The Archmage’s Destruction Strategy - 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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#069. Anomaly

 

“You went to the harvest site and found nothing there?!”

 

The headquarters of the All-Japan Conqueror’s Association located in Tokyo was housed in a peculiar building nicknamed the ‘Red Castle’ due to its unique exterior.

 

A core facility responsible for integrated management of various information from ‘Adventurer’s Guilds’ established in each region to manage dungeons spread across Japan, arresting and punishing awakened who committed crimes, and overseeing the quantity assessment and distribution of dungeon-produced ingredients harvested from each dungeon’s harvest sites.

 

Surprisingly, the chairman of the Conqueror’s Association, which was evaluated as the core of the Japanese archipelago’s economy after D-day, was a civilian, not an awakened.

 

Takayoshi Hironubu.

 

The man standing at the pinnacle of over 10,000 Japanese awakened was frowning while holding a report.

 

“What are you so surprised about? It must be those illegal harvesters who got to the scheduled harvest sites first again.”

 

The man in armor beside Takayoshi said while lifting up an ice-filled glass of cola.

 

Unlike the civilian Takayoshi, he was an awakened in charge of security, a person with peculiar tendencies who decided to handle security duties for important figures instead of dungeon conquest despite being a ranker in the top tier nationwide.

 

“You don’t know well because you’re not familiar with this, Takayoshi-san, but the civilians hired by adventurers as porters in dungeons plunder harvest sites whenever they get the chance. The adventurers are already turning a blind eye to a certain degree of lawbreaking anyway.”

 

“If it were a level that could simply be described as ‘plundering,’ I wouldn’t be frowning this much either. The problem is the quantity.”

 

Instead of explaining, he handed the report he was holding to the man in armor.

 

Then the man who read the report showed the same expression that Takayoshi had made moments before.

 

“The harvest sites of all dungeons across the country dried up simultaneously?”

 

“To be precise, we should say the generation of new harvests has stopped. The crops that were already growing are being maintained as they were. The problem is the crops in harvest sites that were harvested not long ago. The crops that originally grew on their own without even sowing seeds have suddenly stopped growing.”

 

“Hmm… Is there some reason for this?”

 

“For humanity, dungeons are unknown spaces. Even if there is a reason, there’s no way to find out, and even if there were a method, it would be difficult to discover it immediately. What’s important now is not finding the cause, but somehow managing this anomaly that has begun appearing nationwide.”

 

“You said dungeons are unknown spaces, right? How do you manage it when you can’t even identify the cause?”

 

“Fortunately, as the harvest sites of small and medium dungeons dried up, the harvest yield of Osaka Dungeon has increased.”

 

“The harvest site depletion phenomenon is happening nationwide, but the harvest increase is only occurring in Osaka Dungeon? There are other large dungeons too, aren’t there?”

 

“According to reports, only Osaka Dungeon has shown increased harvest yields.”

 

The man in armor closed his mouth upon hearing that.

 

Then he spoke to Takayoshi with an expression as if pondering something.

 

“Could it be… a trap?”

 

“It could be, or it might not be. Having harvest yields so blatantly concentrated in one direction is practically the same as openly encouraging us to deploy more civilians to Osaka Dungeon.”

 

“Then we should postpone deploying civilians for now.”

 

“No, we need to deploy more.”

 

“But you said it’s likely a trap?”

 

“Even so, we can’t let all those people starve to death.”

 

Takayoshi Hironubu continued speaking.

 

“Recently, with the skyrocketing value of credits, we’ve been able to secure large quantities of disaster supplies held by private capital, but that doesn’t mean the food problem has been completely solved. Moreover, the stockpiled supplies we secured don’t have much leeway in terms of expiration dates. If there’s a means to solve food supply within dungeons, it would be better to resolve supplies with materials harvested from within dungeons whenever possible.”

 

“If too many civilians are active in one dungeon, the possibility of casualties is high. The awakened can’t protect all the numerous civilians operating in that vast space.”

 

“Fortunately, there’s a way to handle that. We can arm the civilians scheduled to be deployed to the dungeon.”

 

“Arm the civilians?”

 

The man looked at Takayoshi with surprised eyes.

 

The fact that conventional weapons possessed by humanity don’t work on monsters that appear from dungeons was information that was now common knowledge.

 

However, Takayoshi spoke to the man with a calm expression as if he had expected such a reaction.

 

“You’re probably thinking, ‘Don’t you know that guns and such don’t work on monsters anyway?'”

 

“I’m glad you’re well aware of that.”

 

“Sorry, but that’s outdated information. Recently, it’s been officially confirmed that firearm attacks suddenly work on low-grade monsters.”

 

“Is that really true?!”

 

“It’s true. For some unknown reason, low-grade monsters that used to deflect all bullets have recently been confirmed through Self-Defense Forces experiments to take damage from bullets, unlike before.”

 

“That’s incredible information. You mentioned low-grade monsters just now – exactly what grade of monsters can be hunted?”

 

“Based on automatic rifles, 3-4 well-trained soldiers can handle up to danger level 3, and it seems one person alone could hunt level 1 monsters.”

 

“What about level 4 and above?”

 

“Level 4 and above monsters still don’t take damage from bullets. However, some anti-tank weapons can apparently damage level 4 and above monsters too.”

 

“Even so, you can’t just hand firearms to civilians without any measures, can you? The conflict between adventurers and civilians is already severe, and we can’t ignore the possibility of accidents occurring within dungeons.”

 

The man was right.

 

In post-D-day Japan, the status of awakened called adventurers was no exaggeration to call a kind of privileged class.

 

While others clutched their starving bellies waiting for their turn in endless ration lines, adventurers were raking in enormous wealth.

 

Sometimes ignoring laws and principles just for being awakened.

 

In such a situation, if firearms were given to civilians, there was a possibility that ‘accidents’ could occur where awakened were killed by armed civilians.

 

The vast dungeon space was essentially a kind of extraterritorial area beyond the reach of law and public authority.

 

“That’s exactly why civilians who can be armed will be limited to a restricted number of people whose identities have been verified. And the insufficient forces will be resolved by deploying Self-Defense Forces personnel and police.”

 

“Then at least up to the 20th floor, harvest work would be possible with only civilians without awakened protection. If we maintain the method of calling awakened to hunt when level 4 and above monsters appear, we could maintain up to the 30th floor with minimal awakened forces.”

 

“That’s right. Discussions with the government side are already complete, and large-scale civilian forces will be deployed to Osaka Dungeon as soon as weapon preparations are finished. Since it’s an operation deploying at least 200,000 people, the amount of food transported to the surface will also increase significantly. Moreover…”

 

Even if the enemy’s purpose was to make them deploy civilians, it didn’t seem like it would be a big problem.

 

Above all, the current Osaka Dungeon was no exaggeration to say it was the dungeon with the most awakened active throughout all of Japan.

 

“Moreover, ‘those people’ are also there in Osaka Dungeon. There’s no need to worry too much.”

 

“Those people… do you mean the ‘Seven of the Eternal Night’?”

 

“That’s right. They’re the strongest adventurer party, more powerful than raid clans by single adventurer party standards, so whatever happens, it won’t be a big problem.”

 

“Certainly. With those people, there would be no problem. They’re evaluated as being capable of breaking through the 100th floor with a single party if only supplies were sufficient.”

 

“Right. So there’s no need to worry too much. Even if some anomaly occurs within Osaka Dungeon, if the numerous adventurers inside and the members of Seven of the Eternal Night join forces, they’ll be able to respond to any situation.”

 

Having said that, Takayoshi picked up a large seal from his desk and stamped it on the documents.

 

It was a cooperation request form asking for a plan to allow 200,000 large-scale civilian entry into Osaka Dungeon, one of Japan’s five major dungeons, for harvest work.

 

***

 

Just because the government deployed 200,000 civilians including Self-Defense Forces and police personnel to the dungeon didn’t mean that influence reached the 70th floor where awakened were concentrated.

 

Of course, among them were those who volunteered for the work of carrying supplies from the base camp on the 65th floor to the next base camp established on the 70th floor, risking danger for greater profit, but the absolute majority of the 200,000 civilians deployed this time were concentrated in the lower layers of the 20th floor and below, where stable harvest work was possible without borrowing the power of awakened.

 

“It’s just a few buildings erected, but it seems like a completely different world.”

 

Nomura Shuuhei, a 25-year-old civilian harvester, was walking toward the base camp on the 30th floor, pulling a folding cart he had received at the dungeon entrance.

 

Behind him, so many crops were loaded that the cart’s durability was concerning, covered with the characteristic dark black soil of dungeon harvest sites.

 

‘I need to quickly deliver this and go back again.’

 

Inside the dungeon operates on a strict performance-based system.

 

That means the more harvest he carries to the base camp, the more rations he can receive on the surface.

 

Nomura, who had stopped at the end of a long waiting line while pulling his cart, pondered for a moment before picking up a radish from the top of his cart.

 

Then he took out a knife from his pocket and began peeling the radish skin with skilled movements.

 

-Scrape, scrape-

 

With sounds that seemed to convey taste just by hearing them, as the white flesh revealed itself from under the radish skin, Nomura opened his mouth and bit the peeled end of the radish.

 

Then he looked around while making crunching chewing sounds.

 

There, like Nomura, countless harvesters were forming a long line, roughly peeling the crops they brought to make do with meals.

 

“Don’t you get in trouble for eating like that?”

 

Then a man who arrived behind Nomura asked.

 

“Well, normally it would be straight to fines without question, but… it should be fine now. Even without bothering to catch people eating in between like this, crops from harvest sites are overflowing.”

 

As he said, the soldiers standing guard with guns weren’t making any particular effort to stop workers from touching the crops.

 

Rather, when there were crops that looked edible raw like sweet potatoes, radishes, carrots, or cabbage, they would ask if they could have one or two.

 

The man who heard Nomura’s words pulled out a soil-covered carrot from the cart he had brought.

 

Then he looked down at the carrot he was holding with a troubled expression without saying anything.

 

“Would you like to borrow my knife?”

 

When Nomura offered his potato knife with a pleasant smile, the man bowed his head.

 

Then, like Nomura, he roughly peeled the carrot skin and began eating the carrot.

 

Like someone who had starved for ten days, the man’s actions were imbued with a strong fear of hunger.

 

“Take your time eating. We have plenty of time.”

 

“It’s because we don’t get to eat such fresh things outside.”

 

Naturally, crops harvested from dungeons aren’t distributed to people as they are.

 

Due to expiration date issues, fresh crops that were recently harvested go into storage, and crops that are half-spoiled or about to spoil are distributed first.

 

Therefore, being able to eat fresh crops immediately after harvest was one of the few privileges that harvesters active in dungeons could enjoy.

 

Though there was the risk of losing one’s life in the process.

 

Nomura wasn’t particularly worried about that fact.

 

‘Of course, I would have been scared before, but now it’s different. With so many adventurers around, what kind of accident could happen?’

 

The Wakayama Dungeon where he had been active before coming to Osaka was a small dungeon with fewer than 100 active personnel.

 

A poor dungeon where reaching the harvest site and collecting harvests from the harvest site could barely be done with the help of Awakened.

 

Nevertheless, the reason he endlessly threw himself into the dungeon was because of his sense of responsibility that if he didn’t harvest, all the people in his village might starve to death.

 

‘But This Place is different. Here there are armed soldiers with guns, and there are adventurers too.’

 

Humans are animals of adaptation.

 

Nomura, who until just recently had never let his guard down with each step he took in the dark dungeon, poured out the crops he had harvested at the Collection Site with the heart of a farmer walking from the village entrance to the fields.

 

Then he began humming and moving toward the Harvest Site once again.

 

Toward the unknown Harvest Site where he had heard from other harvesters who entered the dungeon with him that sweet potatoes as big as forearms could be found.

 

‘In this kind of atmosphere, they probably wouldn’t say anything if I pocketed a few sweet potatoes, right? When I go back up to the Surface this time, I might be able to eat roasted sweet potatoes for the first time in a while.’

 

At that moment, Nomura’s footsteps, which had been moving toward the Harvest Site in an extremely pleasant mood, began to slowly slow down.

 

Due to a subtle unpleasant feeling that even Nomura himself would find difficult to explain.

 

A smell that awakened his senses, cutting through the heavy air characteristic of dungeons where air circulation was poor.

 

The smell of death rising ominously as the organs and secretions of humans torn apart alive mixed with the thick smell of blood.

 

It was a smell that Nomura knew all too well.

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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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