The 31st Piece Turns the Tables
chapter-47

The jellies that Seol made before were the size of his palm but the jelly he just made was only the size of his finger.

It was the size of cheongsimhwan, the ‘clear mind pill’ that Koreans sometimes have.

Seol checked its effects while enjoying the scent.

[[Jelly From a Cloudy Day]

Quality: Treasure

Recommended Level: N/A

Weight: 0.1kg

A jelly made using a Shadow Flower, a flower that grows in Flegueria.

This jelly has completely encased the enhanced, more volatile power of shadows in the Gelatin of Persecutory Delusions. It can last for up to 3 years unless it is stored in a place where it can easily sour.

Bonus Effect: Upon consumption, you will be able to use ‘Miracle of a Cloudy Day’ for one hour. Miracle of a Cloudy Day (You can forcibly use Shadow Summon on a much stronger opponent once. The summoner will be considered 30 levels higher. If the Shadow Summon would still be unsuccessful with an increase of 30 levels, Shadow Summon will fail).]

An increase of an entire 30 levels.

Of course, this level increase didn’t make his Shadow Summon ability absolute, but it did solve one of the issues that Seol had.

His own level.

The higher the Adventure’s difficulty, the higher the opponents’ levels became.

For Shadow Summoners like Seol, however, once the differences in levels passed a certain amount, he was no longer able to summon their shadows.

After all, Seol needed to fight stronger people and use their shadows for him to become stronger himself.

Since the level issue in the system was considered a difference in ‘class’, this Jelly From a Cloudy Day definitely helped overcome that.

‘The important thing is when I use this.’

Something that Seol noticed while enhancing his skills was that he had quite a large amount of excess Shadow Space.

The only thing left to do was acquire a new summon.

However, the important question was what kind of summon should he get next?

As Seol progresses through more Adventures, the difficulty will increase and the enemies will get tougher. Seol also didn’t know when he’d have another opportunity to get another summon after this.

‘I have to… get the strongest summon that I can.’

He had to get a summon who could be his rock until the next opportunity came.

Obviously, Karuna and Jamad were definitely strong summons, but Seol found it hard to be 100% confident when he asked himself if they could defeat every enemy they would potentially face from this point on.

It could be possible if his summons reached a higher rank and if he acquired more summons but as it currently stood, a lot relied on the jelly.

“Fuu… Carefully…”

Seol carefully and meticulously placed the jelly into a clean wrapping paper.

- A dish could be Treasure quality?

- That’s insane LOL! A consumable is a treasure?

- Cooking was this good of a talent?

- Aren’t there barely any players who chose cooking as their talent?

- I bet they all died though… Who the hell would pick cooking? LOL

- The shitty builds probably picked it haha

- Look at how careful he is lmfao!

Seol let out a sigh after he placed the jelly into his inventory.

“Fuu… When am I going to clean all this now?”

Seol had cooked nonstop.

The kitchen, right now, looked like a battlefield.

* * *

Translator - goguma

Proofreader - Karane

* * *

As Seol started to clean the kitchen, something broke the silence.

Knock, knock, knock.

Someone was knocking on the door.

Truthfully, Seol had already noticed the presence earlier. It was because he felt countless mysterious presences around the outbuilding since earlier.

“What is it?”

A voice answered from beyond the door, “Excuse me… Dear guest, someone came to see you.” The voice was obviously terrified.

Seol could hear it in the worker’s voice that they had been crying.

“Me?”

“Yes… W-Well…”

Seol nodded.

‘It’s about time they came.’

It was likely that Seol’s plans were going smoothly.

After all, there was only one person who would come find him in the outbuilding when he hadn’t made any disturbances at all.

“...Where do I need to go?”

“There’s no need for that. I came here quickly because I’m a bit impatient.”

It was another man’s voice this time.

Unlike the worker’s voice earlier, the man’s voice was deep and had weight behind it. Seol could feel from behind the wall that the man wasn’t nervous at all.

“You can go back now. Good work.”

“Uh… I-Is something going to happen?”

“Nothing will. I plan on leaving after a conversation.”

“Thank you…”

Seol could feel the worker leave.

The man beyond the wall leisurely introduced himself.

“I’m sure you know this already but I’m Kibo. Do you plan on not inviting me in?”

“...It’s messy inside. Is that alright?”

“Life’s messier than whatever we can do, ain’t it? I can’t really complain about a bit of mess from a lack of doing chores.”

“Come in.”

“Thank you.”

Creak…

The moment Seol opened the door, he saw Kibo who filled up the door frame.

‘He’s massive.’

Kibo was massive to the point that he practically looked inhuman.

Creak…

That wasn’t the sound of the door closing. It was the sound of the floorboard giving in, screaming.

“There’s no need to be on guard so much. I’m nothing more than a beast who lost his fangs.”

“For a beast who lost his fangs, you’re quite on guard as well.”

Seol was referring to the people swarming outside the outbuilding. Seol could feel many, many presences.

"I just have a few people who like to worry too much. Regardless, for a place where someone’s staying by himself, this place smells like ass.” Kibo looked at the kitchen.

“Well, this and that happened so.”

“I won’t say anything since I said I’d be understanding. I’d think there was a corpse here if I wasn’t though.”

“Have a seat.”

“Sure.”

There was a massive, decorative seat in the outbuilding that was the perfect size for Kibo, almost like it was prepared for him. Kibo then took a seat there.

“Haha… Normally when you visit unannounced, you have to stand around. This is pretty good preparation.”

And it was then…

BAM! BAM! BAM!

Someone was banging on the door.

“Ahjussi! Kibo! Let me in! It’s dangerous!”

“......”

Seol looked at Kibo.

Kibo buried his head into his thin hands like he was troubled. The first thing that Seol noticed though was how massive his hands were.

“Sigh… What a pain, seriously…”

“Are you not going to open the door?! I’m going to break it, alright? I’m breaking down this door! Do you think I won’t be able to do it?”

“So she’s… so…”

“Kibo! Open the door, you bastard! I keep telling you, it’s dangerous!”

It was gruff but it was definitely a woman’s voice.

“Is she calling me a bastard?” asked Seol.

“It’s either me or the both of us.”

“You can let them in.”

“Is that really alright?”

“I feel like she’s going to continue to do that until we do.”

“How wise.”

Kibo lumbered over to the door and opened it.

“Come in, Mira.”

“You should’ve done this from the start!”

“But, you have to be quiet.”

“Okay.”

It was like watching a grandfather and his granddaughter.

Seol had their attention when he sat in the chair across from Kibo.

“Are you a transferee?” asked Seol.

When Seol asked the woman named Mira, Kibo responded.

“Yeah, she’s a fun kid named Yu Mira.”

“Who are you calling ‘fun’, huh?!”

“Shh, be quiet. We’re here to have an important conversation.”

“Urgh…”

She looked like she was 21, 23 at most.

Mira pouted her lips and stuck right next to Kibo like gum.

Kibo and Seol diverted their attention from her and continued their talks.

“I heard about you from Rita. You wanted to trade items?”

“I just thought it would be better to trade than to not receive a proper price for my item.”

“Did you also know that I was the one who owned it?”

“Who knows?”

“Kuku… I bet you did know. It’s obvious, judging by how you weren’t surprised at all when I showed up.”

“I wouldn’t have been surprised by whoever showed up with a treasure like that.”

Mira butted in as they were having their conversation.

“Argh, so are you going to trade it or not?! We’re in a rush!”

“Stop! Mira, I wanted you to sit still so you can watch and learn.”

“Watch and learn what?”

“This unruly girl… Fuu…”

When two parties didn’t have trust in one another, whoever was in a more urgent situation lost. Not only did you not have time to slowly, perfectly understand the other party’s intent, being in a rush often made you have to suffer a loss.

It seemed like Kibo was trying to teach Mira that.

Obviously, MIra didn’t understand his intent at all.

“Since Mira already revealed everything, I guess I have no choice. I desperately need your treasure.”

“Why?”

“Do you know about Nobira’s current situation?”

“If you’re referring to how the ruins hunters are all on edge because of the war of nerves, then yes, I do know.”

Kibo gave a glance to Mira before speaking to Seol again.

“Heka and Doju are belligerent and Shur and I are moderates. We never got along in the first place.”

“So how was there never a fight before now?”

“It was because Borgo was there. That vicious, brutal bastard was always aiming for any openings like a hyena.”

“So you were all wary of Borgo striking in the event that you four fought.”

“Ironically, he was the one keeping the peace. After all, having a third force is one way to prevent a war.”

Borgo died an unfortunate death to Seol.

Even though his faction was the weakest out of the five, the other factions avoided him because of his wickedness and tenacity.

“So what about now?”

“Shur and I are weaker.”

“In terms of strategy?”

“Strategy’s a part of it too, but… more importantly, there’s no one who can keep Heka in check.”

Why was Kibo sounding so weak? How could someone this huge be so meek?

Kibo noticed Seol staring at him and let out a bitter laugh.

“I told you, I lost my fangs.”

“How?”

Mira intervened, trying to stop Kibo from continuing.

"Kibo… This isn’t something you should be telling someone you don’t trust."

"Mira, trust cannot form in a place where there is none."

"...What do you mean?"

"Just like how I don’t trust him, he doesn’t trust me. So where does trust first come in a situation like that?"

"Well, that’s…"

"The person who’s in a more urgent situation is the person who first makes room for trust. Unfortunately, that’s just how the world works."

Kibo let out a sad laugh while rolling up his sleeve.

"...Your arm."

His right arm was completely black.

His black arm reached all the way up to his elbow.

It looked completely different from Yeo-myeong’s haunted hand as well. Seol had a more ominous feeling from it.

“Shadow venom. It’s the price I paid for coveting a treasure.”

“I heard you were a Shadow Summoner. Did you use the treasure?”

"Hahaha… we ruins hunters only call it that. Just because it’s a treasure doesn’t mean it’s used like one. Some of them use their owners' lives as fuel to turn the world into blood. I’ve seen a lot of treasures, and half of them were like that."

“Are you saying that Gallotta’s Tongue is a treasure like that?”

“Since I haven’t found a way to purify it yet, it is.”

“Then why did you lay your hands on it?”

“I was rash. Borgo disappeared, Heka and Doju formed an alliance and started to pressure me… I made a mistake thinking I had to respond right away.”

“What about Shur?”

“After Shur’s close advisor died, he became nothing more than a coward who got lucky with leading a faction. They might be following now but if the situation gets worse, they could just as easily join the other faction. And if that happens, it’s the end for Nobira.”

How would it exactly be the end?

Seol was curious about what kind of future Kibo was seeing.

“Heka and Doju treat all transferees like slaves. They take everything from the transferees. Labor, gold, and sometimes they even just outright sell them. There’s already been quite a number of transferees who died while trying to oppose Heka.”

“...They’ve crossed the line.”

“Their faction is claiming that the people who originally lived in this world should group together to turn the transferees into slaves.”

“It would be accurate to claim that they want to practically turn transferees into livestock, right?”

“I won’t deny that. I don’t know about Doju but Heka is definitely crazy enough to want it.”

Mira’s body shook with fear.

“Heka is… an insane bastard. A few transferees participated in his raid to only end up as corpses.”

“There’s also rumors that he kills transferees for fun. It’s basically a fact though.”

Kibo’s strange way of talking made you take his side the more you listened to him.

“So, you need my treasure to prevent that?” asked Seol.

“I just wanted to trade treasures of equal value.”

“Equal value? Are you really claiming that the treasure that took your arm is worth the same as my treasure?”

“An item that can’t be sold is worth nothing. Since they both aren’t being sold, wouldn’t you agree that they’re worth the same?”

“That’s nothing more than a misinterpretation.”

“Even if it is, what do you think about trading it?”

Seol had practically already acquired Gallota’s Tongue a while ago. If he could just finalize the trade as it stood, it would be much better for Seol. Nevertheless, Seol had a separate reason why he didn’t agree to the trade right away.

‘It’s also annoying if Heka takes over Nobira.’

His thought process could seem off, but in the end, Seol was also a transferee. There was no way he’d have a favorable view of someone who was committing crimes specifically targeting transferees.

Furthermore, after the fight between the factions ends, one faction will inevitably take over everything and become bigger than they are now.

‘And if that happens, it might be hard for me to take them down.’

In the end, the person who was receiving the most harm would be none other than Seol himself. Seol didn’t want the situation in Nobira to turn sour.

Mira looked at Seol thinking to himself.

“Kibo, I don’t think he wants to trade. Let’s just go. We spent way too much time out in the open. Heka could’ve noticed by now,” said Mira to Kibo.

“Mira…”

“I told you to lower your expectations! Transferees only ever think about themselves!”

“Mira, you’re a transferee too. They just haven’t been able to adjust to this world yet.”

“......”

“They just haven’t been able to become family yet.”

Seol listened to their conversation. He then pulled something out from his inventory.

“Is it true that ruins hunters know the value of an item?”

“Well, we’re good at judging the correct value of most items.”

“Then, what is the value of this item?”

“What’s that?”

Place.

Kibo carefully inspected the glass bottle that Seol placed on the table.

“Hmm… It’s a type of medicine, or… or…”

“K-Kibo…”

“Mira, give me a moment.”

“No, it’s not that… your shadow…”

“What?”

“Kibo, your shadow is…”

Kibo was holding the glass bottle in his left hand.

And as such, his shadow should mirror the same thing.

However, Kibo’s shadow placed the glass bottle’s shadow as far away from its right hand as it could. It was almost like Kibo’s shadow was afraid of the liquid inside of the glass bottle.

A shadow was scared.

Kibo instantly looked at Seol.

Seol looked back at him plainly with his golden eyes.

Seol quietly asked another question,

“Do you know the value of this item?”