The Hidden Dungeon Only I Can Enter

It was at the first morning when Toramaru was welcomed as a family member.

My morning started, as usually, with embraces with my mother and Alice.

「Cr*p, I would like to receive it as well … That’s a discrimination against men …」 – something like was coming from the peevish father as he glanced at us from the side.

It doesn’t give much LP, but this way they tend to accumulate slowly. Regretfully, by doing this continuously, it doesn’t give any extra LP. It is useless, unless you do it after some break.

It appears that regarding similar actions, one would need to take one day break to start gaining LP from them again.

『Noir, about that – would it work between different species ?』

Toramaru inquired me about the matter.

「I’m not sure. In the first place, Torumaru is a male, isn’t it ?」

『That’s it. I would say that I don’t know if there are any females of my species. As far as I can remember myself, I was always alone.』

Being alone for many centuries, it was natural for him to admire his friends.

「By the way, does Toramaru possess some sort of special skill ? My skill 【Appraisal Eye】 gives me an ability to see other people’ skills, but it appears useless against Toramaru 」

『I have no idea myself』

「I see …」

For a test, I inquired the 【Great Sage】 about the matter.

Such a skill normally causes an unbearable headache, but this time I have 【Headache Tolerance】, so asking a few questions is not a problem.

Most likely it is not an overkill or a difficult question either.

――Is there a skill to prevent the usage of 【Appraisal Eye】 ?

【 There said to be a 【Concealment】 skill 】

Honestly, what a bother …

That much, if the 【Appraisal】 skill doesn’t work, the 【Editing】 won’t work either …

I may encounter such enemies one day, so I suppose I have to strengthen myself just in case.

As Ema arrived to the house entrance to pick me up, I went for the breakfast.

「Hello-o-o, Noir !」

「Hello-o-o, Ema. You seem to be even more powerful today.」

「Where, are you looking at, you, the Pervert-san ?」

I feel sorry.

But Ema gave me an immediate greeting hug nevertheless.

I’m thankful for her understanding of the LP matter, so it is always welcome.

However, in the passage near my house, there are quite enough of people passing by in the morning.

「Thanks, Ema ? It’s already good enough. I’ve already got a decent amount of LP」

「Have you ? Maybe we should get a bit more ?」

「Listen, I’m getting embarrassed. It’s attracting too much attention.」

「It can’t be helped then … Well, let’s go」

As usually, I walked to school closely alongside with Ema.

At the entrance, I’ve encountered Maria-san’s daughter, assistant and friend Amane-san.

「Greetings, Noir-san」

「Good morning. If the two people are lined like this, it would apparently stand out from the very beginning.」

「What would that mean?」

「Because the both people are beautiful, it means that they are gathering attention.」

Right after those words, Ema stuck me with an elbow.

「You are acting like skirt-chaser from the very beginning. I think you should better stop doing that.」

「But I have no intention of doing that …」

「*chuckle* Noir-san and Ema-san have a good relationship today as well.」

It is not a bad thing, so I wonder why there is a smile.

To a certain extent, I wonder about the reason of such embarrassment.

But it blows easily off with the next word of Maria.

「From today, we are starting the examination term. Two people should be enough for that.」

It seems that there is a test already, even if we haven’t entered the school yet.

According to what Maria-san said, this is a long-term test though.

Further details were supposed to be explained by the teacher.

「I’ve just remembered ! I was called by the teacher. See you later after that.」

I hurried to visit Erna-sensei in the staff room. She was sitting in a chair with stiff shoulders.

「You are late, Noir. I wonder for how long I have been waiting.」

「Sorry, I completely forgot about it.」
「I’m going to forgive you for your courage to say it so boldly, so hurry up.」

「I wonder if this is OK…」

I went on to rubbing sensei’s shoulders, relaxing them.

Before that, I used the 【Shoulder Massage】, which gave me the hint about the best place to touch sensei’s shoulders.

Sensei’s feelings went up visibly better.

「By the way, sensei, are we going to have an exam ?」

「Definitely. But I’m not going to inform you about the contents.」

「Is it so ?」

Even if one is that skillful at shoulder massage, one shouldn’t get a preferential treatment …

However, I’m not to let it pass by without any reward.

「Sensei, it’s about time. I would like to ask you for a hug today.」

「Hmm, is it ? Come here.」

I went to a separate room and received a hug from the teacher.

The hug itself wasn’t unusual, but, as it was not something that a teacher and a student would normally do, it was quite impressive.

As I got my LP, we went to the classroom separately.

As one would expect, there were ongoing discussions about the upcoming exam there.

The students were trembling with fear from the thoughts about what it is going to be. On the other side, there were also people who were excited.

For those, who complete it with exceptional results, there were going to be rewards.

「You, calm down, please. Before the lesson, I’m going to explain the contents of the exam that is going to begin today.」

At the very beginning of the lesson the teacher started her explanation about the exam.

「As you enter the Hero School, it is going to be your first exam. There are different kinds of exams, but this time it’s going to be much like an entry exam. This may sound rather as an examination of the first term results.」

In the Hero School the terms are divided into first semester is from spring to summer, second semester is from fall to winder and the last semester winter to spring.

「The test starts from today and ends one month later. At the end of the term, you are going to submit the ingredients of the designated demon. However, the range of the ingredients are going to be determined by the school.」

The contents of the exam, outlined by the teacher, were as follows:

.There are three designated ingredients.
1. Tail of a Lizardman (1 piece – 3,500 points)
2. Horn of a Unicorn (1 piece – 50,000 points)
3. Dragonkin’s fang (1 piece – 300,000 points, but the second one and further won’t count)
・ You are free to select any method to obtain it.
・ Making a team is OK.

・ 0～4999 points → Dropping out of S class.
・ 5000～9999 points → Full supplementary lessons every day during summer vacation.
・ 10000～99999 points → Full supplementary lessons every morning during summer vacation.
over 100000 points → no supplementary lessons during summer vacation.
Highest score → Special reward from the school side.

「Being a hero is not an easy thing. Always try to do you best. But don’t force yourself too much. I would like to make it clear – trying to start with and achieve the 3rd objective would be quite an unreasonable thing for you to do. …….. so, do your best.」

Somehow, the face expressions of everyone tightened.

To remain in the class, one would need at least two tails of a Lizardman.

I will do my best to get over 100,000 points.

◇　◆　◇

After the school, Ema and I headed to the guild to meet with Luna-san again.

That’s because from now on, we are going to work as an adventurer team of 3 people.

「Ne, ne, Noir, let’s gather the points together !」

「Yeah, I wanted to say it as well.」

「I hope Luna-san is going to cooperate with us. Anyways, those items are quite valuable. The ingredients are too famous to be sold outright at market.」

In other words, this time the option of purchasing and submitting them afterwards would be quite problematic. Furthermore, even a Red Lizardman is a quite rare monster.

「Ema, what amount of points are you aiming for ?」

「Let’s get 100,000 points together. Then we can do whatever we like during the summer vacation.」

「That would be ideal … It is just that …」

Two Unicorns or Dragon subjugation would be required. Our current ability is sort of lacking …

Our meeting was planned to be in the 『Odin』 guild, so we both went inside.

「Let me go, let me go, Luna」

「Calm down, Laura ! Don’t make a fight」

「I won’t give up unless I hit that fellow !」

A quite stimulating scene was unfolding there.

Luna was desperately trying to stop Laura-san, whose face was crimson-red and angry.

The opponent of the quarrel is another receptionist ?

Ema and I looked at each other and rushed towards those two people.