"A big catch...?"
The fisherman asked back in a puzzled tone. I nodded with a look full of conviction.
There was no need to explain the details.
This was a world where magic and legends lived and breathed.
Adventurers searching for hidden relics or odds and ends in rivers, mountains, or caves were bound to exist in any region.
"...Huh, so you were looking for that thing? With nothing on you?"
The fisherman seemed to have jumped to his own conclusion about why I had fallen into the river and flailed around. Then, perhaps a bit curious himself, he accepted my proposal to spare just a moment of his time.
From the fisherman's perspective, it probably wasn't a huge decision to make. It wasn't an attempt that consumed anything major anyway.
'So it should be somewhere around that way...'
Putting one foot up on the gunwale of the ferryboat, I began scanning the surroundings.
There was a considerable gap between the scenery viewed through a screen and what I gauged with my own two eyes, but it didn't matter.
Because right now, I had a reliable guide.
"A rock shaped like a wolf's head?"
After listening to my explanation, the fisherman fell into thought for a moment before raising his head.
"Ah, right. There was something like that about halfway upstream."
Creaking, the old ferryboat began making its way against the current. It wasn't a very fast pace, but there was no need to rush.
The chest sunken beneath the rock wasn't going to run away, after all.
After traveling like that for about thirty minutes—
"See over that way? Check if that's the one you know about."
To the right—that is, down below in the direction of the cliff—terrain with large jutting rocks came into view.
'That's it.'
My eyes lit up. A rock shaped like a wolf with its jaws wide open. There was no mistaking it.
Once we pulled the ferryboat close to the rock, the work began. After tying a rope around my waist, I jumped into the water.
Since I had a reliable safety measure this time, I didn't hesitate. My clothes were already soaking wet anyway.
Clean, unpolluted water. Underneath the rock looked ordinary.
However, I knew there was a space inside a crevice not easily seen from the outside.
When I thrust the harpoon borrowed from the fisherman into the rock crevice—
Clunk—
Just as expected, a heavy sensation met my fingertips.
After rising to the surface to take another breath and diving back down, I carefully pulled on the lodged harpoon.
With crumbling stone dust, a single chest was slowly dragged out. It was the exact same as what I had seen in the game.
Wrapping the net tied at my waist around the chest, which was quite heavy and slippery, I rose back to the surface.
Thanks to the fisherman pulling the rope tied around my waist, I was able to easily return to the ferryboat even while holding the heavy chest.
"Well, I'll be. There really was something down there, huh?"
Seeing the chest I had hauled up onto the boat, the fisherman spoke in surprise.
The small iron chest pulled from the underwater rock crevice was covered in moss and rust. On the outside, it didn't look all that valuable.
Nor was the fisherman's gaze as he looked at the chest that of someone beside himself with shock.
However, I swallowed dryly in tension. That was because I already knew what was inside this.
Nothing was written on the surface of the chest.
Of course, if this had been the game, a line of text like [An unnamed adventurer's old chest. Though heavily rusted, a refreshing energy emanates from within.] would have popped up.
I took the harpoon and twisted the chest open.
With a splash of water, the contents inside revealed themselves.
About fifteen silver coins and a sharp dagger. Along with a single pebble engraved with a mysterious pattern.
The exact contents I had expected. I breathed a sigh of relief.
"Oh, you're in luck, young man. That's a hefty sum."
The fisherman muttered from beside me.
Granted, true to his words, fifteen silver coins was a fairly large sum in the countryside like this. What really mattered, though, were the remaining items.
First, that dagger was enchanted with magic that kept its blade from dulling easily. Even though it had been left sunken underwater for quite a long time, its keen edge gleamed in the sunlight.
Next was the most important thing. That is, the reason I had looked for this chest.
'...A rune.'
An ancient, mysterious relic that allowed one to use magic without complex theory or knowledge.
Naturally, it had a drawback too.
Compared to chanting and casting the same spell on one's own, it consumed a far greater amount of mana.
To me, however, that was a meaningless drawback.
Because my mana was infinite.
Taking a small breath, I picked up the mysteriously glinting stone.
Right away, the mana inside my body reacted and began wrapping around the stone.
VWOOM—
A faint light spread from inside my hand.
The fisherman, who hadn't awakened to mana, didn't seem to see a thing, but it was vividly clear to my eyes: the letters engraved on the stone vanishing as a small pattern settled onto the inside of my forearm.
Soon, the stone lost its power and crumbled away with a dry rustle. At the same time, I could feel that I could use that spell right away.
The spell engraved on the stone was Energy Bolt.
A spell of a level suited to the starting point of the game—in other words, the beginner zone.
I was able to test it out before long.
Having achieved my goal, we reached the shore. As a token of gratitude to the fisherman who had helped me quite a bit, I handed him several silver coins and headed off.
After leaving behind the fisherman, who was overjoyed at earning more profit than he would from catching fish for several days, I stepped onto a forest path.
Because it was a forest leading to a nearby village, traces of a trail remained here and there, but no one was passing through at the moment.
An optimal place to test out the magic I had acquired just a moment ago.
I raised my hand toward a tree located a short distance away. Then I focused my mind briefly.
VWOOM—
Blue light gathered right away. As the pattern on the inside of my arm glinted faintly, the magic took form.
A spell completed without complex, specialized knowledge, or any assistance from a status window or skill window. Energy Bolt.
Formed into the shape of a bullet, the blue light shot across the air at once. And then—
BOOM!
With a resounding blast, it exploded, leaving a deep gouge in the thick tree.
Considerable power. For a spell obtainable in a beginner zone, it was pretty strong.
If you were aiming for a mage class, it was definitely a must-get along the way.
Of course, there was a price to match.
Namely, its massive mana consumption.
To put it a bit more specifically, by the standards of an apprentice mage, using it even twice would be a struggle.
To me right now, however, that wasn't a penalty at all. No, it actually worked in my favor.
Like this, for instance.
From the hand I raised once more, blue bullets formed again. Twice, three times in a row, at that.
KABOOM!
Ten shots in total. After firing off the Energy Bolt spell ten times in a row without rest, I looked ahead.
CRRRACK—
Under the repeated impacts, the thick tree tilted backward.
THUUUD.
A tree so massive it would be hard to wrap both arms around toppled over, sending a deep reverberation down the forest path.
"..."
Standing in place, I blinked and stared at the sight.
...Isn't this broken?
Perhaps because the spell formula was already fixed, adjusting its output seemed impossible, but firing it in rapid succession gave it destructive power that rivaled higher-tier magic.
And most important of all, I felt no exhaustion whatsoever.
Made sense. My mana was infinite, after all.
Phew. Letting out a deep breath, I clenched my fist.
Infinite mana and runes. On top of that, the locations of all sorts of artifacts hidden across the continent that I remembered in my head.
Perhaps beyond mere survival, seeing the ending in person on this continent might be well within reach.
Drawing my gaze away from the massive tree that looked like a fallen giant after a battle, I headed toward the end of the forest path visible in the distance.
***
The village I arrived at after passing through the forest was fairly large for the countryside.
With travelers and mercenaries visible every now and then, villagers absorbed in their daily work came into view.
Naturally, the very first thing I did was buy clothes.
What I had on right now were old clothes worn only by prisoners. If I kept walking around like this, there was no telling what kind of misunderstanding I might invite.
Ah, or is it not a misunderstanding?
Fortunately, since I had torn the sleeves with the dagger and my clothes were still wet in places, no one sent any suspicious glances my way right off the bat.
After buying ordinary clothes at the first general store I saw and changing into them, I thought about my next destination.
Had this been the game, there would have been nothing to think twice about.
Carrying out the quests given in this village and steadily raising my level would have been the right choice, after all.
Right now, however, with neither a level nor a status window, staying in a country village for months hunting and gathering rabbits, wild boars, or tree roots for pocket change was a meaningless act.
'Rather than that...'
I glanced up at the sky.
First, grasping the overall flow of things took priority.
Just as the stingy lord of the city where the execution took place had repaired the rampart and posted more guards, there was no telling what else might have changed upon coming into Hell Difficulty—into the real world.
Perhaps inevitably, major crises and large-scale wars struck this world multiple times.
Simply acquiring items and runes was important, too, but I couldn't afford to miss the currents created by organizations and nations either.
To look into things in greater detail, it would probably be better to move to a place where rumors gathered—in other words, a big city.
Besides, the nearest next rune was near the royal capital anyway.
Having organized my thoughts, I headed toward a small building visible at the entrance of the village.
A place where merchants heading to the city hired escort mercenaries or porters. Around the building, a large number of people were already bustling about.
Pushing open the creaking wooden door and stepping inside, I spotted a guild broker with a tired look on his face.
His role was to connect merchants, porters, and mercenaries with one another and settle payments and fees. Glancing at me, the man opened his mouth in a flat tone.
"Porters get one silver coin a day. Two meals a day. What's left for today is a caravan departing for Avarion in two hours, and one departing for Cailen in five hours—"
A rapid-fire explanation. Seeing my utterly ordinary outfit, he seemed to assume as a matter of course that I had visited the brokerage to apply as a porter.
Well, since I wasn't wearing so much as a single longsword at my waist, it was a reasonable call to make.
Still, I had no intention of joining a caravan as a porter.
Porters, who were treated as practically expendable, were the first to be exposed to danger, and the work was a series of tasks hard to keep up with in a body that hadn't been properly trained.
"I didn't come here to be a porter, though."
"Not a porter, you say?"
Hearing my words, puzzlement and disbelief surfaced on the broker's face. Still, perhaps having no desire to get into an argument, he rose from his seat and headed to the backyard.
In the backyard where I followed him lay wooden swords, wooden spears, and crude bows. Up ahead stood several wooden targets and scarecrows, too.
"It's a simple test."
An annoyed tone of voice. He seemed to have weeded out plenty of drifters applying to be mercenaries, which paid a bit better than porters and was relatively comfortable with no odd jobs.
Shrugging my shoulders, I stood in the middle of the yard. Then I raised my hand.
VWOOM—
A faint blue light began seeping out.
The instant puzzlement crept onto the face of the man watching me not pick up a single weapon, a blue bullet shot from my hand and struck the target up ahead dead center.
KABOOM!
With a loud blast, the wooden board was blown to pieces outright.
His jaw dropped as he froze in place, his eyes scanning the debris.
A brief silence. Before long, the broker slowly turned toward me and stammered.
"...Y-You're a mage?"