“Kyuu can help right? I hope kyuu can!”
The orange-colored rabbit flicked his ears from within the cage.
… He’s so fluffy…
Just then, Haku-san suddenly appeared in the room. Like a ninja… she probably used [Teleport]—wait, no, it was probably the menu’s [Placement] function. At the very least, the capital was within Haku-san’s territory.
“Sorry to keep you waiting. I see you’ve started?”
“Haku Ane-sama.”
Rokuko walked over to Haku-san.
“Haku… sama. Thankyuu for helping me for this…”
“For the Demon King Faction to set their eyes on you, you were in a tough spot, No. 629.”
“… Nkyuu. Seriously.”
Orange settled onto his hind legs and stamped twice. It felt like it was the rabbit’s way of showing stress.
It was natural he’d be stressed, though whether that was due to the Demon King Faction or Haku-san, well. Well.
Right, let’s ask him what’s been on my mind.
“Say, Orange, how’d you manage to contact Haku-san? It’s not like you hopped all the way to the capital, right? You’d definitely have gotten yourself hunted by someone.”
“Nkyuu!? Don’t say something so scary! … But I wanna know kyuu! I was just holding my head from the stress and Haku—sama, just appeared kyuu. So I yielded to her!”
Yep. I get the feeling that a rabbit would just yield as the default but alright?
With that, I looked over to Haku-san, who gave her response while embracing Rokuko.
“I received a declaration of war from the Demon King Faction, saying [We will destroy your faction’s dungeon]. So then when I inspected the place they mentioned, I found you.”
“C’mon nkyuu. They didn’t listen to me at all… uuu, they just found me when I was frolicking in the meadow…”
Orange stamped the ground again.
“By the way, is ‘Orange’ No. 629’s name?”
“Yeah, it was hard for me to keep using a number as his name.”
“… Hmm. So, were you able to become his master as well?”
“No?”
Looks like Haku-san caught on to me wanting to experiment. Orange himself didn’t seem to notice though. He didn’t, but he still tilted his head is puzzlement.
“Ohh, right! How should I improve my dungeon?”
“Hm? Right. First, I will be giving Kehma-san some DP. Please cooperate with him to somehow make it through the Demon King Faction’s assault.”
“… You’re skillfully delegating your work away, Haku-san.”
“Rather than me giving the instructions, I believe that leaving it to Kehma-san will certainly produce more amusing—well-suited results.”
She definitely just said amusing there. Well, I guess Haku-san wants to see at least a little of what’s up my sleeve.
“Which is why I will be officially allowing you to join my faction, Orange. You are welcome.”
“Hahaha~! My deepest thanks nkyuu!”
Orange bowed his head. His hind leg seemed to stamp the ground there for a sec, but let’s pretend I didn’t see it.
“… By the way, are there any other factions than yours, Haku-san?”
“Most of the dungeons in the Raverio Empire are mine. It’s not as absolute as in the Demon King Faction or the Dragon King Faction, though.”
“… Which is why they mistook me for being in the Betrayer’s Faction nkyuu…”
Ah, he just said betrayer, there. Well, Orange was also in the Betrayer’s Faction, it’s just official now.
“Uuu, even I was basikyuuly in the Beast King Faction…”
“Right. I was wanting to ask about that, too. Who’s this Beast King person?”
“Core No. 8.”
I’d asked Orange the question, but Haku-san responded with an audible frankness.
“Although beast-type cores generally belong to his faction, they also follow the law of the jungle and push their children into bottomless pits and leave them there.”
“… So what you’re saying is that they forsake the weak ones?”
“Kyuun…”
I started to feel like the orange rabbit was pitiable… Alright, I have to properly help him in this Dungeon Battle…!
“Alright then, it looks like our meeting is now at its end, so how about we go examine the area?”
Haku-san recited the incantation for [Teleport]. It would’ve been different if it was just Haku-san and Misha, but she couldn’t use dungeon deployment since were all going as well.
Wrapped in [Teleport]’s light, we appeared in the meadow.
… You could say it was a sea of grass for as far as the eye could see. This vast meadow was Orange’s dungeon? Or perhaps we’re underground and this just looks like a vast grassland?
“Nkyuu, my dungeon’s around a fifty meter circumference around here. Ummm, my hole’s somewhere around here, but…. o-ooh, here, here it is nkyuu~”
Orange was hopping through the grass and stopped at a spot with some exposed dirt.
So he put an illusion over it to make it so that enemies wouldn’t find it? I see…
“You could sprain your ankle if you didn’t see it and fell in.”
“Fu fu fu! And then we’ll beat ’em up! Horned rabbits, armored rabbits, magic rabbits, soldier rabbits~, everyone, I’m baaack!”
After descending the stairs, I saw a big room. There were rabbits that looked like armadillos and others with a single horn sprouting from their heads. I guess they’re the horned rabbits and armored rabbits he was talking about.
They all twitched their noses. They seemed to be saying [Welcome back~]… I guess Translation Function-san doesn’t work with rabbit speech?
“Welcome back~”
“Any souvenirs~!?”
“Something stinks~”
Oh, there it goes. I could understand what the three horned rabbits were saying… This’ll make it feel weird next time I go to eat rabbit meat.
And Meat, I can see your tail wagging back and forth there, but you can’t hunt them, okay? Really.
“Nmu nmu. Oh, Kehma. This is my dungeon, nkyuu, and these guys stop people here. The magic rabbits and soldier rabbits run out from that room there and pincer them~. Nokyuu intruder’s ever made it past! It’s the best strategy!”
“I see. But that Demon King Faction guy walked in and out?”
“… He stopped when he saw my core while the armored rabbits were holding him back. Nkyuuu, if he continued, he’d have killed everyone…”
Orange kicked the ground in frustration. He seemed to be aware of his own strength.
Well, up until then it was probably just beginner adventurers hunting rabbits. I mean, even D-Ranks were considered to have graduated from rabbit hunting back in Tsuia.
Still though, getting swarmed by monsters as soon as they entered would definitely do in a rookie.
You could even call their 0% return rate a splendid achievement for a dungeon, an existence that turned lives into DPNourishment. It also had a disadvantage, though.
At the very least, it was definitely much better of a dungeon than ours when I became its master.
“Did you think of that strategy yourself?”
“I was taught it by my rabbit-type core seniors nkyuu. We may be rabbits, but if we swarm them, we can win.”
Oh, so there’s other rabbit-type cores. Heeh… come to think of it, wasn’t something said about Setsuna’s father being a rabbit-type core? Maybe it’s one of them.
As I thought about such irrelevant things, Haku-san wrapped her arms around Rokuko from behind and asked me a question.
“So, Kehma-san. Do you think you could frustrate the Demon King Faction with this dungeon?”
“… I’d like a little more information. Like who we’re up against.”
“So you’re not saying you can’t?”
Just as Haku-san smiled, Rokuko rubbed her nose with a prideful humph.
Err, she was praising me there though?