A Certain Middle-Aged Man’s VRMMO Activity Log - Chapter 53

Toaru Ossan no VRMMO Katsudouki

Author: Shiina Howahowa
—

A/N: At long last it’s the beginning of the dungeon attack de gozaimasu.
And also getting carried away de gozaimasu.

The Dungeon and Sentai Heroes?1

When the maintenance ended, at long last the Challenge from the Dead has opened. And, in order to participate in the 2nd Great player combat area, the Faust city is instantly packed with hordes of people.
There are people who supply the items needed to challenge the dungeon, and the opponents of the people who supply the items, the players engaging in business transactions. 
And of course, with all these new participants coming back to Faust … it’s overflowing with energy like it was on opening day.

Even so, around the time when I finished work and logged in, it probably already calmed down to some degree, though.
I, as well, to prepare to challenge the Challenge from the dead, I already made my own recovery items, and the number of arrows I readied are more than enough. I have properly made Another Bow’s exclusive arrows for production.

—
Another Arrow

Another Bow’s exclusive arrows. It is not able to be fired from anything other than Another Bow.

Quality 5     Atk+10
Another Bow Exclusive Arrow
—

This is the one for production; I had shot a number of previous arrows in test shots, but aside from small-fries, they’re completely useless things against opponents so I’m just not going to introduce them.

――――――――――――――――――――

Also confirming the amount of Enhanced Oil I have, I head to Nexia. Since the Challenge from the Dead exists to the north-side of Nexia.
And it looks like I don’t have to worry about getting lost, because my destination is where there’s a mountain of players who are all coming for the same thing. With a bit of a walk, you can see the entrance that looks like the gate to a temple. I guess in there is the dungeon.

I take my distance from the line of people continuously moving inwards and make my final preparations. Not grouping with a party alone is a beyond reckless act, so at the least I absolutely have to make preparations so that I can use items immediately when I need to.
Items good, arrows good, oils is good, equipment is also good, then charge …

“The Bow user there, wait a second-!”

… I’m getting another bad premonition, but I turn around … there are 5 very colorful people there.

“Uum, did you need something….?”

To that question …

“I am Red!” (Shing!)

“I’m Blue!” (Shing!)

“I’m Yellow!” (Ta-dah!)

“I am Pink!” (Twinkle Twinkle!)

“I am Green!” (Sha-shing!)

“““““ And the 5 of us together, we’re Go2…”””””

It looks like they’re about to say something dangerous so I stop them in a big hurry; I abandon my concerns on why there were sound effects stuck in there.

“Stop stop stop! It will be bad if you go any further!”

They did really well to make themselves look like a Sentai squad; all of them are purposefully wearing full-face helmets and wearing armor separated by 5 colors.
But man, they’re really courageous, these 5 people. Even though there’s such a mountain of people around, it’s impressive that they’re able to wear this outrageously flashy getup. And then there’s this question I’d like to ask.

“… where’s Black?”

Right, if you were going to have one more color for a Sentai squad, it would be Black.

“… He is, somehow today he has abdominal pains …”

Like it was punishment for a crime or something, Blue told me in a whisper. Somehow the Hero group feeling was destroyed in an instant before you realized it, but that’s better.

“Maa, let’s put that aside, ne?”

Pink just told us to let it pass, oi.

“Anyway, we’ve become a 5-person party; we were wondering if you with your solo activities would cooperate with us, and so we tried calling out to you to find out!”

Red tried to heat up the mood when it had gotten luke-warm and forcibly blow it over… maa, let’s hitch a ride with them; either way, if I go solo I think I probably won’t be able to do much of a preview.

“In other words, this is a 1-time temporary party you’re inviting me to?”

I double-check to confirm. Though I don’t think I’m mistaken.

“Exactly! (that is correct)”3

Green declares those lines that make me want to say, oi, it looks like you’re picking a fight with the people who like a certain manga.3

“Alright, then let’s move out!”

Red, the leader as expected, raised his voice and we entered the dungeon. When we entered, a feeling like we’d fallen into a hole immediately accompanied us, and then after that we had descended into the dungeon.
The first dungeon has a man-made ruins form. Let’s immediately activate the Thief Skill’s Trap Detection …

“Then, let’s-”“Don’t move-!”

Having interrupted Red, who was lighting a light while speaking, with a yell, 5 people & 5 people’s Fairies turned in my direction.
I’ll tell you now; Red has a medium-sized Fire dog, Blue has a large Water bird, Yellow has a small Earth rhino, Pink has a Light wild boar piglet, and Green has a Wind squirrel.

“Looks like we’re facing a really nasty map right away; in this room there are 15 individual traps.”

At that single sentence, the hero sentai members became speechless.
Heroes falling for traps might be an old trope, but it goes without saying that they don’t actually want to fall for those traps.
On top of that, according to Trap Detection, there are 4 of them that are red warnings … the last one like that was the flashy treasure chest in that little room the Fairies showed me how to get to before; in other words, it’s the level that’s judged to be instant death if you’re caught in it.

“So that the Heroes aren’t annihilated by the traps, I’ll guide you, so follow me exactly …”

Carefully avoiding places with traps, I slowly proceed. Right from the beginning it’s like this, a dungeon that seriously tries to kill you; it means if you’re negligent you’ll die instantly; if you enter all fired up without suppressing it, it won’t be good.

“… Red’s decision was correct; when I heard we were incorporating another person, I was worried about whether it would be fine.”

“… Avoiding a crisis where we’d all be wiped out is big.”

Blue and Pink chat noisily. Well, yeah, the chance you’ll get a “miss” picking up someone all of a sudden is pretty high; it’s something that will definitely bother you.

“Oi oi, there’s no way the Fairy Queen’s Husband-san is weak, right?”

!? Somehow some really outrageous words just flew out …!?

“Um, that Fairy Queen’s Husband-san is … is that about me?”

I’m afraid of the answer, but I try asking …the response returned was “Looks like the person himself doesn’t know about it,” is it fine for me to cry?

――――――――――――――――――――

After escaping the trap room we found ourselves in right away, a passage came next. At this rate, this looks like a dungeon full of traps; without Trap Detection constantly on, it would be way too dangerous.
Red’s Fairy is giving off light, but as I thought, the range the light reaches has become small; for me, who has the Night Vision ability, it’s fine, but for the other 5 it’s probably not going so well, so it’s probably better for me to navigate too.

The formation is Red and Yellow in the front, the middle is me and Pink, and the rear guard is Blue and Green. Why is an archer in the middle? There’s that kind of opinion too, but in a dungeon a rear attack is the most frightening, so it’s common knowledge that if you don’t arrange it so strong players are in the back, you’re screwed. Since Blue has more than enough abilities to be a vanguard too, he’s in the back to guard against rear attacks.

Monsters came out soon after, but they’re nothing worth mentioning right now.
Whatever you say, these people aren’t just people who call themselves sentai heroes; their true abilities are quite high;  the zombie and skeleton monsters were insta-killed.
I occasionally made a nuisance of myself at monsters by shooting an arrow for interference, but just that and not much else.  That’s enough, as Red’s sword and Yellow’s axe mowed down the groaning monsters relentlessly.

――――――――――――――――――――

The exploration goes slowly, but it’s progressing; we finally find the stairs that go down to floor 2.
We didn’t have any problems fighting monsters, with the hero 5 group’s overwhelming strength completely destroying them; the problem was with the traps and treasure chests. I’m the only one who can detect and dismantle, so no matter what it was going to take some time.
With me retorting full throttle about where it was carrying that treasure chest, a large chest drops from a defeated monster … of course with a trap carefully included. We left that treasure chest, with Trap Detection listing it as a major danger, there without opening it and continued.

“In the end, about how much time did it take us to get here?”

Red checked the time; I bet nobody at all predicted that it would actually take this much time to get here. The devs said that the goal should be floor 10 for now, but it’s not a place where we can reach early on. After all, we have a 1 hour time limit.

“18 minutes … about; honestly, I would have never thought that the very 1stfloor would have taken this much time.”

Blue calmly informs. It’s hard to say whether we’ll reach floor 5, let alone floor 10.

“U-n, at the moment the monsters aren’t anything big, ne; the problem is the traps and chests, ne.”

Pink said her opinion.

“Sorry; even though it would be better if I hurried to dismantle them … it’s dangerous to get in a hurry and be returned na.”

I put out my opinion too; there’s danger in holding back and not speaking up.

“There’s no idiot among us that would give that kind of complaint, so don’t worry; honestly, you’ve helped us survive.”

Was what Green said.

“Anyway, I’ve always thought that if you don’t pay heed to caution, you won’t be able to progress.”

Yellow summarized.

At Yellow’s conclusion, all members nodded their heads in silence and descended the stairs. The dungeon has only bared a small portion of its fangs at us.

SKILLS
[Wind-Blown Hunting Bow]Lv5 ↑3UP
[Kicking Assault]Lv17
[Farsight]Lv47

[Craftsmanship]Lv50
[Small Shield]Lv 3
[Stealth]Lv38
[Physical Ability Reinforcement]Lv21 ↑3UP
[Thief]Lv39 ↑6UP
[Whip]Lv34
[Fairy Language]Lv99 (Forced Acquisition) (Unable to be moved to Reserved Skills)

Reserved Skills
[Woodworking]Lv33
[Blacksmithing]Lv38
[Alchemy]Lv40
[Advanced Cookin]Lv1

ExP 9

Titles Possessed:  The One who Charmed Even the Fairy Queen, The One who Defeated a Great Foe Alone

His second name from other players is “The Fairy Queen’s Husband-san”
A/n:
Hero 6 Group
Another famous name in “One More” is the “Hero 6 Group.”
Their trait is that you can tell in an instant from their appearance and they are separated by color.
Their player levels are also high; they’re top ranked players.

Since Earth has no interest at all regarding this type of thing, he has absolutely no idea.

 
sentai – a squad of heroes, like the power rangers. I guess I could have translated it as “team heroes” or something, but sentai is like a genre all on its own, so I’m leaving it as sentai. Himitsu Sentai Gorenger spoof. “And the 5 of us together, we’re Gorenger!” “Exactly (sono toori de gozaimasu)” is from Jo Jo’s Bizarre Adventures Stardust Crusaders, Telence T. D’arby

t/n: Thank you RS, TD, and GB for your donations!
So, I’ve finally (after a long, arduous, annoying time) bought a house. I am half moved in, and still need to clear out my apartment for sub-letters, so things are only half-died down. Please be understanding regarding the delays…