Ch.192192. Mythical Box, Staff, and Cloak

The staff was incredibly ornate.

Though it seemed almost too plain to be called ornate, when I took it out and held it, the natural wood material of the winding staff—which appeared to be about 160cm long—gave off an antique aura that felt like something a grand archmage from an old fantasy novel would use.

Moreover, the fist-sized red gemstone attached to the end of the staff had a mesmerizing brilliance that made me feel like I could become incredibly wealthy just by selling this gem alone.

[Antique Ruby Staff]

– Grade: SS+

– A staff made from a 1,000-year-old ancient tree with a pure ruby embedded in it. Has the effect of amplifying magical power.

– Magic Power +1 grade

– Magic Attack Power +100

– Magic Skill Mana Consumption -35%

– Magic Skill Effect +55%

– Triple Casting available for magic spells

This was truly mythical.

I quietly looked around the cabin while holding the staff.

I could see Kim Sujeong busily cooking, probably having unlocked some new recipe today.

Kim Sujeong is a mage.

Although she’s just a C-rank mediocre mage, we’ve agreed that she’ll soon receive an SS-rank ability selection ticket and be appointed as the official caretaker of the farm.

She’s already acting like she’s an SS-rank mage and enjoying herself, but what if she sees this Antique Ruby Staff?

I remembered how she drooled over and lunged at the glass stone.

She’s a demon who promised to be my dog for life just for a mere glass stone, growling one moment and whimpering with aegyo the next.

I can’t even imagine how much she’ll pester me.

Even now, while cooking is certainly her hobby, the academic consensus is that she’s doing it to curry favor with me because she remembers I told her she could only learn abilities after I complete the main quest and receive the SS-rank ability selection ticket.

Having lived with her my entire life, I could tell.

“…What should I do?”

I can’t let her see this staff.

I quickly tucked the staff into my belt and entered the cabin as if nothing was wrong.

“How’s it going?”

I asked a question I normally wouldn’t ask as I tried to casually head toward my room.

“Brother. What’s up?”

“What do you mean?”

“Why are you asking such awkward questions?”

“…Nothing. Just curious.”

“It’s just cooking. Did you know snake meat tastes a bit like chicken? This guava snake is really delicious. You can look forward to it.”

Kim Sujeong slightly frowned as if disgusted herself, but remembering she had something at stake, she greeted me with a business smile.

I need to get to my room quickly.

But it wasn’t over yet.

“Is it good?”

“Huh?”

“The staff. Are the options good?”

“….You saw it?”

“A little? You were standing there in a daze holding a staff, so I figured it must be something good.”

“Well. Kind of.”

“Is it bad?”

“It’s just okay.”

“That’s a relief.”

“What is?”

“If it’s too good, you’d have to sell it. But if it’s just mediocre, I could use it.”

“….”

“Don’t worry, brother. I have money to buy it now.”

As she put her hands on her waist confidently, I thought that Kim Sujeong had really matured through her social experiences.

I guess this counts as social experience too.

It was only a month or two ago when she was begging for the glass stone for free.

“Let me think about it.”

Though I say this, giving the staff to Kim Sujeong is actually the most efficient choice right now.

Of course, giving it to a mere C-rank mage would be like putting pearls before swine, but if I consider Kim Sujeong as the farm’s caretaker when I’m away, I already know from my experience with the Light Demon Sword that having a weapon that matches an SS-rank ability can boost that ability’s value by 1.5 or even 2 times.

Especially this Antique Ruby Staff—its basic options are impressive enough, but the mythical special option attached to it has an unbelievable value.

Just the Magic Power +1 grade alone is considered a legendary option because it has no restrictions, and on top of that, the Triple Casting option?

One of the dream options for mages is Double Casting.

This is a legendary option that’s hard to find on items by itself.

Rumor has it that it only appears on S-rank or higher magic weapons, so Triple Casting is even more extraordinary.

Double Casting and Triple Casting.

Literally the ability to cast 2 or 3 magic skills at once.

Unlike other abilities, magic requires casting time, making it impossible to use multiple spells simultaneously.

Well, it’s not like casting takes several minutes, but having options like Double Casting greatly expands your combat versatility.

When others use one skill, you use two at once, so your DPS simply doubles.

You’d consume twice the mana, but high-level mages focus more on dealing damage in a short time rather than conserving their mana.

So Triple Casting, just in the concept of firing three copies of a single spell, is an incredible option.

If you convert it to a melee weapon, imagine using [Leap Slash] three times simultaneously—that’s how amazing this ability is.

The value of this staff?

Not just SS-rank but SS+—perhaps even Kellin’s entire fortune wouldn’t be enough.

Money only has value when you don’t have it; beyond a certain level, it’s just paper.

But just giving it to Kim Sujeong… something in my chest rebels against the idea.

Thinking about Kim Sujeong jumping for joy after getting this staff for free—is my brotherly DNA reacting?

So I decided to hide it for now.

I already have the Thousand-Year Snake’s Return Pill for the auction, so I’ll think more about when to give it to her and what to ask in return.

And that wasn’t all.

The cloak right next to the staff was perfectly suited for me.

[Cloak of Flight]

– Grade: SS

– A cloak made from sky dragon scales. It feels like you could freely fly with it.

– Defense +86

– All Elemental Damage -25%

– Consumes 100 mana per minute to infuse the scales and fly through the sky. Reduces the wearer’s gravity, weight, and all resistance to achieve the flight speed of a sky dragon.

“So I can even fly now.”

I had been thinking that someday while exploring biomes, I would need a flying mount to travel between them.

But I never expected it would come in the form of an item that lets me fly directly rather than a living mount.

Of course, it consumed 100 mana per minute, making it a mana tank in itself, but for me right now, that was no concern at all.

Isn’t this cloak made just for me?

Moreover, since it’s made from dragon scales, it has a high grade and excellent defense, so I could wear it all the time, not just when flying.

It was so light that I barely felt like I was wearing it, and when not using mana, it was almost transparent, as if it was both there and not there.

I put this on right away.

There were also more than 10 other items in the box, ranging from A to S grade with quite good options, but they were somewhat lacking compared to the staff and cloak, so I put them in the equipment box in the storage for now.

Later, I could enhance the good ones and sell them at auction, or create some kind of “Premium Farming Weapon Shop” and sell them with hefty markups.

“Phew…”

It’s finally over.

Using all the accumulated ability selection tickets is something I can do at my leisure anyway.

For now, I’ve finished eating the heaping meal.

Even organizing rewards is this tiring.

Actually, in farming worlds, I usually just dumped everything in storage and only checked one or two items that looked good.

It wasn’t easy to farm items worth getting excited about, and the rest were just ordinary resources.

But in the Rift Dimension, everything can be converted to real-world value, so I couldn’t carelessly glance over things, which is why it took so much time.

Plus, the rewards themselves were of such high grades.

“Brother! Dinner’s ready!”

I had another heaping meal with the feast Kim Sujeong prepared.

As dusk fell, I suddenly heard a voice from outside.

“Friend! Are you home?”

“Huh?”

Hearing Kukum’s voice, I went outside and found him looking for me, having come from the village through the base teleportation portal.

“What’s up?”

“I did it. I found a way to enhance equipment with purification stones.”

“Oh, really?”

I had left that task with him before going to the Steam Forest, so it must have taken him a few days.

Seeing Kukum, who came to tell me right away without even noticing it had gotten dark, I couldn’t contain my curiosity.

“Let’s go. We can do it right now, right?”

“Yes. Enhancement is possible right away as long as you have purification stones.”

“I have 14. Let’s go!!”

I immediately headed to the blacksmith shop with Kukum.

A new “Purification Enhancement” feature had been added next to the regular enhancement content.

“What should I try first?”

Since I knew nothing about purification enhancement, I first placed a random item.