This Love is Futile

I was glad that today was Friday. I really was.

After all, not only was it a time-limited quest, it was also something that did less damage the faster I got it done, so it practically asked me complete it within a night. If I log out once to eat then log back in, I should be able to do it until morning somehow. But to pinpoint a certain book from these piles of books seemed to be very painful to do, but I would do my best.

I sat on the chair and put my arm on the desk. Then, as I was about to tap on the log out button, my eyes went toward the quest column.

The details of the quest from yesterday were there.

Let’s make up my mind and take a look.

I sighed and tapped on it with my finger.

{A threat appeared in the Tre forest!

Something unfamiliar seems to be wandering in the forest.

If you see something wrong, let the Adventurer’s Guild know immediately!

Clear reward: Special herb, Dragon scale.

Quest failure: The city of Tre will be destroyed by the threat. It can’t be used as a base afterward.

【Quest Clear!】

The threat to the City of Tre has disappeared.

Clear rank: D

Quest reward: Special Herb}

Ah, I cleared it.

I guess it was bad to let the dragon arrive at the city and destroy it. But it said it was a D rank clear, so it was considered a quest clear at the lowest rank. If the dragon didn’t find me and I managed to report to the guild quickly, the clear rank should have been higher. Too bad.

But the city itself was protected, so I guess it’s okay.

As I felt a little better, I closed the status screen.

Then I looked at the books around me.

After all, the books that were still on the bookshelf were still better as I could see the book’s title from the back cover. The problem was, if the book I was looking for was among these stacks of papers or among books which rolled on the floor with faded color, then it was doubtful whether I could find it within three days.

If I factored in about a day to make the agent, then another day to gather the materials, then that means I have to find the book I was looking for within a single day.

As a last resort, I had no choice but to call out Yuuta and others and ask them to sell the materials if they had them. But to get there, I needed to find the book first.

Alright, let’s put my spirit into this.

I logged out, ate my meal, canceled the alarm timer, and logged in again.

Since I was sitting on the chair, my HP and MP recovered for a bit. But as expected, the bed was more efficient. Let’s seriously buy a sleeping bag next time.

First, let’s begin from the shelves. I roughly read the titles on the book’s back cover.

There were many books I was curious about, like ‘History of farming tools’, ‘How to grow herbs well’, ‘How to distinguish rain and sunny clouds’, ‘Mountain is calling’, and ‘River is babbling’, but I had no time to read it. I would ask Kyle-san if I could read it slowly next time. There was no book with a title related to ‘Pest’ or ‘Plant’s disease.’

“Uwah, as expected, it was among piles with high difficulty.”

I sighed and sat in the gap between the mountains of books. I pushed the mountain of books away even if I did feel bad doing it. Obviously, the mountain collapsed and there was less space for me to walk.

I piled up the books I had confirmed were not needed in the vacant space. I open the book and read the headline before putting it on the vacant space. In the case of a bundle of papers, I skimmed through it and piled it up, forming yet another mountain. How many times did I do this already?

I suddenly lost my concentration and looked up. I heard something in my ears and exhaled loudly, finally noticing it was the sound of a knock.

“Ah, yes?”

When I replied, the door opened softly as if trying to not disturb me, and Kyle-san showed his face.

“A meal, you’ll eat, right? Don’t be too absorbed into it, take a break for a bit.”

“Ah, alright. Thanks.”

When I noticed it, there were few new mountains around me.

However, there were still about a third of the books on the floor. There were still lots of it. I wonder if I could find it. As I was feeling slightly overwhelmed, I stood up and relaxed my stiffened body. .

The dinner that was served was fresh stew. I learned from Kyle-san’s example, as he dipped his torn bread into the soup before he ate it, and ate it the same way.

“Uwah, it’s delicious…!”

It was the first time I ate such a rich stew. The vegetables were sweet, and the cream was also excellent. The bread that was dipped on it was also delicious. I would ignore the fact the bread was a little burnt. Did Kyle-san bake the bread himself?

“Eat well. There are still more.”

“I’ll eat it! It tastes great…!”

In the end, I asked for two more portions since it was so delicious. I also ate a lot of bread and ate more than what I usually eat. Without condemning my attitude, Kyle-san just smiled and shared his stew many times. His expression showed that he didn’t seem to hate doing so either.

“Would you like an evening drink after a meal? It feels quite refreshing to not eat alone at the table… I guess Mac is still not an adult yet, huh?

“Yeah, I can’t drink liquor yet. Also, I still have work to do. Is there any drink to keep me awake?”

“Oh, wait for a bit.”

With a grin, Kyle-san went to the kitchen in the back. I see. Since Kyle-san lived alone on the outskirts of the city, perhaps he was lonely.

“Kyle-san is good at cooking. Please teach me next time.”

“Oh, okay. You can ask me anytime. I’ll teach you many delicious and rich dishes that would grab your favorite person’s stomach.”

“I’ll take your word seriously, you know?”

“Did you ask as a joke?”

Kyle-san handed me a cup as we laughed together. Then, as I was listening to the state of the farm, I also reported to him that I still didn’t get any hint yet, and we returned to our own activities. Since Kyle-san started his activity early, it seemed he went to sleep. After he told me to complete the task without hurry, he disappeared into a different room.

I also returned to Kyle’s father’s study and resumed my work. I felt the movement of my hand and eyes were faster than before, probably because I was filled with motivation as my stomach was filled.

I could see the stars from the skylight. I took a short break as I looked up at the twinkling stars that looked more beautiful than those in the real world. After that, I was absorbed in flipping through the books until the light began to illuminate through the window. The pile of books I restacked already exceeded 70% of them.

I piled up books on the opposite corner from where I began, then when I made about two piles, I picked up a stack of paper that was about to decay.

‘Countermeasures against root-eating pests.’

That was certainly written on the cover of the paper.

“Is this it…?”

My heart thumped. It was an old document which seemed like it would fall apart if I opened it vigorously.

As I gently turned the page, I saw a picture of a crop that was just like the symptoms that happened on the farm outside.

According to the document, this pest seemed to go through the soil and gnawed on the roots. As a result, the leaves dried up due to lack of nutrition. The reason why it wasn’t affected by pesticide despite being spread by Kyle-san above the soil was because it resided inside the soil. I carefully read the details of the speed of its progress and its favorite crops.

It seemed that the method of exterminating this pest was to pull out the dead leaves all the way to the roots, burn it to the end, then mix the extermination agent into the soil. Also, if there was a mistake, the land would be unusable for a month. To think it was this troublesome.

“How to make the extermination agent. Put three paralysis bags of numbing spiders, three toxin tubes of jumping snakes, five webs of earth mountain spiders, three marcolan carrots, dissemination pills, active potion, and magic potion into alchemy pot, then the moment the brown liquid turns green, put it into a container.”

What was this? This was totally a quest for an alchemist and not a pharmacist. As expected, did the NPC know that I was an alchemist?

Even so, those were troublesome materials. I sighed as I thought – I wonder if I could gather them all in a day. I already had the dissemination pills, an alchemy drug that caused materials to explode in multiple places, and an active potion and magic potion. However, I need to gather the monster materials from scratch. On top of that, these were all materials that were uncollectable unless it was performed by an alchemist. so I doubted anyone would have it. I would need to collect it immediately today… I was worried about how much I could collect by myself though.

With a sigh, I stood up with the obviously decaying document in my hand.