The Most Ordinary (3)

How long had it been since temporary worker Adam joined the workforce? Once again, I was killing time in the office, putting on a show of working hard.

I glanced around. Being Friday, a fair number of desks sat empty. The manager was out too — no one around to give me grief.

I snuck my phone out and fired up the game. Nothing quite matches the thrill of gaming on the clock.

The familiar temple filled the screen. My fingers moved fast, clearing the pile of finished weapons and selling them off to the adventurers.

Ba-bam—!

A message window popped up without warning, but thanks to the mute setting I'd already enabled, only the visual fanfare appeared. That right there was the wisdom of experience, wasn't it?

"Rune Engraving…?"

What the hell was this now? Why was I always the last to know?

When had this even unlocked? Had a message window popped up before and I'd just missed it?

The most likely culprit was one of the buildings I'd put up recently. I tapped through the structures one by one until I found it in the Dusty Library.

Ba-bam—!

"Consumes a great deal of time? I should check just how long it actually takes."

How bad could it really be? For a trial run, I had one of the dwarves craft an Old Longsword and then engrave a rune onto it.

"What, that's all of them? Just three?"

Since the feature had unlocked through the library, upgrading the building would probably unlock more runes. The ones available now were almost certainly the lowest tier.

Still, I didn't have much gold stockpiled, and I had no idea how efficient the runes even were, so I set that aside for later.

"Hmm… I'll just go with the safe pick — Rune of Courage."

When you don't know what something does, you pick the first option on the list. Once I selected the rune, the dwarf started hammering away at the weapon.

Then the estimated time appeared above him… and it was not looking good.

"…Six hours? Are you kidding me? Six hours to make a single longsword?"

Even if it sold for a premium, six hours was way past the line. I canceled the craft without a second thought.

No matter how high the sale price climbed, in that same time I could crank out dozens of longswords.

"Rune characters — what even is the point of this feature? Who's going to craft anything if one weapon takes six hours?"

The developers clearly had nothing but air between their ears. Enhancing weapons and selling them for more was fine in theory, but six hours? Who would bother?

Grumbling under my breath, I flipped through the weapon list looking for something new to unlock. I figured I'd free up one more D-Grade weapon for now.

I was scanning for anything decent when a little hourglass icon in the corner of the screen started blinking. That hourglass tracked the temporary worker's remaining time.

Looks like Adam's shift was over.

"…They give you a temp and then snatch him away. Kind of leaves a bad taste."

He'd been temporary from the start, but having something handed over and then taken back still felt a little sour.

After a not-insignificant stretch of unpaid, fixed-term labor, Adam was wrapped in white light — and then he vanished from the temple.

"Hope next time we meet, it's as a full-time hire."

With temporary worker Adam gone, I poked through the weapon list a while longer, found nothing that caught my eye, and switched over to World Exploration mode. I checked in on my bookmarked residents and took a peek at the places still buried in fog.

I was zoning out, watching the residents go about their lives, when a thought suddenly hit me.

Wasn't Adam originally a resident in World Exploration mode?

But the message window earlier said he'd learned Rune Engraving. So what did that mean now?

Curiosity got the better of me, and I started sweeping the screen, hunting for Adam. Trying to find one random resident whose address I didn't even know across a map that vast, though — that was pure needle-in-a-haystack territory.

Naturally, I came up empty.

"Making me curious for nothing. At least give me a way to find him."

I vented a little, then opened the shop. I always checked the Mystery Shop every day — you never knew when it might put a skill or a weapon up for sale.

"…Nothing."

All it had were gift-type items like Suspiciously Suspicious Painting and Weird Candy. I bought them all anyway.

The candy I'd feed to Hans later. As for the Suspiciously Suspicious Painting… I just dumped it in some alley near the Holy City. Someone always came along and picked it up.

Sometimes the painting changed hands among the residents, and ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠following it around to watch people was entertainment in its own right.

I'd bookmarked every painting I'd scattered around. Hopping between their viewpoints, I eventually landed on one that led me to a temple.

"Adam?"

There he was — in a room with people dressed like priests. What a coincidence. I bookmarked him on the spot.

I needed to see how this Rune Engraving he'd learned actually worked.

Ba-bam—!

An endless scroll. Hero-class adventurers' names mixed in with ordinary ones. Apparently every weapon I'd ever sold was a valid target for rune engraving.

From the look of it, this was a weapon-enhancement feature — a way to strengthen weapons and, by extension, boost the combat power of adventurers and hero-class fighters.

"If I do Kenis's…"

I was about to mindlessly enhance Kenis's weapon when I stopped short. Her current weapon was A-Grade. Was it really smart to slap the lowest-tier rune onto that?

"Hmm…"

My finger hovered, hesitating. I knew absolutely nothing about how Adam's Rune Engraving worked, and dumping it onto an A-Grade ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠weapon on a whim felt risky.

If higher-tier runes showed up later and I couldn't swap out a low-tier one already locked in place… that would be tragic.

In cases like this…

"Alright. Hans — you're the one."

Time to experiment on candy-loving Hans.

When Adam calmly announced that he had been to the Holy Land, the Great Priests nearly tore their hair out in sheer excitement.

Hard as it was to understand, Adam told himself that even this was a form of faith — and clung to his composure.

After a long stretch of uproar, the Great Priests finally managed to claw their way back to something resembling reason.

"Reason" was generous. Their eyes were bloodshot, veins standing out, and their mouths kept pumping out ragged breaths.

"Now — huff — now tell us! You truly went to the Holy Land!!"

Antonio, speaking for the group, asked through heavy gasps. By the end he was shouting, unable to contain himself, though the effort to hold back was visible.

"W-well, yes. I went to the Holy Land and met the God's workers—"

"The God's workers!! Tell us everything about their appearance!! Antonio, you old fool, your explanations are always so vague— AARGH!!"

The other Great Priests dragged the interrupter out. Adam swallowed dryly, cold sweat beading on his skin.

These… were Great Priests?

Faced with the raw, bottomless faith of men revered by all and trusted by every believer, Adam averted his eyes and pretended not to see.

"Ahem! I met the God's workers, and from them I learned a craft. Namely… the method of forging the God's weapons. Of course, being a mere human, I couldn't master it completely. Just the basics. But instead—"

"Instead…?"

Adam carefully drew a book from his coat. Mysterious characters were etched into the fine leather cover, and a soft radiance rose from the letters themselves.

"Instead, the God bestowed upon me this book — along with a mystical script called 'Runes'."

"Runes? I've never heard of such a thing. Has anyone?"

"No, I haven't either…"

The Great Priests, who had spent their entire lives studying theology, tilted their heads. The word "rune" was completely new to them.

Adam closed his eyes with solemn gravity and spoke.

"The God's workers told me this: the script called 'Runes' is a mystical writing created by the God Himself, and the very letters are imbued with the power of miracles."

"…"

When the Great Priests fell silent, Adam cracked an eye open. The people who had been so noisily reactive until now were giving him nothing — and that was strange.

"Oh…"

"Oh?"

It wasn't silence.

It was the brief, breathless quiet that comes just before a volcano erupts.

"WOOOOOOOO!!!!"

"A script created by the God Himself!!! I must see it!!! No — let me see it!!! Please!!!"

"Rune characters!!! Merciful Six Gods!!! What vast grace You pour upon the earth!!!"

"Almighty Six Gods in Heaven!!! Guide me with Your eternal light!!!"

Not even the blazing heat of a forge could match this. Under the volcanic explosion of the Great Priests' reaction, Adam found himself involuntarily shuffling backward.

Then a hand clamped onto his shoulder.

It was Antonio — eyes burning so red with fervor they looked ready to catch fire.

"Young man!! May I… huff — no, may we be permitted to see these so-called runes?!"

Faith deeper than madness. Adam flinched under the force of Antonio's presence.

"Th-that wouldn't be difficult, but—"

As if to rescue him, the book in Adam's hands began to pour out a brilliant light.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

"What is this…?"

As if entranced, Adam opened the pages. On the blank paper, letters carved themselves into existence, forming a single sentence.

Adam read it aloud, slowly.

"Han…s. Rune… of… Courage?"

And so the first rune-bearer was chosen.