"Little Black, anything with hands and feet isn't a monster—you can't just kill them randomly."
"Oh... but green ones are okay?"
Green ones?
Was she talking about the flower demons on the sixth floor?
After nearly clearing out the monsters on the fifth floor, whenever Little Black wanted to vent her excess energy, Lin Jun would let her go play downstairs.
Lin Jun didn't know exactly what she did down there, but the first few times she'd get lost and he'd have to go fetch her.
Once she got familiar with the routes, every time she went to play, she'd bring back one or two monster corpses—he remembered there had been green flower demons among them.
But flower demons didn't have feet either; their lower halves were connected to flower buds.
If not flower demons, then what?
Whatever. Green ones definitely weren't human anyway.
"Mm... green ones are fine, but don't kill ones like today anymore."
Little Black pouted and nodded. Only then did Lin Jun give her a special spicy strip puffshroom with [Strong Acid LV3]—she'd been enjoying sour flavors lately.
Those two humans had already fled in a hurry, clearly terrified out of their wits.
Sure, they'd nearly been killed, but they weren't actually dead!
Besides, Lin Jun had already provided compensation.
That longsword was enchanted—much better than the broken one.
So they were even!
However, this gave Lin Jun a wake-up call. If Little Black frequently encountered different human adventurers, conflicts were inevitable.
Today Little Black had initiated the attack; tomorrow it might be some blind adventurer courting death.
The result would likely be Little Black going on a killing spree while he had to clean up her mess.
This wouldn't do!
He needed to find a way to reduce—if not eliminate—contact between human adventurers and her.
Making her stay put was obviously unrealistic.
With her constantly overflowing energy, getting her to behave for even two days was thanks to the favorability bonus from parasitism.
Unless he used force, long-term confinement was impossible.
As for using force?
Her Bedrock backing made Lin Jun abandon any such thoughts.
But then again, if he couldn't restrict Little Black, he could limit the adventurers!
Pick on the soft persimmons—always the right approach.
In the future, the forest... no, it was a mushroom forest now.
The mushroom forest would be designated as a restricted zone, ensuring no one would disturb Little Black during her feeding and sleeping periods.
As for other times...
Maybe he should upgrade his [Disguise LV2] skill?
Although there were no monsters in the nearby floors that could produce this skill, skills could be leveled up through training too.
He trained through puffshrooms, then transferred back the experience.
While this method severely reduced the experience transferred, with enough puffshrooms and disguise being only level 2—making it relatively easy to upgrade—he might be able to train it to LV4 in the short term. Then he could see if this skill could conceal Little Black's scales.
Of course, adding skills to Little Black would require massive amounts of magic power.
He'd have to scrimp and save for a while.
With his plan set, a batch of puffshrooms loaded with the [Disguise] skill began production.
On another note, something Lin Jun found strange: it seemed no other adventurers had entered the dungeon?
So those two had broken the rules and snuck in?
Anyway, this was good news—he had more time to prepare.
Speaking of which, because of the magic tide incident, Dylan had been dispatched and hadn't been heard from since.
If Dylan had listened to his advice not to get involved with the magic tide, he should be safe.
But it had been over a month now.
He wondered if Dylan had brought enough money for mana potions...
Hopefully his first human subordinate wouldn't starve to death out there.
---
"Huff... huff..."
Dylan groped for the arrow shaft behind him and yanked it out with force.
The intense pain made him clench his teeth, cold sweat instantly soaking his back.
Throwing aside the arrow sticky with fungal threads and blood, Dylan took a long time to recover.
Praise the boss!
As expected, the blood from his wound only gushed for a few spurts before gradually clotting.
Thank goodness for not being human anymore—many vital points were no longer vital.
But then again, if it weren't for earning money for mana potions, he wouldn't have taken this miserable job.
The leader of this trip was the tavern owner's man—a bald, burly fellow reeking of fish, plus three wage workers like Dylan.
Four men total, each carrying a bulging deerskin cargo bag.
They needed to cross the forest west of Mute Wind Town to transport stolen goods to Fisher's Port.
In Dylan's view, the most dangerous part of this trip was the possibility of encountering monsters still wandering after the magic tide.
But he never imagined that even a small-scale, one-time smuggling operation would run into black-on-black crime!
The attackers' first hidden arrow had targeted him.
The dull thud of the arrowhead piercing leather armor was lighter than he'd expected. The arrow struck precisely at his heart.
After understanding what was happening, he deliberately broke some dry branches as he fell, letting his body roll down the slope into the bushes.
Soon, the sound of clashing swords and blades rang out nearby.
At first, he wondered which of the other three was the inside man.
Turns out he was overthinking it.
This group of black-robed attackers seemed intent on wiping them all out.
His "death" gave the other three time to react.
Anyone bold enough to do this job couldn't be completely useless. Seeing eight attackers and knowing they were outmatched, they fought while retreating, then split up to flee after running some distance.
The black-clad men seemed unwilling to let anyone escape, pursuing even after abandoning the bags.
Before the last black-robed figure left, he didn't forget to pick up the cargo bag beside Dylan.
"Argh—"
Shortly after everyone had left, a familiar scream came from ahead—the leader's voice.
Looked like they wouldn't last long either. He needed to get out of here fast.
Dylan wanted to just lie there until everything was over, but the half-burning tree trunk nearby indicated the black-robed group had a fire mage!
If they decided to cremate and destroy evidence, he'd definitely be thoroughly dead.
Pulling out the arrow and crawling from the bushes, the wound in his heart made Dylan grimace in pain. Non-fatal didn't mean it was nothing.
So this was what heartache felt like!
No time to worry about the leaves and twigs stuck to his body, Dylan clutched the notebook in his arms and ran in the opposite direction.
Huh?
Wait, when did I...
The warm foreign object in his palm only now caught Dylan's attention.
The wrinkled cover was made of some unknown material. Running his fingertips over it, he could feel bumpy spiral patterns, and holding it seemed to emanate a slight warmth.
Dylan had some impression of this notebook—it should have been among the stolen goods in his bag.
But when and why had he taken it out to hold specifically?
Had it just fallen into his arms when he collapsed?
No clues, and no time to figure it out.
Another scream echoed through the forest—identity unknown. Those three might have been completely wiped out.
If the attackers planned to destroy evidence, they'd definitely discover he wasn't dead yet.
He had to run faster, farther!
Comments