D-Genesis: Three Years after the Dungeons Appeared Side Stories (eBook)
250 Seiten
J-Novel Club (Verlag)
978-1-7183-5158-5 (ISBN)
Dive into some deep cuts from the world of D-Genesis! Originally included as limited-time bonus features for the Japanese volume releases, these short stories have finally been put together into an anthology and made available for all readers to enjoy. From familiar characters experiencing spooky summer vacations or curry-tastic culinary journeys, to 'what-if' stories exploring alternate realities, to the inner monologues of cats and slimes, this collection has a little bit of everything! You'll also find copious behind-the-scenes commentary from the author about each volume's story. So strap in and get your D-Cards ready-there's plenty of exploring to be done!
Dive into some deep cuts from the world of D-Genesis! Originally included as limited-time bonus features for the Japanese volume releases, these short stories have finally been put together into an anthology and made available for all readers to enjoy. From familiar characters experiencing spooky summer vacations or curry-tastic culinary journeys, to "e;what-if"e; stories exploring alternate realities, to the inner monologues of cats and slimes, this collection has a little bit of everything! You'll also find copious behind-the-scenes commentary from the author about each volume's story. So strap in and get your D-Cards ready-there's plenty of exploring to be done!
Chapter 2: Ashes to Ashes
Foreword
This story takes place over three days, from August 8 through 10, 2019. The final day is Yoshimura’s birthday, on which he turns twenty-nine.
The 2019 G20 Osaka summit plays a pivotal role in D-Genesis. Or at least it’s supposed to—the story is subtitled “Three Years after the Dungeons Appeared,” after all. Fun fact: The Japanese word for “appeared,” which can be romanized to “dekite,” was originally supposed to be written in hiragana. I wrote it that way in the webnovel version, and I still don’t quite understand how it magically changed to being in kanji for the official releases. It’s almost definitely my fault, though. Getting back on track, this story takes place after things have calmed down from the G20 summit a bit.
Since the events here take place in the future after everything has been wrapped up, it includes bits and pieces of info from the “golden bough” segment of volume 8. If these had been normal novels, that would’ve definitely been a huge no-no (because the readers wouldn’t have had any idea what was going on), but this is the fast and loose world of webnovels, so yeah...
By the way, that particular “tradition” of referring to events in future volumes is kept alive and well into the rest of the short stories. Ah well, can’t do anything about it now!
Anyway, since this was my first short story, I didn’t have a good sense of how long it should be, so I ended up just writing and writing until it was pretty much the size of a novella, with no sign of nearing the end. Time went on, the release date began to loom, and the pressure was so great I thought I might expire—which is another terrible tradition that has continued into the later stories...
For D-Genesis, there’s a roughly three-to-five-month gap between the draft being finalized and the book being published (new novels need to go through proofreading, artwork creation, etc.)—which may seem like enough time to write not only a short story, but the entire next volume. However, I’m not sure if I’m just cursed with chronic laziness, or if a so-called “holiday novelist” can only handle so much, but the best-case scenarios just never seem to happen, and the release date always manages to sneak up on me. It makes no sense...
Prologue
It’s sooooo hot...
We were under the dark shadow of an umbrella planted in the burning white sand, melting like a couple of slimes. Next to me lay Miyoshi’s corpse—er, body, limbs splayed out lazily, with a straw hat pulled down over her eyes.
“Hey...” I mumbled.
“What is it?” Miyoshi murmured back.
“Why are we at the beach, exactly?”
“Well, the main volumes are stuck in perpetual winter, and this book is coming out in summer. We’ve got to give people something summer-ish as a treat at some point, right?”
It was a bit meta for my tastes, but I could smell what she was cooking. Still—
“Don’t you think jumping straight to the beach as an emblem for summer is about the most trite thing we could’ve done?”
“Well, how about fireworks, then?”
“Ah yes, bright flowers bursting across the night sky. What a lovely idea!” I groaned in a mocking voice. “Is that what you wanted me to say? Big fireworks displays in Tokyo are hot, stuffy, and crowded as hell. Summer barely even comes to mind with fireworks; I just think of the massive throngs of people.”
“Yup, that sounds like our lovely capital to me!”
At the busiest summer times, anyone who decided to head over to the Edo River, Sumida River, or even Odaiba might well end up in a living hell.
“Okay, then how about wind chimes?” Miyoshi suggested.
“Chimes made out of Nambu iron sound so refreshing when they ring! Yeah, I feel myself cooling off just by thinking about it!” My words dripped with sarcasm. “Like hell! The wind never stops blowing, and the chimes never stop chiming! The ones made out of resin or glass may look refreshing, but I swear I’d rather rip my ears off than be subjected to the obnoxious sounds they make!”
Ah, the summer heat really brings out my inner rage.
“Hmm, what about sprinkling water on the streets?”
“That’s actually nice and cool when it’s done in the morning or evening,” I replied. “When I see people sprinkling water in the afternoon, though, I kind of want to scream at them to stop making the street into a damn sauna.”
The scorching midsummer sun above was already trying its absolute hardest to cook us to death. Meanwhile, the young women around us were all oiled up, as if they were purposefully frying themselves to a delicious golden brown.
“What is this, some kind of restaurant? Next thing you know, they’ll be rubbing salt all over themselves too. Oh, I guess they’re already brining in the ocean, huh...”
“You’re awfully grumpy today, Kei. We may as well just stick with the beach theme, huh?”
“What, are you gonna be the resident swimsuit babe or something, then?”
“H-H-How dare you look at me like someone just gave you socks for Christmas!” Miyoshi roared indignantly. “Fine, if you’re gonna call me out like that, I’ll just have to rise to the challenge, then!”
“Huh? Sure, I guess...”
Suddenly full of energy, Miyoshi leaped to her feet, threw off her hoodie, and struck a proud pose with her hands on her hips.
“How about this?” It was a tankini with a crossed front, a style that had been quite popular of late. Despite her slovenly lifestyle, her waist was still rather slender, and the outfit looked pretty good on her. Yet—
“Hmmm. I’d say the curves are a bit...understated?”
I heard a growl escape her throat.
“Kei, that was super-duper rude!”
“Now, now. We can leave the swimsuit babe role to the other ladies.” I took a look around, but all I saw was either families out on summer vacation or couples enjoying themselves. And everyone in our immediate area was being all super lovey-dovey... “I think I’m gonna be sick,” I grumbled.
“Come on, it’s no big deal! It’s right there in the title of the series!” Miyoshi declared.
“The hell are you talking about?”
“See, there’s a couple right there! And one over there too!”
I stared blankly.
“What’s your point?”
“It’s ‘Three Years After the Dames and Gents Appeared’!”
My entire body went limp from the sheer ridiculousness of her attempted pun.
“We really need to find you a husband.”
And thus we bring you a summer horror special! This story documents three days and two nights of terror and madness that befell our heroes one summer.
Annotations
Three Years After the Dames and Gents Appeared: A typo the author made in a Twitter post (“danjou” instead of “dungeon”). It was so ridiculous he couldn’t help but chuckle.
Day 1
“Nnggh...”
I let out a funny noise as I stretched my back, having finally gotten out of the car. We had made it to the Shizugatake Service Area on the Hokuriku Expressway, and the blue summer sky stretched out as far as we could see.
As they got out of the back seat, Saito and Mitsurugi each murmured their respective thoughts.
“So we’re a little over four hours out from Tokyo, huh...”
“Wow, so this is the Shizugatake SA?”
Saito was wearing a summery sleeveless high-neck mini top with a high-waisted activewear skort, while Mitsurugi wore a long-sleeved blouse, a pair of black skinny jeans, and a straw capeline hat.
“You were pushing for this service area really hard—but you’ve never even been here before?” I asked Mitsurugi.
“Heh. Nope!” she replied, looking around as if she had some kind of objective to accomplish and was ready to head out to explore the area as soon as possible.
“Saito really isn’t worried about getting sunburnt, is she?” Miyoshi observed. Mitsurugi’s outfit was quite clearly aimed at warding off potential sunburns, but Saito’s practically gleamed with a sense of liberation.
“She said the SPF 50 sunscreen she put on wasn’t just for show,” I responded.
“Oh, that’s right—they even protect their hair with UV spray. Actresses and models really take care of themselves, don’t they?”
“And you don’t?”
“I mean, I’ve got my own strategy, but compared to them it’s more like I’m just dangling my arms in front of me in a No Guard Stance.”
“You and your references... I swear you’ve got to be lying about your age or something.”
“Oh, stop Joe-king around, silly.”
“Agh...”
We had left Tokyo early in the morning, so it wasn’t even noon yet. The sun was only going to beat down on us harder as the day progressed.
There was a reason the four of us had come out here together. Saito had shown up at our office the day before and offered to take us on a summer vacation with her. Apparently a friend of hers had invited her to stay at a villa resort ahead of its actual opening...
| Erscheint lt. Verlag | 9.12.2025 |
|---|---|
| Reihe/Serie | D-Genesis: Three Years after the Dungeons Appeared |
| Illustrationen | ttl |
| Übersetzer | A. V. N. Wilson |
| Sprache | englisch |
| Themenwelt | Literatur ► Fantasy / Science Fiction ► Fantasy |
| Schlagworte | adult protagonists • Dungeons • Light Novel • Military • Science Fiction • Slice of Life |
| ISBN-10 | 1-7183-5158-5 / 1718351585 |
| ISBN-13 | 978-1-7183-5158-5 / 9781718351585 |
| Informationen gemäß Produktsicherheitsverordnung (GPSR) | |
| Haben Sie eine Frage zum Produkt? |
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