"Oh my, good day to you, Brother."
As educational standards climbed, a nobles-only Imperial Academy was completed in the royal capital.
The sons and daughters of the nobility flocked to the Imperial Academy and applied themselves to raising their learning.
Gradually, simple primary institutions—city schools, provincial schools—increased in number.
And so schooling spread little by little from the central nobility down to the common folk.
"My lady, I hereby break off our engagement!"
Now and then some outrageous business like a broken engagement would play out at a school party, leaving the nobles aghast—that sort of tale came to be heard as well.
In every world, it seems, there are people who do things outside all common sense.
"Did you see that, Aithel? A broken engagement, he says."
"I saw it. To think I'd witness one for real—the karma of the world runs deep, 'tis."
For us gods, of course, we could watch it like an entertaining play.
For the parties involved it must have been unbearable, but in the end it's someone else's affair.
At the Imperial Academy, by concentrating cutting-edge education, research too came to advance.
In particular, teaching combat professions like knights and mages systematically to students—rather than the old traditions passed down by word of mouth—led to a greater boost in combat power than expected.
They say people were stronger in the old days; even the empire had been reckoned inferior in strength to its peak, but now it was able to recover ground.
In the sense that a small elite could carry out missions better than large numbers, concentrated study and the strengthening of combat power really were effective.
Oh, right—we gods were bored, so over these past few centuries we made dungeons and played around with them, too.
Dungeons that swallow up adventurers still remain here and there across the world.
I'd made one beginner's dungeon near the imperial capital as well.
So the combat professions at the Imperial Academy flocked to the dungeon, fought, and racked up achievements.
The monsters that appear there aren't all that strong—slimes, goblins, up to about orcs.
Some rare items should be set to drop, too, so there was the fun of treasure-hunting.
And so, before anyone knew it, adventurers at dungeons all over the world came to make their attempts in search of a fortune, and the adventurer's trade saw the light of day.
In the old days mercenaries were one thing, but adventurers were looked down on—times change, though.
"Well, I do want it to be a world of swords and sorcery and adventurers."
"Lord Lunga, you thought that up after the fact and tacked it on, 'tis."
"Gwahaha. What's the harm—it's true, isn't it. Dungeons are fun."
Not knowing it's the gods at play, the adventurers head down into the dungeons.
There's real profit in it, so no harm done—but from a god's-eye view, there's something not entirely satisfying about it.
The little differences in rules from the real world—like a sky and a sun being visible even inside a dungeon—were, in the end, the traces of gods at play.
Corpses vanishing, drop items being left behind—those too.
The punchline is that the first dungeon master was actually a god, and there were those who took over its management afterward.
The dungeon core, too, was part of the management system.
Of course we're not merely playing; even a god has his reasons, such as they are.
"Sooner or later the Demon Lord revives. Aithel?"
"Aye—waah, it's not as though I'd forgotten, mind you."
"Staaare."
"What's with that look. It's fine."
"Anyhow, I'd like to give them chances to fight and raise the overall level of the fighting force."
"I see."
"And what's handy for training adventurers and knights is the dungeon system."
"Clever!"
"I'm smart, right?"
The Imperial Academy's students, too, enter the beginner dungeon party by party.
It's a world where death is possible, of course, and they were staking their lives.
The desperately fighting students and the monsters wage their battles.
Falling in love, forging friendships, suffering betrayals—all sorts of stories must play out there.
From a god's-eye view it all breezes right past, but that's part of the charm.
We haven't delivered any oracles, but they've accepted it, so it should be fine.
It seems a graduation exam—an assault on the dungeon's lowest floor—is coming up soon.
Everyone reinforces their gear, packs plenty of potions, and reconfirms their individual roles.
The lowest floor was a level where nothing but orcs appear.
Deep within that level is a boss room, where a monster called an Orc Master has been confirmed.
Subduing it and bringing back its mana crystal counted as a clear.
Spacing themselves out, party after party challenges the dungeon.
All of them are knights and mages who've fought here many times, and three years of attendance had honed their skills considerably.
It's been a long time since I handed off the dungeon master role, so I've forgotten the details—but the dungeon core, which gathers up mana and reallocates it to manage monster spawns, was still running even now.
This sits in a hidden room even further beyond the boss room, so it's not something you can easily find.
It has to be kept properly hidden, or things get troublesome.
Well, it should be fine. Probably.