Remove ads

It's not wrong to make Friends in the Dungeon (Danmachi / Sanctioned [Worm])

Reader mode
Alivaril said:
internet why
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Because the dog who keeps his cool, can make it to the roof!

Also, I'm pretty sure that song predates widespread internet, or at best is from the dialup era. Also, it's nothing you couldn't (and I have) hear played over broadcast radio, nothing to fear as far as workplace safety goes unless your work at, like, a religious fundamentalist daycare center or something.
 
Leafy503 said:
I like the idea that QA's Friends are just normal animals with slightly off looks and abilities, just enough that they won't be mistaken for dungeon monsters. :wink2:
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
That is a problem when some monsters are "just normal animals with slightly off looks and abilities".

edit: Speaking of which, Bell gets compared a lot to a white bunny while there is also a bunny-looking white-colored monster. Curious.
 
Last edited:
Remove ads
Chapter 33: Introduction, Interrogation, and Investment
  • Threadmarks
    • Special thanks to @saganatsu, @DB_Explorer, @fictionfan, @Adephagia, @orchamus, @Just_A_Knight, Mr. Silver, @DaGeek247, and my fourteen other patrons not mentioned here. An extremely enthusiastic "Thank you" to @Torgamous for her patronage as well.


    ~ ~ ~ ~ ~​

    Queen Administrator found herself simultaneously unimpressed and intrigued by the Loki Familia's home, a series of window-dotted cuboid structures far taller than their length or width and terminating in wedge-shaped roofs. Even the smallest of the subsections was several stories taller than nearby buildings and the highest watchtower loomed above all. It also may have been lacking guardrails, but human eyes were inadequate for confirming that impression without additional confirmation.

    The inhabitants managed to seem larger and far more intimidating than the "Twilight Manor" they occupied. Queen Administrator did not deem Aiz Wallenstein to have adequately prepared the Hestia Familia for the loud myriad of often-armored human subspecies practically shouting at each other in the manor's primary dining hall. None wore helmets. Queen Administrator didn't think that even a majority of the approximately half a hundred humans inside were actually eating; instead, they seemed to be occupied with simple chatting. Several tables had even pushed dishes aside to allow simple games or arm-strength comparison contests.

    "I brought Queen Administrator and her new Familia member, Liliruca Arde," Aiz said, louder than her normal volume but still much quieter than the general bedlam. "And Friends. Please don't startle them or get within arm's reach without asking."

    Queen Administrator momentarily admired the gold-eyed human's ability to technically obey her social obligations while deliberately failing to convey necessary information. Aiz had included her own Friend, Felicity, under the mantle of 'Friends' and human sensory abilities did not seem capable of easily distinguishing between different audio inputs; it was unlikely they could hear Aiz under the general sound of cheerful chatting.

    Queen Administrator was honestly glad that Aiz was doing the bare minimum. There were enough enhanced non-hosts and pseudo-pseudo-hosts inside for her to have trouble telling them apart, and it would only take one infiltrator for Host to be grievously injured.

    QA's pleased impression of deliberate information suppression vanished as almost twenty different humans from various parts of the room stopped their conversation and turned to look in Host's direction. Significant portions of the remainder soon trailed off and turned to see what was apparently so interesting. And they were interested, Queen Administrator was certain, although Lili may not have been. QA heard her new sibling take several steps back to half-hide behind Lady Sable while Sir Kara curled protectively around Queen Administrator Host.

    Queen Administrator was prepared for a rush of uncomfortably powerful host-equivalents. Instead, the non-hosts who first heard Aiz seemed to physically restrain their less enhanced allies from moving too quickly and whispered likely-relevant messages too quietly for even Host's translation-assisted hearing to distinguish between them. QA expected Aiz could have improved overall efficiency by simply speaking louder.

    The end result still seemed to be the same; approximately twenty of the non-hosts got up from their seats with far slower motions than QA knew them to be capable of. The remainder went back to what they were doing, albeit at a more normal conversational volume. One of those who wished to approach, a brown-haired human with rabbit-based hearing organs, seemed to get her leg stuck under the table before simply opting to backflip out of it. A nearby Familia member slowly clapped three times, something that seemed to embarrass the rabbit-girl, before returning to his inspection of a chessboard.

    The unspoken agreement of quiet among those approaching lasted for less than ten seconds before several looked at each other and began trying to speak simultaneously. The slower members joined a moment later. The end result heavily strained Host's ability to distinguish between individual auditory inputs.

    "Welcome to the Twilight Manor! We hope you enjoy your stay~"
    "Do you actually give your babies knives?"
    "Can I pleeeeease pet your Friends? I want to hug them and squeeze..."
    "Cori, you make it sound like a hotel."
    "I honestly thought you'd be older."
    "How'd ya get Aiz t'wanna train ya, anyway? Ye got some fancy skill?"
    "She won't be able to understand you if you all talk at once!"
    "I thought Arde was younger. And a cat-person."
    "Why don't your cats smell like blood?"
    "We could be an awesome hotel if we wanted to."
    "Could I please pet your cats, too?"
    "Was your first reflex really to throw a knife at Lefiya?"
    "Better yet, why don't your cats smell like cats?"
    "Guuuuys, slow down! I wanna hear her voice!"
    "So do you have a Spirit or are you a Spirit?"
    "Good shampoo? That's cherry blossom, I think."
    "So was the Monster Mansion an assassination attempt or not?"
    "Why Arde, anyway? Heard you rejected a bunch of others."
    "Hey, will your bridging magic work in the Dungeon?"
    "No, no, they almost smell like when Riveria Riverias something."
    "So are the 'Friends' a breed or Spirit-blessed individually?"
    "Can't you ask your questions after we get cuddle permission?"
    "You've totally ruined 'special friend' jokes, you know."
    "I don't smell charred flesh or snow."
    "Is it true you and Aiz are dating?"

    Further questions were drowned out by the sound of a metal mug slamming on wood and a follow-up shout from the same direction.

    "Shut up and quit enjoying your own voices, idiots!"

    Queen Administrator tracked the sound to an angry male with grey hair, grey fur on the exterior of the wolf-imitating ears atop his head, and white fur on the inside of his ears. After a moment of thought, Queen Administrator smiled to express gratitude. She couldn't even remember the vast majority of the questions she'd just been asked and the interruption was welcome. Coherent communications would save time overall.

    The male established eye contact with QA, wrinkled his nose, and looked to Aiz instead. Queen Administrator ceased smiling and transitioned to a frown. She was reasonably confident he had just been rather rude.

    "You sure the little shits are worth the trouble?" the man rumbled.

    Queen Administrator made her frown more pronounced. She believed that referring to her and Lili as excrement implied he both didn't believe in their worth and had decided to be insulting at the same time. He also apparently silenced his Familia members under false pretenses in order to ask his own question — a question that may have been intended for reputation purposes, QA noted. The enhanced senses and sensory interpretation shown by Aiz should've allowed them to converse if he hadn't chosen to remain in his seat; the grey-haired member of a human subtype felt like a pseudo-pseudo-host and QA assumed that status automatically came with enhanced senses.

    "Yes," Aiz answered unhappily. "Please don't be cruel to them, Bete."

    Bete looked at Lili and her chosen cover behind Lady Sable, immediately shook his head, and examined Queen Administrator more carefully. Given Host's unimpressive physical stature, Queen Administrator decided an additional demonstration may be in order.

    "You are welcome to let Sir Kara bite your arm should you think us useless," Queen Administrator offered.

    Given the Loki Familia's apparent position as one of Orario's acknowledged leaders, they should have an emergency supply of medicine on hand. He would survive. Unfortunately, Bete promptly snorted and shook his head.

    "Think I'm fucking dumb enough to let an unknown monster bite me? Fuck off. Besides, hiding behind pets that Aiz empowered isn't going to impress anyone. She's not a fucking servant to fetch—"

    "Bete," Aiz interrupted, appearing increasingly displeased by his rude language, ongoing verbal assault, or both. "That's enough."

    Bete closed his teeth, glared at Queen Administrator for several more seconds, and reluctantly nodded.

    "Don't waste her time," Bete growled.

    Conversations around the room slowly resumed after the borderline hostile pseudo-pseudo-host turned away, glaring at his cup as though it had personally wronged him. Given his apparent displeasure with even inanimate objects, Queen Administrator suspected he may have been suffering from an anger-related neurochemical imbalance. That tentative hypothesis was only supported by the next words uttered by a orange-haired human near Host.

    "Don't mind Bete. He's basically a big puppy when he gets to know you."

    Unfortunately, the rapid pace of the follow-up replies forced QA to again ignore individual speakers in favor of the content they attempted to convey. It wasn't as bad as before, but QA knew she had no hope of reliably associating this many non-hosts with what they said.

    "Hellhounds don't count as puppies, Dryka."

    "No, no, she's got a point. Trails after, ah, those he likes and barks at everyone else? Totally a puppy."

    "He'll kill you if you continue down that road, you know."

    "Figure of speech," Aiz immediately murmured to Host. "Anger. Not real killing."

    "Hah, yeah. Anyway, Queen Administrator? Welcome to the Twilight Manor! I would say it's not always like this, buuuut that's only because it's sometimes worse."

    "Don't even try to pretend you're not part of the problem."

    "Hey, someone did fetch Loki, right?"

    "Nah. Her Aiz-sense is probably bringing her down right now."

    "I don't think that's a real thing."

    Aiz finally joined the bewildering bombardment session. QA's familiarity with her didn't help that much.

    "I was going to see her after leaving Administrator with Riveria," Aiz answered. "Would anyone be willing to speak with Lili about Supporting?"

    "Sing of Hera and she'll demand more. Why Lady Riveria, though?"

    "Tiona said Administrator wanted to try out archery. Advice, I guess?"

    "Nah, it's totally magic. Nation ruled mostly by Spirits, remember?"

    "That's still not confirmed."

    "I know Queen Administrator is your pupil, but isn't helping Arde a bit much? No offense."

    "Eh, she's probably partying with Administrator for a bit, I guess? Supporter and all. Let it be."

    "Why not just leave Arde with Captain Finn? They can bond over being short or something."

    "Guess ye dinnae like yer height tha' much if yer sayin' tha' near a dwarf, eh?"

    "More like being mistaken as kids."

    "Guys, you're both totally getting latrine duty next Expedition."

    "That won't stop me from reaching the top shelf."

    "A'right, ye've los' yer leg priv'leges. Hol' still!"

    A scuffle near the back of the crowd distracted those bombarding Queen Administrator with questions and generally speaking over each other. Aiz used the distraction to wave toward a nearby pair of doors and began hurriedly walking in that direction. QA and the rest of the party followed.

    One of the few humans who hadn't been distracted seemed to stop himself from making additional information requests, blinked with just one eye, and turned to the apparent conflict between an axe-wielding human subtype and a significantly taller baseline human. Both of them seemed to be laughing despite the apparent assault.

    """Fight, fight, fight, fight, fight, fight!""" the alarmingly bloodthirsty crowd began to chant.

    Queen Administrator could see why Host felt that such an environment would not be conductive to long-term recovery or general stability. Not only could they manage a disconcerting flip from allies to enemies within seconds, but the rate of their questions was such that a human couldn't possibly answer them all.

    Aiz waited inside what was apparently the entrance to a spiral stairwell until Lili slipped within, then shut the door behind QA's new sibling. The sudden reduction in volume had Felicity pushing her head out of the cloths and assessing the surrounding area. Aiz absentmindedly pushed the opposite food-basket up her own arm and began petting the Friend. Felicity pushed her head into the contact, a behavior that seemed to accomplish its intended purpose of making Aiz smile momentarily. It quickly faded as the pseudo-pseudo-host looked up at Administrator and Lili.

    "I'm sorry," Aiz sighed. "There's no helping them when they're this excited. They… might calm themselves before you return."

    "Understood. Does 'Bete' have a predisposition toward anger?"

    Aiz hesitated for several seconds before shaking her head.

    "He's very protective," Aiz explained. "And he can be very cruel about perceived weakness. But he's not bad, just difficult."

    Queen Administrator nodded in understanding. Spite was a powerful motivator for host-species and shards alike; both were often willing to strain themselves to disprove a prior insult. Queen Administrator generally disliked using such tactics on other shards, although she could acknowledge that her reciprocated rivalry with Queen Objective had proven rather productive in past Cycles.

    "I understand. I will inform you if he disobeys your edicts."

    Aiz blinked, appeared to consider Queen Administrator's declaration of intent, and ultimately decided to continue up the spiral steps. Queen Administrator, Lili, and their Friends followed. QA was rather looking forward to the upcoming lessons; she would rather like to know what her new spell did and felt she'd been adequately patient so far.

    ~ ~ ~​

    To Alexander's great surprise, his proposal for a diplomatic division had been approved. Apparently, the Guild's leadership had snuck it under the noses of Orario's gods by using those same invitations for untitled 'important business' as always and started off by talking about the possible wages of full-time negotiators. Those who'd appeared verified that their taxes wouldn't be raised, lost interest immediately after confirmation, and approved the entirety of the proposal without a second thought. Some of them even instructed the Guild not to bother them with such trivial things in the future. Apparently, those untitled invitations were far more useful than Alexander had given them credit for.

    Idiots.

    Alexander hadn't been taught by his parents to hear the entirety of something before agreeing to it, so what was their excuse? They were more than old enough to know better. And some of them did know better and read through the piles of papers they'd been given, but those also tended to be the ones who viewed other deities with disdain. Demeter and Hephaestus had reportedly been delighted, but held their questions until all the idiots had left. It'd probably be weeks until Orario's public fully realized what had actually happened.

    Alexander wasn't going to be in charge of the Guild's new subgroup, but honestly, he'd neither expected nor truly wanted to be such. He could handle one faction at a time. Being in charge of the people handling different factions would push his stress tolerance beyond its limits, and not in a manner he expected to raise his Basic Abilities.

    His first assignment seemed excessively ambitious, though. He was supposed to try to ask Queen Administrator for her homeland's location so formal diplomatic negotiations could be established with the hopes of exclusively borrowing a few spellcasters capable of bridging space. Apparently, he wasn't the only one tired of the gods' nonsense; part of the deal would involve specifically not making contracts with other gods.

    If Alexander was reading between the lines properly, then the Guild hoped to set up a regular bridge between the surface and the safe zone of the Dungeon's eighteenth floor. Such an arrangement would grant them a monopoly on a nigh-necessary shortcut and would allow the Guild to not only exert their reach on the surface, but also enforce their will on the well-known criminal haven of Rivira, a permanent outpost built within the Safe Zone. Plenty of blacklisted adventurers sold drops and stolen items there without ever returning to Orario's surface. Nearly all of them had been blacklisted for good reason and the Guild didn't want them merely restricted, but gone.

    Alexander wasn't positive it was a good idea to send him, though. Sure, he was a familiar face, but he was also the one who originally had to explain the princess debacle to her. Wouldn't it be better to send someone else?
     
    Last edited:
  • Threadmarks
    • Got to say the part with everyone talking at once was obnoxious. And honestly I would've preferred if one of our Friends had bitten Bete. He's such a toxic character.
     
    Last edited:
    Colshan said:
    Got to say the part with everyone talking at once was obnoxious.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    Obnoxious IC or to read? If the latter, I could do a spoiler'd bit dividing the individual conversational threads, as well as which ones were isolated. I thought some people would have more fun working it out on their own, though.
     
    Last edited:
    Alivaril said:
    Obnoxious IC or to read? If the latter, I could do a spoiler'd bit with the individual conversational threads and which ones were just isolated. I thought some people would have more fun working it out on their own, though.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    Obnoxious IC. I was just sitting here trying to imagine having to deal with and parse through all of those conversations at once. Good characterization though.
     
    I feel like this update was just a bunch of people talking about what they plan to do. Which makes sense for an interlude in a quest then you are giving information to the questers in a neat way, but in a pure story it seems better to just do it.
     
    Last edited:
    Ugh, Bete.

    Prick.

    Think the only time he wasn't insufferable was in Ryuugi's Prytaneum.

    I'm gonna laugh when we rub his nose in his own delusions.
     
    Just discovered this.
    Have not fully investigated the quest that it is based on for the Worm side of things, but I find this story quite enjoyable.

    People having to adapt to being a different species is a major interest of mine, and QA experiencing humanity has so far been entertaining.
    Taylor being a Shard has been relatively minor so far, but there is much potential there as well.
    Also new family member is a shapeshifter, who perhaps needs to have the suggestion to attempt to become a Friend, or at least get a bit creative.

    ... being a pokemon fanfic author myself I'm finding myself considering how this QA/Taylor combination would react to that world. It seems like it would be QA having an intense mixture of joy and paranoia because that setting is a place where her Friends are... well to be honest her Friends and mindset is close enough to the local's own that I can see why dropping the pair there isn't the best place to explore QA having to be human, which is a big part of what makes this story great.
     
    Alivaril said:
    Obnoxious IC or to read? If the latter, I could do a spoiler'd bit dividing the individual conversational threads, as well as which ones were isolated. I thought some people would have more fun working it out on their own, though.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    I'd definitely advise against using spoilers to do it. If the content isn't important (and most of that wasn't) then maybe just put a couple overlapping quotes and say that they continued on for a minute before being interrupted or something.

    E.I.G. said:
    Have not fully investigated the quest that it is based on for the Worm side of things, but I find this story quite enjoyable.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    The quest was decent, but this is 1000x better.
     
    Alivaril said:
    Queen Administrator didn't think that even a majority of the approximately half a hundred humans humans inside were actually eating; instead, they seemed to be occupied with simple chatting.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    Double word.
    Alivaril said:
    "No, no, the smell like when Riveria Riverias something."
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    "they"? Or else a word missing somewhere.
    Alivaril said:
    the grey-haired member of a human subtype felt like a pseudo-pseudo host and QA assumed that status automatically came with enhanced senses.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    pseudo-pseudo-host
     
    curiosity said:
    Double word.

    "they"? Or else a word missing somewhere.

    pseudo-pseudo-host
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    Fixed all of the above. Thanks!

    EDIT:
    Colshan said:
    Got to say the part with everyone talking at once was obnoxious. And honestly I would've preferred if one of our Friends had bitten Bete. He's such a toxic character.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...
    Filling Bete with toxin probably isn't going to make him less poisonous, you know. Unless the Friends are doing the eating, there's no known food preparation method for safely consuming something bitten by them. :V
     
    Last edited:
    Reader mode
    You must login or register to reply here.
    Remove ads
    Back
    Top