Just when you think with Falin back everything is resolving quickly, things turn awful in the blink of an eye. The elf we have seen is the creator of the dungeon and, like Maricelle uses ancient magic. The expertise level between her and Marcielle is noticeable. It’s quite crushing that the gang loses Falin as soon as they rescue her. Though the Dungeon Master refers to Falin more as the Red Dragon. Of course it makes sense now why Falin had powers that she didn’t have before. Though it is clear as well that the consciousness of Falin is in there, which makes it even more difficult to swallow leaving Falin. This is a worse fate than Falin dying.
What exactly is it that triggered the Dungeon Master’s wrath? Was it killing the Red Dragon or using the ancient magic to revive Falin? While it is hard to say, the focus on Chilchuck is nice because he is the most distant of the 4 of them. Why did he stick with the party and not follow the path Shuro & Namari did? He stuck with them, yes, because he got paid to, but he grew attached to the party. For him asking Laios to turn back because he doesn’t want to see any more unnecessary deaths. It doesn’t mean giving up on Falin because that would be cruel to say to Laios. But more so, retreating doesn’t mean giving up and admitting defeat.
Kabru and his party have been getting a good amount of focus, but the focus on Kabru is interesting in that there is more to him than meets the eye. He is very shrewd and perceptive; in fact, he very much feels like the opposite of Laios. To him, being clear that Laios and his sister are good people but then getting treasures of the dungeon is bad because they would throw it away. Though he has been watching them this whole time. I am curious to learn more about him.
This volume really did a good job at showing the teamwork of Laios with Marcielle & Chilchuck with Senshi. The latter is one we have seen before, but seeing them work together in combat is quite cool. More notably, Laios aims to help support Marcielle in learning healing magic. It would make sense Laios would have trouble learning from his sister because, unlike Marcille who is by-the-book smart, Falin had outstanding intuition. But those types have trouble teaching because it comes easy for them. It was good to see Laios being dedicated to curing Marcille when she was petrified.
Also, the concept of cleaners is interesting, but it makes sense this concept must be in the dungeon. How does the dungeon get cleaned up, because remains can’t just disappear like in video games? It’s a simple but cool concept. Now we have more parties joining. We meet Shuro who is with Kabru’s group. Actually, Laios and Kabru’s interactions might be the most interesting.