In a quiet inn located within Rivira, the city built by adventurers on the 18th floor, Bell was sitting peacefully in his room, taking a well-earned rest.
’The monsters from the 13th to 18th floors matched the reports exactly.’
Starting from the 12th floor, Bell had cleared every monster from the 13th to the 18th floor in just a few hours, and had thoroughly gathered information on each type.
’Slis are immune to physical attacks, but can’t withstand magic.’
’Gargoyles are tough, but they can’t handle weapons imbued with lightning.’
’No wonder magic works so well against monsters.’
These observations made it clear—using the right magic drastically improved efficiency in clearing monsters.
Also, Goliath hadn’t respawned on his way down, saving him a great deal of trouble.
’That wraps up the Middle Floor conquest.’
Bell felt much more at ease now.
His progress through the Middle Floors had been incredibly fast—almost absurdly so.
After the 12th floor, Bell hadn’t even relied on Lightning Command to speed things up. He had made steady progress using only Runes and combat techniques.
There were no major snags throughout the run, and no monster took an unreasonable amount of ti to analyze or figure out.
In this regard, "Kuji Kanesada" had saved him a lot of effort.
’Today’s progress should give my Status a significant boost. Now I need to start thinking about how to gather enough Excelia during the expedition.’
Securing enough Excelia was a requirent for leveling up, sothing critical for any adventurer.
Bell took this seriously. He didn’t want to reach the point where his Status was maxed out but have to delay his level-up, resulting in wasted Excelia.
From his perspective, letting valuable Excelia go to waste was sothing best avoided. Otherwise, that lost progress could hold him back later.
’I still need to finish setting up coordinates for a temporary return route.’
’But it’s not too hard. As long as there’s a stable coordinate point set up on the Familia side, I just need to create a temporary one on mine.’
’It needs testing, but for now I can establish a temporary coordinate here in the safe zone. Once I return, I’ll set up the permanent one at the Familia.’
Bell gave his head a light shake. He had just reached the safe zone—now wasn’t the ti to dive into follow-up tasks. What he needed was a bit of ntal rest.
"Goddess-sama, Hephaestus-sama, I’m going to take a short break."
Since there was nothing particularly worth watching during his downti, Bell didn’t see any need for Goddess-sama or Hephaestus-sama to keep monitoring him.
[Understood, Bell-kun. Go ahead and rest.]
With their confirmation, Bell shut off the screen capture device.
Now that the goddesses weren’t watching, he could finally relax a bit.
Not that he was trying to put on a show in front of them—it was just hard to rest properly under their gaze, especially now that he’d beco more self-aware.
’Rivira is just a temporary stop for . I need to find a safer location to set up my own base as soon as possible.’
Bell couldn’t truly let his guard down in a place built by others.
But that was a concern for after he got so rest. For now, what he needed was sleep.
He set up a soundproof barrier inside the room and ensured a few basic security asures. Then, he took off his dust-covered cloak and outerwear and tossed them into his four-dinsional storage.
Glancing at the wooden bed in the room, Bell hesitated for a mont, then pulled out the familiar bed he usually used from his storage.
Even while staying outside, he still preferred to sleep in his own bed.
After stretching out a bit, Bell lay down and used a rune to help induce sleep. His mind relaxed quickly, and he drifted into a deep slumber.
The prolonged tension in his mind finally eased.
Bell slowly fell into a peaceful sleep.
...
Two hours later, Finn, Riveria, and the others stepped into the 18th floor’s Rivira City.
Riveria glanced up at the ceiling, glittering with clusters of crystal. These crystals automatically adjusted their brightness to simulate "morning," "noon," and "night," independent from the world outside the Dungeon.
"It’s already nightti."
"But... is it usually this quiet around now?"
The City of Rivira was often seen as a symbol of adventurers’ greed—a place where desires ran rampant.
Riveria recalled that the last ti they passed through here during an expedition, it was also night.
Yet back then, the city had still been lively, filled with cheering and even drunken adventurers causing a scene. So why was it so silent now?
Finn scanned the city, sensing that the atmosphere was heavier than usual.
"It does feel off. The mood is heavier than normal."
His sixth sense was telling him sothing wasn’t right.
"Let’s look around. Sothing must have happened in Rivira."
Sure enough, as Finn suspected, sothing had indeed occurred—a rare murder case right in the adventurer-run city of Rivira.
The victim was, without question, an adventurer. After all, almost no one else ca here.
It was precisely because an adventurer had been killed that this incident caused such a stir—otherwise, it wouldn’t have drawn this much attention.
As Finn and the others walked down the street, they soon spotted an inn where a large group of adventurers had gathered.
They all realized imdiately—this was where the problem was.
Finn stepped forward and asked quietly,
"Hey, what’s going on up there?"
The man ahead didn’t even turn around. His eyes remained fixed ahead as he replied,
"You don’t know? An adventurer’s been killed."
Finn’s brows shot up. He hadn’t expected to run into this sort of situation the mont they arrived in Rivira.
If they hadn’t decided to spend the night here, he would’ve already taken Riveria and the others and left.
An adventurer being killed on this city... that wasn’t sothing trivial.
But since they had chosen to rest here for the night, this murder case was now unavoidable.
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