Chapter 82

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Chapter 82: Listening to Old Harper Tell Stories From the Past

The characteristic of convenience food is that it’s easy to prepare and eat. Everyone soon enjoyed a meal of hot cheese instant noodles with various types of canned meat and congee.

Lolth realized she had underestimated Isabella’s appetite. Though they’d planned to eat the canned food along their journey, Isabella had already consumed one-third of it tonight. The young knight was becoming more open-minded indeed!

If they wanted meat for tomorrow night’s camp, they would need to hunt wild game. Fortunately, the vast, sparsely populated area meant abundant magical creatures and wild animals, so hunting shouldn’t prove difficult.

While dealing with wild animals was straightforward enough, preparing magical beast meat was rather complicated. Most magical beast meat served as material for “Magic Potions” and proved harmful if consumed directly. Consuming it could transform someone into a warrior or even cause them to explode into thin air. Only Abyssal Demons possessed powerful enough digestion to safely consume magical beast meat.

However… Lolth had experimented with using magical creatures as ingredients for special dishes! Perhaps they could test how humans perceived their magical beast dishes — after all, at the Demon King Castle, many demon colleagues had criticized their eating habits, leaving Lolth sad for quite some time.

But that was a story for another time. Tonight, everyone was full and satisfied.

Since instant food allowed for quick eating, it was time to turn in early. After lighting the bonfire, everyone sat around it on the ground, enjoying this leisurely moment. Lolth continued studying the recipe, while Kanor relied on her keen taste buds and learning ability to recreate the instant noodle-making process in her mind. Ann, prone to daydreaming, hugged her box and remained lost in thought, while Isabella touched her round belly, secretly loosening her knight armor by two notches.

Old Harper observed the four young people in their various poses, semi-paralyzed, and the roaring bonfire before them. Feeling the weight of his duty as an adventurer, he cleared his throat and began to speak.

“Ahem, youth is truly wonderful… It reminds me of my own adventures with friends when I was young! It was during the summer when I was thirty…”

Upon hearing Old Harper speak, Lolth’s gaze lifted from the recipe, revealing an eager expression.

“Oh – this atmosphere, is it time for campfire stories?”

Though Lolth had never been a human adventurer, she knew that camping around a bonfire after dinner was the second-best opportunity for mercenaries and adventurers to boast, right after drinking in a tavern. She found herself quite interested in listening to stories and chatting.

Despite Ann and Isabella maintaining composed expressions, it was clear these two strong individuals had never been active as “adventurers.” Isabella, in particular, found Old Harper’s stories quite fascinating. Even young Kanor looked excited.

“Ah, Uncle Harper, I haven’t heard your story of slaying the Earth Dragon in days!”

“No way, you really killed an Earth Dragon!” Lolth exclaimed, glancing at Uncle Harper’s hammer, once again doubting if this old man was hiding his true strength.

Hearing Kanor’s words, Harper blushed before the knowledgeable lord and Isabella, clearing his throat.

“It was just luck… Today, instead of talking about how I killed the Earth Dragon, let’s focus on the story of the mysterious dungeon I encountered!”

Old Harper sat up straighter, crossed his hands, and spoke with gravity.

“Dungeon,” Isabella muttered, “isn’t that a legend for adventurers? My father spent a long time searching for those places.”

“I’ve heard similar rumors in the east, but… no one has actually been there,” Ann, who had some interaction with Harper as the mayor, couldn’t help but ask, “Uncle Harper, are you sure you didn’t make a mistake?”

Kanor appeared puzzled by this new story. “What is a dungeon?”

“Ah, legend has it that it’s a refuge built by an ancient civilization from the last era to escape a great disaster,” book-loving Lolth explained casually. “Many believe it holds treasures of the ancient civilization, Divine Artifacts, advanced technology beyond our time, as well as extinct magical creatures and beings… However, there hasn’t been any reliable evidence of those places for over a thousand years — records from that time are full of legends, and many think they’re just exaggerated stories about underground dwelling monsters.”

“Master Lolth… do you believe they actually exist?”

Kanor looked at Lolth curiously.

“I think they should exist,” Lolth shrugged. “After all, the Demon King Castle is located on the Quicksilver Ruins. At least the ancient civilization is real, so dungeons must be real too, don’t you think?”

“Yes, they are indeed real,” Old Harper nodded solemnly. “I’m not bragging — our adventure team really entered a dungeon… It was in the western desert of the United Kingdom of South Sotua. We took an exploration mission after a huge sandstorm caused by a soil element eruption created new terrain changes in the border desert…”

“We thought it would be an easy task, since monsters usually enter a dormant period after elemental eruptions. The client’s unexpectedly generous reward led our team leader to take on this task.”

“The team leader had planned to hand over the adventure team to the deputy leader after this mission so he could return home and marry his childhood sweetheart. He needed the money, and the deputy leader also wanted funds to bring gifts when visiting his long-lost wife and son…”

Lolth couldn’t help but complain, “Well, with you as the main and deputy leaders of the adventure team, it’s hard for this mission to go smoothly…”

“Lord Lolth really has foresight,” Old Harper raised his thumb in acknowledgment. “This mission did indeed go wrong. Shortly after entering the depths of the border desert, a small-scale elemental eruption occurred, like an aftermath… But for us, it was terrifying enough!”

“To escape this elemental eruption, our adventure team was forced to split up. I, along with the team leader, deputy leader, and some other team members, found a cave hidden under a sand dune during the small sandstorm!”

“Although finding a cave in the desert was strange, we had no choice at that time — we could only hide inside. And what we initially thought was a monster’s nest surprisingly had a staircase leading downwards!”