Even If You Dig It, Asne Just Needs to Touch It and It Shudders Awake
Even if you dig it, Asne just needs to touch it once and it shudders awake.
“Th-this kind of place has a gold vein…? It feels like my entire common sense is being shattered…!”
“Things that defy common sense happen sometimes when you live long enough. Try to think positively.”
“Ahem… With such a perfect example right in front of me, I can’t even argue.”
“Come on, come on~ Just accept it~ Can you tell things like the reserves? I’m pretty confident in the quality. What do you think?”
“Hmm… Give me a moment… First, the quality… Oh my… Is what I’m seeing right now real? Or am I actually dreaming while asleep, or perhaps in the afterlife…? No, it’s far too vivid for that. Hoo… Was something like this truly possible…!”
The dwarf let out a sigh-like groan. I was curious, but it seemed like she needed time to collect herself, so I waited. She probably needed to examine it more closely too.
Watching her, she kept blinking rapidly, rubbing her eyes, and repeating the actions of someone who thought they were seeing things. After a while, she finally spoke.
“Hoo… My lord. If my eyes are not mistaken, this gold vein… is made of gold that is almost perfectly pure… Well, calling it a vein feels wrong. It’s hard to believe, but it’s basically just a massive lump of gold. I don’t know until we dig it up, but judging by what’s appeared on the surface, it looks like the ground below is also filled with gold nuggets. And if they’re the same as what’s exposed here, they’re incredibly pure gold.”
“That’s incredible.”
“Incredible? It’s hard to describe something like this with a word as mild as incredible. This is the kind of thing that only exists in imagination. Here, if I clear away the dirt like this and break off a piece… something this size would be worth just under three thousand gold.”
The dwarf bent down, cleared the dirt beside the sparkling yellow gold, and with a grunt, pried off a chunk. I’d thought gold would be soft and break easily, but that wasn’t the case. In reality, tearing off a piece like that required tremendous strength. But true to her nature as a summon from another world, she showed off quite the power.
She handed me a gold nugget slightly smaller than my fist. It felt quite heavy. Three thousand gold probably meant roughly three kilograms. That was about the same price as one of the container houses used by the residents.
“Wow. Just what’s visible on the surface must easily exceed a hundred kilograms, right?”
“My lord, are you finally grasping the reality? It spreads out much wider underneath… The reserves are beyond even my imagination. We should at least be talking in tons.”
“Whoa… I’m floored.”
“F-floored…? My lord… If you have bladder issues, it would be best to take care of them.”
The surrounding residents looked shocked at my words. Miya and Asne rushed over in surprise and checked my lower body. Lei and Ruin were chatting with each other about whether healing magic would help. Mino and Diya were seriously discussing what herbs were good for the bladder.
“That’s not what I meant! It’s just an exclamation from my world! I didn’t actually wet myself!”
“Ahahaha…! I thought so~! There wasn’t any smell, so I didn’t believe it anyway!!!”
Miya laughed while avoiding my eyes.
“Hoo… What a relief. And my lord… you truly are magnificent.”
“Asne? Where exactly are you looking while saying that?”
“Hehe… Who knows?”
Asne stared intently at my lower body and spoke with a seductive expression.
“Your wives must be very happy!”
“Mhm! I can feel the lord’s great vessel.”
I wished they would stop making comments that made it sound like they could see everything even though I was wearing pants.
“Haha! As expected of Hyung-nim!”
Mino slapped my back heartily.
“Orabeoni is truly so… splendid… slurp…♡”
“Diya?!”
“Mom…!?”
“Haa… My head hurts…”
Mino and Miya were horrified by Diya licking her lips with a seductive expression, and I felt dizzy too. But it seemed like a joke; she hugged Mino and comforted him.
“Ahem! Anyway! It’s great that there’s gold, but it’ll be hard to sell it like this. Is there a way?”
“If it’s this pure, it would be easy to cast it into gold coins.”
The dwarf suggested turning it into coins. But would even those be accepted as currency?
I stored the gold nugget I was holding into my status window. When I checked, it could fortunately be converted into the same amount of gold.
“No need for that. It can just be converted directly. We just need to mine it.”
“Hoo… As expected of a lord who commands such powerful residents. You’re no ordinary man.”
“Is it possible to convert it directly without mining?”
Just in case, I placed my hand on the gold vein and tried to convert it straight from the status window without digging. As expected, I couldn’t cheese it that easily. Still, it didn’t matter. If we just needed to mine it, we had plenty of labor.
“Minsoo! Is this how you mine it~?”
“Whoa! Nice job, Miya!”
“Haha! I can’t lose to my daughter! Hup hup hup!!!”
“Hng~ Mommy can still use her strength too.”
“Hehe… The gold cuts easier than mud…”
With just a casual swipe of their claws, the Miya family piled up heaps of gold nuggets. All I could do was cheer them on with “Jjaran jjaran jjaran~” The dwarf watched the scene with a dazed expression.
I had been calling her “dwarf” this whole time while trying to think of a name, but nothing came to mind. In that case, it would be good to take something fitting like I did with Lily. Rough red hair, a stubborn-looking face. Suddenly, Uluru came to mind—the massive rock formation that was a tourist spot in Australia.
‘But how could a person’s name be Uluru? That feels a bit off… Lulu… Hmm… That has a purple taste to it, so… Lulu! The sound feels nice too.’
I approached the dejected dwarf and cleared my throat to get her attention. But she didn’t react. I decided to bring up a topic she might find interesting first.
“By the way, what kinds of things can you make with gold?”
“With gold, you say? Hah…! Why, all sorts of things!”
Talking about minerals seemed to revive her spirits. I listened while chiming in agreement. Honestly, some of the stories were quite interesting.
“Then for those things, you… um… I said I’d give you a name. Right. How about Lulu? Does Lulu sound good?”
“A name is whatever you want to call me! Lulu or Looloo, call me whatever you like!”
“Alright. Lulu. Can Lulu make everything you just mentioned?”
“Ah. That’s… Some of them will be difficult. We lack the proper facilities, after all.”
“Ah… That makes sense. Building facilities alone would be tough, right?”
“It’ll take time, but I can build them by myself.”
“Really? Then what building do you think we need most right now?”
“A forge, of course.”
A forge would be nice. But if I asked whether we needed one immediately, my answer would be no.
“Wouldn’t a forge need a furnace?”
“Obviously.”
“Lighting a fire would produce smoke, right?”
“Obviously.”
“Then it’ll be difficult.”
“What!? Why?!”
“I don’t want to expose the territory right now. Even though this is an island, if smoke rises, it might be visible from afar. I don’t want to put us at that kind of risk.”
“Ugh… I see. If that’s the reason, I’ll have to endure it.”
“My lord, if that’s the case, I think I can help with that.”
Asne, who had been listening to me and Lulu, chimed in. Since she could even control seawater, smoke probably wouldn’t be a big deal for her. But…
“If Asne says so, that would help… but the most important thing is missing. I’m really sorry to Lulu, but right now, there aren’t any residents in my territory who need the items a forge would produce.”
It’s not like forges only make weapons. They could also make tools needed for farming. But my residents, the snow leopard tribe, didn’t use tools.
“I see… Their bodies are stronger than any weapon or tool, so there’s no need to use them…”
Lulu looked at the snow leopard family, who were still casually slicing through gold with a dejected expression.
“And the only minerals in my territory are gold and mithril, right? If we make something with those, it would be too high-class and probably hard to sell.”
“Ah…! Aah…! M-mithril! You said there was a mithril vein too!?”
Lulu had been shocked just by the gold. Since she hadn’t believed there were any veins to begin with, mithril had probably been completely out of her mind. But there was gold right in front of her. So what about mithril?
Mithril equipment from dungeons and gates commanded incredibly high prices. Its performance was just as good, so it was the number one “want-to-have” equipment for any hunter. It would be strange if a dwarf didn’t show interest in such a mineral.
“Do you want to see the mithril too?”
“O-of course!”
“Then… could you guide us to the place that feels like Lei?”
“Of course, my lord!”
We converted only the mined gold into coins and arrived at the edge of the mountain thanks to the collaboration between Snow Leopard Express and Black Wing Navigation.
“This terrain really doesn’t look like it would have a vein at all… but that white, shining vein over there…”
Perhaps because Lei had pointed out the exact spot, we saw white lines the moment we arrived. The alien color embedded in the ground sparkled brilliantly under the sunlight. It was clearly no ordinary mineral.
‘That must be mithril.’
Lulu walked forward as if in a trance, lay down on the ground, and very carefully brushed away the dirt. Even though mithril was supposed to be incredibly tough, she handled it as if it were something that would shatter at the slightest touch.
“Ah… Aah…! M-mithril with this kind of purity… this much…! Has the god of minerals, Maharat, bestowed a blessing upon this island…!”
Not quite. It was simply a mineral created by Lei’s trait. And it had been further enhanced by Lulu’s trait. If you thought about it, Lulu’s contribution was quite significant. The reason the purity was so high was probably because of her trait.
“Aah… Now… I can die without regrets…”
Lulu’s movements stopped as she pressed her lips against the mithril vein.
“She fainted again. My lord, should I wake her?”
“Hyung-nim, this dwarf is smiling.”
“Leave her be. She seems to be having a good dream.”
Whether there was mithril or not, we didn’t need it in the territory right now. So I decided to leave Lulu alone for a while so she could be happy.