The S-Classes That I Raised [EN]: Chapter 293

291. Leaving After a Good Haul (4)

At Shishio’s command, the Amaterasu Guild members moved quickly. The one who was most pleased with my plan was none other than Kiyoshi, the chief advisor of the Amaterasu Guild. I had met him once before. He was beside Shishio, trying his best to dissuade his guild leader.

He must have suffered a lot this time too.

“Thank you so much, Chief Han!”

Kiyoshi was delighted that things seemed to be working out well, thanks to me. My conscience pricked slightly.

“No, well, it benefits me too.”

“I tried to stop him, saying that the Amaterasu Guild might end up taking all the blame, but it was no use.”

Oh dear. Once he’s fixated on something, he doesn’t listen to anything else.

“You’re having a hard time. But how did you end up…?”

Taking care of a big, overgrown child. Kiyoshi lowered his voice in response to my question.

“It’s still the best option.”

“Ah, yes.”

He probably meant that having the Amaterasu Guild in first place was the best-case scenario. What were the other two S-Rank Hunters like? I felt a bit sorry for him.

‘Is it better to have this person around?’

I examined the middle-aged man, who seemed to have a decent impression. At first, I only planned to take the dungeon and leave, so I didn’t investigate the people around Shishio. But for now, it would be better to have someone competent by my side. If he tries to wiggle out of the contract later, it won’t be too late to deal with him then. More than anything.

[Shishio (S)]

Shishio was also on the list of those susceptible to mind control. But I didn’t think his real name was Shishio, yet that’s what it says. Does it register the name I call and recognize him by?

I also wondered how I was perceived. I think I’ve rambled about love four times, so it probably applied to the last words. Suddenly trying to take care of him, and even mentioning that he eats little. It’s the opposite of a caretaker’s attitude, but Yoo-hyun and Yerim also try to take care of me, too. Is he perhaps a vulnerable person? He might seem weak compared to Shishio, but Yoo-hyun and Yerim also try to take care of me.

“I’ll tell the Amaterasu Guild Leader to listen to Kiyoshi’s words.”

“Yes? Ah, thank you, but he probably won’t listen.”

“With this incident, he won’t ignore you like before. I’ll give you my contact information, so if any problems arise, please tell me. I get along surprisingly well with the Amaterasu Guild Leader, so we’ve decided to keep in touch often.”

He’ll listen for at least a month. Judging by his attitude, he seemed to have a good relationship with his caretaker. Kiyoshi took the contact information, looking doubtful at my words. Please work hard and revive the guild in the future.

Things went smoothly. The two S-Rank Hunters who had allied to suppress the Amaterasu Guild were quickly captured. Without needing many to step in, Shishio blocked them with his body, and Yerim froze them.

Then, with the two S-Rank Hunters tied up and kneeling, and the list of cooperating guilds fluttering, we went on air.

The broadcast content was as I had said in advance. They praised the Haeyeon Guild Leader of Korea for defeating the five SS-Rank monsters that had plunged the Japanese archipelago into a crisis of destruction, and showed related footage.

“Amazing! There’s not a trace of the city left!”

“Everything has melted! It’s an incredible sight~”

The footage was just the aftermath of the battle, but it was still impressive. Comparing the old city photos with the current desolate landscape made everyone exclaim in admiration.

Then, when the story came out that the two S-Rank Hunters had attacked the Haeyeon Guild Leader who had saved Japan, curses erupted from everywhere. The guests, who had been prepared in advance, were realistically excited and angry.

But is it okay to do a broadcast like this? It feels a bit like a variety show.

Yoo-hyun showed no sign of giving testimony, and he seemed annoyed and bothered by all of it, so I, who had been with him, stepped in instead.

“I have reaffirmed that the Amaterasu Guild Leader is a trustworthy person. As the leader of Japan’s top guild, his attitude was impeccable.”

It hurt to blatantly lie on the broadcast. But with one flick of the tongue, I’d get one, two, three, four… S-Rank equipment. And a ton of reward money. I have to deck out our Yerim with S-Rank gear this time.

I shook hands with Shishio, smiled brightly, promising to continue our trust and friendship, and ended the broadcast. And finally.

“Can I really pick and take whatever I want?”

Yerim said with a voice full of anticipation. Her face was so bright and radiant that it seemed to emit light.

“Of course! What non-S-Rank equipment do you have? Take it all.”

“Uncle’s the best! The Guild Leader’s the best too, at least for now! Of course, I could have caught an SS-Rank monster alone with the buff!”

Various equipment was displayed before us. All of it was A-Rank or higher. They had brought almost all the items from the Amaterasu Guild, as well as the mid-to-large-sized guilds on the list.

However, the main equipment used by each guild was excluded. If they took away all the tools, the future income would disappear. If they wanted to make them gather materials, they had to give them at least a pickaxe.

“There aren’t as many S-Ranks as I thought. Only these three weapons. But you already have a weapon, Yerim, so focus on other equipment.”

“Yes!”

Those three weren’t leftovers either; they originally had owners. There’s almost no reason to leave S-Rank equipment idle.

“There’s only one longsword here, how about it?”

I held up a sword in the form of a typical longsword. The blade was quite long, over 1 meter. The blade had a slightly blackish tint on a silver-white background, and the guard, grip, and pommel were all black. It had a simple shape with almost no decorations.

“The Sword of Silence River. Let’s see, increased penetration and partial paralysis effect. The paralysis is B-Rank, so it won’t work well on the monsters you mainly deal with. But the options are decent.”

It’s not a very good weapon for an S-Rank. When I go back to Korea, I’ll have to go straight to the newbie and tell him to hand over a sword. Yoo-hyun took the sword from me and swung it lightly.

“It’s not bad for immediate use. It’ll be more useful than an A-Rank.”

He checked the weight and balance of the sword, spun it around, and put it in his inventory.

“Otherwise, what I have is better.”

“I guess so? Since we’re excluding the main equipment in use, the quality is just so-so. See if there’s anything you can give to the guild members. We can take it back later when something good comes out.”

“Uncle, can I choose items with magic power options that match my skills, like I said yesterday?”

Yerim asked, holding up a bracelet.

“Yeah. For now. But once you have all the equipment that’s optimal for you, you’ll need to get spare equipment for different situations. Each dungeon has different characteristics, and you can’t always choose where to go. Various resistance items are the basics.”

Yoo-hyun might have to fight underwater, and Yerim might fall into a desert. So, they needed to have some equipment to prepare for battles that didn’t suit them. Yerim could still go to places that matched her attributes, but someday she would have to攻略[conquer] new dungeons without information.

“I want to have higher-grade detoxification equipment. But there isn’t any here.”

“Wait a minute… um, there’s only B-Rank on the list. They said A-Rank is needed when攻略[conquering] Japanese attribute dungeons.”

“High-grade resistance equipment seems rare.”

“It’s generally like that.”

A-Rank was rare, and S-Rank was really hard to find. As far as I remembered, there wasn’t an S-Rank poison resistance item yet.

“Myung-woo, is it hard to make S-Rank detoxification items?”

I have it, but I can’t follow them into the dungeon, so it would be nice if I could give each of them one. Myung-woo, who was looking at the displayed items, turned his head towards me.

“The materials are the problem.”

“Materials?”

“Yeah. I told you yesterday that each magic stone has its own characteristics. If you maximize those characteristics, they become skills attached to the item. But it’s rare for a magic stone to contain only one characteristic.”

Myung-woo took out a magic stone and explained.

“This magic stone contains defense enhancement, fire resistance, physical regeneration, poison resistance, and momentary acceleration characteristics. It’s S-Rank. It would be great if we could make equipment with all those characteristics as S-Rank skills, but unfortunately, that’s impossible. It’s even difficult to extract just one of them and make it S-Rank. It’s like having five characteristics all contained in one S-Rank magic stone vessel.”

“If it’s all of them, then, uh, there’s not enough of the characteristics contained to make it S-Rank? To make an S-Rank skill, you need 100 of the characteristics of the entire vessel, but each of the five characteristics occupies 20, or something like that.”

“That’s right. To be exact, the amounts are different. This magic stone has about 60 defense enhancement and about 35 physical regeneration? If you make equipment with it, you’ll get A-Rank defense enhancement and C-Rank physical regeneration skills. That’s if you perfectly match the sub-materials and it’s made successfully. Usually, it’ll be about B-Rank defense enhancement.”

So, to make an S-Rank poison resistance item, you need to find an SS-Rank magic stone with a high poison resistance characteristic. No wonder it’s rare.

“Myung-woo, you seem like an expert.”

“I am an expert. And a unique one.”

“It hasn’t been a few months, but you seem like a scholar who has been studying the field of dungeon items for ten years.”

“That’s a bit embarrassing. Anyway, that’s why I’m experimenting with combining magic stones and other materials. If I can supplement it well, it seems possible to make S-Rank equipment with S-Rank materials.”

“Wow, then you’ll be able to mass-produce S-Rank equipment. S-Rank magic stones come out often.”

“It’s still far off, still. I have to try with SS-Rank magic stones too.”

Then SS-Rank equipment might come out. I’m looking forward to it. Myung-woo picked up a few pieces of equipment and disappeared. He was probably going to take them to the smithy.

Yerim repeatedly brought things to show me, and Yoo-hyun carefully examined the items. There was quite a bit of equipment for summoned beasts, so he called Peace to try them on. Yerim was also eager to get gear for Blue. But Noah didn’t seem very motivated.

“Mr. Noah, aren’t you choosing anything?”

“Myung-woo said he’d modify some suitable equipment for me. So I can use it even in my transformed state. I have equipment for my human form.”

“That’s good. Equipment that can be used in the transformed state must be rare.”

“Yes. I’m grateful.”

Noah blinked his gray eyes and looked down at the equipment nearby.

“Myung-woo is really amazing. He’s irreplaceable, the only one in the world.”

“That’s right. No one can replace him. Even if more people who can make items appear, it’ll be hard for them to surpass Myung-woo, let alone be similar to him.”

He had his original talent, skills, and a strong supporter. At my words, Noah nodded slightly. He looked somehow forlorn. I wish he would cheer up. Should I recommend counseling? When you think about it, he’s been suffering from domestic violence for a long time… I heard there’s a professional counselor for Hunters.

‘But where did Sung Hyun-jae go?’

Moon Hyun-ah was also nowhere to be seen. Did they have something to do together? The cell phone I had stored in the dungeon building was broken, so I couldn’t contact them. I was worried for no reason. Should I ask the Amaterasu Guild to find them? The door burst open.

“Am I late?”

It was Moon Hyun-ah. Just in case, I peeked behind her, but no one followed her in.

“There’s not much for me to take, so I’ll just give gifts to the kids.”

As the guild leader of a large guild, Hyun-ah, like Yoo-hyun, didn’t have any equipment to replace.

“Have you seen the Seseong Guild Leader?”

At my question, Moon Hyun-ah nodded and approached me.

“I saw him. That human left.”

“…Yes?”

“He left earlier. He’s probably entering the East Sea by now.”

What was she suddenly saying? I was flustered and dumbfounded. He left? Alone? Well, something might have suddenly come up. There’s no particular reason for him to tell me. It would be stranger if the Seseong Guild Leader reported everything to outsiders.

But still, he just left. Without a word.

“He told me to give this to Chief Han.”

Moon Hyun-ah took something out of her inventory. It was a round frame with threads intertwined and a feather ornament.

“…What is this?”

“A dreamcatcher!”

Yerim shouted, teleporting over here.

“Pretty!”

“Dreamcatcher? What’s that?”

“If you hang it up, it blocks nightmares and lets you have good dreams.”

“…Oh, really.”

I frowned unconsciously. Yerim looked puzzled, wondering what was wrong, and Yoo-hyun and Noah also approached.

“It’s nothing, just.”

What should I say about this? It was a complicated feeling that was hard to explain. I suppressed the surge of emotion and put the dreamcatcher in my inventory.

“Didn’t he say anything else? How did he seem?”

“He always seemed bad. But that was the first time I saw him show it like that.”

“Was that a bad mood? I just thought he was trying to be serious.”

Yerim tilted her head.

“I was ambiguous at first too. He doesn’t hold back halfway if he’s in a bad mood, he releases it right away.”

“That’s right. He immediately suppresses the person who upset him, or at least throws a warning.”

Noah agreed with Moon Hyun-ah’s words. Hearing those words made me feel even stranger. Could it be that he left because it was hard to put up with me? That’s okay. It’s okay, but why take care of me until the end? He should have just gotten angry.

“Don’t worry about it, hyung [older brother/term of endearment]. If it seems like it’s because of hyung, be careful. It’s better not to meet for a while.”

“…There’s no need to be careful.”

He even stepped aside himself, lest I cause an accident.

“Don’t worry about the person who left first, let’s finish packing and go home. I’m dying for Korean air.”

Let’s go home. Let’s go back first. And then, let’s have a proper talk.

Unlike when we arrived, the airport was deserted when we returned. It was only natural since the damage caused by the monsters hadn’t been cleaned up yet. The Amaterasu Guild was also busy with the cleanup, so only a few people, including Shishio, came to see us off.

“I don’t know when we’ll see each other again, but take care. Contact me if anything good happens.”

Like getting an SS-Rank item. At my words, Shishio nodded and scratched his thick hair.

“A lot happened in a short time.”

He looked at Peace, who was in my arms, and then raised his gaze again. He had a lingering look in his eyes for Peace. Peace grumbled softly, as if he felt bad.

“I was wondering whether to say this or not.”

“If you’re wondering, it’s better not to say it.”

“When I see Chief Han, I think of someone.”

Oh, wait a minute. Could it be his caretaker? I was curious, but I didn’t want to hear it. Your expression is a bit, a bit too wistful.

“My mother was small and weak─”

“Goodbye! Thank you for your hard work! Let’s not meet again!”

I couldn’t believe that had just happened. I pretended not to hear and immediately turned around and boarded the plane. Why did it have to be that! I’m never coming to Japan again!