Chapter 141

I think about it every time, but I was desperate for an airplane.
Inevitably, you’re going to be traveling to and from multiple countries, and it’s frustrating to try to do it overland. How many days are wasted just traveling.
─And then, as promised, Chelsea had a seizure. Despite the last few flights, she was still uncomfortable in the airplane.
It didn’t even make sense to me.
“It’s not my everyday mode of transportation.
It’s not all hype. As Chelsea says, the air is dangerous. Monsters that would be easy to deal with on the ground pose a major threat, and you may encounter special aircraft that can wreak havoc on your precision machinery.
Compared to Earth, the chances of crashing in flight are very high. If I had to quantify it, it would be less than 3 percent, but we all know that 3 percent is not a low number.
Especially if you’re a mobile gamer.
“Should I be grateful for the car?
If Polaris had been set in pre-modern times, he might have lost his mind. He doesn’t have the energy to travel for two or three weeks on horseback or in a carriage.
In retrospect, it wasn’t just about transportation. Kim was benefiting from many of the blessings of a near-modern civilization. Guns, food, toilets.
“If it weren’t for Polaris, I’d be dead or dying.
Yeah, maybe it’s a good thing it’s a Polaris….
Kim was surprised by her own fleeting thought.
‘You’ve certainly changed a lot.
In the early days of “drifting” in the English language, it was so frustrating.
We’ve moved beyond adapting to fully embracing it.
Even if the prospects of returning to your original life are still bleak,
The sense of injustice and despair is growing thinner by the day─.
‘I’m more used to being called a string, so that’s all I have to say.
I thought.
If a message pops up in front of you out of the blue and asks you to return to Earth, what would you do? Would you be able to grab hold of the tether without hesitation?
“I don’t know.
It’s hard to say for sure. In many ways, it’s not the same.
There’s a lot of stuff to let go of first.
“…….”
Kim turned her gaze from the car window to her left. As usual, Asterique was clinging to his side, breathing evenly.
Somewhere along the line, the horns stopped poking Kim in the face, and Arya was leaning against Asterike, who was a human domino.
“Ugh.”
They’re like gold.
* * *
It wasn’t until the end of August that I was able to return to the lap. It was a long time coming, but not long enough for me to relax. I met with my agents at a meeting.
After all, it’s not so easy from here on out.
“Ishradra. Are you sure?”
“Didn’t you say most likely?”
Unusually, Edwin was also present in the lab director’s office. It was a meeting of the minds, not to react, but to anticipate the Legion’s actions and stay one step ahead.
“I’m not saying it’s a sure thing, but the Legion has always had a lot of interest in Ish’rad, and there’s a lot of resources there that the Legion would covet.”
“Resources? You mean the solution that strengthens spells?”
“Nope. That’s not a problem.”
Edwin, who was quick to deny it, explained.
“At the head of the ivory tower is an insider in the Legion.”
“……You mean you’ve been stealing it.”
“I understand that a lot of the spell research that the Legion has in the first place comes from the Ivory Tower. We have our own research within the organization, but it’s not the same amount.”
Kushan heaved a heavy sigh. He’d inferred it to some extent. The Legion’s technology was advanced in some ways, even compared to Celbrox Labs.
The Ivory Tower has been studying spells for a long time, and if you’ve been given access to their resources, it’s understandable why a legion with such a short history would have such a high level of technology.
“Well, what’s done is done, let’s leave it alone.”
Kim interjected just in time to keep the chapter from going off on a tangent.
“If there is a resource the Legion covets other than the already leaked research….”
“It’s a person.”
Edwin’s conclusion was simple.
“We need to fill the ranks, especially now that the executive ranks are as empty as they are, and there’s no better target for that than Ishrad.”
Neither Kushan nor Kim could have predicted what was coming next. In addition to the research facility that takes up an entire city, there is one other famous building in Ishrad.
“The Legion is going to target Philstein Prison.”
It’s a necessary facility for a country. Unless you’re summarily executing all criminals, or you’re a lawless place like Banjar, but there’s something that sets Philstein apart from other prisons.
That all inmates are spellbearers.
Ishrad buys criminals with spells from around the world. To be used as guinea pigs. It’s not as active as it used to be due to accessibility issues, but the ‘buying’ still continues.
It’s a goldmine for Legion.
“I see. I’ve been on the lookout, but it’s hard to tell from a distance.”
Kushan nodded, then glared at Edwin.
“I’ve asked you a lot of questions before, and I wish you’d been as supportive then as you are now.”
This was when Kim had just brought Edwin in. Unsurprisingly, Kushan has been relentless in his interrogation of Edwin, accusing him of being a traitor to the Legion. But it didn’t yield much.
“You’ve been a moron the whole time, what kind of change of heart did you have?”
“I didn’t say anything because I didn’t know you at all, and by my standards, there was no guarantee that you weren’t worse than the Legion.”
“Is it different now?”
“Well, I don’t know anything about this lab yet, but….”
Edwin’s eyes flicked to Kim.
“At least you have someone you can trust in these matters.”
It’s a friend of a friend, so to speak. Kim is clearly an enemy of the Legion and considers Celbrox Labs a colleague. That was enough for him to open his mouth.
“I see.”
Kushan smiled bitterly and looked at Kim.
But I was left scratching my head.
“Uh-oh, something’s going on here, isn’t it?
In the original, Edwin would have joined the rap because he’d been impressed by the professor and Leila; in the current dialog, the nuance is that he’s in Dustborn, not the rap.
After thinking about this for a bit.
“…… sounds good, right?
It didn’t look too bad.
* * *
Before we left for Ishkarad, we needed to do some maintenance. First, Edwin’s gear. Of the eleven items sent by the Asus General Corporation, a shield and a mace were the only survivors.
“I think we’re good to go at this point.”
Edwin seemed satisfied in his own way. The quality of the equipment alone would rival that of a 3-star special weapon, though without the special effects, the comparison would be moot.
In the game, they used shields and swords, but in the real world, they adopted one-piece, chainless blunt weapons. There’s no particular reason for this. It was simply easier to handle.
Even with the game setup, Edwin wasn’t a particularly technical player. He’s the type of player who takes his cockroach-like life and Pekatum-like toughness to the extreme.
It’s similar no matter what you squeeze.
Unless you’re clogged up with systems like a game.
Next up was the long-awaited six-star weapon.
“Here. Take it.”
At the crafting workshop, the item was delivered as expected. Tamtam throws the scabbard and the whole thing to Kim, who grabs it with a flourish.
“Be careful. I don’t want you to get sick.”
“What, asshole, do you think I made it that sloppy?”
“No, I’m not suspicious, I’m just wary of it because it’s new.”
Tam Tam’s eyes narrowed at the scratch on his master’s pride. He’d been so groveling when he’d handed over Laktnidi, but now he seemed to be back to his old self.
But only for a moment. Soon, the tension in Tam Tam’s eyes eased.
“It’s nice to know you value them. I know it seems like I’m just churning out stuff to everyone else, but each piece is like a child to me, so take care of it, really.”
“Of course.”
Kim Yi Hyun thought to himself that he was the only one who could objectively grasp the value of this sword, even more than Tam Tam, its mother and father.
“This is the most valuable thing I own.
I have very few possessions to begin with, and I couldn’t buy this much equipment if I had to spend all my money right now. Except for a few war worthy Chapters like mortars.
He drew a sword from a black scabbard with a small loop.
The revealed form looked rather crude, an Estoc that specialized in stabbing, to put it mildly. It’s essentially just a hilt joined to a messy awl.
It matches the illustration perfectly.
I was very pleased with the results.
“I’ve got the other sword repaired, so you can keep it, um.”
Tamtam’s mouth twitched hesitantly.
“That, the awl. I don’t know where the hell it came from, but I’ll warn you.”
The way he looked at the knife was a mixture of attachment and reluctance. It was his own handiwork, even though he had used the kernel. It was a child that could not be purely pretty.
“You’d better be careful, I honestly don’t think it’s a sword.”
Tamtam’s assessment was half right.
In the game system, it is categorized as a sword.
But it didn’t have the word “sword” in its name.
[Chu Lingzheng (芻霊釘)]
[Rating: ★★★★★★]
[Category: Weapons].
[Description: A weapon forged from a mysterious artifact found in the ruins of Naraka. It may borrow the form of a sword, but its essence is more like a nail. Not much is known about what era it was made or what it was used for, but one thing is for certain: it is a cursed casting. After all these years, it seems the curse has not been broken].
[Effect: Attacking the same target 3 times inflicts a “Death” effect that deals magic damage equal to 30% of the target’s max HP for 3 seconds, and the user becomes “Resonate” and loses 15% HP.
In addition, Death has a 1 minute cooldown after activation, and each time you activate Death within a single battle, Resonance deals 5% more damage].
“Honestly, it’s not very universal.
It’s a boss-specific weapon, so you can’t hit every boss with it. Magic damage, not fixed damage. Damage dealt varies based on resistance. Long cooldown with a penalty.
I wouldn’t say it’s bad, but it’s not eye-poppingly good either. It’s just the right performance for a deployable weapon.
There was even talk that it was targeted at non-paying users. The idea is that once you give them a taste of paid equipment, they’ll have no choice but to open their wallets.
But there’s a trade-off.
Even if you can do worse than 5 stars in some situations – like
Conversely, if the conditions are right, it’s perfectly capable of achieving a six-star value.
“I’ll be careful. And thank you, from the bottom of my heart.”
“Uh, yeah. Uh-huh. Shyly….”
It’s rewarding to be so fond of it, Tam Tam muttered to himself. In the game, it was expected of him to follow orders, but now that it was real, he was grateful that he hadn’t failed.
I put it back in its scabbard and held it against my waist. I know it’s ugly, but I’m so grateful. It seems like just yesterday that I was wielding a [Sword of the Gods], but now I’ve gotten six stars.
“That’s good.
The stars are bullies after all.
* * *
The last one was Chelsea.
“Sorry I’m late.”
After arriving at the lab, I asked him to wait a while, and the next day at lunch, he came to me with circles under his eyes, as if he hadn’t slept all night. They were signs of anguish.
“Just out of curiosity, are there any side effects?”
“I haven’t tried it, so I can’t vouch for it.”
Obviously, this item didn’t exist in the game. It only existed in the configuration. An item that can take over someone else’s spell would be a huge system flaw.
“The researchers said it looks fine in their interpretation. They say it depends on the fit, but I don’t know the technical details. They say it’s theoretically possible to make it in a lab.”
It’s only theoretically possible. The Professor and Leila will be furious if you do anything inhumane in the lab. The Cellbrosics Lab is a disgrace to the organization.
“Inzara.
Suddenly, I remembered Shadow: he was the victim of a classic human experiment. An incapacitated boy gained immense power and endless pain from the factors implanted in him.
The probability of Chelsea doing so converges to 0%.
Aside from the question of suitability, the case is completely different.
“Because the factors that went into Shedore are special.
It’s the epitome of insanity. You could say it’s the original sin of the Labs. While it was the Legion that created the Shadow, the research itself began in the distant past, in the Labs.
We’ll talk about it someday.
“I decided on …….”
Chelsea squeezes her eyes shut and opens them.
“I need to increase my value, and I need to get as much as I can while I’m young.”
His mischievous grin was awkward. He looked like he’d die in a helicopter. I couldn’t imagine not being scared of him injecting my body with questionable drugs.
I had to reward them for their courage.
“Okay. Don’t worry about the money.”
“It’s a promise, and I won’t blame you if it goes wrong, but I’ll curse you if you make me work for an allowance.”
“Did you ever squeeze him, because in my book, he’s always been a good sport about it.”
“Our boss can be trusted with that.”
The stiff smile became natural.
That day, Chelsea awakened Spell.