Chapter 88: Adamantite AdventurersA few days had passed after our discovery of the mithril mine, and the adventurer’s guild had confirmed our statement, saying that they had found the monster’s corpse.

    The news quickly spread around the kingdom, as some people believed that mithril and adamantite mines brought good fortune to the empires where they appeared.

    But everyone talked about how the princess and her "companion" had defeated the monster that inhabited the cave, calling her a saint.

    It reminded me of the times in Port Town Blue when people said the same thing after we delivered potions and food to them, although they didn’t know it was the princess back then.

    Naturally, we were both promoted to adamantite adventurers, which was the next rank after mithril.

    It was quite funny how we discovered a mithril mine to rank up from mithril adventurers. Either way, we were congratulated by the guild master as he explained that they had never seen someone go up from that rank so fast.

    After receiving our new adventurer cards and a pouch full of gold, I asked if I could keep the mithril slab I had brought, to which the guild agreed.

    I wanted to try making something out of the metal, and since I knew I couldn’t use magic to mold it, I thought about practicing some good old blacksmithing.

    Thankfully, it was a pretty big slab of metal, so I had a few tries to make something good out of it.

    We flew from Speranza to End Town since we couldn’t teleport because of the mithril, but it took us a mere day as we flew as fast as we could.

    Once we arrived, we were received by the guards at the gate, congratulating us for becoming adamantite-ranked adventurers.

    Apparently, the news of the princess’s rank-up had spread across the kingdom, and their residents shared a feeling of pride after hearing how talented the second princess was.

    I overheard one of the guards saying, "She resembled her brother," which made me wonder what type of guy her big brother was.

    I knew Melina’s little sister since she still lived in the castle, but the first prince was supposedly studying magic in the academy of the Droman Empire.

    The Droman Empire was the neighboring country of the Sephyr Kingdom in the western continent, separated by the vast Illusive Woods we had seen on the other side of the border wall.

    Because of its difficulty to transverse, most of the traveling to the Empire was thanks to the ships that left from either Port Town Blue or a small port town that was closer to the capital.

    Melina explained to me that there were three big magic academies in the world. One was in the Sephyr Kingdom, one in the Droman Empire, and one in an eastern country known as the Xianlong Empire.

    ’Interesting. That sounds like a Chinese name...’ I thought, hearing her talk about the eastern country.

    When I asked why her brother was sent to another academy instead of the one in his own kingdom, she said that it was a decision for the student to make.

    Sending a prince to another empire to study was a sign of goodwill and a relationship with the neighboring countries. However, students could still decline the offer to go to a certain academy.

    ’That’s... quite nice of them, I guess. I mean, it’s good that they don’t force anyone to go anywhere, but I wasn’t expecting them to be that chill about it.’ I thought.

    Melina had chosen the academy in Sephyr since no other member of the royal family was there at the moment, but she also said she didn’t want to go somewhere far by herself.

    "Traveling to other places is more fun with others, you know?" she said, locking eyes with me as we both stopped walking.

    "I... see," I replied somewhat coldly.

    ’I wonder how long I can keep fooling myself into believing that Melina is not my past wife...’ I thought, as every time the princess spoke, she reminded me of the past Melina.

    Seriously, I’m not that big of an idiot. Of course, I have noticed all of the similarities since we started hanging out together. I even talked about it with Jackson, who tried to convince me that it could all be a cruel coincidence.

    Honestly, I wanted to believe that at first, and I’ve been trying hard to fool myself into thinking that everything is just a coincidence. But she just made it harder whenever she spoke.

    ’Even if she isn’t my past wife. I will protect her with everything I have. I couldn’t do anything for the past Melina in her final moments, so I will not let anything bad happen to this one...’ I thought, pulling myself together as we kept walking through the town.

    When we made it home, we met with Gina and Carli, who were cleaning and doing mundane tasks around the place, promptly stopping to congratulate us on our new adventurer ranks.

    Showing the slab of mithril to the two maids, I asked if they had some tips for me, as I wanted to use the metal to make something. However, the maids explained that their mithril weapons had been crafted by a dwarf that resided in their kingdom, and thus they had no experience with it.

    When we inquired about the alchemists, they told us they were in the tree house in End Forest, explaining how they had become addicted to learning and experimenting.

    They had a bunch of shadow dogs taking care of the perimeter and following them whenever the alchemists went outside to gather materials.

    "Good to know their training is going well," I said with a bit of pride in my voice.

    After our encounter with Dr. Lane at the capital, where he explained how his business had been doing horribly after the appearance of my potions, I felt kind of bad.

    I just wanted to give everyone an equal chance at surviving, but I never thought about the business I would be taking down with it. However, now that those same alchemists were learning my recipes, the feeling of guilt slowly dissipated.

    After catching up with the maids, I visited Jackson to show him the piece of metal and was happily surprised to see Karla in his office talking to him.

    Karla was the knight who had turned adventurer and helped us against the fight with the Goblin King. After that winter, she had gone on an adventure and hadn’t visited. However, I remembered that the main reason why so many adventurers first started to come to our town was thanks to her gossip as she traveled. S~ea??h the novёlF~ire.net website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

    After greeting her, Jackson told Karla that I already knew his secret, making her smile.

    I could tell that Karla cared for Jackson, but I couldn’t tell if she was in love with him or if she simply considered him a good friend.

    Karla was there to ask him to travel again with her, but poor Jack was too busy with the paperwork for End Town.

    At that moment, I realized. Jackson never wanted to be the mayor of the town. In fact, he said it himself plenty of times too. But because everyone in town trusted him, he was the best option.

    However, now that the town had grown substantially and the number of people working to get all the paperwork done had increased, Karla thought she could take Jackson on an adventure.

    Noticing that Jackson was about to decline again, I stepped up and told him that he should go.

    Jackson was never supposed to stay in one place. He was an adventurer when I met him, so chaining him to a city or country just felt cruel.

    "But, who is gonna take on all this work, then?" he asked.

    "I’m sure we can find someone if we talk to the king," I replied.

    Melina and I were supposed to meet with the king in a few days since he wanted to reward us publicly for securing a mithril mine, so that could be a good time to bring it up to him.

    However, we ended up moving the meeting a few months after since we still had things we needed to do in End Town.

    Jackson said he would think about it as long as we got someone qualified and not a corrupt noble, so I told him to leave it to me, then asked if he knew something about crafting with mithril.

    Both Jackson and Karla explained that I would have to do it the traditional way if I wanted to craft anything with mithril. But I already knew that.

    I mostly asked to see if they had any tips or secrets when it came down to smithing, but Jackson said that practice was the only thing that could make me get good at it.

    I sighed. "Fine, I guess I just need to do trial and error..." I said.

    After leaving the office, I was intercepted by Vespera, who hugged me while saying how much she missed me.

    "I guess we did stay away from each other for some time. My bad..." I apologized to my companion, but the queen demon spider’s cold expression showed a smile as she lovingly rubbed her cheek against mine.