I Became a Veteran Who Has to Stir Up Trouble to Survive - Chapter 48

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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[048] Collapse
“Cough…! Cough…!”
What happened?
My head felt foggy, and I couldn’t see anything.
A splitting headache and ringing in my ears crashed over me, as if I’d been struck on the back of the skull with a massive hammer.
‘…Am I dead?’
No—if I were dead, the pain wouldn’t be this vivid.
That insufferable Goddess wasn’t even visible.
I blinked slowly, but the pitch-black darkness showed no sign of lifting.
The crushing pressure bearing down on my chest and the acrid dust clawing at my nostrils kept forcing coughs from my throat.
“Ugh….”
As I groaned and tried to push myself upright, I realized a massive weight was pinning my entire body.
‘Damn it… the cave collapsed.’
The memory of the ceiling caving in flashed through my mind like a panorama.
If that’s the case, then right now I’m….
“…Malton?! Radi!!”
I squeezed out my companions’ names through a throat tasting of blood, but only heavy silence answered.
A terrible premonition seized me.
‘Could I be the only one who survived?’
“Hey! Someone answer me!! Can you hear me?!”
I screamed desperately, but even my echo refused to sound in this suffocating space.
‘Calm down… stay composed, Doran.’
I fought to steady my breathing and reclaim my composure.
At least I don’t think any bones are broken. My head feels split open, but it’s not fatal.
The problem is that my body is completely wedged in place.
Trapped within unstable rubble that could collapse again at any moment.
‘I have to get out somehow.’
I carefully twisted my body to create space, but even the slightest movement sent cascades of dirt pouring down from above.
“Damn it…!”
At this rate, I’d be buried alive without question.
That’s when it happened.
“…ran, sir?”
Beyond the pile of stones, a voice reached me—faint and distant.
“Radi?! Radi, is that you?!”
“Doran, sir…! Cough…! Y-you were alive…!”
Relief flooded through me at the sound of that voice seeping through the cracks in the rock.
“Where are you?! Are you hurt?!”
“I’m fine, sir! Malton is with me too! It’s just… our exit is completely blocked….”
“Wait! I’m coming to you!”
I clenched my teeth and felt my way through the debris around me.
My lantern was smashed to pieces, and the only thing left in my grasp was a single sword.
I couldn’t pierce through these massive boulders with it, but perhaps I could manage to pry open the gaps between them.
‘I can’t let the blade bend. I need to be careful….’
I carefully wedged the longsword into the crevice between the rocks.
Creak, creak…!
The wooden scabbard shrieked and crumbled, but I pressed down with my full weight as cautiously as possible.
Finally, the massive boulder tumbled away, and my limbs—which had been bound—regained their freedom.
I gasped for breath as I squeezed my body through the narrow gap.
“Huff… huff….”
Covered in dust, I pushed my backpack ahead of me and crawled desperately until, beyond the faint glow of a lantern, I came face-to-face with two people digging through the rocks.
“Doran…!”
“You’re alive!”
Radi and Malton, their faces caked with dirt, pulled me up.
“Is everyone… uninjured?”
“Just some bruising. Are you alright, Doran?”
“Fortunately, your limbs seem intact, Doran. And this situation….”
Malton shone his lantern around the area.
Only then could I properly assess the situation.
We were trapped in a section of the collapsed Cave—an isolated space sealed off on all sides.
“Both the entrance and exit… are completely blocked.”
“Damn it….”
A hopeless situation.
But I couldn’t sit here waiting for death to claim me.
I had to find an escape route, no matter what.
As I steadied my breathing and began formulating a plan, Malton wiped the dust from his lantern and spoke.
“We’re fortunate we weren’t crushed by the falling rocks, but I can’t fathom why the Cave suddenly collapsed when it was perfectly stable before.”
“That’s strange… there were no warning signs from what we could see outside.”
Hearing those words, I suddenly recalled the ominous warning message I’d seen in the log window just before the Cave collapsed.
「A supreme demon is forcing its way through the dimensional rift and descending into the mortal realm!」
“Shit.”
This is my fault.
The collapse of the Medaolinum Dungeon’s layer passages was unprecedented.
If that’s the case, it’s reasonable to assume it’s because of the ■■ stat I awakened.
They say words have power, but I never expected it to manifest in less than a day.
The fact that a demon descended personally to kill me made my breath catch, but it wasn’t over yet.
‘It takes time for an archfiend to forcibly descend to the Surface…!’
Besides, demons have extremely limited time to act in the mortal realm, so if I escape this Dungeon before the demon arrives, I can survive.
A race against time—whether I escape first or the demon arrives first. My life hangs in the balance.
「Time remaining until demon’s arrival: ??:??:??」
I stared ahead with sunken eyes and began calculating my options with cold precision.
A stone labyrinth filled with collapsed debris, where the only light came from the hazy glow of dust-caked lanterns.
In this cave where human senses couldn’t penetrate even a single step ahead, what possible way could there be to escape?
As I stared into the pitch-black darkness, a single idea struck me.
“Malton, hold onto this for me.”
I stripped off my clothes and handed them to Malton, then closed my eyes.
‘That creature was definitely in my transformation list….’
As I focused my mind, my body shrank with a sensation like my bones twisting, and my skin took on a grayish hue.
「You have transformed into the Cave Ape, Radgit!」
「Radgit can navigate through darkness by detecting minute air currents and scents!」
—Grrrrgh….
A bestial growl leaked from my throat.
As I surveyed my surroundings with my altered vision, I felt faint air currents flowing between the stone piles that had seemed completely blocked.
But that breeze was blowing from deeper underground, not toward the exit.
‘As I suspected, the way back is completely sealed.’
However, as a stroke of luck, the passage leading to the Lower Layers still seemed open.
First, I’d have to pass through Layer 2, then escape the Dungeon through an alternate route.
I uttered the words in a hoarse, guttural voice.
—Grrrrgh… this way.
“Doran…?”
Radi, who had only just noticed my appearance, flinched in surprise and took a step back, but Malton grinned and nodded knowingly.
“Looks like you’ve found the path. Lead on.”
As we cleared away the debris piled in a crevice between rocks, a small opening appeared between the bedrock that had seemed completely sealed.
We squeezed through the gaps in the rubble and pressed forward.
But we hadn’t gone far before an enormous boulder blocked our path.
With Radgit’s meager strength, there was no way I could move something of that weight.
I stared silently at Malton, and he immediately grasped my intention, handing the lantern to Radi.
“Radi, hold this for a moment.”
“Huh? Oh, understood.”
Malton gripped his mace and swung it with all his might—CRASH! A tremendous impact echoed through the cave.
As the massive boulder shattered and the path opened, we hurled ourselves through the cloud of dust.
Cutting through the debris relentlessly, breaking past the stone piles, we surged forward without hesitation, and Radi, struggling to keep up, gasped out desperately.
“Huff, huff… slow down a little! We can’t move as fast as you, Doran!”
“You seem unusually hurried. Is there a reason?”
—I’ll explain once we escape.
For now, they wouldn’t understand if I mentioned the demon. First priority was getting out of this place.
How long had we wandered through the darkness?
Suddenly, a dull tapping sound echoed from beyond the stone wall.
“A rescue team?! I can feel signs of life from outside!!”
“Is anyone there?! Please, save us!!”
As desperate cries pierced our ears, we came to a simultaneous halt.
“Seems they’re trapped beneath the rubble….”
Malton cast a sympathetic glance their way, yet he couldn’t bring himself to rush to their aid.
Time was of the essence in this moment.
Rescuing them would require moving boulders and excavating through debris—a delay we could ill afford.
Moreover, I was currently disguised as Radgit, and if I wasn’t careful, I might be mistaken for a monster and attacked.
The logical choice would be to ignore them and press on….
‘…No.’
I pulled my robe lower over my head and made my decision.
─We’ll save them.
“Pardon? Truly? But you said we were in a hurry just moments ago….”
─It’s not about compassion.
Radi’s eyes widened in surprise, but this was the result of rapid calculation.
Before the demon descended, chaos would inevitably erupt as everyone scrambled to escape the Dungeon.
Could I—or could the three of us alone—navigate that maelstrom?
‘Impossible.’
Whether as a force to stand against the mobs, as pawns to amplify the disorder, or even as meat shields.
The more bodies, the better.
─I need to put them in my debt. There will be uses for that later.
“Then step back for now. I’ll extract them as quickly as possible. …Radi, keep the adventurers’ attention from falling on Doran.”
“Y-yes!”
Malton readily hefted his mace and brought it down upon the rocks in rapid succession.
As the debris was swiftly cleared, over a dozen adventurers crawled out, covered in dust.
“W-we’re alive…! Thank you! Thank you so much!”
“We don’t know who you are, but you’re our saviors! And you as well….”
They stood at a distance, regarding me with confusion as I remained shrouded in my robe, but Radi stepped forward and deftly obscured their view with the lantern’s light.
Malton brushed the dust from his golden hair as he addressed the adventurers.
“I understand you’re all disoriented, but proceed in an orderly fashion. We must escape this Cave before it collapses further.”
“”Yes! Understood!””
I led the group through side passages, racing through the crumbling Cave.
As we rescued adventurers we encountered along the way, our numbers swelled considerably.
As we hurried through the Cave, faint light finally began to appear ahead.
“The exit!”
The adventurers cheered and rushed outside, but their cries of joy transformed into screams of horror at what they witnessed on Layer 2.
“W-what is this…!”
“The sky… the sky is tearing apart!!”
As I barely squeezed through the rubble and emerged, the heavens above displayed a hell far worse than the collapsed Cave interior.
A crimson fissure had torn across the previously pristine Sky, and through the gap, dark red demonic energy poured down relentlessly.
The ground trembled as if struck by an earthquake, and distant bestial shrieks echoed across the landscape.
Before us, hundreds of panicked adventurers were tangled together, fleeing in every direction.
By any measure, the situation was utterly abnormal.
「Warning! A dimensional rift is opening!」
「The aura of a great demon is eroding the Surface!」
「Time remaining until demon descent: 54:37:12」
「Current dimensional rift erosion rate: 1%」
“That… surely that can’t be the dimensional rift I’ve only heard rumors about…?”
“No… is a demon really descending…?! If that’s the case, then the cave collapse was all…?”
The survivors who had only now grasped the situation turned ashen and collapsed to the ground.
After hastily returning to human form and surveying my surroundings, I could see even Malton furrowing his brow, while Radi stood frozen with his mouth agape, staring up at the sky.
As if misfortune piled upon misfortune, a blood-soaked Messenger staggered toward us through the crowd of adventurers.
“W-we’re finished… it’s all over…!”
“Hey! What happened! Explain the situation!”
“All the passages leading to Layer 1 are blocked!! We’re completely trapped here!!”
The rockfall had sealed off every escape route.
At the Messenger’s words, the surroundings fell silent as if doused with cold water.
The way back was blocked.
A demon descended from above.
Perfect isolation. A rat in a trap.
We could only wait for destruction to slowly approach.
Despair began filling the eyes of the people around me.
But I clenched my fists and glared up at the rift in the sky.
One promising escape route had been cut off.
Yet there remained one more. A single, final option.
Ding—!
「The Main Quest details have been updated!」
「Quest objective: Activate the portal and escape before the demon descends.」
「Success reward: Survival」
「Failure consequence: Death」
“It’s not over yet.”
“P-pardon…?”
“There is a way out.”
My fingertip pointed toward the Clearing below the rift, where a massive structure stood.
In the center of the desolate Stone Plaza, an incongruous structure woven from cloth and wooden frames stood precariously.
From within the enormous barrier, a surge of mana so powerful it could not be concealed flowed outward.
「This is a trace of the Royal Mages preparing a gate spell!」
「Current portal activation rate: 23%」
Though incomplete, if I gathered materials quickly enough, I could activate the portal and escape before the demon descended.
And here, were there not abundant laborers brimming with the will to survive?
I swept my robes and advanced toward the crowd drowning in despair.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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