Chapter 44.1

Let’s Harvest the Purple Monsters!

After seeing the three Adventurers walk away, Haruki headed to the prefab.

When he opened the door, a terrible heat poured out.

It was so hot.

It was abnormally hot!

Akane’s shop was just a prefab.

It had no insulation or air conditioning.

Because of this, the summer heat and direct sunlight had raised the temperature of the place up like a sauna.

However, Akane’s expression was filled with confidence.

But in the next second…

Her soul seemed to leave her body, and she looked towards the window.

Was it because Haruki had opened the door? Or was she just showing her true form?

Her change in attitude was absurd.

“Hey.”

“What? If you have no business here, could you get lost? This prefab is hot enough as it is. If people come inside without a reason, it will just get hotter.”

“Don’t you have anything else you should be saying to a customer?”

Haruki suppressed his annoyance.

“…I was worried.”

“Huh?”

“I thought your presence had really become like air! Oh, sorry! That’s exactly what it is. Hehehe!”

“…I see. I see. Alright. If you were worried about me, I’ll have to thank you.”

Haruki said as he took the magic bag from Karen. Then he roughly took out its contents.

—10 minutes later.

“Ahahahahaha! Why? Why are you so mean to me, Air!!”

The materials seemed to fill up the entire prefab. Akane was crying with abandon.

The materials were from the Silver Wolves that they had continued to hunt on the 8th floor.

(They had killed Owners as well, but you couldn’t get any materials from them to sell.)

“How many did you hunt!”

“I think there’s about 5,000 in all.”

“Ahahahaha! Air is going to destroy my business.”

“Hahaha. I’m glad you appreciate it.”

“I’m crying here!”

Akane ground her teeth loudly as she began to appraise the materials.

That being said, even someone as capable as her would take time to get through 5,000 Silver Wolves worth of materials.

And so Haruki left the prefab for now.

He put his clothes and belongings in the house and then gave Mister Kitora some gifts from Sapporo.

When he returned, Akane was nearly finished.

“That’s quick.”

“It’s because I’m doing it quickly!”

Akane quickly picked up the materials and separated them based on their condition.

Was she really appraising them? It was so fast that it made him wonder.

She really was impressive.

In spite of the tears and runny nose, the quality of her work did not drop.

“In the first place, why do you even have so many materials? Why didn’t you sell them in Sapporo?”

“Well, I enjoy doing business with you.”

He wanted to sell them to Akane.

He said this suggestively, and Akane started to work faster.

“I wanted to see how you would cry if I sold you a whole month’s worth of materials all at once.”

“Grr…”

Akane’s speed dropped a little.

When she was finished, Akane glared at the register screen with a pale face.

“A-and then the 5% bo…bonus…the total…is…”

“Speak up.”

“The total is 3,055,500 yen!! Take it all, you thief! Ahahahahahaha!!”

She said as she burst into tears once again.

It was Haruki’s turn to turn pale. He had not been expecting that number.

As for Karen, she looked like she was about to faint.

“Three million… Maybe you meant two million?”

“I wish that I did!”

See, look for yourself! Akane shouted as she pointed around the store.

There were two piles of skins that she had separated based on their condition. There were nearly 5,000.

They looked like two mountains of snow.

As for the fangs, she didn’t even know how many there were.

There was barely any space to stand.

Haruki ignored Akane, who was glaring at him with all of her might. He pulled out his IC card.

Even after splitting it with Karen, he received 1,520,000.

“1,520,000 per person…”

He had never seen such a number, even with the bonus!

Now he could buy powerful weapons!

Oh, wait. He wouldn’t be able to equip them…

Still, what should he do?

Maybe he could just buy one of the high-end series as motivation for leveling up!?

Haruki was feeling quite elated due to the amount of money.

“I know, Akane.”

“What?”

She was probably thinking of her new life with all this fur around.

Her eyes were white.

“I want some armor.”

The incident with Shikama and the others had ruined Karen’s armor.

She was currently just wearing a leather breastplate.

And it would be good to have something made especially for her.

Also, Haruki was going to try and reach the center layers now.

And so it would be good for him to have improved armor.

“Any requests?”

“I want to reach the center layers within the year. For me, make everything but the breastplate, ‘middle.’ But for Karen, make it everything.”

Is that alright? Haruki asked Karen with his eyes.

While he started talks without her, Karen didn’t seem to mind. And she just nodded.

It seemed that mention of the center layers had made her feel motivated.

Akane hummed merrily as her finger slid through the air like she was a conductor.

She knew that Haruki and Karen could hunt on the 8th floor of Chikaho.

And she used that knowledge to imagine what kind of weapons and armor they would need.

“…Very well. I’m going to do everything I can to get that money back!”

“Fine. Do your worst. However, if you create anything that’s half-assed, I’m not going to buy it, alright?”

“Hmph. Did you forget who you were talking to? …I’ll show you something you won’t forget!”

“Well, you better do it then.”

He waved his hand and left the prefab.

If Haruki provoked her, Akane would do everything in her power to create great armor.

She may just take all the money he made today back.

However, Haruki didn’t mind.

Having lots of money was nice and everything. But there was no point in being stingy if you died.

＊

They rested quietly until the next day.

It was then that Haruki returned to exploring the garage dungeon.

He used the gate to reach the 5th floor so he could aim for the 6th.

The 5th floor boss was a large Silver Wolf, like the one he had seen in Chikaho.

They killed it quickly.

As they had leveled up, they were able to hunt without much trouble.

Once the boss was dead, the dungeon started to glow, which always happened during the first time.

As for what it dropped, it was a large claw and a dark red stone.

He knew what the claw was but wasn’t what the stone was for.

He would have to have Akane to appraise it later.

And so he stored it in the magic bag.

Then they went down to the 6th floor and activated the gate.

From the 6th floor, there would be traps just like there was in ‘Chikaho.’

However, unlike Chikaho, there was no grass growing here.

So they didn’t need to worry about missing the traps.

“Are the monsters on this floor also Silver Wolves?”

“Who knows?”

This dungeon wasn’t like Chikaho.

In Chikaho, the monsters slowly got stronger.

But here, it seemed like they alternated between getting stronger and then weaker.

If that pattern continued, then they should be weak this time.

“Weak…?”

Karen sounded like she was skeptical of Haruki’s theory.

“Weren’t the onions and potatoes weak?”

When he said the potatoes were ‘weak,’ Rhea suddenly reacted.

She started smacking Haruki on the head with her leaves.

Sorry. Sorry.

“…Karaboshi, you really are strange.”

“Huh?”

“First, these onions…”

Karen raised her finger like she was a teacher.

Karen as a teacher…

It made him a little excited.

Oh, she just glared at him.

“When you attack them, the stimulant is dispersed into the air as a gas. And it’s impossible to avoid it. If you get even a little bit of it on you, you will not be able to stop crying. In other words, you are robbed of your eyesight. Karaboshi, can you fight without being able to see?”

“No.”

The reason that you cried when cutting onions was that the substance that flew into the air was too stimulating.

So if it touched your eye membrane, of course, you would cry.

However, onions also stimulated your eyes through your nose membrane.

That’s why wearing goggles didn’t help.

That being said, there were a few ways of dealing with it…