NOVEL NEXT Chapter 9.2
Chapter 9.2
Another almost useless yet complex feature. A sharing function connected multiple storage spaces, so the contents can be accessed from all ends. In this case, it seemed that he had connected the food stand’s storage box with the pantry at the workshop. This should have been a feature that could only have been implemented with all sharing spaces in the same place first, but since Hiroshi had already set up a sharing connection with something else, he simply expanded it to include the storage box. With Hiroshi’s skillsets, he only needed one end of the sharing space to create multiple outlets.
Since the capacity of the shared space increased with each additional outlet, this enchantment was rather vital to some occupations. However, the catalyst was very expensive, and having an NPC cast the enchantment would almost always result in a failure. All in all, it was something an average use could only dream about. In this case, Makoto (who went and breezed through a hunting quest while she was bored) had brought home some guts that could be processed into a catalyst. So, Haruna was already aware that all of their bags were already connected to the storage room of the workshop. However, she didn’t know that the storage box at the food stand had already been connected to something.
Needless to say, knowledge of this simply broken enchantment is hidden from the public. Unlike the in-game world, it seems that not even governments in this world were aware of it. Douga would watch with envy as Hiroshi and the rest of the party would pass food and tools back and forth through their bags. Apparently, even the Knight’s Order mostly carried their provisions by foot or horse. Even if they layered the Expand Capacity enchantment to the max, an ordinary bag would not be able to carry enough supplies to last them through long battles.
No wonder there’s some stuff in here I don’t remember putting in…
So, how much do ya need?
Let me see. Hm… 30 curry buns, maybe? I think the more we have the more they’ll sell, but that should even them out with what we have left in skewers.
Alrighty.
Hiroshi began prepping the curry buns. Haruna wondered if he didn’t have to work on more tools for future gigs, but she concluded that he must have had some time on his hands since he was the one who called her. She was continuing to fry more curry buns, when…
「Gimme all your money!」
A pretty buff warrior with an experienced looked was holding up a knife of a menacing size. Judging by his looks, he wasn’t eating too well. The people around her screamed and ran, shocked. Haruna, frowning, sprung to action without a smidge of fear in her eyes.
Her movement was too fast, not only for the civilians around her, but even the robber. A faint and sharp metallic sound was heard as the people around them saw that the man’s knife had been sliced off at the handle. Haruna’s rapier, drawn out of her sheath without anyone noticing, had pieced the center of the knife’s blade, detaching it from the handle. Why did she disarm him in such a way? Simple. If the blade had flown into a bat of oil or hit someone in the crowd, it would be a disaster.
「Can I take your order?」
Haruna asked, throwing the blade of the knife into the ground and holding the rapier against his throat, holding up a smile all the while. She may look rather frail, but she could take on most any Field Boss. If a robber wanted to get anything from Haruna, they would have to at least be able to go toe-to-toe with the Chivalrous Thief Alvin.
「…One… Corndog, please…」
Understanding that Haruna was offering to let him leave unharmed in exchange for a purchase. He emptied his pockets to buy a corndog, and scrambled away with his tail between his legs. The crowd, who had been watching this ordeal, burst out in cheers for Haruna. It only took fifteen minutes after the incident for all of their merchandise, including the additional portions, to be bought up by the crowd.
「Anything scary-looking around?」
In the woods a little ways out of Wulls, Mio, Tatsuya, and Makoto (the gathering team) were checking their surroundings to see if there were any dangerous creatures lurking around the area. They were here because of the Crown Prince Layotte practically tying their hands to cure the Crown Princess Elena. They need a large amount of potion materials, namely for antidotes. So, they were out in the woods, doubling their time as training Tatsuya and Mio. While they wanted to bring Haruna to hone her Gathering skills, too, she had to stay back to get rid of their food stand stock, as things were heading in a direction where it was dubious whether or not Hiroshi and Haruna could continue their food stand business.
Today, they had to collect more than vegetation. They also had to collect some insides from monsters. So, they had found themselves in an area with relatively aggressive animals. Since they would be rather exposed while gathering materials, detecting any enemies in the area was a must, and they had to search more diligently than during ordinary quests. Although they were still near the edge of the woods, where they could still see a main road behind them. At this point, there weren’t many aggressive creatures nor any materials worth bringing home.
「Over that way, there’s some sort of big lizard.」
Mio dropped a rather scary answer to Tatusya’s question, as she pointed in the general direction of the sky.
「Which way?」
「That way.」
They squinted in the direction of Mio’s indication, but neither Tatsuya nor Makoto could spot anything like that. She was pointing up (implying that the creature was in the sky) but they couldn’t even see a bird, let alone a lizard-like creature.
「How far away are we talking, here?」
「Like, fifteen kilometers?」
In other words, well beyond how far a naked eye can see. Mio’s eyes, beefed up by Vision Enhancement skills, can see even beyond the horizon.
「Come on. You think we can see that far?」
「Sensei could, maybe.」
「Our senses aren’t heightened like yours…」
Tatusya counted. In-game, while a player’s sensory stats came into play for almost any activity, the only skills that buffed them were all of the Crafting skills and Art skills, as well as some of the Archery and Thieving skills, and maybe Detecting and Searching skills. As a result, these stats were extremely difficult to grind on purpose. Both the modifiers and the Training Bonuses for the non-Crafting and non-Art skills were much lower in comparison, making Sensory stats even more difficult to raise.
Unlike other stats that became difficult to raise past 150, it was extremely difficult to get past 100 on any Sensory stat. Most players had not reached the 150 bench mark at all. People like Hiroshi and Mio, who would chuckle at the thought of “only” hitting 300 on the Sensory stats, were legends even among the most hardcore players. Even Haruna’s stats (top third in the party) partially in thanks to her Extra Skill in Singing, were way out of Makoto and Tatsuya’s league. Tatsuya might have a shot, since he had reached Intermediate on Potion Making and Metalworking, and had been grinding his Harvesting and Felling skills. However, Makoto hadn’t even gone near those skills.
「A large lizard in the sky, huh? Doesn’t sound good.」
「What does it look like?」
「Torso’s kind of stubby. Its front limbs are webbed wings. Pretty thick legs with big claws. Poison stinger on its tail. Black in color.」
「A Wyvern…?」
「Looks like it.」
Tatsuya frowned at Mio’s response. Even though they had a considerable distance between them in Wulls, even a civilian (with the help of Speed boosting items) could travel out here and back to the city within a day. The only time a Wyvern would show up around this area in-game would be for special events.
「It sees us.」
「…Right. Their Detection range was nuts.」
「And they’re carnivorous…」
With that, they stared at each other.
「…Are we gonna do it?」
「Makoto, can you take down a Wyvern with your equipment right now?」
「Piece of cake. You?」
「My weapon’s good, at least. If I don’t take any hits, I’m good.」
After a mere confirmation disguised as a strategy meeting, Mio silently drew her bow. Despite the layers of Extend Range and Boost Penetration enchantments, it was just a bow made out of ordinary lumber. The quality of the bow made it more powerful than a large crossbow, but it was nowhere near hitting something 15 kilometers away. But, her stance to fight back seemed to have been picked up by the creature. It came charging head-on towards this group of frail prey.
「10 Kilometers and counting… 9, 8, 7…」
「We can’t burn it too much ‘cause of the materials, right?」
「Then the quickest way’s for me to cut off its head.」
Makoto declared, and Tatsuya and Mio nodded in response. Unless it was some primeval creature like a Slime, just about anything would die with its head cut off. The Wyvern wasn’t an exception. If it’s head were to be cut off, or its heart smashed, it would die for sure.
「A kilometer. Attacking.」
Staring down the Wyvern, which had approached close enough for Makoto and Tatsuya to see, Mio fired two arrows in a row. The arrows accurately pierced the joints of the Wyvern’s wings. It lost control of its wings, lost its balance, and crashed onto the ground. However, because of its fast velocity, it crashed only a few dozen meters from the party, in an open area. They were in each other’s range of attack.
「Oxygen Ring!」
Tatsuya activated a rather obscure special attack spell against the fallen Wyvern. This spell trapped the target in a confined area before generating an overload of oxygen to oxidize and/or cause oxygen poisoning on the target, or else, evacuating all oxygen from the area to suffocate it. This time, he had chosen the suffocation mode, but the Wyvern was resilient enough to even retain its consciousness. This spell would cause brain damage in a flash against a human, but the Wyvern’s anatomy seemed to protect from any immediate critical injury.
However, trapped in the confined area of the spell, the Wyvern couldn’t even roll over. Makoto mercifully decapitated the poor beast with her giant sword, which she had been happily wielding for three months now. While not as impenetrable as a dragon’s, a Wyvern’s skin was very tough. It shows Makoto’s skill that she could so easily slice through it, without so much as a grunt. Now, she didn’t get to showcase much by cutting an immobilized target, but a successful surprise attack against a single target by a spell-wielder and an archer would steal any thunder from the close-combat members in almost any situation.
「That’s a weird spell you got there.」
「It really comes in handy when I’m hunting for materials from living creatures. It preserves at least double the amount of materials compared to regular attack spells. Not to mention that the quality of the hide is much better. If I’m after some organs, I might switch up the spell depending on what I’m facing off against.」
「So you’ve played with these?」
「You could say that. I’d be helping this gal here or Hiro a lot. I did some trial and error on how to gather as much materials as possible in the least number of kills.」
「Yep. I’d definitely do the same in your shoes.」
Makoto nodded, understanding. Mio had ignored them to observe the Wyvern corpse.
「What’s up?」
「I was thinking… We get something like this, we might want to chop it up into reasonable chunks and just have Sensei take them apart.」
「Really?」
Tatsuya and Makoto remembered that, according to Hiroshi, Mio should be able to collect most of the materials from the corpse.
「Mm-hmm. Some materials are better to enchant them as soon as they’re collected.」
「Like what?」
「In case of the Wyvern, its hide, for example. And the stinger on its tail can be used to make poison or antidotes, but it needs to be processed a little when extracting it.」
In reality, most wouldn’t attempt to take down a Wyvern solo with a Player Level below 300. It was only natural that its loot required delicate handling. Of course, that was just a guideline, and a player with the right stats, skills, and/or prowess could take one down without worrying about the number of their Player Level. In fact, Haruna was only at Level 135 when she encountered one through an event. It was a close call, but she took one down on her own. In Fairytale Chronicles, as long as the player had enough Attack to punch through an enemies Armor, enough HP to not get one-hit-killed, and enough problem-solving skills, they could take care of most enemies. Of course, growing the problem-solving skills was the hard part.
「I can do it now, but if I enchant the hide, for example, it’ll be 70% the quality of Sensei doing it.」
「Then let’s just chop it up and take them home. It’ll fit in our bags, right?」
「With room to spare. Actually, he linked all our bags before we left.」
「Okay. He really puts the devil in the details, doesn’t he?」
With that, they chopped up the corpse in general parts (by each wing or limb) and stowed them in their bags. Convenient that blood stopped pouring out of the chunks as they put them away. Each hunk of meat was way bigger than the opening of the bag, but you know… Magic.
In fact, without the shared space, the materials from the Wyvern alone might have filled their bags to the brim. Despite the bags’ capacity expanded to several times their appearance, the Wyvern had a wingspan of over ten meters. To top it off, all of the materials were quite rare in these parts, so it would have been quite a waste to leave anything behind. The link allowed them to access the storage room and the storage box on top of everyone’s bags, which allowed them to pack everything away. Without this enhancement, they might have only been able to bring home the hide.
Everyone would have so much more respect for Hiroshi if he devoted himself to useful projects like this one, but alas, he often spent all of his efforts to crafting Taiyaki molds or Mixytwirly treats and all sorts of spices. That was Hiroshi Azuma’s vice, indeed.