Itai no wa Iya nanode Bōgyo-Ryoku ni Kyokufuri Shitai to Omoimasu Chapter 46

Defense Specialization and Exploring the Ruins

What they got in this battle was, first of all, a book, which was their primary objective.

And also three medals.

It could be said that they were quite lucky.

This was because players with three medals would avoid fighting with high-level players as much as possible.

They probably would have run away from Sally too, if she was still in her normal equipment.

The five medals, which was more than the three that the defeated players had, succeeded in robbing the three of their composure.

They probably couldn’t resist the temptation to nearly triple their medals at once.

「Went for the wool and came home shorn… or something like that.」

With that, Sally took that old book out of her inventory.

「Well, let’s read it, shall we?」

「Yep! Let’s do that!」

The two sat down on a large stone brick and looked through the book.

It was so tattered it was impossible to read any of the pages properly, but as they flipped through it, they found one page in the middle that was readable.

「【Ancient Heart】, led by the welling water, in the faint glow it shall manifest. O brave one, exorcize the demon, journey to the calm blue sea.」

「What does that mean?」

「【Ancient Heart】 has something to do with welling water… and if it’s there, we can go to a dungeon, can’t we? Feels like there will be a battle.」

「…something related to welling water, so… like a fountain?」

The two searched the ruins and found that there were four fountains in them.

There was a big fountain in the middle of the ruins and smaller ones some distance away from it.

The fountain tops were made of beautiful diamond-shaped red crystals.

However, there was no sign of water, and they were dried up.

「Let’s try the big fountain in the middle for now.」

「Yep, let’s do that.」

After a short walk, the two reached the big fountain.

Then, perhaps Sally had an idea, she quickly climbed onto the part of the fountain’s basin that would once have been filled with water.

「【Ocean】!」

Water spread out from under Sally’s feet.

It filled the basin.

With that, the fountain began to glow a faint blue color.

「Oh!?」

「How’s that?」

However, the glow gradually faded.

The water in the basin disappeared as well, as if it had been absorbed by the fountain.

They listened carefully, but there was no sound of anything being activated.

「Hmm… nothing happened?」

「…I guess so. But I think there’s something about this fountain.」

「Yep, I think so too. Let’s try the other fountains, still.」

The two tried to do the same with the other fountains, but all of them glowed faintly, with no further changes occurring.

「Sally, you haven’t read all the way through that book yet, right? Why don’t we read it properly one more time?」

「…let’s do that. There might be other clues.」

The two had come to an impasse and read the book carefully again. They looked through it from the first page, but still, there was no readable text.

And then they got to that sentence that they stopped reading at.

「The “faint glow” is the glow from the fountain, and the fountain should be the welling water…」

They thought about it, but didn’t come up with anything new, so they set it aside and looked at the next pages.

「Huh?」

「This is… a picture?」

The last page.

There was a picture on it, though it was crumbling.

「A pot? …no, a water jug?」

Figures of people placing what looked like pots around each of the four fountains were in it. There was something round floating on the top of the picture. It was colored red.

「Is this the 【Ancient Heart】?」

Maple said, pointing to the red circle.

「…It may be… Hmmm… maybe you have to fill water jugs and place them around them? I don’t get it…」

The two grunted and groaned in thought, but the information they got from the picture was too vague to lead to a good idea.

「Let’s take a break. I don’t think we’ll be able to come up with anything if we just keep thinking like this.」

「That’s true.」

The two sat down to relax in the middle of the ruins.

Being somewhere with a good overlook rather than hiding in a strange place would make it easier to notice players approaching, and they could relax.

「Including today, there are only three days left of this event, huh…」

Sally muttered.

The event was already past the turning point. There wasn’t much left to do.

「It’s been a ve-ery packed four days, don’t you think? Maybe packed with more adventure than all the playing we’ve done so far!」

「Ahaha, that’s for sure!」

They defeated the Goblin King, spent the night in the forest where the ghosts wandered, won a battle against a monster bird of overwhelming strength in the snowy mountains, got Syrup and Oboro on their side, and then explored the bamboo forest.

In the canyon, they fought against the fakes, and in the desert, they explored with Kasumi while running away from snails.

At the sea, they met Kanade, making a new connection, and they also got medals.

As Maple had said, the two had gone through a very packed event time.

「If we can explore these ruins and… one more dungeon, it’ll be alright.」

「Will we spend the entire fifth day in the ruins?」

「Yep, that’s the plan. It might take just that long.」

The two took a brief break and started exploring the ruins again.

Unlike the first time, they took their time trying to find cellars and hidden rooms.

The reason was the old picture mentioned earlier.

The two expected to find the water jugs from the painting somewhere in these ruins.

To recreate the situation in the painting, they would need water jugs.

That picture may not have been absolutely correct, but it was the only clue the two had at the moment.

The sun was setting as the two continued their search, sometimes splitting up, but in the end they didn’t find anything.

「Let’s get under a roof somewhere and rest.」

「Let’s do just that.」

With their shoulders drooped at the fact that they hadn’t achieved as much as they had hoped for, the two ate.

「There was nothing, e-eh.」

「…maybe something will change again at night, so… why not take turns exploring every now and then?」

「Yep, sure!」

The two decided not to explore simultaneously, deciding that one of them would rest, since there was still more exploring to be done tomorrow.

They had learned in their escape from the snails that if they didn’t give themselves some breathing room, they’d make mistakes.

After talking for a while after dinner, Sally went out to explore first.

「Take care!」

「I’m off.」

Maple summoned Syrup to play with it. There wasn’t anything else to do.

Nevertheless, sometimes taking a break is also admirable work.

Since the two of them had decided on it together, she couldn’t just break the promise and head out to explore on her own.

After a while, Sally returned.

By the looks of it, she was probably not successful. Her expression wasn’t bright.

And then, after a bit of time, Maple departed.

This was repeated several times, and for the umpteenth time, it was Maple’s turn to go.

「I’m gone, alright?」

「Yep, I hope there’s something around…」

Maple explored inside the ruins.

First of all, she started with the big fountain.

So far, she had always started with the big fountain.

Then she would look around the whole place to check out the smaller fountains.

Maple looked up at the sky.

「The moon is beautiful…」

The full moon in the sky was serenely showering the ground with pale moonlight.

The real world is so full of electric light that one would not be able to experience the brightness of the moonlight as well as this.

Maple walked down the pathway to the big fountain.

「Hm?」

Maple paused.

There was a change in the big fountain that they had been waiting for.

The fountain was glowing faintly despite the fact that the two hadn’t done anything to it.