What the hell happened back there?!”

“Look, just think about it logically for a sec. They didn’t have any combat experience. It’d be dangerous to pit them against monsters, so I just spun them and rolled them and flung them around? And stuff? I mean, even dungeon kings can get rolled over by spike balls. It’d be one deplorable state of affairs if you couldn’t have a bunch of spike balls rolling around in a dungeon. I just did a bunch more rolling than usual. That’s all?”

Before he thought about the deplorable state of affairs in a dungeon, he should have considered the deplorable state of affairs of his own actions. His tactic had leveled them, but who in the world even thought to shove clerics into a bunch of iron balls and roll them around a dungeon? I wanted to press him about the concept of common sense, but that sounded exhausting. He had whipped up some impressive leveling results with his bootcamp, after all.

“Lord Haruka, everyone has returned safely!”

“Good work? I mean, we all came back together, so there was no need to check. I know we didn’t lose anyone. And if we gained someone, that’d just be a monster, so we’d need to send ’em straight back to where they’d come from? Just go about your business!”

“Sir! Yes, sir!”

I was a bit curious about the way they lined up in military formation and saluted, and I definitely didn’t hear the response that I didn’t want to hear? “Sir?” Are they for real?!

“Look, it was just combat experience. Miss Armor Rep and the others weakened the monsters first. Then we tossed ’em right in. Things were going well, so we went all the way to the 43rd floor dungeon king and chucked ’em at that one, too. Along the way, Sister Girl and her squad underwent a pretty impressive change in both positioning and posture…I mean, posture is pretty important, don’t you think? Just for, like, health and stuff?”

“Sir, yes sir!” they shouted.

“What the hell did you do to them?! They didn’t change their posture. They changed their personalities!”

“Posture has nothing to do with this!”

“I did notice that they stopped crying about halfway through. Soon enough, they were laughing. And this is how they were by the time we were done? This is the personal growth they achieved in the dungeon today? I mean, their eyes are horrifying, so let’s pretend that’s what this is?”

“Don’t ignore what happened here!”

Angelica-san and Nefertiri-san were looking the other way and sticking their tongues out. Meanwhile, Slimey bounced around as if he didn’t know a thing! Don’t cutesy your way out of your guilt, here!

“Uhhh… So, like, what did you do to them?”

“What kind of training?”

“What exactly do you mean by training?”

“What kind of training, and what kind of experience?”

“Why did you skip all the way to combat experience if they’ve never fought before?!”

“Huh? Well, I just fastened swords to their hands, pointed them at the monsters, and shot them at the enemy till they killed ’em. Nothing like good ole combat for training!”

“You’ve got it backward! Why are you tying swords to their hands and throwing them at the enemy? Did you play human darts with them?!”

Apparently, Haruka-kun had tied up the monsters with Magic Thread and played darts with the clerics. Yup, the three of them had a darts party! Thrown into the hopeless fear, confusion, and psychological damage of being hurled at monsters with a sword tied to your hand over and over again…It had turned the priests and clerics into obedient killing machines. This was U.S. Marines Sgt. Hartman levels of bootcamp intensity!

“No, you don’t get it! I was holding them up by the feet the whole time, so it wasn’t really throwing, ya know?”

“That’s worse!”

“So, not darts, just wielding them like human whips?!”

“Yeah, I was holding onto their feet, not their thick thighs. You have nothing to worry about in terms of healthy, wholesome, teenage-boy developments! They did so well slaughtering the dungeon monsters that they thanked me with cries of joy by the end of it. Not a single injury was sustained! Although, the cries of joy were technically during the slaughtering, not after, and the monsters getting slaughtered mercilessly were crying in agony. Ya know?”

“Those poor monsters!”

So, he’d fastened heavy, falchion-type swords to their arms, then carried them by the legs and wielded them to cut down the monsters to forcefully level them up. By handling them like whips, he forced their arms to swing down in proper swordplay technique. They had gotten better at swordplay than should’ve been possible in a single day, and their downward swings were perfect. It was the ideal strike for a counterattack. It cut through the opponent’s attacks, arriving at the very essence of fighting other humans. With Haruka-kun’s training and equipment, we now had a bunch of beginners on hand who were stronger than the Church’s knights.

“Hiyaaah!”

“They’re so strong!”

“They don’t have any technique, but they’ve got that single move down!”

“They can’t protect themselves, yet they’re somehow specialized in self-protection.”

“Face off against. Each other. Make right. Position,” said Miss Armor Rep.

“Yes ma’am!”

We checked out the results of their day in the training grounds. It was impressive. They had neither experience nor ability, so it was easy to correct their form. Plus, we all had the upper hand in terms of stats. They were still strong, though, and when we hit them, they hit back just as hard. They had learned a single technique that proved ideal for counterattacking human opponents.

With their defense-specialized equipment, the clerics were fully loaded with Healing and Recovery. Their valuable weapons also were designed specifically to pierce through opponents’ armor: broadsword falchions. “Falchion” came from the Latin word for scythe. They stormed at us with heavy blows, their entire bodies flexing as they attacked.

“All units, initiate evasion!” I ordered. “Once their posture breaks, counterattack. If you have the leeway, make it double!”

“Roger!”

They were masters of the initial attack. Now it was our job to teach them about staying alert. That was something you had to learn from real battle experience. It was something Angelica-san and Nefertiri-san had once taught us that we would pass on today.

Jiggle jiggle?

“You too, Slimey,” I added. “It’s hard for ordinary people to learn from you. That’s all. Your techniques are top-class, but people can’t learn them right away. They’d just break a bone.”

Anyone who could learn Slimey’s sticky-style ought to abandon their humanity at once. He was truly unstoppable!

“Hiyaaah!”

“Work on. Foot position.”

“Rhythm. Too simple. See through!”

People could learn. If the enemy studied their swordplay, they could counter it. The clerics needed a counterattack: the ability to launch consecutive attacks. We demonstrated, combining evasive and defensive maneuvers. Just like the training we had once received, we passed on the one-more-set session tradition to a new group of trainees.

“Wow. We really became teachers, didn’t we?”

“It feels somewhat embarrassing teaching right in front of Angelica-san,” said Book Club President.

“We got stronger the same way, you know?”

“A training tour to level 40, though. That’s plain ridiculous!”

“So cruel!”

Haruka-kun had never shoved us inside iron balls and rolled us around a dungeon, but we’d had to train and fight endlessly in the monster forest. The cruel part for us was that we had to model our techniques after Haruka-kun. I mean, he was the one explaining and demonstrating, so it was pretty much impossible to understand. “Whack ’em until they’re dead? And stuff?” That was how we’d had to learn. He made sure we were never in any real danger, but from start to finish, morning till night, not a single bit of explanation coming out of his mouth made a lick of sense.

“Is just swinging down like that enough?”

“Push through. Create a pause. That’s all they need.”

Most of our class ended up as balanced all-arounders, but Arianna-san’s group specialized in brute-force swordplay. The priority was on close-quarters skirmishes and defense. Defeat the enemy in one blow and break away to avoid counterattacks. Oh, not to mention equipment deceptions. What is Haruka-kun going to try to pull next?

“Still, they pack a serious punch for being essentially dueling specialists.”

“Yeah, they could cause havoc outside, too!”

Even if we lectured him and told him he overdid it, he already stuffed the orphans’ backpacks full of not hopes and dreams but multiple fusion-warhead missiles. If the orphans targeted us all at once with those, I’m not sure if we could survive the explosion. According to the manufacturer, “I don’t think they’ll get kidnapped now, ya know?” No, I really don’t think so! Who would try to kidnap kids equipped with those? How could anyone take a look at those backpacks and think, Oh, great! I’ll kidnap those kids now! If the kids fought back, they could destroy the whole city!

We did have to worry about potential stampedes. But, “In the very rare, unfortunate circumstance that they run into a monster stampede outside,” the only misfortune would befall the monsters! And if we could deal with the stampedes that easily, then shouldn’t all the problems in this world be fixed already? Those were overkill defenses, to say the least. Haruka-kun didn’t even try to find any other solutions besides providing perfect protection by annihilating every enemy in sight!

This time, he did that for Arianna-san’s group. We were still dealing with the Church, no matter if Arianna-san’s had become crazy dangerous weapons of mass destruction or not. These hyper-destructive soldiers should only be used when truly merciless slaughter was called for. Just imagining the damage was terrifying. Poor Theocracy. Run while you can!

After eating dinner together, the priests went back to the castle, while the clerics decided to stay here. It was lonely without Haruka-kun or Oda-kun’s and Kakizaki-kun’s groups. The dining hall was quieter than normal with no one to lob our complaints at.

“Bath tiiime!”

“Please tell Lord Haruka that this is an incredible fortune,” said Arianna-san, “one beyond anything I could have imagined. After all the training we received, we can’t possibly accept this!”

Entreaties rang out from the bath. Currently, they were regarding the sum of money that the spellstones were worth. Haruka-kun hadn’t killed a single monster himself, but the sisters begged us to transfer the money to him nonetheless.

“Uh, but you guys were the ones stuffed inside those spiky balls, carried by the feet, and whipped at the monsters like human weapons?”

“Yeah, you guys did all the real work! Haruka-kun’s the one in the wrong here!”

“Is it really that much? Oh, we’ve just lost track of common sense.”

“We’re going around crushing dungeons left and right, and we still constantly feel a pinch in our pockets.”

“One dungeon hasn’t even lasted three days lately!”

“All of our money goes straight into clothes and weapons. We could sell our stuff for a fortune, you know,” said Book Club President. “Oh, and we’re also eating our earnings.”

“We don’t know when to stop! It’s a real problem!”

Trying to sustain a modern lifestyle in a medieval world was bound to be expensive. Even if Haruka-kun was giving us huge discounts, the real value of what we bought was insane. We lived a very pricey lifestyle.

“I don’t know how we’re spending a million ele on 90-percent-off deals.”

“Wasn’t our original objective when we got to this inn to earn twenty-five thousand ele per day?!”

That 90 percent discount was for Haruka-kun’s labor expenses, though, so most of the money went to him anyway…He went back and forth between big-spender and broke with astonishing speed. The budget for our equipment was basically equivalent to a whole government’s, and the only cash we had on hand was what we’d borrowed from Haruka-kun most of the time.

“Meanwhile, Arianna-san is too scared to even hold a million ele!”

“Yeah, we probably shouldn’t tell them how much their new equipment is worth.”

It wasn’t worth mentioning that everything they had was national-treasure-class equipment. A million ele per person wouldn’t even come close…Not for even one of those swords. Yeah, we needed to keep quiet about that.

Also, the nuns’ habits had turned stretchy and skin-tight. Their figures oozed sensuality. The perpetrator claimed it was for the sake of making the outfits easier to fight in, but he had added deep slits to the skirts and fishnet tights that went up to a knife-equipped garter belt. We’re awaiting comments from the perpetrator on his last will and testament!

“He broke down actual clerics with his moral corruption! How are we supposed to fight that?!”

“Why are the clerics’ habits so sexy?!”

“Yeah, I kinda want one!”

“Right?”

Our biggest problem was economic corruption. Our long-running objective of becoming strong enough to protect Haruka-kun and going out to fight dungeons in his stead had resulted in us going so bankrupt that our only hope might be selling ourselves into his service. It felt all too possible at this point. Although, the slaveowner had a regular habit of bankruptcy himself.

“Clothes and food are the absolute basics, though,” I said.

“Yup.”

“So the problem is the additional outfits we order,” I said.

“We won’t surrender those!”

“I think our most expensive problem is the sweets,” Vice Rep A said.

“We’ll never surrender those either!”

We had to make more money. We had too many things we weren’t willing to give up.

“Probably. Finished new round. Bargain today,” said Angelica-san.

“New method. With luster. Beautiful. Comfortable. Amazing,” said Nefertiri-san.

“Oh em geeeeeeeee!”

Everyone rushed to clean themselves up and get out of the bath. Arianna-san and the other sisters looked on in shock as we fought each other to finish bathing first. They didn’t understand yet. A battle is coming, and I’m going win!

DAY 94
NIGHT

The trap that a good person does good deeds and a bad person does bad deeds has got this all twisted up.

WHITE LOSER INN

I HADN’T STARTED THE BARGAIN SALE YET. Is this really going to repeat again? I still had to prepare.

Figuring I had about an hour until the girls got out of the bath, I washed up real quick and lined the merchandise up in the dining hall. The moment I finished setting things up and was ready to start preparing my own defenses, warm bodies that were still sopping wet crushed me before I had the chance. It hasn’t even been thirty minuufffffftrrtttgh!

“Silk! Or cotton? It’s so glossy!”

“New products! New products!”

“The design is nice overall, but look at that weave!”

Well, they were right. As in, they were up close and tight. Overwhelming pressure (squishiness) crushed and drained my HP. Even my MP started to tank, Revival activating.

“Squeeeeee! New products! Brand new!”

“But they’re all limited editions! It’s a trap!” (Weep.)

There was no time between the moment I sensed their presence and their arrival. Seriously? Ground-Shrink?! No, it could’ve been Blinding Step, too. Whatever it was, it sent me bouncing all over the place like a pinball from soft chest to chest, crushed and smushed and smothered! It was a JK stampede!

“That’s mine! I call dibs!”

“How can you make such cute minidresses? I need to have them all!”

“The glossy fabric is too cute!”

“I want everything!”

I tried to reach out my arms, but their soft bodies crowded in on me. They were in their pajamas, so it wasn’t underwear, but the pajamas were chamises and T-shirts. The fabric was softer and thinner than underwear, transferring a saturation attack of soft, squishy sensations from every direction!

“Oh my God! Just feel the fabric!”

“Mmmm, it feels sooo good!”

And with their short boxers, bare legs were everywhere! I got knocked backward and buried my face in someone’s chest, gasping for air among the soft squishiness. Bouncing boobs buried my every battle for breathing room. When I finally burst out, I got boinged straight in the face, sending me shooting into the center of the throng!

“His needlework is simply inhuman.”

“And his level of night activities!”

This was actually the first time slips and negligees had appeared in the dining hall. I heard that girls got sloppy when there were no boys around, but this was beyond all expectations! Wait a sec—I am a boy! Supposedly? Heavy marshmallows bounced against me. Soft flesh squished and swallowed me. The sweet scent of bare skin surrounded me, sending my senses into a frenzy. I saw a gap and tried to use Airwalk to escape, but a soft manju mobbed me instantly, ending in a failed takeoff. This fabric is way too thin!

“I need that bag! No, don’t take it!”

“Those PJs are adorbs! Like, so adorable I don’t think I’ll be able to fall asleep!”

Th-this is the thin line between pain and paradise. This was the most flesh-filled fight I’d faced yet! The sheer number of objects crushed me into oblivion, sending me backflipping away from Pang Tong into a round of fleshy high-fives faster than ya boy Kongming!

“You can’t keep constantly and aggressively stimulating a teenage boy who is a teenage boy while being a teenage boy ’cause he’s a teenage boy! Those thighs are touching me. As in, that dangerous up-and-down motion is super questionabllllllllllle! Oh my God, what are you doing to me?!”

“Ooh, yeah. That’s good. I want that one too!”

“Loan us cash! How much can you give us?”

“I need everything!”

If they kept rampaging like this, they might even ruin the clothes, which made sense. The fact that my belt had somehow been taken off defied all logic!

“Amazing! How is it so cute?”

“Can you even call these clothes?”

“You can see that the blouse has been sewn by draping glossy fabric, and the knit garments were all done with a shuttle-free loom. The level of craftsmanship is above and beyond!”

“Gimme ’em all!”

On one hand, it was obvious that the girls weren’t wearing anything under their sleeping garments. That meant we were in serious trouble when clothes got pushed up or pulled down! The bare-skin ratio around here was way too high. Their boxers rode lower and lower, practically all the way down to the groin. This had to stop! I was in trouble myself, too. I mean, if my pants got pulled any lower, I’d be convicted of sexual assault even though I was the victim here! Who keeps pulling on my pants?!

“I need this in a size small! What do you mean there aren’t sizes? This one’s my favorite!”

“Can you make some adjustments? Additional orders!”

“Yeah, I need this one in a different color.”

“Additional orders already!”

They did out in orders, and I did make negligees that opened in the front…but that didn’t mean those fronts should be opened now! No, that’ll be game over! Keep the clothes closed, ladies!

“Don’t pull! That one’s my baby! Mine!”

“No! I got to it first! It’s destiny!”

“C’mon, that’s too much destiny!” she sobbed.

My production of low-rise boxer shorts backfired today. All of my classmates had long legs and a lot of their waists were at the same height. This meant my position was continually perilous! The stimulation started to strangle me!

“Don’t you guys see the teenage boy on the verge of a breakdown over here? We might get a fatal misfire in here at this rate…What kind of trap is this?!”

After getting squished and stuck between frilly butts, Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl had no hope of mercy from this teenage boy. More importantly, the girls definitely sealed off all routes of escape! They were even cuddling with Slimey, so I didn’t have any backup. I had to scheme a solo escape while surrounded by enemies on all sides!

“Hang on, I wanted that one! No fair!”

“Hey, I want it too!”

“You can’t take all of them for yourself!”

They say that the good will be rewarded and the evil punished. I didn’t have the leeway to doubt whether or not I was the good guy. All I knew was that this level of blessed disaster blurred the boundary between good and evil!

In a teenage-boy paradise more legendary than any experienced by the ancient heroes, I was crushed and rubbed by a raging wave of fleshy muscles more ravaging than the depths of hell. I was the very sensory manifestation of the sentiment that you can’t win against a crowd alone!

“I’m in trouble even trying to distract myself with complicated thoughts! Teenage boys are constantly having trouble in the first place. This is overdoing it!”

“Time to try this on! Who needs a changing room? I’ll just slip it on underneath what I’ve got on.”

“Let me try them next, if they don’t fit you! Please don’t let it fit!”

With boosts to my Wisdom control, I could make new shirts and minidresses with Magic Thread. This was the grand opening, so there were a lot of products. I was also able to add lace and embroidery as well as knitted goods, so I’d assembled quite the collection. After adding some innerwear, shoes, and bags to the collection, the bargain sale never seemed to end—nor did the JK stampede!

“Hey, let’s trade!”

“Sure, but not that!”

“Share some of the miniskirts. You’re hogging them!”

“There aren’t any mules left. Who bought them all up?”

I was a bit vulnerable after getting trapped in a never-ending whirlpool of soft skin and sweet scents, tangled and grappled in the freshly washed heaven, and swept away in a sea of sensitive sensations. And I was in trouble?

“Look at that adorable loungewear!”

“Is it just me or has his sense for women’s clothes got even better?”

“He’s figured out how to make things both cute and sexy!”

“Oh, check it out! New wallets.”

“How many wallets do you think I need?”

They’d emptied their wallets already. Why five wallets per person wasn’t enough was a mystery to me. The raw materials are dirt cheap, so more money for me, I guess?

I was in a far too dangerous, seriously perilous situation to worry about that now, though. I’d be doomed if the bargain sale didn’t end soon. And if I lost consciousness, things could get even worse…I was preserving my HP with Revival and Recovery, but I was running low on MP as a result. I was nearly out of MP batteries! Please let me grab a few and come back? I won’t come back, but, ya know? Hang on. Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl are keeping my equipment away from me!

“Three belts per person just isn’t enough!”

“Yeah, and I need way more shoes!”

I couldn’t see the forest for the trees. I was captivated by the line and couldn’t read the book…I could see and read everything but was held prisoner by the bodies and skin spreading everywhere? I was in the midst of experiencing 3D visual stimulation experience and full-bodied, sensory skin stimulation to the point where I was beginning to doubt the very necessity of all the smokescreens, mysterious lights, and optical illusions I had installed. It was no use. The rampaging tsunami of destruction was crashing down all over me and carrying me away.

It went without saying that Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl, who’d had every opportunity to break me out of there, bore the consequences for their inaction. It was inevitable. So why was it that when I came to, all of the clothes were strangely organized and sorted in the dining hall? I got the sense that I seriously shouldn’t think too hard about it.

DAY 95
MORNING

A flicked-up, magnetic mushroom wave magnetism doesn’t sound very tasty. It’d be a lot faster to chuck it without the magnetism.

WHITE LOSER INN

LAST NIGHT, A TENTACLE-FREE teenage boy burst through the heavens with limit-breaking vigor. Meaning, I put freaking everything into my revenge.

“To put it simply, I guess stuff happened to inspire these morning glares?”

Glaaaaaaare!

Apparently, the result of combining all of my skills and Entangling myself in them resulted in more might than expected, breaking down my two beauties until their tongues lolled out of their mouths. They hadn’t fully recovered by morning, and they looked awfully cute as they pouted and glared at me. Those glares didn’t have enough juice for a full counterattack. I’d need to develop a skill exclusively for waking them up. It didn’t need to fix their tongues—nothing that fancy.

I had given them a lot to be angry about.

“Morning,” I said. “Did you guys sleep okay? As in, did you have a good sleeping and waking and jumping and shouting until morning? And stuff? In my younger days, I heard about squeaky beds, but this is definitely my first time dealing with a symphony of gonging and ringing from a full-metal bed breaking from getting bedded too hard, then repairing it with Alchemy in a new harmony of resounding full-metal Alchemy battle. Even after all that patching up with Alchemy, it’s still falling apart?”

Glaaaaaare!

I couldn’t keep up with adding new metal with Alchemy to the broken portions, so the bed was a wreck. It had a certain charm of a bed that had survived countless battles, breaking through and bearing the brunt of long, brutal wars to become the battle-tested bed it was today. I made it stronger and sturdier with boosted endurance, but this crumbling bed was officially testing the limits of my taste.

Feeling relaxed and refreshed as could be, I made my way downstairs to the dining hall. Huh? Wrong room! Wait, what happened to the dining hall? The standard location for wholesome meals had transformed into a bewitching lair of alluring temptation kind of dining hall?

“Morning!”

“G-good m-morning…I mean, what’s with those shameless outfits? Just what kind of job are y’all going off to this morning? And how much do you charge? No, not that. I mean—you put on sexy minidresses first thing in the morning! They’re so hot that an enemy army would just assume it’s a rip-off trap and run away before the battle even began. That’s the level of traptitude we’re talking here! I’ve only got forty ele, but how about it? Probably asking for more than that, right?”

I went downstairs, and it was basically a girls’ bar. I mean, I’ve totally lost control and am freaking out, but that’s what has to be going on, right? I suspected that they’d add a charge of five hundred million ele to the bill the moment I sat at the table. Ooh, I’ll just go visit the pimpin’ king, steal a few hundred million ele, and come back! There’s no way forty ele will cover the cost of this establishment!

“Uh, we’re not doing some kind of shady job.”

“Yeah, what’s the big deal?”

“We can’t wear these outfits with the guys around. That’s all.”

“And we can only blame the manufacturer for that!”

“And why the hell do you only have forty ele? What are you going to do about room and board?!”

They were mad at me. They found out I did have enough cash for room and board. I’d lent out an unfathomable amount of cash and didn’t have a single ele on hand. I’d put room and board on the tab after last night’s bargain sale plunder. Even worse, I hadn’t killed a single monster yesterday, so I had no fresh income!

Every morning, I went around to collect my earnings from the adventurer’s guild, general store, armory, and various factories. This brief, minor indulgence immediately subjected me to the laborious lecturing labors of poverty and nightly try-hard, all-night, intense labor seshes. To rephrase: I was always out of cash! Because I spent it?

“Actually, most people paid for their bargain goods last night on tab, so the real reason I’m in the red relates to those minidress renters! Oh, and the presence of a boy? I’m a high school boy whose attendance record is causing a problem. In fact, the high school girls shouldn’t be considered high schoolers anymore either. How are we even pupils at this point, given the lack of registration and home visits? Our school life is doomed?”

“I don’t know why you’re bringing up school now. Why in the world would there be house visits in a fantasy world?!”

“Oh my God, don’t tell me he went to school all these years not evening knowing its name!”

All I could remember was a complete, utter sense of not caring in the slightest about the school’s name. It was just some ordinary school. Nothing special. Even its name wasn’t special. Probs? Not like I remembered.

The bigger problem was the unbearable JK girls’ bar around me. I had no place to put my eyes, and Jupiter Eye could see everything as I made breakfast. I whipped up some simple sandwiches, mushroom soup, and fruit punch for dessert.

“Yay, fruit punch!”

“Punch! Punch! Punch! Punch! Punch!” they chanted.

“Uh, something about that seems wrong for a bunch of teenage girls to be chanting, so please stop? Add in the fruit part at the very least. It’d reduce the problem. Plus, I feel like it’s rude to the dessert if you don’t call it by its full name!”

“Thanks for the food!”

Jiggle jiggle!

Nobody listened to me! My feelings blew away in a cold breeze. Speaking of my feelings, I really needed to get out of here?

“So tasty!”

Wiggle wiggle!

Today, the Church squad was gonna go fighting in dungeons with the girls. They split into two teams with Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl keeping tabs on them. The reason being was the insane libel that I would do something inappropriate if they left things to me. Let’s not forget that Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl had been the ones rolling those spike balls and duel-wielding clerics in each hand, chucking them at the monsters like darts. They always shook their heads and sighed as if it had nothing to do with them, but they had legit participated!

Jiggle jiggle!

That meant it was just me and Slimey today. We decided to do some mushroom foraging, mithril mining, and burden the brutal reality of the working-class life required for hotshot livin’.

“Working-class, big-spender life! Just try to take on my rage, sadness, punishment, and free time today!” I roared.

Current monster forest status: electrifying scattered iron powder for a rampaging jolt of electrical current death-match in all directions. The electrocuted gobos spasmed and cried out as we set straight to picking mushrooms.

It was one lively foraging sesh, what with Slimey Entangling himself with lightning and shooting around the forest like a pinball, bouncing off the trees after the fleeing monsters.

Using a catalyst increased the power output, saved on energy, and resulted in totally different effects and damages from the fire bullets, spellstones, and steel bullets. I didn’t want to shoot out my coins as bullets. I didn’t have any of those in the first place. That was why I’d come to forage mushrooms, right?

“Still, knocking a whole field of mushrooms up in the air and snatching them…Considering the various challenging implications of mushroom foraging while foraging is a challenging endeavor?”

Wiggle wiggle.

I’d go with a cliché name—Electro-Mushroom Cannon. I still had more than enough mushrooms in my item bag. There was plenty of storage, but I couldn’t sell them. High-class mushrooms were too valuable to sell. The market would just reject them. It was impossible to convert all of them into cash. I needed to undertake the illogical labor of foraging cheaper, lower-grade mushrooms from thinner regions of the forest, even though I needed a lot of money. The only monsters around here were low-level goblins, small fry that weren’t even worth practicing on. This went on for a while until I ran into a cave.

“It’s just a cave, not a dungeon. Honestly, I still don’t understand the difference between the two. I don’t even know how to differentiate a hole from a cavern. I’m seriously worried about payback, so feel free to snack on any dungeon kings. But stay away from any Hall of the Mountain Kings! We can just run from them?”

Wiggle wiggle!

Alas, a cave. I didn’t think we needed to worry about payback from some weak-sounding cave king. I concluded my investigation with Area Analyze after learning it was just a damp, dark, empty cave with nothing inside it. Still, I had already opened up a hole to go inside, so I went in. I dug a bit deeper and put my hand on the wall, used Holding on the dirt, and started digging a tunnel farther and farther along. I used Alchemy on the dirt to harden it, then built the earth into pillars to hold up the tunnel as I proceeded along, using Area Analyze to search for mithril.

“There’s some copper over there, but not much. Ah, and there’s iron? Not too much of that either, and it’s not pure, so I’ll take an iron-hard pass. Even when we look for the stuff, we can’t find it, huh?”

Jiggle jiggle.

“I mean, look. There’s some crystal? That’s a provocative letter of challenge addressed straight to a teenage boy for making see-through armor. Thus, it’s firmly sealed off?”

Boink boink!

“Some teenage hopes and dreams should never be fulfilled, right? Mainly see-through armor?”

Mithril was supposed to be a legendary substance that couldn’t be found in reality. You’d expect to basically never find it, but it wasn’t that uncommon. Legends were just some who-cares fairy tales that claimed mithril weapons only existed in the olden days. I knew it was around, though, so I kept on digging.

I did my digging and left the rest to Sir Greatluck. The cave was obviously an event flag, right? I even tried to imitate Heidi of the Alps to ask for some mithril, but there wasn’t a single ore to be seen.

“Although Peter the Goatherd was the one who really did the asking. Maybe his request wasn’t even granted?”

I mined the nearby iron and kept digging my tunnel. The duke previously said that they had to check their budget before commissioning me to build any more tunnels, but I knew that old dude was flat broke. I dug one anyway in the general direction of my previous excavations, but all I found was iron. Maybe I ought to go to dungeons in search of more mithril golems?

Seriously, all I found was copper and iron with some occasional gold or silver.

“Foraging mushrooms is more beneficial at this rate. The demon scythes are already working hard in the forest, so it makes sense that I should focus on mining instead. But I really might not find any mithril?”

Wiggle wiggle.

I had only been able to implement mithril on tiny parts of Miss Armor Rep’s and Dancer Girl’s sets of armor. I hadn’t even gotten to the Variant Necklace. Although, maybe I shouldn’t get to that, given the current status of Perversion and Grotesquemorphosis?

I mined trace amounts of mithril and coal. It wasn’t of good enough purity to do much with at all, though. I needed massive amounts of mithril, but I couldn’t find any good veins no matter how far I dug—more iron, copper, gold, and silver, sure, but that was it. I mined a massive load of hard earth for construction, but I kept up my digging only to find the tiniest quantity of the main reason I was here: mithril. I had mined so much iron, and it wasn’t even particularly pure. I couldn’t really care at this point, though. Even though I had to refine it all, it was still a massive quantity of iron ore?

“Maybe I could invent a Meteor Rain skill by dropping all this iron from the sky?”

Jiggle jiggle!

I had extended the range of my detection skills, letting me find tons of iron ore. My extended MP battery life allowed me to keep digging for a while, too. Above all else, I had improved Control, so I could dig faster, using much less MP in the process. It had only been a month or so, and my mining had properly improved. Last time, I had needed the money so badly that I’d dug up the iron, too. Not that I didn’t need money now.

Dig and search. Scrap and scrape together a few bits of mithril. Dig further. I had dug a lot deeper than planned, but I still didn’t get a resp—

Huh? No, that’s not mithril. It had a strong response, whatever it was. Not coal, either. And the mystery gold variations I found before had given a different reading…My goodness?

“Why is there a treasure chest?! Since when do treasure chests actually get buried? I’m calling it a treasure chest, but it’s more like a stone coffin. I must be getting a response from whatever’s inside? I’m not even in a dungeon. I’m just digging a tunnel and accidentally ran into a treasure chest?”

Wiggle wiggle?

I dug it up and opened it. If the contents weren’t valuable, then today would end up being a waste of time. Actually, no. In terms of money, I had dug up so much gold, silver, iron, and copper to almost drive me crazy. As for the mithril? Putting it all together it would basically equal the amount found in that one mithril golem. Not finding a single mithril lode felt pretty unsatisfying after all that work coming here and digging a giant hole. And in teenage-boy terms, being unsatisfied with lodes led to late-night frustrations and fantasies! I needed supplemental satisfaction!

Uh, when I opened it up, there was a multi-headed snake? It hissed at me and started to grow bigger and bigger. Another miss! I didn’t think I could sell a snake at the general store as armor, much less use it as equipment. There was a big lid and a sort of seal on the coffin, but who wouldn’t try to open something up that said, “Do Not Open,” am I right? If you didn’t want me to open it, then don’t write ‘Don’t open it!’ I’d obviously open it!

Its scales reflected my instant round of large-model, armor-piercing fire bullets. I couldn’t freeze it, and my witty remarks weren’t slowing it down either! Slimey was jiggling with joy at my classy banter, but the snake showed no response whatsoever!

“To be totally honest, I couldn’t not go for a sexy babe with a snake seductively draped around her neck, but that would definitely be the snake attacking her, right? I don’t know if that treasure chest was a trap or just a way to seal away the snake, but I wish they had at least included a babe in there? Or just the babe and no snake?”

The snake kept on growing, filling up the narrow tunnel. And then there was the tunnel, which was shrinking? ’Cause I was shrinking it? I mean, I built this tunnel to find treasure. No point in keeping it around if there wasn’t any. The snake struggled against the walls, wriggling in pain and finally halting its growth. I kept up the shrinking. We repeated the battle of shrinkage for some time, until it finally became a normal-sized snake. Then, I snatched the “Hydra. Lv: 100” by the head. Like an idiot.

The snake hissed like crazy as Slimey jiggled around. I gripped its head so it couldn’t bite me. It wriggled around, growing new heads to attack. I tossed it to my other hand in a panic, only for another head to regrow on the other side, so I stepped back and held it with my tentacles.

“As if I’m not already being bitten by tanukis day after day! Oh, come on! Stop growing new heads!”

A new head appeared, and one of my tentacles pinched its little jaws shut. Ah, you sweet summer hydra. You don’t know what battles my tentacles have been through! You’re so sweet that I could practically sell you stewed in syrup!

“Hang on, we’re going to eat hydras now?! No, no! I’m sure you’ve got buckets of topics to discuss with your fellow former dungeon buddies. Should I call in the former dungeon emperors for a reunion? Should I go beat a dungeon right now just to get you a happy reunion?”

Jiggle jiggle.

Slimey said I was wrong, but about what? Was the snake not a colleague but a subordinate, maybe? Looked like the dungeon industry was a pretty traditional, hierarchical one where bosses engaged in power harassment of their employees. If it were sexual harassment, though, perhaps I would consider getting involved. This was just a snake, not a lamia babe, so sexual harassment wouldn’t be fun! I tried giving the hydra a little pat, but it didn’t appreciate it.

Petting the snake didn’t give me any pleasure either, which was strange, given that my snake-like, Grotesquemorphisized tentacles caused a tremendous outbreak of quivering, moaning, groaning, arching, backbreaking, heartaching pleasure for Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl. I supposed I had to thank snakes in general for the sensation of entangling and crawling over soft, sweet skin from head to toe, so I decided to treat the creature kindly. Although, I did get the sense that centipede, slug, and sea anemone style tentacles had been more numerous, those caused trials and tribulations of tremendous tremulations that somehow resulted in unconscious twitching. Grotesquemorphosis had so many variations that I imagined it would have a hard time getting along with anyone. Er, except for Slimey, who was growing out tentacles to happily pet my necklace?

“Oh! I should add it to my ‘Snakecharmer’s Necklace: Can insert seven items. Intelligence +40%. Snake Replication (Three snakes, grow from the body with MP). Poison production. Scale Hardening. +Defense.’ You didn’t like that more stony snake before. Why are you so into the hydra?”

Wiggle wiggle.

The heads of the hydra were of all different sizes and functioned kind of like tentacles. Reminded me of my nights. Was I gonna start growing snakes every night, too? My reptile series of grotesqueries certainly pleasured Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl, so making more would only result in more pleasure, right?

“Now I see, my Slimey friend! Together, we shall rule this land! Mwahaha!”

Jigglejigglejigglejigglejiggle!

We cackled together for a bit. I mean, I had to? With that, I combined it into my necklace. I had no idea what would happen, but the hydra went right inside the Snakecharmer’s Necklace. I used Appraisal on it and saw, “Hydra: Vitality +30%. HP Boost. Scale Armor. Multi-Head Growth. Titanic Growth. Fatal Poison. Power-Word Kill. Status Ailment Infliction (all types). Automatic Regeneration. Automatic Healing. Revival. Automatic Offense. Automatic Defense. +Attack.”

“What? It turned into equipment?” I gasped. “I can actually use three snakes as equipment. It can already insert seven necklaces, plus three snakes, too? This is one bargain of an item!”

Jiggle jiggle.

Equipping it strengthened my body with Vitality and HP stat boosts. It also provided recovery with the Automatic Healing attributes. It was perfect for mitigating self-inflicted damage. The perfect snake to stop me from self-destructing. Had Slimey taught the snake how to do that? This was already the fourth status-ailment-inflicting item I had. With three, even a tickle sent the pair of them into a series of convulsions. Now, I had four… A single stroke might knock them out now? I needed to hold myself back, or the fun would end the moment I touched them. The stimulation was too great to even fall unconscious, so it’d be a never-ending series of endings? I almost felt bad for them. No way was I gonna hold back.

“Ew, I really grew snakes!”

The fact that the snakes moved automatically and couldn’t be controlled might come in handy. I couldn’t maintain full control over magic thread and Magic Hands while activating high-speed movement at this point, so at least I didn’t have to worry about controlling the snakes. They might get confused before they got used to Teleport, but I was grateful for more helping hands, er, snakes. Plus, it allowed me to keep up my reptile jokes. That was a nice plus!

“Thanks, Slimey. Want some apple pie as a treat?”

Jiggle jiggle!

He enjoyed it. As, I’m sure, Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl would enjoy…many things. Oh yes. Yes, just imagine it!

I would give them apple pie as well.

DAY 95
NOON

Why can’t the girls understand that a powerful killer attack with a strong stride is a necessary component for a slippery slit?

DUNGEON

GOD IS DEAD—an oft-referenced Nietzsche quote that was supposed to sum up nihilism.

“Die evil monsters! Good monsters, you die, too!” Arianna-san commanded.

“Yes, ma’am!” the clerics bellowed in response with a fury that could tempt God to commit suicide before launching themselves straight at the monsters. They swung their swords in a single, powerful blow, smiting the monsters. Simple, straightforward, stubborn downward swings of singular obliteration.

They left the defenses to the forcefields imbued in their habits and rosaries, continuing the murderous onslaught. It was a single attack that concentrated all the power of their bodies at once, as if in prayer…the school of Jigen-ryu swordplay.

“Will they ever be able to step inside a church again?” Vice Rep A asked.

“They, like, totally won’t be able to stand up for themselves if they’re not at leaaaaast, like, this strong, though,” said Vice Rep B.

“Stand up for themselves? They’ll tear holes through anyone who gets in their way,” Vice Rep C said.

“Their technique is straight-up scary!”

“Isn’t that the approach of first-kill, first-win?”

Protecting yourself and others was difficult. Kill the enemy first, and you were safe—that was the approach championed by Haruka-kun. Kill the strong, even if you were weak. Kill because you couldn’t protect.

“He could’ve at least taught them how to evade. They’re too frail, aren’t they?”

“Haruka-kun is the only one who can really fight that way.”

“Well, they’ve got disposable weapons, so it’s gonna work one way or another.”

Once they had grown a few more levels, they could hold out in a battle by using disposable weapons. Haruka-kun couldn’t even use those because of his low level, but he could throw enough money at the problem to solve it. It was weird that the person who had made the weapons was the only one who couldn’t use them, but a spellstone trade boosted everyone’s power levels.

“Don’t spellstone weapons have a level requirement of 30?”

“Worse,” explained Book Club President. “They gain efficiency based on level. They’re almost useless at anything below level 50.”

“Still, they’re really solid once you get to that point. Just expensive.”

There was a flash of white leg as they drew their swords—an indoors duel technique for taking on human foes. The church squad listened to their commander, combining retreat and raiding tactics, alternating between the two in continually improving coordination, crushing monsters before falling back.

“My concern is what happens when they don’t have their equipment on.”

“The only thing they can do is raise their level and get better at fighting.”

“Aren’t their habits pretty powered-up already?”

“The bigger problem is that Storage is imbued underneath the slit in their skirts.”

“One lecture coming up for a fresh guilty verdict!”

The clerics approached and swung, cutting down the level 27 Armored Gibbons. The long-armed monkeys (Haruka-kun wouldn’t stop complaining about how they weren’t called long-armed apes) were felled by the clerics’ blades before their telescoping arms reached their targets.

“Only a few of these BEEPers left. Cut those BEEPing BEEPs into mincemeat, and BEEP BEEP the BEEP outta ’em!”

“Yes, ma’am!”

Ladies shouldn’t use such foul language! The moment the clerics entered a battle, their whole demeanor changed. Before battle, they were polite, cheerful, well-mannered, and gentle, making the shift all the more shocking. I mean, the sisters who had been thanking us for everything mere moments ago were now screaming at the top of their lungs, roaring that hell itself wouldn’t be painful enough for those monsters. They wore maniacal grins as they sliced the apes’ heads off.

“I was a bit worried about them going into battle with their gentle personalities.”

“Yeah, this should’ve made me less worried. So why am I more worried than ever?”

“They’ve got more than enough accessories that raise their resistances. Maybe we should get them some items for sensing enemies’ locations.”

“We also need to think about when they’re defenseless in the bath.”

“Watching them fight…I’m kinda getting into the idea of a habit.”

“That’s a good idea. We’ll need to place some orders!”

In the Theocracy, they faced enemies on all sides. Returning was hopeless unless they could perfectly protect themselves. Haruka-kun couldn’t protect them. It was exactly because they were backed into a corner that such aggressive offenses needed to be prioritized. Protecting themselves with a 100 percent success rate was impossible. They could only ensure their own safety by killing all of their enemies and destroying the Church from the inside.

Still, I couldn’t deny that the sexy habits were pretty sweet. We were all broke from last night’s bargain sale, including our moneylender! Engels’ law was realer than ever after our human wave tactics. I gotta get rich!

“But what happens after the clerics break out?”

“I heard that the priests are learning how to handle the explosives.”

“Oh, then they can implement some covert operations.”

The Theocracy’s citadel was also its central cathedral—both the pinnacle of their faith and an impregnable fortress. But as a simple stone structure, it had its weak points. The entire structure would collapse under its own weight if the central pillars and walls were destroyed. Such havoc would be created that the Church would hardly be in a position to pursue the sisters.

No matter how hopeless the situation, Haruka-kun found and pursued the faintest possibility of victory. We had our own magician behind the scenes, conjuring up tricks that miracles were built on. It didn’t matter how badly things went wrong; he was our deceitful, cheating fraudster. That was how we had made it through the war—and barely so at that. He had needed to overclock himself to make sure nobody died. Now, he continued to fight in a situation where every move he made threatened to tear apart his skin, muscles, and bones.

Since then, he further powered up his equipment despite his weakened body, continuing to cheat his way forward. He acquired new power after new power, learned technique after technique, and his body was still as weak as ever. He made adjustments until victory was possible. Just in case that method wasn’t enough, he further powered up everyone’s equipment with mithril.

Haruka-kun, who’d had to handle unexpected numbers of attacks in the bloody throes of war, including suicide bombings, acquired the G*ndam Funnels and Magic Thread to improve his defenses. In order to control his Teleport skill, he had polished his swordplay, reducing the burden Teleport put on his body and granting him amazing, newfound strength.

He went on to defeat several dungeons, and even faced off against dungeon kings while still being level 24. Weak and yet strong. Frail yet destructive. Always trying to grow stronger. He had reached the limits of Perversion, but things sounded especially dangerous for the warrior sister squad.

“We’ll continue training Arianna-san’s group until the 39th floor,” I said. “Leave the fighting to them. We can coach them from the back line. Starting on floor 40, they’ll swap to the rearguard and watch us in action. Give it your all!”

“We can do that!”

Haruka-kun did everything he possibly could to give us marginally better odds. We had to get stronger, reduce the impossibilities, and give ourselves more possibilities. Then we could be useful to him—become cards in his deck. This included making Arianna-san and the others stronger. It may have just been a minor safety measure, but it still had to mean something. Just like when Shalliceres-san fought against a dungeon with the Imperial Guard or when Murimour-san led the women of the frontier to defend Omui. No matter how crazy strong Haruka-kun and his three companions were, we had to be ready when the time came. We had to do everything we could to become stronger!

“We’ve got to set a good example,” I called. “Swords at the ready, everyone!”

“Roger!”

We’d heard time and time again from Angelica-san and Nefertiri-san about how hard Haruka-kun worked, using trial and error to find new ways to improve everyone’s armor. He improved and even remade every piece ten, a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand times. He executed millions, even billions, of calculations to forge the armor we used every day. This peerless armor was priceless beyond all comprehension through the multitude of techniques used to create it. The armor that he poured his heart and soul into protected us all…If we don’t become stronger, we’ll bring dishonor to young women everywhere!

“Line up and stand by,” I called. “Draw them into range, then strike!”

“We’re at the ready!”

If I told Haruka-kun all that, he’d act like I was saying gibberish. But everything we’d done up until this point would be meaningless if we couldn’t be useful to Haruka-kun, especially at a time like this, when Oda-kun and Kikazaki-kun weren’t around.

We had cried and suffered so much since coming to this world. But Haruka-kun made us smile. He spoiled us. He was kind, so we had to grow much stronger. He brought us so much joy; we had to give something back.

“Now goooooo!” I yelled.

“Yeeeeaaaah!”

The front line charged in and cut down the enemy ranks. The second row came in from behind to slay the next group of monsters as soon as the first had fallen. The monsters that survived the front row’s initial assault were then killed by the second liners. Our coordination and formations were sound. This was the start of true strategizing.

“That quickly…”

“Wow, they’re amazing!”

“St-strong!”

“So these are the black-haired warrior maidens…”

“I didn’t realize a group could cooperate like that.”

“A whole herd of level 41 monsters, killed in the blink of an eye!”

There were only two rounds of killing blows, the second occurring the very moment the first ended. Repeating that process created a cycle of slaughter that the enemy couldn’t stop. The monsters crumbled, undone by the momentum of our attacks. The limited space made the coordination difficult; exact positioning was more important than ever in the narrow room. The clerics needed to watch and learn.

“The coordination was impeccable. The strategy and instruction were perfect as well.”

“How do you even stop an onslaught like that?”

“There’s no way we can replicate it…”

“That level of tactics!”

“But imagine if we somehow could!”

We let Arianna-san’s group kill off the few remaining monsters, and then went down to the next floor. I was glad that they had actually watched us finish the job, though—I was worried they might charge in from behind, unable to hold themselves back. They were holding on to their humanity so far. Which brought back the original worry that they were so gentle that they wouldn’t even be able to protect themselves.

We demonstrated and they studied, occasionally mixing in with our formations. They got more experience finishing off the weakened monsters all the way down to the final 57th floor. Now they would watch us take on a dungeon king.

Angelica-san and Nefertiri-san accompanied us to provide defense. There wasn’t any real risk involved here, but they demonstrated how to fight with a blade while maintaining an ironclad defense. We lacked the strength to really be considered role-models to others, but I was pretty sure we were a better example than Haruka-kun, at least. Yeah, he was just crazy. Sure, he targeted the monsters’ weak points, but it came across as plain old bullying!

Angelica-san and Nefertiri-san wanted to teach the clerics not just about charge attacks but defense, counterattacks, and saturation attacks, too. If the enemy reached out their hand, lop it off. Intercept their pauses and overwhelm them without going too far. Draw in the enemy while counterattacking. Surround them. When a giant green body charged at you, turn the massive scythe aside. Send the beast spinning at full speed and concentrate attacking power on its undefended back.

The pair forced back the level 57 Metal Mantises with their swordplay. If the mantis left its legs exposed, that was where they struck; if it extended its scythes, they tossed them aside. Angelica-san and Nefertiri-san stopped them, surrounded them, and then weakened them with a series of attacks from behind. Arianna-san’s group stayed in a defensive formation, coordinating to provide backup without changing positions. At first glance, the mantises looked like they had killer attacks. Turned out they were just employing Intimidate. The dungeon emperors took any killer attacks and knocked them aside, creating deliberate lulls in battle so they could retreat at any time.

That was the technique we had wanted to teach them…and had failed. I supposed it was a bit too much for the sisters to handle just yet.

“That battle was way too one-sided to bother trying to teach them a method of evacuation warfare!”

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

“The only ones who wanted to evacuate in this battle were the monsters.”

“Yeah, I thought the monsters were gonna give up attacking altogether and retreat!”

“They were facing off against dungeon emperors, after all.”

If I were a monster, I’d run, I thought. When a single attack killed the monsters every time, there was no need to retreat. I didn’t think the four of them had ever retreated in their lives. Unfortunately, the clerics had become crazed, one-hit murderers without any concept of caution as the four worst possible individuals in the world had served as their instructors. Is that what Haruka-kun wanted to teach them all along? We failed in our duty to become good examples!

DAY 95
EVENING

Going too overkill in a monster-bonking, bullying group-battle makes us unfit as instructors.

OMUI
DUKE'S PALACE

I SWUNG BY THE DUKE’S PALACE for some allowance, emptying out the coffers of the massage chairs. Apparently, there was some kinda rule in fantasy worlds where you could fix any of your unpaid bills just by going fishing in the massage chairs at the duke’s castle. The profitability of vending machines held up in fantasy worlds too!

“I really am grateful,” the old dude said. “Even though you already provided us several years’ worth of iron, we were already close to running out of stock due to the incredible consumption rate. I could never have imagined that our mining wouldn’t keep up with demand, even with all those tunnels you built. It was an impossibility until you and your friends came here. Ever since then, all of our predictions for economic growth have been completely surpassed. Our supply chain hasn’t managed to keep pace. It’s an incredible help.”

“Yeah, about that. I just built some new tunnels, so feel free to use ’em? I couldn’t find what I was looking for. Or, like, there was only a tiny little bit, but there were tons and tons of iron and copper. Tell the miner peeps, ’kay? They’re a lot longer and easier to mine up than the old tunnels I dug, so go nuts. You should get lots of iron. It’s nonstop mining profits all day, every day? Tough world, ya know?”

I brought a huge load of surplus metal, so Mr. Meridad was slacking off. He said Merimeri was leading the frontier army and fighting a dungeon, and Royal Girl was off under the instruction of Mrs. Murimuri fighting another dungeon. Meanwhile, Mr. Meridad was here slacking off! I’m gonna tattle on his lazy ass!

“How are things with the people of the Church? I heard that they’re being trained currently. You’re correct, too. They very well may be targeted. In the worst-case scenario, they could be killed here on the frontier, and the Church will promptly place the blame on the kingdom. I considered providing them with protection, but enabling their own self-defense is the best option. They’ll be in mortal peril when they return to the Theocracy, after all. It’s gutting. All they did was hold out a helping hand.”

“Status update,” I said. “Class Rep and the others are training them, and I’d say they’re already strong enough to take out the Theocracy’s knights? I’m guessing that, even today, they’d probs be able to fight on par with the Theocracy’s knight instructors’ troop. They don’t have enough knowledge or experience, though, so they could find themselves in trouble in a battle that they didn’t come out of the gates dominating in. They’d also be at a disadvantage if the knights attacked them on a flat, wide-open plain. Still, I gave ’em loads of spellstone hand grenades, which horses definitely aren’t fans of. TBH, it’s not only horses that aren’t fans of them. You can deal with most problems by chucking some hand grenades, like with Stalker Girl. It’s all good, ya know? I’d love to equip them with some zamba blades for horse-slaying, but their current falchion broadswords should be more than enough to cleave horses in two. Plus, ‘falchion’ has more a stylish vibe than ‘zamba,’ ya feel? Don’t want the horses getting creeped out by a weird sword name and running away before they get cleaved in two, right? And stuff?”

I was pretty sure they could take on the Theocracy based on what I had previously seen, but their lack of experience would prove problematic. I couldn’t do anything about the fact that they didn’t have combat jobs, but that would hold them back long-term. That was why I needed to turn them into an overwhelming force—one so overwhelming they could freak out the enemy and avoid a drawn-out war of attrition, where the difference in experience would become more apparent. They needed to either instantly obliterate the enemy or strike fear into the hearts of their foes. That was why I had started off by teaching them that killer charge attack.

Showing your deadliest attack right off the bat would terrify the opponent and put them on edge. It also reduced the odds of a strong counterattack. That was why I had decided to focus on having them master an ultimate killing strike. The enemy might figure out it was a bluff, but they would still have to deal with the force of the attack itself, so I was confident this was the best approach.

“Ahem. I heard that you were training them for self-defense, Haruka, but you’re saying they could already defeat the Church’s knights? Do you mean in single combat? Surely they couldn’t defeat the entire legion on their own. The Church’s knights are among the most powerful in the world. And you’re saying Lady Arianna’s group can stand up to them? What in the world did you do? It has only been two days since they started training.”

Everyone in Sister Girl’s squad was low-leveled. They were powerful overall, but that was only their simple base strength fortified by equipment. Because of that, I decided to equip them with the armor-piercing destruction falchions. I also imbued resistances and skill nullifications as well as Reflection into their church get-ups. I only added Forcefield to their rosaries, which should give them enough leeway to win in a fight. They might not be able to win with strength alone, but even the Theocracy wouldn’t just whip out their deadliest trump cards against a group they assumed to be powerless.

Sister Girl and her friends still needed to be prepped for and capable of longer-term battles, so I let my classmates handle the training for that. They were far more capable at group tactics than even the frontier army or Imperial Guard, and Class Rep was a good teacher. I couldn’t form a party, so I didn’t know the first thing about group tactics. With the dungeon emperors around, the power level was so overkill that Sister Girl and her group wouldn’t learn anything until at least the mid-floors of a dungeon. The monsters got obliterated before they could even start to run away! Miss Armor Rep, Dancer Girl, and I all swung swords too fast for the eye to follow, so you really couldn’t learn anything from us.

“Yeah, it’s day two, so they’re learning group tactics now. I’d say they could probably take out the whole legion? If they weren’t at a level disadvantage, they’d have no problem nullifying the Theocracy’s gaudy equipment and magic items. Leveling up and getting spellstones is easier here on the frontier, so once they’re over level 50, they’ll almost certainly be able to win? Plus, their new habits are hot. Every time they draw their broadswords, it exposes fishnet tights beneath those slits! That’s hot as heck!”

Adaptation was impossible without grasping the full capabilities of the opponent. But the moment the enemy caught an entrancing glimpse of thick thighs clad in fishnet tights, graced with a garter belt in the most alluring possible position… Well, the freshly drawn falchion would be splitting them in two. How could you help yourself, even if you did recognize that a single glance might be your downfall? That gap between tights and garter belt was the ultimate seduction! In a battle against teenage boys, a slit was the most dangerous weapon of all!

“Running away exposes your backside, so it’s always safest to strike first,” I said. “Running away is way safer after you’ve killed all the enemies. Pretty sure that enemies can’t hurt you, so long as you kill them all. Agatha Christie did once say that ‘every murderer is someone’s friend,’ so that’s one mysterious endorsement of my strat.”

After that, I went to hear about the current sitch via information from the pimpin’ king. Stalker Girl’s clan was currently in the capital, investigating the movements of the Church’s spies. They reported that assassins had infiltrated the castle keep. The king had the lolly-lickin’ old dude, so he was fine. I would love to get a thorough and polite introduction to any sexy female assassin’s infiltration but not from that lolly-licker! He needed a bonking!

Further investigations were made possible by a fresh supply of maid outfits for Maid Girl’s troop of maids. These outfits were powered up for battle, so they’d be fine too. I’d pretty much equipped the entire thing with traps.

Even sending a few elite assassins to infiltrate was idiotic. No matter the approach—a diversion, some outlandish scheme of deception—it wouldn’t work because they were idiots! The idiots were too stupid to understand what was happening and would just kill the enemies. In a sense, they were the mortal enemy of special agents, because they were plain idiots whether you befriended them or made enemies with them! Those dum-dums!

Then, the advisor and some bureaucrats came over with various reports. Mr. Meridad was getting all upset in the far corner of the room, but we ignored him. Who needed that guy anyhow? Getting government stuff done always went faster with the advisor, so I wrote up a memo about the new tunnels and their deposits and handed it over to him. Then, I gave him instructions about the development plan for mining them. Mr. Meridad eventually gave up and went for some massage chair therapy. I knew things would go faster without him around.

“Should I make a blast furnace?” I asked. “If I make a big one, it’ll bring down costs, and require fewer operators too. It’ll use a ton of fuel, though, so you’ll need to keep it running to prop up production. But if you look at cost efficiency per goods produced, it’s a lot more efficient. It just takes a lot of work to get going? Ya know?”

The issue was that our resident experts (the nerds) were out of town. They couldn’t be beat when it came to niche knowledge and production planning. If I made them make it…Yeah, I better stop imagining things right there. They’d end up building giant robots! That sounded kind of awesome, actually, but it pissed me off, too, so never mind!

“Nah. Even with anticipating poor crop harvests, it’s more efficient to just lump everything together large-scale. Doing crop rotation for the soil is a drag, but it’s a lot easier to manage once you have the system in place? If you keep planting the same crop, there’s a higher chance the plants will get sick or taken out by insects, so you swap over to a different crop next time you plant something. Also, things won’t get moving until we find a way to minimize labor and land management. We need to ramp up production, or our whole harvest is going to get gobbled up by a single group of people every morning.”

“I see, I see,” replied the bureaucrats.

We were lagging in terms of livestock, which made labor even more precious. I couldn’t make pizza for lack of cheese! The factories had started to stabilize, but they still couldn’t keep up with demand. Not that they needed to if it wasn’t reasonable. This was excess demand caused by all the investments I poured into the market anyhow. Even with the consumption cycle running, we’d have to reduce production if we made too much, or demand flagged. Making manufacturing as efficient as possible to minimize losses of capital and labor was most practical. I also wanted to expand magic item production, but that would make us the Church’s target. I was keeping that strictly to my side-job stuff for now, but I’d have no choice but to start setting up factories for magic item production before long.

The frontier had become the kingdom’s economic backbone. This town already had twice the population of the rest of the kingdom. Normally, mass immigration was destabilizing and could cause public safety concerns. Not here, though. How could there be public safety issues here? Even if someone started some shady company or something, they couldn’t commit any crimes with the club-wielding wives around. If you could take on those wives, then you’d be much safer fighting monsters out in the forest and could make way more money, too!

I managed to set up mass production for spellstone refrigerators and washing machines, but I still made all the magic items at my side-job for the most part. I’d been too busy to work on my spellstone trailer idea. Besides, I wanted some sort of magic-powered bicycle, and I’d already lost to the nerds at shipbuilding! I wanted to put the nerds to work making something worthless to get them out of my hair, but honestly, it was still faster to just make stuff myself, shove everything into my item bag, and send it flying. The bag had unlimited capacity, so it made for great high-speed shipping.

“We’ve also established transport channels to the capital. We kinda gotta throw everything at the wall to get industry moving, ya feel? First, get some capital in merchants’ hands. Then, let them figure out how to work efficiently. Don’t worry about governance or anything. Just invest, invest, invest! People will deal with their own lives, so no need to go sticking sticky fingers into it. Ya vibe? Everyone’s working hard. With a little help from the government, they’ll all make themselves hardworking and happy, so your job’s just to watch it all unfold and stuff?”

Adam Smith said it was better to let free markets do their thing. If God tried to stick his invisible hand into our economic affairs, I’d lop that hand right off. Then we’d have a severed, invisible hand stinking up the place, but whatever.

“That’s the antithesis of mercantilism, and TBH, going all in on the free market is too extreme. That focuses entirely on profits, which can easily create shortages and other dumb crap, so you need regulations. Still, you really just gotta let the free market do its thing? I learned that from JKonomics back at the inn!”

“Haruka, we’ve got a huge volume of shipping orders from the capital.”

“Call in merchants from the capital,” I said. “They’ll compete for the orders, and the price for shipping will set itself. Right now, we’re still trying to whip up economic circulation. We’re not quite at the point where we’re fixing problems that pop up. We need a robust economy first or else we’re chickens running around with our heads cut off here? And having a head is good?”

Once the kingdom’s economy improved, we could compete with the Merchant Kingdom. In fact, we already had a leg up. They had lost all their power outside of distribution. The kingdom had all the mushrooms and spellstones, and the beastfolk slave trade had collapsed. They received magic items based on contracts from the Theocracy, and while it was true that they had market penetration for selling them, that didn’t matter anymore. Both countries had been so laser-focused on profit margins that they hadn’t built any industry themselves.

The Merchant Kingdom exclusively did the selling—they did no manufacturing whatsoever. The merchants hadn’t made money selling regular old merchandise; instead, they made money trading in weapons and governmental power. They didn’t have ordinary merchants or engineers. It was a country of traders with no physical wares to trade. A country with no future.

Their lone avenue had been to capture beastfolk and use their shipping channels to monopolize the slave trade. After the nerds came to town, they couldn’t capture new beastfolk. Then, the nerds pirated the poop out of their navy. Game over.

Now! Theocracy Econ 101 time. The Theocracy’s political and economic might was based on its monopoly over magic item technology, the magic-item-based might of the Theocracy’s army, and a monopoly on the Church’s faith. Their economy, government, military, and faith were all aligned. That was what made the Theocracy powerful.

All that had broken down as of late. They couldn’t get spellstones anymore, and their economy was screwed now that the kingdom was making magic items too.

The Theocracy’s military had taken a huge blow in the war, and they lost their hidden jewel, Dancer Girl. They used their ultimate trump card to cause artificial deluges. Their monopoly, might, and political authority were all gone. The only thing left was their faith.

They could just pray and die for all I cared. Prayer wouldn’t save them now. They could be as faithful as they wanted as their nation slid into poverty.

On the one hand, a weaker Merchant Kingdom and Theocracy was good for the kingdom. Without the breakwater of those two nations, however, far-off countries might start to make a move.

“Haruka,” said Mr. Meridad, “the king has received an appeal for aid from the Beast Kingdom. You appear to harbor ill-will toward beastfolk…I’m not sure what they’ve done to upset you, but their nation is a friendly one. It is the acts of the Church that have caused them discrimination and suffering. I’d like you to do what you can to help them. Of course, this is simply a request, one which you have every right to refuse. You’ve done far too much for both the frontier and our kingdom for us to ever repay you. We’re hardly in any position to ask anything of you, yet that is exactly what I am doing. The beastfolk are a prideful people; they are courageous and incredibly strong. But their numbers are few and divided between their clans. Their economy is weak, so though they are elite warriors, they have poor equipment. I worry…” He paused. “I worry that they are on the verge of annihilation.”

“I’m not tryin’ ta send aid, but the new shipments should help with their economic problems. We’ll get richer too? Capturing slaves should be difficult with the nerds around, and we’ve got the meatheads in the capital and stuff? The problem was that we didn’t have a navy, so we couldn’t defend the Beast Kingdom from an invasion, but now we’ve got the upper hand there? The enemy can’t use warships. Their only choice would be a land invasion, and the beastfolk would have an advantage there. There’s no roundabout path we can take to get there anyhow. The beastfolk should handle their own problems, don’tcha think?”

The nerds would save the beastfolk, and if they weren’t enough, the meatheads could hop over. I’d already sent the necessary supplies, and I didn’t have any particular interest in their country. No particular interest, as in, never even bothered to learn the name of their country? Seriously, I didn’t care.

I got a huge stack of cash from the massage chairs and the fresh iron supply. That rejuvenated me, but the money had a life as fleeting as a dragonfly’s. Once I get back to the inn, I’ll pay my room and board and hand off some sweets to Poster Girl.

“I guess even dragonflies are basically just flies in terms of flying capability and name, minus the dragon part. Unlike short-lived adult flies, those dragonflies live for a few weeks, which I guess is where the mighty dragon part of the name hops in to drag out their life spans! Still, that’s pretty short?”

Slimey had fallen asleep on my shoulder out of boredom ages ago. I made my way up to my room. Today’s errands had taken longer than expected, so there was a chance everyone was already back and making a fuss over how hungry they were. Plus, we were connected to the orphanage, and the orphans needed their meal. I needed to hurry back!

DAY 95
EVENING

I figured there’d be this kinda stuff, but I thought that that kinda job would have that kinda stuff, so I made it just in case?

WHITE LOSER INN

WHEN I GOT BACK TO THE INN, I heard a chorus of “Welcome home, Master! Lovey-dovey rub!” and with that, the inn was transformed into a maid inn. This fantasy world had as many mysteries as it did teenage girls! Was there something funky in the water?

“I’m home! Or, to put it another way—what the hell is going on? Are you working as maids to pay back your rent?! Wow, interesting idea! But those maid outfits seem to be the miniskirt-maid type. Totally impractical for actual cleaning work. Indeed, these maid outfits featured the ultimate thigh gap between knee socks and knee stockings for absolute thigh domination! What is up?”

“Don’t worry about that! Now please, sit down, Master!”

This was suspicious. I was greeted by teenage, miniskirted maids. Whatever happened to modesty?! I activated Magic Entanglement and was ready for combat. I had Presence Sensing activated within a five-hundred-foot radius, too, just to be safe. Even though I used Understanding on the area, I wasn’t understanding anything at all!

“You must’ve worked so hard today, Master!”

“Yes, great work today! Let’s give you a nice shoulder massage.”

“That’s right, Master. First, we’ll take off your cloak and gloves. And here, I’ll take your shield.”

Take off my equipment?! I already had the Universe Staff in storage, but I lost three key pieces of armor in the blink of an eye. This was alarming. I was facing off against none other than dungeon maids, Miss Armor Rep Maid Girl, and Dancer Rep Maid Girl. I had no avenue of escape. Is it really okay for dungeon emperors to be in maid costumes?! Yes, it was really okay, especially with a variety of maids before me: classic and cutesy maids, goth lolis, Victorian-era maids, Tudor maids, Lancaster maids—fluffy frills and thick thighs everywhere!

“Hang on! I know I made long-skirted maid outfits, but you’re all in miniskirts. Even Sister Girl and the clerics are off to the side looking super embarrassed! Maybe I’ll have to make them miniskirt maid habits. But why are the clerics in maid outfits too?! I thought they were about frugality and humility, especially since they’re older and in their twenties despite their lack of experience. Combat experience, I mean!” I paused “My God, their legs are on another level! This is one mature trap!”

“Have some of our homemade omelet rice, Master!”

“We just need to put in a spoonful of love! Lovey-dovey love!”

“Now say ‘ah!’”

“It’s my turn!”

“Let me blow on your food to cool it down! Open wide!”

“Yes, Master!”

“Eat up!”

“Say ‘aaaaahhhhhhh!’”

The sketchiness was breaking limits over here! You’d think this was a bit of Greatluck, but this was one earth-shattering, mind-bogglingly suspicious maid service. I was a teenage boy! How was I gonna open up wide like that? I mean, that was so embarrassing! Even if maid play was an embarrassing thing I’d like to do with a girlfriend, I didn’t have a damn girlfriend, and I was still only sixteen. This was way too much! And yet they had me by both the arms, soft objects rubbing in on me and locking me in place, forcing me down in my chair to face countless omelet-rice-filled spoons. I didn’t want to not eat and see them switch those spoons out for forks. Forks are basically tridents with an extra prong for stabbing!

“Say ‘ahhhhhh!’”

No way! I really couldn’t! I didn’t know opening my damn mouth could be so embarrassing. I mean, getting fed like this was something only love-dovey couples did. Why was I involved? And it was way too much food to eat anyhow!

“Open wide for me, Master!”

“Now it’s my turn! Say ‘ahhhh!’”

“Please, Master, have mine! ‘Ahhh!’”

“Hurry up, Master. Eat more! Eat more!”

“Ahhhh!”

Was this some sort of fetish play where I had to eat from everyone’s spoon? What kind of fetish is that? No way! Anyone who could just play along was a pervert, all screwed in the head! Like a crazy flasher dude who was naked under his overcoat!

I munched on the bites of omelet rice, looking around the room, abandoning all hope. The clerics looked shy and confused. They didn’t know what to do and looked at me like they wanted to apologize. And their thick, sweet thighs…Well, leaving those aside, they had some issue with what was going on. They probably had something they wanted to ask me to do for them, so once they did me a favor and stopped all this, I’d just ask. I mean, asking for a favor after doing all this was some sort of punishment game for shyness. I couldn’t be seen by my classmates going ‘ah.’ That was just way too emba—amgh, munch munch—rrassing?!

“Haruka-kun, please!”

“We beg you!”

“Make us habits, too!”

“Er, you want to dress up as clerics for Halloween? So, you’re pulling the European thing of using blackmail to rob sweets from the houses you visit! Someone who plays a prank and gives sweets is clearly more honest! ‘Trick or treat’ is kind of like ‘blackmail or robbery!’ if you think about it. Fine, have some sweets?”

It was an ancient Celtic festival; a religious act celebrating the autumn harvest by chasing out evil spirits. Somehow, it had evolved into the mysterious Halloween event in which a pumpkin may or may not appear and much candy was acquired via threats. October 31—which represented the end of the Celtic year, the end of autumn, and the start of winter—was the day that they believed departed spirits returned to earth. To protect themselves from spirits and witches, they donned masks and lit bonfires. Then the kids went around to each of the nearby houses, wearing masks to protect themselves. Yeah, the whole ritual was famous, and it looked like today’s variation was “trick or sexual assault.” Seems pretty different!

“We want candy, but that’s not the issue here!”

Not the issue? So, this had nothing to do with Halloween, but they still wanted candy? I mean, if they were gonna go this far, sure, I’d give ’em sweets. What was with the cosplay?

“I know it’s really over the top, Haruka-kun, but we want combat habits. Look, I understand just how much work it is to make habits that we can bring into battle for the whole group. But we really want them. We’ll pay whatever it takes, of course. So, please!”

“Please, Haruka-kun!”

Oh. They want to go to the Theocracy.

Now that they were close with the sisters, they wanted to help them. To avoid needless casualties, they wanted to infiltrate the frontier in disguise. For that purpose, they needed battle-safe habits.

They were naive. So naive! Navy-blue naval vessel level naivety! To infiltrate enemy territory and fight while avoiding civilian casualties was an act of suicide. In the church, there was a strong chance that all the civilians were priests and, therefore, enemies. Assuming they could avoid civilian casualties wouldn’t just disadvantage them—it could end their lives.

But that’s what the clerics intended on doing, and my classmates wanted to help them. Maybe I needed to change Sister Girl’s name to Idiot Girl and get her a meathead-matching bucket. She’d probably appreciate it if it were a cute bucket, though? Yeah, I’m capable of anticipating ladies’ needs. I’m sensitive like that.

“You want to help the Theocracy?” I said. “Well, the people you want to help abandoned the frontier as a corrupted territory, called the beastfolk filthy animals, and enslaved them. Oh yeah, and on top of that, they’re a bunch of perverted old god dude fetishists? They’ll hate you even if you try to help. They’re blind believers, following whatever the enemy tells them. There’s no point in risking your lives to save them. What would the point be to begin with? Even if you’re able to protect them, what will you do when they harm the frontier or the beastfolk? That’s what they believe, you know. Even though everyone is free to believe whatever they want, everyone also needs to take responsibility for those beliefs—including the outrage that hurtful beliefs will inspire in others! They reap what they sow!”

I wouldn’t expect any excuses from the people of the Theocracy. They’d just say, “We were tricked. We didn’t know. We didn’t realize.” If they believed what they were told, then they were part of the problem. They deserved retaliation for their sins. Whether their intentions were good or bad didn’t matter to all the people they’d hurt.

“Lord Haruka,” said Sister Girl. “The responsibility lies entirely with us and the Church. If those people hurt anyone in the name of God…I will destroy them. I will teach them, persuade them. If they do any harm after that, I will take full responsibility. I beg your mercy, just this once.”

Was this conviction? Or a last-ditch effort? I didn’t think Sister Girl even knew herself, but she looked determined. This was the reason why I’d been confronted with miniskirt maids. Seriously, couldn’t they have just asked me normally? I mean, I was a broken man at this point! Any guy who could get out of a maid café in good shape has got to have some high-level mental fortitude! The maids were marvels beyond marvels, and I had suffered a hell of a lot of damage. How could any teenage boy endure what I had just gone through?! Yeah, I was damaged!

Welp, I kind of predicted this would happen and had already finished sexy combat habits for the whole class. In my foresight, I’d made them miniskirt versions, too. I hadn’t anticipated any of it at all. I had just kinda felt like making them, and they were already done. Only after making Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl test out four variations each, that is! Everybody knows that the position of slits and level of mini-ness requires at least eight rounds of testing. I gave it my all!

DAY 96
MORNING

Even after an opera with some dancing, the ignore-to-listen ratio of my opinions is sky-high!

WHITE LOSER INN

THE HABITS HAD AN UNDENIABLE air of apostasy about them.

They still suggested purity even as they revealed apocalyptic proportions of bared, sweet, alluring skin as well as curves, and exposed thighs. Time for a stroking holy war! Those fishnet-tights-wrapped thick thighs created a dizzying sense of sensuality that circulated like all universal controversies that accentuated the rawness of overflowing flesh by emphasizing their obscene seductiveness!

The outcome of our negotiations were as follows: In exchange for banning tentacles, we reached a fair agreement that Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl could not bind me by force either. Afterward, we raised the curtain on our nightly conflict, then tore that curtain right off. Of course, without tentacles, I simply introduced my hundred-headed hydra for a very lively, intimate dance. They slithered over the white chest peeking out of the habit, infiltrated the brown thighs in between tights and skirt, entangled and restrained their arms and ankles, and opened their long legs! They squirmed up every inch of their bodies, squeezing and rubbing and wrapping and binding their flesh, leaving sweet nibbles from the countless snake heads’ countless fangs. They licked bare skin with their red tongues, leaving the ladies twitching and dripping in hydra saliva as they writhed in a sensory snake festival! They shed tears and gasped as the snakes reached new territory; they arched their backs, moaning and crying with pleasure as their mouths opened wide in screams of ecstasy.

“Not fair. We said no tentacles…Mmmmm!”

“Yes, no tentacles! These are snakes! Totally fair game.”

Hisssss! Hissss!

“Aaaaaah!”

The snakes nibbled on their trembling round asses, saliva-imbued Sensitivity-Boosts making the ladies pant and gasp with pleasure. The snakes’ bodies extended from the head, wrapping around and squeezing soft flesh. The tips of the snakes’ red tongues, imbued with the skill Aphrodisiac, made for a feast of sexual stimulation. Dripping wet snakes wriggled all over their writhing bodies, drowning them in pleasure.

A hundred tongues of a hundred snakes tormented them. Their slippery, reptilian bodies swept over them from head to toe. A sexy prayer from a cleric to the great god Eros. So sexy!

“But there’s no turn for the real me! Sure, the hydra is a part of my body, just like the tentacles, so I can move them at will and feel everything I touch. But the sensation of soft skin burning with desire transmitted from a hundred hydras is so intense that the teenage boy part of me isn’t gonna even get a chance!”

Hissss?

Yep, the Sensitivity-Boost Quartet activated the nerves to make the two smiling, convulsing beautiful girls go mad as they drowned in saliva from snake tongues (and other parts). I heard various squirts and splutters as their eyes rolled back in their heads. Recovery ensured that they regained consciousness again right away, but they had basically turned into mindless dolls that lost their sense of self out of pure stimulation.

I made sure to record everything with Jupiter Eye for my eternal perusal. My hydra sure did its job! Those snakes knew a thing or two about life. It made me suspect whether this was the real reason they had been sealed deep underground—that was how good they were. They were talented engineers, worthy of a contest with the notable Rafflesia itself.

“Look, I just lost track of time, trapped by the loveliness of the loveable snake show…Oh God, now that the light is back in your eyes, you’re really glaring at me!”

Yup, the glares of heaven glare down on all the glares of the land, as they said. Those blank, hollow glares concealed a deep emptiness of the soul. The corners of their mouths rose, and those hands revealed…morning stars. Oh. They’re pissed?

I battled against the flow of time, using Wisdom’s High-Speed Thinking to expand time, throwing us into a slow-motion world. I piled together all my skills and made adjustments, just like when I used draping to sew together clothes. I manipulated my own body and senses from the tips of my finger to my beating heart, the soles of my feet to the tips of my hair, grasping every part of myself, losing all track of time in the process.

I needed to run. That was how mad they were! Seriously mad! Mega meteors-mashing-my-face-off mad! I wiped the fluid off my body in a hurry and leaped into a Teleport-based escape. I needed to run. I needed just one more millimeter of leeway. Anything that put distance between us! They drove me straight into the training grounds, leaving me surrounded by a world of morning stars. All I could see were giant, spiked balls. It was a steel-colored world. The next thing I knew, they were bonking me? A lot?

Bonk! Bang! Smash! Squelch! Whomp! Whack! Wallop! Thrash! Thwonk! Thud!

“You. Evil! Bad! Bonk!”

Wheeze, wheeze, gasp!

Last night, I upped my shoulder shields from six to twelve with some mithril. I layered iron scales in the shape of an acute triangle, allowing the protection to extend from my clavicle to my shoulders and down to my elbows. I equipped my gloves, which had now become complete gauntlets. I was still completely unable to stop the spiked balls as they pummeled into me. I bent myself to dodge an attack while I dodged the topic of the argument with some light fantasy humor. The steel ball still came pummeling back into me. They were still super mad! I managed to limit the impact to a light graze, but I got bonked like crazy, even with a graze and using Vanish. The madness and the badness were harmonized in a bonking bard’s brutal ballet. There was no good morning for me after getting a good taste of all this morning star! Put simply I was getting bonked into an eternal rest!

“No, see, the hydras were just trying to introduce themselves with a lil’ squirm! Everyone knows that’s the polite, proper greeting. Just as promised, I didn’t use my tentacles, so I’m a completely guiltless teenage boy who didn’t do anything wrong? And it’s not that the snakes did anything wrong either! They were just introducing themselves with pleasant, friendly squirms. Don’t blame my sweet innocent reptiles…So yeah, I got new equipment? Did ya like my little presentation? It seems like you did! That’s all that matters. The snakes may have tried hard, to the point that you lost consciousness out of mind-blowing ecstasy, yeah, but…it was sexy?”

Bang! Clang! Crash! Smash! Smush! Crush! Crack-a-lack! Smack! Bonk!

Maybe the Sensitivity-Boost Quartet didn’t do the job. Keeping them from fainting with constant Recovery and Healing, allowing for nonstop, quadruple Sensitivity-Boosted Sexual Technique snakes to go to town was on par with any tentacular temptation! What a show!

My snakes achieved a remarkable victory during their first appearance, creating majestic movements with their little nibbles and red snake tongues. I had witnessed a symphony of unparalleled, collaborative harmony between seductive revealing habits and devilish snakes tonight. What a combo indeed! I was getting bonked like crazy as a result. Worth it! Wait, no, maybe not. I’d suffer more for this! I only regretted that I didn’t have enough time, since the teenage boy was up for his final performance. Unfortunately, I’d reached my own satisfaction in under a minute. At least teenage boys are always longing for more! I really wanted to keep going?

“It’s morning now, so I’d better make breakfast. I’m sure one refreshing, stimulating morning is about to begin. As in, I’m already overstimulated first thing in the morning. I’m so sleepy? Last night was so satisfying that I forgot to sleep at all, but since the teenage boy didn’t get his turn, the teenage boy is unsatisfied this morning. But morning’s here, and it’s great! That was one hell of a snake show!”

“Just what are those…? Those snakes. So dangerous!”

“Broke the rules! Can’t just whip out snakes because you can’t use tentacles! That’s unfair!”

Jiggle jiggle.

Everyone besides Slimey was tired this morning. Actually, Slimey was the one who said the snakes were technically fair, but he’d slept peacefully all night as if he had nothing to do with it. He was full of energy, bouncing around all over.

“Good morning!” the girls called.

“Thanks for the habits, but they’re a bit overly sexual.”

“Good morning. Er…as in, why are you all in miniskirt cheongsam? Even Sister Girl’s group was in cheongsam. Are you hitting up Chinatown to chow down on some cheap eats or chew those cheap Chinatown eats in stylish Chinese style? Also, you’re all super hot?”

More thighs. Thighs peeking in and out of the slits in the dresses was a wonderful sight, as was the exposed leg in between miniskirt and fishnet tights in yesterday’s maid outfits. These miniskirted cheongsam had no shortage of squishy and plenty of plumpness in a paradise of plump legs, leaving my eyes no landing spot! This flirtatious, exposed thigh forest was far more dangerous than the depths of any monster forest!

“You spent all that time making them, so we figured we should wear them.”

“How do they look? Are they good?”

“Sheesh, calm down, Sister Girl. So, cheongsam today, huh?”

Those thighs were trying to tell me something. Actually, they weren’t. Thick thighs can’t talk! Fish can’t see water. People can’t see the sky. Teenage boys can’t see thick thighs, as in we like to swim in ’em, but whyever would that be? ’Cause that’s nature! For real!

“We’re entertaining you as thanks for making us the habits,” said Book Club President.

“Yeah, we brought some pork buns back from town! Eat up!”

“And boiled dumplings! Oh, and here’s some fried rice!”

“C’mon, let’s eat together.”

“A taste of China surrounded by girls in cheongsam. It’s a pretty good treat, right?”

What a precious sight, a true treasure in my eyes—these thighs were a hell of a lot thicker than ordinary treasure! The sight before me burned my eyes like the sun in the sky. That was the sky-high impact of this panorama of thighs! It looked like the unsatiated teenage boy would go through yet another morning tribulation. If it turned out to be a test from God, I’d go sicko mode on his ass!

“Lord Haruka,” said Sister Girl. “The Theocracy is very dangerous. I cannot say what will happen to anyone who accompanies us. The sympathy of your classmates is more than enough. Please refrain from an indiscriminate attack against the Theocracy and allow us alone to take responsibility. I beg you.”

The few extra years on Sister Girl gave her thighs an extra level of plumpness. But women of the Church, initiating such sensual hostilities? The church supposedly sought a harmonious world after all, didn’t they? So, wouldn’t it only be right to unleash a completely indiscriminate saturation attack against their entire country? I suppose debates over religious doctrine can get complicated.

“Even after an opera with some dancing, my proposal was never even taken up! Far from getting a fair debate, the ignore-to-listen ratio of my opinions is sky-high around here! Y’all didn’t even listen?”

If my opinions had ever even approached the horizon of their minds, they wouldn’t be doing their one-more-sets every single night. And sure, the Theocracy was dangerous, but there was a common myth in my homeland that said there was nothing more dangerous than a teenage girl—the very demographic gathered here today. The real danger was to the Theocracy as they faced those dangerous thighs. So thick, plump, and juicy!

Sure, my classmates could be kind to strangers, but not so kind that they would risk their lives for them. They were worried about the clerics and didn’t want to abandon their new friends. They weren’t thinking beyond that. They just couldn’t bear to see anything bad happen to the clerics.

“Arianna-san, we’ve already decided to help you!” the girls protested.

We still had plenty of time. I didn’t know what move the Theocracy was going to make yet. I’d just do whatever I needed to, regardless of if something bad happened or if it was just that something good didn’t happen. So, it didn’t matter. Whether they put on a smile and came in for a handshake or thrust swords in our faces, it was their decision. We could dig a pit trap for them to fall into with a bunch of creepy bugs at the bottom. That was the sort of approach we could take.

Yeah, trapping them in a hole and burying them would do the job. Burying all the old dudes would even be a solid idea for the capital. That would really solve all our issues. Churches have the vibe of doing mysterious underground stuff anyway, right?

If the girls went to the Theocracy, the frontier would be a lot weaker, since the meatheads were in the capital and the nerds were in the Beast Kingdom. I wouldn’t be able to move. The biggest problem was that the Theocracy had managed to capture Dancer Girl once already. They must have had some method of subduing dungeon emperors. Maybe there was a dark force pulling the strings behind the Theocracy. Or perhaps they had someone or something with combat prowess on the same level as a dungeon emperor. That meant I absolutely needed to keep the three dungeon emperors here. The three of them didn’t want me to do anything on my own, either. Maybe they didn’t like how things had gone down at Murimuri Castle last time because they were really angry with me afterward.

If the Theocracy didn’t make a move until the nerds were back, then we’d have no problem. We had to deal with the Beast Kingdom problem first. The Merchant Kingdom had sundered into factions, each of which were scheming up some kind of contact. Peace on the frontier and in the kingdom had to take priority, but there was too much to keep track of right now. Including too many thighs?

I had a lot to think about, and a mountain of stuff to do. My days were busy with making money, and my nights were packed from start to finish! So much to do! I’d already had a sleep deficit before I’d gotten so busy with bustling, squirmy snakes and habit action that I didn’t sleep all night. If everyone could just do sexy stuff instead of evil stuff, there’d already be world peace! Do you see what I have to put up with?

DAY 96
NOON

What is the bigger step for man—going to the moon, or growing snakes out of my body?

I MOPED AND MASHED monsters all morning. I gathered my teenage-boy feelings and bonked, since there was no place else to put them. Last night had been too short. All the thick thighs had been right up in my eyes this morning, plus the squirmy snakes.

Damn it, you monsters! Die! Bonk! Bonking is justice! Bonking is truth!

“Boy, I do love bonking. Boy, do I love bonking. Man, I’m a huge fan of bonking. I do love extermination and bonking. I do love charging and bonking. I do love retreating and bonking, purging and bonking, and fleeing and bonking in a dungeon or a monster forest or whichever kingdom this is. Oh, yeah. Where are we again? I love all the bonking that this world has to offer! And stuuuuuff!”

I sang as I bonked. I didn’t exactly not get the sense that my frustrations didn’t disappear, but there weren’t enough monsters to fully get it out of my system. With nowhere to place my dissatisfaction, I dumped it on my blade and unleashed a storm of death crows and fire and blood in a whirlwind tempest of bonking!

“The moment I let my guard down last night, I was assaulted by the sensory seduction of exposed skin scaling all over the snakes I shot, surrounded by screams and moans of echoing pleasure! Only, I got pummeled by morning stars all morning long. To put things simply, they got super pissed and glared at me a lot?”

Bonking these ugly, level 89 monsters was a far better peaceful resolution method than bonking me. And so, I bonked, because night would eventually fall after the bonking. There were no joys in the afternoon, but night was on its way! There were two suns, so in a sense, it was technically always afternoon. I guess I just had to wait?

I changed up my footwork and quickened my steps. I threw in irregular beats, switching tempo and rhythm as I bonked all over the place. I added modulations into my horizontal movement and inclined the axis of my rotation to create an ever-changing flow. Disrupting the arc of an object in motion was difficult, so I used that phenomenon to combine gyration and footwork into directional vectors, shifting the position of my shoulders and elbows to manipulate my blade. The joints of my body moved in a circular motion, a multi-axis, omni-directional variation. I connected the movements into a storm of swords.

Infinite, spiral, motion. Wisdom accumulated data to control my sword’s dance.

The sword technique contained infinite variations of uncontrollable movements. My only option for preserving MP in a drawn-out fight was inertia. Under the burden of this motion, my joints snapped, my muscles tore, and my blood vessels severed as my nerves blasted apart in a loop of healing and self-destruction. With proper usage, I could reduce the pressure and use Wisdom to teach myself the right movements. It was an endless, self-revising trial run.

“The top priority is making sure that my arms don’t tear off ’cause it’s a pain to go chasing after them when they go shooting off across the room. Doesn’t it seem weird to you that a human has to think about this? Also, ouch?”

Boink boink!

I acquired incredible equipment and skills to control my other skills. Then, I used Magic Entanglement, which could aggregate and expand all of those effects. Can I really even say that I don’t have any cheats at this point?

I had to keep learning. I had been flailing around without knowing what I was doing—which, on the flip side, implied infinite possible combinations. Yup, it did hurt. As in, my arm did rip off. But this wasn’t the time nor place to be crying in pain. So long as I didn’t die, I could get by, and I bet I could get by if I died just a little bit, too.

“Crude. Shoddy. Full of waste…But properly done. And yet…”

“Reckless. Not just body, but brain. Will shatter. Swordplay must match. With the body. Falling apart. No good. And hurts you…”

I wiped out the level 89 Skeleton Paladins with my swordplay but collapsed in the process. I didn’t get hit by a single attack, but the accumulated self-destruction had resulted in me spurting blood everywhere, and now I was in for a lecture. My consciousness was hazy, so I couldn’t pick up everything they were saying. It wasn’t like I didn’t tune out the lectures I got every day anyway. It was no big deal, since it was never my fault in the first place!

I didn’t want to make them worry, though. I suppose I needed to practice more.

“Look, it hurts, but I healed right away. This is just a little fooling around. It can’t even be compared to the truly epic battles of revival and recovery that unfolded before me in the darkest night? The true battles are way more intense than this and feel way better too! Ya know?”

They’re glaring?

“I’m already better,” I said. “I just went a little harder than usual, but I’m all fixed up now. There’s this saying back where I’m from to make the ‘pain fly away.’ You just shout Transition Pain, and it makes the pain transfer straight to someone else. I’m from one scary yet peaceful world, ya know? They even say that you can be cured of illness by infecting someone else, and I survived that world, so this is really no biggie? Ya know?”

Jiggle jiggle!

The pair looked on the verge of tears, so I patted their heads. I’d give them some sweets later and all would be well. If I got mischievous, we’d have public safety concerns, though. I’d be in trouble if Halloween took root in this world. But I’d love to make some mischief?

I pet Slimey, then passed around the sweets. I didn’t mean to make them so worried.

“Really! I get healed up right away, and everything reattaches just fine,” I said. “As long as injuries heal up and everything reattaches, there’s no problem at all? Solve a problem at its root and stuff?”

I got a grasp of the necessary sword and bodily movements. Wisdom drilled that knowledge into me. I was starting to adjust in the right direction. I only needed to practice to get where I needed to be.

My three companions still looked worried. I fed them my brand-new, MK II “I don’t have cinnamon, so I fried apple peel for a dash of spice” apple pie. Ordinarily, I could say something to calm them down like: “In my old world, you can fly through the sky without any magic or wings, and people have even been to the moon, so this is really nothing to worry about!” That was a pretty cool thing to say. But I haven’t been to the moon myself, and this world didn’t even have a moon. They had suns, but nobody on Earth ever went to the sun. If you tried, you certainly wouldn’t come back, so there actually was plenty to worry about in that case.

We finished the break and got on to some light training. Having an expert watch your technique and give you instructions on correct form was one hell of a cheat code. Certain mistakes get reinforced when practicing on your own. The bonus? It was incredibly fun watching them fight in skintight armor! What a perk! After that, we went down to the next floor. The 90th floor was the final one. Here we would face not a floor boss but a dungeon king.

Supposedly a world of difference existed between those two. The king was the dominant existence presiding over the entire dungeon, but…Yeah, I really couldn’t tell the difference? I kinda started off with dungeon emperors and all.

“I was faced with such overwhelming, supreme forcefulness that dungeon bosses and dungeon kings feel pretty much the same to me? I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t notice if you swapped one for the other when I wasn’t looking.”

Jiggle jiggle.

The skulking “Skeleton King: Lv. 90” was a humungous skeleton, apparently unrelated to the Starving Skeleton of Japanese lore but still helter-skeltering all up in my business with its giant broadsword. Given its enormous frame, its speed and precision with the blade was incomprehensible. Its attacks were easy to read and dodge, though, so I just did my lil’ dance?

“You think this is indeed the legendary dance that entranced the whole world?”

Jiggle jiggle!

I tilted my head and dodged in a series of backflips as Miss Armor Rep and Slimey reacted in appreciation. Even the hard-to-impress Dancer Girl clapped. I was causing a stir! We were practically playing out a Thriller dodge dance—especially with a skeleton as my partner—but was I really fighting for my life tonight? Now the skeleton king was low-key pissed! It thrashed ever more aggressively with its blade, swinging in every direction. Aw man, it won’t dance with me!

It couldn’t hit me. I saw all its attacks coming and leaped out of the way with ease. I threw it off balance and counterattacked.

I had learned sincere swordsmanship and studied the pinnacle of footwork. Inefficiencies were struck from my mind. I countered the skeleton’s jumble of unconnected steps, gargantuan strength, and uncontained speed with a bunch of fast, powerful movements. The skeleton king’s sword technique objectively paled in comparison to mine. Of course it couldn’t hit me. I knew a thing or two about getting hit after all my experience getting bonked by Miss Armor Rep.

I steadied my blade, shifted, and dodged the strike before fleeing with fleet footwork. I almost felt like I was giving the skeleton king a lesson, but, for some reason, it insisted on giving me obvious openings. With me, the master on the other side, shaving my movements down to the bare minimum, eliminating all excess.

Yesterday, I won. But I didn’t understand yesterday. I only realized my problems after physically falling apart, and my understanding only reached that physical limit. Human bone structure was surprisingly simple to grasp? If you could call this growth, I only needed to grow ten thousand or ten million times what I already had before I’d catch up with Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl. Until then, I was in for eternal bonking. I’m way too far off!

I cornered it. I predicted its intentions, adjusted my sword, and drove it another step back, putting it at even more of a disadvantage. I drove it into yet further into panic, and it fumbled its posture and positioning even greater. I kept its wild sword swipes in check, deftly countering its motions. It rocked back on its heels unsteadily, swaying as it started to swing its sword, and I got in a jab before it swung its own blade, tottering. It was aiming to swing and then retreat, but it was so out of control that I could easily counter it. I anticipated its movement, dodged, and hid in its blind spot. This is exactly the way they bonk me!

Not thinking ahead, the skeleton king lost more of its chances with every move. Each movement limited its possibilities, allowing me to more easily read the next. Every step led it further into a corner, broke down its stance, and reduced its options. It was going to get bonked. This is definitely what happened to me this morning! Revenge time, baby!

“You’re getting. Stronger. You’re getting. Really strong.”

Nod nod.

Jiggle jiggle.

Wow, I actually passed! Thank goodness I decided to keep the hydra out of the fight and just use my sword. They glared at me when I sent out the snakes? Why the bad vibes after getting so close and cozy the very first time they met? That coziness made their faces scrunch up so winningly and their red tongues loll out of their mouths! Oh crap, I gotta escape!

“Right, so swordsmanship is all about increasing your possibilities, and when you lose them, you get cornered and lose the fight. Wouldn’t that mean combining swordsmanship, snakes, and tentacles would give me new possibilities? Why are you glaring at me? Let’s practice!”

Even with my current level of swordplay, I could always just pull that old classic, “if you can’t win with the sword, win with squirmy-squirmy” if I got cornered. When your opponents were sexy monster girls, it might be your only possibility for victory! Squirmy?

“Some wise pervert once said that humans are creatures of possibility, and possibilities are limitless with a bit of imagination! There are no limits to the teenage boy’s possibilities, with fluid-squirting, vibrating tentacles and sweet-kissing snakes on my side!”

There was no limit to a teenage boy’s imagination either. I was imagining twenty-four hours a day, three hundred and sixty-five days a year. Speaking of which, I planned to do some extra imagining tonight!

DAY 96
EVENING

Sergeant Hardman is the bad guy here! I didn’t do anything wrong! Why is this world so bad at distinguishing guilt?

DUKE'S PALACE

I HEARD THAT LADY ARIANNA of the Church was here to see me, so I paused my training and went back to my study. Now that the castle had been expanded yet again, it was quite a long walk. Passing through halls full of fine art still made me nervous! Gorgeous, sublime paintings on the walls and the countless austere sculptures were intimidating.

The old stone walls had been swapped out for ones wallpapered in colors so dazzling they nearly hurt the eyes. Countless expensive ornaments decorated the way to the study. Every time I entered, I felt queasy. The size of the paintings made me dizzy, and the sheer comfort and luxuriousness of the chair I sat myself in made me anxious about actually sitting in it. I used to complain about my squeaky old chair, but I almost felt ready to go searching for it in storage.

“Duke Omui, did you hear anything from the Church? If we are causing you any trouble whatsoever, we will gladly return to our homeland right away!”

She sat down on a leather sofa that oozed luxuriousness, comfort, and good taste, so much so that I felt ill at ease with it. The fanciful renovations of Murimuri Castle had left me surprised and joyful, but it had been somewhat unpleasant to acclimate to such luxuries in my own home.

“Sorry for the worry,” I said. “As of now, we’ve heard nothing. You are important guests who extended a hand in our time of need. If the Church moves against you, please keep in mind that we are your fast friends. You are now twenty peerless warriors after your recent training. The Theocracy may be an enemy, but they dare not move against you.”

They were reckless after having trained, studied, and been battle-hardened under a rash and impulsive tutor. They had the strength to overwhelm the Church’s knights, and even fight against those knights’ own instructors. That was what the boy had said, so surely, it was true. We had to trust his words, no matter how foolish or arrogant they sounded. If I doubted what he said, then nothing in the whole world could be trusted.

“He instilled within us the skills needed to protect ourselves,” Lady Arianna said. “He said that we are still a long way from being able to defend everyone, but we have obtained the means to fight. We must wield that strength to protect the happiness of others. I beg of you, do not let us bring new risks to the frontier.”

They were noble-minded, gentle holy people: the seed of goodness left in the rotten Church. They’d steeled themselves for death and still possessed that conviction. The only thing that had changed was their highly revealing clothing. However, they were still pure, humble people of faith. But could they truly fight?

I had to believe the boy.

No matter how unbelievable, no matter if the possibility slipped between my fingers like mist, Haruka-kun proved he could make it true. He’d proved himself many times over, all for the happiness of the frontier. He brought fairy tales to life, and all to bring a smile to our land. It did not matter if I couldn’t imagine it; it was foolish to imagine the scope of his schemes to begin with. It was wiser to die than to oppose his imaginings. He was a miracle brought upon this land, standing in defiance of reality.

“Our army was formerly powerless in the face of the monster forest,” I said. “But we continued to struggle, and we survived until this day. There is not a man or woman among us who would not fight for the purposes of our benefactor. We will defend both the peace of the frontier and our precious guests. Do not worry, my lady.”

Still uncomfortable, I decided to set my mind at ease for inviting the women for a training session. Once we made it to the training grounds…

Unbelievable!

“Lord Haruka’s precious armor is for what?”

“Smashing the BEEPing BEEP out of our motherBEEPing enemies and crushing them to a pulp!”

“And the falchions Lord Haruka gave us?!”

“For slicing the BEEP out of the BEEPing BEEPers until rivers run red with blood!”

“And what wisdom did Mistress Class Rep bestow upon us?!”

“Destroy! Destroy! Destroy!”

“Then BEEP the BEEP out of the BEEPing BEEP, already! Chaaaarge!”

“Yes, milady!”

What kind of training had Haruka given these clerics? They broke through my army’s formation in a single attack. My men couldn’t even handle a single blow before they were scattered, their lines carved apart. The frontier army’s elite didn’t stand a chance.

“It takes some courage to stand up to us! Now give ’em this BEEPing BEEP as a commemorative award! Attack!”

“Yes, milady! Advance!”

“Destroy! Destroy! Destroy!”

My men pulled back—or more accurately, they fled in terror. Hmm. My men had initially taken up formation to avoid injuring the holy people. Now they were swallowed up by a wave of destructive terrors, drowning in chaos. They quaked in their boots at the sight of these vicious beasts that cackled with laughter as they exterminated monsters. Watching was truly frightening! Too frightening! What had Haruka done to them?!

In the confusion, my men managed to pull back into formation…only to face another attack. Even if they moved out of the way to encircle the clerics upon their charge, the clerics merely broke their formation in a single attack. The battle was intense precisely because of the quality of both sides’ armor. Neither side could land a finishing blow, so both had to shift formations time and time again, locked in a stalemate.

“They’re getting pushed back.”

“No, they cannot break through such force without fighting to kill.”

The clerics’ single attack was too powerful to turn away. If my men pursued them after retreating, then their formation would have to split in two, increasing the risk of a complete collapse. Even when the clerics pulled back, my men couldn’t pursue them; if they tried to encircle the foe, their formation would crumble.

Haruka had been correct. This might be too much for the Theocracy to handle. The clerics had mastered this approach to battle. In just a few days times, they had learned to fight on par with my own men. Maybe I’ll ask Haruka to train my soldiers next time. From what I had heard from Merielle, training with Haruka was so ludicrous that it could cause lasting psychological trauma, but I could not deny its effectiveness.

Now it was my turn to take the field. I had much to teach them. The dangers of retreat, for example.

Yikes! I’m scared!

“Destroy! Destroy! Destroy!”

“It is nothing short of an honor to train alongside the frontier army, known as the strongest on the continent,” said Lady Arianna. “Lord Haruka taught us that the only way to survive was to strike and retreat, but now we have experienced combat for ourselves. Thank you very much.”

“I’m…glad to hear it. Although, your strength should be more than enough to overwhelm any typical opponent, even if you’re unable to strike and retreat as planned.”

Their astonishing recovery speed galled me as I entered the fray. Most opponents would collapse in fear before the force of these church women. Meeting them head-on in an attack so devastatingly powerful was a tall order.

I quickly learned why my men were so frightened to cross blades with them. Those women were frightening! They truly enjoyed slaughter. Though they wore the holy attire of the Church, warriors who loved both the hunt and the kill were hidden beneath those robes. They would make sport of anyone weaker than themselves.

“While Haruka does speak of dispensing with the frills of titles and whatnot, you are still the Theocracy’s princess,” I said. “So why did he teach you BEEP, BEEP, and the like? Holy men and women of the Church shouldn’t be screaming about smashing the BEEPing BEEP out of their motherBEEPing BEEP! Haruka, what have you doooone!”

Addressing their teacher would be futile, so I could only scream into the void. Everything was broken. Yet, this was truly the only way.

“He didn’t take such care with our own princess either.” I sighed. “He even bullied the king.”

I thought he was simply small-minded, but the fact is that his mind is a fathomless abyss. Even reason drowned in the absurd depths of that pool.

“Hey, you,” shouted Lady Arianna. “Get your BEEPing BEEP together, and BEEP the BEEP BEEP BEEP out of those pieces of BEEP!”

“Sorry, milady. At once!”

There would be problems if they returned to the Theocracy like this… Many, many problems.

DAY 96
EVENING

This is an irrational fantasy world where you’re allowed to chase rabbits on a mountain, but chasing bunnies in an inn gets you reported?

WHITE LOSER INN

YESTERDAY MORNING WE HAD A MINISKIRT girls’ bar. Last night, there was a miniskirt maid cafe. This morning, it was miniskirt cheongsam. Exuberant, fully exposed legs were the ultimate, excellent ending! Yeah, those were fantastic!

Hence, the inner workings of my heart and soul were balanced and at peace. Nothing in this world could shake me. Now that those sights were preserved forever in my memory, I was ascending! When I returned to the inn with my tranquil heart, I found bunny paradise. Violent, vicious, murderous, monstrous, furious, feral bunnies?

“Welcome back! Did you beat a dungeon?”

Skintight bunny suits emphasized every curve. They were open in the back, and the front plunged, too. All four limbs were exposed, and their legs were clad in fishnets. Clamped up in glossy, glittering black bunny suits, white fluffy round tails shaking on every butt… It’s a trap! I almost reached out to grab those tails, but I couldn’t! This was a teenage boy snare! I would immediately get arrested if I made contact, and that would deal the final blow to my sex appeal for all eternity. It’s not a honey trap. It’s a bunny trap!

“Good work today! Here, have a drink!”

Damn. A tuxedo bunny had appeared. Hello there, push-up bra tightly pinning in sweet, overflowing, pale breasts. It is nipply nice to mushingly make your jiggling acquaintance?

One: attack.

Two: defend.

Three: rub.

Four: squeeze!

Wait, not those last two! That was a valley trap that would hem me in on all sides! It was just as much of a trap as the round butt poking out of the bunny suit! The high-leg design barely managed to cover the important parts! So, my first move should really be…

“Wait, no! I can’t fight! Tentacles, go home!”

A teenage boy making his move would only mark his end. There was only one choice: fight back, especially with the unbearable damage of bunny suits piercing hole after hole in my teenage boy brain! Such a marvelous bunny festival. I think if I went to a casino, just staring at the bunnies would be more than enough for me! Gosh, I’d love to play these slots!

“What the…? What the what? The bunny group is what?! And your what is all up in my what. You’re whatting me. What? Didn’t I give you your habits and everything? They’re fit for combat, so what the what the whaaat? Kodak moment?”

All their what was getting up in my what. As they gradually approached, I began to understand the what and the what and the charming allure of squishy bunny fluff! There was once a scandalous incident of someone who chased after rabbits on a mountain to eat them. Here I was, up against the twin mountains of rolling hills submerging into deep valleys, submitting me to the tunnel vision of this fabulous tourist sightseeing spot!

“This is our way of saying thanks. That’s all!”

“Yeah, we’re grateful.”

“There was a leak that you were into bunnies.”

“Also, you really need to stop saying what and making hip-hop gestures with your hands.”

The fluffy bunny tails up in my face were saying something. Well, the butts weren’t actually talking, but the white tails sure were shaking! The bunny suits didn’t cover much, so I stood in the middle of scantily clad teenage girls with a 360-degree view of no-place-to-put-my-eyes levels of enticing temptations. And stuff!

“Come now, take a seat.”

“Good work today, hon. Now take off your gear.”

“Oh, you’re so stiff! Here, have a little shoulder rub.”

“Rub rub! Rub rub! Squish squish!”

Er, something else was mixed into that massage! Something pressed against my back! I mean, what was it?! What the what? On the way home, I had stopped by the general store and the armory to snatch all the cash I could. Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl had gone on ahead. So, they were the girls’ accomplices! They must’ve told the girls about all my self-destruction in the dungeon.

The combination of my sleepless night, the damage and exhaustion from fighting, and the stimulus of the bunny suits and massages were starting to make me dizzy, ditzy, and ready for some glitzy!

“Now, what do you know? This wasn’t juice. It was alcohol!” one of the girls deadpanned.

“Say what the what?!”

“Oooops! We accidentally made you drink alcohol. Oh noooo!” another deadpanned.

The distraction of all the bunnies must’ve made me drop my guard, but it was a sweet drink. An underage drinking problem was bubbling up! Although it was way stranger if you didn’t start drinking after fifteen. Wait, hang on. Was I feeling drunk, not tired or exhausted?

“Here, have some more healing medicine: alcohol!”

“That’s right! Drink up!”

“Woooo! Another round!”

I thought the world had started to spin! So that was alcohol, not just me getting drunk on bunnies? I felt like my muscles were unwinding. My brain was no longer able to string thoughts together as the bunnies kept making me drink. A sensation that could have been pleasure, or maybe just languor, washed over me. Something was happening that I had to be skeptical of, but my thoughts were hazy, and I was too woozy to make much sense of it. My eyelids were…

“Is he asleep?”

“Yeah, he’s snoring.”

“Bunny suits really did do the trick.”

“He reacted pretty well to the maid outfits and cheongsam, though.”

“Good thing he has low tolerance.”

“Yeah, it’s a miracle he didn’t have an immunity skill.”

“He’s covered in bruises…”

“Internal bruising from severed muscles and blood vessels, I’d guess.”

“I didn’t realize it was this bad…”

“So, this is the power of Revival?”

“Revival isn’t supposed to be used by humans. Chronic destruction and repair has to be terrible for him, and yet…”

“I’ll totally, like, give him a massage with healing and recovery, then.”

“Okay, go for it.”

“And here’s a hot towel.”

Plunk.

Wipe wipe. Rub rub. Wipe wipe. Rub rub. Touch touch…

I dreamed. I hadn’t had any dreams since coming here, not a single one, but I dreamed this time. It felt familiar somehow, even though it wasn’t familiar at all. It was me, but a version of myself I didn’t recognize. It still felt so familiar, so close to me, that I couldn’t stop crying.

When I opened my eyes, I was lying on my bed beneath the sheets in my boxers. I looked down and found all my bruises had disappeared.

The only people capable of this level of healing were Vice Rep B and Sister Girl. They must’ve seen how busted up I was. Wait. Does that mean they saw me naked?! Better not think about it. It had to be my imagination. My memory was all fuzzy, so I really couldn’t overthink it. Although, I was literally just wearing boxers? Hang on, it was already…

“Wait, leopard print?! I did make leopard print boxers, but I was too embarrassed to wear them. These are leopard print boxers, though! No, it has to be my imagination! Don’t think about it!”

“Good morning. Did you. Sleep well?”

“Everyone. Was so worried.”

Normally, my brain kept working subconsciously, but I was drawing a blank right now. I had so much to constantly prepare for that I had been abusing Wisdom to run calculations and plans in my head, constantly pushing myself to the limit… Had Wisdom even gotten drunk?

“My injuries heal on their own. I usually get new injuries by the time the first injuries are done healing, too… But I don’t feel pain anywhere right now. Wow. This is the first time in a long time.”

Vice Rep B apparently gave me a massage and wiped me down after I fell asleep. Now that I was in such good shape, I wanted to train, but I didn’t want to undo all her hard work. Besides, I still felt a light, lingering hangover.

Even so, I felt completely refreshed. I didn’t want to do anything. Two bunnies sat right here on my bed, and I didn’t even stir! Was alcohol the mysterious substance that could calm a teenage boy’s rampaging soul? Oh, I was also out of MP now that I looked, which always multiplied my exhaustion. I thought I’d had plenty of MP left for my side-jobs last night. Well, I could always eat some MP mushrooms.

I took a long bath with Slimey, chillaxin’ and relaxin’. Then I went waxin’ and maxin’ back to my room for some roly-poly-oly on the bed? At this rate, I might level up my NEET to Super NEET.

Emptiness. I felt like the constant welling of teenage boy desire had been somehow eradicated, leaving only a blank, empty space. I was sluggish. Maybe it’s time to go to bed… My boxers definitely hadn’t been leopard print before?

DAY 97
MORNING

I’m grateful for the price drop profitlessness that came from its suspiciousness that let me bargain it down to free.

WHITE LOSER INN

MORNING CAME. Feeling the same mysterious refreshing refreshment, I got my dose of glares at the guild, handed off mushroom bento at the general store, and swung by the armory. Among the new shipments was a suspicious, lucky piece of jewelry. “Fortune Ear Cuff: An amulet that shifts one’s fortune according to LUK. +Luck.” Apparently, there were no benefits for my sex appeal?

My luck stat was already above the limit, so I really didn’t need any more luck. This was the first ear cuff I’d come across, so it was worth picking up for research purposes. I had a new potential product to sell! It was shady to copy, but that’s me! Ya know? Plus, it was an amulet, which was a good omen, a potential signal that potential effects on my sex appeal were potentially potent!

“How much is this, old dude? Is it cheap? ’Cause if it’s cheap, I’ll definitely be super-duper cheap! After you tell me the price, I’m going to try to bargain it down a lot! If it’s expensive, I’m gonna tear your beard off? I’d love to do that, even if it’s cheap, but never mind that, and all that jazz?”

“Don’t tear my beard off!” he barked. “Why do you always talk about tearing off my beard? That ear cuff, huh? Sure, I’ll give it to you for free. One of my customers dropped that off. He couldn’t sell it for anything. That guy won it while gambling, but it doesn’t really have any market value with those questionable attributes. I took it off his hands ’cause I felt bad, but it’s a waste of space. Not to mention, all the swords I make are from the metal you gave me, so you can have it. And free is cheap, so don’t tear off my precious beard! Or my bald head!”

I tried to bargain with him, and he gave me it for free. Guess ear cuffs didn’t make much profit, but I left him a ton of iron anyway. I still needed more mithril. Iron I had more than enough of. I was desperate for mithril to upgrade our equipment at this point. I was able to mine a lot more easily with Holding and purify with Alchemy, but all it’d done was leave me with way too much iron.

Now for an inspection. As a little test, I put the ear cuff on and tried touching Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl’s butts. They got mad. Like, super mad?

“This thing is worthless! You’d think an ear cuff could at least prevent a lecture or something!”

The two of them wore ordinary clothes today. I mean, with such supreme cuteness and lovely ladyness, my teenage-boyness drove me to inevitably try to touch their butts. The resulting outrage was more than sufficient evidence of this experiment! I’d really appreciate if this lecture could end already? It was just an experiment, so I hadn’t done anything wrong.

The item wasn’t suited for dungeons either, but when I reached out my hand as part of the next experiment, I just got whacked. Why did I reach? Because of the peach! But instead, I got beat. That wasn’t so sweet, not like the juicy pulp of the peach that I couldn’t reach. Now they had their morning stars out, so I decided to call it quits on the experiments. I guess I couldn’t become a lucky lecher that easily, even with more luck!

I unleashed my attacks in a single breath. I still had a long way to go before I could constantly shift my rhythm in combat. Still, the flow of my Life or Death was getting better. Slowly and quickly, flowing into sharpness, subconsciously matching the unfurling rhythm of battle. I finally grasped the simple, lightning-fast attacks of the monsters. I was able to read them and match them move for move. I drove the monsters to panic, then cut them apart.

Déjà vu. Ordinarily, I would’ve gotten bonked by now. When you try to read the opponent’s rhythm, it leaves openings in your defense and offense to exploit. So, I got beaten to a pulp every time. Bonked and bonked again.

“That’s right! Now you’re the ones getting bonked!” I roared.

BONK BONK BONK BONK!

I bonked with all my might. It looks like my feelings came through to the frightened monsters. I made sure to add a little gravity magic in with my bonks too. I’d been bonked day after day in training. These monsters would now feel my pain and suffering! Oh, oops, they’re dead.

“Come on, the least you could’ve done was survive my warm-up bonks!” I sighed. “How are you gonna see the main event if you don’t live?”

In exchange for the last round of clothes, the girls gave me the “Demon Robe: All stats +30%. Complete Strengthening. MP (ultra). Magic Control (ultra). MP Flow Rectification. MP Cycle Multiplication. Effect Synergy Adjustment.” I was feeling good. I canceled their debt from the habits and the massive rip-offs from the latest orders of three outfits each…But it was worth it.

It gave me a sense of control on par with controlling the girls via finances. Yeah, it was on par with the astonishing force of a tumult of sexy bunnies, thighs wrapped in fishnet tights, and the dangerous rubbing and squeezing and stroking and crowding from every side. How wondrous (wily) and voluptuous (villainous)! They were upscale bunnies, but if a bar like that opened, I’d dance with joy.

I could sense that Entanglement was more organized even without forcibly activating control. The freewheeling rampage of my MP was restrained, and I felt a natural harmony in its flow. It became a lot easier to control and had much less of a physical burden. This powered me up considerably.

“I need to readjust everything from scratch now, don’t I?”

Because I couldn’t control things on my own, I used to let Wisdom play catch-up and had hurt myself in the process. Having any semblance of control would drastically cut down the burden and make learning far easier for Wisdom.

The 82nd floor was buried in level 82 Slash Bats. With more enemies, I needed more speed. My body’s complicated, circular movements harmonized, as I stepped and turned in irregular beats, adjusting my tempo and rhythm. I could swoop in to cut down the bats in a dance of blades without ever allowing my enemies near me.

We had some gross, ugly level 89 Magma Slimes on floor 89, but cute, pretty Slimey stepped in for a chow sesh? I guess Slimey didn’t have any problems with piping-hot food. Those slimes looked seriously boiling?

The 90th floor featured a level 90 Acid Tarantula floor boss that leered down at us from the grand, high ceiling. I just walked up to the ceiling, and now it was looking straight at me?

“Hey, don’t look down on me just ’cause you’re up on the ceiling! I mean, teenage boys are all cocky, egotistical brats nowadays, which means they’re so full of themselves that they can fill up a room! Ya know? And stuff?”

I tried losing my cool, but I really didn’t have any regrets whatsoever about killing this monster, so I wasn’t the bad guy. Maybe the spider wasn’t looking down on me from the ceiling after all. Poor thing just wanted to shoot webs at me. It shot out powerful acids from its body, too, so if you stayed on the floor, you’d get drenched in acid. This was all just speculation, though, because I knocked it down, and it was currently getting munched on by Slimey.

“Some nice acid should be good for Slimey’s digestion.”

Jiggle jiggle!

Acid may have helped Slimey’s digestion, but it was only a good thing inside of a digestive system? The fluid all over the floor sizzled and released a foul-smelling smoke. Slimey didn’t have a stomach, though, so I guessed he was fine? I hope?

DAY 97
NOON

A deceptive deceit toward a pure, honest teenage boy of this world was unanimously rejected by the other teenage boys of this world.

DUNGEON
91ST FLOOR

THAT WAS ENOUGH TRAINING for me for the day, so it was first-come, first-serve starting on the 91st floor, as usual. I wish they would’ve told me I was done? They left me in the dust!

It was our third round of bats today—level 91 Ignition Bats, which exploded when you touched them. I could stop any kind of bat in midair by sending vibration magic through the air. My vibration magic—mastered through long, hard practice each and every night—worked wonders. Of course, it worked in much more dramatic ways late at night, with bustling vibrations and rambunctious, rippling, vigorous vibrations. It always earned screaming rave reviews!

After freezing the bats, I went to unleash a storm of G*ndam funnel fire. Before I could, the whole floor was overcome by a chain reaction of exploding, squealing bats. My poor little G*ndies were left hanging in midair?

Jiggle jiggle!

I sighed at the full-bellied Slimey. “I guess I’m happy so long as Slimey is happy.”

I was in top physical condition, having woken up without any pain at all. They still weren’t going to let me fight? I wanted to test the limits of my new and improved abilities. The others were just getting in my way!

Well, at least I was used to only participating in 1 percent of combat and 99 percent of exercise. My own allies were the most dangerous ones present in group battles. They’d just get mad at me if I got in their way, so I had to control myself. Holding back was so burdensome compared to all the data I could gather by unleashing everything at once and experimenting until I had determined the limits of my power.

“At this rate, I’ll gain more skills and better equipment before I adjust to my current power level?”

They were just worried about me. And I guess it would be a bit rude to tear up all of these freshly healed blood vessels? I still had Revival, so they would heal right away and only leave some bruises. Those bruises would get noticed, though. I was a bit hesitant.

Maybe that was why they only left a measly three level 92 Lizard Warriors for me. The lizards held round shields and longswords, were equipped with protective breastplates, and their drop items looked pretty profitable. They launched sharp, violent sword attacks as they handled their shields deftly using those level 90+ stats. The rest of their bodies were covered in hard scales and bulged with rippling muscles. They occasionally lashed their long, thick tails like whips toward me. These lizards were worthy of being called warriors. But they were slow despite having speed stats in the 800s. They could only move forward and backward in quick bursts and suffered from a fatal lack of technique.

No matter how fast they were, the predictability and simplicity of their movements and technique, as well as the wasted motion in their attacks, left them unable to make use of their stats. Their rhythm was no better. They just attacked repetitively without any variation in their rhythm or tempo. They were sitting ducks. Er, sitting lizards?

An attack couldn’t be threatening if you knew when and where it was coming. Even if they tried to throw in feints and unique attacks, I could match their pace so long as I had a handle on their rhythm. Plus, their exaggerated motions launched with sky-high stats drained their energy all the faster.

“Hiyah!”

The three lizard warriors came at me simultaneously. I adjusted my movements to meet them. At this level of Entanglement, I didn’t have any burden on my body. I dodged their fast, straightforward attacks. I weaved and countered and slipped through their defenses, shifting rhythms irregularly and breaking them down in unexpected jolts. I disrupted their postures and let my body sweep my sword along with it. I didn’t even have to use my arm muscles. Okay, time to finish them off. Looks like everyone else is done.

“Secret Sword: Lizard Return! Er, the lizards aren’t returning, but my sword is returning to the lizards! As in, it’s turning back to send them away? Okay, enough reruns of these returned lizards.”

A single step, then a horizontal slash ripped off those cheapo breastplates. I beheaded the nearest two, then shifted my posture from my back and shoulders down to my elbows. I drew an arc with the Universe Staff, turning around completely to cut off the head of the final lizard warrior, its arms and blade raised, leaving it wide open. I was totally imitating Dancer Girl, but it worked.

I was able to cut through two with a single, forceful swing. I wish I could’ve taken out the third one with a centrifugal force generated by a corkscrew motion. But, yeah, that was still too advanced for me?

Even the level 92 lizards’ speed and defense weren’t enough to keep their heads attached under the force of my sped-up slash. Now that had I mimicked her, the dancer was doing a little victory hula, a shit-eating grin on her face? Whatever. It was thanks to her that I could defeat level 90 monsters without hurting myself in the process. That was enough. I hadn’t taken any damage or scratched my gear, so this was the perfect slaughter for earning some pocket change!

“These breastplates look like they’ll sell for a lot, but everyone in our class could use them, including me. I’ll properly appraise them later. Unfortunately, they’re flat, so guys only? Well, I think at least two of the girls will be able to wear them, one human girl and one Tiny Tanuki. I’m getting a real strong feeling that if I recommend the breastplate to her, she’ll chomp on my head. Is there a helmet lying around here somewhere? Getting chewed on really friggin’ hurts!”

Boink boink.

“Just like the Code of Hammurabi’s famous ‘an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth,’ it’s a chew for a chew. Getting chewed out like that will probably summon the wild animal teenage boys for a stamp to crush my sex appeal, so I’d better apprehend my apprehension before it appears and acupunctures me into an apoplexy.”

Jiggle jiggle.

We split up to gather the spellstones and drop items. Mostly, I let my tentacles do the picking up? My snakes came out to help, too, causing two of my fighting companions to sprint into the corner and glare from a distance? Well, I made a lot today, so I could let the Little Miss Greeds off the leash for a little shopping trip on the way back into town, at least. I’m gonna rip the hell outta the armory old dude. Not sure if he had any money after I ripped him off this morning, though. Well, he must have enough pennies saved up to buy food and whatnot. That’ll be something.

We were in a dungeon and all, so it was a good place to test out my high-speed Auto Hydra technique. Every time I sent out the hydra, though, a certain cohort of two took out their morning stars for a vicious bullying sesh?

Would I just have to wait until tomorrow for a chance? Tonight, we had a battle scheduled! I’d booked an all-star lineup: Mr. Tentacles, Mr. Snakes, Mr. Magic Thread, and Mr. Magic Hands. So long as I preserve my MP, that is!

I finally got to try out my dodecuplet G*ndam funnels. As expected, it was hard to concentrate on manipulating twelve objects at once while in motion. It would be a lot easier if I could stand still but combining the operation of those with Teleport caused Wisdom’s Parallel Thinking calculations to break down. They didn’t crumble altogether, but lags in the calculations caused gaps and delays. The Demon Robe had drastically upped my control, but in this case, there were just too many skills and effects in play. I needed practice.

“The Demon Robe is a great item. It would be even better with a mithril upgrade. With additional control, I could even go up to twenty-four G*ndam funnels! The sky’s the limit!”

For the breastplates, I could make deeper-cut models for the girls. The two flatter ones could fill the empty space with rubber balls. They’d line up for that for sure!

“But a teenage boy values honesty above all else! That fraudulence is difficult for the heart of a teenage boy to accept! Indeed, I’ll accept an uplifted heart if it lets me get closer, but push-up strats are too deadly. They’ve gotta be off limits!”

Wiggle wiggle.

“Er, it’s not about needing something big enough to cover Vice Rep B, but rather that we’d never be able to contain the sheer force that they generate while in motion without a fantasy world’s magic! Yup, even for her bunny suit, I had to weave in ultra-dense mithril thread around the chest section to keep everything in check. Yet, they’d still nearly flown out from the literal force of vibration, creating an incredible state of bursting to the brim, their massive volume rippling yet remaining firmly in place…It was almost too much!”

As I debated whether I should continue discussing the challenges of breastplate design, we went down a long hallway on the way to the 94th floor. Vice Rep B had a real problem on her hands. She was the only girl who needed to stick to cloth equipment. She’d needed new armor long ago, but she still stuck to fabric-based armor. In the nasty event she ran into a resistance nullifying skill, all she had was that one layer of clothing to protect her. Any blow could potentially prove fatal. I needed to find some way to protect her torso, or at least her chest. On top of that, she preferred magic-specialized equipment. She never used magic in battle, wielding her bludgeoning hammer—which she proclaimed a staff—yet she wore exclusively magic-specialized cloth equipment.

“I guess my only option is to try to make an outfit on the same level as the ballgowns,” I said, sighing. “I can’t replicate that with normal clothes. The resistances came from the multilayered frills, drapes, and lace. Resistances go up with surface area. Is a battle dress my only option?”

I suspected she’d wear a magic-specialized battle dress that minimized metallic parts. However, that would require the teenage-boy-seducing custom measurements all over again. And once I finished Vice Rep B’s armor, the rest of the girls would demand their own!

Still, we weren’t in as dire need for improvements to armor. Each piece was increasingly fine-tuned, with improved flexibility coming from new materials and more moveable pieces that made the armor both lighter and stronger. I wasn’t sure what would come next.

“Working on a battle dress, huh? After I finally made it through the triple-threat of the bras, pads, and bikinis… After all these improvements to their armor… I don’t know if I have the courage to light this new fire.”

Wiggle wiggle.

I couldn’t see what the final form would look like with my current knowledge of magic circles and alchemy. Since knowledge of magic items was banned here, I would only be able to find information in the Theocracy. So, I couldn’t just burn the place down?

“My plan was to napalm bomb the god dude as well as all the old dudes, so those sexy sisters really threw me for a loop.”

Jiggle jiggle.

Time to pause my napalm research. Meanwhile, the 94th floor dungeon king was a level 94 Ignis Avis. Both parts of its name came from Latin. Together they made sense and sounded cool. I supposed my complaint wasn’t really with the name, but still?

“Ignis avis just means ‘fire bird’ in Latin, so why not just call it that?! I guess you don’t want to get this one mixed up with the previous flame birds, but there’s no need to go overboard with ignis! What’s even different between you and the phoenix?!”

Jiggle jiggle.

There were species names and academic names that, when sent through fantasy world translation, could create complicated results that only led to discord. But this mostly seemed lazy!

“It looks kinda like a peafowl, with its big feathers wreathed in flames like a Chinese firebird? Now it’s burning, but, ya know?”

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

The name was hard to remember and understand. It was totally just there to confuse me. Who could I send my complaints about monster names to around here? Like, come on. Just go with Fire Bird for this guy?

“Unless you’re telling me that fire bird is in a different dungeon somewhere?! I guess a fire bird is one that’s burning, whereas the flame bird is covered in flames. So which is ignis?!”

There was no way for me to determine which was which, and I didn’t know what other species of fire-associated birds might be out there. Long story short, this was a Roman bird of fire. And it seemed to be having a pretty good time?

I didn’t get to ask any of the questions I had because it had already gotten shredded by my dodecuplet G*ndamn funnels, chained up and dragged to the ground, relentlessly slashed, and devoured whole. It was a fiery, burning, passionate Roman bird, but birds tended to be weak once grounded. They weren’t really suited to enclosed spaces like dungeons. I mean, really. Forcing it into a tight room like this one was just unfair?

“It had the ultimate aerial skill combination of Ultra Super-Speed, Helix, Flight, and Feather Shot, plus all the defensive effects that come along with Inferno, fully equipped for fire bullets bombing raid style. Yet this super high-spec, mega, speed-specialized brutal bird couldn’t show off any of its skills in the cramped space of a dungeon and went down. With no reward, either!”

Jiggle jiggle.

If this ignis avis had been able to get out into the open air, we wouldn’t have been able to win so easily. In fact, if it’d joined a dungeon deluge, we’d have been really screwed?

The hidden rooms didn’t have anything special, so while I’d make a lot of money off this dungeon, it didn’t improve the equipment situation. The ignis avis’s drop item was solid, but it was too specialized and didn’t really have any killer skills. “Ignis Cloak: Speed +40%. Posture Control (large). Super-Speed (large). Inferno. Helix. Fire Feathers.” Well, I shouldn’t say that—Super-Speed was always useful. Still, it was all speed and no defense. That said, I didn’t have many cloaks, so I was grateful. I just really needed some more defense at this point.

“All right, time to go home,” I said. “I haven’t made dinner lately, so what should I make tonight? Two days of dealing with cosplay traps from the girls should be enough to immunize me, and I’ll steel myself for the worst. There’s nothing to fear as long as I ready myself! They just caught me off guard last time! Although, I should’ve been amply prepared, since I made all those clothes myself. No matter how crazy they are, they won’t show up in underwear, so I think I’m safe today?”

Jiggle jiggle.

Now that it was on my mind, I realized I’d forgotten to look at yesterday’s skeleton king’s drop item, the Undead King Sword.

“I mean, I really can’t act all that surprised, even when you throw the title ‘Undead King’ around. What, am I gonna be like, ‘Oh no, not a deathless dungeon emperor! Not like I haven’t fought a dozen of those already!’ Yawn. I’ve got the Sex God title, for one. Even the pimpin’ king has a king title?”

Jiggle jiggle.

From that perspective, I suppose yesterday’s fight was between a king and a god with three emperors watching. I guess they were presiding over the fight in a way. Tough world, huh?

DAY 97
EVENING

Underage drinking puts me at risk of dropping out, but my school is too heartless to even check in on me.

WHITE LOSER INN

HARUKA-KUN CAREFULLY opened the door. His guard was up, as was the hood of his black cloak, which carefully narrowed his feel of vision. Time to strike!

“Welcome back! Good work today!”

“Come now, take a seat.”

“That’s right, hon! If you don’t, we’ll tie you up!”

The police uniforms pumped everyone up. The blue skintight bluets and matching ties had Haruka-kun frozen in place. Girls swooped in to take him by the arms and force him into a chair. We managed to surprise him with an outfit he had never seen and took him off to the dining room before he could regain his senses. After that, we made him say ‘ah’ and fed him cutlets and rice as he remained totally spaced out. Oh, is he rebooting?

“H-h-hang on! Miniskirt police uniforms?! I don’t remember making these. I do remember making miniskirt police uniforms, but I didn’t make those handmade hats…What is with this constantly changing cosplay inn situation? Illegal employment of high school girls is going to put this inn at risk of being forced to close! Now police officers are making me open my mouth and say ‘ahhhhhn…’ Munch munch.”

All we’d done was take the tight, multicolor miniskirts he had made for us, turn them blue, and added matching police hats and badges. We took our ties and turned them blue as well. Voila! Miniskirt police uniforms.

Surprising him was enough to throw him off-guard, tie him down, and make him open up wide for bites of cutlet—pre-made cutlet and rice bowls that he had made, by the way.

“Great work today, honey!”

“Would you like dinner?”

“How about a bath?”

“Or how about…”

“O-o-or how about I can’t hear you, as I’ve decided? Seriously, what kind of police bureau makes it so that the innocent seem like sex criminals just by interacting with the police?! Seeing me with the police is gonna make someone else call the police! It’s an unbreakable cycle!”

His eyes were shooting around in their sockets like pinballs. We already stripped his equipment off. If we didn’t, he’d jump right into training or his side-jobs. We had to take his equipment off and restrain him. If we didn’t, he’d go over the top in trying to get stronger to protect us or making new equipment to do the same.

“Sooo, cutie! We were just thinking how we’d like to go a little deeper in the dungeons…”

Rub rub.

“We won’t do anything reckless. We’ll make sure we’re fully equipped and have escape routes in advance.”

Stroke stroke.

He constantly prepared new equipment and hadn’t gotten any rest. Even on his days off, he went mining for mithril. He worked way too hard at night to get any sleep, so we needed to force him to rest. Lower his guard with some cosplay, then crowd in on him with a JK stampede to get that equipment off. With a full encirclement of maidens, his body’s automatic reaction forced him into our trap. It’s almost too easy.

“You’ll let us, right? If we sense even a hint of danger, we’ll retreat right away.”

Squish squish.

“Please, Haruka-kun! Four parties for the 89th floor. Or even the 85th!”

Touch touch. Squeeze squeeze. Boing boing. Round round.

A few girls sat on his lap and others hugged him from the right and left. We clung to him until he approved. The tightly packed girls dangled bites of katsu over his mouth. We clamped our legs around him to hold him in place, rotated our positions around him. It was a constant assault. He froze up the moment he’d gotten back, his eyes swimming and eventually drowning. His whole face turned red as his brain short-circuited.

To get stronger, we had to fight on deeper floors. Most of our class was butting up against the level 110 wall. Haruka-kun came back covered in bruises yesterday because of our weakness. That was the real reason he covered his whole body in a long black cloak, even on hot days—and why only the guys’ bath had a small, private room. It was also why Angelica-san and Nefertiri-san had broken down in tears, talking about what he did to himself: how his bones broke, limbs tore off, blood vessels severed. They told us how he fought while gushing blood and vomiting, collapsing and crawling, and how enemies bullied him.

They said that he patted their heads and told them everything was going to be all right while blood gushed from wounds all over his body. How could anything be all right? The moment he stopped hurting himself in battle, he powered up his own equipment even more. He got new items that only increased the burden on his body. They had thought that he finally had a good balance, but he was still trying to grow stronger.

We had to become stronger enough for him to recognize that he could stop trying so hard. It was embarrassing for all of us, but being embarrassed wasn’t too bad when we thought about what Haruka-kun had gone through.

The result of our efforts was permission to give delving deeper into dungeons a try, with supervision. Even if we passed in their eyes, our instructors would stick with us for a while. Fighting in the 80s required equipment with some worrisome components, so he hadn’t given us any yet.

“He’s such a worrywart.”

“Especially considering how he doesn’t worry about himself at all!”

“And we’re so worried about him!”

Haruka-kun fled for the bath, probably telling Slimey that everything was going to be okay all the while. He was an overprotective worrywart, a shy pamperer who was a twisted fraudster and always worried about us too much.

“The miniskirt police uniform strategy worked like a charm.”

“Not sure how much it actually got us, though.”

“At least it ended without incident.”

“Yeah, I think it’s time for a girls’ meeting.”

There, we heard the heroic tales of those who dared to face the terrors of the Sex God. The girls turned bright red, occasionally gripping their fists in excitement, other times pinching their noses to stop the sudden nosebleeds…and sinking into the bath? The two of them painted a very vivid picture with lots of gesturing. Huh? They used their cheeks?!

Our objective over the last three days had been to prevent Haruka-kun’s excessive training and side-job labor. Twelve hours of genuine rest every three days was the bare minimum needed to heal from the exhaustion he’d accumulated. After all his self-destruction yesterday, we got him drunk and put him to sleep. He had pretended he was all right without getting any sleep before, but now he was finally getting real rest. If he overdid it again, we could always make him drink.

“The poison of the Ultimate Dungeon’s deepest floors didn’t hurt him. Alcohol was weirdly effective, though!”

“Even if he tries to ignore it, the accumulated exhaustion adds up,” said Book Club President.

“Exactly! We’ve discovered a sound tactic!”

All our additional orders distracted him and interfered with his side-jobs. Angelica-san explained that he focused intensely on magic when making clothes but never tried any reckless magical experiments. “Experiments” inevitably involved dangerous manipulation of his own body. If we didn’t keep him busy with clothes, he’d hurt himself. At the same time, too many clothing orders meant he didn’t get enough rest.

I wanted Haruka-kun, who was in the most danger out of us all, to get stronger. But getting stronger was exactly what caused him to suffer. The only real way to protect him was to get stronger ourselves. He had even whispered to Kakizaki-kun and Oda-kun’s groups that they were “getting stronger” before they left in search of experience. All we could do was get stronger. Maybe one day, we could protect Haruka-kun.

Yup, I better get more alcohol ready. But it was strictly off-limits for the girls! If any of us got drunk, maidenhoods could be at stake. Because even when sober… I mean, look at their faces right now!

DAY 97
EVENING

The dangers of a lecture on loose public morals from Public Morals Rep is shrouded in the mystery of who Public Morals Rep even is.

WHITE LOSER INN

WHEN I GOT HOME, miniskirt police officers surrounded me and coaxed me into a “say ah” investigation of cutlets over rice. I had no idea what they were saying, but the high school girls I knew were definitely miniskirt police officers. This inn was getting out of control?

They had made Poster Girl join in on the miniskirt maid sesh. She hadn’t joined in on the bunny or police officer rounds, which was good! It was already sketchy enough that high-school-aged girls were doing this level of cosplay. I was glad that the junior-high-aged girl was no longer involved. If she had joined, this inn would’ve turned into the official sketchy champion of the grand prix of sketchy inns—the undisputed champion of unseemliness! Fair enough, given its unseemly name.

“I was wondering what they wanted from me,” I said. “Turns out it’s going down to lower floors. Slimey, can you go and tell them it’s too dangerous, so they can’t?”

Instead of rushing to get stronger, they needed proper training and better equipment. Their equipment wasn’t keeping up with their level growth. Those floors were still too dangerous.

“Those broke, commoner, high school girls probably want to go down to lower floors to make more money, but they’re still high schoolers. I’d just like some peace and quiet. Sheesh!”

Jiggle jiggle.

It was impossible to say if you’d resist all the ailments found on the deeper floors, even if you were fully equipped with ailment resistances. I also had a new worry—they had gotten me drunk and had put me to sleep. I didn’t have immunity to alcohol. Part of it probably had to do with individual physiology, but now it was common knowledge that I had a weakness to it.

If I couldn’t even be in a drinking atmosphere without getting drunk, then I needed to create a status ailment weapon. I already had birdlime in full effect in the pseudo-dungeon. That had melted down Royal Girls’ armor to nothing in the half-naked heave-ho jolly good time. It’d been an objective lesson that skill resistances only countered other skills, not the physical substances themselves.

“Brewing alcohol could have some use for animal-type monsters, although whacking them is still faster. Maybe it’d be useful for bug monsters?”

I could also make it a frontier specialty product. Brewing liquor could be profitable, though it would take a lot of effort. The only problem was that it was outside of the realm of my expertise. I’d go to a suspicious establishment in a flash if beautiful babes were present, but without beautiful babes, I couldn’t really care less about drinking.

“Drinking is only a small part of places that feature beautiful babes as far as I’m concerned. If it’s all about drinking, what’s even the point? The beautiful babes are the best part!”

That was a fact. So where were my incentives here? The inn was a lot more suspicious than any other local place these days, however. Is there something wrong with this place?

“If touching the babes is going to get the police called, then it’s practically a torture chamber for teenage boys. An adult store is leagues better at that point. Ya know?”

Wiggle wiggle.

It was hard for Slimey, who had never been to high school, to understand my troubles. Where did he learn to read and write, though?

“I sensed a hint of obsequiousness from the girls but mostly obscenity?”

Those miniskirt police officers were way more dangerous than any dungeon!

“It’s kinda hard to eat cutlets over rice by opening my mouth like a baby bird! The chunks are too big! Those are the premade rice bowls with extra-big cutlets. They weren’t designed to be eaten by saying ‘ah,’ especially one after the next like that!”

They were more intent on stuffing me than seducing me, but their seductiveness still overwhelmed the salty crunch of any fried cutlets. After the last three days, I needed a one-more-set myself. Too much food. Well, at least I had fully recovered. Hopefully, I had freed myself from future seductions by allowing them to go to deeper dungeon floors, albeit with conditions.

“If this continues every day, it’s going to be too much in teenage-boy terms, potentially robbing me of the youth that is the very last stand of my stumbling sex appeal. Public Morals Rep is gonna lecture me on loose public morals around here, but who is Public Morals Rep anyhow?”

Everyone was wantonly weaponizing their loose morals. Public Morals Rep must’ve been sent to another world. This inn was at the point of requiring the adult entertainment laws around here to need revising.

I didn’t find a single bruise anywhere on my body nor any trace of pain. I wasn’t leveling up, but I still felt like I needed to train to keep myself sharp. I had to admit I couldn’t win, especially with Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl on the girls’ side. I needed to give in and rest, so I did—physically, at least. All those bare legs didn’t give me a chance to rest mentally!

Since I was feeling good but couldn’t train, I decided to work on my side-jobs. I went back to my room and looked at my newly acquired equipment.

There was the Thunder Dragon Spear, which gave +30% boosts to Vitality, Power, and Dexterity, a thunder-type boost, and the skills Thunder Gear, Thunder Attack, and Lightning Flash, not to mention an attack buff. That was a sweet find from a hidden room. As for why lizard gladiator, the promoted class of lizard warriors, was guarding a thunder dragon spear…I mean, it was a lizard? I understood that it was in the treasure chest, not a drop item, but it still didn’t make sense. Regardless, it’d make for a great bargain sale item after a mithril upgrade.

Then there was the drop from the Roman fire bird: “Ignis Cloak: Speed +40%. Stance Control (large). Super-Speed (large). Arc Inferno. Whirlwind. Fire Feathers.” It was another bargain sale candidate, but some of the skills were almost too good. Those might help me in flight, as a matter of fact. At the very least, maybe I could land without crashing? ’Cause crashing really hurt?

I divided the spoils as Slimey jiggled. I categorized them and used Appraisal as Slimey wiggled.

There was a possibility that the girls may have just been trying to give me some comfort. Well, I guess I need comfort too, ya know? From the ordinary perspective of a teenage boy, what they were doing was too provocative to provide any comfort, meaning all healing properties were fleshy stimulants that revealed more than they healed. But perhaps you might possibly be able to faintly guess that healing was their objective?

“I don’t think there’s any teenage boy who gets healed morning and night by teenage girls’ bare legs, bare thighs, bare backs, and bare shoulders. Not to mention stomachs and bellies and cleavage shown from low angles!”

Wiggle wiggle?

No doubt about it: it was a beautiful sight. But getting the full experience shoved right in my face and played on repeat was the furthest possible thing from comforting! This teenage boy was left hardly comforted—I was getting triggered into berserk mode!

“Yeah, I’m tired… Mostly of having to rewatch that scene in my head as I make jokes about it?”

This was some serious psychological exhaustion, but my body was in great shape. Since when do only teenage boys need to work their side-jobs day after day to afford room and board?

The skeleton king’s drop item was the “Undead King Sword: Power, Speed, Dexterity +30%. Power Word Kill Resistance. Undead Killer. +Attack.” I didn’t understand the effects, but it wasn’t worth fussing about. The Undead Killer seemed like foreshadowing…but I’ve already done a lot of undead killing? I had the God’s Sword and stuff.

“Well, maybe there’re some undead monsters coming up. I think I’ll be all right with my two-for-one staff stuffed with the God’s Sword and God’s Spear?”

Whoever had this would be able to kill an unkillable enemy. Although, you’d be better off bouncing if you met an enemy like that. Holding this weapon was pretty reckless in the first place… Maybe I should give it to the nerds?

“So, does ‘undead killer’ mean that if an immortal shows up, they’ll just kill it ’cause they’re too stupid to know what the word even means? They can’t be killed by a power word if they don’t know the meaning of the word itself. That’s problematic for an immortal killer.”

Those idiots would probably whack an undead to death with their boomerangs. Or more likely bludgeon them with boomerangs and throw the undead corpse?

I kept my work light to preserve MP. Because the results of running out of MP were carved into my brain, granting me salted and peppered and buttered and grilled levels of boredom! That sounded tasty! Still, I was at a low level of risk. I was still fully equipped and almost at full MP.

Knock knock.

Someone was at the door. The girls were still in the bath, and the knock hadn’t triggered anything in my Presence Sensing or Area Analysis. I wouldn’t want to welcome any assassinations, although I’d assess any assassins assembling? Can I please just have asses instead?

“Come in. The door’s unlocked? It’s just closed? In teenage-boy terms, my door is always open. Although, if any more doors are opened in my sexuality, I’ll have various concerns! If you’re here to sell me sex, I’ve got no money, so I’ll just put it on my tab like my room and board? Please?”

“I have returned! I came in secret, as I have a report I must convey to you. And please pay your room and board!”

A sneaky girl had sneakily returned. As in, Stalker Girl. Poster Girl would’ve been thrilled to see her, but I guess she’d had to come in secret. Any teenage boy visited by a junior high school girl in the dead of night was liable to get a certain title added to his status that started “Lo.” It seemed like she was in a hurry, so we could avoid that?

“Well, welcome back! Want some sweets? Did you use the nerds? I doubt they were of any use. Since your clan is such a valuable source of information, you can use all the idiots you like, though. Just sneak them behind enemy lines and leave ’em there if you want?”

Munchmunchmunchmunch!

Despite her urgent report, sweets apparently took priority. She hurried to eat the sweets. The report? Not so much.

“They are delicious. Sweet and delicious. Is that apple flavored?”

“It’s your first time eating apple pie? Here, I’ve got plenty.”

Jiggle jiggle!

Slimey joined in on the feastivities. He’d fallen asleep halfway through my previous mutterings anyhow.

“The Theocracy and the Merchant Kingdom are divided. Each faction has sent special envoys, secret messengers, and secret agents into Diorelle. (Munchmunch.) Groups that posed threats of subservice activities and assassinations were destroyed by your stupid companions. (Chew chew.) The marauders that came from the Merchant Kingdom by sea were chased away by our otaku companions (Munchmunch). At the moment, there are no problems in the capital. (Gulpgulp!)”

She’d come hurrying back even though there were no problems in the capital. That meant something must have happened that concerned the frontier…but whatever it was, apple pie was more important. I wondered if it was more important than french fries, so I gave her some of those too. She went for the french fries first, so it must not have been that important. We must be in for unprecedented peace!

“These are so salty and delicious. You’re using a different salt, aren’t you? It’s even better than before. (Chew chew.) Oh, and we’ve found the people from the Theocracy pursuing Sister Girl’s group—(chew chew)—along with an assassin (munchmunch). They threatened some merchants to get through the new pseudo-dungeon, so I hurried over to tell you (chompchomp).”

Oh? She really did rush here. I didn’t feel any urgency coming from her, but I guess she did have an emergency report?

“And Sister Girl is in the duke’s castle. I should’ve had them here, but I suppose I didn’t have much choice. I guess I’ll try heading over?”

Jiggle jiggle.

Slimey hopped onto my head as I put my foot on the window frame. Off we flew. I maintained my speed, altitude, and posture as we swooped across the sky. Then…I fell. As always. The Ignis Cloak helped me maintain control and speed, so I got faster. Just watch out for those landings!

DAY 97
NIGHT

Being able to read the room and unable to be in the room has created a risky reality of the room.

DUKE'S PALACE

I INITIALLY BUILT THE new castle with a wide landing area for my incoming flights, so I’d have a safe zone to crash into. I had high hopes for landing. The Ignis Cloak provided me a smooth flight through the air, but the Super-Speed combined with Whirlwind made for one intense crash landing. Going through all that pain was futile in the end, as the old dudes had fallen into a hole. Oh, and other ones were stuck to the wall, and even more were hanging from the trees…Old dudes were all over the place.

“Oh well! A crash-landing area is a lot more compact than a regular landing area, so that’s one benefit! Yup, I fell?”

Jiggle jiggle.

“I don’t care if the culprits are kidnappers or assassins. I just wish the gender ratio was at least a little tilted toward sexy female assassins or sexy female secret agents!”

I put away the lovely flowers I had procured to go along with the rope for tying up any sexy assassin. I would’ve prepared funeral chrysanthemums if I knew this was what I’d find.

“Ah, Haruka-kun,” said Mr. Meridad. “The culprits were caught in the traps before we were able to apprehend them. Could you please teach us residents of this castle where they are next time? I’m quite frightened now! I didn’t know traps were even there. Next time, please tell us before we move in!”

“Nah, I just put them in spots where the watch wouldn’t be able to see trespassers, so you wouldn’t normally ever go there. And you guys didn’t fall, or get buried, or stuck in the trees, or to the walls, or tied up in rope, so you’re fine? I prepared all these traps for my sexy female assassins and secret agents, so why are they all old dudes?!”

I flew here in the hopes of finding sexy female spies tied up, writhing and struggling and groaning…Ugh. So many old dudes. I had placed all my trust in these traps, but they failed to read the room and caught old dudes instead! Maybe I’ll just burn them all.

“Lord Haruka!” Sister Girl and the others came running, armed, the deep slits in their habits revealing their thunderous, clapping thighs. “They were after us, weren’t they? It is our fault that—”

“Stalker Girl, how many of them were there? Were they all old dudes?! No ladies?! Is there a single lovely lady among our visitors today? Or perhaps a sexy female spy? And stuff?”

“No, this should be all of them. Reports said that they were of considerable skill, but I suppose the castle was too much for them with traps installed in all the prime spots for sneaking. By the way, since when was the castle this beautiful?”

I guess if they’re old dudes, I have to just capture ’em. Torture or questioning would be no fun. ’Cause if I was going to submit a capture culprit to torture, my hydra and grotesque tentacles wouldn’t be able to squirm any answers out of them unless it was a sexy female agent or something!

“Lord Meropapa, we have discovered a poisonous substance, likely intended for the purpose of assassination.”

“A close look revealed the agents to be a secret corps of the fanatical Theocracy.”

“Hmm. The units must’ve been disposable. Squeeze them for all the information you can. Don’t hold back.”

The frontier army captain left with a salute. His speech, as always, felt so unsteady. It must’ve been a lot of effort to carry the duke’s authority on his shoulders.

“Lord Haruka, is everyone safe at the inn? We tried to submit a report as soon as we could.”

“Mother rushed to the orphanage. We’ve heard that everyone is safe there. It’s well-guarded, too.”

Royal Girl and Merimeri showed up in full gear. Royal Girl’s armor was sexy, but a fully armed Maid Girl stared at me from the shadows. No, it wasn’t quite a glare, but she did stare and point her blade in my direction.

“All the enemies came here. They just left the inn in peace and stuff? The only people you’d need to worry about at the inn are the infiltrators. Even if they surpassed time and space, they’d get bonked. They’d be much more sorry than safe. Ya know?”

The inn was the safest place in the whole kingdom. It had strong walls and ample defenses. The current residents had ultimate brutal bonking force on their side too? If you were willing to take on that inn, you might as well fight dungeons instead. It sounded like they sent elite troops from the Theocracy, but these guys wouldn’t even make it to the entrance of the girls’ bath. The girls also rushed after me to the duke’s castle, by the way!

We gathered in the meeting room to share information. Class Rep had Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl hold my mouth closed when I tried to explain my poor little sexy female agent-less traps, creating a blockade on my breathing! Why did the slaves listen to Class Rep instead of their master? What was this gap in our authority?

“A rebellion in the Theocracy?!”

“Is it really true that the upper brass of the Church has pulled a coup d’état and the pope has imprisoned the royal family?”

“If that’s true, then the pope’s faction has complete control!”

Sister Girl lost consciousness when she heard this and had to be carried to her bedroom. It must’ve been shocking to hear that her family had been apprehended. Then Mr. Meridad informed me of the true secret status of her birth…which, I mean, I’d already known just by looking at her status screen. Does nobody else bother looking at those?

Everyone else gasped in shock. Just by looking at the titles in the room, we currently had two princesses, a frontier king, a sex god, two dungeon emperors, and a Slime Emperor. A lot of the girls had king-class skills, too. Was one more princess in the mix really that surprising?

“They’ve taken leaders of other factions they deem threats captive as well.”

“I can’t believe the Theocracy has been taken over by the military!”

Out here on the frontier, you could find dungeon kings lurking in the dungeons. All you needed to do was dig and monsters with ‘king’ in their titles would come pouring out. Until just a month or two ago, there was even a goblin king in the forest.

“The monarchy, displeased with the pope’s takeover, have been imprisoned in the royal palace. The other faction leaders have been captured. Even if there were a revolt, it would just be an anger-fueled outburst without a banner to rally behind.”

“They sent assassins after Arianna-san!”

“Any individuals who raise dissent are accused of heresy and executed. It’s become a total reign of terror.”

Outside of the Theocracy, however, there was a single princess who carried the blood of the royal family, one who was trusted by the people and opposed the pope. Of course they wanted to capture or assassinate her. I’d made another crucial error. It drove me up the wall every single time, every damn time. My sheer, shocking stupidity was enough to throw Wisdom right out the window and make me hate myself.

“You have all been so good to me. I remain unable to give anything to you in return nor contribute to the good of the frontier. Despite that, you have treated us with a surfeit of kindness that I will not forget for the rest of my days. We must hurry back to our homeland. Our people are in danger, and when God Himself has come under fire, we cannot simply keep a safe distance and politely raise our objections. These days in Omui have been a treasure. Thank you so much.”

I had taught them how to protect themselves—how to fight. I had given them the strength so when the time to fight came, Sister Girl and the others would choose to go to battle. They had come to the frontier, a hellscape of monsters, without the power to defend themselves. Then, I taught them how to fight for real. It was the equivalent of telling them to go and throw their lives away.

Every time I made a mistake on account of my own stupidity, someone ended up on the verge of death. Someone else died. I had vowed not to make any more mistakes, but I kept on screwing up. I was the one who cornered the Theocracy. This was my fault. People were going to die because of that, maybe including Sister Girl and her companions.

“Please wait a moment!”

“No, you can’t!”

“It is our country, our problem,” Sister Girl said.

I hate myself, I thought. My dumb brain. If I tore off my head would a smarter one grow back?

“It’s too dangerous.”

“You can’t! You’re the enemy of your country now!”

“Please, change your mind!”

“You must stop this. It’s far too reckless.”

“Think of what will happen when you go! You’ll die. You must rethink this.”

The meeting room fell into confusion. Everyone tried to stop them, but the priests and clerics were stubborn. The chaos only increased as the girls pleaded for the clerics to let them come and fight alongside them. Mr. Meridad even said he would mobilize the army and place them under house arrest.

“You can’t go!”

“At least let us check it out with you!”

Munchmunchmunch?

The real provocation wasn’t here in this meeting room—it was over in the Church! So why was the meeting room a battlefield? The fighting power assembled in this room right now was enough to destroy the Theocracy many times over, but we couldn’t leave the frontier undefended.

“Please accept the patronage of the kingdom.”

Jiggle jiggle?

“We need more information. We don’t know enough to decide on a course of action.”

Chewchewchew?

As much as the Theocracy boasted of their military, it wasn’t worth fearing in terms of military strength. It wasn’t even a real threat. They had already received a substantial blow to their might, and with internal discord, they shouldn’t be able to muster up a real army. We couldn’t underestimate the dark side of the Theocracy, though, which had been deeply involved with evil forces throughout history. Hence, their ultimate weapons and secret knowledge.

“We won’t let you! You can’t!”

“There are things you can and cannot achieve. Going there without a strategy is tantamount to suicide!”

Chompchompchompchomp?

The Theocracy had unleashed Dancer Girl in their war against the frontier. Under normal circumstances, she would have been powerful enough to annihilate any nation. And she was so freakin’ hot! Thank you!

“Yet we must still go home,” Sister Girl said. “We will never forget your kindness. You must let us go. This is our duty as clerics of the Church.”

This was why I had wanted to launch a long-range saturation attack of high-volume explosives all stealthily to just finish things without any more fuss. It didn’t quite seem to be a particularly cozy approach to enter enemy territory and enjoy an enemied existence in a direct confrontation with an opponent who might have all kinds of secret weapons. If there was a welcoming enemy, then they probably wouldn’t be an enemy at all. Think of it! A pleasant enemy that self-annihilated.

I had a lot that I wanted to tell everyone, but I couldn’t speak because my mouth was still covered! I could try licking and nibbling but not talking? My hydra had mouths, so if I grew enough snake heads, I’d have a choir on hand. I got the feeling that they’d get cut down by the girls, so I decided against it?

“We cannot possibly inconvenience you any further!”

“We’re telling you that you can’t go, so knock it off!”

Jiggle jiggle?

Lick lick?

“And what the hell is going on with those four?!”

They still wouldn’t let me open my mouth to join the discussion. Those eyes that once held such determination had now glazed over. I had to talk, but their hands were over my mouth, so I tried giving those sexy fingers a lick? Now this is fun!

“Sssss’alllllll right, y’all. Not one of you has suggested letting me talk and instead bludgeoned freedom of speech from teenage boys so hard that you’ve physically blocked my speech and my breathing by oppression and suffocation? I’m choking? Squirmy?”

“The snakes are talking!”

I figured it out! I mean, everyone was staring at the snakes, but I was the one who was talking. If I hadn’t been able to get their fingers off, I probably would’ve developed a freaky ventriloquist skill. While sorcery was par for the course in this world, ventriloquism was something different altogether!

“SSsssno, first I need someone to do something about these hands, or I’ll be unable to breathe in the air around me and oxidize it occidentally. As in, accidentally. As in, I’m suffering from cyanosis from suffocation in this room, which none of you guys are reading? Why are they so bad at covering my eyes but so good at covering my mouth? Couldn’t you have balanced out those skills a bit more? This is an excess level of ability! Squirmy squirm?”

“Okay, well, if you want to make a point, then actually make it! Or…at least try your best?”

The teenage boy had gotten his lines okayed at long last, and I could supposedly talk. I could sense an itty-bitty mix of pity and suspicion, so I finally gave talking a try.

“Ahhhhhh!” I gasped. “Air tastes so good! As in, why don’t we just pinpoint the main chapel of the Church and blow it up? That’s where everyone is gathered?”

“Pinpoint one building? From this far away?”

So ignorant! It was obviously a possibility with enough technique and precision.

“Yeah, like, pin them down until their pins are pointed? If you never give up, you can always pinpoint your dreams, ya know? And stuff?”

We would obviously succeed at some point. It would require a countless number of failed attempts first, but we’d succeed eventually?

“That’s the exact opposite of pinpointing! It’s not pinpointing them if you bomb the whole area in a saturation attack until you manage to hit the right target!”

“Hang on, don’t mistake this for a saturation attack! A full-fledged saturation attack involves way more firepower. This is much more peaceful! Apologize to my friend!”

Shoot enough times and one of them would hit. The only problem was with precise hits. You’d need to fire a countless number of times, leaving devastating damage. If you were lucky, though, you’d hit, and it’d end early. Could I win a prize for that?

“No pinpoint attacks if saturation attacks and carpet-bombings are more peaceful!”

“You’ve somehow twisted a pinpoint attack into the worst possible version of itself!”

“But if we get lucky and hit them on the first try, then it’ll be an easy solution, won’t it?”

“You can’t fool us! That’ll just result in pinpoint addiction where you keep thinking the next one is gonna hit for sure!”

“We already agreed that weapons of mass destruction are off limits. I can’t believe we gave someone who proposed a solution even worse than weapons of mass destruction the right to speak.”

“We won’t be able to hit them on the first try, will we? If we can’t, then the proposal is rejected.”

“Okay, but if we use enough firepower, then we will hit first try ’cause we won’t be able to miss? That’s a guaranteed success?”

“Shut up already! Okay, cover his mouth!”

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

“SssSSsssSss, if we get closer, it’ll increase the odds of successsss, ssso if we get as close as posssssible, we can get the highest possible odds of a possible pinpoint! We can’t miss if we shoot from inside the chapel? Then we’ll be surrounded by it, so it’ll be the easiest possible pin to point of all time. Wiggle?”

“Now his tentacles are joining the conversation!”

“You can’t let those out. They look inappropriate! Put them away!”

The meeting danced in confusion and contusion as screams and glares flared in my direction. If everything was off-limits or impossible, then we’d never find a way out of this meeting. Meetings were supposed to be a place to gather possibilities until the best possible option was discovered! Talking about things that we couldn’t do was a waste of time. Speaking of losing time, I was losing oxygen? My lungs hurt? As a completely normal ordinary human, not having oxygen or air was bad for my health?

DAY 97
LATE NIGHT

There’s nothing I can do about it—in the case of a railcar, a railcar cannon’s name says everything you need to know.

WHITE LOSER INN

WE HAD DINNER AT THE INN. Everyone had finally calmed down. The clerics bowed their heads low in apology.

“Sorry for causing such a fuss,” Arianna-san said. “We haven’t changed our feelings, but we agree that we cannot return without a plan. Please find it in your hearts to forgive us.”

They wore their modest, refined church habits. Beautiful, noble faces peeked out from behind long veils. The problem was that their new, skin-tight habits emphasized every curve of their bodies. And the long slip in their skirts that went all the way to the hip. And then the fishnets on top of that. They sure made a fuss about purity and chastity, but their outfits were incredibly sexy?

“Assisting us doesn’t address our problem, though,” she continued. “We could never bear putting any of you in danger!”

Arianna-san and her companions had calmed down, but they were still too stubborn to change their minds. To be exact, a certain someone threatening to blow up the entire Theocracy had taken them by such surprise that they had no choice but to return to their senses. The sheer degree of Haruka-kun’s nonsense was so nonsensical that it had snapped them out of their own nonsense.

“I mean, I’m about to go over to the Beast Kingdom on an official invitation. After I’m there, I can just go a little further to the Theocracy, bonk the main chapel, and everything is solved? If there’s a time when bonking doesn’t solve the problem, then you just keep bonking until it destroys the problem. Once it’s destroyed, it’s solved? Logically speaking? Well, that’s ignoring the rumor that my logic is suspect, so let’s just say literally speaking!”

The problem was distance and time. The first division of the royal army and half the Imperial Guard would come to the frontier. Kakizaki-kun’s group would also follow us to the Theocracy. The frontier army, the Imperial Guard, and then the first division would be here fighting the monster forest and dungeons. The plan had originally been for the rest of us to go to the Beast Kingdom. Now, we’d continue on to the Theocracy.

Meanwhile, Haruka-kun was intent on going straight to the main chapel and blowing the whole thing up. It was a crazy plan, to say the least, and it wouldn’t yield us any information whatsoever.

“If we dispatch the whole kingdom’s army to the frontier, wouldn’t that leave it defenseless?”

“Oda-kun’s group took out the Merchant Kingdom’s navy, though. They shouldn’t be able to make a move.”

“If Haruka-kun lets Kakizaki-kun and his friends loose in the jungle, they’ll overrun all the armies on the continent.”

“He wants to let them loose and not pick them back up, I reckon.”

So, we either had to prop up the frontier with the armies or buy more time. We could maintain peace via Oda-kun and Kakizaki-kun’s groups' privateering and guerilla warfare with the Second Royal Division guarding Diorelle. Then a small number of us would infiltrate the Theocracy…or more like invade, I guess? I’m sure it would end up being a forceful invasion, with our central corps dictating we crush the enemy to gravel and then pound them into dust!

“Will negotiations work at this point?”

“We’d be fools to assume so. This is the time for war, not chitchat!”

“We’ve got one guy in our own group with nothing but an all-out carpet-bombing on his mind.”

“It sounds like that’s been his plan for the Theocracy all along.”

“Having Arianna-san and the others protect themselves isn’t enough anymore.”

“We can’t bring a mass-murdering god of destruction with us on a mission to protect the people of the Theocracy.”

“Haruka-kun has always been wary of the dangers of the Church. Not the Theocracy. Not the country. The church.”

“Are you implying they have another weapon besides Nefertiri-san?”

It made sense. They needed something with the power to subdue Nefertiri-san, who was probably a former dungeon emperor. It was the only thing that made sense.

“Arianna-san’s group seemed all right, though.”

“Yeah, the drinks knocked them right out. That stuff sure is strong!”

I figured Haruka-kun was a lightweight, given that he’d fallen asleep after five or six drinks, but Arianna-san and the other clerics started wobbling at the first sip. I didn’t know much about alcohol, but maybe that meant he could tolerate it. Meanwhile, Slimey wasn’t affected at all.

Haruka-kun’s group was discussing what to do—who to leave here on the frontier and who to send with us to the Theocracy. Ideally, one of them would stay in the kingdom. He called it the safest plan, but it involved Haruka-kun being alone and defenseless, which was the riskiest plan of all. Angelica-san, Nefertiri-san, and Slimey were all opposed to it and currently arguing with him.

“He worries so much about everyone but himself.”

“Yeah! And puts himself in danger for no good reason!”

“He’s fighting out there on the verge of death every single day. He hasn’t done any reflecting or learning whatsoever!”

“Then it’s settled: lecture time!”

He was scheming to do something dangerous by himself again, so those three were mad at him. They always got mad at him, and he never learned.

“Either way, we’ve got a minimum of three days before we move,” I said. “We’ve got to train ourselves and Arianna-san’s group as much as possible!”

“Roger!”

There wasn’t enough time. What we had to do was simple, though: Defeat as many dungeons as possible to make the frontier safer and lower the risks of deluges. This would also help us level up, get more combat experience, and help us find better equipment.

Our current objective for the clerics was for them to be able to definitively beat the first fifty floors of a dungeon in a single party with instructor supervision. If possible, we wanted them to be able to make it to the 75th floor with two parties. Then, in a total of four parties, they had to be able to defeat a whole dungeon of up to ninety floors. At a minimum, they had to be able to beat a level 80 dungeon king as a team.

We didn’t just lack the appropriate equipment; it was going to be harder to upgrade equipment moving forward. This meant we needed to polish our true strength in order to match our equipment. We didn’t want to be ashamed in front of the beautiful equipment, or Haruka-kun, who had made it for us.

Stalker Girl saw Poster Girl, hugged each other and cried, having seen one another for the first time in a while. Stalker Girl’s clan stayed in the capital gathering information and keeping track of other countries’ movements. Now it was our turn to fight. Haruka-kun kept trying to keep the fight away from us. The reality was that we’d have another war, a battle between humans where people killed each other. The taboo of murder.

“Let’s finish this and come back to a peaceful frontier,” I said. “That’s what we’re fighting for.”

“That’s right!”

We wouldn’t risk our lives. We would only fight with strategies that guaranteed our safety. Absolutely no one would extend themselves beyond their limits or the limits of their equipment. We wouldn’t risk our lives. We’d have an all-out but easy battle, striking away at the stone bridge of the enemy from a safe position until it crumbled away. It was my job as the commander—my responsibility—to see that everyone returned to the frontier smiling. That was all—that was everything.

“I’m not sure if our standard equipment will be enough. Should we get more gear for fighting humans?”

“The church has a lot of offensive magic tools for nullification. We might be better off with our normal stuff.”

“Save the physical attacks for last, right?”

“If status ailment don’t work, then we’ll have no choice.”

“They also have high resistances to magic. Physical attacks are our best bet!”

“The morning stars might be surprisingly effective. They do a good job at breaking through tricks.”

“Good idea! But wielding morning stars while dressed in habits…”

“We’ll need Haruka-kun to dress up as a priest or something, won’t we?”

The girls shuddered. “Ugh. All I can imagine is something demonic.”

There weren’t many adventurers in the Theocracy, so showing up in full gear would stand out. Most people wore the robes of the Church. Each of the many factions had differences in their official attire, some to the point where you could barely recognize that they were holy people. None of them were sexy, though. Were Haruka-kun’s habits really going to work? How would we not be suspect in such suspicious outfits?

“Long-range is the main issue, isn’t it?”

“Taking consecutive attacks is scary without full armor.”

“And using forcefields will deplete MP.”

“We could have some people handle defense.”

“We can’t walk around with shields, though.”

“Not being able to use the carriage inside the Theocracy makes things really tough.”

“I wouldn’t want to ride a horse either. Going on foot is our best bet.”

“This is tough!”

Camouflaging Haruka-kun’s carriage was an option, but that carriage wasn’t really an option, considering carriage designs in the Theocracy. Carriages in the Theocracy were shoddy, built with low-quality materials. Official church carriages were gaudy but rare, so they stood out.

Also, they used normal horses. Haruka-kun’s were straight out of some Victorian steampunk universe on overdrive. They’d give us away instantly.

“We’re dealing with Haruka-kun, after all, so no matter how much serious thought we put into this…”

“Yup. He’ll pull something and claim, ‘I’m not the bad guy?’”

“Exactly! And he’ll just pretend something ridiculous is totally normal.”

“I’m sure he’s mass-producing explosives this very moment.”

“He wanted to blow up the whole damn kingdom in the first place!”

“When we got back to the frontier, he had already connected his carriages and added long-barrel cannons.”

“With the viable range on those things, you can tell that he wasn’t thinking about defense.”

If we left him alone, he’d come up with over-the-top defensive weapons that protected with insta-kill offensive abilities. Sure, it did make us very safe, but it came from his very dangerous “kill before you get killed, ’cause you can’t get killed if you kill? So kill? And stuff?” perspective, which had wiped out the entire horde of monsters in the kingdom from a safe distance. It wasn’t peaceful at all, but it was the habitual crime of a habitual criminal who didn’t have a peaceful bone in his body.

“The kingdom should be fine so long as the Merchant Kingdom’s stuck, right?”

“Well, ‘stuck,’ as in Haruka-kun told Oda-kun’s group to do everything they could to sink their ships and grab whatever fell off them. Are we sure the Merchant Kingdom even exists anymore?”

“Yeah, whatever they did, the Merchant Kingdom was way more horrifying than ordinary pirates.”

“I don’t think pirates would even go so far as to describe stealing loot as ‘grabbing whatever fell off’ the ships.”

“Normally, it’s, ‘Hand over your loot, or we’ll sink your ship!’ Not sink the ship and then grab the stuff later.”

“Didn’t he try to say that it wasn’t actually an act of privateering since they weren’t sailing on an ocean, so he wasn’t the bad guy?”

“He did try that!”

The Merchant Kingdom could only attempt a land invasion with their navy cut off. Unlike ships, though, a land invasion would take a long time. Even if they launched one, we’d have plenty of time to leave and come back before they arrived. Especially given that they’d be up against the kingdom’s impregnable fortresses.

We continued our discussion as we prepared for tomorrow with more serious expressions than usual. We didn’t have much time left to train, so we took preparations seriously, organizing our gear. We would ensure mornings could keep being what they had become—times of fun and laughter. That was the reason we kept getting stronger, after all.

DAY 97
LATE NIGHT

If you can’t murder a mortal enemy, you’ve just got to bury them. So why don’t they get it?

WHITE LOSER INN

THEY WERE PISSED. Miss Armor Rep, Dancer Girl, and even Slimey were super pissed at the idea of going in different groups?

I was great at lewd lasciviousness, but they were livid with viciousness? If they were liable to get lascivious, I’d join right away, but now they were vicious with lividness? Unfortunately?

It would just be excess fighting power. They had too much power to dedicate to defense. Their excessive, explosive fighting force amounted to “BRB, we’re gonna end the world” levels of excessive explosions. No matter how you spun it, a group of three dungeon emperors swung the tide in our direction. Nothing else could exist beyond bonking: the world would get catapulted into a pure state of bonk, where all that was could only be bonked?

On top of that, I didn’t want to bring them into the heart of the Theocracy. If there was something there that could nullify their powers somehow, the enemy could turn the tables on us. If there was even the slightest possibility of them getting controlled by the enemy, sending our fighting force into their trap would be exactly what they hoped for. I didn’t want them anywhere close to that darkness. I just wanted to be close to their bodies!

Finally, they were too powerful to be well-suited to a secret mission. I didn’t think they could just sneakily dig tunnels. Unlike yours truly?

“I can just sneak over to the grand chapel and do some devious whacking and bonking. Then, I’ll pick up the rest and bring it back big-bucks-billionaire style. Everything will be totally, for sure, completely fine? Since the girls will become a decoy, isolated in the heart of the enemy, they’re the ones who need some protection? I’m just thinking about the safe strat of sneaking into the Theocracy for some demolition work—a sixteen-year-old setting off to find himself for a free ride! If I’m gonna get the chance to meet God, then I’ll happily cut him down in the process?”

The king’s castle was protected by intensive magical security. Given that I’d made my way into there without anyone besides the lolly-lickin’ old dude noticing, it was clear that I had the best sneaking prowess, far and away. It had nothing to do with my grand sneaking up behind countless goblins in the forest to whack them to death? Just looking at my stats and recognizing that I was a stealth-specialized, high-speed, closer-range mage would show you that I’d be fine in this position. Er…but seriously, what are my stats telling me to do?

“It just doesn’t make sense to tell all four people with the most forceful, furious, destructive forces to do a stealth mission. You’d crush the main chapel to dust with all four of us working on the demolition! There’s nothing inconspicuous about that?”

Wiggle wiggle.

The worst possible thing we could do was spread ourselves too thin and find ourselves unable to achieve our main objective. Yet, something felt wrong about sending our strongest weapons in on a stealth mission. Getting discovered midway through couldn’t matter less. Spies that would get their jobs done more efficiently by charging in head-on defeated the entire point of hiding, sneaking, and concealing their presence.

“You cannot. Go alone. Absolutely. Not.”

“Agreed. If there’s danger. We go together.”

Boink boink!

The whole point was to do it myself so that it wouldn’t be dangerous, but they didn’t get that. A sneaky annihilation of the main chapel, a stealthy explosion, and a steadfast goods pick-up was a guaranteed success, but they were mad at me. I had to find out some way to make that clear to them.

“Look, it’s literally just hoppin’ over, killing, picking up, and burning? It’s an Old Enough! ‘My First Chore’ level of a three-step simple (genocide) task! Ya know?”

They responded with glares. A fine retort, on their part, but I needed to convince them. Like, I didn’t need them to applaud my idea like I won Jeopardy! or something, but I think my explanations jeopardized my strategy. I saw some spiked balls being readied, so clearly, we weren’t done discussing things yet.

While we talked, I made progress at my side-jobs. I had found better stuff, but I hadn’t upgraded it with mithril yet. I was now working on those upgrades—boosted power and survivability to get us past our worries. I ought to have gone looking for more mithril, but the battle wouldn’t wait any longer. Bonking never did seem to wait, even when I asked it to. I had no choice but to take battle more seriously than training, even though training was far crueler.

I was still in the middle of explaining while I focused on my latest innovation—an ear cuff!

“This also points to the possibility of earrings,” I said. “I’m pretty sure piercings weren’t allowed at school, but there haven’t been any uniform inspections lately? The girls’ uniforms have been ransacked and ravaged to the point of lewd, nude rapacity, so why can’t I get any cute lewd, nude teachers to discipline me around here? I’m ripe for punishment, but there’s no one to do the deed. I thought there was someone in charge, but maybe it was just my imagination?”

I decided to make the ear cuff give a boost to Sensing. I wish I could’ve imbued it with Area Analyze, but that was impossible, apparently? I think it would just hurt everyone’s head if they tried it anyway. I had heard about skull-splitting pain, but brain-splitting pain was a whole new bane of existence I had never considered before. It seriously hurt! The skill was useful, but I couldn’t recommend that others use it.

I assumed that Elf Girl’s Emotion Sensing skill would be useful, but apparently, it involved picking up subconscious feelings and desires from everyone around you. That didn’t seem well-suited to teenage girls, so I scrapped that idea. Especially given that the whole damn group was afflicted with all 108 earthly desires (and a few more to boot). Just activating that skill was bound to be way too noisy. Being a teenager sure is rough.

“I’ll imbue it with Mobility Perception, Presence Sensing, and Enemy Tracking,” I decided. “Oh, and if we’re worried about traps, then Trap Sensing…Dang, a triple-spellstone ear cuff is way too big! This’ll pull your earlobes straight down to the floor! No pimpin’ earlobes for a pimpin’ king! No way! The girls will yell at me if I don’t shrink this! Sheesh.”

Nod nod!

I also wanted to craft a supplemental weapon, like a parrying dagger. My understanding of the G*ndam funnels’ Automatic Defense was advancing, and I had finally reached the point where I might be able to recreate them. Their value would be way above what the market could afford, so I hadn’t bothered. Still, if my classmates were going to be fighting for their lives, it would be better to sell at a loss. I needed to use a lot of high-grade spellstones, but I found tons of those in the dungeons. For free, too.

I immersed myself, reaching the pinnacle of concentration…and ran out of MP. That complete drain came with a side of licking from two gorgeous babes! I had even tried saving MP for tonight and kept my equipment on and everything. Somewhere along the way, the two of them had changed into lingerie. They closed in on me from both sides. Technically, they had clothes on, but more than half of their skin was bare. They closed in with a full-press attack! In the blink of an eye, they pulled away my item bag; in an instant, they stole my restoration mushrooms and had me locked in by my arms in complete submission. They jeered at me with nasty (sexy) smiles as I gasped for air, still dizzy from my drained MP as I watched their sexy bodies.

On my right was Dancer Girl, who wore good nightwear but didn’t look remotely ready to say good night. She wore a see-through, mesh, sleeveless, halter-neck, long-skirt cheongsam nightgown. It had a lot of fabric that basically contradicted its very purpose in wonderful hypocrisy through a revelation of so much revealing by revealing so much in a black, bare-skin-showing, see-through, cheongsam nightgown!

On my other side, the nightwear came in the form of the busty corset-boosted power of a lace-up bustier top. It raised various questions, as the lace-up contained much more surface area than the rest of the top combined, lacing up my questions with a see-through side and unlacing them with a completely exposed underwear-denying-and-boycotting garter belt and stockings! The only non-see-through parts were the lace underwear and a bikini that covered so little that their translucency hardly mattered as it was translating into a low-rise lowering of skin-exposure to completely expose one fearsome babe!

Even MP wouldn’t have been able to protect me from this. I had Wisdom, which divided my thinking into countless channels to raise hypothetical possibilities at unbelievable rates. Even with such powers at my disposal, these outfits threw out all Wisdom and disassembled all intelligence. My consciousness—capable of weaving together complex calculations and bearing the burdens of brutal skills. One long, hard look at these two froze all of them into statues! These traps could captivate all Wisdom’s processing at once. A single pause in High-Speed Thinking could prove fatal. That’s what was happening right now?

Their curves and tight waists were works of art. Graceful, round curves tightening and bursting into big bubbly butts, beguiling shadows falling over thick amber thighs as they came to pin me down!

Beautiful, graceful bodies straddled me from the left and right. Long, alluring legs of white and amber tangled across me, trapping me while showing off every inch of their surfaces. Hang on, an arm lock?!

A voluptuous view expanded in Wisdom Eye like a kaleidoscope. It was sexy! I was entranced and electrified by every view, every angle. I abandoned thinking and fell into the thousands of frames, the millions of images that sensually melted my brain into nothing. As my consciousness was captivated, the forceful stimulations that stormed my brain began to stir. These weren’t just images—this firepower was physical, too! I was witness to the true dungeon emperors’ might!

As the seductiveness of bare skin and sexiness of seeing skin through see-through mesh overcame me, shocking jolts of sensory pleasure from beautiful, pale fingers and soft, charming lips scorched my nerves. The soft sensations of fingers, legs, and faces slipping across my body consumed me, teenage-boying the teenage-boyed teenage boy in his teenage-boyness in complete, merciless domination!

They spoke of the ancient Tower of Babel, toppled by God in his wrath. The teenage boy who now aimed to tower to the tops of heaven, prod by God’s rod manifested as magnificent muses maintaining an endless overkill with Healing and Recovery. To put it simply: They were doing the exact same thing to me that I did to them every single night!

Then the teenage boy awoke to the fleeting sadness of the night’s end. They’d drained me dry…I really couldn’t get out of that arm lock?

DAY 98
MORNING

I’m just a teenage boy, so I can’t help going out in the heavy rain and catching a cold.

WHITE LOSER INN

DELIGHTFUL SMILES WITH plenty of sneering smirks and giggly grins, all morning long. Their smiles shined on me like the rising sun itself. They couldn’t stop cackling about how total their victory was!

“Good mooorning!”

Their long, slender legs were beautiful to behold. Their cute little feet, thin ankles, and lovely curves of their calves folded across thick, plump throbbing overflowing thighs.

There was no sight more supreme. What I was beholding was higher than the highest heights of undreamed dreams that no teenage boy had ever dreamed of. I woke to smirks on their lovely lips. Glowing light beamed out of their bright, peeping eyes—all of which shoved my defeat in my face.

Rain sprinkled outside for the first time in a while. I didn’t have the energy to attempt my revenge while focusing on raincoat production. I didn’t have enough MP because of how hard I resisted last night, so I mass-produced my raincoats as I gobbled down MP restoration mushrooms. At some point, I heard a two-piece harmony of “Singin’ in the Rain” from behind me… Just how good are your moods, anyway?!

They said revenge tasted sweet. I was dying to get a renewed taste of reviewed revenge revealed in recreated respiration, revelation, inspiration, and desperation. In the context of MP and inn fees, side-jobs were my only choice, though?

“Good morning! It’s raincoat sales time! In all colors, too. As in multicolored? The free ones are for the orphans, not you guys. Tiny Tanuki, cut out the cheering and pony up the cash! Revel in the glory in contributing to my riches! And stuff?”

“Ooh, they’re so cute! I’ll buy one!”

“No umbrellas? What about rainboots?”

Their equipment was already water-resistant and water-repellant. It kept out the rain, but it was also important to not feel like you were getting wet in the rain. Did they really want to make the effort to change into galoshes, though? The cloaks and boots they owned were waterproof?

I made bank. Not before getting trampled in a JK stampede, but I survived. I couldn’t avoid the orphan launcher either and spent the whole morning getting squished and buried. So heavy!

“I could make umbrellas, but that’ll take time and effort, so they’ll be expensive? All of your clothes are already water-resistant and water-repellant. You really don’t need umbrellas…I guess you have all this stuff ’cause you want it, though, not because you actually need it? The greed embodied by high school girls is a mystery that I’ve yet to unravel, although talking about your bodies feels kinda sexual? We wouldn’t want to file a police report because of physical forms indulging in sexual forms? That’d be bad?”

“We’re not indulging in sexual forms!”

“We’re still maidens, you know!”

“Well, putting aside the problem of horny physical forms, did you decide on the formations for today? We’ll adjust based on what you guys decided? We can split into four groups, two groups, or all go together. Oh, are Merimeri and Royal Girl joining? That’s a lot of you?”

We talked about plans for the day while I made breakfast. They wanted to go to the bottom floors of a dungeon, but plans regarding the Theocracy had also changed. I didn’t know what the plan was. Within one week, at most, the First Royal Division’s macho chicks and half the Imperial Guard would be coming to the frontier. Meanwhile, we’d set off to embark to the Beast Kingdom to visit, view, present, and purview the fluffiness of the beastfolk. Then we’d burn down the Church. But first, fluffiness!

The meatheads would probably come along with the macho chicks. We’d probably see the nerds nerding somewhere over in the Beast Kingdom, too.

Royal Girl would serve as representative of the pimpin’ king, so we just had to bring Mr. Meridad with us. The girls would go with Sister Girl’s squad. Basically, we’d all be traveling together.

Still, the most dangerous part of any fantasy world was the frontier. Right where we were. So why did we have all these errands in other places? The final challenge would normally be to come here, wouldn’t it?

“Don’t call us horny! We’re pure and innocent!”

“Frankfurters! But where’s the mustard?”

“Slurp, munch munch…Uh, what were we talking about? How we’re splitting up for the day?”

“Yummm! It’s, like, sooo tasty!”

You could hang up a mosaic of this morning’s vigorous breakfast: girls gobbling up fat frankfurters as they licked their lips.

“Wefght should trainmp as a groump, but fightchning alonegh is also importanmpf.”

“Donffp knowmp how many dayshmp we haf lefmpt, so harffd to saygh.”

“Don’t talk while you’re chewing! This is becoming a lewd scene. Drool’s hanging out of your mouth while you wolf down sausages!”

No more sausages. It was getting difficult to stay in the room! Especially with the way they glanced over at me as they gobbled!

“Frankfurters are already becoming a famous product of the frontier. Except that they’re named after Frankfort. Is that really okay? I suppose this place doesn’t have a name anyhow, so we could just name the frontier Frankfort, if necessary. That would then become the surname of the duke’s family, though, which would be a problematic problem since Merimeri Frankfort and Murimuri Frankfort just sound like we were mocking poor Frankfort?”

Wiggle wiggle?

I guess it wasn’t a problem since Merimeri was merrily chowing down too. Don’t forget the bread and salad, though.

“It’s so good! I could have more!”

“Isn’t it?”

“But now we’re back to the tight compression shorts mornings, aren’t we? They’re multicolor, so please stick to the darker colors. Got it? I’ve made them so they aren’t transparent, but since I’ve kept them as tight as possible for magic power circulation, they really reveal the shadows and bumps in revelatory vividness, which is just asking for problems. We’re at risk of thick, thot thigh pinching, so please don’t go outside like that? That’ll just cause problems, se(ductive)vere problems?”

“Of course we’re not going out like this! Leave us alone.”

I lined up the ear cuffs and mithril-upgraded equipment I had worked on last night for sale, all the while reveling in the renewed revelation that tight compression shorts were among my mangiest dangers. Getting swept away in a deluge of tight compression shorts pinching and pressing tightly against me was exhausting. I wanted to head off to a dungeon to rest both body and soul. A dungeon was the only place where I could really relax!

“My mouf is full…Ack, juice is gonna leak everywhere!”

“Eep! It’s so hot inside!”

On the other side of the room, Poster Girl and Stalker Girl laughed and giggled as they gorged on frankfurters. Slimey jiggled—the only wholesome sight in the whole room. Please don’t imitate the older girls’ way of eating those sausages, got it?

After that, my true trials and tribulations began: the girls put on their armor. They chattered away as they pulled on their boots and grieves. There were different parts for the legs, knees, and ankles, all arranged in flexible, mobile pieces. It wasn’t as simple as putting on an outfit. They slowly equipped themselves with each piece. It was surprisingly difficult and involved much benching and stooping. They were bending over in those super-tight compression shorts, sticking out their butts for a bare confrontation, exposing a poor, already brutalized teenage boy to the frightening tightness of elastic compression shorts. Yeah, it was hot?

“The whole point of the material was to be elastic and as skin-tight as possible, so they are sticking to the skin exactly as their job description entails. Conforming right to the flesh, exposing shadows and unevenness in their super-tight, skin-squeezing elastic fantasticity…Stop bending over with your butts in my direction?”

Shake shake!

Since their butts had gotten so perky, bending over revealed way too much yummy-yummy that should not be seen! Was that shaking a response to me? Their strong, healthy muscles shook in unwholesome, unhealthy, elastic jerks. The room was awash with jiggling. The off-white was rough. Even light-grey was shockingly destructive. Now that I thought about it, the girls had stuck to black when the nerds were still around?

When it was time for the breastplates, they had to raise their arms and hands up to get them on…a movement that nearly shot their breasts out of low-cut halter tops. The ensuing wave of bouncing jiggles nearly brought down the protective covers. I felt like I already needed to go home for the day, and it was first thing in the morning.

It kept raining outside. Wetness sounded appealing to me, but the only wetness available was the gloomy rain outside.

“Prolonged wetness is a guaranteed trick to get the high school boys of the world to rush outside and catch colds. That’ll happen again and again.”

Graduating high school might be tough if it happened too often.

“Meanie-meanie, girly-girly, crazy-crazy? When it gets rainy, the meanies get crazy, so whoever controls them will girl the world meanly and supremely? It’s rainy?”

“What does the rain have to do with world domination?! And how does that have anything to do with us?!”

“We’re not acting out because of the rain! And for the millionth time, we’re not mean!”

The mean girls howled at the rain. You’d think they were summoning a companion!

“This is the first time it’s rained for a full morning. Is it rainy season or something?”

“I do recall that it rained several times when we were in the dungeon. The road was wet when we were walking home.”

“It also rains at night sometimes. Maybe we were just lucky.”

“Yeah, I’d rather it be sunny out.”

“Raining does impede visibility. We don’t need this world to get even more dangerous.”

“But look at those ponchos. They’re adorbs!”

“The orphans are so cute in their little ponchos!”

“Those little sweethearts!”

“Lord Haruka, thank you for providing us with this protective rain gear.”

“Think about how cute it’d be if we all had parasols, though.”

“Now that’s a good idea!”

“Parasols made by Haruka-kun sound like they’d be overly powerful.”

“They’d probably have blades in them.”

“Or cannons!”

“Blech. Maybe they’d be spinning cutter umbrellas.”

“I didn’t want to have to picture that!”

Everyone was having a good time despite the rain. Three girls were noisy enough. Thirty was nothing short of a clamor. They had no intention of listening to the sounds of rain with all their chatter and clamor as we made our way to the dungeon. I mean, they were teenage girls. They should’ve been able to shout and giggle away without going to a bloody battlefield. Nevertheless, the fight was about to begin.

“Ready your shields and spears. Archers—fire!”

“Roger!”

They disciplined the clerics, keeping their berserker modes in check. They weren’t on their way to being meatheads anymore—these were tight battle formation instructions straight from Instructor Class Rep.

“Split into groups of three, then search and destroy!”

“Roger! Go! Going! Gone! And still going!”

They split into teams of three—two classmates and one cleric—and went after the monsters. They intentionally didn’t defeat the monsters in a group battle, instead choosing to focus on giving the clerics experience fighting alone. It was a sharp decision, adapting to our needs in the moment. Since when did being the president of student council involve such grave responsibility?

The three bonk council members kept watch over the fight. I wasn’t allowed to interfere, so I played the card game trump and speed out of boredom. Speed’s speed was too speedy, and the game ended in less than a second!

Even though I put in four decks of cards—and even though I wanted to pop into the battle for less than a second—I hadn’t thought it would go that fast. Guess I had to play old maid instead?

“No one is taking any cards because they don’t want to risk being an old maid?! This won’t go anywhere!”

The battle unfolded once again in spectacular fashion. Yes! Rise, my millionaire might! We started on the first floor so Sister Girls’ group could get some training and time with their new equipment. It was gonna be a while before I got to do anything?

DAY 98
NOON

Is sixteen an appropriate age to raise a rebellion against the church of the seventeen-year-olds?

DUNGEON

THE GIRLS HAD NEW EQUIPMENT, so they sent the monsters flying as they fought, each getting used to their new gear. Their levels had changed a little, but getting used to armor depended on the person. As for the feel of my weapon, it was 100 percent tree branch. It looked like a tree branch, and it felt like a tree branch. Compared to the twinkling flashes of platinum swords and armor, I felt a bit lacking in the visual department?

“Scatter and evade!” called Class Rep. “Draw the enemy into the center!”

“Yes ma’am!”

Sister Girls’ clerics followed Class Rep’s commands to the letter, giving their all on the front lines of the battlefield. The priests were mostly defensive specialists. This world sure is hard on us guys.

Swords and spears that flamed with fury skewered the wall of monsters. After all the rain today, we dealt with a flood—a flood of blood that drenched the floor in repulsive beauty…Or was I just enchanted by the beautiful girls’ joyful shouts about slaughter and the even more beautiful profits?

“Raise your weapons and chaaaarge!”

“Roger!”

“Crush them! Run them down! Slaughter them mercilessly till not a single one is left alive!”

“Search and destroy mission, go!”

The heavily armored maidens stampeded across the room.

“This brings a whole new meaning to the phrase ‘women’s work,’” I said. “I see the need for assertive women in society, but bloodthirsty, murderous women in the workplace seems potentially problematic?”

They were bursting with power, but this much power might destroy whatever femininity they had left. They seemed more interested in combat than commitment?

“Yikes! That’ll leave them soaked in bug juice, right?”

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

Jiggle jiggle.

The poor girls were weak against bug type monsters. They won without any physical damage, just considerable psychological trauma. They were drenched in sticky white goop, slimy bug guts clinging to their bodies… Look at this outbreak of mean girls with dead eyes! The five of them charged in so fast that they got completely soaked in the sticky white fluid.

After the fight, I washed them off with water magic and bubbly soap. Then, I supplied warm water with water magic as well as hot air with heat magic and wind magic to clean and dry their hair. They were completely silent and red-faced the whole time. The fight must’ve been traumatic? Because I couldn’t use tentacles, I had to brush each one’s hair one at a time. They wouldn’t stop trembling, so I guess the damage hit deeper than expected.

They cleared through the upper floors with ease, using high-speed movement and emphasizing evasion. They improved their ability to fight without taking hits, then focused on long-range attacks and battles on the mid-floors. The deeper they got, the less leeway they had in close combat, making defensive formations and coordinated attacks indispensable. Ailment resistances became a matter of life or death. Hmm. Maybe battle dresses are the only option.

My classmates all had unique cheat skills. Each had a completely different role in a group battle, but they were flexible, able to swap positions to respond to different opponents. They gained their power precisely by knowing each other so well. It made sense that Sister Girls’ group couldn’t match up that for the time being. Plus, Royal Girl and Merimeri spent so much time with us that they also were a part of the squad.

“Nudist Girl’s sword is something to watch, but Fish Girl… Wow, that’s plain ridiculous.”

That swordplay was 100 percent Miss Armor Rep’s. They didn’t execute it on anything close to her level, but their technique was the same kind of efficient, logical sword fighting.

“They worked hard. This whole time. So hard,” said Miss Armor Rep.

Rattle rattle.

Jiggle jiggle.

They hadn’t gotten anywhere close to her level, but their initial strike and downswing closely resembled Miss Armor Rep’s gorgeous style. Not to mention her way of adding and restraining power. Their breathing, judgment, and technical skill were still far off. Even if you could only call it an imitation, they were beginning to understand the logic of swordplay.

“Gymnastics Girl. Not far behind,” said Dancer Girl. “She is killing. Soundly. In a melee. Top kill count. Is hers.”

Nod nod.

Wiggle wiggle.

Here, phantasmagoric, kaleidoscopic shifting. Simply dancing into the fiends, sweeping through them in a swirl. Gymnastics Girl was starting to apply Dancer Girl’s techniques. They were imitations, but even the pale ghost of the dance allowed her to evade the attacks of the mid-floor monsters. She also added in acrobatic maneuvers from gymnastics in a combination of unpredictable, free-wheeling movements. Use of centrifugal force was her offense; speed and technique transcended any lack in defenses.

“Is this a Febreze-sponsored dungeon?!”

“Why would your stupid nickname for me infect the dungeon?! Of all the things to call me! There might even be fairies here, so why not something like Fairy Dancer? Shut it with the Febreze! People are gonna think I smell bad or something!”

She was against it? I guess calling stuff Febreze reminded her too much of life back on Earth. Ah, those gentle, ordinary days back when everyone called her Febreze-san.

“No one called me that! How did you come to think that the whole world knew me as that or something? You’re giving me a dumb nickname on purpose! Don’t turn it into something nostalgic!”

I didn’t know if this was a difficult age for her or what, but it looked like the sixteen-year-olds were feeling rebellious against the leadership of this seventeen-year-old.

“All right, let’s keep up the pace.”

“The 80th floor will have a boss. If it looks like it’s gonna take you guys a while, I might intervene,” I said. “I’d really like to finish things today. I’m so bored!”

“Here we go.”

The floors in the 70s took ages, but I supposed that was because the monsters were giant hornworms. Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl didn’t even participate. The mean girls, who were right behind the charging sister squad, got soaked in bug guts. I needed to take a bunch of time washing their hair and stuff.

“Scatter! Don’t pause! Keep moving! Shield users, stay close!”

Yeah, this one looked like it would also take ages. Wielding big shields made it difficult to stop short, but this enemy looked pretty fast for a mobility-based battle. It also had Magic Reflection, making it hard to attack from a distance—a level 80 Hell Tiger. It was an agile, vicious carnivorous attacker, moving quietly, disguising its presence. It had long, glittering golden fur with black stripes on its massive frame.

“Yaah! As in aaaaaaah!”

A giant tiger sprang silently through the air, rending the air in a brutal blow with sharp claws. This fiend had perfected the art of hunting, with all its movements working toward predation. Humans couldn’t compare to this overwhelming speed and force. The girls were slow and clumsy in comparison.

“Mobilize defenses! Aim for the legs!”

“Roger!”

Stopping the movement of wild beasts was key in order to stand a chance against them. The girls planned to overwhelm it with numbers, letting the injuries add up. If they couldn’t coordinate their movements, the tiger could hunt them down one by one. It was damn difficult to seamlessly coordinate rapid-fire movements for that long.

“Its fur is like metal! My sword just bounced off it!”

“Don’t slash! Stab or bludgeon!”

“Roger!”

The strategy was fine on the surface, but it was reckless to try to attack the legs of a beast this agile. Slashing created a wide surface area of damage; stabbing attacked a single point. They had the numbers to keep up with the tiger but didn’t have the speed to land a hit.

No one pulled out their trump cards. The amount of effort required put a real drain on MP in addition to their stamina. Ultimate attacks would break them apart.

The tiger roared in agony as a sword cut through its flesh. Fish Girl separated from the group and pulled it in. Then, Nudist Girl came flying in with a slash at just the right moment, swapping positions with Fish Girl, who landed a hit, slashing through the thin fur on the tiger’s belly. The beast recoiled straight into a fierce blow from Gymnastic Girl’s club. She smacked it the moment it landed, rendering it unable to counterattack.

Graaaaaaagh!

The tiger’s agonized bellows resounded as it swiped with its claws. They clanged off the large shields held up by the volleyball team duo, who drove their spears into it straight after. A wounded animal was frightening, but not as frightening as teenage girls! They’d hunt down tigers, monsters, or even old dudes all for some pocket change—the ultimate predators! Human beings stood at the top of the food chain, and teenage girls were at the very pinnacle of that. Of course, a mere tiger was going to get its fur and skin torn off, its spellstones removed, and its claws and fangs turned into accessories?

“Don’t ruin our reputation with your weird narration!” the girls shouted.

A moment of discomfort, recoiling. The Mean Girls targeted that gap with their spears. They aimed for the eyes and throat, driving in the pikes, creating a fresh blind spot to target its legs and finally crush the beasts’ mobility.

The tiger was a predator through and through. But the mean girls…They bite! A big ole cat couldn’t prey on the fearsome beasts that bit kobold heads! That was clearer than day could ever be, so clear you could see straight through to tomorrow!

“We don’t bite, for heaven’s sake!” they shouted.

“And we’re not mean!”

The relentless arrows and distracting magic fired by the arts girls irritated the tiger, slowing it down. Tiny Tanuki flew in with her axe held high; Vice Rep A unleashed a storm with her septuple swords. The tiger trembled, head shaking as the smashing of an enormous hammer into the floor made the whole room quake and two round objects wobble. Two massive masses trembled and tremored across the room as vibrating weapons. Vice Rep B’s boo—I mean hammer—smashed and crashed!

“Come on, guys! I said hammer!” I protested. “That’s literally what I said! It’s not my fault they were jiggling so much! I mean, I was just reflecting on the incredible effort required to restrain such shaking masses from my bra-making days! That was a heroic tale of overtime labor? I was observing just to confirm the efficacy of my efforts. I’m not the bad guy… Huh? I was pumping my fist? That was just in support, you know? Showing my appreciation and congratulation, not my stimulation. Enough with the false accusations of a completely innocent falsely accused teenage boy, please?”

“Yep, he’s guilty!”

Today was a rare rainy day. After we escaped the rain in the dungeon, I got showered by a rain of glares. Another glarey day out, isn’t it?

DAY 98
AFTERNOON

The navy is so far removed from naivety that it can’t even be called a collection of ships.

DUNGEON
81ST FLOOR

WHAT WAS SO WRONG ABOUT finding a way to kill time in a dungeon? Roll roll.

“I’m soooo bored.”

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

Jiggle jiggle.

I mean, I had nothing to do.

“Right flank, advance and surround the enemy!”

“Roger!”

“Line up your shields! Now push!”

“Roger!”

“Bring out your bows! Target the center!”

“R-right away!”

“Ready for a charge to BEEP the BEEP out of those BEEPers!”

“Yes, ma’am!”

“We’ve encircled the enemy!”

“The center can no longer move.”

“Rear guard, rapid-fire! Overwhelm them!”

“All combat units ready. Crush them!”

“Roger!”

Clang clang!

Roll roll?

The little doggos whimpered until even those were crushed.

“Split up and gather the spellstones. Medics, attend to any injured.”

“There are a lot of good spellstones here. You really can get rich on the low floors.”

“Picking them up takes a long time, though, so I don’t know if the opportunity cost is worth it.”

“We’d normally also have to worry about wear and tear on our weapons, but ours don’t break! This is even more profitable!”

“Without any scratches to our armor, we’re only dealing with the cost of new arrows.”

“Yup, we need to make a lot to afford what this new gear cost!”

Roll roll?

More expensive equipment required a big up-front cost, but they made up for that by lasting longer. They had better cost performance and didn’t require as much upkeep, either. Above all else, weapons that didn’t break were lifesaving. So basically, me ripping them off was a good thing!

“Everyone, gather round. Let’s get this meeting over with.”

“Okay!”

“Any problems?”

“Was it necessary for the rear guard to stay so distant?”

“Yeah, that applied pressure.”

“I liked how the arrows distracted the enemy. It made charging in a lot easier.”

“It’s also a lot easier to retreat with two full units.”

“Yeah, we had more than enough with Arianna-san’s group in the fold.”

“It was better for the right flank to break through and then take the rear, right?”

“Yeah, we don’t want anyone to get isolated.”

“Maybe more cross fire than pincer attack there?”

“Aren’t those the same thing but with swords?”

“I think it’s actually easier to corner the foe with a partial encirclement.”

“I agree.”

“Anything else?”

Roll roll?

“Ohhh… Shield Trigger!”

“Actually,” the girls shouted in my direction, “the board game party that’s going on over there is distracting!”

“Yeah, no kidding!”

“I wasn’t expecting them to do more triggering than our own shield triggering!”

“What kind of game has this many bishops?!”

“I also happened to notice the use of certain words from our bishops during the fight.”

“I always utilized cross fire tactics in board games anyhow.”

“What do you mean ‘jump?!’ Like a knight in chess?!”

“Activating mass traps? What kind of board game is this?!”

“I don’t understand how your bored game board game is so distracting, but you need to stop!”

What else was there for us to do? Teenage girls had something against board games for whatever reason. Our bored game battle was a battle against time itself, wielding the dice in every which way, confronting free time, engaging it, betraying it with every strategy we could employ. Yet the girls had some sorta problem with that.

“Vanguard, deploy. Force them back!”

“Roger!”

“A fifth of the enemy is now paralyzed.”

“Arianna-san, take the left!”

“Right away!”

“The center is wide open!”

“Stand back! Stand back!”

“Some of the squares had land mines! Crap!”

Roll roll.

“Damn. My piece. Lost over half its HP!”

Jiggle jiggle.

“My turn. Now! I’ll turn. The tables!”

“Oh no, I didn’t expect Miss Armor Rep to get this far with that attack and stuff!”

“Ah! Activated. Trap tile. ‘Go to tile G74.’ Oh no! That’s awful!”

Wiggle wiggle!

“That path. Sealed. Way around. Too far. No choice but to fight. A life or death fight, as usual!”

Boink boink!

“That’s what you call an attack from behind. I love doing it from behind! I’m darn good at it!”

“Crap. Pinned down. Where’s the jump tile?”

“Slimey, you betrayed me! How could you?!”

Jiggle jiggle jiggle!

“Not. Again. A pitfall…all the way. To K40.”

“That’s right! Take that! Skip six tiles! I’m. Flying!”

“Damn!”

Jiggle!

“Stop playing! It’s too distracting!” shouted the girls.

“Oho, so you’ve taken an interest in our little game?” I inquired. “And stuff?”

“Listening to you guys makes it sound super fun!”

“How can a board game be more interesting than fighting in an actual dungeon?!”

They were mad at me? The game was just getting good, but the fight had ended. I escaped after Dancer Girl and Slimey had cut me off and had managed to interfere with Miss Armor Rep’s progression, but time was up. I couldn’t let Dancer Girl free, though, or she’d get away. Slimey’s intentions were impossible to read with his master poker face. He’s as round as ever!

The girls were getting upset, but we had nothing else to do. As Nietzsche said, “Against boredom, even gods struggle in vain.” Boredom was an eternal challenge. Probs? I didn’t get a chance to fight, so I was so bored! I wished I could go bonk the old god dude right about now, but he wasn’t here, so we’d started playing board games. My turn was next. I really wanted to keep playing?

If we didn’t hurry up our game and finish it, the girls would finish the dungeon. I was guessing this one ended in the late 80s. If this dungeon went into the 90s, then there would’ve been something to wear us out psychologically. I didn’t sense anything like that, though.

“I can just about tell from the layout and make of the dungeon anyhow,” I said.

If this dungeon did go into the 90s, then there would’ve been more of a jump in difficulty with the lower floor monsters. The 100-floor Ultimate Dungeon was on a different level altogether. I experienced the next-level wonders of that dungeon every night, with gratitude.

“Well, they’re getting stronger, right? I can tell from their training sessions, too. I guess they are level 100+ ultimate fighters, but when I call them biters, they get mad at me? All glarey-eyed?”

“They are working. So hard. To get. Stronger. With all their hearts.”

“They get stronger. Because of those feelings. Their will. So powerful.”

Boink boink.

“It sounds like you’re praising them, but I wouldn’t be able to tell based on how badly you beat the crap out of them when you train with them. No matter how strong they get are, they always going to be a pile of Xs-for-eyes?”

Oh, now you look the other way and start whistling! A three-part whistle harmony, too! The triumphant libretto from Aida! It kind of suited Dancer Girl but using a triumphant march song to indicate sneakiness just didn’t feel right! It was like they were boasting and had no regrets for their actions. In fact, they seemed to be proud of themselves!

“Why is background music suddenly starting in the middle of the battle?! We started the charge ages ago!”

The girls were trying to match their movements to the triumphant music. Their fighting was glorious, but their eyes were glarious? Even the clerics harmonized with some glares!

“Yeah, cut it out!”

“Why are your snakes becoming trumpets? You’re starting a full orchestra!”

“Seriously, this is ridiculous!”

“Nefertiri-san broke out into classic ballet. The monsters spectated before breaking out in thunderous applause!”

“That made it so much harder to kill them!”

The clapping continued with a teary-eyed standing ovation as the cheering level 81 war wolves got cut to pieces. Merciless! Well, I’m sure it wasn’t because they were impressed by the opera, but rather because they were excited by the alluring, seductive, bare-skin revealing, sensory, seductive, bouncing body of Dancer Girl. I totally got it, because I nearly got cut to pieces myself! That was scary!

“You see, the opera Aida depicts the tragic love of a man and woman who were torn between Egypt and Ethiopia in the age of the pharaohs. The triumphant march comes in act two after Radamès’ victorious battle! He returns to Egyptian trumpets, or ‘Aida trumpets,’ joining with the mixed chorus in a climactic number. This battle was also getting exciting, so my snakes really tried their best?”

“We were trying to corner the enemy but when we heard that we burst out charging!”

They were mad?

“Ready your shields, defense formations…Huh?”

“Nope, that’s no good! You modeled your mode after the wrong rung, so regret it!”

This was the problem with the lower floors. When the girls retreated, we needed to quickly clean up our board game to take on the level 82 Quake Kongs.

“Hang on. ‘Kong,’ originates from the giant beast in the movie King Kong. Because of the movie’s influence, ‘kong’ was mistakenly assumed to mean ‘gorilla’ or ‘ape.’ This made it all the way to Japanese game-makers, who ended up making a ‘donkey’ kong. And now it’s ended up in this fantasy world? How?!”

A loud sound rung out. The floor quaked, cracking and rending apart. Our footing was thrown off. This was the result of the quake kongs’ devasting Quake skill. It was this type of skill that made the lower floors so frightening. If the girls so much as paused, they could completely lose their footing and be overrun by the rampaging gorillas. They’d probably still win in the end, but they’d risk their lives in the process. Going head-to-head in fistfights against gorillas didn’t seem particularly good for their innocent-young-woman reputation either, so we swapped spots with them?

When we dodged their attacks, they unleashed their skill Bellow, making the air shake. Gorillas specialized in quake attacks. Bellow likely induced paralysis or ailments that disrupted balance with the irregular vibrations. It was a nasty technique that caused physical ailments that were harder to resist than magic-induced ones. If you couldn’t nullify the attack with a snap-judgment, it was dangerous.

I hit the quake kongs with my own waves of vibration, sending them flying. I mean, teenage boys could never lose in battles of vibrations, especially late at night or in bedrooms. I’ve induced plenty of quaking in my day! Quake was wasted on monkeys. Yup, it really drained MP.

“Fighting every night with a numbers disadvantage, alone as can be and as busy as a bee being the birds and the bees with Vibration as my only ally has allocated it reliable force! Amid nightly endless eternal time of nights, shaking sweet flesh and vibrating naked skin of trembling and screaming dungeon emperors has made me the ultimate vibrator of sexy vibes you OUGHT TO KNOOOOW!”

“A vibration counterattack?!”

“That’s the power of his nights…”

The kongs that lost in terms of quakeification were now in danger of complete extermination. This fantasy world was in a strong need of designating endangered species, but I think the two individuals during multidirectional murdering would massacre the monsters before I could submit a request?

(“The shaking makes your head split. No vibrating!”)

(“The thousands… The tens of thousands… Never!”)

(“How could you? After all we’ve been through…If your skill level increases, think of us!”)

Jiggle jiggle?

Class Rep and the others had been studying the two of them, but they were going all out right now. They were too fast to see, so I didn’t think watching would get the girls very far? Yeah, they were fighting seriously. They’d been slowly increasing their power, but this whole dungeon was now in danger.

“The final floor is next. How about fighting the dungeon king? You probably could’ve won against these gorillas in close combat. I didn’t want to have to call you guys biters and get glared at or something, though?”

“Stop right there!” the girls yelled. “Don’t call us anything that threatens our innocent maidenhood!”

Sixteen-year-olds could legally marry, and they could compete with the wives in any bargain sale. If they could beat those wives, then I suspected they should be fine against the quake kongs, or even the Theocracy? Historical theocracies tended to love using poison, drugs, curses, traps, and hostages and the like? Oh, and torture. So, yeah, that wasn’t good?

I understood my classmates’ desire to get stronger. If they were going up against the Church, they didn’t want to hear, see, or know that any bad fate awaited the clerics. With almost one hundred days of experience in this world, they should’ve known well and good that the only way to avoid tragedy and travesty was to inflict brutality and barbarity!

You just had to murder tragedy before it reached you. It sucked, but that was what my fantasy world experience had proved time and again.

“As a teenage boy, I should be hawing and hooting my way through lazy high school days. So why do I have no memory of high school days at all here?”

Jiggle jiggle.

Everyone was ready for the final floor, their equipment ready and fire in their eyes. Even Sister Girls’ squad, who didn’t have anything to do with the frontier, were ready to face it. To fight, to get stronger. They were determined to face death; determined to at least get in a blow before the end…Foolish! The church would do everything it could to maintain its authority, exhausting every end to commit horrors while proclaiming peace. When Sister Girls’ group was kept as hostages by the Church, I was sure they weren’t allowed to do anything, much less fight. Such a church, oh-so-good at being bad, had only terrors awaiting it.

The clerics, who once dedicated their prayers to God, polished their swords as if in prayer. They subconsciously understood that their lives rested in those blades. That was why I had to go. So long as we had Sister Girl, there was still a chance we could avoid an all-out war with the Theocracy. She was our only hope if the Church and the government split, and the Church split into factions.

“Since I gave you the swords, the responsibility for them lies with me, the manufacturer. Any(god)body who abdicates responsibility for his creations deserves to be in for it, you know?”

I wanted to carve up the enemy, but nothing would be solved so long as the root remained. If all the Church’s pupils were true believers in the Church, then the whole nation was our enemy. The girls refused to paint them all with the same brush. That was naive, far too naive. I wanted them to stay that way. A naively naive, naive-stuffed frontier was the happiest frontier, after all.

Everyone looked after each other on the frontier, called out to each other. Laughing and smiling as they looked after one another. That was why the orphans, who had spent their lives getting punished, abused, scolded, bullied, injured, robbed, and abandoned by adults weren’t scared of grown-ups anymore. They hadn’t been able to smile wholeheartedly until they got here, so it was better to stay naive. The real world wasn’t like that. I just had to exterminate reality. A religion that didn’t permit naivety was more worthless than a navy without ships.

DAY 98
EVENING

A cringy dungeon king is unhinged to the point of dinginess and swings injured limbs to the point of dizziness.

DUNGEON
83RD FLOOR

AN 80S-CLASS DUNGEON KING: a full step up above a floor boss. Somehow, Haruka-kun didn’t seem to understand the difference, just like he didn’t seem to understand the difference between dungeons and potential housing. The distinction eluded him.

In terms of sheer force, dungeon kings were on a whole other level. They gave off an air of intelligence, craftiness, and strategy. I supposed Haruka-kun was too sly and crafty to notice a crafty opponent.

Whether it was a dungeon king or the Church, it was all the same to him. While the rest of us thought about how to fight, Haruka-kun thought about how to kill. If he could kill the enemy, he could win. He did whatever it took, forcing his body to bear the burden of his countless skills, falling apart as he felled the opponent.

We couldn’t lose to the dungeon king today. We couldn’t make excuses that the monster was too strong or that we were scared. We just had to kill it—if we killed it, it would die. Before Haruka-kun’s body fell apart, before he gave himself up. We can do this!

“This is the last one, so go ahead and use plenty of MP. Just make sure to save 30 percent.”

“Roger!”

We had to stay alert because exhausting MP was dangerous. If anyone lost consciousness during this battle, they might die. A bow itself isn’t a threat—it needs arrows to stand a chance. Therefore, we had to preserve MP. Running out of MP was flirting with death. No one could overdo it.

The dungeon king that stood before us: “Sphinx. Lv: 83.” It was a sheep sphinx, with the deathless attribute. Fortunately, we had borrowed Haruka-kun’s “Undead King Sword: Power, Speed, Dexterity +30%. Power Word Kill Resistance. Undead Killer. +Attack.” Fish Girl had been designated as the wielder. Or Chika-chan, I should say, but none of us called each other by our names anymore.

“Just so you know, sheep were a symbol of life force in ancient Egypt, so this sheep monster has Super Horny and Alpha Male? It’s also super fluffy and a king. Throw in a harem, and this is getting hot! But also, they like to fight? It’s a contradictory contraband kind of conversation in terms of convivial, vivacious, vigorous fluffiness so be careful! In convoluted ways?”

It sounded like advice at first, but he ended up babbling. I didn’t know why he had to emphasize the fluffiness. Was he a fluff fetishist? Well, I did know he loved to “pet.”

“Uh…he’s saying a sheep with Super Horny and Alpha Male is hot?!”

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

“It really seems to want to force itself onto him…”

“It must be trying to mate!”

“Eww, don’t say that! It’s too fluffy!”

The sheep sphinx was in a state of excitement, with bloodshot eyes, uneven breathing, and drool hanging from its mouth. It was sexually excited?!

“The Andro Sphinx is famous, with its human face, lion body, and eagle wings. It claims to be the guardian of the sacred…but that’s just a chimera, right? With some human mixed in? I mean, the half-sheep Criosphinx, and then the falcon-headed Hieracosphinx complete the set. Yup, three types? Unless this is some secret hidden sphinx card? And stuff?”

As Haruka-kun spoke, the sphinx gave a leering, human expression. It surveyed the room with its eyes. What a creep!

“Ew, it’s coming our way!”

“Look! It’s erect!”

“Eeeep!”

“It’s got its tongue out!”

“Let’s cut it off!”

“The size of that thing…”

“No! Don’t say anything! We all see it!”

Our swords couldn’t cut through its fur. Our spears and axes couldn’t either. Rock-hard, curved horns blocked our attacks, and its own attacks were hard to dodge.

“It’s trying to knock us over and mount us! Ughhh, gross!”

“This monster is a sex criminal! We need to kill it in the name of women everywhere!”

“But it’s so quick and tough. What can we do?”

“Someone needs to act as the decoy and create a gap for everyone else to break through its defenses.”

“Class Rep!” everyone shouted.

We couldn’t target its eyes because of the horns. Its torso was protected by the tough fur, and its deadly claws made attacking its limbs too dangerous. A snake tail protected it from attacks from behind, so we didn’t have any gaps to exploit.

“No way!” I shouted. “Hang on. Is it getting bigger?”

“Good luck, Class Rep!”

“Stop it! If it pins me down, then it’ll do this and that!”

“Don’t worry! You’ve got armor on!”

“Yeah, it’s just gonna pin you down.”

“It can still try to pull something, though.”

“Yes,” Book Club President agreed. “There is a risk of ejaculation.”

“Nonononononono!” I shrieked. “Keep me out of this! Not even for a misfire!”

If we didn’t take it out quick, I was going to be turned into a decoy and risk my very maidenhood. Arianna-san took the jokes to make her the decoy seriously, so everyone was trying to calm her down.

“Not you, Arianna-san! Class Rep is the one who has Alpha Male, Super Horny, and Revival! She’s the only one who can take it!”

Uh…They were joking about me too, weren’t they? Weren’t they? Weren’t they?

Baaaaaaaaaaa!

The sphinx charged at us head-on, shaking its horns. It reared up on its sturdy hind legs, flailing its arms as it tried to mount us. Its front two legs were open wide, fully exposing…What a pervert! Don’t whip it around in front of young ladies!

“Arc Inferno!”

“Ack! Extreme Wind Cutter!”

“Get out! Great Deluge!”

“Freeze it—Absolute Zero!”

“Six-Sword Flurry!”

“Lightning Cut!”

“Hyaaaaah! Aqua Dracobomb!”

“InstantBEEPStab!”

“IronBEEPCrush!”

“Rip it the BEEP apart!”

“Chop it to pieces!”

“BEEP the BEEP outta it!”

“Rip off its BEEEEEPin’ skin!”

“I’m going back! Septuple Slash!”

“And I’ll BEEP its BEEEEPin’ BEEP!”

“Hraaah!”

We found its weak point! Lucky for us, it stood right out. That allowed us to BEEP the motherBEEPin’ BEEP off its BEEP till its giant BEEPin BEEP got BEEPed to BEEP. It turned out our experience surviving the terrors of a sex god had a purpose after all! As we concentrated a furious round of attacks on its exposed part, it roared and bleated, tears streaming down its face until we gouged it out, severed it, smashed it, crushed it, and tore it to pieces. Compared to the sex god we knew, this was nothing. That other sex god is way worse.

Baaaaaabaabababaaaaa!

“Class Rep!”

“Oh! Sorry. Instant Stab!”

Baaaaaaagh… Thump.

We destroyed the enemy of women. For whatever reason, Haruka-kun stood off to the side, frozen, staring at the fallen sphinx in horror.

“Thanks, Fish Girl. Okay, why don’t you give Haruka-kun back his sword. Thanks, Haruka-kun. We beat the dungeon emp—aaagh?!”

“Good work. You finished it off and stuff? Now you’ve got even more stuff with Hijack as a result, and stuff and the like? Wow! You’ve taken its Libido Boost, too! So do your best? Ya know?”

He made me deal the final blow. I went to hand over the Undead King Sword to him—and he chucked me right at the dungeon king with the sword pointing at it! In addition to my Super Horny and Alpha Male leveling up, I also now had Libido Boost—and this thing had Revival, too?!

“Ee-ee-eeeeeeeeek! Don’t throw me like that! Why’d you want me to finish it off? I didn’t ‘take’ anything!”

“It’s okay,” the girls said, “Just do your best.”

“A m-m-m-maiden shouldn’t have these skills! If I get anymore, or their levels go up any further, I’ll get the Sex Goddess title! Please, nooooo!”

They all stuck their tongues out at me! Now they were taunting me even more, scratching their chins at me! I’m just a maiden… I’m still a maiden… They intended to make me a human sacrifice!

It was getting late, so we went back to the inn. The tongue-sticking-out squad was giving a lecture, but Arianna-san’s group was too tired. They had made it all the way to the bottom of a dungeon in just a few days and must’ve been at their physical and mental limits. Mushroom doping meant they were up for the task, but keeping your MP up by forcing it to recover like that was bound to fall apart sooner or later.

Still, I didn’t hear a single complaint from them. They were desperately trying to get stronger. They managed to break through the level-50 level wall in just a few days. They were trying so hard. They never even cried. Er, well, they had cried when Haruka-kun committed his forced leveling up on them. Now, they were trying to get stronger all on their own. And they were almost out of time.

Today we had passed the dungeon king floor, but we had failed the 82nd floor’s quake kongs. If Haruka-kun hadn’t had the ability to read their skills and react accordingly, we all could’ve died. Everyone was anxious—after all, Haruka-kun ended up insisting on coming to the Theocracy with us because we weren’t strong enough.

Haruka-kun had made robes for the priests prior to making the new habits. He probably modeled it on the one for himself. We knew he liked making others do cosplay but had no interest in cosplaying himself, which meant he really intended to wear those priest’s robes himself.

I’m sure that he intended on making Arianna-san stay here on the frontier because the Theocracy was dangerous or something. He’d make Angelica-san and the others stay for some excuse and then go by himself. He’d try to gloss over all of it, saying, “It just kinda worked out,” or “I got lost and ended up at the main chapel? And stuff?” I knew he wanted to sneak in there alone.

There was no way he’d abandon Arianna-san and the others. You could tell precisely because he was acting like he had no interest in them.

When we were dealing with Diorelle, he made a whole fuss about how he couldn’t care less about the kingdom before brazenly following Princess Shalliceres and saved the orphans. He talked smack about how the people of Diorelle were complicit with the kingdom’s crimes, but then came up with an elaborate strategy to defeat the nobles without getting any innocent lives lost in a civil conflict.

He had even made sure to avoid getting innocent people caught up in the conflict with Nallogi, risking his life with Teleport to save Stalker Girl.

It had been no different when he’d saved our class. He had claimed it was a coincidence, but he hurried to our side. That fiery rain must’ve been all he could bear. The kobold leader appeared before Haruka-kun, and he faced it down, gnashing his teeth and exhausting himself to defeat it. That day, he stood there, not wavering so much as an inch. He was defenseless, immobile, and exposed right in front of a monster. He pretended it was fine, but that must’ve been all he could bear. The recoil from the magic left him battered and bloody. He won, but only by going to the verge of death. I remembered that day. He could’ve died! He kept on lying, lying, lying, and lying some more that he was okay. Lying that he couldn’t care less, and lying that it was all an accident.

Haruka-kun’s lies were kind to us. He deceived us and lied to us so gently. It was also cruel—he had to face the painful reality behind the lie alone.

That was why we had to strategize to make sure he was never alone. Why were we going to guard the clerics in their battle against the Theocracy? They were more determined and fired up than ever now that they knew they could live on with the Church. Time had run out. The royals were facing execution. Haruka-kun would surely hurry there.

First, the Theocracy wanted to get Arianna-san back from Diorelle. They wouldn’t execute the royal family yet. They were being used as bait. We needed the power to shut down their cowardly strategy. The might to crush their strategy. Most importantly, the power to stop Haruka-kun’s suffering!

We couldn’t let him get any stronger. He was well above his own limit—only alive thanks to his limit-breaking Greatluck. After the training he had forced the clerics through, they understood too. The power to fight like that safely at level 24? It was simply impossible.

The church had declared Haruka-kun an enemy anyhow. The idiots! If Haruka-kun was an enemy, then so were we. If they posed a threat, then we’d be Haruka-kun’s sword and shield. Whatever it took so he didn’t need to fight anymore.

We had decided all this long ago. We had neither the time nor strength to see it through. We couldn’t keep up. The more we tried, the farther he drifted away. I mean, why the hell did he have to split up his shoulder shields into twelve pieces that flew all over the place? Why snakes? Why a freaking hydra?! That legendary beast shouldn’t be performing an opera or getting all sexual, right?! Humanity itself couldn’t keep up with him!

DAY 98
NIGHT

Their wide-open eyeballs in their eye sockets were neither eyeing nor spying but twitching.

WHITE LOSER INN

THAT WAS BORING. I never got a chance to fight, and I didn’t win our board game either! My own slaves laid an ambush for me to bully me and not let me score. It was a fierce board game of boring through boredom by a furious wave of fatal attacks on the board!

“I guess I did lay traps to stop the others in their tracks. No one could really advance much in the end. It felt like it would never end?”

Jiggle jiggle.

Before the girls could start any sketchy cosplay back at the inn, I whipped up dinner. Three rounds in a row was tough for any teenage boy! The dangerous deeds I witnessed in the sexual predator programming from earlier today—the only way I could make it through was by controlling myself with Blockhead in a manly battle of endurance longer than Le Mans. The last thing I needed was an inn full of another set of fantasies. I pinned down my hands, but I still felt the tentacles on the verge of emerging!

“I’m at the pure, innocent age where I should wish I should be concerned with a single lover. Instead, I get bullied by a group! I’m beset by groping, grinding sensations and a surge of sexual stimulation. Even Miss Instructor Rep’s taking part. Although, I’m not sure how she could be helpful. Why is she here?” She’d just get in the way of the goblins in the monster forest, after all.

“Here’s the omelet rice per the orphans’ request, although that is literally the only thing they ever request. Hmm, well Hamburg steak does show up sometimes, so it’s classic Japanese kids’ meals. If we let the orphans call the shots, they’ll discover spaghetti Napolitana, fried chicken, frankfurters, and french fries soon. Since it’s a kids’ lunch, there’s also gotta be pudding? I’ve never seen so much ketchup in my life.”

“Thanks for all the food!”

I was relieved I’d managed to prevent an outbreak of cosplay. Soon, though, I realized that meant all the girls just took off their equipment before dinner, leaving them in tight compression shorts. So sexy! Is there really no peace for the teenage boys of this world? The least you can do is make them black like before! I took a glance this morning and saw way more gray than yesterday. The gray was so sheer! As was the pink. Next thing I knew, brown was showing up, too?

The girls tightly swiped the food, jiggling as they sprinkled on some toppings, poking as they slurped their share of pudding. Yup, we’d be having a one-more-set tonight. Thanks to those same workouts, their figures were getting even better, creating an eternal thigh-thickening mechanism of devastating teenage-boy destruction! They’re so hot!

Maybe it was because of the rain, but it was humid. All the cooking and the congregation of human bodies raised the humidity further. Sweaty compression shorts created a whole new cavalcade of cruelty, combining with the beads of glistening sweat that clung to their skin. A captivating dinner! I ensured ventilation in the dining hall, and to maintain comfort, the fabric of their outfits seams stretched when wet. The fabric was comfortable to wear but uncomfortable to see! The devastatingly tight compression shorts clung to their bodies, fabric thinner than ever, laying bare every soft curve of their bodies. It’s too much!

The girls puckered their lips and blew on the food to cool it down, moaning about how delicious it was, opening wide to gobble the thick, juicy sausages with drool dripping off their lolling tongues. They opened wide, slowly lowering their lips around the rim of the sausage, forcing it into their mouths a bit at a time with difficulty, licking up the juicy meat around the shaft…

“This is way too sexy! You can’t lick the frankfurter like that! Who makes those kinds of sounds while eating a damn hot dog?!”

I guess I’d have to ban frankfurters. It just felt wrong! Thank goodness I built a separate dining hall in the orphanage. It would be a disaster if the orphans tried imitating this.

Loud pops and slurping noises sounded out as the girls stuffed fat frankfurters into their open mouths. They were subjecting me to a form of teenage-boy torture with this sexual, surround-sound, max-volume background music. This kids’ meal was X-rated. That much was clear!

I didn’t do anything today, but dinner was enough to exhaust me. I made my way to the bath. The girls started their workout, but they’d need to do some DDR as well to burn off all those calories. There were already enough challenges to the integrity of their compression shorts. I needed to get to the bath before the leotards appeared!

I collapsed into the bath, sighing as Slimey jiggled. I felt light. The accumulated exhaustion melted away in the bath, and my body relaxed. Looking back, it was a rare occurrence to have just whiled away the whole day playing cards and board games. I guess I’d always liked fantasy board games. I never thought to play them in a fantasy world? I used a bit of vibration magic in a fight, but I had hardly moved all day. Maybe I was feeling sluggish after my day off yesterday, but my body felt amazingly soft and light, without any pains or aches.

I stretched out in the bath and enjoyed a long soak. This really wasn’t the time to be relaxing like this, but rest was necessary. If I didn’t get stronger, people could lose their lives. If I hurried too much, I’d end up destroying myself in the process. I felt light, limber, as if my body were getting slowly but surely remade.

Eventually, the girls banned my long-range saturation attack plan. The infiltration priests’ robes I made for myself ended up being a waste of time. Why did the only clothes I ever make for myself always end up being useless? I had no clue when the next time I could wear my yukata would be.

“One-more-set! One-more-set!”

I got out of the bath and immediately ran away upon seeing the leotards and hip-hop dance moves. Those were fresh vibes I couldn’t handle. Funky stimulation was off-limits for teenage boys. They were going to funk me with punking and grooving and hip-hop head rolls and head spins if I didn’t get outta there!

I rushed into my room and got straight to work so I wouldn’t replay what I just witnessed in my head. I mean, Dancer Girl expressed interest in all sorts of dance. I wasn’t expecting the girls to teach her, though? I knew she’d be good at hip-hop dancing.

“I’d like to make an Automatic-Defense-equipped, sword-catching parrying dagger and a tonfa gun for indoor combat. Ideally, I would also boost the effects and power of the rapier design. Fighting humans sure is a pain. There’s no end to sneaky little strategies when you’re not just attacking head-on.”

I didn’t know what countermeasures I needed to prepare for. Any advantage could end up as a lifeline. In a contest of traps, you lost when you ran out of options, unlike when fighting monsters. An abundance of options was exactly what we needed. And we could never have enough explosives. Throw enough, and all your problems would kaboom away.

“I know the habits are just a disguise, but clerics capable of hip-hop dancing…In those revealing habits, this could get epic? Prospective priests would line up to join the Church!”

Wiggle wiggle.

The Automatic Defense parrying dagger was a trump card. It was the perfect counterplay to a surprise assassination attempt, but it was powered by a spellstone, so it couldn’t last long in battle.

I continued my side-jobs, squeezing in a little dessert break. It felt a bit lonely without my demon scythes. I’d sent them out to protect the nerds, who weren’t back yet. The nerds didn’t have any aerial battle maneuvers, so the demon scythes would handle that for them. While the meatheads didn’t throw boomerangs, they were great at throwing javelins. Oh, and chucking halberds and axes. They even threw swords to skewer monsters. Why did they try to bludgeon everything with only the boomerangs?

“They were there to instruct the macho chicks, but I sure hope they didn’t teach them that. Now I’m worried about what’ll happen when the first division goes into battle.”

Boink boink.

I felt so light. I wanted to do some training, but since the girls were so worried about me, I needed to not upset everyone and show them that I was resting.

“I’m an Archsage with Revival and maxed-out Recovery and Healing. What could they possibly be worried about? I even have Resuscitation, so if I die a little, I’ll still come back to life? Any lost limbs grow back? I also sprout snakes?”

Wiggle wiggle.

“I understand my classmates’ perspective, but I don’t get why Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl are trying to stop me from getting stronger. I did think that I was breaking my own limit sometimes. Maybe this is what that feels like?”

Jiggle jiggle.

I had the Life Jewel inside the Ring of the Destitute. That item “tempered the body,” which might have been a power-up to my stats or could have referred to transforming me into a modified wizard beyond the realm of humanity, not to mention its effects on “lovemaking.” That item was full of sketchy crap.

“I already have Alchemy and Archsage, so I fulfill all the conditions for its activation and everything,” I sighed. I felt like using it meant I was giving up my humanity, which I wasn’t exactly thrilled about. Giving up my humanity sounded like giving up on life. When I tried it out, unleashing the power made my body collapse more easily than normal, even if it did feel like my stats increased.

At first, I figured it was a bad egg…but at the same time, this light feeling wasn’t normal. Life force flowed through me as if I’d gotten an entirely fresh batch of cells in my body. Magic power and abilities circulated through every corner of my body, remaking me from scratch.

“I figured that after overusing my body, my super-recovery began to activate when I took a proper rest. This feeling might be Body Manipulation reformulating my body altogether?”

Maybe I was being remade into a stronger, sturdier body. I was also absorbing magic power, skills, spells, and stuff I probably hadn’t noticed. Whatever it was, Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl responded to me using it. It probably had a recoil, so it still brought my body to its limit even as I forced myself to rest to heal properly. I’d come this far by piling on my skills to get by despite my low stats and judged that my body couldn’t bear the burden I put on it. They probably thought of the current status quo as an improvement.

“I don’t love it ’cause it feels like it’s cutting down on my natural life span, but if I died today, my life span would be the least of my problems. Maybe I’ll just take an abundance mindset and think of it as extending my life span by sneakily killing my life span’s killers.”

Wiggle wiggle.

“Well, there’s this ancient teenage-boy saying that goes, ‘never do today what you can leave till tomorrow’ that’s been passed down through the generations. It’s total yolo. It is true that, even if I survive today, I could die in some accident tomorrow, so I think it’s a helpful perspective?”

Jiggle jiggle.

There was nothing more foolish than looking ten or a hundred years into the future and tripping and falling because you failed to watch where you were stepping. What’s most important is right in front of your eyes.

“Neuter the future when it comes! And since we’re still pleasant in the present, we don’t know what’s coming. If you accumulate things in the present, you’ll come across the things that come after ’em. As in, it’ll work out somehow? Probs? I mean, ’cause if it doesn’t, there’s no way to sort through all the possibilities of what to do about it in advance. So, who cares and stuff?”

Boink boink.

I achieved so many logical conclusions that I was blameless, establishing my complete guiltlessness day after day after day, yet I still hadn’t come to a universal theory of truth and justice. I said I didn’t do anything wrong, and they still lectured me!

“I suppose this is the challenge the pioneers faced. Could it be the burden of genius? ’Cause I definitely didn’t do anything wrong?”

Maybe no one listened to me just ’cause I was a loner. That was too depressing to think about, though, so I decided to ignore it.

“What is this hyperdrive fatigue?! I’m healthier than ever, but I’ve totally lost energy and enthusiasm. I guess I can just laze around?”

Wiggle wiggle.

I thought Slimey was just hanging out with me, but it turned out he was making sure I didn’t do any training. I was more or less under house arrest in the inn. Didn’t anybody need me for anything? Was this anti-teenage-boy sexism? Life is cruel?

I added some MP to the process, speeding up my side-jobs and breaking through the limit of my labor. I rushed to finish my merchandise, getting everything we’d need ready.

I realized that I had inserted seven full objects into my ring, maxing it out. I’d need to swap rings out and choose carefully, according to my present needs.

“If I just chuck things in willy-nilly, I self-destruct. But without my rings, I feel kind of like a ring. Empty inside.”

I had totally forgotten about the Ring of the Dungeon Master, and I had given the Ring of the Golem Crafter and a whole bunch of other stuff over to the dummy dungeon’s Master Golem.

“I was frustrated that I didn’t have enough rings for the longest time. I didn’t expect to still be frustrated once I’d maxed mine out. Is this the influence of the greedy girls around me?”

I ran out of MP just as I finished my side-jobs. Two smiling beauties immediately came through the door…or well, I assumed they were smiling because I was looking at their legs. Those alluring long legs made you want to achieve the pinnacle of climactic apex stroking and licking all over. They were long, muscular, and slim but soft at the same time. It was as if they had been carved like a sculpture—graceful, vivid contradictions of themselves, conflicting poles of balanced ambivalently poised legs. Only these legs’ ladies were anything but ambivalent!

They were wearing gym shorts today. Nametags reading “Angie” and “Neffie” were affixed to their chests. Uh, what are the girls teaching them in those girls’ meetings?

Miss Armor Rep’s “Angie” shorts were tangerine, and Dancer Girl’s “Neffie” shorts were navy. They exposed the entirety of their long, strong legs. The gym wear clung tightly to their bodies, cupped every mound, valley, shadow, and curve. With their arms and legs completely exposed, I could see the full beauty of their bodies.

Those bodies claimed to be gym-ready while clearly demonstrating that gym class was the last place we ought to be. The shirts swelled round at the chest, tightly packed, with hopes, dreams, and boobs nearly bursting out!

“We’re! Back!”

“Night exercise! Gym clothes! Are perfect!”

When they moved even a little, the shirt rose, sending their tight waists and adorable stomachs peeking out. Beneath that, well-stuffed gym shorts clung to their voluminous butts, the shorts shaking and jiggling along with their tightly packed contents. The shorts were too short for the volume of butt they had, so their cheeks peeked out. I cheered on their shorts’s failed attempts to contain booty…and they tied me up?!

“I’d been captivated by the low-angle triangle zone only to be captured by my rapture…Urk! Does this mean I won’t be able to escape if I can’t get my eyes off the prize?!”

The two alluring bodies closed in on me, their curves and flesh nearly bursting out of their tight clothes. Those juicy bodies pressed in on me, squeezing me, holding my hands back as they slowly began taking off my equipment. I couldn’t move! The shorts were so tight they even clamped down on the intergluteal cleft. Their soft flesh practically spilled out of the tops; two beautiful girls from two beautiful angles entrapping me. All I could see were healthy thighs locking me in place—yup, there was no escape!

“It’s not just spells. Also equipment, stats, and magic power,” came a purring voice.

“That’s right,” another cooed. “No more MP. Means service time.”

“H-hang on—”

Slurp.

“Waaaagh, I mean—”

Smoochsmooch.

“Mfffgh…”

They overwhelmed me. What was this that kept stealing my exhausted MP? The “lovemaking” task from Body Manipulation? This must’ve referred to the ancient, legendary arts of Taoist “lovemaking” techniques, differentiated from the sex techniques developed by later generations. It was originally a high-level technique for manipulating one’s yin and yang. According to legend, there was some woman or something who didn’t age, not even after turning 280, and became a superhuman master of lovemaking who would pass on her secrets to you. The term “lovemaking” didn’t refer to relations between man and woman in this case but crafting the sheer essence of power.

In Japan as well, in the “human sexual behavior” volume of Tamba Yasuyori’s ancient medical text Ishinpo, one of the so-called “seven injuries” was the hyakuhei position, where the woman mounted an exhausted man. That technique…

“It focuses on restoring circulation to the body, including magical power, blood, breathing, skills—anything that you can feel. Energy is circulated, kneading and massaging and expanding the essence of yin and yang. And the pinnacle? Unification with the spirits!”

To achieve the pinnacle of immortal Xian and penetrate all the truths of the world with perfect clarity. This was the goal of alchemy in Asian cultures, unlike the alchemy of the west. That was the “lovemaking” that the Life Jewel referred to!

“Yup, I win?”

The two gasped in surprise. Then moaned, then squealed, then gasped again.

That’s right. You can’t count out plain old humble sex techniques. I had Lascivious to apply those in full force, mixed with the lovemaking techniques of eastern alchemy, applied by the power of Sex God. I refined both my Status Ailment Infliction (all types) and Alchemy with the yin and yang refinement provided by Lovemaking and added them to Lascivious. That didn’t just provide a sensitivity boost, but also transformed the confusion, fear, and pain of the acts into pure stimulation and pleasure with Lovemaking. I may have been out of MP, but I still had qi!

“Aaaaagh! Ah, ah, ahhh! Ahhhhh! Aaaaaah!”

Plunk.

“Wa, Aaagh! Urrrrn! Ah! Ah! Mmmmm!”

Plud.

After that, I recovered my MP with some mushrooms. It went without saying that a teenage boy who had gone three days without doing the deed was in need of a good deed that counterattacked bad deeds. An eye for an eye, as they say. As in, their wide-open eyeballs in their eye sockets were neither eyeing nor spying but twitching farewell, goodbye, take care not I spy with my little eye, two pairs of eyes rolling in pleasure, as eternal recovery inhibited a final goodbye? Come here, snakes and tentacles! No need to get excited! I felt great. Now how about they get on my high horse and start riding?

“Agggh! Ah, ah, ahhh!”

(On repeat!)

DAY 99
MORNING

The archnemesis of the ultimate frontier wives has appeared, but change is already here.

WHITE LOSER INN

DESPITE THEIR GLAZED-OVER LOOKS, I detected the faintest luster of a glare in their jet-black, empty eyes. That’s one scary look! There had been more than a few sights so far that you’d declare off-limits, but the yesterday’s break-down vibes and driven-mad-with-furious-crazed-pleasure faces for teenage girls. Plus, the shameless squeals, moans, screams, and cries that certainly come from teenage girls’ mouths, and the gasps and sobbing, the writhing…The level of madness and badness pulled off the curtains on a heaven on earth, but the eyes behind the curtain held pitch-black glares!

Glaaaaaaaaaaare.

I had to keep my mouth shut. Revenge was revenge, to be sure, but I only revenged because their revenge was unavenged. Hence, their glaring eyes, now dead set on revenge! Oh sh—! Wagh!

(Revenge service commences.)

A refreshing morning arrived at last. The bright sun sparkled. I had spent an invigorating morning doing invigorating things, so was this like a second, different morning? Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl were in good moods, having worked out the glares from their eyes. For some reason, I felt considerably weakened, but I guess they’d swallowed my energy. Those empty eye sockets did something fearsome, no doubt—they stole the energy of a teenage boy’s morning. They took everything I had?

When I went down to the dining hall, Poster Girl reported that there was a merchant who wished to meet me. Normally, I’d ignore something like that, but I went down to the lobby with Slimey for the meet and greet this time. It’s not like I needed to remember his name.

“My name is Hels of the Delibaur Corporation,” the man said. “It is an honor to meet you. You are the pinnacle of all merchants!”

It was a young-lookin’ old dude, probably in his late 20s. The merchant gave a polite bow. His expression was refined, but this was the kind of person who could hide his true feelings. He might be difficult to deal with.

“I thought my dreams as a teenage boy were fulfilled when I heard that a Japanese delivery health service of the escort sort was coming here…But you’re just an old dude? Can we change this up? Two more old dudes and this is gonna be a strikeout?”

“Ah, I can provide change whenever necessary, of course. I can even exchange bills at your request.”

I said nothing, confused.

There must’ve been some issue with the translation function here, ’cause we were talking about very different matters.

“Er, you see, I thought that delivery health was supposed to send a beautiful young escort to your inn, for a series of discussions, percussions, repercussions, disruptions, and eruptions, but an old dude is a disruption, so I’d like to get a change! But you seem intent on an emergency discussion. Ya know?”

“Indeed. You must be speaking of the rumors about the president of the Delibaur Corporation, Ellyus. It is rare for a beautiful young woman to lead a company, so she has become quite famous. She’s good advertising, too! Our president would normally introduce herself to you. I have come to inform you that she is on her way as we speak. As improper as it is, I came ahead as the vice president to make this initial introduction.”

In other words, there was a hot chick headed this-a-way. But as the dude said, they spread rumors about the hot chick to draw you in. This is a trap! The fact that the old dude was here was a dead giveaway! I didn’t have time to beg for a different escort! I gotta be careful about delivery health in this fantasy world!

“Uh, so did you just come to make my acquaintance then? Hi and stuff? It’s not exactly a meet-cute, is it? What rom-com are we in, anyhow?! Er, it’s not that I don’t know my genres. It’s just that things seem to be mixed up in this fantasy world where all the most fantastic parts are the most realistic and the most realistic parts, like delivery health, are the most unreliable. Seriously, how could I have expected a delivery health ambush?!”

He looked at me questioningly, silent.

Yeah, this wasn’t getting anywhere. Not that getting it on with an old dude would be any fun, but we really couldn’t understand each other in the slightest.

“Of course. It is not just greetings that I would like to extend to you but business,” he continued. “I am sure you are aware that we have no intention of competing with the Zackary Company or anyone else. It would be a great honor for us to conduct business with you. I did not expect to meet the Lord Haruka himself. I apologize for being the one to greet you rather than our company president. I guarantee that our president will be present at the official meeting, but I have the authority to negotiate on the firm’s behalf. I will endeavor to respond to any request you may have.”

Okay, so the hot chick was coming later? Was he trying to get me in the club by promising their hottest server? This sounded like one of those obvious traps where the sexy chick would leave if I didn’t keep buying crazy overpriced drinks. Only, if you didn’t pay in this world, they sent a friggin’ old dude instead! It was well beyond my innocent, teenage-boy imagination.

“Okay, so you wanna do business. What do you want to buy, and what do you want to sell? In terms of what you’re offering, the difference between the goods (hot chick) and the bads (old dude) is way too far apart. ’Cause if you’re selling the goods (hot chicks), I’ll definitely be listening, but I’m only seeing some bad products so far, ya know?”

The old dude looked at me for a moment. “You may be young, but the rumors are true. Without a moment of regard for gold, silver, or jewels, you ask me directly what I am here to buy or sell. I can see why you won’t give talentless merchants the time of day. Naturally, I have confidence in both our wares and their prices, so look as you please. Yet, I admit, it seems unusual for someone such as yourself to need a merchant. We take full fault in the matter of Diorelle’s inability to rival the Theocracy or Merchant Kingdom. I have complete confidence in our powers as merchants to stand our ground and use our negotiating, buying, and selling as weapons. In Diorelle, the nobles had control over business transactions. They destroyed our business by selling to the Theocracy and Merchant Kingdom at vast discounts, driving prices lower and lower. Unable to see past their own noses, they sunk the fortunes of Diorelle with their greed, resulting in a collapse of both the kingdom’s fortunes and military might. This is the knowledge we bring to the table. We are prepared to do whatever we can to assist you, Lord Haruka.”

Information, huh? For merchants, a distribution network should be top priority, but it was expensive to actualize. Of course, the bureaucrats had made that impossible. Taxes were a necessary evil, but not being able to collect them crippled the nobility. But even with all that in mind, information wasn’t as valuable as this guy claimed. He wasn’t wrong that information was a crucial weapon for a merchant, though. Hang on…Is he gonna sell me information on delivery health services?!

“So you’re selling the good stuff, eh?” I asked.

“Oh, nothing to truly boast of.”

“But it must be expensive, right?”

“We can offer you information on the Merchant Kingdom and Theocracy, with the latest updates from the former nobles of Diorelle as a bonus, for…this much?”

“How I am supposed to judge the value of unknown information? I’d say about this much?”

“Oh, no, no. We couldn’t. We pride ourselves on obtaining nothing but the best information. Consider this the most suitable price.”

“Oh no. Oh no. Merchants pride themselves on overvaluing their wares and ripping people off. What you consider the most suitable price will be overpriced? So how about this?”

“Oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no. An extra-special discount price in expressing our gratitude for the hope of your continued, eternal business would look like this.”

“Oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no. To impress me with the ‘Oh me, oh my, yippie-kai-ei,’ it’ll take this price.”

“Oh no. Oh no, oh no, oh no…”

“No. Oh no, oh no. Oh no. Oh…”

“Oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no…”

Jiggle jiggle jiggle jiggle…

“No, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh…”

Wiggle wiggle wiggle wiggle…

“Well then, well then, well then…”

“What are you two babbling on about?” shouted Class Rep. “I came to check on you only to discover this nonsense! Why are you shoving the beads on the abacus back and forth with sneers like that? I didn’t even know there were abacuses here! And when’s dinner?”

I guess she came to get me ’cause the girls were hungry. I had introduced the abacus to the general store lady ages ago, and it’d become a bestseller. It was so famous that, even though it was supposed to be a frontier secret, this old dude had learned how to use it. He understood its value. Next thing I knew, he’d be breaking out in even more fancy merchant speech!

“If it is not Lord Class Rep! Please allow me the pleasure of making your acquaintance. I am Hels of the Delibaur Corporation. It may not be much, but we are pleased to present the latest cosmetic goods. It would be great advertising if the beautiful, renowned, black-haired warrior princesses made use of our products! Please, accept this gift!”

Not bad. They said that if you wanted to shoot the general, shoot his horse first, but everybody knew that it was a pain to hurt a poor lil’ horsey like that. Just bonk the general and be done with it. In one quick exchange, he’d managed to figure out that my consumer classmates were higher up on the food chain than me, their measly side-job supplier! I can’t underestimate this guy.

Everything about the dude was suspicious. He had coiffed hair, a thin mustache, and spectacles with cats’ eye frames. Glasses were a luxury good in this world. Maybe he wore them to show off. Most suspicious of all was his use of the abacus as a maraca! I don’t think I’ll ever understand fantasy world folk.

We decided to wait for the delivery health boss girl for the formal negotiations, but Class Rep made sure to secure makeup sets for everyone first.

“You claim you want to wait for formal negotiations, but you set the prices in advance. It’s a shady strat but proof that you’re a real-deal merchant,” I said.

The most worrisome bit of all was that he had been willing to provide free information—the thing I had wanted most of all, and all for the price of an introduction. The Delivery Health Corporation knew how to do their negotiations. From a teenage-boy perspective, something about this delivery health service wasn’t quite right. Probably how old this guy was.

A contract was necessary. I couldn’t penetrate the markets of the whole continent with the general store lady alone. While a monopoly was useful for now, it wouldn’t be good for the world long-term. Competition kept the economy in check. Merchants didn’t have any sense of what was good for the public, so if you let them run loose, they’ll just devour all the riches for themselves to make a monopoly that sucks everyone else dry. You needed them to make the world go round, but if you let them go around too much, they’d run wild on a limitless profit rampage. That was just economics.

“Economics is all about numbers, and turning the world into a numerical mechanism is dangerous. ’Cause on the road to ultimate rip-offs and bigshot big-spending, the truth is that the only big-spending necessary is food to eat and a place to live?”

Given that this world was about as developed as Earth had been during the Middle Ages, it was too early to unleash capitalism like that.

Meanwhile, I lined up chicken and egg rice bowls. Every time the orphans wanted omelet rice, the girls asked for chicken and egg rice bowls the next day. Was there logic behind that? The nerds always asked for grilled beef and cutlet rice bowls regardless of what anyone else ate.

Anyhow, I had to rip off this rip-off merchant. I had actualized the sword-catching parrying dagger and brought it to market. The G*ndam funnels’ skill Automatic Defense was an emergency measure, but it provided real protection. Because of how it needed to respond in real-time to attacks, it only had a limited number of activations each day before it ran out of MP. I added Weapon Shatter, too, but it was primarily defensive equipment.

To match the habits, I sold long white gloves and chain stitch gauntlets as a set. These had a sliding functionality for a concealed parrying dagger, tonfa, and pile bunker, making the gloves equal parts practical and powerful.

“The tonfa is a gun tonfa, so it’s a melee weapon with three bullets for ranged use, making it the ultimate self-defense weapon for interior combat? As for the pile bunker…that’s just for aesthetics? I kinda wanted to throw something in there?”

“We’ll buy them, but what exactly do you think habits are?!”

Not to mention the special tall boots I made with pointed, bladed tips. Just like the orphans’ boots, I added Super-Speed, Evasion, and Kick in an elegant, upscale John Lobb design simply bursting with class.

“I’ve also concealed rapiers inside the ceremonial staves, so you can use them as staves for magic or as scythes. Pretty handy to be able to do some grass-cutting just like the demon scythes, don’tcha think?”

“Yup, you don’t understand what habits are in the slightest!”

That should be enough for self-protection. In a surprise attack or assassination attempt, there wouldn’t be time to change equipment, so it cost a lot. This level of defense was necessary. For real. I was selling them everything at major discounts?

I knew that the girls were telling the truth when they said they wanted to protect the clerics. They wanted to save the Theocracy without getting innocent commoners mixed up things. But I knew that their true intention was to become decoys in my stead. They wanted to be the ones to catch the enemy’s attention, to take the enemy’s attacks, and to finish the enemy off themselves. It was reckless—gambling when they didn’t know their opponent’s hand. That was a big enough risk for me and one far more dangerous for the girls.

I could take it. I already had blood on my hands. The girls didn’t, so really, there was no need for them to kill anyone. They didn’t need to go that deep into this fantasy world. Me? I didn’t even know this world’s name.

DAY 99
LATE MORNING

There’s an opening the moment you take out your weapon, but if it’s a wonderful opening, then I don’t mind.

DUNGEON
57TH FLOOR

SISTER GIRL’S GROUP was in a melee against long-toothed, sharp-clawed beasts: “Sabre Tiger. Lv: 57,” thrashing and slashing and smashing them around. Their broadswords rampaged with fury, blasting opening the slits in their habits.

Pitch-black, tight habits clung to them. The deep slits in their long skirts unveiled white legs in fishnet tights as they lopped off tiger heads with downward roundhouse kicks.

With hands covered in elegant gloves that went up to the elbow, they snatched the saber tigers’ heads, wedged their iron claws into the tigers’ open jaws, then burst their heads open with the pile bunkers that shot out of their sleeves.

“Those pile bunkers are evaporating any sense of religious piety!”

“That iron claw and pile bunker combo is nuts.”

The agile beasts leaped around the room, slashing with sharp claws and gnashing with long fangs. But their prized fangs were blocked by the tonfa, and with the tonfa deep into their mouths, the bullets fired blew their heads off. They really shouldn’t be eating gun-equipped tonfas to begin with?

The clerics surrounded the leaping tigers and unleashed their dance of death. Their new staves transformed into magic-bladed scythes that severed the monsters’ heads from their necks.

My classmates were also practicing with their upgraded habits. God would run away screaming if he so much as saw clerics this fierce. I was damn scared myself.

“Pretty good kicks, eh?”

“Good thing the tigers’ heads are at just the right height for kicking.”

If you asked the tigers, I was sure that they’d deny that was the reason they were quadrupedal, but at least everyone appreciated the kick-equipped, blade-shooting boot tips and pointed heels of the armored boots. It took so many models and experiments to arrive at that design!

“You need to be up-close to use the tonfas, but they make for really good defense,” I said. They were easy to use and practice with, and just changing the way you wielded them provided a whole different type of functionality. That practicality was why they were used so widely by police around the world back on Earth. Adding a gun to their getup was just my teenage boy aesthetics at work. I couldn’t do anything about that.

“They’re totally perfect except for one big problem.”

“Yeah, they’re the perfect item aside from that.”

“They seem so reliable as weapons. Putting that one problem aside, of course.”

“Yeah, apart from the design being way too erotic, they’re perfect.”

Everyone shouted at once. “Why do all the weapons have to come out from the skirt slit? Everyone can see! They can see so much!”

Adding storage to equipment made it possible to use weapons in many combinations. I typically added it to the back of the cloak, but the habit design made it difficult to find the right place. Adding a deep slit to the back to draw out broadswords, shields, or halberds would create quite the spectacle, as did the deep slit position I stitched in the nether-realm between fishnet tights and garter belt where plump thighs jiggled in and out of sight. I guess the girls had some sorta problem with it?

“No, you see,” I said, “this is the result of countless calculations and experimentations to create the ultimate easy-to-use slit and the ultimate opening for legs, which can be both seen and not seen, just like the ultimateness of my design in question. And as you can’t quite see the unseeable, it’s fine. Can’t you see? Don’t you see?”

“We don’t want people to see our legs to begin with! Why do we have to show off our thighs every time we want to take out a weapon?!”

Those outfits were amazing for fighting other humans, but the girls were upset? There was always going to be a gap when you drew your weapon. A dangerous gap that the enemy could target. Only a guy who had a screw loose wouldn’t lose his focus when confronted with beautiful, thick, pale thighs suddenly appearing the instant that deep slit suddenly revealed itself. He’d lose his cool as he witnessed the glory of the nether-realm and the enticing possibility of seeing what-must-not-be-seen as the slit opened wider and then closed. If I were in the enemy’s position, I’d be easily distracted by that slit. I was sure about that. In fact, I was scared about how easily I’d get killed in that situation?

“You can’t pull a big shield out of there ’cause it’s just a slit? But it is one looong slit, so other things come out? Like long legs?”

“Yeah, that’s what we’re trying to tell you! The slit is too long! If you made it any longer, it’d go all the way to the hip!”

Part of that had to do with their long legs. The boots were long, above-the-knee models, so if I didn’t make the slit long enough, you wouldn’t be able to see the fishnet tights underneath. I did cute embroidery on the garter belts too, so you needed to able to see that as well. And having a knife attached to a garter belt was a top-notch aesthetic! That was my right to preserve as an artistic teenage boy!

Today, the priests were learning how to use explosives, as well as conduct infiltration and tracking, with the frontier army. But that army only knew how to charge? If it had been the Imperial Guard, then there was the slightest chance they could do anything else. A troop led by Royal Girl was probably just gonna charge straight forward, though? Charging was the name of the game here too?

“Stab ’em all!”

“Raaaah!”

The rapier inside the staff became this habit model’s primary weapon. But rapiers were for dueling, not killing monsters. Humans were frail. Stab them, and you could disable them right away. Monsters were tough and would just keep rampaging. Rapiers were stabbing weapons—not that you couldn’t slash as well. The blades were thin, though, so using them on a hard opponent only risked breaking a blade. They were made for finding an opening in the opponent’s defenses and stabbing that point, which made them difficult to use against armored monsters.

Everyone ran around dodging attacks with fierce motions, meaning that slits were swinging around and exposing thighs. It was a fierce melee of bouncing, bubbling bodies in habits so tight you could see the gluteus maximus and intergluteal cleft in all their goodness. Can’t wait to see these in kneeling position!

“Scatter! Surround the foe, and attack in waves!”

“Roger!”

This battle would’ve been way too much for the nerds. I got it—if I suddenly saw habits this sexy, I’d just watch on and cheer for those outfits, even if I were getting attacked. I didn’t know which side I’d support in that battle, but sensory stimulation and excitement left no room for stipulated explications in all their sensual exaltation, exacting my excitement into stunning expectations of simmering erotic combinations!

“Don’t target the hard parts! Aim for the gaps!”

“Crap! My sword’s bending!”

The habits clung tightly to each limb and the throbbing motion of the hips. Fabric was drawn taut across every bit of flesh, the compressed contents bursting out according to the wearers motion. A bustling, busty scene!

“I’m still having trouble aiming!”

“It’s because of your broadsword.”

The burst of womanly curves drawn into tight waists, and the long slits of the thin fabric underneath exposed bountiful legs. When the girls got in solid stances, wide-open legs opened the curtain on their fishnet-stockinged thighs for all to see.

“Let’s just take our time.”

“There’s no need to rush. Be precise.”

I was just there to support them. Of course, the problem was whether to support the butts or the thighs. Did I need to come up with a chant?

“Why is our instructor just staring?” the girls shouted. “You don’t have any advice for us?”

“Shells look tough on the surface but are susceptible to pressure. You’re gonna need to cut beneath the shells to kill? If you used morning stars, this would all be over in an instant, ya know?”

The girls leaped around to avoid the level 58 Land Crayfishes’ massive claws and stabbed them with their rapiers. If they didn’t find the gaps in the shell, their rapiers went pinging off the armor. Even if they did manage to penetrate flesh, it became a war of attrition versus the monsters’ hefty HP. All their jumping had turned it into an evasive battle. Since they were frolicking all over the place, so were the habit slits. It was quite a show!

“Maiden kiiick!” they screamed.

Bludgeoning did the trick. The difference in weight meant that crayfishes’ tails sent the girls flying backward. That was a good thing; I don’t think they wanted to beat monsters in a weight contest. I heard that crayfish can be pronounced like cray or like craw, but the only logical pronunciation in this battle was crevasse—all the cracks and crevices were quite a sight!

“Maiden pile bunker!”

The crayfish swung their giant claws, blocking attacks with shields, charging into the girls’ formation, and swinging their tails in every direction. It was true that using rapiers against an armored opponent made for great practice. I doubted armored old dudes would go into predictable formations or swing their tails around, though?

“Maiden’s rapier—oh, it doesn’t work?”

“Just adding ‘maiden’ to the name doesn’t suddenly make them armor-piercing?” I said.

“Ugh. They’re so hard!”

Were they trying to rival the orphan kick? Still, kicking the giant crayfish didn’t deal much damage. A pile bunker to the brain was a one-shot kill. Maidens didn’t go straight from an iron claw into a pile bunker, though? Driving in nails like that was more of a macho construction worker thing?

“Concentrate on attacking the heads!”

“Their necks are softer too!”

This was supposed to be practice and adjustment time for their new habits, but we were really taking it easy, only getting as far as the mid-floors. It turned out the rapiers were difficult to use, so while they were getting good practice in, the weapon wasn’t a great fit for the monsters we were facing. Small, agile opponents, sure. But the crayfish were too tough to stab.

To fight human opponents, you needed a variety of options rather than relying on excessive power. I had designed the habits to emphasize evasive and defensive skills over brawn. The girls didn’t have any easy way to take out the monsters, leading to long fights. They seemed determined to use these shelled opponents as stabbing practice, so they didn’t swap out their weapons. They kept up the elaborate evasions and slow-but-steady stabbing, gradually depleting the crayfishes’ HP.

“Always stick with a partner!” shouted Class Rep. “Coordinate your timing and stab together!”

“Roger!”

Compared to armor, the habits were lightweight and easy to move in. Nobody even got so much as grazed. They were specialized for hit-and-run tactics, which led to a difficult fight. I suppose that if this hadn’t been training, they’d have switched to broadswords and killed all the crayfish instantaneously. I’ll just let them do what they want.

Because this battle was taking so long, we might be able to finish our board game this time. Oh, come on! A mine tile?! My own battle was just beginning.

DAY 99
NOON

We’re still in attendance, broadly speaking, so our attendance record should be fine. We just can’t go home?

DUNGEON
57TH FLOOR

WE PICKED UP THE PACE and blew through the floors. When we made it to the 80th floor, Class Rep announced the end of the sensational habit training, and they went back to their unrefined armor to trample the floors. It was true that the sexy, formfitting armor unveiled their womanly figures in full sensual force, but in teenage-boy terms, it was nothing compared to the unmatched, skin-tight habits.

“Front line, don’t meet them! Let them pass! Surround them first, then chip away at them!”

“Roger!”

Still, hitting the 80s made the pace drop quite a bit. The margin for error got a lot narrower here. The best bet was to get stronger slowly and steadily, but the girls were itching to rush down to the lower levels. They insisted on practicing dueling back at the inn. In the dungeons, they raised both their levels and coordination skills.

Sister Girl was rushing things most of all. Having seen my classmates’ determination and resolve for her sake, she had fallen into complete silence. She swung her sword with absolute focus. The clerics had improved and reached a new level of skill—their swordplay surpassed uncertainty. They now had the resolve to risk their lives on their swords, in a good way. Their determination was greater than their fear of death, which was on the bad side of things.

We gathered items from the hidden room and dropped equipment as we went. I didn’t find anything that would give anyone more than a minor boost in battle. Getting stronger a little bit at a time was the only option. It took a long time, but minor boosts could end up saving lives in battle. Constant dripping could wear away stones that had piled into a mountain…Er, well, only one of those things at a time, I guess? We gotta decide whether to drip away or pile up? Otherwise, you’d just be stuck in a loop without getting anywhere!

We sealed off the special weapons for the party leaders. They wouldn’t be able to get a rest in the Theocracy, so we decided against using any weapons with intense MP usage.

“We can’t break through! Prioritize defense for now!”

“Roger!”

This cow didn’t care about getting a body full of arrows or spearheads; it kept on chasing after the teenage girls and their butts. They may have been aiming elsewhere, but I don’t know enough about cow fetishes to be sure.

Sturdy and stubborn. This level 80 behemoth had the tenacity to keep chasing no matter how many blows it took. It was tough. Too tough for sirloin, I feared. It didn’t have the high-grade beef mark, so I supposed it was just an ordinary, straightforward floor boss without much culinary potential.

Brrrrooooooagh!

Jiggle jiggle!

“Oh, oops. Looks like Slimey can’t hold back anymore?”

Slimey jiggled after the cow that chased the girls, hungry as could be. I suppose the behemoth was just a lump of beef?

I stepped in front of Slimey, who couldn’t help himself. Miss Armor Rep then stepped in front of me, and Dancer Girl in front of her. We made a chain of restraint. I rushed in front of Dancer Girl only for Miss Armor Rep to shoot past me and Dancer Girl to fly past her again. I used Speed-Up to dance through the air ahead of them. We lined up in mid-air—and boom, bull’s eye! We mashed it into a meatball for Slimey’s meal. As I took out one leg, the other three legs, head, and tail all got chopped off. All I got was one leg?!

“While y’all were tantalizing the cow with your teasing and hurting its feelings going all ‘Heh heh, we’ve got you now,’ Slimey, was the one getting the tasty delights of the tormented cow? I’m the one with nothing to do over here, so getting teased just turned me on! Let’s stop the teasing and tormenting moving forward?”

Everyone glared at me, but I had to at least try to make my point?

“We have plenty of time! And we weren’t teasing the cow!”

“Nobody said ‘Heh heh, we’ve got you now!’ Why would we be teasing the cow like that?!”

“We couldn’t have ‘got’ it in the first place!”

“Even if we did, nobody would be giggling!”

“Still, killing instantly like that…”

“Yup, it lost all its confidence in a blink.”

“We all knew it was possible, but seeing it is always a different beast.”

I didn’t want to make my delivery health girl wait. Teenage boys always made an effort to properly greet their properly waiting, naked delivery health girls. It was a teenage boy’s destiny to not make naked women wait any longer!

“All right, let’s keep going.”

“Sounds good!”

Class Rep’s leadership was always on point. We were out of school, but we couldn’t ever go back to school, so we were at risk of getting expelled! Although, we had been in class when we’d gotten sent to this world and hadn’t been dismissed, so we were technically still in attendance. We weren’t truant; we just couldn’t leave school to go home? The fact that we’d come here in our indoor school slippers was proof of that?

“We’re in the 80s now,” she said. “Brace yourselves.”

“You got it!”

Chiming in with the girls never got me counted as one of them, especially not by Class Rep? This was where the monsters officially got dangerous for the girls’ equipment, so I shouldn’t be letting them fight on these floors at all. I shouldn’t…but they wanted to. They were probably all out of cash, after all. As was I! I understood their feelings!

“We couldn’t finish it.”

“It was a good lesson. We need to be able to shave the monsters’ health down. It’ll take a long time either way.”

“Yeah, you can’t overdo it!”

“I don’t want to get caught in a war of attrition though.”

“I don’t think there was any way for us to win.”

True, you could make a ton of money on the lower floors, but it meant fighting in territory where they couldn’t completely guarantee their own safety. They were worried about me for some reason, but I was the one with an over-the-limit Luck stat. It was a perfect safety net, surpassing any kind of cheat skill. I didn’t have any job modifiers, but I didn’t have any of the restraints jobs came with either. I was unemployed!

“Things get sticky when monsters are immune to ailments and magic.”

“If I unleashed all my magic, we could still overwhelm them.”

“No, you can’t do that!”

That meant I could freely use weapons that didn’t have level minimums. Being able to access any weapon was a great cheat code. I was just a little weak. Yeah, a tiny bit frail, and teensy tad self-destructive. In terms of firepower, though, I was on the level of a dungeon emperor. I had adopted the first-come-first-kill plan of killing the enemy before it killed me. My unlimited reviving capabilities and having one-shotted the behemoth were proof of that, and I hadn’t even lost any limbs in the process. I’d nailed it.

My classmates would’ve been able to crush the behemoth by overwhelming it with an all-out deluge. But it probably would’ve used up all their MP in one battle. In a fantasy world, MP depletion meant death. Monsters didn’t wait for you to recover your MP, nor did dungeon emperors. In fact, they joyfully waited for you to run out and attacked you when you did!

“We need more offense…”

“Toootally,” said Vice Rep B. “When that shows up…”

“Yup, running out of MP means getting sucked dry in all sorts of ways in teenage-boy terms; nightly MP exhaustion is a true teenage-boy peril! Miss Armor Rep has also become capable of astounding feats after Dancer Girl taught her techniques. Even with her feet!”

Wiggle wiggle.

“What are you muttering about over there?” the girls hissed at me.

They didn’t have the strength. Monsters didn’t go down easily by nature—they were strong, sturdy, and overflowed with life force. Normal people didn’t just one-shot monsters, rip them to shreds, and gobble them up. Monsters this deep didn’t go down easily, not even against powerful weapons and people with level 100+ stats. The more time it took to win, the greater the probability of getting an inflicted ailment. Yeah, that behemoth wouldn’t get ripped to shreds as it mooed for mercy and then get devoured in ordinary circumstances. But apparently it was damn delicious, so I supposed that was good. Slimey was really psyched? Bouncing and jiggling all over? What a cute little Slime!

Jiggle jiggle!

Cuteness was justice in this case, and justice always won in the end. We won in the end, so justice was done. Yup, cuteness became justice. And jiggling is the ultimate truth!

After that, the girls plowed through the 81st, 82nd, and 83rd floors. They could deal with fast monsters, no problem. The swallows were swallowed in flames, the crocodiles got rocked, the dolls were child’s play. But the 84th floor Armored Cobras were hard and fast. It was hard to aim at targets slithering on the floor, and attacks to the legs and feet were dangerous. Those cobras came fast, too. Unfortunately for them, they didn’t know the right direction to go squirming in. Those talentless snakes! Still, with Fatal Poison, Fatality, and Status Ailment Infliction (all types), it was a sea of poisonous perils!

“Maintain a circle formation. Freeze them first, then strike!”

“Roger!”

The important thing was to not let them touch you. Focus on defense and use ranged magic to weaken them by flipping them over, them shaving down on their numbers. Make accurate judgments and fight them without any pretenses or showiness. The only remaining question was if they could hold out in a battle of endurance. The battle would depend on if the girls could withstand the bombardment, and if their Status Ailment (all types) resistances held out.

The snakes shot out acids and toxins from a distance. It didn’t melt the girls’ armor—it wasn’t so weak as to get damaged by some level 80 monsters’ attacks. But if they wore habits, then they would get slowly melted. I wanted to see that, but acid was still a bad idea.

“Raise your shields! Just focus on not getting hit by the poison! Don’t let them get closer!”

“Roger!”

The intensity of fire increased until the girls couldn’t dodge it all, but they weren’t affected by the ailments yet. If things stayed that way, they’d win. But if they did get inflicted with poison or another aliment, there was the possibility of defeat, even if that chance was a tiny fraction of a percent. I applied the Insurance effect, but that was for my peace of mind. With restoration mushrooms, they’d be fine, so I watched everyone closely, mushrooms clenched tightly in hand. The girls’ armor was getting drenched in sticky fluid. I waited at the ready with my fat mushrooms?

“Prioritize the densest areas! Vanguard, close in! Vice Rep B, stay back! We need you on standby for healing magic.”

“Roger!”

“Awww, coooome on!”

Er, something about the way she said “coooome” didn’t feel quite right, which kinda ruined the impressive “Roger” from everyone else. The girls really should’ve thought about their phrasing.

Queen Bee had taken out the Eternal Ice Spear but not activated it yet. She could instantly defeat snake opponents by activating Position Freeze, but it used too much MP. Super powerful weapons came with limitations that couldn’t be covered up by MP or MP batteries.

If they had MP Absorption like I did, then they could charge up MP batteries on the spot, but there was a limit to how much MP you could restore in one day. Even with bigger MP batteries, you couldn’t necessarily recharge them right away. According to the Skill Reference book, MP Absorption was a monster skill, same as Revival. What was that book insinuating about me? There was the possibility Class Rep could get it with Hijack, but you couldn’t acquire the skill by normal means.

Anyway, if I chucked Slimey in there and activated Ice World, I’d turn this snake fest into a snake feast, a speedrunner’s path to victory complete with seconds to spare. Slimey recovered quickly too. He had probably absorbed MP and HP from his meals.

So long as there was no darkness or bugs or gross crap, the three dungeon emperors were more than enough to exterminate all the dungeons, despite their level 48 level cap (due to my own limitations). There was no way I’d send the three of them alone to complete that task after they’d spent an eternity trapped in dungeons completely alone. That was my selfish decision, and as a result, the girls faced completely unnecessary dangers. We should be doing this ourselves…Although, I’d still let the girls deal with the bugs and gross shit? Yeah, my squad would be skipping those. I’d rather face the darkness!

They dodged the snakes’ shots, closed the distance, maintained perfect defenses, and made it to the edge of the sea of cobras, all without getting inflicted with any ailments.

“Ready your swords! It’s extermination time! Chaaaarge!”

“Roger! Commence extermination!”

“Hiyaaaaaaah!”

Accumulating stress had apparently pushed these girls into a violent aesthetic. “Snake disinfectant specialists” sounded like pleasant folks who just really loved reptiles, but this was a truly violent sight to behold.

“Skewered!”

“I’ll slice them to pieces!”

“Or just cut them in chunks!”

“Or mince them! Actually, that sounds like a lot of work.”

“Thin shavings!”

“How about dicing! Wait, how is that different from cubing?”

“What else is there? Er…chopping?”

“We cut could them into thin, rectangular slices.”

“Hemispherical slices!”

“You deserve the worst for getting maidens all goopy!”

“Thin, rectangular slices are gonna be tough with them squirming like this.”

“Same with mincing.”

“Snakes really aren’t suited for cutting into wedges!”

“They’re more of a natural fit for julienne.”

“We’re gonna get ripped off to get our armor cleaned.”

“I honestly don’t care at this point!”

The girls were both trying to show off their homemaking skills and massacre the snakes at the same time. The thin shavings had to take the grand prize in terms of brutality. The silver medal went to mincing and bronze to shredding.

“In terms of battle techniques, half-moon wedges sound the coolest, if you ask me. Julienne kinda has a bad reputation because of Mitsunari-san? Also, I’m sure the kinds of chopping and thin slicing demonstrated today aren’t exactly what they intended in cooking class? You’re doing it a tad too murderously! I mean, just cut them? ‘’Cause Slimey will happily eat all them snakes.”

Jiggle jiggle!

DAY 99
AFTERNOON

Monsters nowadays don’t have any respect for authority or hierarchy. What disrespectful, bothersome brats.

DUNGEON
85TH FLOOR

FEINT, ROTATE POSITIONS, shift into maneuvers. Scheme a sudden escape, and then corner the fleeing foe to finish them off with a little crossfire.

There was only a little bit left…Was this it? The goal was within reach, but I was nearly out of HP and unable to move. I guess I’m done for…Urk! “Return to start.” This is it, huh?

“Aaargh! I was so close! Why do you keep rolling sixes and keep catching up with me?! That die is rigged to roll a six, isn’t it?! That sort of luck isn’t possible! You’re cheating!”

I don’t wanna lose! But of course my undefeated dungeon emperors sent my poor little piece all the way back to the beginning! Unforgivable. Fleeing and activating trap tiles while keeping just a tiny sliver of HP?! They were in the middle of the most dangerous zone, but several consecutive sixes meant they were lapping me!

I pulled out all the stops, holding the die with Holding, calculating the vectors and speed of the roll with Wisdom, and activating it with Blockhead. This combined with my luck should make me unbeatable. That’s right, all sixes! I unleashed my ultimate, unlimited charge and trampled over the board…

“Hey, Haruka-kun? Would you mind at least watching us while we fight a dungeon king?!”

“They’re more fired up over a board game than the actual fight! What’s going on over there?!”

“Yeah, the fight over here is kinda reaching its climax too. I’m getting bonked like crazy in a fierce competition with three dungeon emperors, and since I lost all my HP, I’m activating a revenge-mode roll to double my roll in a shocking activation of unlimited unleashing of catch-up chaotic convulsions…Just bonk the dungeon king however you like? Let me know what you do once it’s over? That’s right! ‘Skip 30 Tiles, activate!’ Go, go, go! Long jump there…”

“You’re distracting us with your game! Don’t turn this place into a gambling ring! Also, lining up the manju like that has distracted Class Rep so badly that she stopped issuing commands! Put those away!”

I tried to drown out the low, reverberating growls of the dungeon emperor and the even louder lectures of temperamental teenage girls. Uh, don’t look at me. Face the monster!

The dungeon king bellowed and stomped its feet, causing the final floor to shake, nearly to the point of creating shock waves. The indomitable Slimey rolled the die with a jiggle.

Another six! Everyone was rolling sixes! The three of them were deadlocked right now but stuck in the trap zone near the goal. If I didn’t stop them somehow, they’d break out before I caught up. Dancer Girl tried to circumvent the trap zone, but I was positioned to take a different route altogether without any obstacles in my way. Slimey still maintained his narrow lead, though. Miss Armor Rep was now about to set the stage for the finale by choosing her path to the goal…

Gwoooooooooah!

“So loud!”

“Too! Loud!”

“Be! Quiet! Die!”

Boink boink!

I wish the monster would just die and let us play our game in peace. We were busy over here, so of course dungeon emperors would get irritable if you shushed them. Monsters nowadays didn’t have any respect for authority or hierarchy. What disrespectful, bothersome brats!

“Uh, Haruka-san? Please stop.”

Yikes! A word from the normally silent arts club girls was way more frightening than my other obnoxious classmates or the bellowing dungeon kings. We decided to play silently going forward. Roll roll.

“No, we’re telling you to stop playing! Don’t you feel bad for disrespecting the dungeon king?! Class Rep, hurry up and tell us what to do!”

I mean, I knew what was gonna happen without even looking. The girls couldn’t handle it. Class Rep would have to pull out her ace, and that’d be too much for the dungeon king to handle. The end, Q.E.D.

“By the way, Q.E.D. stands for quod erat demonstrandum, Latin for ‘which was to be demonstrated’ and was used to confirm verification of identity and to conclude proofs in modern philosophy. But QED stands for quantum electrodynamics, which is the relativistic quantum field theory of electrodynamics. Whether you use periods or not is really important?”

Wiggle wiggle.

Yeah, any professor would be surprised if you concluded 1+1=2 with quantum electrodynamics. They’d probably be so surprised they’d had no choice but to give you full points!

The dungeon emperor’s huge body was bent over. If you stretched it out, it was probably over fifty feet, maybe closer to sixty. I had no idea as to the exact number, nor any interest. I mean, it was a scorpion and all? Plus, catching it and stretching it out would be a real drag. I’d rather stick to estimates.

It had a hard carapace, six massive claws, and eight legs crunching into the ground. That made for an economical fourteen limbs. It also had a long tail with a massive stinger dripping suspicious fluids—probably poison—raised up behind it. If it wasn’t poison, then I had no clue what it would be, other than something that made me pretty uncomfortable to think about. Especially dripping out of the tip?

“Stop distracting us with your creepy explanations!” the girls shouted.

The scorpion’s hard carapace was equipped with Inferno Resistance, Water Resistance, Freeze Resistance, Physical Resistance, Slash Resistance, and even Status Ailment Resistance. Meanwhile, this shell was being electrocuted. Yup, it had forgotten Electricity Resistance or Lightning Resistance or something. Not to mention, Book Club President wore the Ripple Necklace, which was equipped with the Resistance Nullification effect, amplified all the girls’ status ailment attacks to create a complete deluge and permeation of ailments bombarding the scorpion.

The scorpion hung on, even as it got more and more ragged. It had no resistance to the electricity, so it remained paralyzed, twitching in place. This is a scorpion we’re talking about. I really don’t want to see any twitching.

Its six claws pounded into the ground despite its body being immobile. Its opponent was Miss Shield Rep with the Mirror Greatshield, who broke the scorpion apart with the Mirror Greatshield’s reflected Weapon Shatter and Equipment Shatter. Four of its claws were obliterated with Shield Bash. The other two were already worn out by the attack deluge.

With a creaking sound, the scorpion swung its poisonous tail, its ultimate weapon. Poison sprayed from the thick tip at high speed. Even that was feeble resistance against Class Rep’s Thunderbolt Chainwhip, which lashed down in a fearsome attack along with Arc Thunder, blasting apart the scorpion’s hard shell.

Queen Bee trampled what remained of it as she wedged her spear in its back. She was literally looking down on it. The Eternal Ice Spear froze the monster from the inside out. When the dungeon king lost all ability to move, teenage girls closed in on it for the beating of a lifetime. It had Freeze Resistance but not Ice Resistance. Furthermore, the resistances were only applied to its carapace, not its insides. The carapace did its best, but in the end, it got smashed to pieces and was thrown to the floor, squashed beneath Queen Bee’s feet as it spurted fluid. It’d be problematic if the scorpion was enjoying itself with all this feet stuff. Yeah, that would make this scorpion part of a very different enterprise.

Gyaaaaaaiiiiiiii!

The screeches of a beast on the verge of death. I really hope those aren’t screeches of gratitude! The once impenetrable, powerful, perfectly effective, effect-focused dungeon king was getting bashed to pieces. What a one-sided beating.

“Good work,” called Class Rep. “Boss defeated!”

“We did it!”

They had to use their best items, but it was a complete victory. Slimey did do some snacking about halfway through, but the girls were able to beat an 85-floor dungeon on their own, including a level 85 dungeon king, a death scorpion.

With that objective completed, the whole class had overcome the level 110 level wall and achieved new power. I wouldn’t be useful for much longer at this rate.

“Nice job,” I said, “I’d say you guys pass. Before we go back, how about washing off the mud? I’ve got some water prepared, so freshen up! The hot water’s here, and the mister’s that way. Just leave your armor over there. Oh, and I’ve got sweets, so feel free to take a rest.”

“Wow! Thank you!”

It was a close one. The thin coating of status ailment resistance that I applied to the interior of the armor was starting to change colors. The poison had penetrated the armor. This emergency layer had resisted the poison, but it looked like the intense toxins had eroded the membrane. Looked like the membrane was one-use only.

That poison was more powerful than the Status Ailment Resistance on the armor’s surface. One monster’s poison had been able to pass through practically two layers of immunities in thirty sets of armor. I had underestimated this world again. The armor wasn’t invincible. I had seen as much with my own eyes. They were close to death today.

A particularly penetrative poison or paralysis ailment could be fatal in a fight against a dungeon king. It could’ve caused a chain reaction, putting multiple people in danger. Even if the poison seeping completely through was incredibly unlikely, Fatal Poison and Power-Word Kill were still options, not to mention Dissolve and Gangrene. I had put too much faith in my armor.

Knowing the 80s, it was possible for two layers of poison to pass through the armor. I knew there was a remote chance of it happening once. Today, it happened twice. I couldn’t have screwed this up worse.

“Sorry,” I said. “This armor wasn’t good enough. My pride and ineptitude…You all almost died today because of that. I’m sorry.”

All I could do was apologize and bow my head. It was a mistake that had risked their lives. The only reason everyone had survived today was because we had gotten lucky.

“Don’t apologize!” the girls shouted. “You didn’t do anything wrong. So don’t apologize!”

Er…what? Hang on, this wasn’t good? I thought they were just going to use the mist shower to wash their faces and arms and legs!

“Expecting our armor to protect us perfectly every time would be crazy!”

“Yeah! That’s why we also have rings, necklaces, bracelets, and innerwear, isn’t it?”

“Even if somebody had gotten poisoned, how would it have been your fault?”

“We all know the risks of battle. We were the ones who couldn’t dodge the attacks. Your armor protected us!”

“There’s no such thing as 100 percent certainty. We all know just how many times you made and remade our armor and other equipment.”

“It’s a miracle no one got poisoned. These are the dungeon’s lower floors. We’re alive thanks to you! So you can’t apologize!”

“Yeah, that’s, like, sooo right! And everyone’s tooootally fine! We’re all grateful to you and stuff? Like, thaaaanks?”

Hang on, was I apologizing because I sold the armor to them at rip-off prices as having perfect resistances? That was why I had set the prices so high! There were no refunds, so the best I could do was recall and fix the armor… But let’s get back to the real issue at hand.

“I’d really appreciate you just sticking to your faces and limbs in the mister? You should’ve had your tight compression shorts and halter tops underneath the armor, so why are your whole bodies dripping wet?! Also, I’m sorta seeing some things poking out at me, which might cause a real pokey problem on my end!”

This wasn’t a problem of distance anymore—they were going to crush me to death! Their wet clothes clung to their skin, so I was getting smushed in softness!

“The mister just felt so good.”

“Yeah, can you add one to the bath?”

Sure, it felt good, but things besides the mist were also feeling good, which was bad. Yup, badness in various forms of badness underneath the dripping, skin-tight fabric, which also looked bad, and felt super-duper bad as in super-duper good. I was facing a panorama of teenage girl danger zone with a high skin ratio. Saying there was no place to put my eyes undersold the scenario!

Drops of water still clung to their bare skin, entrancing, fresh, and juicy. Drips splashed off their bountiful bodies, as the soaked-through tank tops and compression shorts pinched and clung tight to their white flesh. The clerics, Royal Girl, and Merimeri also joined in! Oh no, this is too much. Not Merimeri! She’s still in junior high!

“It feels so good, especially with lotion. The hot water is making me feel all warm inside too.”

I skipped past warm to straight-up hot. The raw sensations were getting me hotter than a Japanese honeybees’ thermal bee ball killing technique used against their hornet archnemeses, especially with all the soft, circular mounds brushing up against me in a teenage-boy killing technique!

This was a high-pressure trap to high-key out-trap the trappings of any high-stakes Kongming or Pang Tong creation. It was creating high-pressure sensations from the pink, skin-tight, soaked-through shirts and the soft flesh rubbing all over me—and smooth and sticky with lotion, too?!

“Just know that we’re all grateful for you and have no complaints about anything, so you shouldn’t apologize no matter what,” Class Rep said.

“Exactly! Thank you, Haruka-kun!”

Look, they were saying the right thing, but taking the wrong actions? I mean, there was no way this much overflowing teenage flesh tightly wrapped in soaked-through shirts couldn’t be?

Even in the dim light of the dungeon, Jupiter Eye could see dripping, towel-wrapped parts no good boy should see. You could call this an 18+ sensational scene of situations that no sixteen-year-old teenage boy should see either situationally or scenically. More importantly, why the hell did they know Perez Prado’s erotic “Tabu,” and why were they whistling it? Who taught them that?! I mean, this is just another wrong added to a whole pile of wrongs! And don’t dance, Dancer Girl! It’s too sexy!

They’re grateful, I thought. Teenage-girl expressions of gratitude were dangerous, especially for teenage boys! I needed to get out of here, ’cause any moment now there was gonna be a warrant out for my arrest. In which case, I considered sending out my snakes and tentacles, but that would result in worse than an arrest—irreparable damage to my sex appeal. A tricky situation indeed!

DAY 99
EVENING

Collapsing on the bottom floor of a dungeon has tragic fate vibes, but the cause was female molesters?

DUNGEON
85TH FLOOR

EVERYONE GOT MAD AT HIM. After a maiden’s outraged rampage Haruka-kun’s body, squished and crushed, rolled around on the dungeon floor. He was a more dangerous opponent than the dungeon king, but the power of a drippingwet teenage-girl deluge was several levels more powerful. His eyes were happy Xs in the end.

Nobody wanted to hear it. Not even a little “sorry.” After how much he worried for us, looked after us, treated us kindly and protected us, “sorry” was the last thing we wanted to hear from him.

Accepting an apology would be an insult to him—the boy who spent day after day saving our lives. We couldn’t permit even one tiny “sorry.”

None of us could accuse him of anything. We would never hold it against him if he did make a mistake or overlook something. How could we reproach someone who did so much for us? He gave us happiness, our lives, everything. How could he think to apologize?

He had made the armor with the intention of protecting us without fail. He made us custom-made armor on par with the lower-floor dungeon drop items, optimized for each of us. We had heard about the countless hours he’d spent making, remaking, experimenting with his crafting. Who in their right mind would ask for anything more?

So everyone got upset and mobbed him. We knew he wouldn’t listen to a lecture, so we had to physically show him how we felt. We knew our voices wouldn’t reach him. How many times had we already raised our voices and shouted, “This is enough!” at him? He’d probably only blame himself if something ever happened and one of us died.

That was why we couldn’t die. Haruka-kun would suffer. At the same time, we had to get stronger, even if it involved taking risks. Otherwise, Haruka-kun would continue to suffer.

“How is our happy-looking corpse?”

“If we just left him here, he’d probably be a nuisance to the dungeon.”

“Any dungeon with Haruka-kun in charge would be in serious trouble.”

“We need to bring him back! He’s too dangerous to leave lying around in a dungeon!”

We had to take unreasonable risks as safely as possible and dare to get stronger, hence our tough fight today. And yet, he had been so bored that he’d started a board game. Then when we were in the slightest bit of trouble, he sent in Slimey to save our butts. If there was the slightest risk to our lives, he blamed himself. Of course we’d gotten mad at him.

“Don’t worry. We. Will carry him back,” said Angelica-san.

“He’s our master,” said Nefertiri-san.

Jiggle jiggle.

If he could only worry about himself a fraction of how much he worried about us. If he could only spoil himself a fraction of how much he spoiled us. He probably didn’t even understand how we felt. I knew that he’d start making designs for new armor the moment he got home and would have it ready by morning.

More than thirty sets of armor. Yup. He’d even made equipment for the people from the Theocracy at some point. He hadn’t taken measurements, so the designs were flat and unrefined, but he had still made defensive gear in everyone’s sizes. At this rate, he might make some for Oda-kun and Kakizaki-kun’s groups, which would make over forty sets. He could build them at incredible speeds but only by placing an enormous burden on his mind. I knew he’d make the armor in no time, even if it hurt so badly that it felt as if his head might split open.

“You might think I suffered a terrible fate if I told you I’d collapsed on the bottom floor of a dungeon, but it was actually because of female molesters! It wasn’t horrible in the slightest? What’s up with that? Where can I submit my claim that I was attacked by level-110 female molesters in this dungeon, a claim that’s less of a shame and more of a triumph? I’d love to pester these molesters!”

“Don’t call us molesters! We’re young ladies!”

“Shut up!”

“And don’t treat us like monsters! What if that gets added to our status?!”

“Hang on…Okay, safe!”

“You’re accepting your guilt by checking your statuses!” he shouted. “That’s right, molesters!”

“Shut it!”

Guests were waiting for us when we got back to the inn. It was the suspicious merchant from this morning and a beautiful woman. Both looked young enough to be in their twenties but possessed tense yet cool postures and well-mannered expressions. Still, there was no denying that the makeup sets we got were top-notch. Uh…Why is Haruka-kun sitting so formally?

“Yes!” he muttered. “Hels the old dude and the escort babe!”

“What in the world?” everyone shouted. “Why are you calling her? You’re convicted!”

Somehow, he’d ordered this woman with the first merchant! He needed a lecture.

“Behold, a merciless lecture,” I roared, “a storm of a lecture that destroys a thousand crows of a thousand universes with steel, wind, thunder, flame! A lecture to harpoon your very soul! A mere regular lecture won’t suffice! A grand lecture is unleashed, one loaded with everything we’ve got!”

“Call a medic! Class Rep is broken!”

(Healing commenced. Munch munch.)

“It is the utmost honor to stand before you,” said the woman. “I serve as the president of Delibaur Corporation. My name is Ellyus, and it’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance. I believe Hels has already informed you, but we have no intention of competing with the Zackary Company. Have no fear. We merely wish to develop and expand in tandem.”

These two didn’t have anything to do with the sex industry; they were merchants from the Merchant Kingdom.

“What screwed up delivery health service is this? You mixed up my order again and sent me an old dude in an aaggghravating development of mixed-up screwing. How is a teenage boy supposed to achieve the screwing of his screwed-up dreams with the violent shock of unpleasant general store international sales expansion?”

“That general store was called the Zackary Company this whole time?!”

“They’re not delivery health!”

These merchants wanted to start trading with Haruka-kun, and they weren’t an escort service. Haruka-kun was guilty of not understanding that and was 100 percent convicted and expelled from school for ordering an escort and waiting for her in a formal, seated position, claiming it was simply healthy teenage-boy behavior. We’ll crush him for this later.

“As was proposed this morning, we are willing to share information from the Theocracy, the Merchant Kingdom, and the discontented locations within this kingdom. This is all in honor of making your acquaintance, so we are happy to share regardless of our dealings moving forward. We present this gift to you as evidence of the Delibaur Corporation’s hospitality.”

They recognized the importance of connecting with Haruka-kun, so they knew their stuff. It wouldn’t be smart for a normal high schooler to enter a deal with such savvy adults lightly. Everyone was holding their breath—’cause a student who was anything but normal was doing all the wheeling and dealing.

“Oh, I can choose? If you’re cool with free, then I’ll pass on the information about the Theocracy and the Merchant Kingdom and the discontented kingdom places and take the change, even if the free goods are a rip-off trap. If y’all are down, then you can hear the rattling, battering, and clattering of an iron ball rainfall being prepped, so just be open to the idea. ’Cause if you’re gonna give me info for free, then I want it about the country behind the Theocracy, not the Theocracy itself. Oooh, and how about the Elf Kingdom? I really don’t give a crap about information involving countries with nothing but old dudes?”

After a pause, the man said, “He’s onto us, President.”

Their affable facades flickered, expressions changing as they revealed their true feelings. A happy yet sort of troubled expression wavered in their eyes. Now they had truly assessed Haruka-kun.

“Phooo,” the president sighed. “I knew you were a piece of work, and I came here prepared for that. To think that I couldn’t even negotiate…If I may ask, why those two nations?”

We were about to go to the Theocracy and knew next to nothing about the Merchant Kingdom—why didn’t Haruka-kun want information about them?! What was even behind the Theocracy? Their religion was the dominant one on the continent. What could be behind the Church, whose religion had already spread to multiple countries?

“Well, if God was right and everyone really followed his commands, then there wouldn’t be discrimination against beastfolk, for one. I mean, think about the ears! Any religion that discriminates against beast ears is horrible! Cuteness is justice! They should write that down in the holy scripture!”

“You are aware of the secret history that has been disseminated over many long years, twisting the true word of the Church?”

A secret history, truth shrouded in darkness. The explanation behind the way religious doctrine had been twisted and then came to rule the Theocracy. It was the last thing I was expecting him to ask about. Arianna-san and the others trembled in anger, sad and furious at their own foolishness.

The Elf Kingdom was supposedly in the middle of a deep forest in untrodden lands, so there shouldn’t have been any information on it. What exactly was Haruka-kun trying to find out?

“If we’re talking why, it’s ’cause I got stuff to do over there? Yeah, I got some errands behind the Theocracy, and apparently, some stuff I gotta do in the Elf Kingdom? I was really trying to just hole up, you know? I mean, seriously. If they wanted something from me, they could’ve just told me, ya know? ’Cause I got stuff to do, fo sho? So…Whaddaya want from me?”

“This isn’t negotiating. You’re grabbing us by the necks and choking us,” the president said. “What makes you think we have anything to do with the Elf Kingdom?”

I lost track of what was happening. Haruka-kun shouldn’t know anything about the elves in the first place…Ah, wait, there’s Kirikiru-san.

“The sword old dude and the spear old dude are still holed up, and the merchant selling my sex appeal hasn’t showed either. They probably hid away once Elf Girl got here, so I figured someone was gonna be on the way, and lo-and-behold, a shady old dude showed up! He was way too good with that abacus?”

Now that Haruka-kun mentioned it, Ofter and Gatek’s party hadn’t been here since we’d gotten back to the frontier. They had defended Murimuri Castle with the others, but we hadn’t seen them once since. And yeah, Kirikiru was an elf…I still couldn’t figure out what was happening, though. The merchants looked equal parts troubled and pleased. Both quivered, wry smiles plastered onto their faces.

“Yeah, because, like, even if you bought an abacus from the general store, there’s no way you should’ve known how to use it…That means you got it from someone who does know how to use it? Which means you have a connection to someone who’s been to the frontier?”

True, there hadn’t been any abacuses around when we’d first gotten here. Haruka-kun made one for the general store lady. Bureaucrats had learned how to use it since then.

“Yeah, that’s one thing. I know who it’s been sold to since they’re handmade trial products and I’m the guy who made them. Just seeing you with one is enough to figure everything out? Not to mention, the wares you’ve brought to sell were out of this world. Where in the world did you get them from? Outside of the frontier? Because we don’t have any information on the sale of equipment like that beyond of the frontier—not even one of those products?”

“He’s saying that their products are originally from here?”

“There was no need for us to deal with the Merchant Kingdom after all.”

I see. Haruka-kun had been investigating this whole time.

“Yup, I can’t keep my purse strings tight when there’s a pheromone ring at stake, so I thoroughly investigated everywhere in the kingdom and didn’t even find a rumor of its existence. But Elf Girl’s illness had the same dense magical substance as the frontier, right? That meant there was a place besides the frontier overflowing with magical substance, where deep dungeons with dungeon items could pop up, ya know? Of course, we’d be in trouble if big dungeons popped up, but the frontier is the only real solution for dungeons anyhow? Which meant someone’s gotta investigate, ’cause if some dungeon killer showed up, I’d be in real trouble. Or so I thought. But nobody did? Which meant that it was someone who knew Elf Girl? Then two shady individuals conveniently disappeared at just the right time and stuff?”

“Impressive deduction.”

He was searching for the pheromone ring to improve his sex appeal this whole time? That was lecture-worthy!

The president chuckled. “My apologies—you’ve won. It seems that there’s no deceiving you. I swear, we have no ill-intent. It was simply that the information Kirikiru provided us was nonsensical to the point of incomprehensible and left us bewildered. We could hardly reach out, much less reach a conclusion in our discussions. To provide such information was honestly meant as a token to make your acquaintance…Truly, you’ve bested us.”

The two merchants got on their knees and bowed deeply—to none other than the elf, Erailia-san.

“We are a new elven merchant company,” the president explained, “and are by no means qualified to represent the elves in any way. Nonetheless, I do pray that the shrine maiden Lady Erailia was no trouble to you. I assure you that all the elves feel the same. We did our best to gather medicine for her. However, we could find no adequate solution, not even through the top brass of the Merchant Kingdom. So, we went all the way to the frontier, and yet our power was still insufficient…Sir Vizmuregzero had already been taken away by the time Sir Ofter provided us with the medicine. We were two steps behind on everything and anything, it seems. We took on a dangerous duty but were unable to save you. We’re sorry, Lady Erailia. And…thank you.”

They pressed their heads to the floor. After Vizmuregzero had joined the Merchant Kingdom to try to find medicine from the frontier, Erailia-san was saved, but she was in a perilous condition. A dense magical substance had infected her body after serving as a shrine maiden tasked with curbing the revitalization of the dungeons. She continued to try to fulfill her duties with all her heart in spite of this until the next shrine maiden was selected. Soon she collapsed and was unable to move.

Finally, the intensity left Haruka-kun’s gaze. Erailia-san sobbed. She was relieved of her suffering, having been burdened from such a grave responsibility. Rather than being accused of abandoning her duty, she received apologies and thanks. Sincere, heartfelt thanks at that. I knew it wouldn’t be enough for Haruka-kun, though. She had finally been relieved from her duties—formally this time.

The merchants explained that dungeons were one incentive, but they also wanted to find a certain “Mushroom Evangelist.” They heard rumors that this Mushroom Evangelist was a young boy who went around healing the masses with a gentle smile and compassionate eyes but were unable to find anyone who matched that description. Yup, they wouldn’t have with that description.

Instead, they shifted to researching the “Dungeon Destroyer,” but grew confused after being completely unable to understand the reports they were receiving. That was why they had come today. Not that meeting Haruka-kun would clear up the confusion. Talking to him just made you more confused! The shrine maiden Erailia-san, who had gone missing, was healthy at the very least. Simply seeing the happiness in her smile proved they could trust him.

They explained that it was true that they wanted to sell their wares. Above all else, however, they were deeply grateful that Haruka-kun had saved Erailia-san, and planned a deal to deliver information, weapons, and equipment. The Elf Kingdom was supposedly raising a tremendous sum to hire this Dungeon Destroyer to come defeat dungeons there. The ‘Dungeon Destroyer?’ Flattery will get you everywhere with him.

He was probably out of cash, for one. Some loose change for his inn fees would probably suffice. He survived by gathering the spellstones in dungeons, without any salary at all. He wasn’t even an adventurer, so he could get neither subsidies for his dungeon raids nor rewards for having defeated them. He kept on fighting, even when they didn’t prove profitable. Yeah, he kills dungeons for free.

The merchants explained all this as they handed over various papers and answered our questions before moving on to discussing the Elf Kingdom.

“Okay, then how about this as the fee for the info? I’m not paying for the delivery health ’cause there was no delivery of that! I was prepared to pay with all my heart and soul, and even got in proper position, but no. No delivery for me? Here, mushrooms? I’ll even throw in our famed local mushroom pennants! Kabam!”

“H-how could we accept this? This information is provided as an expression of but a fraction of our gratitude. Our comrades won’t forgive us if we accept anything. We don’t have the cash on hand to pay for such high-grade restoration mushrooms. So please…”

“Isn’t there some shrine maiden doing some dungeon sealing? You’ve got no dungeons, right? So, she’ll just get sick and stuff? Isn’t it obvious? She’ll obviously get sick. Then everyone’ll freak out ’cause you’ll still have no medicine? You wanna just freak out until she dies? Yup, you need these pennants! If you say you don’t, I’ll never forgive you! This mushroom shape’s so cute! I’ve got so, so many of them…”

Haruka-kun bowed his head to the two of them. We were standing in the middle of the inn lobby, all the customers moving as far away as possible. They’d seen those pennants before.

The merchants hunched their shoulders, tears dripping down their cheeks as they murmured “thank you,” as if chanting a prayer, or maybe as if they were in the midst of a nightmare.

They had a long way to go. They hadn’t managed to gather proper information at all. They couldn’t even find the Mushroom Evangelist. They knew nothing of that very real, feared figure. There was a legend of a boy in a black cloak. The moment someone fell ill and didn’t have money to afford medicine, he appeared.

People would say things like “I can’t afford that,” or “I’ll never be able to pay you back,” or “Don’t waste this on me.” He didn’t accept complaints or rejections, no matter the tears or apologies. In the blink of an eye, he’d shove a mushroom down their throats, shouting, “Eat my mushroom already!”—a strange but miraculous technique. As soon as they healed, he’d shout, “Now time to get to work!” and throw them right into a job with a sky-high salary. He was the strangest, most feared legendary figure the frontier had ever seen.

Not a single person had managed to escape. A fearsome tale from our present time, gathering victims to this day. Now, two more fell prey to this myth, the legend of the frontier’s Mushroom Evangelist.

We were dumbfounded when we first witnessed it. We begged him to stop saying “Eat my fat mushroom!” so many times, but he kept at it despite it all. And most of his patients were women.

According to the perpetrator, “In the labor-starved labor market of the frontier, it sure is tough to secure laborers. So I’m going around finding sick people to work at my factories and stuff? Just doing some headhunting? I wasn’t hunting for their heads to put them on my wall or anything? Can’t kidnap healthy people and force them to work, and stuff?” He was going around headhunting sick people to work in his factories. Sickness isn’t exactly a qualification for employment!

Factories doing sewing and spinning were full of former patients. These employees got a high salary, tasty meals, sweets, and beautiful outfits. It was one of the most appealing workplaces out there.

You didn’t pay for the services of the Mushroom Evangelist—he forced them on you. He never listened to his patients’ opinions, and no matter what anyone said, he shoved his mushroom into their mouths. You couldn’t defy him. He didn’t listen to you. No wonder the merchants couldn’t get proper information about him.

Seriously, though. How did Delibaur and Hels get twisted into delivery health escorts? I still planned on lecturing about that.

According to the accused, “I never ordered the delivery health, so I totally didn’t do anything wrong? Ya know?” Yup, it’s lecture time!

DAY 99
NIGHT

They claim this is the third bit of honesty, but I’ve been honest this whole time, so it was no good.

WHITE LOSER INN

I WAS THE VICTIM OF DELIVERY HEALTH FRAUD. They were in the cruel business of shattering a pure, innocent teenage boy’s dreams. The demons I met in the dungeons weren’t as evil as this delivery health fraudulence! It was a friggin’ old dude!

At least I got information on the Elf Kingdom and the country beyond that, which I didn’t have so much as a map of before. Unfortunately, there was no information on special agricultural and manufactured products. There was an ocean apparently, though? If there was an ocean, then there were fish, lots of fish! And there was bound to be a flourishing fishing industry. Fish Girl could have a heartwarming family reunion at last. Looks like I needed to do a survey of how many fish were swimming out there.

For whatever reason, the delivery health peeps were crying. That destroyed the escort event flag for good. We were at risk of tripping a tragic one and having the next shrine maiden collapse and send some other lolly-licking old dude—now that was the last event I wanted in my life! Fortunately, we could stop new lolly-lickers from spawning as long as we shoved a mushroom into her mouth.

“Indeed. Perfect deduction by yours truly, Mr. Washington!”

“Uh, didn’t Washington chop down a cherry tree?”

“I think this Washington would be more likely to chop down the tree, threaten his father with the axe, and then coerce his way to the presidency? Our Washington is way too scary for his father to get mad at him?”

“Something about this story feels off!”

“Hurry, father! Run away!”

“Actually, the story of Washington and the cherry tree is a fable about the importance of honesty invented by Mason Lock Weems.”

“Okay, I’m totally lost now. I have literally no idea where this conversation has gone!”

I managed to break the lolly-licking event flag but ended up destroying the delivery health event flag as a result. It felt like a net loss. At least they were gonna give me loads of precious metals, so I’d make some money?

“Is this the start of an automatic, reloading, big-spender delivery system?” I gasped. “Gemstones and precious metals are lined up before I’ve even begun my ripping off…Even some foreign currency is sneakily mixed in!”

If they wanted to present me with all this, I could just take it over to the general store. This was all a part of my ingenious scheme to promote more donations by donating my own donations to the general store and generate yet more generous donations, of course!

“Um…What exactly is this?”

“Er, souvenirs? I threw in some famous frontier mushroom pennants to boot? They’re on trend?”

Everyone was too blown away by the beauty of the pennants to even speak.

“Excuse me, but you must ignore all this,” said Book Club President. “There’s no point in asking questions. You won’t be able to understand the answers anyway. It’s simply impossible.”

Look, they might have said that there was no rush to deal with the Elf Kingdom’s dungeons, but I doubted it. Consider this: the shrine girl was chosen based on having a strong resistance to magical substance, but even she got infected by it. In other words, the dungeons couldn’t be held back much longer. The next shrine maiden would inevitably fall ill too. Once they burned through magically resistant shrine maidens, the seal would break, and the deluge would come, one-hundo-percent guaranteed.

The delivery healthy company bowed their heads a bunch and bounced. The sword and spear dudes were supposedly coming next. I was worried we’d miss each other, though, so I skipped the part where I explained stuff to the general store lady to get to the other part. She wouldn’t have any competition with international sales, and it provided a profitable outlet for excess goods. It marked a productive strategic growth initiative for my big-bucks lifestyle. First product to sell abroad: pennants!

Despite being the victim of delivery health fraud, Class Rep was mad at me with a vicious delivery hellacious farce? It was typical of standard mysteries. Get mad at the assailant, not the victim! I was but an innocent teenage boy cruelly deceived into waiting to greet a delivery health girl. Alas, now I had to make dinner.

I reserved an extra building and went over there to cook up barbecued pork dinner sets only to find everyone standing around talking to Elf Girl and Sister Girl. What was this, a shakedown?

“Sure, a shakedown would be satisfying because the coins in this world probably clink extra nice, but also in terms of a big, shaking, bouncing butt that…N-n-n-never mind! I wasn’t saying anything, only focusing on making dinner like a good teenage boy in eternal quietude and silence, hence me not saying anything? Yeah, it’s a little smoky in here, but I’m doing proper ventilation so there’s really no need to whip out any morning stars?”

The number of morning stars continues to increase!

“Anywho, here ya go? Eat up, eat up! With guaranteed one-more-sets, there’s an automatic punishment levied in store for you, so don’t even try to hold back?”

“There’s no levying in store! Thanks for the food!”

The delivery health company left without ever making a delivery. But thanks to that very same company, all the girls had changed into normal outfits, so for the first time in ages, I could pass a meal in quiet reflection. Poster Girl and Stalker Girl lined up to get their food properly.

Yup. They all wore miniskirts or short-shorts with sleeveless tops, so there was plenty of exposure. It felt a lot safer in here than with these rather than compression shorts. I’d designed those strictly as innerwear to be put on beneath their armor, so I hadn’t been prepared for the explosive impact! Maybe they needed to cover up because of the mister.

No matter how I chopped the cabbage, there weren’t any frolicking orphans around, or baguette-snatching meatheads, or room-reading-resistant nerds to nerdle around…In other words, the dining hall had become a lewd, lascivious environment lately!

I mean, one night I had to deal with the sensual tension and temptations of friggin’ bunny suits! Not to mention the cheongsam and miniskirt maid outfits. I couldn’t relax at all with those around. The compression shorts were just as bad.

The consideration of remodeling my armor was also a factor, but I felt strange, mostly because of all the resting the girls had forced on me over the last few days. I thought I had completely recovered last night, but for some reason I felt uncomfortable and a bit sick at the moment. Is there something new wrong with me?

“Miss Armor Rep, Dancer Girl, would you guys mind training with me for a bit? I’m all rested up, and I dunno if it’s because I rested too much but I feel weird, so I kinda want to figure things out.”

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

Jiggle jiggle?

Slimey even decided to come along. I really wished they would talk normally, though? I guess they decided to relax the ban on training, which was good. If I let this weird feeling linger, it could cause a fatal mistake in combat. All the rest and relaxation had made me lower my guard lately. I wanted to go all out.

To put it plainly…I was trying to get out of a lecture! Yeah, I wasn’t even the one who ordered the delivery health escort, but the girls wouldn’t listen to a single sentence from this teenage boy. Not a single word! Even though I was the victim of fraud, I was at a real risk of a dangerous lecture session.

“Let’s get started,” I said.

Jiggle jiggle!

I wrapped magical power around my body and molded my skills deep into my very cells. It wasn’t just entangling myself in it—the magic had activated throughout my body, spreading like a fever. My body didn’t feel light; it felt thin. The magical power, spells, and skills completely permeated my body. It was a strange, illusory feeling. Was this all the rest making me rusty?

Something was off. I still had something extra to give, and the excess Entanglement felt mismatched compared to usual. As I continued to keep close tabs on my own body, I carefully started to move. I sensed the flow that I had felt last night, and breathed in and out, letting the magical power, spells, effects, and skills circulate within my body and becoming one with them. I was worried for a moment when I felt my body sort of swell up, but I didn’t lose any HP. Time to fight.

“Okay. Here I come.”

Wiggle wiggle.

I let my breath out and stepped forward, focusing on the power circulating inside of me. My consciousness was running on Thought Acceleration, so the whole world seemed to move in extreme slow motion.

I thrust my body into motion across the greyish, gooey world around me. It was vague, but I didn’t feel much resistance at all. There wasn’t the usual sense of heavy clinging that I felt when moving in slow motion. Instead, I felt the world and time flowing gently past. My movements were clumsy, and I felt off. Yup. I crashed.

“Agggh!” I shouted. “I dunno how I dodged, stopped, and fell all at the same time. What the hell just happened?! I’m literally acting according to my own intentions, but I can’t understand the result! What was that?”

“Too fast. You’ve never done. That speed before. You were indecisive and fell.”

“Defensive position. Walking skill comes too late. Control and consciousness. Off track. It’s not. Working.”

Wiggle wiggle.

Even Wisdom’s analysis couldn’t keep up with my body’s movements. I was officially moving faster than my consciousness.

I had to recreate the failure in my brain, adjust the calculations, accumulate control, readjust, and recharge. I intensified Thought Acceleration, and the world slowed down even more. My body still felt more supple than it should have. My movements were sharp and quick. My speed and precision had drastically increased, but I felt unmoored.

I readjusted my control again. But when I tried to move my feet, they got tangled up, and I tripped over myself again.

“I can’t stop,” I said. “My stats don’t have the strength necessary to stop my speed. If I try to stop myself, I take damage. If I don’t stop, I fall over. I just need to purposefully fall in a way that doesn’t hurt myself for emergency stops?”

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

Jiggle jiggle.

The three of them were being considerate toward my body, holding back their reactions because of all my self-inflicted falls. They were smiling—not a hint of ill will was in their expressions. They were unabashedly enjoying me falling and crashing all over the place! This wasn’t revenge, per se, but it felt like something very close it!

“Pfffoo!”

Third time’s the charm! As in, I didn’t need charm because I was always right. I fell on my third try too. Like a charm. I still hadn’t linked up my mind and body properly. It wasn’t just that I had gotten faster but that my movements now generated a naturally higher speed. I had to keep testing this out, gathering information, and accumulating experience to adjust my control bit by bit. If it was a simple Speed stat boost I was dealing with, I could just rejig my calculations. But in this case, I had to teach Wisdom my body’s new strength and speed in order for it could make said adjustments.

I repeated the same maneuver: step forward, kick out, swing, twist, and extend. After all that, I tried to stop myself—and fell over. I needed to be able to deal with linear, circular, and corkscrew movements to have any chance of stopping. I fumbled, bumbled, and tumbled. I was getting a hang of things, so my next fall was going to be even more spectacular!

At the very least, I wasn’t taking self-inflicted damage. My resistances held up against my speed and power too. This was likely because of the Life Jewel’s Alchemy effect, body-tempering, which had rebuilt my body from scratch. I supposed that was why they had made me rest. They wanted me to wait until my body had been remade. I didn’t know if it was because I just needed to rest in general or if it was dangerous for me to fight during that process, but that was the reason for this whole forced-rest situation. In which case, just tell me! Seriously, don’t bother with the bunny-suits?

“It’s all I can handle to try to get a grasp on my own combat movements today,” I said. “I know I should start with regular movements, but radio calisthenics really don’t translate well into battle?”

In addition to there not being a radio calisthenics skill, the Life Jewel’s Lovemaking skill had some tai-chi-style effect on my qi?

I shifted my focus, slowly adapting. I united the movements of my muscles and the Entangled skills and magic, kneading and straightening out the execution. You could call this kung fu training. I had only learned about kung fu through books and movies, so I couldn’t actually do it. I could shoot out snakes, though, so almost as good! And just to keep things balanced, my tentacles obviously needed their own share of attention and training.

Hissssss.

“Put them away! Don’t need! Training for them!”

Tai chi is famous for its health benefits, but mastering the “cross hands to penetrate” move involves executing gentle, flowing motions with proper posture. The movements themselves reap health benefits, but activating them in battle will naturally see them not as slow or gentle but sharp and powerful. It was a truly powerful, sublime martial art—the heart and spirit of tai chi.

After mastering the twenty-four basic tai chi moves and the eighteen movements method, the moves can be strung together into nearly endless combinations. Miss Armor Rep, Dancer Girl, and Slimey seemed to take an interest, so our training session turned into a tai chi lecture? If we weren’t going to fight, then maybe radio calisthenics would’ve been better.

“Step up and raise hands, then brush knee and twist step, then step up, deflect, parry, and punch? Cross hands, fist under elbow, then shift into raise hands and step forward! White crane spreads its wings, brush knee. Not easy, huh?”

While refining my technique, I worked on stepping forward more precisely. Martial arts and dance had evolved from walking. Once steps were combined with hand movements into cross hands, fist under elbow, and brush knee, even overfull compression shorts were no obstacle to tai chi fun. People always talked about how tai chi brought health in old age, but I needed to use it now so I could even make it that far. Tai chi and compression shorts were co-starring in the drama of my dreams—and they would kill me if I examined them too hard!

Left strike tiger, right strike tiger, twin fists strike opponent’s ears, turn body right heel kick, turn body and chop with fist. My two ladies had recently gotten body controlling skills, so they were getting the hang of things. I supposed I only knew these moves from seeing them in anime and on TV myself. I distributed tonfas, which would help. The exercise would also help burn all the calories they just consumed. The moves looked simple on the surface, but they required full body concentration, making them much better exercises than you’d expect. Soon enough, the pair were drenched in sweat…beads of sweat clinging to their bodies…Oh boy.

Single whip, high pat on horse, turn body and left heel kick, step up and punch—my goodness, both of their parting wild horse’s manes were gorgeous to watch!

“Turns out doing tai chi in compression shorts is hot? Look at those booties!”

With all the sweat dripping down their bodies, this was getting a bit more disastrous in terms of healthsome, wholesome, winsome teenage-boy terms?

Embrace the tiger and return to mountain, cross hands, diagonal single whip, brush knee. My mind’s recording capabilities hustled and bustled to keep up with every busty, booting-bursting step! These movies were testing the limits of a rated T for teenage boy!

I almost lost it. I focused way too much on the jiggle with a twist, the wiggle with a turn, the little twitch with a step, and the bubbly bounce with a plunge.

“Not gonna lie, I would’ve loved to join in on the DDR, as dubious as it is that my teenage boyhood would’ve been able to withstand the stimulation of participation. I mean, all the jiggling and flying at a slant and all the bouncing of the tight, muscular, juicy body parts—it’s too hot to handle!”

Then, on the white crane spreads its wings and needle at sea bottom, something horrifying happened: a magnificent, grand jiggling! The sheer force of the motion sent out a violent, rippling, rampaging tremor! More so than tai chi, this was the stuff that needed to be recorded to get transmitted down to the next generation!

I couldn’t handle any more single whips, so I went to turn body and swing over lotus instead only to confront more compression shorts traps!

“Who knew tai chi could be so perilous?” I pondered. “This may be the greatest danger tai chi has ever birthed in its thousand-year history! Yeah, these compression shorts are too tight! Their peerlessly plugged penetrations created a mosaic of prominent, protruding, protuberances exuding exotic, erotic teenage-boy jubilance! What a mosaic!”

The rippling of flesh continued through the cross hands to penetrate, and the fan penetrates the back. Meanwhile, Wisdom was close to overheating from all its effort to record every single bit of motion—only for a particular aggressive series of parting wild horses’ manes and series of kicks with the tight-as-tight-can-be shorts squeezed tightly into high-five worthy zones that threatened a teenage boy to dare not high with his own five. It was an I-thought-I-was-gonna-die-five, like, five times!

I wasn’t so tired that I couldn’t stand back up, but based on present circumstances, it simply wasn’t a feasible option. No standing up for me!

The compression shorts team was too tired to stand as well, so they lay down, as constricted by their little shorts as ever and doused in slick sweat. Their skin was entirely revealed. In other words, they were rolling around in their tight booty shorts?

“At least close your legs, please! Those shorts have plenty of surface area but pretty low defenses in other areas?”

That lack of their defense transformed into teenage-boy offense, resulting in a teenage-boy massacre!

I felt like I had improved my Magic Entanglement and Body Control. I familiarized myself with both Magic Entanglement and qi, slowly adapting and adjusting my movements. I didn’t think I’d be able to sleep much tonight. For other reasons.

That night, there was no end to the orchestra of screams and cries of pleasure. I made sure to put a barrier around my bedroom, but I was still worried the sounds could be heard. A new skill, Ear Wife?!

DAY 100
EARLY MORNING

The teenage-boy lamentation and its simultaneous importance are deeply carved into my soul, and yet are disappearing.

WHITE LOSER INN

THE RAIN STOPPED FALLING sometime in the night, so I woke up to a shower of yellow sunshine and glares. Anger followed those glares in a peculiar, collaborative harmony of sleepy-eyed glares first thing in the morning.

Indeed. The war between my collaboration of Grotesquemorphosis and tentacles versus Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl had reached a tenuous ceasefire. With both glaring at me this early in the morning and avoiding confrontation, I was winning the war of attrition. It was unfortunate that there wasn’t going to be a revenge match. I had been losing those lately, though so this would be good for my pride.

“Ahhh, I feel great.”

The singular skill Lovemaking, tested under real battle conditions—now that was the true victor of last night. The overkill that came after was all delight. My victory had been decided in a single instant. Lovemaking amplified the yin and yang of tai chi inherently cycling between men and women.

Once I had resigned myself to the tempestuous torment of tight compression shorts, Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl let their guards down. They confidently schemed to defeat me with sexual techniques, unaware of what I had planned. They couldn’t even see the flow of qi between us! All that energy had been spurted and splattered all over their naked bodies. I circulated my qi for that attack. Qi activation: the very basis of yin and yang.

I first combined Lascivious with qi-activated Lovemaking. Then I amplified the pleasure and sensuality with my accumulated qi and unleashed vibration magic that penetrated into the very depths of their bodies. Naturally, with the two of them swallowed up by pleasure in uncontrollable trembling, I was able to make some very friendly (glarey?) introductions to my snakes and grotesque tentacles! The two of them were frozen, locked in eye contact with the squirmy squirmers—was this the beginning of a friendship? Although they had already gotten prrreetty darn friendly with one another.

“Even after going so hard, I still have full HP and MP!”

After bearing the brunt of the pinnacle of their sex techniques, I was able to redirect all the sexual energy back at them in a single counter. Lovemaking with qi circulation allowed me to do sexy stuff without even using MP! Since it circulated qi to the other party as well, it restored them too, which made for a never-ending battle that ended in morning glares.

Well, now the tight-compression-short-wearing teenage girls were all busy trying to let out their accumulated horny energy from tai chi. Of course, letting it out involved a lot of loud screams of pleasure and the like. I needed to make sure they were okay later. ’Cause they were kinda going crazy?

“Status,” I called.

NAME: Haruka RACE: Human

Lv: 24 JOB: —

HP: 588 MP: 646

VIT: 477 POW: 493 SPE: 631

DEX: 533 Res: 599 INT: 663

LUK: Max (Above Limit)

SP: 3414

COMBAT SKILLS: Ultimate Cane Mastery Lv1, Avoid Lv9, Magic Entanglement LvMax, Life or Death LvMax, Rapid Movement LvMax, Bend not Break Lv8, Eye Mastery Lv2, Diamond Fist Lv7, Random Fire Lv7, Limit Break Lv5

MAGIC: Demolish Lv3, Teleport Lv9, Gravity Lv9, Holding Lv9, Composite Sorcery Lv8, Alchemy Lv9, Void Lv7, Qi Wizardry Lv1

SKILLS: General Health LvMax, Sensitivity LvMax, Body Manipulation LvMax, Walking Mastery Lv9, Servitude Lv9, Presence Sensing Lv8, Magic Control LvMax, Presence Concealment Lv9, Stealth Lv9, Hiding LvMax, Insentience Lv9, Physical-Proof Lv6, MP Absorption Lv8, Revival LvMax, Dash Lv8, Airwalk Lv8, Overclock Lv9, Jupiter Eye Lv7, Lascivious Lv7, Lovemaking Lv1

TITLES: Shut-In Lv8, NEET Lv8, Loner Lv8, Archsage Lv2, Master Fencer Lv8, Alchemist Lv8, Sex God Lv7

ABILITIES: Wisdom Lv6, Master of None Lv9, Blockhead LvMax

EQUIPMENT: Universe Staff, Clothes Set?, Leather Glove?, Leather Boots?, Cloak?, Jupiter Eye, Ring of the Destitute, Item Bag, Monster Bracelet Power+81% Speed+77%, Vitality+41%, Black Hat, Wisdom Crown, 100-Poisons Anklet, Fortune Ear Cuff, Aegis Shoulder Shields, Sorcerer’s Bracelet

What a relief. I was still human. My body had been remade, so I was worried that I might have ended up as a demi-human or something. Nope, I was just a regular old teenage boy. And that meant that I definitely wasn’t the bad guy!

“Still, that level-25 level wall is rough,” I sighed. “Just how many dungeons have I beat at level 24?”

Maybe there was some condition that needed to be met to level up. The thing was, it was hard to imagine a condition that I hadn’t already fulfilled. I had beaten dungeon kings and dungeon emperors. More than a few at this point. If there was some condition I hadn’t met, then I don’t think anybody in this world would be over level 25.

In terms of stats, that was solid growth for my HP, Vitality, and Power—all areas of concern. My Vitality and Power up about ten points every time I leveled up, so they had gone up eleven levels worth since I’d checked last. Even HP only went up about twenty points, so that was eight levels worth of growth. Since the portion for my level wasn’t going up, I was grateful for the extra gains.

So Body Manipulation improved my stats, but my level stayed the same. I put off the problem of my body being unable to keep up with my skills for now. This was anything but a solution. Just another trick. In which case, I only needed to keep tricking things into working forever, I guess?

“Looks like my newly learned holy magic went into whatever Composite Sorcery is. Then I got big gains for Limit Break, Lascivious, and Sex God. Revival hit its max too. Yup, I have nothing but good memories of those gains.”

Learning holy magic had given me the Archsage title, so it made sense that the Bane Sorcerer title went away. I gained two levels on Master Fencer, but I hadn’t gotten Sword God like Fish Girl. On top of that, I’d been taking the utmost care to not get any additional equipment…and ended up with, like, five new things anyway. Life sure is strange sometimes!

“The 100-Poisons Anklet, Fortune Ear Cuff, and Aegis Shoulder Shields are all compound items, so that could make me self-destruct. The bracelet is the nastiest of all, though.”

I couldn’t even take off my “Monster Bracelet: Powers up all abilities.” It was filled to the brim with compound items that had boosts of 81 percent, 77 percent, and 41 percent for Power, Speed, and Vitality. I’d spotted the probable culprit behind my self-destruction. Probably. Actually, this one item had several suspicious traits, and was now my prime suspect in a complicated, convoluted crime! It wasn’t even trying to hide it!

I had mastered cane fighting, hence Ultimate Staff Mastery, and I hadn’t gotten any legal complaints about my Shinto-muso cane style from the cane bureau, so I was probably fine. Looking at my stats made me as confident as ever. This was whack.

“Sheesh. I can’t believe my status is whack like this just when I gotta go over to the Theocracy. Nobody’s gonna know I’m cool if they look at it!”

Big stat changes essentially make you a different person altogether. When the change happens too quickly, you lose your sense of self.

“All right now, Miss Glares. Come out and have some sweets? I’m about to do radio calisthenics and tai chi. Want to join? ’Cause, yeah, I really gotta practice, or I’m done for?”

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

Jiggle jiggle.

The two of them had warned me time and time again to not use the Life Jewel. “Don’t use it! Don’t use it!” They’d said it so many times I ended up thinking it was a gag and went for it. It was a trap!

“Reap. What you sow,” Miss Armor Rep said. “Equipment. You can always take off. But body, alchemy? You’ll never. Go back.”

“You don’t have. Your old body anymore,” said Dancer Girl. “If you don’t fix your body. You can’t go back.”

Boink boink!

Slimey body slammed me as the lecture raged on. They were upset and crying, so I patted their heads. I even had sweets ready; I was perfectly prepared.

“Hey, you’re my servants, as in, I’m your master, so I’m not going back to my old world,” I said. “I told you that we’d be together forever, and we will be. Don’t worry about my body. Since I am a perfectly ordinary healthy human being, I do have a life span. We’ll be together for all of it, so don’t sweat it? Didn’t I tell you from the start that I have no intention of going back? Although, I want to help my classmates go home and send the nerds flying off to a different dimension? ’Cause they’re obnoxious? They’re the perfect nerds for jamming into a rip in the space-time continuum? I think they’d fit—just barely!”

I couldn’t leave this world with my new body. It sounded like an “eating the food of the underworld” kinda thing. But apparently, the girls were okay, even after going ham on the food here? That was why they were trying to stop me from using the Life Jewel.

Ya know, if I could use body alchemy once, why couldn’t I use it again? I had made sure to backup the deets on my old body with Wisdom. Yup, those were the basics of an ordinary teenage boy back on Earth. All the pain and agony I had gone through as an Earthly teenage boy were chiseled into my very soul. Poor teenage boys. We grow up and lose all our precious (sexy) memories!

Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl were still crying. Did they have some kinda trauma from a failed backup? They must’ve thought I would leave them at any moment. I had made my decision the moment I’d taken Miss Armor Rep out of that dungeon. After that, I got Slimey out. Then I released Dancer Girl. Not to mention the demon scythes, the Rafflesia, and the Master Golem. The mean girls…Yeah, I’m making sure they get outta here. That was the archnemesis of my sex appeal—the fact that I was enslaving teenage girls! A teenage girl slaver couldn’t go home without getting arrested. I can’t go back to Japan!

I consoled them, fed them sweets, and patted their heads till they calmed down. They must’ve wanted me to stay with them, but at the same time, wanted me to be able to go home. Feeling all that at once must’ve been painful.

“It’ll be lonely here once the girls go home, but I’ll still be around? That’s why I used the Life Jewel, so that I won’t die so easily!”

After the two of them wiped their tears and blew their noses, we went off to the training grounds. I learned yoga from Dancer Girl, improving my breathing and balance. Then it was my turn; I taught tai chi. We started off slow and precise, speeding up bit by bit.

I didn’t know if it was my improved Intelligence stat or Wisdom, but I was able to learn things more easily now. All I needed to do was see or hear something once, and I could perfectly remember it. It was incredibly useful. I had the necessary skills to replicate any such motion with my body after just seeing it once.

Still, it was just imitation. I had to practice it; get my body used to the movements on a deeper level. I traced the shape from memory and manipulated my body to follow it. You could also use weapons in tai chi—as did many martial arts in general—so the movements worked while wielding a sword as well, as martial arts did in general. Since Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl took a liking to the compression shorts, there was no end to the compression going on around here!

My classmates still had the glow of innocent youth as they attempted tai chi. In sharp contrast to their pure expressions, their exposed, adult bodies hugged by short compression shorts and sleeveless halter-neck shirts oozed sex appeal, The tightly packed objects inside the clothes swelled and burst out as they bounced. The girls continued to practice with their stunning bodies and muscular, supple thighs as thick as can be. And I used the power of Jupiter Eye to catch every detail!

“All right, time for breakfast,” I called. “Any more of this and I’ll be facing teenage-boy troubles, so we’re moving on to a peaceful, harmonious breakfast! I’m going to stuff my frustrations into thick, dripping sandwiches! Juicy breasts squeezed tight between soft loafs!”

“Did you say sandwiches?!”

“I want an egg sandwich!”

“Me too! Me too!”

“No cucumber for me!”

“A crispy cutlet sandwich for me, maybe?”

“Oh em geeee! Cutlet sandwiches?!”

“What about a BLT? That’d be awesome!”

“Not gonna lie, I could even go for a Hamburg steak sandwich.”

“You mean a hamburger?”

“With tomato!”

“Do you have any jam?”

We arrived at the dining hall, the girls shouting in excitement. It was a noisy start to another lively day. I needed to distribute the upgraded equipment, which should allow them to fight more safely in the 80s. On the flip side, the 90s were still a total no-go. Any further improvements to status ailment resistances would sacrifice other features. I should be able to overcome this with a new material of some kind, but I couldn’t think of anything last night. I was busy, ya know?

“Thanks for all the food!”

“Eggs! Where are the eggs?”

“No way! Teriyaki! It’s so good!”

“Ooh, I want some too!”

“I heard that he managed to make teriyaki!”

“It’s delicious!”

“Oh, nice! And corn soup!”

“Wooooooo!”

I spent a few hours last night re-reading How to Magic Item! Then carefully reading Let’s Go Magic Items!, complaining about the titles all the while. As a lover of literature, I couldn’t just let those titles slide! After that, I finished reading The Blacksmith’s Alchemy Manual and committed Skill Reference to memory. Sure, I was technically an Archsage, but was that enough sagely time to qualify?

I still didn’t understand qi wizardry, and I couldn’t imbue it into items. Qi wizards didn’t wear equipment in the first place?

Then, just when I thought things couldn’t get any worse around here, the girls were wearing makeup? My classmates were all beautiful to begin with, so even some light makeup took things to a whole new level. The dining hall was rife with tension. The mean girls did everyone’s hair and makeup. Our regular old, everyday dining hall was now a whole different world. Just on the surface, though?

“C’mon, you can’t hog all the eggs!”

“Hey, that’s mine!”

“First come, first ser— Hrmf! Mrrmfgh!”

“Gimme back my teriyaki!”

“Don’t yank my plate from me!”

“I didn’t even eat my Hamburg steak yet.”

“Hey! Who ran off with my jam?!”

“You took too much! Share some with the rest of us!”

The results spoke for themselves. The mean girls were sort of pros, having worked as models and gotten recruited as idols. They were the perfect people to handle clothes coordination, hair styling, and makeup. They had never joined a specific company, though, always choosing their own gigs. They claimed to be ordinary magazine models, but at the same time, they were so charismatic that they arguably had an influence on the whole world of fashion. Or that was what Fashion Club Girl was saying, at least. They were true wonders of crazed biting. They bewildered the monsters of this world with their chomping and were currently biting the hell out of some sandwiches? Classic mean girls! They’d each secured three sandwiches each by taking a bite out of all of them. They were gonna become influencers in the world of monsters at this rate.

“Thanks for the meal! It was delicious!”

With their lips rouged and glossed in deep reds and vibrant pinks…the girls put on armor. Yeah, armor? It didn’t matter how much they’d done themselves up. Only the people present right now would see it. Seriously, what was the point?

DAY 100
MORNING

Seems like some more care is necessary for those split ends at the top of my head.

DUNGEON ENTRANCE

THE ENTRANCE TO A DUNGEON. This stark cave opening to a small hill in a grassy field was the entrance to the world of the dungeon and our fight for survival. A tragic scene was unfolding in front of this particular dungeon entrance. That’s right, time to change!

“Urgh! My armor shrunk again!”

“Same heeere!” (Sob.)

Er, armor doesn’t shrink? Fleshy, flailing limbs from busty beauties in light make-up were everywhere. The new armor was designed to be completely airtight, making them even harder to put on. Their breathability had been sacrificed for the sake of greater mobility, tightness, and toughness in order to prevent toxins leaking through. The helmets and torso portions were now easier to take off, but the arm and leg pieces had several steps to through in order for them to latch on properly. Getting the leg guards on was more of a struggle than ever before.

“Only the abdomen piece shrunk, right?”

“It’s so strange how that happens!”

Butts bounced as they bent over. Taught, rounded compression shorts prickled and wiggled and stretched. A totally immodest collage! This was the heavenly reward of my craftsman’s skills, no doubt!

“All I can do is test things out and give them to you, so make sure to take plenty of breaks,” I said. “The main armor piece should be easy to take off now. So you can take more breaks and swap it out more easily. The lower half isn’t as loose as before either. It’s easy to take off but real hard to put back on. I’m going to try to come up with a new design for equipping everything. Hang in there, and try these out until I do? Should be nice and cozy?”

“It’s fine. Thanks!”

The aforementioned sanity issue led everyone to leave the inn wearing lighter equipment and changing in front of the armor, which meant that we filed all the way to the dungeon entrances with jiggling asses stuffed in tight compression shorts. The scene unfolding was a sight to behold, a mere glimpse at the terrors that lay in waiting. We hadn’t even entered the dungeon yet!

Up until this point, I had faced the dangers of lightly equipped, defenseless teenage girls. The girls would fight all the way to the dungeon’s 80th floor starting today, where my squad would rendezvous with them. In the meantime, we planned to beat a dungeon ourselves. I didn’t think I was in any condition to fight in front of my classmates yet. It was probably best for me to go off to the forest by myself, but we needed to at least finish off the 80+ floor dungeons before leaving for the Theocracy. If we could beat all the dungeons with 75 floors or more, then the frontier army, Imperial Guard, and First Royal Division should be enough to defend the frontier if they work together. Powering up was a priority, but so was beating dungeons? I also hadn’t earned anything from instructing lately, so I was all out of allowance money! Everything I ripped off from this morning’s bargain sale and breakfast fees had been spent, as in, sent straight into the pockets of the street vendors that we ran into on the way here? Mo money, mo problems, as they say.

“All right, be careful,” I called. “Don’t overdo it, ’kay? As in, keep a proper grip on your handkerchiefs and halberds? The safest, accident-free route to success is a flexible battle plan that places safety as a top priority, and since the dungeon isn’t done till the engine is run, then always run if there’s a route for doing the done dungeon is the best bet to run safely? Understand?”

“Not even a little!”

“I didn’t understand a single word you said, but I almost barely understood what you meant. We’ll see you later,” said Class Rep. “We’re off.”

“See you!”

Class Rep led our classmates into the dungeon. We needed to hurry. I activated Rapid Movement to head to another nearby dungeon. Power swelled through my body. A pulse of energy sent me speeding up and—tumbling seven times ass-over-teakettle with Slimey. Real fast! I thought. We made it to the dungeon. Simply running made my legs tangle, but I’m sure that was because my legs were too long. Yeah. Let’s say that’s the reason.

“Okay, here we go,” I said. “I want to try to adjust my skills as we go, so leave some monsters for me, please? You don’t need to worry about my body, but it’s not fine at all in the slightest anymore. So that’s why. ’Kay?”

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

Wiggle wiggle.

Same response as always. They responded the same way whether or not they understood me. Which meant I couldn’t let my guard down. Gotta do my best!

I spread my consciousness from the tips of my toenails to my split ends, grasping every part of my body. I shaped each movement to match what I envisioned. I learned the way my body responded to each action. First, I had to get used to this new state. Also, I really needed to take better care of my hair? That’s a lot of split ends!

Making sure not to use Magic Entanglement, I slashed my staff with minimal force. I swung the weapon along with the flow of my dance steps and tai chi movements, swaying my body with it. Not swinging with my body but using my mind to swing my body.

“I can beat monsters up to level 30 with my stats alone,” I said. “I kill ’em in one hit, but I guess I always did that?”

Jiggle jiggle.

They were glaring at me ’cause I wasn’t even using Entanglement. Without using Entanglement to cover my equipment in my MP, spells, and skills, all I had access to were my raw stats. Even without a full grasp on my new body, I should’ve been able to handle the lower floors. I couldn’t let my guard down or overestimate myself. But as an expert overestimater, I was crushing it. If you could flip over my status, I’m sure it would have “Guard Down” and “Overestimate” written on it in giant bold letters.

I kept my guard up and expectations low, recalling the days I had spent alone fighting in the forest discreetly layering discretion upon discretion. I had beaten those monsters without relying on strength of any kind. I’d only been trying to survive. I had to go back to my roots. Yes, that’s it!

“Hiyaaaaaaaagh!”

Jiggly jiggliggle!

I controlled my body, imagining the shape of the strike with High-Speed Thinking and Slow Motion before tracing it. I couldn’t slow things down that much without Entanglement, but the monsters on these floors practically moved in slow motion. They were slow and stupid?

I rechecked my motions with every step as I danced, wielding my staff. Sometimes I messed up and spun in a full circle or something, but that was because I had gotten stronger and faster. I had no real complaints. The girls must’ve experienced this every day, leveling up so quickly. They were envious of me—me, who had barely leveled up at all! They didn’t complain, though and simply kept growing stronger. They still pressed on and leveled up even more, unable to control their own bodies with such drastic stat changes every day, unable to feel the same way even two days in a row…

I ought to admire them for that. The girls were stubborn try-hards, but they had accomplished amazing things. They willed themselves through it with sheer determination. They had worked so hard that they’d surpassed level 110 in a mere 100 days. It was worthy of more than just respect.

By that logic, I had to respect the nerds as well, but they fought using both stats and skills. They adjusted their skills to match their numerical stats before activating them. In other words, they had it easy. The nerds didn’t believe in their own strength in the slightest. They only believed in numbers their stats displayed, their skills, and their equipment. All fights were based off those; it was why they were strong, had barely struggled, and weren’t worthy of respect.

Meanwhile, the meatheads probably hadn’t so much as looked at their own stats. Skills must’ve been like toys to them. They wielded their bodies based on intuition and instinct wild animals or barbarians who went all out every single time. Better to send them back to the jungle than respect them.

I slowly adapted to the monsters as we passed the 10th floor. I still didn’t need any sort of strategy, instead overwhelming them with strength and speed. I wielded my body like a weapon and crushed the monsters in their tracks.

The girls weren’t like those nerds. After training one day, they had more or less gotten bumped back to ground zero after their level-ups had changed their physical condition. In a world where one mistake could end up killing you, they waged war against fear day after day. They protected, saved, and supported one another as they fought for their survival and to ensure that they won without losing a single friend. They were true heroes worthy of respect…Probably. I think?

By the 20th floor, I started to get a handle on my new body. Getting used to my new power and keeping up practicing until I had a good sense of things was really the only thing I could do. I had to push both my mind and body to align, the same way I was skilled at pushing late-night battles. Those nightly things handled my body every which way with unseemly, vulgar torsos arching, gasping for air, sobbing, and crying out in pure… Er, no, it’s nothing at all! Anyway, I was getting used to my new body. Apparently, I was killing monsters while muttering, “I’ll get all up in those soft bodies!” I had no idea that I’d said, “I’ll plunge deep into those creamy crevasses!” Hey, I’m just a teenage boy?

I got off with a lecture. They judged that, without my equipment, I wouldn’t be able to survive anything more. I only had to do a little groveling. My status as their master had finally come in handy.

Once we made it to the 30s, I couldn’t just do whatever I wanted anymore. I needed to watch my opponent and adjust their movements. I started to feel more discomfort, but that was because I was getting tossed around. I wasn’t self-destructing. Falling in the middle of battle was dangerous, so I kept my movements in check as I got to know myself again.

Maybe it was the effect of my newly promoted Ultimate Cane Mastery, but I could control my swordsmanship even more precisely now. It almost felt like the blade was one of my fingers, which gave me a better grasp of the blade’s movements. Of course, the downside of being better was that I was reminded of how much better Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl were. I didn’t even need to really pay attention to them. All I had to do was glimpse Miss Armor Rep’s swordplay or Dancer Girls’ movements in order to tell. I wasn’t a fan of my improvements. I could see how far above me the other two were every day. And how nice would it be to be on top of them…Er, nope, nothing! Nothing at all!

We made it to the 40s, and the monsters’ strength started to overwhelm me. I needed to rely on my technique to survive. I was still ahead in terms of stats, but I was a fragile human up against jacked monsters. It became the ultimate training, one where I needed to stake my survival on the application of my mind and accumulated techniques. Training meant bonking. Something did feel wrong about that, but I absolutely needed to improve myself in these battles in order to survive my training.

I didn’t feel tired at all. Energy seemed to well up from deep within me. It was just like how forces flowed up and gushed out from deep within last night, a consecutive, penetrating, pumping force welling up as if my boiling blood would burst all over in an ultimate explosion again and again. That was thanks to Lovemaking and Qi Wizard.

Starting at floor 50, I tried activating Magic Entanglement. High-Speed Thinking accelerated, and I sunk into a flow of time that was so slow it almost seemed to not move at all. My body just about managed to keep up. I needed to be able to control myself in this state. A few dozen skeleton knights vanished into thin air in the blink of an eye. I pummeled them into dust, unable to hold back my newfound strength and power.

It was a victory, but not a good one. Miss Armor Rep and the others shook their heads, indicating that I hadn’t passed this time. Not surprising. Even I could admit that I had flung wildly about place like an idiot. I hadn’t self-destructed, but I had completely succumbed to the overwhelming force.

More hidden rooms started appearing in the 50s, so we dropped our pace. Around an hour had passed since we got here. We were moving through the floors faster, as I was a little more evenly matched with the dungeon emperors now. Fighting the lower-floor and mid-floor monsters for them was like moving through the fog—meanwhile, the three of them blew away the monsters like a gust of wind.

All I could do was gain experience and collect more data. Once we made it to the 60s, I increased my power, force, and speed, but lost precious control. I had more power than ever before, able to activate it beyond its resistances normally allowed, and obliterated the level 60, floor-boss-strength gargoyle. Before, I would’ve needed to slice the gargoyle with my staff. Now, I could wallop it head-on.

We advanced, aiming for the 70th floor. My body flung itself all over the place when I was up against the fast monsters in the 60s. I could keep up with them by using only a fraction of my full speed, so I subconsciously poured in too much strength and lost control.

I was good at half-assed, mismatched fights, but this was my first time not self-destructing. I was just getting tossed around instead. Before, my arms tore off and went flying. Now they went flying with the rest of me still attached. Tripping and falling was dangerous, but I didn’t like having to go pick up my detached arms much either?

I spun clumsily through the air, tripping and tumbling uncomfortably. I charged, unable to restrain my power, swinging and missing and stumbling forward and pawing at nothing but air. It was lame, pathetic, and dangerous—but good, for now. Blood wasn’t spurting everywhere; I didn’t break bones. My limbs didn’t fly across the room. It still hurt a bit, but Miss Armor Rep, Dancer Girl, and Slimey weren’t constantly watching me with concern, sadness painted all over their faces.

It was still only approximate, but I started to get a grasp of my body with Magic Entanglement activated. Wisdom was going all out. It gathered and analyzed data, running calculations to arrive at the optimal input. That was why I danced clumsily, swung wildly—it was all in order to figure out my new body’s specs and adjust my skills and motions so they to all lined up.

Now, we were into the 70s. I stumbled awkwardly, bounced around, swung, crashed, and cut through the air, tumbling into a comical Life or Death. It wasn’t much to look at it, but I managed to use the attack. Importantly, I used it without self-destruction—only a little self-eruption. Pretty sure I just got a lump on my head.

“Was it a badly-aimed Airwalk step that launched me headfirst into the wall?”

Wiggle wiggle.

Despite it all, I had to keep up my clumsy rampage. I didn’t have enough data yet, so I couldn’t utilize Blockhead. Blockhead wrapped my body in magical power and enabled me to adjust my movements as if outside my own body. Previously, my body hadn’t been able to handle this forced adjustment and had taken damage instead. I didn’t have enough data to use it right now. In the end, it was just an adjustment anyhow.

I’d stopped hurting myself, but somehow, I had more bruises and scratches than before.

“I’ll need to invent band-aids when I get back,” I said. “That’ll make me feel safer. I can probably sell ’em to adventurers too?”

As expected, the 80s were brutal. I used to get by on trickery that utilized my skills, but I couldn’t fully rely on those. I snapped out my sword, and then snapped out my sword, and snapped out my sword again. All I could do was hope to land a few roughshod hits. I kept on thrusting. I thrust with all my might. I thrust with everything I had. My sword snapped out so far I almost ate Snap Crackle Pop. Now, it was time to pop off!

If I could land a hit, victory was mine. I had no technique, but that was all I needed. I was wallowing in dire distress, but I thrust at every opening I had. Unable to do so much as land I hit, I pawed at the air. These monsters had tons of Vitality and hardness. They boasted massive reservoirs of HP, wore iron-tough armor and boasted sturdy, powerful constitutions. Yet, if I hit them, I’d kill them. That was all I could aim for. Really, it was all I’d ever done.

“Low level. No skills. Crappy weapons. I couldn’t catch fish. I couldn’t do anything cool. I couldn’t do anything at all. But I killed. Thinking about how much effort the girls have put in all this time, I don’t have any excuses, especially considering all I do is swing and kill…And I wish you’d just die already!”

It was a tough fight against the 80th floor boss. Sure, I didn’t self-destruct anymore, but I was pathetically weak. It was just so difficult to get a handle on my new body. I never knew the process would be so scary!

“I never realized just how hard those girls worked,” I said.

Nod nod.

Rattle rattle.

Jiggle jiggle.

I threw everything I had into swiping and struggling, arriving at the 86th floor. Finally—the showdown against the dungeon king. Facing off against a beast-type monster with my current lack of control was a worst-case scenario. I wanted to just splash a bucket of vinegar in its vinegar-hating, dog-like face. I believed in the mystical truth, long passed down, that if I bonked this beast into a spellstone and converted that to cash, I’d soon get two bunny honeys, one under each arm. I bonked with all my might!

I concentrated on my whole body as I fought at full throttle. I was getting tired. I had fixated too hard on my own power and had worn myself out with all the swinging and missing. I had gotten fast, better at moving my feet, and made smarter decisions about how to move. But my stats weren’t even half of those of Miss Armor Rep and the others—they had strength several times mine. Not being able to beat this dungeon king would be real bad for my sex appeal.

I was biased. Seriously. I’d gotten the Power and Vitality I had been craving this whole time, but I gotten caught up in trying to show it off. Disgraceful, unseemly, cowardly killing was all I needed. Better to be the NPC I am and leave the heroism to the heroes. As enchanting as it was to look up at them, I shouldn’t try to emulate them. No matter how strong I got or how badly I wanted to win, it wouldn’t work. So, I got stronger to win. For the sake of my ends, I couldn’t be picky about the means.

Rough breathing and growling came from the beast: a furry, level 86 Werewolf. Hang on. Doesn’t that mean it’s technically a man? The vibes changed considerably. This was a wolfman! Quick and flexible, powerful and foul-smelling. Werewolves were below mean girls in the grand hierarchy!

I relaxed my muscles and let my body go along with the flow of my motion. I Entangled myself in that very flow. Going overboard and Entangling myself in everything to force and cheat my way into making something happen always worked in my experience!

“Life…or death!”

Everything turned white as I lost consciousness. I took a single step as my sped-up body fell into slowed time. Like it was nothing. Like I always did. Just a simple step, and there it was: exactly what I had been looking for this whole time.

My body twisted, off-tempo, moving into a simple swing. For the sake of that swing, everything—my stats, magic, spells, skills—unified into one. By the time it was finished, only a single thing remained: my blade, swinging. No matter how fast, tough, or strong. No matter its immunities, I’d force it through the air. Once my blade cut, the enemy died. This was all I had done so far. And it’s all I needed to do moving forward.

DAY 100
LUNCH

Whatever prevented the girls’ homemaking prowess from blossoming was relentlessly crushed and trampled.

DUNGEON
80TH FLOOR

HARUKA-KUN MOVED DIFFERENTLY. He was still pulling something funny, though. He defeated 80th floor boss, a venom plant, with a single stroke—the definition of an instant kill. He looked the same way he had back in the forest, wielding his wooden stick, fighting the only way that he could.

“What was that plant even thinking?” Haruka-kun said. “Who tries to poison a guy out here while he’s drenched in sweat and trying to prepare a barbecue?! It didn’t just fail to read the room. It tried to pollute the room! Plants like that deserve to be cut down, for heaven’s sake. Just how much of a saucy little plant do you have to get to try to disrupt a little planter boy’s barbecue?!”

Jiggle jiggle!

The four had appeared during the middle of our battle against the floor boss, lined up some grills, placed down picnic sheets, prepared charcoal, poured on the oil, and started grilling! Incredible! They were used to barbecuing. I could tell by how quickly those meat and veggies were chopped, skewered, and lined right up. Next thing I knew, they had washed and boiled rice, too. Are those green peas? Wow, green pea rice!

Then, the moment I thought the monster was starting to grow, I found it had already been cut down. It tried to emit a poisonous gas, interrupting Haruka-kun while he was busy cooking rice, of all times!

“Hey, watch it!”

“Usurper!”

“Line cutter!”

“There’s a line here, you know!”

“This isn’t a line-cutting workout!”

“Well, she did protect the barbecue and all.”

“Yeah, the barbecue really is our savior today.”

“BBQ! BBQ!”

“BQQ over a barbecue?”

“BQQ?!”

No, there would be no boo-hooing over this barbecue. It was a friggin’ barbecue! And we were gonna get to eat it! No BQQ! Only BBQ! Although, if we were technically following the English spelling, it would be a BBC, wouldn’t it?

“The world barbecue originated from the Arawk word barbaca, a form of cooking meat that originated in the Caribbean with the Taíno people. That’s where the Spanish word ‘barbacoa’ derives from, and ultimately, the English word barbecue. The Q is just to match the sound of the world based on the English letter Q ’cause we really don’t need any BBCs around all these teenage girls! If you don’t apologize to the Taíno people right now you’re gonna get green pea rice and no barbecue! It is good though? And stuff?”

“We’re so sorry, Taíno! Please forgive us! We won’t say anything else! Thanks for the food!”

Haruka-kun was strict about BBQ jokes, apparently. “The tanuki people are being rude to the Taíno people,” he continued, which resulted in his head getting bitten by one of those very tanuki people!

“Incomplete. A shadow of his former self. Unskilled. But. Stronger,” reported Angelica-san. “Only took. One day. Until he could fight all-out.”

“More absurd. Than ever,” added Nefertiri-san. “Almost hard for him. To live. Still fought. He has. New powers.”

Jiggle! Jiggle jiggle!

Just as Angelica-san and the others feared, Haruka-kun had pulled something. We couldn’t fight to protect him until he could overcome the irregularities with his body. He had to suffer so much in exchange for his new body, his skills out of control. He ate dirt as he clumsily fought, falling over with every step, completely ungraceful.

The reason he suddenly started doing tai chi was because slow movements were the only ones that he could even control. He had to get used to every minute movement while speeding up a tiny bit at a time.

Waking up one morning with a completely new body…That was sure to give you trouble in daily life, not to mention on the battlefield. There was no easy solution to reacting faster and moving quicker than your brain expects. He should’ve begun a long, deliberate process of rehabilitation. Instead, he threw himself right into the fire, forcing himself to endure painful falls and crashes as he collided into walls time and again. It was just like back when he struggled for survival, alone in the woods.

“He’s already able to fight on the lower floors of dungeons?!”

“That shouldn’t be possible! He has a brand-new body!”

“Yeah, that’s, like, true and stuff,” Vice Rep B said. “But he totes wasn’t giving up. Like, he just kept fighting anyway.”

“We could’ve protected him,” Shimazaki-san whispered. “He could’ve just been patient, especially now, of all times! Why did he…?”

Shimazaki-san’s group, who were technically his servants, were especially eager to defend him. The Imperial Guard were even teaching them defense techniques in their search to find ways to become his shields. If his body broke down, then he didn’t need to fight—everyone around here agreed with that. Today we had been prepared to get him off the battlefield’s front lines, and yet…

“He killed the 80th floor boss in a single hit!”

“And in the blink of an eye, too!”

“There was something…I dunno, different. He was moving differently.”

“Yeah, this was much more like a bullet being shot.”

“He’s going to have to start from scratch! And after how hard he worked to learn everything, too…”

He had gotten stronger to the point where he couldn’t damage himself. It wasn’t due to leveling up. In the process, though, he had lost the ability to use the techniques he’d spent so long practicing when he was weak—all for the slightest boost to sturdiness. For that alone, he had to throw away everything he had worked hard to learn up until this point. His body had transformed; it’d become something different. He lost all control but somehow managed to regain it in just a single day.

If the alternative meant forcing Angelica-san and the others to see him undergo such pain and destruction, then he could bear it. They couldn’t stand to watch him. He made them witness a whole new kind of agony so that they wouldn’t have to see the old one. Now, they had to watch him faceplant, waving his arms helplessly. They had to watch him trip and fall and roll every time he tried to fight.

Despite all the torment this world had put Haruka-kun through, he took on more torment of his own accord in order to fight. The world beat him, smashed him, broke him to pieces, but he stood up every time. The moon glimmering on the surface of a pool, a flash of flowers in a mirror. He smashed that mirror to pieces to grab the flowers. He plunged into the pool and reached the moon. He never gave up in his pursuit of the beautiful and impossible, even knowing that there was no end to his struggle.

“We’ve finished lunch. Should we get going?” I asked.

“I checked all the hidden rooms along the way. Let’s kill the dungeon king and call it a day,” Haruka-kun said. “I’m guessing there are about five floors left.”

Everyone had taken off all their armor aside from their leg plates, so we were busy putting everything back on. I put on my wrist guards, elbow guards, upper-arm plates, shoulder plates, and finally the breastplate. It was an intensive process. Plus, it was humid, and I was hot from exercising. The armor was less breathable so we had more poison resistance, so I was sweating a lot. We made sure to take proper breaks, but drawn-out battles were dangerous under these conditions.

Me and the other girls were even sweaty while eating, so our innerwear clung to us tightly. Haruka-kun avoided looking at us, staring up at the ceiling as we finished eating our barbecue. Why was he so sensitive to compression shorts and halter tops? We switched to spaghetti straps for greater comfort during our breaks with the less breathable armor. When we had armor on, long gloves and boleros covered everything up. Without the armor, we were pretty exposed. Haruka-kun was the one who designed it to be like this, though, so why the suspicious behavior?

“Close the distance,” I commanded. “Ready your halberds!”

“Halberds, readied!”

Erailia-san seemed to be in better spirits after yesterday. Her smile was gentler, and she fought more fiercely in battle. Arianna-san’s group had strong attacks but still lacked in defensive coordination. Still, not even a week had passed since they learned to fight. The fact that they could already do battle on the lower floors like this…Yeah, their early training experience with Haruka-kun had broken them in more ways than one. The enthusiasm was good enough for me.

“Don’t let them out! Trample and crush them! Charge!”

“Roger! Go!”

The arts club dazzled the monsters’ eyes with magic as the rest of us lined up our halberds to bludgeon the monsters. We charged. No more fighting today, I thought. Not for Haruka-kun. I didn’t want to see him faceplant like that again. Just for today, just for tomorrow, we had to show that we could protect him. Haruka-kun was watching us, so we couldn’t leave a single monster alive.

Even if he’d had time to slowly get used to his new body, it was a totally unreasonable task. By morning, he had already come up with new regular armor and light armor for us. In a single night, he’d come up with a new status ailment resistance to block being physically poisoned, too, and had made thirty fresh suits of armor. He had grumbled that it wasn’t nearly good enough and wouldn’t stop working on something better if anybody suffered so much as a scratch.

With our new armor, I wouldn’t accept defeat. No injuries. No poison. It was an embarrassment to all the girls that we couldn’t be trusted to protect him for even one day. It sullies our pride!

“Trample them! Strike now!”

“Roger! Kill them all!”

We smashed our way to the 88th floor, no sweat. We skewered the dungeon king and minced the monster, all to defend our honor. Haruka-kun gave us a passing grade. Spirits high, we went back to the inn. When we got there, Haruka-kun reappeared holding boxes.

“Er, I know that it’s too much for today, but given that you guys did a good job on a few of the floors down there, I figured I’d hand over some incomplete Guardian Hairpins. They’re not finished, so they’re single use, but here are some ‘Barrier Hair Ornaments: Emergency simple barrier (One use per spellstone)’ for all of you,” he said. “Ya know, as a reward? I haven’t made finishing touches yet, so I’m accepting customizations. Just one per person, though. You got it? Well, I guess they’re just samples? The base is a hairband. Alternatives are gonna be a barrette, alligator clip, or hairpin. I’ll have bows, ribbons, combs, and U-pins for special rip-off deals for y’all later! But choose your designs first, ’kay?”

He was giving us a reward for working so hard. He was the one who had gotten beaten up and run ragged from working too hard. Yet he acted as if nothing had happened. He was the one who didn’t get any reward, no matter how hard he tried or how many risks he took. He gave us rewards instead.

“Could you do a black barrette with colored jewels?”

“Aw, isn’t there some hair-growing magic or something? Ooo, bobby pins!”

“I’ll take a yellow alligator clip with a red heart shape!”

“We can only choose one? C’mon, I can’t choose!”

“Once he finishes these, I’m bound to go bankrupt more than a few times.”

“Well, I don’t exactly have enough spellstones to just go giving them out, ya know?” he said. “The point of a fun bargain sale is to hook you the first time and then rip you off at insanely profitable rates the second time for nonstop bankrupting around the clock, ya feel?”

“We’re in!”

“Okay, I’ll take a hairpin with a blue spellstone!”

“Hang on, it was supposed to be my turn!”

“This one with black gold.”

“That’s lamé! Ooh, it’s so nice!”

Overjoyed with the hair accessories, the teary-eyed girls clung to the teenage boy in gratitude. He looked awfully uncomfortable. Both sides had bright red faces. O-oh, it’s my turn now? Hmm…

“I-I’ll take a red hairpin, please,” I said. “H-hang on, y-you don’t need to put it on me! Th-that’s embarrassing!”

“Hang in there, Class Rep! Get ’er!”

“Get me? In what way?!”

“Now show your gratitude! Hug hiiiiim!”

“Th-thanmfffh you Harukaknffffgh! Mfffffgh!”

The other girls burst out laughing as they squeezed us together from the outside.

“That’s right! This is our gratitude!”

“Now he just needs a matching hairband!”

“Perfect!”

“H-h-how, h-h-how is this gratituuuuuddfrrggh!”

“Thank you, Haruka-kun!” Squeeze, push, rub, rub, jiggle, boiyong, wriggle, pat, squeeze, pet, hug!

Next thing I knew, he was a corpse! He might’ve died a while ago, to be honest. Had he heard any of that gratitude whatsoever? A smile was on his face, and he still had plenty of HP…He didn’t respond, though. He was just a polite corpse lying on the ground.

DAY 100
NIGHT

I do like looking down on women, but not when they look ready to gouge my eyes out!

WHITE LOSER INN

THEY HAD THE BARRIER HAIRPINS, and I planned on equipping them with throwing rosaries. I had given them free samples to pique their interest as a reward, too. It was all a trap to lure them in for even greater rip-offs yet to come!

I completed the semi-custom orders, one per person, with the safety measures of handing it to them from the other side of a table. The girls trampled the table without hesitation, flinging off their armor to envelop me in a stuffed-compression-shorts squish.

After a lot of requests, I installed a coin-operated mist steamer in the bath, with floral scents as well as Disinfect, Purify, and Deodorant as imbued effects. That scored me some cash on the side. The stuffed compression shorts had evolved into dripping compression shorts, creating a new world of tight, soaked-though, camel-toe activity. What a terrifying trifecta I was now faced with!

The tragedy was that it didn’t end there. I upgraded innerwear to counter the less breathable, remodeled armor. I thinned out the fabric to increase breathability, which meant that it shrunk even more when wet. Coupled with the Adhesion effect, this resulted in shorts so tight you could’ve joked that they were just body paint. They trampled me in gratitude for these upgraded outfits in a sea of dripping tightness…Of course I lost consciousness!

“Yeah, that was too much! ‘Jiggle Resistance’ or ‘Poking Resistance’ hasn’t been discovered in this world yet! A wholesome, healthsome teenage boy doesn’t stand a chance!”

When I regained consciousness…Well, it wasn’t that I didn’t feel like my clothes were properly on. It was more like they had been rearranged after getting torn away? That was what it felt like…Had there been some kind of misfire?!

I took a few deep breaths and spread my qi throughout my body. I mixed my MP and skills, kneading and unifying them across my body. My blood, flesh, bones, nerves, nails, teeth and hair—I sensed and filled every part of me, aligning it all in perfect harmony. The water in the bathtub rippled. I felt a strange sensation working inside of me, something besides Revival, as I forced myself to relax.

“It’s not wrong to expect a relaxing bath, but it feels so wrong to demand modesty from teenage girls. Not just wrong—a futile effort beyond chasing shadows. If I could make those girls more ladylike, I could catch my own shadow, no problem. Which I’ve tried to do before. It wasn’t much fun, I’ll have you know? Yeah, I should’ve left that one as more of a hypothetical? Ya know?”

They got me again. I had planned on training tonight, but they stopped me with their teenage-girl deluge. I was used to falling—it was all I did back in the forest. I didn’t think they needed to be worried about me, but going overboard was off-limits apparently.

Activating the qi all around my body completed the technique: Full Cycle Qi! It opened my lungs, cycled through my blood vessels, and realigned my nerves in complete circulation, saturating every inch of my body with Entangled, activated qi. Small waves kicked up, lapping back and forth in the bathtub and growing larger. Ordinarily, this so-called “qi” couldn’t have been seen or felt in any way. There was a part of me that wanted to dig the cool anime vibes. Thanks to Jupiter Eye, I could see and grasp qi perfectly, though, so it was actually fairly easy. Since I used Alchemy to put MP into the circulation, the technique restored my HP and MP in a pinch, too.

I couldn’t say that any of this happened over a gradual period or that it was as natural as breathing. The burden of this circulation and cycling fell to Wisdom, which interfered with its analyses and calculations that controlled other skills.

I took slow breaths as I circulated the qi throughout my body. I enjoyed my bath as the qi united with my body, flowing in and out of me, at one with all parts of me. To be honest, I had no clue what was happening, but it was probably fine?

Jiggle jiggle.

My reactions had gotten too fast. Maybe it was an implicit understanding or the way the Alchemy had changed me, but I was in overdrive. The unfamiliar response was probably what led to my chaotic, disjointed movements.

I’d underestimated the situation, assuming that Wisdom’s control was all I needed. I never doubted that Wisdom could readjust to any shifts in my physical specs in order to adapt and control, no matter how drastic those changes might be. The result was a major misstep—literally. Wisdom was too confused by the data to even start calculations. The connections of my nerves themselves had fundamentally changed, messing with the inputs for Wisdom. It couldn’t calculate anything based on the data. The very nature of the numbers that made up the data was now different. Therefore, I ended up a complete mess. Wisdom’s calculations had fallen apart, and my control was unstable.

I wasn’t damaging myself in the process, just banging myself up every time I fell. I wasn’t taking internal injuries anymore. There was something reassuring in knowing I wouldn’t get my arms torn off anymore, too. I really didn’t want Miss Armor Rep and the others to have to go get an arm for me when one flew toward them in the middle of battle.

I let my mind drift as I relaxed in the bath. Leaving aside the dripping, sticky-tight compression shorts for now…my main concern was that the rapiers I’d made lacked in power. Rapiers were swords with single-sided blades meant for self-defense, or weapons specialized for stabbing in duels. They were light and practical but quite weak. They were only intended to be used when fighting other humans, so the girls had a tough time with them in the dungeon.

“That’s why the estoc developed. That’s a sturdy, two-handed sword for armored combat, literally derived from the word ‘armor piercer’ in German. It’s a bit large to incorporate into a staff, though. Plus, it’s long and heavy. Given that we don’t know what the girls will be up against, I’m a bit uneasy sending them in with rapiers alone…Rapiers were developed in duels and are specialized for disarming the opponent. Maybe I was naïve in thinking that would be enough for self-defense in this world.”

I could think about it more tonight. The habits had iron armor woven into their hoods and sleeves, and chain mail covered the rest. It didn’t seem to be too heavy for them, so maybe it wouldn’t hurt to strengthen some of the other panels. For example, upgrading the breast area—an area that was subject of much debate, philosophy, and righteousness for teenage boys such as myself. I needed to upgrade the armor in the breast area…Should I enhance the breast area itself while was there?

“Approximately two individuals will definitely come to me demanding heavy breastplate armor,” I said. “The big, hemispherical defenses will just feel empty with all that flatness inside. That’d just add a ton of weight I still think they’ll want it, though?”

Boink boink!

I managed to stealthily escape to my room with gentle tai chi maneuvers in order to not get sweaty. The girls had also finished their baths…but I’d really prefer if they didn’t wander around the inn in their lingerie? That would be an insta-kill of a teenage boy. I managed to escape the life-threatening situation by the skin of my teeth—I was nearly in one of those immobile teenage boy situations. One shot away from an explosion!

“Without the guys or orphans around, these girls are beyond liberated,” I said. “They’re so explosively exposing that we’re on the verge of a Nudist Girl outbreak! When will they realize that there’s still a teenage boy around? A healthy, easygoing boy in danger of turning into a queasy, coming boy is in the midst of becoming a wealthy, healthy teenage boy. I’m at risk of bankrupting them morally as well as financially!”

Wiggle wiggle.

I decided to try to make the rapier blade heavier, thicker, and sharper. The trial product turned out great. Its balance was terrible, but I could try to fix that by making the hilt heavier. This should be enough to cut through the armor of any knights they had to fight…but that also meant the girls would have to kill. Their safety was top priority, without question. I wanted to make sure they weren’t plagued by nightmares at the same time, to whatever extent I could. Those girls were too kind to be murderers.

Merimeri spoke to me about it. She had killed people before. After I rescued her, she needed to display her determination to protect the frontier by executing thieves.

“Don’t look down on women,” she’d said. “If it’s necessary to protect something, women can become monsters. Their determination is unshakeable and very, very real.”

I get that I was being selfish, but I didn’t like what I didn’t like, okay? No matter how harsh and cruel this world was, I wanted my classmates to live in a world of kindness. They became monsters terrifying enough to make me want to scamper away and hide forever at my bargain sales (read: maiden battles). I wasn’t looking down on them! I mean, they straight-up went crazy on me with sheer violence—I didn’t see any desire to protect me when they were like that! I do like looking down on women, but not when they look ready to gouge my eyes out?

“I guess this is about it.”

The weapon was focused on stabbing but could slash when needed. It was also able to pierce through armor without needing to aim for gaps. This was a weapon not for self-defense but for killing. Strong enough to take on monsters, and…butcher human beings.

“They’ll need this, I suppose. Even though it would’ve been okay with me if they kept on complaining forever…”

Jiggle jiggle.

Innocent, immaculate eyes peeped from the doorframe. They were sweet, adorable, set in faces as symmetrical as works of art. Undeniable, alluring seduction rolled off the tips of the tongues that poked out at me teasingly. Beautiful angel girls who were at once heavenly and naughty, obscene demons stood adorably at my door.

“Hey there. Did you have fun with the girls? Did you talk a lot… A… Huh…?”

Those selfish, forever-seventeen European and Middle Eastern bodies of theirs were gently draped in the habits that revealed both the slenderness of girls and the softness of women.

The slenderness of their long, thin limbs and skinny backs; the shaking of the black cloth of the habits pulled tight around their chests; elegant thighs exposed by the deep slit in the skirt. They defiled those habits in a heavenly manner, opening their legs wide at their high, robust hips and tight waists. The black-and-white habits embodied all the purity, delight, and charm of young maidens. At the same time, their curvaceous figures oozed maturity and sex appeal, inviting sheer seduction with the licking of red tongues sneaking out from full, glossy lips. They squeezed their arms together as if to hold two fruits to their chests! Such fullness overflowed from the neckline, stretching the fabric to its limits as soft, lush breasts swelled into the light…N-n-n-no bra?! This is a scandal!

“We’re back…Tried on new habits. How do we look?”

Two orbs swayed as they spoke. The mountains of those breasts have brought forth a mouse—namely me, mentally scampering away from the beauty of the four crushing behemoths! A disaster was on the horizon. Yet, the sun must climb over those mountains!

“Yes, um, absolutely perfect, ya see? That’s what I’m seeing?”

Those rising, overflowing objects that were so perky, soft, and brimming jiggled at the touch. The defensive force of those proudly overpouring objects was emphasized even more by the tightly stretched fabric. Their bodies were slender and chiseled for the most part, contrasting all the more with this sheer explosion of flesh combined with the healthy, young, trim, vivacious figures to create the proportions of any man’s dreams. That’s playing dirty. Forever-seventeen bodies are so cowardly!

“It’s too late,” Miss Armor Rep purred. “Side-jobs. Over for today.”

“You work too much.”

Their faces radiated angelic kindness. Their seductive adult bodies closed in on me from both sides, squishing against me as they held me down.

How foolish, I thought. I had fallen into so many traps, tasted and chewed the bitter taste of defeat, the fruit of hardship. As in, I had been tasted and chewed myself? The trap was as clear as day and as obvious as could be! Yes, I had overlooked it, just as I was overlooking it now despite being caught in it. Yup, all my equipment was already gone?

Traps were dangerous—too dangerous for teenage boys! We needed Kongming-level strategy to deal with this level of peril! The peril was part of the lure, the allure! Those habits were part of an incredulous inquisition to instigate sensual and sensational seduction—those monstrously inquisitive and inquisitioning monster girls’ naughtiness was their allure.

“Good work, today. Now let’s. Lay down.”

Kiss, kiss, slurp…

Yup, they took me to bed every single time before I even realized what was happening?

They were taking me to bed, but this was no time or place to actually go to bed. There was no chance in hell of me actually falling asleep while their arms and legs were skillfully pressing against me softly and seductively.

Dancer Girl was on my upper half, squatting with her full ass above my chest as she held down my arms and legs. Her thick, gorgeous, amber thighs opened wide as she kept me pinned down. Meanwhile, Miss Armor Rep was positioned between my own open legs, holding them. I couldn’t move a muscle. It always ends up like this?

In the flow of never-ending time, the two of them swapped positions. They were truly terrifying. In addition to my Alpha Male and Super Horny skills that granted me superhuman sexual endurance, Revival had hit level max, and Lovemaking allowed for unlimited restoration…And I still couldn’t keep up with them!

“This super submission must be the reason why Diamond Fist is leveling up so fast. I never even used it in battle! I can’t overcome these techniques—i-in so many ways!”

I had already fallen to the depths of teenage-boy hell. All I could do was unleash a hell of my own—Lovemaking Pulse! This wasn’t your average concentrating-eyebrows emoji. It must’ve been perfectly ordinary for Miss Armor Rep and Dancer Girl, but the rest of the girls didn’t understand the true meaning of Lovemaking. They didn’t understand the true meaning of my last attack!

With the right mindset, dungeon emperors might have enough mental fortitude to withstand it. However, these two didn’t have enough experience, and the sudden wave of pressure completely broke their spirits. Even if the pair had the knowledge of Book Club President, Taoist lovemaking techniques were closely-guarded secrets. All she probably would’ve known was that it was a technique for developing immortality based on the unification of yin and yang. That was the original purpose of the qi wizards who first utilized these ancient lovemaking techniques. Since the techniques could be used to manipulate life and death itself, they could apply them in battle. This time, I tried applying them to Lascivious—that was all it took.

Lovemaking, which unified and wove together the qi of men and women, produced a yet more amplified “spirit qi” which caused continuous stimulations at the pinnacle of pleasure. In this fraction of a second, I unleashed the true form of my novel “if ya tryna sex me, then I’ll just sex ya back?” They experienced their own attacks reflected on them with the force of a hundred horny teenage boys. Not sure anything can be worse than that?

Their sweet voices let out gasps and groans. The tables had only just begun to turn. The vindictive teenage boy would vindicate his honor tenfold! Let’s go! A thousand shots!

◆
AFTERWORD
◆

THANK YOU FOR PICKING UP this book. We’re already at the 9th volume, so I really don’t think there are any series newcomers reading at this point. You probably know what I’m going to say: I wrote too many pages for the 9th consecutive volume (lol).

I cut it down and stuffed it all into more than 500 pages and 230,000 Japanese characters, then sent it over to my editor Y-san with a 9th consecutive tongue-out emoji. Lately, I’ve really been wanting to throw that emoji out the window. Just chuck it right out. Anyway! How are you all doing nowadays?

To the editor that I’ve forced through hell and back, and the godlike drawings of Saku Enomaru-sensei (which I should be used to by now but still manage to surpass my expectations every time): thank you. For real, though. If y’all ever feel like yanking the tongue out of that emoji, I’ll happily join.

Starting with this volume, we have a simultaneous release with Bibi-sensei’s manga version. Thank you for the incredible comic, as always. Also, my eternal gratitude and apologies to the folks at Oraido editing. That Y-san has offloaded the editing to some other poor sap this time!

In addition, I’ve heard that the tragedy of an even graver victim has occurred—the sad news of the blog post “Translating Chaos: I Translate Loner Life in Another World” (ha ha…). Yup, for the first time, to Eric Margolis, Xu Weixing, and the other translators—my thanks and apologies. Like, I’m seriously sryyyy (RIP).

My chaos (and Y-san’s suffering) has become a worldwide phenomenon!

I also wanted to express my gratitude for Booota-sama and talk them up. They did the illustrations for the first two volumes! Congratulations on your VTuber debut!

Also also, my thanks to sakuga999-sama from the shosetuka ni naffiliated wiki site. Online, they’ve even started calling the number of volumes predicted in the “story outline” section a “book of prophecy.” We’re honestly considering just matching the real releases to that at editorial meetings. Starting with this volume!

And also also, thank you as always for reading. For this series to be nine volumes, and for this to be my ninth afterword…At this point, I just drown everyone in thanks and apologies every time. I thought I’d be able to evacuate before the damage set in…only to find myself drowning in apologies to my new myriad of victims!

I was able to make this book thanks to the great agony and effort of my editors and many others. Thank you so much to every one of you for reading.

—SHOJI GOJI

Thank you for reading!

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