Chapter 17
"By now, they must have set out."
Early morning.
Having left the inn, I passed the guild beneath the pale morning sunlight.
There was a red-brick house on the boundary between the noble and commercial districts.
The workshop of a personal mage serving the lord's family was a place where magical research was conducted with the lord's permission.
It was largely free of legal responsibility for explosions, gas leaks, and escaped experimental subjects.
In a workshop where all manner of dangerous research was conducted, one could also obtain dangerous magical tools not available on the market.
But the workshop's most useful feature was that it could imbue items with magic.
Enchanted goods sold on the market were mass-produced with identical magical effects, like products stamped out in a factory, but if one visited a workshop in person, one could have the desired magic imbued.
But mages tended to become deeply absorbed in their research. They generally refused to meet with anyone.
To those who had devoted their lives to magical research, customers were nothing but nuisances.
Of course, there were exceptions.
Knock, knock.
I knocked on the firmly shut iron door.
Bang, bang.
I struck it hard.
There was no response, but Eck's senses told him she was inside. He could hear a pen scratching across parchment.
Bang, bang, bang!
"Phila Emoson. I know you're in there, so I came to see you. Open up, will you?"
"...."
Phila had come to the door, but hesitated over whether to open it.
I made that decision easier for her.
"I was referred by the lord."
Click.
The inner lock was released, and the iron door swung open with a heavy groan.
Long, disheveled pink hair flowed down past her waist.
The mage, wearing thick glasses perched on the bridge of her nose and a messy robe, stammered.
"Why did the lord...?"
"Here's the letter of introduction."
I handed the mage the letter of introduction Lisette had written.
After reading it, Phila blinked, then carefully folded it with an expression that screamed she couldn't be more bothered and opened the door wide.
"P-please, come in."
She welcomed me as a guest.
***
As soon as I stepped inside, acrid smoke invaded my nostrils.
The pungent smell of medicinal herbs stung my nose.
Something made my skin sting.
All kinds of experimental apparatus and parchments lay scattered messily throughout the workshop, leaving barely enough room to set foot anywhere.
In front of the brazier at the back of the room.
A woman in a hooded robe awkwardly cleared a space on the floor.
She brought over a chair from deeper inside the room and set it down.
"P-please sit here."
The mage, Phila.
A mage bearing the lord's seal who was responsible for one of the pillars of the advanced enhancement system in the game.
Her luxuriant pink hair, reaching her thighs, overflowed with magical power and shone vividly pink even in the dim workshop.
Her breasts, impossible to conceal even beneath the robe, left a thick pocket of air between the robe and her stomach, making the robe flutter whenever she moved.
Whenever she bent over to clear the floor, the robe draped over her buttocks traced an indecent silhouette.
"...."
But I squeezed my eyes shut and averted my gaze.
Phila had one fatal flaw.
As beautiful as Elena, Phila was one of the named NPCs who stayed with Elena into the late game—and one whom Elena fucked especially often.
Phila was a futanari woman with male genitals.
'Tsk.'
I clicked my tongue inwardly.
Being a futanari with a face like that was just too much.
Even with her looks debuffed by her glasses, beneath the waist of a beauty who could easily make several men cry if she walked around outside...
'...It was fine in the game.'
That was because Elena had been the one getting fucked.
In effect, she was no different from a breathtakingly beautiful man with severe gynecomastia.
And yet she was so defenseless.
As a man, I found it repulsive.
Thinking that way, Eck's lust gradually subsided as well.
"Please wait a moment. There's still something I'm making."
Phila stirred the contents of the cauldron over the brazier several times with a ladle.
Phila was the mage directly under the lord.
Anything she researched would also be reported to the lord.
But at this point, I had never heard what she was researching.
"May I ask what you're making?"
"Y-yes? A certain noble asked me to make it. It's, um... something like an aphrodisiac."
Of course an adult game would have an aphrodisiac. Well, even if this were reality, it was something worth researching.
'Could she be planning to use it on herself?'
Come to think of it, Phila boasted some of the most formidable sexual stamina in the game.
If that was the result of testing aphrodisiacs on herself, one could certainly call it a success.
'Should I ask for one too?'
I hadn't been able to relieve myself lately, and it was making me restless, but as a man, I couldn't pass up a chance to enhance my stamina.
"Do you test its effects by drinking it yourself?"
"Yes, well. A lot of people say they can't trust an aphrodisiac made by a woman, so I suppose I'll have to drink it myself."
"Hmm..."
Was that the secret behind the sexual stamina Phila had lavished on Elena?
Stamina so powerful that even a brothel would turn her away—the stamina that had let her make up for Elena's lack of money by raping her all day long.
By the time she appeared in the game, she was researching something else.
'Is that the secret behind her stamina?'
"How much would you pay me if I became a test subject for that drug?"
"Y-yes? Wha...? Really?"
Even as Phila panicked, her eyes sparkled brightly behind her glasses.
"Really... really, really?"
Phila shook her breasts.
Her pink hair shimmered in the brazier's light as though sprinkled with gold dust.
"You really mean it, right? You won't change your mind later and say you don't want to?"
"Why do you need to confirm it so much? If I say I'll do it, I'll do it."
"Everyone says that. They say they'll drink it, but when it's time to actually drink it, they r-run away."
Phila returned to the cauldron.
She ladled up a thick liquid.
It was purple.
The purple liquid rose in a thick, sticky ribbon and poured into a bowl.
A strange scent tickled the tip of my nose, and the more I smelled it, the more my lower body tingled.
"Oh. It's not finished yet."
Phila cleared her throat as she poured the liquid from the bowl back into the cauldron.
"M-more importantly, you came with Lady Lisette's letter of introduction. Why did you come to see me?"
I had come to find Phila for three reasons.
Building connections for Elena, refining ingredients for Ellis's medicine, and enhancing equipment.
I started with what I could do as a customer.
"Could you imbue it with magic?"
"Magic? The magic I can put on it varies wildly depending on the material. Have you decided what magic you want?"
"Yes. I looked into it beforehand."
I took the ogre-leather light armor out of my bag.
Phila's eyes widened behind her glasses.
"This has red power imbued in it, doesn't it? If it's this, I can put almost anything into it. It will suffer little damage, too. I've never seen magical power preserved this cleanly since I left my family's home."
She ran her fingers over the light armor like a child who had received a toy.
Phila's eyes roved over the light armor as if licking it.
"What magic should I put in it? Hardening? Poison resistance? Repulsion? Heat resistance? Regeneration? Name it. Kuh-heung."
She snorted with excitement.
She pushed her glasses back up as they slid down her nose; the lenses reflected the brazier's light.
"I want mental-interference resistance and illusion resistance."
"Huh? Those enchantments? After bringing such excellent material all this way? Why not put transformation magic in it instead? You could transform into a Red Ogre and wield its power for a while."
Transform into a Red Ogre and use its power temporarily.
It was powerful magic, and putting it in would make hunting easier.
But that was all.
I shook my head.
"Mental-interference resistance and illusion resistance will do."
The elite monster I was targeting only appeared on days when the Red Moon rose.
It emitted a force that drove witnesses mad, and resisting that force required resistance to mental interference and illusions.
Magic resistance could resist almost every kind of magic, but while versatile, it was not very effective.
"Hmm... Illusion resistance is rather tricky. The reagents are expensive, too. Are you sure? You probably won't have much use for it compared to the cost."
"Just do it. I can cover the materials and the cost, so go ahead."
I took out my money pouch and paid the cost of the preliminary work in advance.
Phila counted the money in the pouch, then returned the pouch to me.
"Is it not enough?"
"I-it's enough, but... um... you said you'd become a test subject, right? You only need to pay for the ingredients."
"...."
She'd been like this when she fucked Elena in the game, too.
For no reason, I felt a chill run down my spine.
Before taking out the cost of the ingredients, I asked:
"Should I procure the ingredients separately? Or do you have them?"
"I have the ingredients."
"Then I'll get you new ones later, so please use those to proceed for now."
"Now?"
"I need to use it when the Red Moon rises, so please finish it as soon as possible."
Only then did Phila seem to realize why I wanted mental-interference and illusion resistance, and she took ingredients out of the cupboard one by one to prepare them.
"Nngh."
"These?"
"Y-yes."
She rose onto her toes, reached into the cupboard, and handed me the ingredients.
"Th-thank you."
Let's not blush.
It's not as though she was interested in men.
The woman who had fucked Elena that much.
Unable to bring myself to voice her secret, I turned away.
"Then I'll come back tomorrow."
"Yes. I'll have it finished by tomorrow afternoon."
***
Click.
The dull scrape of the iron door closing and locking echoed through the workshop.
Phila stared blankly around the workshop.
Her gaze drifted to the faint dust left where Eck had stood.
She unconsciously wrapped both arms tightly around her ample chest.
Men had always been like that.
The renowned nobleman who claimed to serve at the lord's side, the honorable knight who claimed to protect a lady, and the adventurers and thieves who prowled the back alleys.
Men ran sticky, disgusting gazes over her breasts and buttocks.
Whenever she felt those blatant stares, she forced herself to endure the shame.
It was as though her stepmother's sharp, irritable voice echoed in her ears.
Only vulgar men were drawn to a vulgar body.
Phila hated her body, wrapped herself tightly in a thick robe, and grew her hair long to hide her face as well.
But Eck was different somehow.
It was the look of someone seeing something disgusting.
'I'd never felt a gaze like that before.'
Could that be why?
In front of Eck, she gathered her breasts together frivolously with both arms or bent over to show him the ugly outline of her buttocks.
Each time, he would frown and avert his gaze.
Clear disgust filled that gaze.
It was different from the gazes of men who were always imagining how they could fuck her.
It was thrilling.
She had never experienced anything like it before.
Eck wouldn't pounce on her even after seeing her vulgar body.
She was certain of it.
He was the only dignified man she had ever met.
She had never felt so reassured by a man before.
"Hee-hee-hee. If I keep getting him to come here as a customer, he could become my boyfriend, right?"
A boyfriend.
What a sweet word.
"If we become close, he might even share his essence with me. Then my research would progress, too."
Hee-hee-hee-hee.
After her guest left, Phila took off her robe and tossed it over a chair.
The thin clothing hidden beneath the robe was revealed; a comfortable camisole strained to the point of bursting as it supported her breasts.
The underwear cut deeply into her crotch had nothing protruding from it.
It was that of an ordinary woman.
Humming a buoyant little tune, Phila began preparing the ingredients she would use for the enchantment.