How to Survive as a Dungeon Manager in Another World

Episode 2 – Encounter

Blackmore’s notoriety stems from the people, not the environment.

A Demon Realm among Demon Realms.

Among them, Blackmore, with its especially high number of disappearances, was so vast that wanderers and fugitives from across the continent flocked to it.

What does that mean?

It means that those who lived ordinary lives would never willingly come to Blackmore.

‘Suicide?!’

That woman, even a glance tells you she’s a noble young lady, born and bred to luxury in the Empire.

For such a lady to crawl all the way out here, just for one little suicide attempt… whatever house she hails from, there’s bound to be hell to pay.

A missing person report will surely be filed.

Then a full-blown search will commence, no doubt.

If it ends as a simple disappearance, I’d be ever so fortunate, but what if her body is ultimately discovered here, in Blackmoor?

I, as the manager, in name and deed…

Can I truly escape scrutiny?

‘Hardly likely.’

Knowing that fact, what I had to do was obvious.

I had to stop her, right then and there.

But how?

Just a few more steps and she’ll be tumbling over the edge?

“……”

*Swishhh*—

The sound of the waves crashing beyond the cliff was ferocious.

The woman’s hair whipped wildly in the wind at the edge of the precipice.

In that instant, she smiled.

And our eyes met.

Her eyes, swirling with a pitch-black darkness, like a soul drowning in a lightless abyss.

Something….

Something was about to happen.

I squeezed my eyes shut.

“No—!!”

When I opened them, I found myself already sprinting towards the woman.

“!!!”

Her surprised face swam into view through my violently shaking vision.

Her gaze was fixed, precisely, on me.

More than anything—

‘She’s stopped!’

She’d been poised to leap, but now she had halted.

Eyes wide with shock.

It seemed my sudden appearance had startled her.

My heart hammered, as if desperate to burst through my ribs.

Ragged breaths rattled past my Adam’s apple.

I ran, and ran.

And then.

The distance narrowed, bit by bit.

“Who…!”

I reached out with my right hand toward her flustered form, but then, an immense pressure crushed time itself.

Everything was sickeningly slow.

The way her hair whipped in the wind, the dirt kicked up from the ground, even the sluggish extension of my hand.

I could track each and every one of those moments with my gaze.

“Got…”

Just before my hand could graze her, she twisted away frantically.

“???”

Huh.

Wait. Just a moment.

Did she, just now, avoid me?

If that’s the case, then I…

“…Eh?”

My center of gravity scattered in an instant.

Simultaneously, my body began to lurch in the direction I’d reached.

And.

What lay in that direction was none other than—

“!!!”

…An endless precipice.

“Ah.”

Damn it all.

This is really screwed up.

Thump, thump.

Her silver hair, now a wild tangle, whipping around her, the girl dragged her feet, lacking all strength.

Whish—!

She glanced around for a moment.

An eerie fog settling heavy in the air.

Sheer, precipitous cliffs.

Trees, a dense, suffocating carpet of green.

Hmm, just as I’d heard.

It seems unlikely that one would find a trace of humanity in a place like this.

“…Ha.”

The corners of her lips twisted into a chilling grimace.

Her blurred gaze leaked unrestrained madness, and a savage smile stretched across her impassive face.

How did things become like this?

She closed her eyes, slowly retracing the past.

Ludine Carlyle.

Second daughter of the Carlyle Count, one of the three guardian families protecting the Northern Continent.

And, a b*stard.

A tale with nothing particularly special about it.

One day, the lord of the manor impulsively engaged in relations with a maid of humble birth, and thus, a girl was unintentionally born—a common enough story.

Labeled a b*stard from the moment of birth.

— The Count really… what on earth was he thinking, bringing a b*stard into the manor…

— Aah, the poor Countess…

— How dare a lowborn b*stard dare cling to the Count’s residence!

No one welcomed Ludine.

Her existence… was nothing more than an unforeseen ‘accident.’

She had only one choice left.

Be immediately banished from the manor and wander the streets.

Or, endure countless torments and ostracism while remaining in the manor.

Ludine chose the latter.

Or rather, she was chosen by it.

She was too young to decide anything, and above all, she desperately wanted her mother to remain in the manor.

From then on, Rudine changed.

She hid herself behind a mask, relentlessly whipping herself onward.

She gave her heart easily to no one, striving without a day’s rest to be recognized as a member of the family.

It was a time of bone-scraping endurance.

Fueling her life into a roaring flame with the mockery and shame that echoed around her at every chance.

Then, one day it happened.

Her patience, pushed to its very limit, finally burst.

—Get up this instant! The sun is already high in the sky!

*Smack.*

The head maid, entering the room, slapped her cheek.

The head maid did not hide her usual, vile inferiority complex.

It was something possible because the Countess, who gripped the manor with an iron fist, was her backer.

—I will punish you for violating the greeting time.

—For the next week, you shouldn’t even think about leaving your room.

This is my room.

Not a prison.

—Oh my, you must be hungry, don’t hesitate, eat up quickly.

—The food is a little spoiled, but you’re alright with that, right?

—It’s a meal I prepared with sincerity for you, Miss. You must eat it all without leaving any behind, understood?

For a moment, laughter bubbled up.

Anger, loathing, animosity, those sharp emotions tore her reason to shreds.

The desire to rip that detestable woman into pieces was seething.

‘Shall I kill her.’

What screams would she utter if I plunged a blade into that thin neck of hers?

To what depths could she possibly fall in the face of death’s terror?

A voice, like an auditory hallucination, formed vividly in her eardrums.

It urged her to slaughter, as if an echo.

—What kind of table manners did you learn from?!

Rudine carefully caressed the dagger hidden behind her back.

— Honestly, it’s always like this with the baseborn.

And, without hesitation, she raised her right hand high.

*Chwack—!*

And in that instant.

The unforeseen occurred.

The dagger clutched in her right hand sank into the head maid’s nape.

— *Kyaaak!!*

A scream, tearing at the very air, filled the space.

Rudene, with a madness-stricken face, hacked, ripped, and cleaved at the head maid, a machine possessed.

Eyes stained with malice and frenzy.

A gaze in which a truly pitch-black darkness flickered.

*Pshwak—! Pshwak—!*

Torn shreds of flesh scattered into the air.

Blood poured forth, pooling on the floor, forming a mire.

*Thud—!*

The head maid, hideously butchered, fell to the floor, face ashen.

“Haa… haa…”

Rudene caught her bursting breath.

And.

Gazing at the head maid, now chillingly cold, the emotion she felt was none other than—

“…Heu.”

Elation.

A profound, deep-seated elation.

The next day.

The entire manor was turned inside out by the head maid’s death.

Murder, of all things.

A situation that could scarcely be comprehended with any words.

— Tch, the cursed she-devil…

The Count clicked his tongue, steeped in scorn.

A b*stard child, pushed past bearing, murdering a servant.

The moment word of it reached society, it was clear the Earl of Carlisle’s prestige would plummet.

Therefore, the Earl swiftly concealed the situation.

He silenced the servants who witnessed the event with an iron fist.

And began to erase every trace of Ludine left in the manor, one by one.

Swiftly.

And, thoroughly.

‘Ah, it’s over then.’

Ludine bent double, laughing until a scream tore from her throat.

All that she had strived for her whole life had vanished in an instant.

All that remained was despair, like a mire.

A chaotic tangle of black, viscous emotions sent out tendrils, bearing fruit.

And.

The final decision regarding Ludine’s fate was.

— Ludine Carlisle is banished to Blackmoor.

“Ha.”

Ludine, hacking her way through the mountains, let out a hollow laugh.

Her throat burned, as if she had swallowed a furnace.

The crunch of teeth grinding was clearly audible.

Was the rising clamor my own voice?

Or the rage directed at the Earl’s family’s filth?

Probably both.

“…”

After walking for what felt like an eternity, Ludine was met by a cliff, sheer and precipitous.

The cliff’s edge.

There was nowhere further to go, nowhere to escape to.

“…There’s no path.”

She stood there, blank, when.

“No—!!”

Someone was rushing toward her.

No, not quite. He was charging.

And wreathed in mana from head to toe.

“???”

A man?

Why is there a man here?

Without preamble, the man reached a hand towards her.

As if to seize her.

“Who…!”

Rudine was aghast.

The man’s speed was far too great.

Sent from the manor?

Impossible, given the face was wholly unfamiliar, and more importantly, she sensed no killing intent from him.

Whatever the cause, they would collide if things continued.

Rudine, instinctively, twisted her body sharply to avoid impact.

And.

“Uh-oh?”

The man, hand outstretched towards her…

Was careening straight over the cliff edge.

“You goddamn b*tch—!!”

…emitting a rather rough curse.