Chapter 64

Chapter 64.

The job trait I had unlocked through Lee A-un’s Spirit Sorcerer.

Using that power, I summoned the “spirits” that served as the core ingredient for the Nutritional Supplement and floated them in the air.

Tee-hee-hee!

Just as I was admiring the sacred aura emitted by the white fairies that flickered with white light.

“Eek!”

Yeriche, who had crossed the Portal, was startled by the fairies and collapsed to the floor.

I calmly sent the spirits back.

“What was that? Am I dreaming?”

“What do you mean?”

“The fairies that were circling around you!”

“What are those?”

“???”

Yeriche was stunned.

“No, but… there were fairies?”

Since I lied so calmly, she seemed confused about whether what she had just seen was a dream or waking life.

“They were definitely there… The fairies were giggling…”

“Stop pretending to be cute.”

“That is not what I am doing! They really were there!”

“Yes, yes. I will say you saw fairies or spirits or whatever, so come sit here for now.”

“…B-but it was real…”

The Saintess shrank back and sat down in front of the table.

I smoothly pushed one Nutritional Supplement in front of the Saintess.

“Mm!”

In an instant, her aggrieved look vanished as if it had been a lie, and she settled into perfect calm.

It was the attitude of a true professional facing a product.

‘She seems used to this kind of thing.’

“Try infusing Divine Power into this the same way you make Holy Water.”

“Yes.”

The Saintess closed her eyes the moment she answered.

There was not even any preparatory motion for concentrating her mind.

The instant she closed her eyes…

FLASH!

Dazzling, pure white Divine Power burst out from above the crown of the Saintess’s head.

‘…What? Why is it so fast?’

Divine Power was not originally something that could be used with such instant activation.

Divine Power was power borrowed from a god.

‘I do not know whether Earth truly has gods or not, but in any case.’

To use Divine Power, one had to ask the god who owned that power to “please bestow power.”

To use an analogy, the process of knock, knock, tapping on the door, saying “It is me. Please give me power,” and then receiving the answer, “It is you. I will lend it to you,” was absolutely necessary.

Unlike Mana, it was a convenient power that did not need to be trained, and it had the advantage of being the only power with healing capability.

In exchange, it had the drawback of being cumbersome and slow to use, which kept it balanced with Mana.

However, Yeriche’s Divine Power was at the level where it activated almost as soon as she closed her eyes.

It was strangely fast.

‘The title of “Earth’s strongest” was not just for show.’

FLASH!

The Saintess’s Divine Power seeped into the Nutritional Supplement.

As the Divine Power harmonized with the white Nutritional Supplement, it took on a pearl-like color shining in seven hues.

Hiss—

Then, with the sound of air escaping, it turned into plain water.

‘Ah.’

It was a failure.

“Saintess. This is a failure.”

“…Huh? Why?”

The Saintess opened her eyes and looked at the “thing that used to be a Nutritional Supplement” in front of her.

Now it had become nothing more than a water bottle.

“…Huh?”

As though she could not believe it, the Saintess picked up the water bottle and brought it right up to her eyes.

She shook it this way and that, even smelled it, and her eyes gradually narrowed.

Soon, a suspicious gaze full of certainty fixed on me.

“What is it?”

“You switched it, did you not?”

“…”

This brat?

“Are you insane, Saintess?”

“Then are you saying I made a mistake? I did it exactly the same way I do when making Holy Water…”

“The result is proving it, is it not?”

I shook my head and put the water bottle aside.

“The blend was wrong.”

“…That cannot be true…”

‘Mm.’

In truth, this was my calculation error.

The Saintess’s Divine Power was faster than that used by the High Priests of Lost Honor… and incomparably stronger.

This Nutritional Supplement’s blend had been adjusted to the standard of the High Priests’ Divine Power.

Since the Saintess’s Divine Power struck into it with power beyond that, it had lost its medicinal effect.

However, there was no need to admit my mistake in front of the Saintess.

Instead, I brazenly raised my chin and clicked my tongue as though I found her pathetic.

“How clumsy. To blame someone else when you are the one who failed to control your power.”

“…Kgh.”

The Saintess’s face flushed with frustration.

“Try using your Divine Power a little more delicately.”

“Delicately? What do you mean by that? Just tell me what I am supposed to do.”

“You do not know…”

“I do not…”

I did not know either.

“I see… So this is all you amount to.”

“…I will try one more time.”

The Saintess, now stubbornly determined, snatched one of the Nutritional Supplements rolling on the table.

The Saintess closed her eyes, turned her Divine Power off and on, and muttered.

“Pour it weakly…? Like this? Or… this sort of feeling?”

Now serious, the Saintess did not begrudge the Nutritional Supplements that were turning into water.

‘She must instinctively know.’

She knew that enormous wealth awaited if she succeeded, so she did not consider the sunk cost caused by failure a waste.

A foundation for success. That was probably how she thought of it.

…And like that, three more failed.

“What am I supposed to do? You told me to be delicate!”

“How incompetent…”

“Kgh…! No, I really only put in a little! Why does it still turn into plain water?”

The Saintess’s face gradually began to heat up.

And then five.

“No!!! I did it properly!! I poured it gently!!!”

“You cannot even do that?”

“One more!!”

By the time she reached the tenth one.

“Ah!!! Why!!!”

BANG, BANG, BANG!

The Saintess’s eyes flipped, and she began slamming the table wildly.

Every time she swung her fist, the Nutritional Supplement bottles scattered across the table rattled! Rattled! and danced noisily.

“You!!! Fucking!!! Bastard!!!”

BANG, BANG!

At this rate, would the table really split in half?

On top of that, she occasionally spat curses in Italian, and honestly, it was frightening.

“Shit! Why is everything going wrong today?! What a pain! I am so fucking sick of this!” she shouted in Italian.

‘Italians swear with their whole bodies.’

She had abundant gestures, such as gathering the tips of both hands’ fingers and shaking them up and down forcefully, or stretching both arms toward the sky.

One could say that even from far away, it was obvious she was “furious.”

[The opening curse means “shit.” The sentence just now can be interpreted as, “Shit! Why is everything going wrong today?!” The following “what a pain” is…]

‘How useful. You do not need to tell me any more.’

Thanks to Snowy, who whispered real-time translations of the curses into my ear, I felt as though my delicate heart might be wounded.

“Hoo. Hoo.”

The Saintess’s eyes, gleaming with rage and madness, turned toward me.

Her face was flushed red enough to burst, and rough breaths puffed out through the tip of her nose.

Instead of speaking, she held out her hand sharply.

I took out one Nutritional Supplement I had kept separately in my pocket and placed it in her hand.

The Saintess huffed, carefully cupped the Nutritional Supplement in both hands, and tried to close her eyes again.

“Wait a moment.”

“?”

Tap. Tap.

I placed five additional bottles of Nutritional Supplement in front of the Saintess.

Now there were six bottles of Nutritional Supplement in front of her.

“What is this?”

“Do not think of making it weak. Try doing it the way you usually do. Instead, imagine turning these six bottles into Holy Water at the same time.”

I had not merely watched her failures while teasing her.

Even if the Nutritional Supplement was easy to make, it was not an elixir that should be wasted so pointlessly.

The current plain-water transformation caused by blending failure was ultimately happening because the Saintess’s Divine Power was too strong.

No matter how hard she tried to fire her Divine Power weakly, it did not go as she wanted.

‘…Even when she tries to manifest it as weakly as possible, her basic output is above a High Priest’s. I have to acknowledge that, at least when it comes to her absurdly overpowered Divine Power.’

Inwardly, I raised my thumb.

Now that I knew the cause, the solution was simple.

Instead of having one poor Nutritional Supplement get beaten down by the Saintess’s absurd Divine Power alone…

They could take the hit together.

After carefully observing and calculating how the Nutritional Supplements turned into plain water, six bottles were exactly right for the current Saintess.

‘The ordinary Divine Power value for Holy Water production is equal to six High Priests, then.’

I gave two thumbs up in my mind.

“Try it.”

The Saintess took a deep breath and closed her eyes.

FLASH!

When she raised her Divine Power, the six bottles of Nutritional Supplement simultaneously took on a pearl-like glow shining in seven hues.

They did not turn into transparent plain water, and instead fully contained that brilliant light.

It was a perfect settling.

‘It worked.’

“Please…!”

The Saintess, who knew nothing, opened her eyes while clasping her hands together and trembling, then examined the result.

The result was a great success.

“I-it worked!”

The Saintess sprang up and bounced in place.

“It worked! Yes! This is me! I can do it!”

After cheering for a long while, she cleared her throat and soon shrugged with an arrogant expression.

“You saw that, did you not? If I put my mind to it, this much is simple.”

Watching that change in attitude, I revised my evaluation of the Saintess upward.

‘This woman is the real thing, at least when it comes to Divine Power.’

“Now let us appraise it.”

[I will call Kang Hyo-jun.]

CRASH!

BANG!

Perhaps he had been waiting nearby, but Kang Hyo-jun burst into the reception room, panting for breath with appraisal glasses in hand.

He must have run in such a hurry that his necktie was crooked.

“Hoo, hoo… Special One. I have been waiting. You succeeded in manufacturing a consumable Artifact?”

“See for yourself.”

I handed Kang Hyo-jun the Holy Water shining in seven hues.

Kang Hyo-jun held up the monocle and carefully examined the Holy Water.

“I-it really is a consumable Artifact.”

“What are the effects?”

Yeriche asked anxiously.

The Holy Water Yeriche had made before had two abilities.

“Increased Healing,” which raised the body’s natural healing power.

And “Disease Resistance,” which raised immunity to prevent disease.

If that Holy Water had properly become a consumable Artifact, those two should be attached to it.

“One is… Increased Healing.”

One was there.

“What is the grade?”

“A-rank.”

“Ugh.”

Yeriche let out a disappointed sound.

I understood. She must have hoped for it to match or surpass the S-rank effect possessed by the Red Elixir.

“Disease Resistance is properly attached as well. Likewise, it is A-rank.”

“…That is good.”

Yeriche spoke coolly, as though shaking off her regret.

A faint disappointment passed through her eyes, which had been sparkling with expectation, but she deliberately nodded as if she were being cool about it.

“It did not surpass the Red Elixir, but this alone is a splendid result.”

That was certainly true. The Red Elixir had become a major topic because it was the first to appear with S-rank performance, and it had turned the Auction House upside down by being judged “double S-rank” with one more S-rank effect attached.

Compared to that, this Artifact Holy Water, which was double A-rank, was clearly one grade below the Red Elixir.

At that moment,

“W-wait a moment. Saintess.”

Kang Hyo-jun spoke without taking the appraisal glasses off his eyes.

When Yeriche confirmed his gaze, a strange sense of expectation began creeping over her face once again.

“Could it be?”

“…Yes. There is one more.”

But what if one more effect was attached here?

What if it was a “triple” consumable with as many as three abilities?

“T-triple?!”

Then a ridiculously amazing consumable that had never once appeared in the world would be born.

I watched Kang Hyo-jun’s and Yeriche’s reactions with a warm feeling.

‘Why do you think I went as far as making Nutritional Supplements?’

The two effects existing Holy Water had. And the one effect the Nutritional Supplement originally possessed.

It had been decided from the beginning that a “triple” would emerge.

“…‘Effect Enhancement.’ The grade is S-rank.”

“W-what… S-rank?!”

Yeriche staggered as though she was about to faint and sank onto the sofa with a thump.

It was a historic moment when a “triple consumable Artifact,” something that had never appeared in history, was born.

Moreover, she had created that Artifact with her own hands.

It was a situation more than sufficient for dopamine to explode.

On top of that, were there not more than twenty unopened Nutritional Supplements still rolling around in front of Yeriche?

‘All of that must look like money to her.’

It was enough to drive the money demon Saintess out of her mind.

‘But it is too early to celebrate, Saintess.’

The Nutritional Supplement…

had its own built-in ability to inflate the effects of the Divine Power used as its material.

In other words.

When “Increased Healing (A)” and “Disease Resistance (A)” were combined with “Effect Enhancement (S),” those two A-rank traits would exert effects at S-rank or higher.

On top of that, the “healing” authority naturally contained within Divine Power itself would be expanded.

‘This part was beyond even my expectations.’

In addition to the Nutritional Supplement’s effect amplification, Yeriche’s absurdly powerful Divine Power itself was a variable.

Yeriche was stronger than a High Priest.

That meant even the inherent “healing” authority dwelling in Divine Power itself could receive an Artifact effect classification.

“T-there is one more!”

“Q-quadruple?!”

A quadruple with four traits appearing in the consumable market, where even a triple had never appeared before.

‘This is getting interesting.’

“It is B-rank Wound Healing!”

“Huaaah.”

Unable to endure the dopamine that had exceeded her limit, the Saintess’s eyes rolled back, and she collapsed beside the sofa.

Kang Hyo-jun began examining the other Holy Waters closely as well, whether to check if he had seen incorrectly or whether the appraisal glasses might have malfunctioned.

Watching him, I called Happy.

“…What is it, Special One?”

“Happy, you have appraisal glasses as well, correct?”

“I do.”

I held out one bottle of Holy Water to Happy.

“Would you take a look?”

Happy tilted her head and checked the Holy Water.

Beyond the lenses of her glasses, her pupils began shaking as though an earthquake had struck them.

“Huuuh…! Q-quadruple…!”

Immediately afterward, Happy clutched her heart and sank to the floor.

“I will supply this to the market through Kang Hyo-jun. With this, the existing Holy Water has lost its market-dominant position. Is that correct?”

“…That is correct.”

Happy’s complexion turned as white as a sheet of paper.

“The Holy Water monopoly, relationships with the upper echelons… To summarize your value in the Market, that is about it. Thanks to this Holy Water, all of your value will disappear. Is that correct as well?”

“…Yes.”

Mm-hmm.

This was exactly it.

“Now there is no longer a place for you in the Market.”

“…That is, correct.”

“Will you join the foundation?”

“…”

Tears streamed down Happy’s face.

They were certainly tears of joy.

After all, she would be escaping a black company like the Black Market.

And she would be working at a foundation full of dreams and hope, the future and goodwill.

“…Yes.”

So from now on, do not insult people you have just met, Happy.