Side Story 2: Undersea Dungeon 08

Urushi and Silent Sea leapt at the minotaur, the boss of the third floor.

Both seemed fired up at the taste of minotaur meat, but they weren’t being reckless.

「Woof woof!」

「Got it! First, we crush its legs!」

「Woof!」

The two struck at the minotaur with perfect coordination. One always remained in front to draw its attention, allowing the other to lunge at its legs from a blind spot.

「Grr!」

「Take this!」

「Mooooooogh!」

This boss was actually a “High Minotaur”, a more powerful species of minotaur. Still, it stood no chance against the kin of a divine beast.

Its legs were immobilized in a matter of minutes, allowing Urushi to finish the fight by biting through its neck. By this point, the minotaur was covered in so many bite marks that I almost felt sorry for it.

「Nom nom…」

「Om nom… Indeed, this is quite delicious! A strange flavor, not entirely the same as beef or human!」

「Woof!」

「Oh, you say this part is the most tasty?」

「Woof.」

「I see! Let’s give it a taste…」

The two happily dined on the slain minotaur. But to most observers, this must be quite the grotesque scene: two wolves noisily tearing into the flesh of a human-shaped bull.

Either way, it seems Silent Sea and Urushi had completely hit it off. Urushi should have a skill that makes him hated by his own kind, but perhaps that didn’t affect Silent Sea?

I asked them about my doubts, and it turned out that the skill had nearly no effect on Silent Sea because he wasn’t a full wolf.

『You’re both the kin of divine beasts, right? But it still has no effect?』

「I doubt that would matter. We may be divine beast kin, but the lineages we come from are completely different.」

Apparently, Silent Sea didn’t think such skills had much effect on divine beast kin in the first place.

「Mm, that was very tasty.」

「Woof!」

Hold on! They already finished eating that massive High Minotaur?!

The only thing left of the minotaur’s remains were the cleanly-picked bones at their feet. Well, as long as they’re satisfied, I guess.

Now that Urushi and Silent Sea were full from feasting on the third floor boss, we had them lead the way down the stairs to the fourth floor. Just before reaching the bottom of the stairs, Urushi stopped in his tracks.

「Arf!」

「Good! You have learned the proper usage of caution!」

「Woof!」

Well, either way, there weren’t any traps this time. It seemed that the fourth floor had fewer traps in exchange for a surge in the number of monsters. I suppose there wasn’t much point in throwing additional traps at someone who cleared the third floor.

Rather, the concept of this floor seemed to be designed to whittle us down little by little, as most of the enemies could use poison.

But for us, this was actually far easier to handle. We all had high resistance to poison, as well as abilities to cure poison.

「Fuhaha! The food is coming to us!」

「Woof woof!」

「Nom nom…」

「Om nom…」

The wolf duo devoured the swarms of poisonous monsters charging at us. They came in every shape and size, including aquatic foes, terrestrial beasts, and even insects and undead. But since both of them were immune to poison, it was practically an all-you-can-eat buffet.

The monsters did little to slow us down, and we reached the boss chamber in far less time than it had taken to clear the third floor.

「I sense the presence of a powerful foe.」

「Woof.」

「Mana too.」

Fran and the others stood before the door to the boss room with determined expressions. They could sense the powerful mana radiating from the other side.

This boss was sure to be on an entirely different level from the minotaur on the third floor.

「Let’s go.」

「Indeed.」

「Woof!」

We pushed open the door and stepped into the wide chamber—where a grotesque lump of flesh awaited us. It was a gray, gelatinous mass with several long tentacles sprouting out from it.

This was apparently a slug-type monster with the name of “Strange Slug”.

『It has the skills Instant Regeneration and Division. Those tentacles might split off into other copies if you cut them off.』

「Hoho? That sounds troublesome… but, I wonder, is it edible?」

「W-Woof?」

「Ah, you don’t know. Unfortunate.」

Silent Sea seems to have gotten a taste for eating monsters ever since the minotaur. Well, devouring does sound like an effective method of attack, as they could erase any mass that they eat.

「We just need to defeat it before it divides.」

「Indeed!」

「Woof woof!」

Fran sounded eager too, but I had something I wanted to test first. After all, when it comes to slugs…

『Try this!』

「Shigyaaaaaah!」

『Whoa, it’s super effective!』

Slugs shrink when exposed to salt due to “osmotic dehydration” or something like that, and the same thing apparently applied to this monster. In fact, it seemed even weaker to salt than a normal slug.

Just splashing a little seawater on it was enough to make it recoil in pain. I decided to go further and dump a bunch of salt on it, using the huge amount in my storage that we purchased in bulk.

That wasn’t enough to kill it, but it was suffering so much that it couldn’t even fight back.

『There.』

「Shugyaaooo!!」

I aimed my blade carefully and smashed through its magic stone. The slug’s body dissolved into a liquid that quickly drained out of the room.

Wow, as expected from the magic stone of a high-ranked monster. Delicious!

「…」

「…」

「…」

H-Hey, don’t look at me like that! Okay, I’m sorry for killing it on my own! I won’t let it happen again, I promise!

「…I wanted that boss.」

「Woof.」

「Master stole it.」

A-Anyways, how about we take a break and eat some curry?

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