The Fourth Wave of Settlers... None

[Kasumigaseki]

"What in the world is that?"

The Iruma Daikan, Yoshida Nishinoichinojō, stood dumbstruck, gazing at the tower that rose from the eastern horizon, lit by the morning sun.

For some time now a tower-type dungeon had been just barely peeking its head over the eastern horizon from Kasumigaseki, but all at once it had become a soaring tower that looked ready to scrape the heavens.

"Something outrageous must have happened."

The magistrate's office was busy, but short-handed. Iruma was a region with no dungeon of any note, so there was no one well-versed in dungeons, and no way to consult an expert.

"At that height, it will be visible from quite far off. Without a doubt, a messenger from Fuchū will come as well. If they arrive before I return, tell them I have gone to Adachi. It is urgent. Ready a horse."

The Iruma magistracy had only two horses, so this time only one subordinate would accompany Nishinoichinojō. And of course, not a horse-beastfolk, but an ordinary animal horse.

[Kōnodai]

Kōnodai, in the province of Sō. The lord of the province of Sō, Kazusa-no-suke, was likewise gazing in a daze at the tower far to the northwest. He had known that Tsukuba Naiyaku-no-jō had gathered mercenaries and adventurers and set out to subdue the dungeon in Adachi, but if the dungeon had grown this large, then the operation must have ended in miserable failure.

"A dungeon disaster, this is. Sanni-no-suke, we may take it that the pirates who took up residence in the Adachi dungeon drove off Naiyaku-no-jō. How much damage do you reckon there is?"

"Most likely annihilation. I have never seen nor heard of a dungeon of such height."

Miura Sanni-no-suke answered.

"When a great number die for whatever reason, a dungeon runs wild and balloons rapidly in size, and most of the time it collapses. Honestly, what is Musashi-no-kami doing, leaving the pirates to run loose?"

The reason such a dungeon collapses is that its income and expenditure fall out of balance under the rapid growth. It is otherwise if the Dungeon Master has intelligence and is managing the books.

"A dungeon that produces food and other daily necessities is vital to people's livelihoods, and a daikan is duty-bound to manage it so that pirates and the like do not take up residence. But Adachi is uninhabited and has no daikan, and what that dungeon produces is, fuel though it may be, ultimately just paper, so it is of low priority. It was no doubt left neglected. If only the neighboring Iruma Daikan had at least conducted one proper survey, the danger could have been grasped before things came to this."

"That is hindsight, but it makes him unfit to govern."

In Sō, no information had reached them, and the connection between the Iruma Daikan and the dungeon was unknown.

"Your Excellency, there is a possibility this will not end with mere pirates taking up residence in the dungeon. You are aware of the implement called a spyglass, are you not?"

"Ah, that pricey thing that is good for nothing but peeping at women changing their clothes."

"Your Excellency and I are both men, so that understanding is not mistaken, but women can use a spyglass to look at scenery. So if there are women among the pirates, it is possible for them to spy on our situation here from that tower."

With a telescope, women may look only at scenery, and men only at women: that is common sense. And, for the record, the same holds in the bijin-ga, the beauty-portraits, of the Edo period.

"In other words, you are saying the pirates can observe our forces and strike wherever we are thinly defended."

"That is so. Fortunately, this Kōnodai lies in a part of Sō close to Adachi, so the risk of the rear regions such as Inba being targeted is low. But there is a danger that Sashima and Toyoda to the north, and the northern part of Katsushika, will be ravaged."

"It is a long way from here to the Adachi dungeon, and subduing it would be a grueling task."

"Subduing it is Musashi-no-kami-dono's task, but we must brush away the sparks that fall upon us. For the sake of what is to come, we must ask Tsukuba Naiyaku-no-jō-dono how Tsukuba attacked and how it lost."

"I shall send a messenger to Tsukuba. Though he may not answer how he lost. Also, I shall send Okamoto Shuyu-no-kami to Adachi to confirm what is happening. By all means, do not draw too near the dungeon. There is no telling what the pirates might do once you enter the sphere of influence surrounding it."

"My lord, is it even possible to know how far the sphere of influence extends?"

"Frankly, I do not know. We have no choice but to proceed with caution. There is much about dungeons that is unknown. The nearby Nakayama Racecourse Dungeon has also declined considerably, the wheat harvest was poor, and the squash grew badly, but the cause is unknown."

A dungeon draws its energy from human emotion and life, but the Nakayama Racecourse Dungeon was one for which gambling-related emotion was effective. Turning it into farmland merely because water could be had there left the dungeon short of the energy it gained.

[Tsukuba]

At this distance the Library-City Dungeon was, naturally, too thin to make out, but one could see it glittering on the western horizon, reflecting the morning sun. Wild rumors spread, that Naiyaku-no-jō had lost, or even that his head had been taken, and Tsukuba was thrown into utter chaos.

And so the sudden growth of the Library-City Dungeon stirred up turmoil all around it. For the record, the influx from the surrounding regions continued, but this time no settler worth special mention came.