THE STRONGEST EXIT BOSS
"Take a look at this."
In front of the exit room lay a single corpse.
An immature-looking male mage, his skin and hair well cared for and glossy.
A familiar face.
"It's Abison."
It was exactly the same face as the one on the ID inside the wallet we'd returned to the dwarf.
Thanks to soul preservation, despite being a dead body, it gave off a strangely uncanny feeling, as if he were merely 'asleep.'
"Maybe that's why—he still looks so neat even like this. Like a rich family's young master."
Yernil said.
"That's probably right."
"Really?"
"Yes. Because he received a soul preservation magic service."
That spell was insanely expensive even in the game, and it would be the same here.
If it were cheap, they would've slapped soul preservation on all the slaves, then collected and recycled the corpses a few days later.
Burning that expensive magic insurance(?) on the first floor? Abison must have been a beloved son of a wealthy family, a newbie who had just begun labyrinth exploration, and someone who joined a veteran party like Virtanen's using his parents' backing.
"Ah..."
Yernil nodded.
"If we retrieve the body and take it out with us, that family will probably pay a reward. We could look forward to that. More importantly..."
I pointed to the damaged part of Abison's body. One of his legs was missing.
"Do you hear anything around here? Like insects chewing on meat?"
"...Ugh."
Realizing what I was looking for, Yernil's face went pale.
Virtanen had said Abison was bitten and carried off by a Black Hornet. A giant wasp-type monster.
"I hear it."
"Do you hear the sound of insect wings flapping?"
"No."
"You don't?"
"No."
"...That's strange."
If a Black Hornet has prey, it doesn't hunt more, nor does it leave the area and travel far.
"Then let's head toward where you hear the chewing sound."
"There's no need to go far. It's right over there..."
Yernil pointed to a secluded corner a few meters away. We'd been so focused on watching out for hornets that we hadn't noticed, but now that we looked, there was a massive white egg sac there.
"It's a Black Hornet egg."
The egg sac, about the size of a human torso, had its top torn open, and inside it a huge, fat larva was wriggling.
While chewing on a chunk of Abison's thigh.
The Black Hornet must have chopped up Abison's leg piece by piece—ankle, knee, thigh—and fed them in one by one, through the ripped opening at the top of the egg sac.
"This is even stranger."
I fell into utter confusion.
Where the hell did the Black Hornet that had been feeding it go?
Until the larva becomes an adult, it has almost no survival ability, so the Black Hornet has to keep supplying it with food. Needless to say, if there's prey, it never leaves its post to guard the egg sac.
"So where did it go?"
If other adventurers had defeated the Black Hornet, there would be signs of battle, and they would have dealt with the larva too.
That meant the Black Hornet had abandoned its own egg and left of its own accord—but why?
The Black Hornet is the strongest field monster on the first floor of the labyrinth, so it didn't flee due to a clash with another field monster.
Then the only possibility is the exit room.
No matter how I thought about it, that was the only thing that fit.
The Black Hornet sensed the presence of the boss inside the exit room and fled.
But that would mean the Black Hornet had encountered that exit boss before—does that make sense? How would a field mob like a Black Hornet ever meet a boss mob that only exists in the exit room?
"Ah."
It can.
I remembered.
Fuck.
There is exactly one scenario that makes this absurd situation make sense.
"Yernil. We're screwed."
The worst possible pull had happened for the exit boss.
No matter what came out as the first-floor exit boss, I was confident I could take it down with poison arrows—except for this one.
"Ah, seriously, we're fucked."
Out of the countless runs I'd played in the game, there had been exactly one case where this showed up as the exit boss on the first floor.
And I hit that astronomical probability?
Is it because this is developer difficulty?
No wonder my luck in finding the exit room was so good.
'Possessed Adventurer.'
Even when playing the game, these were the enemies I least wanted to encounter early on as exit bosses.
If you ran into them, nine times out of ten it was game over.
The concept is that an adventurer active in the labyrinth had their soul captured by the Labyrinth Master and became his thrall.
They come with an unremovable 'Madness' status ailment by default, making conversation impossible, and they retain all the skills and magic they had as adventurers.
And they're insanely strong.
Originally, they were adventurers considered among the very best on that floor, then one day they suddenly go missing.
In town, NPCs chatter things like, 'Did you hear? Mr. Hong Gil-dong went missing on the nth floor of the labyrinth!' And then, a few days later, they pop up as the exit boss of floor n.
In other words, some famous adventurer who recently went missing on the first floor, who has a history of beating the shit out of a Black Hornet with gusto, became the Labyrinth Master's slave and showed up here as the exit boss—and the Black Hornet, catching that scent, panicked and ran.
This is the only scenario that explains the current bizarre phenomenon.
When I asked Yernil, she told me a rumor she'd heard in Flandor City.
"I wasn't an adventurer, so I don't know the details. But I've heard that a thief called Mister Backattack went missing on the first floor of the labyrinth. At a tavern."
"Mister Backattack?"
"Yes. They say he once soloed a Black Hornet that showed up when his entire party was down? That's how he got famous."
Fuck. It's that bastard.
No doubt about it.
Of all things, a thief class too?
The absolute worst matchup for a mage.
ON TOP OF THAT, if he was strong enough to solo a Black Hornet, his level would be high too. At least level 7.
No—
it could be even higher.
To begin with, the adventurers the Labyrinth Master recruits as exit bosses are the strongest on their respective floors, and those types usually can operate on the next floor as well.
An adventurer who had been exploring the second floor returned to the first floor, acted as a sort of leader there, and then got recruited by the Labyrinth Master.
If you think of it that way, in the worst case he could be as high as level 10.
"Puhahahahaha!"
At the tavern, Rats of the Beer Barrel, the bartender burst into loud laughter at the dwarf's story.
"Hey now, my friend. At least say something that makes sense."
"I'm telling you it's true!"
"A no-chant, ultra-fast caster? Even having just one of those would be a once-in-a-century genius."
"Tch, believe it or don't, I don't care!"
"Hold on a second, Virtanen."
The bartender suddenly pulled out some whiskey and poured a glass, handing it over.
"What the hell are you doing? I didn't order this."
"Didn't you order it with no chant?"
"Agh..."
After landing a clean hit on Virtanen, the bartender shoved the glass toward him.
"Drink it fast and ultra-quick! It's your punishment for spouting nonsense!"
Nearby adventurers snickered. Virtanen downed the drink in one go and wiped his beard.
"Kahhh. Emma went to the temple, and Jikal doesn't drink. Feels lonely not having anyone to back up my story."
Emma had requested additional resurrection scrolls. Even at best, it would take two days for her to return with them.
"So. How was Jikal?"
the bartender asked.
"Well, not bad. Lacks labyrinth experience, but skill-wise he's solid."
"Of course. Everyone I introduce pulls their own weight. Once that guy builds up some labyrinth experience, he might even succeed Mister Backattack."
"Khahaha!"
Virtanen snorted.
"Backattack was practically a legend among first-floor adventurers. Even after joining a second-floor party, he still more than pulled his weight."
"Oh, really?"
"Yeah."
"..."
"..."
"Such a shame that someone like that got caught by the Labyrinth Master."
The bartender said as he poured more whiskey.
"There's someone even more unfortunate."
"Who?"
"The adventurers who meet Backattack as the exit boss."
"True enough."
"Most first-floor adventurers don't have the ability to predict the exit boss in advance. They get excited thinking, 'This must be the exit room!' and slam the door open—then the moment they do, heads start flying one by one."
BANG!
The tavern door burst open.
"Looks like it's time for my head to fly."
Virtanen gave a bitter smile.
A middle-aged noblewoman with a deathly pale face rushed in through the entrance.
Abison's mother, Lady Marisa.
Behind her ran a young male mage as well—Abison's older brother, the mage Clorence.
"Virtanen! Where is the dwarf warrior Virtanen!"
Lady Marisa shouted.
"I'm right here."
When the dwarf raised his hand, Marisa rushed straight toward him.
"Abison... Is it true that Abison is dead?"
"It is. He died once and was resurrected, but while searching for the exit room to escape, he was taken by a Black Hornet."
"Ah..."
Marisa staggered, clutching the back of her neck. Her eldest son Clorence hurriedly supported her.
Virtanen greeted Clorence with a nod.
"You must be Abison's elder brother."
"Yes. Haah. He kept insisting on exploring the labyrinth, and in the end..."
"Virtanen!"
Marisa cried out tearfully.
"Didn't I beg you to take good care of him! Why do you think I paid extra to hire you—even though you're a second-floor party—to handle the first floor!"
"Madam. I sympathize with your grief, but Abison's death is not our responsibility. We were his companions, not his bodyguards or trainers. And we did everything we could to protect our teammate."
"..."
Marisa, eyes brimming with tears, looked to her firstborn son.
"Mother. The soul preservation should still be active. Please calm down and listen to what Virtanen has to say."
Clorence soothed her.
"Ahem."
Virtanen drained another drink and explained the situation.
"Considering the soul preservation duration and the rate of bodily deterioration, if we return and recover the body within a week, resurrection should be possible."
"When will the resurrection scroll be ready?"
"In two or three days."
"Two or three days..."
Clorence calculated the dates.
"The entry gate opens in four days."
"That's right."
"If we go in, time will be tight. Will you be able to find Abison immediately?"
"This."
Virtanen held up Abison's ID.
"We'll use lost-item tracking magic and trace it back."
"You managed to obtain the ID. Impressive."
"A genius mage found it for us."
"A genius mage?"
At that, the bartender cut in.
"A talent freak who can cast no-chant spells at ultra-high speed."
"Can such a mage even exist? Just one of those traits would already be top-tier talent..."
Clorence, being a mage himself, found it even harder to believe than the bartender.
"Clorence! Do you think—do you think that mage might retrieve Abison's body?"
Marisa activated her hope circuit.
"It's possible,"
Virtanen said.
"That party only has two people."
To retrieve a body, the party must have vacancies to begin with. If a party member died while fighting the exit boss, they would push their own teammate's corpse through the gate instead of Abison's.
"They can hand Abison's body over using one of the two empty slots."
"...!"
"But clearing the exit room with just two people won't be easy,"
Clorence said.
"That's true. And on top of that, they're a magic academy slave team."
"A slave team!?"
Clorence recoiled in shock.
"Then doesn't that mean the chances are almost nonexistent? They won't even have proper equipment!"
"That's right."
Virtanen nodded.
"But that mage is a truly absurd bundle of talent, and sharp as hell too. I don't have any proof, but for some reason I just believe in him. Maybe the two of them really will clear the exit room on their own."
"Hm."
"As long as they don't run into someone like Backattack as the exit boss."
"..."
A brief silence fell.
"T-This isn't the time to be standing around. Clorence."
Lady Marisa snapped back to her senses and began fussing again.
"We need to put up a bounty for recovering Abison's body. We should commission mercenaries through the Adventurers' Guild. I don't care how much it costs."
At that, the adventurers in the tavern suddenly lit up.
"How much are you offering?"
The first to speak was a swordsman who had come from the far east.
The leader of a three-man group mainly active on the third floor and recently rising in reputation at the Adventurers' Guild—
Hijikata the Swordsman.
"You'll need to pay third-floor rates if you want people to come down that far. Hire us."
A famous lizardman warrior from the second floor alongside Virtanen, Rildragon Aaron, entered the bidding.
"We're not as sloppy as Virtanen—"
"Everyone."
Clorence swept his gaze across the adventurers.
"Lose interest."
"..."
As if by magic, the tavern fell silent.
"I'll go in together with Virtanen and retrieve my brother myself."
"A fifth-floor mage going in with us?"
Virtanen asked brightly.
"Yes. He's my brother, so I should be the one to bring him back. And also..."
Clorence continued.
"I'm interested in that genius mage as well."
Lord Virtanen.
Emma. And Jikal.
I miss you...
'They said they'd revive Abison's body, right?'
They'd probably enter with an additional mage, revive Abison, and throw him through the exit gate along with three mana stones.
Then they'd find a new exit room and leave.
If they let us tag along in one of those three mana stone slots, that'd be sweet—but...
"Waiting for Virtanen isn't an option."
From my perspective, that plan was dead.
"Why not?"
"Because of this larva."
The Black Hornet is the top dog among first-floor field monsters, and the stench it gives off functions like a wide-area monster suppression ward.
Thanks to that, there isn't a single monster anywhere nearby right now.
"But before the dwarf party arrives, this thing will die. And once that happens, monsters drawn by the scent will swarm in en masse."
"Then... then what do we do? Do we give up on this exit room and wait for the next one?"
"No. If what's inside is a Possessed Adventurer, then none of the parties currently on the first floor can clear it anyway. Waiting for another exit room is hopeless."
And there's no guarantee that another party we meet would be as negotiable as Virtanen's.
If anything, it could be a hostile group like that bald party.
The best option is for Yernil and me to take down Backattack ourselves and get out.
"Can we... beat Backattack?"
Yernil's eyes filled with anxious dread, like a puppy caught in the rain.
Hard to say.
Even in the game, if you ran into a Possessed Adventurer as an early exit boss, nine times out of ten it was game over.
But in the game, mages didn't have the ability to fire off four Fireballs in a single turn.
And while playing as a first-floor slave party, it was rare to farm Venomic Spider poison arrows.
In terms of raw power, we weren't lacking.
"Yernil."
"Yes."
"Can you trust me and follow my lead?"
"...! Yes!"
"Can you do exactly as I tell you?"
"Yes!"
Good.
Then I'll have to use a somewhat rough strategy.