The minutia of dungeons was usually delegated to the many imperial guilds. They didn't have total freedom, but as long as they broadly followed imperial policy and culture, they had a lot of leeway to make decisions.
Kid was quickly absorbed because that's just how the Azure Dragons felt it was best to handle her situation, although the fact she was confirmed to be a mostly harmless child by a top-ranked Scanner was enough rationale that most guilds would probably do something similar.
Some would probably try to put her in the foster care system, others might outright try to adopt her, and more than a few might be even more hands off than Suon and Van had been with her...
But there was no reason to try and restrict her or create an artificial border between her and Terra.
She was ultimately just a kid, after all.
However, aggressive monsters were naturally handled very differently, and usually with lethal or suppressive force.
While the animals in the forests both Red and Lost stayed on their side, causing both to inevitably be deemed stable dungeons, or in short, a non-threat... wild dungeons were also quite common.
The path to dungeon stabilization varied considerably from dungeon to dungeon. Sometimes it was a gate, sometimes it was a whole military fortress.
The Azure Dragons specialized in talent, meaning they usually got emergency calls and helped out other guilds deal with major problems, but the other guilds in the big five specialized more in containment and suppression.
Stable B or A rank dungeons were closer akin to military operations than convenient adventuring sites. They couldn't prepare and review every detail like an actual military operation, since high ranking adventurers tended to be very unique and eccentric individuals, but they tried.
And sometimes, when the dungeon in question had an intelligent boss or an existing culture of its own, it transcended from military operation to international diplomacy.
War between humans of the same world could boil down to numbers games. Skills helped, but even an A rank adventurer could only take so much. A national military could calculate the expenditure of material and human life it'd take, and only relatively small and peaceful nations would have trouble paying up if it came to it.
War between worlds was different.
A single chokepoint, a single portal that permitted perhaps a small group of people at a time, acted as a metaphysical hallway between both sides.
This is why, among adventurers, who were essentially like elite special operatives, reigned supreme when it came to dungeon management, regardless of whether it was through peaceful or violent means.
But even compared to adventurers, intelligent dungeon bosses were a cut above.
Kid couldn't even be called an exception, since her first Skill had been an S rank skill. Sure, it was limited and there were countless ways for people to deal with it if she ever became a problem child, but it was also her first Skill.
Dungeon bosses are individuals deemed supreme by their whole world, whether that world was tiny or massive. They were already the best of the best, at least by their home standards. The only question was how their world matched up with Terra.
And at least one world did, in fact, match up.
***
At the Terran side of the portal to Naraka, it was like a border gate.
People were allowed to go through with passports. There was that kind of diplomatic relationship between the two worlds, and since the portal was in the Empire, occasionally foreigners would fly to it just to go through.
There were even complex diplomatic arrangements set up to enable such travel.
But it wasn't a particularly large portal, only about the same size as the one to the Lost.
And so, most of the traffic was material, or workers on either side negotiating the exchange of said goods.
Since Naraka was a vast civilization at least on par with Terra, the city that held the Terran portal was quite large, serving as a transport hub, a tourist city, and a shipping center, all in one.
It was one of the few portals without ordinary guild management. After all, it was a national affair.
Of course, in a fit of irony, most of the goods traded weren't even cultural, so the two worlds barely knew about one another.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
Naraka was a major exporter of the precise mana crystals used in modern computing. Other crystals worked, but not as well. In exchange, they wanted wood and other plant matter.
It was awfully mundane.
But unlike Terra, Naraka had a dungeon boss who served as its supreme ruler.
And one day, that man went through the portal without giving any particular notice. After all, he was Naraka's supreme leader, and if anyone had diplomatic immunity in Terra, it was doubtlessly him.
***
The top five imperial guilds, colloquially known as the big five, weren't exactly rivals. They each had their own specializations and their own philosophies, allowing them to solve different problems.
The working group that handled issues related to Naraka essentially pulled from all five on a need basis.
After all, while both worlds were heavyweights in terms of civilization, Naraka had a stark advantage.
Terra was the easier of the two. It was basically an E or low D rank dungeon, at least from the human perspective. People weren't even convinced you could gain Skills in Terra, despite the occasional reports of people doing so.
The most dangerous natural phenomenon on Terra was that portals occasionally appeared.
Naraka's civilization had been forged out of an A rank dungeon, and people could very definitely gain Skills there.
When warfare between worlds was determined by Skills rather than numbers, Terra's only advantage was that conquering a foreign world as armed to the teeth as they were was simply very expensive, and that it wouldn't get Naraka anything they couldn't already get through trade.
As usual, mutually beneficial trade remained the ultimate solution to war.
Nevertheless, Naraka's supreme ruler suddenly just going for a stroll in Terra got all five guild heads in a remote meeting, together with the Emperor himself, the prime minister, the current head of foreign affairs, a couple intelligence agency leaders, and a few other major big shots who were feeling awfully small in that moment.
"What does he want, do we know?"
"We're not sure. We asked through official channels, and they just gave us the usual."
"That he's beyond their questioning?"
"You got it."
"This could be an international disaster."
"If something happened to him while he's here, it could start a war."
"Likely a global war, too."
The guild heads weren't too sure where that last comment came from, but it was the head of foreign affairs who'd said so, so... they took it as basically beyond their own questioning. At least in practical terms.
"Do we have anyone who can escort him?"
"He's refused all escorts, but we have people trailing him."
"Will that be seen as a threat?"
"No, it should be fine. He's... taking public transportation."
"Public transportation?!"
In Earth terms, that was akin to hearing the Pope had randomly gotten on a plane to the US, arrived in Manhattan, and was taking a public train.
There wasn't a diplomat alive who'd want an effectively religious and political superleader to arrive and start using services meant for the poorest citizens of your country.
Actually, at least some people in New York might recognize the Pope.
Here on Terra, not many people even really knew Naraka had a proper dungeon boss. It was true information that the various world governments felt free to release openly, but it's not like there were photographs.
Most knew him more plainly as the Demon King, where he took on more of a fairytale-like role. It didn't help that he was a pretty big mystery to his own people, so the sparse facts had mixed freely with speculation and rumor before even reaching Terra, where distance and his lack of absolute sovereignty turned those folktales into something of an exotic mythology from a faraway land.
And so...
"How sure are we that it's him?"
"Completely sure. You can always tell with dungeon bosses, you know."
"Ah... right..."
At least it wasn't an adventurer who felt the need to clarify that. It was the humble head of trade and commerce, who felt even smaller than he did just a moment prior, when even the Emperor had an expression of bored certainty, despite gracefully allowing one of the big five to answer.
"Where's he headed, do we know?"
"Actually... we just confirmed it. His ticket's to... Red Town?"
"Huh? Why there?"
The leader of the Azure Dragons suddenly felt very nervous.
After all, that town had been named back when the portal to the Red Forest suddenly opened up in the middle of a farm, only a few hundred years prior. It was a funny historical fact that few people paid much heed to, since the portal was pretty much a small fry by modern standards.
Even he wasn't concerned about that particular detail.
Basically, there was an awful lot of chaos, and all of it was because someone decided to go out for a stroll.
***
I suddenly received a message from Van.
Well... I hadn't noticed it right away, since I'd been busy making more planter pots, but once I washed my hands clean, I saw it.
I replied back, asking,
'Why is he bringing snacks...?'
I wasn't sure when I should go, so once it was the next day, I just left at the 'usual' time, aiming to get there around noon.
After all, there was apparently no longer any need to hide the fact I didn't go to school.
Although, I was admittedly surprised they didn't try to make me attend a school, I was relieved. Though I was a kid, actual children grow up. That was effectively their defining characteristic.
I didn't even have that in common with them.
***
When I arrived, I saw Van with a few other people.
The portal area was empty aside from them. It seemed they'd closed it up again, or something like that.
Suon wasn't with them, which felt pretty peculiar.
"Hey there, kiddo," Van addressed me as he approached. "How are you doing these days?"
"Uh... alright."
Aside from being asked to go to the portal, I couldn't say I had any real complaints, though I kept that to myself.
Although my experiments were being rather troublesome, that wasn't a bad thing. It's just how it was. Since it was mainly a matter of time, there wasn't really any problem there.
"What's going on?" I asked.
"Uh... well... our guild head thinks a dungeon boss is coming to visit."
"A dungeon boss...?"
Although I initially wondered why they'd come here, I realized that I was a dungeon boss, and that I wanted to explore other dungeons, so... it really wasn't unthinkable.
"But why?" I wondered.