「Wha-, t-this is!?」

Just as they had been surrounded by Sword Bees, 40 or so of them suddenly disappeared from behind them.

No, rather than disappearing, it would be more correct to say that they were burned to ashes.

As that happened, the leader heard and saw a familiar voice and appearance.

「Rei-san!?」

Rei nodded towards the leader as he, Elena and Set approached them from behind.

Yellow didn’t fly over but sat on Elena’s left shoulder instead.

「Why are you here? Weren’t you heading for the fourth floor?」

「Why? We just had some minor business to finish.」

Despite being surrounded by Sword Bees from all directions except the one they came from, Rei replied casually.

In this situation, the leader felt a sense of security as he spoke……similar to the same feeling he would have when Vosk, his big bro, was around.

「Some minor business? No, either way, you’ve saved us Rei-san. I didn’t think that the Sword Bees would attack us like this.」

「You’re right. These aren’t ordinary Sword Bees. ……No, well, to be exact, the Sword Bee leading them isn’t ordinary.」

「It’s not ordinary?」

「Yeah. It seems to be a Queen Bee of sorts, it’s much bigger than ordinary Sword Bees. ……Do you know what I’m talking about?」

Glancing at Set to tell him to watch his back, Rei asked the leader.

With outsiders around, Set couldn’t show off his skills, so he directly went over to the Sword Bees to physically attack them.

Set ignored the adventurers, who seemed to be in shock, as he walked past them.

「A Queen Bee? No, I’m sorry, I’ve never heard of one before. ……Hey, have any of you heard of one before?」

「Ah, I’ve heard of it.」

In response to the leader’s question, the thief replied as he held up his daggers, holding back the Sword Bees that were looking to attack him at any moment.

However, the Sword Bees didn’t move at all, despite being right in front of the thief. ……No, rather they couldn’t move.

They had attacked the adventurers thinking that they had lost Rei completely. However, Rei had suddenly appeared before them again.

As for the Queen Bee, it watched Rei from behind the swarm of Sword Bees.

Although its compound eyes gave off an emotionless feeling, as expected of insect monsters, the sound of it’s vibrating wings seemed to show its frustration.

The Queen Bee was once again thinking whether or not to retreat from an enemy that could easily defeat its swarm. However, as it had been chased so far, the queen bee decided that it was unlikely it could escape. It had originally decided to fight the adventurers while Rei and the others had yet to catch up to it.

The Queen Bee’s mistake was overestimating its own strength. It had definitely been dizzied by the power of Rei’s group. Certainly, Rei, Elena and Set’s strength was overwhelming. However, ignoring the three of them, the six adventurers it had attacked, after escaping from Rei, weren’t to be looked down on either. In the first place, they were adventurers who were usually active on deeper floors and had the skills to match. At the very least, they were more than strong enough to clear the third floor.

After all, even though it was a Queen Bee, it was still a E rank monster at best.

「Kikikikiki-!」

Instructions were given to Sword Bees with the beating of wings. Take out the adventurers first and buy it as much time as possible.

Following the instructions they were given, the Sword Bees all attacked at the same time.

Countless Sword Bees slashed towards the adventurers with the ‘swords’ that extended from their tails……

「What do they think they’re doing. Are they aiming for us because they think we’re weak? Don’t underestimate us too much!」

With a shout, the leader rapidly struck out with his sword.

One strike, two strikes, three strikes. His sword swiftly passed through the air, leaving behind Sword Bees without their abdomens.

「……Heh.」

Rei, who was watching from close by, made a sound in admiration.

Given what had happened to him the day before, Rei hadn’t expected the leader to be a good fighter.

As for the rest of the adventurers, they wielded their spears, daggers, bows, swords and battle axe as they took down the Sword Bees attacking them one after another.

They had been surprised when the Sword Bees had initially surrounded them, but demonstrating their true abilities, E rank Sword Bees were no match for them. The number of enemies slowly started to decrease.

However……

「It won’t be good if things continue like this.」

Rei muttered to himself as he used his Death Scythe to slice several Sword Bees in half.

The Sword Bees were definitely not very strong. Right now, Rei and the adventurers were in an advantageous position. ……Yes. For now.

(There are a lot of them. No, there are too many of them. In that case……it would still be better to deal with the Queen Bee giving the orders than deal with the small fry.)

Rei’s aim wasn’t the Sword Bees, but the queen. Quickly putting his thoughts in order, he looked around. Rei guessed that the Queen Bee had to be in a position where it could watch the entire fight if it were to give out such precise orders to the Sword Bees.

However, no matter where he looked, he could only see 30cm large Sword Bees. The Queen Bee couldn’t be found anywhere.

(Tch, did we scare the queen too much after our first fight? I didn’t expect it to be so clever. It might be because they’re bees, but I didn’t think the Sword Bees would protect their queen to the point of killing themselves. In that case……)

Although he couldn’t see the Queen Bee, Rei had several ways of finding it. He looked around to see what method he could use.

Fortunately, following their leader’s orders, the adventurers seemed to be doing more than enough. Rei called out to Set, who was fighting off the Sword Bees which were trying to wrap around behind them.

「Set, find the Queen Bee!」

「Guru~? ……Guru~!」

Knocking down a Sword Bee with his forefoot, Set gave a sharp cry. Jumping off the ground before leaping off both walls in a sort of triangle jump, Set passed over the heads of the adventurers before rushing straight towards the place where the Sword Bees were densest, blasting away nearly 30 Sword Bees before landing next to Rei. At the same time, Set looked around for several seconds.

Sword Bees hardly had any emotions, but it seemed they weren’t entirely emotionless. The moment Set paused, he sensed the scent of the Queen Bee from the right side of a crossroad.

「Gururururururu~!」

Leaping forward with another cry, Set jumped from wall to wall like a ping pong ball as he controlled his speed……

「Kikikikikiki-!」

The Queen Bee must have noticed Set coming towards her. it vibrated its wings to give orders to the surrounding Sword Bees as it shot out multiple wind blades.

The wind blades were invisible as they headed towards Set.

Naturally, the Sword Bees attacking Set were not immune to them and many were sliced apart.

However, with orders from the Queen Bee, the Sword Bees continued to block Set’s path without regard for their own injuries.

「Gururu~!」

Seeing Sword Bees sliced apart by the invisible wind blades, Set gave a loud cry and flapped his wings to forcibly change his trajectory. Jumping off a wall with his momentum……he finally reached his target, the Queen Bee.

「Kikikikiki-!」

The Queen Bee probably realised it could no longer escape. It vibrated her wings threateningly and shot out more wind blades while thrusting with a poisonous stinger at the same time.

「Guru~!」

Set gave a brave cry despite sensing the approaching wind blades.

Instead of avoiding them by sight, Set used his hearing, smell and even his sixth sense to avoid the wind blades as he moved forward.

With so many wind blades shot at him, Set had no choice but to use his skill to shrink himself, slipping past the wind blades as he rushed forward.

Fortunately, the adventurers, who weren’t aware of Set’s secret, were too preoccupied dealing with the Sword Bees. Despite being significantly stronger than the Sword Bees, there were an innumerable number of them.

The young men might have been active on the deeper floors, but that didn’t mean they had the same level of extraordinary strength as Rei and Elena. In Elgin, quality could make up for a lack of quantity, but that required a certain level of quality.

As for this group of adventurers, their quality wasn’t high enough to deal with the quantity of Sword Bees. Because of that, they were too busy doing their best to hold out and didn’t notice Set shrinking his body down to 1m in length.

However, the same couldn’t be said for the Queen Bee, who saw Set transform right in front of it. After all, Set had just avoided the dense wind blades it had shot out. The Queen Bee had been waiting for an opportunity to strike with its poisonous stinger right after Set was hit by the wind blades. Unfortunately, that moment became a fatal opening for the queen bee.

「Gurururururu~!」

Set returned to his original 2m size and gave a cry as he swiped out with his forefoot. The effect of his Bracelet of Herculean Strength overlapping with his natural physical strength made Set’s attack fatal for a monster 1m in size, even if it was a Queen Bee.

Set’s eagle claw struck the Queen Bee’s abdomen where her poisonous stinger was. The momentum caused the Queen Bee to make a half turn in the air, pointing its head towards the ground. Set’s other other claw attacked mercilessly……the next moment, the Queen Bee’s head exploded just like her abdomen.

「Gururururu~!」

Set gave a victory cry as he looked at the corpse of the Queen Bee.

At the same time, the Sword Bees that had been attacking the adventurers and Rei’s group froze for a moment as if they had lost signal. Immediately after, they flew away in different directions as if escaping.

All Rei and the others did was watch them leave.

Of course, if they had wanted to chase after the Sword Bees, they could have done it. But the adventurers were exhausted after the extended fight and Rei and Elena had no reason to hunt down the Sword Bees either.

That was especially so for Rei, who only wanted the Queen Bee’s magic stone and wasn’t as interested in the ordinary Sword Bees.

「Phew……I’m dead.」

One of the adventurers said that as he leaned against the dungeon wall.

His other companions just looked at him as they took a break and drank from the water bottles given to them from their porter

「Hey, you lot! Strip out the magic stones and proofs of subjugation before taking a break!」

「Ehhh……big bro, can’t we just take a short break?」

「Don’t be stupid! Remember what big bro Vosk always says! You have to be careful in the dungeon! Anyway, get to work!」

The leader shouted at his party before turning towards Rei and the others.

「Uh, thank you for your help. So……about splitting the rewards……」

After glancing at Elena, Rei nodded towards the leader, who seemed to hesitating over something.

「Well, we can give you the Sword Bees, but I’d like to take the Queen Bee here.」

「No! That’s too much for us! We can’t do something like that to people who saved our lives. You were the one who killed the Queen Bee, so that’s fine for you to take. But……」

「Don’t worry about it. In the first place, we entered the dungeon to collect magic items and magic stones from rare monsters. In particular, I already have a lot of Sword Bee magic stones. I don’t want any more and I don’t have any money issues right now either.」

「But, still……」

Rei judged that it would be useless to continue talking with the leader, who still seemed to want to give them a share.

However, despite making that judgement, Rei’s impression of the leader did improve.

After all, there were 100 dead Sword Bees lying around, maybe even more. Considering that, it was only natural that people would want to monopolise it all. Even so, the leader had still asked to divide it up.

However, for Rei, it would be a troublesome task to dismantle all the Sword Bees here. Queen Bee aside, it would also be troublesome if he stored the Sword Bees into the Misty Ring now and took out the magic stones later.

In the end, it was just a matter of weighing effort against reward.

For that reason, Rei simply shrugged his shoulders after storing away the Queen Bee’s corpse before leaving with Elena, Set and Yellow while the leader’s voice still hung in the air.

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