chapter01 · 017-ep17

Episode 17: Encounter

A minor, an explorer, grabbed the tail of a boss monster over twenty meters long and swung it around.

The sight was so far beyond sense that it looked like a hallucination. After a few frozen moments, the comments began to move again, timidly.

【N-no, wait, surely that's...】

【That's not okay for a human being】

【The mist makes the picture hard to see. It must've been a hallucination...】

【Obviously you can't swing a boss monster over twenty meters long around lol】

【Oh, someone else saw the same hallucination I did lol】

【We're all hallucinating 'cause we're so worried about Karin ojou-sama lol】

【Throwing a boss monster around? Sure, maybe a minotaur, but not THIS lmao】

【Ah, the mist's clearing】

【Now we'll see what really happened】

As the white mist thinned and the picture became clearer—

"I knew letting the mist get so thick was a mistake! It's too hard to see, desu waaaaa!"

"RUOOOOOOOOOOOOOH!?"

WHOOSH! BANG! WHOOSH! BANG!

The floating camera captured Karin perfectly as she swung the large chimera around, raising a wind to scatter the mist while smashing it into the walls and floor over and over.

【AAAAAAAH!? IT WAS REAAAAAL!?】

【Nope! Watching this stream's gonna drive me insane!】

【That's TOO absurd! What IS this!?】

【B-but I've heard rumors that genuine top explorers can do stuff like this...】

【Isn't that an urban legend!?】

【No wonder her channel never grew if she was streaming stuff like this and everyone called it fake!!!!!!!!!!】

【How is her dress STILL not even dirty!?】

【Weird... Even when Kagerou streamed 'Messing With a Lower-Layer Boss,' he latched onto its back and focused his attacks there before the mist filled the room...】

【N-no, Karin ojou-sama's right! Instead of going after its hard-to-reach back ourselves, we can save time and energy by waiting for a tail attack and swinging it around!】

"Precisely, desu wa!"

【I WAS JOKING AND KARIN OJOU-SAMA AGREED WITH ME!?!?!?】

【I'm going into a dungeon tomorrow. This stream is seriously gonna make me lose my mind】

【I feel like I could swing a monster around now too...】

【Could Dungeon Alive have been based on real events...?】

【GET A GRIP!!】

As chat dissolved into confusion—DOGOGOGON!

Karin landed a finishing blow on the large chimera, already groggy from being swung around so much.

After several punches to the face, the beast collapsed and fell completely still.

"Phew, defeated, desu wa! ...But letting the mist spread wasn't very suited to streaming after all. I panicked and tried to clear it using the chimera-sama, and now my hands hurt, desu no."

Karin blew on both hands.

"I'm sorry. I'll be more careful next time, desu wa."

【【【【Uh... okay...】】】】

Chat could only reply in bewilderment, at a loss for what to say to her apology.

After defeating the boss of lower-layer floor 1, Karin kept moving through the dungeon.

Her fighting had been so wildly absurd that chat's tension from her entrance to the lower layers had completely melted away.

【The new gatekeeping skeleton intel Karin ojou-sama revealed is really causing a stir now lol】

【A famous explorer who's been on TV quoted a clip on their official account, saying 'Wait, seriously... Am I allowed to try this?' It's spreading like wildfire lol】

【The country's biggest clans, Black Tiger and White Knight, might be moving behind the scenes too】

【There's already a rumor Black Tiger's been unusually busy...】

【They ignored the whole Lord Vomit affair and now they want to take Karin-sama's intel? The nerve of them】

【W H A T E L S E I S N E W】

【Now 'Minotaur Helicopter' is trending lmao】

Between the lower-layer action and the middle-layer boss revelation continuing to spread, more viewers kept arriving. Some time after her first lower-layer boss victory, her concurrents passed a hundred and twenty thousand.

【120k concurrents. That's amazing, but considering what's on this stream, shouldn't it be even higher? lol】

【Clips are spreading fast, but Karin-sama's going so fast she might finish the lower layers before everyone can even get here】

【If anything, there are so many clips now that people think she's a fake-video operation lol】

【People were posting about her on other streams like crazy earlier, but it's slowed down. Guess they're glued to the stream now lol】

【She's so far outside the norm that none of the usual rules apply lol】

【She could almost afford to slow down and let more people gather lol】

【So the tea challenge really WAS necessary...?】

【And while we're saying that, she's already at the next boss room】

【Too fast, José!】

【Floor 2 cleared without a scratch too. You don't often get to watch a lower-layer stream this calmly...】

"Now then, let us defeat the floor 2 boss next, desu wa!"

As chat relaxed and discussed news from social media, Karin announced her intention and opened the boss-room door.

The lower layers of this dungeon contained four floors altogether. Clear this boss, and she'd be halfway through.

【So, who's the next victim...?】

【Maybe the jellyfish, one of the strongest lower-layer bosses, will show up】

【That one only appears in big dungeons with abyssal layers beyond even the deep layers】

【Karin-sama said this dungeon's only confirmed to have deep layers, so no jellyfish】

【I want to watch Karin ojou-sama cook up more lower-layer bosses】

Chat was already talking about future streams.

But amid all the anticipation of what sort of boss battle she would show them next—

"...? Huh? There is no boss, desu wa?"

Karin's voice echoed quietly across the huge chamber.

The massive monster that should have occupied the center was gone.

The floating camera scanned the chamber along with her, but there was no sign of a boss monster anywhere.

【? What? Did someone else kill it first?】

【No, the door won't open from the surface side during the respawn interval. Otherwise people could just walk through】

【What's going on? I've only seen an empty boss room when returning to the surface from below】

【But there's no boss in the hall?】

【Can't be. Maybe it comes out of the ground like the gatekeeping skeleton?】

【It would've come out already... Besides, most lower-layer bosses start out in the middle of the room】

Puzzled comments rolled in at the strange situation.

"...Above us, desu wa."

Karin immediately sensed its presence and looked up at the ceiling. There was the boss—

In the jaws of something vastly stronger, on the verge of death.

"B-buoh..."

CRUNCHCRUNCHCRUNCH!

In an instant, the massive body of the lower-layer floor 2 boss, the <Orc King>, was crushed between those jaws with ease.

SPLAT!

The orc king fell, utterly dead.

As if to confirm it, the door to lower-layer floor 3 opened. The sound of something chewing the orc king's flesh echoed through the boss room.

"What IS that monster, desu no...!?"

Karin looked up at the source of the sound, eyes wide.

It was a giant snake that seemed to have grown out of the dungeon ceiling.

But 'snake' hardly conveyed the savagery of its appearance. Its head alone, covered in mighty scales, was several meters long. The inside of its many-fanged mouth was stained crimson with its prey's blood.

Caught on its teeth were pieces of other prey, presumably left there as it had torn into them with sheer appetite and bloodlust.

Most noticeable were <Orc King Skin>, <Gigant Wolf Fur>, and <Iron Crab Shell>.

Rather than swallowing its prey whole, it had chewed them up and left behind those scraps. Every one was a distinctive part of a boss monster from floors 3 or 4 of this dungeon's lower layers.

"—GUOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH!"

"...!"

The giant serpent swallowed its mouthful of orc king and roared at Karin. Mana greater than that of the lower-layer bosses rose from its body, warping the surrounding air like heat haze.

【Huh!? What's THAT!? WHAT is that!?】

【Does a giant snake like that even appear in the lower layers!? A rare monster!?】

【More than a snake, with that size and those fangs... Isn't that a limbless dragon!?】

【WHAAAAT!? Wyrms are rare monsters found ONLY in the deep layers!?】

【The deep layers!?】

Chat, so relaxed a moment ago, was gripped by unprecedented tension and confusion.

The deep layers.

An absolute danger zone beyond the lower layers.

Its monsters were on an entirely different level even from those below, and the nation's most powerful clans tackled it in parties.

If the lower layers were 'another world,' the deep layers were 'an alien world.'

Explorers used that name in fear of the den of genuine monsters capable of destroying entire cities.

【Is that seriously a deep-layer monster!? SERIOUSLY!?】

【Look at the air around it! Only a deep-layer monster could distort the air with mana like that!?】

【Why's a deep-layer monster in the lower layers!?】

【Why else...?】

【An irregularity!?】

Monsters fixed to their floors, boss rooms accessible only through doors, monsters unable to leave the dungeon—an irregularity was an abnormal event that defied such dungeon rules.

In dungeon conquest, where information and preparation were vital, it was the dungeon's malice made manifest, and it claimed explorers' lives with alarming frequency. Now it had bared its fangs at Karin.

"A monster from the deep layers, desu no...!? Truly...!?"

Karin trembled and spoke hoarsely at the comments.

【Yeah, it's an irregularity!】

【Even Karin-sama can't handle a deep-layer monster!】

【Run! Run NOW!】

【And this one must be particularly dangerous even by deep-layer standards! It ate several lower-layer bosses without a scratch! That's NOT normal!】

【I get why you're trembling, but RUN!】

【Even Karin-sama's frozen with fear... But you have to MOVE!】

【You can escape, Karin-sama, so hurry!】

【We don't know what abilities it has! Please move!】

【Crap, I'm sweating for real...】

【Run!】

Chat filled with screams. Every last viewer, even those who'd seen Karin fight until now, cried for her to flee.

That was how great a threat the deep layers posed. It was a fair assessment of the monster she faced.

"GUOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH!"

"...!"

Under the gaze of that monster, Karin trembled harder as chat descended into panic—and then—

"...! An irregularity! An unexpected, mighty foe! This is EXACTLY like what happened in Dungeon Alive! This is the BEST footage EVER, desu wa!!!"

Her eyes glittered like a girl's whose dream had come true, and she squealed with delight at the monster from the deep layers.