7-7. Scrolls and Cheat
Satou's here. I'm reminded of Icarus when we're talking about flying human, but flying in the air has been everybody's dream since the olden days. In this world, people aren't flying with wax wings, but with magic.
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I'm told that the granddaughter of elder Dohar will be my wife if I stay, so I promise Zajir-san who glares at me when he hears that to part away, thus we leave Bollhart city behind.
The nearest city is four days away.
Since the path there is a mountain trail, it'll probably be five days.
There are several carriages going to the same direction as us, but since our speeds are different, we're not moving in caravan. It seems that normally, even if the moving speeds are different, many carriages join together to evade thieves, monsters and beasts.
Since we wouldn't be able to craft, experiment and do training if we're together with other merchants, I try not to intrude each other's turf as much as possible.
Even so, there are times when we meet them during the break, so I've put dummy barrels, boxes and various luggage around.
Currently, the coachman is Lulu. Arisa has installed a cushion on the driver's seat during our stay in the Bollhart city, so it looks comfortable now. It seems that the inside of the cushion seat contains coiled springs that she's asked the blacksmiths to make.
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Two days after we've left Bollhart city, the caravan of merchants aren't near our camping ground at last, so I decide to use the many scrolls that I've bought.
Before I use the scrolls, I finally activate the five kind of magic skills; Earth, Fire, Wind, Ice, and Light.
First I make a wall made from mud with [Mud Wall (Wall)]. It's a one meter tall, one meter wide, and five centimeters thick [Wall]. It looks like it'll collapse if it's just touched lightly.
Lulu and the others who are watching give an applause. Tama wants to climb it, but I warn her that it's fragile so she shouldn't.
Next, I harden the mud wall with [Hard Clay]. It's not glossy like a porcelain, but it's strengthened enough.
It seems that both the mud wall and the hardened wall would not return back to their original forms even with passing time. If I have a potter's wheel, I would be able to make pot for medicines. Come to think of it, I don't have Ceramic making skill yet, let's try it next time.
When I use [Rock Smasher] on the mud wall and the hardened mud wall, both of them break and become sand.
When I use [Freeze Water] on the water in the bucket, it freezes for three centimeters from the surface. Since it's winter now, it doesn't seem like it'd melt even if it's left alone. If I use it on a pond if we find one, we would be able to play on a skating ring made from it. I'll make skate boots while we're moving.
The [Air Curtain] could be used to make windbreak, but the effect disappear in about three minutes.
Since all the life magic I've tried have subtle effects, I'm omitting it. [Deodorant] seems to be usable for when I've moved my body like after training.
It's quite unpopular when I use it later. I've already expected the kind of Arisa's reaction, "Boy's sweats are proof of youth you know, and you're erasing that! erasing that!", but even Lulu looks really disappointed. When we're sleeping, even Pochi and Tama say, "There's no master's scent nodesu.", they rub their noses while putting on strange faces, so I decide not to use it except when I'm really stinky of sweats.
Next I try using [Condense]. It condenses the moonlight and it does get a bit brighter, but that's it. The magic tool Light Drop that hasn't had role recently is much brighter. No wonder it becomes a bad stock.
I use the other bad stock [Furnace Flame (Forge)] from a place away from everyone. I ask Mia to standby with a long stick for if the fire spread. I change into cheap shirt and trousers since I don't want my clothes get burned. Arisa is saying some stupid things from behind, "Shirt is way better than robe isn't it. That slender body line is irresistible."
I put a copper dagger I've got from the thieves back then on a rock and use the magic. The MP consumption is slightly bigger, maybe because this spell belong to intermediate class. Since the flame appears only one meter away from the scroll, I move it to the dagger's place in a hurry. Even though the copper dagger should have been more soluble than iron, it only gets hot and isn't melting. Since the nearby weeds are burning, I ask Mia to put down the fire.
I'll try the remaining nature magic. I use [Signal] to send Morse codes to Nana. I ask Nana to activate [Signal] too so that she can receives it.
"It's ton ton ton, tsu, tsu, tsu, ton ton ton."
"Then, try to send the same thing back."
"Yes, master."
A signal sound from one scene of the movie I've seen a long time ago is playing back in my head.
Arisa who's seemingly bored begins to sing [SOS] song while doing strange choreography. I wonder if that's from olden idol? Since the song is upbeat, Pochi and Tama have also begun to dance together. Even Mia is accompanying the music with reed flute.
No well, you girls, you don't have to force yourself to watch, if you're tired it's fine to do as you like you know?
I pull myself together and use [Sonar]. It's searching for enemies in 20 meters wide range. It seems that it doesn't detect small animals, and only targets dangerous ones like poisonous snakes and stray dogs. The effect only last for five minutes. I know now just how irregular the radar is.
I try the remaining ones in turns. [Fence] creates transparent horse-rail-like fences that's one meter tall and one meter wide. However, it's quite fragile, it partially breaks from [Short Stun], and completely breaks when Liza lightly kicks it.
It might be usable if the opponent is just some low level thieves, but if it's a knight-class, then it would get broken without any resistance.
The last one I use is [Cube], and it's just like how Arisa has demonstrated, the activated cube is not more than 10 centimeters in size.
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It's the real thing now.
So that Liza and the others don't get hurt, I move two mountains away from them. Unlike from before I announce that I'm high leveled where they'd get worried if I go alone in uninhabited place, they don't object at all now. However, when we're in place with people, there's always someone beside me at midnight, perhaps they're thinking that I'd go to have some night time. Good grief, it's no good. I've felt that my sexual desire has decreased sharply after I arrive at this world, but I'm still a healthy man. I'd like to have a nightlife once in a while.
My destination is a place with five monsters called Soldier Beetles. They're drone beetle-like monsters with the size of light cars, their level are lower 20s.
When I'm two kilometers away from it, I activate [Sonar] and go closer. It seems that the range of enemy search is around one kilometer. I think it's because the skill level is 10, it's quite different from the initial one. However, since I have radar already, it's regretful to think that I'd never use this magic. The effective time has been quite extended too.
Above all, judging from the name, it'd be bad if an enemy with good sense notice me when I'm searching using this. In truth I could sense radar-like wave of magic from [Sonar] when I'm using [Signal] magic. On the contrary, I think it could be usable for fake warning.
Since I've got to the place 500 meters away from the monsters, I shoot [Short Stun] to check its effective range. Just like Magic Arrow, the possible shot amount has increased. The amount is the same as magic arrow it seems. I shoot one to one of the beetle. The remaining 120 go towards the other three. I divide it to 20, 40, and 64.
As the result, the beetle shot with one is fainted with dented shell, but the one shot with 20 gets its shell crushed and is half-dead. The beetles shot with 40 and more have been completely smashed.
It's disqualified as a magic for making thing faints.
It'd be fine if the opponent are knights or heavy infantries, but if it's civilians, they'd surely die. I'll analyze this spell, and I'll make one that won't increase in strength with skill level and status. The time limit is until I get to Toruma (Ossan)'s household to make scrolls. It's been awhile since I've got a work with delivery date, it's tensing me up.
Strangely, the only safe monster is coming toward here. Is it not running because its intelligence is low, or is it trying to revenge its friends.
Since it's vigorously flying here, I try to use [Mud Wall (Wall)]
I use it at maximum power, and a gigantic wall of 300 meters wide, 20 meters high, and 5 meters thick wall appears.
Since I create it just before the beetle, it hits the wall splendidly. I've thought that it would pierce through the wall, but seems that the wall is surprisingly hard, and the monster is stuck on the other side of the wall.
--Looks like I could build a castle overnight.
Since it'd only obstruct me if I leave it alone, I destroy it with [Rock Smasher]. The mud wall becomes fine sands and collapses. Since it looks like I'd get swallowed in it, I quickly jump onto a nearby tree and get out of the trouble.
Once again, I make [Mud Wall], and cancel it, it returns to the similar state as the original. As expected, the destroyed woods and undergrowth aren't restored.
The fainted monster finally recovers after 30 minutes, and it's going here. Since it's firing fire bullet even though it's just an insect, I take it with [Air Curtain]. Even though it's taking the fire bullet directly, the fire bullet is not piercing through and gets scattered away in front of the wind wall. It seems to be usable as defense if the opponents are just small fries.
The insect seems to have given up on fire bullet and begins to ram here, I'll put up [Cube] to stop it. Looks like I could create 300 meters cube at most, but the limitation is that I can't create one if there's something inside it. I make a cube of about 10 meters big in front of the beetle. The beetle can't break through the cube, just like with the mud wall. It loses its momentum and stops after pushing the cube for about 20 meters. The beetle stalls and begins falling, but by flapping its wings, it lands near me and runs on the ground attacking me.
Just as expected.
I make [Fence] in front of the beetle that's attacking on the ground. It looks like I could create multiple ones with this too, but since I could only create five spatially, I create five of it.
The fence seems to be fixed on the ground, and it won't move as long as it's not destroyed. The beetle which is moving at 30-40 Km/H is skewered by one of the fence and dies, but there's no trace of the fence moving. Since the fences could be canceled individually, I remove the unused ones and leave one alone. I leave it to confirm the effective time.
I put one complete corpse of the beetle into the Storage, and only collect the shells and the cores of the rest.
The dying one becomes a sacrifice for [Condense]. It seems that the focus power is increased with skill level, the condensed moonlight becomes laser-like. Unfortunately since the original light for the amplified one is weak, the power isn't that strong. It's about as powerful as one Remote Arrow. Furthermore, the effect only materialize after five minutes, so I think it's only usable during daytime as point attack. If it collects sunlight, the power will surely increase. Since it somehow feels cruel to keep doing this, I end it with Remote Arrow.
Continuing on, it's time to experiment with [Furnace Flame (Forge)].
I've thought of making furnace with [Mud Wall] reinforced with [Hard Clay], but I decide to use [Cube] instead.
I create transparent furnace by using several [Cubes]. It looks like the cube is reinforced if they're connected. Even though I could erase [Cube] blocks that has been connected whole, I could not separate them once connected so I have to be careful.
And then I put copper and iron daggers inside the transparent furnace made from Cubes, and activate [Furnace Flame (Forge)]. Three minutes after activation, the copper dagger melts, and in five minutes, the iron dagger also becomes liquid. It seems that [Cube] is about as durable as [Shield], it could withstand [Furnace Flame (Forge)] for 30 minutes before breaking. I found out that I could extend the endurance time to 50 minutes by creating two Cubes layered.
I open the menu and narrow the search on the map. I search for places where there are metal veins on the mountain nearby. There are veins for metal called [Iron Stone] and [Uutz Steel] it seems. I mark them, including the copper vein.
The former is approximately 30 meters away from the ground surface, so I expose it by skillfully using [Mud Wall (Wall)]. The rest of the work is done by adjusting the power of [Rock Smasher] to cut the ores. I've thought of using the sharper holy sword for an moment, but I decide to use [Rock Smasher] as a training for using magic.
Then I put the iron ore inside the transparent cube-made furnace, activate [Furnace Flame (Forge)], and begin the refining process. At first, I fail at the adjustment and the finished product is unusable, but by the third time, I'm able to refine normally. The light is dazzling, but thanks to Light Adjustment skill, it doesn't become a problem. Even while being discouraged by the small quantity of ingots refined from large quantity of ores, I continue the work.
Since Uutz Steel would darken and become brittle if I go too far, I have a hard time in adjusting the heat level for refining. I might've not been able to refine it if I don't know the accurate temperature from AR.
Thanks to the complex refinery from before, the copper one is easy.
I've thought that my magic power would be exhausted halfway, but maybe thanks to the quick MP recovery rate, it isn't even depleted by half. I've made 100KG iron ingots, 20KG Uutz steel ingots, and 70KG copper ingots before the sky turns white. The copper ingots alone worths 200 gold coins huh. Magic is tremendous after all.
I take out an anvil from the Storage, and try to create an iron sword using the same process of creating the fairy sword, but I'm only able to make a brittle sword. It's not like it could not receive magic power, but it's cracked even before I put 10 points on it. So the process is for mithril after all.
Let's try to look for mithril veins when we're moving.
>Title [Magic Blacksmith] is Acquired
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I'm going back by strolling on the sky by using Cubes as footholds. I've changed into Silver Mask since I don't know if anyone's watching.
At first I make cubes in the shape of stairs to play around with, but since it's fun to walk on the air, I try to see how far I can go up while shouting, "I can fly". I'm unusually in high tension if I do say so myself.
I keep making footholds as I jump from them, and I'm become able to see the morning sun on the horizon. I could see a white line leading up to the sky at the southeast direction, I wonder what's that? Judging from the map, it's on the direction of Bornean forest. Well, I will probably know about it in time.
Since it's become hard to breath, I try to see below, and my back grows cold.
Huh? Did I get too carried away?
According to the AR, the altitude is about 4 kilometers. Even I would probably die if I fall from this height. I must be careful not to run out of magic power.
Even though I'm at this altitude, I unexpectedly don't feel fear, since the stratosphere should be about 10 kilometers high, there's no worry of jumping out to the space yet.
For approximately 10 minutes, I practice fighting in the sky. 3D Maneuver, and Space Grasp are doing nice jobs. I've become able to understand the minimum [Cube] size needed too.
I feel like I could fight dragons or demons in the air if it's like this.
There's a hawk with five meter wing-span near the mountain, so I try practicing air battle with it during my way back. If I have wings to glide through air, there would be more usable tactics.
>[Sky Drive Skill Acquired]
Sky Drive is a skill with similar effect as using [Cube] as footholds to fly in the air, it uses less magic power. I would be able to have midnight stroll easier with this. Since the only one who could endure the wind pressure and decompression is me, it's too bad that I can't invite Arisa and the others to have some air night strolls. I think there's a wind magic called [Windbreak (Canopy)], I'll request it from Ossan's household when I'm getting scrolls from them.
>Title [One who Flies without Wings] Acquired
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