Published: February 1, 2026
Gill has dived into almost every labyrinth there is, so long as it isn’t buried too deep in the frontier.
That includes everything around the Capital City, of course—the range you can get to by carriage, and even places he’ll calmly walk to for a day or so after getting off partway.
Before he met Lizel he used to systematically clear them one after another, and despite being a solo adventurer he’d spend the night inside and finish conquering a labyrinth in just a few days. For the record, under normal circumstances just reaching the next magic circle in a day is considered plenty.
Among all the labyrinths around the Capital, there’s only one Gill has never entered.
“This feels kind of nostalgic.”
“You’ve never been here.”
“Well, that’s true too.”
It was a labyrinth that had been newly discovered after Lizel started traveling with him.
The labyrinth that Ain and his group were the first to conquer, the one named the “Tower of Wisdom.”
The other day, when Lizel brought Gill a souvenir and sat with him for a drink—not that Lizel was actually drinking, just keeping him company and chatting—he’d heard then that this was the only labyrinth Gill hadn’t gone into, so today they’d come to visit it.
“It’s a time of day when there are usually a fair number of adventurers around, but it’s empty. I heard it used to be crowded.”
“This is normal for a labyrinth that’s already been cleared, y’know.”
A labyrinth that must have been bustling right after its discovery was now sparsely populated after having been conquered.
Aside from Lizel’s party there were two other adventurer groups who went in ahead; no one else was there.
The mechanism that you can’t proceed unless you solve riddles must be a hassle. Even giving them the benefit of the doubt, adventurers are generally not the sort who seem suited to brainwork.
By now, the guild’s restrictions had been lifted and anyone was free to enter.
“Big Brother, you wander around labyrinths alone from time to time. How come you never came here?”
“If it’s a pain to clear, that’s a drag. If it weren’t for him, I wouldn’t be going in today either.”
“I’ll do my best.”
It’s not that Gill is incapable of thinking.
But taking time to stop and think every step of the way is annoying, and while there’s no problem if you can just bull through without thinking, from what he’d heard from Ain there are mechanisms here where you literally can’t move forward unless you solve the riddle.
In labyrinths he’d cleared alone before, there might be one or two such mechanisms; in that case he’d solve them and move on. But if the whole labyrinth is like that, it’s a hassle on another level.
On top of that, the monsters in this labyrinth weren’t especially strong, so for Gill, it wasn’t a labyrinth he felt any stubborn desire to challenge.
“But I figured since we had the chance, maybe you’d like to fight the boss at least once. There just happened to be a quest for it, and we might even get to spend a night inside, so I picked this place.”
“Only planning on one night—that’s so very you, Leader.”
“Huh?”
Where in the world do you find a party that fully clears a labyrinth from first floor to deepest floor in one or two days?
Lizel, who had actually never once done a complete run from the first floor to the deepest floor, said it as if it were obvious. He’d clearly been influenced by Gill. Well, it wasn’t impossible, Eleven thought, shaking his head with a grin.
“Anyway, Leader.”
“What is it?”
He crooked a finger, beckoning Lizel over.
Grabbing his arm, he pulled Lizel a few steps away from Gill. Ignoring Gill’s suspicious sideways glance, the two of them leaned in close as if to whisper secrets.
Eleven dropped his voice to the bare minimum. Even Gill probably couldn’t hear him this time.
“You still trying to butter Big Brother up?”
“No. Even if that weren’t the case, I think I would’ve picked this labyrinth for the same reason.”