I Became a 6★ Gacha Character

376 - Hammer, Anvil, and Enhancement Stone 1

TL/Editor: raei

Schedule: 5/week

Illustrations: Posted in discord

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Season 2 hadn't changed much drastically, and days passed just like that.

Quantity over quality, quality over quantity. Both sayings fit as the Empire's people poured in droves. Of course, it wasn't just mid-rank and above who crossed over from the Empire to the Kingdom.

Perhaps because the Tower, where the temple forces and Kingdom's knights were stationed, seemed safer than the monster-infested northern Empire. The market was packed every day of the week as low-rank adventurer hopefuls flocked in to mine mana stones while fighting goblins.

Of course, as the number of low-rank adventurers increased, so did the number of blockheads and F-ranks, leading to more incidents. But proportionally, it hadn't increased that much.

"Ugh, it's so crowded. Should we really move to the 50th floor?"

"I heard they rushed in and perfectly restored the city in just a week."

So the talk among the group was about moving to the 50th floor. For Irene, it took less than 5 minutes using the gate to get to the temple, and since Han Se-ah was gifted the mansion, the rest of the group didn't have mansions in the city anyway, so it was worth considering.

No matter how many high-rank adventurers from the Empire had flooded into the Tower, it would be less crowded than the city full of low-rank adventurers, mercenaries, and laborers.

As Han Se-ah casually brought it up, Grace and Irene immediately nodded in agreement. Perhaps it was because they kept getting lewd looks now that there were so many dark-skinned men around. They seemed to like the idea more intensely than expected.

Of course, I was in favor of it too. After facing the berserk ogre on the 51st floor, it seemed our party members could no longer breeze through.

"We should definitely move our quarters to the 50th floor. It'll be a good chance to upgrade our equipment too."

"Equipment upgrades? Ah, the stone dwarves' mana stones and enhancement stones."

-Yeah, looks like they're seriously lacking damage against ogres

-Isn't this the Roland Ballista party anyway? Wanna make a tougher Roland Ballista?

-Come to think of it, weren't the stone dwarves going crazy selling enhancement stones and stuff? Why haven't they done anything with those?

-Why? Because the bomb addict only looked at bombs instead of enhancement stones lololololololol

-Enhancement stones have a chance of failure, but bombs always explode, so aren't bombs 100 times better? No? Yes?

Come to think of it, we didn't know what the reward for this 50th floor was. Usually, there were gate usage rights, magic items from the Magic Tower, various factions offering support, and players getting an extra system assist.

This time, we were in a frenzied state when clearing the 50th floor, and when I opened my eyes, we were already in a carriage heading to the Empire. The patch also made time fly by.

But one thing was for sure - our group's equipment hadn't been upgraded yet. Of course, that was natural since we had a bomb maniac who only took bombs instead of enhancement stones from the stone dwarves.

No matter how good bombs were, now that enhancement stones were out, we should upgrade our equipment. Otherwise, we'd be losing our fundamentals as RPG users.

...Though watching Han Se-ah throw bombs made me wonder if this was really an RPG.

"Then we can earn money exploring the plains for a while, and use that to have the stone dwarf artisans upgrade our equipment on the 50th floor."

"But these equipments were made by the Magic Tower. Can the stone dwarves really upgrade them?"

"Given their skill with equipment, the stone dwarves are probably better than the Magic Tower's mages... so it should be possible."

As we chatted about this and that, pushing through the bustling market towards the 50th floor gate, the streets became a bit less crowded. Most novice adventurers headed to the 10th floor, and merchants used the 40th floor gate to the Harpy Kingdom, so the 50th floor gate was relatively quiet.

Following behind a merchant group paying the gate usage fee, Han Se-ah presented her adventurer's badge. The gate managing mages bowed their heads and let us through.

I guessed free gate usage rights were included in the 50th floor clear benefits this time too. But gate usage rights were pretty standard, I wondered what other rewards there were? Probably something related to the Harpy Kingdom or Empire.

"The streets are... so clean. As expected of the stone dwarves, I suppose?"

"Yeah. This street was definitely destroyed when the knights charged in"

Passing through the gate without a hitch, my vision cleared with a familiar sensation. Was the gate on the 50th floor connected to the Harpy Empire's plaza instead of the underground city?

Harpies flew overhead, leaving only shadows and dust as they disappeared, while stone dwarves bustled about chattering excitedly. It seemed Empress Podarge was ruling the empire better than expected. Though her method was terror politics, eliminating unbelievers who hated humans.

Still, thanks to that, restrictions on stone dwarves seemed to have been lifted, as they walked around freely with not a shadow on their faces. Deeply rooted hatred couldn't be helped, but the stone dwarves called harpies 'flappers' and didn't think highly of them either, so... well, they'd figure it out.

"So, shall we find lodgings first? On a long-term contract for a few months."

"Today, instead of going to the 51st floor, it might be better to look around the 50th floor."

"True... if we're going for a long-term contract, that would be better. There's no point in staying on the 50th floor if we end up with an inconvenient location."

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Raei Translations

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The sudden start of choosing lodgings on the 50th floor.

Given the need to balance enhancement stone farming in the highland area with exploring the 52nd floor, viewers' interest heated up intensely.

When a streamer played an RPG game, even for a single item, all sorts of advice popped up - this option is good, that's a waste of money, you're a noob if you skip this option, and so on. If there was so much advice for ordinary items in a regular RPG game, now that they'd started looking at real estate in a virtual reality game, the fervor was beyond words.

-If you're gonna upgrade, wouldn't it be better to be closer to the underground city?

-Just get lodgings in the underground city? It's not like you'll get depressed from not seeing sunlight, and there's no point in considering southern exposure here

-No lol if you stay in the underground city you'll have to climb cliff rocks every time you go up to the 51st floor, so annoying

-Why are there so many children of darkness ffs lol Are you crazy to get lodgings underground?

-Yeah, you should just go underground for upgrades, wtf lodgings underground lol

"Hey now, you know if you get too immersed and speak too harshly, you'll get cut off, right? It's not me doing the cutting, but when the cutting-edge AI teacher starts slashing, even I can't protect your neck. And thinking about the route, above ground seems better than underground," Han Se-ah warned.

[Pro Home Keeper 32Years donated ₩10,000!]

Good sunlight is useless, hard to sleep lol

[James MKer donated $50!]

Koreans always want sunlight, but in our neighborhood you'd end up as well-done BBQ

[Legendary Home Security Donated ₩30,000!]

Isn't there a stone dwarf district left in the Harpy capital? Seems like settling there would work

The situation where a single word determined the world's #1 lodging location. Now that it was the 52nd floor, and there was no way they'd build a mansion on that green plain enduring goblins, the 50th floor lodgings would likely be maintained for a while. Perhaps that was why not just the chat, but donations started going wild too.

Dollars, yen, euros, and even the streaming site's common coins. At this point, it seemed like Han Se-ah had sharply caught on to the money-making angle, given how excited the donations were getting.

Some guys even brought photos about feng shui and started comparing cities, to which some Western nerds responded by bringing reconstruction images of the 50th floor city, restored from the aerial view briefly captured during the last Harpy Empress boss battle, pointing out key locations.

...A 3D reconstruction? Were they insane, for real?

"By the way, I wonder if there are any suitable places for lodgings?"

"Harpy lodgings won't have ceilings, so how about we check out the stone dwarf district?"

"True, the stone dwarf brothers' workshop street did have a similar feel to human buildings."

While Han Se-ah smiled contentedly, struck by a money storm amidst the donation tempest, our group chatted. Harpy mansions definitely had issues for human habitation, like no doors on the first floor or open ceilings.

Even if there were doors, they were for stone dwarf slaves or human laborers, so the first and second floors were often not connected. So what we needed to find was a stone dwarf-style building between the underground and the 51st floor gate.

Among the countless nonsensical opinions showered on Han Se-ah, if you picked out only the sensible ones, there were some similarities to our party's opinions.

"Hmm? Aren't those the Squishy Heroes?!"

"You're right? The Squishy Hero has returned!"

Thinking that, we headed towards the stone dwarf district in the Harpy Empire, a place that used to be a slave management office but was now liberated as a workshop street. Some stone dwarves came rolling towards us.

Sounds of gravel grinding, stones rolling ta-da-dak, even clapping sounds like pak-pak. As they made such a commotion, curious harpies flew overhead, startled, and fled. From far away, a stone dwarf shouting in a shrill voice came running.

Who was it... the only apprentice of the stone dwarf who built the city, who was with Laurencia... but I couldn't remember the name.

"Ah, Granny Shasha!"

"Yes, big Squishies. What brings you here again?"

Ah, it was Granny Shasha.

As Irene, with her good memory, started chatting with a bright smile, the stone dwarves who crowded around also read the mood and quietly started to listen.

"You're looking for lodgings to stay in?"

"I'll! I'll build it for you!"

"You little runt, what are you saying? When it comes to buildings, I'm the one!"

But that silence didn't last long.

When they heard we were looking for lodgings, instead of thinking about showing us around, they were full of ideas about demolishing empty workshops and building new ones. Looking at this, I wondered if I really lacked sensitivity towards other races.

"Everyone shut up! They're my guests, so I'll build it," Granny Shasha declared firmly.

And seeing that even Granny Shasha didn't stop them, even more so.

Han Se-ah's expression twisted in bewilderment as she ended up being forced to buy a building out of the blue.

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