chap12+++++++

Clicking his tongue, he chased after the fleeing Honey Den.
Without so much as a Hey, or an Out of the way, Honey Den pushed down people as he went and ran over top of them. It was the right way to flee in a crowd, but hard for any decent person to do. He apparently had no concern for his fellow man.
“You’re scum!” Haruhiro shouted.
As he jumped over one of the fallen people, Haruhiro let out that insult despite himself, but Honey Den turned just his head back and shouted, “Shut up! I’ll kill you, you piece of shit!” “You’re the piece of shit!” Setora snapped.
For Honey Den, it must have felt as if, suddenly, a single woman had risen up to stand in his way.
The fact was, they had planned for the possibility he would bolt, and the party was spread out across the area. Honey Den had happened to pick the direction Setora was in.
Setora tried to sweep Honey Den’s leg. Or rather, she gave Honey Den’s shin the hardest kick she could muster.
“Gweh?!” Honey Den pitched forward and fell. He tried to get right back up, but Setora was on him in no time, putting her foot on his back.
“You think I’d let you escape, you moron?” she snarled.
“Nughhhhhhh...”
As Honey Den groaned, Kiichi ran over to him, hissing and baring his fangs threateningly.

“Whuh?! The hell?! A cat?! S-Stop! Don’t bite! I don’t taste any good...”
“As if I’d let him eat you,” Setora said contemptuously.
When Setora put her whole weight on her heel, Honey Den let out a kind of creepy squeal. Was he kind of enjoying this? He was seriously creepy...




Either way, Honey Den was now successfully captured. They would have loved to make him talk and be done with him here, but a bunch of curious lookie-loos had gathered around, so there was no time for that.
The sun was setting, and the dragons had flown off, so Haruhiro and the party escorted Honey Den into Roronea. That still attracted a lot of onlookers who, despite knowing nothing, loudly shouted that they wanted to hit him, tear him apart, and kill him.
What to do?
Jimmy offered a suggestion.
“How about using our ship? It should be coming into port about now.”
When they headed to the port, the Mantis-go was coming alongside the pier. For some reason, the K&K’s KMW Momohina was on the gunwale, not the deck, doing what looked like kung-fu practice. Maybe that was part of her charm... or not? It was hard to tell.,
Nothing could be said on that point, but the gunwale was no wider than a simple handrail, and just standing on it at all was terrifying. Despite that, she was doing flips, and screaming high kicks.
Seriously? It was inhuman.
“Mew, that’s so cool...” Yume let out a sigh of admiration, and it wasn’t hard to understand why, but Haruhiro would really rather she not start aspiring to be like that.
Once they helped with the mooring and boarded the Mantis-go, that noisy sahuagin Ginzy met with Haruhiro and the party, acting like he was the captain.
He was too noisy to bear. Best to ignore him.
“Hey, hey, hey! I’m the captain of this ship, I’ll have you know!!
What are you ignoring me for?! Hey, what for?! Damn it, I’ll sue!
No, I’d love to sue, but where can I?! Who will hear my pleas?!
Hey, hey, hey, hey?! Hey! I said, hey!”
“Whewwww. Shut your mouth, dummy!” Momohina attacked Ginzy as she came down from the gunwale, easily lifting him up and giving him a hearty toss. “Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeek!” His arms and legs flailing pathetically, Ginzy fell straight into the sea.
Sploosh! There was a great splash, and then he just sunk.
He floated back up a little later, making a fuss again. “What was that for, out of nowhere?! I know I’m a sahuagin, but this is too much! I’m not a sea sahuagin, I’m a land sahuagin, so the sea water’s too salty. I’m halfway to being a freshwater fish, even though I’m not a fish, okay?! I’m stiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiill the captain, though!”
They ignored him, and got on with the interrogation in the ship’s hold. She must not have had anything to do, because Momohina tagged along.
Once the crew cleared out, the party and Momohina bound Honey Den to a pillar in the hold, and started the interrogation by asking if he’d gone into the forest with Red-Eyed Ben and Step.
“I have no idea what you’re on about,” the man whined. “Oww, it hurts. My teeth hurt.”
Kuzaku cracked his knuckles, taking a threatening attitude.
“This guy doesn’t seem to get the situation he’s in, does he?” Honey Den just sneered a little.
Shihoru threw a What now? glance in Haruhiro’s direction. It was hard to decide.
The pirates were ruffians, so they might use physical pain to extract a confession, but Haruhiro would honestly prefer not to be so uncivilized. Kuzaku was only making the threat. Basically, they were just posturing.
Merry said calmly, “If you need to make him hurt a bit, so long as he’s still breathing, I can back you up.”
At those unsettling words, Honey Den’s expression changed just a little. “Heh. No matter what you do to me, I don’t know what I don’t know. I can’t tell you anything I have no clue about. Oww, my teeth hurt.”
“Hey, hey, Haru-kun,” Yume started to say. “This person, he says his teeth hurt, so why not try takin’ them out for him?” “You say some scary things, Yume...”
“Isn’t that a bit weak?” Setora sniffed.
She was blatantly looking down on Honey Den. He might have been the type she hated. Well, Haruhiro kind of hated him, too.
Really hated him, maybe.
“He can only act tough for now,” she said contemptuously. “Cut off a finger or two. If you do that, he’ll tell you anything, I guarantee it.”
“Don’t underestimate me, you bitch!” Honey Den screamed.
“If you want to live to see the dawn tomorrow, keep your slobber in your mouth, pirate.”
“I... I ain’t scared of nothing! I mean it!”
“Do you want to see if you can still say that once I pluck out your eyeball and shove your severed ear into the socket?”
“Wh-What’s with her?! I-Is she nuts?! No sane person comes up with things like that, right?!”
“I have reason to be used to cutting up dead bodies,” Setora said coolly. “If they are still alive, that is of little consequence.
Perhaps I should use you to prove that right now.”
“I-I-I-I-If you think you c-can do it, b-bring it on, bitch! I-I-I-I can’t t-tell you what I d-d-d-don’t know!”
“Where should I start?” Setora pulled out a small blade and took a step toward Honey Den. She was perfectly expressionless, without a hint of hesitation in her voice or actions. “Why don’t I skin that hideous face of yours? They often say fresh air tastes good, and without your skin, maybe you’ll be able to taste it with your face. Want to try?”
“Y-Y-Y-Y-You can’t do that! I won’t taste anything! It’ll just hurt! It’ll hurt like hell just getting my face skinned, too!”
“It may hurt so badly that you want to bite your tongue and die, but that does not concern me in the least.”
“D-Don’t you have any human conscience?! There’s something wrong with you!”
“Think what you will; it has no influence on me.” Setora took another step towards Honey Den.
She couldn’t possibly mean to go through with it... or so Haruhiro hoped, but Setora might very well do it without batting an eye. That was how she made them feel.
Was that part of the act? Probably. Hopefully it was just an act.
Now, as for whether he felt sorry for Honey Den... no, not in the slightest, but Haruhiro didn’t want to think he had no choice but to let Setora get her hands dirty. He moved to stop Setora.
“Hold on, Sis!” Momohina cried.
He was beaten to it.
Momohina stepped up, still sweaty from kung-fu practice, so she just had her coat over her shoulders, not done up. She hadn’t been wearing it before, but at some point she’d put the fake mustache back on.
“Who are you calling Sis?” Setora asked, looking disappointed.
“Heh...” Momohina laughed. “You’re a sis, so I called you Sis,
Sis.”
“I don’t understand...”
“Have no feeeear. I don’t understand it myself, either!”
“KMW, was it?” Setora asked coolly. “Will you torture this rotten, cavity riddled piece of trash instead of me?”
“Pirates have pirate-yyyyyyyyyy wayssssssss of doing thangs.”
“...Thangs?”
“Thoings? Hm? Did I get it wrong?”
“I don’t think either is correct...”
“Whuddever. Pirates have their own way of doing things. That’s right! Full speed ahead! On that note, Jimmy-chan, the thing, get the thing ready!”
Momohina seemed to be referring to some specific thing, but no matter how you looked at him, Jimmy seemed confused.
“What is the thing?” he asked.
“Fungh?!” Momohina’s eyes went wide, and she beckoned Jimmy over to whisper in his ear.
Jimmy nodded, left the hold, and came back shortly with it in his arms.
“Yes! Thiiiis is what a pirate should use!” Momohina lifted the bundle of large bird feathers she had received from Jimmy up high.
Jimmy had brought a pot, too. Momohina dipped the feather in that pot.
“I-Is that...?” Kuzaku began.
Momohina went, “Ta-daaaah!” and pulled the feather bundle from the pot. The feather bundle was glistening and wet.
“Oil?” Shihoru whispered.
“Bingo! We have a winnerrrrrrr!” Momohina clapped in a way that seemed dodgy as she slowly swayed the feather bundle around.
“Oil?” Merry tilted her head. “You’re going to burn him?” “Eek!” Honey Den’s whole body went rigid.
Setora looked around the hold. “Will the ship be all right?” Hold on, you two, your thinking is way too merciless.
Haruhiro cleared his throat. “If we burn him, won’t he kind of die?”
“Fwah!” Yume clapped her hands. “Yume thinks she’s got it! It’s ticklin’ time, isn’t it?!”
“Hahah!” Momohina’s face brimmed with a smile as she pointed the feather bundle towards Yume. “Ding, ding, ding, ding, diiiing! You got it! Fifty thousand points to Yumeyume!”
“Woo! Yume got it!”
Did these two have something in common, after all?
“Urgh?!” Honey Den’s eyes darted about. “T-T-Tickling?! H-H-
H-Hold on, hey...”
Momohina went, “Mweeheehee,” a dirty smile on her face as she waved the feather bundle back and forth gently, approaching Honey Den.
“No, listen, I don’t mind pain, but this really isn’t my thing...”
“Gwahahah! Boyyyys! Strip hiiiim!”
If that was the KMW’s orders, so be it. Haruhiro and the party were underlings of the K&K Pirate Company.
Haruhiro had Kuzaku and Jimmy help disrobe a struggling Honey Den. Or rather, since it would be a real pain to untie him and then tie him up again, they cut off all of his clothes except for his underwear with knives.
He wasn’t exactly ripped, and he had thick body hair, so he was hard to look at. The girls, with the exception of Momohina, looked away in distaste, but Honey Den seemed not so much embarrassed as shy and pleased.
He was a deviant. They had themselves a sexual deviant here.
“Are we ready to go full speed aheeeaaad?!” the KMW cried.
Haruhiro, Kuzaku, and Jimmy just answered, “Sure.”
“You have no energyyyy! Full speed aheeeaaad?!”
While wondering what kind of ritual this was, Haruhiro desperately screamed, “Full speed ahead!”
Jimmy said, “Sure,” like before, and Kuzaku shouted, “Full speed ahead!” even louder than Haruhiro.
Now the company’s KMW was satisfied. “’Kay! That’ll do! Let’s get starteeeed. Prepare yourseeeelf!”
“No, stop, stop, stop, stop!” Honey Den howled.
“I will not stop! Meow!”
“Eagh?!”
“How do you like it heeeere?!”
“Hah?! Hahaha?!”
“Moooore!”
“Nwahahhoah?! Gyahahahahahahahahahoh?! S-S-S-Stop it, please?!”
“I. Will. Not. Stop. More, more! Goochie, goochie, goo!”
“Ngahhhhhhhhhhhh?! No, no, not theeeere, ahhhh?!”
“Here’s the spoooot! You like it heeere, huuuuh! Here, here, here, here, here.”
“Nnnghiiiiiiiiiiiaaaaaaaaaahoahhhhhhhh?!” This was reeeeaaaally... hard to watch.
But it was wildly effective.
Honey Den finally acknowledged he had been talked into going to the dragons’ nest by Red-Eyed Ben. They had wanted a younger hand along for labor, so they’d brought Step.
Relying on a map made a really long time ago by the famous adventurer Edgmer, they’d tried the route through the forest to the dragons’ nest. However, they’d been found by the runaruka. After a chase in which Step was shot and killed, Ben and Honey Den had barely managed to shake their runaruka pursuers somehow.
Honey Den had learned from that, and suggested they abandon the plan. But Ben had stubbornly refused to accept it, and threatened to kill Honey Den if he backed out.
“He was serious,” Honey Den told them. “He’s a liar, but when he says he’ll do something, he damn well does it, that bastard.”
They had been together in the Skull Pirate Gang, so Honey Den knew Red-Eyed Ben well. According to Honey Den, when Ben snapped, you never knew what he’d do. The reason he’d angered Dead Skull and gotten demoted was that he’d fought with one of his fellow pirates over something petty, then later ambushed and killed the man. He told tall tales, and came across as a petty thug, so people were prone to taking him lightly, but he was a capable man.
So Ben and Honey Den had stared at the map and chosen a route north along the coast for their second attempt.
It had gone well at first, with no encounters with runaruka, to the point that they were laughing, What was that first attempt?
Step died for nothing!
However, at that point, they were almost at the dragons’ nest.
Even the famous adventurer Edgmer had never entered the dragon’s nest. Looking at their copy of the map, the dragon’s nest was blank. The real map held nothing but a cutesy dragon and dragon eggs drawn in.
Basically, what it was like and what creatures inhabited the place was a complete unknown.
An unexplored frontier.
One that was to be, to say the least, a far more terrifying place than Honey Den had ever imagined.


14. Death is Not the End



There were many small holes in the rocky wall that rose high along the coast.
The seabirds apparently nested here during the spring mating season, but there was no way they had dug those themselves.
There were no holes to be seen lower on the wall, with them only appearing around seven to eight meters above the surface, so it was hard to imagine they were the result of erosion by seawater.
Had the sea breeze, or rain water, or something like that gouged out these holes over a long period of time? Haruhiro didn’t know. It was a mystery.
Soon, night would come.
Haruhiro climbed up the rock wall, clinging right next to the holes.
When he looked down from the rock wall, he saw that his comrades, the K&K company’s KMW Momohina, Section Chief Jimmy, Managing Director Giancarlo, and the runaruka pirate Tsiha were all looking up at him. So was Honey Den, who was bound and gagged.
He wasn’t especially afraid of heights, but he was quite high, and there were rocks down below. If he messed up and fell, he’d get hurt badly. Merry was here, though, so if he didn’t die instantly, he’d be all right. He just had to be sure not to strike his head. Yeah. It was fine, just fine.
Stretching his neck out, he quietly peeked into one of the holes, which had a diameter of about 1.2 meters.
It was maybe 1.5 meters deep. This hole had likely witnessed the drama of sea birds building their nests, laying eggs, and then the chicks growing large enough to leave the nest. There were

feathers and nest materials scattered around, and in the middle of them, or rather on top of them, a single man was snoring loudly.
His feet were turned this way, so it wasn’t possible to make a facial confirmation, but not many people would be coming out here, three to four kilometers from Roronea, to find a place to sleep.
It was more or less certain. This man was Red-Eyed Ben, AKA Benjamin Fry.
According to the testimony of Honey Den, even after the sinking of the Great Tiger-go, Ben had been targeted by the dragons for days. However, perhaps because of his devilishly good luck, he had somehow managed to escape from danger.
Ben and Honey Den had been seeking a way out of the Emerald Archipelago. However, partly due to the uproar surrounding the dragons, right now, it was hard to find any ship willing to take men with reputations as bad as theirs aboard. The two had considered stowing away, but if they were caught, they’d get the stuffing beat out of them, and it wouldn’t end there. They’d likely be cast into the sea. If that happened, the odds of survival were minimal.
Honey Den had despaired and turned to drinking heavily in the emergency marketplace, but Ben hadn’t given up. With this hidey hole as his base of operations, he’d sought out old associates, certified noggoodniks, the lowest of the low, even among pirates, and threatened them, buttered them up, deceived them, and tried to find a way to get himself on a boat.
That was going to end today. But how to end it?
According to Honey Den, Ben had hidden the treasure, and its location remained unknown. It was too big for him to keep it hidden beneath his clothes, so if he were to carry it with him, it would have to be inside a bag or something. That was what he’d done while they were in Roronea, but as far as Honey Den knew, ever since he’d moved his hiding place here, Ben had gone around without carrying anything.
He’d asked where the treasure was, but the response had been less than friendly.
“What, are you planning to steal it?”
He’d nearly gotten himself killed, so he’d never tried asking again.
Would the treasure be in this hole? From the looks of it, there was nothing like a bag lying around, but Ben might very well be using it as a pillow.
Before Ben and Honey Den had taken the coastal route to the dragon’s nest, they’d needed to rest a night here. Ben had used this hole, while Honey Den slept in the one next to it.
In other words, Ben knew that Honey Den knew where his hideout was. Out of caution, he’d probably keep the treasure in another place entirely.
By Haruhiro’s reasoning, the dragons attacking Roronea were trying to get their treasure back. He wanted to ask Ben where it was. Would the man honestly tell them?
Take a deep breath. Deeper. Deeper.
Haruhiro was pressed against the rock wall, so his feet weren’t on the ground. Rather than sink into the ground, he would enter the wall. Become one with it. That was the image he used.
Stealth...
No good, huh? I feel like I should be able to enter it, but I can’t. What could it be? It doesn’t feel completely impossible. Is something off? It’s not coming together. I’m probably almost there. The difference between almost there and there is huge, though.
Am I in a slump, after all? What should I do in times like this? I could do it normally before. I should be able to. There’s no way I can’t. It’s weird that I can’t. The more I think that, the more I panic. Calm down. Take a different tack. Well, it’s one thing to say that to myself, but it’s another thing to do it.
His comrades down below must have been thinking, Huh, what is Haruhiro doing?
Haruhiro couldn’t waste time. He couldn’t slip into it smoothly, but it wasn’t like he couldn’t use Stealth at all.
Fine, let’s do this.
Once his mind was made up, he didn’t hesitate. Haruhiro went into the hole, making hardly a sound. Ben was still snoring.
Haruhiro drew his dagger with his right hand. Then, suddenly, he took a kick to the right leg.
“Guh...!”
Taking repeated kicks as he faltered, Haruhiro was nearly forced out of the hole. He instinctively braced himself with his left hand and both legs to hold on.
Red-eyed Ben. This guy, he wasn’t sleeping. He’d been awake. Since when?
“Gahhhh!” Ben sat up, trying to take another kick at Haruhiro.
Haruhiro shouted, “Dammit!” He thrust out with his dagger.
Ben pulled his foot back. “Who the hell’re you?!”
He was feeling around for something. The treasure? No. A curved sword.
In a cramped crouching position inside the hole, Ben swung the curved sword’s sheathe away. He turned its cutting edge towards Haruhiro.
“I asked, who’re you?! Answer me, you scallywag!”
Haruhiro kept mum. In the current situation, it was best to provide Ben with as little information as possible. Still, the hole was tight. Ben had the advantage, being deeper inside it.
Haruhiro decided to get out of the hole.
“Hey, you...!” Ben shouted.
Haruhiro didn’t go far from the hole, circling around to the opposite direction from which he’d come, and waited for the man there.
“Ha...!” Yume started to shout for him.
Haruhiro looked down and shook his head.
Yume hurriedly covered her mouth with both hands.
Ben was taking his time to come out.
Don’t think, Haruhiro told himself. Not about what Ben’s like, or what he’ll do when he comes out. If something happens while I’m thinking, it’ll slow down my reaction. For now, deal with him when he comes out. That’s all I have to do.
Eventually, Ben poked his head out. He was facing the opposite direction from Haruhiro.
“Nnngh!” Honey Den made noise through his gag.
Ben noticed, and looked down. “You...”
“Nnnnnngh...!”
Is Honey Den trying to tell Ben something? I can’t tell, but Ben’s shocked. Now’s the time.
Haruhiro jumped on Ben. First he stabbed the dagger into Ben’s shoulder, tangled with him, made it so they fell into the hole together, and then grappled with him.
“You little shit, what do you think you’re doing?! That hurts, dammit!”
“Where’s the egg?!” Haruhiro shouted.
“Damn your mouth, Honey Den! It’s not here, you idiot!”
“I’ll bet! What hole did you hide it in?!”
“I dunno!”
With the dagger still buried in his right shoulder, Ben couldn’t use his right arm properly. He let go of his curved sword. Haruhiro wanted to choke him out. If he were unconscious, the rest would be easy.
“Now’s the time!” Haruhiro shouted. “If you talk, I’ll let you go!”
“You think you’re in a position to say that?! I don’t even know who you are, kid! Don’t act so full of yourself!”
Haruhiro didn’t think he was acting full of himself. If anything, he was desperate. This man, he was strong. That, and he stank...
What was that? It was awful. He was beyond stinking. Was it his armpits? It was impossible to tell where the stench came from. Even if he tried not to breathe through his nose, Haruhiro could detect the strong smell. Just grappling with the guy was enough to make it unbearable. It was driving him nuts.
“You stink!” Haruhiro shouted. “Seriously!”
“Wahahahahahahaha!” Oops.
Until that point, Ben had tried to throw Haruhiro off him, or tried to poke him in the eyes, but now he must have decided his stench was a weapon. He got really damn close.
This is terrible. I want to puke. It’s mind-numbing. This guy is dead. I swear I’m going to kill him. He stinks too bad to let live.
“Guuuuuaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!”
Haruhiro mustered all his strength and slammed Ben up against the wall. He bashed Ben’s head into the wall repeatedly.
Ben screamed as he struck back. Up, and down.
Haruhiro took a hit in the solar plexus, and it hurt badly. Oh, crap. He got flipped over, pinned, and now his head was outside the hole.
“Screw you! Screw you! Screw you!” Ben was strangling him.
With both hands. He could clench his right hand, too, apparently.
Was it a burst of hysterical strength in a time of crisis? Ben’s eyes weren’t just reddish brown; they were blood red. He was dripping snot and spittle, too.
Gross, Haruhiro wanted to moan. I can’t take this anymore. This is the worst.
At the foot of the rock wall, his comrades were all shouting. Haruhiro grasped the hilt of the dagger, and stabbed into Ben’s shoulder.
“Aghhhh, it huuuuuuuuurts!!”
Ben’s right hand loosened its grip. Haruhiro tried to slip free, but Ben was having none of that. They were both desperate. Haruhiro was on the verge of suffocation, so he was fighting for his life.
The next thing he knew, he was falling.
“Ohhhhh?! Damn you! Ohhh! Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh?!”
Ben was trying to point Haruhiro’s body downwards. He meant to use Haruhiro as a cushion to save himself.
Am I going to die this time? No, no, no. I’m the younger one. Is it because I’m younger? Haruhiro didn’t really understand, but that was what he thought. I’m still young. I can’t die.
Maybe that thought gave him the strength, or maybe it didn’t.
“Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!” He twisted around, and left the rest to luck.
He heard a crunching, breaking sound.
Ben was beneath Haruhiro, his eyes wide. His jaw was slack, and his mouth open.
Haruhiro knew he wasn’t unharmed himself, but he wanted to get away from this man as soon as possible. He tried to stand, but intense pain shot through his body, and he let out a scream despite himself.
Maybe I’m not just not unharmed, but really badly harmed? Like, huh? My consciousness is fading...
If Merry hadn’t raced over to cast Sacrament, who knew what might have happened.
It was too late for Ben. There was heavy damage to his head, back, and probably internal organs, too. He died nearly instantly.
“Uwahhh,” Haruhiro mumbled. “What now...?”
He crouched down and clutched his head. Honey Den had warned him that Ben was tough, but he’d underestimated the guy. Who knew he’d be so stubborn? Or, more importantly, that he’d stink that bad.
“The location of the egg...” Shihoru murmured.
That was all Shihoru said.
Sorry. Try to understand.
Everyone sighed, frowned, or stared off into space.
Yeah, I know...
In the middle of all that, Kuzaku crouched down next to Haruhiro. “Yeah,” he said with a nod. “Still, I’m glad. You nearly gave me a heart attack for a moment there. You’re still alive, at least. That’s the most important thing. Well, we’ll work something out. We always have before.”
Then Kuzaku added, “Okay!”
He grabbed Haruhiro’s arm, and stood up dragging Haruhiro with him.
“Let’s look! I’m sure it’s gotta be in one of these holes. There are a lot of holes, but there’re a lot of us, too. I’m sure we’ll find it in no time.”
Are you an angel? was what Haruhiro wanted to ask him, but he felt like it would be misunderstood. He was too big to be an angel, anyway. Maybe size had nothing to do with it.
Haruhiro sniffled. “You sure are positive, Kuzaku, man.”
“It’s thanks to you, and to everyone.”
“You’re able to say these things so easily...”
“What things?”
“No, it’s nothing.”
There might not be countless holes in the rock wall, but there were dozens, maybe about a hundred. What was more, they had no proof Red-Eyed Ben had hidden the treasure in one of the holes. That said, they had no idea where else it could be. For now, they would have to try checking the holes one by one.
“We’re climbing up there?” Managing Director Giancarlo objected. “You’ve gotta be kidding...”
Yeah, he muttered, but he was quick to start clambering up the wall. KMW Momohina the kung-fu master mage seemed like she could walk up walls if she put her mind to it, so there were no problems there. Meanwhile, Jimmy and Tsiha decided to stay on the ground and guard Honey Den.
Shihoru stayed with Jimmy and Tsiha, while Haruhiro, Kuzaku, Yume, Merry, Setora, and Kiichi each went on checking the holes one by one.
With seven people and one pet on the job, it obviously still took a fair amount of time, but it might not have been an unbearable amount of work. It felt like Kiichi might do the work of two to three people on his own.
When they had been searching the holes for a while, Shihoru informed them the dragons were flying in.
Taking a look, Haruhiro saw that she was right; there were indeed three dragons circling over Roronea.
The dragons had descended on Roronea again yesterday, leveling a few buildings. If they found the treasure, like it was lying out somewhere, would the dragons take it back, and leave everything settled? That would be up to how the dragons felt, he supposed.

Chapter end