Huh?

(A-rank adventurer Mashiro POV)

"Huh? Some idiot had Treant lumber!?"

"That's right, Mashiro. Apparently they said they took advantage of a large-scale logging site or something."

"There wasn't any scheduled logging, what's going on?"

That's what the door guard stationed at the boss room leading to the lower floors told me.

The lower floors of Karkassa Dungeon are a forest area.

This forest has many Treants mixed in with normal trees, but the Treants just try to conceal the paths you've taken and get you lost; they don't attack.

However, if you were to hunt those Treants, a black devil—the Black Mantis—would appear.

The Black Mantis is a berserker-type monster. It attacks and massacres any adventurers or monsters it sees indiscriminately. The only exceptions are Treants disguised as trees.

And once a Black Mantis appears, it rampages for a week. The lower floor's lockdown isn't lifted until a week later, when its corpse is found as if its lifespan had run out.

Conversely, once a year, they do large-scale logging to deliberately lure out the Black Mantis and have it wipe out the monsters in the forest area, but…

"It's not that time yet, right? They bullshitting?"

"That's just it, they definitely had freshly cut Treant lumber."

"So a Black Mantis could appear any moment."

If that happens, they'd need to observe for three days, and if a Black Mantis is confirmed, lock down for a week.

Seriously, what idiots.

Do they not know why there's a door guard stationed at this boss room, or why adventurers are always told "Don't hunt the Treants"?

The idiots will probably be demoted. They might be charged for the damages.

"Sorry, but could you go warn the others right away? There are four parties in the depths right now. One of them is checking the logging site. I can't offer much of a reward, but this is an emergency request for The Silver by name."

"Just great. And here I thought today would be easy spider hunting."

"We're counting on The Silver's nose. Please."

"Can't be helped, buy me a drink when I get back."

It would leave a bad taste to abandon fellow adventurers from the same town. I decided to accept this request.

 

*

 

I tracked down two parties and warned them, then went for the third. Unfortunately, the Black Mantis was already bearing down on them.

"Watch out!"

I leaped in to intercept that black scythe. Damn, if this weren't a dwarf-made sword, my arm would've been lopped right off!

Deflecting the blow, I flicked a dart at its eyes. But those red compound eyes tracked the trajectory perfectly, and it dodged with minimal movement. Damn mantis bastard.

"Eeeek!? Ah, The Silver…!"

"Hurry up and run, tell the door guard the devil appeared and lock it down!"

"S-sorry!"

They looked like C-rank adventurers. Those guys wouldn't even be able to resist a Black Mantis.

If I left them alone, they'd be killed in an instant, and then I'd be next anyway, so jumping in to buy time amounted to the same thing. But at least more people would survive, and they could report the devil's appearance to the door guard.

After that, I just have to survive somehow… but that's the troublesome part.

If I can lure it to the spider colony, I might be able to foist it off on the spiders and escape!

—Thinking about that during a razor-thin battle was a mistake. I heard a bad crack.

My sword was in trouble. At this rate it'd get snapped! I threw myself into a roll to avoid having it snapped in two. But in doing so, I backed myself into a corner.

"Kuh, to think this is where I'd…!"

That's when it happened.

"Hey～, need help?"

"Huh!?"

An easygoing woman's voice that didn't fit the situation at all.