Ch.10The Library’s Hidden Piece (1)

# Guild-Certified Library

A library certified by the guild.

Books on monsters, herbs, alchemy, swordsmanship, spearmanship, archery, and more.

A place where books containing information necessary for adventurer work are stored, with many useful resources for novice adventurers.

‘Of course, that’s only for the ground floor, which is open to both adventurers and the general public.’

The situation is different for the underground section, which is only accessible to adventurers ranked Silver and above.

If the materials upstairs could be considered beginner guides, the ones downstairs could be called autobiographies.

Most adventurers are prideful and vain creatures.

They all want to share the great things they’ve accomplished.

That’s why many adventurers take on disciples, though there are also those who don’t.

They want their knowledge to receive special treatment.

What emerged from this are autobiographies, and within them are techniques they personally created and concealed.

‘Though most are worthless or have long since been plundered.’

If the Apostles are reincarnators like me, the prevailing theory would be that most mediocre techniques have already been discovered.

Nevertheless, I was confident that what I was looking for now hadn’t been plundered.

Because the people who hid this were complete lunatics.

“Ah, found it.”

I picked up five books with different contents and headed to a secluded corner.

The underground floor was already deserted, but better safe than sorry.

After finding a spot in the corner, I examined the books I’d brought.

They looked old at a glance. No one seemed to have searched for them either, as they were covered in dust.

“Ugh, dust…”

After dusting them off, I could finally see the titles.

[How to Make a Good Mushroom Stew], [100 Types of Grasshoppers and Their Habitats], and so on.

Titles that seemed out of place for adventurers, which explained why they were gathering dust.

What about the contents, then?

The contents were no different from the titles.

Just full of trivial information, with no hints of hidden techniques like other books might have.

Then, was there something special about the books themselves?

No.

They were books made through ordinary processes.

Moreover, they were books that could be found anywhere in a guild-certified library.

‘When I first found these, I was so dumbfounded.’

These books are essentially answer keys.

Answer keys that combine information obtained through tremendous hardship.

I tore out pages 5, 87, 21, 45, and 11 from each book respectively.

Then I cut them to the right size and overlapped them all. Afterward, when I shone light through the overlapped pages, a magic circle revealed itself.

“Seeing it in person makes me even more annoyed…”

After confirming again that no one was around, I sprinkled the catalyst I had brought onto the magic circle.

Woong-

Then, as I infused mana, the magic circle began to operate with a faint hum.

After absorbing enough mana, the magic circle emitted light and summoned a being.

“Hmm… Huh?!?!?”

What was summoned was a tiny fairy, about the size of an adult man’s palm.

Golden hair that reached her waist.

Green eyes that seemed to capture the colors of nature.

Wings that shimmered with rainbow colors.

If she had been normal-sized, she would have been a beauty that men would line up for.

“A succubus? More importantly, you summoned me..?!”

Whatever I was thinking, she seemed shocked by the fact that she had been summoned.

“You.. you! You! That magic circle! How did you find it..?!”

“Ah~ This? Well, let’s just say I’m good.”

Upon discovering the paper in my hand, she immediately rushed forward to snatch the magic circle.

“Give that to me right now!”

“Stop, Lilly.”

Of course, with just one word from me, she froze as if under a spell.

“It’s a contract you personally established, right?”

“What…? You really found it all? By doing those crazy things…?”

Lilly wore an expression as if she’d been hit on the back of the head with a hammer.

That’s understandable, considering the difficulty of finding the answers for this answer key was beyond imagination.

The creators of this were five S-rank adventurers who were active 300 years ago.

In their later years, they came together under a plan to create this technique, as if they’d gone senile.

What they created were all sorts of trials.

Clearing high-difficulty artificial dungeons.

Hunting legendary monsters.

Discovering legendary herbs.

Grave robbing.

And so on.

Under the name of test supervisors, they brought in all sorts of nobles and other races.

‘Depending on the situation, sometimes the clues had already disappeared, so it took several attempts…’

When I went through all that trouble to get an item, only to find the quest NPC dead, I thought my blood pressure would kill me.

There was a reason why that fairy had allowed the creation of this magic circle, which was no different from a slave contract.

She probably thought no one would ever obtain it, no matter who tried.

“No, that can’t be… You’re an Apostle.”

While I was reminiscing about my hardships, Lilly, who had finished her thoughts, was glaring at me.

It wasn’t just a statement made to deny reality, but one filled with a strange certainty.

Since it was obvious that her racial skill of lie detection would reveal the truth anyway, I simply acknowledged it.

“That’s right. But how did you know?”

Instead, I asked about the reason she could be so certain.

Since it seemed unlikely she knew through lie detection, as I hadn’t said anything that could be a clue.

“I’m not going to tell you…”

“That’s an order.”

Lilly tried to keep her mouth shut, as if she wouldn’t speak, but unfortunately, as long as I had the contract, it was futile.

“Argh! Really…!! Fairies can see souls with their eyes. The souls of Apostles are different, and they have traces of contracts with the Evil God.”

The fairies’ ability to see souls.

Generally, it’s a racial trait useful for seeing through transformation abilities like Polymorph.

Apparently, there are traces of contracts with the so-called Evil God in the soul.

The problem is, I have no memory of making such a contract.

I was simply playing a game when I was suddenly brought here.

Would she know something about it?

I opened my mouth to gain information.

“Do you know anything about this contract?”

“Why are you asking me? You’re the one who stamped the contract and came here. Even stealing someone else’s body.”

Of course, she only showed hostility, perhaps mistaking my questioning as an attempt to mock her.

“Ha, don’t tell me. Did that Evil God give you a quest? Like ‘Mock the fairy in front of you~’ or something?”

“Quest?”

Why was the word quest suddenly coming up?

I looked at her with confusion.

“What? Surprised that I know so well? It’s the main ability of you Apostles, along with status windows or whatever.”

She snapped at me as if there was nothing more to say, but for me, even that was useful information.

‘So those Apostles have such abilities?’

After leaving the Sword Examination Guild yesterday, I looked into more details about what Apostles are.

Due to the limited time, I couldn’t gather much information, but I could confirm one thing for certain.

[All Apostles are hostile to this world.]

The major incidents caused by Apostles all contained the intention to disrupt the world.

I don’t know if there are those who refuse, but the tendencies of those who have surfaced were all like that.

What I heard from Lilly and what I investigated myself.

None of it was sufficient, but I could draw one conclusion.

That I am clearly different from ordinary Apostles.

‘I need more information.’

I looked at Lilly, who was venting her anger in front of me.

Right now, thanks to this hidden piece, I have the upper hand, but normally, I wouldn’t even be able to face someone like her.

‘She probably knows a lot of information, and there’s less risk if she searches for information instead of me.’

Even if not for the ‘main reward’ of this hidden piece, she was a very useful and necessary existence for me.

So in the end, I needed to persuade her to become my ally.

I could force her to follow orders, but that wasn’t a fundamental solution.

‘For now, the contract is in effect so it’s fine, but who knows when some loophole might appear.’

The fortunate thing was that thanks to her lie detection, I didn’t need to prove anything further.

I opened my mouth toward her, who continued to vent.

“I don’t have such abilities. I’ve never even communicated with the Evil God, let alone received quests.”

“What? That doesn’t make… Wait, you can’t be.”

At my words, Lilly seemed to sense something strange and stared at me intently.

More precisely, she stared at my soul.

“There’s almost no trace of the Evil God. At this level, it’s hard to even say you’ve made a contract… And your soul is somehow…”

Having realized that I was somehow different from other Apostles, she seemed to have developed a will to explore me.

“Let’s have a chat.”

* * *

“I’ll be watching you.”

This was her conclusion after hearing my story.

For now, she might believe my words, which contained no lies, but her decision was not to trust me completely.

It also contained a warning not to do anything foolish, but…

“As if you could do anything to me anyway.”

“Shut up!”

It wasn’t a very frightening warning to me, who held the contract.

Lilly, unable to contain her anger, began to nibble on my finger, but I didn’t feel much pain.

Only saliva on my finger.

As I wiped the saliva off my finger, I demanded the main reward of this hidden technique from her.

“Anyway, give me the cultivation technique you’ve been keeping.”

One might mistake the fairy Lilly herself as the reward, but originally she had nothing to do with the reward.

If anything, she could be described as someone who kept the reward, like a fairy of a holy sword.

However, she had put herself up as a reward due to the ridiculously high difficulty.

“Ah, that… I never thought someone would actually come to claim it…”

She muttered as if slightly dumbfounded, disappeared briefly, and then returned with a book larger than her own body.

“Here you go.”

A book that looked old yet well-maintained.

On its cover was written:

[Super Awesome Cultivation Technique]

What a dispiriting title.