A labyrinth is as alluring as nectar that entices small flying insects with clever flowers.
Even if that nectar is poison and leads to death, its allure never fades.
Excerpt from the preface of the “Collection of Aphorisms by Nameless Adventurers (Book)”.
“Lies. All lies. What’s this talk of nectar, you idiot.”
The boy tried to recall where he had heard those words, but his thoughts wouldn’t coalesce. His head felt foggy. His body creaked. Everything about him cried out that he was lacking.
*Rest, eat something, sleep.*
But he couldn’t. He walked desperately through a dark, narrow path. Because if he didn’t, he would die.
“GYAGYAGYA!!!!”
A monstrous creature was closing in from behind him. It had a human-like form, but it was small like a child, yet grotesque, with a large, squashed nose. A single small horn grew from its head. It was a gremlin, a species antagonistic to humanity, that threatened the child struggling through the labyrinth. It extended its dully gleaming claws, and as it dragged its body, it swung those claws towards the back of the human child.
“GYAAAAAAA!!!!”
“Shut it…!”
The dull thud came not from the boy, but from the gremlin’s body.
It was a slender spear grasped in the boy’s right hand. He had found it in this underground corridor, this “labyrinth.” Perhaps someone had forgotten it, or perhaps it was the leftover from someone who had died; he wielded what he found and impaled the gremlin.
“GYA!?”
The second gremlin, surprised by the counterattack, had the spear swung down onto its head. The shaft, already old and worn, likely broke from the force. It creaked heavily in the middle and snapped in two. The last remaining gremlin twisted its mouth into a grin as it watched this, and the boy, now gripping the spear broken in half, glared at the jagged tip with loathing.
“GYAAAAAAAAR!!!!”
Even after losing two companions and being left alone, it attacked with undiminished killing intent. It was undeniably an antagonistic species to humanity. The gremlin swung its claws towards the boy’s head, aiming to strike true this time. The boy held the broken spear horizontally to block. It cracked. The remaining hilt had long since reached its limit of durability. It shattered and crumbled, and then the claws continued towards the boy’s head.
“…!!!”
He managed to evade it by sheer luck or reflex. As the hilt disintegrated, the boy collapsed forward, in doing so dodging its claws. He then pushed the gremlin aside and, with his bare hand, grabbed the blunt tip of the other broken spear.
“Daaah!!!!”
“GAAAAA!?”
The blade, having lost its function as a spear, only partially pierced the gremlin’s body. Therefore, the boy, still gripping the blade, lowered his posture and charged forward with his whole body. The impact of slamming the gremlin against a nearby wall drove the blade through its body, destroying its internal organs.
“Gah!!!?”
The gremlin’s body twitched, and then it died.
“…Thought I was gonna die.”
The boy slowly stood up and leaned against the wall, wobbling. He clutched his right hand, which had held the blade, groaning in pain. Meanwhile, the corpses of the three gremlins rapidly began to disintegrate, as if melting into the labyrinth. And where the bodies had been, three bluish-purple stones rolled. The boy looked at the “magic stones,” crystals of magical power, and for a moment, as if considering what to do, he looked up at the ceiling. Then, with a sigh, he scooped up the magic stones with his uninjured left hand and put them in his pocket. He then resumed moving.
“When I get back, I’m never exploring a labyrinth again.”
The boy—Ul—kept walking, spitting out the most bitter complaints. The circumstances that led him to this ordeal dated back about a few days.
***
The Age of Labyrinth Proliferation
The Continent of Israilia
Great Sin Labyrinth City Greed
Labyrinths overflowed from the bottom of the earth, and monsters overflowed, causing humanity to lose a vast amount of territory. In limited land, a world where various humans and their superior beings, spirits, lived together.
The boy called Ul, a “Nameless” individual, was a wanderer not permitted to live within safe cities, roaming the spaces between them. The reason he fell into an underground labyrinth was due to his father’s death from illness.
1. On his deathbed, his father informed him of his debts.
“You were truly a good-for-nothing, but I’ll at least bury you when you die.”
“I’m sorry, Ul… By my will, your sister Akane is a pledge for my debt.”
“Huh???”
2. He was apprehended by the loan sharks.
“My apologies, about Akane please…”
“Huh? Wait, don’t die. I’ll kill you myself. …Seriously? He’s dead.”
“Yo, loan shark here! You trash?!”
“Let’s get straight to the point.”
3. He was assigned to forced labor in a labyrinth mine surrounding Greed, the Great Sin City.
“Your idiotic father offered your sister as collateral for his debt. It’s a formal contract. Here’s the document.”
“I’ll work to repay that debt, so please don’t sell my sister.”
“Ten gold coins.”
“I’m going to kill that father for real.”
“He’s already dead, though.”
Thus, Ul and his sister’s fate plummeted rapidly, seamlessly into the abyss.
Separated from his sister, Ul was forced to hunt monsters in labyrinths to excavate “magic stones,” the energy resource for city management that could be obtained from labyrinths.
Needless to say, hunting labyrinth monsters is dangerous.
Even “Adventurers” who make monster hunting their profession typically gather their numbers, prepare their equipment, and hunt monsters that can be defeated safely. Yet, the monsters in this workplace were hardly given proper equipment.
In essence, it was a “black” environment. If he continued to work here, he would die sooner or later. Ul understood this.
However, the ten gold coins for which his sister was sold could not possibly be collected with the meager wages earned here.
He had to do something.
“If you want to repay the debt that badly, there’s a good job for you,” a gnome, the manager of the labyrinth exploration, proposed one day.
He said there was a reaction resembling a labyrinth’s “core” deep within a small-scale labyrinth separate from the one Ul worked in. His request was for Ul to act as a scout into that inner territory.
Why would Ul be given such a request? Because no one else wanted it.
A core meant a “master.” An extremely powerful monster, even among dangerous ones. A formidable existence guarding the heart of the labyrinth. Even in a small-scale labyrinth, the risk was no different.
Those who knew of the threat were unwilling to go near it.
Those who didn’t know, unaware of the danger, recklessly challenged it and never returned.
That’s why the offer reached Ul.
“If you’re going to take a look, I’ll give you one silver coin just for scouting. Considering your current pay, it’s a fortune, isn’t it?”
“I’ll go if you promise to clear my debt when I retrieve the core.”
“Who do you think you’re extorting?”
He was punched in the face by a beastkin, likely the man’s escort. Blood streamed from his nose, but Ul didn’t care.
“If you won’t promise, I won’t go.”
Perhaps due to his small stature, characteristic of gnomes, his employer glared at him menacingly from below. Yet, Ul didn’t flinch and glared back. For Ul, who had lived as a “Nameless” person, being bullied and blackmailed was commonplace, so he knew. He knew that he couldn’t back down even an inch at a time like this.
“Hah, fine. Try it. You’ll probably die.”
*It’s all the same whether I die here or not,* Ul thought, swallowing the words, and nodded.
“I’ll do it.”
Thus, a challenge that bordered on reckless began.
Ul himself understood that this was a gamble with extremely poor odds. But he was certain that if he continued as he was, he would slowly weaken and die. Several people who had been in his situation before had already ended up as silent bones. It was a desperate gamble at the edge of a cliff.
This was the chain of events that led him to fall into the underground labyrinth alone.
Considering the circumstances of his descent into the labyrinth, a crucible of demons and desires, it was, frankly, rather commonplace.
In truth, Ul was an undeniable ordinary person. Nothing special had ever happened in his life until today. In terms of being special, his sister was far more so.
Therefore, just as countless ordinary people had sunk into the depths of labyrinths before him, he too was supposed to join the ranks of nameless corpses.
This gamble, this decision,
Would go on to define the tumultuous destiny of himself,
His sister,
The labyrinth,
Dragons,
Heroes and Demon Kings and Spirits and Gods and the World,
And various other entities,
But at this point, he had no way of knowing.
