Level Eater-Chapter 232

While Tatsuro and Ai were heading toward Cardina and the others after completing their mission.

Cardina and the others confirmed their success when the rock rain, rock thorns, and petrification powder in response to their attacks stopped.

"Peewee!"

"It's Father and the others!"

Following Cardina's detection magic picking up Tatsuro and Ai's response, Nana pointed in their direction in response to her cry.

So when they went to meet them, they arrived just before Tatsuro and Ai surfaced.

Then Ai carried Tatsuro using air jump to get on Jeanne's back, and they saved time by storing their wetsuits directly in their [Item Box] without taking them off.

"How is it? There weren't any skills without levels, so I destroyed them all."

"Perfect. Since then, it's just been like a rock mountain with a face and eyes."

"Oh... Ohhh? It's kind of trembling—"

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!"

"-------!"

As Ai was observing the rock mountain monster with her far-seeing skill, it suddenly started making noise, and despite being at quite a distance, it began howling at a volume that felt like it could destroy their ears.

"Shut uuuuuuuuuup!!"

"So noooooooooisy!!"

Without coordinating, Tatsuro fired a laser mixed with explosive attributes while Ai fired her RokeDra-pan (According to Ai, short for Rocket Dragon Punch) at exactly the same time.

First, the laser hit and scraped off just a small part of the rock mountain, then the dragon head made of white spirit energy followed by scraping off a different spot.

"Ah-------.............................."

"It-it's quiet now. Probably due to the stress of suddenly not being able to use skills..."

"Despite its huge body, it's like a child."

"Well, it would be scary if you suddenly couldn't use skills."

While it's not a problem for Tatsuro since he's the one taking them, it would certainly be frightening even for a monster to suddenly lose skills they could use until just moments ago.

In his original world, not having skills was normal, but now he feels inconvenienced without them.

Tatsuro gave a wry smile, thinking about how much he had adapted to this world.

Just then, the rock mountain that had been silent started slowly moving forward.

"Hey, Tatsuro. It's kind of coming this way~"

"Indeed. I wonder what it can do without skills."

"...But. With a body that big, wouldn't just falling toward us be quite powerful?"

"The range would be wide and the power exceptional. That would certainly be scary. But if it's dodged, can it get up on its own?"

"Probably not. It has a mouth but no hands. ...Well, even with hands, it doesn't look like it could stand up."

While they were discussing this, the rock mountain kept approaching.

The sight was quite spectacular, and while Tatsuro wanted to watch a bit longer since they didn't know what it would do when it got close, he decided to try a plan.

"Dad. What are you doing?"

"Well, I got curious about what it plans to do when it gets close. Given its appearance, behavior, and apparent lack of intelligence, even a child's trick might work."

While saying this, Tatsuro created ten humanoid red-glowing objects using a mixture of light and fire magic.

At this point, Ai and the others guessed what he was planning to do and silently watched over him.

"Well then, go on."

When Tatsuro waved his staff and commanded, those humanoid lights floated toward the rock mountain.

And when they got close enough, the monster stopped moving.

However, since it just stayed still without doing anything, Tatsuro executed his second strategy.

"Hah!"

When he waved his staff again with a casual command, lasers were simultaneously fired from those red light objects in humanoid shapes.

And finally, seeming to recognize these mysterious glowing objects as enemies, it showed movement.

The monster began slowly swaying its huge body back and forth, and as they observed for a while, the swaying became larger...

"Ah"

"Pii"

"Neigh"

Just as Leah had said, it fell forward, and with a grand splash and sound, all ten of the red light humanoids that Tatsuro had created with magic were crushed and disappeared.

But for Tatsuro and the others, that was the only damage. So far, it could only be described as an almost harmless attack.

However, as pointed out earlier, the monster apparently couldn't get up on its own.

With more than half its body submerged in water, it thrashed about, swaying from side to side.

If it had been a beautiful cone-shaped mountain, it might have been able to roll side to side and move.

But unfortunately, its rugged shape worked against it, and the more it moved, the deeper it sank into the water bottom.

"Looks like it would have been fine to leave all its levels intact."

"What a silly thing."

"Really..."

The monster that had been so fierce before. Tatsuro and the others let out a sigh at its now pitiful state, reduced to just a huge lump of rock.

"Well then, shall we start dismantling it? Wonder how much we need to break to defeat it."

"...Um. It seems to be a type of golem, so destroying or removing the magic stone that serves as its power source should defeat it."

"Do you know where it is?"

"Yes. Let's see, it's about twelve meters to the left of the center where it was touching the water bottom."

Tatsuro used light magic to mark and confirm the position Leah indicated.

"Around here?"

"A little more to the right—Stop. From that position, a bit higher—There."

"So we need to dig there?"

"That should be it."

So Tatsuro and the others landed on the rock mountain monster and began digging intensely using magic and weapons.

The swaying got worse as they dug deeper, but they ignored it and kept digging vigorously, with Tatsuro storing all the debris in the [Infinite Item Field] without leaving any behind.

After digging about ten meters like this, part of a bright blue magic stone became visible.

"This looks quite large."

"It would probably fetch quite a price if sold. Well, we're not hurting for money... Still, let's remove it carefully just in case."

"Yeah. Since it's this big, I want to see it in pristine condition."

So Tatsuro and the others carefully dug around it as if excavating a fossil, and eventually revealed its full form.

By this point, the monster was swaying its body so violently they could barely stand.

This was because for dungeon monsters, exposing their magic stone to enemies was like offering up their hearts.

"Well then, who has the lowest level now... was it Nana?"

"Ah, I gained one level after defeating some strong ones. Then Nana-nee can finish it quickly."

"Understood. Heave-ho, heeeave-ho!"

Trying not to damage the beautifully excavated magic stone, Nana in her [True Form] state tried to lift the nearly 8-meter magic stone.

While it should have been absolutely impossible considering her physical size, the combination of dragon-species base abilities and status corrections allowed her to wrench it from the rock mountain monster's body with both hands.

| You have reached "Level: 49"|

"I became level 49!"

"So Nana has finally reached the level cap too. Now if Athena gains one more level, everyone will have cleared the first stage of leveling up."

"Then let's quickly get to land. I'm tired after all these tough enemies."

"Yeah. Well then, shall we clean up quickly and rest?"

After storing the huge magic stone Nana was holding and the corpse in the [Infinite Item Field], Tatsuro and the others rode on Jeanne's back and hurried to the next point on land.

As they flew over the water, suddenly a row of gun turrets appeared across the shore.

"Looks like they don't want to let us land easily."

"Geez! Let us rest!"

While Ai was complaining, hundreds of gun turrets began rapid-firing shells imbued with powerful explosive magic.

"Jeanne, prioritize evasion. Everyone else, intercept and defend!"

"Understood"

"Peewee!"

"Neigh"

"Yes!"

"Understood"

"Roger that"

It took over an hour to get through the rain of shells, destroying them all, before they finally managed to land.

"Haah... No more, let me rest."

"I second that..."

In front of the glowing pond that led to the next floor, Tatsuro, and the others didn't even have the energy to bring out the rest house and just sprawled out on the ground as they were.

By this point, there seemed to be no monsters or traps, so they each recovered their fatigued bodies and depleted magic.

Once they recovered somewhat, they brought out the house and started taking proper meals and rest.

"But you know. Even though it's a level 7 dungeon and supposed to be on the harder side, the difficulty seems to have been raised by orders of magnitude compared to that."

"Indeed. It seemed to have a pretty casual personality, makes me wonder if they messed up the adjustment during the update."

"That really does seem possible, unfortunately..."

Everyone responded with wry smiles to Nana's casually dropped words.

"But well, it's the first day of reopening, so they might fix it from here on."

"In that case, why don't we wait here for a few days before going to the next layer? If we give it some time, they might readjust things."

"That's true."

While hearing Ai's opinion, Tatsuro thinks about what to do next.

If it really is an adjustment mistake, it might be fixed in a few days.

In that case, they could continue clearing more safely and easily than now.

On the other hand, assuming it's an adjustment mistake, if they challenge the super high-difficulty dungeon without waiting.

The SP and materials obtainable from each monster showed sufficient returns for the difficulty.

This was confirmed by the results when they had Leah examine the various materials obtained just from this layer.

They were all even higher-grade materials than before.

(Should we choose safety? Or income...?)

After wrestling with these two choices, Tatsuro made his decision.

"Let's wait here for about one week in this world, that is, twelve days. While the high-quality materials are certainly welcome, and the SP per monster is exceptional. But conversely, when enemies are too strong, it makes [Level Eater] harder to use."

"Ah—I see. Things like stopping at near death can only be done when we have room to spare. Looking at it that way, the SP gain might not be much different from before."

"Yeah. Actually, calculating the SP we got from this layer, it was only slightly more. I think we should ensure safety here. Well, and it would be tough if layers like this continue."

"That's true. The materials are regrettable, but it might be better for our safety."

"If Father thinks that's best, I have no objections."

"Peewee"

"Neiiigh"

"Me neither~"

Since there were no objections from anyone, Tatsuro, and the others decided to spend twelve days here, assuming it was some kind of vague dungeon adjustment mistake, praying for it to be fixed.