Day 301-310/Day 305

Day 305
Today, I decided that I'm going to capture【God of Algae】's【Deep Lair: Blessing of the Algae Women】with its entrance located at the bottom of a blue-holed submarine cavern at the intersection of the many canals in the city center. Since it's underwater, I decided to conquer it alone and gave the others free time. I gave them the okay to do special training in【Ship Ambrasm Parabellum】, or go shopping and sightseeing.
With only Kanami-chan as a representative of «Parabellum», I asked her to ensure the establishment of our new branch by selecting a suitable building for hidden use such as the building in the Atarakua Demon Empire, the same as the [Snake's Heart - Col Hydra].
With Kanami-chan's charm, she attracts both men and women, so getting a contract would be easy and lead to favorable conditions. Also, it wouldn't be good if, by some chance, my body clone was discovered by the trading company leader of the city. With that, we probably could finish the service quickly and take the children shopping somewhere.
After setting things up, I left early in the morning by riding a [Row Boat] until I arrived near the intersection where the【Deep Lair: Blessing of the Algae Women】is located. There are large numbers of boats that traveled around here. It could be seen that whenever they pass each other they are almost close enough to collide. However, they never managed to actually hit since the boatmen are already accustomed to the area.
This place is the only location where it's quite busy from early in the morning, full of energy and enthusiasm. After entering an alley with some shade, I saw the destination near the area I landed at.
I then used【Recognition Difficulty】so I would be difficult to be noticed, and also activated【Thundershark Dragonlord's Scales】which is one of the【Exoskeleton】types that are currently registered on the【Exoskeleton Suit】. The exoskeleton has some differences from before. It now has a unique luster of blue tones and on the back, there's some kind of a dark lightning decoration made of countless fins that fade in. It also sharpened the forearms with sharp fins, which had increased to 4 with my additional arms.
There's webbing between the fingers, and from the long tail extending from my hips there was a large fin on the end. The change from before is only slight, but since the capability has been improved, I can't complain. After checking to make sure no one saw me switch into my gear, I quietly dove into the water.
【Thundershark Dragonlord's Scales】was gained from Shark Head ・ Bolt Wyrm which is considerably faster than a swimming mermaid and merman, so my【Exoskeleton】made me similarly as fast when equipped.
Moreover, its abilities are significantly increased while underwater. I could comfortably move with【Fast Swimming】and【Aquatic】. The swimming speed also became even faster since I had overlapped effects from invocation abilities such as [Underwater Predator] and [Terrain Efficacy: Water]. I effortlessly passed by a mermaid and merman, and rushed to the seafloor cavern and the enigmatic blue hole that lead to the entrance of the 【Deep Lair: Blessing of the Algae Women】.
I immediately went down about 10 meters into the subterranean cave. I then went into a lateral hole at the right. If you look within the poorly lit lateral hole, you can slightly make out a light further down. As you move forward, the space begins to spread open and eventually becomes a wide open area. This place is like an underwater paradise. The bottom had coral spread throughout the place becoming a light source shaped like the vine of some sort of [Ocean Grape]. The stock of [Umami Kelp] can be used to make soup with a deep and excellent flavor.
There are [Golden Sea Urchin] that are covered in spikes and needles (splinters), but has high quality contents inside.
There also could be found [White King Oyster] which is referred to as [Sea-flavored ​​Concentrated Milk], and only here can you find the firm and lean [Crown Snow Crab].
In addition, there were big [Black Headed Tuna] which could be sold at a high price as a luxury fish, used for special occasions. All around swam schools of the [Glory Red Sea Bream], and so many more!
You can find a variety of seafood all over the place. Looking at the sight, I was left speechless. On land, there were a large amount of merchant retailers that had expressed their descriptions about this place. After coming here, I found that it was just as described. Here, you can get all kinds of delicious ingredients from this dungeon by reaching out to grab it. I can only think of words like: "here you can be filled to your heart's content."
There is some skill needed to collect this stuff however. If not done well, it can result in destroying the taste. Also, you need to make sure there is no poison in the ingredients so it won't be dangerous. There's an unlimited amount of tasty food and there were still spectacles here that can't be seen in other dungeons.
~
Probably because the shallower area is known to be safe, there are spectacles that are similar to that of a group of friendly moms chatting together at women's meetings. The merman's children that look a little younger than 10 years old kids and other mermaids would freely play with visitors around the edges, and eat [Sweet Shrimp] that they caught by themselves.
For these children, they probably considered it as a common snack, but [Sweet Shrimp] is a dungeon ingredient that is quite expensive if sold outside. If you looked at this as a person who cannot swim underwater, the sight might cause you to envy these children.
A couple of merman and mermaid sat down close together on chairs of coral, they're so enamored that they're feeding each other, an atmosphere that would lead you spitting sugars from your mouth. Disregarding the pink romantic aura scattering from them, the things that the couples were eating are called [Ball of Love Jellyfish].
It was a jellyfish that looks like a round pink candy. By mutually eating it with a lover, the love between them will be long lasting. That also is one of this dungeon's food. Therefore, it is quite hard to obtain because of its high popularity and rarity. But couples here seem to have managed to obtain it in abundance.
It is impossible to relax in a normal dungeon but it seems there are a lot of normal people here and it seems that this is a normal occurrence. Honestly, I can say with all certainty that this is a wonderful place.
Due to the fact that there is a huge variety of seafood ingredients, I couldn't go into detail on all of it. So, for the time being, I went around examining what I could. By weaving a net of gold thread and swimming quickly around the area, I managed to collect a large catch of marine fish and seaweed.
Outside of the nets' reach, some shellfish started clinging like reef on to the thread as I swam. I can ask to the locals later whether I picked any unusual finds if I run into one.
As I continued examining and catching the wildlife, I came to the realization that night had come without me having fought a single thing. But all the same, the seafood here is too delicious. I just couldn't stop! While regretting that I had spent the time uselessly, I decided to put serious effort into capturing this dungeon properly tomorrow.
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RAWS
“三百五日目”
今日は都市中央にある多数の運河の交差点の底にある、ブルーホールめいた海底洞窟が入口となっている【藻女の深き恵みの洞窟タングラブル・ディープケイブ】の攻略をする事にした。
水中にあるので挑戦するのは俺単鬼だけであり、他の皆には自由に行動してもらう事になっている。
【アンブラッセム・パラべラム号】で特訓してもいいし、買い物や観光をしたりしてもいい。
ただカナ美ちゃんにだけは魔帝国にも造った総合商会≪戦に備えよパラべラム≫の子会社――迷宮商会≪蛇の心臓コル・ヒドレ≫と同じように、偽装用の新しい子会社が入るのに適した建物を選び、確保するように頼んでいる。
分体などを使って建物の売買を担う大手の商会は既に判明しているし、カナ美ちゃんなら男女問わず魅了してアッサリと好条件で契約を結べるだろうから、多分サッサと終わらせて子供達と何処か買い物に出かけるに違いない。
なんて事はさて置き、早朝から俺は【藻女の深き恵みの洞窟】がある交差点近くまで小銭で乗れる手漕ぎボードを使って移動した。
周囲には数多くの小船が行き交い、接触しそうになるほど近くを擦れ違うものの、船頭が慣れているからか当たる事はない。
場所が場所だけに早朝から賑やかで、活気に満ちている。
それを見ていると目的地近くまで来たので一旦陸地に上がり、物陰になる路地裏に入る。そして注目され難くする為【認識困難】を使い、【外骨格着装】を発動させて現在登録されている三種類の【外骨格】の内の一つである【雷鮫龍侯の楯鱗】を装着した。
青色を基調とした独特の光沢を持つ凹凸の少ない滑らかな形状をした外骨格で、背面にはやや黒みを帯びた雷鳴宝石製の鰭が無数に並び、四本に増えた前腕部には鋭利な刃鰭がある。
指の間には水掻きがあり、臀部辺りから伸びる長い尻尾の先端には大きな鰭が存在する。
以前と比べて若干の変化があるようだが、能力は劣化するどころか向上しているようなので、まあ問題にはならないだろう。
装着した後は誰も見ていない事を確認して、静かに素早く潜水する。
【雷鮫龍侯の楯鱗】は素材にしたのが“シャークヘッド・ボルトワイアーム”だけあって、そもそも装着時の遊泳速度は人魚や魚人達よりもかなり速い。
それに加えて水中時のステータスを大幅に底上げしたり、楽に動けるようになる【高速水泳】や【水棲】、【水中の捕食者】や【地形効果：水】なども重複発動させた事で遊泳速度はより速くなり、水中に居た人魚や魚人達を楽々と追い抜きながら、【藻女の深き恵みの洞窟】の出入り口であるブルーホールめいた海底洞窟に突入した。
海底洞窟は最初の数十メートル程は直下に進み、底に到着すると今度は真横にある横穴へ進むようになっていた。
光源が乏しく薄暗い横穴の中をしばらく進んでいくと、次第に進行方向に光が見え始め、更に進むとどこまでも続いていそうな明るく開けた空間が広がっていた。
そこはまるで海中の楽園のようだった。
随所にあるサンゴが光源となっているそこは、まるでブドウのような“海巨峰”、出汁をとるとより味を深めてくれる“ウマミコンブ”、外はトゲトゲしているが中身は極上品の“黄金ウニ”、海の濃縮ミルクとも呼ばれている“白王牡蠣ハクオウカキ”、ギュッと引き締まった身をした“王冠ズワイカニ”、高級魚として高値のつく大きな“黒兜マグロ”、祝い事があれば何かと重宝される“栄光マダイ”などなど、至る所に様々な海産物を発見できる。
その光景に、俺は言葉を失った。
以前ここについて大型量販店と表現した事もあったが、実際に来てみてまさにその通りだ、と思った。
手を伸ばせば美味そうな迷宮食材が取り放題だ。お好きにどうぞ、と言われているようにしか思えない。
採取には多少の知識が必要なモノもあるが、それも傷みやすいとか味が落ちるとかで、毒があるとか攻撃されるなんて事はない。
安全に美味い食材が取り放題であり、それだけでなく、他の迷宮では見られない光景がまだあった。
浅い場所は安全である事が知られている為か、まるで女子会の如く集まって談笑しているママ友だろう一団が居り、その子供だろう一桁くらいの幼い子供の魚人や人魚達はそこら辺で自由に遊んだり、自分達で甘味の強い“甘身エビ”を捕まえては食べていた。
多分子供達にとってはオヤツ感覚なのだろうが、“甘身エビ”は外で売れば結構高額になる迷宮食材である。
水中で活動できない者が見れば、羨ましいと思ってしまうに違いない。
少し離れた場所ではサンゴの椅子に腰掛けた魚人と人魚のカップルが、互いに何かを食べさせあっては砂糖を口から吐き出してしまいそうなほど惚気けている。
ピンク色のオーラを撒き散らすような惚気はともかく、多分カップルが食べているのは“恋玉クラゲ”だろう。
ピンク色の丸々とした飴玉みたいなクラゲで、それを恋人と食べさせあうと長続きする、なんて話もある迷宮食材の一つである。
そのため人気が高いが希少なので滅多に手に入らないそうだが、あのカップルは見事に発見したらしい。
その他にも数多くの一般人が居て、それでいてゆったりくつろいでいるなんて普通の迷宮なら有り得ない光景は、しかしここではこれが日常風景らしい。
正直、なんと素晴らしい場所だろうかと思わずには居られない。
ここで得られる海産物の種類は豊富過ぎるため、情報を集めても網羅はできなかった。
だからとりあえず、何があるのか調べながら回っていった。
黄金糸を使って網を造り、泳いでいる魚やら自生している海藻やらを一網打尽にしたり。
岩礁などにへばりついていた貝類などをこそぎ落として片っ端から収納したり。
泳いでいればすぐ遭遇できる地元民に珍しい品がどこなら取りやすいか聞いてみたり。
などなど調べるのに熱中しすぎて、まさか戦闘もせず夜が来た時には思わず我に返ったものだ。
いや、でも、ここの海産物、美味しくて手が止まらないのである。
無駄に時間を費やしてしまった事に反省して、明日はちゃんと攻略しようと心に決めた。
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Category:Novel
Category:Re:Monster Volume 8