Chapter 51: The Mysterious Dungeon (3)

I watched Leticia relentlessly beat the zombie wizard’s head with her staff, then quietly turned my head away.

A strange sense of deja vu washed over me as I offered a prayer for the zombie wizard’s soul, wearing a detached smile.

That’s right.

My darling, do whatever you want.

I couldn’t help but wonder if it was right to relentlessly beat the head of a fellow wizard, even a zombified one, with

brute force instead of magic, but I tried to ignore the zombie wizard’s pathetic screams.

“Argh…Aaaagh…?! Y, Yoouu, are…yooou…not…a…ma…m, maaagician…?!”

“How rude. I am a magician, you know?”

“N, No…! Yooou…aree…nooot…a…maagiciiaaan…yoou…are…a, a gooorilla!! Aaaaaagh?!”

“What, gorilla? You’re the one who’s dead, with your skin and hair all gone, and you’re calling me a gorilla! And how

dare you wound Charlotte’s body? You’re really dead today.”

He’s already dead because he’s a zombie, so telling him he’s going to die again is a bit cruel.

But I couldn’t stop Leticia, so I just chuckled softly.

Poor zombie.

Well, this is your fate.

At least meeting his end at the hands of Leticia, a sage who has seen the end of magic, should be an honor for this zombie.

Right?

“Aaaaaaaagh!!”

“You still have the strength to scream? Uh-oh. Don’t gather magic in your staff. I’ll send you off in one go.”

…I can’t tell who’s the bad guy and who’s the good guy in this scene.

I once again turned my head away, ignoring the zombie, its head and torso so badly beaten that it was

unrecognizable, giving me a pitiful look just before it died.

Goodbye.

I hope you’re born as a kinder zombie… no, a human, next time.

I quietly prayed for the soul of the dead zombie wizard.

“”Aaaaah?!

“Hey. You don’t even have eyes, so why aren’t you looking down? Who are you yelling at!”

“…C, Crrrazy…maaagician…… Soooomeone… stop her! Help the zombie!”

……I definitely heard him clearly say “help the zombie” at the end, but maybe it’s just my imagination.

Leaving those words behind, the zombie, who had been thoroughly beaten by Leticia, finally went limp and stopped moving.

That zombie wizard, who was modified by that demon, seemed stronger than the tiger-like magical beast that

appeared earlier, but he died at Leticia’s hands without even being able to properly use magic once.

Ah.

He did use magic at the beginning.

…It does feel like a waste, since he was a special individual who could talk and was all alone.

Perhaps this dungeon isn’t that dangerous after all.

No.

Maybe there’s nothing to be safe about if Leticia is by my side.

I seriously suppressed the urge to put Leticia, the magician, in front.

What am I, a warrior, going to do by putting a magician in front?

I took a deep breath and stared at the zombie wizard’s horribly mangled body, leaking brain matter, with a disgusted

expression, then tugged on Leticia’s sleeve, who was still glaring at the zombie wizard’s corpse, seemingly not yet

satisfied.

“Leticia. He’s dead.”

“He hurt you.”

“My wound has already healed. You know I have super-regeneration abilities because I’m half-vampire, right?”

“But this f*cker hurt you.”

“…I said he’s already dead.”

“He’s a zombie. A special zombie that can talk. It wouldn’t be strange if he came back to life.”

Is he an undead?

No, well… zombies are a type of undead, but still, it’s not like he’s a skeleton, how can a zombie come back to life after

dying again?

I looked at Leticia with a dumbfounded expression, then pointed at the mashed-up zombie and chuckled.

“If he had that kind of regenerative ability, he would have already recovered and gotten up. Well, since he’s a wizard,

he might be able to use healing magic…but if he can use healing magic in that state, that would be quite surprising in

itself.”

Suddenly, I thought Leticia’s claim might be correct.

I put my hand on my chin and briefly considered using a skill to finish him off, but I dismissed the idea when I saw

that he wasn’t moving even slightly.

Still keeping my gaze fixed on the zombie wizard, I said in a somewhat subdued voice.

“Leticia, it seems like that possibility is unlikely. I think that guy is already dead.”

I have no desire to kill the corpse a third time, after it had already been killed twice.

He’s a wizard who was used by the enemy, unable to find peace.

It must be painful for them to be turned into zombies, attacking humans while craving the blood and flesh of the

living, longing for their former selves.

Of course, there might be humans who don’t feel that way, but most humans would.

Although I couldn’t properly make out his form because he had been beaten by Leticia, I bent my knees.

It would have been better if Chloe, the Saintess, had come with us, but I sighed and closed my eyes, briefly praying

for the dead wizard’s soul.

At least I hope he has a peaceful journey.

A few seconds passed.

I opened my eyes, glanced at Leticia, who was closing her eyes with her hands clasped together, and then reached out

to search the wizard’s clothes.

If there was even one item that could identify him, I wanted to deliver it to his family or close acquaintances.

Please understand that it’s absolutely not good to take any useful items from the dead wizard.

With that thought in mind, I thoroughly searched even the inner pockets of his clothes, but I couldn’t find any items

that could identify him.

Feeling an unnecessary sense of discomfort, I clenched and unclenched my hands a few times, then dusted them off.

“Well…”

The fact that he became a zombie means that he went through the hands of the demon who created this dungeon, so

there’s no way that demon would leave behind any items that could identify him.

I bit my lip.

It would be nice if I could take his corpse or bones, but zombies are usually either burned with magic, or they’re sent

to the afterlife with a priest’s hymn or burned with holy magic.

Anyway, both methods involve burning the zombie, but the process itself was unsettling.

“It’s burning well.”

“…But Leticia, isn’t the fire a bit excessive for a funeral?”

“He’s a special zombie. To send him off properly, even the dead wizard would understand this much.”

“….”

In the end, I watched Leticia burn the zombie with magic, and I prayed for the wizard’s soul one last time.

Please don’t be born as a zombie again.

Though, it’s not like he was born because he wanted to be.

I thought I heard the pitiful cries of a magician from somewhere.

After that, as if it had been our misunderstanding, no magical beasts stronger than the zombie wizard appeared.

As if our worries had been in vain, Leticia, wiping the blood of a magical beast splattered on her cheek with a

disgusted expression using Clean magic, muttered.

“As expected… I guess. A zombie that could speak a considerable amount of language appeared, so I thought it might

be a special dungeon, but it was all a misunderstanding. I should have been sure from the moment I realized that the

skill of creating dungeons was inferior to that of the Demon King.”

“…It’s a bit anticlimactic. It looks like the exit will be visible soon.”

I wiped the purple blood on my hand and continued Leticia’s words.

“Vigilance is key, but if it’s this level, the rest of the dungeon will probably be the same.”

It was truly anticlimactic that the zombie wizard that appeared almost at the beginning was the strongest among the

magical beasts that have appeared so far.

As we moved forward, all that blocked our way were magical beasts that were weaker than the tiger-like magical

beast that appeared at the beginning.

There wasn’t a single magical beast stronger than that.

When you think we’ve almost reached the end of the dungeon, the tension we felt at the beginning feels anticlimactic.

I walked forward with Leticia and looked around.

“Dungeons are exciting… but they’re still unpleasant places. If there’s no more information to be gained, I want to

escape quickly.”

I also nodded at Leticia’s words, frowning.

Because a dungeon is indeed an unpleasant place.

It was created to kill humans, so it’s only natural to feel bad.

And soon after, a huge gate that looked like the exit appeared.

“Is that the exit?”

“There really wasn’t much. It would be best to quickly leave and report the information we found here, and then

move on to another dungeon.”

“Yes.”

When we first set foot in the dungeon, I was worried that the penalty for failing the quest would be that we might be

unable to escape the dungeon forever, but it seems like it was unnecessary worry.

What do you mean, unable to escape forever?

The exit is right in front of us, so if we go out there, the quest will be over.

I thought we got this reward relatively easily, and just as I was about to leave with Leticia, ‘it’ appeared.

“Leticia!?”

“huh…!”

Suddenly, a figure appeared from the darkness, and before we had time to react, ‘it’ swung its sword widely at Leticia.

The sword strike, swinging from top to bottom, split Leticia’s defensive magic.

Blood splattered from Leticia’s abdomen.

Fortunately, thanks to casting several defensive magic spells in an instant over the broken defensive magic, she

avoided a fatal injury, but I was surprised by the being that pierced Leticia’s defensive magic in an instant, and I

widened my eyes.

Just then I coughed, feeling pain in my abdomen.

“Cough?!”

I was kicked in the abdomen by ‘it’.

Almost at the same time Leticia was slashed by the sword.

I opened my eyes to their limit, unable to see the attack, but then I frowned, seeing the attack slightly, and moved my

hand, clenching my fist.

“…!”

Shadow Control, Night Restraint.

I saw the ropes of shadow that sprang from the floor grab the guy’s feet.

I don’t know who it is, but if he wanted to kill us, he should have killed us in one go when the surprise attack

succeeded.

“Die.”

At Leticia’s cold declaration, an explosion erupted from under ‘it’s’ feet.