The SSR Spearman (Doesn’t) Hide His One-Shot Damage - Chapter 22

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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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Chapter 22

“Ah, I see.”

I answered calmly, then looked once more at the right-hand path, which radiated a light as dazzling as heaven itself.
…It’s definitely suspicious.

‘The Labyrinth would never let us out this easily.’

I made up my mind.
For now, I’ll wait and watch what happens here.

“Everyone, stop! It’s not too late to go in once we’ve checked it’s safe!”

I spun around and shouted at the party right away.
Just moments ago, the crossroads had been bustling, but now it felt strangely bare.

“Where did everyone go?”
“The Imperial soldiers? Their bodies were mutating by the second, so I suppose they bolted in a hurry.”
“….”
“That leaves only us and the three Imperial Knights over there.”

Ailin set Achilles down on the floor with a thud, the boy she’d been carrying on her shoulder the whole time, then jerked her chin toward the three Imperial Knights behind her.
With a soft *shff*, her eyeballs rolled sideways, the whites glinting.

“Including that one who’s been so unusually chummy with you.”
“….”

Just as Ailin had said, James was crouching in front of the crossroads.

“James, what’s wrong with you? The exit is right in front of us!”
“Uuu… uuuuuu…”
“Sir James! We can finally return to the surface! Why are you being so stubborn?!”

Because James, who had lost his mind, refused to budge from where he stood, the rest of the knights seemed to be stuck in place as well.
Thanks to that, three Imperial Knights ended up staying behind with us.

‘He’s completely lost it…’

I was watching James, who was frantically tearing at his own hair and muttering nonstop, when it happened.

“Setanta! Over here! There’s something carved into the wall!”
“Hm?”

Rian was pressed flat against the wall of the crossroads, eyes sparkling.

“There’s a carving of a scale tilted to the left!”
“Let’s have a look.”

I stepped closer to check, and sure enough, a scale emblem was carved into the wall.
Heavily weighted toward the gloomy, blood-red left path, an asymmetrical scale emblem.

‘…Wait. Just now, a horde of Imperial soldiers rushed down the right-hand path, didn’t they?’

Wait, could this be…
Some kind of mechanic where you offer up a sacrifice to restore balance?

“Perhaps, Setanta, this is…”
“……!”

Wooooong-.

In that instant.
Darkness suddenly settled over the right-hand path, the one that had been bathed in bright light.
As if it had never been bright at all.
A darkness so cloying it clung to everything.

Squelch!

Then thick, crimson liquid began seeping out from beneath the stone floor of the path.

[……has returned to the embrace of the Goddess.]
[……has returned to the embrace of the Goddess.]

In the hush before the fork, where a sinister darkness had settled, red fluid kept soaking into the stone floor without pause.
From the place I had once thought was our escape route, it kept coming, and coming.
As though wringing the juice out of everyone who had gone in.

“Huh? Wh-whoa……?”
“W-wait a moment……! What just—”
“Aaah……, aaaaaaah……!”

The three Imperial Knights, faced with that sight, could not hide their horror.
And then, right after—.

……Click!

“Setanta-nim, the scale……!”

The scale carving on the wall had changed.
As if its balance had been struck.
Level, tilting neither way.

[Because a hidden condition has been met, the fastest route to the Boss Stage opens!]

* * *

‘A gimmick where you offer up a sacrifice to level the scale, huh.’

I’ve been playing this game for years, and I’ve never heard of anything like that…….

Glance.
I stole a sidelong look at Hecate.
And once again, this one pulled off something big.

‘Is she strong because she’s a Hidden Route limited character?’

Looking at it again, that ‘Doom Detection’ ability alone makes her a guide on par with a Tier 0.
She was clearly the top-priority Hero to recruit if we wanted to reach the Hidden Route ending.

“Let’s take a short break.”

I suggested a rest to the party.
Once we got through this passage, it would be straight into the boss fight.
We could rest, get our gear in order, and use the downtime to work on the New Character’s Trust Level.

‘While I’m at it, I should look after the party’s mental health so no Status Ailments pop up.’

To take down the boss without any major complications, the heroes’ mental care is what matters.
What if someone loses it, like James over there?
They might do something reckless at any moment and put the whole party in danger.

“It’s a curse from those Ailand bastards…”

[The target hero is under extreme stress.]

“This is all because of your filthy race’s original sin!”

James was propped against the far wall with the two surviving knights beside him.
Apparently he had the fragile nerves of a glass heart, because he still didn’t seem quite himself.

“H-hey, James… Provoking them right now won’t do us any good!”
“Mmph, mmmph!”
“D-don’t you understand? Our lives are in their hands now.”

Thankfully, the Blue Cloaks beside me had enough sense to read the room.
They quietly hushed James and shot sidelong glances at me, gauging my reaction.

‘As for our side…’

Rian was still pale, but his mind seemed clear enough; his eyes were steady as he sank into thought.
Ailin had dumped Achilles carelessly onto the cold stone floor and was now trying to calm Hecate, who was trembling.

“Hic…”

Hecate looked miserable, as if she’d been hyperventilating for a while now.

‘…Is she a glass heart too?’

Had this world’s god given the New Characters absurdly powerful abilities and simply forgotten to include sturdy nerves?
I narrowed my eyes and watched, and that was when it happened.

[TIP – If stressful situations persist, heroes may occasionally act out unpredictably.]

Grab!

Hecate suddenly shot out a hand, yanked Ailin’s head toward her,

“…?!”

and began stroking Ailin’s hair indiscriminately.
Just like someone petting an animal’s fur.

“H-hey. What on earth are you doing all of a sudden…?”
“This dazzling platinum color… It’s exactly like our Jorangi’s mane…”
“What are you even—”
“Sob, sob, I got tangled up with some lunatic. What a nightmare this is…”

Perhaps because her hair was being mauled like a dog’s, Ailin’s face went blank for a moment, as though something in her had short-circuited.

“…If it keeps her steady, go right ahead.”

Before long she squeezed her eyes shut and seemed to resign herself to enduring it.

[TIP – Heroes with whom you’ve built rapport in advance will be easier to recruit later.]

Ding!
And just then, a tip message popped up.

‘Wait, could this be the Trust Event moment?’

If so, I can’t let this opportunity slip away.
Comfort someone who’s wallowing in despair, and their heart opens up on its own!

I smoothed my clothes neatly and rose from my seat.
The top button that had popped off and vanished earlier when my chest muscles pushed it away—I decided to pass it off as a fashion statement and leave it at that.

‘Alright, let’s get to work on building that Trust Level.’

I immediately moved to Hecate’s side and spoke to her.

“Hecate, I’m sorry about before.”
“…Hm?”
“Once we’re back on the surface, I’ll be sure to compensate you for the horse. Don’t you worry about it.”
“….”
“And to your late horse friend as well, please accept my deepest apologies…”

But there was one serious problem.

‘Ugh, now that I actually try to get close to her, I have no idea what to say.’

A shocking truth.
Unlike in the game, communicating with real people doesn’t come with multiple-choice options!

“Um, is it because he’s a pony that you named him Jorangi?”
“….”
“Maybe it’s because he’s such a small build, but when the three of us rode him, he really wobbled.”

In the game, it was easy since I just had to memorize the choices.
Trying to build Trust with a living, breathing person is so, so hard.
I-I have to say something, anything, at least-

“You wretched bastard.”
“Huh?”

[Hecate’s Trust Level toward you has slightly decreased.]

Wretched…?
What did she just say?

“Jorangi’s enemy!”

[Hecate’s Trust Level toward you has drastically decreased!]

Hecate’s deep-blue eyes, dark as the night sea, turned toward me.
Strangely, her right eye shone brighter than the left, filled with a burning, resentful glare…

“Ha-ha… I’ll come back another time.”

If I dug my own grave any deeper with her here, there’d be no coming back from it.
I forced an awkward smile and backed away.

‘In the game, I was loved by everyone, but in real life I have zero social skills?’

Faced with this painful reality, my heart felt as though it had been pummeled by a keyboard…

‘A Trust Event without the bonus of a triple pull or Trust Inheritance is harder than clearing a Labyrinth.’

Recruitment difficulty naturally scales with performance.
It’s a pity, but we decided to put off recruiting the new character for another day.

‘Still, the proxy trust act using our fixed party member succeeded.’

Thankfully, Ailin and Hecate seemed to have grown unexpectedly close.
Perhaps it’s because she’s the only female Hero among those stranded in the Labyrinth.

“…Have you calmed down a bit?”
“Waaah.”
“Now, let go of me.”

[Hecate’s mental state has stabilized.]

At last, along with Ailin’s thoroughly tousled hair.
The mental care for the party and the proxy trust work were both complete.

“Let’s get moving. Let’s finish this quickly and everyone can head back to the surface.”

Before setting off, I quietly checked the party’s condition.
Aside from James, whose eyes were still glassy and vacant, the rest looked reasonably fine.

‘Ailin… still wearing that face of excessive calm, I see.’

I couldn’t say why, but even though her condition had improved, I felt uneasy about it.
Setting those minor doubts aside, we decided to head toward the Boss Room.

* * *

At last, we arrived at the Boss Room’s door in the Labyrinth.
A stone gate far larger than anything before greeted us.

“Setanta, over here! There’s more writing carved into the stone gate!”

Rian studied the stone gate, eyes gleaming.

“Another ominous inscription! It even looks a bit like my handwriting, which makes it all the more chilling!”
“Hmm…”

The inscription on the gate read as follows.

「This world has repeated itself countless times until now.」
「The place where you now stand is the final world that will never repeat again.」

‘…Is it a metaphor for a roguelike game, where death means the end?’

The Hero had clearly come after me with memories from the previous run.
As though this world had simply rewound itself.

Death and a fresh start, then…

‘Could it be those playthroughs where I kept restarting after every Game Over?’

…Ha, no way, right?
I was mulling over the words carved into the Boss Room’s stone gate with a dull gaze when it happened.

“Setanta, seeing this inscription reminded me of something, so…”
“Hm?”
“This is a story I heard back when I was at the Magic Tower…”

Rian suddenly opened his mouth.
A sudden glint of interest flickered in the gray eyes of the boy.

“Long, long ago. Have you ever heard the tale that the Great Mage cast Guardian Magic upon this world?”
“…?”

The Great Mage?

“The Magic Tower even holds a festival every year to commemorate his birthday–”
“Well, I more or less know about him.”

The Great Mage of the Empire.
I remembered him because he occasionally came up in dialogue and records in the original game.
Wasn’t he one of the founding heroes who established the Empire a thousand years ago?

‘Was he a grandpa or a grandma? He had a rather over-the-top character setup.’

Most of the magic used in the main story of the original game was built on the theoretical foundation this man designed.
A truly peerless genius of a mage.
He supposedly enjoyed every sort of wealth and honor and lived past a hundred before he passed.

Even right before his death, he reportedly split his own soul apart, using it as a medium to install a massive magic circle before he left.
So that the world would endure for a thousand years, or ten thousand.
Declaring that he would serve as this world’s guardian for all eternity.

‘A genius who enjoyed wealth and glory, then the ending is a sacrifice. Classic.’

The ending was rather abrupt, so personally, it’s not a setting I particularly like.
Still, what that Guardian Magic he supposedly cast at the end actually was never came out, not even in the main story…

“What kind of Guardian Magic did he cast for this world to be preserved forever?”
“Ah, that hasn’t been revealed yet, but… ahem! In some circles…”

At my question, Rian hesitated in a very obvious way before continuing.

“There’s a conjecture that it’s a sort of Time Magic, one that automatically turns back the world’s clock whenever it faces an extinction crisis it cannot possibly overcome…”
“Wait, time… turns back?”

Wait, what did he just say?
My heart sank with a jolt.

A large-scale Guardian Magic where time resets every time the world faces ruin?
This is like…
Isn’t this just the rule of a roguelike game, where a Game Over sends you back to the very beginning?

“What kind of hypothesis is it? I’d like to know the details more precisely.”

When I pressed him, Lian twisted his body with an oddly embarrassed air.
He even cleared his throat, “Ahem! Ahem!”, stalling for time.
What’s this guy doing now?

“Actually, this was a hypothesis I put forward back when I was at the Magic Tower…”
“…Huh?”
“But nobody paid it any attention, so in the end it was simply buried.”

Lian was silent for a moment.
Then, his eyes growing misty, he gazed into the distance and said,

“It was a paper I felt really confident about.”
“…?”
“After that, I suppose Professor lost faith in me too, because he stopped giving me red bean tea….”
“Red bean tea…?”
“Yes. The professor only served red bean tea to students he recognized as outstanding and excellent….”
“….”

This bastard.
Was he a depraved graduate student?!

‘…But that’s not what matters.’

The matter of the Great Mage’s Guardian Magic was a setting left unresolved even in the main story.
The truth revealed through the Hidden Route, and the worldbuilding details I had never known…
A hunch told me that the clue to returning to my original world might be right here.

“So the Great Mage cast a Time Magic that has lasted a thousand years? Using his own soul as the medium?”
“That’s right. You understand quickly, Setanta!”
“So that every time a crisis arrives, time turns back to before the destruction?”
“Yes! That’s exactly what I argued! Though no one ever believed me…!”

Thwack!
Rian slapped his palm down hard on the inscription of the Stone Gate in the Boss Room.

“But right here! Looking at this inscription on the Stone Gate, I was certain! That I had been right!”

His eyes grew wistful again as he stared into the distance.

“Ha, Professor. I was never wrong…. That bastard Alex, the red bean tea gift set that went to him should have been mine.”
“I’ll buy you red bean tea later, so just keep explaining!”

I shook the shoulders of the guy whose mind was completely elsewhere, forcing him to focus on me again.

“Ugh, uhhh…. S-Setanta, stop….”
“Enough with the red bean tea! Keep going with what you know!”
“Uuugh….”

Perhaps the shaking had left him dizzy,
Rian pushed his ash-gray hair back with trembling fingers and spoke.

“S-so. The Great Mage, just before dying, shattered his own soul into pieces and sealed them throughout the world….”
“Where?”
“So that the Guardian Magic could never be lifted, so no one could steal them… inside ancient ruins in the form of dungeons.”
“No way.”
“Yes. I suspect this Labyrinth that swallowed us… was the very place where the Great Mage’s soul was sealed.”

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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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