[Hahahaha]

"My lord! You cannot enter, my lord!"

Two adventurers blocked the path before Solarin and the other church warriors, while behind them stretched a fluorescent, dazzling mushroom forest.

They had accepted employment to guide these church personnel, but the job description certainly hadn't mentioned that the journey's destination would be a one-way trip to the afterlife!

Breaking into the fifth floor's mushroom forest?

What kind of joke was that? They'd never heard of anyone who went in and came back out alive!

The beautiful mushroom forest before their eyes looked no different from Death's own backyard to them.

If they wanted to die, wouldn't it be better to just find a rope somewhere? Why drag the two of them along?

"My lord, if you insist on entering, we'll have no choice but to abandon this commission here."

Seeing the two adventurers' strong resistance, Mane turned to look at Solarin. "What should we do?"

"Listen to them." Solarin, whose right eye flickered with silver arcs of light, showed no objection.

Seeing that the church personnel weren't insisting on entering, the two adventurers immediately breathed sighs of relief.

Mane looked at Solarin with some surprise, not expecting her to agree so readily—this seemed quite different from the style of action he remembered from her.

【Truth Vision】

The world was split into countless color blocks on her retina—this was an ability that distinguished the traces of all things in existence.

The black of undead creatures like vampires, the pale yellow or milky white of humans, the light green of elves, the brown of dwarves, and various magical creatures each had their own colors as well...

Though there would be differences between individuals, and some strange life forms would have their own unique colors.

But Solarin had never seen colors like what she'd witnessed since entering this dungeon—chaos.

In the sticky veins of the fungal carpet, countless colors churned chaotically within, blending into these unusual mottled patterns.

She didn't know what this color represented, but it gave her an extremely oppressive feeling.

What alarmed her even more was that from entering the dungeon all the way to this point, all the mycelia and puffshrooms appeared as the same "chaos" under her 【Truth Vision】.

Generally speaking, even among the same species of magical creature, different individuals would have subtle differences, not this kind of uniform coloration.

She wasn't sure if it was the "chaos" color itself that was like this, or if all the mushrooms in the entire dungeon were actually one individual.

Based on the intelligence they'd gathered, the latter seemed more likely.

Entering the dungeon felt to her perception like entering the belly of some giant beast—to say she wasn't disturbed would be a lie.

It was just that duty called. She had summoned other squads but received no response, so she had no choice but to come down personally to confirm the demon clan's whereabouts.

So when the two adventurers advised against entering the mushroom forest that appeared entirely chaotic in her eyes, she readily agreed to back down.

"Let's continue to the next floor and take a look." Solarin said expressionlessly.

She no longer held hope of finding that demon here. Once she finished this trip, she'd write a report about the Amethyst Dungeon for the bishop.

---

Lin Jun watched with satisfaction as the church warriors, led by the adventurers, bypassed the mushroom forest and swamp area, completely unaware that this squad leader named Solarin was already planning to file a report about him.

With external affairs settled for now, it was time to handle internal matters.

That means you—Yellow Book!

In the mushroom forest, a puffshroom viciously slammed the yellow book onto the ground. Around them were Little Black, who had just been woken up and looked displeased, and Norris, who had been temporarily released from slime prison for a day's leave since his translation services were needed.

[My lord, I was very well-behaved in the secret chamber. What did you bring me out here for?]

The Codex, already sensing what was coming, tried its best to appear obedient, but unfortunately Lin Jun knew exactly what kind of creature it was—acting cute wouldn't help at all.

Facing the yellow book, Lin Jun rattled off a string of data:

"Two vampire attacks, losses of two hundred sixty-seven puffshrooms of various types, fungal carpet damage covering over a quarter of the fifth floor, seven mushroom trees toppled.

And to contain you, we constantly need four elite puffshrooms and thirty regular puffshrooms standing guard.

Not to mention this time it even attracted people from the Church of Light.

I have a question now—wouldn't it be more cost-effective to just lay you off directly?"

Norris, kneeling before the yellow book, honestly repeated the boss's words. In a moment, he'd also have to read aloud in his mind whatever the yellow book typed in response.

The boss said that once this was over, he could have a day off, which he planned to spend entirely sleeping. Slimes that split every two hours were truly torturous...

[Um... may I ask what 'lay off' means?]

A puffshroom's tentacle made a slashing motion under its cap, and the yellow book instantly understood.

[Boss, I'm also a loyal member of the mushroom garden!]

[No need for guards—just like before, just have any old puffshroom stuff me into a stone pedestal!]

[I absolutely love the mushroom garden! If anyone dares steal me, I'll charm them into running back to the mushroom forest!]

[Why bother with layoffs?]

If only the yellow book knew what emoticons were—it would probably be using every cute expression available right now.

Just looking at these words, Norris was wondering if the boss was being a bit heartless.

"How about this—I'll give you a chance. Tell me what value you have, what you can bring to the mushroom garden?"

[?]

What value?

As a Codex, people either coveted it or feared it—when had it ever had to consider such a question?

Seeing the yellow book unable to produce anything useful after a long while, the puffshroom waved its tentacles, calling Little Black over.

[I, I, I can help you with early warning! I can detect outsiders from very far away!]

"How far?"

[From here, I can sense all the way to within the stairwell!]

That was roughly a third of the fifth floor's size—quite far indeed, at least much farther than adventurers' scouting techniques.

But—

"So basically useless then..."

[???]

Little Black's claws were already reaching over.

[I, I can also help people improve their attributes!]

"How many improvements before they go insane?"

[I can help you control others!]

Lin Jun thought about his own 【Fusion Parasitism】 skill and had Little Black pick up the yellow book...

Norris, responsible for translation, was already trembling. So what he'd been silently sympathizing with was actually a terrifying evil tome?

And the boss seemed to... disdain all these abilities?

[No, how can all these functions be useless?!]

"They all feel impractical. Originally, leaving you to gather dust wasn't out of the question, but now you keep causing trouble, so I can only say goodbye."

[Can't... can't you just throw me out directly?]

"Oh? And let you spill everything about the mushroom garden?"

[The dragon-person can only tear my pages, not destroy the entire book! Doing this serves no purpose other than making me suffer for nothing!]

"Let's try it anyway. It's not like trying costs anything, and I'm not the one in pain. Little Black—"

Feeling the dragon scales scraping against the pages, the yellow book suddenly burst into desperate laughter.

[Hahahaha]

*Rip—*

Little Black tore off a page in one motion, and it quickly crumbled to ash.

[Ah, pain pain pain pain pain]

[You ask why I'm laughing!]

*Rip—*

[Ahhhhhh wuwuwuwu]

[Stop, stop! I'll speak myself!]

Only then did Lin Jun have Little Black pause temporarily, to see what final words this thing had.

[The Amethyst Dungeon is in peril]

Seeing Little Black about to reach over again, the yellow book quickly spilled the rest.

[Hasn't the dungeon already developed long-term rifts?]

[This is a dangerous omen! If you don't do something about it, your mushroom garden will be in danger!]

Oh?

Actually had something worthwhile?

Lin Jun, who originally hadn't expected any gains, became interested. He hadn't mentioned anything about slimes and rifts to the yellow book, unless its perception was even greater than it had initially claimed, able to sense across two floors to detect the location of the sixth floor's rift.

The puffshroom took the yellow book from the obedient Little Black's hands and placed it back on the ground.

"Continue. I'm listening."