chapter02 · 041-ep41
Episode 41: The Trigger Behind the Trigger
"Good day, everyone~ It's been a while since my last Elegant dungeon stream~"
Two days after becoming the Three-Hundred-Million-Yen Woman, Karin had recovered from the shock—with the help of Mafuyu's counseling—and begun her first after-school dungeon stream since the collapse.
But before anything else, she spoke, her voice still trembling a little.
"Um. About the superchats you sent the other day... As many of you know, they added up to an outrageous three hundred million yen."
【Lmao】
【Earning a top-tier annual superchat total in a single hour was completely broken, desu wa!】
【Japan's always been strong in the superchat rankings, but even so, that was obviously insane lol】
【But even that amount is too little for a hero who deserves more than a national honor!】
"Th-thank you, desu no. But to be honest, three hundred million yen frightens me considerably more than a deep-layer boss dragon... So I've decided to accept about thirty percent as a token of your feelings, and put the rest into the Shibuya Reconstruction Fund and the Dungeon Collapse Preparedness Reserve Fund!"
【Scarier than a dragon lmao】
【Well yeah, strangers sending you 300 million yen in an hour would be terrifying lol】
【We did go a little overboard】
【We're sorry, desu wa! We got carried away at the time!】
【And the fact that Karin ojou-sama would put it to good use is why we donated in the first place!】
【Shibuya did take a fair bit of collateral damage, after all. Zero deaths, but plenty of injuries. She's covered both reconstruction and future collapse preparedness. No notes】
【An incredibly sensible use of the money, desu wa!】
【This is why I can't quit being an ojou-sama fan, desu no!】
【Why doesn't this good sense ever translate into common sense...】
【Donations are tax-deductible, too, so it's a good use in that sense!】
【Best friend-chan put her up to this, didn't she】
Chat filled with approval as Karin explained what she was doing with their three hundred million yen. Given the sum involved, she'd been a little nervous about whether the people who'd gone out of their way to send it would accept her decision. She sighed in relief.
"Incidentally, I consulted Mafu—my best friend about which funds to send it to, so they're trustworthy. With that settled, let's get on with today's stream!"
Having said what she needed to say, Karin turned her thoughts to dungeon streaming.
"As I mentioned briefly on Twiitter, today's stream will be a little special. You see—the original illustration Mochimochi Tamago-sensei drew of Setsuna-sama and me is finally arriving at my house next week!"
It was a one-of-a-kind masterpiece drawn by the creator of Dungeon Alive. With so many new viewers watching, Karin explained how it had come about before announcing the stream's purpose.
"—And so, today I shall make a frame to display this family treasure! Not an ordinary frame, of course! I'll use lower-layer materials and <Divine Artisan> to make one even a nuclear missile couldn't destroy!"
【lol】
【Lmao for miles】
【I get it, but that's going WAY too hard lol】
【The nuclear missile's probably a figure of speech, but it's terrifying that Karin ojou-sama might actually manage it!】
【I'd heard about it, but she really IS going to craft inside the dungeon...】
【She's making a picture frame with the <Divine Artisan> that supposedly made those ridiculous magical weapons? Seriously, desu wa!?】
【The new ojou-samas are confused!】
【The old ones are confused every stream, so no problem!】
【Come to think of it, this'll be our first time seeing her craft with <Divine Artisan> too!】
【I'm excited, desu wa!】
With that, Karin headed straight down to the lower layers and began her in-dungeon crafting stream.
"""GYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!?"""
Monsters' death screams rang through the lower layers. Needless to say, those were the monsters she wanted for frame materials.
【Huh!? I thought she'd use those weapons from Shibuya, but she's doing barehanded musou!?】
【I'd heard about it, but she really takes no damage in the lower layers wearing a dress!?】
【After what she did in Shibuya I can believe it, but seeing it myself... my brain refuses】
【Right, people who joined after Shibuya haven't seen her usual streams】
【Everyone, THIS is Karin ojou-sama's 'Elegant' streaming...】
【What, exactly, is elegant about videos of someone beating monsters to death barehanded...?】
【It's 'Elegant,' not elegant...】
【New viewers, take your time getting used to the ojou-sama's brand of 'Elegant,' desu wa!】
Chat buzzed over Karin's material gathering. There seemed to be plenty of new viewers: her concurrent count had already reached an outrageous 500,000.
(Oh. I watched the recording of the chatting stream afterward, so I knew that had a ridiculous viewer count too, but seeing this many in real time is hard to believe...)
Karin nearly cried out as she gathered materials. Her channel had hit five million subscribers, yet despite all the public attention, she had barely appeared in the media. People who ordinarily never watched streams had come to see what the hero who saved Shibuya was like. The stream had hardly begun, and already the audience was enormous.
(B-but as numbers go, it's better than three hundred million! ...Still, at this viewer count, any mistake I make will spread faster than ever. I must be careful...)
Karin, who had finally learned a thing or two, reminded herself of that. After collecting a large quantity of lower-layer materials, she moved up to the middle layers 'just in case.' She blew away approaching monsters at range with bone shards, then activated her skill.
<Divine Artisan>.
A famous dud unique skill that could only process lower-layer or deeper materials, and whose creations only their maker could use. But put that dud skill in the hands of someone with Karin's tremendous fighting ability, and it became a monstrous skill that churned out absurdly powerful magic items.
"Desu wa! Desu wa!"
Tonk, tink, clank!
"Desu wa! Desu wa!"
Tonk, tink, clank!
As she had once before, she condensed mana to a strange chant. She worked the lower-layer materials with a hammer-shaped tool in her hand—and poof. A splendid picture frame stood before her.
【PFFFFFT lol】
【As usual, that is NOT how you make a picture frame, desu wa lol】
【Huh? What is this? A fake video?】
【What just happened, desu no!?】
【The cries of the new ojou-samas are music to my ears...!】
【Watching an ojou-sama see one of Karin ojou-sama's insane streams for the first time is feeding my soul, desu wa!】
【Wait, wasn't an insane amount of mana condensing just now...?】
【I don't even have a decent detection skill and I could feel something freaky through the screen!?】
【Was space warping!?】
【At a glance it looked like an ordinary crafting skill, but the mana she put into it was off the charts...!?】
【Warping space with mana? What is she, a deep-layer monster...?】
【She's the ojou-sama who killed the BOSS of those monsters in seconds without a scratch, so...】
【She's warping space even more than a deep-layer boss, and I've forgotten how to laugh】
【I can believe she made those Gatling guns and pile bunkers after seeing that...】
【Isn't that a mana output you're NOT supposed to get from a crafting skill!?】
"Now, let us test a few things."
Ignoring the flood of comments, Karin took a sheet of drawing paper from inside her clothes and put it in the new frame.
"...Good, good. At least it appears I can put something in and take it out myself."
Given <Divine Artisan>'s shitty restriction that nobody but the creator could use its products, she had to check whether the frame would even work. Apparently it would.
"Next, a test of its strength!"
Karin said this and sped back to the lower layers. She swung the frame with all her might—
BAKKAAAAAAAAAAN!
"MOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH!?"
She smashed it into a minotaur, the lower-layer monster with the greatest resistance to blunt impacts. The charging bull died when its skull split open, prized horns and all. The frame she'd used as a blunt weapon, on the other hand, didn't have a scratch.
"Good. It passed the minotaur-horn test, at least!"
【PFFFFFFFFFFFFFT!? LOL】
【No fucking way!?】
【I thought I'd be impossible to surprise after the Elegatling guns and pile bunkers... My imagination was lacking. I'm off to rewatch Dungeon Alive】
【The horns are the hardest part of a minotaur, which ALREADY has maxed-out blunt-impact resistance!?】
【When an ojou-sama who kills minotaurs by throwing them into walls picks up a frame, this was inevitable...】
【What even IS a picture frame anymore...?】
【An ogre with an iron club. Karin ojou-sama with a picture frame】
【Too Elegant for words!?】
【That stupid frame's harder than most explorers' weapons and armor lol】
【Nuclear missile aside, it'd definitely stop an anti-materiel rifle lmao】
【She is NOT playing around lol】
Chat erupted, but Karin's strength tests weren't over.
"Might I borrow a little fire?"
"GUEEEEEEEEEH!?"
She strangled a lower-layer fire kong and tested the frame's heat resistance in the flames it spat.
"Those scythes look promising!"
"GYUIIIIIIIIIH!?"
She broke the scythes of an attacking bloody mantis to test the frame's resistance to slashing. She subjected it to every sort of attack to gauge its durability.
【Ojou-sama is running wild lol】
【Karin-sama: 'Consider being killed by me the same as being caught in a natural disaster'】
【What the hell is WITH that frame!? It's seriously not breaking at all!?】
【Um... could <Divine Artisan> actually be a terrifying skill, not a dud unique...?】
【👺 Your judgment is too slow】
【Karin ojou-sama being abnormal goes without saying, but people ARE starting to agree the skill's ceiling and range of applications are insane...】
【As far as we know: camouflage dress, monster-wiping Gatlings, wind-dragon-killing pile bunkers, item box, and an indestructible picture frame...】
【At this point she effectively has multiple unique skills!?】
【Seriously, what is going ON...】
"There! Perfect!"
Karin removed the drawing paper from the frame, beaming. After all those attacks, the frame was unscratched and the paper inside unharmed. (Now THIS is a frame worthy of preserving the divine original Mochimochi Tamago-sensei is sending me!) The result exceeded her expectations. She had done enough for today's stream.
(I'd like to make something for Mafuyu too, since she's been doing so much for me lately... But I can't give anyone items made with dungeon materials. I'll have to prepare something else once I get home.)
Karin put the frame in her item box and began preparing to leave.
"You gotta be fucking kidding me!"
"Why'd an enhanced variant have to show up NOW!?"
"Shit! This is the worst!"
"Hurry up and run! If we don't get away while that deadweight's getting killed, we're next!"
"Wouldn't have run into the thing if that piece of trash hadn't whined for a whole day about not going to the lower layers... Served her right!"
"...? What is going on?"
A group of explorers raced away down the passage, their faces pale. It was rare to see other people in the lower layers. Her floating camera caught them too, and chat began to stir.
【Who the hell were they?】
【Trouble?】
【They were far away, so I had to zoom in on a still frame, but isn't that emblem Black Shell's?】
【Black Tiger's leading affiliated clan!】
【One of the shitty clans, desu wa!?】
【Clans can HAVE affiliates?】
【Not officially. But a former clan member branches off and becomes a clan master → they stay close and collaborate all the time, so people call them an affiliate. Black Tiger's got a bunch like that】
【They looked seriously rattled. Did something really happen...?】
While Karin and her viewers were still trying to take in the sudden turn—
"D-don't, don't leave meeeeeee! Don't leave me behind!"
"—This won't do."
DOGYUN!
Toward the passage Black Shell had fled from. The instant Karin heard that desperate cry and sensed the approaching monster, she became a gust of wind powerful enough to shake the dungeon.
None of them knew that this encounter would, in time, set off a quiet, all-out conflict with Black Tiger, the strongest corrupt clan in the country.