The End of the Bandits

It's been a week since the adventurers attacked. That means the dungeon was peaceful.

Adventurers haven't come, so the bandits are uninjured.

The bandits left and brought back corpses twice this past week. The four corpses turned into around 600 DP. It was most likely too difficult to capture them alive.

… Though I really did think that, isn't that poor earnings for twenty-six people? Well, one of them is a non-combat child.

Ah, their reward? I decided to wait a few days since they hadn't killed inside the cave. There's no rush you know?

By the way, the boss plays around with the dog-eared girl every day… that's the only part I don't find peaceful.

Even if she's a slave or something, as a Japanese, I can't just suddenly adjust and accept it.

Rather than the other slaves serving the bandits, just one of them became a plaything.

Is it a small relief that, other than the boss, no one made a move on her?

It seems his underlings' evaluations of him is something like [The boss is a lolicon]. After being asked if he would buy more adult female slaves, he said they'd get them by raiding.

"… Still, he doesn't get tired of doing it day after day…"

"It's becoming an eyesore now."

"I had a hunch he was a good guy, but guess I imagined it~…"

However, Rokuko might actually have a lot of human characteristics, pouting over a girl being made into a plaything.

"Oi… I don't like them contaminating the dungeon with their body fluids… it's annoying."

"Ah, that? … Though it's okay for me to use the master room as a restroom?"

"Yeah, it's fine if it's Kehma or Gobsuke, it can't be helped… I did more or less summon you as monsters."

"I'm considered a monster too? … Now that you mention it, I was summoned huh."

"It feels like you're just going in circles. Don't be so easygoing… moreover, oi, is there no way to get them to leave?"

"With that tone, your hobby is definitely scat. But your goblin and scat hobbies are bad."

"I'm not aroused by excrement you know!? Kehma is also misunderstanding that thing with the goblin you know!?"

Yeah, it was fiddling around with Rokuko yesterday.

It seems like… today is the day the dungeon's peace will be broken.

No, the time for peace has arrived, maybe.

"Ah, something amazing is coming…"

Hearing Rokuko mutter something to herself, I pulled up the map.

Map of the surrounding area… As long as it's within view distance from the dungeon, I can see detailed geographic information and features. On it were red dots signifying enemies, marching forward in well-regulated rows.

"About thirty people huh… they finally came. Were they early? Or slow…?"

"Who's coming? Those guys?"

"Yeah, it's probably the suppression group. And looking at how fast they're progressing, they're a trained group. The knights… will probably be the end of the bandits. Though unlikely, it'd be delicious if they survived."

And it seems that the bandits noticed. Taking out the semi-transparent monitor from the menu, I decided to check out what the bandits were doing.

It really is convenient since it could be used as though there were surveillance cameras installed in the dungeon.

When I looked, underlings were reporting to the boss in a panic.

[Boss, it's bad, knights! They're coming our way!]

[What!? How were we exposed, we killed everyone that saw our base!?]

The bandit's boss panicked. It seems he didn't think that knights would be dispatched for them.

[No, they're human but having said that they're knights, it's better to not be killed… how many?]

[S-sorry, I came back as soon as I saw them wearing armor. At least, err, more than five people!]

[Tch, can't be helped then… well, we're going to ambush them in the dungeon even if there's more or less of 'em anyway.]

[That so?]

[If there's a small amount we'll use a surprise attack, if there's a lot of 'em we'll fence them in from the outside. The End.]

[Ooh! I see, as expected of the boss! Alright, everyone heard him! Let's ambush 'em!]

[[[ YEAH! ]]]

Apparently it looks like they're motivated; more so, inside the dungeon.

That's very convenient. It's good that I taught the bandit boss how to fight using the exits and passages for ambushes this week. It's really good he isn't bright enough to escape from here.

"Then, can the bandits win?"

"Though it depends on the strength of the knights… if the strength of those thirty are like the recent adventurers, they'll be wiped out for sure."

I also checked out how the group of knights were doing.

I decided to watch until they completed the long-awaited annihilation of the bandits. Since it's happening also due to the results of my work.

As for the bandits, eight were in the entrance room, with eight people on the way to the Core Room. It seems the ambush will be in the Core Room with nine people, including the bandit boss. Though they distributed their forces, the rooms limited how many could actually perform an ambush.

When the bandits finished their ambush preparations, the knights arrived at the cave entrance.

[Full stop. Henry-dono, is this the [Ordinary Cave]?]

[Yes. Most likely, that is the bandits' hideout… Beck, I leave it to you.]

[Yeah. Thanks for cooperating… Life, return the beats to my wave—[Life Search].]

A knight wearing full body armor used the skill. After a moment, a transparent wave extended around the knight using the skill… Judging by its name, it looks like it's a skill that searches for living things. I wonder if it uses the principles of echolocation?

At least with this, the bandits' ambush will lose its effect.

[Hmm… from what I heard, there are at least eight people that way. They're preparing to ambush us.]

There certainly were eight bandits waiting in the first room.

… Maybe he can't hear what's beyond the wooden door? Or maybe it's the effective range?

[That's it for the information.]

[Alright, let's commence the bandit suppression. Though it doesn't look like there are any prisoners… as a precaution, we'll use a sleeping drug.]

[Understood!]

[Five people stay and watch the attack from the outside. The rest, surround the entrance. Kill any escaping bandits.]

[Roger that.]

The group of knights surrounded the cave's exit, taking position. They began to burn an incense at the entrance.

… So that's how it is? Well, that makes it unnecessary to purposely walk into an ambush.

After the incense burned for a while, it was time for the bandits to move.

When they started to smell the aroma of the incense, they weren't able to endure the drowsiness and collapsed.

[Gu, this is… it's a sleeping drug! R-run, get to the back room!]

[No, we should attack before we can't move! They won't have many people if they used a trick like this. Let's go!]

[If we shut the door, the smoke… ugu-… w-what do we do…]

[Hmph, cowards, you go and sleep. I'm going to kill them all!]

One of the new guys from before that had finished off the adventurers in the cave, becoming top brass, headed out of the cave with five desperate slaves.

The only guy to remain, not collapsed from drowsiness, was the guy who suggested to withdraw… he was crouching and hitting his abdomen.

As for the six who went outside, their fighting strength dropped due to drowsiness. They couldn't do anything against the swords of the knights that encircled the entrance. They threw their blunt swords in desperation, though it was easily deflected by the knights' armors.

Listening to his comrades' shrieks outside, he mumbled [Ahh, I wasn't wrong…]. He fell asleep with the other eight there, collapsing.

His definitive mistake was to become a comrade of the bandits to begin with, but it didn't seem he noticed that.

Though the smell thinned, they couldn't tell when it came to the point where it wouldn't put them to sleep, so the knights used [Life Search] again.

[[Life Search]… Hmm, there are two left for now.]

[Alright… the passage is narrow. We'll go in in rows of two. Be careful.]

The knights entered the dungeon one after another… However, that the knights took up positions outside the cave meant that they already knew that the inside of the dungeon was a dungeon.

Yep, it was correct for us to expand it. Otherwise the DP from those six people dying would have been wasted.

[… Alright, two bandits left. Be sure to finish them off.]

[Is that alright?]

[We can't turn back at this point. Besides, it's our job to raze the bandit hideout. If we crush the head, it'll be fine to leave the rest to adventurers… Look, we're still far from the back. There are probably people better than the underlings arranged at the entrance farther inside… Though it'd be nice if we already defeated the boss earlier.]

[Indeed.]

When they decapitated the two sleeping bandits, DP came in.

Feeling my clothes being tugged on, I looked at Rokuko. She had a strange look on her face.

"Is it fine to not take the corpses from a bit ago? It's wasteful."

"… You absolutely can't absorb them you know? If you did that we wouldn't be able to deceive them anymore."

"Deceive them?"

"… Once they know that this is a dungeon that eats people, or that this beginner dungeon gained energy, they might consider this dungeon is dangerous and destroy the core. Though I more or less have insurance…"

"Uu, I'll die if the core gets destroyed… Insurance? What is it?"

"… Hey, remember the goblin room I made a while ago?"

"Ooh, the area you made a bit away! It was the dummy [Ordinary Cave] right?"

"Yeah. Since this world doesn't have very accurate maps, we can probably deceive them even if the cave's position shifts somewhat… maybe, well, it's possible they'll accept it and misunderstand that this cave is an ordinary cave. That's just a small hope though…"

"Un un, I see… Huh? What about the core?"

In fact, by placing a dummy core, the castling function… though I want to save the function that could instantly switch it with the genuine Dungeon Core in case of an emergency (It can be used even if an intruder is in the Core Room), there was no choice. Since it cost 5000 DP, we couldn't take this out till yesterday. Nevertheless, it's the type of device that couldn't be installed if there are any intruders in the necessary parts of the dungeon.

"… Well, since we separated the rooms on the floor with doors, when the time comes we'll turn the Core Room into an impregnable trap room."

By dividing the floors up, we can set up traps even if there's an intruder on another floor.

… Naturally, that's if there aren't intruders in the room. That condition still counts.

"But right now the bandit boss is lying in wait in the Core Room."

Of course, the bandits are treated as intruders.

"Yeah… in other words, right now we want them to overlook us and appeal to them as a harmless dungeon."

"I get it, so that's why I can't take the corpses. Then, how will they overlook us?"

"… F-for now we just wait and see."

In fact, there was nothing he could do for now.

He returned his attention to the group of knights.

[Is the loot room this way? A bed… u-]

[… That's a distinctive smell. Were there women here as well? But, they didn't use [Purify]… there's so much that even if they used it it wouldn't be enough.]

Right now, the knights were examining the boss' bedroom.

It's the room that he made the dog-eared girl his plaything. By the way, the dog-eared girl is under the bed right now. She had eyes like a dead fish and didn't even twitch. Without finding her, the knights moved on to the next room.

Though the knights probably would have been able to find her if they used [Life Search], they didn't use it for some reason. I wonder if there's a usage restriction? The knights probably couldn't use it just to simply explore. The captain-ish knight that had used [Life Search] outside of the dungeon was, right now, issuing instructions to subordinates at the entrance room.

The boss' bedroom had been turned into a jail.

They did that in order to capture the guys that they attacked, but in the end they didn't use it. It turned into a loot room.

[It's not that good eh.]

[Was our timing off? If we'd come here a bit sooner there might have been some valuables. We replenished our rations… it looks like we came a bit too late…]

[Oi, watch what you're saying. But well, isn't it fine with this sake we got?]

Still, the knights retrieved the valuable items from this room before going to the master room. Though there really wasn't anything worth mentioning. The bread was moldy and got thrown away… About the magic tool that could be used for light? It was like a lantern… Though well, the boss brought everything that could be used for combat to the Core Room.

So the only things left were old food and bad loot. Since it had become a dead end, the knights put the food into boxes and carried it out.

After they finished carrying the food out, they resumed the suppression.

Putting his hand to the wooden door, a knight tried to open it. A sword sprouted from the door.

[Guah!?]

It wasn't a trap. Behind the wooden door was a bandit piercing the knight that tried to open the door.

Then, the door was completely destroyed with swords.

[Uoaaaaaah!]

[Gu-!? Ryan, get awa-! Uooooh!]

The injured soldier withdrew and combat began.

[Dammit, since they tried to ambush us at the entrance I was negligent… Light, heal this person's wounds—[Healing]!]

[S-sorry, captain… gu-u…!]

Wrapped in the magic's light, the injured soldier's wounds were healed. The large slash wound closed and the bleeding stopped. Though he was still exhausted and weak, he wasn't in a life-threatening situation.

… So that's recovery magic huh. It's my first time seeing it.

Ah, the combat finished while I was admiring it.

[Sorry, Haggis was also injured in the fight just now. Please heal him.]

[Damn, this is too exhausting… Can you take up command instead if I collapse? Light, heal this person's wounds—[Healing].]

[There's no other way so it can't be helped. Since I can't use recovery magic, just captain… Seriously, it'd be nice if more healing scrolls showed up on the market…]

[There definitely isn't enough recovery magic scrolls produced, since the Church has a monopoly on it…]

Hmm, hearing that was good… By the way, it seems I can exchange 100000 DP for a healing scroll. Calling it rare… it's the same price as the cheapest dragon. Yup.

However, if they're able to recover from wounds they went to great lengths to inflict, there's no longer a chance for the bandits to win.

[Alright then. I checked Ryan a little ago, be careful of surprise attacks okay? … Even though the [Ordinary Cave] is said to be a very short dungeon.]

[Captain. There are pickaxes on the ground. The bandits likely dug more.]

[Huh? The walls of a dungeon will be repaired even if they're dug into. Why do they have something like that?]

[I don't know, but… there are traces of them digging through walls.]

Is that so? I looked at Rokuko.

"Usually, the opened holes are closed up, yeah. Don't humans do that too?"

"Like healing scratches huh."

"Sort of like that. Though it isn't particularly painful."

[Hmm…? What does that mean? Though it was already a very unusual thing for bandits to set up in a dungeon, maybe this has something to do with that?"

[No way, the bandits are the dungeon boss?]

[Hahaha, I've never heard of something like humans being a dungeon boss. Maybe the bandits are dragons?]

[The rooms here are too small for dragons to fit in.]

The knights carefully advanced through the dungeon while joking around.

As for the remaining bandits, nine were lying in wait in the Core Room.

Though they had no choice but to take their time while looking through the eight rooms in the dungeon, the knights finally arrived in front of the Core Room… However, the knights didn't know how to open the door to the Core Room.

I changed my view to the bandits.

An underling moved his ear from the door, reporting to the boss.

[… It looks like they arrived.]

[Alright. Prepare your bows, quietly… Shoot 'em dead soon as they open the door.]

[Boss, we got this.]

[Fuu. Those guys should be exhausted by getting here. If it comes to that, we'll put an end to it and just push through.]

In reality they've recovered. I wonder what they'd do if I told them the knights had no chance of losing.

… I'd die from the core being destroyed in a fit of anger.

… Creeeak, the wooden door to the Core Room opened slowly.

The moment that happened, the bandit boss gave the signal to shoot their bows. Arrows shot towards the passage.

With heavy impact, there were the sounds of arrows hitting armor. However, just one of them. One of them was really lucky—and the worst case for the knights—that an arrow slipped into the visor's opening, going through his brain.

At the corner of my vision I saw the DP increase. Looks like he died in one hit.

[Ryui! Dammit, it's no good! He didn't survive!]

[Tch…! Just one person!]

[Boss!]

[You guys! Go for their joints! Our armor will just deflect-]

The boss slashed at him.

[Geh-, you bastard, you Melon Vomit!]

[Don't call me thaaaaaat!]

[Uwaaah!]

The bandit boss was enraged, slashing with his sword. His vigor engulfed the knight's body, causing him to flinch. He rammed his sword into an opening on the knight's armor—violently stirring up the insides. I saw the DP increase again, guess he died as well.

I don't want to see what's inside…

Rather, the heck kind of nickname is Melon Vomit?

[Wha-, impolitely vomiting melon while eating together with Hime-sama!]

[How dare you do that to Ryui and Eijin, you Vomit Bastard!]

[That melon was rotten! It wasn't my fault! Why did you take my fucking reward moneeeeeeeey!]

[More than just vomiting the melon, you killed the chef after falsely accusing him of making the melon rotten! Right in front of Hime-sama!]

[Shut up! He was just jealous that Hime-sama was in love with me! I would have been emperor right now if it wasn't for him!]

Ah, thanks for explaining how you became Melon Vomit. I literally leaned more about it than I thought.

Thereafter, Melon Vomit struggled more than expected because he got so angry.

In addition to killing the guy with his sword, he inflicted many injuries on the knights.

But that was all.

With the cooperation of the subordinates supporting each other, they gradually wore him down. The knights successfully surrounded him, sealing off his movements.

Then, before he noticed it, a sword grew from his belly.

[Dammit… after that… even though…]

Dropping to his knees with a thud, Melon Vomit was defeated.

Grabbing his hair, the knight forcibly lifted his face.

[Oi, where are your other comrades? Melon Vomit.]

[Tch… everyone was here because of it, goddamn it… why… I did what I was told…]

Though his words near the end were faint, it reached the knight's ears.

With that, all of the bandits had become DP.

[Was there a mastermind? … Though there was evidence there were women, maybe they escaped.]

[Though he said everyone… I don't get it. Wait, it looks like this room is the Dungeon Core's.]

[Heeeh, here… that's a Dungeon Core huh? It's the first time I've seen one.]

[As I'd heard, it was a small dungeon. There weren't even stairs.]

One of the knights aimed his sword towards the Dungeon Core.

[Alright then, should I destroy the core?]