000-020 · 006-ch5
Chapter 5: Wandering Around the Surface
Preface
Story numbers don't jump. I'll lightly touch on the story of delivering Amamiya Kanata to the surface in recollections and bulletin boards later. For now, this work's main text is centered on the protagonist, so please wait for other characters' reactions in bulletin boards etc.
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"I bought clothes, so now let's buy some decent alcohol."
I went to the surface and first entered a clothing store near the dungeon entrance to buy several pieces of reasonable clothing.
(It helped that there were many people walking around in exploration equipment even on the surface.)
I thought I'd stand out since I didn't have proper surface clothes, but that wasn't the case. Good.
When I was on the surface, this didn't exist yet, but over the past ten years or so, the area around the dungeon has changed quite a bit. The biggest change is still the buildings around the dungeon. Before, there was just a dungeon entrance in the middle of a city, but now general companies have been cleared away, and instead shops and such that explorers challenging the dungeon use have appeared en masse. Also, the buildings themselves seem to have been strengthened with defensive performance, perhaps in preparation for monster stampedes.
(Even so... those in power sure have their hands in everything. It's annoying that there's nothing we can do as individuals.)
First, since I didn't have any money I could use on the surface at all, I brought in monster materials I'd appropriately hunted in the lower layers to a purchasing shop.
But then being told to show my explorer certificate hurt. I didn't have that kind of thing, and even if I'd had one, if it hadn't been updated in 10 years it would be expired.
In the end, since the materials I brought in were from a deep part of the lower layer and were in considerable quantity, I was able to get them to buy from me, but they kept quite a bit as a "handling fee." They must do that kind of business regularly. They even showed me the back entrance normally.
According to what I asked, these were rules set by the Dungeon Union and Explorers Association. They said it was to prevent fraud by prohibiting material purchases from minors, but that's a nuisance to us.
(Then after that... let's buy some local products to take back. Should I drink alcohol? Well, whatever.)
After that, leaving the dungeon perimeter area, I entered a regular store. I entered a liquor store that looked decent, and after explaining they were local products for my father who I was meeting for the first time in a long time, I chose several. I didn't lie.
This is a pretty serious story - for now I intend to go meet my parents after 10 years.
(10 years... that's long. Now then, are they alive?)
Ten years ago I told them what I wanted to do, and we had a huge fight about it. Even so, in the end, while being beaten, I got them to accept, and I challenged myself to dungeon life.
This is our second meeting since then. I think of myself as having a personality that's distant from familial love and friendship and such, and I've been wanting to pay back the debt of gratitude for being raised by my parents since before I dived into the dungeon.
Even so, meeting them after so long makes me feel sentimental.
After changing between shinkansen, more shinkansen, express trains, and local trains for seven hours, I finally arrived at the station nearest to my parents' home. From there, it's another hour on foot to reach the house. I went to visit them, but my parents' reaction was rather lukewarm.
Right after I returned, my father opened the liquor I had brought and poured it into a glass, then started talking to me.
"Takumi, what are you going to do from here on?"
"Huh? Ah, from here on. I'm going back to the dungeon. Life there is fun too, you see."
"I see," he said while wetting his lips with the alcohol. Before I entered the dungeon, my parents had sent enough money for me to live comfortably for a lifetime, but apparently he had lived sparingly and continued farming. When I called out to my father who was reading a book on the side, he replied "Oh, you've returned," and I was surprised.
"If that's what you want to do, then it's fine."
"Mm, yeah."
"It's okay if you turn your eyes outward too, I think."
"...Outward, is it."
We talked about this several times 10 years ago as well.
At that time, I was only looking at dungeons. That was partly because my hobbies were oriented toward fantasy like light novels, anime, and games, but also partly because I was escaping from other things.
"Do you still not know desire?"
"..."
Desire. That's a word I used to say often in the past, and something I was actually suffering from.
As a university student, I was probably done in mentally, but compared to my high school days, desire had completely disappeared.
"If you can live until you die, that's fine." Desire for fame, desire for money, desire for things, desire for recognition. All of that had disappeared. Only appetite still existed since my stomach was empty. Other desires were lacking. Even my sexual desire had disappeared - I thought that was pretty bad myself. Or rather, at one point even my survival desire disappeared and I seemed to have developed a mental disorder.
"I suppose that's how it is."
"...With current you, you should be able to earn enough to live until you die, right?"
"Well, yeah, I guess."
"Then I don't think there's any need to be afraid. When you come to hate it, you can quit anytime."
In other words, my parents are telling me to reintegrate into society in some form.
(Well, I suppose that's true. In the dungeon where you don't know when you'll die for 10 years. And also, if I don't return, you won't know whether I'm dead or alive.)
Worry as parents. That's only natural.
However.
"Now, it's fun diving into the dungeon."
"...Is that so."
"It's not like I'm not thinking about other things like I did before."
To my quietly listening parents, I wet my lips with a soft drink and spoke too.
"Beyond the very back of the dungeon, there's something like another world."
"Another world?"
"Yes. Basically inside the dungeon it becomes a cave, but there's sky there. And there's civilization with people. That's clearly not like Earth's, it's more like a fantasy world view with magic and such."
"...Beyond the back of the dungeon, you mean."
"Yes. And that place is also vast. I've been walking around there for several years, but I haven't explored it all at all."
Exactly the fantasy world I'd been wanting. That's why I'm drawn there.
"Well, why don't you think about something or other?"
"...Hmm. Do your best."
Well, naturally. Living a life I like for 10 years makes me feel like trying to do my best a bit too. Mental care, important.
After that, when my mother returned from shopping, I talked about 10 years' worth of memories. Since I hadn't had a long conversation with someone for a long time, I became talkative, and it seems that thanks to the money I left behind, my parents now have the financial leeway to challenge various things. Now he's planning to invest even more in dungeon-related stocks and use it to build his own log cabin in a remote location.