Maou no Hajimekata

Huh?

Whats wrong, Sofia?

Bored and without anything to do, Lilu asked Sofia who made a strange noise just now.

Contrary to Aur who had a hard time against the traps, the air here was nice and relaxed.

Daddys gone.

As she said that, several images popped up in the air in front of her. That was the scenery that Sofia surveyed. She saw everything that happened within the Dungeon. It displayed various rooms and passages, but Aur was nowhere to be seen.

Maybe he got overwhelmed and fled from the dungeon to rethink his strategy?

It must be something like that.

Thats probably whats going on right now, yes.

Both Sakuya and Lilu tilted their heads as they awaited Tena to foretell what Aur was doing right now.

She nodded shortly and activated her power.

[Right now I cannot tell what he is doing. My foresight cannot reach him.] [I dont even understand what youre saying.] [Maybe he returned home to eat dinner?]

Misha was watching them with her arms folded comfortably on her chest, Yutsu appeared to be deeply in thought, and Tatsuki just munched on a third bowl of lunch today.

[Maybe he got fed up with all of this and simply bailed out?] [No no no, thats not possible. Aur would never get seriously angry over something like that.] [But Ive gotta say, that was really stupid of you to get done in like that, Yunis.]

Yunis sat next to Hoderi, who was holding his head and smiled brightly.

Lilu was both happy and amazed at her friend, and bonked her lightly on the head with her fist for her stupidity.

[This food, delicious!]

Behind them, Tatsuki was nodding fiercely as she consumed another bowl of food.

[I dont know what to do! Mama, please stop teasing me and help me! Please? Pretty please?] [No~~pe. As I said to you earlier, we are neutral in all of this. We promised to lend you the power, but on the condition that youll have to do all the thinking yourself, remember?]

Mari said so to Sofia, who was deeply troubled.

[Besides, one way or another, Im sure daddy will be coming here soon enough.]

At the exact moment that Mari said that.

The ceiling exploded and pieces of rubble flew towards everyone on the ground.

Three people responded to that with lightning quick reflexes.

Yunis flew in her Spirit form, slashing away at the debris.

Sakuya waved her fan and destroy the pieces of rock that retained its shape.

And Tatsuki, while still munching on her food, slashed with her tail, creating a vortex of water that blew all the remaining rubble to the sides of the room.

Sofias body had not even a scratch on it.

[Ive finally found you, you prank-loving brat!]

Aur jumped down from the hole in the ceiling, lifted Sofia up and hugged her, much to her surprise.

[Arent you going to counterattack?]

Aur looked over everyone without letting go of his daughter.

[Shes not going to. Youve won the moment you got here, Aur.]

Nodding to Lilus words, he let Sofia down after a while.

[Well young lady? Care to explain to me what this was all about?] [Daddy, how did you do it? How did you disappear?]

Sofia answered Aurs question with another question.

[Why the answer is very simple. I hid in my Dungeon.]

Aur took a deep breath and began his explanation.

[Originally, you took control only of this portion of the volcano and turned it into your Dungeon. This mountain has a lot more of smaller and bigger sections besides this one, so I just took control over them, turned them into my own Dungeon, and slowly made my way up here.]

Magma that flowed through the mountain was like a liquefied dragon vein, a mass of pure magical power. Thanks to that he could use as much magical power as he wanted, which made the task of creating another smaller Dungeon within this one rather easy.

[Its similar to what Spina did the other day.]

Aur nodded at Lilus words.

[Sofia, your critical weakness is knowing only the world within the Dungeon and not paying attention to the outside world, and that hindered your ability to deal with intruders.]

Aurs sermon was interrupted by Sofia, who made a face as if she was about to cry.

[D-Daddy!]

All this time she was clinging onto his robes around his navel, so she didnt even looked at him as he was lecturing her. Way to ruin an impression.

[DADDY IS BETTER AT PLAYING IN MY DUNGEON THAN ME!!!! WAAAAHHH!!!]

Aaaaaaand there you go, he made her cry. I hope hes proud of himself.

[W-what? I, I dont understand!] [DADDY IS BIGGER, BETTER, STRONGER AND SMARTER THAN MEEEEE!!!!! HE DOESNT NEED ME ANYMOREEEEEEE!!!!!!]

Aur only blinks his eyes, dumbfounded.

He thought she was mad at him for neglecting her and Mari. That she was jealous about him being with other girls.

His every assumption completely missed the mark. She was jealous, that much was true, but of his skills as a Dungeon Master!

[Dont say stupid things.]

Aur looked at others for help, but everyone just turned their eyes awkwardly or they pretended that they didnt see anything.

Because they knew that to him, Dungeons were the most important thing in the world. But not as a subject of his obsession.

To Aur, Dungeon was like a wall, a foundation of his home that protected everyone he held dear. Its value was only as high as the number of people it could protect within its walls.

But that kind of reasoning would not pass with Sofia, because she is the Dungeon itself.

Aurs Dungeon could never protect someone like her.

[Daddys Dungeon is. Is more important to him.. than meeeeee!]

He couldve lied that she was more important to him.To him, a cunning old sorcerer, deceiving a little child was the easiest thing to do in the world.

[That might be so.]

But he couldnt bring himself to do it, so instead he got on one knee so that his line of sight could match Sofias and looked into her teary eyes.

[But that doesnt mean that youre not important to me. You and my Dungeon are both my precious children. Its like youre its younger sister, and its your older sister. I cannot say which one of you I like more, but its not something that should he hastely decided either.] [Older sister?]

Aur nodded at his daughter, who seemed to have calmed down somewhat.

[Yes, and in order to take care of you, I havent seen her for almost a year, you know? So I had to go reunite with her not to make her feel bad, you understand?]

Sofia nodded to show that she understood him.

[Now thats more like it. Good girl, good girl.]

As he stroked her head, she calmed down completely and shown her usual, brilliant smile.

[Daddy, was I a good Master? Did you had fun?] [Oh, I certainly did, you can be sure of that.]

It was a tiresome and bizarre, but fun experience.

It can even be said that she bested him as an adventurer.

[Yay! From now on Im going to do my best to be the bestest Dungeon Master ever to make mommy Dungeon and older sister Dungeon proud!] [Except for the fact that your mommy is not a dungeon, sweetie.] [Eh? But youre always having fun playing with mommy and the others.]

Sofia is the Dungeon incarnate, of course shed know what was going on inside of it.

[You know, daddy would be happy if you stopped peeking inside his bedroom, all right?] [Huh? Why?]

Persuading her not to peek anymore took another hour or so of steady psychological manipulation and all of his persuasive skills.