The curse's mark, disguised as Tanian's fortune-telling, had been deeply imprinted. There was a chance he could be wrong, and my fate wasn't particularly good anyway, so I tried to brush it off lightly. But in a corner of my mind, the curse's mark flaunted its presence, refusing to be forgotten. A Saint Candidate being a curse—what an ominous age.
In the end, I couldn't sleep properly all night, plagued by writhing anxiety. My heart hadn't trembled like this since I'd faced Kagan and Kesik's cavalry charge head-on. That bastard Tanian—was this his way of getting back at me for the advice I gave Erich? No, surely not.
In any case, thanks to Tanian's performance, I had to bid farewell with a goodbye kiss to a comfortable night's sleep, and the aftereffects lingered into the morning.
"This is driving me crazy."
While wandering around the club room, I slammed my shin into a desk leg. Perhaps from the impact, the desk leg wobbled precariously. This never happened normally—it was all Tanian's fault. How dare he inflict a debuff on his advisor.
At least it wasn't a desk I used often, and if it was just wobbling from the impact, I figured I could force it back into place. I fiddled with it roughly, only to learn once again that one shouldn't carelessly trespass into another's professional domain.
'This isn't working.'
The four-legged desk had devolved into a three-legged one. Zhuge Liang said the structure supported by three legs was important—maybe this was actually its most beautiful form?
As I stared blankly at the precariously standing three-legged desk, I spotted the Vice Principal passing by the hallway window, and soon after came the sound of knocking. What could bring him here so early in the morning? Probably not for a good reason.
"Yes, please come in."
I set down the former desk leg I'd been holding and invited him in. The Vice Principal cautiously opened the door and entered. Those faintly trembling pupils—I could tell. Bad news. For a moment, Tanian's mark flashed through my mind again, but I forcibly suppressed it.
"I didn't expect a visitor so early in the morning. If I'd known, I would have at least prepared some tea."
An unwelcome visitor, but a visitor nonetheless. I greeted him with a smile, but the Vice Principal still couldn't control his trembling pupils and was wiping away sweat with a handkerchief. All he could manage was a bare response to my greeting. Then, having seemingly composed himself, he carefully spoke.
"Inspector. Um... about the proposal you submitted the day before yesterday."
"The proposal? Is there some problem with it?"
During club time the day before yesterday, Luize had suggested we all go on a picnic outside the Academy, so I'd written up an appropriate proposal and submitted it. "Outside the Academy" just meant a small hill beyond the walls—easily within round-trip distance.
Since I was planning to lead the group anyway, there had been no issues when I submitted it, but the fact that the Vice Principal came so early in the morning suggested something had happened.
The Vice Principal let out a small sigh at my question, then barely managed to continue.
"A dungeon appeared near the picnic location."
"What?"
No, what the hell, why did that appear?
An artifact inside the Academy had detected the formation of a dungeon. Well, it was called a dungeon, but it wasn't the grandiose kind where you pass through a gate, beat up the monsters inside, and claim treasure.
When I first learned dungeons existed after my possession, I wondered if the original story was some hybrid romance-hunter genre, and even tried shouting for a status window alone in a corner. Of course, nothing appeared. It's an embarrassing dark history, but it was a long time ago.
Anyway, the academic consensus in this world is that dungeons are "formed when atmospheric mana becomes bound to a specific location, transforming the surrounding environment." Every year there are heated debates in papers claiming other causes exist, but the basic framework revolves around mana issues.
I'd looked into it once out of curiosity when I heard there were dungeons in a romance fantasy world, but lost interest after that. Since I never read the original, how would I know why the author included such a thing? But hearing about a dungeon at this timing made something click.
'This is a crisis setup device.'
Compared to dungeons in other settings, it was safer, but dungeons in this world were still troublesome burdens harboring harmful creatures far removed from the adjacent ecosystem. What's more, there were no barriers distinguishing dungeons, so you could walk along perfectly fine and suddenly enter one of those harmful creature habitats.
And a dungeon had formed near the location where the Baking Club planned to go on a picnic. That massive trap where it's difficult to distinguish with the naked eye whether it's a dungeon or not.
'Fuck.'
An advisor leading high-ranking officials on a picnic near a dungeon? You'd have to be more than just crazy. And I was one step away from becoming that more-than-just-crazy bastard.
"Don't regional administrators periodically manage dungeons? If they just disperse the accumulated mana, there shouldn't be any dungeon formation."
Since dungeons fundamentally form from accumulated mana, regional administrators and lords throughout the Empire have a periodic duty to prevent dungeons and patrol their jurisdictions. It's not even difficult—just wave around an artifact made by the Magic Tower and the accumulated mana disperses.
At my question containing such doubt, the Vice Principal answered with a troubled expression.
"The regional administrator managing the area near the Academy was recently arrested and sent to the Imperial Capital. A successor hasn't arrived yet, and it formed in that brief window."
"Ah."
Only then did a small memory tucked away in a corner of my mind surface.
"That bastard who played around with the road budget—dig into him and deal with it."
On the day I arrived at the Academy, I'd casually given such instructions to the Deputy Director. So that's why a successor hasn't come yet. I never imagined the small ball I'd thrown would come back like this.
"Then I'll handle it myself. Thank you for informing me."
It wasn't intentional, but since I threw the ball, I should clean up the mess too.
Fortunately, there's still time before the picnic, and since it's a newly formed dungeon, the danger level should be relatively low, which eases the burden. Canceling the picnic isn't an option, so I'll just have to go stir things up a bit. As long as I deal with the harmful beasts inside the dungeon, the dungeon itself isn't dangerous.
"If you would do that, we'd be most grateful. We'll be counting on you."
The Vice Principal seemed relieved by my offer to handle it personally, bowing his head with a small smile. He probably knows that the Inspection Department was behind the regional administrator being dragged to the Imperial Capital, yet he doesn't look at me with resentment—for which I'm grateful. I'd feel bad about arresting the Vice Principal for lese-majeste, after all.
Whether he knew what I was thinking or not, the Vice Principal's gaze shifted behind me. When I turned around, I spotted the three-legged table. Ah, that thing...
"There's a damaged item here. I'll have it replaced with something better."
I didn't bother mentioning that I was the one who smashed it.
Since leaving during club time would be unsettling, I decided to handle this while the club members were confined to their classrooms under the guise of classes. There can't be many advisors who work this hard for their members. I wonder if they even realize all the effort I put in.
At times like this, I'm truly grateful that classes exist. Sometimes I think that if we introduced everything from zero period to evening self-study like before my possession, I wouldn't have to suffer through all this surveillance and whatnot. Though the price might be a mass petition from the Blue Bloods.
'It really is right next door.'
When I arrived at the location the Vice Principal had indicated, I found the dungeon nestled in a forest quite close to our chosen picnic spot. I only noticed it was a dungeon because I knew to look for one—otherwise, I would have thought it was just an ordinary forest. The thought that we would have been wandering around here completely oblivious sends chills down my spine.
Seeing it with my own eyes, a deep fury rises from my core. Unless you're extraordinarily unlucky, dungeons don't just appear. Yet here one has formed during my stay at the Academy, and now I'm the one who has to personally deal with it.
What's more, since it appeared on Imperial territory that's technically outside the Academy, I can't even dump this on the Three Kingdoms forces under the pretext of protecting key personnel from the Three Kingdoms. And I certainly can't burden the Academy security personnel, who already have their hands full.
"At my rank, dealing with this..."
I mutter in frustration, but there's no one to hear me. Once you reach the Director level, even field command becomes rare—yet here I am, personally going to a dungeon and doing the legwork myself. If you searched through the Empire's entire history, I'd probably be the first. And if I'm not the first, that's an even bigger problem.
If I'd had even a single attendant I could put to work, this wouldn't be so exhausting. At times like this, I almost wish I had the Second Section Chief with me.
...No, on second thought, not the Second Section Chief. I must have lost my mind for a moment. Even if the sky falls, not that bastard.
'Our proud son of a bitch.'
Recalling the Second Section Chief's face—which reminds me of my resolve to stand alone—I stepped into the dungeon.
Perhaps because it was recently formed, the dungeon's interior didn't look particularly special. The trees were a bit denser, and the animals wandering around were somewhat larger? Though I must say, watching a rabbit tear apart a squirrel was rather memorable.
Of course, the moment those teeth bit into even one of the Six-Member Group, it would leave a deep scratch on my civil service career, so I dealt with it immediately. In your next life, be born in a proper ecosystem instead of a dungeon.
But I'm not seeing anything as threatening as I expected. No matter how newly formed a dungeon is, there should at least be a beast capable of threatening a village. Surely that rabbit I just dealt with wasn't a max-level rabbit, and there should at least be bears or lions or something of that caliber.
As if responding to my thoughts, something with black fur emerged from between the bushes.
- Grrrowl!
Oh.
Yes, that's more like it.
The black bear that suddenly appeared charged at me in an instant, then reared up on its hind legs and swung its massive right paw toward my head.
This bastard's got some real spunk. I like it.