The Dungeon Conquerors: Journey to the Peak

This second garden was different as it was an underground garden with no sunlight. The only source of light was a special plant called "Doroto" which had fruits capable of generating light by consuming the energy of the earth.

The Rashaminthiam plant did not need sunlight to grow and the warm light of the sun was actually bad for it. So to make this plant grow one needed to prepare a dark area with nutritious soil. And even though this plant did not like strong light, it did need a little bit of light to function properly.

So this garden was specially created for only the Rashaminthiam plants.

That all important plants were located at the centre of the garden and were surrounded by several other kinds of plants. These plants were very useful and could increase the nutritional content of the soil around it.

There were a total of 5 Rashaminthiam plants and all of them had a few buds growing on them. Lauren's challenge was to make those buds to bloom.

If she failed to control her magic properly, the bud she was trying to bloom would be immediately destroyed. Even without turning into blooming flowers, those buds still had several uses in medicine and alchemy. So losing it was a wasteful thing.

So, to stop any and every one from trying and to control their loss, the Okniser family made a rule that if a person wanted to try blooming the bud, that person needed to give an amount of money to the Okniser family that was equivalent to the market price of an unbloomed bud.

This way only the people who were truly confident in making the flower bloom would take the test. Those buds were way too expensive for a casual person.

If one was able to actually make the flower to bloom, then that person would be rewarded very handsomely and his previously taken money would also be given back. Not only that but as the family had announced, that person would also be able to choose a single item from the family treasure vault.

That was exactly what Lauren wanted.

Lauren gave Maria a card that could be used to withdraw one hundred thousand zeni from the merchant guild. That was the payment that she needed to make and that money was given to her for this mission by her teacher. So Lauren herself was not going to face any losses even if she failed.

But obviously Lauren had no intention to fail and she was confident that she would definitely be able to bloom it.

...

After handing Maria the money, Lauren took a deep breath and started to concentrate. Lauren was actually able to truly make one of this type of flower to bloom in Utrena's garden. So Lauren's magic control was definitely at the needed level.

The only thing Lauren was worried about was the other minor factors like temperature or the availability of a natural enemy.

But all the worries turned out to be useless as Lauren was able to control her magic power easily. Even Maria was surprised as they had not seen anyone with such exquisite magic control in the last decade or two.

The flower was still not bloomed but if Lauren was able to mention her control and did not lose her concentration then it was just a matter of time before she would be successful.

Even if she somehow failed to make the current flower to bloom, Maria was still going to allow her to take the challenge once again even without any extra money.

After about 3 hours of continuous control of magic, finally a beautiful looking white flower appeared on the plant. This flower had a bell like shape and was also giving off a gentle light. It was a fully bloomed Rashaminthiam flower.

Maria was extremely happy and went to check the flower. After giving it a thorough check, she happily exclaimed that it was perfect. Hearing that Lauren gave a relieved smile and everyone else started to congratulate her.

Next Maria asked Lauren to come with her to meet with the head of the family. There she could negotiate a price to make other buds to bloom too. Obviously just making one bud to bloom was enough to get the mentioned rewards, but the Okniser family also wanted other buds to bloom too.

So they were going to offer her a special mission.

But Lauren was a little bit tired after concentrating for so long. So instead of meeting the family head immediately, she asked Maria to schedule a meeting the next day. As Lauren was only at the mithril rank, making this flower to bloom was quite taxing on her total mana reserve.

Maria agreed with this suggestion and brought all of Rein's group to the main mansion to show them their room. At first she offered everyone different rooms but they all refused and wanted a single large room.

Then she tried to give them two rooms, one for all the girls and another one for the only boy but she was rejected again.

Finally she gave everyone a large room to live in. Maria wanted at least Rein to have a single room and she was planning for some night crawling action. But her plan was wasted as all the girls were staying with Rein.

Obviously all the girls except Kagura spend the whole night having fun with Rein. As Rein did not need to sleep, the girls even took turns to spend some alone time with him. It was a satisfying night for everyone.

The next day, Lauren was taken to the deeper part of the mansion for her meeting with the family head. Rein was going to accompany her in this meeting. The other girls also wanted to go but taking so many people for a meeting was not good so Maria politely refused.

But still Kagura decided to go with Rein in her sword form. She had no intention of staying away from him for even a second, so she was staying in Rein's inventory. And with their network, All the girls were going to be connected anyway so it was not a big deal.

Maria took them to a large and imposing looking door and asked them to enter it. Then she closed the door and did not enter it herself. She had told Rein and Lauren about it before so they were not surprised.

For this family their head held a special meaning. So even the members of the family were not allowed to visit his chambers without any reason. Lauren getting a chance to meet him in person was actually a big deal and an opportunity that many would like to have.

After entering the room, they found an old butler there who bowed to them. This butler might look old, but he was actually an orichalcum rank powerhouse with the capability to kill most of the powerful adventurers.

He then guided the two of them toward a sofa and served them a cup of tea and some exquisite sweets.

After waiting for a minute or so, a man entered the room. Just as Rein had expected, he was the second strongest person of this family and a violet rank transcendental powerhouse. But none of his or her features were visible as that person was wearing a lot of clothing.

Rein was able to use his Eye of Truth to find out that this person was not male but a female. And after seeing her in such close proximity, he was also able to judge why she was covering her whole body.

This person also had an inherent special ability and this ability was passive. It was not something that helped her in battle but it was quite a powerful ability. It made her body to release a certain type of pheromone that could make anyone to have a positive impression of her.

But as her powers grew, the effect of the pheromones also grew. Instead of just giving a positive impression, it suddenly started to create lustful thoughts on everyone's mind who came closer to her. Over time this ability became a nuisance for her.

Currently no one below the level of a transcendental being was able to resist her pheromones.

That was the reason why she made minimum contact with the outside and even her family. And also the reason why she was dressed in such a way. She was also using a voice changing magical device as even her real voice had some charming properties.

"Miss Lauren, I'm Derotixa Luna Okniser and I really appreciate you coming to us taking on our challenge. After thinking about it I decided to directly give you the best possible treatment to show our sincerity. So the offer I'm going to give you is the best that my family can offer.

We will pay you 20 percent extra of the reward money of a single flower and I will also grant you permission to choose three things from our treasury instead of just one. What do you think ?"

It was actually a very good offer. So after thinking about it for a few moments, Lauren decided to accept it. Derotixa then gave her a contract and she signed it. With this this deal was done and both of the girls got ready to leave.

But then Rein spoke up for the first time in this meeting -

"Miss Derotixa, do you know there is a way to get rid of even an inherent special ability ?"

Hearing that immediately her whole body shook once. This bombshell that Rein dropped was definitely super effective on her.

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