“Ah, I see.”
I replied calmly, then looked once more at the right-hand path, which radiated a mesmerizing light like something out of heaven.
……It certainly was suspicious.
‘There is no way the Labyrinth would let us leave this easily.’
I had made my decision.
For now, we would stay here and see what happened.
“Everyone, stop! It will not be too late to enter after we confirm that it is safe!”
I immediately turned around and shouted toward the group.
But for some reason, the area in front of the fork, which had been crowded just moments ago, looked rather empty.
“Where did everyone go?”
“You mean the Imperial soldiers? Perhaps because their bodies were mutating more by the minute, they all rushed off in a hurry.”
“…….”
“The only ones left are us and those three Imperial Knights over there.”
Aileen dropped Achilles, whom she had been carrying over her shoulder all this time, onto the cold floor with a heavy thump, then glanced toward the three Imperial Knights behind us.
The whites of her eyes gleamed as her gaze slowly slid sideways.
“Including the one who was particularly friendly toward you.”
“…….”
Just as Aileen said, James was crouched in front of the fork.
“James, what are you doing?! The exit is right in front of us!”
“Ugh…… Uuuugh…….”
“Sir James! We can return to the surface now! Why are you being so stubborn?!”
Apparently, because James was refusing to move after suffering Mental Breakdown, the other knights had been unable to leave either.
Thanks to that, all three Imperial Knights had remained here with us.
‘He has completely lost his mind…….’
I was watching James claw madly at his own hair and mutter without a moment’s pause when—
“Setanta! Look over here! There is something carved into the wall!”
“Hmm?”
Rian had pressed himself against the wall beside the fork, his eyes sparkling.
“There is an image of a scale here, tilted toward the left!”
“Let me see.”
I walked over and checked it myself.
There really was a scale engraved into the wall.
An asymmetrical scale, tilted heavily toward the sinister, blood-red path on the left.
‘……Wait a minute. The Imperial soldiers all rushed down the right-hand path just now.’
No way……
This could not possibly be some mechanism where you had to sacrifice people to balance the scales, could it?
“Perhaps, Setanta, this means…….”
“……!”
WHOOOOOM—
At that moment.
Darkness abruptly descended over the right-hand path that had been shining so brightly.
As though it had never been illuminated at all.
A horribly thick and viscous darkness swallowed it whole.
SQUELCH!
Then crimson blood began seeping out from beneath the passage.
[……returns to the Goddess’s embrace.]
[……returns to the Goddess’s embrace.]
In the eerie silence before the darkened fork, the red liquid continued spreading across the stone floor without end.
It poured endlessly, endlessly from the place we had once thought was an exit.
As though every person who had entered had been squeezed dry.
“Huh? U-Uhh……?”
“W-Wait……! What just…….”
“Aah…… Aaaaaah……!”
The three Imperial Knights stared at the sight in utter horror.
And then—
CLICK!
“Setanta, the scale……!”
The scale engraved on the wall changed.
As though equilibrium had finally been achieved.
It now rested perfectly level, tilted toward neither side.
[You have satisfied a hidden condition. The fastest path to the Boss Stage opens!]
* * *
‘A mechanism where you sacrifice people to balance a scale.’
I had played this game for years, and I had never even heard of anything like that…….
I glanced sideways at Hecate.
She had pulled through for us again.
‘Is she this strong because she is exclusive to the Hidden Route?’
The more I thought about it, the more impressive she seemed.
That “impending-doom detection” ability alone already made her a Tier-0 guide.
If I wanted to reach the Hidden Route ending, she was undoubtedly the number-one hero I needed to recruit.
“Let us rest for a while.”
I suggested that the group take a break.
Once we passed through this passage, we would be heading straight into the boss battle.
We could rest, reorganize our equipment, and use the opportunity to work on the new character’s Trust as well.
‘And while I am at it, I should make sure everyone’s mental condition is stable enough to avoid any status effects.’
If I wanted to defeat the boss without any major unexpected complications, keeping the heroes mentally stable was important.
If someone lost their mind like James over there?
There was no telling what kind of reckless action they might take and how much danger they might bring upon the party.
“It is a curse cast by those Ailant bastards…….”
[The target hero is under extreme stress.]
“This is all…… because of the original sin committed by your filthy people!”
James was leaning against the opposite wall with the other two surviving knights.
Apparently, he was the type of hero with exceptionally fragile nerves, because his mind still did not seem to have recovered.
“J-James…… there is nothing to gain by provoking them right now!”
“Mmph, mmmph!”
“D-Do you not understand……? Our lives are in their hands now.”
Fortunately, the other two blue-cloaked knights seemed capable of reading the situation.
They quieted James down and kept glancing nervously in my direction.
‘As for our people…….’
Rian was still pale, but his mind seemed perfectly sound. His clear eyes showed that he was lost in thought.
Aileen, meanwhile, had casually abandoned Achilles on the cold floor and was trying to calm the trembling Hecate.
“Hic…….”
Hecate had looked miserable for some time now, almost as though she were hyperventilating.
‘……Is she mentally fragile too?’
Had the god of this world given the new character an absurdly powerful ability in exchange for denying her a strong mind?
I narrowed my eyes as I observed her.
[TIP – If a stressful situation continues, heroes may occasionally take unexpected actions.]
Suddenly, Hecate reached out and grabbed Aileen by the hair.
“……?!”
Then she began vigorously stroking Aileen’s hair.
As though she were petting an animal’s fur.
“W-Wait. What is the meaning of this all of a sudden……?”
“This brilliant platinum color……. It looks exactly like Pony’s mane…….”
“What are you…….”
“Waaah, I ran into some lunatic and now I have to go through all of this…….”
Perhaps because her hair was being thoroughly ruffled like a dog’s fur, Aileen’s expression momentarily froze as though something inside her had malfunctioned.
“……If that helps calm you, then do as you please.”
Eventually, she squeezed her eyes shut and apparently decided to endure it.
[TIP – Heroes with whom you establish a relationship beforehand will be easier to recruit later.]
DING!
As if on cue, a tip message appeared.
‘Wait, could this be the perfect time to work on her Trust?’
If so, I could not let this opportunity pass.
Comforting someone when they were discouraged naturally made them open their heart to you!
I neatly straightened my clothes and rose to my feet.
I decided to regard the missing top button, which had previously been launched away by my chest muscles, as a fashion choice.
‘Then shall I begin working on her Trust?’
I immediately approached Hecate and spoke to her.
“Hecate, I apologize for what happened earlier.”
“……Huh?”
“Once we reach the surface, I will make sure to compensate you for the value of your horse, so please do not worry.”
“…….”
“And I offer my deepest apologies to your deceased equine companion as well…….”
There was, however, one serious problem.
‘Damn it. Now that I am actually trying to get closer to her, I have no idea what to say.’
A shocking realization.
Unlike in a game, conversations with real people did not come with multiple-choice dialogue options!
“Um, did you name him Pony because he was a pony?”
“…….”
“I suppose he was rather small. He was staggering quite badly when the three of us rode him together.”
In the game, it had been easy because I only needed to memorize the correct dialogue choices.
Trying to raise the Trust of an actual living person was far, far harder.
I-I just had to keep saying something—
“You murderous bastard.”
“Huh?”
[Hecate’s Trust toward you decreases slightly.]
Murderous……?
What did she just call me?
“You killed Pony!”
[Hecate’s Trust toward you decreases significantly!]
Hecate’s deep-blue eyes, dark as the night sea, turned toward me.
For some reason, her right eye glowed slightly brighter than the left, and her gaze was filled with bitter resentment…….
“Haha…… I will come back another time.”
If I drove her Trust any lower, there might be no recovering from it.
I gave an awkward laugh and retreated.
‘I was loved by everyone in the game, but in reality, I have absolutely no social skills?’
The painful realization struck my heart as though someone had slammed it with a keyboard…….
‘Building Trust without the starter three-pull bonus or Trust Carryover helping me is harder than clearing the Labyrinth.’
Recruitment difficulty was usually proportional to performance.
It was unfortunate, but I would have to postpone recruiting the new character until another time.
‘At least using one of my permanent party members to build Trust by proxy worked.’
Fortunately, Aileen and Hecate seemed to have grown unexpectedly close.
Perhaps it was because they were the only two female heroes among everyone stranded in the Labyrinth.
“……Have you calmed down somewhat?”
“Waaaaah.”
“Then please let go of me now.”
[Hecate’s Mental State stabilizes.]
At last, accompanied by Aileen’s thoroughly disheveled hair, both the party’s mental care and my proxy Trust-building attempt came to an end.
“Let us get moving. We should finish this quickly and get everyone back to the surface.”
Before we departed, I quietly checked the party’s condition.
Aside from James, whose eyes were still vacant and unfocused, everyone else looked more or less fine.
‘Aileen…… still looks almost unnaturally calm.’
I did not know why her improved condition somehow made me feel even more uneasy.
But I pushed the minor doubt aside and decided it was time to head toward the Boss Room.
* * *
At last, we arrived before the door to the Labyrinth’s Boss Room.
An enormous stone door, incomparable to the one from earlier, stood before us.
“Setanta, here! There is another inscription carved into the stone door!”
Rian examined the door with shining eyes.
“This one is ominous as well! It almost looks like my handwriting, which makes it even more unsettling!”
“Hmm…….”
The inscription on the stone door read as follows.
「This world has repeated itself countless times until now.」
「The place upon which you now stand is the final world, one that will never repeat again.」
‘……Is this supposed to be a metaphor for a roguelike game where death means the end?’
The Hero clearly possessed memories from the previous run and had tried to kill me.
It was almost as though the entire world itself had been rewound.
Death and a new beginning…….
‘Could all those playthroughs where I restarted after every Game Over actually have been……?’
……No, surely not.
I was staring skeptically at the inscription on the Boss Room’s stone door when Rian suddenly spoke.
“Setanta, seeing this inscription reminded me of something.”
“Hmm?”
“This is something I heard during my time at the Mage Tower…….”
Rian suddenly began talking.
A strange gleam had appeared in his gray eyes.
“Long, long ago, have you ever heard the story that a great Archmage cast guardian magic over this world?”
“……?”
An Archmage?
“The Mage Tower even holds an annual ceremony commemorating this person’s birthday—”
“Yes, I know the broad outline.”
The Empire’s Archmage.
I remembered the figure because they had occasionally been mentioned in dialogue and written records in the original game.
If I recall correctly, they had been one of the founding heroes who helped establish the Empire a thousand years ago.
‘Was the Archmage an old man or an old woman? Either way, the character had a rather excessive backstory.’
Most of the magic used during the main story of the original game had been developed on the theoretical foundations designed by that person.
A truly unparalleled magical genius.
They had supposedly enjoyed every imaginable form of wealth and glory and lived well past the age of one hundred.
Even immediately before death, the Archmage had divided their own soul into fragments and used those fragments as a medium to establish an enormous magic formation.
All so that the world would continue to exist for thousands, even tens of thousands of years.
They had apparently intended to remain the eternal guardian of this world.
‘A genius enjoys wealth and glory, and somehow the story still ends with self-sacrifice.’
I personally had never liked that part of the setting very much because the ending had felt rather abrupt.
But even in the main story, it had never been revealed exactly what kind of guardian magic the Archmage had cast at the end of their life…….
“What kind of guardian magic could make this world continue forever?”
“Ah, that has never actually been discovered. Ahem! However, some have suggested…….”
Rian visibly hesitated before continuing.
“That if the world ever faced a catastrophe it could not possibly overcome, the flow of time itself would automatically rewind…… In other words, they believe it may have been a form of time magic.”
“What? Time…… rewinds?”
What did he just say?
My heart suddenly sank.
A massive protective spell that reset time whenever the world faced destruction?
That sounded exactly like…….
The rules of a roguelike game where everything restarted from the beginning after a Game Over.
“What hypothesis is that? I want to hear the details.”
When I pressed him, Rian twisted awkwardly in apparent embarrassment.
“Ahem! Hmm!”
He even cleared his throat several times, deliberately stalling.
What was wrong with this bastard now?
“Actually, back when I was at the Mage Tower…… that was a hypothesis I proposed myself…….”
“……What?”
“But no one showed any interest, so eventually the idea was forgotten.”
Rian fell silent for a moment.
Then he gazed wistfully into the distance, his eyes growing moist.
“I was really confident in that paper.”
“……?”
“After that day, perhaps my professor was disappointed in me, because he never gave me red bean tea again…….”
“Red bean…… tea?”
“Yes. My professor only served red bean tea to exceptional students whom he personally acknowledged…….”
“…….”
This bastard.
Had he been a fallen graduate student?!
‘……But that is not what matters right now.’
The truth behind the Archmage’s guardian magic had never been revealed even in the main story.
Secrets being uncovered only through the Hidden Route, along with parts of the world’s lore that even I did not know…….
I suddenly had the feeling that somewhere among them might be a clue that could lead me back to my original world.
“So the Archmage cast time magic capable of lasting for a thousand years, using their own soul as the medium?”
“That is correct. You understand remarkably quickly, Setanta!”
“And whenever the world faced destruction, time would rewind to before the crisis?”
“Yes! That was my theory! Although no one believed me……!”
SMACK!
Rian slapped his palm against the inscription on the Boss Room’s stone door.
“But here! After reading what is written on this stone door, I became certain! I was right!”
Once again, he gazed wistfully into the distance.
“Professor, I was not wrong after all……. That red bean tea gift set that went to that bastard Alex should have been mine.”
“I will buy you red bean tea later, so explain the rest first!”
I grabbed his shoulders and shook him vigorously, forcing his wandering attention back toward me.
“U-Uwaaaa……. S-Setanta, please stop…….”
“Forget the red bean tea! Tell me everything else you know!”
“Ugh…….”
Apparently dizzy from having his head shaken around, Rian brushed back his gray hair with a trembling hand before speaking.
“S-So, the story goes that shortly before the Archmage died, they shattered their own soul into countless fragments and sealed them throughout the world…….”
“Where?”
“To ensure the guardian magic could never be undone and so that no one could steal them…… the fragments were sealed inside ancient ruins constructed in the form of dungeons.”
“Do not tell me.”
“Yes. It seems that the Labyrinth that swallowed us…… may be the very place where one of the Archmage’s soul fragments was sealed.”