< Chapter 60: Maiden’s Labyrinth (1) >
The 32nd ranked superhuman in the world.
Dungeon creator Maiden.
“Hehe. When will they start?”
She was looking at the monitor with an evil smile in the situation room.
“Sister, you’re still the same.”
Yu Hwa spoke to her, looking at her.
“I’m always the same.”
Today, Yu Hwa was assigned to guard the training labyrinth.
Just in case, she had placed active superhumans all around.
“Did the thing with that bastard Kim Shin-woo went well last time?”
“Yes. Thanks to your help, sister, it was resolved well.”
“That’s good.”
Yu Hwa had received a lot of help from many people to cover up Kim Shin-woo’s death.
Maiden was one of them.
“But why did you agree to help with this annoying task, sister?”
Yu Hwa knew that Maiden was not the kind of person who would take on such a bothersome task.
“Tsk.”
Maiden clicked her tongue.
“Why do you think? Some jerk who knows my weakness threatened me to help him.”
“Oh. Jin Ho oppa?”
“Don’t even mention his name. That trashy mongrel! How dare he bring up what happened when I was 20?”
“…Haha.”
Maiden looked no different from Yu Hwa, but she was 41 years old, the same age as Pi Jin Ho.
She heard that they were classmates at the military academy and had a lot of trouble.
“Just wait and see. I’ll make him regret it when he sees his students crying.”
Maiden smiled wickedly.
“But sister. The cadets this time won’t be easy, you know?”
“What?”
Maiden turned her chair around and looked at Yu Hwa.
She had a dissatisfied expression.
“They’re called the golden generation, right? The first-year students.”
“I know that. There are more than ten of them who can jump into active duty without any problem.”
“That’s right.”
“But so what?”
Maiden snorted.
“My labyrinth is a nightmare for even active superhumans. Do you think these fledglings who just became adults can clear my dungeon safely?”
She had an arrogant expression and tone.
“Yes. At least one team will pass without any trouble, I think.”
Maiden frowned.
“Who? Shin Jia’s team?”
“Nah. Not her. She has skills but no experience.”
Yu Hwa criticized Shin Jia harshly.
“Then Ha Si-yeon’s side?”
“Um. That team is right, but not because of Ha Si-yeon cadet.”
“Then who?”
Yu Hwa looked at the monitor and smiled softly.
“The 107th rank.”
“…107th rank?”
The monitor screen was filled with the image of the 107th rank, Kang Seo-yul.
“Oh. They’re starting. Sister. Then I’ll go back to my position.”
“What? Hey! Finish what you were saying! What can the 107th rank do to my dungeon!”
Maiden’s sharp scream echoed loudly.
* * *
The test of conquering Maiden’s labyrinth is done by forming teams of six.
There are 498 first-year students, so there are 83 teams in total.
Of course, this labyrinth is a masterpiece of masterpieces, created by the outstanding dungeon creator Maiden and the funds of the Korean government and the military academy.
It boasts a huge area that can accommodate 83 teams at the same time without any problem.
You could say ‘money talks’, but it’s not just money.
Rather, it’s an investment.
This kind of educational labyrinth makes money once it’s built.
The income from the labyrinth usage fees from other countries is quite sweet.
Well, that’s only possible if it’s well made, but the creator is Maiden, so there should be no problem.
The only thing left is to conduct a few experiments for safety assurance.
In other words, we were selected as the guinea pigs for the safety experiment.
“Wow. I’ve been to artificial labyrinths a few times, but this one seems to be on a different level.”
Ha Si-yeon looked around and admired.
Our team leader was not guarding, but sightseeing the labyrinth.
“Ha.. team leader. Are you not doing it properly?”
“Ah, yes. I’m sorry.”
At my words, Ha Si-yeon quickly looked around with a tense face.
“Everyone, be alert. This is a labyrinth. And it’s Maiden’s labyrinth. Don’t let your guard down or you’ll be gone.”
“Okay.”
“Yes.”
Our team consists of Ha Si-yeon and me, ranked 2nd, 107th, 180th, 291st, 381st, and 473rd.
It’s a very balanced team.
No, rather, should I say we’re lucky? I didn’t expect to be on the same team as Ha Si-yeon.
This makes things easier.
It’s easier to speak up.
“There’s something ahead.”
Ha Si-yeon, who was ahead of us, said to me as if she had found something.
“Team leader. If you find something, you have to decide as the team leader.”
Ha Si-yeon stopped and glanced at me.
And then smirked.
“…But I’ve been wondering since before. Why am I the team leader?”
“If you don’t do it as the 2nd rank in this combination, who will?”
What an obvious thing to say.
But it seemed that it was not obvious to the other cadets.
“Seo-yul should do it.”
“Kang Seo-yul should do it.”
“The top scorer in the written test should do it.”
They all pointed their fingers at me.
“…You want me to do it?”
“Yes. Honestly, the ranking doesn’t matter in Labyrinth Conquest. Brain matters.”
“That’s right. It’s a well-known fact that Seo-yul is smart. You did well in the virtual ruins conquest last time too.”
Following Ha Si-yeon, the other team members backed up Ha Si-yeon’s words and stepped forward.
I was dumbfounded.
…Do I get command authority so easily?
Has my reputation improved a lot?
Or are all the team members nice?
Both?
“Then I’ll take command authority? Everyone agrees?”
“Yes.”
Anyway, it’s a win-win situation.
I took command authority five minutes after the conquest started.
“Then Si-yeon. Brief me on what you saw ahead.”
“Ah, yes. There are three monsters ahead. They look like rats. But I’ve never seen them before.”
Monsters that look like rats…
“Are they brown all over and have green eyes?”
“Huh? How did you know? Yes.”
“They’re plague rats.”
My guess was right.
That means that the inside of this labyrinth hasn’t changed much from the original work.
Then I can proceed as planned.
“What should we do? Take care of them?”
“No. Let’s avoid them.”
Maiden’s Labyrinth conquest essential precaution 1.
Avoid monsters with plague in their name at all costs.
“Plague rats are easy to deal with, but the problem is after they’re dealt with. They spew poison when they die.”
“Oh.”
Of course, since this is an educational dungeon, they only spray paralyzing poison, but poison is poison anyway. It’s very annoying if you absorb it.
“Then should we go around and go straight?”
“No.”
That’s a bad idea.
“It’s not long since the conquest started. If we go straight to the center now, we’ll just end up fighting with other teams.”
“Oh. That’s right.”
The other team members nodded their heads.
“Then what do we do? We get higher scores depending on how fast we reach the center, right?”
The 180th-ranked male student asked a sharp question. But he seemed a bit dumb.
“Don’t worry too much about the ranking. If you look closely, you’ll see that there’s only a 20-point difference between the 1st and the 10th place.”
“Huh? Oh. That’s true.”
The instructor deliberately focused the explanation on the ranking. The ranking is not important in this labyrinth conquest.
“Let’s collect the treasures on the outskirts.”
“Outskirts treasures?”
“Yes.”
I showed them the 27th rule on the last page of the rule book.
[27. There are ‘treasures’ all over the labyrinth. These treasures have random scores assigned to them.]
“…There was such a rule?”
“We haven’t had this rule book for long, so you probably didn’t notice.”
We received this rule book right after we entered.
Most of them only thought about reaching the center quickly to get points.
“Even if there are teams that noticed, they are more likely to aim for the treasures in the center than the outskirts.”
In fact, there were very few teams that aimed for the treasures on the outskirts in the original work.
Honestly, it’s more efficient to aim for both the central conquest and the treasure acquisition at the same time.
But there are also many competitors as it is efficient.
“How about it? I think it’s a pretty good strategy with high chances of winning.”
I waited for everyone’s reaction.
“…It’s true that as Seo-yul said, even if we fall behind by 10 places, we can gain 20 points with this treasure.”
“The probability of encountering other teams will also be low.”
“Yes. Good. Let’s do as Seo-yul says.”
With Ha Si-yeon as the last one, everyone agreed with my opinion.
“Okay. Since everyone agreed, let’s turn to the outskirts area conquest.”
We turned our backs on the center and started to go back.
This is going smoother than I thought.
* * *
A lot of time has passed since then.
“Reptilian monsters are only dangerous-looking, they’re nothing. Just think of them as score chunks.”
“There’s a trap here. Let’s avoid it if it’s hard to disarm.”
I gave instructions at the right time and continued the conquest.
Using the original work knowledge and the knowledge I learned beforehand as much as possible, as safely as possible.
“This treasure is a trap. Do you see the oddly carved hole at the bottom?”
“Okay. This one is real. But looking at the shape of the altar, it seems that the trap will be activated if the weight decreases. Let’s put this stone instead.”
They all followed my words well, so there was nothing too difficult.
I was really a lucky team leader to have met these team members.
“Okay. A short break.”
At my words, they all slumped down on their seats.
“Si-yeon, you rest too. I checked the surroundings for safety.”
“Ah, yes.”
Ha Si-yeon sat down on the floor last, and I sat down too.
“That makes three treasures.”
“Cool. We already have 38 points.”
“If we add the elite monster (score acquisition named) we killed, we would have over 50 points.”
They all seemed to be in a good mood because the conquest was going smoothly.
“It’s all thanks to our team leader Kang Seo-yul .”
“That’s right. I thought you were some kind of prophet or something.”
“You knew all the traps, so I had nothing to do.”
They all looked at me with admiration in their eyes. It was burdensome.
“It’s thanks to you guys for following my instructions well.”
“Wow. Even the virtue of humility.”
“The true loyalist of this era…”
Their eyes became even hotter.
I guess I did something wrong.
“Anyway, at this rate, we might be able to get the fourth treasure and sleep in the safe zone by today.”
“Wow~ It’s really perfect.”
We found a safe zone on the way. We still had some stamina left, so we left it for now.
After about 10 minutes of rest.
“Shall we start again?”
“Yeah.”
We started walking again.
“There’s a monster ahead.”
“You know what to do, right?”
“Okay!”
We went on for about another 30 minutes.
“…Oh? Why is this treasure room so big?”
We arrived at the fourth treasure room.
“…Wow shit.”
I shivered as I looked at the door.
“We found this on the first day?”
“Why?”
Ha Si-yeon looked up at me and asked.
“Rule book item 36.”
I casually opened the rule book and showed it to my team members.
[36. There are three special rooms in the labyrinth where relics are sleeping.]
“…relics?”
“Yeah.”
Relics that only exist three in the labyrinth.
“Don’t you feel it from the name? I think these relics are the key items for conquering the labyrinth.”
“…Now that you mention it, yeah.”
“That and there are only three of them. Yeah. It feels like it.”
They all nodded their heads at my opinion. In fact, relics are key items for conquering the labyrinth.
I knew that one of the three relics was in a treasure room on the outskirts, so I chose the side conquest.
…But I didn’t expect to find it so soon.
There are a total of 20 treasure rooms on the outskirts.
Honestly, I was going to give up and go to the center if I couldn’t find it by the second day, but I found it in one day.
I’m lucky.
“Seo-yul!”
It was then.
Zzzz-
Along with Ha Si-yeon’s scream,
I heard the sound of freezing around me.
Clang! Clang!
A sound of ice shattering as it hit something.
Ha Si-yeon must have pushed something away with her ice magic.
“…Arrow?”
Sure enough, there were arrows rolling on the floor.
I felt familiar arrows and familiar magic.
I quickly turned my eyes to where the arrow came from.
“…Jia.”
“Yeah. It’s Jia’s team.”
Across the dark corridor.
Jia was pulling her bowstring.
…What?
Why is Jia doing side conquest?
According to the original work, Kim Chul-jin’s team with Choi Ji-hoon was doing side conquest.
And Jia should be fighting like crazy in the center by now. Why is she here?
“Seo-yul!”
…No. Now is not the time to think about that.
“Counter stance!”
We quickly formed a formation.
And then the next moment.
Swoosh!
Along with the sound of Jia’s arrow piercing the air.
Three cadets, led by a swordsman wearing a blue armor of magic, rushed in.
Blue armor of magic.
As soon as I saw its shape, my eyes widened.
“Choi Ji-hoon!”
It was Choi Ji-hoon wearing magic armor.
Clang!
I drew my dagger and deflected Choi Ji-hoon’s sword.
…Why is he on the same team as Jia!?
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