If he already knew what I was going to do, then no matter how I attacked or defended, he would know in advance and counter everything.
Could a game boss really have precognition?
Was that even possible?
“No, no…….”
If an opponent had specific patterns, then I would naturally act according to those patterns as well.
That was precisely why a ‘strategy’ could exist in the first place.
‘Then is this a boss that cannot be defeated with any predictable strategy?’
That explanation was actually more convincing than the boss genuinely possessing the ability to see the future.
But if ordinary, predictable strategies really did not work against him…….
‘Was this boss actually designed to be beaten?’
If this were an ordinary game, I would have defeated him after reading strategy guides written by other players who had discovered some absurdly unconventional method.
“Um…….”
Maybe she could not remember my name, or maybe this game simply had never asked the Player to enter a name in the first place.
Either way, the woman always hesitated like that whenever she tried to address me.
‘Come to think of it, did I ever tell her my name?’
Even if I had, I probably only said it once.
There was no one else here who had any reason to call my name, and I had not even noticed that no one ever addressed me by it.
If anything, I probably would have found it stranger if the woman constantly called me by name.
“What is it?”
This was not a dating sim, and managing an NPC was irritating, but there was no way a character like her existed for absolutely no reason.
Especially not in a game whose setting was otherwise crawling with nothing but monsters.
“Since monsters disappear on their own after they die, I thought that would eventually disappear too, so I left it alone, but…….”
“Ah.”
“I still feel uncomfortable leaving it like that indefinitely…….”
Even without a smell, having something dead lying in the same room was not particularly pleasant.
In that sense, it was convenient that corpses normally disappeared on their own.
“We should get rid of it.”
But I was somewhat reluctant to dispose of the corpse completely.
The bug was already preventing the reward from appearing, but if the error fixed itself, the reward would probably appear where that corpse was lying…….
“That is not what I meant…….”
Then what did she mean?
“It feels as though my brother is lying there, and I cannot even give him a funeral…….”
“What?”
Was she seriously saying she wanted to hold a funeral for her family using a monster's corpse?
“Are you out of your mind?”
Did it not matter that this was not actually her family, as long as it looked like them?
“I-I know that it is the corpse of a monster! But the fact that the monster took my brother's appearance means my brother must have died…….”
The woman's face crumpled as though she were about to cry.
Was she actually planning to appeal to me with tears?
“I never even saw my brother's final moments……!”
The instant tears began gathering in her eyes, I waved my hands dismissively.
“Ah, enough, enough. You do not need to justify it.”
“But…….”
“So what do you want? Just tell me that.”
No matter what reason she gave me, the fact that she wanted to hold a funeral using that monster's corpse would not change.
Hearing the explanation would not make me feel any better about it either.
The only question was how she intended to do it.
At my words, the woman's expression immediately brightened, and she stated what she wanted.
“I want to cremate the body.”
“Cremate it?”
“Yes. If it had truly been my brother's body, we would never have used the sort of method commoners use, but that is not really my brother's body, so…….”
“…….”
What exactly was she trying to say?
A moment ago, she wanted to hold a funeral as though it were truly her family member's body, yet now she was treating it as something entirely separate from him.
Of course, there was no way she could sincerely believe it was her brother's actual corpse, but…….
“And all the monsters in this place are beings whose existence was never permitted in this world. They should be burned completely, until even the fact that they ever existed is erased.”
That part had nothing to do with me.
“You do remember that all my weapons and items came from monster corpses, right?”
“Ah…….”
To fulfill the woman's wish, we would have to burn the corpse.
But if the corpse disappeared, there was no guarantee the reward or items would ever appear.
“Um…….”
Immediate desire or survival.
The woman hesitated, unable to readily choose either.
“You actually have to think about this?”
Both she and I could revive countless times.
If necessary, she could simply hope we made it through during the next Run.
Of course, that perspective only worked if this entire situation was treated as nothing more than a replayable game.
‘I do not even know whether the bug will be fixed next Run.’
But if this situation were reality rather than a game—as difficult as that was to believe after everything that had happened—then the woman should have concluded that we could not burn it.
For all we knew, this might be our only chance.
“Was this really something you needed to think about?”
Even if this was only a game to me, was it not reality to her?
The woman flinched under my gaze, then seemed to accept what I meant.
“You're right. It was not really something I needed to hesitate over.”
“Exactly. There is nothing to think about.”
“I absolutely have to give my brother a funeral.”
“…….”
She really was out of her mind.
Then again, if she had been perfectly sane to begin with, she would never have thrown a tantrum about entering the Boss Room with me.
“Whew.”
I needed to stop merely saying I had given up on this Run and genuinely treat it as though it had never existed.
Making it down ten floors in a single Run was already a remarkable achievement.
It was infuriating that I had even defeated the boss only to get stuck afterward, but……
“Ah. This still pisses me off.”
It was not as though I had made it down ten floors thanks to her.
Why did I have to do what she wanted?
“Y-Yes?”
I glared at her for a moment, then sighed and opened my Inventory.
“I cannot use Magic or anything like that.”
As I spoke, I pulled out the one [Flame Potion] I happened to have left.
How did she somehow manage to make me use the exact last one?
That was practically a talent in itself.
“That is fine.”
What was suddenly fine?
Ignoring whatever nonsense she meant by that, I threw the [Flame Potion] toward the corpse.
SHATTER.
The bottle broke, and flames immediately surged up and engulfed the body.
“Haah.”
[Status Effects - None]
If my Status Effects were supposedly perfectly normal, why did my head keep hurting?
I rubbed my perfectly healthy temple and watched the corpse burn.
“Um…… are you all right?”
“…….”
“Are you feeling sick?”
“…….”
“Does it hurt so badly that you cannot even speak?”
“…….”
“…….”
I answered the woman's interference with nothing but silence until she eventually fell quiet as well.
It did not take nearly as long as I expected for the corpse to burn completely to ash.
If anything, it happened so quickly that it felt unreal.
“Huh? O-Over there……!”
“Hmm?”
Once even the ashes had burned away and the flames completely disappeared, the room changed.
The doors opened.
And rewards appeared where the ashes had been.
“W-What is this……?”
“Fuck…….”
I never imagined there would be a mechanism like this.
Even the woman who had insisted on cremating the corpse stared blankly at the items that had appeared, clearly just as stunned as I was.
“Status Window.”
[Status Effects - None]
The Status Window was definitely broken.
There were no Status Effects at all?
Was I seriously not under some kind of Hallucination-Type Curse?
“Ah, fuck. My head hurts.”
It felt as though someone had struck me hard in the back of the head.
I was dizzy, like I had spun around a dozen times with my forehead pressed against an elephant's trunk.
And the Status Window was telling me everything was fine?
Forget the headache and dizziness for a moment.
Was this situation genuinely not a ‘bug,’ but the ‘correct outcome’?
How did that make any sense?
“Inventory…….”
Thanks to destroying so many weapons with my stupid stunt earlier, I had more than enough room.
But that did not mean anything that had already been there disappeared, or that anything new had spontaneously appeared.
“Whew…….”
Normally, I would have carefully sorted every item by type, then organized the newly dropped rewards accordingly……
“Ah, what a pain.”
Usually, I would have separated everything properly, but I did not have the mental energy for that now.
I abandoned the sorting halfway through and simply shoved the visible rewards into my Inventory one after another, starting from the items stacked on top.
When I felt better later, I would deal with it myself.
There was no one else who could do it anyway.
“There is nothing left for us to do here. Let us go.”
We had done everything we possibly could while trapped in this room.
“Yes.”
As though she had been waiting for those words, the woman headed toward the door first.
I was thoroughly sick of this place after everything I had done, but apparently she had been just as desperate to leave.
“Ha.”
Even thinking about it again was ridiculous.
It was not as though we had spent all that time fighting.
We had simply been trapped here because we had failed to burn one severed corpse.
Run 1243
Thinking back on it, I have no idea how we ever discovered the way to escape floor 70.
It was practically a miracle.
How did she even come up with the idea of holding a funeral for something that was not actually that person's corpse?
Still, thanks to her, I learned that burning the Doppelgänger boss's corpse ends the encounter.
If I had not, I have no idea what I might have done to that woman after she announced she wanted to do something so strange.
……Would I really have killed her?
. . . . . .
Run 1349
The farther I progress, the stronger my instinct becomes that understanding this game's worldbuilding will make clearing it easier.
Why the hell did the developer wait this long to explain the setting and make everything harder than it needed to be?
If the game's worldbuilding is that important to clearing it, then explain all of it earlier.
Because of this, I lost countless chances to extract information from the previous bosses.
Run 1350
Every boss talks endlessly until experiencing its first death, so why does every single one of them suddenly lock its mouth after I kill it once?
It is not as though I can say, "I have some questions, so let us talk before fighting."
I cannot exactly interrogate them while fighting either.
Damn developer.
Damn studio.
Damn it.
. . . . . .
Run 1401
If the bosses will not answer, why not ask the woman instead?
I desperately want to punch my past self for thinking that and actually asking her.
At least I only have to meet bosses inside Boss Rooms.
That woman stays with me the entire way down.
What a stupid decision.
The information I get from her is definitely different, but now my ears hurt the entire time we travel together, and she has become even more troublesome.
For the first time, I genuinely wished I could turn back time.
Repeating Runs is technically a kind of time reversal, but that woman does not reset.
Once I encounter her, there is absolutely no escaping her endless chatter.
Why do NPCs not reset?
. . . . . .
Run 1421
Unlike the woman, the old man refuses to give me proper answers no matter how much I ask.
He does look at me as though he finds the questions interesting, though.
It is still somewhat disgusting how he keeps pretending not to know that the dungeon returns to an earlier state whenever I die.
Lately, it feels as though he is barely even bothering with the act.
Is he thinking, "You know, and I know, so I will just go through the motions"?
The woman still refuses not only to enter the shop, but even to approach it.
Run 1422
Apparently, this game is extremely devoted to making everyone fulfill their assigned role.
The old man handles the shop and gives tips.
The woman explains the worldbuilding.
The monsters and bosses are enemies.
None of them do anything outside their designated roles.
The woman is slightly strange because she keeps showing interest in what I am doing and hovering around me.
But merely watching does not affect anything, so I will exclude her.
. . . . . .
Run 2346
I finally succeeded in clearing floor 90.
It would have been fine if the boss had not said something strange at the very end.
Then again, as usual, it was probably nothing more than the final struggle of something that was already dying.