Translator: Shizukuku

Editor: Sour

Read at Watashi Wa Sugoi Desu!

Chapter 106 – Sometimes I Just Want to Relax and Collect Materials

It had been a long time since I’d been in the Tre forest, and I felt like I had come home! It was a very enjoyable experience.

The enemies in the recent forests were very strong so they were a little too much for me.

I loved this forest, where I could progress by myself. And the forest was a treasure trove of materials! I hadn’t done much of this kind of gathering recently. It was fun. I wondered how many materials I could collect before Vidello-san came back.

As I was going through the forest like that, I received a notification.

I set up my gear so messages from my device could be sent to my gear while I was in the game.

I opened it and found that it was from my mom.

“Oh, it’s from mom. That’s unusual.”

[ How’s your leg? I’m going to the hospital later to pay for it, did you bring your insurance card? ]

Oh, you were worried about me. Thanks.

So, I replied on the spot, too.

[ I borrowed crutches. The doctor said we can bring the insurance card and money later so you can say hi to him, okay? I can forget the pain in my leg when I’m playing games. Hahaha. ]

[ Hahaha. I’m glad to hear you’re okay. I’ll be home early today. I’m glad you have tomorrow and the day after off from school. ]

I laugh at the immediate response to my message. Tomorrow and the day after were weekend gaming days for me. But I guessed I should start studying for my tests a little more.

I wished I could learn the ancient magical language as easily.

My inventory had grown quite a bit, so I decided to head back to my workshop for the day.

From here, I guessed it would be about an hour’s walk back to Tre. I wasn’t sure.

I wondered if I could get to my workshop from here using a magic circle.

My MP was about half gone, so I took out an MP high potion and drank it in one gulp.

After confirming that I had recovered, I drew a magic circle.

“…I guess it’s no good.”

Even though I finished writing everything correctly, the words just disappeared as if my skill had been canceled. I wondered if it would be possible to jump to Vidello-san’s place if I had a bit more MP. Well, I guessed that was impossible for now. I wondered if MP was capped. Lately, it seemed like I was learning how to use my MP all the time. It was fun, though.

I gave up and decided to walk home.

Every once in a while, I saw a player walking by. When it seemed like we were both just strolling, I’d give a friendly greeting as I passed by, and the other person would also greet me lightly and leave. If someone was running or encountering monsters, I’d just pass them by.

When I was getting closer to the city of Tre, I looked around. Okay, no people at the moment, and nothing was appearing on the map.

So, I decided to try activating the magic circle again.

Maybe because I was still getting used to it, I had to write slowly or the letters wouldn’t light up.

After checking the map a bit, I drew out the letters, and after a feeling of lightness, I was standing in my workshop. Okay, success. And my MP was almost out. I still had a long way to go. I guessed I’d need a monstrous amount of MP to get to Sage-san’s level. Since HP limits could be raised with food, maybe I could make a food that raised MP. But I had a horrible feeling that gathering the materials would be incredibly difficult. I wondered if I would need super-rare materials that could only be obtained through quests or something.

I stuffed the materials in my inventory into the storeroom again, and it suddenly occurred to me that this time I should go to the city of Due.

Since the forest of Tre had been the mainstream, I had rarely retraced my way back to the beginning city.

I filled my empty inventory with a few potions, seeing that I still had time today, and this time I headed for the north gate on the opposite side of the city from the usual.

I didn’t go through this gate very often, so I didn’t really know the gatekeepers there.

As I was about to pass between the two standing gatekeepers with my head bowed, one of them said to me in a friendly manner, “Have a safe trip, Mac.” How did he know my name?　When I turned my head in surprise, the gatekeeper on the other side informed me, “I heard that the area around the river is a little strange today, so be careful.”

“Thank you very much. By ‘strange’ do you mean there’s a giant fish in there or something?”

“No, I’m not sure, but the river is running low. I heard that the water level was much lower than usual, and I was wondering if there was something wrong upstream.”

“Is that so? Thank you very much. I’ll go check it out in a bit. I’m free today.”

“I hope Vidello comes back soon.”

“Yes… eh? What? Why?”

How could such a thing have spread all the way to the northern gate…? 

As my eyes widened and my mouth opened, the gatekeepers laughed, “Hahaha.”

“You know, we share a dormitory, right? The north gate is pretty basic. There’s a filling station, but the only dorms are at the south gate. It’s a pain in the ass to get to and from when I’m assigned here. Thanks again for all the goodies. I can’t count how many times Mac has helped me.”

“Ah, I see, I didn’t realize…”

“In case you forgot, I was there off-duty when Vidello first brought you back to his room. The two of you were all red-faced and gave us a good laugh. We were all relieved that Vidello had finally made his move.”

No more… Please stop, it’s embarrassing. That was the first time, wasn’t it? The day Vidello-san almost died. So you were there at that time. 

I was aware of the blood rushing to my face, but there was nothing I could do about it, so I decided to flee the scene.

“Oh, um, the river, I’ll let you know if I find anything. Ah, the information fee… I didn’t bring a lot of potions with me today. What should I do?”

Usually, when I asked about such things, I would have a low-ranked potion with me. But I’d only brought along enough for my own use today. As I pondered that for a moment, the gatekeeper chuckled.

“I don’t need it. Instead, if you get any information about the river, I would appreciate it if you could tell me more about it later. But you didn’t bring anything with you? Then you didn’t bring any emergency rations either? Won’t that be a problem if something happens?”

“Hmm, well, I didn’t plan on going very far, and my main plan was to collect materials, so I came lightly packed. I can’t get a lot of materials if I pack too much stuff.”

“That makes sense. But wait a minute. We’re handing out free food to travelers who are empty-handed, but it’s only simple emergency rations. Just water and bread, and not very tasty. Courtesy of the lord of Tre.”

While we were talking about it, the other gatekeeper handed me one of the leather bags.

Inside the bag was a sack of water and a loaf of bread. This would be a strong ally in the event that I get lost. It was amazing that the lord of Tre was giving these out for free. I was relieved that the old man wasn’t the lord of this place anymore. That was really great.

I quickly put the emergency rations away in my inventory. When I did so, it seemed to be treated as a single item, a simple emergency ration. I wondered if I could fill the bag to the brim with water or other materials, and it would still be just one item in my inventory. Then maybe I could bring back more materials.

Watching the people with beginner-class equipment, I continued onward.

There was only one long suspension bridge between the cities of Due and Tre, with a canyon underneath it. The river flowed so fast that it was said if you fell off, you’d immediately die and respawn. I hadn’t tried it because I didn’t want to fall off. But if you walked upriver from the bridge for a bit, there was a path down to the bottom, and there was a wide ledge where you could collect materials in the middle of the canyon. It was relatively popular, so there must have been quite a lot of people passing through. I used to go there a lot. I enjoyed secret places like that.

The water almost came up to the edge of that collection point, so it was also a water refueling spot. I wondered if it was possible to go further down from there. I hoped I could. This was exciting.

I had never heard of the water level being so low.

I hummed a tune as I arrived at the canyon, and as I peered into the canyon from above, the water had indeed decreased considerably.

“Wow… the lowered water level makes the suspension bridge seem even higher…”

When the wind blew, my heart would flutter. I wasn’t very good at heights, so I didn’t want to look down from that height.

I pulled my head back and left the suspension bridge. I continue along the canyon upstream through a field with a few trees growing in spots. The path was well maintained, so I was tempted to walk on the road, but in this world, you could go anywhere in these field-like areas, so it was fun. The places where players couldn’t go were marked by cliffs, thorns, or woven trees, so we could see that we couldn’t go there. There was no sense of discomfort, as was often the case in other games, when a place where there was nothing in the way suddenly became impossible to go to. I guess that explained falling into the canyon.

I went down the road that led down to the middle of the canyon, just as I had done when I came here before.

There were still the same grassy and mineral materials as before.

But the river, which had previously flowed all the way up to there, had disappeared, revealing a deeper canyon.

I went to the edge and peeked in.

There was some ivy extending downwards that you could climb down to.