Scenario GateNo, I got caught too... But if I say that right off the bat, it'll ruin the mood, so maybe I should start with a normal greeting.
"Hello."
But just then, something suddenly entered my field of vision.
A tiny creature with rainbow-colored wings.
"Wow! Another new guest!"
The moment I heard the sound it made, I held my breath.
"Hello! Welcome!"
It was speaking Korean.
Not just mimicking sounds, either. It was a properly structured sentence with a clear meaning.
"This is the 'Fairy Kingdom'!"
A dungeon creature capable of conversing with humans...?
The moment I encountered this fairy, I immediately realized what kind of "food box" I had gotten myself trapped in.
***
That's how taste works.
Some people dislike common flavors such as sweetness or saltiness, while others develop unusual preferences, like enjoying sourness. There's nothing particularly strange about that.
There are bound to be oddballs in this world who stray from the mainstream.
The reason I'm suddenly bringing this up is...
Because the gate we've entered is a place shaped by the hands of exactly that kind of 'food weirdo.'
When entities that aren't hostile toward humans appear and, on top of that, speak a familiar language, the answer is obvious.
"Hmm."
First, let's establish one thing.
This gate is designed to extract human emotions—anything except fear.
Dungeon creatures usually feed on the fear and pain of intelligent beings. Occasionally, however, some seek out entirely different emotions.
Joy, pleasure, sadness.
Things of that sort.
'Looks like I've stumbled across one with unusual tastes.'
Dungeon creatures with peculiar tastes sometimes construct entire narratives inside their dungeons in order to provoke different emotions from living beings.
Unlike simple pain, which can be inflicted quickly, making someone laugh or cry takes considerably more effort.
'I knew I'd run into something like this eventually.'
What would Earthlings say if they witnessed a situation this unusual?
Wouldn't scholars start arguing that EX-grade gates needed to be divided into more specific categories?
And if they were to coin a new classification, something like 『Scenario Gate』 would probably fit quite well.
Honestly, I couldn't think of a more intuitive name.
"Wow! Wow! You're really big!"
"It's big!"
"Welcome, nice to meet you!"
Once I had finished organizing my thoughts, I turned my attention back to the present.
At some point, several fairies had gathered around me.
"We're having a festival right now! You're invited too. Would you like to take a seat?"
The tiny creatures eagerly urged me to join their so-called festival.
The atmosphere seemed lighthearted enough, so for a moment I didn't think much of it.
But the instant they said that, the people around me cried out in alarm.
"Sit down right now!"
"Just say yes, no matter what!"
"Hiiieek...!"
I flinched.
Come to think of it, why had they all been so terrified this entire time?
Tilting my head, I walked over to someone I recognized.
Then I sat down on the bare ground beside her and asked,
"What exactly happened while I was gone?"
First, I needed to understand what had turned the atmosphere here into this.
"Actually..."
After a brief hesitation, Seonwoo Yeon began recounting everything they had experienced.
"Before you arrived, we had casualties. Three people, in fact."
"The first victim was an association employee who entered with me. They mistook an approaching fairy for a monster and attacked it first, but..."
"Do they fight back if you touch them?"
"It's more than just fighting back. The fairies seem gentle at first, but the moment they're injured, they completely change..."
Cold sweat beaded across Seonwoo Yeon's face, probably because she was reliving the fear she'd felt at the time.
"If you peel back that face, there are three layers of teeth hidden underneath. The fairies use them to devour a person's head in an instant."
"Aha."
"I had my analyzer running at the time, and I saw something else too. The fairy had originally registered as E-rank, but the moment it changed, its magic power became completely unreadable."
"Hmm."
"T, to be honest, I don't really understand what's happening either. But for now, it's probably best not to touch the fairies..."
The revelation that those adorable creatures were concealing such horrifying true forms was certainly interesting.
But the truly important part lay elsewhere.
"How did the second victim die?"
I listened quietly to Seonwoo Yeon's explanation before asking.
She hesitated, then continued.
"That's... we couldn't exactly abandon the mission just because we'd suffered casualties. So afterward, our investigation team continued deeper into the dungeon to search for the missing people..."
Even now, the fairies around us were happily dancing.
"Fortunately, we quickly found the analysts who'd been swept inside. But the real problem began after that."
"What happened next?"
"F, first of all, no matter how hard we searched, we couldn't find an exit..."
Hahahaha.
The fairies laughed in shrill voices as they danced around the campfire.
Despite their adorable appearance, every person who had arrived before me stiffened whenever one of the fairies entered their field of vision.
Soon, Seonwoo Yeon continued.
"Then... I think it was around nine hours after we entered the dungeon. The fairies suddenly made us an offer."
"We're going to have a festival today! We'll invite you too. Would you like to sit down?"
"Just like Giryeo-ssi heard a moment ago, they invited us to the festival."
With no immediate solution to their predicament, Seonwoo Yeon's group had decided to accept the fairies' invitation.
And that was when the incident occurred.
During the festival, the fairies brought out something for a game they called 'Balloon Play'...
"This is something that's commonly done on Earth."
The problem was that the investigation team had carelessly dismissed one of the fairies' remarks.
"The loser gets a 'penalty'!"
The hunters participated in the game with some degree of tension, but not enough to believe their lives were actually at stake.
That complacency soon led to their defeat.
Bang!
In the end, one of the hunters popped the balloon.
When the fairies saw that the humans had lost, they burst into delighted laughter.
Then they carried out the punishment they had mentioned earlier.
"...The fairy tore off the loser's head, just like with the first victim."
It was a punishment no human could possibly have anticipated.
They had lost a game.
And someone had died because of it.
"Then the third victim..."
But do you know what was even more terrifying?
The festival in this kingdom didn't end after a single night.
After giving the shaken humans food and somewhere to sleep, the fairies resumed the festival the very next day.
No.
I don't want to.
I hate this!
Terrified by what had happened the day before, one of the analysts flatly refused to participate in the festival again.
Naturally, the fairies tried to persuade them.
They told the analyst to come join them because every guest in the kingdom was required to attend the festival...
But how could an ordinary analyst, someone who wasn't even a combat specialist, endure a situation like that?
Eventually, the person fled from the fairies.
"Ugh."
"Don't cry, Seonwoo Yeon-ssi."
The fairies showed no mercy.
They killed the woman who tried to escape.
That was why the atmosphere here felt more like a funeral than a festival.
Everyone had already realized that if they defied the fairies, blood would be spilled.
"Hey, everyone! Should we show you our dance again? Can you clap for us?"
"Heugh!"
"Ugh."
The moment the fairy spoke, the humans participating in the festival hurriedly began clapping.
A festival on a green hill.
It was a beautiful scene, as though it had been taken straight from a fairy tale.
But with every participant pale from terror, the sight was anything but pleasant.
"Giryeo-ssi, please help us... W, what are we supposed to do in a situation like this?"
Seonwoo Yeon pleaded desperately for me to find some way to bring the festival to an end.
Unfortunately, I wasn't immediately sure what to do either.
"Is there any kind of hint?"
Of course, if this really was a scenario gate, there had to be some broader flow or direction we were meant to follow.
'Could the balloon game during the festival be some kind of opportunity to eliminate all the fairies...?'
Just as I, a former archmage, was entertaining such a bold idea—
"By the way, these guests are really big. Could they actually be giants?"
"No, they can't be. Their colors are different, aren't they?"
A faint whisper reached my ears through the heat and noise of the festival.
"Giants?"
I immediately asked aloud.
Seonwoo Yeon looked horrified when she saw me interrupt the fairies' conversation.
But honestly, there was no reason for me to worry that much.
The deaths that had occurred so far were probably little more than a mechanism for driving the adventurers into participating in the festival.
"What exactly do you mean by giants?"
The inhabitants of a scenario gate weren't necessarily beings that had to be feared unconditionally.
So I questioned the fairies without hesitation, hoping to squeeze even the smallest piece of information out of them.
"Giants? Scary ones! Monsters that love eating us!"
"Hmm."
"But it's okay now. They promised not to hurt us anymore."
"If they eat all of us, then there won't be any of us left for them to eat~"
The fairies who had been whispering among themselves fluttered toward me, leaving faint blue afterimages in their wake.
"The giants promised to spare us. In return, we agreed to offer one fairy to the giants every year."
"Then the rest of us are safe."
"We're safe!"
So that's the basic setup of this feeding box.
Should I start steering the conversation toward the real issue now?
"I understand. In any case, I don't want to remain in this kingdom any longer. If you happen to know how to leave this place, please tell me."
"Leave?"
"Leave the kingdom?"
"Go away!"
Far from becoming angry, the fairies readily offered an answer.
"I don't know."
"I don't know the way either."
"But if you go beyond the hill, there's a big tree where someone named Apara lives."
"Apara is always wandering around alone. So maybe Apara knows a path the rest of us don't?"
Ssak.
As they spoke, the fairies all pointed in the same direction.
"Go that way!"
At that moment, one of the hunters cautiously asked,
"Then... what about the festival?"
But—
"The festival is over."
"It's over. You can go now."
"W, what did you say?"
As expected, the fairies' festival had merely been a means of providing the information necessary to progress through the dungeon.
Things had dragged on for so long only because Seonwoo Yeon and the others had been too terrified to properly communicate with the fairies.
'Of course, since this dungeon is still in an early stage of development, the guidance isn't exactly smooth either.'
I briefly thought that to myself as I rose to my feet.
The others hesitated before following after me.
They were the unfortunate missing people who had been swallowed by the EX-level gate.
Wait.
Something doesn't add up.
Why does the head count seem so far off?
"Let's see. One, two, three, four... Only four people?"
As I counted them, Seonwoo Yeon explained.
"Ah, right. We still haven't found the first expedition team—the Treasure Hunter team. We've searched the village all day, but there was no sign of them."
Then my calculations were correct.
The list had included four members of the first expedition team, four members of the follow-up investigation team, two analysts, and one civilian.
Eleven people in total.
"But why did the investigation team lose two people?"
At present, aside from Seonwoo Yeon and one unnamed association employee, everyone here was a non-combatant.
Fully aware of just how dire the group's situation was, I closed my eyes.
"G, Giryeo-ssi? What's wrong?"
Still, this was worth attempting.
That wind magician was useful enough, and I hadn't wasted the time I'd invested before.
"It's fine. Don't worry about it. Since so many of you are meeting each other for the first time, why don't we at least introduce ourselves?"
I tightened my grip around the Hydra.
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