Families, lovers, employees, automatons, steam carriages and pet dogs out for an outing. People were scattered sparsely across the grassland around the lake, and there wasn't a single proper building nearby. The sky was very blue without a single cloud. The chimney smoke from distant places had just been chased away by the air purification airships that circled twice a day.
[April 7th, 1838. Nine Holder was enjoying the wealth and leisure built up by magical civilization and colonial trade.]
Such narration would co out.
However, the next mont, the color of the sky changed to a deep gray-green, and monsters poured down from overhead. Screams and percussion sounds heavier than heartbeats. Monsters making strange cries. Urgent musical sounds.
That park beca a dungeon in its entirety and fell away, not returning until the monsters inside had devoured every moving living thing down to the bone.
[When the dungeon disappeared, all that remained in the park were torn pieces of clothing, bloodstains, and bones with leftover flesh.]
Whether it was due to censorship, that part wasn't properly depicted. It only showed a full circle tour of black bloodstains scattered throughout the park.
Thirteen years later, that park's na was 'morial Park.' It had beco a place to reflect on and mourn that day's terrible disaster.
Esperanza had also received quests to find people in the park. The NPCs were all dressed in black clothing, and there wasn't a single person who looked like they had co out to have fun.
Perhaps that day, Count Avondale was also at that place. He didn't look like the type to go out for walks in the park on weekends, but he might have happened to go out that particular day.
But if Esperanza was there, the casualties could be reduced to half of half, maybe even more. Lord Avondale was an annoying person, but since she had already seen his face and conversed with him, it wasn't difficult to decide to save him.
But wasn't Count Avondale soone who was supposed to die? What if saving him prevented her from leaving this ga?
"Hmm. Uuuuuuum."
'Why can't I get out in the first place? And not even at the ga's tiline, but 13 years before? Moreover, entering the mansion of a character I only knew by na?'
Dear administrator, there must have been better options than this!
Esperanza lay sprawled on the bed groaning. What on earth was the intention?
After rolling around like that for a while, sothing suddenly flashed through her mind. Jack's paper crumpled and thrown sowhere in her inventory. She had completely forgotten that this thing was itemized. The most important information among what Jack had rattled off was always displayed in the quest window.
Though not now.
[Item: Jack's Note]
"It looks exactly like what's drawn in the item window."
That was about all she could think after taking it out. She could read the text of the Golden Claw worldview, but since Jack had terrible handwriting, decoding wasn't easy. After pondering for a long ti, she could only decode text that was rely six sentences long.
Among them, what Esperanza focused on was the last sentence.
Normally she would have dismissed it with 'This guy's fishing again,' but having co 13 years back, this sentence didn't look like an ordinary sentence either.
"Is it real?"
The Golden Claw existed in this world 13 years ago.
The legendary item that would eliminate dungeon appearances and bring peace to this worldview. An object mocked by users as a 'MacGuffin' due to its abilities. Only rumors ran rampant, and no quest had ever given proper information about it. Whenever you went looking for the Golden Claw, it was always a wild goose chase with completely different stories unfolding.
'But if it's 13 years ago......'
By the ga's tiline, the Golden Claw might have already disappeared or beco impossible to find. But 13 years ago, at this point before everything began, it might have existed.
Then what needed to be done was clear. Find the 'Golden Claw.'
Suddenly a window that hadn't been there before appeared. Esperanza, who had been sitting awkwardly, was startled and fell backward.
[Quest: Find the Golden Claw!]
Progress: (0/???)
Completion Rewards
—Title: Master of Ti
—Items: Golden Claw, Return Ticket (Ho)
It was real. It was real!
She had used a return ticket long ago. It was an item that would take you back to the starting point when you absolutely couldn't clear a dungeon at your level, but she hadn't obtained one even once after reaching the top 100 rankings because the feeling of being logged out was unpleasant. It was also a cash item. But now she longed for it more than ever.
Alright, let's find the Golden Claw and go ho.
Once she had a sense of purpose, things to do ca to mind in sequence.
The person who might know about the Golden Claw was... In this world without monsters or dungeons, it would be a aningless object, but she could find clues from Dr. Sullivan, who was a magical engineer.
So... first, let's properly dress up tomorrow. What she needed now was the appearance of a lady that no one would turn away at the door.
She didn't know what Dr. Sullivan was doing for a living now, but the kind of appearance where employees wouldn't call the police even if she showed up unannounced.
What would she need to do for that?
First, she needed to select the most tiless-looking clothes from those chosen yesterday. She had no idea what the current fashion was, but it probably wouldn't change so drastically that even ten years of alterations couldn't keep up.
The ga world originally didn't change that rapidly. Creating new settings was also work. With help from the maids and Mrs. Lux, she should be able to manage sohow.
Next, what would she need to act like a lady?
The answer was simple. Money.
Esperanza, who had opened her inventory and poured out banknotes, sighed deeply.
"It's labor, labor."
She would need to sort banknotes from before 1837 and after 1837. How long would it take? Three hours? Four hours?
She glanced at the sky outside the window. Dark clouds hung low in the dusky sky. The sight of darkness falling over Nine Holder's perpetually damp gray sky, as always.
Sleep was out of the question. Esperanza, who had pulled her negligee up to her knees and sat down on the rug among the scattered banknotes, sighed.
Before perfectly sorting banknotes from before 1837 and after 1837, her plan changed. It was because of the thought that if she ended up staying here even into 1838, wouldn't it be okay to use banknotes issued in 1838 too?
Eventually, papers sorted into banknotes from before 1837, 1838 banknotes, 1839 banknotes, and banknotes from after that ford four piles. She didn't have the energy to stack them neatly.
After putting them separately into her inventory, she washed herself. The magically operated bathtub heated water while spouting steam. She could see a round orb among the connected gears.
It was a magic stone containing magical power. A magic stone that emitted black light like soone's eyes.
"He's called a magical engineer, and he's installed sothing like this in his house. Impressive."
Unless you were quite wealthy, you couldn't have embedded magic stones in every bathtub in your house. No matter how much magic stones poured out like water from the mines in northern Nine Holder, storing magical power in them, making machinery precise enough to operate that power, and maintaining and repairing that machinery was much more expensive than one might think.
It ant this was a luxury that wouldn't be given without special favor, regardless of how wealthy Count Avondale was. And the Count would have offered such favor without any emotion. It must an he valued this partnership that much.
"Maybe giving him the scythe was a bit much."
It was a weapon bought for achievent purposes early in the ga. After she started spending money on the ga, even if only a little, it was sothing she never looked at again, so she gave it away easily.
'Esperanza-nim, why do you carry around such weapons when you're highly ranked? What a waste of inventory space. You should throw away stuff like that and try this once. I think this would suit you well.'
She rembered what Cyrus, who was ranked 2nd and had done dungeon conquests with her a few tis, had said. He had poured out weapons he had raised himself as if treating a beginner. How pitiful it must have looked that she was still carrying around that scythe.......
She blew on her fingers that had gotten puffy in the bath water and fell into thought.
Hmm. It seems giving him the scythe was indeed too much. She should make ands.
??????°??☆????°??????
Esperanza t the Count again when it was well past 3:30 in the afternoon. At the point when a full day had passed since entering the world 13 years ago.
If it had been her original body, she might have woken up at nearly twelve o'clock, but a hunter's body overflowed with stamina. No matter how much longer she tried to dawdle, she couldn't help but get out of bed by 8:30.
She had a simple breakfast and toured the house following Mrs. Lux. There was nothing special. The places where there might be sothing special were all the Count's private spaces. The study, research lab, and material storage room.
Still, the mansion's map had changed from black to mostly colored. The study she had visited yesterday also had a cream color, with 'Study' scrawled in fancy cursive.
The mansion was excellent, but it was an old-fashioned and typical noble mansion, unlike what you'd expect from a magical engineer's house. Only the elevator used by the elderly employees and the garage containing the steam carriage were fitting for a mansion of this era.
Among the places she toured, what she gained were an excellent stable and an indoor shooting range. She thought while stroking the mane of a horse that seed more lively than in the ga's tiline.
'Why raise horses when there's a steam carriage? Is it a hobby?'
She also looked over the empty shooting range.
"This shooting range was built by the previous Count, and back then it was terribly noisy whenever gentlen gathered to shoot, as if the world was coming to an end. Now it's soundproofed, so there's no such worry."
"It's soundproofed? That's quite......"
"Expensive."
Mrs. Lux said firmly.
"The butler nearly fell backward when he heard the price. You rember seeing him yesterday, don't you? Old Butler Howard."
He had looked about the sa age as Mrs. Lux. But making such a comnt probably wasn't a good idea. When she silently nodded, Mrs. Lux excitedly continued talking.
"But our Count installed soundproofing on the entire outer wall. Isn't that amazing?"
"Indeed."
She had no choice but to agree. As Esperanza who had obtained and personally decorated a house in the ga, she knew roughly the price. Materials and technology would be much more expensive now than back then.
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