ShangriLa Frontier ~ Shitty Games Hunter Challenges Godly Game ~

「First of all, and the most important thing: our top priority right about now is to discover the location and secure those “Black Bamboo Shoots” that “Ivory” wants us to get. But seriously now, “Black”? Talk about poor naming sense……」

「Well, maybe they are called that because they are all blackened from being in the sol for too long?」

「Yes, that’s one way to look at it, Explosive Green Peas, really outside of the box, you know? Have you even looked at that image “Ivory” gave us? There was an unexpected hint there. “Crown” before the name of the bamboo shoots.」

Now, the question is, why is this item even called Crown Bamboo Shoots?

For the time being the tension finally managed to drop down by quite a lot, and guided by the Bansai-sensei we were currently climbing on top of the hill where there was a Stonehenge-like formation made out of stone at the very top of it. We still needed to be vigilant about our surroundings, but aside from the occasional vibration of the earth, there was actually nothing too alarming around us as this moment. So with the vast sky right above us, it was time to finally decide onto what we were going to do from this point onwards. And there is no better way to decide on the course of action than to make a brainstorming session.

「If the name of this thing does not have some weird or unusual way to read it, it would essentially mean “Crown”. And when it comes to crowns, there is only one way in which they can be used. Namely……」

「Does that mean that something is actually wearing it somewhere out there?」

「Yes, that’s the correct answer here, Akitsu Akane-san. Or at the very least, that’s what I think is going on here. Maybe the Professor requested “Ivory” to give us that picture because he managed to reach the same conclusion, or even something better…… You see, it’s hard to grasp because it’s so enlarged, but the object in this picture is obviously quite strange if you compare it to its background.」

…… Ahh, I see. So, there is something strange about the way in which it grows, huh? I mean, it’s pretty obvious when you start to think about it. Because you are so focused on the things in the foreground, you basically stop paying attention to the background at all. And if you look closely on this picture, those bamboo shoots really do not grow from the ground at all. The ground is certainly there, but it can be seen way beyond the bamboo shoots, and the shoots themselves are growing on something else.

「I am ninety nine percent sure that this item that we are looking for is the monster drop item. It probably does not belong to a Swimming Mine because its biological habitat is way different than what would be needed for a plant like that to grow and expand properly. It may not seem so at a first glance, generally speaking, every monster in this game has a certain “ground” on which they are based. So while it may not be a drop item from Swimming Mine itself, it may very well belong to a boss monster that is derived from it.」

「I have seen one of those lizard things out there that has some sort of liquid covering its body, and it was also wearing a sort of a camouflage from dried up mud and fallen leaves, but I could not see anything like bamboo shoots growing from anywhere around its body.」

「As we have already seen on the previous layers, this Behemoth right here seems to be home to some never-before-seen types of monsters. So it is entirely plausible that the bamboo shoots that we are looking for are part of some new monster that we are yet to encounter around those parts.」

Not to even mention the fact that no matter how many times we tried to call her here, “Ivory” was no responding or showing up. Perhaps she was going to show herself once more when we would finally bring those bamboo shoots to the designated place? Ahh, I certainly miss the good old times when all you had to do was to say “Brave Fish” and she would appear in front of us just like that!

But I guess that Bansai-san would not be a true member of the “Library” if he did not jumped to a whole new level of consideration right after ending this particular “branch”, entertaining a theory completely different from that of “Monster Drop Item”. I guess that when it comes to bamboo shoots, there is more to them than meets the eye.

「Everyone, the time is growing pretty late, so how about that those of you who wish to log out for the day do so right now?」

After that suggestion was voiced out, there were no people who wished to drop out at this stage. Everyone proclaimed loudly that they are all pumped up and ready to go. With that taken out of the way, we could start to consider a whole another thing that needed to be addressed here: what is the trigger that causes Swimming Mines to emerge in the first place?

「Could it be that some sort of obstruction is the trigger here?」

「Ah, no, or maybe it’s all about the way in which those enemies perceive those who enter their “territory”?」

「Then how about we give this a go and see for ourselves? Every theory out there needs a field test, right?」

I wondered if they were able to notice us because of the noise of our footsteps, because the first contact was a group action, but it seems that the Swimming Mines do not notice us even though we were talking quite loudly right about now.

Then, do they react only to the footsteps, not the sound of our voices? I went down from the rock to the ground and tried tap dance the best I could, but there was no reaction. Not that I really counted on some of those things to actually pop up in here, since we were pretty far away from “soft” soil and closer to the stony ground. And even if they came, I was easily able to escape just in the nick of time.

「Okay, so the trigger here is neither the sound, nor the distance at which our voices carry……」

「Could it be that they were perhaps trying to get away from my carved wounds? I mean, this thing is supposed to make the monsters whose levels are lower than mine to run away in fear, so it wouldn’t be all that surprising.」

「No, I don’t really think that this is the case in here. Because it was them who started to approach us in the first place, not the other way around. So those conditions are clearly as far away from being normal as possible. But then…… No, it might actually be that all of the monsters created here inside of the Behemoth are treated like artificial creations, not actual living beings. Or maybe……」