I Couldn’t Afford to Buy Mana, so I Started Streaming

“Seriously…”

Erichiton sighed deeply and swung the door open.

As expected, nothing happened.

“What have I been doing all this time?”

She scoffed slightly in disbelief and slowly moved her feet.

The grand chandelier hung from the ceiling, and the hallway with its heavy carpet was densely packed with antique furniture.

[Just a merchant. Sometimes plays the clown too.]

“Just a merchant? What the…”

Suddenly—

A sharp, hot pain pierced through her head.

“Ugh.”

Erichiton, who collapsed on the floor, took shallow breaths while pressing her temples with both hands.

[Appetite]

She fought fiercely against the horde of demon beasts.

At times, being ripped apart and devoured by bones and flesh, and at other times, tearing apart black clumps of flesh.

[Eat]

Just before her consciousness shattered.

The witch compelled her to devour even her pet dog, which she had named Esha.

“Hehe… ha.”

Erichiton barely suppressed the rising nausea and, with trembling hands, gradually lifted herself off the ground.

It had been three weeks since she regained her senses.

During that time, Luri had been steadily teaching Erichiton Korean and Hangul.

And during her free time, she would play video media appropriate for Erichiton’s language level.

Talking penguins, talking dinosaurs, and now talking fairies.

‘This isn’t funny at all. What, a translator? At least there’s that.’

After realizing that she had no right to indiscriminately infringe upon others’ freedom inside the virtual reality,

[Tree Wiki: NoName]

[Last edited: 2054-06-15 23:15:41]

“1. Overview

2. Life

3. Talents

4. Status and Influence

5. Awards Record

(…)

20. Anecdotes”

Erichiton began collecting information on Na-me as much as she could.

[Q. What is a subscriber?]

[A. A person who follows a channel or page to continuously watch content like V-tube or blogs…]

[Q. Speak so I can understand.]

[A. People who follow influential storytellers in the village. They regularly come to hear or see what that storyteller has to say or do first.]

‘200 million… crazy…’

As she scrolled down and continued asking questions,

‘I never really thought they were like people from the past…’

Erichiton’s astonishment deepened.

‘I have to meet them.’

Once her resolve solidified, she headed to the private room’s first-floor banquet hall.

A large metal dial and a heavy receiver.

It was the “telephone” invented by the Fourth Princess and kept in the imperial palace.

Erichiton hesitated for a moment, then slowly turned the dial.

Churrrrr—

[Hello?]

Don’t be fooled by that cheerful child’s voice.

“Is this the Fourth Princess? Please come out for a moment.”

[Why? I’m busy.]

The expression on Erichiton’s face stiffened slightly.

“What are you doing?”

[Just checking out the museum. Wow, it’s the Erythrium Eaterium Alloy!]

“If you’re at the museum, you could spare some time…!”

As Na-me’s cheerful response continued, Erichiton felt a vein popping on her forehead.

Just as her patience was reaching its limit,

Poot—

A hologram screen appeared over the telephone.

Inside it was Na-me, holding a selfie stick and beaming widely.

[You have to be quiet in the museum, so let’s just browse together.]

“Hey! Just come out already!”

[Ugh, how loud. I should lower the volume.]

* * *

The museum had various exhibition plates of alchemical formations.

The history of alchemy could be said to have begun with gold and developed into gold.

Let’s recall the first life for a moment.

The eternal dream of alchemists was to turn common metals into gold.

However, since this is a world where mana exists, that dream doesn’t stay as mere imagination.

We can materialize gold.

You can feel the heavy weight and shimmering nuggets in your palm… but suddenly it disappears?

How would you feel if the gold that appeared right before your eyes vanished into thin air?

You would just go insane.

Everyone would be engulfed by the overwhelming urge to grasp that gold, their eyes turning wild.

“With current technology, it’s definitely possible. But maintaining the alchemical formation costs more, so there’s hardly any practical profit.”

[Oh.]

Erichiton was already clearly showing her dislike about hearing that.

“Hmm… I guess I should check out hydrogen again!”

[Hey hey, Fourth Princess…! Sorry, what did you say? Oh, gold is amazing! I wore a gold leaf dress in my childhood, so I know how valuable it is!]

“Are you even listening properly? Anyway, next is mercury.”

[Ha-ah.]

She had come without much expectation, but the quality of the museum was quite high.

Moreover, it seemed to be trendy these days to mix museums with art galleries, as various works of art could also be found.

Churrrrr—

As I pressed the button, red liquid surged up and met the blue waterfall.

Overall, what a marvelous experience.

I roughly browsed through the actinide group and exited the museum.

“Wow, it’s hot.”

Temperatures soared to 35 degrees.

I called a taxi and set the aquarium as my destination.

“So why did you call?”

[You haven’t contacted me at all, so I called. How long are you going to keep me in a dragon maid’s care?]

“You wanted to be independent, right? When did you start asking for time and money?”

[Um. So what?]

“So, you’re going through the re-socialization process with Luri’s time and my money. Even defectors undergo 12 weeks of training just for crossing a border. Do you know anything about it?”

[I know… I know a lot. Ah, I know a lot.]

Suddenly, Erichiton started speaking in awkward Korean.

“Pfft. Is that the best you can do?”

[I’ve only been learning for three weeks!]

“Three weeks?”

[That’s the normal pace of learning, Fourth Princess. Do you think I’m some kind of monster like you or Yonggari?]

I temporarily took my earphones out and absorbed the scenery of Texas.

How can the sky be this clear?

Suddenly feeling a bit hungry, I thought to grab a snack later.

Thus, I arrived at the Dallas World Aquarium.

“Sorry, I zoned out for a moment. What did you say?”

[You just ignored me for 15 minutes… keep saying that, huh.]

“Yeah, I will.”

[Why do I have to go through all this hardship? I feel like throwing up every time I see that bespectacled penguin. Thanks to that crazy Yonggari, I’ve binge-watched season 25! Who was that again? Arrogance? Hibris? What did they do?]

“I installed a language module for them.”

[You should have done that for me too, then.]

“I couldn’t touch it because of the severe contamination. Just recovering the memories and self from the erosion was a miracle.”

[A miracle… that’s true but…]

What’s with the sudden quietness?

I ignored it and bought the ticket.

“Yes, one child, please.”

Before entering the zoo and aquarium hall, I first dropped by the sandwich shop on the third floor.

I set the camera on the opposite side and ordered a ham sandwich.

“Hehe, it feels like we’re on a date. Right, Erichiton?”

[What date! I don’t even want to see your face!]

Weeeing—

Soon, a robot server delivered the sandwich to my table.

“Let’s eat. Yum.”

I chewed on the sandwich while watching the kids with their families.

It could be considered a late-night snack in Korean time.

While eating, I spread out the pamphlet I had brought from the desk and charted my moving route.

“Wow, there’s a manatee! How cute, hehe. You’ve never seen anything like this in your past life, right? I’m showing you something special.”

[…]

“Why? Is it not great?”

[Tell me when you finish eating.]

Erichiton didn’t seem to react much.

In fact, there was a subtle sense of rejection in her voice.

[Ugh.]

A tiny sound of dry heaving.

“Eria, as you live, you’ll eat this and that too. How could you live a lifetime eating only what you like? My dad nags me to eat vegetables these days too—”

[Demon beasts can’t eat this stuff!]

She shouted with a trembling voice.

“Oh. That’s true. So I ate a few for you instead.”

[It was terrible. It was horrible. Ugh… ]

I could feel emotions welling up.

I was left speechless.

As she sobbed, I blocked out the noise and chewed on the sandwich.

My appetite suddenly vanished.

I discarded the remaining sandwich and turned my steps toward the chubby manatee.

“Manatee, manatee. Let’s go see the manatee.”

The erosion of appetite, appetite.

If the ability of jealousy is to replicate the unique magic of the target it destroyed, then it stands to reason.

The wave of demon beasts that crashed down on Duke Zakario’s fief, the safety zone that disappeared due to erosion.

In the fief where Duke Zakario had been accused of treason and the army had disbanded.

There was no longer a knight order to protect the tens of thousands of refugees.

Except for a few incompetent rural soldiers and Erichiton, who was once erosion.

Colossal demon beasts charged in like a tide to devour the refugees.

The start of the consumption might have been the small to medium demon beasts classified as wolf packs.

The mutation brought by appetite was also permanent.

Gaining wolf legs, pterosaur wings, and arms and tails of incomprehensible demon beasts clinging on to her body.

The size of appetite was growing, transforming into such a bizarre chimera that it made one doubt it was a creature like us.

For some demon beasts, their aura hearts were unclear.

In such cases, one had no choice but to devour everything in the vicinity suspected to be an aura heart.

When Erichiton struggled too much, I temporarily changed my body to help her consume flesh.

The demon beasts were revoltingly distasteful when compared to potions.

However, at the moment the strongest beings on Earth were born.

From that point onward, even colossal demon beasts would burst at just one kick from Erichiton.

A walking calamity.

When I reached a level where even I couldn’t handle it anymore.

The only solution that came to mind was her pet dog, which was dying from being contaminated by the mana.

[Appetite! Eat! Before you lose your self, quickly!]

[I will use magic to stop the fusion and fix the moment of mutation! Quickly while Esha still breathes!]

In retrospect, I could sever the bloated body of appetite.

[Woof…! Woof…!]

Erichiton had turned back into the small puppy she had raised.

[Kyii…]

A living being moaning from demonization.

I took her life gently with both hands.

The life of a hero who saved 58,000 people.

“What are you thinking about, Fourth Princess?”

“Ah! You startled me! What are you?”

Erichiton’s hologram appeared on my shoulder.

The hologram projector suddenly turned on, catching me off guard.

I hurriedly shoved the device into my pocket and put my earphones back on.

[No, I just saw an interesting button and pressed it. It’s not a big deal, is it?]

“Haah. You gave me a scare.”

[Wow, the fish are pretty… so this is an aquarium.]

“Yeah.”

When we stood in front of the massive glass wall of the aquarium, none of us could speak for a while.

Pointy sharks, gracefully moving rays, and little fish of every hue.

The blue light filled the space, and the waves flowed smoothly.

Overwhelmed by such grandeur and beauty, Erichiton was also watching that magnificent scene through the screen.

“I think life is most beautiful when it’s alive.”

[Yeah, I think so too.]

Erichiton said casually.

[I don’t want to agree with you, though.]