ShangriLa Frontier ~ Shitty Games Hunter Challenges Godly Game ~

「I looked around the shipwrecks earlier, but I did not manage to find anything quest related in there. And believe me, I was really thorough with my investigation.」

Sure, there was a whole lot of treasure and valuables in there, but none of them look appealing enough to be considered quest-related.

「What about the towers? Were there any clues there?」

「Nope. …… They were just like ice cream cones: empty on the inside. …… Mold, that was a serious metaphor, so no laughing, if you please.」

「Ice cream cones…… Fufufu…… No, no, no! I’m sorry! I’m sorry!」

「If we start thinking about it like that, that would mean we would have to search the whole castle and town inch by inch!」

Let’s not go back to the city. We would be searching all day for clues, and we have no guarantee whatsoever that we would be able to find anything at all.

「So in the end, our only option is to search throughout this castle until we find something……?」

「Well, we have to check every nook and cranny out, so might as well stay on the lookout for anything suspicious.」

What came after that was a few seconds of a very awkward silence.

I don’t know about anyone else, but for me that much was kind of an obvious ever since we first arrived here in this place.

「Now, let’s take one more look around and start exploring! Be careful not to enter the basement, and let’s search every single nook and cranny of this place!」

「I know that I said that, but……」

This whole castle is crazy big. It is so big that you can easily get lost in here. It that sense, it is more of a labyrinth than a dungeon.

What’s more, since the general color scheme of this place is blue, aside from the occasional furniture all of the rooms in here look more or less the same. With that being said, the room we were currently in had a giant fireplace with blue flames burning inside of it. I turn towards Rei while looking around.

「Hey, Rei? Found anything?」

「Not really…… If not counting a decorative sword, I have nothing on my end.」

Rei shows me the decorative sword that was hanging on the wall. The sword looked truly decorative, and in real fight of swords and magics it would truly not be of much use. Plus, since Rei’s current armor set was more Japanese-oriented, it did not really go too well with a Western-looking sword.

「When we talk about clues for quests in castles, throne room comes to mind as the place that should have some……」

「Does that me we rush to the throne room!?」

「Stay! STAY, god damn it! Kutanid is not going anywhere! We don’t have to be in THAT much of a hurry!」

「Yes, sir!」

If you want to say something like that, you might as well start to call me Colonel Sanraku. That, or Brigadier General. Those titles sound really cool. Marshal? Not so much, it sounds lame in my opinion.

「I think that if we are on the lookout for something, it might as well be a diary. At least that would be the case in every other game that I have played thus far.」

At the current moment, our team ‘Mortals’ divided into two separate teams that are on the lookout for any clues. It was only natural for Rust and Mold to be together in one team, so ‘Team A’ consisted of me, Rei, Akitsu Akane and Emul. It was more convenient that way.

Sickle, Alva, Nereis and Straude were all part of the other team, if that was not obvious at that point in time.

We were yet to find any clues in here, but my brain has been working full throttle all this time.

What is the relationship between Kutanid and Lulilas? I feel like this is the key to the mystery of this place, a key that shall open the door to Kutanid’s gimmick and bring us victory.

In the first place, this whole city may have been a normal island with a city in the middle of it. Not underwater, but on the surface. And it was probably just that: a city, not a city-state. To be something like that, it should have been way larger than it is now.

And something must have happened to this city, there is no doubt about it. The desolated landscape is more than enough of a proof.

Siege, collapse…… There are many things such as that, and even plagues and pandemics that come to mind, but none of that matters for the moment. Something happened here, then came Kutanid and did something else.

「…… As far as I can see it, if the city was attacked by a huge monster, shouldn’t the damages be far greater?」

A devastated and completely abandoned city. But if it was truly the working of Kutanid’s invasion…… Wouldn’t the damages be way more severe?

But even if he did end up leveling the whole city to the ground, shouldn’t it be a piece of cake for Kutanid to bring it all back to normal and make it feel like brand new? So why would Kutanid choose to leave the city in this half-desolated state……? If it’s a hobby, then surely it is a pretty twisted one.

「There were certainly signs of life around this town when we were looking around earlier. But what could that possibly mean……?」

「They all perished, slowly……」

「Yes, that is exactly it, Rei.」

Ara, is my role being snatched away from me right now? Oh well, doesn’t matter all that much. I mean, it is always way more fun if more people manage to figure something out rather than arriving at the conclusion alone.

Has the arrival of Kutanid caused a mass panic throughout the city? It certainly feel like the current residents of this city are not exactly the ones who were living here before.

「More like this city getting destroyed in an instant by a huge cataclysm, doesn’t it feel to you that it was more like a gradual disaster?」

「I can’t help but to worry now. Alright, let us look into other room.」

「I understand! Just leave it to me to unlock it!」

At times like this, it was really convenient to have a Thief in our party. If it wasn’t for Akitsu Akane here, we would have to open the lock the old fashioned, master key way (which means forcing the lock open with lots of violence).

It was at that time that I have become aware of a particular detail on Akitsu Akane’s fox mask. While he was already on his way to the next room, I realized that he had markings that looked like patterns carved directly on his skin…… It was only later that I would learn that those were curse marks put on him by Siegwurm the Skylord.

「…… That.」

They say that the Devil will never use violence in order to obtain what he wants. But if indeed so, then what is the exchange that underwent between Kutanid and Lulilas?

「It’s a contract.」

Could it be that just like people making offering to the gods, the people of this town were making some sort of offerings to Kutanid?

The answer to that question surely would await us somewhere around this castle.