| Author: SS Samurai | Original Source: Syosetu |
| Translator: rm31439 | English Source: Re:Library |
The gate, through which we had entered, closed. At the same time, the dragon started to move.
«Ye children of man…»
Moreover, it spoke.
«Thou art well qualified to fight Us,” it continued to talk. “We shall give thee praise. As the true ruler here, the Golden Rose Queen Dragon.»
Oh~, sorry about the name. So, it was female?
“Hey, Mika, do you think it’s fine, if we beat this dragon already?” I asked her.
“Shouldn’t we wait until it’s done talking?”
“You’re right.”
«Children of man, what art thou saying?»
Oh, she wasn’t made to say this. She seems to have a proper ego. Should I try to talk to her? Though for the most part, it doesn’t matter. Maybe this will clear up the exhaustion of those days here.
“Erm… Miss Golden Rose Queen Dragon!”
«Oh, ho, what is it? And… looking at thee, art thou not still wee lasses? Didst thou enter this labyrinth just by the two of thee? Art there no adult children of man?”
Huh, it’s surprising that she pays attention to something like that. I mean, I did forget to turn back into Ayumu after waking up this morning. Well, it shouldn’t matter. She’s interesting, so let’s talk to her for a bit more.
“That’s true. It’s just us.”
«W-what?! One finally cometh here, and ’tis two lasses! …Ha-ha-ha! Thou art curious.»
No, no, rather than that, there’s one thing I’d like to ask her, you know.
“Miss Golden Rose Queen Dragon, I’d like to ask you a few questions, are you fine with that?”
«Hrm, ’tis unusual. What dost thou want to ask? We shall tell thee if ’tis within the scope of Our knowledge.»
I secretly told Mika via message, what I was going to ask. She looked as if she was holding back her laughter and sent back a “You want to ask her that?”.
“Miss Golden Rose Queen Dragon, why are you in here? Don’t you have leisure time?”
This question left the dragon with her mouth gaping wide open.
«Aye… We were born in here,» she replied, after a while. «Now, finally, We were given life in this world and awoken from Our slumber. We art something like an existence created by the labyrinth, so to speak. There was nay time for Us to feel a thing like ‘leisure’.»
Oh, that was a surprisingly pitiable answer…
Mika also told me in a message, that I “shouldn’t have asked her that”.
“I see… Then it will be the end for you when you are defeated, right?”
In reaction to that reply, the dragon let loose a bellow and spoke in a furious tone of voice.
«Ridiculous. Ye say ye will defeat Us? What drivel thou art speaking~!!»
That roar… is it to intimidate us? That’s right, maybe I can intimidate her, too. A competition based on threats might be cool.
I immediately turned back into Ayumu and glared at the dragon with a profoundly sharp gaze. When I did that, Mika gave a jump for some reason.
Oh, was that because I accidentally scared her the other day?1
The dragon also looked quite shocked, as if my intimidation was working.
«Wha…!? We see, one needeth true power, merely to arrive here. Anon, come at Us!”
With those words as my signal, I circled around to the dragon's back in an instant and cut off her tail at the base, using [Secret Extreme Sword Technique – Fivefold Destruction]. Incidentally, the moment I severed it, I turned back into Alim.
«Grah~~~!? When didst thou-?»
I asked Mika, whether it’d be fine with her, if I did it all by myself.
“That’s alright. Or rather, I think it’d be better that way.”
“Gotcha! Thank you.”
«What art ye so brazenly talking about~?!»
She doesn’t have to get that angry, does she?
Then I further lopped off her arms, legs, and wings.
To be honest, I could also normally kill her, couldn’t I? This way, dismantling her would be easier.
«Grah~…! Oh… ’tis… Our loss…? We were not even able to compete with thee… Curses! Strike Us down properly.»
So she roared, but this dragon had, in fact, already died twice.
The first time I cut off her tail and her head at the same time, and put her whole body in storage. Then I took out a single scale and sprinkled an Armita over it to revive her (how fast something is resurrected, is based on the person who uses the Amrita). During that time, I took off her tail once more.
The second time was when I lobbed off her arms, legs, and wings. In fact, I cut off her head, too, and put her whole body in storage again. I took out another scale and this time I used a Legend Potion.2 She was brought back to life. After confirming that, I severed her tail, arms, legs, and wings again.
This brought us to the present. Since she was SS-Rank, I had assumed she’d notice what I did, but it didn’t look like she did at all.
Maybe she still is’t going all out.
Thank you, Miss Dragon, for taking part in the Amrita experiment and for providing magic cores and materials. But there is still one experiment left, you see. Well, that’s after I’ve defeated her once.
“Yep, that’s it. See you later, Miss Golden Rose Queen Dragon.”
«See thee later? What in the world art thou…?»
“You’ll understand it then, you know.”
I killed her.
“You told her ‘See you later’… what did you mean by that?” Mika asked me, while I was dismantling the defeated dragon.
Incidentally, at this point I had already dismantled the two carcasses from before.
“We still have a bunch of Amritas.”
“Oh, so you want to kill her several times and get tons of materials… Is that it?”
“Yeah, that’s the gist of it. There’s also another thing I’d like to try.”
“Still, I feel a bit bad for Miss Golden Rose Queen Dragon…”
“Well, that’s true. Because of that, I’ll make it less painful for her,” I replied, while staring at the treasure chest that emerged, where the dragon had been.
TL notes:
What the hell? That poor dragon. And it’s not even over for her, since Alim will likely bring her back to life at some point for further experiments/material harvesting…
Also, I tried to made her talk in Shakespearean English. There’s a very high chance I messed up somewhere with pronouns, verbs and/or expressions. If you notice any, just write a comment and I’ll fix it.
