376 - Hammer, Anvil, and Enhancement Stone 1

376 - Hammer, Anvil, and Enhancement Stone 1

TL/Editor: raei

Schedule: 5/week

Illustrations: Posted in discord

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Season 2 hadn't changed much drastically, and days passed just like that.

Quantity over quality, quality over quantity. Both sayings fit as the Empire's people poured in droves. Of course, it wasn't just mid-rank and above who crossed over from the Empire to the Kingdom.

Perhaps because the Tower, where the temple forces and Kingdom's knights were stationed, seemed safer than the monster-infested northern Empire. The market was packed every day of the week as low-rank adventurer hopefuls flocked in to mine mana stones while fighting goblins.

Of course, as the number of low-rank adventurers increased, so did the number of blockheads and F-ranks, leading to more incidents. But proportionally, it hadn't increased that much.

"Ugh, it's so crowded. Should we really move to the 50th floor?"

"That might not be a bad idea. Didn't they say the stone dwarves repaired the whole city?"

"I heard they rushed in and perfectly restored the city in just a week."

So the talk among the group was about moving to the 50th floor. For Irene, it took less than 5 minutes using the gate to get to the temple, and since Han Se-ah was gifted the mansion, the rest of the group didn't have mansions in the city anyway, so it was worth considering.

No matter how many high-rank adventurers from the Empire had flooded into the Tower, it would be less crowded than the city full of low-rank adventurers, mercenaries, and laborers.

As Han Se-ah casually brought it up, Grace and Irene immediately nodded in agreement. Perhaps it was because they kept getting lewd looks now that there were so many dark-skinned men around. They seemed to like the idea more intensely than expected.

Of course, I was in favor of it too. After facing the berserk ogre on the 51st floor, it seemed our party members could no longer breeze through.

"We should definitely move our quarters to the 50th floor. It'll be a good chance to upgrade our equipment too."

"Equipment upgrades? Ah, the stone dwarves' mana stones and enhancement stones."

-Yeah, looks like they're seriously lacking damage against ogres

-Isn't this the Roland Ballista party anyway? Wanna make a tougher Roland Ballista?

-Come to think of it, weren't the stone dwarves going crazy selling enhancement stones and stuff? Why haven't they done anything with those?

-Why? Because the bomb addict only looked at bombs instead of enhancement stones lololololololol

-Enhancement stones have a chance of failure, but bombs always explode, so aren't bombs 100 times better? No? Yes?

Come to think of it, we didn't know what the reward for this 50th floor was. Usually, there were gate usage rights, magic items from the Magic Tower, various factions offering support, and players getting an extra system assist.

This time, we were in a frenzied state when clearing the 50th floor, and when I opened my eyes, we were already in a carriage heading to the Empire. The patch also made time fly by.

But one thing was for sure - our group's equipment hadn't been upgraded yet. Of course, that was natural since we had a bomb maniac who only took bombs instead of enhancement stones from the stone dwarves.

No matter how good bombs were, now that enhancement stones were out, we should upgrade our equipment. Otherwise, we'd be losing our fundamentals as RPG users.

...Though watching Han Se-ah throw bombs made me wonder if this was really an RPG.

"Then we can earn money exploring the plains for a while, and use that to have the stone dwarf artisans upgrade our equipment on the 50th floor."

"But these equipments were made by the Magic Tower. Can the stone dwarves really upgrade them?"

Isn't there a stone dwarf district left in the Harpy capital? Seems like settling there would work

The situation where a single word determined the world's #1 lodging location. Now that it was the 52nd floor, and there was no way they'd build a mansion on that green plain enduring goblins, the 50th floor lodgings would likely be maintained for a while. Perhaps that was why not just the chat, but donations started going wild too.

Dollars, yen, euros, and even the streaming site's common coins. At this point, it seemed like Han Se-ah had sharply caught on to the money-making angle, given how excited the donations were getting.

Some guys even brought photos about feng shui and started comparing cities, to which some Western nerds responded by bringing reconstruction images of the 50th floor city, restored from the aerial view briefly captured during the last Harpy Empress boss battle, pointing out key locations.

...A 3D reconstruction? Were they insane, for real?

"By the way, I wonder if there are any suitable places for lodgings?"

"Harpy lodgings won't have ceilings, so how about we check out the stone dwarf district?"

"True, the stone dwarf brothers' workshop street did have a similar feel to human buildings."

While Han Se-ah smiled contentedly, struck by a money storm amidst the donation tempest, our group chatted. Harpy mansions definitely had issues for human habitation, like no doors on the first floor or open ceilings.

Even if there were doors, they were for stone dwarf slaves or human laborers, so the first and second floors were often not connected. So what we needed to find was a stone dwarf-style building between the underground and the 51st floor gate.

Among the countless nonsensical opinions showered on Han Se-ah, if you picked out only the sensible ones, there were some similarities to our party's opinions.

"Hmm? Aren't those the Squishy Heroes?!"

"You're right? The Squishy Hero has returned!"

Thinking that, we headed towards the stone dwarf district in the Harpy Empire, a place that used to be a slave management office but was now liberated as a workshop street. Some stone dwarves came rolling towards us.

Sounds of gravel grinding, stones rolling ta-da-dak, even clapping sounds like pak-pak. As they made such a commotion, curious harpies flew overhead, startled, and fled. From far away, a stone dwarf shouting in a shrill voice came running.

Who was it... the only apprentice of the stone dwarf who built the city, who was with Laurencia... but I couldn't remember the name.

"Ah, Granny Shasha!"

"Yes, big Squishies. What brings you here again?"

Ah, it was Granny Shasha.

As Irene, with her good memory, started chatting with a bright smile, the stone dwarves who crowded around also read the mood and quietly started to listen.

"You're looking for lodgings to stay in?"

"I'll! I'll build it for you!"

"You little runt, what are you saying? When it comes to buildings, I'm the one!"

But that silence didn't last long.

When they heard we were looking for lodgings, instead of thinking about showing us around, they were full of ideas about demolishing empty workshops and building new ones. Looking at this, I wondered if I really lacked sensitivity towards other races.

"Everyone shut up! They're my guests, so I'll build it," Granny Shasha declared firmly.

And seeing that even Granny Shasha didn't stop them, even more so.

Han Se-ah's expression twisted in bewilderment as she ended up being forced to buy a building out of the blue.