VIP Chapter 147: Why Not Just Ask?
Will was stunned.
He actually…
This was his first time seeing Shuna in action within a dungeon. Although he could guess some things from the state she described in her letters, seeing it with his own eyes was still quite a shock.
Of course, he wasn’t the only one who was stunned.
Will glanced behind him.
There were about ten people behind him.
The five people with less sophisticated equipment seemed to be the first team to enter. Some of them had severe burns, with skin peeling off their arms and numerous blisters.
The remaining team was clearly not through any harsh battles, possessing better equipment and no injuries. However, their shields and armor were also severely scorched.
One could imagine what had happened here before the two of them, Will and Shuna, arrived—
The first team had undergone a difficult battle with severe injuries and had to send out a distress signal. The second rescue team was capable enough and tried to defeat Cerberus while minimizing damage to save the people, but in the end, they could only switch to defense.
However, it was okay. After Shuna and he arrived, all that became history.
“Wh-what is that!?”
“What just happened?”
“That… that terrifying Cerberus is just gone?!”
After a brief silence, the people erupted in exclamations of disbelief, their jaws practically dropping.
Alright…
Will admitted that even with his high confidence in Shuna’s strength, he hadn’t expected her to be this powerful.
He had only said “instant kill” as a joke!
“Uh… don’t panic, don’t panic. It’s like this. We’re the Shining Star Adventuring Team, passing by. We heard you were trapped and came to rescue you…”
Will approached and began casting cooling and healing magic on the severely burned team members, believing that targeted treatment could alleviate their injuries.
“No, I’m not talking about that. There are only two of you… and you came to rescue us?! Isn’t that too reckless?! What if something happened and you got trapped here too?!”
“Uh…”
Frankly speaking, Will had thought the same thing.
However…
“Never mind that. Just tell me if you succeeded.”
Will flicked his hand, releasing the healing spell. Visibly, the injured person shivered from the sudden cold.
“…Thank you both for saving our lives!!!”
Compared to all this…
After achieving the feat of instantly killing Cerberus, Shuna didn’t go to the people she was supposed to rescue. Instead, she remained by Cerberus’s side.
“Shuna, what’s wrong?”
After Will finished dealing with the “rescue,” about fifteen minutes later, he walked over to Shuna.
“Oh, I’m looking for that Thing in the corpse.”
Will understood. It was the “Green Ghost Stone.”
Shuna seemed to have been preoccupied with this matter.
“How are the injured over there? Have they evacuated?”
“Mm, they’ve basically evacuated. The situation isn’t critical. It looks like their captain is quite experienced.”
“Excellent, then let me search again.”
She specifically searched at the “main head” of Cerberus, the center one. Will understood why; if the Green Ghost Stone was an amplification item, it would likely be in the most core area.
“Speaking of which, there’s something that has been bothering me, and I hope it didn’t happen this time.”
Shuna unhesitatingly used her hand to sift through the still-smoking rocks of Cerberus, her hand covered in blood halfway up her forearm.
“What is it?”
“Last time with the Green Mane Lion, for some reason, I didn’t get complete fragments like the first time. They all turned into unrecognizable pieces.”
“Mm, you mean the fragments with the white edges you took out before?”
Will remembered.
In fact, the first time Shuna sent him the Green Ghost Stone, it was a relatively complete stone.
But by the second time, only small fragments remained.
Some fragments even looked strange, with whitish calcified marks, making him feel that something was not quite right.
“That’s right.”
She nodded.
“Fragments are hard to research for internal structure, and I can’t test their other properties.”
Shuna squatted down, seemingly having made a discovery.
“I’ve thought about it repeatedly. Last time I got a complete fragment here, I killed it with the same magic spell. However, with the Green Mane Lion, I used physical means. If I use the same magic with similar power, can I get a complete…”
But Shuna stopped mid-sentence.
“No, it seems I didn’t achieve it.”
Her fingers stirred in the minced meat and blood of Cerberus beneath her feet, and finally, she pulled out a small fragment.
Indeed…
Only fragments remained.
She brought it to Will, and viscous, scorching hot blood dripped from the small fragment before his eyes.
Fortunately, Will had taken several courses in dungeon monster dissection at school, so he didn’t find it too revolting.
He leaned closer, observing carefully at Shuna’s fingertips.
“Hmm, that’s strange. It’s the same kind of fragment as before, and it also has these whitish edges.”
“I suspect this stone was tampered with, possibly after I obtained the whole stone. Because… someone didn’t want me to get a more complete one?”
“That’s a bit of a wild guess. Who would do that?”
“It’s not that wild.”
Shuna rubbed the fragment in her hand, cleaning it significantly, allowing for a clearer view of the broken edges. She held it up to her eyes, examining it closely.
“At first glance, it looks like natural breakage. But it’s very recent, and if I turn it slightly, I can see… hmm, this edge should have been treated with some kind of magic.”
“Indeed.”
“Ice attribute magic? If it were fire attribute magic from this place, it shouldn’t leave white marks…”
“Mm. That’s a possible assumption. It might have been processed in another dungeon and brought here… uh, I mean, if, if there were exchanges between dungeons…”
Shuna’s eyes lit up upon hearing this.
“You make a very good point! We can investigate this!”
“Sure, sure. Then let’s head out now. We can find someone to analyze the magical traces…”
Will’s words trailed off.
Because Shuna, using water attribute magic, wiped her hands, placed the fragment in her bag, and then took Will’s hand—
“Do we still need to ask? The simplest way to find out is right in front of us!”
“Wh-what?”
Shuna, pulling Will along, rushed to the door leading to the 30th floor.
The door to the “Emperor Boss.”
This door was covered in a layer of black mist, looking quite terrifying. The door was also marked with red, incomprehensible dungeon text, giving one an immediate sense of “do not approach.”
But Shuna looked at this door…
With unusual happiness.
“Let’s directly go ask the administrator of ‘Rock Fire Iron Wall’ who’s waiting on the 30th floor for someone to conquer him—isn’t that the easiest way?!”
“Huh?”
“Emperors are sentient beings that can communicate, isn’t that common knowledge in the dungeon world?”
Oh, right. Otherwise, how could there be an Empress in the original work who went out partying and drinking?
“Common sense is….”
“Maybe if we just ask, he’ll tell us?”
“No, would he really say it that easily?!”
After Shuna finished speaking, she directly pulled Will and pushed open the door to the BOSS room.
“If he doesn’t want to talk, we’ll just beat it out of him—”
