Chapter 12
The person who'd just commented on my post.
It was obvious they knew something.
They might have been an expert in an industry dealing with artifacts and items like these.
I couldn't be sure, but it seemed worth probing.
I decided to reply to the comment right away and test the waters a little.
ㄴ ??? Where'd you get that crown?
ㄴ (OP) It dropped when I killed a King Slime in the Tower.
ㄴ For real? What are its stats?
“...This person really is in the business.”
A few seconds after I replied, they answered right away.
The moment I told them about the crown, they asked about its stats.
They definitely seemed to work in the field or have plenty of related information.
“I'll try it on for now. If it causes trouble, I'll just run.”
Might as well ask and get some information, too.
If anything went wrong, I planned to just run away.
I'd already routed my connection through a proxy anyway.
ㄴ For real? What are its stats?
ㄴ I think it was +50% Mana Efficiency or somethin'
ㄴ What
ㄴ Bullshit. Bring me your artifact registration certificate right now. You have 10 seconds.
ㄴ Why you, why you, why you, why you
“Guess it really is that good. Everyone's losing their minds.”
As soon as I posted the reply, the original commenter disappeared,
and the other Gallery users started flooding me with congratulatory messages.
“So I get that it's good, but why are they freaking out this much?”
I looked over the reactions, and every one of them was full of warm congratulations.
Why was the reception for this so overwhelmingly positive?
I still didn't understand.
Good performance? There were tons of artifacts with good stats.
And it's not like I'd let on that I'd gotten it early in my climb or anything.
Just as I started wondering why everyone was reacting like this...
[Title: Why +50% Mana Efficiency Is Total Bullshit]
A post popped up that looked like it might answer my question.
There was a hint of anger in the title alone.
It seemed like it would be more than enough to answer my question.
[Title: Why +50% Mana Efficiency Is Total Bullshit]
First off, Hunter forum bros, here's who I am.
(Photo of a Hunter ID with the important info blurred.)
I'm an active A-rank appraiser, and I've traded over 100 items with dwarves, so you can trust me.
This is the crown in question.
(Photo zoomed in on the crown)
To start with, yeah, that's definitely a King Slime Crown.
If you look closely, there's a blue gem set in the middle of the crown.
It's natural mithril, which has the characteristic of gleaming even without light.
Since the photo clearly shows that trait, it's not a fake.
More than anything, you can tell the fakes at a glance just by looking at them.
So, the crown is genuine.
But what we need to pay attention to is that +50% Mana Efficiency stat.
Slime crowns always boost resistance-related stats,
and even when you're lucky enough to get a Mana Efficiency-type stat, it's only 10–20%.
On top of that, the highest recorded value is 35%, belonging to Aquila, that eagle-headed guy on the other side of the planet.
And that crown was melted down to make Aquila's Talon.
In other words, this is a stat that's never appeared in the world before.
And anyway, the King Slime Crown's recorded drop rate is only 0.2%.
On top of that, there are fewer than 300 King Slime Crowns currently on the market.
So, in short, that +50% Mana Efficiency is total bullshit. Yeah.
Here's the three-line summary.
1. The crown is genuine.
2. But that stat is an absolutely impossible value. Even Aquila only got 35%.
3. Finally, King Slime Crowns are extremely rare.
So yeah, it's bullshit.
ButIdon'tknowaboutanyofthat;Aphrodite'sMirrorjustannouncedthatit'sreal.
Shit, Hunter forum bro, can't you sell it to me?
ㄴ What the— I was nodding along, and then you suddenly drifted into a completely different lane;;
ㄴ Uh… so you're saying I should have a glass of bleach right now?
ㄴ Shit, waiter! Waiter!
ㄴ Hmm… the dwarves who use this forum are gonna lose it when they see this.
ㄴ LOL, Dwarf Emperor incoming in a hurry
ㄴ Nah, the ones on this forum are all balding forty-somethings lol
“Hmm! So, in short, it's fucking amazing!”
Honestly, I didn't read that whole long post carefully,
but I could tell my crown was a one-of-a-kind artifact on a global scale.
“…Should I sell it?”
I looked back and forth between the crown and the Gallery post.
A one-of-a-kind artifact in the whole world… I wonder how much it would go for.
The post even said the crown had been melted down and made into a new weapon.
The crown just kept breaking new records.
Gulp—
Just imagining how much money I could get by selling it made my mouth water.
“No, get a grip. What kind of lunatic would sell this? I must be crazy.”
For a moment, I was nearly swallowed up by the greed in my heart and almost made the wrong choice.
I wasn't some money-hungry fiend. Whether I used it to climb the Tower or for something else, I'd make a bigger profit than by selling it.
Sell this?
That was too pathetic to even call foolish.
Of course, I could get an unimaginable amount of money for it right now.
But my goal wasn't just money.
The Tower.
Reaching the top of that mysterious box full of questions was one of my goals, too.
“Then, for now, I'll wear the crown…”
I immediately set out to test the crown.
“There shouldn't be anyone around at this hour.”
After killing time on the Gallery, it was already dark outside.
I checked the time on my phone, and it was well past nine p.m.
The surveillance around the Tower had probably thinned out by now.
I headed straight for the Tower to test the crown and my Magic stat.
*
An office somewhere in Gangnam, Seoul.
In contrast to the surrounding forest of skyscrapers, someone was moving frantically inside a small, shabby-looking building.
“Team Leader! Team Leader!!!”
A man with his hair slicked neatly into a 2:8 part and an untrimmed beard that stood in stark contrast.
His name was Kang Taejun.
He was the team leader of the Myeongwol Appraisal Office.
And right now, he was desperately searching for the office's owner as if a war had broken out.
“Sniff… Reze-chaaaan…”
“There you are…”
Taejun, who'd been running around the office like crazy, spotted a door labeled Supply Room.
From inside came the sound of a woman sobbing.
Sensing that the voice belonged to his boss, he burst through the door.
Clack—!
“Boss!”
“Eeeaaagh—!”
The woman inside was so startled when Taejun suddenly barged in that she toppled over.
Her name was Han Sion.
She was the owner of the Myeongwol Office and a woman who had once worked as an S-rank Hunter.
“Hey! You can't just burst through the door like that!”
“You're one to talk! Weren't you in the supply room again, snacking and reading comics?!”
“Do you have any idea how long I've been looking for you?!”
Sion angrily snapped at Taejun for barging in.
But she was utterly subdued by Taejun's brazen response.
Sion couldn't understand why she was the one getting yelled at.
She looked at Taejun with an expression that said just that.
“Look at this! Look at this!”
Taejun showed Sion his phone, looking exasperated.
“What's the big deal with this...?”
“Wh-what the hell is this?!”
Sion's expression instantly stiffened when she saw the screen Taejun showed her.
A familiar mirror appeared on the screen before her.
It was Aphrodite's Mirror, the one that had been taken from her last time to pay off a debt to another office.
And reflected in the mirror on the screen was a crown.
“50% Mana Efficiency…?”
Along with the absurd text, “50% Mana Efficiency,”
it gleamed brilliantly, making its presence known from within the mirror.
“And look at this, too.”
“Why, what's it now…?”
As if to snap Sion out of her daze as she stared at the screen,
Taejun began showing her another screen.
The screen he showed her was a picture of the crown beside some butter mochi.
“Oh, that's the crown from earlier?”
“No, please take a look at those things underneath the crown.”
Sion had no idea what exactly he wanted her to look at,
but she followed Taejun's words and looked at the thing he was pointing at.
A blue food that looked absolutely disgusting.
With unknown things—jelly or whatever—stuck in it, it looked like it might make her throw up the snacks she'd eaten.
Sion looked back at Taejun in confusion, but all she got in return was a serious gaze.
His seriousness was unusual, so she narrowed her eyes and fixed her gaze on the screen once more.
Then—
“Wh-what is that? Why is mana smoke rising from it?”
Sion found what Taejun had been trying to show her.
And she understood why he'd shown it to her.
Their finances were already in a dire state.
She'd wanted to start a guild, but hadn't been able to.
The mirror had been taken, and the employees had left,
and all she could do was barely keep the company going with her former reputation and the strength she had left.
“Find them… We absolutely can't let the Association, another appraisal office, or a guild snatch them away.
We have to find the person who made this.
I don't know when or where this alchemist appeared,
but if we can find and recruit them somehow, we can achieve not only a guild, but my own goal as well.