Chapter 179: Access Conditions Met
’I had no idea a place like that existed.’
Walfred nodded at the detailed explanation, his expression one of genuine fascination. Then he remembered the entry conditions for the Dimensional Exchange, and asked a question.
"Does that place have entry conditions too?"
"Yes, it does."
"What are they?"
"The independent dimensional realm, meaning the ten people in the world holding the most coins."
"...What?"
Walfred’s eyes went wide.
The Dimensional Exchange let anyone in with a mere 50,000 coins to their name. This was an absurdly strict condition by comparison.
"Because of that, people usually enter the Auction House as a guild. They funnel as many coins as possible to the guild master."
That would raise the odds of landing in the top ten. If you wanted to compete with other guilds or other nations, that was clearly the way to do it.
Walfred nodded.
Just then.
Ding!
-----
[Notice]
[Elma proposes a trade.]
[Trade item]: 883,931 coins
[Do you accept the trade?]
[YES] / [NO]
-----
Along with the sudden alert.
A message he never expected appeared.
Elma was handing over an enormous sum of coins, free of charge. Walfred looked at her, stunned.
"Wh, what is this? All of a sudden..."
"Like I said, funneling."
Elma’s reaction, by contrast, was calm.
She looked straight into his startled eyes and continued.
"Please accept it. And go into the Dimensional Auction House and buy something that’ll help bring down the White Whale."
Her expression was more serious than he’d ever seen it.
Her voice carried real resolve, and Walfred hesitated for a moment. Free coins were fine, but something about it struck him as inefficient.
So he asked the practical question.
"Wouldn’t it make more sense for you to go instead of me?"
He knew nothing about the Dimensional Auction House.
He hadn’t even known it existed until a minute ago.
Elma, on the other hand, talked like someone who had been there before. So wouldn’t it be more efficient for her to go in?
That was his thinking, but Elma shook her head firmly.
"I can’t."
"Why not?"
"Most of the items listed at the Dimensional Auction House come with a no-trade or no-transfer condition once you buy them."
"...Ah."
At that, Walfred understood.
Why Elma was funneling coins to him and sending someone with zero experience into the Auction House.
Now that he had the full picture.
Walfred accepted her generosity.
"All right. I’ll take it, and thanks."
"Yes!"
Elma broke into a wide smile.
She’d just handed over practically her entire fortune, and she looked relieved about it. He touched [YES], and the trade went through in an instant.
Then his balance appeared.
[Coins held: 2,005,733 coins]
His wallet had gotten very comfortable, very fast.
After confirming the sum, now up around two million coins, Walfred turned back to Elma. Another question about the Auction House had occurred to him.
"There’s one thing I want to ask."
"What is it?"
"How long does an auction take?"
It was an obvious question.
With the extermination looming, the auction had to take less than twelve hours. Otherwise the whole thing would be backwards.
The moment he finished asking.
Elma answered right away.
"Hmm, it varies each time. The shortest was around five hours, and the longest was about two days, I think."
"...Two days?"
Walfred’s eyes went round.
Even as a worst case, that was far too long.
"Wait, then what happens to the extermination..."
"Oh, that’s not a problem."
The instant he brought up the extermination.
Elma seemed to realize what he was worried about, and reassured him.
"Time flows differently in the Dimensional Auction House than it does here. A day there works out to about an hour here."
In other words, even if he burned two days in the Auction House, only about two hours would pass in reality. So there was no danger of being late.
He was still nodding in understanding when Elma murmured something that caught his attention.
"It’s the exact opposite of Eden’s trial."
The trial of the Eden System.
The gate every B-rank hunter had to pass through to ascend to A-rank. The moment he heard her say it, he felt a flicker of curiosity.
’If it’s the exact opposite...’
Then time in the trial space must run far slower than in reality. So just how slowly did it flow?
He was about to ask.
But he never got the chance.
"...! Ugh! Cough, cough!"
Elma suddenly doubled over, hacking violently. A moment later, dark red blood poured out between her cracked lips.
Splat! Splat, splat!
The blood soaked the pure white snow.
The moment he saw it.
Walfred’s expression hardened.
"Now that I think about it, you said you’d been poisoned."
"...That’s right. It happened while we were exterminating the Sea King Beast, through my own carelessness..."
She wiped the blood from her mouth.
Elma smiled bitterly. Then she gave him a brief explanation of the Deep-Sea Blood Venom, the lethal, unranked poison eating away at her body.
It was the worst kind of poison. The more she used skills or spent mana, the weaker her body became.
"There’s no treatment? No antidote?"
"No. Nothing known so far. Which means that no matter how hard I push, about twenty percent of my peak output is my limit."
She gave a self-mocking smile.
As if it were painful to be called an S-rank hunter when she couldn’t freely use a single skill.
He was watching her quietly.
And then a memory flashed through his mind.
"Ah."
Walfred suddenly remembered a piece of loot he’d shoved deep into his bag. He set the bag down on the ground.
"Hold on a second."
"Yes?"
Wait for what?
Elma watched, puzzled, as Walfred rummaged through the bag for a while and finally pulled out a deep blue heart.
’Found it.’
The gate boss he’d exterminated at Smathers Beach.
A B-rank Elite Monster, the Kraken.
The loot he’d secured after killing it: the Kraken’s heart.
-----
[Name]: Kraken’s Heart
[Rank]: Rare
[The heart of a frozen sea creature brimming with vitality.]
[When consumed, it can neutralize poisons of the frozen sea, azure sea, or deep sea. The effect is reduced if the poison is A-rank or higher.]
-----
The Kraken’s heart was a kind of antidote.
The poisons it could neutralize were listed as those of the frozen sea, azure sea, and deep sea. And the poison Elma was suffering from was called Deep-Sea Blood Venom.
’They both have "deep sea" in them, so...’
Maybe this could get her body back to normal? True, it said the effect was reduced against anything A-rank or higher.
Still, better to bet on a slim chance than to let the thing rot in his bag. With that in mind, he held the Kraken’s heart out to her.
"Here, take it."
"What’s this...?"
She looked at him quizzically.
A moment later, having accepted the heart almost on reflex, Elma checked its details and finally nodded.
"Ah, the heart of a frozen sea creature."
She said it like she knew exactly what it was.
Seeing that, Walfred asked immediately.
"You’ve eaten one before?"
"This is my first Kraken heart, but I have eaten similar hearts, yes."
She admitted it readily.
And yet the poison was still with her, which meant...
"So it doesn’t cure it?"
"No. Though it does weaken the poison and restore my condition quite a bit, temporarily."
"How much does it restore?"
"A heart from a B-rank Elite should bring me back to about half my peak."
The moment she finished answering.
Elma held the Kraken’s heart back out to Walfred and bowed her head politely.
"I’m sorry. You were kind enough to think of me, and..."
"No, I’m giving it to you. Just eat it."
"Are, are you sure?"
Elma asked back, looking surprised.
Walfred nodded without a word. He had no real use for it anyway, and more to the point, she’d just handed him a small fortune in coins.
’Besides...’
If it could get her back to half her peak, that would help in the extermination. So he passed over the Kraken’s heart without a second thought.
"Thank you. I’ll gratefully accept."
With heartfelt thanks.
Elma bowed her head politely.
Then she began biting off small pieces of the Kraken’s heart and chewing them thoroughly.
A little while later.
Gulp!
"Well?"
"...It doesn’t taste good."
That wasn’t what he was asking about.
He let out a dry laugh at the non-answer, and she gave an awkward smile of her own, as if to say she was joking. Then she offered a proper reply.
"It went as expected. I’ve recovered about half."
"Then..."
"Yes. I should be able to help out at least somewhat in this extermination."
It wasn’t a full cure, but her strength was partly back, which was better than nothing.
Her color had improved quite a bit, too.
Walfred grinned. And just as his conversation with Elma was wrapping up.
Ding!
Along with the familiar alert tone.
-----
[Hunter Shop: Dimensional Exchange-Open]
[Access conditions met.]
[Would you like to connect now?]
[YES] / [NO]
-----
The message he’d been waiting for appeared.
The rare shop that opened on no fixed schedule.
The Dimensional Exchange was announcing that it was open for business.