∗ ∗ ∗
The magic tool was an unusual shape. What first stood out was a rectangular box about one arm span wide. There was a thin slot visible on the side. On top of the rectangular box part was a crystal ball, in which a strange light swirled. It looked almost mystical, and as I kept looking at it, I felt a strange force drawing me in...
“Hey, don’t stare at it too much. It’ll mess up the results,” Fresco said. I quickly stepped back.
Come to think of it, I’d been told something similar at the Church. The magic tool I’d touched after my root skill was determined was a lot bigger than this one, but there were similar parts. In particular, the crystal ball was the same. I remembered that back then, the technician had instructed me to hold my hand upon it for a while. I’d probably have to do the same thing this time too.
The other mechanical parts were probably smaller due to the limited number of functions. To make a complete status card like the one I had, the magic tool probably needed to be bigger as well. Due to their mechanisms, the more powerful a magic tool was, the bigger it had to be. The circuits were more complex, there was more mana required, and various other factors demanded that it increase in size. This was not an easy problem to get around. Some ancient magic tools and those found in labyrinths had solved this, but those were miniaturized so small that current technology couldn’t analyze and reverse-engineer them, so they were the exception to the rule. Adventurers sought to retrieve these devices because they could be sold for a very high price.
I was low on funds too, so a part of me hoped I could make a huge profit off of one someday, but that wasn’t feasible right now. The most famous labyrinths were generally managed by countries and had restrictions on who could enter. For example, they might limit it to adventurers of a certain rank.
The first adventurer rank we could register as was the very lowest: iron. From there, it went from copper, to silver, to gold, to platinum...and the last one was orichalcum, but barely anyone made it that high. Even as the heir to a duke, I’d never met an orichalcum-rank adventurer even once. There were only a handful of them in the first place, and they could choose whatever jobs they wanted, wherever they wanted, so they weren’t bound to a single country. I couldn’t imagine any of them would want to come to a prejudiced, Church-dominated country like Oraculum Kingdom anyway.
At their core, adventurers loved freedom. Their position vastly differed from the Church, which seemed to make a point of restricting freedom. But both groups still kept up the appearance of civility. They had enough adult manners for that—or maybe they were both just that brazen. That was why there was tension between them.
I got a bit off topic there. Back to the magic tool.
Fresco introduced it. “Now then, as you’re aware, this’ll let us make status cards. Do you know how to use it?” he asked, just as expected. I knew, but everyone else tilted their heads. That only made sense. The kobolds would have never seen this before. Not to insult their intelligence—there just weren’t any of these in the Purgatory Forest. I’d barely even come into contact with any civilized tools over the past month. The kobolds had lived their whole lives there, so they wouldn’t have known what it was.
Fresco nodded, extrapolating from their expressions. “I guess you guys must be from the sticks. Oh, not making fun of you or anything. There’s a lot of people like that who try to become adventurers. And they’ve got a surprising amount of promise. They’re used to living in rough rural areas. Got more guts than the city folks, that’s for sure. So I’ve got big expectations for you all.”
I translated his words for the kobolds, who were happy to hear it.
“Anyway. To use it, you’ve gotta put your hands on the crystal ball, one at a time. Then it’ll pull your info from the Divine Intellect and display your name and skills here—just your general skills, got it? Your root skills are set to not display initially, so I won’t be able to see ’em. As for the other entries, like species, sex, and title, just tell me and I’ll input them.” After explaining some more important points, Fresco looked at the kobolds and said, “All right, who’s first? You’re all getting them. Doesn’t matter to me who we start with.”
The first one to raise their paw was...
“Woof! (Me first, please!)”
...one of the kobold soldiers, Mataza.
Honestly, I had thought I should do it first. Sure, I already had a status card that worked just fine, but one issued by the adventurer’s guild would be handy in a lot of ways. I could alter the parts where I couldn’t lie on my current status card. I’d also be able to activate the effect of <Info Lookup>, which I’d received from Aht. It had the effect of being able to modify details on a status card. To be precise, it was the ability to influence the Divine Intellect, Aht had said.
But if Mataza wanted to go first, I had no real reason to obstruct him. Fortunately, “species” wasn’t included on the display. So I gave a nod, and Fresco spoke to Mataza. “Okay, got it. Go ahead and put your paw on there.”
I interpreted this for Mataza, who then willingly did as he was instructed.