Chapter 167: An Invention to Amuse the Goddess (Bonus)

"I think you two have gone far enough."

"Hmph!" *2

Hestia and Loki, fresh from their scuffle, turned their heads away in sync, arms crossed, showing zero intention of calming down.

The three pillars of the Loki Familia all sighed together.

Loki could be respectable when serious—but when she acted out, she was pure trouble.

Only Finn, as the captain, stepped forward to break the tension.

"Bell-kun, what was that free service you mentioned earlier?"

"Ah, that's just something I came up with during my downtime."

Bell had been thinking about how to deal with the issue of Goddess-sama getting bored while he was out in the Dungeon, so he came up with a solution.

"Since I'm the only member of the Hestia Familia, when I'm away in the Dungeon, Goddess-sama tends to get bored sitting around the home. So I thought of a way to fix that."

"If she could see what I'm doing down in the Dungeon from our home, maybe she wouldn't feel so bored."

Finn caught on immediately.

"Like a war game broadcast, huh? Displaying multiple scenes of the battlefield throughout the Familia's base?"

"But this is the Dungeon. The gods' divine power can't penetrate it. If they could, plenty of gods would've done this already."

Dungeon exploration was always a spectacle, but divine power couldn't reach inside. If it ever did, the Dungeon would detect it and react violently.

Bell wasn't surprised by Finn's reaction.

He remembered it clearly from Season 2—the full-scale war game broadcasted across Orario at the start. That kind of spectacle was unforgettable.

The gods' inability to peer into the Dungeon likely stemmed from divine powers being unable to infiltrate it. That was probably the core reason.

And given that over a thousand years had passed, it wasn't like the gods had never tried to watch. Most likely, they did—and failed. Which was why they stopped trying with divine power.

But that didn't mean the Dungeon restricted everything.

"It's something I've already tested."

Bell raised his palm, revealing a small purple crystal. It was a cheap gemstone commonly mined from the upper levels—typically used in low-grade accessories.

But this wasn't just a decorative stone—it was a makeshift communication device he'd cobbled together.

He gently tapped it, and the crystal gave off a soft glow as it projected ten shimmering images into the air above.

The moment those images appeared, the four adventurers familiar with Dungeon crawling all went wide-eyed, clearly stunned.

"What... what is this!?"

Finn was the first to react, quickly forcing himself to calm down.

"Bell-kun, is this... footage from the Dungeon?"

Even the three gods who had just turned their attention to the display couldn't stay calm anymore.

"Hey, hey, hey—do you really need to go this far for a side project?"

Loki, more than anyone, understood just how much something like this could shake the status quo.

What did this imply?

It meant that gods could now observe the Dungeon—without triggering a riot.

"Loki-sama, I think you might be overthinking this. I never intended to change anything in Orario. I only made this to keep Goddess-sama entertained."

Bell truly had no idea what kind of ripple effect his invention might cause in Orario.

Then again, even if he did, he wouldn't care.

After all, his sole reason for making it was to help Goddess-sama stave off boredom.

'You... you're seriously spoiling her way too much!'

Loki nearly lost it at that.

Most creators developed tools for personal utility—but this kid? He kept churning out world-changing stuff every time.

She'd thought spatial storage was already pushing the limit, but now this? This was something else entirely.

If this got out, the fallout could be bigger than anything they'd dealt with so far.

And it all started just because this kid wanted to cheer up that shorty?

Loki couldn't believe anything more absurd existed.

"Bell-kun, if this gets exposed, you're going to be in serious trouble."

Finn understood perfectly well—this invention would bring a storm of problems with it.

Sure, there were already a few devices that let people view parts of the Dungeon, but those typically needed some kind of medium—usually something a Familia member brought into the Dungeon.

Maybe those, too, were invented to keep gods entertained.

But nothing compared to what Bell had just shown.

Just a glance showed ten whole floors of the Dungeon. You could even see multiple adventurers actively fighting monsters. The sheer number of observation points meant this boy had scattered a massive network of devices throughout the Dungeon—and the Dungeon hadn't reacted at all.

What did that mean?

It meant the Dungeon didn't care about this kind of surveillance—and didn't recognize it as divine interference.

In other words, this system could be just as effective even on the lower floors.

"Captain Finn, you don't have to worry. The reason the devices work well on the first ten floors is because the monster activity and environmental shifts are minimal. In the middle and lower floors, monsters are far more active and the space is much larger. These devices would probably be destroyed soon after being placed, so the risk isn't too high."

That had been a major issue during testing.

The only reason so many devices worked on the upper floors was because monster density was low and the Dungeon didn't change much.

So the safest placement zone was the relatively peaceful upper levels. Once you got to the middle floors, the risk of monsters destroying the devices skyrocketed.

Of course, all of that was assuming Bell hadn't gone into the middle or lower floors himself.

If he had, then planting this system deeper into the Dungeon might actually be feasible.

Still, it was also true that some maze-like floors in the middle levels underwent structural changes. If that happened, the devices would be wiped out by the shifting layout.