ch21-ch40 · 039-ch33
Chapter 33
That day, Sai had set out for an adventure at Shinjuku Tower.
He trained rookies, but he also continued adventuring like he was still in his prime.
He was an old man who wanted to push forward as far as he could go, even if he didn't know how far that would be.
Currently, he was on the seventeenth floor of Shinjuku Tower.
On this floor, monsters that intermediate adventurers in the other world would face roamed about — Blood Tigers, Spirit Wolves, and the like.
There were even Thunder Spiders, which were troublesome to deal with due to their high intelligence.
Little by little, but surely, powerful enemies were appearing.
He needed to fight more carefully than ever.
While exploring the seventeenth floor, he went around defeating the monsters that appeared.
He dealt with spirit-type monsters using magic.
Even for Sai, who had conquered numerous dungeons, Shinjuku Tower was special.
Floors 1 through 5 were for rookie adventurers. The monsters just charged in mindlessly.
Floors 6 through 10 were for beginner adventurers. Monsters started to think and attack in groups, and traps appeared.
Floors 11 through 15 were for intermediate adventurers. The monsters' physical strength and magical power both gradually increased, and they started using nasty attacks.
Floors 16 through 20 were also for intermediate adventurers. In Japan, these were considered advanced, but in the other world, this level of difficulty was still intermediate.
The monsters grew even stronger, and the traps became even more insidious.
But the biggest problem from the sixteenth floor onward was mapping.
The dungeon pathways changed every few days.
Areas where people were present didn't change; the alterations happened out of sight.
The only things that didn't change were the safe areas and the teleportation device locations.
So no matter how detailed a map you made, it was only valid for a few days.
To reach higher floors, you had to consolidate your map within those few days and find the stairs leading upward.
It was as if the dungeon was designed to encourage adventurers' growth.
Was this what they called the will of Shinjuku Tower?
Incidentally, from the sixteenth floor onward, Sai made a point of opening any treasure chests he found.
Simply because the various items obtainable from the sixteenth floor and above sold for high prices.
What was most in demand were various types of potions — recovery potions, antidote potions, magic recovery potions, and so on.
From the sixteenth floor onward, high-grade potions started appearing.
Their selling price was about the annual salary of a typical salaryman per bottle.
With such insane prices, of course he'd collect them.
Since Shinjuku Tower's appearance, various industries had been developing products based on dungeon-sourced materials and items. Medical companies like pharmaceutical firms were developing new medicines based on the potions adventurers brought back.
Naturally. They were recovery medicines that healed injuries and illnesses at astonishing speed.
There was no way they wouldn't pursue something so far removed from existing medicine.
But currently, no company had been able to develop recovery potions from scratch.
Because they couldn't obtain the base materials.
They seemed to have some idea of what was needed, but apparently some necessary ingredients hadn't been found on Earth.
An uncreatable miracle drug. That was the position of recovery potions.
...Well, of course.
The materials needed for potions were based on plants that grew in the other world.
You couldn't make potions from plants growing in the dungeon either.
In other words, those plants currently didn't exist on Earth.
From Sai's perspective, he wondered why these things were on Earth at all.
He knew that Shinjuku Tower was connected to the other world.
But he couldn't figure out the causal relationship, and it confused him.
While lost in thought, he continued straight down the corridor, then turned.
After proceeding through several turns, he found a small room.
Sai decided to enter, hoping for a treasure chest.
He also started speaking to the viewers watching his stream.
"Alright, for those watching this stream, I thought I'd give a little lesson."
"When you find a door, absolutely never just barge in looking for a treasure chest."
He confirmed the presence of monsters through presence detection.
He began running through several scenarios in his head.
"You can tell a lot even before opening a door — what kind of monsters are beyond, from their footsteps, voices, and smell."
But from the small room ahead, there was no sound of footsteps or voices.
"Just because you listen closely and hear nothing doesn't mean it's safe to go in, got it? There could be an ambush or a trap. By the way, there are monsters around the seventeenth floor that do that kind of thing, right? ...I'm going to focus and move, so watch me."
He kicked open the door to the small room.
It was a room that had become a Thunder Spider's nest.
He quickly checked for traps... No traps.
The spider had probably been monitoring the door's opening through its web.
The moment he opened it, the spider sprayed webs at him.
If you touched the webs, you'd receive a strong electric shock, so you absolutely must not make contact.
Some might think it would be fine with insulated gloves, but touching it that way would leave you dealing with the web's strong adhesiveness.
The best way to deal with the webs was with wind.
Sai immediately used Wind Cutter, a wind-attribute spell, to cut through the webs.
This severed the magical energy flow through the cut sections, largely nullifying the lightning strike from the web.
Still, even cut, the webs remained on the ground, and electricity could still travel through any gaps.
That was what made Thunder Spiders troublesome.
Furthermore, Thunder Spiders fired lightning-attribute magic bullets, so you couldn't let your guard down. The standard approach would be to deflect the magic bullets with Hexa Shield, but this was Earth. Showing viewers Hexa Shield was fine, but demonstrating a technique they couldn't use would be a failure as an instructor.
This time, he decided to try Earth's pest control methods.
He opened his Item Box in a spot not visible to the camera and took out a special tool.
It was a bottle filled with extremely strong coffee brewed with mint — so strong a human couldn't drink it. Topped with finely crushed coffee beans, mint leaves, and insecticide.
Using water magic, he vaporized this concoction — something that barely qualified as coffee — and filled the room.
"GIIIIIIIII!?"
The Thunder Spider let out a deranged shriek, but Sai quickly left the room.
He waited by the door for a while.
Spiders — when they consume coffee, or rather caffeine, they become intoxicated.
Mint is effective against not just monsters but insects in general. As expected, the Thunder Spider let out a strange battle cry and tried to flee the room.
Precisely because it had intelligence, it took that kind of action.
And because it had intelligence, its actions were easy to read.
The moment the Thunder Spider burst out of the room, Sai split its cephalothorax and abdomen in two with his blade, then finished it by bisecting its head and thorax as well.
Back in his days in the other world, Sai hadn't known how to defeat them this way. But this was Earth, and it was the result of Earth know-how.
He'd been impressed watching some adventurer take them down with this method, so he'd prepared this tool and used it in battle this time.
"I borrowed a method I saw an adventurer using before. Mint-caffeine bomb. I'm sure many of you know about it — as you can see, it takes them down easily."
The smell of concentrated coffee mixed with mint wafted from the room.
Making Shinjuku Tower, where adventurers fought day and night, smell like coffee and mint might be a bit of a sin.
Thinking that, Sai was privately impressed that the tool had worked well.
"The people in this world sure come up with clever ideas too..."
Muttering to himself, he re-entered the room.
Some Thunder Spider webs remained.
In Shinjuku Tower, when a monster disappeared, these kinds of residues usually vanished too, but occasionally some parts remained. These webs could also be sold to companies at high prices, so he collected them.
There was also a treasure chest. He quickly checked for traps — none.
Inside was an intermediate antidote potion.
It was a universal antidote that could nullify many poisons and was effective even when drunk. This too could be sold to pharmaceutical companies for a huge sum.
"It's tough for a middle-aged old man, but I'm pushing forward."
Sai grumbled about nearing his limit, but the viewers watching his stream could only be amazed at how effortlessly he handled the monsters as he advanced through the seventeenth floor.
And so, before the clock passed midnight, he completed the seventeenth floor.
He set foot onto the eighteenth floor.
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Thank you for reading.