Chapter 8

Chapter 9 The Hunt Is On 1 The minotaur ended up fighting the giant lizardman five more times. Each time, the boss dropped a sharp, ordinary scimitar with no blessing. It did, however, also drop a skill. Humans called this skill Warrior’s Protection. It increased your strength and magic resistance and constantly refilled your stamina at a fixed rate. It remained active unless you deactivated it yourself, so it was easy to use. Most importantly, the minotaur was glad for the opportunity to learn some sword techniques. The lizardman was the first nonhuman enemy to teach it some interesting swordplay. It had received a high-quality longsword and various potions from the humans it had killed in the fight against the recent party. The minotaur then descended farther and farther down. It fought the boss of every floor. It also got into many battles with humans. For a while, it adopted a two-sword style using the Blood Scimitar and one of the lizardman’s regular scimitars. It tried a variety of moves while recalling its fights against the lizardman boss. On the fifty-second floor, it fought a group of three humans, killed one of them, and obtained a halberd. After crushing the boss of the fifty-fifth floor, it officially obtained the skill Charge. This skill was extremely well suited to the minotaur and increased the force of its charge remarkably. It then fought a group of four people, killed them all, and was rewarded with some explosives. Once it grew tired of using the scimitars, it fished around in its storage for a new weapon. A blessed bastard sword it had gotten from an adventurer caught its attention. For some reason, it felt very familiar, and the minotaur decided to try it. It was only natural that this blade would feel familiar to the monster adventurer—this bastard sword was a very rare drop that one could receive from killing the minotaur, after all. Because the minotaur could not encounter another of its kind, this weapon was impossible for it to obtain on its own. There were no easy fights from the fiftieth floor on, whether it was fighting the boss of a floor or against humans. There were multiple occasions where the minotaur was pushed to the brink of death, defeating its enemies while wounded and collapsing before obtaining new power. The monsters that roamed the corridors on the sixty-second floor were one-eyed ghosts. The minotaur had no idea how to defeat them. It failed again and again, then finally discovered that it could kill them with an elemental weapon from its storage. Once it obtained the skill Crushing Breath on a slightly lower floor, it no longer had any trouble with incorporeal monsters. It had a tough battle with humans on the sixty-second floor as well. It was a fight that taught it not to underestimate the usefulness of a shield. The boss of the eightieth floor, a manticore, dropped a blessed Zweihänder, which became the minotaur’s main weapon. Its weight and destructive power were satisfactory, but the sword’s center of gravity was too far to the front, and its make seemed rough, rendering it tricky to use. The minotaur felt there would be another weapon that suited it better. From armor to gauntlets, shields to boots, the humans dropped a large amount of defensive equipment, some of it with blessings that would thrill most adventurers. The minotaur, however, had no interest in defensive equipment and tossed these items unceremoniously into its storage. It did the same with accessories like necklaces, rings, bracelets, and all weapons other than swords. It did collect potions and other items that granted various buffs and used them as well. Fighting without defensive equipment caused the minotaur’s physical defense and magic defense to increase more quickly than they would have otherwise. The beast also stored whatever else caught its eye from among the dropped items of the adventurers who attacked it. One such item the minotaur had received from an adventurer that it quickly grew fond of was a belt. During a fight against a party of humans, a spellblade was pulling potions out of the pouches in their belt in quick succession and drinking them. The minotaur wondered how the belt could fit that many, so it killed the spellblade and studied the belt. If you put a consumable item into one of the pouches and then used it, the belt would automatically reload with another of the same item from your storage. This belt also carried a blessing that increased movement speed by 10 percent and stamina by 20 percent. The minotaur took a liking to this item and used it habitually from then on. It put explosives in two of the pouches. They had no use beyond exploding when thrown, but the humans who came to the lower floors often had them, so they were easy to replenish. The minotaur was becoming much better at using them to hit sorcerers camping in the rear guard of their parties. Afterward, the minotaur fought the boss of the ninetieth floor, which turned out to be a chimera. The chimera’s normal drop was an exploding sword. It was basically an explosive in the shape of a sword but more powerful than the other explosives it had been collecting and could be thrown more accurately and from farther away. Human adventurers considered the explosive sword a worthless drop, but the minotaur took a liking to it and killed over twenty chimeras in a row to stock up on them. When humans defeated monsters, they gained experience points, but they gained none from killing other humans. It was the opposite for the minotaur. It gained experience from killing humans but not monsters. Even if defeating monsters got it no closer to a level-up, though, fighting them was still a good way to hone its skills. Each monster was totally different from the last. Every time the minotaur encountered a new creature, it would endure or dodge its attacks, analyze its characteristics, devise an effective battle strategy, hone its techniques, and then kill it. Encountering strong enemies and learning to defeat them filled the minotaur with joy. It felt like it was fulfilling its purpose in life. It also obtained blessings called skill drops from monsters. It learned a skill that expelled hot, damaging breath; a skill that lowered the probability of suffering a critical hit; a skill that allowed the user to detect the positions and types of enemies on their current floor; and more, including many that humans could not learn. It ranked up Warcry, which had become so strong that it seemed like a different skill altogether. There was more to gain from fighting humans than experience points alone. It was also a valuable opportunity for study. The minotaur could observe methods of sword fighting and also all kinds of magic, weapons, attacks, methods of teamwork, and more, and it absorbed this information greedily. 2 “Dammit. That old bastard…” Muttering in annoyance, Logan rubbed a red potion into the wound on his chest. Red potions didn’t have much of an effect outside of labyrinths, but they weren’t totally ineffective. Logan actually had an item in his Bag that would have healed this wound instantly, but he didn’t feel like using it at the moment. Seven days after the Heavenly Blade’s son and chief vassal had come to the guild, he had been invited to dinner at House Mercurius. According to the messenger, they wanted to hear him share memories about Percival. That was probably something Julius himself had asked for. Logan had accepted the proposal, visited the House Mercurius estate, and talked about Percival’s younger days. Julius listened attentively, his eyes glistening. The alcohol and food were delicious. Panzel had also been at dinner. It looked like House Mercurius really had hired him. Actually, he was probably more than a mere employee. The chief vassal seemed to always be keeping him close at hand. He was likely thinking that, with some training, Panzel could go on to achieve great things. Logan was in complete agreement with that assessment. The invites hadn’t stopped there. He soon received a subsequent invitation, then a third. Julius seemed to want Logan to come over every day, but no matter how close Micaene was to the royal capital, he was very busy as the guild leader and couldn’t go out that often. He was now visiting about once every seven to ten days. He had already visited over ten times. The last time he’d gone, Julius had asked him a question after hearing that his weapon of choice was a war hammer. “What kind of weapon is a war hammer?” With the chief vassal’s permission, Logan produced the real thing and showed it to him. It was then that the chief vassal had added some of his own commentary. “It’s not a weapon that requires skill, but it’s extremely powerful and cannot be managed unless the user has tremendous strength.” Logan was offended by his choice of words. “What was that? ‘Not a weapon that requires skill,’ huh? How about I give you a taste of my skill?” They moved to a dueling ground, and Logan squared off against Pan’ja, who used a longsword. Logan won, of course. He broke three of Pan’ja’s swords, and after breaking a few bones as well, the chief vassal surrendered. The chief vassal, however, was something of a sore loser and challenged Logan again after dinner. Rather immaturely, this time he ended up using a longsword so ridiculously thick, Logan wondered if it was a family heirloom or something. To Logan’s shock, he was unable to break the longsword with his hammer, even with a direct blow. He became intent on shattering it, but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t do so. The chief vassal broke through his defense and slashed him across the chest, and this time, Logan was forced to surrender. There was no way that would happen next time. He would show that arrogant old man the true capability of the war hammer. “Mr. Logan.” “Later, Eador. I’m in a bad mood.” “It’s an imperial messenger.” “Huh?” “Viscount Stinger has arrived carrying a secret royal decree from His Majesty.” 3 Viscount Stinger said he wanted to hear everything Logan knew about the strange minotaur. Logan shared with him all the information he had gathered. The viscount then asked for more details about Gil Linx, who was currently missing. He asked whether or not Logan thought Gil had been killed by the minotaur. Logan told the viscount everything he knew about the current situation without holding anything back. He said he didn’t think there was any way the great sorcerer could have been killed by the minotaur. No matter how strong a unique monster the minotaur was, Gil could have eliminated it with a single long-distance attack. The minotaur would have no way to defend against it. He could assume that the minotaur had had Alestra’s Bracelet at the time, but no one could use it other than the Heavenly Blade or his son. There was no way a monster would be able to. Even on the small chance that it could, Gil had magic at his disposal that could be used in ways that did not require hitting his opponent with a spell directly. Gil was also a master of close combat. He conveyed all of this to the messenger. “But his life force did disappear, correct?” “That is true, but I just can’t bring myself to believe that Gil is dead. I’ve decided to believe he’s simply gone somewhere I can’t see him.” The viscount ended up leaving without sharing the contents of the royal decree. The next day, the viscount visited again and officially conveyed the king’s order. It was to convene a hunt for the minotaur under the guild leader’s name. The one actually paying the reward was the king, but he could not organize this task himself. The reward being offered was enough money to buy multiple guilds. Logan’s commission was also tremendous. The official reason for the hunt was to exterminate the minotaur thought to have killed Gil Linx and recover his lost property, but Logan suspected the true motive lay elsewhere. Logan found the information supplied by Viscount Stinger insufficient, so he indicated he would comply with the order but would need two days to come up with a reasonable implementation, as the incredibly high reward would be likely to raise suspicion and discord among the adventurers. The viscount said he would leave the details to Logan and left. It would be difficult for him to investigate the happenings of the royal palace in a timely manner, so Logan wrote a letter to Pan’ja with some questions. Shortly afterward, Pan’ja himself visited the guild. “We reported Lord Percival’s death sixty days after his life force vanished from the crystal ball, and we have already applied for Lord Julius’s succession to head of the family.” It had probably taken him that long to sort out all the necessary preparations. “The king should have received our application within five to seven days.” “So that means around ten days ago.” “I believe it was eight.” “Hmm. What happened then?” “In order for you to fully grasp the situation, there are some things you need to know.” The chief vassal was giving him a stern look. He wanted to make sure Logan knew he couldn’t breathe a word of this to anyone. Logan met the chief vassal’s eyes seriously and nodded. The chief vassal then related a story, mixing in some of his own conjecture. 4 The previous king’s second queen fell into the king’s disfavor after she gave birth to a daughter, and he confined her to her quarters. From then on, she lived imprisoned with her child in a deep corner of the inner palace. What people didn’t know, however, was that this was actually an arrangement by the previous king to try to give the second queen and her child a peaceful life. The current king inherited this sentiment from his father, and while he publicly pretended to shun his half-sister, he actually held a deep affection for her. His half-sister was supposed to quietly live out her entire life in that deep corner of the palace, but she ended up falling in love with a man after having what felt like a miracle encounter. This man turned out to be someone the king loved for his bravery and integrity—the young head of House Mercurius. When the young man prostrated himself before the king, begging him for permission to marry his lover without yet knowing her true identity, the king had never felt such joy in all his life. The king decided to forgo the official proceedings normally expected when marrying off a royal princess to a subject, instead allowing her to marry under the subordinate family name she had used all her life. He did this to convey his will that they would not be treated as a branch of the royal family. When the king heard the couple had given birth to a baby boy, he was overcome with joy and tried to send out a royal messenger. However, he was warned against this by a trusted adviser. They couldn’t take even the smallest risk of the major nobles becoming aware that the boy had a claim as sixth in line for the throne. If certain circumstances aligned, the boy could even become king. Then, just recently, the king received notice that Percival Mercurius had died of illness. He was horrified and ordered a discreet investigation. He subsequently learned that Percival had been killed by a minotaur. His sister, who had seemed so happy, had become a widow. His cute nephew, whom he had never had a chance to meet, was now a boy without a father. To the king, the minotaur had become an enemy of the throne. However, he couldn’t dispatch a squadron of knights just to avenge the death of one noble. Neither could he reveal publicly that Percival had been killed by a monster in the labyrinth. For that reason, he used the death of Gil Linx, a man who had done great things for the royal family and the kingdom, as a pretext to offer a reward from the royal coffers for the extermination of the minotaur. Of course, this was done with the utmost confidentiality. “I see. So that’s what’s going on,” Logan remarked after Pan’ja finished his story. Logan set an impressive reward for the hunt and posted the job to the request board on the first floor of the guild. It was an extraordinary sum of money for defeating a single monster, and adventurers showed up to take on the job one after another. Logan was convinced that the minotaur would soon be defeated. 5 As the minotaur descended deeper into the labyrinth, the battles became more harrowing, and there were several times it almost died. The fight against the boss of the one hundredth floor, the metal dragon, was especially difficult, and the minotaur suffered many harsh defeats. But it continued training and challenging this foe and, eventually, emerged victorious. After a certain point, strong parties of humans began attacking the minotaur in succession, for which it was grateful. The minotaur killed them all and, in doing so, was able to raise its level, learn new skills, and replenish its consumable items. After defeating the metal dragon once, the minotaur fought it many more times. It was a valuable fight not just because it was a very strong enemy but also because it dropped a different type of amazing sword every time it was killed. The minotaur killed dragon after dragon after dragon, each time looking forward to the next sword that would appear. It fought the metal dragon using a longsword. It fought it using a shortsword. It fought it while relying heavily on its skills. Some battles were long. Some were very short. It tried out a wide variety of fighting styles, and after it killed the final boss one hundred times, the dragon stopped spawning. It was as if the labyrinth had recognized that the minotaur, not the metal dragon, was now the master of the boss room of the deepest floor. The minotaur remained there. There were no longer any monsters it wanted to fight. If there were any opponents worth engaging, they would be humans. Adventurers came to the boss room repeatedly to challenge it. Still, the minotaur’s hunger was not yet quelled. An enemy truly worth fighting, an enemy truly worth defeating, had yet to appear. The minotaur needed to grow stronger to prepare for that day. 6 By the time it became clear that the minotaur had become the new ruler of the boss room of the labyrinth’s final floor, two years had passed. There was still no shortage of adventurers being attracted by the high reward to be gained from slaying the beast. Rumors of an invincible monster gradually spread across the land, and challengers gathered from far and wide. Once the number of adventurers defeated and killed by the minotaur exceeded three hundred, Logan had no choice but to withdraw the hunt. Then, in order to take responsibility for allowing this situation to happen, he resigned as guild leader. Eador, the manager, succeeded him. The adventurers were surprised that someone without a background as an adventurer was being named guild leader, but the guild employees all trusted him. Logan was now living at House Mercurius. Pan’ja Raban had been inviting him to quit his busy job at the guild and move into their estate for a while. He had fun lending a hand with Panzel’s training. The boy was showing remarkable growth. And best of all, life at House Mercurius was comfortable. After some time, the request was posted again under the new guild leader. Many strong parties set their sights on killing this powerful monster. Many died, and many fled. The most persistent of all was the sorcerer named Eisel. But in the end, he died as well. The minotaur was still alive and well on the final floor of the Sazardon Labyrinth.