Chapter 71 – Return to the Guild (1/2)
As I thought. It's better to kill that bitch.”
<Woah woah woah! Wait a sec!>
Without letting a moment go by after her words left her mouth, I quickly pulled Claret's proverbial reins. Sometimes I was lead to wonder if I should put actual ones on her for times like this.
”Master! Who knows what other sort of trick those bastards had set! It's safer to just eliminate her!”
<Well, I mean, it's true that it's possible there might be something, but at the same time there might not! And besides, having strong allies is going to be important in case things escalate!>
”But it's not like she's that strong! Sure, she's way stronger than most people, but if it's you, you can find plenty of stronger people!”
<But it's better to try to get in good standing with as many as we can! Who knows when such allies can be useful! And besides, I can't find any other suspicious things about her. Did you notice anything Alicia?>
<Huh? Ummm, no I didn't, but I don't think I'd be able to find anything well hidden.>
xcept hidden skills themselves are extremely well hidden. Normally there's no way to even see them in the first place, so finding one would take extraordinary abilities. So do you have it?>
I turned my attention back to the dark spirit.
”Yes Master, if that's what you want.”
I didn't like putting down Claret like some aggressive mongrel, but she did have the volatility of nitroglycerine when it came to my safety. There probably wasn't a single thing I could do about that, aside from perhaps providing some evidence that I wasn't the Scarlet she's always thought, but fat chance at that.
<Anyways, so the best I can tell, the skill had been properly disabled, so there should be no chance for the ones who sent Sarah to be able to observe her any more. At least through that skill.>
<Do you think there's another way they can be watching?>
<I practically guarantee it. The question is how, and how much can they learn though it. Simply put, it doesn't make much sense for people who have power like reincarnating people into various worlds to not be able to observe the status of those worlds they operate on. Else they wouldn't know how to make adjustments if they were needed.>
<So that would mean that they'd have the ability to look at how things are going in the world. But how?>
That, was the million dollar question.
<Considering that they needed a special skill to see details on the level of individuals, I'm betting that their observation method is on a pretty macro scale. Meaning that they can see a lot, but not in detail.>
<So they can see how a country is doing, but not each person in that country?>
Alicia's analogy wasn't too far off. It really was impressive just how fast her mind could run.
<Kinda. Since something like the status of a nation is incredibly abstract and beyond the capabilities of the system, I'm thinking that their main way to observe is from above, as if they're hiding in the clouds looking down on us.>
In other words, the best they can do is look at the world from the view point of a spy satellite. That said, spy satellites on Earth were getting advanced enough that they could easily track individuals, though identifying two people apart who wore the same coloured clothes and had the same colour hair was way beyond even their capabilities. It was difficult to say how the observation system that these people compared to Earth's spy satellites.
I could only hope that it wasn't more capable, but it depended in its purpose in the first place. If it was more to observe the greater environmental shifts, then as long as I didn't do anything to change the shape of the land, I'd be virtually invisible to such a system.
”I see! If they're looking down from the clouds, then no matter how good their eyesight is, there's no way for them to see how one person is moving around!”
(Ah, looks like we've got someone who took my words literally.)
<Then even if they do manage to find us, every time we go indoors they'll have trouble finding us again!>
(Wait, Alicia took that literally. too?! Well, if it eases their nerves, then whatever.)
It really didn't matter that much, and trying to explain the very concept of extra-dimensional space as well as remote observations was probably going to take quite a lot of time, so it was probably better to simply drop the subject.
”Umm...are you alright Scarlet?”
Suddenly an unexpected voice came from the side.
”Huh? Oh, yea, I am.”
”Are you sure? You were staring off into space for quite a while.”
It seemed like this little conversation of ours had taken a bit more time than I expected. Or rather, I had entirely forgotten that Sarah was even around by the end.
”Yea, I'm fine. Sometimes I have a lot of things on my mind.”
”Did you come up with a way to improve your schteev?!”
”...No, I didn't.”
Was I going to have to add gluttonous to this person's title?
”I was thinking about where to head out after leaving this dungeon.”
It was a bit half-assed, but the excuse was close enough to the truth.
”I see. Well, I heard that there's a martial tournament starting up in the south.”
I was a bit surprised. I had figured that she was some stuck up racist who pretty much ignored everyone around her seeing them as primitive barbarians or something, and was only reasonable to me due to the fact that I kicked her ass on top of the fact that I had proven to her to at least have a bit more modern knowledge than the other locals. I couldn't deny that if I thought I could return to a modern world soon after, I might've had a similar mindset.
”You were thinking something pretty rude, weren't you?”
”Nonsense.”
”sigh Well, it's pretty hard to not hear when everyone talked about it. Apparently it's one of the biggest events around, so quite a lot of people go, especially those that think they're strong. If you joined the tournament, you'd probably be able to easily win.”
”Not interested.”
Straight up, I couldn't see a single useful thing about participating in such an event. Normally the point of such a thing would be to gain fame, rewards, and perhaps to test your own abilities, but none of those really appealed to me.
It was possible to go as a spectator, but my meeting with Sarah had told me that I no longer could afford the leisure of wasting time like that. At the very least, I needed to progress towards one of my goals, and even if I couldn't find any clues for making a new body for Alicia, I'd have to go and get even stronger soon. Especially when I had no idea how the next attempt would go, just overall increasing my strength was a sure-fire way to reduce the risk.
No matter how I cut it, the tournament was not a good use of my time as it was. Maybe I'd check it out in the future, but in the meantime, there was little benefit and too many drawbacks.
”Well, I'm going to be heading to the surface now. Keep up the practice and you should be able to use magic pretty quickly. After that, it shouldn't be difficult to learn to fire your gun and make new ammo.”
”How long do you think until I could make a shock rifle?”
”...Probably quite a while. Try to stick with simpler designs, and you should be able to make a gun you like pretty quickly, depending on how good you are at designing them.”
I had little expectations for her to actually being able to pick up designing a weapon from almost scratch within any short time period. The only reason why I was so good at it was thanks to the time I had spent making graphical assets for my game.
Thinking back, it felt like so long ago, like an entire lifetime ago.
(...technically it really was a lifetime ago now that I think about it.)
I shouldered my bag then checked my clothes, making sure that everything was covering my body as well as they could. After adjusting my hat to sit snugly on my head, I took my steps towards the fountain.
”Oh right, take these as well, just in case.”
”What are they?”
It wasn't much, but I handed over a handful of vials Alicia had identified while we were sorting out the contents of my magic bag.
”Healing potions. If you get hurt, drink one and it'll fix you back up.”
”Is that really alright? You've given me so much already. I even tried to kill you.”
(Tried is the operative word, and frankly it was kinda pathetic from my perspective.)
”It's fine. I don't have any need of them.”
It was true as well. Those potions weren't that strong, so they'd only recover a small percentage of my health. If used several at once, they'd benefit Claret, but I'd much rather just cast healing magic on her. And beyond even that, I had better healing potions anyways if magic wasn't an option. If anything, Sarah was helping me out by taking some of the clutter from my bag.
”Umm, that's right! Also that pile of things you left in the other fountain room! Don't forget to pick them up!”
”...I said that you can have that all before.”
”Ah, right. You really meant that huh?”
That stuff really was just trash anyways. If she sold them she'd probably make a bit of cash, but after that treasure chest at the bottom of this dungeon, anything I'd get from that pile would probably little more than chump change. Even if the contents of that chest didn't add up to nearly as much as I imagined, selling all that junk off wasn't really worth the effort.
”Well, I'll be heading off now.”
”Thank you! For everything! And, umm...I'll call!”
I kinda hoped she wouldn't, but the hopeful way she stated that made me hesitate to try to let her down. The fact that she looked like she was about ready to tear up further made things awkward on my side for having such a thought.
”Right. Later then.”
With those half-hearted parting words, I put my hand on the fountain and sent the command to return to the first floor.
I stretched my arms over my head as I enjoyed the coolness in the deep shadow in an alley across from the city's adventurers' guild.
As always, the real sun was an excessively bright, oppressive thing. While just as bright, at least the dungeon's artificial sun wasn't such a scary thing. The fact that it was just past noon when I exited the dungeon only made things worse.
Looking up to confirm that all the little fluffballs had finished their little mana treats, I cleared the smile that had crept up onto my face and headed towards the guild building.
The inside was as noisy and dirty as the last time I had been here. Unlike Linsington City, the building wasn't devoid of activity in the middle of the day. Most likely the dungeon had something to do with that, as people could exit at any time of the day since keeping track of time inside wasn't easy,
That said, it wasn't that busy. There were two groups sitting at a table enjoying a meal, and a single person at the reception desk turning in some sort of request.
For me, I just went towards the materials counter. There was a bored looking middle aged man sitting while propping his chin in the palm of one hand while he rested his elbow on the counter.
If a single word could describe the man, it would have been clean. If a second could be allowed, then I would've picked poor. Not poor as in for penniless, but someone who was a bit pitiful. He was clean shaven and his uniform was free of dirt and even wrinkles, but the top of his head was equally as void of decorations, including hair.
He didn't look that old, yet somehow there was a distinct desertification of hair from the front of his crown to the rear, leaving nothing behind. It was so bad that I wondered if it might have been better if he had just given up and removed all of it, pretending it was a fashion choice, rather than advertising the fact that he lost the genetic lottery.
”Excuse me, I'd like to sell some things.”
”Welcome miss. Wild materials or dungeon materials?”
It seemed like they got enough of both to not just presume that everyone who came to sell off things were bringing one or the other.
”Dungeon. Do you accept items as well?”
”Sure, we handle that sort of thing as well. I don't see any sacks, but you have a magic bag?”
”That's right.”
I unshouldered my bag and opened it up. The fact that the man froze for a moment when he saw the killer bunny's face didn't escape me.
The various items I had found in the dungeon, both from monster drops and the boss treasure chests were placed on the counter.
Mounds of claws, fangs, various veiny difficult to identify organs as well as equipment I didn't need were piled up.