Chapter 97: Level 2.5 — The Demon Proprietress

Hill listened to Siloque’s heartbeat.

When she said the name “Beiren”, Siloque’s heartbeat was normal.

“But this name is pretty common. Are you talking about a man or a woman? Real or in a game?”

Hill confirmed that Siloque’s heart rate was steady and regular.

She looked up at her brother’s face, full of confusion.

“Why are you suddenly asking me this, Hill?”

“Becaus…”

Hill moved her lips.

“Brother, you said this name while sleeping. Hill thought it must be someone very important to you.”

“I even muttered it in my sleep? Looks like you’re right—I really am pure-hearted.”

Siloque smiled proudly.

A satisfied expression, like recalling a beloved thing.

Hill’s heart skipped a beat.

“So, you remember that person.”

“That’s right. That person is very important to me.”

“More important than Hill?”

Siloque smoothed Hill’s pale golden ponytail and met her gaze directly.

“Equally important.”

“.I see.”

Hill felt a tug in her heart.

She wasn’t sure if it was happiness or sadness, but it was definitely a wave of emotion.

Her brother’s resolute and affectionate expression said it all.

If she asked any further, she’d just lose.

Beiren—

Hill will find you.

She made up her mind.

Taking a deep breath of Siloque’s scent, she pushed him away.

Her expression turned bright and innocent.

“Never mind, whatever about Beiren. Brother, at least promise Hill you won’t dye your hair today.”

Siloque squeezed out the words with reluctance, like squeezing toothpaste.

“Eh—? Fine… I promise…”

***

Siloque pulled up the hood of his hoodie, adding a gray baseball cap underneath.

He looked like a hip-hop star, only missing sunglasses and shouting “Check it out”.

He kept this getup all the way, getting hit on several times, but Hill blocked them all with “She’s my girlfriend.”

The strange looks from others made Siloque feel a different kind of discomfort.

Shouldn’t Hill have pretended to be his girlfriend instead? Was this backwards?

Just like that, they arrived at the Explorer Hall at the dungeon’s entrance, exchanged the R Coins for cash, then skillfully led his sister to the BOSS Room on the first floor.

Siloque changed back into a trench coat and pants, proper attire for dungeon exploration.

Hill also put on light armor, volunteering to help Siloque tie his hair. She really liked the feel of that white hair…

Every time they entered a new floor, they had to defeat the head monster.

“Uwoooooo—!!”

LV17 Siloque and Lv11 Hill faced the first floor’s gatekeeper—the Minotaur General.

“This is perverted…so perverted! Brother, it’s practically not wearing anything, just a scrap of cloth around the waist. This is sexual harassment. But it’s still better than a Man-Eating Flower.”

“…As I said before, Hill, you focus on attracting the mobs, I’ll handle the Bull General.”

“Is it always this troublesome to get to the next floor…”

Hill complained, using her skills to lure the Minotaur heavy-armored warrior.

Yeah, not only troublesome, but if you died in front of a BOSS you’d already beaten, it’d be embarrassing too.

Ordinary Explorers had it rough.

If you didn’t want to fight, you could hire someone to protect you, or the safest way—buy a Transfer Crystal to skip ahead, but all safe methods cost money.

Also, head monster respawn times were longer than normal monsters.

Once someone beat it, you could enter and exit freely for a while, so you could slip to the next floor or use a Transfer Crystal on the return.

Shopkeepers must be making a killing.

First-floor BOSSes weren’t that hard for Siloque now.

Back in his previous life, he’d already figured out all the Minotaur General’s weak points from guides, and now he had plenty of strength to challenge it.

After about ten minutes, Siloque finished off the Bull General and took Hill to the second floor.

The Demon Landlady’s shop was located in the gap space between the second and third floors of the dungeon.

In the original story, Cass accidentally became the first human in a hundred years to visit her shop.

This time, Siloque was just visiting with his sister to buy some things.

He had no intention of triggering her quest line, since it was only a side quest anyway.

As long as he didn’t trigger it, no events would be activated.

Without triggering events, the Minotaurs wouldn’t join in, and all problems would be avoided—Q-E-D, proven.

Ahead of them, a wide canyon divided a grassland where giant cattle grazed into north and south.

Once you crossed the canyon, you’d be in the area where the shop was.

After passing through the cattle’s territory, the two of them climbed a natural stone bridge across the canyon.

Though the bridge was wide, the canyon was over ten meters deep, making it a little nerve-wracking to cross.

When they stepped off the bridge, they both sighed in relief.

“What would happen if you fell off that bridge?”

Siloque shrugged, answering Hill’s murmured question.

“If you’re at least level 10, you probably wouldn’t die. But you’d have to walk east for a long time to find a way back up, and a bunch of Wet and Sticky Monsters would spawn at the bottom. It’s a real pain to get back.”

“I see…”

Hill nodded.

But Siloque noticed a flicker of emotion on her face that wasn’t reassurance.

He kept watching her.

She seemed to sense her brother’s question and looked back at the canyon.

“Hill was just thinking… If you do your best to scout, raise your level, and study tactics against a BOSS but still lose, that’s understandable. But Hill absolutely couldn’t accept dying from accidentally falling from a high place.”

“Souls players die from slipping and falling all the time… But yeah. This is reality—if you die, it’s over. I wouldn’t want such an embarrassing death either.”

“Since we agree, brother, hurry up and lead the way! Hill wants to see what a demon looks like too!”

“Alright, alright.”

***

The siblings came to a hollow surrounded by dense, low shrubs, no different in appearance from the rest of the area.

Siloque squatted down and checked the base of a tree, finding a purple root.

This was the place.

He reached out and touched the empty air.

“[Yesterday, a fox on the mountain sneezed. Today, I caught a fat fish. Time to cook it in a proper kitchen.]”

Click—

Success, the code phrase was correct.

“Ohhh!”

The surrounding scenery changed in an instant, and Hill exclaimed in awe.

An open plaza about 80 meters in diameter appeared, like an ancient Greek set.

Traces of overgrown plants were everywhere, and at the center stood a four-story villa covered in vines.

This was the special gap space between the second and third floors.

Siloque opened the wooden door.

A wind chime rang sweetly.

The moment they walked in, a strange dry sensation, like drying off after a swim, washed over them, fading in less than a second.

Skills and magic were silenced—an effect of the shop’s barrier.

What drew his eyes first wasn’t the endless shelves over ten meters high, or the dazzling merchandise.

“Welcome.”

Behind a chrome-copper counter sat the owner of the shop—the first person Siloque looked at—Asmodi.

In the setting, Asmodi was over a thousand years old—old enough to be a great-great-great-grandmother.

But you must never call her an old lady, or she’d beat you half to death.

If not for her slightly pointed ears and two goat horns, no one would recognize her as a demon.

With elegant poise, she wore a tight black qipao with gold patterns, a beige shawl, and long ink-black hair that covered one eye.

Her cherry-colored lips held a slender pipe as she exhaled smoke, her gaze lazy yet regal.

Unlike Priss’s sleepy laziness, she seemed more like a relaxed noblewoman content with life.

“Brother, the demon looks even more powerful than in 18+ games, and there’s no exclamation mark above her head. She’s not an NPC? …Brother?”

Siloque was gazing at Asmodi with an artist’s eye.

How to put it…so alluring.

Truly, this was the world of eroge.

Look, the slit in the qipao went almost up to the thigh, the smooth, firm legs gleamed.

The scandalous dress was practically no different from lingerie.

The tightness of the qipao created an eye-catching cleavage that sparked an explorer’s spirit to delve into the abyss.

Dressing like this in the real world would be indecent, but here…

Siloque wordlessly gave Asmodi a thumbs-up.

Asmodi: “?”

“Bro~ther?…”

—This was perfectly normal attire.

Nice! So pleasing to the eye! Thanks for the treat!

“Brother, why are you looking at her so pervertedly?”

“A beauty like this is as rare as a breathtaking landscape. Not appreciating it properly would be disrespectful to her.”

“……Hill is also a beauty, so can brother look at Hill pervertedly too?”

“Hill, you’re not a beauty. You’re just really cute. That’s enough. Any cuter and the world might explode.”

“Uuuu…”

Hill sighed with a mix of frustration and helplessness.

“Sooner or later, Hill will surpass her.”

She puffed her cheeks and looked away, but was drawn to the merchandise.

She walked over to a display case lined with weapons.

“Amazing, this is mithril, right?”

“Well done, Hill. It’s mithril alloy. Even so, to buy this in the Explorer Hall, you’d have to spend at least 800,000 R.”

“How much is it here?”

“300,000 R.”

Asmodi tapped her pipe on the ashtray, scattering the ashes.

“It’s an old thing that’s been sitting too long. Not worth much.”

Her bewitching voice was addictive.

She blew a smoke ring and asked comfortably:

“What are the two of you looking for?”