Chapter 24: 24

24 : Dangle Fern – 1

“Login.”
“Chuchuu!”
Yep, it’s the 3rd day of service for『CNP』.
Let’s divide my playtime for the morning and afternoon today as well.

“Now, first was collecting the poison from the Poison Spitting Rat, right?”
I adjusted the Poison Rat’s Pointed Hat that I had made yesterday, and took the Poison Spitting Rat’s Poison Receiving Bag in my hand before leaving the safety area.
Then, I headed towards the 2nd layer while avoiding combat, however……

“There’s nothing but Poisonous Bite Rats here.”
Looking at the situation on the 2nd layer, there were only 4 Poisonous Bite Rats just wandering around.
Did this perhaps mean that the Poison Spitting Rat’s respawn timer was slower compared to the Poisonous Bite Rat’s?
Wait no, if that was the case, then all of the Poisonous Bite Rats should’ve respawned, but…… Well, nevertheless, I couldn’t do much about the ones that didn’t respawn.

“『Taruwiveno』”
“Jyuu!?”
I discreetly applied poison at the level of a severe illness to one of the Poisonous Bite Rats.
Finally, after 2 minutes had elapsed, the Poisonous Bite Rat had died from the poison.
Since it was killed via a cursed poison, its corpse remained in place.
Thereupon, the 3 other remaining Poisonous Bite Rats instantly swarmed around the dead body.
And so, they lost any ounce of voluntary alertness regarding their surroundings.

“Then, without delay, without delay.”

I rushed out of the area between the 1st and 2nd layer, and hurriedly hopped towards the other side of the room which had 2 staircases that led to the 3rd layer.
From there on, I quickly climbed up the steps and didn’t stop moving until I reached a point which couldn’t be seen from the lower floor.

“Hmm?”
Well, I was almost at the 3rd layer, but…… When I came up the stairs, some strange things entered my field of view.
The first was a fence-like object that was about as high as my knee and it appeared to have blocked off something.
It seems like I could’ve gotten obstructed by it when I was coming up from the lower level or while I was in a hurry, so I’ll have to exercise caution next time.
But, why was something like this here?
Even though the rats’ carnage had spread all over the 2nd layer, there were practically no signs of damage here, which made it come across as suspicious.
However, when I appraised it, it looked to be just a regular fence.

“Moss? Vine? Fern?”
The second peculiarity was a green plant that grew from the ceiling of the 3rd layer, 4 meters away from the floor.
It was a moss-like plant which grew like a vine, but had leaves similar to a fern sprouting out. Some parts of it were also swaying back and forth.
As far as I could see, this wasn’t damaged by the rats either.
Rather, this might be the first time I’ve seen a living plant in『CNP』thus far.
In any case, it was certainly suspicious, so I pointed the『Appraisal Loupe』towards it.


△△△△△
Dangling Meat Fern Flower ‎ Level 1
HP : 41/41
▽▽▽▽▽


“A monster!?”

What appeared was a pitiful level and HP, but…… Clearly, it wasn’t the appraisal results that you’d get from an item.
I was startled by that matter.
However, I immediately realized.
Exactly, if you really thought about it carefully, the appraised results only consisted of a name, level, and HP. NPCs, monsters, players, and other sorts of classifications weren’t written on the appraisal at all.
Consequently, plants were considered as living too.
If that was so, then the other living beings…… I think they’d also be written in the same format as the Poisonous Bite Rats were.

“Chuu, Chuchuu~”
“It sure is whining a lot.”
The Poison Rat’s Pointed Hat I was wearing on my head was crying out for some reason.
I don’t know what its purpose was.
However, it was chirping in a fixed rhythm to a certain extent which made it seem as if it was happy.
Hmm, the Dangling Meat Fern Flower didn’t appear to attack or have any intention to and it doesn’t give off an impression of being suspicious either.
There’s no use worrying about it forever, so for the time being, it’s probably fine to just ignore it.

“Now then, how about beyond the stairs……”
It’s a bit late for this, but the staircase of the 3rd layer was neatly surrounded and enclosed by concrete walls with nothing besides a single doorway.
What could be seen from the doorway, were left and right passages extending outwards.
Be as that may, one of the paths led to an immediate dead end because of the structure of the building.
On that account, I hid myself behind the wall next to the entrance and stuck my hand out from the stairway.

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“Hah?”
In doing so, a 3rd anomaly happened to catch my eye.
The stairwell that I was in right now was at the end of the 2nd layer.
Then, yesterday I sat down in the 2nd layer at a place where the building’s exterior wall was missing, so from what I’ve seen, I knew that the『Tower of Mice』was an ordinary building with its walls extending vertically from the ground. Even if I was mistaken, it at least wasn’t a structure that expanded horizontally as you climbed up.

Despite this, the left and right pathways that stretched out were…… Evidently longer than the width of the 2nd layer.
In addition to that, it was the same for both sides as well.

“I treated this dungeon too lightly, huh…… The entire place had turned unusual……”
I slightly pressed against the my temples.
Why, did it suddenly become so obviously strange now?
No need to even think about it.
The whole area had turned odd presumably because of a curse.

“I wonder if it’ll be good to try taking a look at the space itself.”
I aimed the『Appraisal Loupe』at the air in front of me and used it.


△△△△△
Tower of Mice

A dungeon in the shape of a tower, filled with large rats mutated by a curse.
Anything that catches their attention will be bitten, cursed, and devoured. They will not stop until their stomachs are appeased.

Curse Concentration : 11
▽▽▽▽▽


“The curse concentration went up.”
There were no changes to the flavor text.
However, the curse concentration had increased.

This meant that my『Magic Eye of Poison・1』was strengthened, but at the same time, the cost was raised as well.
I’ll likely have to be a little careful with that.

“Still, all things considered……”
Well, after seeing the flavor text once again, I noticed something.
There’s a clear difference between the contents of the flavor text and the actual behavior of the rats.

“The rats certainly ate whatever they could, but they didn’t eat what they couldn’t and even if their comrades died, they had influence over the extent in which they pursued me…… Rather, they were being controlled, weren’t they.”
Yesterday, after I logged out of the game, I searched it up and『CNP』was referred to as a game set in a parallel world that was managed by AI. Even if they’re monsters, each and every one of them moved with their own characteristic routine of thoughts. It could be said that there were almost no unnatural occurrences since causal relationships didn’t seem to hold true here.
However, the rats in the 2nd layer of the『Tower of Mice』were obviously not acting out of instinct, but moving in accordance with someone’s will.
If so…… Then just as you’d expect from a dungeon, there was probably a boss.

“Hey, where was your master located when you were still alive?”
“Chuu?”
“Master, boss, leader, the most distinguished person in your group, the strongest one, that kind of thing.”
“Chuu?”
“Muu-, either this was originally impossible to begin with, or it wasn’t possible yet…… Should I think of it as the latter?”
“Chuuuu?”
So I can’t get information out of the Poison Rat’s Pointed Hat, huh.
Well, I don’t even know the reason behind its squeaks and it was formerly just a rat after all.
It could be considered clever enough to the point where it would chirp back during exchanges though.

“I guess I should start exploring for now.”
“Chuu chuu~”
In order to commerce the exploration of the 3rd layer, I left the room that contained the stairway.

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