TN: Please read my translations only on my website nyx-translation.com since I never give my permission to any site to host my translations. And if you like my translations, please support this site on Ko-fi and Patreon to read several chapters ahead!
Sponsored chapter by Patreon. Enjoy~
TL: ALT
Chapter 87 – Day 32 of Exploration
When the eastern sky began to turn white, I went out of the cave.
Hel was watching over the fire and talking to Lipa, who had woken up earlier.
“Good morning.”
“Good morning!”
“Good morning. Lipa wants to seal his curse; what do you think?”
Hel asked me.
“If that’s what he wants, then I don’t see a problem. In the demon land, there will be times when you have to deal with monsters. You just have to get along with them.”
“That’s what he said. Now that the lord has given his permission, I’ll make a ring that will reduce the effect of the curse by half. In return, I’ll need your help later.”
“Yes! Thank you, Hel-neesan!”
Lipa had already become Hel’s subordinate.
I made some quick preparations and then told Lipa, “Help with whatever you’re told, and if you don’t understand, just pretend you do,” and I set off to run south.
Breakfast was the cam fruit that had attacked me. If I don’t run into a sandstorm, I should be back by this evening.
The night monsters that were still moving attacked me, but I avoided them and continued on my way. I know this road better than the monsters that have recently settled here. The Golden Bat swarm didn’t even try to attack me.
As I approached the desert, I came upon a group of Arachne building their nest. These half-human, half-spider monsters spit out strands of thread to form a large dome-like shape in which they lay eggs that look like wine barrels. From what I’ve seen before, they might be forming the shape of an egg.
They were on guard and kept looking around, but as long as I passed by quickly, they only gave me a slight warning. They weren’t scary if you knew how to watch them.
I head south through the desert, passing a sand coyote sleeping on the side of the road.
As I continue, I see a thin line in the sky. From the top of the dune, the chain looks like a line. But even a line stands out in the empty desert. The people who lived in the ancient demonic land called Dragonfolk might have used the chain leading to the sky island as a sign.
When I reached the chains, I put on my work gloves and started climbing. There were a lot of golems around the chains, probably because I knocked them over the last time I was here. I decided not to bother with them.
This was my second time climbing the chains. I knew how long it would take, so I took breaks and used my entire body’s magic power while climbing. If you know how to use your body and your magic, you won’t get tired so easily.
I arrived at the island in the morning.
As usual, the temperature was low, but the trees were full of colorful little flowers. I also heard birds singing.
“Hey, Jennifer! Are you alive?”
I called her, but there was no answer. I thought she might be dying from a lack of food, so I walked around the island. It wasn’t a big island, so it didn’t take long to find Jennifer.
Jennifer, who had lost some weight and looked a little sunburnt, was standing in front of P.J.’s grave, holding a stick. There was dirt on the end of the stick.
“Jennifer, did you dig this up?”
Jennifer turned at my voice, but all she did was shake her head and twist her neck.
“Hey, stop that. Your punishment is over, so I’ve come to get you. Jennifer, don’t tell me you’ve gone crazy.”
“Oh, what? You should have told me before. I was starting to doubt myself, thinking I was seeing things again.”
“You saw things about me?”
“Yes. It seems that the flowers on Sky Island have hallucinogenic properties, so I saw a lot of things. I got tired of the dried meat, so I tried different things. It was terrible; I had nightmares even when I was awake.”
Jennifer threw down the stick and touched my body. She was surprised and said, “Oh, it’s you, Makyo-san, the living one.”
“You have legs, too. More importantly, what were you doing in front of the grave?”
“Oh, I was digging. Grave robbing.”
Jennifer, who had only pretended to be serious on the surface, had become completely unconcerned with her own misdeeds. Perhaps she had changed on Sky Island. Maybe she was hiding something, like alcohol.
“After about five days, I got used to life on the island and found out which plants I could eat and that I could survive pretty well, but I was just bored…”
“While you’re being punished, don’t do anything that might get you punished. What if a ghost appears?”
“You’re the one encouraging us to explore the demonic land, aren’t you? This is also a proper archaeological dig.”
“Well, that’s true. So, have you found anything?”
“Yes, please take a look.”
At Jennifer’s urging, I looked into the hole in the graveyard and saw the bones of a human body covered in dirt. However, the head was not human; it resembled the skull of a crocodile. It looked like the head of a rock crocodile.
“It seems that this Peter Jefferson was a person who was close to the lizardman monster.”
“You mean a monster was posing as a human?”
“Well, we don’t know for sure, but it seems that he wore clothes and was intelligent enough to look up information about his ancestors.”
Jennifer said, showing me the stone tablet by her side.
‘I am a return to my ancestors. I have revealed the secret of my ancestors. I seek the truth. Speak to the ‘Keeper of Time’ of the magical beasts.’
“What is this? The more I learn, the more questions I have. In the end, even though Peter Jefferson knows a lot about history, he’s just passing the buck to this ‘Keeper of Time’ guy, isn’t he?”
“No, look. See, there’s a magic circle carved into this stone. No matter how hard you hit it, this tablet won’t break. I’m sure this is the key to the whole thing.”
Indeed, there was a magic circle carved on the back of the tablet.
“Have you tried it?”
“Yes, I carved a magic circle on this stick, and it turned into a wooden stick that didn’t break at all. But…”
“But what?”
“It seems that the damage itself accumulates, and when the magic circle is scratched…”
When the magic circle carved into the stick with a sharp pebble was scratched, the wooden stick shattered into pieces.
“It’s not a magic circle that makes objects hard; it’s more like a magic circle that stops time, isn’t it?”
“Oh, I see. I thought it was a magic circle that temporarily stops the damage.”
“That would be more difficult.”
The sunlight began to shine on the sky island. It got hotter and hotter in the sun.
“I wish we had left the desert in the morning.
We’ll have to rest in the shade of the trees and climb down the chains in the evening.
“Do not worry. Here, hold this bird talisman. It will cool you down.”
Jennifer made me hold a small light blue talisman. I could feel my body temperature dropping.
“Is my body getting cold?”
“Yes. You can tell a lot by watching the monsters. This bird talisman was the only one that was still flying around energetically, even in the daytime. If you wrap a cloth around your body, you’ll be able to move around in the desert.”
“Okay, you copied the tablet, right?”
“Yes, I remember every word and carved it on a stick.”
Jennifer showed me the stick.
“Then let’s put the grave back and go home.”
“Oh, you’re putting it back?”
“Yes. I don’t want anyone standing at my bedside.”
We covered the remains of Peter Jefferson with dirt, and Jennifer said a monk-like prayer. We also washed the gravestone with water and offered flowers and dried meat. It’s better than nothing.
I put the bird talisman around my neck, wrapped a cloth around my face, and put on work gloves.
“Are you ready?”
“Yes, I have everything.”
“Don’t come back here.”
“Yes.”
I began to descend the chain, concentrating all my magic power on my body.
“Makyo-san, you’re going a little too fast.”
“Jennifer, it’ll be easier if you distribute your magic power throughout your body. We’ll take breaks as we go down, so there’s no need to push yourself.”
“You should have told me that when we were climbing up!”
“That was a punishment for you to look at yourself. You’ll have to find everything on your own. Don’t use magic because a sandstorm is coming.”
“I know.”
Once you get the hang of it, you can go down quickly.
We reached the sandy ground around noon, with hardly a break in between. Going down is faster.
“Golems are popping up all around us, but don’t worry about them. Let’s run all the way to the forest.”
“What? No rest?”
Jennifer protested, but she followed me as I started to run.
“If you’re going to run in the desert, you should put some magic power into your legs.”
“At this pace, I’ll use up all my physical and magical strength in a day!”
“Isn’t that the point of being in a demonic land? You have to push yourself to the limit to survive.”
“I know that!”
I used my shadow to judge the direction and ran in a straight line into the forest. I dodged the attacks of the desert monsters and matched Jennifer’s speed.
It seems like she’s calculating her own strength and magic power, and she’s not confused by my running speed. That’s Jennifer for you.
When we reached the forest, we ate some cam fruit and took a short rest. We ran all the way past Arachne’s nest to the cave where we lived. Jennifer was thrilled to be in her usual forest, and she didn’t care if her clothes were torn by branches and leaves; she just kept running. Had she gained the strength to live, or had she forgotten her feminine appearance?
We arrived just before evening. Jennifer’s clothes were in tatters, but her voice was loud as she shouted, “Jennifer Volkov is back!”
“W-w-welcome back!”
“Welcome back!”
“Welcome back!”
The three women came out to greet us, and Lipa stood there with a bright red face. It couldn’t be helped since Jennifer had revealed so much.
“Eh? Who is that? Makyo-san, there’s a suspicious man over there!”
Jennifer, who had noticed Lipa, covered her chest and crotch. She seemed to remember her embarrassment.
“This is Lipa, a member of the bird tribe. I recruited him. Hmm? Wait a minute, Jennifer. What do you think of me?”
“It doesn’t matter if Makyo-san sees me, but I can’t show myself like this to a strange man. Why didn’t you tell me?”
Jennifer went to her room in the cave, covering herself as she went.
“What on earth is this!?”
Jennifer exclaimed as she entered the cave. The passageway was lined with the relics from the swamp that Sylvia and the others had dug up.
“T-t-these are the swamp relics. T-t-there are so many of them, it’s surprising.”
Sylvia explained as if making an excuse.
“There are so many of them! Why doesn’t anyone sort them? This is a broken amphora, right? This one looks like a sword hilt, but when you put them together like this, you can’t tell!”
She stood in front of Sylvia, her eyes flashing. The other four members of the group, except for Lipa, laughed.
“This is no time to laugh! Makyo-san, please expand the warehouse. There are things that Chel-san and the others need to do before they can show off their skills! Seriously, these people from the demonic land…”
Jennifer put her hands on her hips and sighed.
The General Affairs Manager of the demonic land returned.
“Did you say your name was Lipa? If you have time to be shy, you should be working!”
“Yes…”
Lipa began to swing his sword vigorously without knowing why.
If you like my translations, please support me on Ko-Fi and subscribe my Patreon to read several chapters ahead!
Omg Lipa lol
LikeLike