[Deep-Sea Escape Log, Day 16—Day 16 After Taking a Day Off]
After obtaining the biological fighter, I took a rest to recover my health.
For the first time in a while, I spent a peaceful day without seeing any Cyclops.
But… now there were only two days until the Reaper came to this area.
I didn’t have time to just keep resting.
So this time, I planned to strengthen my tools.
By making the blueprint I’d unlocked while scanning the biological fighter—the “Combat Auxiliary Acceleration/Deceleration Device.”
“Hey, well. Good to see you.”
ㄴScholar of Truth: You didn’t stream yesterday, so I thought you’d really died!
ㄴSword Saint of the Draw: You took quite a beating, but you’ve already recovered.
The broadcast had become familiar to me now.
I greeted the regulars I often saw, then immediately explained what I planned to do this time.
“This time… I’m thinking of going out to look for some minerals.”
The equipment I’d unlocked this time required not only titanium, mana stones, and mana-gathering stones, but also additional minerals like gold and diamond.
“Maybe because they’re high-grade minerals, they’re hard to find.”
Titanium was scattered everywhere nearby, but I hadn’t seen gold or diamond even once so far.
Well, of course, I could use the exchange to get gold and diamonds, but…
“The board manager’s rules for using the exchange are the problem.”
It violated the rules the board manager had set when he lifted my exchange suspension.
And there was also the fact that I needed a place where I could obtain minerals steadily.
“To get new equipment, I’m going to look for something like a mineral vein.”
Saying that, I started walking.
Naturally, I had no intention of walking toward the center. It hadn’t even been that long since I got beaten up by the biological fighter…
As I crossed the sand, new footprints were engraved behind me.
I walked while glancing around at the blue map floating on the scanner screen.
Then, I casually checked the viewer count written on the broadcast.
—569,211 viewers
…That was an incredible number.
Since I only talked to the regulars, I sometimes forgot, but ordinary anonymous viewers could watch too.
The empire’s population was said to be a little over fifty-five million, so…
“Does that mean one percent of the empire’s citizens are watching my broadcast?”
And right now, it was between morning and noon. Not exactly an ideal time to watch a broadcast.
And honestly, my broadcast wasn’t even that fun. Wasn’t that true? What was so fun about hunting weird creatures and exploring…
…Was it fun?
Hm, anyway.
As I walked while having those idle thoughts, I soon arrived at the area I wanted.
An area called the Fourth Outskirts on the map.
I just called it, comfortably enough—
ㄴScholar of Truth: How many… jellyfish are there?
—the jellyfish zone.
The sight of this place was rather peculiar.
Because in the space where there should have been a sandy beach, there were countless transparent, jelly-like heads instead of sand.
A space unevenly filled with jelly.
Naturally, all of these were jellyfish.
I took out the scanner hanging at my waist and aimed it at the jellyfish.
Then, fired.
ㄴScholar of Truth: Are you trying to look cool?
“…That’s exactly what I’m doing, so please just let it slide.”
In any case, the mana swept over the jellyfish and displayed the information on the screen.
—Splitting Jellyfish
—A jellyfish that divides its own cells using a small amount of mana. A native creature of the deep sea, when it judges a situation to be unfavorable, it returns to a small-headed form and waits until it is safe. The paralytic venom in its tentacles can be processed into a powerful painkiller.
Fortunately, if it could be called fortunate, all the jellyfish in this area were in hibernation.
But since I didn’t know what would wake them, I didn’t go near them. This place was one of the areas I was only passing through anyway.
Without hesitation, I turned to the right and walked almost to the very end of the veil.
After a short while.
“This is the place.”
I stopped in front of a rock.
At a glance, it looked like an ordinary rock. A gray, irregular shape.
But on the map, this place looked a little different.
Clack.
Standing before the fairly enormous rock, a little over two meters tall, I gripped my sword properly.
I evenly spread mana through my sword and throughout my body, then took my stance.
“My leg hasn’t completely healed, but I can manage this much.”
Heizen Style, First Form.
Flash Bisection 閃光兩斷.
Slice.
A spray of light scattered with the draw.
The rock still looked perfectly intact.
Once more.
Slice.
Once more.
Slice.
A total of three draws.
Then, a change occurred in the rock that had seemed completely unchanged.
Crack. Craaack!
The rock lost its shape and collapsed.
And that wasn’t the end of it.
ㄴScholar of Truth: Is there a space underneath?
ㄴSword Saint of the Draw: So they weren’t meaningless swings.
ㄴGraduate School Is Dangerous: Ah, please. Ah.
The rock didn’t merely collapse—it disappeared somewhere.
When I approached the place where the shattered pieces of rock had vanished…
“As expected, it’s here.”
A deeply dug cave.
A kind of mine had appeared.
“Hup.”
Thud.
The mine I lightly jumped into was smaller than I’d expected.
That was because it wasn’t a mine meant to extract as many minerals as possible, but one used occasionally when a little was needed.
ㄴScholar of Truth: How did you know there was a space like this?
“The map said it was a temporary mineral collection area, so I just came to check.”
The map Eosollujeun had given me contained far more detailed information than I’d expected.
It even included things I would have thought I could only know by going there and confirming myself, making it an incredibly helpful item.
“Now that I think about it, I’ve received way too much help from Eosollujeun…”
Thinking that someday I should grant at least one thing they wanted, I walked into the mine.
The mine’s diameter was roughly three meters. More than enough for an adult man to enter.
Naturally, there were no minerals visible at the entrance.
Whoosh.
A torch mounted on the wall flickered.
It seemed to be operating on mana, but…
ㄴSword Saint of the Draw: How about taking one of the torches?
“Uhh… I almost died after doing something like that before. I’m trying not to touch anything unless I have to.”
Perhaps because the biological fighter from last time had left such a strong impression on my mind, I couldn’t help but act passively.
I felt like I’d only be able to act boldly in this place once I could easily defeat a Reaper.
After walking like that for a while, I soon began to see glittering clusters of light.
Yellow glimmers embedded in the rock, mystical like stars floating in the sky.
When I approached, it was definitely the mineral I had been looking for—gold.
“There really isn’t anything this place doesn’t have.”
At this rate, I felt like there might even be a superintelligent AI somewhere.
With that silly thought, I drew my sword.
A pickaxe was the standard for mining minerals, but… I didn’t have time.
Slice.
After infusing mana and repeating my draw technique about four times, the gold slipped out and rolled across the ground.
For now, I had secured the gold, but…
“Where would… diamond come from?”
Diamond. That was the problem.
The only time I’d ever seen diamond in its mineral state was in MineXcraft.
From what I’d vaguely heard somewhere, it existed stably hundreds of kilometers underground.
This place was about nine kilometers deep, so going deeper? Even excluding the pressure, I’d probably burn to death alive before finding any diamond.
“What am I supposed to do about this…”
If I used the exchange… it would be pretty convenient. But I was afraid of the backlash that would follow afterward.
For now, what I could do immediately was—
“If I look around more and there’s nothing… I’ll have to loot a civilian home or something.”
Of course, looting civilian homes would be my last resort.
If I had no clear way to defeat the old Reaper… then I’d have no choice but to loot one.
With that thought, I went deeper into the mine.
For some reason, the mine seemed darker.
How long had I been walking like that?
ㄴScholar of Truth: There aren’t any torches.
The torches had disappeared.
They had been getting farther and farther apart for a while, and eventually they were gone completely.
I had no choice but to activate magic.
Something close to a simple beginner spell.
Fire · Light 火 · 光
Fwoosh!
A flame of mana rose up, warmly illuminating the surroundings.
Holding the only lamp in the darkness, I went even deeper.
How much longer did I walk after that?
In the mine where silver and gold had been visible, I saw something else.
Something glittering transparently…?
“Diamond?”
I rubbed my eyes and checked again, but it wasn’t my imagination. It really was diamond.
I didn’t know how it could be here, but this was great—
“Wait.”
Why did this feel so wrong?
My intuition rang an alarm. A signal of danger. A sense of alienness.
I slowly looked around once more.
…There was nothing strange.
Quietly, I took out the scanner and scanned the place where the diamond was visible.
Then—
Ding!
With the sound announcing that the scan was complete, information appeared.
—Jewel Anglerfish
—An anglerfish that lives not in water, but in the ground. Unlike ordinary anglerfish, it lures people in with the diamond attached to the tip of its tongue. It is also one of the main culprits behind occasional disappearances.
“Ha…”
This damn deep sea just couldn’t stand seeing me comfortable.
Normally, I would have turned back immediately, but…
“The diamond on that tongue is real.”
I didn’t know how it had made it, but the diamond on its tongue was a genuine diamond.
In other words, I could use it as material.
“Hmm… what if I just cut off the tip of its tongue and run away quickly?”
…It was a fairly plausible plan.
No, it wasn’t that I was some dopamine-crazed lunatic. There was a rational reason.
The jewel anglerfish lived in the ground. So, even if I just twisted the mineral vein, it would have trouble following me.
By contrast, what about me? I could cut off its tongue and immediately run away. Thanks to the information gap, I had a clear advantage.
My hesitation didn’t last long.
Whether I died here, died to the Reaper, or died to the biological fighter, the result would be the same.
I gripped my sword and drew.
Slice.
I immediately grabbed the diamond!
Shwaaaak!
Dust rose as I ran.
Kraaaagh!!
A monstrous shriek rang out behind me, and it chased closely after my back.
“Magic!”
Fire · Light 火 · 光.
I hurled a sphere of burning mana at the wall of the mine.
Kwaaang!!
The wall collapsed, the mine warped, and the monstrous shriek echoed endlessly.
“Just a little more, just a little more!”
The shriek began to draw closer.
My legs began to grow numb.
And then—
“Uwaaagh!!”
Kwaang!!
I barely managed to throw myself out of the mine.
…What a hard life to live.