Having decided to escape from the Underground Space, Rei and his group found that, fortunately, the tentacles did not pursue them.
The tentacles had likely judged Rei to be a formidable foe—someone who had inflicted significant damage on them, just as he had the day before.
...Though for Vihera, who was traveling alongside Rei, the honest truth was that she would have preferred it if they had attacked.
(I dealt that much damage, so it wouldn't be strange for their way of thinking or something similar to have changed. Depending on the circumstances, it might be wise to consider the possibility that tentacles could emerge from that Underground Space again.)
As he climbed the stairs, Rei glanced down at Jabis, whom he was carrying over his shoulder.
As the mastermind behind this incident, he unquestionably had to know something about those tentacles.
Additionally, whatever new information Ranga had obtained that led him to call Rei and the others back undoubtedly held significant meaning.
"I can see the way out," the female guard leading them murmured.
The unmistakable relief in her voice made it clear she had been genuinely frightened of the Underground Space.
If there had been no tentacles, she probably wouldn't have been so scared. But this female guard had clearly seen the sight of Rei fighting the pink tentacles.
...Or rather, it was more accurate to say she had seen Rei about to hurl a spear at what could only be described as a mass of tentacles with hardened defenses.
In any case, unlike adventurers who frequently encountered monsters, the opponents guards typically faced were humans, Beastmen, Elves, and Dwarves.
That was precisely why it wasn't surprising for the guard to feel an even stronger sense of disgust toward the mass of tentacles.
"Hmm. So this mansion's staircase was hidden too."
After emerging from the staircase and looking around, Rei saw a wall sliding horizontally back into place.
The guards and adventurers who had been conducting the forced search of this mansion must have somehow disabled the mechanism concealing the staircase, and as a result, discovered it... that was probably what had happened.
Recalling the mansion they had been searching, Rei made that prediction.
"Excuse me, Rei-san. Could you check this room later? First, I'd like to get to Ranga's location."
"Hm? Ah, got it. That's not a problem."
Rei, who had no intention of searching the room to the point of leaving Ranga waiting, readily nodded at the female guard's words and left the room.
Since he was naturally still carrying Jabis, the guards and adventurers still searching the room for anything of note looked at him with curiosity, but he himself didn't seem particularly bothered by their stares.
Vihera, just like Rei, paid no attention to the surrounding gazes as she exited the room.
...Only the female guard guiding Rei and the others wore a subtle expression, feeling the stares directed at Rei and Vihera ultimately landing on her.
"Uun."
"...Oh, is something wrong?" Vihera asked curiously at the sound that escaped the female guard's mouth.
For Vihera, being the center of attention was an everyday occurrence, and she couldn't understand why the female guard was so bothered by it.
Even Byune, whom Vihera acted as a guardian for, didn't particularly worry about stares when moving together with Vihera.
That was why the female guard's behavior piqued her interest. ...Though in truth, this was actually the normal reaction.
While having that exchange, they continued onward, and eventually Rei and the group arrived in front of a room.
"It's here."
Though Rei found himself questioning the mentally fatigued state of the female guard after such a short time, he and Vihera arrived at the room.
"Ranga-san, it's Yomin. I've brought Rei-san and Vihera-san."
In response to the female guard—Yomin's—words as she knocked and called out, a voice from inside told them to enter.
As the door opened, they were ushered inside.
Yomin herself did not enter, and simply departed from in front of the room.
Rei couldn't help but wonder "Hm?" for a moment, but faster than he could voice it, Ranga, who had been reading some documents at the office desk, looked toward Rei.
Given that this was the mansion they had entered for a forced search, this was naturally not Ranga's actual office.
But even so, the sight of Ranga reading documents at the desk was surprisingly devoid of any sense of incongruity.
"Hey, you two... hm? What Rei-kun is carrying is..."
"Javis. The mastermind behind this incident... apparently. Though that's only based on what he himself claimed, so I don't know if it's true or not."
"Oh, but he was plenty strong, you know? At least strong enough to call himself the mastermind," Vihera countered.
"It's not like the mastermind necessarily has to be strong."
Rei said this in response to Vihera's words, but even he himself was half-convinced that Jabis was indeed the mastermind.
"You two are..."
Ranga, who had been listening to their conversation, covered his face with his hand as if to say he had a headache—no, rather, that his head was literally aching.
It was understandable. Ranga had wanted some kind of lead on the mastermind behind this incident, and had even negotiated with Daskar to carry out this forced search.
And yet, instead of a mere lead, they had brought back the actual mastermind. Ranga was at a complete loss for words.
Though, that wasn't to say he wasn't pleased.
"Hm? What's wrong?"
"No. To be completely honest, you've been a tremendous help. A tremendous help, but... I can't find the words. Nothing comes to mind."
"Really? ...Well, putting that aside. The mastermind business is fine with this guy, but it's about those tentacles in the Underground Space. In the first place, I'm pretty sure I was told that no one should enter the Underground Space. So why were there so many adventurers and guards down there when we arrived?"
Rei's words became slightly harsh, likely because there had been a considerable number of corpses when they arrived in the Underground Space.
If things had gone according to Ranga's instructions, those corpses wouldn't have existed.
And yet, what had possessed them to let that happen?
Rei genuinely found it puzzling.
"Ah... yeah. Actually, the adventurers..."
Ranga spoke hesitantly, but seeing his demeanor, Rei could somewhat understand how things had unfolded.
In other words, it was likely the result of the adventurers acting for their own personal gain.
Of course, the adventurers gathered to carry out this forced search were mostly those who cared deeply about Gilm.
But at the same time, many of them were pure adventurers, and among them, there were likely those who believed they could find something important in the Underground Space—something that would benefit them.
Having actually seen the spatial rift and the tentacles in that space, Rei couldn't completely blame them for feeling that way.
If one could obtain the secrets of those tentacles or whatever else, it would undoubtedly be a massive—an extraordinarily significant—achievement as an adventurer.
Among the gathered adventurers, there must have been those who simply could not let such an opportunity slip by.
The result of that was the scene that could only be called a massacre.
Hearing this, Rei no longer felt like complaining to Ranga.
If this had been caused by the guards going out of control, he might have raised a complaint.
However, if he was told that the reason this incident occurred lay with the adventurers' side, then Rei, being an adventurer himself, couldn't exactly say anything about it.
Had these been anyone else's words besides Ranga's, Rei might have suspected they were just covering for the guards. But as far as Rei knew, Ranga was not the type to do such a thing.
That was precisely why Rei avoided saying anything further.
"Yeah, my bad for asking. Well, it's not strange for there to be guys who react like that among adventurers. ...There are those who seek out the unknown, but there aren't that many of them."
In reality, one of the reasons people became adventurers was a desire to see things with their own eyes that they had never seen before, and such individuals were by no means few.
But this was the frontier.
There were vast quantities of things that couldn't be seen anywhere other than the frontier, and in terms of witnessing the unknown, simply being in Gilm largely fulfilled that desire.
...Though, in the case of such people, it wouldn't be strange for there to be those who still wanted to see even more of the unknown.
"I'm glad you understand."
Ranga nodded to Rei's words with a calm demeanor.
Ranga himself had many—truly many—thoughts about the incident of the unauthorized rush into the Underground Space.
But it was also an undeniable fact that he could not unilaterally blame the adventurers for it.
It was true that the adventurers had suggested going into the Underground Space, but it was also an undeniable fact that the guards had agreed to it.
(If I had to say, it's a case of both sides being equally at fault... I suppose.)
Rei, thinking this from Ranga's demeanor, judged that continuing the conversation would only make things awkward for both of them. He turned his gaze toward Jabis, whom he had carried, and spoke up.
"So, what are you going to do with this Jabis?"
The mastermind behind the series of events.
Naturally, his custody was important.
It would not be an exaggeration to say he was the most important figure among everything discovered in today's forced search.
"If you don't mind, could we take him into our custody? Of course, since it was Rei-kun who captured him, if you were to claim ownership, we would have no choice but to acknowledge that."
"I don't plan on doing anything like that, so you can do as you like with him. That said, if you do manage to learn anything about the situation... I'd like to know as well, but... I won't insist on it."
For Rei, the reward to be gained from capturing this man was not something he was particularly interested in.
Rather, he was far more pleased that resolving this incident would allow the Gigant Turtle dissection to proceed smoothly.
And also, he hoped that Cobolts wouldn't come flooding into Gilm anymore.
Whatever one did in Gilm, even a monster as lowly as a Cobolt appearing in large numbers was nothing short of a troublesome event.
Given that, Rei's greatest wish was to resolve this series of events as quickly as possible.
"I see. It helps that you say so."
"That matter aside, why did you ultimately have us stop the fight in the Underground Space?"
Having decided that the topic of Jabis was concluded, Rei shifted to the next subject—and asked about what bothered him the most.
In the Underground Space, just as a full-scale battle was about to begin, Yomin had come to fetch him and put a stop to the combat.
It was only natural that he was concerned about why the combat had been interrupted.
"Oh, from the one over there... Javis, was it? Couldn't you just ask the mastermind behind this incident directly?"
"Before I could get to that, the fight with Vihera had already started, so I couldn't manage to extract any information. ...Well, based on the impression I got when we clashed, he seemed like the type to properly accept his defeat and provide information."
"I see."
At Rei's words, Ranga smiled as if convinced.
Then, shifting his gaze from the unconscious Jabis to Rei and Vihera, he spoke.
"Actually, among those we captured, there was someone who knew about the Underground Space. According to what we learned from that person, the being summoned in the Underground Space is apparently a fairly high-ranking entity."
"...High-ranking?"
At the words that came from Ranga's mouth, Rei harbored a doubt.
Based on how it felt in battle, it was hard to believe it was a high-ranking entity.
Of course, he understood that it possessed some form of intelligence.
After all, it had recognized Rei as a threat and taken the measure of using tentacles to fortify its defenses.
But that was, so to speak, something that even wild beasts or ordinary monsters would normally do.
There had been no communication whatsoever—no attempt to speak to Rei or anything of the sort.
Given that, even if he was told that entity was a high-ranking one, Rei simply could not accept it.
"At the very least, that's what the person who had this information said. I don't know whether that's actually correct or not. ...But they also definitely said that if we were to forcibly sever the contract, it's unknown what kind of consequences that would lead to."
"...I see. So that's the reason you stopped the fight."
Reluctantly, Rei nodded in acceptance of Ranga's words.