The Sonata skill he got on the twentieth floor boosted the breadth of Curse a lot.
Any sound could activate Curse. As long as Minoru created it, the sound itself carried curses.
He learned where the target lived, located the target, and made a noise by throwing a small rock at a window.
The curse carried by this sound made the target sleep for a full day.
The next day, he got his reward, but the man kept visiting Minoru with more jobs.
The jobs kept escalating, and although he was not killing people directly, he was an accessory to murder.
He told the man he wanted to stop, but he would not allow him.
“Isn’t it too late to back down? You might have noticed it already, but I have my technique on you. You can’t get away no matter how hard you try.”
Yes, of course, he thought.
By looking at the reactions of people he placed curses on, he realized he was also affected.
He also realized that some people were more susceptible to curses than others.
“Karma value is a nice name. More and more of us are calling it that too. You didn’t notice that you have quite the karma value too?
You have a value that you can’t obtain by just killing people. People with a Curse type skill have resistance, but because of that karma value, it’s very easy to use curses on you.”
The man cackled, and Minoru’s heart was broken.
◇ ◇ ◇
From then on, the jobs were the worst.
He could not refuse what came to him, and even as he rejected it, the next moment, there was a corpse in front of him.
Even though he was being manipulated, that all went to his karma score, putting him deeper in that man’s control.
He continued exploring the dungeon in the meantime, telling his worried teammates that he was fine. It was an important time.
They would be facing the boss of the thirtieth floor soon, and he did not want to worry the others.
Everyone was working hard. People rejected by society got together and were struggling to find a means to survive.
Seeker was not a job that tended to last long. With age came a limit, and retirement.
There was a need to either save enough money, or obtain skills to transition to another job.
Possibilities opened up after the thirtieth floor, so he could not drag his feet before then.
Preparations advanced smoothly, and they were ready to face the boss.
But the end came before that could happen.
He found a unique monster on the way to the thirteenth floor, and half the party was lost.
It was no one’s fault, it came down to bad luck. That was all.
But still, their dream was crushed.
◇ ◇ ◇
Minoru was now financially dependent on that man’s work.
His team lost a lot of its power, meaning their range of activity was limited to the twentieth floor. Most of them gave up on challenging the thirtieth floor, and would rather make money on safe floors.
Minoru did not blame them, and decided there was nothing to be done.
Every time he finished a job, his heart broke.
He could not reject it, so he kept saying it was just for the money, as his stress grew.
He reached out to alcohol to soothe his pain, and started his days drinking. He even bought bad medicine from those people.
But still, for five years, he kept doing that work.
◇ ◇ ◇
“You’re done after this one, Minoru. Good job.”
What he heard suddenly did not compute.
“The technique has been lifted, you’re free to go. I think you’ll enjoy challenging the dungeon. Ah, you failed last time. Sorry.”
The man laughed it off, but Minoru knew the technique really was lifted.
And then, he grabbed the man to put a curse on him.
“Don’t screw with me! I’ll kill you! After all you made me do! I’ll kill you! I’ll kill you! I’ll kill you!!”
He took away the man’s power to resist, and kicked him again and again.
The man still had a smile on his face, as Minoru strangled him.
After a while, the man’s strength left his body. The curse also left his body, and the power returned to Minoru.
That was what happened when someone died.
Minoru left the body and fled the scene. Killing this man gave him not a sense of liberation and accomplishment, but instead an indescribable emptiness.
◇ ◇ ◇
Minoru locked himself in his home for a while.
It was not as though he felt like doing nothing, he wanted time to think.
All he did could not have been for nothing. He had to do something to make it so it was not meaningless.
What mattered the most to him were his comrades, and they followed him as a leader.
He wondered if there was a way for them to live without danger, and thought of something. Or rather, he grasped at it.
Minoru contacted his father for the first time in eleven years.
He thought he would get rejected, but he allowed him to come in.
His father looked older than he remembered, but he was still working and full of vitality.
He talked to him about what he had been up to since he left, and apologized to him.
And then he pleaded. He knew they were recruiting workers for simple tasks, so he asked if his comrades could be allowed to work for the Honto corporation.
They were supposedly understaffed, and people who explored the dungeon had plenty of stamina. They should be a good addition.
He bowed, but his father rejected it. He did not say no, he rejected it.
He knew his father did not see former convicts in a positive light. Most did not. But still, seeing his comrades who had tried so hard being rejected made his blood boil, and he did something he should not.
He used Curse to control his father.
He controlled his father to get his comrades into the company. That was his only goal at first, but hearing that his uncle, the head of the company, was ill, made him want more.
He thought about coming back to it himself, and making himself president.
Minoru would not have made this call when he was just thinking about his comrades, but his way of thinking changed in the five years he spent following that man’s instructions.
If he was going to do something, he would go all in. Slowing down would result in failure.
◇ ◇ ◇
He took action quickly, approaching his uncle and using Curse to speed up his illness.
After waiting for him to collapse, he declared himself the next president.
Anyone who went against him was marked and threatened.
He tried threatening his cousin Ai, but since she explored the dungeon as a hobby, she was strong enough to foil it.
He changed his plans, and prepared a trap for her in the dungeon so she would be hospitalized for a while.
After bribing the ones exploring the dungeon with her, she was taken where he wanted, and he used Curse to put her to sleep.
The two people looked at the fallen Ai, and left her behind.
It was quite cruel, even if they were bribed.
Minoru got up to inflict a serious injury to her, but then a rock worm bit her head.
Thankfully, she was protected by a boorish helmet, so she would be all right.
He was just about to go save her, when suddenly a fat man appeared. He wanted to avoid being seen, so he hid again.
The fat man took down the rock worm, saved Aira, cast Healing Magic, and then began treating her.
Healing Magic. He had heard rumors, but it was his first time seeing it.
If he had such power at that time…
Thinking about the past made him bite his lip.
Minoru knew there was little he could do there, and retreated.
He still had a chance, so there was no need to panic.
◇ ◇ ◇
“Gaha.”
It was noon, three days after his failed attempt to trap Ai, that a strong impact pierced his heart and he vomited blood.
He had no idea what happened, until the power returned soon after.
The curse he placed on his uncle was broken.
His Curse skill was not infallible. It could unleash boundless power against a monster, but was reliant on the target’s karma value when used on a human.
The higher this value, the less risk he took putting a curse on someone. Otherwise, he would have to place a little of himself as collateral.
And what he offered for his uncle was his heart and blood.
If he had been successful, they would have returned to him like nothing happened. But if the curse was repelled or broken, the recoil would be beyond what he could expect.
And it was broken, meaning he took even more damage.
Minoru’s heart was wounded, and he vomited so much blood he almost died. He managed to hang on by quickly drinking a potion, but it was close.
At this point, he felt his plans would fail.
His comrades were concerned when he vomited blood and collapsed. But after drinking a potion, he bowed and said he had a request.
He could not do this by himself, so he had to rely on them.
He explained the situation. How in order to gain a stable life, he put a curse on his uncle, and was paying the price for its failure.
No one said anything. It was as though no one knew where to begin.
Eventually, one spoke.
“Why did you do that? Haven’t we been doing all this to live an honest life!?”
“You can’t work in the dungeon forever. We either find a new path, or we go back to the way we were. I don’t want that.”
“It’s still your family! Why did you do that?”
“You’re all more important than my parents.”
“…Dammit… What should we do?”
Minoru looked at his frustrated comrades, apologized, and told him what he needed them to do.
First, get the Curse exclusive item poison incense, and activate it on the thirteenth floor the next day.
The curse was sent back, but there were lingering vestiges on the one who did it. He could not tell where he was exactly, but he strongly felt he was exploring the thirteenth floor.
◇ ◇ ◇
The next day, he saw his comrades leave for the dungeon, and prayed for their success.
The poison incense would activate once its target passed near it, spreading incense and attracting monsters.
But in order for only a specific target to be attacked, the monsters’ thought abilities would be lowered, and their movements would lack their usual vitality.
Still, the numbers meant that there was a high chance their target would perish.
He tried this several times before, so he was confident in its success.
And this time, the target had vestiges of Minoru’s curse.
◇ ◇ ◇
Another failure.
Minoru’s comrades could do nothing as he writhed in pain and vomited blood.
He did not expect it to fail. It was a scary amount of monsters.
Did he run away? In any case, he was left with only one option, deal with him directly. The curse vestiges on his target had left him, and remained in the place where the monsters were released.
By touching them, he should learn more about the target, so he took his comrades, and headed to the dungeon.
Minoru would have probably made a different decision, had he known that if he backed down here, the target would have no intention of getting involved.
If he gave up, at the very least, his comrades would be spared, but that would remain a what if.
The die had already been cast.
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