Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon?, Vol. 5 by Fujino Omori

isn’t far behind and confirms what both of us were thinking—it’s connected to a lower floor.
    Judging from its depth…probably the sixteenth floor.
    We look away from the dark void and exchange glances before nodding to one another.
    I put my right arm firmly around Welf’s waist and my left around Lilly’s backpack.
    All of us take a deep breath and jump in.

    A golden moon hung in the sky.
    The sun completely set, a beautiful night sky spread out over Orario. Magic-stone lamps dotted the city like precious jewels glinting in the night.
    The streets were filled with people enjoying one another’s company, thousands of dots of light around them. And in the center of the city, a building loomed over Central Park.
    A tower stood over the entrance to the Dungeon. Babel.
    A certain goddess looked away from it all from the highest floor of the white tower and moved toward a door.
    Tup, tup
. Her shoes hit the floor as she walked. She tossed her silver hair back over her shoulders with both hands as she went. “Did I keep you waiting?”
    She opened a large wooden door after traversing the long hallway. The Goddess of Beauty—Freya—was the first to offer a greeting.
    The room was adorned with long bookshelves filled with many expensive and luxurious items. Her favorite attendant, Ottar, and one other god with one of his followers gathered here.
    “No, not at all. Sorry for taking up your time, Lady Freya.”
    Hermes was sitting at a rather strange table designed to resemble an apple. He greeted her with a smile and a jubilant voice. Asfi, however, couldn’t hide her nervousness.
    Freya glanced at both of them before taking a seat at the table with Ottar at her side.
    Each of her movements was graceful and captivating. Her black dress revealed an enormous amount of cleavage as she slid into the chair, her sizable bust swaying. The chair lightly squeaked as she leaned back, silver hair brushing against her white necklace.
    Asfi was captivated by her and blushed scarlet red before averting her eyes. Although his follower had been completely taken in by the goddess’s beauty, Hermes just kept on smiling in his own charming way.
    The two deities sat at either side of the table with their followers standing behind them.
    “So, what is it?”
    Freya chose to bypass any idle chatter and get straight to the point.
    She sat with her shoulders square to him, legs uncrossed with a very confident smile on her lips. Hermes’s narrowed eyes opened very wide.
    “As I’m sure you’re already aware, Bell Cranell has yet to return from the Dungeon. Hestia and I are on our way to help him, Lady Freya.”
    “And?”
    “So, I came here to make a request.”
    “Why would you bother to come to me?”
    Freya’s expression didn’t change. Both of the gods exchanged glances and smiles.
    “You protected him, Lady Freya. At the last Denatus, you protected Bell.”
    “…”
    “He’s someone worthy of the attention of someone as beautiful as yourself. So you can’t blame me for being interested.”
    Ten days ago in this very building during the gods’ Denatus meeting, Freya had indeed stuck her neck out to protect Bell. More specifically, she stopped Loki from trying to figure out why he’d grown so fast, by pointing out to the others that it was forbidden for them to investigate personal affairs.
    Freya had all of the male gods present at Denatus under her spell from the beginning. Her beauty was powerful enough to keep them in a trance and doing her bidding without thinking about her motivations.
    Hermes should have been one of them.
    “Lady Freya, I’m crazy about you. However, I’m not so far gone that I don’t notice something right under my nose.”
    …In other words, he had been acting.
    The other male deities around him were practically falling over themselves with one look at her. All he had to do was blend in.
    “Well played,” she whispered as she remembered the charming god’s performance.
    “You’re going