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"Wow! The variety of people in the tower is incredible," Alma said.
"It is, right?" I asked. "Look at that painting guy."
"Painting guy?!" the painting guy groaned angrily. He looked like a lanky, slender punk painted with a sharp, long purple mohawk and angry red eyes. "Hey, Splex, who the hell are these? Are they our pre—"
Splex extended his hand and covered the painting guy’s mouth, stopping him from uttering another word.
"They are... our new recruits, don’t you ever dare enrage them, okay?!" Splex said, having realized we were not to be ssed with.
Good, but did that an they were planning to rob us or sothing?
"They don’t look all that strong to mine that root we found," the shark guy said. "A bunch of little, thin-skinned humans and so kids."
"Who are you calling a thin-skinned human?! I am a Vampire!" Partner said angrily.
"V-Vampire?!" the three leopard siblings gasped.
"W-Wait! Splex! Why did you recruit an Umbralheim vampire?!"
"If we ss with them, we’ll get in trouble!"
"They’re all even more dangerous than any thug we’ve worked with!"
"Wait, you’re from Umbralheim?!" Splex asked.
"No," Partner said. "Okay, so let us mine already, or we’re going to crush you and rob you, okay?"
"Partner, that’s not how you negotiate!" I said, facepalming. "Sorry about that, she’s not good at talking. Would you believe if I told you she used to be a skeleton? Haha."
"...The root is very hard, it’s covered with Diamonium," explained the red ant, the only one who seed serious about this job. "Not even we, who are Level 100, can crush that thing together, can you?"
"Well, I do wonder. Do you guys have a pickaxe?" I asked. "Wait, no, I do have one!"
I took one from my inventory as Splex led us inside the cave. As expected, they might have ambushed us at this mont, but Splex, the fool, had brought people too strong, so they didn’t even consider it.
Instead, we’d help them with their little heist.
"This?" I asked.
We arrived in front of a giant mass of red, purple, and orange crystals, glowing mysteriously and spreading through mysterious roots across the mountain’s depths.
"Wow, so pretty!" Alma said. "Are those precious materials?"
"Very, you can make a fortune if you extract everything here," the red ant said.
"Tch! Like hell you guys could even destroy this thing anyway!" the painting man said.
"Hey, Splex, can I eat them yet?" the shark man asked, tilting his head.
"N-No! Don’t even try it, you dumb fish head!" Splex scread, noticing us watching him shift his deanor. "A-Ahahah! He was just joking, okay? It was a joke, right?"
"Joke?" the shark man tilted his head again.
"h, Splex, I figured you were shady from the start," I said. "But I’m glad you didn’t try anything on us, so we won’t do anything to you or your friends. In fact, I’m quite interested in this fortune, so I’ll be taking it. I’m short on System Points, and it seems I can finally make more now that we’re out of my world... So!"
I swung my pickaxe, channeling the power of my [Mining] Skill at Level 10.
And...
CLAAANK!
An explosion of force erupted from my swing, darkness engulfing the rock as huge cracks spread everywhere. The entire mountain trembled, the crystal shattered, and thousands of sharp pieces fell.
"Uwaaagghhhh!"
The thugs beside us scread in horror as the tsunami of sharp crystals rained down, only to be shielded by my Aura as I stored all the crystals in my Inventory.
"W-What? Huh?! We’re fine?" the painting man asked.
"Hey, they took most of the crystals!"
"That woman’s got a black hole inside her or sothing!"
"So scary! Who is she?!"
The three leopard siblings were pretty funny, to be honest.
"Hmm..." the burly red ant knelt and grabbed a large chunk I left behind, along with a few others. "Thank you for your help, this should be enough to buy food for a while."
"Hey, what are you doing?! Aren’t we going to take what she stole from us?! We found this place first! I’m not going to be satisfied with crumbs!" the painting man said. "You’re on!"
"Wait, you stupid idiot, stop!" Splex cried, trying to stop him, but the painting man rushed to attack, touching the floor with his hand.
"{Canvas: Color Extraction}!"
FLASH!
Suddenly, his magic power spread everywhere, colors draining from our surroundings, turning them white and gray.
The colors gathered above him, shaping into new forms, creatures, floating weapons, and even elents.
"{Canvas: Paint Embodint}!"
"Wow, that’s really amazing!" I said.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
As I was bombarded with attacks, I walked through them with ease, unscathed.
At the end of the day, they were still magic, and I had strong magic defense.
But they also possessed so fascinating molecule- and reality-altering properties.
The thing is, I’m a being of the void, maybe soone else would have died easily, but not .
"Sorry about that, but it won’t work," I said with a smile. "I’m feeling nice today, so I won’t kill you. But please, never do that again." I patted his shoulder, which felt like touching paper. "Anyway, where do you co from?"
"H-Huh?!" the painting man gasped, glaring at us in disbelief. "I-I... Uhhh... I co from Floor 36..."
"Alright," I nodded. "Okay, Splex, we’ll be going, so just behave, okay?"
"I... okay..." Splex muttered.
"Oh, right, can you give the key?" I asked.
"T-The key?!" he gasped. "I..."
I handed him a slightly larger chunk of the crystals; I had enough to fill an entire stadium anyway.
"Co on, give it to . Or I’ll just take it from you," I said.
"Y-Yes!" he said, quickly grabbing the crystal and handing the cube with all its contents. "P-Please keep everything!"
"Okay~ Bye!" I said as we flew away.
"Why did you bring soone like them here?!"
"Are you out of your mind, you stupid sli?!"
"We could have gotten killed if they weren’t weirdly nice to us!"
"That woman swung her pickaxe, and the crystals we’ve been trying to mine for days crumbled instantly! How strong is she?!"
"At least a Player who has reached Floor 70. At the very least."
"Splex, you owe us money for emotional damage and other reparations now."
"What the hell are you even talking about?!"
We could hear the rest of his team yelling at Splex and reprimanding him for what he brought along, but well, everything went so well, so why were they angry?
Huh, so people at our Level are mostly around Floor 70? Well, that’s their estimation based on that attack alone.
"Maria, how many crystals did you take? That was a massive haul..." Lucifer said. "Are they really that valuable?"
"Only one way to find out," I said. "Let’s go sell so!"
We flew down to the large festival surrounding the temples. There were about ten temples and only stalls, the rest was all forests, with no houses or anything of the sort. All these Spirits seed to just live around here and do nothing but sell stuff.
We found a stall that seed to be buying and selling crystals of all shapes and sizes, and as I approached the owner, another cute spirit, I showed him a small crystal.
"How much is this crystal?" I asked him.
"Huh?! Wait, isn’t that a crystal from our mountains? How did you get your hands on it, outsider?" he asked angrily.
"Uuhhh... You didn’t see anything," I said, waving my hand, pink light covering his head and making him forget our interaction.
"Hm? Welco! Do you want to buy sothing?" he asked.
"Actually, you’ll tell us what this is and how much it costs," I said, waving my hand again.
"Yes, a piece of Diamonium of this quality and spiritual essence is highly valuable. This crystal is often used to create Upgrade Ingots and Gems that can make weapons and armor super strong!" the spirit said. "This small piece should be worth about ten thousand System Points. 100 grams are usually sold for a million!"
"Huh, so... Hmm," I said, checking my inventory. "Whew, this is a lot. How much for, like... ten tons?"
"Ten tons? Yes, that would be around a hundred million or more!" he said. "Hmm, no, perhaps two hundred... I can’t say for sure."
"Oho, that sounds very generous!" I said with a nod. "Can you buy it from us?"
"I could," he said. "But I don’t have enough System Points to afford it!"
"Okay, that’s fine," I nodded. "We’ll be going then."
"Looks like the quantity you want to sell is way too huge," Jonathan sighed. "I wonder if we could find another way to sell it? Do we need that many System Points?"
"Yeah, they’re essential for everyone to beco stronger," I said. "I also want to use them for our friends back on Yggdrasil once we get there... and also on Earth. Well, let’s enjoy a day here, then we’ll continue our journey, alright?"
"Sure!" Alma said. "I’m honestly a little hungry, the sll of the food around here is really tempting... But is it true it all costs System Points? How do I know how many I have?"
"You can check your status by just thinking of the word in your head," I said. "Everyone should be able to see how many Points they have by now."
A thing I thought was exclusive to my System turned out to be a tower-wide currency. It seed my System had been preparing for this mont my entire life.
"Oh! I have... I have ten thousand! Wow! How?" Alma said, surprised. "Is that a lot?"
"Not really..." I said. "But you’re new to the System, so that must be starting money. You earn more by leveling up and, apparently, by completing quests and slaying monsters, as Splex told us."
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