Live Dungeon!

After Daryl was done specifying his gear, Tsutomu proceeded to request from the old Dwarf artisan another set for himself for the upcoming Volcano exploration. He wanted to order a few more as well — one each for cold resistance, light-dark elemental resistance, and corrosion resistance — but refrained from doing so because that would obviously make people suspicious.

During the recent Stampede, Tsutomu had referenced the Banquet of Dragons in-game event to provide information and countermeasures against the Black Dragons, the Elemental Dragons, and even the Devourer Dragon. But then, after the Stampede ended, people started to wonder where all that knowledge had originated from, and rumors started circulating that he had spurred the Devourer Dragon upon the Dungeon City on purpose.

The rumors had been denied by the Security Team, them being the ones who had received the information directly, and even Solit Company, but Tsutomu had been under scrutiny from various parties all the same since. It was obvious that he would only come off as more suspicious from now on if he were to continue making public his knowledge as referenced from the game. As such, Tsutomu decided to lay low for some time, letting the major Clans explore deeper into the Dungeon first before catching up to them.

Daryl’s gear was set to be completed in a week or so, and Tsutomu’s Clan, the Absolute Helix, could not be active until then. The plan now was to spend the free time trying to recruit more members.

The only upcoming appointment right now was for a Tank, a Birdkin Boxer among Ealdred Crow’s recommendation list. Preparations had already been done on Ealdred Crow’s side, and the meeting was set to be tomorrow.

With a second Tank slot potentially taken care of, the issue still laid in finding another Attacker. The Stampede had killed many beginner-to-intermediate Explorers of non-Tank Jobs, including an Attacker that Tsutomu had planned to invite over. Their death had left him without an Attacker he had his eyes on, meaning no one to invite.

Still, the Clan had Diniel as their first Attacker, so they would have no issues starting their activities off with a beginner Attacker, either. As such, Tsutomu also planned to find his Clan an Attacker later at the Guild.

“T-this is the place?” Daryl asked while being led to the Clan House by Tsutomu after their shopping trip.

“Mm-hm. Welcome to the Clan House,” Tsutomu answered.

Diniel had already finished moving her things into her personal room here, and Tsutomu was already done moving his belongings from the inn as well.

Daryl, on the other hand, was still in the process of it, having finalized his move just yesterday after staying for so long in Garm’s old apartment from his pre-Guild Staff days — and being told by the latter to get out already.

This raised one point of slight concern for Tsutomu: how Daryl respected Garm as if the latter were his parent. That in and of itself was a good thing, but if he were to keep sticking around Garm like a puppy, he would arguably be unable to stand on his own later down the line. On the other hand, he was a good listener to orders, and his personality painted him as an honest and honorable figure, so perhaps the worry was ultimately excessive on Tsutomu’s part.

Daryl looked up at the solid three-story building, and seemed surprised at its size. It could comfortably house about ten people, most of the facilities were already in place and cleaned, and it was located decently close to the Guild — overall, it was quite an excellent property to own.

Tsutomu unlocked the front door and went inside. Daryl briefly squealed at the fresh wooden smell of the interior before following Tsutomu up the stairs. Despite being taller than Tsutomu, Daryl had only recently turned sixteen, and despite that age already being considered an adult in this world, he most definitely still had a childlike quality about him.

“Daryl, this will be your room, if you’re fine with it. Feel free to remodel it to your liking — just not so much that you change the room’s structure itself.”

“Yes, I understand!”

“We’ll still have free time for the next few days, so after you unpack, you can do whatever until we start working for real. Here’s the key to your room, and a copy of the building’s key.”

Tsutomu detached two keys from their bindings and handed them over to Dary, who accepted them and bowed.

“Yes! Thank you very much!”

“I’ll be in the living room on the first floor, so call me if you need anything.”

“Yes!”

Sent off by Daryl’s enthusiasm, Tsutomu closed the door and headed down to the Clan House’s living room.

There, he sat down on the fluffy sofa and took out some document papers from his Magic Bag on the desk in front of him.

[Man, I just can’t think of any strats — not when I don’t have everyone ready yet. Let’s just focus on gathering new info and looking up the Volcano monsters. The articles for the newspapers are… yup, they’re already done, too.]

The two publishers Tsutomu had been favoring as of late were steadily becoming more relevant, and they were profiting even more from interviews with Tsutomu after the Stampede. Now that they had some decent funds saved up, they were sure to grow bigger on their own without Tsutomu following their every step. Besides, if the two publishers were to work together, they could very well compete against Solit Company.

On the other side, Solit Company had been trying in their own way to pull Tsutomu’s business away from those two publishers, be it how they had sent a journalist to contact him during the Stampede, or how they had recently defended him when people started being suspicious about his unknown origins. Tsutomu himself, seeing that most of his goals regarding the matter had already been accomplished, also thought that it was about time for him to reconsider his attitude toward Solit Company. Dragging this on for too long would only antagonize them, and he would rather not make any more enemies.

[Not that we’re likely to do anything particularly relevant soon, though…]

As for the new Attacker, Tsutomu was now planning their ‘from-scratch’ training. He would not return to the deep-layer action for some time, and likely would not be free to do much either, so he had no issue with being interviewed by Solit Company during that time. After all, he had already given most of the interesting material to the two other publishers.

Tsutomu proceeded to make something to snack on and continued to write down relevant information onto the papers, and once Daryl was done unpacking, he had the latter to watch the place while he left for the Guild. There, he filed a recruitment request to the reception for a new Clan member, then took a look at the Monitors before leaving.

――▽▽――

The next day, Tsutomu paid a visit to Ealdred Crow’s Clan House. The clerk lady at the entrance welcomed him inside and led him to a room — a small room with just a desk and chairs. Already sitting there was a young Birdkin woman, looking nervous.

Tsutomu had already seen Birdkins in town, and interacted with two of them over at Silver Beast. Both of the latter Birdkins had feathers covering their arms, and their legs more closely resembled those of birds than of men. This girl sitting in front of him today was a different type of Birdkin, however.

Her appearance was almost the same as a human’s, even her legs and arms. She did have bright blue wings growing out of her back, however, and now those wings were moving around slightly as if to express her discomfort.

The girl was dressed in quite a revealing ethnic attire, with a cloth wrapped around her large breasts to hold them in place. Tsutomu, while thinking how much of a distraction that could be, greeted her and sat in a chair on the opposite side of the table. The clerk lady put a stack of documents on the desk and proceeded to sit down perpendicularly to the other two.

With Tsutomu and the Birdkin facing each other as if in an interview, the clerk looked at the documents and started to speak,

“Her name is Hannah, Birdkin, seventeen years of age. Her Job is Boxer, a desired role for a Tank. Here is a copy of her Status Card.”

“T-THAnK YOU FOR cONSIDERiNg mY RecOmmenDatION! i’M hAnNAh! Nice tO meET yA!”

Hannah, having fumbled her introduction so spectacularly, turned her face down in embarrassment. The clerk coughed lightly as if to signal the former to try again, and so she hurried to look back up at Tsutomu.

“I’m Hannah! Nice to meet ya!”

“…Whew.”

The clerk spent no effort to hide her sigh, frustrated by Hannah’s failure to speak formally despite her teaching the latter to do so ahead of time… and now Hannah was holding her head, seeming to have realized what she had forgotten to do. Tsutomu simply looked at them before replying,

“Well, yes, nice to meet you as well, Hannah. As you may know, I had already heard about you from Rook and was quite interested in you specifically, which is why I had arranged for a meeting. Thank you for taking your time with this appointment today.”

“I-w-wha- please, stop it! I’m really not that big of a deal, really!”

Tsutomu, following two victories over the Fire Dragons and his teachings to the major Clans, had gained quite a degree of fame among Explorers. Adding to that was the Stampede, after which the nobles had recognized his contributions as the biggest keys to victory, spreading his name quickly even among the general populace. Because of that, Hannah had come to perceive Tsutomu as a far-off figure, even feeling obligated to immediately bow to him.

“So, Hannah, I’m here to recruit you to my Clan. I assume that you’ve already heard the details?”

“Ah, yes, Rook’s already told me everything… and that I’d be assigned in as a Tank. But why me?”

“That’s because I see potential in you as a Tank, of course.”

“What potential? I’m known for being a Tank who dies almost immediately…”

Hannah looked down, dejected, her disarranged blue hair bouncing around. From the day she had left Ealdred Crow to today, she had been trying to make her Tanking work, but achieved no results so far.

The three-role composition, which had not been well-known among Explorers before, was now starting to get more attention thanks in part to the Stampede boosting Tsutomu’s profile. Especially over the last month and a half, the strategies popularized by Tsutomu had become so widespread that even the majority of new Explorers knew about them.

At the present, keywords such as ‘Tank’ and ‘Healer’ were appearing more and more on Guild-mediated recruitment postings. This was a miscalculation on Tsutomu’s part, albeit a fortunate one, since he had expected this not to happen until Ealdred Crow overtook Scarlet Devil Squad’s layer progress.

Hannah, who had been training alone ever since she left Ealdred Crow, had been eager to get on this trend and went through the Guild to find herself a party. Unfortunately, the bad publicity she had by then meant that she never managed to join one.

A Tank as light and weak as a feather — ‘Feather Tank’ was what people condescendingly called Hannah. She was short, her Job was Boxer, and on top of everything, her being a Birdkin meant her VIT was abysmal. Her race’s natural VIT ratings were on the lower side, with their specialized status being AGI, and Hannah’s VIT was low even by Birdkin’s standards.

She had been imitating Garm’s method of standing face-to-face against monsters with a tower shield, but she was unable to wield her tools properly. And since her VIT was low, any direct hit from the enemy could end up being fatal. It was only a natural course of things.

“Yes, so I’ve heard. But I did take that into account as well.”

“…Why? Why do you care so much about me? Surely you can find someone else better.”

“I can give you two reasons. One: I am genuinely interested in your abilities. You do have all the makings of a good Tank — but you do need to significantly change up your gear and attitude.”

“……”

Hannah’s eyes remained wary, as if she did not believe what she had just heard. Tsutomu, seeing that, scratched his cheek out of slight awkwardness before continuing,

“Two: Well, this is a bit personal, but I’d like to help people like you. Do you happen to know what I was called when I started out?”

“…Lucky Boy, you mean?”

“Yes, that’s it. That nickname has caused me so many difficulties… so much so that I couldn’t form a party for myself. Because my LUK rating at the time was actually a D! That was all it took for people to refuse me.”

While Tsutomu narrowed his eyes as if reliving a nostalgic memory, Hannah stared at him. ‘Lucky Boy’ — such was Tsutomu’s old nickname. That, Hannah knew for certain.

“Fortunately, I’ve managed to get by thanks to Garm and Amy. I see you as being in a similar situation, Hannah, so I’d like to help you out.”

“But aren’t you actually good at what you do, though? I’m no good at my job, really.”

“…Tell me: why do you keep at being a Tank?”

“Huh?”

Hannah raised her downcast gaze. Tsutomu widened his eyes slightly and looked straight at her.

“I’ve heard from Rook that you were an excellent Attacker. It should be easy for you to get out of your trouble — just go back to fighting like you used to.”

“…Well…”

“You got nicknamed the ‘Feather Tank,’ which made it impossible for you to find a party, yet you never quit being a Tank. Why?”

“……”

For a brief moment, Hannah looked around as if she was lost, then looked Tsutomu in the eyes as if to retaliate. The reason she kept being a Tank — she had always known it full well for herself.

“…I thought it’d be cool.”

“Come again?”

“I thought it’d be cool! Because I saw Mister Garm standing against the Fire Dragon for hours and hours! He was so cool!”

Hannah sprung up from her seat, her blue wings flapping excitedly. The resulting wind blew the documents all over the place, prompting the clerk to glare at her, which in turn prompted her to stop. The clerk lady and Hannah had in fact known each other for quite some time, the former having been Hannah’s party advisor during the latter’s Ealdred Crow days.

Once Hannah sat herself down, Tsutomu nodded to her.

“I understand — that’s a good motive. So how about it? Why don’t you join my Clan? Garm will be joining us sometime in the future, too.”

Hannah was taken aback by Tsutomu’s indifferent reaction. Most people who had heard her story would either laugh it off or be weirded out, but Tsutomu did neither of those.

“No, it’s not about Mister Garm himself… But do you really think I can do it?”

“I know you can, but not in the same way as Garm. Learn some other methods and gear yourself up properly, and you’ll be able to work as a Tank. Do you understand?”

“…Yes! If it means I can be a Tank at all, I’m willing to try everything! Please teach me!”

“All right! It’s good to have you on board. Oh, but just in case, you’ll be on probation for one week — if you don’t think you’ll fit in, do feel free to leave during that time.”

“Got it!”

“Let’s look at the contract, then.”

Tsutomu took out the Clan application form, which Hannah proceeded to fill out, and then the clerk carefully inspected the details for any flaws. After that was done, the clerk gave her approval, sealing Hannah’s deal of joining the Absolute Helix as a trial-period member.