Gossip: Three Heroes ~Starting to Level Up~

Kanon, Rio, and I, as well as the three knights accompanying us, stood in front of the dungeon.

Since we’d met, we’d spent a week on learning the basics of swordplay, spears, and magic. After that, we did as the knight captain said and registered as adventurers. From now on, we would be focusing on raising our levels, and it seemed that dungeons were the most suited for fulfilling that purpose.

Dungeons reminded me of games, so I was excited.

“Well then, let’s go in, shall we?” At Leonard’s words, we passed by the snaking line of adventurers and headed for the dungeon.

Apparently since the three of them were knights, and we were treated as state guests, it was a matter of course that we had priority. We were told that we didn’t have to pay the adventurers any mind.

Even though we felt a little guilty just passing by all the people who were lined up, it was still lucky that we didn’t have to wait. It’d just be a drag having to sit in that long line, after all. Of course I’d want to enter the dungeon as soon as possible.

“Hey, is this okay?” Rio asked.

“It’s fine. The knights said so.”

“Kanon’s right. It’s not like we’re forcing our way in.”

“Is that so?”

“More importantly, hurry up. The knights are waiting.”

“She’s right.”

“Yeah, okay.” Rio was a little hesitant, but she followed us in the end.

“Everyone, are you ready?”

“““Yes!”””

“This will be your first time in the dungeon, so we’re just trying to warm up for now. Let’s just see how far we can go for the moment. I have a teleportation stone on me, so don’t worry about getting back and just fight to your heart’s content,” said Leonard.

It seemed that a teleportation stone did just as it said in the name, it allowed the user to teleport. Apparently, it was an item that would rarely drop from a boss on every tenth floor. It was a very precious item, but it seemed that the country was lending it out to us since we were heroes.

It just meant that they expected that much from us, probably. We’ll have to do our best.

The first floor was slimes, the second floor giant rats, and the third floor gray wolves. We got that far easily. At first, we had a little bit of trouble with the speed of the gray wolves on the third floor, but once we were used to it, we started to clear them easily.

The fourth floor was goblins, and both Rio and Kanon were a little hesitant to fight humanoid monsters. I also wanted to avoid it if at all possible, but they would just attack us if we didn’t. After the first time we were attacked and we beat them, that feeling disappeared. Even Kanon and Rio seemed to have gotten over it, and recognized that they were monsters.

The fifth floor was a mix of goblins and gray wolves. There were a lot of them, but we didn’t have any real trouble. After clearing the boss on this floor (it was a goblin general), we got our first drop item. It was just a regular sword, but it was just like a game, so the three of us were excited. Somehow, stuff like this just gave us a lot of motivation.

In the sixth floor, there were poisonous spider-type monsters named poison spiders.

“Just like the name, these monsters are poisonous. In this floor, their poison is still not enough to kill you, but you’ll be paralyzed for ten minutes if you get bitten. If that happens, you could lose your life anyway. So be careful,” Aaron warned us.

They were huge spiders around 50 cm in height. Just from their looks, Rio and Kanon freaked out. Also, we could never relax because these monsters would use their spider silk to hang from the ceilings and sneak up on people. But here, magic worked its wonders. After hearing from Louise that fire was these spiders’ weakness, we were advised to start using Fire magic.

“Oh blazing ball of fire, burn mine enemies to nothing! Fireball!” Using the chant for Fireball we learned in training, we shot Fireballs at the spiders.

The spiders burned away while screaming.

“That was pretty good.” Thoroughly motivated by Louise’s praise, I kept shooting my Fireballs at the enemies. Just like that, we easily cleared the 6th floor thanks to Fire magic.

In the seventh floor, it was also poison spiders, but there was also a giant poison spider, their higher form, here as well. Since people could die from the poison in giant poison spider bites, Rio and Kanon were on edge. I was also a little frightened from being told we could die, but I steadied myself, thinking it would be fine as long as we had Fire magic.

There were even more spiders around on the seventh floor than in the sixth, and they were wriggling around everywhere. Using Fireballs, I ended them all.

After lowering their numbers by shooting Fireballs at where they were concentrated, we used our swords and spears to cut apart the rest. At the end, there was the giant poison spider in the boss room.

It really was huge. Including the length of its legs, it seemed to be about 2 meters tall. There were lots of poison spiders squirming around the giant poison spider.

“Kaito! Shoot a Fire Arrow at it!!”

I came to in response to Louise’s words. It seemed that both Kanon and Rio were told by Leonard and Aaron to shoot their magic, too. Somehow, I’m going to be the one to kill that huge thing!

“Oh raging arrow of fire, pierce through mine enemies! Fire Arrow!!”

The Fire Arrow I shot hit the giant poison spider and caused the huge thing to explode. The Fireballs Kanon and Rio shot burned away the surrounding spiders.

“Yes!!”

““We did it!!””

While we were celebrating, a cutting warning interrupted us, “It’s not over yet!”

When we looked, it was true that there were still poison spiders around. Regrouping, we gathered ourselves and started to cut away the rest of the spiders. After all the spiders were gone, a bundle of string was all that was left. When we appraised it, it said, “Giant poison spider’s string.”

“This should go to Kaito, who defeated the giant poison spider.” Saying so, Louise gave it to me.

“Right, that’s the 7th floor cleared. Let’s leave it here for today and return.”

Just like that, we went back to the surface. When we got back to the palace, we confirmed our statuses with the Appraisal tool.

【Name】 Kaito Saitou

【Age】 17

【Job】 Hero from Another World

【Level】 5

【HP】 926

【MP】 882

【Attack】 891

【Defense】 867

【Agility】 860

【Skills】 Appraisal, Item Box, Holy Sword Arts, Fire magic, Water magic, Earth magic, Wind magic, Light magic, Lightning magic, Ice magic

We’d gone up to level 5. Nice!

Kanon and Rio were both also level 5.

I’m gonna get a lot stronger from here on out. And then... with Louise......

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“What do you think?”

“Well, it was their first dungeon, after all. For that, they were pretty good.”

“Right. For their first dungeon, they did well, I think.”

“Kaito’s Fire magic was pretty good, but Kanon and Rio might need some more training.”

“Yeah. It’s no good that they can’t quickly fire their magic.”

“Their sword and spear skills are pretty good for only a week of training, but I’d have liked them to be a little bit better given their title as heroes and their skills.”

“You said it.”

“Yeah, was it too early for them to go to the dungeon?”

“That’s not necessarily the case, but if we were to go deeper, they might have some trouble as they are now.”

“Yes. For now, it might be better to stop going into the dungeon for a while tomorrow, and focus on their magic, sword, and spear training.”

“You’re right. We’re being pressured from up top, but we’ll be the ones injured and in trouble if we go too far.”

“Yeah. Still though, they’re already level 5 just from today’s dungeon run. As expected of heroes.”