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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: FusionX
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Hope is important for humans. The hope that things can get better than they are now. Even if the present is a complete mess, as long as there is hope that it can improve, humans can carry on living.
This didn’t just apply to Athena and Kayla.
For me too, hope was extremely important.
‘It’s okay, you can do well. One thing at a time, slowly.’
Let’s not be impatient.
Recalling that mindset I had engraved countless times, I slowly drifted off to sleep.
As soon as the day changed, I went to the inn and tavern to find the mercenaries.
Disan had already left, thanks to Angolf waking him up early at my request.
“Did he leave any message?”
“He did express his gratitude, saying that he heard Sir Jimnis had prepared a separate room.”
Seeing that there was no other message, either he didn’t remember mentioning the secret passage, or even if he did, he didn’t consider it important.
Whether it was the former or the latter, it was inevitable for Disan to become an idiot in my mind.
‘Objectively speaking, he is indeed an idiot.’
I woke up the mercenaries and bought them breakfast as a hangover cure.
They all had expressions of being touched, as if they hadn’t expected this level of consideration, and I comforted them with a smile, saying it was nothing.
“I hope we didn’t cause any trouble.”
“I won’t say anything about what happened at a drinking session. Don’t worry and go back to help Sir Kuman.”
Actually, except for Disan, I didn’t really pay attention, so I hardly remember what they did among themselves.
They just got drunk on alcohol and the atmosphere and played among themselves, and as long as they didn’t cause trouble to other tables besides ours, that was enough.
“Oh, yes. We believed that Sir Jimnis wouldn’t be that kind of person!”
I responded appropriately with a smile to Danian’s flattery.
After finishing the meal, I sent them back and headed to the house where my companions were waiting, leaving the pioneer castle.
When I returned, I could already see my companions training.
“I told you to rest for a day.”
“Didn’t we rest yesterday when we returned? Moreover, the training intensity is lower than usual, and we’re taking longer breaks.”
It was funny to say anything when they were diligently adjusting and doing it themselves, so I just let it be.
‘Well, it’s better than being lazy.’
I decided to think positively and looked at Athena and Thea.
“I roughly informed them of your existence.”
“So now we can also confidently enter the pioneer castle?”
“That’s right.”
“But how did you explain it? They don’t suspect you bought Thea?”
I explained the fabricated story of Athena’s recruitment.
“…To think you explained it like that… Hmm, certainly there’s no room for suspicion.”
“They’ll think I have no reason to lie. And we actually finished scouting early too.”
“That’s actually because we went to the cave and got delayed.”
“I’ve already ordered furniture, so as soon as it’s ready, we’ll move there.”
At that moment, Kayla spoke.
“Still, it would be better to train here. There’s a yard over there too, but there are so many people around…”
It couldn’t be helped since the house’s location was close to the center of the pioneer castle.
“Ah, I’m not planning to abandon this place either.”
In the first place, the basement wasn’t properly prepared there yet.
‘No time, but lots of work…’
I thought it would be nice if the monster wave happened a bit sooner, but I was stupid.
‘It would be fine even if the monster wave was delayed by about half a year compared to the schedule.’
I thought I was quite selfish.
It was normal for humans to be selfish, so I let it be.
“Then I’ll go to the basement. I have a lot to do.”
“Understood. Master, please don’t overdo it either.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll adjust accordingly. Ah, right. Kayla, have Athena focus on mana control training.”
“Mana control… Could it be.”
Kayla was quick-witted. Since she had explored the cave with me, she knew I had obtained the blue roots of Trenelsi.
Moreover, as a former knight, she would know the basic information about spirit medicine.
“I wonder if you’re not greedy… Understood. I will do as instructed.”
“I’m very greedy. That’s why I’m doing this. And come to the basement around evening.”
“The basement, you said?”
Kayla seemed slightly surprised.
That’s understandable. Until now, I had been very reluctant to let anyone else into the basement.
I had even told them not to call me until I came out unless it was something extraordinary.
For me, who had been like that, to call her, it was natural to be surprised.
“Yeah. To the basement. Come by before the training ends and the sun sets.”
As I answered, I glanced at her leg, and Kayla, who noticed what my gaze meant, nodded her head.
“Understood.”
Having said everything I needed to, it was time to do my own work.
Before entering the basement, I vaguely heard them saying things like how I could rest when showing such behavior, or talking about in-laws.
However, as soon as I entered the basement, the idle thoughts quickly disappeared.
First, I reinstalled the barrier I had removed to make it impossible to feel magical energy from the outside.
After that, I took out the skeleton, checked its condition, and considered the materials for the new skeleton I would create.
‘The performance would be better with monster bones, but to utilize my experience, human bones would be…’
It’s not difficult to obtain corpses.
As the person who saw the horned orc in the Evergreen Forest Village die, it’s common for people to die in this world, and obtaining a corpse isn’t a difficult task.
Especially in a frontier like this, it’s even easier.
‘Still, I need the best possible corpse…’
If the original owner of the corpse or their family heard my thoughts, they would have been terrified.
It was one of the reasons why necromancers were ostracized.
I checked the undead I would create in the future and the reagents I had to see how much I could strengthen them.
‘It would be difficult to match 1st grade.’
It was a temporary name, referring to the undead created from Nenson’s corpse.
‘Well, this one was reinforced with a ton of reagents for training purposes.’
It was a skeleton that was literally strengthened by splurging money.
If I used the same materials at my current level, I could strengthen it to the current level even with half the amount, but at that time, it was the best I could do.
Still, thanks to splurging money like that, I quickly became stronger and gained more benefits, so it was ultimately a wise choice.
‘The materials are lacking, but since my skills have grown, I should be able to strengthen this and that.’
I had also obtained a staff that would amplify my abilities.
Come to think of it, since my magic would be amplified through the staff, I could probably further strengthen the 1st one using it.
‘Phew… One thing at a time…’
I worked on the 1st one and made plans to strengthen the 2nd one.
At the same time, I also pondered ways to recover the weakened power of the staff more quickly.
‘Hmm… It doesn’t seem to be a Black Dragon from the demon realm… Could it be that they killed a dragon from the middle realm and contaminated its corpse?’
It’s theoretically possible… but it’s something that’s only possible in theory.
‘Just how strong was that Lich?’
Dragons use magic in a different way than humans. To be precise, the magic used by humans originated from dragons.
In ancient times, humans who awakened mana saw the magic of dragons and various natural phenomena and created magic to imitate them, which is known to be the origin of magic.
‘Well, now dragons have been in hiding for over a hundred years.’
Anyway, because of that, dragons’ magic resistance isn’t ordinary.
To the point where an average magician can’t even inflict a single wound.
Of course, if they die, that resistance greatly decreases, but they still possess much stronger resistance than average monsters.
Contaminating a dragon’s body with magical energy and turning it into a staff isn’t an easy task.
‘They even made the heart accept magical energy.’
It wasn’t ambiguous at all, and it could accept the pure magical energy I possessed without any issues, so it could be considered to be perfectly contaminated.
‘The current amplification rate isn’t bad either, but considering it’s made from a dragon’s body, it’s too weak. Even with a dragon’s heart embedded in it. Well, thanks to that, it slowly recovers just by being fed magical energy… Is there no way to do it faster?’
Moreover, there would definitely be a limit to just feeding it magical energy. Because all the magic engraved during the staff’s creation process had been destroyed.
It couldn’t be helped. I had to destroy all the security on this staff to use it freely.
In that process, all the engraved magic inevitably got ruined. I couldn’t distinguish all of it in a short period of time.
‘It’s not like the engraved things were trivial enough to grasp in a short time.’
The Lich’s level was beyond my imagination.
That’s why it was best to destroy everything.
‘Well, it’s better to modify it to my liking.’
However, to do that, I needed to first restore the staff to a certain level.
I was trying to shorten that time.
Several methods came to mind, but they all required a lot of money or preparation, making them unsuitable for me at the moment.
‘In the end, it comes back to the basics.’
Constantly infusing it with magical energy.
The method of soaking the staff in blood tainted with magical energy is bad.
There was a possibility of mixing impure energy.
It’s more helpful to just expose it to the pure magical energy coming from my contract’s seal.
Around the time I had planned the creation of the second permanent undead and infused magical energy into the staff.
Knock knock.
“Come in.”
Creak.
It seemed the sun had already set.
“I came as you ordered.”
“Good job. Sit over there for now.”
Kayla seemed quite intrigued by the interior of the basement, as she was slightly looking around.
‘Well, there’s nothing much though.’
Still, the sight of various research equipment and remaining reagents that I had first purchased from Kuman, and the skeleton standing on one side, definitely made this place look like a magician’s laboratory or workshop.
“That is…”
She looked at the staff that was being exposed to the magical energy I was emitting on one side.
“Ah. Since it’s old, its functions have deteriorated, so I’m repairing it.”
“You mean exposing it to magical energy?”
“It’s not an ordinary staff.”
“I heard it was made from a dragon’s… corpse.”
Since dragons haven’t revealed themselves for over a hundred years, the name “dragon” definitely arouses curiosity.
‘I should secure that too.’
A dragon’s corpse.
There was only one dragon corpse that would be discovered in the future.
I knew its location and planned to go find and retrieve it before it was naturally discovered.
It wasn’t small enough to be easily retrieved, so it required thorough preparation and several procedures, but considering the value, I was willing to endure it.
“By the way, why did you call me?”
“Huh? Ah. I need a bit of your blood.”
“My blood… you said?”
Kayla showed a slightly uncomfortable face.
‘Tsk. This is why a profession with a trash reputation is…’
Since there are cases where a curse is placed using the other person’s body as a sacrifice, it’s natural to feel uncomfortable when a Warlock blatantly asks for a part of your body like that.
“Don’t worry. I’m not asking for it to use it for something strange. Ah, if possible, I’d like you to fill it with as much of your mana as possible.”
“You mean mana?”
“You should be able to control that much, right?”
She spoke in a confident voice.
“One of the things I’ve been mindful of since injuring my body is mana control. How much blood should I draw?”
“I don’t need much. I don’t have any proper tools to draw blood either, so just make a small wound and collect a few drops.”
I took out a small container separately, and she used the knife I gave her to make a wound on her hand and drew blood.
It wasn’t a very big wound, so it wouldn’t interfere with training or daily life.
“But I don’t see what my blood has to do with fixing my leg.”
“For now, I’m going to do some tests.”
Kayla showed a puzzled expression at my words.
I mixed the received blood with a prepared solution and sprinkled it on the tendons, muscles, bones, etc. that I had harvested from Denok.
Then, the tendons, muscles, and bones all began to glow faintly.
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