With Hiiragi-san’s Cleansing proficiency finally high enough that we no longer had to worry about getting dirty, we reached the stairs leading down to the tenth floor. After three months of hard work, we had at last arrived at the depth we had originally aimed for.
It was the end of January, and February was right around the corner.
"We finally made it," Hiiragi-san sighed.
"We did. Level-wise, I thought we would’ve been here sooner, but..."
"Truth is, levels weren't enough to solve the problem," Yuji added.
"Exactly," Hiiragi-san agreed. "Our levels might be high, but that just means our raw stats are high. We were drastically lacking the experience needed to actually use those abilities effectively."
As Hiiragi-san said, although our levels were sufficient, our delay was entirely down to lack of experience. Being students meant we could only dive on weekends, but our sheer inexperience was the primary culprit. We had plenty of superficial knowledge from certification courses and games, but we were total novices when it came to the real thing. Everything was a first for us—selecting gear, mapping, fighting monsters... the list was endless.
We stood there for a moment, letting a wave of nostalgia wash over us as we reflected on how far we had come.
"Well, shall we go?"
"Yeah. Can’t stand around forever."
"Right. Let’s move."
We began our descent toward the tenth floor.
Upon reaching the tenth floor, we immediately crossed paths with a party of explorers in their thirties. They were a group of five, soaked in blood, with two members being carried by their comrades. As we watched them pass, the man who seemed to be their leader spoke up.
"Hm? First time on this floor?"
"Ah, yes."
"I see. The orcs down here are tough. Don’t be afraid to pull back if you’re in over your heads. Pride will get you killed."
"Yes, sir! Thank you for the advice!"
"Good luck."
With that, they headed up the stairs toward the ninth floor. After seeing them off, we looked at each other.
"They seemed like good people," I noted.
"Yeah. You see more like them on these floors," Yuji said.
"And fewer of the dangerous or weird ones," Hiiragi-san added.
"Makes sense. There’s a massive filter everyone has to pass through to get here."
By the time explorers reached the tenth floor, the weirdos had mostly been weeded out. The floors where humanoid monsters appeared served as the ultimate threshold. People who came in with a game-like mindset were forced to face the reality of killing things that looked like humans. The mentally fragile either quit, sought counseling, or stayed on the surface floors hunting beast-type monsters. Some who were strong but couldn't handle the trauma ended up obsessed, hunting humanoids with a feverish madness. Those who reached this deep had looked reality in the eye and made their resolve.
"Well, let’s stay sharp like they warned us," I said.
"Yeah. It’d be stupid to get hurt now," Yuji replied.
"Agreed. We’re finally getting what we came for. Let’s do this," Hiiragi-san said, sounding more motivated than usual.
We began exploring the tenth floor with extreme caution. The architecture was the same simple stonework as before. After a while, I signaled for a stop.
"Wait, both of you!"
"A trap, Daiki?"
"Yeah. There’s a pitfall ahead."
I pulled a fist-sized stone from my Spatial Storage and tossed it into the center of the corridor. As it hit the ground, a section of floor roughly two meters square opened up and swallowed it. Ten seconds later, the floor reset, looking perfectly normal again.
"There’s a pitfall there. Stay to the far left."
"Is the right side no good?" Yuji asked.
"The right side has a different trap. If you walk there, a wall slides out and pushes you into the pit."
"These traps are getting nastier."
"They are, though it doesn't look like there are any instant-kill traps yet."
Even this pitfall was the type that simply dropped you to the floor below; if used correctly, it could serve as a shortcut. It wasn’t a death trap filled with spikes or a monster room at the bottom—though, given the height, the fall would still be fatal for an ordinary person.
We continued our exploration even more cautiously, keeping a sharp eye out for traps. After about thirty minutes, they finally appeared.
"Monsters ahead. Two of them. No signs of an ambush," Hiiragi-san warned.
Yuji and I drew our weapons. When Hiiragi-san’s light illuminated the path, two silhouettes appeared—two-meter-tall humanoid monsters with pig-like faces and sickly green skin.
"Orcs," Yuji muttered.
"Orcs!" Hiiragi-san cried out with delight.
After three months of waiting, she finally had her prize in sight. I grabbed her shoulder as she prepared to bolt.
"Calm down, Hiiragi-san. If you rush in like that, you’ll just end up with an avoidable injury."
"He’s right. Take a breath first."
"...In... out. I’m okay. Sorry for worrying you."
She seemed to have cooled down, though she was still vibrating with excitement.
"Standard strategy first?"
"Yeah, go ahead."
"Fine with me."
The orcs, alerted by our light, were charging us from fifty meters away with hammer-like clubs. I took a pepper ball from my backpack and threw it. It landed right in front of them, dispersing its contents.
However...
"Hmm, not very effective?" I noted.
"Do they have status ailment resistance?" Yuji asked.
They slowed down, but they didn’t stop to choke like previous monsters. They kept coming, wiping their eyes and noses. They were within thirty meters. I pulled out the Water Shooter filled with hot sauce.
"Let’s see if this works."
"Daiki, assume it won’t and stay ready to move," Yuji warned.
"I know. Hiiragi-san?"
"Ready when you are."
They flanked me, ready to intercept if the sauce failed.
"...Two, one, fire!"
I sprayed the sauce directly into their faces. This time, it worked perfectly. The orcs dropped their clubs and began thrashing on the ground, screaming in agony. It seemed the sauce was outside their resistance range. We watched them from a safe distance.
"That did it."
"Yeah, looks like we can keep using that for a bit."
"But the pepper balls are probably useless from here on," I said.
"Kokonoe-kun, if monsters with resistances are showing up, that means the shooter will eventually fail too. What then?" Hiiragi-san asked.
"I could think of something else, but..."
These gadgets were basically tutorial weapons. I hadn't expected them to work forever.
"Daiki, maybe we should stop relying on them?" Yuji suggested.
"You think so too?"
"Yeah. They’re handy, but we’ve only been using them for first encounters. It’s better to learn how to fight these things properly while we still have the margin for error."
"Right," Hiiragi-san agreed. "I agree with Hirose-kun. We can't stick to the same routine forever."
"Fair enough. I'll put them away." I stowed the gadgets back in my Spatial Storage.
"Alright, let’s finish them," Yuji said, pointing his kodachi at the prone orcs.
Hiiragi-san didn’t hesitate, joyfully driving her spear into an orc’s neck. Yuji sighed and finished the other one. Once the monsters were dead, Hiiragi-san pulled out her skinning knife.
"Yes! Orc meat!"
Where the corpses had been, a large slab of meat, a thick bone, and a Core Crystal appeared. She was practically hopping with joy. I picked up one of the bones, feeling a bit skeptical.
"Hiiragi-san, what are we doing with the bones?"
"Oh, those are for making soup stock! It's richer than pork bone broth."
I imagined the pig-faced monsters and winced. Yuji looked just as disgusted. We shared a weary smile.
"Come on, let’s find the next one!" Hiiragi-san called out, her steps light as she led us deeper into the dungeon.
We ended the day with a massive haul. After three hours on the tenth floor, we had gathered about 30kg of meat and bones. The appraisal at the Association came to over 400,000 yen. We waited an hour for the quality inspection to pass so we could take the meat home ourselves, and fortunately, it passed without a hitch.
On the bus ride home, Hiiragi-san thanked us repeatedly.
"Thank you so much, you two. Without you..."
"Don’t mention it, Hiiragi-san."
"Yeah, we’re doing this for our own reasons too," Yuji added.
I cut her off before she could bow again. "Anyway, Yuji, Hiiragi-san reached her goal, but what about yours? Juzo-san sent you here for experience, right? Do you have a specific target?"
Yuji grimaced. After a long silence, he finally spoke.
"The old man said the goal is to land a single hit on him in a match."
"Huh?"
"What?"
Land a hit on Juzo-san? That was an impossible task. Even with our enhanced stats, the man toyed with us in practice.
"So, I’ve got no choice but to keep grinding in the dungeon and honing my skills," Yuji sighed.
"I see..."
Hiiragi-san and I shared a wry smile. It looked like we still had a very long way to go.