<<Please take a look at all the tourists who had come here to Kyoto in hopes of becoming an Awakened One—>>
<<Both Kyoto and Nara have the least number of dungeons in Japan as of today—>>
<<It has been said online that training at this temple can Awaken people, but the said training would take have to be done for 10 or so years—>>
<<People should think harder on what it means to become this so-called Awakened Ones! Think on what effects becoming an Awakened One would have on your bodies—>>
<<According to a criminal psychology expert, the many heinous crimes committed by Awakened Ones are comparable to the mass shootings that have been happening in the US—>>
<<Even though Awakened Ones are regarded as dangerous, I would still prefer to become one of them. It’s better to be armed—>>
<<Recruiting Awakened Ones into the police force is unnecessary, won’t you say? It’s not too hard to imagine that they’ll employ excessive force when making arrests. The prime minister has—>>
<<Minister Arikawa of the Dungeon Countermeasure Ministry proposed a tax reduction for adventurers and also petitioned the Diet for an overhaul of the equipment of the JSDF and the police—>>
I absentmindedly turned on the TV and the programs pretty much spouted such things.
Ah, that person in Kyoto looks like my classmate. Can’t remember their name though.
Anyway, there sure was so many people wanting to become Awakened Ones. But the ones treating Awakened Ones as dangerous were just as loud. Experts likened it to “wanting to deal with armed criminals with firearms of one’s own”. I kinda understood what they were trying to say.
Just to give an example, let’s say there was someone with a superpower that fell under the category of hypnosis. Distinctive superpowers aside, superpowers that affected the mind largely didn’t work against monsters and fellow Awakened. At best, it could be decent distractions for a little while. It was a different case when used on non-Awakened people. Just the other day, someone from an organized crime group used such a superpower on more than 30 elderly people and made them surrender a total of about 300 million yen.
The criminal in question was only arrested because they tried to do the same to an elderly person that so happened to be an Awakened One and then fought against that elderly person’s grandchild who also happened to be an Awakened One.
I heard that over 50 incidents like theft, scams, and sexual assaults had already been done through the use of hypnosis-type superpowers, but that was only the ones on record; who knew how many had gone unreported.
There had also been talks about “monster countermeasures”.
Dungeon overflows were roughly divided into 3 stages:
The 1st stage saw the monster population within the dungeon to swell to bizarre degrees. This made thinning their numbers even harder. The 2nd stage had the monsters come out of the dungeon and attack people. The 3rd stage was where a dark dome around the dungeon would appear and consume the surrounding area to be a part of the said dungeon.
Going through these stages supposedly allowed a dungeon to become bigger, just like what happened in Shinjuku. Incidentally, because of such phenomena, the value of land in present Tokyo had depreciated to half of what it was worth 3 years ago.
The monsters that emerge from a dungeon during the 2nd stage couldn’t be perceived or even attacked by the non-Awakened people. Hiding inside a sturdy building wouldn’t even do them any good as monsters could break through easily. It wasn’t so surprising then that people wanted countermeasures so that they could defend themselves, such as becoming an Awakened One. There were “barriers” that could be installed in houses and buildings, but those things had been rising in price, currently at 3 times their normal price. And since the installation of such barriers tended to be pricey, there seemed to be a lot of fakes out there. Minister Arikawa has been lobbying for Awakened Ones and the building of shelters for when dungeons overflowed, but…
<<And where will we get the budget for those!? Will it magically appear out of thin air just because you say so!? Surely, you’re not thinking of raising taxes to pay for these things, are you!?>>
<<To begin with, is the adventurer system itself really necessary? And what reason is there on why the number of Awakened Ones among the JSDF and the police is left undisclosed?>>
<<Letting adventurers keep the item drops they get in dungeons as their personal effects, it’s almost like you have no sense of the crisis we’re in>>
<<You, should, stop! You, should, stop! Traitor! Traitor!>>
Minister Arikawa was met with a flood of fervent criticisms from the opposition party. Personally, I thought the sight of him ignoring the hecklers, fending off critics with a bold smile, and pushing forth his opinions with reasoning was quite amazing. Still, that didn’t change the fact that he was going against the current. Even though his plans were proceeding along, it was hard to imagine they would be realized within the year.
I don’t really get it, but hang in there, Minister Arikawa! You still look suspicious to the point I’m questioning whether you’re really human, but hang in there!
I cheered him on as he was getting drowned out by hecklers even though he was speaking through a mic. Afterward, I picked up the remote so that I could watch the anime I had saved.
“Mm?”
I caught sight of something red on the screen. When I tried to focus out of curiosity, I saw that it was a small red stain on the collar of one of the hecklers. That being said, it was on the screen for only a few seconds. The only reason I saw it was because I had Magic Eyes which also boosted my dynamic visual acuity.
Honestly, I had no idea why I was so curious about it. For all I know, it was simply a member of the parliament who had eaten their lunch and got some ketchup on their collar.
* * *
It was the 4th day of Golden Week. At the halfway mark of the holidays, I was going to a different dungeon.
Because this particular dungeon was rather far from home, I took a train to go there. When I arrived, I found myself in a place more rural than my neighborhood. This place, which apparently used to be a mining site, was less populated than the place that had the Skeleton dungeon.
While thinking the people at the dungeon store must have been having a tough time, I passed through the gate and entered the dungeon. This D rank dungeon had the alias of Ant Labyrinth. Just as the alias would imply, ant monsters made a nest of this dungeon. A chamber here was about the size of small gymnasium. That was a telling sign of the bizarreness of the ants that lived here.
Stranger still, the ceiling and walls in the dungeon had some strange moss. And they weren’t luminous moss. To begin with, luminous moss didn’t shine like this strange moss; they apparently glowed simply by collecting light or something.
I summoned Layla to my side and drew my sword.
In each of her hands was a staff. Because she made them herself and most of the materials were things that originated from me, she was able to both store and summon each staff. One of those was the 1-meter staff she had been using for quite a while now. The other though, she had made recently and it was was more the wand-type. The red stone attached to its pommel was being illuminated by the light inside the dungeon.
“Alright, let’s go. We’ll proceed as we discussed beforehand.”
“Understood!”
This dungeon too was wide enough for me to swing my sword without restriction. Plus, thanks to the bright moss, I had a reliable source of light and therefore could fight with relative ease. Of course, this was still a dungeon, so carelessness had no place in it.
“Oow”
I walked a few steps into a seemingly empty chamber, but all of a sudden, as my right foot touched the ground, my Magic Eye activated. I immediately withdrew my foot. Almost at the same time, something black broke through the ground. Had I been even half a moment late, my right foot would have been caught by the thing that just closed like a bear trap.
“Heave-ho!”
I grabbed it with my left hand and pulled it out all at once. The thing in question, currently scattering sand around, was an ant monster that had black luster. Such monsters were called Myrmidons. I heard that they were soldier ant monsters that transformed into a hero-like figure. No matter how I looked though, the ant monster that landed a few meters away looked nothing more than an ant. Of course, with it arching its large body which was somewhere between 2 to 3 meters long, having 2 human-like forelimbs, and it chomping its mandibles as though to intimidate me, it was safe to say it was far departure from your average ant.
And then, it took out a spear out of the tip of its butt and wielded it with the aforementioned forelimbs. How it hid the spear, I had no idea. Not that it mattered to me at the moment. I wielded my own sword with both of my hands and readied myself to intercept the monster. For a while, we simply glared at each other.
It was now time for the main event.
“[Fireball]”
“Giii!?”
By main event, I meant our testing.
A ball of fire the size of a basketball hit the Myrmidon square on its head. The flames clung at the monster’s head as though viscous oil had been doused on it before hand, and before long burned down the carapace. I stood guard as the Myrmidon writhed and the smell of burning flesh filled the air. Several seconds later, it finally stopped moving and gradually vanished. It was only after I confirmed that there were no other monsters in the vicinity that I let out a sigh.
“Looks like the staff works fine.”
“It did! I’m happy to report that it works without issue!”
We were talking about the wand Layla held in her left hand. As could be guess from the red stone attached to it, the wand was a magic tool made with a Salamander’s magic stone. According to her, anybody could use the wand to cast Red Magic, the branch of magic for flames and such. By anybody though, she meant people that could at least perceive their own magic power.
By the way, the other branches of magic included Blue Magic for water, Green Magic for wind, and Yellow Magic for earth. There were also magic that didn’t belong to those four, such as White Magic for light and Black Magic for darkness.
Going back on topic though, Layla had the Nature Magic superpower. That allowed her to cast magic of the elements that were present in her vicinity. For example, in this dungeon, she would be pretty much limited to manipulating the ground and such. But using this staff, she could create her own flames, allowing her to use such magic in even more battlefields.
“But…there’s much to be desired about its output, isn’t there? Then again, I expected as much.”
“Isn’t it enough that it greatly increases the things you could do?”
In response to Layla and her slightly awkward smile, I lightly shook my head. While the ball of fire was certainly only on the scale of the molotov I once saw on TV, power wasn’t the only thing to consider. I didn’t know exactly in what situations, but the flexibility of having an extra means of attack than what was available at the vicinity would no doubt make a significant difference.
But that aside…
“Is it alright if I try it? I’m curious what it’s like to use magic”
In truth, I was super captivated by the thought of magic and spells. Each time Layla and Uoyama-kun used magic, I always thought must be nice or so cool.
“Of course. Please channel your magic power into the magic stone and then shape it in the tip of the wand.”
I excitedly received the wand from her. I then pointed it to a somewhat faraway wall and concentrated. I tried to sense the flow of magic power within me and then channeled it like she told me.
“That’s it, master! You’re really good at this!”
I wasn’t done yet…I next kneaded the magic power and shaped it. Lastly, I recited the “words of power”.
“[Fireball]!”
A ball of flames shot out and made impact with the wall. With a boom, the flames then scattered and put the surroundings on fire.
“O, ohhhh!”
That’s so impressive! So, so, so impressive! I mean, I just shot out flames from the staff! That was magic! Magic! Wow…just wow…
“That was amazing, master! Is this not your first time!?”
“…that praise is a bit too on the nose.”
“Apologies.”
Oh well, I was still happy about the experience. Even though it was by relying on a magic tool, I still cast my first magic. That elation filled my chest and was enough to move me to tears. Actually, I was smiling and sweating so much underneath my helm that I bet I was making a crazy face!
“Okay! Let me blast all the monsters in the dungeon with magic!”
“No, master. You’re stronger with your sword than with magic, so please hand over the staff.”
“…okay”
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