The Labyrinth Raids of the Ultimate Tank

Chapter 31: Power Of the Guardian

Translator: “Pink Tea” Editor: ”Ryunakama”

「Yo! Welcome, Rude. Now. To enter my room, you have to fight me. What will you do?」

「……Can I just leave the materials and go home?」

「No way! Don’t say such a sad thing…… Okay, today, I shall let you enter the halls governed by me.」

……Room where a guardian lives?

That has to be the innermost part of the labyrinth.

I’m about to step my foot into an area that probably no one visited before.

It’s a bit exciting. This might be childish, but I can’t help but be a little nervous.

He grasped my hand, the next moment I felt faint dizziness and immediately found myself in another location.

The scenery changed.

This room is hardly different from the one where I live.

Or rather, isn’t this actually my room?

The only thing different was an unfamiliar puddle of water.

Surrounded by stones, it reminded me of a small pond.

「I don’t quite understand what this place is myself, but it seems to reflect my thoughts. In other words, I can alter it at will. Previously, it looked like this.」

The moment he said that the room changed to something dreary.

Only the pond remained, everything else disappeared.

The room made of grey stone looked like a prison cell.

The guardian clapped his hands, and the room returned to its previous look.

「……I see.」

「Unfortunately, I had no memories. I didn’t have a room I could use as a reference, so I just left it as it is, but then, I saw your home. That’s nice, it’s amazing. I’d like you to properly show it to me some other day.」

「I don’t mind, but please disguise yourself, so you won’t surprise anyone.」

If adventurers see him, I won’t be able to make any excuses……

「Yes, sure. So, since you came here today, I guess it means that you brought what we discussed?」

As his eyes were sparkling, I handed him the rucksack that I had borrowed in the town.

Snatching it from my hands, he hastily pulled out the materials from the rucksack.

Holding them over his head, he looks at them with shining eyes.

「I see, magic ore and herbs…… And also monster parts and magic stones. Yes, I can work with this.」

「……Can I observe it for a bit?」

I’m curious, just how exactly labyrinths are being made.

「Sure, why not. Then, behold.」

The guardian puffed his chest with pride.

What a childish guy.

Walking up to the pond, he touched it with his hand.

Then, what previously appeared like plain water, instantly changed.

Something is being shown there.

The first floor is written there.

「Is that the map of the labyrinth?」

「Exactly. For example, if I do this……」

The map had info on monsters, the state of trees, and other things.

The guardian put his finger on one such tree and moved it to another place.

Then, he touched the terrain.

And erasing a part of the first floor, that previously looked almost like a square, he changed the map.

「The labyrinth changes according to this map. So the first floor now turned to such an interesting shape.」

The guardian said with a smile, looking at the map of the first floor, that now resembled a gourd.

He put his hand on the map. The view changed, now showing a landscape from somewhere.

For a while, I barely followed what he was talking about.

The guardian looked at me and smiled with his eyes.

「Wh-what is this……?」

「This is called a display, and it can show images from distant places. You see a map in the corner? The circle on it is the area that is currently being shown. The terrain was perfectly transformed, right?」

Indeed, the terrain changed, with the image now showing adventurers, bewildered by that.

It is said that labyrinths can change their layout from time to time.

But I didn’t know that it was done in such a way.

「……Does it mean that you can also send monsters to adventurers??」

「Ooh, you can come up with some nasty stuff. Let’s try it.」

「N-no, wait, don’t!」

I rushed to stop him, but the guardian already moved a picture of a monster to the adventurers’ location.

I looked at the image while grabbing the guardian’s arm, but no monster appeared.

「……What does this mean?」

「It takes time for placed monsters to manifest. It also means that I can’t send out a horde of monsters at once. Guidance is possible to a certain degree, but I don’t want to bother with that.」

「……I see.」

I guess he means reshaping the terrain and setting a large number of monsters along the way.

Anyway, I’m glad that he hates such micromanagement.

「But considering that you earlier said that adventurers act at their own risk, you looked pretty panicked.」

「……This time it would’ve become my fault after all. Also, though they are acting at their own risk, I also wouldn’t want them to die for no reason.」

「Is that so? Anyway, this covers the basics of a labyrinth. Let’s move to another room.」

The guardian touched my hand, and we teleported to another location.

This one was quite spacious.

And, the sounds of monsters’ footsteps were resounding through it.

Fieldzauruses approached us.

Three of them. And some more were visible in the distance.

Perhaps out of fondness of the guardian, but they approached him, rubbing their heads on him.

Patting them on the heads, the guardian looked my way.

「It seems that every labyrinth initially has monsters of only one kind prepared. Here, it’s these fieldzauruses. Ten of them in total. Each monster can be assigned to one location, creating a copy of the original there.」

「Original? Copy…?」

「Yes. In short, I can duplicate monsters from here into any area of the labyrinth. Then, make them attack the adventurers, to gain more magic power. The images of the monsters on the map you just saw are that.」

「……I see. So that’s the reason why no corpses remain in the dungeon?」

「Most likely. Everything I told you is my own findings, so I can’t tell how correct they are. It seems that part of those replicated monsters do remain in the world.」

「And we humans, take them as blessings from God.」

「God, huh. I guess this would mean that I’m a god? Haha, how amusing!」

The guardian loudly laughed, bending backward a bit.

It seems that he found this very funny, since he spent a while in such a state, but then, he returned to his usual expression in one second.

「Anyway. I can’t spend the whole day laughing. First, I will restore the materials.」

「……Restore?」

「Revive the monsters using the raw materials as a base. Like this.」

The guardian slightly pulled from the sheath the katana on his waist and touched the blade with a finger.

A small drop of blood appeared, which he then let dribble onto the magic stone lying on the ground.

That instant, the ground on which the materials were lying shone.

I averted my gaze since the brightness was too much to bear. When the light subsided, the goblin was standing on that spot.

「This should do it. With this, a goblin can be manifested in a dungeon. But adventurers surely wouldn’t be satisfied with just one goblin. So we should deploy a number of them at once.」

He dropped more of his blood onto the parts that I brought.

……Amazing.

「Are these revived goblins the same as the ones that I defeated?」

「Probably not. Were they the same, they probably would’ve shown some reaction to you?

The guardian extended a hand towards the revived goblins.

The goblins made a perfect bow towards him, but to me, they only nodded.

「Yeah…… They seem a bit different.」

「We still have goblin magic stones left. Let’s make a different monster from them.」

「……You mean, that combination thing?」

「Yes. The method is simple. We only have to shuffle magic stones and monster parts a bit. Want to try it, Rude?」

「……I’m going to do that? Or rather, can I even do that?」

「Yes. I’m a bit curious about what kind of monster will result from your blood and energy.」

……Yeah, it’s a bit interesting.

Following his instructions, I pulled out the slime magic stone, a goblin magic stone, and parts of these monsters.

I then dribble my blood on them.

「Rude, you have god’s armor, so why not just directly pour it there?」

「……Understood.」

I wasn’t sure how I was supposed to do that, but when I tried to put my mind to it, I felt like a bit of my endurance disappeared.

Following, a strong light appeared.

「Ooh, looks like it worked.」

When the light disappointed, the humanoid slime stood there.

「Human slime……?」

E rank monsters. It can take the form of a human, but since it still remains a slime in appearance, it’s immediately exposed.

The slime looked at me and at the guardian, shifting between our shapes.

……But it’s still a slime. Since it’s a liquid, it’s extremely obvious.

There is a species that can be considered a higher rank of this one, shadow slime.

Being able to completely transform into a human it is A rank.

They even have stories about them going around.

Like the person walking in the rearguard being taken out without anyone noticing and replaced by a shadow slime.

Slime-type monsters can split their bodies.

Adventurers often talk about the last remaining person in such a group barely escaping with their life, after the whole group got replaced with slimes.

「Eeh, it’s not a new species?」

The guardian showed obvious disappointment.

When I nodded, he dropped his shoulders.

The human slime slithered up to me and grasped my hand.

Then, his shape changed.

A female body. This figure…… Manicia?

「Human slimes can transform by using human memories, but this degree of detail is amazing……」

Isn’t it exactly……like the real one? Though I never saw her without clothes.

Now, if only it wasn’t a liquid I probably would’ve frequented this room pretty often.

That was pretty dangerous.

Perhaps because I was it’s creator, but the human slime seems to be awfully fond of me, touching me all over.

「With this we can keep making monsters.」

「Well, this time it just happened to go well.」

Saying that he arranged the same materials that we just used in the opposite order, and dripped blood on them.

When the light subsided, there was a small slime-like something, but it immediately melted into the ground.

「When it fails, nothing remains. In that case, the painstakingly gathered ingredients are all wasted. But there is no other choice but trial and error.」

「Well. I will leave that to you.」

「Sure. So if I make a new species and post it in the labyrinth……… Would that attract even more adventurers?」

I nodded, patting the human slime.

「I think so. New species of monsters is a major event after all. It would need to be investigated. And everyone will surely be interested where their parts can be used.」

「I see! Then, I only have to place more and more monstersーー」

「……Ah, and also. In your normal labyrinths, the difficulty goes up as you climb to the higher floors. So how about posting goblins on the first floor of this labyrinth?」

「Oh, as expected of an adventurer! And I also have to make areas where ore and herbs can be collected.」

「That’s right. It would be better to hide such places among the trees. Such discovery would probably raise their spirits.」

Currently, the town has a lot of skilled adventurers.

But if we keep improving on the labyrinth, it should attract adventurers of different ranks as well.

The guardian began placing monsters, seemingly enjoying the process, while I observed the map.

「……Can you make something like a hidden passage or hidden rooms?」

「Oooh! A secret passage! And then placing a treasure room there! That’s nice! But since I have no treasures, let’s put a monster there……」

「N-no, please don’t……」

Bringing up various ideas we keep improving on the labyrinth.

This is pretty fun.

And the labyrinth kept changing.

……I will know how it affected things after I return from the city of adventurers.