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Chapter 180 – Day 11 of Management Life
After retrieving the master’s magic stone from the mine, the sorcerers and I slept at the inn.
Meanwhile, the truth about the mine had spread throughout the town.
There were no magic stone deposits beneath the town, and the Earth’s veins had shifted.
The town’s last remaining hope, which had prospered from mining, was crushed. With no reason to stay, the captured soldiers returned home. The rebel army that had gathered at the adventurers’ guild also disbanded.
“I see. That’s terrible.”
I listened to the former rebels eating corn soup and bread.
“What should we do? We have nowhere to direct our anger now.”
An adventurer who had been blown away by someone else sat crying with medicinal herbs stuck to his forehead.
“Why don’t you open your fists and help with the reconstruction? There’s no point in fighting anymore, right?”
“Reconstruction? What’s the point of living here?”
There was no more civil war or rewards. The mining jobs were gone, and they didn’t know whether to repair the ruined buildings of the slave traders.
The war was over, and so was the magic stone mining industry.
The adventurer who had been talking was called away by his companions to hunt monsters elsewhere and left the table.
In his place, a genius sorcerer sat down.
“Lord of the demonic land, would you help us search for the earth veins?”
“That’s not my job. Besides, even if we find the earth veins, there’s no guarantee there will be a magic stone deposit. Wouldn’t it be better to give up and mine magic stones from the big hole?”
Wiping the sweat from under his mask, the sorcerer muttered, “If I could do that, I wouldn’t be in this mess.”
“I hear there are monster users in the demonic land.”
“She’s from the vampire clan. Look, she’s sleeping over there.”
I pointed to Sylvia, who was sleeping with her back against a pillar.
“Are you planning to have monsters search for the earth veins?”
“They depend on magic more than we do.”
“Even the Cursed Eye clan?”
“They can’t see deep underground.”
“Then why not ask the harpies who have been ostracized from the village? You can talk to them. It’s much easier than hiring a monster user. In the demonic land, harpies are considered demonic beast disease patients, and they’re treated like normal residents.”
“I don’t want to ask them for help.”
They’re imprisoning them in rocky areas and persecuting them. They must have a strong sense of discrimination.”
“Is this the time to be saying that? It would be fine if it were just a civil war, but if you can’t import magic stones, the Kingdom of Meiju might attack you.”
“I know. None of the sorcerers speak ill of them.”
“Then…”
“If we’re looking for the earth veins, we have to go to a place with lots of monsters, right? The adventurers who are our guards would rather kill the harpies next to us and take their magic stones than search for a mine.”
If beast disease isn’t recognized as a disease, does that mean they can’t be considered human?
“Can’t you call for reinforcements from the army?”
“Soldiers and adventurers are no different.”
Even if someone from the demonic land stays behind in Cliff Garuda and finds the Earth veins with the sorcerers and harpies, it will take time to dig the tunnels. Since we can’t fly airships, transportation will be delayed.
The possibility of a magic stone shortage in the Kingdom of Meiju this winter is even higher now.
“Should we consider exporting magic stones from the demonic land?”
“Eh…?”
The sorcerer looked at me in surprise.
“Both the Kingdom of Meiju and Cliff Garuda need magic stones, right?”
“Yes, but…”
“Then we can sell them.”
“What about guards for searching for the Earth’s veins?”
“Hmm, should we bring the harpies from the demonic land? Or soldiers? Either way, they’re not quite human.”
The soldiers of the demonic land are practically golems.
“We should just hire mercenaries from the Kingdom of Meiju,”
Chel interjected from the side. She had been eating potatoes at a distant table, so I wasn’t sure if she had been listening, but she had been.
“The Kingdom of Meiju owes us a favor. If Makyo asks, they’ll send mercenaries to Cliff Garuda. Besides, there’s something wrong with their own magic.”
Since Chel was once a noble in the Kingdom of Meiju, her words might carry weight.
“What guarantee do you have that the mercenaries of the demon race won’t kill the harpies?”
“They’re former imperial guards. If they don’t listen to me, you can cut off trade with the Kingdom of Meiju.”
The harpies living in the rocky area west of Cliff Garuda are said to be victims of a beastly disease, not monsters.
The sorcerer removed his mask, revealing a face adorned with intricate geometric tattoos. He twisted his mouth and furrowed his brows, looking as if he were about to cry.
“You dare break the sorcerer’s taboo! How dare you show your true face to outsiders…”
Uchidome of the Curse Eye Clan scolded the sorcerer.
“Silence! Understand the situation. These people are shattering this country’s discriminatory mindset. Think about it. They are telling us to discard the curse of beastification that we spent two centuries creating. This curse was born from our fear of those who are different and our discrimination against them. They are telling us to treat those who are different as if they are no different from us. If we cannot do that, the search for the Earth’s veins will not progress. Our duty as sorcerers is to break the curse placed on the bird people. I am ashamed to call myself a sorcerer. I can’t wear a mask!”
The slender sorcerer gulped down the wine in his glass.
“Makyo-sama. The bird people will do our best to find the Earth’s veins and develop the mines. However, it will probably take more than a year. Eventually, I think the Cliff Garuda royal family will formally request the demonic land for the magic stones in the winter.”
“That’s what I said. The quickest way is to get the magic stones from the big hole.”
“That’s something not only the bird people of this country but also no other race can do. We can’t even get close to it.”
When I looked at Chel, who had gone to the big hole and returned, she nodded vigorously.
“Is there really no way to go to the big hole and come back?”
“At least not in Cliff Garuda.”
“Not even with magic?”
I asked Tokitamago and Uchidome, who were standing behind the sorcerer.
“The Four Great Cursed Families and the Cursed Clan know every curse in existence. Among them, only this person has ever been called a ‘sorcerer’ in history.”
Tokitamago replied. I had thought of him as both a genius and a fool, but maybe he’s actually pretty amazing.
The “big hole” was indeed a place overflowing with magic and off-limits, but was it really impossible to enter?
“Searching for the Earth’s veins is a massive undertaking involving all one hundred families of the cursed arts since the founding of Cliff Garuda. As practitioners of the cursed arts, we will stop at nothing. I apologize for bypassing the royal family’s permission, but we need your help, Makyo-sama. Please.”
The genius practitioner of the cursed arts bowed his head and placed his hands on the table.
Regarding the matter at stake in the big hole, I won’t say that I won’t help.
“Well, we can discuss that later.
Rewards vary by country, so we’ll have to consider that as well.”
“Th-the civil war and the search for the Earth’s veins are both problems for Cliff Garuda. You should come up with a solution to those problems before asking for help from the demonic land.”
Sylvia, who had suddenly appeared, interrupted the conversation between me and the sorcerer.
“The civil war is over, so let’s get back to the demonic land already.”
Chel and the others grabbed me and threw me out of the Adventurers’ Guild.
“What’s going on?”
“This is interference in the internal affairs of another country.”
“No, we’re already interfering by resolving their civil war. However, if we support them too much, they will become dependent on us, which is not in our best interest.”
“W-what was Makyo planning to do in the first place?”
I was taken to an alley and cornered by the women.
“What do you mean? I thought extracting magic stones from the big hole would be a good idea. If the stakes holding the hole are removed, the continent will split apart. When Chel and I went to see it, it had already started to crack, right? The truth is, if we don’t deal with it, it will directly affect the demonic land even more than the magic stone trade.”
“That’s true. Maybe…”
I broke free from Chel’s grip, which had been holding me down.
“We can gather magic stones by hunting monsters every day, but we don’t know anything about the Earth’s veins.”
“That might not be true…”
Hel crossed her arms and looked troubled.
“What!? Hel, you understand the Earth’s veins!”
“The vegetation in the demonic land is clearly different depending on the location. I think the movement of the Earth’s veins has probably caused the soil’s quality to shift.”
I had never thought of that before, but I remembered hearing something similar in a dream from my past life.
When I explored the northwest area, I found a place where the vegetation was clearly different. The monsters also change between the eastern and western parts of the demonic land.
“Well, the soil is different between the desert and the forest, but…”
Sylvia was also confused.
“Of course, I don’t think it’s just the influence of the Earth’s veins. Even though we’re on the same plate, environmental factors would also affect the soil’s quality. Besides, there were conflicts between dungeons…”
“But the vegetation changes so clearly at the entrance of the small stream, so it’s possible. If the Earth’s veins shifted and the ground shifted, creating a groove that became a stream, then it makes sense that slimes would breed there…”
In human terms, 100 or 1,000 years seems like a long time, but in terms of the Earth’s flow, it’s just an instant. We’re just living on a delicate balance.
“When you think about it that way, don’t you wonder why the ancient people of Yggdrasil drove huge stakes into the ground and changed the flow of magic?”
“But if they hadn’t, the continent would have split apart…”
Hel seemed taken aback, probably not expecting me to speak ill of the ancients.
“They just postponed the disaster for the future, right? Midgard did the same thing. Traveling through time with the giant magical beast sounds cool, but from the perspective of our future selves, it’s nothing but a nuisance.”
I was starting to get angry.
Chel, who was sitting next to me, started giggling.
“What are you laughing at?”
“The foolish king… The spirit of the demon king who visited Midgard said Makyo is the arch-enemy of Yggdrasil, so I thought it was true.”
“A-are you being disrespectful to your ancestors?”
Sylvia started laughing too.
“No, I think their technology is amazing. It’s impossible to make golems in the present day, so I respect them for that. However, their approach to dealing with disasters seems like they’re passing everything on to the future. I’m sure they thought that as long as things were good now, that was enough.”
No matter how much we are laughed at as inhabitants of the demonic land, there are issues we must face. There are countless problems: giant magical beasts, crops that won’t grow no matter how much we plant, and ancient ghosts that linger on the southwestern coast, unable to ascend to heaven.
“Are you going to take on the problems from ancient Yggdrasil?”
“I guess so.”
“What exactly do you plan to do?”
Lipa, who had been silently following me, asked.
“Well… I’m not quite sure yet. But I know I won’t leave the current problems unsolved and pass them on to the future. I’ll settle this once and for all!”
When I least expected it, the fate of the demonic land was sealed.
“All right, let’s return to the demonic land. First, we need to make a map of the Earth’s veins.”
We decided to return to the demonic land.
“What about the magic stones?”
“Lipa, go to the royal capital and get a permit to enter the big hole. We’ll probably be able to get in without one anyway.”
“Got it!”
“Are you sure? It’s another country’s territory.”
Hel asked.
“Just because it’s another country doesn’t mean the stake in the big hole isn’t a relic of Yggdrasil. Think about where the magical power that could split the continent would go if we pulled it out. If the ancients could stop it, then we can at least change its direction.”
Chel and Sylvia laughed the whole time.
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