Chapter 34

Chapter 34: Enjoying a Hot Spring Alone with Ria, Then Our Hands Touched
One by one, the Bamboo Fragrance Guild members gathered and began examining the calligraphy.
Soon, a middle-aged man who had come out after hearing the commotion took the letter and inspected it closely.
Then—
“Waaaaah!!”
A roar of cheers burst forth.
It seemed the verdict had come down that it was definitely their master’s handwriting.
They hugged one another, cried, shouted, and rejoiced.
‘Master Sword Saint must have been a highly respected guild master and teacher.’
For them to be this overjoyed.
The fact that I had let them know he was alive filled me with a deep sense of satisfaction.
Soon afterward, they all went inside the large building.
That was probably the indoor training hall.
‘Looks like they’re going to hold a meeting.’
That would probably take a while.
I pitched a small one-touch tent in the mountain and read a new cookbook inside it.
Had about two hours passed?
I stepped out of the tent, packed it up, and looked toward the Bamboo Fragrance Guild through my binoculars.
‘Looks like the meeting is over.’
The guild members were training outside again.
The difference from before was that their faces were bright now.
‘Shall I head down?’
I put on a black windbreaker, a cap, sunglasses, and a black mask.
If anything, I was dressed a bit like Erik.
With that getup on, I descended the ridge and headed toward the main gate of the Bamboo Fragrance Guild.
Soon, I knocked on the old-fashioned iron ring attached to the closed gate.
Knock, knock-!
A moment later, the gate opened.
A young man in a kendo uniform asked me,
“Are you the benefactor our master spoke of?”
I gave a slight nod.
“We have been waiting for you. Please follow me.”
I stepped through the gate after him.
The eyes of everyone training began to focus on me.
‘This is a bit burdensome.’
Soon, the young man guiding me stopped in front of one of the buildings.
“Please wait here. I will call the instructor.”
He stepped inside the building and came back out with a middle-aged man who seemed to be the instructor.
He was the one who had confirmed the Sword Saint’s handwriting on the letter earlier.
“So you are the person said to be the benefactor of our master?”
I gave a small nod.
“At attention—!”
The instructor suddenly shouted at the top of his lungs.
‘What is this……?’
Guild members suddenly surrounded me from all sides, releasing their presence.
Surely they weren’t trying to subdue me and force information out of me.
Then the instructor shouted again.
“Offer thanks!”
At once, the guild members cried out in voices loud enough to shake the mountain.
“Thank you for saving our master, O benefactor!”
Ah……
So it was an expression of gratitude.
I had gotten nervous for nothing.
Soon, the instructor held out a box to me.
“It is the ice-attribute Highest-Grade Magic Stone.”
I accepted it and opened the lid.
A chill spilled out.
It was unmistakably an ice-attribute Highest-Grade Magic Stone.
“May I ask just one thing?”
At the instructor’s question, I gave a small nod.
If it turned out to be an inconvenient question, I planned to simply leave without answering.
“Is our master safe at present?”
That wasn’t a difficult question at all.
I answered with a slight nod.
“I understand. That is enough for us. We will inform the media of this letter and certainly come to retrieve our master with a relief party.”
I nodded, then left the Bamboo Fragrance Guild branch and began descending the mountain.
It did not seem as though anyone was following me.
***
After returning to my country house, I entered the Rift.
The scene before me was—
The S-Rank Hunters were tilling the soil.
‘Right. Ria said she was expanding the field to plant more crops.’
So that was what they were doing.
I walked toward them.
“The other two may have become Ria’s temporary subordinates, but why are you tilling the soil too, Master Sword Saint?”
That’s right.
The Sword Saint was busily turning the earth with a rotary spade.
“I volunteered. It looked fun.”
“Even so……”
“It also cultivates the mind, and I find it enjoyable. More importantly…… how did the matter you went to handle turn out?”
“I delivered the letter safely to your guild.”
“And my guild members? Did they do anything to offend you?”
“No, they were extremely courteous. Perhaps because they are your disciples, but they all seemed like decent people, including the instructor.”
“You flatter us.”
“A rescue party and an advance party will probably set out before long.”
The moment I said that, the Sword Saint set down the rotary spade and stepped back.
What was that for?
Then he bowed deeply toward me.
“Seon-u, you are the benefactor who saved my life and the lives of my companions. I thank you from the bottom of my heart.”
“No, please don’t do that.”
I hurriedly tried to stop him.
The Sword Saint continued,
“I will never forget this debt.”
All I had really done was receive a guest.
Still, it felt good.
***
Night fell.
Ria said to her S-Rank subordinates and the Sword Saint,
“If Bell shows signs of intense alarm while I am out tonight, that means a Monster has come close. Please guard this place in my stead.”
“Of course.”
“All right, Captain. Leave it to us.”
“……”
Here we go again.
Ria’s nightly outing.
Now that there were people to guard the house and Rin, she was clearly intending to go roaming at night again.
“You’re going out again?”
“Yes. There’s somewhere in the south I’ve wanted to visit.”
“A place you wanted to visit? Where?”
“……Do you want to come too, Seon-u?”
Ria suddenly looked oddly shy.
Why?
That made me curious.
But—
‘I have to dig the pit for cultivating Glace Mushrooms starting tomorrow.’
Still, now that I was a Second Awakened, going without sleep for a day or two wouldn’t bother me much.
And if we ran into Monsters during the night walk and hunted them, that would mean combat experience.
And Magic Stones.
Two birds with one stone.
“I’ll go.”
Ria looked surprised, as if she hadn’t expected me to say yes.
After hesitating for a moment, she answered,
“All right……”
Why had she hesitated……?
Just where were we going?
Well, I would find out when we got there.
And so I set out with Ria on a night walk that also doubled as Rift exploration.
Ria had brought a small backpack from her room.
I had no idea what was inside.
Then I said to her,
“Come to think of it, the Rift you came through was in the south too, wasn’t it?”
“That’s right. It’s not very far from here. About two hourglasses’ worth of time?”
So, about two hours away.
That really wasn’t very far.
Though of course, that was probably two hours by Ria’s standards.
“Seon-u, I’ve been thinking.”
“About what?”
“I think our house may be near the center of this Rift.”
“What makes you think that?”
“From the house as the center point, the place I came from is to the south, and the place your world’s people came from is to the west. Both are not too far from our house, right?”
“That’s true.”
“I’ve traveled in all directions, and once I moved for about three hourglasses or more, the terrain started changing. To the west, there was dense jungle terrain. To the east, desert terrain. To the south, volcanic and mountainous terrain. To the north, snowy terrain.”
“That does make sense. Our house really could be near the center of the fourth floor. Was the place where you hunted the Drake to the southwest?”
“Yes. Near the edge where the jungle and volcanic regions began.”
Then that meant where we were currently heading, south, would be mountainous terrain or volcanic terrain.
Why were we going there?
Ria wouldn’t tell me.
Had we walked about three hours?
Along the way, we encountered one High-Grade Monster, which I dealt with and then absorbed through Acresia.
“What a shame. Even though it was High-Grade, I guess it wasn’t the kind of Monster Acresia would want to devour.”
I wanted to raise Acresia’s rank to A-Rank.
But for that, I needed rare Monsters.
It was difficult for now, but one day it would be possible.
So we walked for about three hours, talking all the while.
‘It’s been a long time since it was just the two of us like this.’
In that sense, this night walk wasn’t bad at all.
No, it was actually very pleasant.
Ria seemed to feel the same way, because the smile never left her face.
Then, at some point, Ria suddenly grew quiet.
She looked tense.
“What’s wrong, Ria? Are you not feeling well?”
“N-no. It’s just……”
Where had the charismatic former knight commander gone, the one who had been ordering her subordinates around just earlier?
Now she had become a shy girl.
The reason soon became clear.
We started climbing a rocky hill from which steam was rising.
And before long—
the sound of water trickling.
And a warm, humid heat I could feel on my skin.
‘No way……?’
Surely not.
That was what I thought.
But that was exactly what it was.
‘Hot spring water…….’
There was a hot spring deep enough for a person to soak in fully.
So that was why Ria had wanted to come here alone.
When I looked at her, her face was red as a ripe tomato.
“I-it’s not that I had any strange intentions.”
“I know, I know……!”
“It was a place I found while searching for the Drake, and I thought that someday, when there was time, I’d come back and soak here.”
“I see. Sorry. If I’d known it was a place like this, I wouldn’t have said I was coming too. Maybe I just followed along without thinking and now you can’t enjoy it comfortably?”
“Absolutely not! There’s no way I would be uncomfortable because of you, Seon-u. And I was the one who asked whether you wanted to come.”
That was true.
In any case, at times like this, the important thing was not to panic.
“Anyway, let’s just enjoy ourselves without making it awkward.”
“All right.”
In that case, maybe I should prepare a simple drink and some snacks.
Of course, definitely not like last time, when we drank ourselves senseless.
Just one glass each.
“I’ll go change.”
“All right.”
With that, Ria went behind the rocks.
I opened Acresia and took out some simple snacks.
“Jamón and a highball should do nicely.”
I took out a small table and a cutting board, put on sanitary gloves, and sliced the Jamón thinly.
Then I took out a chunk of ice, carved it into a round sphere, and dropped it into a glass.
After that, I poured in Macallan 25-year-old whisky and sparkling water.
Drip, drip!
I stirred it well with a bar spoon, and that was that.
Then Ria came back out.
She had wrapped herself in the long towel I bought her and had a large towel draped over her shoulders.
‘Phew, thank goodness……!’
I had been faintly worried she might come out barely covered with just a small towel.
At least this way, it was actually less revealing than a bikini.
Why was I feeling relieved?
Was it because I was worried that, if the mood took over again, something like that might happen?
At any rate.
“I’ll go change too. I don’t have a swimsuit or a large towel, so I’ll just wear something comfortable.”
“Mm.”
I came back out wearing comfortable trail shorts.
Ria was already dipping her feet in the water.
I sat down a little distance away and lowered my feet in as well.
“It’s hotter than I expected.”
“Right? And since the air isn’t cool, unless you protect yourself with Mana, you wouldn’t be able to stay in for very long.”
In that case, there was a solution.
I placed two Ice Crystals and the ice-attribute Highest-Grade Magic Stone together off to one side.
At once, the air around us became cooler.
A hot spring was best enjoyed outdoors in winter, after all.
Ria looked pleased.
“This way the air is cool while the water is warm. It’s nice.”
Then the two of us submerged ourselves fully.
It was extremely awkward and embarrassing, a man and a woman sharing a hot spring like this.
To ease the awkwardness, there was only one thing for it.
I set a wooden tray afloat on the water with the highballs and Jamón on it.
“Let’s have just one glass each.”
“Sounds good.”
Ria and I each took a glass.
“Cheers.”
“Cheers!”
It had been a long time since I’d had a drink with Ria.
Since that incident, I hadn’t touched any alcohol at all, including fruit wine.
After one sip, Ria let out an exclamation.
“Ahh! That’s refreshing.”
“It’s called a highball. It’s whisky mixed with sparkling water. Is it good?”
“It is. It goes especially well with the hot spring.”
I took a sip too.
The feeling of soaking in a hot spring while drinking a highball from a wooden tray floating on the water.
This really was paradise.
Then I took a bite of the salty Jamón.
Delicious.
“This is nice.”
“It really is.”
This wasn’t good.
If I let myself get swept up in the mood like this—
Then Ria spoke.
“It’s been a long time since it was just the two of us like this for so long.”
“It really has.”
And then the hand I had resting at my side touched hers.