This feels quite different from usual, doesn’t it?”

Tina muttered as we continued through the valley .

“It does?”

“I have come here a few times before . But it’s way too quiet now . ”

“Maybe it’s because the slimes killed so many monsters? There were more monsters in here than there were in the forest . ”

I had sent the Proud Wolf ahead to ensure that it was safe . And they had killed all the monsters nearby while they were at it .

And there were more here than in the forest .

No strong monster had appeared yet, but I a.s.sumed that there would still be some weaker ones .

And yet…

“Is that true? There were more here than in the forest?”

“Yeah . At least, within the area that the slimes were scouting in . Not that it was that much more than in the forest . ”

“That’s strange… There are usually much fewer monsters in the Delight Valley… Yuji . Could you stop killing monsters for a little while?”

“Sure . ”

So saying, I sent the order to the slimes and the Proud Wolf .

‘Stop for now and come back to us . I want to see something . ’

‘Okay!’

‘Understood!’

And so they returned to us .

After a short while, monsters started to appear in front of us little by little .

“Woah, that’s a lot…”

“It’s just like the forest . This is strange…”

Tina and Lisa muttered to each other as they watched .

According to them, the Delight Valley was under unusual conditions .

“Should we turn back and go by a different route?”

“No, that will be very difficult . It seems that the dragon is staying near the entrance of the valley . It’ll be too dangerous to go back unless it moves . ”

“…What a terrible position to take… In that case, there is only one thing we can do . ”

“Yes?”

“Rush through the Delight Valley as quickly as possible and pray that nothing happens!”

…That wasn’t much of a plan .

Well, it wasn’t like I had an alternative .

“Understood!”

“Got it!”

And like that, we decided to rush through the valley as quickly as possible . Oh, and while praying .

However…it did not take long for a problem to occur .

‘Yuji! A monster!’

‘It looks stronger than the last one!’

A slime said as it looked towards the monster .

It looked like a Red Bear .

It was not…difficult to kill . I think it was considered to be C-Rank back at the guild .

But according to the guild’s information, the Delight Valley wasn’t supposed to have monsters over C-Rank .

…Maybe I should just check .

And so I used the slime to launch an attack .

‘Magic Transfer–Fireball!’

I chanted . Then a Fireball shot towards the Red Bear and burned it .

Apparently, I could kill it in one hit .

‘Fireball’ used a lot more MP than ‘Weak Fireball,’ but the damage was so much stronger .

‘Now bring the monster you just killed over here . ’

‘Understood!’

And so the Proud Wolf and slimes dragged the body back to us .

I pointed at it and asked Tina .

“Is this monster really C-Rank then?”

Tina looked at the bear-like corpse .

She replied immediately .

“A C-Rank Red Bear, huh . …Did you kill it in this valley?”

“Yeah . ”

Tina had said that stronger monsters didn’t come here because it was uncomfortable for them .

A C-Rank and above had not entered the valley for 100 years, so it must have been quite bad .

However, it wasn’t as if there were an actual barrier that kept them out .

If they had a good enough reason to, strong monsters could still enter .

The problem was figuring out the reason…maybe it was related to why the sky suddenly became strangely dark .

As I thought about this…I heard the voice of the slimes .

‘Yuji!’

‘The Earth Dragon is here!’

…Are you serious?

We had searched for it all this time, and then it suddenly appeared here .

And it was the worst possible place . The Earth Dragon seemed to be rus.h.i.+ng straight towards us now .

Of course, the entrance was still being blocked by the mystery dragon .

…We had no choice but to fight .