Dungeon: 'Dark Mansion of Riddles'

The moment she stepped into the entrance hall, the heavy doors slammed shut behind her with a resounding thud. The surroundings were dim, and an aged threshold stretched out at her feet. The rotted, hole-ridden floorboards dropped away into a darkness she couldn't see through. Splashes of reddish-black slime were smeared here and there across the floor.

"Wh-why is a riddle dungeon so horror-coded…?!"

"honestly, a gothic western mansion suits ojou pretty well"

"purely visually speaking, this could totally pass for ojou's home. dilapidation included"

"huh, are you scared of ghosts, ojou?"

"N-no, that's not it! As a celebrity, a celebrity ojou-sama, seeing such a tattered, ruined mansion… it makes me think of fallen nobility, and it gives me the shivers. That's the reason!"

"i've heard ghost phenomena are caused by debris. so dungeons are basically ghosts"

"well, even if they do show up, they'll be ghost-type monsters, so you can just beat them"

"! Then everything's fine!!"

And with that, Karona's face brightened into a beaming smile. If she could beat them, they weren't a threat.

"is it… really fine?? i don't get her criteria at all"

"yeah, she's definitely scared of ghosts"

"there's a real chance she just… lives in a dump like this irl, huh?"

"In any case, this is a riddle dungeon! Time to search the house～!"

In a complete reversal of her earlier nervous tiptoeing, she strode forward with purpose, pressing on with her exploration.

Each room held old furniture, chipped mirrors, cracked paintings. In some of them she found rusted iron grates and sealed doors. And sure enough, along the way, zombies did appear, but…

"Dossei～☆"

"Gberah."

Karona dispatched them with a smack to the head from her parasol. Headshot (parasol golf).

"saturn get"

"saturrrrn thanks"

"saturn = satan. which means karona-jou is satan. a demon lord in the making, it turns out!!"

"Ohohoho, I am a righteous ojou-sama, you see?"

And in the room where she'd finished off the zombies, a glint of metal caught her eye. A key.

The item name popped up: apparently it was called the "Eternal Key" (悠久の鍵).

"Um… Yusuke…? Who's that? Is this the key to Yusuke-san's room, maybe?"

"it's yuukyuu"

"yuukyuu"

"ojou, it's not a person's name lol. that's 久 (hisa/kyuu), not 介 (suke) lol"

"yusuke lmaooo. yuukyuu, ojou. it's yuukyuu (eternal)"

"Yukyu… n-no, that's not it! It's not that I couldn't read it! It was on purpose, I tell you～!? I knew, I knew all along, okay!?"

[Joabou]: "[1000 JPY] for a kanji workbook. please go study"

"So I should buy one!? Hold on!? I am an elegant ojou-sama, so of course I can read this much kanji, it was just a momentary lapse of memory, you see!! L-look! I read the 悠 part just fine, didn't I!? There's no way I couldn't read 久, hohoho, ho… oh get out of the way, zombie～!?"

Venting some of her frustration on the side, Karona began whaling on the zombie creeping up behind her. As it vanished, it dropped a triangular emblem. The item name popped up as "Emblem of Everlasting Darkness" (常闇のエンブレム).

"Ara, this is… I see, a classic game convention, yes? When there's an emblem, there's bound to be some kind of slot or recess somewhere to fit it into!"

"ojou, you can read the item name out loud, you know?"

"can you read it, though?"

"kanji time～!"

"I-I can read it! (mumble mumble)… yami! That's right, isn't it!?"

"sorry, i couldn't hear you"

"what kind of yami was it?"

"hint: a compound using 常 is 常識 (joushiki)"

"…! Jou-yami! It's jou-yami～!! Ohoho, how do you like that. I read it perfectly well, thank you very much!!"

"she fell for it lmaoooo"

"it's read tokoyami, ojou"

"ojou-sama studies kanji during a horror dungeon stream"

"It's read tokoyami!? Ngh, gununu! How dare you trick me! How dare you toy with me so～!?"

The horror mood thoroughly blown out the window, Karona huffed and fumed her way back into tackling the dungeon. Collecting emblems, slotting them into recesses, occasionally pushing stone statues into place, arming other statues with a sword and shield…

"… Fuu, this is actually pretty fun! Though I'd never want to live in a house full of gimmicks like this in real life."

"yeah no"

"a mansion where you have to collect emblems every time you want to get back to your own room"

"her solving the non-kanji puzzles smoothly is actually impressive lol"

And at last, Karona set foot in the basement of the mansion, where the final boss awaited.

"Ara, it's locked… Ah, I see, so this is where I use the Eternal Key!"

"the yusuke key!"

"yusuke finally gets his turn"

"final boss = yusuke"

"It's yuukyuu～!! Geez, I'm opening it, okay!?"

Beyond the door, inside a room of stone brickwork, stood a single Lich. And the Lich opened its mouth.

"… I am the master of this manor. I was worked to death from overwork, and even then I was raised as an undead to be worked still further… hast thou come to drag me, who hath taken my revenge and retreated into my chambers, out once more!? Damn thee, O emissary of Monday!!"

"What kind of backstory is that!? The horror element just flew right out the window!?"

"it wasn't the eternal key (悠久), it was the paid-leave key (有給). same reading"

"i see… he set up all those annoying gimmicks just so he could hole up. makes sense"

"so 'Dark Mansion' really meant 'Black (exploitative) Mansion' huh… truly a masterpiece!"

"How heart-wrenching～～!! There's nothing for it but to send him to the other side… I present to you the gift of an eternal long vacation～～!!"

For the record, since the boss had been chosen purely for looks, he turned out to be incredibly weak, and Karona cleared "Dark Mansion of Riddles" without issue.