episode_0040

The Holy Grail of Sacrifice.

Other miracles are decently useful,

but the most efficient ones are those related to items.

Miracles like item repair, reconstruction, disassembly, synthesis, and summoning are the most efficient.

And among these, the most important is item summoning.

‘Summoning.’

‘It’s really good.’

In Prophecy RPG, it’s an ability that lets the protagonist summon any item they’ve seen at least once.

‘This is really great.’

A holy sword is something that exists only once in this world,

but with the Holy Grail of Sacrifice, you can summon another one and become a dual-wielding swordsman.

It’s practically an item duplication ability.

However.

You can’t just summon anything recklessly.

‘Because summoning is also a miracle that consumes energy.’

The more powerful the magic imbued in an item,

the more complex its structure,

the more expensive it is,

the more energy the Holy Grail of Sacrifice demands.

On the other hand,

if an item has no magic, a simple structure, and is cheap, you can summon it as much as you want.

‘For example, something like this.’

Whoosh!

The Holy Grail of Sacrifice summoned an item.

“Kkamang?…”

(Kkamang = Korean onomatopoeia for “blackie,” a common nickname for black cats.)

A phone charm with a black kitten decoration.

It has zero magic,

its structure is extremely simple,

and it’s a cheap trinket worth only around 1,000 to 2,000 won.

In other words,

it’s something that can be summoned endlessly.

…That said,

whether modern items could be summoned was uncharted territory.

Based on the setting that the user could summon items they remembered, a hypothesis could be formed,

but it wasn’t a 100% certainty.

Still.

Since the summoning succeeded, it’s all good.

“Elrise.”

“Here’s Kkamang for you.”

“Kkamang!”

“I’ll attach it to your sword.”

If I just tied it on, it might fall off mid-use,

so I replaced it with a sturdy string and fastened it to the end of Elrise’s sword hilt.

“Cu…cute!…”

Elrise kept staring at the kitten charm on her sword with an expression of delight.

‘Of course she’d love it.’

In this world, there’s no such thing as cute character merchandise.

There are teddy bears and such,

but dolls cute enough to satisfy Elrise are exclusive to nobles, making them hard to even see.

So this is her first time.

It’s her first time seeing something so perfectly aligned with her tastes.

‘Or is it?’

‘If we count the ice animal figurines I made, is this the second time?’

Anyway.

This is her first time seeing a cute item that doesn’t melt.

“Wooow…”

“A kitty that doesn’t run away when I pet it…”

That’s why she loves it.

Other cute animals would either run away or attack if she tried to touch them,

but the kitten charm stays still.

“Hehe…”

“Huehehehe…”

“Do you like it?”

“Yeah!”

“I really, really love it!”

Elrise beamed and hugged me.

“M-Master?…”

“Here.”

Before Lia could say anything, I handed her one too.

If Elrise got a black kitten charm,

Lia got a white puppy charm.

She often runs up to me wagging her tail like a puppy,

so it’s the perfect fit.

“Wooow…”

“Such a cute puppy…”

“Do you like it?”

“Yeah!”

“Master’s the best!”

Lia also attached the white puppy charm to the end of her sword hilt.

“Hehe…”

“So cute…”

Lia smiled brightly too.

‘This is the true power of the Holy Grail of Sacrifice.’

An insane magical artifact that can summon modern items if the conditions are met.

It can only summon things I know of,

but in other words, it means I can summon any modern item I’m familiar with.

So I tried summoning right away.

“Summon laptop!”

I imagined the laptop from my home and activated the Holy Grail.

It’s a fairly complex item,

and quite expensive,

but since it has no magic,

there’s a chance it could be summoned with the energy I have now.

‘If I can summon a laptop, there’s so much I can do!’

Online games are out of the question,

but offline games are totally doable.

I could also summon CDs to watch anime or movies.

And.

I could watch adult videos too.

Which means I can charge the Holy Grail more efficiently.

…Or so I thought, but when I used the Holy Grail—

“……”

Nothing was summoned.

“……Not enough energy?”

Seems I don’t have enough energy to summon a laptop.

Tch.

That’s disappointing.

But.

It’s not like there’s no other way.

‘If I don’t have the resources for a guaranteed summon!’

‘I’ll try a random summon!’

Random summons let you aim for a jackpot with minimal energy.

But.

If I just summon randomly, I’ll end up with a pile of junk.

Twigs, empty cans, food scraps, old socks, fish bones—all count as items.

So I set a condition.

‘Randomly summon a modern item that I wouldn’t consider trash.’

This should work.

Excluding F-tier items that are literal garbage,

randomly summon from E-tier to S-tier.

‘Ideally, I’d love to roll for S-tier only…’

An S-tier random roll costs 1,000,000 won.

An E-tier to S-tier random roll costs 1,000 won.

That’s the difference.

With the little energy stored in the Holy Grail right now, the cheapest roll is the way to go.

Hitting S-tier would be a jackpot,

and even E-tier would be decent.

‘The kitten and puppy charms are cheap products by Korean standards.’

‘They’d be E-tier items.’

But.

In this world, they’re premium.

Mass-produced factory goods,

but here, they’re on par with handcrafted sculptures.

‘Other items are the same.’

‘As long as it’s not something I’d consider trash, it’ll probably be useful.’

…With that in mind, I checked the Holy Grail of Sacrifice.

[30]

The number 30 appeared on the Holy Grail.

30 random summons available.

Nice.

This should be enough.

“Summon!”

Poof!

The first summon yielded an iron ore.

“……”

Iron ore exists in the modern world too,

so it’s not strange for it to appear.

“This isn’t what I was hoping for when I rolled…”

But.

There are still plenty of chances left.

“Summon!”

Poof!

The second summon was a 500-won coin.

It’s a rare coin that could fetch a decent price from collectors,

so it’s not trash.

But.

This isn’t what I wanted.

“Please, give me something that’ll actually help my life!”

Poof!

The third summon was a bar of soap.

A high-quality one at that.

But.

This world already has soap, so it’s not exactly priceless.

“Next!”

‘This is messed up.’

The 29th summon yielded a kitchen knife.

A decent one,

but since fantasy worlds have those too, it’s underwhelming.

The other summons were similar.

Not trash.

Some were quite valuable if sold,

and others were somewhat useful.

But.

Not a single item that, while cheap in the modern world, would be insanely rare here.

‘No!’

‘There are so many things like that!’

If just sugar, pepper, curry powder, ketchup, or mayonnaise appeared, it’d be a decent win.

They’re expensive if sold,

and great for my cooking.

Especially.

If gochujang, doenjang, or soy sauce appeared—jackpot.

Just one would be enough!

I could eat Korean food infinitely in this world!

‘One is enough!’

‘Analyze it with the Holy Grail of Sacrifice! Figure out its chemical formula! Then I can make infinite amounts!’

Gochujang?

Just toss in some weeds, and I can make it.

Chili peppers and weeds are both plants.

If I use plants as ingredients,

reconstructing them into other plants is simple.

Highly magical herbs are tough,

but vegetables and fruits with no magic are easy.

Or something like cola would be great too.

Instant noodles, chocolate, snacks, frozen foods—things this world has never tasted would be amazing.

Stuff you can buy at any convenience store or supermarket,

but unobtainable here.

There are so many things like that!

‘But!’

‘Why!’

‘Did nothing like that appear!!!’

Out of 30 summons, at least one should’ve been like that!

…Fuming, I channeled my anger into the Holy Grail of Sacrifice.

Poof!

A can of cola appeared.

“……”

Uh…

I did ask for it, but…

What I really wanted was a laptop or tablet.

“……”

Now that I think about it, cola is something I could’ve just summoned normally.

No magic, simple structure, cheap price.

I could summon it anytime.

“……”

I suddenly started regretting everything.

“Sigh…”

“Maybe it’d have been better to just steadily gather energy and summon properly…”

No matter how I look at it, gambling is the fastest way to ruin your life.

…Having learned this lesson,

I used the Holy Grail to analyze the cola’s composition.

Ding!

The Holy Grail registered the cola’s chemical formula in its database.

‘Now I can drink infinite cola.’

Database registration.

The Holy Grail of Sacrifice is an insane magical artifact that can create and summon any item,

but registered items can be made cheaper.

The required materials also simplify.

To make a cake through item creation, you’d need proper ingredients like flour, sugar, and cream,

but once registered, even food waste is enough.

‘It breaks things down to atoms and recombines them.’

‘As long as the necessary atoms are present, that’s all it takes.’

Sugar?

Just carbon (C), oxygen (O), and hydrogen (H) are enough.

Sugar’s formula is C₁₂H₂₂O₁₁.

Diamonds?

Just carbon (C) is enough.

Diamond’s formula is C.

So.

Just supply the atoms.

‘Meaning, with just goblin corpses, weeds, or scrap metal, I can make most things.’

…With that in mind, I took out my cooking tools.

‘Might as well raise some affection.’

Until now, I’ve only cooked simple meals to avoid raising affection too much.

But.

Now that I’m planning to max it out,

I should cook Lia and Elrise’s favorite dishes to boost their affection.

‘Now that I have cola too.’

A certain dish comes to mind.

One that both Lia and Elrise love,

that I love, and that tastes even better with cola.