Chapter 20: Ryo, the Lake, and a Shining Face

[His face is glowing…?!]
[Is it the lake’s effect!?]
[Ryo, are you okay????]
[MochaP] Calm down, everyone.
[MochaP!]
[It’s MochaP!]
[MochaP has descended!!]
[Is MochaP actually calm??]
[MochaP] When Ryo is moved by something delicious, his face glows.
[Wha—?]
[What are you even saying?]
[MochaP?]
[Is MochaP confused too?]
[MochaP needs a mental stabilizer?]
[MochaP] No, I’m sane.
[I’m serious, really. Believe me!!]
[Yeah right—]
[No way—]
[If we assume MochaP is telling the truth—]
[Huh.]
[Wait, no way—]
[Ryo went in for a second taste!]
[Huh.]
[He’s licking it over and over!!]
[A third time!?]
[Each lick makes his face glow even more…!?]
[Wait, seriously?]
[It’s a lake.]
[So MochaP was telling the truth…?]
[And it’s gradating from white to gold.]
[That much?]
[He pulled a cup out of his SAI!?]
[He’s scooping it up and drinking it…!!]
[MochaP] Ryo, bring some of that water back as a souvenir!
[MochaP, that’s unfair.]
[I’m jealous.]
[Ryo isn’t in the “can’t stop, won’t stop” mode, is he? lol]
[This is making me insanely curious.]
[The glow is getting ridiculous! lol]
[Food review, please.]
[How does it taste?]
[Ryo?]
[React to the comments lol]
[Hey.]
[Ryo?]
[No response lolllll]

While the comments were exploding like that, Ryo kept drinking the golden water he scooped with the cup, his face shining brightly.

“Phew… this is insanely good.”

Ryo murmured with a blissed-out expression.

The drone captured his profile perfectly, causing the comment section to erupt along an entirely different vector than the lake water itself.

[Whoa.]
[That’s bad.]
[That good?]
[That face.]
[Glowing makes him twenty percent prettier.]
[It’s too bright to even see his face.]
[Turn down your monitor brightness, it helps.]

“Oh.
I shouldn’t just savor it, I should actually explain the taste.”

Perhaps finally coming back to his senses, Ryo turned toward the drone.

The glow on his face had also settled down.

[Yeah.]
[So what does it taste like?]
[I need to know.]

“To be blunt, it’s chilled consommé soup.”

[Seriously?]
[So the smell was accurate.]
[Chicken or beef?]
[Or something else?]

“It has a strong chicken flavor, but I can taste beef too, so I think it’s a double.
And it’s the really, really good kind.”

[MochaP] Don’t forget the souvenirs.
[For your real-life friend too.]

“Roger that, MochaP.
Roger that for the real-life friend who’s freaking out while watching the stream too.”

[Nice.]
[Yeah, I get why they’d freak out.]
[Speaking of freaking out, Dia is.]
[She’s going wild nonstop lol]
[She keeps saying it’s unfair lol]
[She’s even more jealous of MochaP and the real friend than of us lol]
[What drives Ootsuno Dia that far?]
[She’s way too into dungeon ingredients lol]

Ryo took out a flask and began collecting the lake water.

This time it was consommé, but he had also brought several bottles that had been boiled and sterilized in advance, just in case he needed to collect some kind of liquid.

[Dia is raging that she wants to drink Lake Consommé lol]
[Lake Consommé lol]
[She named it without permission lol]

“That’s a good name, Lake Consommé.
Let’s call the soup collected from this consommé lake that.”

[It got adopted lol]
[Are you submitting it to the Explorer Association or the Dungeon Bureau?]

“Ah… right.
I guess I should collect some for submission to the guild and such.”

[Will it sell for a lot?]

“I’m a minor, so…
Lake Consommé seems like it would have a high rarity rating right now, so it probably won’t make much money for me.”

[It’s rare but doesn’t sell?]
[What are you talking about?]
[Ah… the Minor Explorer Protection Act.]
[What’s that?]
[Basically, items brought in by those under eighteen get their buyback price reduced.]
[And it’s inversely proportional to rarity.]
[The rarer it is, the more they lowball you.]
[That makes no sense.]
[MochaP] It’s meant to discourage students from showing off by taking on overly difficult challenges.
[If the benefits are low, fewer reckless challengers, that kind of logic.]
[Ah.]
[Hmm.]
[I see.]

The comment section was split between understanding, acceptance, and lingering dissatisfaction.

This had been controversial ever since the law was enacted, so it could not be helped.

[Even well-behaved ones like Ryo and Dia get hit by that?]
[I hate the system, but looking at student behavior, yeah…]
[Yeah, no exceptions.]
[It’s garbage, even if adults do it.]
[You can’t make precedents with systems like that.]

“You’ve basically said everything I wanted to say, so that helps.
Well, this is my style, so I don’t mind it that much.
And if you’re in a party, there are exceptions.
If it’s a party of three or more, and more than half the members are adults, that is.”

[There was a party that got cocky and got hit with severe penalties though.]
[Adults mess up just as badly.]
[In that incident, the kid was acting like the guardian…]

“Yeah… um.
If we bring up that incident, I really have nothing to say.”

[What incident?]
[It was like five or six years ago, but some people won’t know it.]

“Um, then—
I’ll give a rough summary.”

It was a party aged sixteen to twenty-four, and the sixteen-year-old was the only sensible one.

One member had just come of age, making four adults in a seven-person party.

Thinking that bringing minors along would no longer reduce buyback prices, they got reckless and entered a dungeon far beyond their capabilities, and then an even more dangerous area within it, where they got stranded.

When the rescue party went in, a powerful monster from a lower floor appeared irregularly on the stranded floor, putting everyone in extreme danger.

In the end, while the rescue party suffered casualties, the stranded party was saved without losing a single member.

Even then, they showed no remorse.

Only the sixteen-year-old girl, later nicknamed “the youngest guardian” by onlookers, went around apologizing to everyone after being rescued.

Eventually, she left the party, saying she could not stay with them anymore, and moved away with her family.

What happened to her after that is unknown.

“And… that’s basically it.”

[Ugh.]
[That was a terrible incident…]
[I remember the news.]
[So that’s what it was about.]
[MochaP] Dungeon streaming wasn’t popular yet back then.
[MochaP] And they weren’t streamers.
[MochaP] But their attitude was similar to some streamers today.
[MochaP] That’s why many explorers who remember that time dislike streaming.
[MochaP] Of course, some just dislike streaming in general.]
[I see.]
[Thanks for the context, MochaP.]
[That awkward feeling when running into regular explorers.]
[Ah… I’ve seen that weird atmosphere in some streams.]

“As MochaP said, I think people who know about that time and aren’t close to streaming tend to feel the strongest aversion.”

[What about you, Ryo?]
[You’ve been solo this whole time, right?]
[You said MochaP talked you into streaming.]

“Ah… well…
I didn’t really feel any aversion.
I just never felt like doing it myself.
But after hearing various stories, there were actually some points where I felt streaming becoming popular was a good thing.”

[Good points?]

“Apparently, it helped people understand, at least a little, what kind of work being an explorer actually is.
Even if it’s just as entertainment.
On that point, personally, I’m grateful.”

[Ah.]
[I see.]
[That makes sense.]
[What do you mean?]

“Basically, it improved the image of dungeons and explorers.
If I go into detail, it’ll get long, so I’ll skip it.”

[I want to hear it.]
[Will you do a chat-only stream sometime?]

“A chat-only stream?
I’m not really sure what that is, but if there’s demand, I’ll talk to MochaP about it.”

Having finished collecting Lake Consommé, Ryo stored the containers in his SAI and stood up.

“I got a bit carried away chatting, but I showed you what I wanted to show you.
And I’ve finished collecting Lake Consommé, so I think it’s about time to head back.”

[Okay.]
[Be careful on the way back.]
[Sneaking time!]

Seeing the worried and excited comments, Ryo smiled faintly.

Then he touched the top of the drone to close the comment display and focused himself.

“Alright.
Let’s start sneaking time.
Safety first, and we’ll head back.”

And with that, Ryo returned safely, bringing today’s stream to an end.

[=== This stream has ended ===]