Shinseong Group recognized Han-eol's outstanding merit and decided to craft for him the finest armament, with a demon spirit stone set into it.
However, the demon spirit stone to be set into the armament was designated as the one Han-eol had brought back on his second expedition.
In a sense, this seemed like an arrangement that left Han-eol at a loss.
‘I submitted two demon spirit stones, one large and one small, across the second and third expeditions, and they're only handing back the small one.’
But Han-eol had no complaints.
Unlike mana crystals, which served as batteries, demon spirit stones extracted from powerful demon beasts could be mounted in all sorts of magic items and armaments for ability-holders, which made their value extremely high.
So the ability-holders of the Pioneer Corps took enormous pride in earning demon spirit stones, and they insisted that the group ought to treat them with commensurate generosity.
Han-eol's thinking was a little different.
‘Humans can't directly use the demon spirit energy held in a demon spirit stone. At least not with the knowledge secured so far.’
So humans devised other means of putting demon spirit energy to use.
That was the crafting of items, or armaments, with demon spirit stones set into them.
Among the items made this way, a very small number were S-grade, drawing out 70 percent or more of the demon spirit energy, but far more numerous were the D-grade items that could not properly harness it and put out a mere 5 percent or so.
Then could fourteen D-grade items at 5 percent output be gathered together to produce the destructive power of an S-grade?
They could not.
An uncrossable river lay between S-grade and D-grade; no matter how many D-grade items were connected in series and used, they could not match a single S-grade item.
According to the knowledge humanity had accumulated, a difference of a single grade brought about a stark gap of dozens of times or more in an item's power.
So Han-eol judged that making an excellent item out of a demon spirit stone was worth more than procuring the stone itself.
‘Frankly, procuring demon spirit stones isn't all that hard for me.’
What if Han-eol's Defense Power or Vitality rose higher than it was now? What if that made his survival certain?
Then he was confident he could sweep up as many demon spirit stones from the Highland as he pleased.
‘I'll hand over as many demon spirit stones as they want, so long as they make me good-quality armor. That's far more profitable for me.’
This was exactly what Han-eol wanted.
The Master Artisan who would craft Han-eol's armament was decided to be Rihanna.
More precisely, Rihanna volunteered herself.
Drawn to the triangular demon spirit stone, a form she had never encountered before, Rihanna chose to take on this mission of her own accord.
Since the mission was ‘crafting a custom-made armament for Han-eol,’ Rihanna interviewed him in person.
“Uh……? You're—?”
Han-eol's mouth fell slightly open at the sight of Rihanna, the mixed-race woman with freckles scattered thickly across her face.
About three months ago, Han-eol had handed in his ruined combat vest for repair and had gotten an earful from Rihanna.
‘And that woman at the counter is the Master Artisan who's going to make my custom armament?’
Han-eol was dumbfounded.
“Heh. We meet again.”
Rihanna smiled broadly at Han-eol's dazed face.
“Ah, yes.”
Only then did Han-eol bow in greeting.
“Heh heh.”
The smile on Rihanna's lips deepened.
Before long, the consultation for the armament's crafting began.
The discussion was long, but the conclusion was simple.
“So you want a light defensive armament that even an ability-holder with weak stamina can wear easily. And it would be better still if that armament came with an option to raise the wearer's Vitality,”
“That is correct.”
“Offensive functions……. A function that reflects some portion of an attack received from a demon beast back at it, for instance. You do not need that?”
“That, well, I can take it or leave it. It is not particularly important.”
“Hmm.”
Rihanna folded her arms and worked her chin between her fingers.
Most ability-holders of the Pioneer Corps preferred armaments that unified attack and defense. Ability-holders who made demands weighted so extremely toward defense, as Han-eol did, were rare.
‘So this greenhorn must be brimming with confidence in his Attack Power. That's why he wants everything dumped into defense and life.’
Han-eol opened up a bit more about what he had been imagining.
“Other options would be fine too, of course. I am a new employee, so I do not know whether an option like this is possible, but an option where a Blink spell activates from the armor on its own when I take a fatal attack from a demon beast would be good as well.”
“Blink? The Blink that close-combat War Mages (War Mage: combat mage) use?”
“Yes. The spell that teleports you several or several dozen meters away when you take an enemy attack. An evasive maneuver, in other words.”
“Hmmm. Interesting.”
Rihanna wrote ‘Blink’ on her tablet with a digital pen, then drew several overlapping circles on top of it.
Han-eol grew excited and spread the wings of his imagination.
“If not a Blink option, then how about something like this? The moment an enemy attack bursts against the armor, it briefly freezes the enemy and slows it, or shocks it and drops it into a Stun (Stun: unconsciousness) state for a moment. Or a hallucination option would be fine as well.”
“Hmmmmm.”
Rihanna's hum stretched out long.
She scribbled a few notes, then sank into deep thought.
‘He's certainly a picky eater. Everything this kid wants is piled onto defense or evasion. Don't tell me he's the type who leaps into a swarm of demon beasts and enjoys a melee?’
Rihanna marked ‘Risk Level 8–9’ beside Han-eol's name on her tablet.
Of all the ability-holders Rihanna had crafted items for, every one who had been given a Risk Level of 8 or above had died in the Highland without lasting a year.
It pained her that a Rookie as young and meek-looking as Han-eol seemed to have so few days left to live.
‘The ones who cross blades with demon beasts directly all have a screw loose somewhere, so there's nothing to be done about it. I can only hope the item I make helps, and that this Rookie lives even a little longer.’
Rihanna poured her affection into her items alone and gave none of her heart to the users of those items.
This was the wisdom for living she had learned from her father, Gale.
Rihanna folded her tablet and stood up.
“Let's end the interview here. The armament will probably be finished within a year.”
“A whole year? Does it take that long?”
Han-eol's face crumpled.
Rihanna twisted the corner of her mouth into a smirk.
“Listen. If you want a good armament, you have to know how to wait. Of course, if I threw it together, I could finish it in two weeks…… surely that is not what you want?”
Han-eol shook his head at once.
“No. I can wait a year.”
“Good. I will do my best as well, so look forward to it.”
Rihanna tapped Han-eol's shoulder with her tablet and left the interview room.
Left alone, Han-eol jammed all ten fingers into his hair.
“Aaah, I'm doomed. A year.”
Frankly, a year was too long.
‘Damn. What if I die in the meantime? The custom-made armament just becomes Shinseong Group's property. If that's how it is, I'd be better off finding a Highland relic and using that.’
Han-eol grumbled on and on, yet he could not fold away a sliver of expectation toward Rihanna.
That was because he had learned that the A-grade combat vest that had saved his life several times was none other than Rihanna's work.
Ten days after that, on August 24.
SHHHHHHH—.
That day, a fierce shower poured down across the whole of Seoul.
“Strange, isn't it? Seoul rose out of the atmosphere ages ago, and yet showers still fall in summer and snow still comes in winter.”
With the Highland deployment just ahead, the seniors of the 1st Assault Corps muttered this while watching the rain pour down outside the window.
Hearing it, Han-eol found himself agreeing.
‘Come to think of it, that really is strange.’
Without meaning to, Han-eol looked up at the sky.
Mid-Land Seoul had broken away from Earth whole, decades ago now, and risen to the altitude of a geostationary satellite, so whether the space up there could be called a sky was uncertain.
Still, the air above Seoul, blanketed in thick, ink-black clouds, was no different from the sky Han-eol had looked up at in the Old Earth days.
‘How is something like this possible?’
It was as Han-eol was tilting his head.
“All right, we are moving out.”
The deployment order came down from the 1st Assault Corps Leader.
“Word is everyone is moving out.”
“Let's head in.”
The ability-holders of the 1st Assault Corps clamored in voices that welled up from the belly, then moved along the dedicated passage connected to the building's basement toward Gangnam Station.
The moment they boarded Line 12, which was not permitted to ordinary people, the train departed as though it had been waiting for them.
A short while later, the ability-holders arrived at the bottom of the Han River.
By now Han-eol no longer trembled much at the sight of the blue mist.
That was to say he had grown that much duller to it.
‘Still, I'm curious. Will the guided transfer succeed this time?’
Han-eol was an unusual case who had already failed the guided transfer three times.
So the 1st Assault Corps had strapped four watches onto him.
Two on each wrist, four in all.
‘Four times the child metal means four times the guiding force, or something like that.’
Han-eol glanced at the watches dangling all over him and gave a bitter smile.
“Next!”
Presently the 1st Assault Corps Leader's booming voice was heard.
“Going in.”
With that vigorous reply, Han-eol leapt into the rippling mist.
PIIING—.
As always, a strong dizziness slammed into Han-eol's brain.
To state the conclusion first, Han-eol finally succeeded at the guided transfer.
The moment he arrived in the Highland, Han-eol checked his watches first. All four watch hands worn on his wrists were pointing in a single direction.
‘Oh? So this works?’
Succeeding at the guided transfer meant, in other words, that the point where Han-eol had arrived was near Base Camp No. 1 on the Highland's Eighth Continent.
First of all, Han-eol planted a receiver right in front of the blue mist.
‘For now, let's move toward where the watch hands point.’
The mere fact that this was not the Seventh Continent put Han-eol's mind considerably at ease.
On top of that, Han-eol wore the Flayed Skin taken from the three-eyed, eight-tailed demon beast, with the A-grade combat vest over it.
Pyros' Ring sat on his left hand, and he carried a full three A-grade recovery potions in necklace form, so barring any real misfortune, the odds of his life being in danger were low.
Han-eol moved quickly while keeping watch on his surroundings.
Kicking off the rugged rock, WHISH, WHISH, WHISH-WHISH-WHISH—.
Pyros' Ring was certainly superb. With his Speed/Agility stat raised by 100, Han-eol's pace resembled a sports car at a full sprint. When he leapt with all his strength, he cleared cliffs dozens of meters apart in a single bound.
And this was not even his top speed. His body felt so light that Han-eol had the sensation of floating in the air.
There was just one thing.
Han-eol's unusually low Stamina/Endurance held him back.
“Hoooo. Huff, huff, huff.”
Before long, Han-eol gave out.
‘I got excited and showed off, and look at the state of me. Hah, hah, hah. Idiot.’
Han-eol slumped down in a safe spot enclosed by rock on three sides and rested.
He took out a high-calorie chocolate bar and ate it, and took in water as well. After resting a good while, his depleted stamina came back up.
Lactic acid did not seem to have built up in his muscles.
‘Is it thanks to my decent Vitality? In that case, if I raise Vitality further, maybe endurance at least will improve, even if stamina doesn't?’
Thinking this over, Han-eol got moving again.