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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: FusionX
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The plan was simple.
Distract the Cerberus, which wasn’t going to be easy considering its keen senses, while I dug a pit deep enough for it to fall into.
The pit was about ten meters deep.
With its massive size, falling from that height should disorient it.
Then, crush its heads.
A relatively simple plan.
“!(@)*&()$#!!”
“Persistent, aren’t you?”
I pulled my shovel out of the Cerberus’s middle head. Its eyes were rolled back, and it remained motionless.
Was it dead?
I looked at the Cerberus’s other two heads, which were struggling to lift its massive body. It was a tenacious creature. It had survived a fall that would have knocked out most creatures.
A true mid-to-late game boss.
A direct confrontation would have been a nightmare.
“I coated the shovel with a potent poison. I wonder if it worked. Why don’t you give us a bark?”
A single drop of this poison could kill a human. I had poured almost an entire bottle onto it, so the poison should be spreading through its system by now.
It would probably die slowly even if I left it alone.
“Mister Johann!”
“Shuri! Prepare a spell from above!”
“!@()!($#&*!!”
How inconsiderate.
I smirked, feeling the two remaining heads glaring at me with murderous intent. The moment it fell into the pit, the battle was already decided. All that remained was to figure out how to finish it off.
I used my skill on the struggling Cerberus.
“Crafting.”
Of course, it went without saying that every dog needed a leash.
I created a thick stone ring and attached it to the dead head, preventing it from being lifted. With the head dead, it couldn’t exert any force, effectively immobilizing it.
It would take a considerable amount of time for it to break free.
The easiest solution for the Cerberus would be to blast its way out with its breath attacks, but who would wait twenty seconds? And using its breath attacks in such a confined space would also damage itself.
Checkmate.
I stepped onto the Cerberus’s massive back and climbed onto its right head, which was still struggling to move due to the impact of the fall.
I adjusted my grip on the shovel.
“Goodbye.”
Battles aren’t won with brute force alone, mutt.
I plunged the mithril shovel into the Cerberus’s thick skull. True to its reputation as the world’s finest metal, the shovel pierced the Cerberus’s skull without any resistance.
The blade was halfway in.
Not enough.
I stomped on the shovel’s handle, driving the entire blade deep into the skull.
A roar, a scream, and a wave of blood washed over me.
Ugh, the stench.
I needed a shower as soon as we got back.
Covered in blood, I twisted the shovel in the wound, widening it. The larger the wound, the faster this massive beast would die.
As if in response to my actions, I felt a rush of hot air and the whooshing sound of wind from above.
I looked to my left, still clinging to the shovel.
Lewis had landed on the Cerberus’s back, and a blazing fireball was engulfing its left head.
What attribute was its left head?
It didn’t matter. It was going to die anyway.
I leaned against the shovel, watching the Cerberus’s left head burn.
The battle was over. It was anticlimactic, but it was the ideal outcome in the end.
We had defeated a powerful monster without suffering any significant casualties.
As the Cerberus finally stopped moving, I pulled out the shovel and wiped the blood off myself with a cloth from my bag.
“I-Is it… over?”
“Well, as you can see…”
“W-We defeated a Cerberus!”
“We didn’t defeat it, Johann did. We just helped a little.”
Just accept the compliment, you cat burglar.
I lay down on the Cerberus’s back, ignoring the prickly fur. It wasn’t comfortable, but it was good enough for a short rest.
My whole body ached from all the digging.
No matter how efficient and fast my Crafting skill was, it still relied on my physical strength.
“I’ll rest for a bit and then we’ll check the reward chest.”
“But how do we get up there?”
“We’ll make a path.”
I would just craft some stairs.
Ignoring the stench of blood and dog, I closed my eyes.
I was used to this.
“Wow… the reward chest is huge!”
“With a chest this big, the rewards must be amazing! We could get at least a thousand gold coins…”
“Wait. Don’t open it yet.”
“Why?”
“It could be a mimic.”
“Ah.”
My words brought a wave of tension to the excited group.
“I’ll check for mimics first.”
I sprayed the chest with the paralysis reagent I had gotten from Viola. If it was a mimic, the reagent should paralyze it. Or would it?
It didn’t matter. Any kind of impairment would be an advantage.
But the chest didn’t react.
I guess it wasn’t a mimic.
“I’m opening the chest.”
I lifted the lid of the chest, which was twice the size of a normal dungeon chest. The contents were… underwhelming.
“The rewards are rather meager for a dungeon with a Cerberus as the final boss.”
“Well, each of these gems could fetch at least thirty gold coins.”
“That’s quite a bit.”
So the real reward was the Cerberus itself? We could sell its hide and bones.
A small amount of gold, a few gems, and some unimpressive equipment.
Were these the belongings of deceased adventurers?
In this world, the belongings of those who died in dungeons would eventually appear in the reward chest. Considering the reports of casualties during the initial surveys, these must have belonged to them.
This was the first time I had actually seen it.
The dungeons I had cleared so far had few, if any, casualties.
Mostly because I was the first to enter them.
“It seems the adventurers who came here weren’t very skilled.”
I scattered the equipment from the chest on the ground.
Old, dented, and clearly cheap.
This was common in unexplored dungeons. The equipment left behind by those who failed to clear the dungeon would usually accumulate.
In the game, it was just a one-line tooltip during loading screens, but seeing it in person felt strange.
Would my equipment be left behind like this if I died in a dungeon?
“Should we hand these over to the Adventurers’ Guild?”
“…They probably won’t be able to find the owners. We should just sell them…”
“Isn’t that a bit harsh?”
“That’s the life of an adventurer. They risk their lives for a chance at fortune. If they die, they become part of the dungeon.”
Sif spoke like a seasoned adventurer.
I didn’t know she had it in her.
“You think so too, Johann?”
“Well, yes.”
To be blunt, selling them was the most practical option.
Adventurers were expendable, and the party that cleared the dungeon had the right to claim the equipment left behind.
Since most of them were lowlifes with nothing to lose, they wouldn’t cause trouble unless they were hired to.
“It’s too much to carry everything. Check for any personal belongings among the equipment. We’ll only take those.”
Sif nodded reluctantly, still looking at the equipment with a hint of longing. The others had mixed expressions.
We pocketed the gold coins and gems and collected any items that seemed like personal belongings from the deceased adventurers’ equipment. Then, we returned to the Cerberus’s carcass.
Since the dungeon rewards were underwhelming, we would have to make do with the Cerberus’s hide and bones.
They should be worth more than steel, at least.
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“I’m here to report on the Beast’s Grave.”
“Excuse me?”
“I’m here to report on the Beast’s Grave exploration.”
The receptionist at the Belen Adventurers’ Guild looked up nervously at the imposing figure, a hulking man with a fierce expression.
His intimidating presence and the faint scent of blood made her gulp. While rough-looking adventurers were common, this man exuded the aura of a seasoned veteran.
“Um, about that…”
Before she could finish, the man placed a collection of items on the counter. A small pendant, a dagger with initials engraved on it, and other trinkets.
The receptionist stared at him, bewildered.
“W-What are these?”
“Belongings of the adventurers who died in the dungeon. I’d like you to return them to their families.”
‘He might be a good person after all.’
The receptionist placed the items inside her desk, her expression softening slightly.
The hulking man then placed a massive fang, an Adventurers’ Guild identification card, and a small notebook on the counter.
“This is a Cerberus fang. Proof of our successful exploration of the Beast’s Grave. And this notebook contains information about the dungeon. I’m submitting this as evidence as well.”
“C-C-Cer…”
“Cer?”
“Cerberus?!”
“Cerberus? The Cerberus? Why would that monster be here?!”
The receptionist’s shriek echoed throughout the guild hall.
Everyone turned to look at the hulking man. Surrounded by curious gazes, the man stared at the receptionist, not the least bit fazed.
His eyes demanded a swift resolution.
The receptionist, her face pale, bowed her head and apologized.
“I-I’m so sorry! I was just surprised!”
“Anyway, I’ve delivered what I needed to. I’ll come back in a few days.”
“Yes! Please come back at this time in two days!”
As the man, who had made a strong impression in a short time, left, the receptionist breathed a sigh of relief.
‘A Cerberus and the Beast’s Grave…’
The fang, as thick as a person’s waist, was chilling.
The receptionist slapped her cheeks and turned to find the guild’s appraiser.
They needed to appraise the fang quickly and send an expedition to verify the claim before the dungeon reset.
A few days later, news of the Beast’s Grave, an unexplored dungeon for the past five years, being cleared was announced in Belen.
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