By the Grace of the Gods: Volume 1

by Roy

  Unclean Ceiling

  Ceiling with filth on it.

  But upon using Appraisal, it had changed to:

  Stone Ceiling

  The cesspit ceiling of the communal toilets in Gimul Town. Cleaned by being disinfected with water and heat.

  The information from the appraisal had changed from an unclean ceiling to a stone one. When looking up the details, it stated it had been disinfected through heat. Where did this information come from, anyway? I’ve always wondered about that, but I guess as long as it wasn’t wrong...

  I continued cleaning while sometimes paying attention to irrelevant things, ultimately resulting in taking 5 hours to clean 1 cesspit; when something else happened, which added another three hours.

  “Well, they have consumed a lot today.”

  The scavenger slimes were preparing to split themselves. There was still work in the other pits to be done... but considering how it could make working more efficient, I figured it’d be better to let them split themselves. We were already in a place out of the public eye, so the slimes went ahead and split. It took three hours for this to finish. But thanks to that, the number of scavenger slimes increased to a total of 1464. There were 730 slimes before they split, so four of them had split twice. It was a surprise to see how many nutrients they had accumulated, but it made it easier to move on to the next job.

  For now, all that was left for today was to make my report. There was no one to demand I hurry like in my past life either. I took my time to leisurely confirm that there was nothing wrong with the slimes. But when I noticed a change in one of the scavenger slime’s stats, a cold chill ran down my back.

  Before cleaning, their skills were:

  Disease Resistance 5, Poison Resistance 5, Foul Feeder 5, Cleanse 6, Deodorize 6, Deodorant Solution 4, Stench Release 4, Nutrient Reduction 3, Jump 2, Consume 6, Absorb 3, Split 6

  But now their skills were:

  Disease Resistance 7, Poison Resistance 6, Foul Feeder 6, Cleanse 7, Deodorize 7, Deodorant Solution 4, Stench Release 6, Nutrient Reduction 5, Jump 2, Consume 7, Absorb 3, Split 6

  Their skills had increased in level across the board. But the most important one was disease resistance. It had increased by 2 levels at once. The others were fine, so there was no problem. But for disease resistance to rise, there had to be a source of disease. In other words, that meant... this place was a breeding ground for diseases!

  No, I knew that. It was hard to admit here, but places where filth builds up become hotbeds for disease. But... last time I asked Elise about scavenger slime skills, she told me that disease resistance level 5 gave immunity to pretty much most serious diseases (life-threatening, of course). For it to rise 2 levels from that... there had to be bacteria here that could create an epidemic! This was really bad... Wait, what about the other cesspits?! Oh no, I have to tell someone about this... but first, disinfection! It’d be no joke if I ran out of here and spread the bacteria everywhere!

  I returned to the entrance in a hurry while trying to calm myself, then checked on the slimes’ condition with Monster Appraisal. Okay, they didn’t seem to have any active diseases at this point. First, I had the cleaner slime cleanse the slime basket, slimes, and all of myself. After that, I thoroughly disinfected the area around the entrance and used the neutral magic Appraisal to confirm all my belongings and slimes were clear. I checked for the words ‘dirty,’ ‘unclean,’ or ‘germs’ in the information details. Thankfully they all said ‘clean,’ so it looked like the cleansing by the cleaner and scavenger slimes was effective.

  I locked the entrance and put up a barrier just in case, before rushing to the guild. I attracted a lot of attention on my way to the guild. Since I was in a hurry, I hadn’t changed. But now wasn’t the time to worry about that. I had to make my report to the guildmaster and ducal house as soon as possible.

  That was my only thought as I ran, but I realized something as I neared the guild. If I started ranting about epidemics to the guild receptionist, at best bad rumors would start and at worst great confusion could break out. That’s why I should pretend to be a young adventurer on his way back after work...

  I dropped my pace to a walk before the guild and stepped inside calmly. Gazes gathered on me for entering the guild with odd clothes, someone even pointing a finger and laughing. But I ignored them and headed for the receptionist. I didn’t have time to care for them. It was all I could do to keep my panic from showing.

  “Excuse me.”

  “Oh my, Ryoma... What’s that odd outfit?”

  “These are my work clothes! What do you think? They’re not the most stylish, but they’re easy to move in and can get as dirty as needed, so much that I can even wade through a swamp!”

  “If you say so...”

  Several people around us were also nodding in agreement.

  “By the way, I’d like to report today’s job to the guildmaster. Does he have time right now?”

  “Huh? The guildmaster?”

  “Could you ask the guildmaster for me? Tell him I have something I want to say.”

  “Really? Hmm... I’ll ask him, but he’s with some guests right now so you might wait a bit.”

  “That’s fine, thank you.”

  The receptionist went through to the back and returned a long moment later.

  “They said it’s okay, Ryoma. Come on in.”

  Luckily, I was able to meet him right away.

  But before I reached the guildmaster’s office, the receptionist pulled me aside.

  “There are some extremely important people visiting the guildmaster right now, so make sure you act very politely, okay? I doubt I’ll need to worry about you, but just in case, yeah?”

  “Thank you for the warning. I’ll be careful.”

  Then we arrived at the guildmaster’s office, where the receptionist knocked on the door.

  “Excuse me, I’ve brought Ryoma.”

  “Come in.”

  We followed the guildmaster’s voice inside.

  There in the room were the four people of the Jamil family and Sebas.

  “Good work, Ryoma.”

  “Everyone... why are you here?”

  “We came to listen to the guildmaster’s words about what you told us yesterday. All of our escorts have also been sent to gather information.”

  “I see...”

  It was a little unexpected, but this was convenient!

  “And...? What’s the matter?”

  “There’s something I’d like you to listen to with confidentiality.”

  “Did something happen? And what are those clothes? With your basket from yesterday and clothes today, don’t you think your outfits have grown more and more eccentric?”

  “These are work clothes I made for cleaning. They were built for function over fashion, so please look past the clumsy shape... What’s more important right now is that I just came from cleaning the town’s communal toilet cesspit.”

  I changed the topic rather forcefully. The guildmaster and ducal house seemed to sense my mood and wore serious expressions to match.

  “Yeah, the thing I told you about yesterday. What about it?”

  “My cleaning method is to use water magic and my familiars, the scavenger slimes. Scavenger slimes will eat unclean items like animal excretions and rotten meat, and they possess the skill for cleansing. I’ve been cleaning with this method.”

  “I’ve never heard of that slime before... Well, I get how you cleaned now.”

  “The real matter starts here. Filth is of course unclean and becomes a breeding ground for disease. If the scavenger slime eats that, their disease resistance skill would naturally increase. Up until today, my scavenger slimes had level 5 disease resistance. But after today’s job, it went up by two whole levels at once.”

  Shocked gasps rose at my statement, a nervous tension running through the room.

  “What?!”

  “Is that true?!”

  “It’s true. There is a disease in th
at pit toilet capable of raising disease resistance from level 5 to level 7. Thankfully I noticed before leaving the pit, so I had my cleaner slimes with the same cleansing skill as the scavenger slimes to take care of the dirt on all of my belongings and confirmed they were clean with the neutral magic Appraisal. I also used Appraisal on the entrance to check the slimes cleaned properly. I did what I could in that situation before coming here. The cleaning is done, but just in case I locked the pit entrance and put a barrier over it to seal it.”

  “I see. Good job. But if disease is running rampant within there...”

  “Guildmaster... Luckily, it seems my slimes can clean properly. That is why I would like to continue doing the job, but could you make it forbidden to approach the cesspit until it’s completely done, and set some guards to make sure no one goes inside?”

  “Of course I can do that. But do you really want to continue cleaning, knowing there’s an outbreak of disease inside?”

  “Why don’t you just leave the work to the slimes instead? You can give them orders from afar, right?”

  “Cleaning up disease is far too dangerous!”

  “We can take responsibility and send personnel to deal with it...”

  Everyone tried to stop me, but I couldn’t let them. There was something I could do about this. As long as I knew that, it would pain me to leave it to someone else.

  “Unfortunately, just slimes aren’t enough to clean it completely. The filth has built up so that it’s stuck to the walls and ceilings. And if I don’t wash it off with water magic, the slimes can’t eat it. If it’s not cleaned completely, the disease will spread. I am grateful for your concern, but please let me do this. If you blindly add more people to the task, you risk spreading the disease outside. If it were just me and my slimes, I can take care of that risk. Anyway, I will be fine... It’s true that it could be done by anyone, but I’m probably the safest and fastest choice.”

  After I said that, I pulled out my status board to show 4 of my skills to persuade them.

  Health 7

  Life Enhancement 3

  Super Recovery 3

  Stamina Enhancement 6

  Everyone who saw that — especially the guildmaster — reacted with surprise.

  “What...?!”

  “Health 7, this is a skill that counters diseases and poisons detrimental to health. At this level, I should certainly be at less risk than other people of contracting a disease. Even if I were to get sick, my life enhancement level 3 and super recovery level 3 will make me sturdier and recover faster. The stamina enhancement will help there. Going two to three days without sleep is absolutely fine for me, which will make my work that much faster. I doubt it will be easy to find someone more suitable than me, so how about it?”

  The people in the room fell silent at my words. It seemed like they couldn’t object. But even if they accepted it logically, they didn’t seem to accept it emotionally, as they all had sour expressions on their faces. The silence continued for a moment, until Reinbach opened his mouth.

  “Well... it certainly is difficult to deny that there wouldn’t be anyone more suited after being shown this. It looks like we will be forcing all the dangers onto you, but we entrust this task to you.”

  Reinbach stood up from his seat and bowed his head deeply.

  “Leave it to me.”

  “...I thought a child would be more susceptible to disease, but you certainly would be the safest option with these skills. All right. Ryoma, you can leave the guards to me. I’ll have a word with some tight-lipped people with high disease resistance. If we’re doing this, it’d be better to not to cause a commotion.”

  “Yes. Thankfully, the communal toilet facilities were built properly so nothing spread. I’m glad we caught on to this early.”

  “Agreed. It would’ve been too late if the epidemic spread through the town.”

  “Yes. Since the cleaner slimes that were in the same pit toilet didn’t increase in disease resistance level like the scavenger slimes, the disease that’s spread through the pit isn’t an airborne one. As long as the filth is disposed of, it should be safe.”

  “What do you mean by airborne?”

  Did the word airborne not exist here? This world did have magic and other medicines impossible on Earth, after all. Based on our conversation up until now, they seemed to treat diseases superstitiously here. I’d heard that Japan treated measles similarly in the past, so it’s possible that their knowledge of pathogens was just less developed than Earth.

  “You know how epidemics spread really quickly? That spread of disease is called infection. The process can happen by spreading from person to person, or by food and water like a poison, or one of many other ways. Among these ways, the poison of epidemics spreads through the air, infecting people who breathe it in. In this case, it makes it very easy for epidemics to spread and very difficult to treat. But this time, my cleaner slimes that didn’t come in contact with the large volumes of filth did not rise in disease resistance level. That’s why I believe this is a case of either infection by direct contact with something unclean, or something to do with ingesting food or drink that had poison in it. In this case, as long as the source of infection — the filth — is cleaned, it shouldn’t be a problem. Thanks to the communal toilets being a pit, the filth falls down right away without contact from anyone else, so as long as I’m careful not to bring the epidemic out with me, it should be possible to deal with. I am no expert though, so this is all incomplete knowledge.”

  “Nothing about that sounds incomplete to me. I’ve never even heard of such a thing before.”

  “Ryoma, I... No, everyone here thinks the same. Where did you gain such knowledge?”

  So their understanding of disease was still undeveloped...

  “I learned from my grandmother. She researched medicines, so she was knowledgeable about diseases. Though I suppose saying I ‘learned’ it isn’t very accurate; my knowledge comes from our casual chats while I helped her prepare medicines.”

  Everyone seemed to accept my words for now. Or perhaps they never intended to question me more, as the topic changed to future plans.

  After we went through several options, it was decided the next step would take place tomorrow, so for today I would return to the inn with the ducal house to rest. In addition to this, there was still the fact that I was potentially infected at the moment. That’s why I suggested I change inns to prevent any possible spread to everyone at the inn, but all 7 of them — including the 2 maids — objected firmly. They understood what I was saying and my reason for it. But what was I going to do if symptoms broke out? I should stay somewhere within their reach, so that they could respond. That was the least they could do for me, they said.

  ...In the end, I folded under the angry tears of Elise and her daughter, while being very grateful for their sentiments.

  Chapter 1 Episode 18: Face-to-Face Meeting

  The next day. Eight men and women were gathered at the Adventurers’ Guild first thing in the morning.

  “Yo, Welanna. You guys here too?”

  “Well, if it isn’t Jeff. You were invited too? What do you think today’s about?”

  “Dunno, and neither do the others. There’s nothing we have in common, not rank, nor age, nor race. We were trying to figure out the criteria for our selection. Do you have any ideas? You lot are the only ones invited as a party.”

  “We don’t know either. The most we have in common is being female beastkin. But that’s unrelated, no?”

  “Yeah. I’m a man, and a human to boot. The others are two humans, a dwarf, and a dragonewt. Gender and species are definitely unrelated.”

  Just then, one more female beastkin entered the room.

  “Good morning! Nya? Welannya, Mizelia, and Cilia were called here too?”

  “You were summoned too, Miya?”

  “That’s right, nya. I got back yesterday evening and the receptionist told me to come here today. I didn’t expect the three of you
to be here too, nya.”

  “Neither did we... Hm? Hey, aren’t you smelling a lot better now? Did you finally move away from that trash mansion?”

  “You refused to listen when we told you to move away from that place...”

  “Did you finally reach your limit?”

  “No, nya. I’m still living in that house now. I know it was like that, but I still paid a pretty penny for it. It’d be a waste not to live there, nya.”

  “Then why has the smell weakened so much?”

  “Actually, the day before yesterday, someone accepted the cleaning request I put through the guild, nya. They cleaned it up neatly for me.”

  “They cleaned that hellish room with the infinite stench of death? Wow.”

  “I was surprised too, nya. But they really cleaned everything in under two hours, even fixing the hole in the wall for me. Apparently it was cleaned with magic? The room was sparkling after, nya.”

  “That’s amazing in itself. Who was it?”

  “A new kid, it seemed. He was probably under 13 years old, and had a big basket weaved from wood and vine, nya.”

  The man called Jeff reacted to those characteristics.

  “Oh? Under 13 with a big basket? Was that guy called Ryoma by any chance?”

  “That’s right, nya! That was what he called himself.”

  “What, you know of him, Jeff?”

  “Only in passing. I saw him being called out by the old man the other day and he looked pretty lost, so I told him the old man was just being a meddling busybody. He sure talked politely for a brat, though.”

  “He really was a polite kid, nya.”

  Just then, one more person entered the room. When Miya saw him, she yelled.

  “Excuse me, I’m...”

  “Ah! It’s the kid, nya!”

  “Miya? You and Jeff are here too, I see.”

  “Hey, sup. So you were called too. We were just talking about you.”

  “About me?”