An Old Man Restaurant Owner Is Unparalleled by Relying on His Old Tricks. It Turns Out, He’s the Legendary Dungeon Conqueror. - 81

Chapter 81: I’m Glad I Did It

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Shinjuku Kabukicho Dungeon, 45th Floor.

I was sprinting down the crystal path while scattering the swarming monsters blocking our way together with Nana Tendou and Elsa Simon. 

“Just as I thought, the controlled monsters are standing on our path. You can almost sense the will of their leader. The leader definitely doesn’t want us to go further this path. Ironically, this only confirms that we’re heading in the right direction.”

While it wouldn’t be weird for monsters of the same type to cooperate, like the Crystal Wolves did, but typically speaking, monsters of different types wouldn’t cooperate with each other. However, all types of monsters on the 45h floor were working in unison, like a well-coordinated army with the sole intention to eliminate us. This made it clear the monsters were under the control of something. But still, their opponents were us. We were S-rank adventurers. 

While I sliced through the monsters ahead with my knife to clear the path, Nana Tendou used her flame-clad slash to burn the monsters on the right and Elsa used her sword to obliterate several monsters at once. 

Alright. At this pace, it won’t be long before we reach our destination. 

Or so I thought, until—

“You know… You… You’re running way too fast, darn it…!”

“Ri-Right… Keeping up with you is almost impossible for us…!”

“Hm? Was I a bit too fast? But I made sure to run at a pace the drones could handle, though….”

〈Even S-rank explorers can’t keep up with Nishida.〉

〈I guess this is proof that Nishida is the strongest.〉

〈Good call putting the others in storage.〉

〈Storage? You mean the My Room thingy, right?〉

After we decided to go down to the 45th floor to cull the source of the problem, I had put all members of Aoi Kadoyama’s party, along with Iijima-san, all members of Mercys, along with Ryoko Hongan into My Room. After all, it would’ve taken us forever to reach here if we had to match with their pace. 

〈The two of them should’ve gone into that My Room thingy too.〉

〈Yeah, but you’ve got to consider their pride as veteran S-ranker.〉

〈Ryoko volunteered to enter My Room on her own, though.〉

〈Well, she’s a rearguard after all.〉

“We should reach the boss’ room after this, but…”

“…I see. So that thing is the source of all this trouble.”

Soon enough, a giant flower came into view. The flower was big enough to tower even the surrounding crystal pillars. The flower’s form resembled a parasitic plant. Its grotesquely vibrant petals were encircling a spherical core as the flower sat there on the boss’ room. 

〈That’s so gross.〉

〈Just looking at it is enough to make me feel uncomfortable.〉

〈Same here.〉

〈What kind of monster is that? Nothing about it comes up in the Danpedia.〉

Upon closer inspection, the sphere in the middle was continuously producing more and more parasitic plants. Noticing our approach, the creature started to close its open petals, trying to shield the sphere at its center. I continued on, not bothered by it. I quickly sliced the petals open with my knife without any hesitation. Though the hard petals put up quite a fight against my knife, but I continued to slash the petals endlessly. After all the petals were gone, I delivered a powerful hit to the spherical core, which I assumed to be its nucleolus. 

“～～～～～～～～～～?!”

The flower writhed in agony before withering away. Its stem and roots crumbled to pieces and the flower soon fell to the ground. 

“All the parasitic plants are all withering away too.”

“It seems the controlled monsters have regained their senses. They started going their own way again.”

“Looks like we managed to take it down.”

Now that we had defeated the ominous giant flower, Aoi Kadoyama and the rest of her party members were finally freed from the parasitic plant’s control. Since we had defeated the dungeon boss beforehand, a transfer portal had already appeared in the boss room. We quickly returned to the surface and had Aoi Kadoyama and her party members got carried to the hospital. Fortunately, some of them had started regaining their consciousness and based from their coherent responses, it seemed they didn’t suffer from any aftereffects from the parasitic plants. 

“Nishida-san, I cannot thank you enough for this. Not only did you agree to help us despite our sudden request, but you also managed to request them in such a short amount of time.”

Rinko Nagao, the director of the Dungeon Management Agency, thanked me while bowing deeply at me. It seemed she had been waiting at the Shinjuku Kabukicho Dungeon’s control center the entire time we were inside, monitoring us from the footage sent by the drones. 

“Right now, the analysis team is investigating the cause of this incident. We suspect an evolved form of a flower-type monster called Floral Dominance to be the main cause. However, Flower Dominance should only be able to grow up to one or two meters in size. We’re still investigating why that flower was able to grow that big…”

“Floral Dominance? I don’t think I’ve heard about that monster before.”

“Yes. The only records of this monster ever appearing in Japan is only in Okinawa Dungeon and that monster is just a mid-level threat at most.”

And so, the Dungeon Management Agency would be investigating what that monster suddenly appeared in the Shinjuku Kabukicho Dungeon and why it was able to grow that massive.

Well, irregularities go hand in hand with dungeons after all. The very existence of dungeons is an irregularity to begin with.

“By the way, is it really okay for me to take all the boss’ defeat rewards?”

“Yes. Everyone has no complaints about that.”

“I didn’t even touch the boss, so it’s fine by me.”

“As for me… I fully understand the extent of my contribution. I don’t deserve any reward.”

While I thought Nana Tendou’s reasoning was understandable, but I felt that Elsa still had the right to the reward. After all, she did fight the boss with Mercys before I arrived. However, she refused the reward adamantly. It seemed wrong to force her to accept it when she refused the reward so vehemently like that. 

Meanwhile, all members of Mercys also declined the reward. 

“I mean, we did nothing but run away…”

They said. 

There were four treasure chests that appeared. Every chest contained a rare drop, as expected from the boss’ defeat reward from a Class 9 dungeon. The rarest item among them was probably the ‘Heroic Spirit Summon’ skill book. No one, including myself, had heard of this skill. So I decided to use it myself. As for other rewards, I planned to sell them all since I didn’t need any of them. 

“I really learned a lot by diving into the dungeon with you, Nishida-san. To be honest, we ended up becoming nothing but a hindrance most of the time. I really regret our own shortcomings, but… We promise we will work together as a party from now on to try to catch up to you, even if just a little.”

“I became keenly aware of our lack of ability. We will train harder so we can explore together again someday.”

“I’m really sorry for holding everyone back! But seriously, Nishida-san, I have nothing but respect for you!”

“A-As for me, I need to get over my shyness first…”

“I will also work hard so I will have something else to be proud of, not just my detection skill!”

The members of Mercys thanked me and…

“Nishida-sama, please lend us your strength again if such an opportunity arises.”

Iijima-san asked me for another support in a not-so-subtle way. 

“Thank you so much for helping our explorers, Nishida-sama. Once the Director has recovered, we would love to offer you a proper reward for your help.”

Aoi Kadoyama’s team thanked me through the drone and in the end, I was only able to return home until the day became quite late. 

“I haven’t made any announcement, so it will be difficult to reopen the restaurant tomorrow… I also need to come up with a new limited-time menu using the lamb I acquired from the dungeon.”

In the end, I decided to open the restaurant the day after tomorrow. I posted my decision on social media and almost immediately, a flood of congratulatory messages poured in. I was almost moved to tears from the support I received from everyone. 

“Ahh… I’m so glad I decided to open a restaurant.”

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