After the hunt comes being hunted.
For Isagi and the girls, defeating the "fishing-village orphan" before them was no simple matter.
A mad-dog BOSS.
Even though, the very instant they laid eyes on it, they'd already had a bad feeling, in the end this thing still vastly exceeded their expectations.
Outwardly it looked like a gaunt, pallid humanoid.
But in reality, this thing was practically omnipotent, able to soar through the skies and burrow through the earth—that's right, this BOSS could not only fly, it could even dig down into the ground.
The mud-choked ground was, to it, just like a pond; head pointed downward, it would simply crawl in, and in the blink of an eye it had vanished without a trace.
One could only rely on the faint shriek it gave off before breaking through the soil to dodge its sudden assaults.
An orphan.
Truly an orphan to the utmost degree.
Its long, thin arms and legs were almost entirely weapons, incomparably sharp, while at the same time capable of contorting into bizarre movements no human body could ever make, as if it had originally been some kind of mollusk.
Thankfully, beyond that there was nothing else to it.
Once they'd grown familiar with its close-combat patterns, relying on the luxurious lineup of himself, Ryuu-senpai, and Ais and Tiona—
plus Lefiya, upon whom Haruhime had cast her level-boosting magic, continually using ice magic to slow and control the enemy's movements—in the end, Lefiya struck the decisive blow, blasting it to death with her magic.
Isagi picked up the Magic Stone from within its body, as well as the tough, ghastly-pale "fish skin" that dropped afterward.
This stuff—taking it back to make equipment, why does it feel a little creepy?
But it was, after all, a BOSS drop, so there was no way he could just toss it.
Isagi put it away all the same.
Then.
He heard that strange voice come drifting over once again from afar.
[Find the correct path, and flee the hunter's pursuit.]
[Or.]
[Kill the hunter.]
"?"
The ever-riddling Dungeon was thoroughly irritating.
But before the boy and girls had any chance to discuss what the deal was with this suddenly appearing "hunter,"
they discovered—
the heaps of garbage piled up not far off began to melt, and before long, a broad road appeared.
What else was there to say—just walk it.
Isagi and the girls kept their formation as they walked inside, and once again heard that crisp "pop" sound by their ears.
Everything before their eyes swiftly transformed; the rotting fishing village vanished, and in its place stood a very quaint little town.
Brick-and-stone houses lay shrouded under a deathly-still nightscape.
All around was pitch-black.
Faintly, a deep-blue glow fell from the sky, clump after clump, like fireflies suspended in the heavens, and also like pairs of eyes.
Isagi and the girls all quickly noticed that, on the walls of the surrounding houses, a lifelike eye would appear from time to time.
As if the eyes of "people" had been gouged out, and then set into the walls.
And still in a living state, no less.
Recalling the "giant mouth" in the sky just now and the "hands" tangled together, Isagi seemed to have a rather bad premonition.
Behind them.
The cry of a cat began to drift over, along with footsteps already drawing near.
Presumably this was that so-called "hunter," then?
Isagi paused for a moment, then abruptly called for the girls beside him to follow.
"Move out first!"
"?!"
Were they running away?
Ais, Lefiya, and the others were a little puzzled, because hadn't the prompt just now said they could also kill the "hunter"?
But there was no nonsense—their long adventuring together had given everyone absolute trust in this moment; since Isagi had said so, there was no need for explanation, just follow the boy.
And so.
With himself in the lead, everyone quickly began threading through the still labyrinth-like town.
As the cat's cries and footsteps behind them grew more and more distant, Isagi turned around and voiced his conjecture to the girls.
And that was—
What does this region, the[Great Waterfall], represent within the Dungeon?
When Isagi spoke this sentence, the girls couldn't help but be taken aback, and they didn't even quite understand what this was supposed to mean.
But the boy's ensuing explanation went like this.
"The Dungeon is alive, and she holds a certain conception of the[Floors]she herself creates. At the very least, in this present age—with the Dungeon's various regions long since fixed over a thousand years—even a place that originally held no meaning has had meaning bestowed upon it by adventurers."
So.
To the Dungeon, what exactly does the[Great Waterfall]mean?
The girls were still a bit baffled by this, which was only natural, because adventurers rarely give thought to such things.
Enter the Dungeon, kill monsters, obtain Magic Stones, collect materials, raise one's ability values and [Excelia]—for adventurers, coming to the Dungeon is, in fact, risking one's life to exchange for something.
Very few people would ever ponder matters concerning the Dungeon itself.
The[Great Waterfall]is a very special place within the Dungeon; it is the entrance to the lower floors, and for adventurers, it is also the true "starting point" in the proper sense.
To head to the lower floors.
One needs at least Lv. 3 strength; an ordinary Lv. 2 adventurer would never come to such a dangerous place.
Likewise, most adventurers' [Excelia] for leveling up from Lv. 3 to Lv. 4 also relies heavily on the Floor 27 Monster Rex, the Two-Headed Dragon Amphisbaena.
The former Ishtar Familia had a great many Lv. 3 and Lv. 4 battle-courtesans, and one very important reason for this was that they had basically monopolized the subjugation of the Two-Headed Dragon—which relied not only on the [Diving] trait that Amazon adventurers almost all possess by nature.
There was another reason, too: the battle-courtesans' "business" was often conducted all the way down at Rivira on Floor 18, and they even treated it as a kind of little amusement during their adventures.
As a result, they would basically obtain firsthand intelligence about the[Great Waterfall]area—when the Monster Rex had respawned and could be subjugated, they were basically always the first to know.
That said.
All in all, for the city's adventurers, the lower floors are "the true beginning of adventure."
Because if one merely wants to earn money in the Dungeon by defeating monsters and obtaining Magic Stones and materials, there is no need to come to a place like this.
To put it in Ais and the others' words.
The sort of fellow who can make it here counts as having become a truly self-reliant adventurer in the city—one who could even be said to be capable of carrying a Familia's development on their shoulders.
Many small and mid-sized Familia
were all "led up" by a single Lv. 3 adventurer.
Isagi had no such experience, but it wasn't hard to understand—after all, with a senior present in the Familia, whether it be everyday training or adventuring into the Dungeon, everything would become far safer and more controllable; that was a perfectly natural thing.
So then, since the[Great Waterfall]holds so much meaning for adventurers.
What about for the Dungeon?
As said earlier.
To the Dungeon, the[Great Waterfall]was once another exit leading to the surface.
At the same time, the so-called concept of "Floors" is nothing more than a division adventurers arbitrarily made for themselves; in reality, this place is a colossal vertical-shaft-like cavern with a drop of fully several hundred meters in height.
Only now did Isagi understand what that[Crossroads]at the very beginning had actually meant.
So.
What about the[Hunting Ground]?
"Hey, hurry over here, don't go wandering around over there!"
A hoarse voice came from afar, catching one somewhat off guard.
Isagi quickly saw, at a street corner not far off, a man wrapped head to toe in bandages and wearing a sheep-bone mask, beckoning toward him.
"An adventurer?"
"How rare—to think someone could actually get through those madmen's turf. Looks like[Mother]really has gone wrong, then..."
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