Chapter 91: The Floating Sanctuary (7)

On the way to the imperial central region, under the direct control of the royal family.

Evan looked at the information broker who was tied up with a rope.

It had been a few days since Evan and Eutenia had taken the information broker out of the building.

Thanks to Eutenia’s soundproof barrier, it was not difficult to gather the data that the information broker had.

That’s how Evan and Eutenia quietly escaped outside with the dark beast and carried the information broker along with the data.

The information broker had been dragged around by Evan’s party for several days, bound by a rope.

It was natural that complaints flowed out of the information broker’s mouth, who had been dragged around continuously.

“Isn’t this a bad thing for both of us?”

Maybe it was because it had been quite a while since he last tried to resist.

The information broker seemed to have finally gained the courage to speak to Evan.

Evan chuckled at the information broker’s words.

From the beginning of his story, it was obvious what he was going to say to him.

In the end, he was going to ask Evan and Eutenia to let him go before any trouble arose.

“It’s a good thing for us.”

“C-Cloud won’t stay still! They’ll keep chasing you if they get a report!”

The information broker was momentarily flustered by Evan’s words.

He brought up Cloud’s name, trying to persuade Evan’s party.

Cloud was an execution agency that operated throughout the empire and caught criminals.

If the rumor that Evan and Eutenia had kidnapped him spread, it was natural that the investigators of Cloud, pressured by the shop side, would chase after them.

But the information broker seemed to know nothing about them.

Evan grabbed one of his shoulders with his gauntlet-clad hand.

Crack.

A strong force went into the gauntlet that held his shoulder.

“You’re making a funny joke. The guys from Cloud were never on good terms with us in the first place.”

“Y-Yes…?”

“And even if we run into them, it’ll only take some time, and there won’t be any more problems.”

The information broker’s face hardened as he met Evan’s eyes.

He would take care of them himself if Cloud came looking for him.

That was what Evan was saying right now.

Evan let go of his hand from the information broker, who blinked his eyes with a stiff face.

And then he leaned against a nearby rock and spoke to the information broker.

“Do you understand?”

“…Yes.”

“If you understand, then it would be better not to make such threats in the future.”

“…”

Gulp.

The sound of swallowing saliva echoed in the wilderness.

Evan added one more word to the information broker.

“And trying to dig up our information… If you want to live long, you’d better refrain from doing that.”

He was warning him about the unique trait that information brokers had.

The information broker sweated profusely and tried to avoid Evan’s gaze.

Evan also turned his gaze and looked at Eutenia.

Eutenia was stroking Alpha’s head and talking to him about something.

“Eutenia. Are you done with the preparations?”

“I’m almost done. How about you, Evan?”

“I’m done too. Now we just need to decide on a method.”

Evan recalled his mission in his head as he answered Eutenia’s question.

Their master had given them one task.

That was to get the thing called the ‘Philosopher’s Stone’.

To find this Philosopher’s Stone, Evan had captured an information broker who knew about the mage.

At the same time, he was able to safely obtain the information about the mage that he had been longing for.

So now it was just a matter of contacting the mage and bringing him with them.

Thud.

Evan pressed down on the information broker’s thigh with his toe.

The information broker opened his eyes wide and looked at Evan and Eutenia as his thigh was stepped on.

“Let me hear the information you told me last time again. Here.”

“Th-That… The information about the mage?”

“Yeah.”

As Evan’s sharp gaze turned to him, the information broker nodded his head without a word.

In his hand, which was tied with a rope, were the data that he had organized about the information he had acquired.

The information broker flipped through the data and checked a few things again.

And then he began to recite the information that Evan had requested one by one.

“Name… Elbon Claude. Age… 57. A mage belonging to the central magic tower of the empire.”

“Eutenia. We’re planning to infiltrate the magic tower directly to find this guy.”

“Specialty… Alchemy. He is estimated to be one of the best in alchemy among the central magic tower. “

“He must know enough about the thing we’re looking for. It won’t be hard once we secure the mage and a workshop to lock him up.”

Evan’s words to Eutenia were mixed in between the information broker’s words.

Still, the information broker ignored him and continued to recite the information.

Every time the pace of the story slowed down, Evan’s foot pressed down on his thigh.

That’s how the terrified voice of the information broker kept echoing in the wilderness.

Eutenia, who was listening to the information broker’s story, also focused on the story with an interested face.

“Family relations… None. He cherishes his disciple who he took in five years ago. He also often goes out of the magic tower…”

“From my point of view, I don’t like it very much, but if there’s a problem, we can use his disciple as a hostage.”

“He avoids researching combat magic… His actual combat power is…”

“He seems to be quite weak in terms of combat, so it should be possible to quietly get out even if a fight breaks out.”

After a while, the information broker’s story was coming to an end.

Evan made one last radical suggestion to Eutenia.

“In the worst case scenario, we might have to make a scene.”

The information broker flinched at Evan’s words.

It was no wonder, since Evan’s last words meant that he was determined to attack the central magic tower.

It meant that he would cause trouble openly within the system depending on the situation.

This kind of method was something that Evan would never have considered before.

But Evan had become a personality that would adopt even radical methods if necessary, after becoming an apostle of God.

***

After wreaking havoc on the fairy village with Pluto.

I finished the battle and watched the smartphone screen while drinking beer.

On the screen, Pluto and Perin were moving to the edge of the forest.

There were no more fairies left in the village, thanks to Pluto sweeping them away with his blood magic.

As soon as the fairies in the village were annihilated, Perin came out with only a small twig from his house.

It was a very contrasting behavior from his previous emotional appearance.

“Did he not have much attachment to the village?”

The NPCs in the game are usually honest about their desires.

In this situation, it was normal to look around the empty houses and take some gold or something.

But Perin didn’t take anything except for a twig.

Did he not have anything to begin with?

Or did he leave behind everything he had?

Either way, it was something I couldn’t know as I watched them from beyond the screen.

“Well… I got all the karma, so it doesn’t matter.”

As I watched them while cooling my throat with cold beer, I saw Yuto waiting for them at the place they were heading to.

Yuto looked different from when I first met him, planting a lot of trees and grasses.

Of course, all of that was Perin’s work.

Perin said he had to decorate Yuto and brought some grasses from around and planted them.

Perin saw Yuto and spread his arms wide and hugged him.

Perin also hugged him with both arms as soon as he saw him.

It was a reunion that happened less than an hour after they parted.

Yet, the two characters hugged each other and talked as if they had met after a year.

-“Yuto!”

-“Sniff sniff.”

Pluto smiled as he watched the two characters reunite.

Of course, a sneer came out of my mouth as I watched them.

What kind of reunion is that when they met again in less than an hour?

No matter how hard they squeezed, it was a scene that wouldn’t even produce a single tear.

As I watched Perin and Yuto who loved each other so much, I put down the beer can and muttered.

“Amazing, amazing.”

What can I say when they like each other?

All I could do was watch the smartphone screen and make my own comments.

As I admired them, Pluto put his scythe in the air and approached them.

And then he asked Perin, who was rubbing his cheek against Yuto’s.

-“Perin.”

-“Yes, Lord Pluto.”

-“You said you became an apostle of the great one this time, right? Then… where is the gift you received from the great one?”

Pluto’s question was about the divine device that Perin had acquired by becoming an apostle.

The information that Perin had become an apostle had already been delivered to Pluto long ago.

So he seemed to be asking about the divine device that Perin had.

Pluto had always been interested in various divine devices, including Deathside.

He had also asked Eutenia about something similar, so it wasn’t strange that Pluto was interested in Perin’s divine device.

“Surely… The divine device that came out this time was quite unusual.”

I recalled the divine device that Perin had in my head and muttered.

The divine devices that were given through <Apostle Selection> usually emit a unique aura.

But Perin didn’t have anything that looked like a divine device right now.

That was because Perin’s divine device was different from other divine devices in its peculiar appearance.

I jumped onto Yuto as soon as I heard Pluto’s question.

Then I introduced him to the divine item I had received and told him about it.

-“This is the divine item I got.”

-“Soil.”

-“Is that… a divine item?”

Pluto opened his mouth with a blank expression as he looked at the shape of the divine item that I was pointing at with my hand.

The reason was that I was pointing at a tree while standing on top of Yuto.

[Divine Item: Fake Divine Tree Yggdrasil].

The huge tree that was stuck in the middle of Yuto was the identity of the divine item that was given to me.

As the name Fake Divine Tree implied, my divine item had the shape of a tree.

-“Yes! This is the gift I received from the great one!”

I nodded vigorously and reaffirmed the truth to Pluto.

The tree that had taken root on Yuto was a divine item that gave me various abilities.

And it was an item that had extraordinary abilities that matched its unusual appearance.

The name of the trait that [Divine Item: Fake Divine Tree Yggdrasil] had was <Fake Domain>.

It was a type of ability that settled in one place and defended a base.

-The recovery speed of living creatures within the range of <Fake Domain> increases.

-The growth speed of plants within the range of <Fake Domain> increases.

-A defensive barrier that protects the range of <Fake Domain> is created every hour.

-A concealment barrier that makes the range of <Fake Domain> invisible is created every hour.

-A magic cannon that bombards a target is charged every hour. The magic cannon can be charged up to 5 times.

The magic cannon that was charged every certain time.

The defensive barrier that protected the area where the trait was active.

And on top of that, the concealment barrier that gave stealth effect to the area where the trait was active.

They were all effects that were specialized in defending a designated area.

These types of fixed items were means that could only be used to defend a base where important facilities were located.

In other words, it was an ability that was not helpful at all unless it was a situation where a base had to be protected.

“But you chose a really artistic location.”

If only the base where the divine item was installed didn’t fly in the sky.

I wondered if Yuto flew because I got this divine item.

Or maybe Yuto was drawn to me because I had this ability.

Either way, it was an interesting situation without a doubt.

I lifted up a can of beer as I looked at the divine item that took root on Yuto.