—————————————————————–
Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: FusionX
—————————————————————–
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
“…This… hurts… too much…”
“I had a tingling feeling on the back of my head.”
I looked down at the carpet… no, the cat beastman who was lying on the floor, holding her stomach.
What was her name again? Serf? Sif? I remember it was something like that.
Let’s just call her Sif.
Anyway, this girl is a monster, no, an NPC that randomly pops up when you explore dungeons in Survival Academy.
According to the setting, she’s a dungeon looter and a thief who appears with a certain probability in front of the treasure room, and if you lose, she steals your treasure and is quite infamous.
On the contrary, if you defeat this girl several times, a quest pops up, and if you clear it, she becomes a merchant who sells quite rare items.
I don’t know if it will be the same in reality, but that’s none of my business.
The problem is that this girl tried to steal my treasure.
I firmly stepped on the thief girl’s wrist.
When I stepped on it with the force to break her wrist, she let out a groan filled with pain.
I heard the sound of something breaking from the wrist I stepped on.
As expected, she had a hidden weapon on her wrist.
If I had shaken hands with her, she would have definitely stabbed my palm with the hidden weapon coated with poison.
It was a part I still remembered as it was an infamous event even in the game.
“H-How…”
“Isn’t it too crude? If you wanted to backstab me, you should have been more cunning. Like collapsing the dungeon entrance and blackmailing me- Or threatening me by piling up monsters like a mountain- Or procuring a Medusa from somewhere and saying you’ll turn me to stone if I don’t make a deal.”
“If that was possible, why would I backstab you!”
Is that so?
No, isn’t this a world setting where you have to go to that extent to backstab someone?
I’m pretty sure one of the ways this girl harasses players is by destroying the dungeon entrance.
Maybe she doesn’t have much equipment yet since it’s still early in the game?
Well, it was none of my business.
What’s important now is how to make use of this girl.
There were quite a few ways to make use of this girl, more than I thought.
“Anyway, since you got caught trying to backstab me, you have to pay the price.”
At my words, Sif struggled frantically.
But soon she started coughing as if it was difficult to breathe and spat out blood from the corner of her mouth.
Did I hit her that hard?
I did launch the attack with a force that could burst a goblin in one hit, but Sif, who belongs to the strong ones, should be able to take this much.
It seems the damage was greater than I thought.
But just in case, it would be better to completely eliminate her ability to resist.
I trampled on Sif’s wrist, crushing it.
Screams filled with pain tormented my ears.
I didn’t want to do this either, but to survive, it was important to minimize variables as much as possible.
“Don’t exaggerate.”
“I’m not exaggerating! It…it really… hurts…”
I took off the backpack and coat that Sif was wearing.
When I stripped off the things covering her body, a thin cloth outfit and a slender figure were revealed.
The pale skin visible through the gaps in her clothes sparkled under the dungeon’s lighting.
But I wasn’t particularly interested.
It was not that I didn’t have sexual desire, but it was distasteful.
I was not hungry enough to commit such a vicious act.
“My backpack!”
I opened the backpack with the feeling of opening a treasure chest.
Inside the backpack, there were various items.
A few pieces of clothing, a few sets of underwear, bottles that seemed to contain potions, and a small amount of money.
“You’re poor.”
“If I had a lot of money, why would I enter dungeons…”
That’s true.
It would be better to register as a mercenary and hunt low-level monsters roaming in forests to gain experience and then switch to being a bodyguard, rather than exploring dungeons.
It was definitely not an easy task to clear a dungeon where you don’t know what dangers might come and it’s not easy to clear.
I was forcibly clearing it with my experience from the game and 10 years of survival on the deserted island.
Normally, entering alone would be considered a suicidal wish.
This girl must have secretly hidden and followed me because of that.
She probably thought she couldn’t win against me in a normal way after seeing my fight.
Even in the game, this girl was known for harassing players with various tools and stealing items before running away, rather than having good combat skills.
You could say she was an NPC specialized in stealing.
That was why she was called a X bitch.
So what should I do?
Leaving her alone made me uneasy about being backstabbed, but killing her felt a bit disturbing.
Even though she was a carpet, I felt a bit conflicted about killing a sentient being.
Heretics were an exception.
Those bastards weren’t sentient, they were just crazy.
“P-Please spare my life…”
“What’s your name?”
“S-Sif…”
“Okay, Sif. Give me a reason why I should let you live.”
I knew roughly what this girl had been up to, but I couldn’t think of anything else to say.
Maybe it was because my communication had been cut off for 10 years.
I might need to practice conversing with people.
Talking was so difficult.
“I…I can be a good porter!”
“Anything else?”
“I…I also have a lot of knowledge a-about dungeons…”
“Nothing else?”
I looked down at Sif while fiddling with the shovel blade.
Sif, like a real cat, made eye contact with me with wide eyes.
Was she trying to act cute like a cat?
I placed the shovel blade against Sif’s neck and said,
“There’s no particular reason for me to keep you alive.”
“W-Wait a minute! T-Then, even my b-body…”
“Enough.”
I smacked the side of Sif’s head with the shovel.
Sif’s body went limp after losing consciousness from the strong impact.
After confirming that Sif had fainted, I wrapped Sif in the coat and carried her on my shoulder.
It would be most convenient to kill her, but since she had some usefulness, I planned to make use of her while clearing items in the dungeon.
“The next dungeon would be good there…”
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
“Wake up.”
“…”
“Wake up.”
As I lightly kicked her side with my foot, Sif woke up with a scream.
It seemed the wound on her stomach still hurt.
Well, a large, noticeable bruise had formed.
“Ouch! Wh-Where is this!”
“A dungeon.”
“What?”
“A dungeon.”
I threw a pouch of jerky to Sif, who had gotten up, and sat on a suitable rock, looking down at the small village visible below the hill.
Goblins were moving busily in the village, preparing for battle.
“Uh, um. Why a dungeon?”
“To loot treasure.”
“Uh, how many days have passed…”
“3 hours have passed.”
“What kind of crazy person enters another dungeon in 3 hours?! Do you have a death wish?!”
What’s the big deal?
In the game, there were people who cleared twenty dungeons in half a day.
Ah, that was an exception because it was a game.
I ignored Sif’s gaze that looked at me like I was a madman and observed the goblin village.
It was good that I had descended vertically to the boss room, but annoyingly, the final room had a composition that I couldn’t easily clear alone.
The goblin village spread around the boss room. And the hobgoblins were inside the boss room with their subordinates.
Originally, I planned to pass on this dungeon and loot another one, but Sif’s sudden appearance made me change my plan.
It was a dungeon with only goblins, but the reward was quite substantial.
If we cleared the treasure chest in this dungeon, the time to complete the grand plan of collecting tuition for the academy would be reduced.
So I planned to utilize Sif appropriately to clear this dungeon.
“Anyway, you’ll have to help me clear this dungeon.”
“D-Don’t tell me you’re going to throw a delicate beauty like me among the goblins…?”
“You have a perverted demon possessing your head.”
I quietly picked up the shovel.
Perhaps my shovel was that scary, Sif flinched and made a frightened expression when she saw it.
With that physique, how did she intend to make a living by robbing?
She probably hadn’t been robbing for long.
If I recalled her dedicated quest that I vaguely remembered, she hadn’t been entering dungeons for long either.
I roughly remembered something about her feeding her family, but that was none of my business.
I didn’t need to consider the circumstances of my enemies.
“But! Goblins are that kind of creatures! Those bastards are the type to go wild with lust just by seeing a woman!”
“Ah, is that so.”
“Y-You’re not really going to throw me in, are you?”
“That’s great.”
“I-I have emergency money hidden away! I’ll give you everything, so spare my life! I don’t want to die! I have younger siblings at home! If I die, my siblings will starve to death too!”
“Then you should have lived diligently.”
“But with just menial jobs, I can’t make enough money to feed my siblings…”
“That’s none of my business.”
Really.
She was not even close to me, and she tried to rob me.
It was tough enough to survive alone in this world, so why should I consider someone else’s circumstances?
I got up from my seat with a piece of jerky in my mouth.
It was about time to move.
“If you perform the role of bait well, I’ll make you an offer you can’t refuse.”
“Do I have the right to refuse?”
“Look at your wrist.”
“T-This is…”
At my words, Sif looked at the heavy bracelet on her wrist.
Sif was startled and tried to touch the bracelet.
I opened my mouth before Sif could touch it.
“It’s a special bracelet. If you try to run away or don’t do your job properly…”
I trailed off to increase her sense of fear.
Sif’s eyes were filled with terror.
I deliberately laughed wickedly and said,
“If you do your job well, I’ll release it.”
“I-I’ll work hard!”
Like a newly enlisted soldier in the army, Sif shouted in a brisk voice.
…I hope my bluff doesn’t get exposed until we clear the dungeon.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
