“Well, my headcanon says you lost all of your friends after borrowing money from everyone you knew to pay off your gambling debt,” I said.
“You have quite the imagination, you know that?!” Instructor Seeker shot back.
The armored person turned to the instructor accusingly.
“No, that didn’t really happen!” said Instructor Seeker. “And I wouldn’t do that even if I did need the money! You believe me, right?!”
Judging by their reaction, whoever the armored person was must’ve been familiar with the instructor’s gambling tendencies. Addiction was getting more widely recognized as an illness lately, and I thought it was about time he got some professional help from a doctor.
Instructor Seeker eventually calmed down and said, “Gimme a break. Anyway, I’m surprised you’re not alone today, Kudo.”
“Right, I’m here with him today,” I said, and Dillon stepped forward.
Instructor Seeker recognized him and said, “Oh, I guided this kid in the dungeon recently. Dillon, isn’t it?”
“Yes, thank you for your help,” said Dillon with a polite bow.
I’m impressed that the instructor remembers his name. I would’ve considered him a saint if only he wasn’t a gambling addict. Seriously.
“Well, excuse me,” said Instructor Seeker.
“Huh? Don’t tell me you can read my mind,” I said.
“You just said that out loud!”
“Makes sense. You wouldn’t have lost so much money gambling if you could read minds,” I said.
“Stop bringing everything back to gambling, will you?!”
I decided I’d veered us off topic enough, so I kept quiet.
“Anyway, he’s the one you helped a while back, right?” he asked.
“Yes, things just happened to end up that way,” I said.
“And you couldn’t just ignore him, hmm?”
“Something like that.”
Instructor Seeker shrugged. “You’re just a big ol’ softy, aren’t you? I heard about that Long-Ears you saved a while back too—”
“Eek!”
The pathetic surprised shriek had come from none other than me, of course. I’d realized the armored person was inching toward me and staring directly at me. The bulky armor made their stare more intimidating than embarrassing, so my reaction had been a mix of fear and some surprise.
“Um...” I mumbled.
“Balrog, meet Kudo,” said Instructor Seeker.
“I’m Kudo Akira. Nice to meet you...” I said while leaning backward.
Balrog was a rather uncommon name. This person was completely covered in armor, so they weren’t a masked Spanish ninja or a Tolkienesque demon, but their name was Balrog nonetheless. And by the way, I surely wasn’t the only one who’d mistakenly called Izuna Drop “Inazuma Drop.”
Eventually, Balrog wordlessly reached out a hand to return my greeting. I shook it hesitantly, and they squeezed back.
“Do you usually dive solo?” I asked.
“No, Balrog is a member of Order of the Black Dawn,” answered Instructor Seeker.
“Oh, so a member of a major team, I take it?”
Order of the Black Dawn was one of the famous teams, and it was known to be a multispecies team due to its diverse roster. Crimson Lance, whom I’d met the other day, was also a member.
“How do you not know Balrog? Everyone should’ve at least heard the name,” said the instructor.
“I don’t really keep up with that sort of stuff,” I said haltingly.
If Balrog was so widely known, they must’ve been one of the higher-ranking members, maybe even an officer. They didn’t even talk, so maybe they were shy and preferred to stay out of the spotlight.
“So, what were you doing today?” asked Instructor Seeker.
“Dillon is level 12 now, so we came back here to get revenge on this floor,” I said.
“‘Revenge’?”
“Yes. He nearly died on this floor, so we’re looking to get some payback on the monsters here,” I explained.
“Ah, I get it.”
“We have to nip trauma like this in the bud, or it’ll come back to haunt him.”
“What? Are you speaking from experience?” asked the instructor.
“No,” I said, “I just figured that would be the case.”
And it was true, I didn’t have trauma—from the dungeon, at least.
Okay, I lied.
I had plenty of trauma from the Visceral Cave, the Ruined Undercity, and the City on route one. I never wanted to go to the Cave again.
“You’re right that it’s best to overcome trauma early,” said Instructor Seeker. “You should handle that while you can because doing so could become more difficult the longer you put it off.”
“Right, I want him to be able to laugh it off once we’re done here,” I said.
Instructor Seeker looked at me with a surprised expression. “Oh, you get it. Why don’t you become a guide too, Kudo?”
“Eh...I think I’ll pass.”
“I thought you’d say that. Let me guess, you value your free time too much?” he asked.
“Of course,” I said. “I’m here to have fun.”
“You and Dracarion are pretty much the only ones who come to the dungeon for fun.”
As I talked with Instructor Seeker, I sensed something else approaching us: a monster, at long last. I heard footsteps thudding in the distance.
“I-Is that...” stuttered Dillon.
“Yep, it’s the first opponent for you to exact revenge on,” I answered.
The footsteps reverberated all around us, making it hard to pinpoint where it was coming from. But the heavy sound and rumbling were a dead giveaway: it was definitely a Block Arm, a monster that appeared in the Misty Hills at depth level 7. It was like a relative of the Golems from the Yellow Wall Vestiges, and it was characterized by its massive rugged right arm. It was a pesky ambush specialist that disguised itself as rocks, much like Moss Faces, and it sneaked up on Divers from behind to crush them with its right arm. However, it had a massive flaw: it made a lot of noise when it moved, so it was easily detected whenever it tried to approach a target. Yet it was worth noting that someone at a similar level as a Block Arm would struggle to fight one even if they faced it head-on.
Also, unfortunately, the resources it dropped were pretty much worthless. It couldn’t even deliver material like minerals or anything, hence the poor thing was widely considered a big heap of trash.
Eventually, I sensed its presence right behind us. People with a high level could sense these things intuitively, so it couldn’t take me, Instructor Seeker, or Balrog by surprise. I gestured for Dillon, who was oblivious to the danger, to move away with us, then the Block Arm emerged from the fog.
“Can you give Dillon a word of advice on that thing, Instructor?” I asked.
“You brought him here, so you advise him,” said Instructor Seeker.
“Whaaat? Come on, you’re a guide,” I complained.
“Don’t slack off now,” he said. “You’re gonna teach him today, right?”
“Well, that’s true,” I admitted.
It seemed he wasn’t gonna let me take the lazy way out, so I decided to see how Dillon would handle himself.
“Let’s see you try taking it on solo for now,” I said.
“Are you sure I can do this on my own?” asked Dillon nervously.
“You’ll be fine. Anyone over level 10 wouldn’t die so easily against one of those. It’s relatively slow for a monster in this region too. I’ll keep an eye out to make sure nothing else sneaks up on you, so focus on the Block Arm in front of you,” I said and gave him a nudge. “Go get it!”
Dillon approached the Block Arm, and the battle began. He looked for an opening and struck with his sword, but the blade obviously couldn’t penetrate the Block Arm’s hard surface. A high-level fighter could slice right through it as if they were demonstrating a knife on sale. I really wanted to know how that worked. How did increasing one’s level make their sword sharper? It didn’t make any sense.
“What do you think of Dillon, Instructor?” I asked.
“Hmm? I think he has talent. That isn’t the swing of someone who’s been farming until just recently.”
Balrog nodded as well, still silent as ever.
“Huh,” I said noncommittally.
“Can’t you tell?” asked Instructor Seeker.
“I mean, I’m just a student,” I said.
“You won’t—and can’t—be taking a walk through the dungeon if you were ‘just a student,’” he said.
“Then I guess my existence proves that isn’t true,” I retorted.
“You’re a special case. The general rule doesn’t apply.”
The instructor and I chatted for a while longer before Dillon returned to us. The Block Arm took this opportunity to disappear into the fog. It probably planned to lurk in the fog so it could get behind us and ambush us again. It was rather clever in contrast to its inorganic appearance. It was too bad its attempt would be completely pointless with Instructor Seeker, Balrog, and me here.
“This is hard,” said Dillon, his expression severe. He was clearly having trouble dealing with the Block Arm.
“Of course you can’t just fight it head-on and expect to take it down. You’d need a hammer or a mace if you wanna take that approach,” I said.
“Then maybe I can’t beat it with my current equipment,” he said.
“Not necessarily. You just have to find a better method,” I said, then went on to explain. “First of all, monsters with extreme anatomy like that tend to have very one-dimensional action patterns. My childhood friend used to tell me that those types look strong and can be intimidating, but they’re so specialized in one thing that their movement ends up being limited. They usually only make predictable moves, and you can bait them into doing exactly what you want. An asymmetric monster like that has a very hard time moving around.”
“So you’re saying...?”
“That monster tends to attack with its giant right arm, but its arm is heavy, so it doesn’t like turning to the left,” I explained.
If I recalled correctly, I’d heard something like this from Hiro after she’d defeated Coconut Crabbie Z, one of the Seafood Seven. It’d also had superlong nails on one side, but it’d gotten obliterated in one hit by Hiro’s Burning Smash. Hiro really had been too strong.