Serena and the Mysterious Labyrinth - Chapter 69

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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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69. Shortcut

“This is terrible! The stairs are disappearing!”

The stairs that Hazel had created by borrowing divine power began to slowly disappear from the bottom up. The stairs at higher elevations still remained, but so many sections had already vanished that it was no longer possible to descend the stairs.

‘Well, that settles whether to chase after them or not.’

Whether they liked it or not, they had to enter through the floor door where Seraph and the priests had disappeared. Olive examined the area around the floor door with admiration.

“It was hidden so perfectly, how did they find it?”

How had they discovered a door with such minute cracks that it couldn’t even be seen while standing? Olive stepped on and around the door, then smiled. The sound was very subtly different.

“The prince has good ears too.”

The guide clicked her tongue.

“Earlier, the way he snatched the princess and knight’s bags was no joke either. And he was quick to escape too. Is he really a prince? Yo?”

As she spoke, she pointed to the dazzling treasure chest.

“That chest could only be opened by picking the lock. The prince must have picked that too. His talents are really not very princely~”

Olive had meant to tease the arrogant prince for having talents in unexpected directions. But Serena, who was listening, felt uncomfortable.

How much had Crown Princess Melang suffered when she was caught up in related suspicions before Serena was born? If she hadn’t endured such mental anguish during her pregnancy, her condition might not have worsened.

“He doesn’t really look like the princess either~”

“My purple hair resembles my mother. Seraph actually has the typical appearance one thinks of when considering the Heuji Royal Family. There have been many platinum blondes throughout generations. Richard has platinum hair too. When they’re together, they look like brothers.”

“Is that so? I’ve always thought Duke Oren and Lady Serena looked more like siblings than Lord Seraph… no, that’s not… I was wrong.”

Serena forgave Count Randy’s slip of the tongue with silence.

While not quite to the extent of a married couple resembling each other, Count Randy also made quite a few verbal blunders. Since he knew he was an irreplaceable genius, he hadn’t needed to worry about such things until now.

‘Originally he had an arrogant personality too, but he matured after meeting a good teacher. That must have been the Grand Mage.’

Maturing and making verbal slips were different domains. Count Randy had developed the habit of thinking before speaking in order to become a candidate for Philia’s husband.

As they say, habits formed at three last until eighty – sometimes he still spoke without thinking, but he had improved considerably.

‘Love truly is great.’

“It’s a dead end inside here, so it’ll be really fun if we run into the prince~”

Olive opened the door in the floor. A ladder was visible. Serena barely managed to climb down the ladder with her trembling hands and thighs and legs that shook even more than her hands.

The space they reached after descending the ladder was a stalactite cave. Two large holes were carved toward the cliff side. They were holes they had seen while climbing the stairs.

“There was a space inside here. High Priest Hazel must have looked outside from here to help us.”

But the priests and prince were nowhere to be seen.

“Strange. There’s no path, so where did they go?”

The holes carved in the cliff were too far from the stairs to enter and exit through, and there was no narrow path or bridge. There was nowhere to hide either.

“There’s a sealed door.”

Serena pointed to a faintly glowing door. Olive praised Serena’s keen eye and stood beside the door, waiting.

“Aren’t you going to open it?”

“Hey, the princess should go first. Yo.”

Serena dragged her heavy body and placed her hand on the sealed door. As soon as Serena’s hand touched it, the sealed door opened. The party no longer seemed surprised and entered through the door as if it were natural.

“There’s a teleportation magic circle.”

“Then we can go straight back to the 1st Floor! Yo!”

At the mention of a teleportation magic circle, the entire party brightened up.

“Wow! The princess really is the best. I hate conquering without the princess.”

“Agreed.”

Ying spoke up for the first time in a while. That’s how significant the presence or absence of a teleportation magic circle was.

“Did the prince also move using the magic circle?”

“Well…”

In any case, since Serena and Seraph shared the same bloodline, there was a possibility of descendant benefits.

‘Can Seraph also use the teleportation magic circle?’

If it were possible, he had never been anywhere other than the 3rd Layer, so where exactly had he moved to?

Just as Serena’s questions were growing, Olive, who had been tracking traces of people passing through, discovered something while investigating the hole in the cliff.

“There’s something strange above the hole.”

Above the hole in the cliff, an iron bar that didn’t match the stalactite cave hung horizontally. Since it could be a trap, they moved the party away and Olive touched the iron bar.

Then a bright line of light shot out through the hole. The line of light extended to a peak at a considerably low location.

“I feel like I’ve seen this shape somewhere before.”

If you thought of the line of light as a rope and the iron bar as a handle, it became a zipline. Olive investigated the opposite hole as well. There was an identical iron bar, and a line of light was drawn pointing to a different peak.

“Ah-ha. I wondered how to get out of here without a magic circle, but there was a shortcut.”

To chase after Seraph, they could use the zipline. But the distance and slope were not to be taken lightly.

“Lady Serena. You must be very tired, so it would be better for you to return to the 1st Floor using the magic circle. We’ll chase after Lord Seraph ourselves.”

“I also agree with the count’s opinion. You must be very tired from climbing the stairs, so please rest now.”

“Hng. I don’t want to go down without the princess. But I guess there’s no choice~”

As her companions said, Serena’s stamina, mana, and mental strength had already reached their limits. It was fortunate she hadn’t fallen while climbing down the ladder.

A zipline? It was obvious she would lose her grip on the iron bar and fall like a labyrinth deer.

‘Should I go back here?’

The original goal of discovering the second staircase would naturally be achieved when Olive’s party chased after Seraph, so Serena could return.

But if she was going to leave it to others like this, why had she come down and suffered?

‘I’ll be bedridden for a week.’

Even without foresight, the future was clearly visible. Her body even seemed to foresee future pain, as she felt phantom pains.

“There’s no choice…”

Serena took out the magic map to give to Count Randy. As Serena took out the map, she muttered.

“To think Seraph’s sticky fingers were that bad. I’m glad I kept the map in my bosom…”

“If the magic map had been stolen, I would have immediately followed and retrieved it. Yo.”

Olive spoke confidently, then corrected herself.

“But the prince is pretty fast, so I might not have caught him. Yo. Always store precious items like magic maps in safe places. Promise! Quickly!”

“Yes, I’ll be careful from now on. The 4th Layer is said to be very dark, so having a magic map will be convenient. Here… huh?”

“What’s wrong?”

The magic map first showed an enlarged view of the current location. Serena looked back and forth between the symbols drawn on the magic map and the zipline.

“It’s possible to travel in both directions.”

“What?”

“You mean it’s not one-way from top to bottom, but you can come back?”

Serena wasn’t lying – two arrows were drawn on the map like that. Anyone could see it was a sign indicating two-way traffic was possible.

“You can come back after going down? Yo? But since this is real, it must be true.”

Olive stared intently at the magic map, then folded it and returned it to Serena.

“Ah, I don’t know. I’ll just go first! If I can’t come back, the rest of you follow me down and the princess returns to the 1st Floor!”

Olive winked with one eye and jumped to grab the iron bar. Then the iron bar shot forward at tremendous speed.

“Kyaaaaaaah!”

The wind of the wilderness disappeared, leaving only wind behind. Just as they thought she would arrive instantly at this speed.

“Kyaaaaaaah!”

The distant scream grew closer and Olive returned. With her black hair disheveled, she had flushed cheeks and laughed with her mouth open.

“Crazy. It’s fucking fun.”

As indicated on the magic map, it was a round-trip zipline.

“It was very fast, but were you okay? It looked dangerous.”

“When I grabbed it, my hands felt like they stuck to it, so unless you let go on purpose, you won’t fall. Yo. It’s like magic.”

Olive’s green eyes, which had been sparkling because it was really fun, grew dim.

“It’s this fun and convenient. But it’s useless without the princess. Yeah. That’s right. Without the princess, we’d have to do damn dangerous and boring mountain climbing and rock climbing on narrow paths. That’s right.”

“Miss Olive, the princess’s stamina has already reached its limit.”

“I know that too. So Olive won’t cry!”

While saying she wouldn’t cry, Olive pretended to cry. Serena let out a long sigh. Just from breathing out a bit longer, her spine tingled ominously. It was a sign that muscle pain would hit.

“Let’s just check the stairs and return to the 1st Floor.”

“What? Aren’t we chasing after Lord Seraph?”

“Richard is a Sword Master so he must have gone quite far, and Seraph won’t be able to catch up at his speed. And they say undead appear on the 4th Layer, but with four priests, it should be safe. They also stole my and Ralph’s bags, so they won’t starve completely.”

Their bags contained emergency food, water, and emergency potions in case they got separated from the party. It would be better than having nothing.

Also, she had this thought.

Rather than Serena desperately chasing after him, wouldn’t leaving him alone have a higher survival rate? After seven attempts, Serena had learned a lesson that bordered on resignation.

Her faith in her sibling also played a part.

‘Right now he’s excited and can’t see anything so he’s charging ahead, but when he gets hungry, tired, and dirty, he’ll give up and come back. What could a pampered prince possibly do?’

When he returned to the lobby, he’d spend a week groaning in misery.

While Serena couldn’t move, having the party explore the remaining unseen areas of the 1st and 2nd layers to recover resources would help with future labyrinth conquests.

Trusting Olive’s words about magically securing her hands, Serena reached out and grabbed the metal rod. Her hands really did stick firmly to the rod.

“Aaaaaahhhhh!”

But saying it was fun was a lie! The zipline moving rapidly by magical force rather than gravity was similar to the speed of falling.

She’d already died from falling three times trying to save her sibling, and now she was going to die this way again! Her body, having experienced rapid falls before, braced for the pain to come when strong hands caught the princess.

“Are you alright?”

Ralph, who had gone ahead, caught Serena and set her down on solid ground. Serena steadied herself, putting strength into her legs that were trembling pitifully like a newborn fawn.

The end of the zipline arrival point was a dead end. As she wondered how this could be, Olive shouted to Ralph.

“Go, Sir Knight! Body slam!”

“What?”

Though bewildered, Ralph slowly ran forward and rammed his shoulder into the wall. The wall crumbled, revealing a new passage. Checking the map, it was a path close to the stairs.

“I heard that even if you break labyrinth walls, adjacent rooms don’t appear?”

“Some walls are like that, and some aren’t! Yo!”

Like the elevator on the 2nd layer, you had to figure it out through experience. The broken wall immediately restored itself. Without knowing, it looked like an ordinary wall.

“Since we broke it from that side, now we should be able to break it from this side too. Yo.”

When Ralph tested it by breaking it, it really worked.

Walking toward the stairs, the group encountered the corpse of a massive monster. It was a monster that had killed Seraph before. Even then, they had only found its dead body.

“Wow, that bat is huge!”

“A labyrinth vampire bat. This was probably the stratum boss of this layer.”

The 3rd layer boss monster’s corpse was covered with burn marks and rotted, sunken traces. There were also signs where chunks of flesh had been cut away, as if intended for food.

“Looks like the prince really went this way.”

“Everyone’s quite skilled.”

Ying, who examined the traces left on the corpse, praised the priests’ handiwork. Serena closed her right eye and opened her left, just in case.

The limited coins received for defeating a stratum boss were not awarded.

‘Of course.’

This time there were no party members like Ying who had participated in combat, so it was natural.

The group walked slowly, considering the princess, and reached another staircase leading down to the next floor.

[You have discovered stairs leading to the next floor. 1 Shop coin will be awarded.]

She received 1 coin instead of 5 coins.

‘At least I got something.’

It was better than 0 coins. Currently, Serena had 7 gacha coins and 7 shop coins.

‘Let’s postpone the gacha for now. When we reunite with Seraph, the group will expand significantly. First expand the lobby and…’

While Count Randy gathered materials from the vampire bat’s corpse, Olive and Ralph examined the traces left near the stairs.

“The trail ends at the stairs.”

“Is it alright not to pursue immediately?”

“Hmm~ I think we’re already too late. The prince won’t want to meet us, so even if we go down right away, there’s a high chance the labyrinth will split.”

“Individual labyrinths, you mean? Are you referring to that?”

“That’s right. That thing.”

“Then we won’t be able to meet the prince?”

“If we keep chasing, we’ll meet him eventually.”

While pretending to rest and pondering what to buy from the shop page, a notification window appeared in Serena’s left eye.

‘A notification? There shouldn’t be anything to notify.’

[You have perfectly conquered the 1st floor of Heuji’s Labyrinth. 10 Shop coins will be awarded.]

Serena opened both eyes in surprise, then quickly closed her right eye. The notification content hadn’t changed, and her shop coins had increased by a whopping 10, making it 17 total.

Though she had suddenly become coin-rich, Serena wasn’t happy at all.

The conquest team was on the 3rd layer, but the 1st floor had been perfectly conquered! What on earth did this mean!

‘What happened on the 1st floor!’

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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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