Chapter 80: You’re better off pretending not to notice that kind of thing

“Oh? A dead end?”

“No, there’s a door there. But…”

We just made it through a long corridor in the second floor of the dungeon.

What waited for us at the end of it was a massive double door.

“Can it be the boss room?”

“Huh? We’re already at the deepest part of this dungeon?”

In every dungeon, without exception, there would always be a monster called a boss monster.

Compared to normal monsters, a boss monster was far stronger. So much so that they posed a threat even to those who have somehow explored the dungeon effortlessly thus far.

I always thought that dungeons were made up of many, many floors. But for the boss monster to be here, maybe dungeons are smaller than what I expected them to be.

“Although there’s only two floors, these two floors are quite complicated. If we explored it normally, we might still be in the first floor, maybe even going in circles. It’s not an exaggeration to say that it’s thanks to Kamuru-dono’s guidance that we’ve made this far so quickly.”

“T-there’s no way…”

To Philia-san’s praise, Kamuru-san scratched his head, shyly trying to deny it.

As expected, the [Labyrinth Exploration] Gift was truly useful.

“So, what do you propose we do, Luke-dono? As far as I can tell, everyone still has strength to spare, but it is a fight with a boss monster we’re talking about.”

“Hmm…how about we go in just to look at what kind of monster we’re up against? If it looks to be too tough for us, let’s escape right away.”

Thanks to my Gift, buying us enough time to escape shouldn’t be that hard.

And so, we decided to open the doors. Inside was a space wider than any we’ve seen within the dungeon. In addition…

“Two minotaurs…?”

In the center of the room were two minotaurs.

They didn’t seem any different from the ones we’ve encountered before.

“Be careful. They might look normal, but they’re boss monsters. It’s possible that they’re of a higher-ranking species, or that they have some special power.”

As soon as Philia-san said that, the two minotaurs began moving.

““Bumooooooooo!!””

The two monsters let out their war cries and then charged toward us.

Noel-kun and Goate-san immediately readied their shields.

However, considering what Philia-san said about these minotaurs, I thought they might be too much for at least Goate-san.

And so, I built a stone wall in front of the enemis. The minotaurs couldn’t stop or avoid in time, so they crashed right into the wall.

Immediately after, I made a golem that was larger than the minotaurs. The minotaurs staggered a little when they crashed into the walls, and they staggered a lot more when I made the golems collide with them. That made enough of an opening for the golem to grab them by the throats and then slam them into the ground.

““!?””

Both of them seemed to have fainted. Even when the golem let go of them, neither of them showed any signs of getting back up.

“…huh? Are they not any different from ordinary minotaurs after all?”

“Apparently, yeah.”

Philia-san said so with an astounded expression.

“…even without my help…the chief’s fine…”

“Oh, Noel…you’re better off pretending not to notice that kind of thing…”

Goate-san wrapped an arm around the shoulders of a sad-looking Noel-kun. While they were like that, Goate-san shook his own head left and right.

“We’ve more or less defeated the boss monster, I suppose?”

“Over there…”

Selen sounded so uncertain when she said so.

Meanwhile, Kamuru-san pointed at something he noticed further in the room

When I looked at it, I saw some kind of extravagant box.

Philia-san spoke next.

“It’s a treasure chest. Likely the reward for overcoming the dungeon.”

“There doesn’t seem to be any traps in it.”

Both Marco-san and Kamuru-san said they didn’t sense any traps from the chest, so we immediately opened it.

“It’s…”

“An ordinary sword…?”

Inside the chest was a very ordinary steel sword.

“Eh? Maybe it’s a sword that has some kind of special effect.”

“Doesn’t seem like it though…”

This reward for completing the dungeon felt extremely cheap.

Mythical-grade items would obviously be preferred, but I thought that the reward should at least be legendary-grade items.

“Oh well, at least it’s sharp. Let’s just take it, I guess.”

“Hold on. This clearly isn’t a suitable reward for completing the dungeon. I think we should negotiate with the dungeon master.”

“Negotiate…?”