“Young lady, you wouldn’t happen to be a Stonehel?”
Yaed asks Hilda, as we slowly walk through the underground waterway.
“Excuse me for not saying it earlier. Yes, I am Hilda Stonehel. My father is Rihalzam Stonehel, and I am an alchemist.”
Hilda seems to be on alert, but still introduces herself.
Yes, it makes sense for her to be on alert when a stranger correctly says her name all of a sudden. How does he know?
“I see I see. So that Rihalzam is a parent too. I guess a lot has changed in the fourth world. We’re here, excuse the mess.”
“You know my father!?”
Yaed’s room feels like a remodeled division of the dungeon. I see there are monster repellents too.
The transmuted monster repellent seem crude, but they work. And more importantly, they seem to have been made through a method I don’t recognize.
“Kind of, from last time. We worked together when I was president, but I’m sure he doesn’t remember.”
I think what Yaed says sounds strange. I can’t really make sense of it, but it doesn’t feel like he’s lying.
Maybe it’s just the delusions you’d expect from a hermit, but the orderly room, and crude yet functional transmuted items lead me to think it’s not.
I can tell that Hilda feels the same way. I feel like she’s pondering what to ask him next.
“…Is this dry glowing mushroom tea? It’s tasty.”
“That is good to hear.”
In the meantime, Yaed serves us tea, and Hilda tastes it.
I’ve never had glowing mushroom tea, but if I remember correctly, it’s pretty expensive.
“Do you grow it here?”
“Yes. I use it as materials to transmute magic items for illumination. And I use the leftovers to make tea.”
That’s when Hilda makes up her mind, and throws out a question.
“Hum, Mister Yaed, were you the president of the alchemist association? Excuse me, but I don’t remember seeing your name in the list of former presidents.”
“Figures.”
Yaed is unaffected by Hilda’s direct question.
He then looks at each of our faces in turn, like he’s trying to make sure of something.
“Oh well, fine. You can take this as the delusional ramblings of an old person. I died once. Done in by an armored salmon with wings. At that time, I had gone from a government official to president of the alchemist association. Rust and Rihalzam were there too. Well, Rust had quit before that happened.”
Yaed stops, and sips his tea.
“Then I died, and then suddenly, I was here. I went back to the time when I was a government official. And there were other differences too compared to last time.
And I was foolish enough to not keep my mouth shut about that time before I died, so people thought I was crazy, and I got fired. And then a lot happened, and now I’m living here.”
Yaed takes a deep breath.
“I made these transmuted items based on what I saw in my previous life. I guess I was jealous of alchemists. Now I understand that I wanted to try alchemy too.
That’s enough of old ramblings. Do you believe anything I said?”
He says that with a certain detachment, and it still doesn’t feel to me like he’s lying.
