Following that, I was subjected to several more traps, but Reversal’s buffs and healing over time allowed me to withstand them all as we brute-forced our way through the passage.
And beyond it, the cave suddenly ended.
The oppressive ceiling and walls disappeared, revealing a large, open space. Within the dome-shaped area, there was a straight bridge extending from the passage we’d come from all the way to the wall on the other side. I could see an exit over there.
There was something wrong with this space, though—right below the bridge, there was water with the same blue-purple color as the mist from earlier.
Needless to say, falling off was probably an awful idea.
Also...
“Places like this always have some kinda surprise, don’t they?” said Chelsea, saying exactly what I was thinking.
“Well, nine out of ten RPGs would either put an ambush here or make the bridge collapse,” I said with a nod as I looked around.
I didn’t see anything suspicious on the walls or ceiling, but the water was so dark.
“We should fly.” With one person joining me on Silver and Juliet carrying another, all of us could fly past here. If we were in the air, the bridge collapsing wouldn’t be a problem, and it’d be easier to deal with anything that came out of the water.
With that in mind, I prepared to summon Silver when...
“Ah. Hold on a sec.”
“Chelsea? What’s wrong?”
“I’m just guessin’, but... Yah!” She took a Gem out of her Inventory and threw it at the empty space.
A moment later, there was an explosion that painted the walls and water in an orange glow.
The three of us were speechless.
“Ah, I knew it,” said Chelsea. “Air mines—and they’re even camouflaged. That military nerd from my old country used those a lot...”
I couldn’t see a thing, but it looked like there was a trap that Chelsea had spotted. She herself was a bit of a mine expert, so maybe it wasn’t that surprising that she’d figured out something we hadn’t...
G expressed no chagrin about this, though. Instead, she actually clapped and praised Chelsea. “Wow! You saw right through it! You’re pretty good too, Chel! By the way, the mines will just keep coming back, so if you try to destroy them all, you’ll just run out of time.”
“That so?” I said.
“Also, the explosions act as a signal.”
A moment later, something broke the surface of the dark water and leaped onto the bridge to block our path.
“GEH GEH GEH!”
“Wha?! The hell are these?!” The things that had emerged from the water, apparently immune to its poisonous properties, were dozens of monsters that looked like mermen.
“Monsters of the Depths of Jealousy...!”
“Bzzt! Wrong! When I absorbed this dungeon into R’lyeh, I didn’t get its monsters or monster-producing mechanisms. They’re just like those air mines—I procured and spread them here! They’re not even tamed, but this is their territory, so they’ll attack any intruders!”
G graciously told us about the mermen.
I was wondering why she was going out of her way to tell us so many things, but it could be that she wasn’t doing it for our benefit, but for the viewers who would watch all of this once she turned it into a video.
Additionally, these mermen were armed with harpoons and the name “APM” was visible above their heads. It did look like they were immune to the poison, so...maybe that stood for “Anti Poison Merman?”
“Hey...” said Nemesis. “Is it just me, or is that naming scheme somewhat familiar?”
Oh, come on! There’s no way that guy could be involved in...
“ALSO! Since this is the halfway point, I’ve placed a boss here!”
After G said that, the water’s surface rippled, and there was a splash even larger than the one that the mermen had made.
“E a H e A h e a H E a h E A H!”
And that was the entrance of a freakish monstrosity that looked like a cross between an octopus and a humanoid giant.
“What is that gargantuan thing...?!” said Nemesis.
“That’s gotta be the main body of the tentacles that attacked us back at the arena!”
The creature was massive, with a size matching even the Afforest King Golem we’d fought some time ago.
This was a pretty large space, yet its octopus-like head almost brushed the ceiling.
The air mines were reacting to it and blowing up, but it didn’t even flinch. Any damage they did rapidly closed. Its grandeur and size made for a sight that could definitely drive someone past the boundaries of sanity.
“Hmm?!”
But there was something that drew my attention more than anything else about it—something above its head.
“Hold on! G! I got a question!”
“What is it? What do you wanna ask?”
“It’s about the name of this octopus thing!” I said as I pointed above its head—at the name hanging up there. I’d already seen the tentacles, but its name was a different—and way bigger—problem.
“Huh?” That was when the girls noticed it too, and their eyes went wide.
I couldn’t blame them. After all...
“This is just a monster, not an Embryo, right?! Why is it named like that?!”
The letters above the octopus giant’s head said “Cthulhu.” This thing was the Great Old One from the Cthulhu Mythos—not just in appearance, but even in name.
“This world’s got Cthulhu as a goddamn monster?!”
“I feel like a world with an ancient evil in it would be fated for destruction...” Nemesis said.
Well, Azurite’s ancestor did beat something literally called “The Evil,” so that part is real, at least.
“No,” said G. “Cthulhu doesn’t exist in this world—at least not in the wild. This one’s not natural.”
“Not natural... You mean...?!” Her words made a certain person come to mind.