The moment the rescue party encountered the elf, the chief and his group instinctively felt something was very wrong.
An elf? Why?
Wasn't this supposed to be a dungeon?
Looking at those ears, she's a high elf? Is this elven territory?
Everyone fell into confusion, and the high elf lowered her bow with an indifferent expression.
"I'm Lune. What brings you here?"
"We came to rescue someone!"
The chief stepped forward first. He was the strongest among them, and he'd had experience dealing with elves before.
'Damn it, these bastards should be in the forest! What are they doing here?!'
The chief's vision blurred as he realized just how badly things had gone sideways.
If this cave was elven territory, it would explain why Richard's pretend knight order and the mage May had gone missing.
'Few things are as obsessive about their territory as elves.'
Still, they at least had some basic decency and cared about their own kind. The chief quickly put his mind to work and waved his hands frantically.
"Have you seen any children?! We came to rescue young ones!"
"Children?"
Lune frowned and shook her head. Then she lowered her bow and pointed with her thumb at a wooden cage.
"There were no young children. These two were the only humans here."
Lune stepped aside and gestured to the women lying on the ground. Both women were tightly wrapped in wooden vines, and one of them was someone the chief and rescue party knew well.
"May!!"
The mage May was bound naked. The chief rushed forward first to check her condition.
"..."
May opened her eyes in a daze. A gag made of wooden vines was stuffed in her mouth, and her eyes widened when she saw the chief's face.
"Mmph?"
"Yeah, it's me! Damn it!"
The chief tried to tear off the vines binding May's mouth. But the vines were incredibly tough and wouldn't tear easily by hand.
"Mmph, mmm?"
With her mouth sealed, she couldn't speak. But she could move her head. While the rescue party questioned May about the children's whereabouts, Lune hoisted the blonde woman over her shoulder.
"Ugh... heavy."
"Who's that?"
"That's none of your business."
Lune shot the chief a cold look. Worried the elf might attack, the chief raised both hands.
"I'm sorry."
"Hmph. Whatever."
Lune looked around the cavity, then turned and walked in the opposite direction from where the rescue party had entered.
"Wait a minute."
The chief felt a sense of déjà vu and called out to Lune.
"Did you happen to see any strange monsters coming this way?"
"Monsters?"
"Yeah, you know, creatures with really long arms that move like this."
The chief mimicked the movements of the unnamed monsters—the ghouls. Lune just frowned and shook her head.
"No idea. I came in from over there. I didn't see any monsters on my way."
Lune pointed to the passage on the opposite side where she stood.
"Anyway, humans, don't even think about coming to the forest. I held back from shooting you just because I saw you here."
"We're truly grateful for your mercy."
Lune turned away with the blonde woman and headed back. The chief swallowed hard as he noticed the melted parts of the elf's clothing, then breathed a sigh of relief.
'That elf got roughed up coming in here too.'
A dungeon dangerous enough to reduce even an elf's clothes to rags. The chief gulped.
'We need to get out of here fast.'
At least they'd saved May. The chief woke her up, and May quickly regained consciousness.
"...?"
"Yeah. We're alive thanks to that elf."
The chief pointed at Lune disappearing into the opposite passage. May, who had been pestered by the rescue party, stared at Lune's retreating figure for a long moment before suddenly screaming in shock.
"Mmph! Mmmph!"
May thrashed her legs, trying to communicate something with her whole body.
But this only exposed her naked lower half, making some people visibly uncomfortable.
"Let's head back to the village for now."
"Does anyone have a dagger? I think we can cut this off."
Scrape, scrape. The chief immediately pulled out a small dagger and cut through the vine gag. Freed from the restraint, May pointed her chin at the disappearing elf and screamed.
"That bitch is a monster too! A monster!!"
Her furious cry filled the cavity. Lune, who had carried the blonde woman—Eila—to the opposite passage, handed her over into the darkness.
Grrr.
A red ghoul accepted Eila and disappeared back into the shadows.
"This is insane...!"
An elf working with monsters? This wasn't just the slash-and-burn village's problem anymore. This needed to be reported to the entire human alliance, and the hunters each drew their weapons.
"It's a trap...!"
"Who the hell are you?!"
The chief shouted to shake off his terror. Lune shrugged once, then raised her black bow and drew the string.
"Lune. My master's property."
Fwip!!
Lune released the drawn string without an arrow. At the same time, a sharp whistling sound rang out, and something grazed the chief's cheek.
"Wind arrow...?"
A power unique to high elves. The technique of borrowing the wind spirit's power to create arrows from air was clearly imbued with killing intent.
"Tch, thought I'd hit you."
Lune twisted her lips and drew her bow again.
"Damn it! The elf's gone crazy! Everyone run—"
"That bitch is just a subordinate! A lackey! The real one is—"
Kuhh.
The sound of rough breathing echoed from somewhere. They looked up toward the source of the sound—the ceiling several meters high.
There—
"GRAAAHHH!!"
A green pig-like monster was shrieking, and it let go of the ceiling it had been gripping and fell to the ground.
THUD!
An orc fell from the sky.
"Uh..."
The orc landed right in front of the chief. May screamed and tried to stand, but her tightly bound upper body made her immediately fall face-first.
"What the..."
"Ah. This is what you call."
Kuhh. With a snorting sound, the orc grabbed the chief by the collar.
"An aerial assault."
Gurgle!
A rain of slimes poured down from above.
***
Squish, squish!
The slimes pressed down on the hunters' bodies. They spread their bodies as wide as possible to prevent movement, and the ambushed hunters struggled desperately to escape the slimes' restraint.
"Ugh, it's too big!"
One male hunter pinned under a big slime flailed with his lower half completely engulfed. In his hand was a sharp, honed dagger.
"Die, just die!"
Stab, stab stab.
But even while being stabbed, the big slime doggedly devoured the hunter's body up to his neck.
"Kyaaah!! What the hell are these things?!"
A female hunter covered by a regular slime desperately tried to tear at the slime's skin with her hands. The regular slime, weaker than the big slime, was losing the grappling match with the hunters.
Grrr!
That's when the ghouls moved. Five ghouls rushing from behind Lune joined the struggling slimes in a coordinated attack.
Kyaaaah!!
The ghouls pressed down hard on the hunters' hands to prevent movement. With their lower halves caught by slimes and upper halves by ghouls, the hunters couldn't budge.
"Th-they're trying to suppress us!!"
"Aaaahhh!!"
Several hunters turned in terror.
A full ten hunters were subdued by the assault of slimes, ghouls, and big slimes.
Already half their forces were captured, and the chief—the rescue party's leader—was caught by some massive monster and on the verge of being killed.
"Kuk, krrgh!"
"..."
The monster held the chief by the collar without a word. The chief sensed it was considering how to eat him and pulled something small from his pocket to survive.
"Urk, krrgh...!"
"...!!"
The chief closed his eyes. Then he pressed the button on his precious magical tool.
FLASH!
As white light burst forth, the monster released the chief's collar. Thanks to the magical flash grenade detonated in the monster's face, the chief escaped.
"Aaahhh!!"
Though his vision hadn't recovered, the chief ran in the opposite direction from the monster. The hunters who'd been trying to flee in a wide circle shouted to guide the chief.
"Over here!"
One hunter grabbed the chief's wrist and led him. The monsters pursuing the fleeing hunters moved sluggishly, and the hunters escaped quickly.
"Ahhh!"
"Help me!"
"Don't leave us behind—!!"
Those caught by the monsters cried out in betrayal, but the hunters turned away with tears in their eyes.
"Just run! We'll think about it after we survive!"
"We'll definitely come back for you! Wait!"
The hunters fled. The dungeon's passage was a straight line, too easy to escape through, and the monsters didn't pursue further.
"Ah, ahhh..."
May, carried on one hunter's back, shed tears at the thought of escaping this nightmarish dungeon. Everything that had happened inside was too shocking to ever tell anyone.
"Now we just need to escape—"
BOOM.
Suddenly, the passage collapsed.
The entrance they'd come through caved in from the ceiling, and they were trapped in a dead end.
"We're... trapped?"
Despair settled in the hunters' eyes.