Chapter 22

“Sometimes you’ll come across a powerful monster that, unfortunately, only a part of it can be used for equipment… How about the Paradox Beetle’s horn that Melissa chopped off?” asked Elitia. “It’d be good if we could use that for something… I still have no idea how she managed to chop off something so hard in the middle of battle, though,” I said. “It’s quite likely that this horn couldn’t have been cut off unless done in battle. The makeup of a monster’s body sometimes changes after it’s been killed. That can make it unsuitable for working with, but the lopped-off horn was preserved in a condition that is workable,” explained Rikerton. There were a lot of mysteries about monsters’ characteristics. If we could only work with a portion of it, we needed to decide how to use it. The whole party considered our options and we decided how to use our materials. ♦AERO WOLF Materials♦ > SUZUNA’s Ashwood Bow: Use Fang to add increased attack, strengthening to +1 > SUZUNA’s Silk Shaman’s Clothing +2: Use Pelt to add increased speed, strengthening to +3 > CION’s Hound’s Leather Vest +1: Use Pelt to add increased speed, strengthening to +2 ♦GRAND MOLE Materials♦ > Use Head Shell to forge two-handed hammer Hammerhead > Use Claw × 2 to forge Mole Knuckle ♦PARADOX BEETLE Materials♦ > THERESIA’s Elluminate Short Sword +3: Use Horn to strengthen to Elluminate Razor Sword +4 > Use Shell to forge Mirrored Shell Pavis ♦STRAY SHEEP Materials♦ > KYOUKA’s Light Steel Ladies’ Armor +3: Use Wool to add slightly increased Breath Resistance, strengthening to +4 > MISAKI’s Bat Leather Jacket +1: Use Wool to add slightly increased Breath Resistance, strengthening to +2 > MADOKA’s Cotton Turban: Use Wool to add slightly increased Breath Resistance, strengthening to +1 ♦THUNDER HEAD Materials♦ > KYOUKA’s Elluminate Cross Spear: Use Thunder Horn to add effect that increases lightning attack’s power, strengthening to +1 > MELISSA’s Denim Overalls: Use Wool to add medium lightning resistance, strengthening to +1 ♦DARKNESS BLITZ Materials♦ > ELITIA’s Unicorn Ribbon +1: Use Black Wool to add Darkness Status Resistance 1, strengthening to +2 > ARIHITO’s Elluminate Mountaineering Boots +2: Use Black Wool to add Darkness Status Resistance 1, strengthening to +3 ♦SILVANUS THE ENCHANTER’S MESSENGER Materials♦ > ARIHITO’s Hardened Ox Leather Armor +2: Use Black Wool to add medium darkness resistance, strengthening to +3 > ELITIA’s High Mithril Knightmail +4: Use Black Wool to add medium darkness resistance, strengthening to +5 > Use Curved Horn to forge Silvanus’s Flute > Use Claws to forge Anti-Charm Charm There was apparently a limit to the number of materials that could be used on a single piece of equipment, so we couldn’t focus on strengthening one thing a lot. That’s part of why we decided to spread the improvements around as much as possible. If there were certain materials that could only be used to make a specific piece of equipment, I asked Ceres and Steiner to make the equipment even if we didn’t have a way to use it at the moment. I also had them divide up a portion of the sheep’s materials for use in my suit. It would take a lot of the materials we had, but everyone agreed to it. “It’s harder to add the necessary resistances when you need them. It’s better to add resistances whenever you can just in case you need them later,” said Ceres. “Yes, especially considering they are in effect without you having to think about them,” I said. “It’s not often we get to strengthen this much equipment in one go. I’m itching to get started. Don’t you agree, Master?” Steiner looked like a heavy suit of armor, but their excited tone reminded me of a boy. I was told there wasn’t a person inside the armor, but they seemed fairly young. “Melissa and I will help since you’ll be working with monster materials. Arihito, do you have plans to use the strengthened equipment today?” asked Rikerton. “No, not yet.” “The work will take some time, but we’re ready. Could you please allow us to take your equipment?” I assumed we wouldn’t be able to use the modified equipment for a few days at least, but Ceres raised a finger. “One day.” “Uh… It’ll be ready tomorrow?” “We will finish all the work tonight and deliver the finished products tomorrow. It’s not that difficult. We’ll be using skills, so as long as we do something about supplying magic, it should be simple. Right, Steiner?” “We ought to avoid drinking mana potions wherever we can, though. Potions are convenient, but they can have side effects if you use them too much.” A mana potion recovered magic, but the license didn’t display mana; it displayed magic. They seemed to mean the same thing… I started to wonder about it but wanted to keep listening to Ceres and Steiner talking as well. “I won’t use such cheap products… I say that, but all potions have side effects, regardless of the quality. They’re not all supposed to be bad, but I don’t feel like testing them.” I had the idea that I could use Charge Assist on Ceres instead, and I could drink the potion, but then I remembered that time I drank too many energy drinks and got really strung out. Energy drinks were definitely potions to me. “Atobe, what’s wrong?” asked Igarashi. “Uh, i-it’s nothing… I was just thinking about something from a long time ago.” “Oh… W-was it that time when…?” Now that she mentioned it, I remembered a time when Igarashi gave me an energy drink. I talked to my coworker, and for some reason he was jealous that our beautiful manager gave one to me. I wondered what flight of fancy had captivated him. “…Arihito, I’ll make Theresia’s bodysuit, too. The leather bodysuit I made from the material from Death from Above. The design won’t change much, but its abilities will increase a lot,” said Melissa. “Yes, please. If you use the Light-Shielding Bodysuit as a lining, I think it’ll solve the problem of it being transparent when you use the camouflage stone.” We wouldn’t know if it worked well until we tested it, but I was hopeful. It would probably be a good idea for them to test the active camouflage in our home the first time, just in case. “Next, we have to decide how you’re going to use the magic stones and runes. This could take a while,” said Ceres. There were the magic stones already installed into our equipment, the magic stones and runes sitting in our storage unit, and the ones we just received. We had a lot of possible combinations of equipment and magic stones. We also had more options for merging stones, but first I wanted to approach it from the assumption that all the magic stones would be used for the party’s equipment. It was a pain to add and remove stones constantly, so it was a good thing we couldn’t change our set magic stones. “It could be nice if we give one person multiple stones with attributes so they have more options, but it could also be a good idea to give each member of the party a different attribute attack. It’s a hard decision.” If Elitia herself could change swords, we’d be able to use magic stones on it. She’d be quite powerful if she could use her sword skills along with the attribute the enemy was weak against. “We won’t be able to merge stones with special attacks right now. We can only merge stones with the same attribute or that have good compatibility…” “And we can only merge once—it’s such a haaard decision! I sort of only want to merge things we have more than one of…,” said Misaki. “Don’t you think it’d be amazing if we could merge a gale stone and an explosion stone?” I said. “The life stone increases vitality… It seems like the kind of thing that could protect the user if it comes down to it. If we merged that and put it into Arihito’s equipment…,” said Suzuna. I appreciated her concern, but it was generally the vanguard’s vitality you wanted to increase. Merging that stone was fine, but if we did, it should go to our foremost vanguard: Cion. “Arihito, I put the materials we can’t use for equipment up for sale like you said. This is the estimated price.” The report Madoka showed me said 5,300 gold. I was pleased with that, considering we’d used what we could, and this was only the cost of what remained. Before I realized it, we’d pretty much gathered enough money to buy a house. I checked how much money we’d gotten so far, and we had around thirty thousand gold. If we converted our silver and copper into gold, we’d have even more. Our priority was improving our equipment, but I wanted to use that money effectively where I could. Part II: New Magic Stones Unless you focused on defeating the same monsters to get magic stones, it was fairly rare to find multiple of the same stone. But we all agreed we wanted to try merging stones since we had the opportunity. We started thinking about what combination we wanted to try. “If we merged an explosion stone and a vitality absorb stone, we could attack a lot of enemies and recover a lot of vitality at the same time…or would that not be possible?” I asked. “If you read the explanation of what the stones do, you can get a feel for what they might do after we merge them,” said Elitia, and I looked it up. ♦Explosion Stone♦ > Execute an explosion-attribute attack on a group of enemies. ♦Vitality Absorb Stone♦ > When equipped to a weapon, the user absorbs a portion of vitality from an enemy attacked with the weapon’s physical-attribute attack. “Hmm? Suzu’s arrow has the explosion attribute, but does that mean it’s not a physical attack?” said Misaki. “It appears so… It seems like I would only absorb from the actual arrow’s attack, not the explosion portion of Blast Arrow. Besides, I’m in the back so I’m low priority for vitality absorb.” I did always want to keep her vitality at its maximum if possible, but her opinion took into consideration the party’s formation. Unlike my Recovery Support, this was a type of recovery that took effect immediately. Pretty much anyone would benefit from that. “Ellie has so many attacks, maybe… Oh, we can’t put any magic stones onto that weapon, can we?” she continued. “Yeah… It would be nice if I’d taken a hit, then I could use a lot of attacks to recover, but I can’t take any magic stones right now.” With that being the case, I wanted to put it on the other vanguards—either Cion or Igarashi—but there were other stones I wanted to prioritize for Igarashi anyway. “I thought this when I first saw the situation, but you’re doing well enough with the stones you currently have on your equipment. The party has attribute attacks such as fire, wind, and lightning, then you have status abnormality attacks as well. How about you take the magic stones on your old equipment that you no longer need and try merging those?” suggested Ceres. “Yeah, that does sound like a good idea. All right, what if we try merging the blaze stone that was on my slingshot with the wind agate?” “Blaze and wind have good compatibility. Wind attacks are generally popular with Seekers as they can put distance between you and the enemy.” Theresia could use her dirks with Double Throw to attack from a distance, but since her short sword had just been upgraded to a razor sword, it might be good to give her an opportunity to attack with that, then put distance between her and the enemy. Even if the fire didn’t have any effect, she could blow them back with the wind. If the fire has an effect, the attack would have quite a lot of power. “Melissa, could you please merge those two stones?” I asked Madoka to get the first slingshot I used out of the storage unit. She used her Take Inventory skill to see what was in storage, then used Unpack Goods to pull out what we needed. Thanks to those skills, we could get any of the magic stones or equipment we needed right here. “Okay…I’ll try. It’s my first time, so everyone step back. It might explode,” said Melissa. “Don’t worry—I can use my power to suppress anything even if there is an accident. Runemakers don’t only compress stones to runes, you know.” “I’ve never heard of a magic stone merge going wrong; I think it’ll be fine. Though, there are very few people who can make magic items.” Melissa herself didn’t actually seem truly concerned, because she stuck her tongue out a little. It was a catlike gesture that you’d only expect from a werecat. Apparently, she had been joking just now—that was unusual for her. “…Wind agate, blaze stone. Two powers become one.” ♦Current Status♦ > MELISSA activated MAGIC ITEM CREATION 2 Merged WIND AGATE and BLAZE STONE > 1 BLUE FLAME STONE created Melissa held her hands over the stones set on the tabletop, recited an incantation that perhaps only people with the skill learned, and the two stones began to shine brightly before merging into one. A new blue magic stone was created. “…Finished,” she said. “Wow… You can see a little blue flame inside this stone,” I said. “It really was like watching a magic spell… Melissa, are you okay?” Suzuna patted Melissa’s cheek with a handkerchief. It seemed that since she could only merge once, it took quite a bit out of her. I looked at my license and saw that Melissa had lost more magic than Madoka did when she used Unpack Goods. Merging did use a lot of magic. “…I’m a little tired, but I’m okay. Dissecting and modifying equipment doesn’t take magic,” said Melissa. “I can’t believe my own daughter learned such an incredible skill… I guess this is what they mean when they say you blink, and your kid’s all grown up.” Rikerton was very impressed by the display while Melissa said something quietly to Suzuna. Perhaps she was thanking her. Misaki and Elitia also smiled at it. “I’ll put this new magic stone into Theresia’s new sword. What do you want to do with the rest of the stones? You should use the runes as well, if you can,” said Ceres. “Yes. We don’t have too much time. We need to hurry up and decide.” We prioritized the strongest stones out of the ones we’d gotten, then assigned the rest. This is what we ended up with: ♦Changes to Magic Stones on Equipment♦ > Affixed LIGHTNING TOPAZ to KYOUKA’s ELLUMINATE CROSS SPEAR +1 > Affixed VITALITY ABSORB STONE to CION’s BEAST CLAW > Affixed LIFE STONE to CION’s HOUND’S LEATHER VEST +2 > Affixed BLUE FLAME STONE and GAZE STONE to THERESIA’s ELLUMINATE RAZOR SWORD +4 > Affixed CAMOUFLAGE STONE to THERESIA’s ?LEATHER BODYSUIT > Swapped EXPLOSION STONE affixed to SUZUNA’s ASHWOOD BOW+1 with GALE STONE > Affixed EXPLOSION STONE to MISAKI’s STEEL MAGIC CARDS +2 > Affixed CONFUSION STONE to MELISSA’s DENIM OVERALLS +1 We had Igarashi specialize in lightning-type attacks. Her skill and the magic stone seemed to go well together. The fact that she could use Thunderbolt meant the skill she could use with the lightning topaz would be even stronger. Cion got the life stone and the vitality absorb stone, which would increase her max vitality and let her absorb vitality when she attacked. We did have another absorb stone left over, but we didn’t have any weapons to equip it to and decided to just set it aside for now. Theresia got the stones we had planned for her. Stun was usable in pretty much any situation, and she could use the blue flame stone to get at the enemy’s weakness when needed. Stones that gave status abnormalities had different effects if put into armor, instead giving the wearer resistance to the enemy’s status abnormality attacks. Since Melissa had such high potential for incredibly powerful single attacks, we decided to give her resistance against Confusion. Next, we swapped out the magic stone on Suzuna’s bow for the gale stone. Since Misaki’s new Steel Magic Cards had an effect where they returned to her after being thrown, we were able to add a stone to those. We put in the explosion stone that had been on Suzuna’s bow. “A-are you sure…? I could go really overboard if you let me use this,” said Misaki. “You’ll need to watch your remaining magic. You can die if you collapse from using up all your magic,” warned Ceres. “Okaaay! I think even I can handle using it just once!” It was decided that Madoka would take a break from our next expedition. She’d helped out incredibly during our fight with Silvanus the Enchanter’s Messenger, but it was still dangerous to have her hide during a battle so that she could use her Morale Discharge. Even if the enemy didn’t know where she was, they might indiscriminately throw around area attacks that could still catch her. “Hmm, if that’s the case… Once I’ve been formally accepted as Arihito’s specialized craftswoman, I’ll be able to stay here for a while. I’ll join you, Madoka,” said Ceres. “Y-yes… I appreciate the offer, Ms. Ceres.” “Ha-ha, and she’s polite enough to treat me with respect as her elder.” Everyone felt better about leaving Madoka behind in town since everything seemed to be going well between the two already. “If we formed multiple parties, we could go into the labyrinth with everyone, but there are some labyrinths with entry limits. It’s best not to get too used to having large numbers. There’s some where you can’t even go in with a full eight-person party—you can only take six,” added Elitia. “Certain monsters have territories that they prevent any Seeker from entering until they meet the requirements. Those monsters have a set number of how many exist, and they don’t cause stampedes, which is good,” said Ceres. Which meant that stampedes were most likely to originate from labyrinths that the average Seeker could go in but had difficult monsters and therefore people avoided it. “The Guild works to prevent stampedes, but they’re always short on people for it. That’s why they have no choice but to rely on Seekers and their personal decisions.” Speaking of personal decisions, the Sleeping Marshes in District Eight had been the source of a stampede, but we never did go in there. After a stampede occurred, there were fewer monsters in the labyrinth from which it originated, and it took some time for it to return to normal. You couldn’t go in during that waiting period. Even so, I still thought there was a chance we’d go back to the Sleeping Marshes someday. We were currently focused on moving forward, but there was probably a clue to Theresia’s past in one of the labyrinths in District Eight. If we could turn her back to a human… But part of me thought it would be cruel to make her remember her past and how she turned into a demi-human by asking. “Arihito, don’t push yourself. You don’t need to solve every single problem yourselves,” said Ceres. “Yeah…but we’ll probably come across situations we can’t just walk away from.” “That inability to walk away from something is both a strength and weakness of yours. This may be an overly heavy statement, but I want you all to see parts of the Labyrinth Country far beyond what I’ve ever seen… Anyway, pep talk’s over. All of the runes you have seem to have serious drawbacks. You should carefully consider whether you will be using them or not.” We had a total of four new runes including the ones we found from the Black Box Murakumo was in and the ones we’d just received. Here’s what they did: ♦Alter Rune♦ > Adds half of user’s magic to their maximum vitality, creating an Alternate Body. ♦Hollow Rune♦ > Inflicts Angry status on target, adding an additional attribute weakness. Cannot be stacked. ♦Trans Rune♦ > Consumes magic to create equipment for an equipment change. ♦Phonia Rune♦ > Gives ability to enhance strength of effects from sound-based attacks and skills. Used effectively, they could all be powerful, but the situations in which they could be used were limited. Then there was one other hurdle preventing us from using runes. “We don’t really have many open rune slots… Does anyone have any equipment with open slots?” I asked. “Kyouka’s armor does. What if we put in the trans rune so she could change equipment when hers breaks?” suggested Elitia. “Th-that’s… Well, I have the Protection Necklace now. I think it’ll be fine…” “It doesn’t matter if you’re twenty-five years old—you can still change into magical equipment when we’re in a pinch!” said Misaki. “Look… I’m no magical girl or anything.” I admired Misaki’s imagination in times like this. Perhaps that’s what it meant when it said it created equipment to change, though I had a feeling it just modified your current equipment. “All right, we’ll give Igarashi the trans rune, and let’s put the hollow rune in Misaki’s cards,” I said. “Drawing the monsters’ attention does sound like a role I’m suited for, but you have to remember to protect me!” “I think we should just hold on to the other runes until we can find a way to use them.” The alter rune would go to best use when we found someone to be our tank. The phonia rune would have to depend on what Silvanus’s Flute did, or we could use it when someone learned a skill that used sound. “Right, I will apply these two runes. Words of power, become one with this object… Enchant Rune!” ♦Current Status♦ > CERES activated ENCHANT RUNE Success > LIGHT STEEL LADIES’ ARMOR +4 transformed into VARIABLE ARMOR +4 > STEEL MAGIC CARDS +3 transformed into JESTER’S WILDCARDS +3 “Ooh… The design on my cards has gone sort of see-through.” “My equipment doesn’t look that different… Maybe it’ll change when I use the ability?” Magic stones were simply placed in a recess in the equipment, but runes fused with the entire item, becoming one. It could be hard to tell there was a change just by looking at the item, but the process provided abilities unattainable with magic stones. That might be why it gave the item a certain name. “Now then, the rest is up to us craftspeople. We’ll be focusing on work, so you lot should go relax. You’ll overwork yourselves if you don’t even rest when not in the labyrinth.” Ceres’s warning was spot on. We decided to treat ourselves like she said and went home to rest until dinnertime. My dreams were neither good nor bad. I usually had weird dreams if I took a nap, but I just had one about Silvanus the Enchanter’s Messenger, which was no surprise. Of course I would—I had almost died then, but I wished I could have dreamed something more peaceful. “……” “S-sorry… Was I talking in my sleep?” I woke up to see Theresia standing next to my bed, bathed in the evening sunlight coming in through the window. “Did you sleep well, Theresia?” She nodded. I felt better knowing that. I would have felt bad if she’d been up the entire time, worrying about me. I went down to the first floor of the house, and the others got up as well. We got ready to go out, then headed to a restaurant we’d found earlier. It was near the Upper Guild, a short walk away from where we were staying. We met up with the support people, Falma, Louisa, Ceres, and Steiner, making us quite a large group. When we’d considered what places would be good to eat with this many people in District Seven, we eventually found a do-it-yourself barbecue joint that served lamb and mutton. “I invited Shiori as well, but she said she didn’t do well in noisy places…,” said Falma. “It’d be nice if there was a place we could eat in peace and quiet, but we have so many people it’s likely to get rambunctious anyway,” I said. “I told her to come have fun sometime. We talked all the way until evening; there’s so much to talk about with her since we’re in the same business.” Falma was in a good mood, but she did seem to miss her children. Her eyes would lock onto any child she saw, though the sun had almost set and there were mostly just adults walking around. “Oh, Atobe, that’s Four Seasons over there,” said Igarashi. If they came over here, we’d have even more people… Kaede and Ibuki spotted us while they were looking for a place to eat and waved as they came over. “Ryouko was right; she said you all would be around here probably,” said Kaede. “You’re the one who said you’d like things to get rowdy since we’re going out to eat, right, Kaede? You were pretty worked up, too, Ibuki,” said Ryouko. “Oh, let’s not get caught up on who said what,” added Ibuki. “Arihito, would you like to eat with us?” “Please do. I think Ryouko will run to the nearest bottle of alcohol if you say no.” Anna nodded vigorously, and Ryouko’s face turned bright red, but alcohol could be a good way to relieve stress, so I wouldn’t have said no to a nice drink, either. We entered Ordo Banquet, a hot pot restaurant, and started off with a drinks order. No one seemed to notice what the restaurant name meant, so I decided not to bring it up myself. Wasn’t an ordo a group of people kind of like a harem that the leader of a certain type of nomadic people would have? “Sheep’s milk alcohol… It’s called kefir. This is the first time I’ve tried it,” said Ryouko. “Mm, me too… How about you, Atobe?” said Igarashi. “I had it once at a Mongolian restaurant. It had quite a strong flavor, but the one this place has is much smoother.” “What, won’t you be drinking this ‘magic nourishment alcohol’? It’s a special drink that recovers spent magic,” said Ceres. “Master, you must work when we return; you shouldn’t be drinking. I’m just having tea…but you’re not going to listen to me, are you?” “I’ll be fine. I won’t get drunk if I have only a little.” I started to wonder how Steiner was going to drink, then saw that he had a straw ready-made from the stalk of some plant. That made sense. “Mr. Atobe, I think everyone has their drinks now…,” said Louisa. “Oh yes, if I can have everyone’s attention… Everyone, good job seeking! And thank you to everyone who came from District Eight to help us; I hope we can work together for a long time to come! Cheers!” “““Cheers!!!””” “““Cheeeeeers!!!””” “Woof!” “……” Joyous voices filled the large room, but I got uncomfortable whenever I did a toast, no matter how many times I’ve done one. “Ummm… So, Igarashi, would you mind doing a rotation for who makes the toast starting next time?” “Atobe, your shoulders are still so tensed up. Theresia’s worried, too.” Theresia stood up and placed her hands on my chair’s back. Did I look that upset? Perhaps she could tell I was uncomfortable? “There’s nothing you need be worried about; you’re among friends,” said Ceres. “It’s just how I am—I’m not good at getting up in front of people.” “Mr. Atobe, sorry to interrupt… But can I…?” Louisa held up her glass. I felt awkward again, but it wasn’t just her—everyone brought their glasses together. Theresia had a glass of the milk alcohol, but it was watered down so much with juice that it had essentially zero alcohol content, and she also brought her glass in to clink. Madoka was still underage, but she also ordered the same drink. “Arihito, you’ve done so much today. We’re going to keep doing the best we can until you need us again. Just let us know when you do,” said Kaede. “I’m sure we’ll have the chance to fight together again. I look forward to it.” “It’s thanks to your party that I was able to make my new racket. It lets me do lightning attacks.” “I’m glad we helped you reach your goals. I’d like to see that lightning attack someday.” After Kaede and Anna, Ryouko and Ibuki came up to speak with me. Ryouko looked at Ceres and then at Falma. After a moment of smiling at them, she finally turned to me. “S-so… Falma is a Chest Cracker from District Eight who’s helped us out a lot. She came to District Seven to open a chest for us…,” I said. “I was certain you’d made more…friends…,” said Ryouko. “Oh, it looks like Arihito really does prefer mature women…,” said Ibuki. “Ah… Wh-what are you talking about, Ibuki? Did you accidentally drink some alcohol?” said Kaede. I was about to respond to Ibuki when Falma stood from her seat and came over. “Mr. Atobe is a customer of my store. I’ve been thinking I’d like to introduce him to my husband, when he returns, since Mr. Atobe’s also been caring for Cion so well.”