Yeah, Yeah, Another World, Another World
“Ah, I almost forgot to give you this.”
With that, he handed Luciti something—it was the 『Wet Honey Jar』 .
“What is this jar?”
“It’s an artifact called the 『Wet Honey Jar』 .”
That name is way too sketchy.
“Oh wow, so this is the legendary artifact I heard about! It came up in today’s cooking class too! I’m glad I didn’t rush out to buy one—thanks!”
“I just happened to get it in the dungeon, figured you’d want it, so I brought it back. Try making different things with it.”
“You got it—leave it to me!”
Luciti happily began fiddling with the jar, so I decided to go look for Apra in the tavern district. As luck would have it, Rio and Apra were just returning from the bathhouse area.
“Ah, there you two are. First, let me give you these.”
I pulled out the 『Fang of the Giant Water Serpent』 and the 『Command Stone』 from my bag and handed them to Apra.
“This is the magic trigger we talked about this morning—the one that accelerates water flow. The iron-looking one is the Command Stone.”
“Thank you very much. I’ll install it right away.”
“Just adding a little water creates a tremendous amount of pressure, so be careful.”
Considering how far it sent Rocco flying…
“Rio, I had a question. According to the map borrowed from the guild, the opposite shore of the underground lake on the 10th floor is blanked out. Is that uncharted territory? Or undiscovered?”
“It’s undiscovered. You want to go there?”
“No one has ever gone to the other side before. I don’t necessarily want to go, but I was curious.”
“You’re a born adventurer, Junpei.”
Well, ‘dungeon explorer’ wasn’t even a profession in my original world…
◇◇◇◇◇
The first lecture of the new course, Common Knowledge in Another World , was held.
The inaugural lecturer was Rio.
“Today, I’d like you all to understand just how dangerous the translation sunglasses Junpei-san possesses really are. To do that, I’ll be talking about the writings found inside dungeons.”
Ahh, so she’s referring to what happened the other day when she gave me that scary look.
“As you all know, many items recovered from dungeons contain symbols that resemble writing—things like ancient human script, monster script, and so on. But their true nature remains unknown.”
Those definitely don’t look like letters to me either.
“However, in the dungeons near this town, there’s a rare item called the 『Notes of the Fool』 . Because of that, people have started suspecting that those mysterious symbols might actually be some kind of language.”
Now that I think about it, yeah—that only seems to appear in this town’s dungeon.
“But aside from those notes, no one has been able to read any other fragments or scrolls containing these symbols. So at the moment, they’re considered worthless and sold off cheaply at roadside stalls.”
Wait, did I already give the ones I bought at the market to Luciti ?
“If we could somehow decipher all the writings in the dungeon, who knows what we might discover? Maybe rooms previously inaccessible would open to us, or new technologies might emerge. There could be beautiful poetry, or perhaps even instructions to control the monsters within the dungeon itself. In short, it’s like an untouched mine.”
An untouched mine… Yeah, that makes sense.
“There are already plenty of sample fragments and scrolls scattered around, so all we need to do now is gather and excavate them.”
Come to think of it, maybe Luciti could read them if I asked her?
“Now then—who do you think should rightly hold the rights to excavate such a mine? A mere rookie adventurer party? No, of course not. That’s why the Adventurer’s Guild believes—and will certainly continue to believe—that the excavation rights belong to them.”
I guess anyone in power tends to think like that.
“At the moment, it seems like excavation rights are held by a regular adventurer party, but once the Adventurer’s Guild realizes this, what do you think they’ll do? Will they pay adventurers a large sum of money to buy the rights? No way. They’ll probably seize them forcefully—under some ridiculous pretext like, ‘You dare withhold resources vital to our nation’s development!'”
She’s speaking as though she’s seen it happen firsthand.
“So what happens to the adventurer party after their excavation rights are taken away? Do they quietly keep exploring the dungeon? Of course not. They’ll definitely tell someone—’Hey man, the Guild totally took my excavation rights!’ And then that person tells someone else. Eventually, the Guild’s reputation plummets. That’s obviously not good for them. So instead… well, you can imagine how this goes. Whatever you do, do not take anything from here or talk about it outside this room. Understood? “
Everyone in attendance nodded silently, their faces pale.
◇◇◇◇◇
“So, I was thinking—we should go back to the cave base…”
After the lecture ended, I explained my idea.
We’ve secured the brothel as a base, so we’re not struggling for shelter anymore. The reward from the old woman’s urgent request was fairly substantial, so we won’t starve for a while, and we can use that money to buy clothes.
In short, food, clothing, and shelter—everything is more or less stable now.
I also mentioned that it would take about eight days round-trip to reach the cave base with our current stamina.
“Of course, everyone has work, classes, or other reasons to stay behind—attendance is voluntary. Does anyone want to come along with me?”
“I’ll go.”
Without hesitation, Okuda volunteered.
As for the others: Rio and Apra have guild work, so being away for eight days would be difficult.
Luciti , Osato, Locko, Hayato, and Matsushita all have lectures planned during parts of the next week, so they’ll pass.
“It’ll just be me, Okuda, and Aoi-chan then. Aoi, are you okay with this? You’ll be traveling with two adults—me and Okuda—for quite a while.”
“No problem at all. I also want to collect branches near that cave, so please take me with you.”
“Great, then let’s go together.”
Once we made the decision, the next step was preparation. We spent the following day getting ready for the expedition. Everyone gave us lists of things they wanted brought back, and two days later, under clear skies, we set out from the city of Liphook.
◇◇◇◇◇
The journey to the cave went surprisingly smoothly, arriving far earlier than expected. Just two days after departure, we reached the entrance to the cave base by evening.
Back when we were heading toward civilization from here, we had to constantly watch our surroundings, which likely slowed us down. But now, with just three people and barely any caution, we made it here much faster than anticipated.
We settled in for the night immediately upon arrival, planning to gather supplies starting the next day.
◇◇◇◇◇
Bright and early the next morning, before the sun had fully risen, we began our activities.
First, we ventured deeper into the cave, passed through the vertical shaft, and arrived at the train room.
The weapons dropped by the skeletons were long gone, and there were no bone fragments left on the floor. However, the train still sat in the center of the room exactly as before.
“The door’s closed,” said Okuda.
Indeed, the door leading to the adjacent room, which had previously been left open, was now shut tight.
Probably because you had to defeat a boss on the other side to open it.
“The inside looks the same as before,” I noted.
There were no changes to the interior—some supplies were still scattered on the floor, just as they had been left after our last visit.
First, we gathered the supplies everyone had requested, then stood there contemplating what else might be useful now that our situation had changed.
Last time, since our goal was finding civilization, we left everything except what we needed nearby. But now, perhaps some of these items held new value.
While I stood there pondering with my arms crossed, Okuda approached holding something.
“We should totally take the train to the underground lake.”
“That’s not meant to float on water, though…”
While I was trying to reason with Okuda—who was still insisting on using the inflatable pool to cross the lake—we both felt a faint vibration underfoot.
“Huh? Earthquake?”
Right after that, we heard a loud shout and the sound of swords clashing violently.
“Eh?! Are they fighting a boss in the next room?!”
We rushed out of the train and ran to the door, confirming that the sounds were indeed coming from the other side.
“If the boss gets defeated, doesn’t the door open?”
“Eh? What if they find us?”
“Like that girl from the neighboring country who used seismic relics to capture us?”
“You mean the slavery route? No thanks.”
“Even if it weren’t ‘no thanks,’ I’d still say no.”
Just as we were talking, the battle sounds stopped.
“It didn’t open?”
“Did the boss win?”
“I can hear footsteps approaching.”
We could clearly hear the sharp sound of boots drawing closer to the door.
“…Ugh, annoying.”
──!!!!
Since the door hadn’t opened after the fight, it was safe to assume the person on the other side was the boss himself .
If we called out through the door now, we might learn something about returning to Earth—but there was also a high chance of immediately sparking another fight.
At the moment, only Aoi, Okuda, and I were on this side.
Trying to face the boss with just the three of us would be reckless.
So, deciding discretion was the better part of valor, we held our breath and waited silently for a while.
◇◇◇◇◇
We stayed still for about five minutes, but eventually, no more sounds came.
I signaled to the others with my eyes, and we slowly backed away from the door.
Once we were safely on the opposite side of the train, I finally exhaled deeply.
“Phew… did the boss win?”
“Most likely.”
“If we hit him with Zoltarak right at the start…”
Let’s not jump into a fight right away.
“Alright, this is too dangerous. Let’s just grab what we need and head back.”
◇◇◇◇◇
Three days after leaving the cave base, we returned to the brothel base carrying the requested supplies and additional loot.
It was a bit rushed, but we successfully completed our mission.
Looking ahead, I saw Luciti holding a book titled “Cooking Even I Can Do” and talking to Apra.
“Hey, Apra, could you make me one of these tools—what’s it called again, a whisk?”
“As I’ve told you repeatedly, I am a magi-engineer, not a cook…
Oh! Wait! If it’s an automatic whisk, that’s within my expertise! Using the pipe from the water serpent…”
Meanwhile, over by the inflatable pool, Hayato was standing with his arms crossed.
“So I float on the surface like a water strider… Then how do I move forward… Ah! Right! Use the water serpent’s pipe to push myself!”
Why does everyone want to use the eel jet?!
It’s way too powerful—and dangerous!
◇
“Hey, where do you think the entrance to that cave dungeon is?”
I asked Rio.
“Hmm… From what I’ve heard, probably in the Kingdom of Ginarga, though it might be in the next country over.”
“A country even further beyond…”
“Since we don’t know the exact location, we can’t say for sure.”
“Yeah, that makes sense.”
Based on our observations alone, at least two parties of adventurers have made it to the boss room. That means the dungeon is either nearly cleared—or already cleared.
“Do you want to enter from the entrance side?”
“No, I just thought—if we knew where the entrance was, maybe we could find information about the boss in a nearby town.”
I wanted more clues about whether it would be safe to speak to the boss from behind the door.