The hidden boss of the Underground Tomb Dungeon, the Skeleton King.
This guy was one that had to be taken down early if you wanted to speedrun the dungeon.
Because it granted a massive amount of experience points that you could never get from a normal green-grade dungeon.
'It'd be a shame to just waste all that experience.'
Unfortunately, thanks to my [Sin of Sloth (Myth)] trait, I was the type who couldn't acquire experience points.
It was a pity, but since the loot from defeating it was top-notch, I'd pushed forward with the dungeon conquest despite the lower efficiency.
But then.
[Perfectly defeated the Skeleton King in the laziest way possible]
[Laziness +650!]
[Your level has increased by 2!]
'Crazy…!'
The moment I saw the system message pop up in front of me, that regret melted away like snow.
Two level-ups. And a whopping 650 Laziness.
It was the biggest single-action gain I'd ever gotten.
And this was without even a quest triggering.
Compared to the less than 100 Laziness I'd earned from taking down that 'old man' Morel last time, this was an insane reward.
But it made sense.
When fighting Morel, even if I'd done it efficiently, I'd still moved my body a bit and used several skills.
But this battle with the Skeleton King?
Calling it a battle was almost embarrassing.
I'd ended it with a perfect single click and then just sat there munching popcorn like I was at a show.
That must've been what got the high evaluation.
'And another difference this time was…'
Having spectators like Karen and Artel.
That was a key factor too.
Looking back at all the big points I'd earned so far, there had always been people watching.
During the spar with Kaiser, the Death Worm illusion, the signature magic demonstration—it was always the same.
'Does having an audience maximize the effect of lazy performances?'
And.
That cringey line I dropped at the end might've helped too.
I hadn't exactly prepared the line in advance; I'd just ad-libbed it on the spot.
'Doing this stuff is starting to feel natural now.'
It came out as smoothly as breathing.
Whether that was good or bad, I wasn't sure…
'Oh, right, this isn't the time.'
I snapped out of my thoughts.
The Laziness reward had been so over-the-top that I'd almost forgotten why I'd come to this dungeon in the first place.
The Skeleton King's loot. Time to claim it.
"Karen, Artel. It's all over, so let's go grab the loot."
"…Ah."
I said this to the two of them, who were staring at me with blank expressions.
It didn't take long to find the item I wanted.
"This is probably the hidden boss's loot."
Artel used detection magic and spotted the one thing glowing amid the scattered debris.
In her palm sat an amethyst emitting an ominous deep purple light.
Focusing on it brought up the item description window.
[Item]
[Skeleton King's Gem (Heroic)]
A gem from the Skeleton King's crown.
Description: Permanently increases Magic stat while held. Slightly boosts power when using black magic.
Skeleton King's Gem.
Its core effect was permanently boosting the Magic stat.
'Exactly by 5.'
Magic +5.
It might not seem like much, but it was huge.
Magic was the most crucial core stat for any mage.
It determined skill power and also served as the cost for casting spells.
It was equivalent to five whole level-ups.
And levels required exponentially more experience the higher you went.
That applied to me too, even though I leveled up via Laziness instead of experience.
My leveling speed was already slowing compared to the early game.
So raw Magic +5 in this situation was incredibly valuable.
'And it even boosts black magic power.'
Black magic enhancement.
Like an extra option, and a pretty useful one at that.
For reference, black magic wasn't forbidden in the [Stella Academia] world.
The academy even had a black magic department.
It was small and had a bad rep, though.
'I was already eyeing some black magic stuff worth picking up…'
All in all, a very tempting item.
As I eyed the gem intently, Artel and Karen exchanged subtle glances and nodded slightly.
And then.
"Jeron. You should take this."
Artel held out the [Skeleton King's Gem] to me.
"Of course it's Jeron's, meow."
Karen nodded vigorously from the side.
Before entering the dungeon, I'd proposed a bet.
That the one with the highest contribution would take all the dungeon loot.
It was all to secure this gem.
But I hadn't even brought up the bet yet, and here they were handing it over.
'…Kinda feels bad now.'
To be honest, I'd basically used them as free labor.
Dragged them along as dungeon bus passengers, made them suffer, then thrown a demonized boss at them out of nowhere.
Sure, I'd handled the end, but that was just one click too.
"Thanks. In exchange, you can have all the other loot we've gotten so far."
I took the gem and said that.
Before reaching the hidden boss room, we'd taken down tons of skeletons and grabbed various loot.
I hadn't contributed even 1% to that, so taking it all felt too greedy.
But.
"No. I won't take it."
"That's rightfully Jeron's share too, meow!"
They refused outright.
In fact.
"…More importantly, you should thank us first."
Artel looked at me with serious eyes, her usual cool demeanor gone.
She bowed her head slightly.
"Thanks for taking down the boss. Without you, we would've…"
"Me too, Karen Stark. Same here, meow."
Karen, uncharacteristically serious, stood ramrod straight and saluted.
"On my honor as a swordswoman, I formally thank you for saving our lives. I will repay this debt someday, meow!"
Their sincere gratitude left me pretty embarrassed.
Truth was, they should be thanking me for the free ride, but somehow I'd ended up as their savior.
"Uh… yeah."
I answered awkwardly and changed the subject.
"Anyway, we're done here. Time to head back."
***
In the end, all the miscellaneous dungeon loot became mine too.
Nothing super important, so I planned to sell it all for gold.
'Really glad I got the Subspace Pocket.'
Carrying it all without one would've been a hassle.
We chatted as we made our way back to the academy.
"Jeron, Artel! Today was so fun, meow! And Jeron, really thanks, meow! In all sorts of ways!"
The moment we reached the academy main gate, Karen bolted off like the wind, saying she needed to train right away to process her insights.
Such a consistent girl.
But then a thought crossed my mind.
'If I could get a training maniac like Karen to slack off, it'd give a ton of Laziness, right?'
It'd probably pour out.
But unlike Artel, Karen was driven by genuine inner motivation—she loved it—so corrupting her wouldn't be easy.
'Makes me wanna try even more for some reason.'
That fired me up.
Getting Karen to slack off. I'll make it happen someday…!
Anyway.
Slacking off.
Slack…
Hmm.
Suddenly, an idea hit me for earning extra Laziness.
I turned to Artel, who was left alone with me and fidgeting by twirling her hair around her finger, looking awkward.
"Artel, don't you feel like it's a waste to part ways like this?"
"…Huh?"
"Wanna do what we did last time?"
"…Uh? Th-that?"
"Go see the cats."
"Oh, a-ah. C-cats… Got it."
Artel rolled her blue eyes around in confusion before finally understanding.
She was usually so sharp, but she wasn't getting it.
Maybe the Skeleton King shook her up.
"Wanna go?"
"…Okay. You helped me out today, after all."
She followed without resistance this time.
I led her once more to the cats' hideout in a secluded corner of the academy.
The cats greeted us warmly today too.
Artel crouched down familiarly now, stroking their backs.
Seeing her much softer expression, I smiled contentedly.
[Laziness +30!]
Not smiling because of the extra Laziness.
…Anyway.
After that, we spent a ton of time playing with Artel and the cats.
***
Afterward, I returned to my dorm room.
First thing I did flopping onto the bed was check my status window.
[Level: 27]
[Laziness: 1000]
'Good, perfect.'
Seeing my well-stacked level and Laziness from the weekend made my chest feel full.
And that wasn't all.
I'd dealt with the annoying mid-boss Morel, got the Rune of Regeneration, the Skeleton King's Gem, various miscellaneous loot, and even boosted favor with Karen and Artel…!
Whew, listing it all is exhausting.
A more perfect weekend couldn't exist.
'Oh, right. That too.'
Then I remembered something.
That black book I'd bought at Arcana's Everything Store recently, [Tales of the Seven Demons].
It was a normal item, but I'd never seen it before.
'What's its deal?'
No more thinking—time to check it now.
I pulled [Tales of the Seven Demons] out of my Subspace Pocket.