Episode 109: The Reason for Breaking the Limit
Thursday morning. Yuma woke up before his alarm went off, stirring restlessly in bed, dozing until the alarm finally blared.
He slapped the top of the beeping clock and sat up groggily.
His eyes were half-closed, eyelids heavy. He rubbed his eyes with the back of his hand, looking around.
Since he couldn’t enter any Dungeons right now, the president had told him to take the day off.
He could have slept in longer, but Ibaraki was tomorrow.
Yuma had things he wanted to get done today, so he slapped both cheeks and got out of bed to prepare to go out.
◇◇◇
Ota Ward, Tokyo.
Yuma stood in front of Aisha’s Laboratory, a place he had visited many times, gazing up at the factory’s exterior.
The rusted, peeling corrugated iron rattled in the wind. Perhaps because the sky was overcast, the dilapidated building looked more forlorn than usual.
Yuma reached for the door, but it was locked.
“Aisha-san! Are you there? It’s Mitaka.”
There was no reply. The area around the building was deserted, with only the sound of the wind in the silence.
Yuma had two reasons for coming here today.
One was because Kanzaki was worried about Aisha, who had stopped responding to calls, saying, “Isn’t that guy dead?”
He asked Yuma to check on her, thinking she wouldn’t want to see him.
“But will she even see me…”
Yuma stepped back from the locked door and looked around. He walked along the factory wall, checking the back, hoping to find a way in.
The other reason Yuma wanted to see Aisha was to learn about his abilities.
The power he used to defeat the Chimera was probably related to the “Deca Slime.” Kanzaki said Aisha might know something about it.
He wanted to know as much as possible about his abilities.
Yuma reached for a door at the back of the factory.
It seemed to be made of aluminum sash, but it was dirty and warped. He turned the knob, and although it was locked, it rattled as if it might open.
“This might work.”
Yuma put his strength into it, pulling the doorknob several times. With a loud click, the door opened.
It seemed to be broken. “I’ll have to apologize to Aisha-san later,” he muttered as he entered the factory.
He peeked into the room where she usually worked, but Aisha wasn’t there.
“Aisha-san! It’s Mitaka. Are you there?”
Yuma went further in, opening a door at the end of the hallway. It was a dimly lit room, but there was a light on in the back, and he sensed someone was there.
The floor was littered with papers, books, and various daily necessities, making it quite messy.
“Aisha-san, are you there?”
“…Hmm?”
He heard a voice for the first time.
“Aisha-san, it’s me, Mitaka Yuma.”
“Oh, Yuma-kun… what’s wrong?”
Aisha’s voice came from the back, but he couldn’t see her. “Come in,” she said, so Yuma stepped over the trash on the floor and moved toward the voice.
“I heard from the president that you haven’t been in touch, so I was worried…”
As Yuma said this, he saw Aisha wrapped in a blanket on a futon in the back of the room. She wasn’t wearing her usual lab coat but a gray sweatshirt.
Her face was gaunt, and the dark circles under her eyes looked darker than usual.
“A-are you okay?”
“Ah, I’m fine.”
Aisha picked up a pair of glasses from a steel shelf next to her and put them on.
It was the first time he had seen her wearing glasses. He wondered if she usually wore contacts.
“Lately, I haven’t been motivated, perhaps due to mental stress… I’ve been living on the futon. Yuma-kun, are you alright? How’s your injury?”
“Oh, I’m totally fine! I’m in great shape.”
“I see… that’s good.”
Aisha lifted the bridge of her glasses with her finger and looked at Yuma.
“Did you come here today… just because you were worried about me?”
Her eyes were sharp, as if she could see through him. Yuma said, “W-well, actually…” and told Aisha that he had heard everything from Kanzaki.
◇◇◇
“I see… Kotaro told you everything.”
“Yes, I was surprised, but…”
There was a moment of silence, and then Aisha sighed and opened her mouth.
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you the truth.”
“N-no… it’s okay.”
“I thought if I told you, you would go to a major company. Your power was absolutely necessary for my research. I couldn’t afford to lose you.”
“H-haah…”
“Well, in the end, I got carried away and lost the most important research location.”
“I’m sorry. It’s because I defeated the Chimera…”
“No, no.”
Aisha shook her head.
“Thanks to you, I was able to come back alive. I’m grateful, I haven’t thanked you yet. Thank you, Yuma-kun.”
“I just passed out, so I think the president was the one who really had a hard time.”
“I have no intention of thanking him at all! I’m paying him, so it’s his job to protect his clients.”
Aisha said coldly.
“That’s right, Yuma-kun. I’ll tell you what I know about your abilities, as far as I know.”
“Ah, yes! Please.”
Yuma straightened up, excited to hear what she had to say.
“The Metal Slime that appeared in your garden is definitely an Abyssal Monster.”
“An Abyssal… Monster?”
“That’s right. Do you know the term ‘Mana Wall’?”
“Yes, I’ve heard of it. It’s about how the limit of growth differs from person to person, right?”
“Yes, that’s right. Even if you keep defeating monsters, once your Mana Index reaches a certain point, it won’t increase any further. Strong Seekers have this limit line at a high level.”
“Yes.”
“But that’s when you defeat monsters in the Lower and Middle Layers.”
“Eh?”
“In the case of Abyssal Monsters, you can always acquire a certain amount of Mana no matter how many you defeat. In other words, there is no Mana Wall.”
“Really!?”
Yuma looked surprised. It was the first time he had heard this.
“However, there’s no way you can defeat an Abyssal Monster with low Mana. You might be able to defeat it by cooperating with many Seekers, but it’s too inefficient. In the end, the key to becoming a Seeker is to defeat monsters in the Lower and Middle Layers to raise your Mana as much as possible.”
“S-so, my Mana Index is high because…”
“In your case, you kept defeating Abyssal Monsters from the beginning. That’s why the ‘Mana Wall’ didn’t matter. You probably exceeded the limit line a long time ago. I don’t think your Mana will increase no matter how many monsters you defeat other than Abyssal Monsters from now on.”
So that’s how it was. He had heard that his Mana Index was 460,000 and wondered where the “Mana Wall” had gone, but that made sense.
“But even if the Metal Slime is an Abyssal Monster, can you really get such a high Mana Index just by defeating it? Isn’t it too high…?”
“That’s because Metal Slimes are special monsters. The rate at which you can acquire Mana is overwhelmingly higher than other monsters. It’s an unprecedented characteristic, but I’m sure of it.”
“I see.”
Yuma frowned, put his hand on his chin, and began to think.
“Then, the ‘Colored’ Slimes and the Deca Slime are also special monsters, right? I’m especially curious about the Deca Slime…”
Aisha straightened up and adjusted her glasses.
“Probably, that Slime is a monster called a Unique Monster.”
“A Unique Monster?”