Chapter 79

Full Preparation

Removing all equipment and various buffs, my current pure specs are as follows.

[Caleb Lv.13]

[Strength(0), Agility(0), Wisdom(22), Health(0), Dexterity(0)]

What about the party members?

First, Yernil.

[Yernil Lv.13]

[Strength(0), Agility(20), Wisdom(0), Health(0), Dexterity(2)]

And Aimus and Backstab.

[Aimus Lv.14]

[Strength(18), Agility(2), Wisdom(0), Health(3), Dexterity(0)]

[Backstab Lv.15]

[Strength(0), Agility(20), Wisdom(0), Health(0), Dexterity(4)]

These two were originally much higher level than Yernil or me, but now the gap has narrowed considerably.

At this level, everyone deserves to wash their face and feet in the Blessing Fountain once.

“This way.”

The 4th floor fountain appears at a fixed location within the steel mill. Specifically, the first melting chamber of the magma furnace.

Click.

When I opened the chamber door, tremendous heat poured out.

On both sides of a long path stretching through the center, square-shaped large tanks were filled with bright red lava.

“There’s a well at the end.”

I moved the entire party to the end of the chamber.

And then farmed skills for the party members one by one at the fountain.

If this were a game, it would probably have come out like this.

[Yernil has learned ‘Arrow Recovery’.]

[Aimus has learned ‘Steel Bloodline’.]

[Backstab has learned ‘Sleep Gas’.]

I’m originally a wizard, so I can’t learn skills from fountains, but because of the hourglass, I was able to acquire the ‘Direction Controller’ skill last time.

What about this time?

I stuck my face right into the fountain water.

[No skills available for acquisition.]

[Hourglass proficiency is insufficient.]

It doesn’t work.

The message about insufficient hourglass proficiency makes me fall into thought.

Is that why the hourglass isn’t expanding either?

Unlike Yernil, who entered the hourglass’s ability range early and received my turn-based commands, Backstab and Aimus haven’t reached that stage yet.

If it’s not a lack of trust between the two of them and me, then it must be an issue with the hourglass’s proficiency.

We’ve crossed the line between life and death together so much that I don’t think trust would still be lacking.

“Puha.“

Anyway, I’m busy right now, so I’ll stop the fountain experience here.

“Now let’s go find the other hammer.”

The massive steel mill covering 5 square kilometers can be divided into three main sections when considering only the main building, excluding spaces like the huge collection yard and scrap processing plant.

First is the furnace we just visited. The furnace alone occupies 80% of the main building’s area.

Second is the steel processing room. The convergence core is here, where field monsters are created. Special bosses also emerge from here.

Third is the production control room. It’s about 180 meters down the corridor from the steel processing room, and this is where the production setting box is located. If you remove the golem doll inside and put in magical equipment, replicas will come out from the steel processing room.

“Let’s go to the production control room.”

Vulant’s Hammer is in the control room.

It’s similarly hidden, but finding it isn’t difficult.

***

“Wasn’t this your first time on the 4th floor?”

When I even found Vulant’s Hammer, the Security Headquarters novice finally burst out in admiration.

How could someone who entered the steel mill for the first time find hidden magical facilities and objects that other adventurers don’t know about so precisely!

…That kind of expression.

“How do you know all this?”

“It must be Professor Isilof.”

I thought it would be okay to play the Yoho tribe possessor card, but the cat graduate from Magic University jumped to a different conclusion.

“Even before I graduated, the professor reported about the steel mill well in his papers. And he speculated that Vulant’s Hammer and Gobniu’s Hammer would be hidden in the steel mill.”

There actually was such content in the data collection Isilof gave me.

Research materials and theories about there being a well in the furnace chamber, that Vulant’s Hammer and Gobniu’s Hammer mentioned in ancient texts would also be there, and if divided by zones, one would be in the steel processing room and one in the control room.

Of course, Isilof didn’t know the specific locations, so he couldn’t mention them.

“The professor’s research has finally borne fruit. Did you come here after receiving that data collection?”

“Yes.”

That’s true, I did receive it.

“I knew it! I was also in Professor Isilof’s club when I was at school, Caleb! The professor really knows how to recognize talent. Is the professor doing well?”

The cat started chatting about school connections.

I responded appropriately.

But I’m curious about how Vulant’s Hammer will work.

In the game, it was like a boing hammer – you just touched the characters’ foreheads with it, tap, and a special ability window would pop up for me to choose and modify.

But what about now?

“You lightly touch the forehead with this.”

When I lifted the hammer and turned around, Yernil, Backstab, and Aimus stepped back.

“Calm down and come here.”

Vulant’s Hammer can only be used once per character, and when you take out the hammer once, it can only be used a total of four times.

“I’ll go first.”

Aimus bravely stepped forward.

“That guy has trouble distinguishing between forehead and crown.”

Backstab made a silly joke.

Aimus shot a glare, then sat cross-legged in front of me.

“It awakens the inner talent that an adventurer possesses, right?”

He asked.

Adventurers in this world also have a concept of special abilities. When you think about it, it makes sense. When they see someone like Yernil with abnormally good hearing, they’d feel that person was born with some special power.

They seem to call it inner talent.

Is it because each character’s first special ability is already possessed from birth? The expression ‘talent’ seems appropriate.

‘Aimus has two special abilities.’

One is Mind Training.

It’s an ability that gives advantage to resistance rolls when mental status abnormalities are applied.

Since I succeeded in enchanting such a person, Lady Lenik must have been a fatal woman in her youth.

The second special ability is Steadfast Mantra.

It’s something like a passive buff that partially raises one’s defense.

Thump.

I lightly struck the monk’s forehead with the end of the hammer.

“Hmm…”

Aimus quietly let his consciousness sink deep into his inner self.

He looked like someone under hypnosis.

“Aimus?”

“Eh…”

“Are you okay?”

“…”

Aimus nodded his head like someone dozing off, then suddenly opened his eyes wide.

“It’s done.”

Aimus, having regained his senses, stood up briskly.

“What happened?”

“In Mount Dalai, we do something called mantra training. It’s inscribing specific incantations into the human inner self with words of truth.”

He touched the mantra side of his special abilities.

In the game, I could select all of a party character’s special abilities.

But here, it seems I can’t do that, right? It’s a bit disappointing, but even if I could have chosen, I would have modified the mantra.

“I changed the ‘Steadfast Mantra’ inscribed within me to ‘Karma Mantra.'”

“So what happens now?”

“Enemies who attack me will receive karma.”

It was a somewhat vague answer, but I know what it means.

The defense increase option that Steadfast Mantra had disappears, but instead, the physical and magical defense of enemies who attack Aimus gets reduced.

Good.

“Yernil and Backstab, come here too.”

I swung Vulant’s Hammer like playing whack-a-mole.

Backstab’s special ability ‘Sharp Eyes’ and Yernil’s special ability ‘Curved Artillery‘ were each modified.

And I…

[Special Ability Modification Opportunity!]

[Select a special ability.]

① Turn-Based Hourglass

② Killing Momentum

When I brought the hammer to my forehead, a message appeared next to the hourglass.

***

It doesn’t explain in advance how the ability will change when modified.

Truly befitting the Abyss of Trickery.

Since Vulant’s Hammer can only be used once, I need to choose carefully.

How did Killing Momentum change when modified in the game?

The action points gained when defeating enemies are reduced to 1 point. Instead, it can be used up to 5 times consecutively in one battle. Originally, it was limited to once per battle, so it’s a modification with some merit.

But even in the game, the practical effectiveness wasn’t that great. Because situations where you can use it five times in a row are rare.

What about here?

If I set up storm clouds, I might be able to get 1 kill each with 1 action point Lightning Shock.

But…

‘There’s no guarantee it’ll be modified like in the game.’

Killing Momentum has already changed from the game. Instead of gaining 2 action points when getting kills, it’s acquiring a 2 action point hourglass.

If it were the same as the game, instead of creating a new hourglass, 2 action points should have been added to my hourglass.

‘Should I just modify the Turn-Based Hourglass?’

If both choices are unknowns anyway, there’s no need to think long about it.

Since Vulant’s Hammer generally has good modification effects, it was rational in the game to choose something that becomes the core of abilities if possible.

[Modifying special ability ‘Turn-Based Hourglass.’]

Once I made up my mind, Vulant’s Hammer activated.

***

“Caleb!”

The cat urgently tapped my shoulder.

She was now looking at the scroll instead of me. The screen connected to the watcher floating in the fog above the steel mill.

“It’s here.”

The Watcher caught something.

The scroll showed an ashen sky.

The Watcher seemed to have been floating in the air observing the ground when it detected something and turned its view upward.

What was displayed on the scroll was something like a very small dot.

We had difficulty identifying what it was. But the Watcher even marked it with a red circle.

“What is that?”

All the adventurers looking at the scroll fell into confusion.

“What’s that dot floating there?”

“Is it something like a Wizard’s Eye?”

“Did they also float a Watcher?”

“It seems to be some kind of flying object.”

“…”

I pondered deeply, then asked the cat.

“Did this dot rise from the ground by any chance?”

“No. It just suddenly appeared.”

Then that means the dot also approached us while floating in the air.

It’s not just hovering after rising into the air from a fixed position, but a flying object that can move through the air.

The Watcher’s detection range is 3 kilometers.

If it appears as a dot of that size at that distance, it’s not a magical tool like a Wizard’s Eye.

If it were something like that, it shouldn’t even be visible as a ‘dot‘.

Only the red circle that the Watcher marked should have been visible on the scroll.

In other words, the actual size of the target is much larger than such tools.

About the size of a person.

There are several possibilities, but if that’s something the enemies sent, the most likely is…

“It’s a Zoin tribe member.”

Several questions are resolved.

How the sleep thief party managed such amazing disguises every time.

They had a Zoin tribe party member, and every time they floated that guy in the air for hovering while securing a wide field of vision.

The 4th floor has many open plains, so it would have been simple.

Then they would have cast elaborate large-scale disguises targeting the 4th floor regular parties they caught this way and moved.

“It’s coming down!”

Yernil pointed at the scroll.

The ‘dot’ was slowly descending to the ground.

Probably because the fog spread throughout the steel mill made it difficult to secure vision.

“I’ll summon the Watcher for now.”

I closed the scroll once and opened it again to summon the Watcher.

“Please cast invisibility.”

With Backstab’s help, I made the Watcher invisible.

Click.

I opened the window and sent it outside.

Sitting in front of the scroll, I aimed my wand and controlled the Watcher’s movement.

“…”

I slowly moved it toward the target party.

The landscape from the Watcher’s perspective gradually changed. Past the steel mill’s situation control room side wall, loading dock, inventory warehouse, scrap processing plant, coolant tank, and the street in front of the steel mill. Toward the target party outside the fog.

Toward where the Zoin tribe member descended.

“Slowly.”

There’s no need to rush too much.

The Watcher has already marked the target’s location with a red circle.

The Watcher detects moving, threatening targets within 3 kilometers and displays them on the scroll like this.

And when targets approach within the Watcher’s 150-meter visual range, disguises or invisibility are automatically dispelled.

I have no intention of approaching that close right now.

“Let’s observe from outside the 150-meter range.”

If we get too close and the disguise is immediately dispelled, the enemies will enter an alert state.

‘I’m getting nervous.’

Honestly, my palms are sweating.

The opponent is a wizard with a higher level than me, and a powerful team.

They’re on a different level from old bald slave parties or Sally’s team, and even compared to the Antonelli group that started with one wizard down and dead.

They should be considered the most powerful and stable among the raiders we’ve faced so far.

Having fooled the Adventurer Association and Security Headquarters for so long, the enemies will be quick with numbers and intuition.

Maybe the enemies already know about us.

They’re probably quite wary seeing the fog.

Wizard battles start with information warfare where each side tries to penetrate the other’s Memory Book.

We need to be sufficiently cautious and slowly engage in reconnaissance and combat from the safest distance.

Now outside the fog.

350 meters from the target.

“What the.”

A somewhat shocking scene unfolded in the scroll showing beyond the fog.

The total number of people standing there was seven.

Three of them were familiar faces.

A human female fighter, a canine beastman thief, and Rilwid.

“Those are the guys we handed over to Security Team 2 for escort.”

***

The cat’s face turned pale.

“That’s impossible… No way…”

She quickly pulled out her notebook.

[Dreta. Security Team 2, please respond.]

“Message transmission.”

The cat’s hands trembled as she sent the note.

I finally recall something that had been bothering me all along.

“Neko.”

“…”

“Right now there are 16 remaining parties.”

From when I joined up with Neko, that’s what was displayed on Neko’s shoulder card. Mine too.

[Current 4th Floor Adventurer Parties: 16]

It was the same when Neko showed me her five cards, saying she had that many.

All five cards displayed ’16‘.

But.

“When we handed Rilwid over to Security Team 2, there were 17 remaining parties.”