ch441-ch460 · 451-ch451

Chapter 451: What Lies Beyond

"They're coming! Putting on the enhancement!"

Right on schedule, arrows come flying at the 300-meter mark.

Kasumi-san sets the invincible box down, and I pin it in place with 【Gate】.

Then Kasumi-san starts stowing away the wheeled trolley.

Lately we always fix it in place at the 300-meter point, and on the way home we leave the mass-production invincible box behind.

The mass-production model has the same armor thickness, but it has lots of windows so you can see out in all four directions—so it's weaker by exactly that much.

Gotta protect those windows with an early enhancement.

"There is something I would like to talk about, if I may?"

Oh? Is she switching up her pattern today?

Normally she'd suddenly come cling onto me from behind......

"What is it?"

I've already set the 'Right Eye Gate' at the castle gate, and the 'Left Eye Gate' up in the sky, shifted a little to the side of the invincible box—so even a surprise attack won't catch us off guard.

"Have you been avoiding me lately?"

Is... she... okay?

"No, we came out here just the two of us again today, so that's not it, right?"

"That is true in the depths of the dungeon. Of course, I can no longer show my face on the surface much, so we have stopped meeting outside—but are you not avoiding being alone with me on Floor 1?"

No, I don't have any intention of avoiding her, though.

I've been racking my brain for a way to keep Kasumi-san from coming to Floor 50—or rather, the moment I look at her face, that's ALL I end up thinking about......

So......

"Kasumi-san. Why don't you stop going to Floor 50?"

"......You are changing the plan now? But in that case, what happens to the 'Blue Ocean' people? And setting me aside, Aikawa-san is officially on record as having joined 'Blue Ocean'......"

If we don't help, someone dies. That is what the dream Chiharu-san saw showed.

That's why Kasumi-san decided to go to Floor 50.

"That's not it. Kasumi-san—just you. I'll go to Floor 50 and bring everyone back without letting a single person die, so I want you to wait for me."

"I...... cannot do that. To be honest, I feel the same way you do, Haruki-san. I am worried sick, truly. But I have decided to believe in you, Haruki-san. That someone like you would not die on a mere Floor 50. Can you not believe in me, Haruki-san? Am I just dead weight?"

That's not what this is about.

The skeletons of Floor 50 are certainly frightening.

But the way Kasumi-san puts it—just Floor 50—and with all the dreams I've kept seeing, maybe I could say the same now.

Except the dream never showed what comes after.

"That's not it either. What scares me is not knowing what happens once we break through Floor 50. What happens then? Does a 'Gate to Floor 51' just open up? No one in the entire world has ever come back. Sometimes I think—maybe somebody DID clear it, and went on ahead, and something happened to them beyond that point......"

"Beyond it? That once you go, you cannot come back? ......Then all the more reason I cannot let you go there alone, Haruki-san. No matter what happens, I will protect you. That is what I swore. Even if we can never come back—as long as I am with you, Haruki-san, I will be fine."

I see......

Now I finally understand.

THAT'S what's scary.

Whenever things get dire, Kasumi-san always tries to make herself my shield.

I have to do something about that......

"Ah, my MP......"

"Let's release the enhancement and pull back for now. The skeletons have not yet come out of the fortress, so once we put some distance between us, we should be able to retrieve the invincible box."

Time's up......

No—if she was going to bring this up, she could have picked any timing but this one......

Or maybe she figured that at any other time, I'd just find a way to slip away?