WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 30: Episode 4: Bamboo-Tube Beauty (11)
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“If there’s anything you want to say, say it.”
“Thank you... honored elders...”
Ise answered gruffly.
“Enough with this elder business. We’re sixteen. We’ve lived five times less than you.”
Geuma sniffled for a long while before forcing the corners of her mouth upward.
She had realized he was making a joke to cheer her up.
“...You’re kind.”
Seolryeong gently held Geuma in her arms and patted her back for quite some time.
“You’re warm. It’s been a long time since I was held by a human.”
“Geuma.”
“I won’t leave with regrets.”
“...”
“A lowly creature of the Qi Condensation Realm met kindred souls and was treated far too well, so I am not sad. Humans gave me a name, taught me love, let me know parting and longing, gave me hope, and at last gave me comfort.”
Geuma bowed deeply to them both.
“Thank you. Humans are truly lovable beings. Thanks to you, I can leave after living my short life happily.”
She wore a smile that might have been laughter or tears.
“May you both remain well. I will pray for you even after death.”
With that final tear, she slowly closed her eyes.
There was no need to eliminate a demon.
As though she did not wish to force them into needless killing, she ended her own life.
Ise rubbed at his tight chest and turned toward Seolryeong.
“...”
Seolryeong was crying even more sorrowfully than Geuma had, huge tears rolling down her face.
“Why are you crying? No, forget it.”
Ise let out a soft sigh and patted her back.
Demons really were the worst, he thought.
* * *
After performing a spirit requiem for Geuma, they also placed Bamboo-Tube Beauty’s corpse inside the Demon-Sealing Talisman Book.
Ise walked over to Seolryeong, who sat there with her face swollen from crying.
“Are you done crying?”
“...Mm.”
After wiping at her eyes, she looked at Ise with determination.
“Then let’s begin.”
“Begin what?”
“We need to gather the spoils.”
The Great Exorcist Order Basic Handbook said this.
When one side died in a life-and-death duel between cultivators, all spoils belonged to the victor in principle.
The dead cultivator’s family and acquaintances could not claim ownership over them.
In other words, everything Kim Siwon owned was theirs.
Their mission reward had only been two Spiritual Stones and three contribution points, and they had to split it between them. They had suffered enough and used far too many resources.
Kim Siwon had spent seventy years gathering his wealth, so it only made sense to strip his cave abode until they recovered their losses.
Ise had planned to do that anyway, but...
“You’re okay with it? You’re not going to start talking about righteousness and duty this time. I was just thinking I’d keep it all for myself and get struck by heavenly tribulation.”
“...The victor taking all is the natural order.”
“It only feels like an order you turn to when it’s convenient for you, right?”
“That’s obviously just your imagination. Come on, fellow Daoist. It’s a shame the corpse is already in the talisman book, but there must be wealth Kim Siwon gathered over seventy years hidden in his cave abode.”
“I already took everything from the corpse. Do you take me for an idiot?”
“...When did you do that?”
“While you were busy crying.”
Ise shook the bundle of items in his hands.
Seolryeong stared at him in disbelief.
Honestly, she had been truly shocked during the battle.
His boldness, courage, and decisiveness were things she could never imitate.
Watching him gain enlightenment in a battle where life and death hung in the balance, then break through a wall, had seemed like proof of dazzling talent.
It was hard to believe the mischievous boy before her was the same cultivator from moments ago.
“You really are full of surprises.”
“There wasn’t a storage pouch. I heard cultivators carry at least a small one.”
“Independent cultivators are usually poor. There might not be much even if we strip the cave abode.”
“That would be a real problem.”
Ise furrowed his brow as though it truly was a problem. The smell of grilled squid was rising from his own body.
Maybe he should have kept the fact that he had taken the items secret. Ise swallowed his belated regret.
* * *
Still, they had to strip the place.
Park Gangseo, a senior at the Qi Condensation Realm from Great Exorcist Order, had once said this.
Honestly, killing cultivators and emptying their pockets was far more profitable than hunting demons.
At the time, Ise had wondered what kind of nonsense a fraudulent Daoist would say. Yet once it became his own situation, he saw it differently.
Until now, he had thought he had no desire for wealth.
But after risking his life in battle, Ise had no desire to return empty-handed without a single spoil.
Especially now that he knew what Spiritual Stones could buy, understood their true value, and had experienced a world where the weak were devoured, the poor and content Ise was dead.
From now on, he would be reborn as a miser, an incarnation of greed.
“There are a lot of consumable spirit artifacts.”
They gathered all the wealth in the cave abode and poured it onto the table.
It had looked like there was nothing there, but Kim Siwon had slyly dug beneath the floor and hidden his valuables underground.
Over fifty Spiritual Stones.
Several demonic cultivation manuals.
More than twenty consumable spirit artifacts.
And one unidentified spirit artifact.
“You choose first. If you choose a spirit artifact, I’ll take an equivalent value in Spiritual Stones. I need Spiritual Stones more than artifacts.”
Ise immediately swept every Spiritual Stone and spirit artifact in front of himself with a resolute expression.
“Do you not even remember that I came out here to help you...?”
With a regretful look, Ise pointed to the only unusually shaped artifact.
Most single-use spirit artifacts came as pellets that activated when crushed, bombs that activated when thrown, or talismans activated by infusing them with spiritual energy.
Talismans and pellets were more accurately called magical objects than spirit artifacts, but many people used spirit artifact as a convenient umbrella term.
Of all the single-use magical objects they had acquired, only this one was made of metal in the shape of a sickle.
“I’ll take this first.”
He did not know what it was, but if it was a reusable spirit artifact, its value started at no less than thirty Spiritual Stones.
As expected, Seolryeong took thirty Spiritual Stones.
When Ise infused the artifact with spiritual energy, it gradually grew larger and changed into something like a saber.
It was a saber, but one with a broad, flat blade. It looked rather like a kitchen cleaver from the Zheng Empire.
He had no idea what else it could do.
He would have to ask a spirit-artifact merchant in Cheongsan City later.
Seolryeong tilted her head after watching him infuse spiritual energy into the artifact.
“Did you advance a realm?”
“Yeah. During the battle earlier.”
“...Seriously. The fact that you can answer that so casually is even more irritating.”
A monster who had broken through to the third star of the Qi Condensation Realm only fifteen days after beginning cultivation had killed a cultivator who had remained at the fifth star after seventy years of training, then stripped their cave abode.
What could be more unfair than that?
Seolryeong could not bring herself to say it aloud.
Whether he understood her feelings or not, Ise took ten Spiritual Stones and several consumable spirit artifacts.
They decided to turn the demonic cultivation manuals over to Great Exorcist Order, then headed for Namsangol.
* * *
Hong Sadeuk emptied the outpost’s entire stock to treat Ise’s burns.
He also asked them to give him a favorable external affiliate evaluation, then generously packed money and food for them.
Ise naturally answered that he would give him the highest possible score.
After thanking Hong Sadeuk for helping them in every way and giving him several of Seolryeong’s talismans as a gift, they left Namsangol.
The two ran all the way to Cheongsan without resting, then headed for Daoist Street.
They wanted to trade their unused spirit artifacts for Spiritual Stones at the spirit-artifact merchant, Hyun Woonja, and have their newly acquired odd artifact appraised.
“Hyun-ong! We’re here.”
Despite Seolryeong’s cheerful greeting, the old man ignored her and continued smoking his pipe.
“I told you to smoke outside.”
“If you’re going to nag, get out of my shop.”
Hyun Woonja waved them away as though annoyed.
Apparently used to his response, Seolryeong set the artifacts they wanted to sell before him. Ise placed the artifact he wanted appraised beside them.
“Please only appraise this one.”
“The appraisal fee is one Spiritual Stone.”
“Hyun-ong, do you really have to be like that? You could at least appraise it for free after seeing my face.”
“Does looking at your face produce Spiritual Stones or spirit artifacts? If you don’t like it, go to some amateurs and get swindled blind.”
“...”
Ise stepped in and held out one Spiritual Stone.
“You won’t lower the fee for your own services, but you’re happy to cut someone else’s pay. Please understand, Elder.”
Hyun Woonja snickered at Ise’s words and took out a magnifying glass.
“Elder, have you known Seolryeong for a long time?”
“What elder? I’m just an old man who won’t act his age. Call me Hyun-ong.”
Seolryeong answered instead.
“We didn’t know each other before. He knows my mother.”
“I’ve seen this brat a few times since she was still pooping her pants.”
“What are you talking about...?”
Ise clutched his stomach and laughed.
A short while later, Hyun-ong emerged with the appraised artifact.
He held it up and infused it with spiritual energy. Its blade became triangular, then square, then split into two blades like scissors.
“Elder Hyun, what is this used for?”
“It’s just a kitchen cleaver.”
“...What?”
“It’s a multipurpose cooking knife made from spirit beast claws and bones. It changes into whatever shape you want when you infuse it with spiritual energy, making it perfect for cooking.”
“Wait, Elder Hyun. Why would someone make a cooking knife from valuable spirit beast materials?”
“If you use ordinary tools when preparing immortal cuisine, the food cultivators eat that is free of turbid qi, its effects weaken. You don’t even know something that basic? Sell it if you don’t need it. I’ll give you five Spiritual Stones for it.”
So...
He had brought back a cooking cleaver worth only five Spiritual Stones and been taken for thirty Spiritual Stones.
When Ise hurriedly looked at Seolryeong, she was suppressing a sly smile.
“I really didn’t know. What can you do? You should consider it fate.”
The old saying that there was no one in the world worth trusting had not been wrong.
Footnotes:
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