Chapter 56
There you are. Elena, that's enough.
Yes.
Elena let the mana she had poured into her sword disperse.
She picked up a water jug that had been set aside and gulped down the water.
A stream of water ran down her neck and seeped below her collarbone. Her training clothes clung to her breasts as they grew wet, revealing the shape of her small but sharply defined cleavage.
When I approached, Varie said:
"Finished?"
"Yes. I've finished my meeting with the young lady."
"I see. Fortunately, it ended quickly. If it had been me, it would've taken another hour. But listen."
Varie grinned and moved close to me.
"You didn't harbor any ulterior motives toward the young lady and put your hands on her, did you?"
"I had no ulterior motives."
"You didn't harbor ulterior motives toward a young lady with beauty from heaven?"
Varie opened their eyes wide, then let out a breath.
"No, that's not it. I can trust you because you're you. I nearly got swept up in your past again. I'm sorry. I apologize."
I shrugged.
"More importantly, there's something I wanted to discuss with you."
"Is it about Elena?"
"Yes."
Varie's expression changed. The sly air disappeared, replaced by a serious look.
"In short..."
Varie paused briefly.
"I have nothing left to teach her."
"Already?"
"Embarrassingly enough, I have nothing more to teach her."
Varie raised a hand, swept back their hair, and laughed hollowly.
"I became a knight at a young age myself and was called a genius, but..."
Varie's gaze shifted toward Elena.
Elena stood there blankly watching us until the conversation ended.
"That girl is on another level. She learned it after watching me demonstrate it once, applied it after watching twice, and after I showed her a third time, I ended up being the one learning from her instead."
Self-deprecation colored Varie's voice.
"It makes the very act of teaching feel meaningless. They say geniuses steal their masters' techniques, but I never thought I'd experience that feeling myself."
A lament from a knight who had once been called a genius in their own right.
There was even awe in the voice.
'Of course. What kind of girl is Elena?'
I had even raised her myself, so I could proudly claim she was stronger than any other Elena.
Even at her current level, I'd have to look among the S-ranks to find a human opponent for her.
Varie leaned toward me.
"Eck. And I'm not saying this because my pride's hurt; I'm saying it because I'm genuinely worried about you..."
Varie whispered in my ear.
"Be careful."
"I know. Elena's talent is extraordinary, so..."
"No, not that. It's just that she keeps rubbing up against you..."
"Sir Varie."
Varie's shoulders jolted upward.
Elena approached us.
"If you're finished talking, shouldn't you get back to the apprentice knights?"
"Ah, ahh, right. Anyway, Eck, I've given you my advice. Be careful on your way back!"
Varie patted my shoulder and returned to the apprentice knights.
Footsteps drew near.
"Uncle."
Elena was soaked in sweat.
Dressed in an apprentice knight's training uniform, her sweat-soaked hair clung to her forehead. She pushed her bangs behind her ear and stared blankly at me.
After holding each other's gaze in silence for several seconds, the corners of Elena's eyes rose slightly.
"Training's over. Let's go back now."
"All right. There isn't anything left for you to learn, is there?"
"Yes! Thanks to you introducing me, I was able to learn so much."
"As expected of the genius I recognized."
I patted Elena's head.
"Hehe, I'm your very own pushover, Uncle. I'm still far from being able to take over everything you do, but I think I'm really not far off now."
"I think you've already caught up with me."
"Really?"
Elena squirmed bashfully at my praise.
"L-Look. That Eck guy is saying it so plainly, and she still doesn't get i—"
"Sir Varie, thank you for today."
"...Ahem. Yes, off you go."
Elena gave a short bow.
I exchanged a light farewell with Varie as well and left the lord's castle.
***
With the appearance of the dungeon, demand for equipment skyrocketed.
The city's forges kept their furnaces roaring without respite. The sound of hammers striking red-hot chunks of metal rang out from every direction.
When I opened the door to Bordeaux's forge, a wave of heat struck my face.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
Metal rang out incessantly.
The forge, where Bordeaux usually worked alone, had an apprentice today.
Sharp-eyed young adventurers had switched to blacksmithing and joined him as apprentices.
"You've come."
When Bordeaux saw us, he clicked his tongue, set down his hammer, and wiped the sweat from his forehead.
"I'm swamped. What brings you here?"
"I heard the competition ended early, so I came by."
"Tch. Anyone would think I'd been keeping it for you."
Bordeaux scrubbed his beard with a towel and walked deeper into the workshop.
He brought out a long object wrapped in cloth from a shelf and set it down on the table.
He removed the cloth.
A sword in a black scabbard.
I took hold of it.
From the sword's balance, I could tell its craftsmanship was flawless.
"Take it."
Elena accepted the sword.
"Are you giving this to me? I had no idea you'd prepared something like this for me."
"It'll fall far short of what your current skill deserves. It may be inconvenient, but I'd like you to make do with it for a while."
"Oh, no! This is already amazing to me! It doesn't compare to the sword I've been using until now."
Elena carefully drew the sword from its scabbard.
Red striations ran across the black blade.
A blade made from a mixture of adamantium and crimson material.
As though responding to Elena's mana, power pulsed faintly through the red striations.
"Bordeaux, what's that sword called?"
"Because it's a red and black sword, I named it the Red-Black Sword."
The Red-Black Sword.
Bordeaux's finest work.
It was an A-rank weapon.
He had made it for the competition, but when the Monster Wave brought the competition to an early end, it became Bordeaux's sore spot, shoved into the corner of his forge in the original story.
Even in the original, it was a hidden gem of sorts that ended up in the hands of the penniless Elena.
But now, because Elena's growth had surpassed my expectations, it had become outdated equipment.
"Bring out the rest as well."
"Hmph. You're really putting me to work."
Bordeaux had his apprentices bring out the other equipment from the back of the workshop.
A helmet, chest armor, arm guards, and shin guards—equipment to protect Elena's entire body.
Elena's eyes grew round as she lifted the helmet.
"When did you prepare all this?"
"It would've been nice if it had been finished before the Monster Wave, but I'm such a slow worker that I'm only giving it to you now. Still, it turned out pretty well, didn't it?"
"Yes! Um, could you help me put it on?"
I shrugged and helped Elena put on the equipment.
The corners of Elena's mouth twitched as she tried to keep her expression under control after receiving the equipment as a gift.
***
Elena walked through the streets wearing her armor.
The alchemist's quarter was filled with the sharp, pungent smells of herbs and solutions. During the day, it was an alley where it was difficult to find a single sign of life.
...But now, the air had cleared, and the atmosphere was completely different.
White steam lingered along the ceiling of the alley, carrying the scents of mild herbs and vapor.
When we entered Dorea's shop, it was completely different from the last time we'd visited.
"You've come."
Dorea spotted me and welcomed us in a leisurely tone.
The countless empty bottles, piles of herbs, and bubbling concoctions in pots that I had seen last time were nowhere to be found. Only an old woman preparing for retirement remained.
"I've been waiting for you to come. You ordered more potions last time, didn't you? One hundred thousand of them. I wondered if you were trying to kill me."
"You seem rather free for someone who says that."
"Ahem."
There were no dark circles beneath Dorea's eyes, and her gaze was gentle.
Even as she mentioned my additional order, her voice held more warmth than anger.
"How long could I keep making them myself? I handed it all over to passionate young people. There are many young people here who have trouble fitting in with others. I took them on because they seemed short on money, and they were delighted."
Dorea straightened her hunched back and rose from her chair.
"One hundred thousand low-grade potions and ten thousand mid-grade potions. And you ordered something unusual as well. So I made it myself."
Dorea returned holding a small glass bottle from the shelf on her workbench.
A murky purple liquid sloshed inside the bottle.
"Some orc shamans turn men into women to make them mating partners. If you mix a concentrated extract of aphrodisiac spores with a woman's vaginal secretions and a few other ingredients, you get this."
Dorea shook the potion.
"This is called a sex-change potion. Its ingredients are so difficult to obtain that you won't find it on the market. Its drawback is that it can only turn someone into a woman, but do you intend to use it?"
"Would I?"
I paid for the sex-change potion and left Dorea's shop.
***
After visiting Bordeaux's forge and Dorea's shop, I went to find Phila's workshop.
When I knocked on the door of Phila's workshop, Phila opened it as though she had been waiting for us.
"O-oh, you've arrived?"
Phila ushered us into the workshop.
The workshop was still cramped, with various objects piled up everywhere.
Books thicker and wider than a forearm were stacked like towers on the research desk. The broad pages were filled with tiny writing.
A book lay open in the middle of the desk, as though someone had been reading the dizzyingly technical texts only moments ago.
The mace of the ancient god stood upright beside the books on the desk.
"Nngh."
Phila struggled to move the books piled up from the floor and make space for us.
"S-sorry. I should have tidied up before you came."
Adjusting the glasses slipping down their nose, Phila guided us farther inside.
"Where is he?"
"He's in bed."
Someone's breathing could be heard from the curtained bed in the back.
When I drew back the curtain, the boy we'd seen yesterday was asleep.
Kyle the Hypnotist.
In the original game, Kyle was the casino lord who possessed hundreds of women through a hypnosis called Gamble. A hypnotist who couldn't resist women and challenged them to wagers had fallen into our hands.
Elena held the power of life and death over him, and he was under a hypnosis that forced him to follow Elena at the cost of his life.
We had acquired the perfect pawn for dealing with hypnotists.
I gave Phila the potion I'd received from Dorea.
"If we use this, there won't be any more incidents of him going around raping women."
"What's this?"
"It's a kind of gender-change potion."
"Ah... um... about that..."
Phila gave an awkward laugh, unsure how to respond.
I grabbed the blanket covering Kyle, who was lying on the bed.
"This child is a girl."
When I pulled back the blanket, a pair of breasts jutted up beneath her thin clothes.
Huh?
"You mean she's not a boy?"
"Yes? Yes."
"That can't be."
I searched through my memories.
Kyle in the adult game was a scumbag who violated, toyed with, raped, and discarded hundreds of women. He was such a blatant character that he was even too pathetic to rape Elena, but he had definitely been a man.
But she had been a girl?
"Phila, is there any possibility of someone becoming male later in life? For example, does a potion that turns someone male exist?"
I had never seen one in the original, but there were many items that had not been implemented in the game, so it was possible.
Phila shook her head in response to my question.
Her breasts swayed a beat after her head did.
"It's not entirely impossible, but masculinization potions exist only in legends. At least in the records of the mage tower where I lived, there was no record of anyone changing from a woman into a man. If such a thing were possible, wouldn't the potion-makers worship it as their god? I doubt those who became women because of circumstances beyond their control would simply sit still."
If Phila was that certain, it had to be practically impossible.
Even in an adult-game world, toying with women was still the game's central premise.
'Then is the game the thing that's wrong?'
Everything I had known until now had been overturned.
This was a serious matter.
"Um, Eck..."
Just then, Phila fidgeted with her fingers and rubbed her legs together as though she desperately needed to relieve herself.