The Royal Military Academy's Impostor Owns a Dungeon [BL] Chapter 1256: In Their Wake

Well, for one, they didn’t actually need to attack large areas.

If they could locate the monster’s core and simply snipe at it instead, then they could even focus on using the tiniest stones. The same went for those creatures with obvious wings. If they could target those specific areas and bring them down that way, then they’d be able to conserve as much spiritual energy as possible without putting too much strain on themselves.

Honestly, if they could only use their space buttons or access the dungeon inventory, it would’ve been nice to take out the underwater pocket dimension. Then those with water-based attributes, like Killian and his tide, could maybe just flush the grounds!

Sadly, none of those options were in the cards for them, so they’d simply have to improvise.

Then again, Luca wasn’t planning on taking down every enemy to begin with. They only needed to clear enough of them to create a relatively safer path toward wherever the core might be.

Since they couldn’t properly scan the environment, which seemed to be the particularly tricky limitation of this dungeon simulation that had been endlessly frustrating poor D-29, they’d just have to do things manually.

Only, just as Luca was about to start another round of attacks, he was surprised when a bunch of bees suddenly gathered around him!

"Huh?"

Luca blinked, immediately looking around for Isabelle, only to spot the little Queen Bee hovering nearby with even more bees surrounding her.

"How come the bees are here? Did they all come with little Isabelle when we entered?"

Killian was the one who answered, stepping forward until he was standing right beside the flying Isabelle.

"We were surprised too. It happened while you were throwing that massive corrupted beast down, but it seems like she can actually summon bees from her hive now..." Killian paused to look at his own child with a hint of despairing amazement before turning back toward Luca. "And apparently, they’re here because she wants to serve as our lookout."

"What? Our lookout?"

Jax spoke up next, causing Luca to turn toward him, only to immediately notice that the redhead’s left cheek was suspiciously bright red!

"?!"

"She won’t stop pulling on my face because she wants to send the bees out to make it easier to look around," Jax muttered, wincing slightly as he gently touched his sore cheek.

As expected, that immediately got a reaction from the other adults.

Because wasn’t something like that a little too dangerous for such a young child and the even smaller bees?

But apparently, it was a completely different matter for the little Queen Bee.

While Isabelle might still be young as a sentient spiritual beast, she’d already spent a long time as the head of her own little kingdom. And if this was the kind of world she might eventually have to navigate, then perhaps it was also time for all her little subjects to start learning how to survive in such a dangerous environment!

Apparently, the white-haired man who smelled suspiciously similar to her princess friend happened to share that exact opinion.

Xavier listened quietly as the others voiced their concerns before offering a different perspective.

"If not in a simulation, then when else?" he asked calmly. "If she’s going to grow into something like Tortie, the guardian beast, at some point, then wouldn’t it be better to start preparing her through simulations?"

Right.

That actually made sense.

"Yeah, we figured the same thing too. That’s why we’re stepping up," Jax said, stretching both arms over his head. "Because doing this is basically a family affair, after all."

From the side, Ollie tilted his head.

"What family affair?"

Jax glanced over at him.

"You’ll need us to actually interpret what the bees are seeing. It’s one thing to send them out to scout, but the fastest way would be to share their vision so we can immediately report back on which areas look promising."

__

Well, they’d said that earlier, even sounding a little confident as they did.

But to be completely honest, what Jax and Killian were seeing through the bees could only be described as hell, with a whole lot of blackened goo mixed in.

Thankfully, things became considerably easier once some of the flying creatures were taken down by those capable of launching long-ranged attacks.

And yes, Butler Gary and Head Maid Gloria actually managed to figure out how to launch those long-ranged attacks and at least target the smaller flying creatures!

Considering the gap between their abilities and Luca’s, there was obviously no way they could replicate what their Young Lord had done right away. But after seeing what their abilities could potentially become provided they continued improving, the two were far more confident about giving it a try.

And what do you know?

Maybe the looming threat of annihilation was enough to make them try considerably harder, because after several attempts, they eventually figured out that they could at least launch similar attacks as long as they got much closer to their targets.

Granted, calling them was definitely a stretch, but hey! Even as poor dupes of the original, they were still faring much better than they had only moments ago.

But their small victory came with its own complication, as the group had to split up just to bring the two members of House Kyros considerably closer to the edge of the metropolis, which naturally took a bit of maneuvering.

Meanwhile, the others stayed behind to protect Jax and Killian, who were left particularly vulnerable as they weren’t simply looking through one or two vision-sharing bees, but an entire group of them! With Isabelle doing most of the heavy lifting by providing the spiritual energy needed to maintain everything, the two fathers concentrated on sorting through the dizzying number of views, hoping to find anything remotely unique that could point them in the right direction.

While all that was happening, Luca was actually asking Xavier if it’d be possible for him to emulate his spatial bloodline ability.

He was hoping to have a much faster way of moving around just in case they needed it, and naturally, his husband didn’t need to be asked twice.

Xavier made sure to remain in close physical contact with his wife as he casually demonstrated the ability, sending a piece of debris straight through torn space. It vanished from where it had been floating, only to reappear beside one of the corrupted creatures and slam squarely into its head.

The creature dropped almost instantly.

"Wooow!"

Princess Nina, who’d once again witnessed her big brother in action, was practically over the moon!

That was also incredibly awesome!

She could only imagine whether she’d eventually be able to do something like that once she became an even bigger girl. Honestly, she even wanted to go with her big brothers the moment they all heard Jax suddenly exclaim:

"Hey! There’s a suspiciously large oblong rock by the leftmost edge, and it’s glowing a little too much for my liking! Could that be the dungeon core?!"

"!!!"

Princess Nina’s eyes widened as she immediately looked toward her Brother Chipmunk.

Sure enough, Luca visibly perked up.

"If there’s nothing quite like it around, then it must be it! You’re saying leftmost?!"

It was rare to see her brother-in-law acting like that, and Nina couldn’t help but want to watch what he’d do next. Only, before the little princess could even prepare herself, she was carefully yet rather suddenly handed over to Princess Kira!

"?"

"?"

Both the big and tiny princesses stared at Xavier Solaris in confusion.

The Orcish Princess had actually been preparing to jump straight into the fray herself, so she was understandably surprised when the Imperial Crown Prince suddenly deposited his precious little sister into her arms.

"Of all the ones left here, you’ve got the right skills to make sure the children can be brought to safety if needed," Xavier said seriously. "So please watch over them for a bit."

Oh.

Princess Kira blinked.

It was rare enough to hear the Empire’s normally prideful Prince ask anyone for something, much less entrust her with something this important.

And while she’d originally planned to run with them, knowing full well that she was fast enough to keep up with most people, that desire was quickly tempered when she looked to the side and saw Princess Marin staring up at her with those shining eyes.

Now, how could she possibly say no to that?!

Especially when the others had no choice but to advance first.

The Orcish Princess sniffled a little, secretly feeling rather pleased at being treated as a competent and capable warrior by someone else she considered extremely strong, before flicking one hand dismissively at them.

"Bah! Who else but me would do it?!" Kira declared proudly. "If that’s all, you can even take your time!"

Luca immediately beamed.

"Thank you so much! I knew we could count on you!"

"!"

Well!

It was admittedly going to be a shame.

The fighting-obsessed Princess wouldn’t get the chance to throw down with a few of those corrupted creatures despite wanting to test the skills she’d been religiously honing. She’d even been looking forward to competing with those two a little, if only to see where she currently stood!

But in a blink of a moment, Princess Kira realized that maybe staying behind to do something more productive wasn’t such a bad thing after all.

Because what in the world had made her think she’d actually be able to follow?!

"?!"

Kira’s eyes practically bugged out as two figures vanished from where they’d been standing.

The air itself seemed to explode.

Then another thunderous crack followed farther away.

What the actual hell?!

How could she have possibly thought she’d be running alongside those two all the way toward the presumptive location of the dungeon core when Luca and Xavier were already moving like two intertwining bullets, practically leaving sonic booms in their wake?!