Chapter 70

Chapter 70

The Tear of the Dead and the Blind Saint

Now that I had come to Daidros to implant the Tear of the Dead into my body.

The key issue was where to implant the jewel.

However, Daidros’s answer had already been decided.

“So... it has to be near the heart?”

“It would be better if it were in the form of an accessory. It would be easier to recognize the wearer. If you choose to implant it into your body, you must ‘engrave’ the fact that you are the jewel’s owner. In the case of the Tear of the Dead, I think near the heart would be appropriate. The heart can be called the source of life, after all.”

“...”

After listening to Daidros’s kind explanation, I leaned back against the sofa and tilted my head back.

“As expected of fantasy...”

I had never experienced implanting something like a jewel into my body in the game either.

There had been no need to.

However, unlike the cursed blade, the Tear of the Dead could not hide the energy leaking from it through a process similar to sealing.

For a while, I silently chewed the remaining Dius horn shell.

Then Daidros asked a question.

“By the way, what have you been chewing?”

“Dius horn shell. I received it this time for catching the lich.”

At the words Dius horn shell, Daidros was colored with shock.

It was not even the horn itself, but only something like the shell, so it did not seem like a precious elixir. Why was he acting like that?

“Is your tongue all right...?”

“My tongue?”

“I have heard that Dius horn tastes horrendously bad...”

“Ah.”

Come to think of it, lately, no matter what food I ate, I had not been able to feel a rich flavor.

Had my tongue become strange because I kept eating bizarre things?

If “Keen Senses” included taste as well... it made sense.

[ Disciple, are you all right...? I think taste is quite an important matter in life... ]

“I am fine, Master. If I am going to keep eating things like this from now on anyway, perhaps it would be better not to feel the taste.”

[ Even so, gastronomy is important... ]

As Sierra and I had such a conversation, Daidros shook his head.

“It is mysterious no matter how many times I see it.”

Leaving those words behind, he drank the glass of liquor on the table.

He was a dragon, so it should be said that there was no particular concept of getting drunk for him. If he wanted to get drunk, he would probably have to pour in a liquid close to poison for humans.

At last, Daidros rose from his seat and said to get it over with quickly.

Soon, guided by him, I took off my top and lay on a long table.

Potions of unknown use had been placed beside my head.

Only when the cold table touched my skin, which still held warmth, did I finally realize what I was trying to do.

Soon, Daidros held out one potion to me.

“What is this? A potion? Is it perhaps some kind of anesthesia?”

“...Did you not say you came expecting pain? It is an elixir. I would feel sorry if you died in the middle of this, so drink it in advance.”

I was left speechless by Daidros’s blunt answer.

“An elixir...”

It was a top-grade potion hard to see even in the game.

A potion on a completely different level from ordinary recovery medicine, possessing healing power on par with the holy magic “Heal.”

At this point, was he not practically showing off that he was a “gold dragon”?

I immediately drank down the elixir.

What meaning would there be if I died before even obtaining my one coin?

“...I will begin. It would be best if you try not to move your body as much as possible.”

Then dragon scales grew from the index finger he raised, forming a sharp dragon claw... or should I call it a talon? In any case, it looked extremely sharp.

In a word, it looked painful.

His claw went toward the area near my heart.

Then his hand drew straight downward.

Naturally, blood burst from between my skin, which split smoothly.

“If you feel like you are about to die, tell me in advance. I will pour an elixir on you. In that sense, losing consciousness would also be troublesome.”

“Kgh... That is truly... kind of you...”

Having one’s chest opened while fully conscious was not only painful, but terribly strange.

Soon, Daidros placed the jewel into my chest.

Then he murmured something like an incantation.

I could not understand what language it was.

Ancient runes, draconic language, and such things brushed through my mind.

[ Ho... The jewel is slowly taking root in your heart. What a marvelous sight. ]

Sierra, who was watching the “surgery” firsthand, let out an exclamation.

Soon, Daidros’s mouth, which had been reciting the incantation, stopped.

Daidros pulled his hand out.

His hand was covered in blood.

He closed my opened chest, then poured an elixir onto it.

“...Somehow, it seems to have been completed.”

Daidros said this after pouring an entire bottle of elixir.

It could be thought of as a simpler task than expected, but I believed that was possible because it was none other than Daidros.

Still lying down, I barely moved my arm and felt my chest to see whether the wound had healed.

“It has already closed.”

It seemed new flesh had grown in that time.

I raised myself from the table and smiled at Daidros.

Sierra approached me and hugged me tightly.

Her bursting chest blocked my face.

Her voice rang in my head as she stroked my head.

[ It must have hurt terribly... You endured well. Now even death itself cannot separate us. ]

“Only once, though. Haha...”

After hearing the effect of the Tear of the Dead, Sierra seemed inwardly pleased. It meant her contract with me could somehow continue a little longer.

At that moment, Daidros, eyes half-lidded, held out an elixir to me.

“...I do not know what conversation you are having, but blood is pouring from your mouth.”

[ It truly is. It got on me too. ]

After Daidros, Sierra added those words.

When I heard him and wiped my mouth, quite a lot of blood came away.

There was blood on Sierra’s chest too, which had been blocking my face.

Was it possible to make contact because it was my blood?

I could not know in detail.

Judging by the fact that Daidros did not mention it separately, it seemed he could not see the blood on Sierra.

While Sierra was thinking about how to handle the blood, she wiped the blood from her chest with her hand and licked it.

At this, I asked Sierra.

“...Master?”

[ I-I am cleaning it up neatly... ]

Sierra turned her head away from me and stammered.

Looking at it one way, perhaps this was the first time Sierra had put something in her mouth since becoming one of the dead. Even though there was no way it tasted good, Sierra licked away every last bit of the blood.

I watched that while putting on my top and straightening my clothes.

As soon as I climbed down from the table, I opened the status window to confirm whether it had applied properly.

Fortunately, I could confirm that “Tear of the Dead [Engraved]” was written in the list of equipped items.

I finally had my one coin.

“Now I think I can push myself a little at a time.”

I had no intention of wasting my one coin in vain.

But I gained confidence that I would be able to walk the line a little more closely.

Of course, the Tear of the Dead was an object containing the grudges of at least several hundred people, so there might be some side effects, but since I had not experienced them yet, I did not know.

Soon, Daidros, who had been observing me, opened his mouth.

“It is perfectly hidden. The energy seems to be concealed well... Unless someone places their hand on your chest, it will be difficult to feel the energy.”

“Thank you. But for this job’s payment... what would be good?”

I glanced at the three neatly emptied elixir bottles and asked him.

“Payment... payment, is it...”

Daidros pretended to think and trailed off.

This time, he had not created a work like the cursed blade, so it seemed he did not want to receive money.

“Will he make me do work?”

In the game too, at times like this, he would entrust miscellaneous quests like errands.

In the middle of that, Daidros cut off the conversation.

“...A guest has arrived.”

It seemed he had sensed someone stepping into the barrier.

—Knock, knock.

Right after Daidros muttered that, someone knocked on the mansion door.

Daidros roughly wiped away the blood on him with a cloth and approached the door.

—Creeeak.

“Chief... my child...”

The one who appeared when the door opened was a village resident.

The villager was carrying a child on his back.

Watching from some distance away, I could see a wound on the ankle.

“This is... it seems he was attacked by something poisonous. If it is one nearby... Huu... We need to call a priest quickly.”

The way Daidros spoke, and his voice, quickly changed into that of the young village chief.

“Yes, thank you... truly, thank you... But I am worried he might not make it through the night... The child is in so much pain...”

I listened to their conversation from a distance and made a judgment.

Daidros probably had various methods to treat that child.

However, judging by his words about calling a priest, it seemed he disliked resolving every problem in the village with the money or abilities he had as a dragon.

Was it because it would not be natural?

But detoxification at least was possible with acupuncture.

I always kept the kit in my backpack.

I slowly approached Daidros.

When Daidros heard my presence, he left the words, “Please wait a moment,” to the resident and briefly closed the door.

Then he looked at me.

“I think I can resolve it.”

I took needles from my backpack, showed them to him, and whispered in his ear.

“...You can handle acupuncture too?”

“If it is merely detoxification, it is more than possible. Would it be better if I did not step forward?”

“Hmm... It seems the poison has already spread through the body, so waiting for a priest would be too late... Very well.”

That was how the quiet conversation with Daidros ended.

Daidros opened the door he had closed and looked at the resident waiting in front of the door.

“This person is an old friend of mine, and he knows acupuncture. Would you please trust me and entrust the child to him?”

The resident checked the bandage around my eyes and seemed uneasy, but Daidros seemed to have built up considerable trust as the village chief, because he answered that he understood.

The detoxification ended fairly simply.

Because the poison had spread quite a bit, it took some time, but it was not difficult.

“...This should be enough.”

I retrieved the needles from the boy’s body and turned my head behind me, speaking to the boy’s mother, who had been watching.

Not long after, the boy who had lost consciousness opened his eyes.

He called his mother, and his mother approached him while shedding tears.

I gave them space and approached Daidros, who was watching with his arms crossed.

Then Daidros opened his mouth.

“To think you could handle acupuncture... Once, long ago, there was a very famous blind Acupuncturist. He was from the East too, and it seems there are many things overlapping with you.”

Was he talking about the person who created acupuncture, whom Priscilla had told me about when I tried to learn acupuncture from her before?

It was a remark that made me feel the years he had lived.

“You asked what you should do about payment, did you not... How about going around the village once? There are more than a few people in this small village who are ailing.”

“...I am fine with that. However, acupuncture has its limits, so I cannot cure every illness. Will that still be enough?”

“It will be enough.”

After Daidros gave that answer, I wandered the village late at night and treated the residents’ minor and major illnesses and injuries.

Daidros had memorized who was hurt in what way, and who had what illness. Thanks to that, it was easy to separate what I could treat from what I could not.

As I went around the village, when I ran out of the needles I was carrying, Daidros hurriedly returned to his mansion and came back, apparently having made needles in the meantime, then handed me a bundle.

It was late, but from some point onward, the village residents began gathering, and in the end, I had to place needles before most of the village watching.

The last was a young girl suffering from a slight headache.

Because she was afraid of having a needle pierce her body and made a fuss, I had to gently soothe her.

“See? It does not hurt at all, does it?”

“Wow...”

The girl looked at the needle placed in her arm, and her eyes grew round.

Soon, she said her head did not hurt and began bouncing in place without even removing the needle.

“They say he is a friend of the chief...”

“He is practically a Saint...”

“A blind Saint...”

“A Saint has come to this little village. Heh heh...”

I heard the village residents watching murmur.

...Most of the village residents felt like that.

After finishing all the work, I was talking with Daidros.

“Why does the word Saint come up?”

I was simply curious.

It had been like that not only in this village, but also at the academy.

Daidros drank a mouthful of liquor and opened his mouth.

“Hahaha! Come to think of it, you cannot read books, so you would not know that ‘fairy tale.’”

“A fairy tale?”

“There is such a thing. They must have felt that your actions and way of speaking resemble the Saint in that fairy tale.”

“Aha...”

A fairy tale.

While playing the game, I had not particularly encountered any story about a fairy tale, so nothing occurred to me.

[ I was never particularly interested in books either, so I do not know what fairy tale he means. ]

Sierra was not much different.

It was probably not something important.

Like that, the topic of conversation passed, and I spoke a little more with Daidros.

They were mainly stories of Daidros’s past.

Perhaps because I had taken the first step well, he seemed to like me in various ways.

“...I will be going back now.”

It was already terribly late.

Only when morning came was I able to exchange farewells and leave Daidros’s mansion.

On my way to take a carriage, when the village residents I met asked, “Where are you going now?” I...

“I will drift wherever my feet lead.”

...left those words behind, got away from them, and boarded the carriage.

Of course, my destination was Innocence Academy.