Arcane Sniper [Matan’s Shooter]

‘I should save the location before I come back again. Arcane Sphere-‘

As he was digging through his bag, something caught his hand. An item that felt so strange due to its long absence, however, the potency of this item was firmly imprinted in Leeha’s memory.

Turning his back to the incoming lava lizards, Leeha stared at the giant lizard.

“Please, at least tell me your name! Before I die, I’d like to hear the esteemed name of our guardian deity.”

“What would you do knowing my name-“

“Arghh!”

In the moment as the giant lizard was about to open its mouth, Leeha threw something he had in his hand.

Something catchable with a fist slipped into the lizard’s maw.

It was obvious that the eyes of the lava lizards popped out.

“Skink! Skink! This brat attacked our guardian deity!”

“Kill him! Kill! Skink!”

The lava from the lava lizards shone brighter. The rapidly rising temperature could be felt even by Leeha.

Would he have to accept their ’embrace of death’ as it is?

‘Please, please, pleeeease!’

Leeha mumbled inwardly, stumbling backwards.

Suddenly, the heat from the giant lizard looming behind him was more oppressive than the impending lava lizards.

“Wa-wait! Give me some time-“

“Dare to make such a remark after attacking our guardian deity, Skink!”

Swoosh-!

Just as a lava lizard leaped towards Leeha, the alert he had anxiously been waiting for finally flashed.

‘Your Rare Seed of the Corrupted World Tree has been activated.’

‘Target: Monstrous Skink’

‘The target’s level is high. The duration of the effect has been reduced.’

‘Duration: 25 seconds’

“Skink- Sir Skink! Please ask them to stop!”

“All… stop.”

Skink!

The monstrous Skink from the lava lizards heard Leeha’s words.

At a single word of command to halt, the leaping lava lizard also forcibly twisted its body to land in an unstable posture. The command of Skink, the guardian deity of their tribe, was that absolute.

Leeha swiftly spun around with wide eyes.

At the last moment, what he had thrown into Skink’s mouth was the Corrupted World Tree’s Seed!

The very same seed he had once obtained with Jin Gonggong in the old mainland.

‘Rare Seed of the Corrupted World Tree’ Effect: Able to control a monster for 6 hours after consumption.

Description: The spores released by the Corrupted World Tree onto all continents consume nutrients and put down deep roots. The plant that grows from the spore uses hypnotic powder to control surrounding creatures and move at its own will. It is said that the hypnotic powder is obtained from ground seeds.

‘An item with a 6-hour effect only lasts for 25 seconds?!’ He was rather fortunate that it lasted for even 25 seconds. It was preposterous to even conceive the idea of controlling a monster with a rare item from the start.

Leeha harbored a momentary resentment, but he had to quickly shake off such thoughts. Within merely 25 seconds, he had to understand everything and reverse the situation.

“Sir Skink! Do you have ‘Fire Flowers’ here?”

“Yes… We do.”

“How many, how many?”

“…I need to check the cultivation field.” Cultivation field?!

Then, it was not likely to be just one or two. Leeha immediately spoke up.

“Could you spare me just a few of those?”

“When the lava… cools… Fire Flowers… disappear.”

“What?”

“There’ll be… no fuel…”

“So you will promise me then! Once the lava is heated again, you will grant me the fire flowers!”

The gaze of Skink was changing every moment.The effects of the seed made themselves vividly clear. There was a dumb and stupefied expression when it had yet to take root, yet when a sudden sharpness would cut through the eyes, It was enough to make Leeha’s heart sink.

“Please! Hurry and respond, there is no time, no time!”

Clutching his anxious heart, Leeha alternately looked at the Lava Lizard and Skink. The moment Skink’s eyes seemed to flip, about to speak, a hologram window finally popped up in front of Leeha.

There wasn’t even time to leisurely read the quest request window. The remaining time was 3 seconds, 2 seconds –

“Accept! Accept!”

Leeha first hit the accept button in haste.

And then, a full 25 seconds passed by.

Complete light returned to the vertically slit eyes of the Skink. He looked at Leeha, who stood idly in front of him, with a furrowed brow.

“Erm, why didn’t this fellow die already? What were you guys doing?”

“Sk…Skink? Says the guardian god……”

“I- Ugh?!”

The giant lizard furrowed his brows.

Suddenly, with a headache, certain information was input into his brain.

“Er, so…you are saying if I rekindle the fire of lava until it flows perfectly, you’ll give me a fire flower?”

“Why would I make such a promise-? Why?” Skink cocked his head.

His closeness level with Leeha was still negative due to the killing of the Fuel Bats, but he did retain the memory of making a certain promise with her.

At least, he could not deny a quest content that had been accepted by the user.

“I shall do my best, Skink.”

Leeha gave a deep bow before Skink.

“Wait a minute! Why-”

A polite greeting was, of course, to hide a smile.

Bewildered Skink and even more confused Lava Lizards stared at Leeha with a puzzled look.

“Living here for a lifetime?”

“That’s right. That’s our mission. Managing the magma with Skink is our job.”

“Have you never been outside the volcano?”

“Sometimes there are curious ones who go to the place you have gone, but most of them return immediately. You are the first one to follow us swimming through the lava.”

“Hm.”

Given that the block itself has to pass through the lava river, there must be no such thing as exchange of goods. Leeha seemed to understand why this place was called the ‘Lonely Volcano.’

“Don’t you want to go outside? There are birds flying, trees, and blooming flowers-”

“Those things are not important.”

“What?”

“All those things are going to be consumed by lava anyway.”

“…Of course, that is true-”

“Then, there’s nothing more beautiful than lava.”

At the same time, he also seemed to understand why it had to an ‘Lonely Volcano.’

As long as their nature itself was set such, there was no need to touch their hearts with some unnecessary remarks.

‘So, being strong is the best? Some friends like Luger… would get along with them, I guess.’

User names like Igor and others briefly passed Leeha’s mind. Those who only care about being powerful would surely get along well with the Lava Lizards.

“Ah! By what name should I call you?”

“I’m number 107. You can call the ones behind me number 108, number 109, 110. We don’t have names.”

Once the Lava Lizards, including number 107, completely closed their mouths, Leeha quietly followed behind them.

‘Well, they still hold grudges. Still, once I clear this, they will be okay. Hehe.’

[Super-High-Temperature Furnace]

Instructions:

“Can you handle all the magma that circulates under the ground? Fortunately, you have spared a few Fuel Bats that still live but their excrement is not enough. They become adults in a month, but you have to heat up the magma right after 3 days. So, you have to find the way. The way to make the magma white-hot. If you can solve that, I will give you as many Fire Flowers as you want.” Skink, who is responsible for the ground’s magma, only worries about this. Let’s find a way to heat the [Magma Origin] of the Lava Lizard Block.

Content: Reach the [Magma Origin’s] target temperature (0%)

Reward: 2 Fire Flowers, Achievement – The One Who Manages Lava

Failure Conditions: Failure to heat the [Magma Origin] within 3 days

Upon Failure: [Lonely Volcano] Major Eruption, Earthquake and Magma Ejection at 10 Random Points within New Continent Erika, Common Reputation in New Continent -2,000, -50% Affinity with all paleos in the New Continent

What he thought was a simple quest, both the failure penalty and rewards turned out to be much larger than Leeha had initially expected.

As her current reputation across the New Continent was barely reaching around 400, a single failure could bring her down to -1,600.

‘And eruption of a volcano or random earthquakes… Well, rumors would spread that I caused those, and that could bring me notoriety.’

Failure was not an option.

Yet Leeha was confident in her own way.

The reward of Fire Flowers was as many as two, plus there was an unknown buff.

‘More than anything, I just have to raise the temperature to the target. They were burning bat excrement as logs? Then what about me?’

This was just the type of quest Leeha wanted. All he needed was money!

He could rush to the city of Gaza, buy all the items at the auction house that could be used as logs, throw everything inside and solve it quickly.

“Phew.”

“How foolish.”

“Hm, no, that’s not correct.”

After walking through what seemed to be the jointly owned cavern of the Lava Lizards for a while, something special began to appear before Leeha’s eyes.

From a hole far larger than the dwelling place of the skink, a soft red glow was being emitted.

“This place is…”

“It’s the Magma Origin. It’s our duty to throw fuel in here to heat up the magma.”

There was a hidden message in his words, implying that this task had been hindered due to Leeha. This was evident with Lava Lizards number 107 to 110 glaring at Leeha with hostile faces.

‘So vast. Of course, all the key origins or sources of things have to be structured like this.’

Leeha sneaked up to the edge of the circular hole and peered inside. You could see lava flowing far down at the bottom.

The architecture, size, and shape felt strangely familiar to Leeha. It was similar to the ‘settling tanks’ near the dragon palace.

“So, you just need to dump the fuel here carelessly?”

“Do you know how much energy a single piece of poop from the Fuel Bat possesses?”

“I don’t know that… but I can easily acquire as much coal as needed.”

Coal is an item that mid-to-low-level users in Middle Earth often collect through hard labor for money. If you are determined, you can collect thousands of pieces in no time at the auction house.

However, the Lava Lizard just snorted and didn’t give any further reply.

“Coal? The energy released when the Fuel Bat’s poop reacts with the magma is equivalent to more than ten tons of coal.”

“What?”

“If you collect around seventy pieces of poop from the fifty Fuel Bats that you killed, you would need to gather over 700 tons of coal. Do you think you can manage that?”

“700 tons?! You’re saying we need 700 tons of coal?”

Is that why the Lava Lizards were so desperate for the Fuel Bat? Does a single lump of poop produced inside the bat’s body possess the energy equivalence to ten tons of coal?

‘This is not the time to think of how rich I’d be if we had such a thing in real life!’

Leeha’s eyes widened as he stared at the Lava Lizards.

There was no room for jokes or leisure amongst these creatures who had to warm up the magma within the next three days.

“Can you do it?”

“Well, I have to try. For the safety and balance of the continent.”

The Lava Lizards nodded at Leeha’s words. Leeha saved the location and immediately moved to Gaza City.

“Paytor!”

“Yes, my lord.”

“How much do we have left in our vault?” Leeha rushed to find the butler NPC as soon as he opened the inner city gate. Even though hunting for the vault first seemed presumptuous, the NPC butler couldn’t resent Leeha. Thanks to User’s unique buff, the [Dignity].

Upon hearing Leeha’s question, Paytor quickly opened the vault door.

Before figuring out how to move over 700 tons of coal, Leeha first wanted to verify whether he had the funds to acquire it. Yet his initial plan seemed to fall apart right from the start.

“We have none.”

“……What? Where did all the money go?”

“For the next six weeks, the income for Gaza City will be zero.”

Paytor remained unflustered despite Leeha’s astounded expression, which only further befuddled Leeha.

“Why? Isn’t there some left-over from the basic income and expenditures- Oh, don’t tell me?!”

“That’s correct. You need to settle your debt with the lord of Castle Dale and master of the Hwahong guild…

“My surgical fee!”

There was no way there could be any money left. At least in terms of money, there was really nothing left that Hwahong could give Leeha.

Including the future revenue from Castle Dale, he still had to pay Hwahong the income of Gaza City for the next six weeks.

“……We’re screwed.”

Staring into the empty vault wasn’t going to spawn any money. With a vacant look on his face, Leeha stared at the vault.

Leeha: Blaugrunn-ssi!

There was only one person he could rely on now.