“Aaaaaah!”
Her body slipped right into the gate, went whooshing down a slide, and—splash!—fell into a ball pit.
Panting as she crawled out of the ball pit, Geuru looked around the dungeon and cried out in awe.
“Wowww……!”
Unlike other dungeons, the Kids Dungeon felt like Santa Grandpa and the elves’ present factory.
Boing! Boing!
The slimes bouncing happily around the factory had ribbons tied around their heads. Cute!
Boing, boing!
The ribbons on the slimes kept swaying, tempting the kindergartener’s eyes as if telling her to open them right away.
‘Presents?!’
Geuru dashed over and stabbed a slime with her fork.
Pop!
“Kwek!”
(X_X)
A small gift box appeared from inside the slime that burst like pudding.
‘Present!’
Geuru immediately opened the gift box.
[Blank Scroll (A)]
A skill can be stored inside the scroll.
Oh, an A-rank Blank Scroll?
It was an item that could store and use skills up to A-rank.
‘Dan Oppa said these are super expensive…….’
A world where skills were ability itself.
Being able to store a skill in a scroll and use it was an incredible advantage, so naturally, even empty scrolls had no choice but to be expensive.
In other words…….
‘Supreme Hero Geuru got something amazing!’
Ta-da—!
Geuru was proudly holding the scroll up like the Taegeukgi when she heard sniffling and sobbing not far away. The owner of the sound seemed to be trying their hardest to hold back their crying. Then they muttered softly.
“Why did it turn out like dis…….”
This voice?
“Huiyeon?”
The sound of someone sniffling—kgh, hup—stopped for a moment, and then her name was called.
“Ge, Geuru……?”
“Huiyeon!”
Huiyeon was crouched down and hiding beneath the factory conveyor belt.
Geuru immediately ran over to Huiyeon and shoved her face down underneath.
Huiyeon raised her head, tears brimming in her eyes.
“Ge, Geuru. Sniff! Hic! Geuruuu…….”
Perhaps relieved at seeing someone she knew, tears began dropping from her eyes like a faucet had been turned on.
“Why are you here?”
“I, I, gulp! I don’t knowww…… I was just running, and then I ended up here…….”
It seemed Huiyeon had run in without knowing a dungeon had appeared.
“But, th-there’s something scaryyy…… Hup!”
“Something scary?”
At that moment, Geuru sensed a huge movement behind her.
Boooiiing—! Thud!
The thing that landed with tremendous force was jiggling like pudding as it approached Geuru.
Boooiiing—! Thud!
Every hair on her body stood on end.
‘It’s the boss……!’
Beside the boss slime, sixteen small slimes bounced up and down.
Though even the small slimes were as big as Geuru.
“Th-that’s it…….”
Huiyeon lowered her voice as much as she could and continued in a whisper.
“We have to hide quickly. Come here.”
Huiyeon shifted aside to make room.
Then she pulled Geuru in beside her, pressed her trembling lips shut, sniffed, and said,
“L-let’s hide and wait until the grown-ups come……. They’ll know we’re gone soon…… and then my dad will come save us…….”
Even as she said it, Huiyeon’s face was full of anxiety.
Geuru knew the source of that anxiety too.
Only those seven years old and under may enter.
That was the dungeon’s condition.
Adults could not be called into this Kids Dungeon.
‘Then we have to get through it by ourselves…….’
Huiyeon was compatible with mana, but she had not awakened yet. That meant there was nothing she could do.
Boooiiiing—! Thuuud—!
The boss slime dropped to the floor again, making the ground shake violently.
‘Right in front of us!’
The boss slime had come close enough to swallow Geuru and Huiyeon at any moment.
Huiyeon clamped a hand over her mouth so she would not scream.
Just then, a small slime that had followed behind bounced closer and rolled its eye down to the floor.
When Huiyeon accidentally met its gaze, she finally screamed.
“Hyaaaaaak—!”
Boing! Boing! Boing!
As if it had found its prey, the small slime began bouncing and signaling to the boss.
Just as Huiyeon squeezed her eyes shut, thinking it was all over—
A gentle voice reached her ear.
“It’s okay, Huiyeon—”
Geuru, who had slipped outside before anyone knew it, gripped her fork with determination.
With the boss slime behind her, Geuru crouched down and gave Huiyeon a bright, bashful smile.
“—Geuru will protect you.”
Huiyeon’s eyes wavered.
The boss slime inhaled deeply. Huuup! Then its body began to swell larger and larger.
The boss slime, which had already been huge, had grown almost as tall as a one-story building.
Geuru pressed one hand over her pounding heart.
‘This is what Hunters do!’
These days, when it was possible to predict almost every place a dungeon would appear, accidents where civilians fell into dungeons rarely happened.
But if such an accident did occur, Hunters treated saving civilians as their top priority.
Geuru was a Hunter too, so she would probably experience things like this from time to time in the future.
She would not keep riding the bus forever.
‘Geuru will defeat it herself! And do her best to save Huiyeon!’
Geuru put away her fork, took out her duck tongs, and firmly gripped a snow duck in her hand.
‘The Kids Dungeon is the territory of the Frost Clan!’
First, hit it with a snow duck and lower its defense!
Soon, the snow duck flew in an arc toward the boss slime.
Thwack!
(X_X)
The eyes of the boss slime, whose defense had been lowered, turned into X’s, and the small slimes beside it raised their brows as if furious.
“Hmph!”
Geuru summoned her fork again and stabbed down on a pudding-like small slime.
Pop!
As the slime broke apart, a gift box fell out.
‘Easy.’
When Geuru swung her fork wide in succession, five slimes were swept away all at once.
Thud, thud, thud—!
Gift boxes came pouring down.
An overwhelming difference in power.
The boss slime instinctively grew frightened and hopped backward.
With madness gleaming in her eyes, Geuru gave a chilling smile and wiped the slime’s mucus from the back of her hand.
“Here I come!”
*
Geuru steadied her heaving breath and exhaled deeply.
“Hoooh—”
Beneath Geuru was a large pile of squishy mucus that had once been slimes. It was the trace of a fierce bloody battle that had unfolded in the toy factory.
Standing atop the giant slime’s corpse, Geuru shook her reward.
[Blank Scroll (S)]
‘Supreme Geuru fought 17 against 1 and won!’
Then what about her level?
When she opened her status window to check, her level, which had hardly progressed from the level 10 range, had jumped all the way to 30.
Name: On Geuru
Level: LV. 30
Title: ■■■ ■■■ ■■ ■■■ (Cannot be viewed)
Strength: 2
Stamina: 2(+14)
Agility: 2
Defense: 2(+88)
Mana: 32
Since the stat window did not display decimal points, all her stats had been 1, but as she grew in the meantime, they had become 2!
On top of that, all the stat points she gained from leveling up were invested into mana, and all her skill points were invested into “Knead-Knead.”
Skill ranks increased as follows.
Beginner Skill < Intermediate Skill < Skilled Skill < Advanced Skill < Highest Skill
The skill “Knead-Knead” had now surpassed Advanced and risen all the way to “Highest”!
Once it surpassed Highest, the skill’s rank could be raised.
Since “Knead-Knead” was currently E-rank, that meant once it surpassed Highest, she would be able to use D-rank Knead-Knead.
And on top of that, her mana stat had risen to 32!
‘Geuru is growing into the supreme one!’
If she grew just a little more, she might even be able to say, “Move over, Amakusa.”
While Geuru recalled her grand goal and smiled in deep satisfaction—
Ding—
[Measuring contribution.]
[New Half-Made Bear mk.1 has entered the rankings at 500th place.]