I obtained a new [Information Magic] and was in high spirits.
Now, what shall I do with this new power!
I imagined sort of things.
「Ah, onii-chan, found you.」
Aya and the others came.
「Aya, what happened? I told you to wait down there.」
「Since onii-chan didn’t come back quickly, we were thinking whether you have died or what and came here to look at the situation.」
「Seiji-sama, Aya-san was very worried.」
「Wait, Elena, I wasn’t worrying!」
Seriously now, it’s impossible for Aya to be worrying about me, perhaps, Aya was behaving misleadingly.
「Ah, you guys are Aya-chan, Elena-chan and Hilda-chan, huh. I wanted to see you.」
Oracle-chan speaks to the three people.
「Eh? Who’s this girl? She’s small!」
「I’m not small because among the Spirits, I’m big!」
「It’s Spirit-sama!」
Hearing that it’s a Spirit, Elena and Hilda knelt down immediately.
「Right! I’m the Spirit of [Information Magic]. It’s Magical Girl Oracle-chan~.」
「Oracle-chan is small and cute! Are those clothes sailor uniform?」
「I’ve told you already, I’m not small! These clothes were made using your world’s clothes as a reference~.」
Even though Elena and Hilda are kneeling, Aya is so over-familiar.
「It’s also good to be respectful like Elena-chan and Hilda-chan, but like Aya-chan, it’s also better to talk like a friend.」
「By any chance, Oracle-chan doesn’t have any friends?」
「Who’s a loner!?」
「Well then, I’ll be a friend of Oracle-chan.」
「Aya-chan, did you not hear what I said? Well, friends… alright, you may.」
Elena and Hilda were looking at Aya’s behavior with dumbfounded expression.
「Now then, you guys may visit the mana crystal, too.」
「Is it fine?」
「You guys are using the smartphone that were given to you in Seiji’s world, aren’t you? If you guys were using information familiarly like that, you will certainly be able to acquire [Information Magic].」
「Y-, Yes, I’ll certainly meet your expectations.」
Elena, you’re stiff.
Toward such a gal-like Spirit, you don’t need to humble yourself like that.
With this and that, the three people visited the mana crystal.
Aya acquired [Information Magic] level 2 while Elena’s and Hilda’s were level 1.
With this, the three of them will be able to acquire [Caution] magic.
This is good.
「By the way, Oracle-chan, now that everyone acquired [Information Magic], can you now tell me about the matter regarding Yurie-san?」
「Oh well, I’ll tell you! To tell you the truth, that black thing is a magic tool used to imprison Spirits.」
「Imprison Spirits? Then, is there any Spirit imprisoned inside?」
「That’s right, which Spirit do you think is imprisoned?」
Listening up to here, it’s easy to guess,
「It’s [Darkness], isn’t it?」
「Yes, that’s right, the [Darkness Spirit] is imprisoned inside that black thing. As for making the [Appraisal] ineffective, it’s the [Darkness Spirit]’s power.」
Like, using it to catch a Spirit, those guys of the Devil race are quite troublesome.
「In other words, if we released the imprisoned [Darkness Spirit], Yurie-san will go back to normal?」
「Right, just as you said~.」
「What should we do to release it?」
「We need various things and follow the necessary steps. There should be something called [Altar of Darkness] inside the stronghold of the Devil race. We need to locate that first.」
「The stronghold of the Devil race, huh. If I remember correctly, the Devil race is residing somewhere in the north, right?」
「That’s right, but I also don’t know anything aside from it being somewhere in the north.」
Hmmm, I should’ve located the stronghold of the Devil race beforehand.
Well, it’s useless even if I say it now.
「I should hurry and look for it, huh.」
「Onii-chan, I will help, too.」
「I will help, too!」「Me, too!」
◊♦◊♦◊♦◊
With that said, among the places we could go to, we went to the northernmost one.
That place is the [Sekabu Village].
There are probably a lot of people who had forgotten it.
This place is thought to be destroyed by the Demon King’s Army, but the truth is, the village was occupied by the Goblins.
「Onii-chan, are we going to search for the Devil race’s town from this place?」
「That’s right. We’ll split up around 1 km apart from each other and all search northwards at the same time. It’s Operation Roller.1」
Actually, I’d like to do it with a remote-controlled [Tracking Beacon], but since the movement speed of the [Tracking Beacon] is about the same as walking-speed, it would take time.
「If you find anything, take out a handkerchief and wave it to inform me and I’ll rush over immediately. Well then, let’s start searching!」
「「Yes!」」
I sent each of them to their respective starting point and with the four of us, the Operation Roller began northwards.
◊♦◊♦◊♦◊♦◊
The Operation Roller began and the four of us had differences in speed.
The fastest one is naturally me.
Since I’m using [Lightning Speed], I’m picking up a considerable speed.
Second is Aya.
Although she’s exerting herself to some degree, her speed is about half of mine.
Elena and Hilda are moving at approximately the same speed, about more than half of Aya’s.
I’m hesitant to make a girl act alone inside a forest, but the monsters inside this forest aren’t that much strong and everyone’s level has risen considerably, too, so they should be alright.
When I’m thinking about such things, Aya is fighting against a tiger-looking monster.
Is she going to be alright?
Aya defeated the tiger-looking monster with ease and put the monster’s corpse in the [Storage Bracelet].
She seems to be alright.
When the search continues for a while, I’ve seen Elena suddenly stops, takes out a handkerchief and waves it.
I stopped searching and rushed over to where Elena is.
「Elena, is something up?」
「Seiji-sama, please look at this.」
When I tried to look at the ground where Elena pointed at, there was a leaf that looked familiar for some reason…..
What’s this?
When I tried to use [Appraisal],
┌─＜Appraisal＞────
│【Mandrake】
│A plant which root can become an ingredient for various medicines,
│especially, using it when the root is dried.
│Rarity: ★★★★
└─────────
Among the ingredients of the Elixir, it’s the ingredient that became a bottleneck.
Moreover, this [Mandrake] has grown en ma.s.se with a considerable number.
If I use the [Earth Magic Stone] to nurture the [Mandrake], wouldn’t I be able to make Elixir as much as I’d like?
I patted Elena, who found it, a lot.
However, we weren’t able to find the stronghold of the Devil race with today’s search in the end.
1. Rōrā sakusen(ローラー作戦だ). Basically, a search operation.