ch21-ch40 · 025-ch24

Chapter 24

For Toru, his first proper monster fight had been the Black Ogre in the hidden floor.

He didn't know that monster's exact rank, but it was the kind of opponent he'd had no choice but to flee from. And yet now, for some reason, he had the conviction that "something like that would be fine."

Even though the only things Toru had actually killed were D-rank bottom-feeder trash.

The furballs, big rats, and demi-goblins he'd practically swept away during his daily cleaning work were the kind that disappeared when you hit them—trash, plain and simple. Frankly, they weren't even threatening enough to call monsters. If he went around boasting that he'd fought monsters with those, he'd be laughed at, or worse, pitied.

You're not an explorer, they'd say.

That was how he'd lived his life, believing it.

Walking with his welded bundle-of-rebar bludgeon over his shoulder, Toru watched the two magic wolves literally lunging at him, thought they're definitely weaker than the Black Ogre, and sidestepped half a pace as he swung the bludgeon down.

A heavy thud rang out, and one of the wolves was crushed against the floor.

The other, thrown off by his sidestep, snapped at empty air—and Toru's returning swing caught it from below, slamming it into the ceiling before it fell, and almost immediately had its head crushed.

By Toru, of course.

It felt almost like his body was moving automatically.

And yet it was undeniably his own body, moving exactly as he intended—a contradictory sensation.

"That was easy, Toru!"

Ignoring Tia, who approached in high spirits, Toru picked up the magic core left behind after the magic wolves dissipated.

The magic cores he picked up during his usual cleaning work were bead-sized or grain-of-sand-sized. The magic wolf's core was about the size of his thumbnail. To Toru, that felt pretty big.

"...Well, I guess it works, at least."

"Umm... I'm getting comments like 'did he really not manage to get an explorer license?' Toru-san, that was your first time fighting monsters, right?"

Anthem's leader, Saito Megumi, approached and said that.

"Oh, me! Can I talk too?"

Tia—probably not sensing that Toru found explanations troublesome—raised her hand and bounced up and down as she looked at the camera.

"Uh, ah, yes. Of course."

Looking a bit flustered by Tia's overly friendly attitude, Megumi nodded with a somewhat relieved expression.

She probably just didn't want to deal with Toru.

Toru didn't particularly want to deal with her either, so they were even. His communication skills weren't high enough to happily chat with someone who had tons of fans, in front of those very fans.

"It's probably because Toru's soul is connected to the holy sword. What was it called, magical affinity? I don't think Toru had much of that originally, but after his soul connected with the holy sword, the vessel for magical power expanded dramatically, I think. I was just a normal person too, before I picked this up."

"The holy sword...?"

"Yeah, the holy sword Lightbringer. It's a divine weapon that the spirits forged from stardust and an ancient dragon tempered inside its body. It connects with its owner's soul and refuses to be used by anyone else. This weapon's, how should I put it, passive effect is being applied to Toru."

Leaving Tia to chatter away in high spirits, Toru decided to check Anthem's stream. He'd participated in the stream by answering Megumi's questions, but not knowing how the viewers were reacting was a bit awkward.

"Tia-chan looking smug is cute" "She's weirdly friendly. The temperature difference is huge 'cause Toru-bro's kinda antisocial" "Wait, I've never heard of a holy sword called Lightbringer" "bro just pulled out his phone lmao" "Toru-bro, you watching? If you are, wave at the camera"

Looked like he might have finally graduated from being 'Worksite-bro.'

That made him a little happy, so Toru raised his non-bludgeon hand toward the camera and gave a small wave. He felt intensely embarrassed the moment he did it, but what was done was done.

"Toru-bro's reading comments!" "Lmao" "He'd rather look at us than talk to Anthem lol" "Is what Tia-chan's saying for real?" "What do you think, Toru-dono? I'm still not used to streaming culture myself, but having outside voices reach us while we're in a labyrinth like this—don't you find it reassuring?"

Chizuru sidled up to him and said. Whether she shared the sentiment, Mido Airi, who was near the camera, also smiled and nodded.

"Uh... well, I dunno much about it, but... when I was working as a cleaner, I was just muttering to myself alone, so it's fresh."

"Muttering to yourself alone...?"

"Huh, Toru-san—do you have a personal channel?"

Megumi's voice rose in surprise, as if she'd picked up on a comment.

Toru checked his device and saw that apparently, by last night, someone had identified the channel where he recorded his labyrinth cleaning. He was amazed at the vitality of netizens—how did they even find such a tiny channel?

"Well, for recording purposes..."

"In that case, maybe you could consider working as a stream explorer from now on. Toru-san seems like he'd find talking a hassle, but Tia-san looks like she'd enjoy chatting."

Megumi's remark was slightly sharp, but she didn't seem to mean any harm. And she wasn't wrong, so Toru couldn't get angry about it.

Actually, looking at Kagurazaka Chizuru made it obvious, but... maybe they really were quite naive about the world.

Thinking about it that way, a lot of things clicked into place.

In their minds, Toru was 'the person who helped us' and 'the person cooperating with us,' not 'the person we're using.' If anyone had that, it was probably Anthem's manager, Hamamatsu Nanami—but rather than a sense of entitlement, maybe she had a strong protective instinct toward the members.

Thinking of her as a monster parent gave a certain consistency to the capable manager's actions. Like trying to push the responsibility for what should have been a self-directed exploration onto the requesting party, S City—because of excessive protectiveness.

Even if that guess was correct, it didn't mean Toru thought "oh well, can't be helped."

They probably had their reasons.

But he had no obligation to be considerate of them, so he figured he'd just rage and leave if he really got pissed off. Unless that happened, he intended to properly accompany them since he'd been paid—but he just had no intention of selling his already-sold-out soul any further.

"Uh... well, for now, let me finish today's exploration safely, and if your fans don't try to flame me, then I'll think about it."

"Scared of getting flamed lmao" "Probably because of those loud unicorns on SNS lol" "Most listeners are grateful to Toru-bro for saving Anthem lol" "But yeah, gotta focus on what's in front of us" "This is a mutated labyrinth investigation. Can't let our guard down."

"Ahaha. Then I'll have to tell the listeners not to roast Toru-san. Hey everyone, please! He's our benefactor."

"Well, I got paid and a license for saving you, so we're even. Acting like a benefactor forever would just piss people off anyway."

"...I don't think Toru-dono has been acting like a benefactor from the start, though..."

Chizuru said, looking troubled, and the listeners agreed.

If only that had been enough to put him at ease, but the noble elf was still glaring at him, so he didn't feel like laughing cheerfully.

◇◇◇

The exploration went smoothly.

The 'upper layers' from floors one to ten showed no discrepancies from the existing map, and any monsters that appeared along the way could be handled by any member without issue. Toru also smashed several monsters with his rebar bludgeon, but he didn't find them particularly threatening.

Incidentally—or rather, as usual—when Toru picked up the magic cores left by the dissipating monsters, the healer Mido Airi showed off her magic bag. The kind of anomalously capacious bag familiar from fantasy fiction. The magic bag she'd brought this time apparently held about as much as five shipping containers.

"Probably costs tens of millions to buy"

"S-rank explorers apparently have even larger-capacity bags"

"I mean, Chizuru's sword alone is probably worth around fifty million"

Come to think of it, if they were A-rank explorers, all their equipment and belongings would naturally be top-tier.

The fact that both Saito Megumi and Mido Airi were wearing skirts with leggings might be because they were conscious of their idol side. Chizuru wore military-style pants and boots, with her katana hung from an oddly modern belt, giving the impression of a warrior. The elf Ilseria was dressed the same as when Toru had seen her at the hotel, with a collapsible magic bow slung over her shoulder like a one-shoulder bag.

"Well, equipment is directly linked to your life, you know. Though I can't exactly wear full plate armor. Since I use a greatsword, I prefer to stay as light as possible."

"Anthem members are wearing NINELINE brand explorer wear" "That place is practically the go-to for explorers" "Plus, Kujo's young lady is interesting" "With normal clothes, one little burst of movement and it's a service scene" "Haah, haah... Can I go to the bathroom?"

"Right, right, NINELINE explorer wear is really helpful. When people like us move suddenly, normal clothes just can't handle it. Oh, that reminds me—"

Megumi, who was handling the stream comments, was clearly used to this—managing both exploration and streaming simultaneously—and occasionally tossed topics to the quiet Mido Airi, or to Ilseria based on comment flow, and sometimes to Toru.

She really does seem like the worrying type, a bit of a tryhard popular kid, Toru thought again.

When someone like that leaves a group, the remaining loud idiots with strong egos usually start infighting. It was the same pattern he'd seen in middle school and high school—though he'd dropped out of high school. Maybe it was Anthem's saving grace that they weren't exactly a 'popular kid group.' Not that this wasn't pure prejudice.

Incidentally, Tia kept trying to join conversations like a friendly dog that didn't need to be prompted, to the point of bewildering Megumi. For Toru, it just meant fewer questions directed at him, which helped.

He'd said a lot of things to Tia in the hotel lobby, but he wasn't still angry at her. Whether he'd come to dislike her—no, not at all. He had no intention of telling her this, but he even found her sense of justice somewhat likeable.

It was like watching rain fall quietly outside a window—a feeling that it wasn't bad to observe from nearby, but he didn't want to go out and get wet.

There would probably be times when their views clashed again. When that happened, they'd clash again. Toru was almost resigned to that.

Maybe one day a fatal split would come, or Tia might get sick of Toru and retreat into the sword. But that hadn't happened yet.

When it did—would he feel relieved?

He didn't know since it hadn't happened yet, but not being able to see Tia's face, so happy and bright when she drank her coffee beverage, would feel a bit wasteful.

Then don't act like that, he thought to himself.

Anyway.

With all that, they broke through the upper layers without trouble.

From the eleventh floor—the 'middle layers'—discrepancies from the map began to appear, and the pace of exploration noticeably slowed. Because Mido Airi, who was handling communication with the backup team, occasionally gave instructions like "go back a bit" to verify the paths Toru and the others had walked and to allow the external mappers to update.

"This world's technology is amazing, Toru. Walking through a labyrinth while staying in contact with the outside, having people outside draw the labyrinth map—I never could have imagined this."

Toru shrugged ambiguously at Tia's expression of fresh amazement.

"Normal explorers without heavy support probably can't do this. Maybe big enough clans have support staff, but nobody's gonna do it for free. And from the explorers actually risking their lives, having to give a cut to people who aren't putting their bodies on the line—that might not sit well."

"Ah, the revenue distribution problem. Classic, right?"

"Well, I don't know if it's classic or not."

"Come to think of it, you've always been solo, haven't you, Toru."

Tia's tone was as usual, as if the morning's events had never happened. Whether she truly wasn't bothered by it or not, Toru had no way to know, but at least it didn't seem like she'd given up on him over that.

"...Hypothetically, if we were gonna do a labyrinth exploration stream together, should we split things fifty-fifty?"

"Ahaha! No way. I'm a spirit possessing the holy sword, and the holy sword's owner is Toru. That means I'm Toru's property. So you should keep all the rewards. If you occasionally give me a treat or something with that money, I won't complain. How's that? Don't I sound like a convenient woman?"

"If you weren't using half my soul, sure."

As they were talking like this, apparently it was all being captured perfectly on camera, and the stream's chat section was oddly lively.

"What a scandalously enviable conversation" "Wait. If Tia-chan is Toru-bro's property, then if I make Toru-bro my property, perhaps...?" "There is no perhaps, dumbass" "Toru-bro sounds normal when talking to Tia-chan" "Worksite-bro scared of Anthem lmao" "Regularly scared of us since he's scared of getting flamed" "Also, explorers below B-rank basically never enter unexplored labyrinths, so mapping isn't that necessary" "Lower-rank explorers who don't use MPS have higher rates of getting lost, right?"

"MPS...?"

"It's a magic version of GPS. Magic Positioning System—MPS. It's standard equipment on stream cameras too."

Mido Airi, who had somehow appeared beside him with a gentle smile, added a supplementary explanation to Toru's muttering.

"Oh, I see... thanks."

"The commenters are also saying this, but are you still not comfortable with us? You don't have to be so formal."

"Uh... well, I'm shy."

"Why's bro's social difficulty level so high lol" "Looks like the type who'd refuse to walk home together 'cause he'd get gossiped about lol" "Even the unicorns are confused" "Show us your dere side, Toru-bro"

"Shut up, you guys. Try being face-to-face with actual idols. I can't tell what line is crossing into trouble."

"No no no lol, don't dere into us lol" "He suddenly gets casual lol Toru-bro lol" "Hehe. You can be about that casual with us too, you know?"

"Yeah, no, that's not happening."

"Oh. That's too bad..."

Mido Airi lowered her brows, genuinely looking disappointed.

But it was too late for Toru to ask "can I talk casually after all?" now, so he had no choice but to leave Airi's disappointment unaddressed.

And so, still without any trouble from monsters even in the middle layers, they carefully proceeded with mapping the labyrinth—and before they knew it, eight hours had passed since the start of the exploration.

For an ordinary working person, that would be past legal working hours, and frankly, walking around fighting monsters continuously for eight hours shouldn't be sustainable—but none of Anthem showed any signs of fatigue, and Toru himself wasn't tired either.

Back when he was a cleaner, he hadn't been completely exhausted recently, but he'd still felt some fatigue. Now, he didn't feel any at all.

"Weird feeling. Walking around this much and my legs don't hurt at all."

"Well, that's the blessing of the holy sword. It has an automatic recovery effect. Even minor injuries heal right away!"

"Well, that's fine for me, but what about Anthem's members...?"

"We're, you know, used to it."

The one who answered with a wry smile was Megumi. Looking around, Airi and Chizuru were nodding normally, while Ilseria shrugged as if exasperated.

"These girls are elites raised for labyrinth exploration. They've been trained to the point where, if they wanted, they could stay in a labyrinth for a whole week straight. They don't live the easy life of someone like you, grinding trash mobs in the upper layers every day and clocking out on time."

"Saying 'you can't possibly be having it as hard as me, so you shouldn't be having a hard time'—that's not gonna lead anywhere fun when you dig into it. Maybe a capable, noble Elf-sama can't understand, but people have different things they find fun or hard. When someone who isn't the person themselves starts saying 'you shouldn't be having a hard time,' I think it never ends well."

"Hmph. So you want me to say 'thank you for your daily labyrinth cleaning, it must have been tough'? How ridiculous."

"Don't make up shit I never said. I'm saying nobody has the right to judge whether someone else's life is easy or hard. Oh, does the capable, noble Elf-sama have that right? Then I guess I have no choice but to apologize for living an easy life. Yeah, real easy. None of my family survived, but real easy."

"Whoa! Hey, hey, hey! We're streaming here, Toru!"

"And Ilseria, stop picking fights! Do you want to see me prostrate myself again?"

"He suddenly snaps lol" "Sudden trigger skill lmao" "Bad chemistry lmao" "Don't make Tia-chan and Chii-chan worry" "Honestly impressed Toru-bro can go toe-to-toe with I-chan lol" "I'm voting for bro" "Hmm, this is even" "Did she just say 'again'? He's already gotten a dogeza?"

"Ah..."

I fucked up, Toru thought, shutting his mouth and scratching his head, but what was done was done. When he glanced at the leader Megumi, she had her hand over her face in a "sorry" gesture, so it didn't seem like Toru was entirely in the wrong.

"We can let the listeners debate ideology later—everyone, we're almost at the boss room on the fourteenth floor."

Mido Airi—surprisingly, or perhaps not—cut through the awkward flow by pointing down the corridor. At that, both the Anthem members and the stream viewers seemed to suddenly tense up, and the exchange between Toru and Ilseria was temporarily swept under the rug.

For Toru, the boss room door was a place he had no memory of entering—only passing through on the way back. But for Saito Megumi, Kagurazaka Chizuru, Mido Airi... and the cameraperson Shingu Sanagi, it had to be a place of trauma.

They'd nearly died. They'd almost given up. They'd braced themselves.

"Let's go, everyone."

The one who said it was Saito Megumi.

"Don't worry. Whether it's a dragon or a Black Knight, I'm not giving those two a chance to step in. I won't let my comrades face danger."

The one who declared this firmly was Ilseria.

The door opened, and they entered the boss room—

There was nothing inside.