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Pantheon, In a Private Room

Eina Tulle, Bell's dungeon advisor, is a half elf. She has pointy ears and beautiful facial features. The young woman was currently wearing the Guild uniform. The uniform consisted of a black vest and pants with a white collared shirt and a bow tie underneath. She has shoulder length brown hair and green eyes underneath a pair of spectacles.

Eina almost had a heart attack earlier upon seeing the tomato creature charging towards her booth while asking for information about a quote on quote 'super pretty monster girl'.

After forcing the white-haired young boy who's now sitting in front of her to take a shower, she began scolding him for barging into the guild like that.

"Well, I suppose that what's done is done. Just remember to not to it again, okay?" Eina gave him a wry smile. She received a large nod from the boy.

She was satisfied at that, and then readjusted her spectacles before getting to the reason as to why they were here. "Well then, the other matter is the information that you requested about a certain type of monster?"

Bell nodded and started explaining what happened to him while he was in the Dungeon. He told her how he had rushed down into the fifth floor and encountered a minotaur.

Eina's eye twitched. The only floor levels that she told Bell could go into were the first and second floor, something that he seemed to have ignored entirely even after her multiple warnings. But her displeasure turned to worry when she heard about the part where the boy was chased by a minotaur.

As the boy went on with his tale, she let some of the tension in her body fade when she remembered that Bell is still here and apparently safe from harm.

Then he told her about how he ran into another monster that engaged with the minotaur and killed it. Eina's eyes widened in shock. What kind of monster could take down a minotaur on its own? And why would it chose to do that? Monsters rarely ever fought against each other and were more likely to team up against adventurers. But more importantly, what was a minotaur and a beast even stronger doing up on the fifth floor for crying out loud! Bell just had the worst luck ever.

Continuing on his tale, Bell told Eina that while he was frozen in shock during the two monsters' clash. He snapped out of it after seeing the unknown monster killed the minotaur and ran away with all his might to escape.

Eina noticed that when he mentioned the unknown monster, his eyes were shinning bright and his cheeks turned red. Eina couldn't help but awkwardly point out that Bell looked like a lovestruck boy. This situation was weird in itself as an adventurer falling in love with a monster would definitely be a first.

Bell could only smile sheepishly and scratch the back of his head at his dungeon advisor's comment.

Thinking back on it, while he had only catched a glimpse of her face because of the dungeon's darkness, but the memory of it remained there.

This girl, or monster made him firmly believe in the possibility of perfection, the possibility of how good someone can look from a minuscule distance. And the one thing that made her so unimaginably attractive, was by far her eyes. Those broad, gleaming crimson red eyes. Her beauty for lied in the mysterious expressiveness of her beautiful eyes.

This had caused his heart to skip a few beats, and then, under pressure from this sensation he had never felt before, he ran away from this unknown.

She was too charming, yet he had no idea who or what she was. Human or monster? He had no clue if he would ever get to see her again, but he figured that this is what made her beauty so strikingly stunning. It was the fact that the memory of her pleasing face that stood on her petite figure got etched into his mind today, without even the faintest possibility that he might get to see her again.

"W-well, it's that s-she was very pretty, and I was w-wondering if she liked me too." Bell finally said with a flustered expression as he told her this.

That was a very strange statement. As far as Eina knew, there weren't that many humanoid monsters that looked pretty. The chances of something like that being capable to feel emotions at all are nonexistent. Still, she would have to press the boy for further description to identify just what exactly did he encounter and tell him to stay as far away from it as possible.

"Well, the story you told me is quite terrifying. While on the fifth floor, you had encountered two monsters that were not supposed to be this far up which is quite frightening, but I think we should get the most important thing out of the way first, Bell." She said in a calm voice with a smile.

"Yes?" Bell asked, unsure if his advisor's current sweet expression was a good sign. To Bell who knew his advisor quite well for the past two months, this sounded more like the calm before the storm.

Once the boy replied, Eina's smile was no longer in place, replaced with a very scary glare. "Not only did you enter the Dungeon by yourself, but you've also gone beyond the floors I've recommended you! Taking risks like that is very dangerous!" She began to rant furiously.

"Next time, you might not be so lucky to survive if you ever encounter another Minotaur... Or that other thing." She told him and his only response was to give her a sheepish laugh. Eina sat back against her chair and took in a deep breath after pointing out the lesson to get out from this situation.

"I-I'm really sorry." He apologized with a glint of regret in his eyes.

"Since you seem to be truly reflecting on it, I suppose I'll forgive you." At that, Bell gave a sigh of relief.

Eina just smiled before moving onto the next thing in her mind with a much more concerning expression on her face while readjusting her sitting position so that she was sitting straight.

"Now then, with that out of the way let's get to the next topic, more specifically, the monster that engaged with the minotaur on the fifth floor… You said it was beautiful? What else can you tell me about it?" Eina said in a serious tone. If dangerous monsters like the one Bell has seen were roaming through the upper floors of the dungeon, then that was very bad. It might have something to do with the Loki familia being done with their expedition and scaring it so much that it ran towards the upper floors, but she still had to report this incident to the guild.

Bell felt his advisor's piercing gaze directly upon him, which made him start to sweat heavily. He seemed to ponder over it for a moment before answering: "W-When I took a good look a-at its face, my heart skipped a beat. Its face was beautiful, but her eyes glowed red…"

"Oh really? So, it's a humanoid monster, huh. Bell, is there truly nothing else that you can tell me on this monster?"

"W-well… L-like I said, it was a b-bit too dark to catch a full glimpse of it, but I t-think it wore an armor and wielded a lance. I-It also spoke to me after killing the minotaur, a-and so t-that's why she may also have f-feelings." Bell stuttered, playing with his fingers timidly.

Eina was speechless. What he had just told her was utterly ridiculous… A monster that could speak? Unless what he was describing was another adventurer. Eina immediately deadpanned as she realised this and then took a deep breath in and released it all out before speaking.

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"Bell… Are you certain that what you saw was a monster?" She asked very slowly to make sure those words rang in his head. Unfortunately, it didn't seem like that was enough because he quickly replied back.

"I t-think so… I-Its eyes glowed red!" He exclaimed.

"Are you certain that you saw its, or should I say her eyes glow red? And if so, are you sure that this wasn't some kind of misunderstanding after a skill or a spell was activated to protect YOUR life?" Eina continued very slowly. She had lost all interest in this conversation after Bell's description of the supposed monster was simply a girl with glowing red eyes. There must've been some kind of misunderstanding and Eina just wanted Bell to realize this and drop the subject.

The boy looked like he had been hit by a huge boulder and then sprayed with insecticide as he realized what his advisor meant to say. "Oh. I… I understand." Bell said, lowering his head in shame.

"While I doubt that you can find the girl that saved you since what you recall of her is quite vague but be sure to thank her if you happen to see her anywhere around." Eina concluded.

"Y-yes!" Bell said enthusiastically, doing a fist pump while standing up from his seat, which Eina also did shortly after.

'This kid is so cute when blushing.' Eina thought as she smiled and placed a hand on her cheek. Obviously, she wasn't into teenagers, it's simply that he reminded her of how she was once herself young and naïve. His actions looked so adorable. No matter how much trouble he causes, Eina doubted that anyone could come to hate this young boy.

Seeing that Bell was about to leave, she cleared her throat, making Bell turn around to hear what she had to say. "Another thing, Bell. I'd suggest you become stronger before proposing to anyone, especially to an adventurer who defeated a minautor. Women like to have stronger men care for them, so if you still have a crush on this adventurer, you must get stronger. Keep that in mind."

Bell contemplated over these words for a moment. It seemed that he was taking them seriously.

"I will! Thanks a lot, Miss Eina." He finally said before leaving the room and started running in the hall, an action that was not tolerated in the guild building. Eina scowled as she herself left the private room to go back to her booth. How dare he break the rules by running in the halls right in front of her nose! She would have to scold him for it the next time he visits.

She really hoped that he would visit again...

Eina suddenly became stressed. Because Bell was so cute, she couldn't help but give him advice, which wasn't bad, but the advice in itself was... Dangerous.

That was when she realised what she had done. She had unintentionally told Bell to push harder and set harsher conditions on himself.

After facepalming for what must've been the hundreth time, Eina came back to the counter along with her many coworkers in the Pantheon's reception area. The room was quite wide and had a lot of space. In the corner, on the entrance side, there were a few sofas and tables for conversations between adventurers. On the opposite side of the entrance, laid the large counter with the many booths that her coworkers occupied. This was where adventurers came to get information on monsters in the dungeon and exchange their crystals to valis.

She took an empty booth at the end of the counter and was approached by someone shortly after.

It was a girl that could not be older than fourteen years old. She was wearing a red-colored full plate armor which looked like it has been drenched in blood. She wears a helmet with plumes of avian feathers attached from either side that leaves only her face exposed. Additionally, the chest and shoulders of her armor have been styled into the shape of wings. She also had a crimson skirt-like armor covering her lower body and a pair of wings on the back of her armour which was most likely just for easthetics. All in all, there was only one word to describe the armour she was wearing: a masterpiece. The armour was probably a new model of armour developped by the Hephaestus familia's smiths.

Looking at the girl's face, she saw that she had red eyes and a very, very pale face almost as if she had some kind of disease. Even so, her visage could only be described as perfect. A world class beauty that could even challenge goddesses of beauty.

Eina quickly realised that the girl in front of her had a rather grim expression plastered on her face. There was most likely something troubling her mind.

"Hello there. How can I help you?" She told the pretty girl that came up to the counter where her booth was.

"May I use the showers~?" She said, her voice hollow, looking down at Eina's breasts with a glint of frustration. While Eina would've reprimanded the person for looking there if it was a man, it was just a little girl, so she probably wasn't staring down because of lust. The half elf thought that the girl did not want to look into Eina's eyes for some reason.

Looking closer at the girl, she noticed that her eyes were downcast. "Is there something wrong?" Eina asked the girl who was clearly going through some kind of conflict in her head. She had expected the girl to tell her about her situation at first but was surprised when she just requested to take the showers.

"No, there is not~." The girl quickly replied, rejecting Eina's concerns.

Eina sighed. If this girl didn't want to talk about it, then there was absolutely nothing she could do. She will not try to press the matter any further than she already had. Girls of her age do tend to have their secrets and can sometimes act a little rebellious around adults... Even so, that teenager seemed to be going through something more than just a simple conflict.

Eina's heart skipped a beat. Why is a girl so young coming back from the dungeon alone? Did her parents or guardian die in the dungeon? This would certainly be terrible news if that were the case, although not surprising due to already having high death tolls everyday from the dungeon.

"Ahem~." The girl had brought back Eina out of her thoughts. The girl looked a bit irritated, but that would be expected of someone with an armour like that. She was most certainly a noble and these kinds of people were not used to waiting around after giving out orders.

"The showers for women are this way, please follow me." Eina said, putting her fake smile that she had to greet the people with back on.

Shalltear nodded before following closely behind. She was led to a room with shower stalls on both sides to the entrance. A few were occupied, but there were so many that she doubted that the showers were ever all occupied at the same time.

"Here's a towel. We can also provide you some body wash and shampoo, but that will cost a few valis."

"Valis~?" Shalltear replied curiously while taking the white towel from the elf receptionists' hands. It seemed as if she had once again asked about something trivial because the reaction the receptionist gave her was confusion.

"Did you hit your head somewhere in the dungeon or what?" The elf woman began. She seemed to really think that Shalltear had a problem. "Valis is the money currency around the world."

"Oh. Then it seems I'll just wash myself with water~." Shalltear replied noncaring but it seemed like the receptionist lady found her to be quite depressed. She looked at Shalltear for a few seconds and then said:

"Are you sure that you're alright?" She repeated in obvious concern. Shalltear didn't like that. Can't she just leave her alone? She wouldn't understand the issue even if she was to tell her about it and it's not like the receptionist lady is a psychologist or anything.

"I. believe. I. said. yes." Shalltear glared furiously at the elf woman who seemed to look down and then give yet another sigh as if she was giving up. Good. There is no need for her to continue pestering Shalltear with her useless concerns. No one would get the magnitude of her current issue.

She walked forward ignoring the stupid elf receptionist's glances of pity, entered one of the shower stalls and slammed the door shut. The stall was somewhat spacious, having a small bench area to place her equipment on. She turned on the shower to cold, unequipped her armour and took off her panties and her bra that was stuffed to look like she had a bigger chest than she actually had. In truth her chest was completly flat and it was one of her biggest shame. While her body was made to be absolutely perfect, the vampire was not too sure if her creator had made a mistake with her cleavage.

After all, even the supreme beings could make mistakes... Safe perhaps for Lord Momonga. As the leader of Ainz Ooal Gown, his mind must be perfect in every way.

Shalltear started washing herself under the cold water and felt herself somewhat tense. Ever since coming up to the surface, she had that thought of the supreme beings abandoning her. She couldn't bare thinking about that and instead tried to think about something else, but what could she be thinking about when something as serious as this happened to her?

Her beloved creator, Lord Peroroncino, had left Nazarick and abandoned Shalltear forever as did all the other supreme beings safe for Lord Momonga and now, was she abandoning Nazarick too?

For the first time since being transported to this place, Shalltear cried. A lot.

It was only now when no eyes were upon her that she could show her pain. It was the pride and curse of a superior existence like herself to always be forced to show only her collected nature. Only in rare circumstances would she be allowed to showcase such debasement to these lower life forms.

Since she was in private, it was the only time she was allowed to cry, and so she did. Since no fluid other than blood had been stored inside her body, she cried crimson tears of blood.

She hated all of it but couldn't lash out at anything in this city... At least not without every single adventurers throwing their pathetic lives away to stop her on her rampage.

Why had she been sent here? Why did she have to go through all of this? Why her and not someone else? She didn't even know how to get back to Nazarick and the only option she came up with was to wait here for the supreme beings to pick her up.

She suddenly stopped crying, her eyes widening in horror.

But would they? Would the supreme beings even have a way to find her?