Chapter 50
“Ah, I haven’t explained that~ The day those worthless bugs finish paying it all back――”
MP gave a wicked little chuckle.
“――will never come~”
“Huh?”
There wasn’t the slightest hint of mercy in MP’s attitude.
Even knowing it wasn’t directed at me, a chill ran down my spine.
“...Um, what do you mean?”
Guy and the others should be steadily paying it back every day.
I couldn’t figure out what MP was getting at.
“Master, do you know what principal and interest are?”
“Well...”
I had a vague idea, but I wasn’t confident...
“Just to be safe, I’ll explain. The principal is the total amount of magic power you lent. You lent the Sky-Cleaving Sword 2,678,078 MP~”
“Yeah, that’s right.”
“Forced Collection only becomes possible one year after the loan is made, so of that amount, 1,435,837 MP is currently eligible for collection~”
What MP said could be checked on my adventurer tag.
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【Loan Status】:
・'Sky-Cleaving Sword':
Amount Lent: 2,678,078 MP
Amount Collectible: 1,435,837 MP
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“An 8% interest charge is applied to this collectible amount every ten days~”
“So if we leave it alone, it’ll be 1.8 times as much in a hundred days?”
“No, that’s not how it works~”
“Huh? It isn’t?”
“That’s right~ What you described is simple interest~”
“Simple interest?”
“Yes! There are two kinds of interest, simple and compound, and magic collection uses compound interest~”
“Uh, okay...”
Several question marks floated in my head.
Rinka, beside me, looked just as dumbfounded.
“It’d take a while to explain properly, so in simple terms――the interest itself also accrues interest~”
“????”
“For example, if they don’t repay anything at all, after a hundred days it’ll be about 2.16 times as much. After a year, 16 times. At the maximum rate of 10% every ten days, it’ll be over 30 times~”
“Huh?!”
What I’d lent them would grow to more than thirty times its original amount in a year!?!
“Well, that’s if they don’t repay anything at all~ Those lice have paid back a little, so it won’t get that bad~”
“I-I see.”
“But those gnats are desperately repaying only the interest~ The principal hasn’t gone down at all~”
Interest every ten days: 114,927 MP
Daily repayment: 11,492 MP.
Multiply the repayment amount by ten... it equals the interest.
“Ah!”
“Hehehe. Do you understand now?”
“Y-yeah.”
“So the day those germs finish paying it back will never come~”
“............”
Rinka and I looked at each other and trembled.
I was reminded anew of how terrifying 【Forced Collection】 was.
“What a terrifying Gift...”
Rinka whispered in a trembling voice.
“Don’t worry~ I won’t collect from you like this, Rinka-san~ As long as you don’t betray Master, you have nothing to worry about~”
“............”
Still trembling, Rinka nodded over and over.
Rinka probably wouldn’t do anything like that in the first place, but it was certainly frightening to hear as someone who owed MP.
“There’s still just barely time~ But tomorrow is their last chance~”
“Their last chance?”
“If they don’t change their ways when we meet tomorrow, things will get bad~”
MP told us with a cool smile.
It was a cold smile that nearly froze my blood.
“With brains smaller than a water flea’s, I doubt those diarrhea-spewing bastards can understand, but at this rate, their fate will be sealed in ten days. After that, they’ll be drained until the day they die. They’ll lose everything~”
MP delivered the death sentence in the usual tone.
I didn’t understand why it would all be over in ten days――but I could clearly tell that it was true.
“But is it okay for it to be so one-sided? I don’t feel sorry for those guys, but it still seems kind of unfair.”
They’d keep having their magic drained without even knowing what was going on.
Am I the only one who thinks that’s unfair?