“Ah. This is Ato … What was it again?” Tia asked.
“Atorumtein.”
“Yeah, that’s it! Atorumtein!”
Next to me, Tia was happily looking around the town, smiling. From behind us, Alexis, who had gotten off the carriage, had a complicated expression on his face.
“Save your excitement for later. Ed, are you sure this is where the treasure is?”
“Oh, yes, the treasure! Ever since you said, ‘You’ll see when you get there!’ I’ve been curious about it for so long!” Tia exclaimed with joy.
“Gahahah! Don’t be so hasty, you long-lived elf. There must have been some circumstances with the kid that kept him from telling us, right?” Old man Gonzo said, laughing.
“Of course. However, it’s not something we can talk about here, so would you mind if we booked an inn and… Talk about it there?”
“I don’t mind. How about you, Alexis?”
“Hmm. You’re right, standing around here and talking about it is not very elegant. That’s fine with me.”
“Me too!”
“Well, there you go.”
With the whole party in agreement, we walked through the town of Atorumtein. The people walking through the streets were bustling, but there were only a few stalls, indicating that this was not a town that catered to outsiders.
“Wow, all those chimneys! Are they all blacksmiths? Then, surely, they must have some awesome weapons.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Tia. There are no weapons in this town, aren’t there?”
“Eh, why!? E-Ed?”
“Ah, the hero is right this time. It’s true that this is a town of mines and blacksmiths, but what can be mined here is silver. So, what they make here is mainly tableware.”
“Eh. Ah, so maybe the treasure is some kind of legendary tableware that can make any food taste good?!”
“That’s great! If we can improve the taste, maybe even the little boy can have a taste of my muscle pills?”
“No, that’s a little … Well, anyway, we’ll talk about it in detail when we get to the inn.”
“Yes, Ed-sensei!” Tia said, excitedly.
By the way, what the old man Gonzo called “Muscle Pill” was a highly concentrated pill that only contained the nutrients necessary for muscle growth. The taste of blood and fat that slowly dissolved in the mouth evoked a nausea that was incomparable to that of ordinary poisons, and was not something that a person with a proper sense of taste could eat.
In addition, when I was made to eat it when I didn’t know anything about it, I threw up as hard as I could and couldn’t taste anything for about three days. I definitely won’t eat it the second time around. …
After such dangerous and amusing chit-chat, we arrived at the inn before long. Unfortunately, there was no such thing as a luxury inn that Alexis could book, but we got a room at the best inn in town and we looked at each other again.
“Then, please explain.” Alexis said, after closing the door.
“All right. Then, … I obtained this information from a reliable source, and it seems that this silver mine is inhabited by rock worms.”
“Rockworms …!?”
Alexis was taken aback by my words as I slowly started to speak. Of course. Rockworms were mineral-eating magic beasts that would shorten the life of any mine quickly if targeted by them. In addition, the areas it had devoured were filled with holes, and there had been many cases of large-scale collapses due to people not noticing the presence of rockworms.
This Atorumtein was no exception. If left unchecked, the mine would collapse in about three months. By the time we visited the town six months later on my first visit, it was a dark place of hopelessness and despair, abandoned by those who had lost their jobs.
“Hey, Ed, are you sure you can trust that information? It couldn’t have been a joke, right?”
“Of course. The other party is a living magic beast, so I wouldn’t go so far as to say that it is devouring the mines at this very moment. However, there is no doubt that it is using the silver mines of Atorumtein as a feeding ground.”
“Then, why did you keep this information from us?”
“It’s to make sure we kill the rockworm ourselves. If, for some reason, the information were to leak out, it would be a disaster in more ways than one.”
“… Mithril.”
I grinned inwardly at Alexis’ bitter expression as he muttered. But beside us, there was one long-eared elf girl who couldn’t keep up with the conversation.
“Hey, hey? I don’t understand, but what does that annoying magic beast have to do anything with mithril?”
“Oh, you don’t know, Tia? Tia, do you know what mithril is?” Surprised, I asked.
“What … Mithril is mithril, right? Because of the high rate of transfer of mana and a high capacity for mana, most of the best magic tools and weapons with magic enchantments are made of mithril.”
“I’m not talking about that. … I’ll tell you what. Mithril is a mutation of silver that has been exposed to mana for a long time.”
“Really?! So, maybe all the silver in this mountain, where strong magic beasts live, has been turned into mithril!?”
Tia creased her forehead when I looked at her with a troubled expression. I don’t know if I should say this … She’d find out soon enough anyway.
“If you add mana to silver, it becomes mithril. That’s true, but … in reality, it needs to be exposed to very strong magical power all the time, from morning to night, to become mithril. So, it’s not enough to have a magic beast living nearby. You will need to expose it to the magic beasts mana for a long time. …”
“… so what?”
“… … Rockworms eat ore. But not all of the ore they eat is digested and absorbed. The remaining ore continues to be bathed in Rockworm’s mana in its belly, and over the course of decades, it turns into mithril. In other words, …”
“……!? Wait, I don’t want to hear it!”
“Mithril is the undigested poop of rockworms.” (T/N: LMAO didn’t expect this)
“NO! I don’t want to hear it!”
The reality was so cruel that Tia squeezed her long ears shut with her hands and shook her head in disgust.
Well, yeah. If you hadn’t heard about it before, it was a natural reaction. For the record, we didn’t see it the first time. We asked the people of this town to dismantle the corpses in order to give work to those who lost their jobs. Later, we were given a lump of mithril, but all we were told at the time was that it came from this mine.
“How, I didn’t know mithril was such a … thing…” Tia muttered.
“There are mithril mines that change with natural environmental magic, though. In that case, it would be more like a regular mithril mine, and that should be much more productive for the world as a whole.”
“T-then! The mithril I’ve been touching is not magic beast’s poo, is it …?
“Uh, maybe.”
Realistically, the majority of mithril products on the market should be made from mithril mined and processed. If it was a normal commercially available product, it would definitely be that one.
“But that’s exactly the kind of treasure we’re after this time, you know?” I added.
“Eh …Eh? W-What do you mean…?”
“Fufufu ..The lodged feces in the belly of a rockworm is the perfect lump of pure mithril that can never be obtained from a mine! That’s the treasure we’re after, and the material for our new weapons!”
“NOOO!!!!!”
Tia’s heartbreaking cry echoed throughout the room of the inn. But this was the one thing I couldn’t give up. If they want to think about the future after …… I was gone, they absolutely need it.
“Gahahahah! It doesn’t matter if it’s shit or not, as long as it makes you stronger!”
“No! I don’t want a poop weapon. …”
“Give up, Tia. A weapon made of pure mithril would certainly be a strength multiplier.” I said.
“Ugh… then Alexis would get it too, right?”
“Hahaha, I have this holy sword.”
“That’s not fair! Hey, Ed! You wouldn’t do something so horrible, would you?”
“Leave it to me. I’ll prepare the best weapon for you.”
“Uwaaaaaa!!”
I patted her on the shoulder with the biggest smile I could muster, and Tia started to cry as she bit on the absurdity of the world. After that, I was harassed in the most insidious ways, such as having my ears and cheeks pulled and my knees snapped from behind, but … five days later, We finally decided to enter the mine to kill the rockworm.