Serena and the Mysterious Labyrinth - Chapter 53

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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53. Encounter (1)

As Serena was rinsing her foot that had stepped in dung in the water pooled on the floor, Ying must have crossed the bridge, as the party that had been outside entered the cave.

“Shh.”

Olive signaled for quiet and pointed to the bats hanging from the ceiling. Ying glanced at the ceiling and drew her bow to shoot a bat.

“Zero! Signal before you catch it!”

Shooting one bat with one arrow was fine, but as the giant bat crashed down, Olive who was below nearly got crushed.

At Olive’s protest, Ying tilted her head.

“Can’t you dodge?”

“I can dodge! Everyone can dodge, but if you tell us before shooting, we could have dodged in advance!”

While Olive and Ying bickered over a similar topic as before, Serena examined the labyrinth bat that had died a violent death along with Count Randy and Ralph.

What kind of bat was as tall as Grey who would be waiting in the lobby?

“It’s enormous. Do all animals grow large in the labyrinth?”

“Instead of having special abilities, they increase their size to boost attack power.”

The labyrinth bat was as tall as a small child and even larger when it spread its wings.

Both the labyrinth condors gliding outside the cave and the labyrinth bats inside the cave were large enough to grab an adult and drop them.

“Hmm.”

Count Randy seemed to think the giant bat’s wing membrane was useful, so he called Olive and Ying.

“I’ll process the body, so please remove the wings.”

“Wouldn’t it be done instantly if we put it on the scale? Right?”

“There’s plenty of meat so it’s fine if the quantity decreases a bit, but it would be a waste if the wings disappeared.”

It was just light work of cutting the wings from the body, so why bother making a deal with a god and paying transaction fees?

At the alchemist’s rational explanation, Olive picked up her knife without complaint. Ying joined in to retrieve her arrow as well, so it was finished quickly.

Count Randy placed the wingless bat body and fairy tale on the scale to obtain processed leather, meat, bones, and some organs.

The processed bat meat looked like ordinary meat, but Serena felt somehow reluctant. It wasn’t that she was being picky just because it had wings after having eaten rats.

‘Is it okay to eat bat meat?’

As far as Serena knew, the source of the pandemic that struck the world in her previous life was bats. Of course, this was a labyrinth in a different world, so there was a high probability there was no such disease, but having suffered from that illness before, she felt uneasy.

The grandmother she had placed in a nursing home complained about not getting visits, and Serena herself had no one to care for her when she was sick, which was so heartbreaking.

She even had aftereffects that made her sense of taste worse than before getting the pandemic. The sadness when she bought Korean beef with great determination to celebrate her recovery, only to find it tasteless and dry. You can never know unless you’ve experienced it.

Just like poverty, you can never truly understand unless you’re the one going through it.

‘I guess there’s no choice since there’s nothing else to eat.’

With more people, there were more mouths to feed. Protein was as important a nutrient as carbohydrates, and among Serena’s party were growing teenagers and children. They absolutely needed to eat protein for growth.

‘It would be nice if we could catch a condor.’

Fortunately, there was one more monster on the 3rd Layer that looked more delicious(?) than bats. Serena hoped that the next labyrinth condor to die would crash to the ground rather than in mid-air.

“Alright, we’re done so let’s go find the path, shh!”

The guide who had finished processing the bat and was about to look for the next path to take lowered her stance and signaled. The party tensed and followed the guide’s signal.

‘What is it?’

As Serena breathed slowly and quietly, the sound that the guide had detected first reached her ears.

Aaaahhh!

It echoed from far away and was very faint, but it was a human scream. Serena’s remaining eye widened. The others also opened their eyes wide like Serena and concentrated on listening.

Even after waiting several minutes, the scream didn’t come again. Olive, who had been concentrating with a serious expression, shook her head.

“Doesn’t seem to be heard anymore. Let’s go our way.”

“That sound just now… was a human scream. That’s how it sounded to me.”

“I heard it that way too. Someone cried out ‘Ahhh!'”

“It sounded that way to me too…”

Everyone agreed it sounded like a human scream.

“Could there be other people on this floor?”

“Olive, Ying, isn’t it that the labyrinth overlapped like with the Count and Gray Young Master? We need to rescue them quickly.”

Ralph said innocently. The young knight had seen as many as four people’s labyrinths overlap after falling into the labyrinth, so he didn’t have any particular suspicions.

“It’s too early to conclude it’s human. It could be a monster that mimics human voices.”

“The Count is right. Harpies scream like women. Right.”

“It could be a monster.”

Ralph hung his head as if embarrassed for concluding it was human without thinking deeply.

“There’s also a possibility it’s human as Sir Ralph said, so don’t be embarrassed. However…”

Count Randy stroked his chin as if he had much to think about.

“What’s wrong?”

“Labyrinths overlapping with each other is not a commonly seen phenomenon in labyrinths. Since Lady Serena entered the labyrinth, labyrinths have overlapped more than twice already. I don’t understand how this is happening.”

“Right. It’s strange. Right.”

Following Count Randy, Olive also said it was strange. Ying nodded in agreement.

“To meet other people in a labyrinth, it has to be pure coincidence, or you have related magical tools, or you have tremendous connection with each other, or if not that, you need some poison-filled desire like ‘I’ll kill other parties in this labyrinth and take everything for myself~’. That’s what it takes. But here.”

Olive looked around at the party members.

“Zero and I were together when we fell together, so that’s understandable. Meeting the Princess was coincidence, let’s say. The Count met because he has the Countess. But this doesn’t happen this frequently. Right, Zero?”

“Exclude our meeting with the Princess. The darkness guided us.”

“Sorry. I shouldn’t have asked.”

Olive apologized for asking Ying with a serious face.

“I’m so happy the Princess is here, I feel secure with the knight here, and I’m damn excited to meet a precious alchemist, you know? But meeting someone else here again? Isn’t that a bit strange?”

“As the guide says. It’s very strange.”

“I don’t really know, but didn’t we meet because the Princess wanted it? It’s not strange.”

Serena’s addition of party members through draws seemed like a strange phenomenon to the labyrinth expert and intellectual. Ralph firmly believed that Serena had summoned the people.

‘I can’t tell them I drew you all. And with 100,000 people swallowed by this labyrinth, we could encounter them while exploring.’

From Serena’s perspective, knowing that 100,000 people were trapped in the labyrinth, it seemed natural to encounter people frequently.

When she died and saw it, the tower was so packed with people it seemed ready to burst, and even if each had their own labyrinth, there had to be limits.

‘I can’t say this either.’

Serena combined her limited labyrinth knowledge to make excuses.

“There’s nothing particularly strange about it. Doesn’t the labyrinth reflect desires? Olive and Ying. Before meeting you two, I desperately wanted to meet an expert knowledgeable about labyrinths. Weren’t you also looking for solutions when you lacked equipment and food?”

Serena spoke calmly while shrugging her shoulders. Her trapezius muscles were stiffly hardened and hurt terribly.

“As for Count Randy, Philia worried and thought about him constantly, so we met at the perfect time. Since Grey is the Count’s nephew, blood relations must have drawn them together. Moreover, think about when we met Grey. You were all poisoned and on the brink of death. The antidote Grey happened to have saved you all.”

Now that she said it, it sounded plausible. The party members who heard Serena’s words seemed convinced and nodded slightly.

“Even so, it’s too frequent.”

They say when you know much, you worry much. Since Count Randy couldn’t shake his worries, Serena spoke indirectly so only the Count would understand.

“It could be that we meet frequently because many people were swallowed by the labyrinth.”

“The earthquake was big. Right. Since people flocked for the festival, quite a lot must have been swallowed~”

“That’s certainly true. I forgot the prerequisite conditions.”

Usually, even if many people entered a labyrinth, it would be just a few parties or a few units of soldiers at most. If half of Heuji City was swallowed, there were that many people swallowed, and the probability of encounters could change.

“If it’s people, we’ll rescue them, and if it’s a monster mimicking human voices, we’ll just deal with it. We can think about it while walking, so let’s get going.”

“Yes~”

Olive took the lead on the path she had scouted earlier.

“The path is damn complicated. Right! Princess, keep checking the map frequently, be careful not to fall behind the party, be careful not to slip on the slippery floor! Everyone look after the person in front, behind, and beside you! Prom! Ise!”

***

The stalactite cave was more massive than it looked from outside and the paths were complex. Natural structures didn’t need to consider users, so they were hard to understand at a glance, wasteful of space and movement, and difficult to walk through.

“This is a dud.”

The first exit they chose led outside but was a dead-end chasm. Olive turned around to guide the party to the next path, then stopped and leaned her upper body out over the chasm.

“It’s dangerous!”

Ralph, startled by Olive’s sudden action, grabbed the guide. When Ralph caught her, Olive gave up on maintaining balance and leaned her body further out.

“Olive!”

“Shh.”

This time it was Ying who told them to be quiet. Ying leaned her upper body out less than Olive.

By now it was possible to guess why they were doing this. Serena breathed softly and kept silent.

Ahhhhh! Ahhh!

A human scream could be heard from far away. Judging by the similar tone, it was the same person screaming.

“Ah~ I can’t tell the direction. Zero?”

Ying shook her head. Olive leaned on Ralph and slowly entered the cave.

“I can’t pinpoint the direction because of the echo. But it sounds like the same person as before. You know.”

“I think so too.”

“Whoever it is really has good lungs~”

“If they’re running around, we need to rescue them quickly.”

“I want to do that too, but we don’t even know the direction, you know? Or we might already be too late to save them~”

“Why is that?”

“Harpies hang or impale their prey up high. They might be hanging there screaming for help.”

“Or it could really be a harpy crying~”

“If it were a harpy, wouldn’t it sound like a woman’s scream? To me it sounded more like a man’s voice than a woman’s.”

“I think so too.”

“Really? It sounded like a woman’s scream to me.”

Just from the screams alone, the gender was ambiguous and uncertain.

“It seems to be getting closer little by little. We can only hope they don’t die before then.”

Since there was nothing else they could do, everyone agreed with the Princess’s words.

***

The next direction Olive led them was also a dead end. A thousand-foot chasm that made one dizzy just looking down and weakened the legs greeted the party.

“Ugh, there. If we could jump over there, it would be really convenient.”

Olive gritted her teeth looking at the cliff and cave on the other side.

“This place seems far from the boss monster so it should be okay. If we ask the Count to make a grappling hook and throw it… the Princess probably can’t cross, right?”

Serena firmly shut her mouth and resolutely shook her head. Olive looked disappointed as she kept measuring the distance and pouted her lips.

While moving to the next exit, Olive asked the party.

“If it’s a person and not a monster, there’s a higher chance of meeting someone you know rather than a complete stranger, right? Does anyone come to mind?”

The young knight walking right behind the guide answered Olive’s question.

“All my family and friends are in Kizen, so they probably wouldn’t be in the labyrinth. Um… my brother’s colleagues?”

“Guards are good~ What about you, Count?”

“I’ve already met my wife and Lady Serena, so there’s no one else.”

Count Randy, who was about to say he was satisfied having met Philia and Serena, quickly continued.

“It would be good to see His Highness the 5th Prince so Grey won’t worry. Or at least some Imperial Knights to entrust with escort duties.”

“I don’t know about the Prince, but additional knights would be good! Zero… like me, came here for fun and has no connections in Heuji, so there’s no one related to him! You’d think it would be good if capable, skilled fellow professionals like us appeared, right?”

“I am darkness.”

“Right! Zero wants skilled fellow professionals! Got it!”

Olive arbitrarily cut off Ying’s words. Ying didn’t seem particularly displeased and closed her mouth.

“What about you, Princess? You know the most people!”

Currently, Serena was the only person in the party who was born and raised in Heujihen. The rest were all outsiders or foreigners with no connections in Heuji.

Serena was different. Born and raised in the very center of Heujihen, she had never left the city.

After the tragedy of Heuji, family outings and trips became taboo, so she grew up like a hothouse flower within Heujihen, like a pet bird in a golden cage.

Naturally, everyone Serena knew was in Heujihen and the royal palace. If by chance the labyrinth overlapped with another person, there was a high probability it would be someone connected to Serena.

“Who would you like, Princess?”

Who would be good to meet next? Since she could draw necessary people through summoning, Serena mentioned someone unnecessary but with strong ties who had a high probability of meeting.

“It would be good if it were my younger brother.”

She was curious whether he was alive or dead. Or whether he had killed or been killed. But she didn’t need him.

‘He’ll probably be 0-star like Grey anyway.’

A gambling-addicted prince who was 2nd in line for the throne and raised more preciously than Serena? He’d be useless until reaching the final floor of the labyrinth.

“Lady Serena…”

Count Randy, who knew about the incident at the royal palace just before being consumed by the labyrinth, worried about Serena.

“If it’s your younger brother, that would be a prince, right? Blood relations have high probability?”

Olive, who didn’t know about the incident, spoke cheerfully and then brought up her own story.

“As for who I’d like~ hmm, I wish an Olive-eyed Sword Master would appear and sweep everything away. Swoosh swoosh~”

Ahhh!

As if responding to Olive’s wish, a scream was heard from afar. The direction was still completely unclear.

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