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Join the Server“Thank you all.”
“Thank you? We’re the ones who are grateful. Thanks to the food you made, we’re full of energy!”
“By the way, that’s amazing. The sun hasn’t even set yet, and you’ve already filled your cart! And here in Tunnel B of all places!”
With magic aiding my ore-finding, nothing was an obstacle.
Not long after lunch, I was able to fill the cart used for hauling ore.
Since mining any more would leave me with no way to carry it, it was time to leave Tunnel B.
“Then I’ll be going now.”
“Alright! We won’t forget today’s meal!”
“Thinking about that braised chicken makes me want to eat it again! Hahaha!”
I pulled the cart along the rails and exited the mine.
As they said, the sun was still high in the sky.
“This is heavier than I thought?”
Even with the dedicated rails for the carts, the amount of ore in mine was too much.
If my stats weren’t as high as they were, even pulling it would have been difficult.
Struggling along, I soon arrived at the ore receiving station right next to the office.
Whether by chance or not, the employee I had met at the office was waiting there.
“Huh? You’re that one from earlier.”
“Hello. We meet again.”
She still looked tired.
Holding a clipboard and recording something, she seemed to be tallying the ore.
“That’s a lot of ore. First Hanson comes in with Mithril, now this. Did something happen in Tunnel B today?”
“Well, nothing in particular… Haha.”
I couldn’t exactly explain that efficiency had increased because I fed them braised chicken.
She’d probably just scoff.
Still expressionless, she approached my cart.
“The miners must have loaded the ore for you, right? Haah, how am I supposed to organize things when you bring them in so haphazardly like this?”
“Huh? No, I mined this myself.”
“…?”
For a moment, the employee’s stoic expression flickered.
“No, I understand that you brought this in, Mr. Lee Chang. But the miners must have put the ore in the cart for you.”
“No, this is all mine.”
“…?”
Her expression changed again.
She shook her head briefly, then began to assess the situation with a rather serious expression.
“So, all the ore in this cart belongs to Mr. Lee Chang?”
“Yes.”
“That means you mined all of this yourself?”
“Yes.”
“Mr. Lee Chang, you signed the contract and came to mine for the first time today, correct?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“No, that doesn’t make any sense!”
“But it’s true…”
No matter how much I tried to explain, she didn’t believe me.
Shaking her head as if she couldn’t accept it, she summoned that man, ‘Nelson,’ and sent him to Tunnel B.
“I’ve sent Nelson to Tunnel B, so your lie will soon be revealed. Trying to pass off someone else’s ore as your own… You’d better be prepared.”
“No, I’m telling you, it’s really mine. I mined it.”
“Be quiet. I’ll hear your excuses later.”
Soon, Nelson arrived, bringing one of the miners from Tunnel B with him.
But contrary to her expectations, Nelson also wore a flustered expression.
“Aileen, I went to Tunnel B and checked… it seems what he says is true.”
“What? You mean Mr. Lee Chang mined all this himself?”
“Hoho, I suppose it’s hard to believe. But it’s true. Everyone in Tunnel B, myself included, saw it.”
“Good heavens…”
She looked at me with a bewildered expression.
With a witness now present, she had no choice but to believe me.
Seeing how things had turned out, I looked at her with a confident expression.
“See? I told you it was mine.”
“B-but how…”
I was used to this kind of question by now.
So I paused briefly, then scratched the back of my head awkwardly and answered.
“I guess it’s just talent.”
***
“Divided at a 50% rate, the total comes to 12 Silver Irons, 9 Hard Steels, 8 Mana Steels…”
The settlement took quite a while.
With the cart filled with a variety of ores, it was unavoidable.
Though I had to pay 50%, even after that, it was still a substantial amount.
Since it would be difficult to fit it all in my inventory, I exchanged what I didn’t need for cash on the spot.
“You’re truly remarkable. This is the first time I’ve been this surprised.”
“Not at all. It just worked out that way.”
“And the miner mentioned something about braised chicken… Did you cook that inside the mine?”
“Ah, is it not allowed to cook inside the mine?”
“No, it’s not that, but…”
She quietly trailed off.
While she did, I brought up the main point I had in mind from the start.
“Excuse me, would it be possible for me to enter Tunnel C?”
“…You were planning that from the beginning, weren’t you?”
“Haha, yes. You noticed.”
“I could only assume that someone with your skill would go to Tunnel B as a newbie to gain trust.”
As she said, my destination had always been Tunnel C.
But Tunnel C was strictly controlled.
It wasn’t a place they’d let just any outsider enter because they wanted to.
“Well, with skill like this, I suppose I can trust you.”
Only after gaining recognition in Tunnel B would the basic conditions for the quest be met.
Simultaneously with her nod, a quest window appeared.
[Hidden Quest ‘Secret of Vasen Mine, Tunnel C’ has been created.]
Quest Rank: Rare
Description: Investigate and resolve the issues in Tunnel C of Vasen Mine, once known as the empire’s only rock salt mine.
Reward: Monetary compensation.
‘A rock salt mine? I didn’t know that.’
This was one of the pieces of information I had before regression.
I had come straight to Tunnel B to gain the trust of the NPCs in order to receive this hidden quest.
The quest rank was Rare.
Despite that, the reward was simply set as monetary compensation.
But the real purpose of this quest wasn’t the compensation.
The reason a Rare quest’s reward was only ‘monetary compensation’ was because of ‘that’ which could be obtained in Tunnel C.
Of course, its value was far beyond Rare.
“Then, I’ll guide you right away.”
Aileen moved her feet toward the mine.
***
“This is it.”
“The security is tight.”
“We had no choice, monsters started appearing.”
The information I gathered on the way to Tunnel C was roughly as follows.
Tunnel C was originally famous as the empire’s only rock salt mine.
Then, one day, monsters appeared in large numbers.
Moving stone statues and scorpions with hard exoskeletons.
And finally, a massive golem.
Each was an incredibly powerful monster.
So the office employees had no choice but to temporarily block the entrance to Tunnel C and post guards.
Fortunately, the monsters inside the tunnel didn’t seem intent on coming out, so no problems had occurred yet.
“Then, wouldn’t it be possible to ask the empire for help?”
“This was once the empire’s only rock salt mine, but it’s currently the private property of the merchant ‘Gilbert.’ So expecting help from the empire is unlikely.”
“Then, could we ask this Gilbert…”
“Haah… The truth is, compared to ore mines, a rock salt mine doesn’t yield much profit relative to the investment.”
“Ah…”
I don’t know much about the price of salt in Unreal World.
But the moment I heard her words, I could roughly understand the situation.
This Gilbert was, as she said, a ‘merchant prince.’
Someone who pursued profit ruthlessly.
So he had no intention of spending money to deal with a rock salt mine that wouldn’t generate enough profit to justify the cost.
“I mentioned it to him recently, and he just said if I wanted it dealt with so badly, to do it myself.”
“Hmm, I see.”
“As remarkable as you are, Mr. Lee Chang, I don’t expect you to solve the problem. I’d just like you to get a sense of the situation.”
“And after that?”
“Once we understand the situation, we can calculate whether hiring mercenaries to deal with it is feasible.”
Well, the creatures appearing here were quite powerful monsters.
And whatever kind it was, a golem would be at least level 40, even at its weakest.
The fact that she was letting me in because I asked didn’t mean she expected me to solve the problem completely.
“This is it. Well, I’ll leave it to you.”
“Thank you.”
As befitting a mine, the entrance was firmly sealed with large rocks and rails.
But fortunately, there was a small side entrance.
Thanks to the woman named Aileen opening the lock, I could easily enter the gate.
[You have entered the sealed rock salt mine, Tunnel C.]
“It feels like I can taste salt in the air.”
– Wow, it really is rock salt! Master, master!
“Yeah, I know.”
Looking around, I could see transparent-looking things embedded in the walls here and there.
The manual was getting excited, but I was also a bit curious, so I swung my pickaxe.
Even without using the vibration detection spell, a chunk of transparent rock came loose quickly.
That’s how abundant the rock salt was.
<Vasen Mine Rock Salt>
Grade: Normal
Description: A piece of rock salt mined from Vasen Mine. It seems to have few impurities, so it can be used directly in cooking.
“Oh, rock salt. How interesting.”
Most of the salt I’d seen in reality was solar salt or refined salt.
That is, salt made using seawater.
So this was my first time seeing a transparent lump of salt that looked as hard as rock.
– But the principle is the same. It’s all just salt that was once part of an ancient sea, then the land rose and the salt solidified into rock.
“Oh, you’re smart.”
– Of course. I am the [Cooking Mastery Manual]! Heheh!
Curious, I touched my tongue to the rock salt.
And as expected,
“Ah, salty!”
– You can scrape it into powder to use!
It tasted salty, no different from regular salt.
‘The salt I got from the training ground was almost gone, so this is fortunate.’
The seasonings I brought from the training ground weren’t a large amount.
It was fortunate I’d managed to use them this long.
This abundance of rock salt was like a gift for me.
I could probably collect enough salt to last for months, no, years, in my Food Storage.
‘Come to think of it, my satiety is pretty low too, isn’t it?’
It hadn’t been long since I ate the braised chicken, but I had started pickaxe work right after.
Having used the vibration detection spell constantly, my satiety had already dropped quite a bit.
With that thought, I immediately summoned Chorong.
“Alright, before we go deeper, shall we fill our stomachs first?”
– Kkyuu?
The first dish using rock salt.
My mouth was already watering.
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