The Royal Military Academy's Impostor Owns a Dungeon [BL]

Relatively unthreatening.

Consisting mostly of sprawling open fields where docile creatures wandered freely.

Possible sightings of gentle, rolling plains stretching beneath clear skies, with lush grass, wildflowers, and the occasional peaceful stream winding through the landscape.

And an overall low energy signature that’d otherwise make the whole place seem less like a dungeon and more like some idyllic farming simulation where Espers could spend their time gathering all sorts of valuable materials!

That was how Luca described a D-rank dungeon to everyone who needed to hear it, so surely an E-rank dungeon would be even more manageable, right?

Of course, most of what he knew had come from stories he’d accidentally overheard from the Awakened back in Tesseris, but considering what he could recall from his own past experiences of happily excavating and gathering with his good brother regardless of the dungeon level, surely it couldn’t have been that different.

If anything, an E-rank dungeon should theoretically be even tamer, which seemed to be enough to placate most of the understandably wary dungeon settlers.

And in fairness to the young Kyros heir, it wasn’t as though he was the only one saying this. His own mother and two aunts actually corroborated his description, which certainly made everyone feel much better about allowing Luca to embark on something crazy.

Yes, they were all aware that, technically, this one was clearly labeled as a simulation. But it was always better to be safe than slaughtered, so there was absolutely no way they’d let him go in alone!

This was especially important when, according to D-29, unlocking access to the subsequent levels seemed to be two-pronged. There was the clearance for the entire structure itself, but apparently, every participant also needed their own individual clearance.

Upon hearing something like that, it wasn’t difficult to deduce that only those who’d personally cleared Level E would be able to access Level D afterward.

And with the possibility of even more rewards being dangled right in front of one deeply enamored dungeon owner, everyone was already certain that Luca would continue trying to unlock the subsequent levels for as long as there were rewards to be had!

The fact that one blonde, who had serious reservations about hijackings, dungeons, and monsters, actually declared that he was coming despite his hair antenna practically wiggling in distress was enough to alert everyone to the problem.

The golden-eyed cadet was probably going to be unstoppable the moment he started.

And if that was the case, then anyone who skipped out now might very well end up being the one who couldn’t catch up later.

Jax was the primary advocate for that line of thinking. He even reminded everyone that he’d once vowed to come along with the others, so if there happened to be a limit on the number of participants, then he was expressing his interest as early as possible!

Right.

That thing about a headcount!

They’d almost forgotten about that important mechanic!

Surprisingly, however, the little system informed them that there didn’t seem to be any difficulty scaling based on the number of participants for the new bounties. So really, wasn’t this the perfect opportunity to go?

Thus, as one could probably expect, given such favorable conditions, they just had to go.

And by they, that apparently included the children, who’d demanded to come along after declaring that they wouldn’t know what to do if everyone disappeared and never came back!

The little girls, along with one literal baby Queen Bee who’d thoroughly shocked Eden and Curtis just by existing, looked so pitiful as they begged Duchess Amelia that one would’ve thought they knew exactly which adult to target when it came to dungeon-related disappearances.

They even managed to convince her by solemnly promising that they’d behave and wouldn’t so much as touch the ground with their bare feet unless they were explicitly told they could.

Princess Nina, in particular, seemed to take the matter very seriously.

The little princess straightened her back and raised one hand like she was about to take an official military oath.

”We promise we won’t run around even if there are pretty flowers!” she declared solemnly.

Then, after thinking about it, she hurriedly added, ”Or cute animals!”

A tiny pause.

”Even if they’re really cute.”

Her expression grew increasingly grave as she looked toward her little partners-in-crime, clearly expecting the same level of commitment from everyone. After all, they needed the adults to know that they understood just how serious this mission was!

It was such a warm and touching sight that several of the clearly too emotional adults were almost moved to tears, or at the very least, moved enough to immediately volunteer to carry the children themselves.

Well, that was some time ago.

Now, the important thing was for someone to explain why the rolling plains of greenery and the docile creatures were nowhere to be found—and instead of all that, what greeted the first-time dungeon seekers had them shrieking for dear life!

”AHHHHHHHH!”

__

Well, that was the rated-E version of their reaction, because there were honestly those who were instead screaming something along the lines of Fuckity-fuck-fuck! internally as they ran around trying to evade what most definitely were not harmless creatures, all of which seemed to be trying their absolute best to eat them!

Now, to be fair, they weren’t simply running away.

Though admittedly, it would definitely look like that to anyone who could see their group right now.

But regrouping was clearly an important matter, and there really wasn’t much of a choice when none of them had expected things to turn out like this!

See, the start of their journey had actually been quite cool, especially for those who’d never had the unfortunate opportunity of entering this kind of training simulation before.

Apparently, once a simulation was activated, all participants would have to walk into the bridge before being instructed to stand in designated areas for participation. What they hadn’t expected, however, was to see prompts issuing each of them temporary Challenger IDs, which really only reinforced their earlier theory that they couldn’t afford to miss this particular simulation unless they wanted to be left behind to clear it by themselves later!

But when the countdown finally ended and everyone came to, they were surprised to find themselves somewhere that looked nothing like one of the clearings inside Luca’s dungeon space.

Instead, they’d landed right in the middle of what appeared to be a sprawling yet completely unfamiliar metropolis!

Luca even remembered hearing his good brother breathe out a genuinely impressed ”Wow” the moment Ollie got a proper look at where they’d essentially touched down.

Unfortunately, the exclamation hadn’t even turned cold on his lips when it was immediately replaced by a startled shriek as a gigantic mass practically catapulted straight toward them!

”AHHHHH!”

Now, in most cases, that probably wouldn’t have been such a big deal.

Especially inside an E-class dungeon, where the worst thing something like that should’ve amounted to was maybe a particularly aggressive fluff-like attack.

But unless every single person in their group had suddenly lost the use of their eyes, then how could any of them possibly miss the fact that whatever was hurtling straight toward them was most definitely a giant slobber of inky corruption?!