“What else did mew find?” Pardoe asked, leaning forward. His eyes were sparkling with keen interest.
“Well... we did find some other things, but could we deal with that armor first? We want to make sure we’re properly protected.”
“Meow~ We’ll save the rest as a treat for later, then. So where’s this armurrr?
“It’s in the carriage up front. Hey, Rulitora!”
We had taken the armor out of the Unlimited Bath beforehand, so I shouted for Rulitora to come over. Soon enough, he came inside with the full set of armor in hand.
Pardoe and Crissa opened their eyes wide at Rulitora’s giant stature. Crissa even hid herself behind Pardoe, frightened. Pardoe quickly collected himself, though, and began inspecting the armor at once.
He used something that looked like a golden magnifying glass, a magic circle drawn on parchment, and a crystal ball faintly tinted crimson. All of them were tools I had never seen before. They were likely helping him determine what kind of spell had been cast on the armor.
He was in his forties, but he was about the size of a human child, so I couldn’t help but think he looked like a child playing with his toys. His eyes had sparkled like a kid’s when I told him about the magic armor, too.
Anyway, it was the black set of armor with two horns pointing out from the helmet. Rakti had confirmed that the armor had some spell cast on it, but she wasn’t able to tell what. The design was enough that I wouldn’t be surprised if it was actually cursed.
“Will this take time?” I asked the cleric in a low voice.
“No, inspections can be finished almost immediately. That’s what all those tools are for.” He answered me in a similarly low voice, covering his mouth.
Analysis didn’t take much time by itself, since the tools did most of the work. It was possible to not use tools and cast spells to directly analyze the item instead, but that took too much time and would wear out the practitioner quickly. On that note, the spells used were categorized under “artisan magic” here, not cleric magic.
“Hmm...” Pardoe was deep in thought as he inspected the armor.
“Is there something wrong?”
“Not wrong, but... you could say it’s cursed, in a sense?”
“I wouldn’t be surprised if it were, but what do you mean by that?”
“Well, it’s not actually cursed. It’s got a propurr spell cast on it.” Pardoe faced us and started explaining the details on the spell. “This set of armor can deter all attacks.”
“Whoa! That’s like legendary armor, isn’t it?!” Clena jumped up from the table and yelled out in shock.
Even I could tell it was something special. Speaking in game terminology, it was like gear that negated all types of damage. It’d be something you couldn’t obtain until endgame.
“In exchange, it sucks MP from its wearer after every attack.”
“...So every time you’d take damage?”
“The amount it absorbs depends on each attack as well... if I were to give this armor an inscription, it’d be the ‘magic eater.’”
“...Well, I get that this is some pretty dangerous armor, at least.”
I understood why Pardoe said it was cursed in a sense. I could tell why it had been left in the armory unused now. You couldn’t control how much MP it sucked away from you, after all.
“Honestly, you could collapse at any time if you wore this. I wouldn’t recommend this armor... It would take some time, but I could make a mew set for you as well,” Pardoe told us in a worried tone. But in response, I showed him my status card.
“...No, don’t worry about it. Work on it for me.”
Pardoe and Crissa peered at my status card next to each other, and then their tails whipped upward. Crissa’s tail lifted up her skirt. Well, it wasn’t a surprising reaction, seeing as how my stats were shooting off the card itself.
“...U-understood. I’ll take care of it. So you want me to tailor it to your size?”
I was wondering if it was possible to modify a piece of armor with a spell cast on it, but Pardoe was showing no signs of getting worked up despite being a little baffled. He sure was professional.
“I should call Shakova over for this.”
“Shakova?”
“Shakova Remus. He’s second to none when it comes to fiddling with magic equipment.”
According to Pardoe, he was another ketolt blacksmith good enough to have a family name. Pardoe was at the top in magic appraisals and handling, but Shakova beat him in craftsmanship and ornamentation.
“I see. Please do, then.”
“So about the price...”
After we agreed, Crissa came forward holding something in her hands. It looked similar to an abacus with round stones inside the frame.
She was in charge of all monetary matters. What an upstanding lady. Rather, Pardoe seemed like he was the typical workaholic handyman who couldn’t be bothered to calculate anything.
In any case, the total cost ended up being quite high, maybe because we were dealing with a magic item. The tailoring itself cost ten times as much as the brigandine I bought in Jupiteropolis. The fee for bringing in Shakova’s services also contributed to the final amount. It was like a technical fee.
I looked over at Clena just in case, and she nodded at me in response. So the price was fair.
“Why don’t we have him inspect that black thing while we’re at it?”
“You mean the metal grave marker?”
“Yeah, that. The grave marker.”
We figured it might need some fine-tuning, so we had Pardoe take a look at it as well. He confirmed that the grave marker had been cast with a spell that unleashed tremendous power against demons. It was definitely something the first sacred king had used, judging by the “Demon King of the Sixth Heaven” inscription as well.
This would be proof that Hadesopolis was once the home of the demon lord. I’d tell both temples about this and have them spread the word.
I had some other ideas about the grave marker as well, but I wanted to focus on the armor for now. If this went well, then we would have them work on our other equipment too. I agreed to the price without trying to haggle. I paid a portion of it as deposit.
Clena also suggested we show him one of the chests of gold coins we’d found, and he confirmed that it was the real deal.
After that, Pardoe took my measurements. I wondered how he would do it with his small body, but he took out a stepladder. I knew he was a middle-aged man, but I couldn’t keep myself from smiling as his tail swayed back and forth.
After that, we left the “magic eater” armor to Pardoe and returned to the Goddess of Fire’s temple. The elder greeted us when we arrived. He was a tanned, muscular man with a boisterous laugh. All the other temples were similar enough to each other, but the temple of the Goddess of Fire felt particularly broadminded. They had a fiery atmosphere, you could say.
Of course Rakti entered the temple along with us, but no one took any notice of her true identity. I asked her about it, and she said concealing herself was a simple task.
Since the blessing ritual wasn’t until tomorrow, we were guided to our room after our meeting with the elder. It was another fancy VIP room reserved for pilgrims. The room itself was similar to the one we had stayed in at the earth temple. There were separate living and bedrooms.
“And of course, there’s this,” I muttered, looking at the relief hung on the pillar above the fireplace. The relief depicted the five goddess—or rather six goddesses, except the last had been cut off.
The bottom of the relief should have depicted the Goddess of Darkness, Rakti, but it had been broken off. Rakti looked at the relief from beside me with a complex expression.
“It’s kind of weird looking at it again, though.”
“What do you mean?” Clena asked from behind me.
I continued staring at the relief and said assertively, “They look nothing like the actual goddesses.”
I had only seen th
e Goddess of Light and the Goddess of Earth in my dream, but they looked nothing like these depictions. The Goddess of Light looked more majestic and had a harsher personality, while the Goddess of Earth was like a kind older sister. I looked at Rakti, who was nodding in agreement to my words. She didn’t think they looked alike either.
“By the way, are they ordered by age here?”
“They should be.”
“Light, Fire, Wind, Water, Earth, was it? Earth didn’t seem like she’d be the second youngest at all.”
“That’s right. She’s the closest to Rakti in age.”
Come to think of it, she had been soothing Rakti while the Goddess of Light was scolding her in my dream. Maybe she was the motherly type by nature.
“It’s okay to be surprised, Touya. Sister Earth is very mature.”
“...Whoever carved this had never seen the goddesses before.”
“That’s true. We haven’t shown ourselves to humans for a long, long time now. It’s the first time I’ve heard of someone seeing us in a dream, too.”
“Not even San Pilaca did?”
“Oh, the one who received all of my sisters’ blessings... no, I don’t believe they met my sisters either. Also, they kept on ignoring me...”
Rakti had a mix of emotions on her face. They were enemies back then, so not much could have been done about that.
So even San Pilaca never met the goddesses in a dream, huh. What in the world was that dream, anyway?
“What kind of person is the Goddess of Fire?” Roni asked.
“Sister Fire is always really cheerful and energetic...” Rakti looked over to her and replied. She seemed to cheer up a little. She must have been good friends with the Goddess of Fire.
“I bet she doesn’t look anything like this relief either, right?”
“Oh, she doesn’t. Not at all.”
“Now I want to see this relief with all six goddesses on it. Not that it would make them look any more accurate or anything.”
“I don’t remember seeing anything in the temple in Hadesopolis...”
“Actually, there was a relief of just one person in the temple ruins.”
Rium and Rulitora joined the conversation.
“Oh yeah, I think I remember that...” I searched my memories and just barely recalled seeing a relief in the temple.
“I’m sorry. That was me.” Rakti started apologizing for some reason. She had no reason to, though. I wondered if it was just a habit.
“...That depiction couldn’t have been further off, though.”
Rakti wasn’t even that old, for one.
“I’m so sorry...”
“Okay, stop there. The real one is much cuter, so keep your chin up.”
I had to make sure Rakti didn’t fall into one of her holes again.
I woke up in the temple of the Goddess of Fire’s VIP room the next day. The layout of the room was mostly similar to what we had seen in the Goddess of Light’s temple in Ceresopolis. By the standards of this world, this was essentially a five-star hotel.
My bed was the second from the wall. Rulitora was lying face-down on the bed closest to the wall. His long striped tail was spilling from the edge of the bed as he slept. His posture was as sloppy as ever, like a father who was taking a much-needed break from work on the weekend. The ceremony for the Goddess of Fire’s blessing wouldn’t be until afternoon. Since we were always relying on Rulitora day in and day out, I let him sleep for now.
Rium had buried herself into my bed. She had originally come here to deliver the holy tool I needed to communicate with Haruno’s party. She ended up tagging along during our investigation into Hadesopolis, but still wasn’t showing any sign of going back now that that was over. She was hardly being a bother, not to mention we had gone farther east and away from Athena, where Haruno was, after crossing the void, and I wasn’t about to let Rium go back on her own. I’d sent Haruno a message last night saying as much, and received a reply asking us to take care of Rium for the time being.
I looked over at the bed beside me to see Rakti’s sleeping face. It felt a little wrong to say this about a goddess, but she truly looked like an angel as she slept.
One bed down from her was Clena, who had woken up and was rubbing her eyes, still half-asleep. She had a bit of a bedhead.
Roni should have been sleeping in the next bed, but she was nowhere to be seen. She had probably gotten up already. Though the temple was taking care of our meals, she still had plenty of tasks on her plate, such as mending our clothes. She was as much of a workaholic as ever. I’d need to thank her later.
“Morning, Clena. You look sleepy.”
“Good morning. I guess I am, but...”
“What’s wrong?”
Clena was staring at me for some reason. Was that a hint of jealousy in her eyes, or was I imagining things?
“I realized something. Even the VIP room in a temple can’t compare to how secure I feel sleeping in the Unlimited Bath...”
“Oh...” I mumbled, understanding how she felt.
I wasn’t complaining, but now that we knew that the temples were hiding a sixth goddess, this wasn’t exactly a place we could rest peacefully. The fact that we had brought along Rakti Loa, the Goddess of Darkness and the youngest goddess sister concealed by history, wasn’t helping. In contrast, my Unlimited Bath, which blocked all interference with the outside world, was a space where we could rest without having to worry about anybody bothering us. Though I had gotten desensitized to the fact that the Goddess of Darkness was right next to me, there was one thing I couldn’t forget. The Olympus Alliance had made all knowledge and documents pertaining to this goddess taboo.
“Would you rather sleep in there starting tonight?”
“I don’t mind either way. I appreciate having a real bed, too.”
It was exciting to stay in a room in a foreign land, but it was also perfectly reasonable to prefer the Unlimited Bath for its security.
“Oh yeah, who should we go to for new bedding?”
“The Ficus Brand could take care of that.”
According to Clena, the legendary pervert Ficus, who had focused exclusively on crafting women’s undergarments, was also the name to trust for all things sleep-related. It’d be a different story if we had to consider traveling, but they were the best in the business for bedding and garments for indoor use. Now that we had a Japanese-style bedroom, I wanted to get us better bedding instead of sleeping on the blankets we had been using up until now. If it was possible, I wanted a set of Japanese futons.
Clena looked like she was about to change, so I opened the door to the Unlimited Bath. In the past, the girls would change while I stayed outside, but now the Unlimited Bath was divided into a few rooms. There was a big changing room, a bathing room, and a Japanese-style bedroom. Clena usually used the bedroom, so I got dressed in the changing room.
I quickly put on my clothes and washed my face to freshen up, then looked around the changing room, where all our luggage had been piled up. It was filled with the treasures we had scavenged from Hadesopolis. We’d thought about exchanging all of them for gems, but how would we even approach getting rid of so much? It was a crazy amount, including what we had already transported outside. So much that they wouldn’t all fit inside the carriage no matter how tightly we packed them. If we were asked how we’d managed to carry so much, I’d have to reveal at least a little bit about my gift. Because of that, we’d need to find someone trustworthy.
We thought about selling a portion of it ourselves as well, but who knew how quickly we’d be able to free up space in our room that way? I wanted to free up some space as quickly as possible, so we’d need to find a way to sell them off all at once.
“Is the sink free?”
Clena finished dressing herself and came back out. She was wearing a clean-looking white dress. The dress looked rather fancy, judging by the complex embroidery around the chest. She had brought it with her after fleeing from home, but didn’t have
the opportunity to wear it until now. She had wanted to avoid attracting attention when she was traveling, since the dress looked so expensive at a glance. Two girls traveling together, one wearing an expensive dress. That would have indeed attracted some second glances. But now that she was staying in the VIP room of a temple, the light dress was perfect for the hot temperatures in Hephaestusopolis.
I’d already finished washing my face, so I let Clena use the sink. She finished washing her face as well, then clutched the embroidery on her chest and said to me with a shy smile, “I wasn’t really fond of this dress in the past.”
“Really? I think it looks cute.”
“But it emphasizes my chest so much,” she said, pouting. The dress was sleeveless.
Oh yeah, she had said that she had a complex about her figure because the other daughters of aristocrats were so much thinner than her. She had probably avoided wearing clothes that exposed her arms. Just how thin were those other girls?
Her reputation had likely suffered since everyone knew her father was missing, and people were more inclined to make fun of her figure because of it.
“...Well, if you say it’s cute, Touya, then I guess it’s fine.”
She said something cute.
“...What are you staring at me so much for?”
“No, I was just thinking you were cute.”
“What? Are you still half-asleep?” she grumbled, but her cheeks flushed red.
Her silver hair was cut into a short bob that curled inward. I might have just been boasting, but the shampoo made from my MP had gradually made her hair glossier and given it a healthy sheen. Yeah, she was cute.
She acted strong and had prim and proper looks, yet had the cuteness of a young lady as well. She was now finally able to wear a sleeveless dress after I kept telling her I liked her physique, and that was something to be proud of. Maybe it was wrong of me to think this, but there was a chance some of the girls among Clena’s bullies were simply jealous of her. Though that might have just been a gap in the way I, a person from another world, thought compared to them, so I opted to keep silent.
The Chaotic Stone Sauna Page 3