Dungeon bakery

Chapter 6

“How… how can that be a dungeon?”

Baek Seol looked as shocked as if someone had just told her that the cute dog she’d seen on her morning walk could actually fly.

She shook her head hard.

There’s no way there’s a space behind that door.

She had seen it from outside. There was nothing there.

It didn’t make any sense!

And a dungeon? That was even more ridiculous…

“What do you mean, how? That’s the entrance to the dungeon, bbi.”

Lucy simply shrugged, looking completely unfazed.

He was in the form of a tiny bush warbler, so the gesture was ridiculously cute.

But Baek Seol didn’t even notice.

The entrance to a dungeon…?

“This door itself is the dungeon entrance, bbi. Humans seem to call it the ‘Dungeon of Beginnings.’”

“But there’s supposed to be no entrance to the Dungeon of Beginnings anywhere…”

As a devoted viewer of the YouTube channel Dungeon Expedition, Baek Seol remembered hearing that ever since the Dungeon of Beginnings suddenly appeared 28 years ago, no one had ever found its entrance.

So how could there be one here?

And people had spent years trying to uncover the secrets of the Dungeon of Beginnings. How had nobody noticed this?

“That’s right, bbi. It didn’t exist before. But now it does, bbi. Thanks to the great power of □□□□□ reaching this place, bbi.”

Seeing how confused Baek Seol was, Lucy answered firmly.

He sounded so certain that his confidence finally calmed her racing thoughts a little.

“Fine. Let’s say it really is a dungeon. But you want me to go in there…? If it’s a dungeon, won’t there be monsters inside?”

Baek Seol gave him a serious look.

Lucy gave a sly smile and fluttered over to the brown door.

Then he kicked it hard.

Click!

The sign that had been turned to CLOSED flipped around to OPEN.

“Don’t worry, bbi. Just go in once and see for yourself. Think of it as taking a chance. You’ll change your mind, bbi.”

“No way!”

After being pushed around by Kim Gyo in graduate school, Baek Seol had learned one very important lesson.

“Think of it as taking a chance. Just try it once and collect some data.”

“Think of it as taking a chance. Why don’t you try being a teaching assistant? It’s not that hard.”

“Think of it as taking a chance…”

She had kept “taking a chance” until she actually got tricked into becoming the perfect pushover.

Memories of her miserable graduate-student days came rushing back, and Baek Seol’s eyes grew slightly watery.

Damn it. I just remembered something painful.

Anyway, there was no way she was opening that door without making sure she would be safe first.

“Absolutely not.”

“You don’t trust me, bbi?!”

Maybe Lucy was still bothered by the fact that Baek Seol had used a trick to clear the quest last time, because he was being unusually stubborn today.

Neither of them was willing to back down.

The tension dragged on for quite a while, to the point where it felt like their argument might turn into a real fight.

“…Is there really no other way to get the ingredients?”

Ugh. We’re seriously going to end up fighting.

Tired, Baek Seol rubbed her forehead and asked.

Lucy also looked a little exhausted as he grumbled,

“There is an underground shop where you can buy ingredients, bbi. But it won’t be unlocked until you get ingredients from the dungeon, bbi.”

Ugh.

So she really did have to get the ingredients somehow.

But she didn’t want to go inside!

Isn’t there some other option?

Like delivery or something…

Just as Baek Seol was desperately trying to think of some ridiculous solution—

Creeeeak.

“…Huh?”

Something strange caught her eye.

Wait.

Did that door just open…?

No.

She wasn’t imagining it.

The brown door was actually opening.

And it was opening fast!

Eeeek!

Baek Seol’s eyes went wide in horror.

The scene unfolded before her almost like slow motion.

The dungeon entrance is opening!

I didn’t even open it!

And that means the dungeon full of monsters is opening too!

Which meant…

A monster opened the door!

As if proving her fears right, a gloomy black mist began spreading through the gap in the open door.

Oh!

It opened because Lucy changed the sign to OPEN earlier!

The black mist brushed against the tip of Baek Seol’s nose.

At the same time, she caught sight of something moving inside it.

The upper part of the creature was sharp and pointed like a pen nib, while the lower half was round like a pumpkin.

It gave off an incredibly frightening aura.

Slowly, it emerged from the mist.

Baek Seol desperately tried to move her body, which had frozen solid with fear.

Then the creature opened its mouth menacingly.

“Kyung!”

“Eek…?”

Huh…?

Kyung…?

Baek Seol’s face was covered in cold sweat.

She stared blankly at the creature in front of her.

Thanks to all the dungeon videos she had watched on YouTube, Baek Seol actually knew quite a bit about the monsters that lived in dungeons.

And she immediately recognized this one too.

“…A slime?”

It was a tiny, adorable pink slime.

There was even something resembling an antenna sticking out of its head, with a little heart-shaped gem attached to the end.

W-What?

It’s so much smaller and cuter than the slimes I saw on Dungeon Expedition.

Slimes were common low-level monsters found in dungeons.

But “low-level” didn’t mean harmless.

A slime could easily melt an ordinary human down to the bone.

Yet the slime standing in front of her didn’t look dangerous at all.

It was simply too cute.

The slime stared at Baek Seol with tiny black bead-like eyes.

Oh my gosh! Slimes have eyes too!

Baek Seol stared back in amazement.

Then a system window appeared in front of her.

<System: A quest has appeared.>

Still somewhat dazed, Baek Seol opened the quest window.

<Quest: Your First Dungeon Customer!>

A first customer has arrived at Dungeon Bakery.

Sell the customer the bread they want and make them happy.

Condition: Satisfy your first customer

Reward: Dungeon Bakery Owner Lv. Up!

**　　　　2,000p**

2,000 points?

Then, if I convert that to Korean won…

Two million won?

The quest reward was two million won.

Two million…

Two…

The look in Baek Seol’s eyes began to waver.

She was a practical person who cared very much about money.

Exactly three seconds later, she found herself standing there with a professional business smile on her face, bowing politely.

“Welcome, customer!”

Lucy, who had been standing beside her in a daze, blinked in confusion.

But Baek Seol quickly pointed toward the display shelf filled with red bean buns.

“The bread is right over here. Take your time and have a look.”

After spending years as a miserable graduate student under the extremely demanding Kim Gyo, Baek Seol had developed an incredible ability to read the room and react quickly.

And right now, it didn’t matter that her customer was a monster.

It didn’t matter that the customer had turned out to be a monster.

It didn’t matter that customer = monster.

The only thing that mattered was this:

If I make that slime happy, I get two million won.

“Kyuu.”

To her surprise, the slime seemed to understand her.

It bounced once and began hopping toward the display shelf.

Baek Seol followed right behind it with her professional smile still firmly in place.

Her mind was already working at full speed.

Come to think of it, the only bread she had was the red bean bun she had received as a quest reward.

Will a red bean bun be enough…?

While Baek Seol worried, the slime stared at the red bean buns on the shelf.

Its tiny black eyes narrowed slightly.

For some reason, it looked like it was thinking very seriously.

After staring at the bread for a long time, the slime made a small whining sound.

Then it suddenly jumped up and bit into a red bean bun.

Or rather—

It didn’t really bite it.

It absorbed it into its body.

Baek Seol hurried after the slime as it bounced toward the counter, carrying the neatly wrapped red bean bun inside its transparent pink body.

Even with the two million won reward clouding her judgment, Baek Seol was still a little stunned.

She had just met a monster for the first time.

And now that monster was standing at her counter to buy bread.

She stumbled over her words.

“Uh… so you’d like the red bean bun? G-Good choice, customer.”

“Kyuu.”

For some reason, the slime sounded a little depressed.

But Baek Seol was too busy panicking over how to actually process the payment to notice.

“Just touch the slime’s body, bbi. The payment will happen automatically.”

Following Lucy’s instructions, Baek Seol gently tapped the slime with her index finger.

<System: Slime No. 97 has purchased a Red Bean Bun. You have received 100p.>

The red bean bun was worth 100 points?

Then that means it costs 100,000 won.

What kind of bread costs 100,000 won?!

That thought briefly crossed Baek Seol’s mind.

Meanwhile, the slime started eating its red bean bun.

Is that really eating…?

It wasn’t chewing with a mouth.

Instead, the bun was slowly melting inside its body.

Since the slime was transparent, Baek Seol could see the red bean bun dissolving right in front of her.

It was a little creepy.

Still, she kept smiling brightly.

As soon as the bread completely disappeared, a bar appeared above the slime’s head.

Baek Seol, who had played countless tycoon games, immediately recognized it.

A satisfaction meter.

…Huh?

The bar filled a little past halfway.

Then it stopped at around 70%.

The slime glanced around the bakery as if it still wanted something.

Then it bounced away and disappeared back into the dungeon.

Baek Seol waited.

And waited.

But the system never showed a quest-complete message.

Which meant—

The slime wasn’t satisfied.

While Baek Seol blinked in confusion, Lucy flew over and landed on the counter.

“Hmph. Slimes don’t like sweet things, bbi. And they don’t have very good memories, so they can’t recall memories either, bbi. You need to make a plain, simple bread that slimes will like, bbi.”

“That’s too bad… Wait. Hold on.”

Baek Seol’s survival instinct suddenly switched off.

And only then did her brain finally start working normally again.

“Did you just say the slime is a customer?!”

Oh my god!

A monster is my customer!

I just sold bread to a slime!

“So does that mean I have to sell bread to monsters from now on?”

Lucy lightly shook his head.

“Not necessarily, bbi. I told you before that both doors can be used by customers, didn’t I, bbi?”

He pointed toward the two doors.

“One leads to the Dungeon of Beginnings. The other is connected to the human world. So humans can also be your customers, bbi.”

“…”

If Lucy was telling the truth, then both monsters and humans could become her customers.

But…

There’s no way any humans would come all the way out here, right…?

The bakery was in the middle of nowhere.

There was a dungeon right next to it.

Unless people were coming here specifically for dungeon tours, why would any ordinary human ever come here?

“Baek Seol, the bread you make is special, bbi. Once humans learn about it, so many people might come rushing here that you’ll actually have to be careful, bbi.”

Baek Seol blinked at Lucy.

He didn’t usually compliment her.

Really?

But…

“I couldn’t even satisfy my first customer.”

“I told you, bbi. Slimes like plain bread, bbi. And once you get the ingredients from the dungeon, the recipe will appear automatically, bbi. It’s the most basic kind of bread, bbi.”

Hmm.

Basic bread.

So, in the end, if she wanted to clear that quest, she had to get the ingredients from the dungeon.

“What ingredient do I need?”

“The fruit of a Young Yggdrasil, bbi. If you bring it back and dry it before grinding it into powder, it can be used just like flour, which is the basic ingredient for bread, bbi.”

“The fruit of a Young Yggdrasil…? Do you know what it looks like?”

“Of course, bbi. Did you forget that I am the World’s Staff? I know exactly where to find it too, bbi.”

Oh.

So that’s how it is.

A little radar inside Baek Seol’s head suddenly went off.

Her Shortcut Radar.

“Then that dungeon isn’t dangerous for you at all, right?”

“Hah. Who would dare attack me, bbi? Besides, didn’t I tell you that dungeon isn’t dangerous at all, bbi?”

Ah.

I see.

“Then it should be super easy for you to go get it for me, right?”

“Of course… bbi?”

Lucy happily began to answer.

Then he suddenly froze.

Slowly, creakily, he turned his head toward Baek Seol.

He had finally realized what she was getting at.

His wings began flapping wildly.

“What are you talking about, bbi?! Of course the bakery owner has to collect the ingredients herself, bbi! I’m the support character, bbi!”

“Right. Since you’re the support character, you should help me get the ingredients too.”

“Nooo, bbi!”

Lucy’s resistance was fierce.

But Baek Seol wasn’t backing down either.

Until just a few days ago, she had been a miserable graduate student who lived almost like a slave compared to an ordinary person.

And now she was expected to go through even more trouble?

Absolutely not.

More importantly, even without all that—

A dungeon was the last place Baek Seol wanted to go.

Everyone knew dungeons were dangerous.

Ever since dungeons appeared on Earth, humans had been in constant conflict with the monsters inside them.

That alone was enough reason.

But there was something else.

“Noona, no matter where you go, stay away from dungeons. Always. Okay? Even when you get a job later.”

Her younger brother, Baek Ho, had sometimes grabbed onto her clothes and cried like that ever since he was a teenager.

“I’m scared you’ll leave me behind as Mom did.”

Baek Seol had always kept her brother’s request in mind.

The only reason she had decided to rent a place here, where the Dungeon of Beginnings was located, was because she had been certain that the dungeon would never open.

“…Stay away from dungeons. And Hunters too. Please.”

Even her father, who normally wasn’t the type to ask for favors, had left her with the same warning when he went abroad.

Since both of them were completely ordinary people, they had always been especially afraid of dungeons and Hunters.

So, having grown up constantly being told to stay away from dungeons and Hunters, Baek Seol had naturally developed a vague fear of dungeons.

And she had filled the curiosity that came from that fear by watching Dungeon Expedition on YouTube.

“All right, then. I guess there’s no other choice.”

Baek Seol sighed.

“I need a support character who can help me. If you can’t do it…”

“…Bbi?”

“I Have a Suggestion.”

Baek Seol had no intention of entering the dungeon unless she could guarantee her own safety first.

She would use any means necessary.

<System: Using the ‘I Have a Suggestion’ skill. Please write your suggestion on the Suggestion Board.>

She was going to use her hidden skill.

“Ah. Ah. Oh, it automatically writes down what I say. Let me erase what I said before. I’ll start now.”

Strangely enough, the moment she began speaking, her words started appearing on the screen automatically.

“Starting here. ‘I have a suggestion. If you’re a support character, shouldn’t you actively help me? I think there’s a serious problem with the system here. Therefore, I request that my support character be replaced—’”

Whoosh.

The color drained from Lucy’s face right before her eyes.

“Eek!! If you submit a suggestion to the system, it might actually come true, bbi!”

“Yeah, I know. So, should I submit it now…?”

“I’ll go, bbi! I’ll go!”

Lucy immediately flapped his wings and shouted in panic.

“You’re playing dirty, bbi!”

“Come on. How is that playing dirty? I’m just asking for what I’m entitled to.”

Baek Seol gave him an awkward little smile.

“Think of it as taking a chance and going, Lucy.”

The moment those words came out of her mouth, Baek Seol suddenly felt strangely satisfied.

She had just used the exact same phrase Kim Gyo had always used on her.