108th
The Nymphs and Pluto’s Underground Labyrinth
108 ? Nymph Cult and Pluto’s Underground Labyrinth #6
Clang, clank, rattle.
A fairly spacious indoor carriage runs through a wide field. Since the roads are not well maintained, it is natural that the bumpy roads will cut your buttocks.
Fluffy.
The carriage I rode in today boasted a rather comfortable ride. This was because I had chartered a luxury carriage that cost 10 silver just to get to the vicinity of the swamps of Kalan.
It had windows, just like the carriages that nobles rode in with their personal coachmen. The seats were soft and comfortable with cotton cushions under the leather seats. It also didn’t cause motion sickness as much.
Still, the price of 10 silver is not usually expensive. Even if you split the cost among 5 people, each person would have to pay 2 silver.
Even the socialite, no, the converted Paranoy, was penniless and had no money, so I had to pay for his share as the party host.
Before arriving, 4 silver was missing, and including Luna’s money, 6 silver was missing.
6 silver.
Sval, isn’t 6 silver worth about 600,000 won?
It was heartbreaking to think that we would have to lose that much money on transportation from the start. If it had been just a carriage with a decent amount of luggage space, five people could have made a quick buck for a few dozen Coopers per person.
Of course, your butt might hurt a little and you might get cuts here and there, but it’s natural for low-level adventurers to live frugally like that.
However, Velmina, a wizard who had broken the ink and tried it at the Ivory Tower of the Magic University, did not seem to think so.
I wouldn’t take a single step in this city without a carriage with a roof and soft sofas.
When you say it like that, ordinary people like us have no choice but to go along with the wizard’s opinion!
As I said before, magicians are high-level personnel.
Wizards are also noble players that you want to have in your party, as their magical abilities are extremely helpful in Pluto’s Labyrinth.
Especially if you can use attribute attacks such as water, fire, lightning, or ice, your popularity will be beyond imagination, and your demand will be higher than that of a goddess in an engineering department in a male high school!
That’s why wizards are usually arrogant and have strong pride.
Since they are treated well and not criticized here and there, their self-esteem is high and they tend to develop narcissistic tendencies that are almost like whining. But even so, they are forgiven, which is what makes them a wizard.
Honestly, magic is really fucking powerful and amazing.
I wish I could learn subaltern magic too.
But, to enter the Magic University of Carinthos, you need to submit a letter of recommendation and pay a tuition fee of several gold coins each season?
There’s no way I could afford something like that.
Then, what about the treatment of warriors like me, Hassan, who are too poor to learn magic and are busy making ends meet with our bodies?
“Mr. Didier, when you get out of the carriage, please help me with my luggage.”
“Huh, even if you use magic, who do you know as a porter?”
“You don’t like it?”
“Actually, carrying luggage is the most fun for me! I’ll carry it for you as much as you want.”
In this way, they are treated as odd jobs that must be done with the body.
Of course, it is said that truly outstanding warriors who can manifest Aura or something are treated no differently than battle magicians.
But from my perspective as an outsider, things like auras that emit black energy from a sword or magic that shoots fireballs from one’s hands are just nonsense.
I just think that there are some really amazing things in this world. When I think about it, the grace I received from the gods was actually one of the rare powers.
Magic, aura and grace.
If you have just one of these three, you won’t starve to death. Or you’ll have some weird talent like that pink-haired voodoo woman Luna.
“Huhhh… .”
“Just stay still.”
Luna was wiping the beads of sweat dripping from the forehead of Paranoy, who was sitting next to her, into her leather water bottle.
As I locked eyes with Paranoy, who was trembling in fear, I couldn’t help but ask Luna a question.
“Luna, what are you doing?”
“Collecting Nymph Sweat…!”
“No, I can tell just by looking at it. What are you going to do with it?”
“Nymphs have nothing to throw away…! With the body fluids of a nymph, you can make a potion that increases your mana sensitivity.”
“I see.”
I didn’t really understand what the potion that increased mana sensitivity was, so I just thought, ‘Oh, I see.’
I am said to be a descendant of Jupiter and a hunter of the wilderness, and I have a long nickname, but terms like karma and mana still feel unfamiliar to me. When will I ever get used to it?
As I was thinking about such things, the decision maker Belmina, who had been sitting in the corner, looking out the window with a blank expression, opened her mouth as if she was interested.
“A potion that increases mana sensitivity?”
“Yeah, it’s more of an elixir than a potion, to be exact. The body parts of nymphs are useful materials for many things.”
“I’ve also heard that wands made from nymph hand bones are sold for high prices.”
And then, it was Velmina, the ice wizard, who was looking into Paranoy’s palm. The way her pale blue eyes shined was similar to Luna’s eyes looking at the herbs.
It means having an eye for materials.
I had a vague feeling that I knew why the nymphs on this continent were decreasing in number like an endangered species.
I thought it disappeared because it was pushed out of the competition for survival by the alien elves. It seems it just disappeared because of rumors that it was good for the body.
As the son of a health center, I began to feel a strange sense of strangeness towards the nymphs who were so useful in so many ways. After all, the health center was the first to react sensitively to such rumors.
However, Belmina’s gaze, which had been looking at Paranoy’s palm, returned to observing the changing scenery outside the window.
“But that’s just a rumor. Mana sensitivity isn’t something that can be easily acquired. Only one in ten people can sense mana. And only one in ten people can control that mana.”
“And, it is said that one of those ten people can use that mana to create useful magic? I, Didier, have heard of that as well.”
Didier, who was sitting next to me, joined in the conversation as if he knew something. I guess it was because he was itching to sit still and leave.
It would take at least a day to get to the swamp area of Kallan where the labyrinth is located.
Of course, from my perspective as the party host, it’s better to have some conversation like this than to just sit there and not say anything to each other.
“I thought you were living off of sawdust. Mr. Didier, you know a lot. Then you know very well. I am a woman of fortune who has gone through 10 times three times.”
In the end, is this just a wizard’s boast? As I was thinking that, Velmina, who was looking outside, added a few more words, her eyes growing even more drowsy.
“But it wasn’t just luck. Mana sensitivity is like a muscle. It can’t be developed without effort.”
“Hmm.” Muscle.
Belmina’s words made me picture a woman with sky blue hair trying to wield magic.
But the only magic I know is Hogwarts and Gryffindor. The fact that the headmaster of the Sval School of Magic is gay still hasn’t gone away in shock.
So, I couldn’t quite picture the image of practicing magic in my head, but I vaguely understood that wizards didn’t just suck up to others, but that they earned their status through hard work.
Could it be that the high pride of the world’s famous wizards is the confidence that their efforts were not in vain?
After all, nothing in this world is easy.
When it seemed as if the story would end like that, Luna, who had collected all the beads of sweat from Paranoy’s forehead, closed the cap of the leather water bottle and said a word.
“But if you have a magic potion, mana sensitivity will become much easier!
“I told you, there’s no way that could happen.”
“T-It’s true. In our Ideophee, we all use magic potions to increase our sensitivity….”
Luna was surprisingly strong even against the Ice Wizard. Has she gained confidence recently because she’s leveled up and been active?
“Profit… . Water, suffocating… .”
However, it looks quite pitiful that only Paranoy, sitting between them, is unable to say anything and is just trembling. I am starting to wonder if I should start mediating.
Belmina looks out the window and looks into Luna’s eyes as she speaks.
“Ah, Ideopheus. I’ve heard the story about Ideopheus, the island of superstition, from the Ivory Tower’s research paper. Do you still carry snake oil around as a panacea? That’s what it says in the book.”
“… I love the snake oil effect!”
“Unfortunately, it has already been proven in the Ivory Tower that magical powers have no effect. It seems that Ideophee’s magical power research is about two hundred years behind the Ivory Tower.”
“Two hundred years?”
“Well, it’s an archipelago made up of isolated islands. It’s not that I don’t understand that information is late. But I have to make sure of the facts. Magic is not a superstition, it’s a real discipline.”
To be honest, from my perspective, it was a bit funny to hear that magic was not a superstition but a real discipline.
If I had said something like that on the Earth I lived on, I would have been treated like a pitiful person. But when a real wizard does it, it is so different.
“Ugh, ugh… .”
Despite her struggles, unfortunately this fight was Luna’s defeat.
Luna has a lot to say, but she can’t seem to organize it, so her face turns red as if she’s seething.
He watched with nervous eyes to see what Luna would say in response. He wondered how Luna would strike him. But unexpectedly, Luna swallowed her words and took out something like a needle and a handkerchief from her bosom.
Ssuk, ssuk, rustle.
I wondered if she was embroidering to calm her troubled mind.
Swish, swish.
Luna was writing Velmina’s name on her handkerchief with drops of blood from her finger that she had pricked with a needle!! Writing a name in red. Didn’t you say that was a curse?
Luna completes the curse and puts the handkerchief back in her bosom.
Belmina just looked puzzled at the guy’s smug expression. That was the end of their argument about magical power.
* * *
It was around this time that I was starting to feel awkward in the still, quiet atmosphere inside the carriage.
“Party leader, look at that. Wow, aren’t the fields and flowers beautiful?”
Didier, the dwarf axe warrior who, like me, had been watching the women’s faces, looked out the window on his left and said something sentimental.
Who would have thought that a hairy man who drinks beer straight from the case and looks like he could eat grass roots raw, let alone flowers, knows how to enjoy the scenery?
I feel like my preconceptions about dwarves are a little off.
But, just as Didier said, outside the window where the carriage was running, there was a wide field with white and yellow flowers in full bloom.
“They are really pretty. You can pick those petals, grind them, and make tea with them. Or you can put them on top of a pudding made with milk and eggs and embroider them.”
“Is that so?”
Since then, Didier has been rambling on about how he makes his desserts, but honestly, none of it has caught my ear.
My eyes were simply fixed on the petals fluttering in the wind outside.
A few weeks ago, when I was here, this place was a horrible, magical place with swamps and fog and crocodiles and goblins running wild everywhere.
But is it possible that in just a few weeks, all that hard land can dry up and become fields of such beautiful flowers? It seems impossible without true magic.
“Anyway, the term ‘Kalran’s Swamp’ is now an old one. It is said that flowers used to bloom like this on this land before it was cursed by the goddess of vegetation and seasons.”
That’s when Didier’s explanation ended.
“Nose, Core’s playground.”
Paranoy, who had been cowering between Luna and the ice wizard Velmina, spoke first.
I felt puzzled when I saw that a social person who I thought would be far from cooperative was interested in me and started talking, so I asked him a question.
“What playground?”
“Kore, daughter of Ceres. Wow… This place used to be a field where Kore, the maiden of spring, used to play. But one day, it was cursed by Ceres and turned into a swamp.”
“The Goddess’s Curse. The long winter that happened 30 years ago. It’s a story you can easily find in research books.”
Surprisingly, the one who heard Paranoy’s words was the ice wizard Velmina. I became nervous about what kind of remark the ice wizard would make to chill the atmosphere.
“As the winters continued for several years, research on ice magic became more active. Eventually, the snow would melt, the ground would become soggy, and the society’s consensus was that flowers would never bloom again.”
The colorful colors reflected in Belmina’s transparent sky blue eyes. A strange emotion flashed through those colors.
“They say that this eternal swamp was completely dried up by the prayers of someone who received grace from the sun god. Honestly, I didn’t believe it. Now that I see it for myself, I understand. Indeed, the power of the transcendent is a power that goes beyond logic and cognition…”
A prayer to receive the grace of the sun god. I don’t know about magic or magic, but I can think of something about it.
On that day when we set up a ridiculous table of offerings and shouted “Long Live the Sun,” did an arrow fly through the clouds and fog from the sky and dry up the entire area?
I never would have guessed that flowers like this would grow on that land.
The dwarf warrior who was smiling while looking out the window then added a few more words.
“The sun god? I heard that he is the great warrior of the goddess Ceres. The god of light may be able to dry out the muddy land, but it is Ceres’s job to make such beautiful flowers bloom.”
“Indeed, perhaps he is a great warrior who has received the grace of the gods of light and abundance. Hehe, of course, that is unlikely to happen. It would not be easy for even a gold-tier hero to receive the grace of two gods in one body.”
“If.”
I couldn’t help but open my mouth at that story.
“What if such a person exists?”
“Well, I would like to meet you once. A great warrior loved by the gods. Or a slave of the temple who is hated and cursed. Come to think of it, a barbarian. Do you also have a favor from some god…?”
Pee-pee! Crunch.
As Velmina was about to say something to me, a sharp blade flew in from somewhere and landed right next to her head.
“Ah, an arrow!?”
Hehehe.
I can hear two horses neighing and galloping.
The coachman who was driving the horses in the front seat shouted urgently.
“Shippal, thief, thief! Ladies and gentlemen, thieves have appeared!”
Thief.
A thief.
You’re going to be a target for thieves if you ride around in such an expensive carriage.
“Damn, the warrior has some work to do. Everyone, grab your extension cords!”
[Work Review]
An illustration of Hippolyta has been released…!!
The way he hides his confidence and dark intentions between his eyebrows is really well captured!!! You can check out more detailed pictures in the work settings..!!!!
And we are currently voting for the main character of the next illustration..!!!!
The 20th… is the deadline..!!!
Michuri is coming in…!!!
