Chapter 278

278th Episode

The Rift, Ceres’ Delusion #5

I quickly summed up my situation.

There was a dungeon that might have a named monster at the city entrance, and I had come here to clear it out. However, inside was a greenhouse-like area full of all kinds of flowers and giant insects buzzing about.

The ruler of a massive beehive within, the nymph Doris of Honey Water, had her bees kidnap me to demand the return of stolen goods.

It sounds utterly absurd, but unfortunately, this was very much real.

“Hurry, hand over what you’ve stolen, thief-!”

Wooong- Woomm-.

The more Doris, seated like a queen in her chair, barked commands in a high-handed manner, the more threatening the wing beats of the bees surrounding her became.

For the moment, though, it seemed they had no intention of attacking me. At the very least, this nymph Doris of Honey Water intended to speak with me.

I asked,

“So, this black-haired man stole something precious from you, right?”

“There’s no point in pretending ignorance! You’re undoubtedly the thief who fled with Ceres’ valuable treasure!”

In my opinion, there’s a characteristic about people.

People tend to find those of a different race look somewhat similar. As if their faces blur together making it hard to distinguish individuals.

In this sense, this nymph of honey water was clearly mistaking me for someone else.

Given how distinct and strong these people look, the subtle features of Samaritan faces might have escaped her notice.

With that in mind, I decided to clarify the misunderstanding calmly.

“I just arrived here today. I don’t even know what treasure you’re talking about.”

“Lies! Black hair! Black eyes! Tall stature! Male! That’s exactly you-!”

Wooong-.

The more I tried to explain, the more the nymph seemed to froth at the mouth in anger. The buzzing around me seemed to rise in sync with her rage.

Should I fight and subdue her?

But while I didn’t know much about the nymph, those bees surrounding her were quite formidable.

Earlier, I had stomped on them and hit them with my gauntlets, yet their exoskeletons were so tough that they remained undamaged.

Thus, I tried one final attempt to clarify as I spoke calmly.

“Look once again. Was it really me?”

“Hmm.”

With that, the nymph Doris of Honey Water stood up from her seat.

Then she approached me with a clicking sound, bringing her face dangerously close.

With our noses nearly touching, I was a bit taken aback, but Doris seemed unfazed as she stared into my eyes intensely.

“Pitch-black eyes, no doubt about it! Undoubtedly you! Quickly, return the stolen goods! Because of you, I can’t leave here!”

But how could inspecting my face worsen the situation?

“Thief-!”

“I’m not a thief. I didn’t take anything!”

“This pumpkin tiara reacts to your presence! It’s better not to lie! If you’re going to persist with this act, this Doris has ways too-!”

Crack.

As the nymph Doris clapped her hands toward the air, several bees buzzed in from outside. It seemed like it was finally time to fight.

At the moment when I was steeling myself for the fight, the large honeybees suddenly dropped something in front of me and then flew away while swaying their rears.

“What’s this?”

It was a wooden vase, carved as if from a tree. A rather rustic wooden vase, seemingly hand-carved.

About the size of a soda can, it was clearly packed tightly with something thick.

What could it be?

While I was puzzled, holding the vase and examining it, the nymph Doris spoke.

“That’s the royal jelly honey I’ve carefully aged! It’s so precious that I haven’t even presented it to Lady Ceres, but I’ll offer it to you! Please, just return the stolen item….”

Doris broke down in tears. At once, the bees buzzing nearby gathered around the small nymph as if to console her, gently brushing her.

Wing-wing.

What is with these bees?

I was very confused. Suddenly, her bursting into tears made me feel as though I had really done something wrong. I was starting to feel like I should return the item I supposedly stole from her.

“Hay, what exactly did you lose? If you tell me, I can help you look for it.”

“All those who spoke thus never returned! Even Theseus, who said he’d help, sealed me away and fled-!”

“Really?”

“Yes! Thanks to that, I, Doris, have had no choice but to wait for the thief for years in this flower field, not knowing when they’ll come back!”

That’s right.

It seemed this nymph of honey water had been trapped here alone for around thirty years. Perhaps that’s why she seemed unfamiliar with conversing with others.

So, ultimately, how must I close this rift? Should I just defeat her? I was starting to feel curious about that when the nymph Doris, whose tears had now ceased, spoke.

“However, the perpetrator always returns to the scene of the crime! This rift is a giant beehive to capture the thief—you! Now the nymph of honey water, Doris, is finally free!”

Ah.

I believed I understood the significance of this dungeon called the “Entrance of Fall” or the Rift. It was a trap for capturing thieves.

“So, man! Hand over the only treasure, Kore!”

“Kore?”

The word “Kore” seemed familiar from somewhere. What was it? Where did I hear it? Just as I was trying hard to recall it,

“You there! Attack that man-!”

It seemed she could no longer hold back her anger. The nymph Doris directed her bee “friends” to attack me.

Woooom-.

In response, furious bees started charging toward me. Even though they were bees, their size being as large as human heads made them quite formidable. I tensed, ready to fight them.

Wing-wing-yaa-wing.

Curiously, the honeybees didn’t attack me. Instead, they seemed to be rubbing their bodies against me. It somewhat resembled the grooming behavior bees do to show each other affection.

“What’s with these bees.”

Did they coat my body with honey?

“Hey, what are you doing? Quickly, attack that thief!”

Doris seemed equally confused by the situation.

When her bees ignored her attack orders and instead acted friendly toward me, she scolded them, but the bees continued to clean dust and petals off my body instead of attacking.

I don’t know how to talk to bees like the Nymph of Honey Hassan, but at least I understood these creatures held no hostility toward me.

They seem to know something.

Perhaps they realized that if they attacked me, they wouldn’t remain as “honey/bees” but split into “honey” and “bees”. They were clever creatures.

“Taming such ferocious Baschir honeybees! Only a nymph of honey water, or my friend Kore, could do such a thing!”

Krang, koo-koo-crash-.

Suddenly, something trembled like an earthquake, causing the beehive-like hut to shudder violently in all directions. Both I and the nymph Doris lost our balance and fell over.

Woooom-.

Amidst the upheaval, the bees that had initially flustered were buzzing violently and spreading in all directions toward the entrances.

Hassan, are you alright?

We’ll rescue you soon!

It seemed Hippolyte and Antiope were attacking the beehive outside. Just as I thought I was about to grasp a clue, the situation escalated.

If I stayed here, I might get crushed under the collapsing beehive.

So, I lifted my half-swooned Samaritan girl, Kirill, placing her around my waist.

Then I noticed the nymph Doris of Honey Water crouched on the floor, shouting.

“Kore, he was my and the bees’ friend! But the black-haired man stole him! I saw it! Now you’re trying to steal away the bees too! Give him back!”

Rumble, rumble rumble-.

Amidst the swaying trees as if they were uprooting, Doris’ loud cries were all I could hear. She was talking about someone named Kore, seemingly a human.

Come to think of it, didn’t they say Goddess Ceres’ daughter was called Kore?

I thought they wanted me to return stolen sweets or something. But it turns out to be a person.

“Hay! Are you just planning to stay there sprawled out!?”

“Huuuuh, huuuh-. My hard work, my beehive is collapsing-.”

“Such bees.”

Do nymphs all seem to have this spacey side? It’s as if they lost out in the survival competition against the foreign Kamps.

For some reason, I saw traces of Paranoi in this frightened nymph of honey water.

That’s why, leaving her here while the beehive collapses somehow felt sinful.

“-Such bees.”

So, with Doris tucked under one arm and the Samaritan girl Kirill under the other, I ran for the entrance of the beehive with all my strength.

As my body cleaved through the air with a whoosh, I could see the beehive crumble and crash to the ground where I had been moments ago.

“Sister, how will you destroy it!? There are people inside!”

“Ah, I lost control of my strength. I have a severe aversion to alcohol-.”

Oh, shi-.

Since this beehive was roughly a good thirty meters high, I felt as if I were floating helplessly in mid-air. If I fell like this, my legs would definitely be ruined.

Just as I was troubled,

Woooom-.

I heard an intense wingbeat from somewhere, and then the bees had grabbed me by the back.

Wing-wing-yaa-wing.

The bees, buzzing strangely, acted as if they were saving me like a parachute. I always thought bees were pesky creatures, but seeing as they helped me this way, they were quite useful.

Wing.

Their fur-covered, fat little bodies looked somewhat cute, like fluffy moles. Honestly speaking, these bees were better than that spider, Keng Keng.

Plop.

Thanks to the bees, I safely landed on the flower field. noticing this, Hippolyte and Antiope re-sheathed their weapons at their waists and backs and slowly approached.

“Hassan, are you alright? The moment I saw the bees taking you, my buzz went away. But, it seems the bees have brought you back now.”

Hippolyte extended her hand toward the bees buzzing around her. The bees that had been buzzing ferociously a moment ago now settled down to sit on Hippolyte’s arm as if they forgot their earlier hostility.

“Interesting.”

Antiope, too, placed a couple of head-sized bees on her palms and chuckled.

“Wow, sister look. These are Baschir honeybees! Beings whose ferocity cannot be cut without aura. How are they so tame now? Hey, Hassan, what just happened?”

“I don’t know. Such bees, if only someone could explain it.”

I said that, got up, and dusted off my pants and buttocks. As I did, Hippolyte furrowed her brow realizing there were two women lying under me.

“So it’s that kid. And who’s that next to her?”

“A nymph of honey water, they say.”

“A nymph of honey water? What’s a nymph doing here?”

Thus, I explained to Hippolyte everything that had happened just now.

This place was kind of a trap to regain Ceres’ beloved daughter Kore. A black-haired man had stolen Kore, and this nymph had been trapped here to find her. At least, that’s all I understood.

After listening for some time, Hippolyte folded her arms and hummed.

“Kore. So Kore was kidnapped by someone. Incredible, that the daughter Ceres cherished was abducted. No wonder Goddess Ceres was angry.”

Then, she held the just-fallen nymph to ask.

“Hey, nymph. Is what I just heard true? Is Kore indeed missing?”

“Y-Yes! That’s correct! I saw it clearly with my own eyes! I couldn’t stop it, which is why Lady Ceres punished me like this….”

“Hmm. So that’s it. Judging from the situation, Kore, while enjoying herself with nymphs and flowers, was kidnapped by a black-haired man, right?”

“Absolutely!”

“Sister, that’s not the point right now. The matter seems rather straightforward. That thing on her head— isn’t it the core of the dungeon? Break it, and this rift will be destroyed as well.”

Antiope’s finger pointed at the tiara on the nymph Doris’ head. Seeing it, Hippolyte also nodded in agreement.

“Indeed, that seems to be the case.”

“Anyway, things ended rather smoothly. Lucky these bees are tame. These creatures, while dangerous individually, are as threatening as silver-ranked beasts in groups. They would need to be fought with aura.”

The ranks of the creatures buzzing around us seemed to be silver-ranked.

Certainly, if the creatures with tough exoskeletons that couldn’t be harmed without infusing aura were dealt with seriously, it would have been quite the hassle.

“Just stop coming over.”

Wing-wing.

As I kept shooing the bees that were continuously getting close to me, Hippolyte extended her hand and snatched the tiara from the nymph Doris’ head.

And at once, she broke it with force.

Crack.

“My…my tiara!”

The nymph Doris cried out in despair, but the nymph, caught by powerful Amazons, could do nothing.

Upon looking again, it seemed that nymphs themselves weren’t especially strong; rather, the dangerous factor was the bees they commanded, which had led to this dungeon being deemed hazardous.

Rumble rumble-.

As the tiara shattered, the surrounding space shook fiercely as if an earthquake had struck.

“Anyway, with this, it seems the rift is over. Ended easier than expected. But we did gain some important information. That’s a win.”

“Hmm, feels like we didn’t do much. My whole body is stiff from inactivity.”

A zap-zap of electricity crackled from Antiope’s hands. She seemed dissatisfied from the lack of action. The sister was more warlike, so she might feel this way.

But Hippolyte didn’t seem to care as she said:

“We’ve understood why the gentle goddess Ceres grew angry. It’s a big gain. With this, we might restore the relationship between the gods of Hypos and the earth. It can help humanity.”

[Afterword]

Squeak! Thank you so much, Gwae-Eek, Jiyeo-dul-leo-cha, Yubub-ddab-bap, Kadeom, Zerdial, yayayeah, Potato Salad, Qw-and-Qw-Ice-Cream, Panfear, Qaisha, Potato Server, and especially our generous patron thegodenel for your support!

Thanks to your support, the nymphs pulled through overtime work for this!

Thus, we could successfully achieve consecutive updates!

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Thank you once again for your generous support!

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