Magic Tools Are Selling Too Well

The imperial capital of the empire, Felix, is bustling with overflowing crowds on weekends.
This is because, except for special weekend lectures, it’s a day when the academy is closed without classes.

One might think, is there really that many people just because students have a day off?
But this wasn’t just about students.

After the establishment of the academy as a hero training institution, most aspiring candidates selected as heroes enroll in the academy and graduate with certification.

So most of the heroes currently active are academy graduates.
Naturally, the lifestyle pattern of having classes on weekdays and resting on weekends remained ingrained in their bodies.

Therefore, weekends were two days when not only students, but also heroes who go out for monster hunting and dungeon exploration, or heroes active in other countries, all take lodgings and rest.

“Is this people or a swarm of ants… There’s really a damn lot.”
“I wholeheartedly agree, Senior. Six people have already hit my shoulder. I’m enduring it in case they might be heroes good at punching, Senior.”

On such a golden weekend, the three of us were walking on a street in the outskirts of the imperial capital.

Not just within Felix, but because it’s the outskirts, it feels like even more heroes are gathering.
Heroes returning from hunting, or heroes just about to go to other cities, and heroes on other business were all gathered in the outskirts.

“Foxtail. Show me the map one more time.”
“Yes, Senior.”

As we expected, the [Intermediate Antidote] had no effect on Morphine’s mother.
When I did a mana diagnosis the very next day after she drank the antidote, I felt that nothing had changed at all.

In such cases, the reason is one of two.

Either it’s a very high-level poison that can only be solved with a [Superior Antidote], or it’s a poison containing ‘special mana’ that can’t be treated with just a general antidote.
And through our experience so far, we knew that the possibility of the former was almost non-existent.

A poison of unknown ‘special mana’.
We were on our way to investigate to find out the identity of this poison.
There was only one investigation site.
It was the mana stone factory where Morphine’s mother had worked for 10 years.

Breaking through the overflowing crowd and following the direction shown on the map, we finally arrived at a site with almost no people.

It was a site occupying a huge area alone among many fields that seemed to be used by the empire’s farmers.

“This seems… to be the right place.”
“T-this is…”

We couldn’t help but be bewildered in front of this site.

From afar it looked like an ordinary mana stone factory, but when we came inside, it was a completely ruined factory with no one working.

‘Morphine’s mother collapsed two years ago… Does that mean the factory closed down in two years?’

There were traces of the factory being in operation everywhere.
Carts for moving mana stones and stones that had lost their power were scattered here and there.
On one side, there was a mountain of stones piled up as if spilled out and dilapidated buildings.

However, among all this, only traces of people were missing.

“Are you here to see the land?”

I turned my head at the voice coming from nearby.

An old man with a sharp impression in shabby attire was standing holding a few farming tools.
He seemed to be a farmer working nearby.

“Ah, no… Wasn’t there originally a mana stone factory here?”

The old man settled in a corner and sat down with a thump.
Then he gulped down water as if his throat was parched.

“Phew- There was. There still is. Look, it’s obviously a mana stone factory.”
“But…”
“About two years ago. The people working there caught some disease and all died. The factory owner tried to hush it up and hire new people, but rumors were already bad so no one would do it. No matter how desperate for money, who would walk straight into death?”

So in the end, they couldn’t find workers, and finally, the factory closed down.
That’s what the old man was saying.

They all died after catching some disease.
And it happened to be the people working at this factory.
All of it was in line with Morphine’s mother.

In other words, the poison his mother contracted started from something in this factory.

Morphine, who had been listening to the story, asked urgently.

“Isn’t there anyone still alive among those who worked at that factory? Or even their families…!”
“I don’t know. I’m a farmer working here, how would I know about people working in the factory? I heard they all died after suffering for a while. Well, if even the church couldn’t cure them, what could be done?”

The old man, who spat out those words in a self-deprecating tone, continued to drink water as if his throat was still dry.

Feeling Morphine getting choked up beside me, I restrained him as if to say calm down.
There were still more things we needed to ask him.

“Sir. Then, besides the people who worked here, are there any farmers in the area who caught that unknown disease? It’s fine if you saw it directly or just heard about it.”

I approached the old man and asked while putting 1 gold in his pocket.

At that, the old man stopped drinking water and straightened his posture.

Indeed, there’s no one who isn’t kind in front of money.
Whether old or young.

“Ahem, hmm. Well, there aren’t any among the farmers…”
“Yes. If you know anything, please tell us comfortably.”
“About a year ago… A party of heroes came here once.”
“A hero party?”
“That’s right. I only saw from afar so I don’t know the details, but seeing them enter the inner part of Felix imperial capital, they looked like heroes who came from outside.”
“Did those heroes do something here?”
“I don’t know about that. But from what I saw from afar, they just looked around here briefly… and went straight into the inner city… Only later did I hear the news. That they all died.”
“……!”

The moment I heard those words, my hair stood on end.

A hero party that had visited this place was wiped out after contracting that disease.
This was unexpected new information, but it was also dangerous information.

Not just people who worked at the factory, but anyone who visited the factory.
It meant they could die from being poisoned by an unknown toxin.

“So after that… This factory is called the factory of death and everyone tries not to even look at it. You seemed like outsiders who didn’t know, so I came to tell you that.”

With those final words, the old man gathered his farming tools again and went on his way.

A brief silence fell.

We came to investigate boldly, but we too were in a dangerous situation.
To find the cause without anyone getting hurt, we needed to move more carefully.

“For now… Let’s look around individually and check if there’s anything suspicious. Don’t touch anything carelessly, just look with your eyes. If you think you’ve found something, call out. Understood?”
“Understood, Senior.”
“Yes, Senior.”

The three of us decided to spread out and thoroughly examine from the outside to the inside of the factory.

Morphine headed towards the building on the left, Delia towards the open space on the right.
I entered the building in front of the entrance and started searching.

A mana stone factory was a factory that classified and processed various grades of mana stones.
Among these, the main work was breaking down mana stones and crushing them into powder.

Mana stone powder, used as various experimental materials and alchemy materials, had a wide range of uses.
Naturally, there was high demand, and a corresponding high supply.

I looked at the mountain-like pile of stones.
All these stones were mana stones.

I told the juniors not to touch, but actually, to confirm exactly what kind of poison it is, you need to come into contact with it.

If mana stones were the cause of the poison, I could figure it out the moment I sensed it by touch.
And if I could just know the identity of the poison, I was confident I could certainly manufacture an antidote.

I picked up a rolling mana stone and tried to sense it.
And I found something strange.

‘There’s no… mana?’

All the mana stones in the factory were ordinary stones without mana.

It wasn’t just one.
All the stones I picked up subsequently were the same.

In other words, it meant that all the normal mana stones with remaining mana had already been collected.

That was clearly strange.
Would they have had the leisure to collect valuable things from a place called the factory of death?
If they acted with such leisure, why did the hero party that reportedly stopped by all die?

This was equivalent to saying that the cause of this poison was not the mana stones.
If these were the cause, the people collecting the mana stones would have also been poisoned and collapsed.

‘Then……’

The remaining causes were narrowed down.

There are limited cases where humans get poisoned through specific mediums.
Most typically, breathing air sprayed with poison, touching objects contaminated with poison, or eating something containing poison.

The possibility of air sprayed with poison was ruled out.
If there was poison in the atmosphere, the old man we saw earlier would have already been poisoned and died.

And it wasn’t objects contaminated with poison either.
I searched all the mana stones and surrounding instruments that could be the cause, but there was no possibility of poison.

Then there was only one possibility left.

“Seniooor!! There’s a strangely shaped well here!!”

It was ‘eating something containing poison’.