Bonus Short Stories

Lazy Dungeon Master — LNCrawler · All chapters

Bonus Short Stories

Long Distance Swimming Battle — Niku vs. Misha

Keima and the others were at the beach following the end of the Dungeon Battle. Haku had made the [Ivory Secret Spot] dungeon exclusively for vacations on an eternally summer beach; of course, everyone was wearing swimsuits.

Among the crowd of beach babes, there were two individuals who had chosen to wear, out of all things, school swimsuits. One of them was Niku Kuroinu. She chose her navy school swimsuit for the simple reason that someone told her that’s what children should wear. The other individual was Misha. She chose her white school swimsuit for laughs and functionality. Between them was the wall that stood between all cats and dogs, all canine beastkin and feline Warbeasts. Why where cats and dogs fated to rivalry in all universes? It was a mystery, but these two were no exception.

“I heard that this was a swimsuit for children.”

“I’m a kid at heart, so it’s okay! And white is an adult’s color, so it’s all okaaay!” That was an excuse pretty much nobody would take seriously, but that was just how Misha operated.

“Let’s race to see who can swim to that cliff faster, dog! If you lose, stop copying my fashion and strip off that bathing suit!” Misha pointed at a cliff about five kilometers away.

“...Fine. If I win, you’ll strip off yours.”

“Oh geez, we’ve got a pervy dog on our hands who’s gonna lose on purpose so she can strip.”

“The thought hadn’t even crossed my mind, but I see that it did through yours, pervy cat.” Sparks metaphorically flew between the two of them.

“Do you think that a pup that can only dog paddle could possibly beat my front crawl? Hmmm?”

“Say that after removing the inefficient melons on your chest.” They trash-talked each other while preparing.

“Okay, and by the why, the race will start... NOW!” Misha started the race without any warning, which made pretty much everyone shake their heads with varying degrees of disgust, but Misha didn’t mind.

“Nyahahaha! I am the law! This isn’t breaking any rules!”

“Ngh...!” Niku rushed into the ocean after Misha and began dog paddling to catch up.

Somehow, she caught up.

“Nyaaghoohahohobhooh! Ghaabhooohh, can’t breathe, bhhabhoooh!”

“...The front crawl seems to be a particularly unpleasant form of swimming.”

“Ghbhohgbhoohoh... bwaah! This isn’t my loss! This is a failure of the front crawl...!” Misha swapped to dog paddling and caught her breath. In truth, she was a terrible swimmer. As a Warcat she had a high muscle density which made it hard for her to float. She had heard of the front crawl, but never actually practiced swimming with it before.

“Speaking of which... Are you not embarrassed to be ‘dog’ paddling?”

“I... what..? That’s it, I’m back to crawling—hobohbohboho!” Niku played Misha like an absolute fiddle, tricking her into giving up the dog paddle and used the resulting opening to take the lead.

“No way! I’m not gonna let you win! Uwooooh!” Psssh! A pillar of water shot up. Misha, pumped up, launched out of the ocean and began running across the surface.

“Nyahaha! This is the way to go! You’re too slow, doggy girl!”

“You can run... across the surface of the water...?”

“If you surround your feet with mana, then step forward with your right foot before your left foot sinks, and vice versa, you can run! It’s way easier than running through the air! Easy wiiiiin!” said Misha, unaware of how insane it was, before reaching the cliff and winning in no time. Incidentally, Misha actually could run through the air thanks to months of rigorous training.

She ran back to the beach as well, arriving with energy to spare. When Niku finally dog paddled her way back, Misha looked down at her and cackled smugly.

“Now, strip!”

“Ngh... I guess I have no choice.” Niku, with surprisingly little hesitation, stripped off her school swimsuit then and there. Her brown skin was exposed in its entirety beneath the sun, not an inch of clothing covering it. Misha found herself speechless at just how casually Niku did that.

“Wait a sec, you actually did it? Just like that? Are you a streaker or something? I’m impressed, dog girl...”

“Hm...? I’m a slave. It’s normal for slaves to not wear clothes around their masters.”

“Crap! That makes me sound like the villain here! Gaaah... Here, wear this instead!” Misha threw a bikini made of shells at Niku. In short, dogs and cats were fated to be rivals, but they weren’t fated to be enemies. It was an unwritten rule between them to have fun fighting among one another. Also, Misha had a sense of responsibility strong enough for her to be the guildmaster of the entire Adventurer’s Guild, plus the kindness to prepare a spare bathing suit ahead of time in case her opponent lost.

“...Just remember, I did take off my school swimsuit, as promised.” Niku put on the shell bikini. Judging by her wagging tail, she didn’t feel all that bad about it.

By the way.

“Misha, I believe that it is indeed against the rules to run across the water in a swimming competition.”

“Guh...!”

Haku, who had been watching over all of this from afar, interjected and made Misha strip as well. Legends say that mysterious Light magic shielded Misha’s naked body with blinding rays until she could prepare a spare swimsuit of her own.

Gather Ocean Resources!

Putting that aside, Neruneh and Ichika were pumped about all the ocean resources within their reach.

“There’s so many water materiaaals... Aaah, I want to bring it all home to experiment wiiith...”

“Heeey, Neruneeeh, you’re about to leave the dungeon territory, girl. It’s really cold out there. Let’s just fish instead, fish! Let’s steal food right out the water! We can even go diving for more!” The two of them cared more about food and research, respectively, than sexiness. They were wearing swimsuits, but not really in a way that mattered. Neruneh even wore a lab coat that covered most of her body.

“Take a look at this, Ichikaaa! It’s a Sea Anemoneee!”

“Those, like, taste super good fried, right?”

“Ummm, can you even eat theseeee?”

“...Ah, yeah, I’m gonna say prolly not. They’re hella poisonous.”

“I’ll take them for my research, theeen.”

“Oh, you can eat these plain. Throw ’em in the food bucket, girl.”

“Okaaaay.”

Ichika and Neruneh steadily gathered food and research materials.

“Aaah, Ichikaaa. This spot looks good for fishing, doesn’t iiiit?”

“Oh, time for some fishin’! Let’s go, let’s gooooo!”

“Okaaaay.” They carried their fishing rods to a bit of rocky land jutting into the ocean.

“Okie dokie, just gotta put on the bait, and swoosh!”

“Are these mice things the baiiit? I did see them around heeeere.”

“Yuppers. This is a totes perfect spot, mmm, we’re gonna have fish for dinner... Whoa, that was fast! I got a bite!” The string of her rod was getting pulled in a peculiar way. There was no mistaking it... An extremely, absolutely normal fish had taken the bait! Ichika pulled the rod up hard. Indeed, it was a normal fish. A fish about thirty centimeters long and perfect for eating.

“Wooow, a mister fishy.”

“I’m totally all about cooking my fish, but I hear Master used to live someplace where they ate ’em raw. Sounds wild, but I’m pretty sure that kinda junk happens in the legends left by the God of Food Ishidaka.”

“Raaaw? Won’t that hurt your stomach?”

“River fish would, but not ocean fish. I know some Pavella bros that eat fish raw sometimes. Let’s try it out later. If junk goes bad we can just cast {Healing} on ourselves, yeah?”

“Okay! Let’s experimeeent!” Ichika put her fish in the food bucket and put new bait on her hook. She got another bite in no time.

“Holy crackers, these fish are playing nice! They prolly don’t know about hooks since nobody comes here!”

“Is that actually a thing?”

“Uh, duh. Fish are surprisingly smart, my dude.” Ichika easily pulled out the fish after a brief battle that lasted about a minute. “Oh shizzle. This one’s poisonous, like, in a ‘you’re gonna die’ kinda way.”

“Okay, into the research buckeeeet.”

“Roger that. Careful now, if any of that gets in your mouth you’re gonna get paralyzed and choke to death. For real.” She threw something resembling a puffer fish into the research materials bucket. Incidentally, in Pavella some people hunted monsters by tricking them into eating those poisonous fish, but as the monsters killed in that way couldn’t be eaten later, Ichika wasn’t a fan.

“The poison’s pretty useful for extermination quests and stuff, though.”

“That’s truuue. Well, I’ll see how it gooooes.”

“Some peeps use alchemy to turn them into poison balls, but monsters are totes more likely to eat ’em like chumps if they’re kept as fish.”

“The balls sound like they would last a long tiiime.” Neruneh poked the poisonous fish swimming in her bucket. It swelled in size.

“Oh, caught another one. This one’s edible!”

“Wow, Ichika, you’re really good at fishiiing!”

“Duh. I did it all the time when I was adventuring around Pavella. You can eat for free, so like, they’re total bros for poor adventurers. The ocean salts ’em for free, too.” Neruneh, with a tiny gasp, guessed what kind of life Ichika had lived.

“’Kaaay, here’s a big fish. We better get going soon, Neruneh.”

“Okaaaay.” By the time they had caught enough fish, it was about noon. The two of them returned to home base.

“By the way, where is home baaase?”

“Wha, you don’t remember, Neruneh...? Uhhhh... Where’d we start fishing again...?” Ichika had gotten so absorbed in fishing that she had lost track of their starting point while swapping between locations. The same went for Neruneh, who had her eyes on the ground looking for things to gather.

“...It’s still warm, so at least we know we’re still in the dungeon. Just gotta walk along the beach randomly till we find them, I guess?”

“Seems soooo.” And thus, Ichika walked off in a random direction with Neruneh close behind. Unfortunately, that direction happened to be the exact opposite of where the others went.

In the end, Haku sent some of her subordinates to find them, which saved them from getting lost. Or well, they had already gotten lost, but you know what I mean.

“I-I knew we were going the wrong way when it got cold. We woulda gotten back in no time even if you guys didn’t find us.”

“...I was just looking for materials, sooooo.”

Neither of them would accept that, however, and made excuses until the end of time.

Beach Volleyball! A Bathing Suit Slips Off But Nobody Saw, I Promise!

You couldn’t have a beach party without beach volleyball. Thus, Keima prepared a net and ball. He didn’t know the proper rules of the sport, so he settled on a vague summary of them: Two versus two, no holding the ball, hit the ball back to the enemy side within three bounces after it enters your side, those who make the ball hit the ground on their opponent’s side wins, and if the ball goes outside the court whichever team touched it last loses. Basically, the idea was just to have casual fun.

“This volleyball sounds like it will be quite the training experience... Is anyone brave enough to duel me?”

“You’re getting pretty pumped up, huh, Sally! Okay! I’ll play too!”

Sally the Living Armor (presently in human form wearing bikini armor) was jumping side to side for exercise within the court when Amelia the Lamia slithered in to play. The sand was pretty hot, but Amelia had enough fire resistance that she didn’t mind at all.

“The rules recommend a two on two, so I would like for two more to join us...” She scanned the beach and soon her eyes fell on those slacking off beneath a parasol.

“Ah, perfect. We have two resting participants ready to play.”

“Heeey, Dolce, Rei! Come over and plaaay!”

“No waaaay...”

“I-I decline...”

“Now, now, don’t be like that.” Dolce the Wraith and Rei the Vampire had long succumbed to the blistering rays pouring down boldly from the sun, but nonetheless, they were dragged out from their shade. They both had sunlight resistance and thus were in no danger of dying. It was just a matter of personal distaste, from a species perspective.

“So in short, we’re playing beach volleyball. The teams are Rei and I versus Amelia and Dolce!”

“Um, I never said that I would play.”

“Yeah, like, just do a one on one. I’m gonna pass on this, hard.”

“We can’t have that. The rules say to play with teams of two.”

“...Why do you care so much about rules Keima just lazily made up on the spot, Sally? Haaah... Can we just not do anything, then? We’ll camp out in the corners and just be there for moral support.”

“If you insist. At least keep an eye out to see if the ball goes out of the court, please.” With that settled, Rei and Dolce snuggled up in the corners to watch the game without participating. Rei was like a rabbit thrown into a den of Dragons. The other three participants were all skilled A-Rank adventurers at the peak of their strength, whereas Rei was a failure of a Vampire with an attack stat of zero. She had no way of getting out of the game, so she swore to herself to stay quiet and wait until it was over.

“Hyaaaah!”

“Take this!”

Which is why, upon seeing the ball getting hit so hard it nearly exploded on the spot, a cold sweat ran down her back and she seriously considered the possibility that, if hit by the ball, she would probably die. Sally was a fighter so she wasn’t surprising, but how could Amelia block her smashes without breaking a sweat? And even Dolce, exhausted like Rei was, was easily dodging each attempted spike that accidentally went her way.

“That was close. What’s going on, Sally? Don’t aim at me, I’m just watching.”

“If the ball bounces out of the court after hitting someone, it’s their loss. This is a viable strategy.” Rei’s cold sweat turned into a gushing river.

“Oh? Rei, you look sick. Is this much sun just too much for a Vampire to bear?”

“I’m! I-I’m okay, Amelia!”

“If you insist. Let’s continue.” Why did I say that?! That could’ve been my way out! Rei clutched her head and squatted.

“Ultimate move, Cobra Block! You’re going down, Sally!”

“Guh, Amelia?! Is that even fair?! You can block anything if you stand on your tail like that!”

“Hahaha, this is an unbeatable technique I developed by exploiting a loophole in the rules! Ouch! Hey, don’t aim at my boobs! My swimsuit will fall off!” As Amelia stood on her tail, Sally smacked the ball right at her chest. The ball slammed into her boobs so hard they bounced back to hit the ball into the ground, which shot back up to hit her boobs again. Normally that would inflict a killer amount of damage beyond human comprehension of pain, but Amelia’s defense was high enough that it just hurt a little. The bigger threat was her swimsuit falling off.

“I will not! Stop until! You submit, Amelia!”

“Ah, no, you’re making me feel weird...! Stop it, Sally!” Boing! Amelia’s boobs once again blocked the ball and sent it flying. Coincidentally, it went right in Rei’s direction, with plenty of momentum. “Ah?! Oh no!”

“Huh?” Amelia let out a scream, but Rei couldn’t react in time. The ball charged forward and Rei fell to the ground along with Amelia’s swimsuit, unconscious.

“Hah?! A-Am I... dead...?”

“No, you just fell unconscious. Good grief. If you felt that bad, you should have said something instead of just acting tough.” When Rei awoke, she found herself resting on Sally’s lap beneath the shade of the parasol.

“U-Umm. How did the volleyball game go?”

“Sally destroyed the ball to protect you, Rei, so she lost.” Rei blinked. Was that part of the rules?

“Erm. Sorry for making you lose.”

“Fear not. Chivalry demands that knights use all their strength when protecting others.” Sally grinned with pride at Rei’s apology.

“Now then, since Rei’s woken up, let’s get a new ball and start round two!”

“...Anything but that!”

Round two ended up bending the rules to be a one on one.

Haku’s Swimming Class

“So, in conclusion, Rokuko. You don’t know how to swim?”

“I don’t...”

“That’s nothing to be ashamed about. You just haven’t had the opportunity to swim before now. With a little practice, you’ll be swimming with the best of them.” Haku took Rokuko’s hand and smiled gently. That she wrapped her fingers around Rokuko’s like a lover would is a secret between you and me.

“...Haku. I’ll... I’ll try learning how to swim! I’ll have to manage a water type dungeon from now on, and it just won’t make sense if I don’t know how to swim!”

“That’s the spirit, Rokuko!” Thus began Haku teaching Rokuko how to swim. Incidentally, Haku barely knew how to swim herself, but let’s pretend not to know that for now.

“It all starts with entering the water, Rokuko!”

“Okay, Haku!” They began walking toward the ocean as its waves crashed onto the sandy beach. Rokuko instinctively jumped in fear after some of the water got on her feet.

“...Don’t worry. The water will feel entirely natural once you’re deep inside of it.”

“O-Okay.” Rokuko timidly entered the ocean. Once the water was up to her knees, it didn’t feel so ticklish anymore.

“Are you feeling quite alright, Rokuko?”

“U-Uh-huh.”

“Let’s go a bit deeper, then, so you can begin practicing holding your breath.” That’s certainly the first step to learning to swim, Haku thought, thinking back to an old textbook she had read a long time ago.

“Hold your breath and stick your head under the water.”

“But if I stop breathing... won’t I die?!”

“You don’t have to hold it for that long. Also, have you forgotten that we Dungeon Cores don’t actually need to breathe?”

“Wow, I sure did.” Rokuko ducked her head under the water. Speaking of which... How long should she remain under, again? Haku thought, tilting her head. Soon enough, Rokuko’s head floated to the surface. She then started flailing while choking.

“What?! Are you okay, Rokuko?” Haku stood Rokuko up and saw snot flowing from her nose as she coughed up sea water.

“H-Haku! M-My body just floated on its own! It wouldn’t stay down!”

“Th-That’s perfectly normal. Indeed, yes. Human bodies float in the water.”

“My mouth’s so salty, and like, it kinda hurt!”

“Ocean water is just salty. Aaah, you have so much salt on you. Let’s clean your face up.”

“Bwuuuh.” Haku wet her hands with sea water and rubbed gently around Rokuko’s nose. Which meant... Rokuko’s snot was on her hand. Haku gulped upon realizing this, but nonetheless washed it off so Rokuko wouldn’t notice her impure thoughts.

“Okay! Let’s practice paddling. Take my hand and kick your feet.”

“L-Like this?” Rokuko grabbed onto Haku’s hand and tried kicking her feet. While standing. ...The water got cloudy with kicked up dirt.

“I don’t think that’s right.”

“Me neither.”

“...Ah! Right, you need to be floating in the water. As in, lift your feet up and stretch them out, then kick as if you were walking.”

“Stretch my feet out, then kick them...” Subsequently, Rokuko sunk into the water. “Glub glub glub...”

“Rokuko?! Here, I’ll pull you up!”

“Bwuuh, H-Haku... Fwaah, nnn!” Imagine, if you will, the comedy of errors that was Rokuko continuing to sink despite kicking her hardest and being pulled by Haku.

“I... I think playing with sand is the real appeal of a beach.”

“D-Don’t worry! You’ll learn to swim in no time! I’ll save you even if you start to drown! Actually, Dungeon Cores don’t need air, so it’s not even possible for you to drown.”

“Okay, I’ll try practicing a bit more... Though really, maybe I should focus on getting used to not breathing...”

“Ngh... I’m sorry, Rokuko. The truth is, I usually use {Aqua Walk} to move around within water. I don’t actually know how to swim either...” {Aqua Walk} was a Water magic skill that allowed one to walk through water as if it were land. When activated, the water felt like air and was breathable. The skill only effected one person, however, and despite that a scroll ran the price of 100,000 DP. Too much for Rokuko. Haku could pay for it without blinking, but she feared babying Rokuko to that extent for the sole purpose of walking through the ocean together.

“.........” But really, it was just 100,000 DP. Too much to be considered spare change, but when framed as a celebratory gift for her little sister, well, it was almost too little, even. Haku warmed up to the idea.

“S-Sister... Glubbhohoh...”

“Ah! Oh, no! Rokukooooooo!” In the end, Rokuko merely sank without ever learning to swim. Though on the bright side, she never drowned. She only experienced the misery of failure and the pain of a mouth full of sea water.