To enter a dungeon, you must first register with the government-run Hunter Association.
Registering with the Hunter Association is a simple process. Your criminal record is checked, and you attend an hour-long lecture as part of the registration process. Once you become a Hunter, you are granted a permit to carry knives and firearms. Of course, using weapons for purposes other than fighting monsters is strictly prohibited.
That’s all it takes to register. Quick and anticlimactic.
The government actively encourages individuals with a certain level of strength to become Hunters. This is because failing to hunt monsters results in an increase in the number of creatures emerging from dungeons.
However, being a Hunter is extremely dangerous, and many have already lost their lives. Since it requires risking one’s life, only a select few are willing to take on the role.
Hunters are ranked from S-class to F-class. Naturally, as someone starting out for the first time today, I’m at the lowest rank: F-class.
The nearest dungeon to our school was about a 30-minute bus ride away. After getting off the bus, we walked for about three minutes past scattered rice fields, eventually reaching the base of a mountain where a large tunnel-like hole opened up. That was the dungeon entrance.
Our group consisted of:
- Me
- Yokota, with the Blessing [Nail Bat]
- Kamikawa, with the Blessing [Boxing]
- Kikuchi, with the Blessing [Brawling]
Together, we entered the dungeon located at the edge of town.
The inside of the dungeon resembled a limestone cave, stretching endlessly inward. The path branched off in multiple directions, turning it into a literal maze.
“Hey, don’t dawdle! Move faster!”
Yokota, with his Blessing [Nail Bat], kicked me from behind.
I nearly fell forward but managed to regain my balance.
My backpack was heavy. I had been assigned the role of carrying supplies, so I was stuck lugging a large rucksack.
Inside were water, food, and three recovery potions. Recovery potions were rare items dropped by dungeon monsters and were quite valuable.
“Hey, did you hear? This guy’s Blessing is apparently game-related,” Yokota sneered, mocking me.
“Hahaha… what the hell is that?” Kamikawa laughed exaggeratedly, clutching his stomach.
“Not just any game, but some crappy, specific one. It doesn’t work with other games at all.”
“That’s hilarious. That’s not a Blessing—it’s a curse!”
“HAHAHAHA!”
The three of them mocked me as their laughter echoed off the dungeon walls.
We pressed on, stepping on the damp ground as we went deeper. A small monster appeared.
“A goblin!”
“Piece of cake.”
“Watch me!”
As Yokota and Kamikawa spoke, Kikuchi stepped forward.
Kikuchi was equipped with a two-handed sword. He raised it high and brought it down on the goblin.
The goblin died instantly.
In the game First Final, goblins weren’t particularly strong enemies either. They were only slightly tougher than blue slimes and appeared during the tutorial phase.
“This sword I picked up in yesterday’s dungeon is amazing. It’s apparently a rare drop and a huge win for me,” Kikuchi said, gazing at his sword with admiration.
We ventured further, encountering a second goblin, which Kikuchi also dispatched with a single blow.
Kikuchi’s body briefly glowed.
“Oh! I leveled up!” Kikuchi exclaimed happily.
“What level are you now?”
“I’m at level 11.”
“Damn… I’m still at level 9,” Yokota grumbled, dissatisfied as he looked at Kikuchi’s smile.
Kikuchi stared intently at the air in front of him. A screen about the size of a PC monitor floated in the air—it looked like some kind of status window.
How do you open a status window?
(Status window, open!)
I tried concentrating hard in my mind, but nothing happened.
“Ugh… I’m still only level 7. You guys are way ahead of me,” Kamikawa complained, looking frustrated.
“Well, we invited you to join us in the dungeon yesterday and the day before, but you prioritized hanging out with that girl instead,” Yokota said.
“But if I don’t spend time with her, she’ll go off with other guys…”
“Then just dump her. Once you level up and get stronger, you’ll have your pick of better girls.”
“R-really?” Kamikawa asked, intrigued by Yokota’s suggestion.
“We’re going to rule the school. Once we get overwhelmingly strong, no one will dare oppose us. And then, we’ll have free reign over all the girls. Dump that tramp already.”
Kikuchi, the group’s leader, licked his lips with satisfaction. “Once we dominate the school, next up is the neighboring school. And after that, we’ll take over all the schools. Once we’re strong enough, no one—not even the police—will be able to stop us.”
“Wait, does that mean we’ll take over Shirabara Academy too?” Kamikawa’s eyes widened in surprise.
“Of course.”
“Whoa! Shirabara Academy girls, here we come!” Kamikawa’s eyes gleamed with lust.
Shirabara Academy was a private girls’ high school in the city, known for its idol-like beauties.
“Look at this! At level 11, I can do this,” Kikuchi said, jumping lightly. Despite the modest effort, he leaped nearly two meters high.
Before dungeons started appearing, the Guinness World Record for vertical jump height was about 120 cm. His jump was an incredible feat.
“Wow,”
Yokota and Kamikawa exclaimed in amazement.
It seems that with the emergence of dungeons, the concept of “levels” now exists in the real world as well. By defeating monsters and earning experience points to level up, even physical abilities in reality seem to improve.
We proceeded further into the dungeon. We found a descending staircase. Who could have created such an artificial dungeon with stairs like these in modern Japan, and for what purpose? The mystery only deepens. We descended to the second floor of the dungeon.
Although we didn’t encounter many, we saw about two other parties in this dungeon. It seems there are several other groups attempting to conquer this dungeon. Most parties appeared to be in their twenties, or at most, college students.
One group was fully decked out like they had stepped straight out of a fantasy movie: armor, robes with wizard staffs, impressive longswords, and bows.
They must have received excellent combat-oriented blessings.
As for Kikuchi and his group, they were just wearing their school uniforms, with no special protective gear.
“We’ve got to get some decent armor drops too.”
“It’s crazy expensive if you try to buy it,” Kamikawa responded to Kikuchi’s comment.
For high school students with limited allowances, buying proper armor is nearly impossible.
Thud, thud, thud…
As we continued for a while, we heard footsteps approaching.
“Here they come,” Kikuchi said, raising his voice and readying himself.
“Leave it to me,” Yokota said, raising his spiked bat.
From behind the dungeon wall, a kobold emerged.
Kobolds seem to be slightly stronger than goblins. That was the case in the game First Final, too.
Kikuchi and his group surrounded the kobold and struck it repeatedly.
As I watched the realistic battle unfolding before me, my gamer instincts were stirred.
In the game First Final, kobolds were the first enemies you fought right after finishing the tutorial. However, if you tried to fight them alone, you often couldn’t win. The game’s balance was so broken that most players quit after being defeated by the first kobold.
That said, kobold attack motions are slow and telegraphed. If you let them strike first, you can time your dodge to avoid their attack and then counter with the skill “Power Attack.”
This way, even at a low level, you can defeat a kobold in one hit right after finishing the tutorial. But the timing for this move is extremely strict. It often takes playing the game for nearly 1,000 hours to master it. What a terrible game. How did I even sink so much time into it?
Then it dawned on me.
What’s happening in front of me is not a game. Games and reality are different. Even though I pride myself on being a hardcore gamer, if someone accused me of blending reality with games after this, I couldn’t argue back.
I shook my head as if to clear my thoughts.
For a while, Kikuchi and his group continued hunting kobolds.
They must have killed over 20.
“Got it! A sword drop!” Yokota exclaimed.
“It’s a one-handed sword. It seems weaker than the one I’m using,” Kikuchi said as he picked up the sword.
“Man, I wish I could use a sword too, but my blessing won’t work with it,” Yokota muttered.
“Yokota, are you planning to keep using that spiked bat even after leveling up? If you reach a high level, you might become as useless as that one guy we know,” Kikuchi sneered at me with a condescending glance and smirked.
“No way. There’s gotta be a Steel Spiked Bat or Hero’s Spiked Bat drop,” Yokota argued.
“Haha! A Hero’s Spiked Bat… That’s hilarious,” Kikuchi laughed uncontrollably.
“Come on, Kikuchi, that’s enough,” Kamikawa said.
“My bad, but that was just too funny.”
“Tch.” Yokota clicked his tongue repeatedly.
“Hey, that’s a rare drop item. Put it in the backpack so we can sell it,” Kikuchi said, looking at me.
I placed the sword, still in its scabbard, into my backpack. Since the sword was long, part of it stuck out from the bag.
“Don’t just stand there! Pick up the dropped magic stones too! You’re already useless in combat; don’t slack off!”
“Ugh…”
Kikuchi’s shout was immediately followed by a sharp blow to my stomach. Kikuchi had kicked me.
Because of the blessings, even though it looked like a light kick, the force behind it was tremendous.
My body flew over three meters and slammed into the dungeon wall. My entire body trembled, and sharp pain overwhelmed me.
“Ugh,” I groaned as my body slid down to the ground.
“Hey, a weakling like him will die easily,” Yokota remarked, grinning.
“If he dies, so be it. Inside a dungeon, there’s no police investigation, no surveillance cameras, and no witnesses. We just report to the Hunter Association that he was killed by a monster, and it’s ruled an accident. The body would be eaten by monsters anyway.”
“Yeah, if someone dies in a dungeon, it doesn’t even make the news anymore,” Yokota and Kikuchi laughed together.
“But blessings are incredible. I’m getting ridiculously strong…” Kikuchi said with a twisted grin.
“There’s only Uekusa left in our school. Once we crush her, there won’t be anyone left to oppose us.”
“Yeah, with the way we’ve been leveling up in the dungeon, it won’t be long before we’re strong enough to beat Uekusa to a pulp.”
“Uekusa, huh… She’s got an annoyingly strong personality, but she’s undeniably hot. I’d love to break her spirit and make her mine,” Kamikawa said, smirking in a disgusting way as he indulged his fantasy.
Uekusa Ayame is a second-year student at our school and the head of the disciplinary committee. She comes from a family of traditional martial artists and is said to be a master of her craft.
Her blessing is Ancient Martial Arts. Even Kikuchi, Kamikawa, and Yokota together couldn’t beat her. And above all, Uekusa Ayame is breathtakingly beautiful.
“Get up! I’ll seriously kill you if you don’t start collecting the magic stones!” Kikuchi shouted at me, glaring.
Pain wracked my body as I slowly stood up.
I somehow managed to collect the magic stones and put them into the backpack.
“Hm? Something’s coming,” Yokota said.
Two shadows emerged from behind a corner in the dungeon.
“Tch… Two kobolds,” Kikuchi clicked his tongue.
“With our levels now, we should be able to take them, right?” Kamikawa asked.
“Maybe, but it’s not worth risking our lives over.”
“But the kobolds are faster than us.”
“No problem,” Kikuchi said, grabbing the backpack from my back. “Hand it over.”
Kikuchi forcibly took the bag from me and then delivered a much stronger kick to my back. My body was flung toward the kobolds.
I flew nearly ten meters and tumbled to the ground, rolling several times before coming to a stop.
“Hahaha… You’re bait to distract the monsters,” Kikuchi’s voice echoed from afar as he and the others ran off.
Lying on my back, I gazed up at the dungeon ceiling. For some reason, it felt familiar.
It hit me.
This dungeon is just like the beginner dungeon from the game First Final.
The graphics in the crappy game First Final were so bad that it didn’t resemble reality much at first glance, which is why I hadn’t noticed. But when I thought about it, the dungeon map and even the monsters on each floor were exactly the same.
What does this mean? What’s going on?
As I stood there, confused, the two kobolds closed in on me.
