Dreams for the Future (4)

I should head to the Mage Guild. After returning to the inn and turning the matter over in my head for a long while, I finally settled on that conclusion.

In truth, today had been earmarked entirely for working on my paper. I’d planned to at least hammer out a rough outline for my thesis on the correlation between the hieroglyphs and the five-senses characters we’d discovered in the ruins. The Audumla Guild had said they would be calling in people to interpret the inscriptions. It was only a matter of time before a university professor or the poor graduate students under ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠their thumb showed up. The academics would examine the text, haul their interpretations and research data back to the lab, and set their team—the lab head and their academic slaves—to work.

If I lounged around the inn doing nothing while they made their round trip, I’d end up publishing a paper that was already obsolete in the academic world. The only way for an individual like me to outpace an organized team was to make productive use of the time they wasted traveling back and forth.

But fuck all that. My dick is way more important.

I could write the paper anytime later. There was also the fallback plan of briefly returning to academia, checking their papers, and then designing mine from an entirely different angle. A whole department team would have multiple projects running at once anyway. Research tied to that ruin would almost certainly get pushed to the next quarter. No—there was no “almost” about it. I knew from bitter experience. The work never fucking ended.

I had endured three years of hearing “Just push through today, it’ll be over soon” on repeat. The bastards coming this time were almost certainly graduate students—officially called research assistants. Who knew? Maybe they’d secretly sabotage the inscriptions because they didn’t feel like working.

You must never confuse your priorities when you work.

That was the single greatest lesson I had learned while surviving as a research slave at Carmine University. Tasks without rules or order led straight to endless overtime or irreparable disasters.

The hierarchy of my life was simple: survival > objective > everything else. Publishing the paper fell under “objective”—part of the process of finding a way back to Earth—while my dick fell squarely under “survival.” It belonged there with crushing weight. If I had to choose between becoming a respected scholar in this world or a eunuch from Earth, I would pick the former without hesitation.

Crinkle.

I crumpled the sheet of paper containing the typo I’d just written and hurled it toward the trash bin. Writing down your goals is enormously helpful for organizing your mindset. That was why I had been trying to list my immediate priorities—the guidelines that would dictate my actions for the foreseeable future.

Swish. Scratch, scratch.

The things I needed to do going forward looked like this.

Roughly something like that.

Part of me wanted to write “0. Find Yerna and fuck her senseless” at the very top, but I held back. As the British professor Krapika once said, the most terrifying thing is not death itself, but the fear that this rage might simply weather away. I agreed with him completely. Releasing anger and hatred too often dulls the explosive power you need at the critical moment. It’s the same as how frequent masturbation reduces your load or how you can only save money by quitting cigarettes and alcohol. I couldn’t afford to waste my hatred on that bitch in trivial places.

Emotion is a resource that wears down. When I finally stood before Yerna, I couldn’t have half-hearted anger left inside me. That was the moment I needed to unleash every last drop of my libido like a hunting dog kept indoors for a month and finally released into the garden—screaming like a madman, kyaaaaaaaack!

“That’s what makes it satisfying.”

I nodded. With my goals set, I pulled on the clothes I had laid on the bed—a black robe and a mask I had prepared in advance. Whoosh!

I had bought them at a clothing shop on the way back. When dealing with snobs like the ones at the Mage Guild who flaunted their academic credentials, you needed a certain dignified status to earn any respect. For example, the status of a master’s degree archaeologist from Carmine University.

“Hehehe.”

In my palm, the Carmine University graduation badge and the master’s qualification in archaeology that I had never once used sparkled. Both were fancy brooch-like temporary IDs. No fear of my identity being exposed.

These badges were rare magic items even in this world. Their function was similar to a credit card or ID from modern civilization. Most public institutions or large organizations could verify authenticity with these alone. It was the perfect way to hide the fact that the adventurer Nord from the Audumla Guild was actually a master’s-educated archaeologist. Even if I lost it, I could remotely disable its functions, so there was no risk. The Mage Guild wouldn’t ask me to remove my mask. Archaeologists handled artifacts, and there were always far too many people targeting valuable relics. It was common for archaeologists to conceal their identities. The brooch wouldn’t reveal personal details either. That was why I was certain they wouldn’t demand I take the mask off. In fact, the identity-verification function had been added to these brooches precisely to protect archaeologists.

Swish.

My reflection in the mirror looked rather bat-like thanks to the black robe. Still, the mask on my face was shaped like a bear. It was a show of respect to my idol and great hero, Vectorman Bear. It would have been perfect if the mask also had a voice-modulation effect, but it wasn’t strictly necessary.

“Vector—voice drop.”

I consciously lowered my voice into something sexy and husky. It was noticeably deeper than my usual tone. With this, my disguise was flawless. No one would ever think I was the adventurer Nord anymore!

“Kuhuhu. Perfect. Kuhuhuhu… Huh?”

I had been chuckling with satisfaction when I suddenly realized a massive problem.

“Kuhuhuhuhuhu. Fuck. I bought the clothes with my face showing.”

What a stupid thing to do. No matter how distracted I had been, this was an unforgivably idiotic mistake. If the Mage Guild investigated the robe even a little, they would trace it straight to my bare face. All they had to do was ask the clothing shop if anyone had bought a black robe like this. There was only one black-haired, black-eyed adventurer in all of Sargadis!

“Goddammit.”

I had been so preoccupied with my oversized swinging dick that I hadn’t noticed something so obvious. The damn thing kept smacking against my thighs and it was so distracting I couldn’t focus on anything else. When I went to the smithy I hadn’t noticed either.

Whoosh!Thud.

I tore off the robe and mask and flung them onto the bed. There was no way I could wear those to the Mage Guild now. Should I buy a new costume? But anything from a shop could be traced too easily, so that felt risky. The real problem wasn’t whether I had shown my face at the store—it was that I couldn’t possibly make a suit from scratch at home. That was something only people with actual craftsmanship could do. And since I’d also need to modify the mask, ordinary skill wouldn’t cut it. I had never made or mended clothes in my life. The last time was during high school home economics class. Expecting decent results with that level of skill was insane. To produce wearable clothes on your very first attempt, you would need to have been born with universal cheat-level dexterity.

“—Ah.”

Right. For example, like the dwarves—the race of blacksmiths.

The human body degenerates when it isn’t used. And this doesn’t just apply to muscles. Even the brain, split into left and right hemispheres, loses function if left idle. Like people who start stumbling over basic arithmetic as they age. Which was why I, fuck, had completely forgotten the name of the inn where Francesca was staying. It was all because becoming an adventurer had drastically reduced the amount of time I spent using my head. It was definitely not because I was stupid.

Anyway, even though I had heard the name just yesterday, all I could remember was “Children of Something-or-Other.” What kind of inn name was that? It wasn’t like they were Seo Taiji and Boys. With no other choice, I went to ask Dorka.

“What inn? You switching inns? That’s cold, man.”

“Here. Three days’ lodging fee. Found it on the road.”

“It’s probably the Children of Mutarat.”

Thanks to Dorka’s lightning-fast shift from double personality to capitalist mode, I arrived at the inn where Francesca was staying. The bag on my back contained the black robe and mask I had bought earlier. To avoid leaving any eyewitness testimony about “a suspicious guy carrying a suspicious bag,” I had also packed various pieces of equipment so it would look like I was heading out on a quest.

Ting-a-ling.

“Welcome~. Are you looking for a room?”

The innkeeper was a plump, middle-aged woman. I gave a casual reply to her greeting.

“No. I’m here to see someone I know. Do you happen to know a woman named Francesca who’s staying here?”

“Franc? And who might you be?”

Her eyes turned wary, the look of someone staring at a suspicious character. She seemed to have racism baked into her bones. So “Franc” was Francesca’s nickname. It sounded like something that would roll around cutely—perfect for her. Come to think of it, the fact that the innkeeper used her nickname meant they were quite close. Not as close as me and Dorka, but still.

“I’m an adventurer who worked with her. I have some business with her.”

“Business? What kind of business brings you all the way to her lodging?”

“She suggested we grab a drink sometime, so I came by. I also have some personal questions.”

My real purpose was getting a custom robe and mask, but I wasn’t stupid enough to say that out loud. But why was this auntie’s expression souring? Was she pissed off at the idea of someone drinking in her inn?

“She suggested having a drink? That girl?”

“Yes. Is there some problem I don’t know about?”

Maybe Francesca was still a minor? Her height was short, but her face looked like a perfectly normal woman in her twenties.

“It’s not that. The kid passes out after one or two drinks.”

“Huh?”

For real? Where had she sold her dwarf genes? A half-dwarf getting wasted after a few cups? Maybe she was half-elf instead of half-dwarf. Francesca, the new humanity born from half-dwarf and half-elf genes. A genetic combination that spat in the face of every eugenics principle I knew from this world. I had been taught that only members of the same species could produce children, yet here she was. I was starting to worry about her safety. The day this fact became known, biologists eager to become the Darwin of this world would try to kidnap and dissect her.

“Hmmmm. So that’s how it is?”

While I was pondering from a biological perspective whether dwarves had an abundance of alcohol dehydrogenase or simply didn’t absorb alcohol and excreted it directly, the innkeeper looked me up and down.

“Hey, you.”

“Yes.”

“Franc is only twenty-two. She’s an adult by age, but it’s still a difficult age to live alone in unfamiliar lands.”

“Yes? Yes.”

I didn’t understand why the auntie was telling me this, but I nodded as if I understood everything. I was already used to the way older people rambled without clear context.

“She has no one to rely on, so she must always feel lonely and tired, yet she works so, so hard. Do you understand?”

The atmosphere had somehow turned into a lecture directed at me. But fuck, aren’t those words perfectly applicable to me too?

“I didn’t know the full story… but I do know that Francesca is a good person.”

“Good. As long as you know that.”

The innkeeper, arms still crossed, nodded in satisfaction at my answer and pointed inside the inn.

“Come in. Franc said she wouldn’t be back until evening, so if you have nowhere else to go, wait inside.”

“Did she go out for work?”

“Today’s the day she has to pay her lodging fee.”

The sorrows of renters were the same no matter which world you were in. She had just finished that brutal quest yesterday, yet here she was, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠heading out again to survive. My heart ached at the thought of her difficult life. Even though dwarves were supposed ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠to be sturdy, adventurer work was harsh. At Iron Class especially, it was a daily grind of earning just enough to eat for the day. As a comrade who had crossed the line of death with her, my sincere wish was that she would only work enough not to damage her health.

I glanced at the clock tower outside the inn. It was five in the afternoon. Since she said she would return in the evening, it probably wouldn’t take too long.

“I’ll wait, then.”

“Smart choice. Or would you like a drink while you wait?”

“I don’t know when she’ll be back, so getting drunk by myself feels wrong.”

“Oh my. Such good manners. It’s rare to see a young man with manners these days.”

“I also have wit. I’m a multi-talented entertainer.”

I gave an appropriate reply and sat down in a corner seat so I wouldn’t interfere with business. If the currency system hadn’t made small transactions impossible, I would have ordered something to drink. Ordinary merchants and residents often used cheap goods priced by the gram—like flour—instead of currency. It was essentially barter. I couldn’t do that, though, since I had neither the ability nor the storage to buy flour in bulk.

As a result, my money was leaking at an alarming rate. Right now I wasn’t saving any of my quest rewards; I was living by chipping away at what I had already accumulated. That was what happened when you ate out and paid for lodging every day instead of working diligently.

Once I reach Bronze… or at the latest when I hit Silver Class, I should find a house.

Buying one right now would be reckless. Iron to Bronze Class adventurers were easy prey. If an idiot like me started flaunting wealth by buying a house, it would cause huge problems. Some might not stop at robbing empty houses—they might target me directly to steal my wallet. An idiot adventurer with plenty of money but insufficient skill. To the poor of this world, that was the kind of temptation that made them want to close their eyes, smash the back of your head, and take your wallet. Whether they got caught and arrested later didn’t matter. To people living without a future, dying this way or that was all the same.

While I killed time staring out the window, six o’clock soon passed. That was when the person I had been waiting for finally appeared.

Step, step.

Francesca appeared through the wide-open inn door. Even though I had been lost in thought, I noticed her the instant she entered. Her small stature—maybe 160 centimeters—and the gray robe made her impossible to miss.

“Francesca.”

“Huh? Nord?”

When I called out, Francesca looked startled and pulled back her hood. I left my bag beside the table and walked toward her.

“Huh? Ah, wait! ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Don’t come any closer!”

“Yes?”

Francesca even stretched out her hand to stop me from approaching. I froze mid-step in an awkward pose. I couldn’t understand why she was reacting with such disgust. Had suggesting we grab a drink been her polite way of saying I was filthy and she never wanted to see me again?

“I-I went on a sewer request today!”

“…What?”

Francesca shouted and hurriedly backed away. Wind from behind the door brushed her gray robe and struck my nose. It was the sewer stench I had smelled far too many times before. Today, she was colored by the sewers. A flood of memories from the sewers filled my head—pleasant memories with the giant cockroaches of this other world, the ones with huge compound eyes and horizontally opening mandibles.

“Gack.”