CH 39

“Holy–! What’s that hand?!”

“Oi, oi, what’s up with that, Ari?”

“You’re not cheating, are you?”

It was the old-timers, seated in a circle on the floor near the guild’s entrance, that were making all that noise. Since morning, they’d been playing a game using something similar to popsicle sticks. The number of players changed often, decreasing with requests to fix leaky roofs and increasing once repairs were finished inside. Female adventurers looked on with disdain from their chairs, knowing full well that they were the ones working hard at home.

Today, I was working at the guild and Fikar was studying in a small room in the back.

The sounds of work rang out left and right, complemented by sudden outbursts of laughter and restrained chatter. In the background, the pitter-patter of rain had become a constant.

The rainy season had arrived.

“Mm, there are always plenty of leaks this time of year, huh~”

Tarina-san sighed as she piled up the files for completed requests. Right before the rainy season began, there had been a period of severe lightning strikes, causing many to turn to the guild to request repair work. As a result, most of the adventurers in Tortea were dispatched and, even as they rarely had to enter the forest during this season, the number of requests didn’t go down. There were some adventurers that had been asked to wait at the guild in case of urgent requests, but the number of those was decreasing. The rest of the adventurers, no more than 20 at any given time, were out in neighboring towns exchanging information about rain damage or trading for food.

I offered a hot drink to the troubled Tarina-san and asked a question as I returned to my seat.

“The rainy season will continue like this for another month, right? Won’t it be bad if we don’t have enough manpower?”

“It won’t be good if there are too few people to take down rampaging monsters. There are loads of creatures that act up in this weather, but we don’t have many high-ranking adventurers to begin with, y’know?”

Rain turned the forest into a muddy mess and worsened the already poor visibility of the region. If you got attacked in those conditions, even the weak monsters around Tortea could cause a major incident.

“Well, I don’t know what will happen in the future, so let’s just get our current work done. Sumire, that shelf, please. Thanks.”

Tarina-san, quickly switching out of a negative mindset, was asking me to do the same, so I nodded along.

My main task was to scan documents, or so it would be called in a modern workplace. I placed a completed form onto a flat, smooth stone. After a while, the paper appeared to slowly melt into the stone. When it was completely melted, I put another form on top. It was a simple and mindless task, but the paperwork tended to pile up because the time spent waiting for each document to melt added up quickly.

Being a low-rank staffer, I was often the one doing this so that the more talented people didn’t have to waste their time. While one request was melting into the stone, I wrote out the template for a new one on a fresh piece of paper. Sitting at my desk next to Tarina-san’s service window, I worked silently.

The guild’s reception counter was the height where you would have to work standing up, meaning I normally wouldn’t be seen if I sat down and to the side to do my work. However, some of the regulars knew that my desk was always there and peered over the counter to ask me for help.

So when I saw a shadow grow over my hands, I thought someone was trying to catch my attention.

That’s why I was taken aback when…

“Hmm? … hyYYAAAAA WHAT THE HELL?!?”

What I saw looming above me wasn’t an adventurer.

In my surprise, I reflexively tried to retreat from my desk, falling in my chair and hitting my back hard. Before I could savor the pain, my panicked mind fumbled around, trying to figure out who or what the culprit was.

Eh? Just now, a mushroom? Something looking like a mushroom?

I lifted my head and, indeed, there was a mushroom growing before my eyes.

It had a mountainous cap as thick as my waist and colored in a visually painful combination of de~ep purple and pink marble. There were also white circles 10cm across, each with a smaller black circle inside of them, scattered all over the place. If I had to describe the creature, it would be a mushroom monster with a lot of eyeballs. By the way, the stem was a fluorescent yellowish green. If there’s a Creator out there, I’d love to question Him for an hour as to why such a color scheme was chosen.

The creepy-looking mushroom growing on my desk bent its stem, pointing its cap at me as if to stare into my soul.

The sight of so many eyeballs pointing at you would frighten anyone.

Following my scream and fall, the guild was silent.

For a heartbeat, the sound of the rain dominated the air, then the building became noisy all at once.

“Hey! Ain’t that a jammer mushroom?”

“Is it possessing Sumire? How many years has it been since it’s visited Tortea?”

With the help of Fikar, who had come to my side before I knew it, I was finally able to recover from my fall. I thanked him, but he still looked worried.

Though, the people around us were all smiles. Did they not feel threatened by large and poisonous mushrooms? Some of them went so far as to stroke its eerie eyeballs.

Or rather, what do you mean I’m possessed?!

“Ah, I was wondering why Fikar suddenly leaped out. A jammer mushroom, huh?”

Gartis-san, the manager of Tortea’s guild branch who’d been teaching Fikar one-on-one in a small room, appeared quietly and assessed the ominous ‘jammer mushroom’ without panicking.

Jammer mushrooms; I remembered hearing about them.

They were very dense for a mushroom and, despite their poisonous appearance, they were non-toxic and very tasty when eaten hot. They could grow on any inorganic or dead material, but there were some restrictions.

Jammer mushrooms could “possess” people, suddenly appearing next to them one day. There were never any warnings, no signs, and you’d never see them growing. One moment there’s nothing and the next there’s this giant thing next to you.

Pick it, burn it, drown it, boil it, and travel to an arid region – you’ll still be able to find it growing. According to the records, there was once a possessed person who rode a dragon and lived off the land, but it always sprouted up the moment they went to fetch water.

The people it possessed were always women and the duration could be as short as half a year or as long as several years.

They weren’t harmful.

“This’ll be delicious torn and roasted or boiled and made into a soup. How long’s it been since I’ve had any of this stuff?”

Gartis-san laughed as he placed a big, burly hand on the jammer mushroom’s cap and plucked it. It only took a light flick to leave no evidence that it had ever been on the desk.

I turned away from the eye-filled mushroom that was offered to me, shaking my head.

Its initial impact was so strong that I didn’t feel like touching it despite its harmlessness.

“Then, we’ll eat it ourselves. You guys are lucky you’re on standby!”

“Thanks, Sumire!!”

“Please keep bringing them to me when they grow. They’re my favorite~”

“Oi, don’t you try and keep them all for yourself!”

The insides of the jammer mushroom, which was being diced up by the crowd, were as red as blood.

Its color scheme is seriously wrong…