Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon?

by Fujino Omori

  “Bell?!?”

  It was him, just as she had expected.

  Relief flowed through her. She was about ready to cry, but she was lost for words when the light hit him.

  He was looking at her with big eyes, almost begging for forgiveness. But his face was covered in cuts, red with blood and brown from mud. He looked utterly exhausted.

  His upper body was in rough shape. Hestia’s eyes spun as she looked at the shreds of cloth draped over his shoulders. They had been a shirt when she left. The skin peeking out from under what was left of his clothes was crisscrossed with gashes and swollen.

  His lower body was even worse. His pants were stained with who knew what and frayed all to hell. However, there were three gashes across his right knee that had to come from a very sharp knife. Black and still bleeding, they were the worst injuries on a body riddled with them.

  Hestia went pale as she carefully approached him.

  “What happened to you? What’s with all these injuries? Were you mugged?!”

  “No, it’s not that…”

  “Then what the hell happened?”

  “I went into the Dungeon…”

  As the words rolled off her tongue, she forgot her anger for a moment and just stood in awe.

  “Are you crazy?! You went into the Dungeon like that? At night?!?!”

  “… I’m sorry.”

  Bell did not have any armor whatsoever on his body. Going into the Dungeon like this was the same as going in naked.

  One hit from a strong monster, and it would be over. Bell’s condition was proof of that.

  He may have had a knife for protection, but the lack of thought and consideration for his life shocked Hestia to no end. Going into the Dungeon like this was not fearless, it was foolish.

  “… Why would you even try this? You’re not some thrill seeker, so what was going through your head?”

  “……”

  The more Hestia looked at Bell, the less she wanted to scold him. He was not himself; he seemed darker, almost brooding. So she decided to change her tone to try to get a response out of him.

  Bell showed no signs of opening his mouth. His hair covered his eyes. He was flat-out refusing to open up.

  Hestia sighed, beside herself.

  “Okay, okay. I won’t ask you anything else. You’re pretty stubborn, I can’t win.”

  “I’m sorry…”

  “I said it’s okay, didn’t I? For now, you need a shower. The bleeding has almost stopped, but your wounds are dirty. I’ll treat them when you are done.”

  “… Thank you.”

  Bell showed her a small smile. Although she was still hurting inside, Hestia smiled, too.

  She stepped away from the door to let Bell inside, but he staggered forward.

  The injury on his right leg must have been serious.

  Cursing her lack of height, Hestia offered her shoulder to the struggling boy. She had to stand on the balls of her feet to keep him upright.

  “I-I’m sorry.”

  “All you do is apologize. If you really are sorry, think about what you did.”

  “A-aahh, sorry…”

  “Again?”

  Hesita half carried Bell toward the shower room. It was next to the bed behind an old, white wooden door. The door hung at a strange angle because one of the hinges was loose.

  Hestia focused all of her strength to keep Bell upright as they made their way through the room. Just in front of the shower room, Hestia got an idea.

  “Bell, sleep on the bed tonight, okay?”

  “Are you sure…?”

  “Of course! You’re hurt, and I can’t drag you all the way to the sofa, now can I?”

  She knew that he needed sleep, first and foremost, to heal his injuries. It was the least she could do to give up her bed to help him rest.

  As soon as she finished offering her bed, she got another idea. Why not tease him a bit?

  “But I’ll be sleeping in the same bed. I’m exhausted from going out and looking for you, you know? You wouldn’t refuse, would you?”

  “Yeah, sure. You must be tired, too. Let’s get some sleep together.”

  “… Eh?”

  Bell completely missed her teasing tone and accepted the condition right away. Caught completely off guard by his words, Hestia felt as if she’d been hit with a right hook. She quickly collected her thoughts; her heart had to recover. What was she going to do now?

  Was she taking advantage of him? He was completely spent. There was no way to tell if he even knew what he was saying.

  Damn it, Bell! You’re so close…!

  Hestia’s teeth clenched as she thought about what Bell had just said. Her face turned pink as her heart jumped.

  We can snuggle! No, we will snuggle!

  Visions of what was to come filled her mind as she made mental notes about the size and weight of the boy she was holding up.

  She had his word. He couldn’t get away now. Yay!

  “Goddess…”

  “…! Wh-what’s wrong?”

  Bell’s voice woke her up from her daydreams. She rushed to respond.

  Had he seen through her plan? Hestia was sweating bullets as she waited for Bell’s next words.

  “… I-I want to get strong.”

  “!”

  She craned her neck to look up at his face.

  He was looking straight forward, but not at anything in particular.

  Hestia took a breath and looked back at the shower room door. She said, “Yes…” and accepted his words.

  Bell Cranell

  Level One

  Strength: H-120 → G-221 Defense: I-42 → H-101

  Utility: H-139 → G-232 Agility: G-225 → F-313 Magic: I-0

  Magic

  ( )

  Skills

  Realis Phrase

  Rapid Growth

  Continued desire results in continued growth

  Stronger desire results in stronger growth

  “—!”

  Hestia’s hands stopped moving in an instant.

  Her eyes were glued to the thin back of the boy beneath her. His status was laid out before her as if she had opened an ancient book of hieroglyphs.

  The information expressed in the Falna she had given him sent shivers down her spine.

  A day had passed since Bell’s return.

  He screamed when he’d realized he was sleeping next to the goddess. He spent a full day in that bed and awoke at his usual time the next morning to find himself in that predicament. It was still early, so they decided they might as well do a status update.

  It was just how it always was: Bell facedown on the bed without a shirt, the goddess sitting on his rear end, pricking her finger and dripping blood on his back… The only thing out of the ordinary was the numbers floating to the surface, a completely unbelievable status.

  He’s growing too fast.

  Bell was the first member of her Familia, and thus he was the first human to receive her Falna, her blessing. A few of her friends had told her some things about how blessed children grow, but she wasn’t an expert.

  She didn’t know how to make them get experience quickly, how to unlock their skills, or how to release the magic within them.

  She only knew that the status on his back was not normal, at all.

  This wasn’t growth. It was leaps and bounds.

  There might not be another adventurer like him…

  If everyone grew at Bell’s pace, then most adventurers would be in Level Two, almost to Level Three.

  Most adventurers had a difficult time reaching Level Two, so much so that most Level Twos were members of large Familias. More than half of adventurers never advanced beyond Level One.

  Bell’s status was currently the equivalent of two average, veteran adventurers’ statuses combined.

  The only time a blessed person’s status points went up 10 points or more at once was during the early stages of his or her career. Then they usually hit a wall and came to t
heir god to complain about it.

  Very few of them made it past that first wall. The rest just went around in circles.

  Why did he grow this much…? The only possible explanation is…!

  There was something swelling within him.

  Hestia, the only one to know about the skill Realis Phrase, bit her lip as her head spun.

  The children had an emotion called “jealousy.” This emotion was rocking Hestia to her very core.

  “Goddess?”

  “!”

  Bell was looking over his shoulder, trying to figure out why Hestia had stopped.

  “Aah! Sorry! Sorry!” she said, trying to reassure him and returning to work. At least she acted like she was getting back to work. She was almost finished anyway.

  What should I do…? Just give the status to him as it is…?

  Sudden confidence and strength led to arrogance.

  Hestia knew that much. She knew that all the children, not just humans, had this weakness. Arrogance led to carelessness, and then to death.

  Part of her wanted to believe that Bell wasn’t the kind of person who would be arrogant. But the other part said, “What if?” and she couldn’t ignore that feeling as his protector. What if she lost him?

  Trust and worry fought for control of her decision. But no matter how many reasons she thought of to trust Bell, worry kept winning out.

  But if I don’t give him the real status, I’ll be lying to him…

  That would interfere with Bell’s growth.

  If he didn’t know what he was capable of, he’d fight enemies he had no business crossing blades with every day. What would this do to his status if he survived? Excelia tended to accumulate faster when the person fought against an opponent stronger than themselves.

  No matter how good it would make her feel, lying to Bell now would be no different that personally cutting a hole in his hopes and dreams with her own two hands.

  For a brief moment, Hestia did not think. There was only silence within her heart.

  In the end, she chose to trust him.

  Fighting back the “what if” with self control, she forced the scale to tip.

  He was doing something that the gods could not change. It was well within her power to give him a push in the form of his status. “I want to be strong.” Even if his motivation came from feelings for another, he had made up his mind.

  “Bell, is it okay if I just tell you your status today?”

  “Um, sure. That’s fine with me.”

  Bell looked up over his shoulder as she told him how many points he had grown.

  But she left out the part about his skill, Realis Phrase.

  It’s a rare skill, for sure.

  Most skills were fairly common and had similar effects among adventurers.

  While it was not fully understood how skills were acquired, the skills that had been confirmed to exist had different names and effects. It was still fairly easy to find another adventurer with something similar.

  Furthermore, members of specific races tended to have similar skill sets. Many elves had skills that increased magic; dwarves usually had skills that improved their physical strength.

  There were many different types of skills with various outcomes for all types of races. However, when an extremely low number of adventurers possessed a certain skill, it was considered a “rare skill.”

  The gods referred to it as such.

  If he knew, things would get ugly…

  She wasn’t keeping the information about his skill away from him out of spite.

  Sure, her jealously of Wallensomething was 70 percent (maybe 90 percent) of her reasoning, but there were other circumstances that were keeping her lips sealed.

  Gods and goddesses were here to have fun. When news of a “rare” or “original” skill reached their ears, they pursued it like kids in a candy store. Their sparkling eyes went wide open. A little bit of drool oozed out of their mouths.

  Some of the more foolish gods might even try to get the skill’s possessor into his or her own Familia, ignoring the current blessing altogether.

  Just playing a game.

  Bell isn’t good at lying. He’ll tell anyone about his skill if they ask. Word will travel fast. So, just this one thing, I’ll keep to myself.

  The skill increased growth under certain conditions.

  Realis Phrase was without a doubt an undocumented skill.

  Hestia decided to protect Bell from the other gods by locking this secret deep within her mind.

  Bell’s jaw dropped as Hestia told him what was written on his back—other than his skill, of course. Hestia put the finishing touches on the hieroglyphs. It was the one thing she could do to help him.

  “So, yeah. You grew quite a lot this time. Do you know why?”

  “No… not really… Ah!”

  “Yes?”

  “Well… the other night I went down to the lower sixth floor…”

  “Huh? W-what? Are you crazy?! What were you thinking? And with no armor?!?”

  “I-I’m sorry!”

  Hestia jumped to her feet and stood over him, glaring. She released a torrent of scolding and reprimands onto Bell, still shirtless on the bed.

  “The point is, I don’t know exactly why, but you are growing at an alarming rate. I don’t know how long this will last or how high you’ll go. Let’s call it a growth spurt.”

  “U-understood!”

  “… This is just my opinion, but I think you have great potential. You have talent and great instincts as an adventurer.”

  That skill couldn’t be the only reason Bell had done this well so far.

  It was only the spark that allowed him to grow so quickly.

  There had been many indications of what he was really capable of doing.

  A farm boy from the countryside with no teacher had survived near-death situations while prowling the Dungeon alone every day.

  The skill Realis Phrase raised the basic status. It didn’t teach how to attack, when to block or dodge. Only real experience in battle could do that. Even if he didn’t have the skill, he was the only one who could make those decisions in combat. That was his true strength.

  The fact that Bell had survived alone this long showed he had talent.

  “… You will get stronger. And I want you to get even stronger than you are now.”

  “… Yes.”

  Bell sat up and looked into Hestia’s eyes. She crossed her arms and looked back down at him.

  She put all her heart into her next words.

  “… I want you to promise me that you won’t try to do too much. I want you to swear that you won’t repeat the other night.”

  “I—”

  “Your will to get stronger is amazing, and I respect you for it. I will encourage you, support you, help you in any way I can… So.”

  Her eyes glistened as tears started to flow. She pleaded with all of her being.

  “… Please don’t leave me alone.”

  Her pleas had an immediate effect.

  Bell’s shoulders sank as he looked upon her. His face was deep in thought, as though he was remembering another promise he had kept. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

  Stillness filled the air. For the two of them, it was a long silence.

  “… I promise.”

  Bell raised his head.

  His face looked pitiful, about to cry, but also happy and about to burst at the seams all at the same time.

  There was not a hint of deceit in his smile. For Hestia, this face was far more trustworthy than any words.

  Now, she was sure that this boy was worthy of her trust.

  “I won’t try too hard. I’ll do my best to get stronger… But I will not leave you behind or make you worry. You will not be alone.”

  “I’m glad to hear that. I can relax now.”

  Fighting off the urge to jump into his arms, Hestia smiled at the boy.

  She picked up his shirt from the floor and gave it to hi
m. He said a quick “Thank you.” She looked up at the ceiling as he changed.

  … I’m so happy!

  There was something she could do for him.

  Her feet thumped on the warped flooring as she ran to a shelf in the kitchen. Most of the shelf was used for cookware, but she went to a box in the center and threw it open. Her hand flew around blindly as she fumbled for something hidden inside. Pulling the box down, she looked past the flyers and paperwork for her part-time job and found what she was looking for.

  She grabbed an invitation entitled GANESHA’S CELEBRATION OF THE GODS.

  Hephaistos will be there, right?

  The face of the friend and goddess who found this room popped into Hestia’s mind.

  Getting in touch with Hephaistos was never easy because she was always working and traveling to many places around the city.

  Hestia decided to use this party as an opportunity to see her friend in person.

  The party started… tonight.

  “Ah!” came out of her mouth as she quickly looked around. “Bell, I’m going to be out tonight. Maybe for a few days. That okay?”

  “Eh? Ah, I understand. Something for work?”

  “Nope. I wasn’t really interested at first, but some of my closest friends are going to a party. I’m thinking I’ll go and say hi. It’s been too long since I have seen everyone.”

  “Then by all means, go!” Bell said with a smile. Friends were important. He had no reason to refuse.

  Hestia felt bad for bringing this up out of the blue, but she smiled back and walked to the closet. None of her clothes were really appropriate for the event, but she grabbed the best dress she had and put it in her travel bag. A few more odds and ends and she was ready to go. All that was left was to request someone to cover her shift at work. She’d do that on the way.

  She was almost out the door when she thought of one last thing.

  “Bell, are you going to the Dungeon today?”

  “I’m planning to, yes… Should I not?”

  He had just made that promise. He timidly looked up at the goddess, expecting another lecture to hit him like a brick wall.

  “No, it’s okay, go ahead. But be extra careful, okay? You are still recovering, remember?”

  “I will! Thank you!”

  Bell looked so happy with dimples in his cheeks. He nodded to Hestia as she set out.