Lazy Dungeon Master

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With an incredibly alarming speed, the beastkin pet thrust her hand into the open [Storage]’s hole.
She then grabbed her E-Rank and C-Rank Guild Card collections.

“Wha—!?”
“Any more? … None at B-Rank, none above.
Mm, good.”

She had many F-Rank and E-Ranks in her collections, but she didn’t have too many D-Rank or C-Rank cards.

“What the f*ck are you—”

The moment Kiwami tried to say that, she was thrown down to the tent’s floor.
She fainted on impact.
The beastkin pet then clenched her right hand and punched her forcibly in the face.

“That’s enough.”
“Eh, shouldn’t we question them for any other victims? I thought you’d enjoy what came after this, in a way?”
“It’s fine.
We’ve gathered the victims’ cards.
That is enough.”

Gesunoh heard a voice come out of nowhere.
The pet was responding to that voice.

What the f*ck is going on?
Gesunoh was incredibly confused, but he managed to come back to himself.
Then—

“Don’t move! You know what’ll happen to this Ojou-sama if you move, yeah?”

Saying that, he’d picked Mai up in the crook of his elbow and pointed a knife at her.
Gesunoh’s quick reaction was probably the best thing he could have done.

“What should we do? Meat-senpai.”
“… Perhaps he could be useful for Goshujin-sama somehow?”
“No, no, he knows too much now that he’s touched the body this money.”
“True.”

At least, it would have been the best thing if this situation was like anything Gesunoh could have expected.
He’d intended to buy enough time by taking a hostage to get Kiwami back up and escape the tent.
Moreover, once the beastkin pet’s master died, it would have been freed.
With that, he could have used magic on its collar to become her new master… At worst, he would have gained at least enough time to seriously think about his next move.

However.
The slave, a beastkin that should have wanted to have control over its own life and death, was binding Kiwami’s hands and feet of her own volition.
She didn’t seem to care about him at all.

“What the hell, seriously what the f*ck! Release Kiwami! Are you fine with me killing this girl then!?”
“Feel free to do whatever you want with the toy.”
“What did you just say…?”

With that, Gesunoh suddenly realized that something was off.
The Ojou-sama hadn’t been asleep, she’d already woken up.
Even so, she hadn’t said even a single word since he took her hostage.
She hadn’t even moved.

She didn’t even appear to be breathing, nor did she seem to have a body temperature.

At long last, Gesunoh looked down at the [Ojou-sama] in his arm.
The person—no, the thing he saw there was a wooden doll.
Her hair seemed strangely real, but her face was flat.
There weren’t even eye sockets or a mouth.
The doll slowly moved its head to stare at Gesunoh.

“Hiiii—!?”

Gesunoh threw the doll girl at the slave and ran away at full speed, abandoning Kiwami.

Him throwing the doll at the slave gave him enough time to get out of the tent and run toward the pedestal.
To escape from the room, he had to return the magic sword to its spot in the pedestal.
He’d have to get close to the tent again, but he wouldn’t be able to escape without doing this first.
Despite everything that had happened, Gesunoh was still confident that he could do this with his C-Rank skills.

“What the fck, what the fcking f*ck… it was going so well!”

He wondered if he’d done something wrong—well, he obviously had, but he didn’t mean it that way.

… He felt sorry for Kiwami, but it was for the best for them to break up here.
They were monsters in human form.
They’d be killed after being caught.
They were just mimicking being human…

“… Monsters? Wait, this is a safety zone…”

Which means they were variants? Right, they were variants!
Reporting the existence of a variant was the obligation of all adventurers, they’d even be rewarded substantially for the information.
Yeah, that’s right! He wasn’t running away right now, he was strategically withdrawing so that he could report their existence!

Gesunoh plunged the magic sword that had been at his waist back into the pedestal.

“Good, now I can—”

Gesunoh turned around to see his way out.

However, the passage remained blocked off by needles.
As if he’d been trapped within a monster’s mouth.