Rot Heart: A LitRPG of Rot Magic in an Ancient World (Book 1 completed)

129 - Ahead of Us



The dim magical lights of the eastern cellar cast steady shadows on the rough stone walls. Under the hill of Trabine, Div and Lugsellos looked into each other's eyes. Neither saying anything.

"Lug, why are you not answering?"

Lugsellos looked down. "I'm putting my words together. One moment."

Div nodded, and silence settled once again, only broken by the subtle yet constant creaking coming from the thousands of wooden barrels stored in the room.

Lugsellos looked up again, meeting Div's gaze. He opened his mouth. "Interrogations."

"Was that the word you were looking for?"

Lugsellos shook his head. "There's no nice way to put it. The elders have drafted me to participate in the interrogation of prisoners."

Div let his friend's words settle into his head. "I didn't know we had caught prisoners."

"Is that so surprising? No doubt the mountaineers have some of us in captivity, too."

"I guess," Div muttered. "And they're using your special skills to extract the truth from them?"

Div had seen firsthand how effective Lugsellos' skillset could be in that situation. It made sense for the elders to make use of it. They needed every advantage they could get, especially now that the village was surrounded.

Lugsellos acquiesced. "That's right."

"So, torture… Are you holding up? Did they ask you if you agreed?"

Lugsellos stepped forward and put a hand on Div's shoulder. He bent his leg a little to bring their faces to the same level. "I'm not torturing anyone. There are people here who are much more skilled than I will ever be. All I'm doing is controlling how sincere the answers are, and using my evolved skill to radiate an aura of trust."

"Is it working?"

"Well, I'm perfectly capable of detecting lies. It doesn't tell us if the information is true, but it's better than nothing. As for my attempts to use Empathic Resonance to make our subjects talk faster… Let's just say the effects are subtle."

Div nodded. "Evolved Rank skills are complicated."

Lugsellos smiled. "I've heard about your little adventures."

"It wasn't on purpose."

"I know."

Div asked again. "So, are you alright?"

Lugsellos removed his hand from Div's shoulder. "I'm fine. Nobody's forcing me. They might if I refused, but I'm perfectly willing to participate. There'll be few such opportunities to level my skills. I've already reached level 2."

Div wasn't sure what to make of it, and it didn't help that his friend could read him like an open book. At least, Lugsellos had the tact not to comment on that.

"Don't forget to come home from time to time," Div said, tentatively.

"I don't want to hear that from you. Particularly as you're about to hole up in this cellar, my guess is that you'll be there for days, milking all the experience you can from these rotting fish."

Div opened his mouth, ready to retort. Then, he closed it again. Lugsellos wasn't wrong.

"Now that we're both Evolved Ranks," Lugsellos continued. "The next step is ascension. It's unlikely we will make it, but I'm unwilling to let it go without even trying. More importantly, we're at war; all our efforts must be put toward that."

"You're right, Lugsellos." Div sighed. "We must win this war, but I still wish we'd heard from you earlier. It's been weeks."

Lugsellos paused, silent.

Div knew his words were superfluous, for Lugsellos could sense how he felt.

Finally, after long minutes spent contemplating, Lugsellos spoke. "Being around you and the others is hard. Div, I can sense everything, all your doubts, anxieties, fears, and desires. It's not new, nor is it going anywhere, but it's exhausting. Please understand that I need a break from time to time."

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"Isn't it the same with everyone else?" Div asked.

"It is, but I don't have to care for them the same way I do for you and Genno."

Div nodded slowly. He understood, as much as someone outside Lugsellos' situation could understand.

Without exchanging many more words, Lugsellos and Div parted. The former returned to his interrogations, leaving the latter alone in the underground vault.

Div lingered in the silence. A hollowness gnawed at his chest. Lugsellos had always been the stable one, the kind who could shoulder burdens without breaking, a pillar upon which he and En had leaned over and over. But now…

He felt inadequate, like he couldn't do the same for him. The truth was, since En was gone, Div didn't need Lugsellos as much.

He paused, forcibly suppressing this thought. He didn't even want to go down this way, and if Lugsellos caught a whiff of that…

Feeling guilty and powerless, Div sighed, then shook his head with vigor. Ruminating over Lugsellos wouldn't do any good. He had rotting fish to take care of, and not a small amount.

The air in the cellar was thick with brine and decay. Every breath tasted like old seawater.

"They really went heavy with the salt," Div whispered. "Those fish are not even from the sea."

He stretched his arms as much as the low ceiling allowed him to and returned to the first barrel. Fish, salt, and fungus blended into a pungent paste. Once more, he dipped his finger inside and brought it to his mouth.

As he tasted the fruit of his labor, he couldn't help but let a cough escape from his throat.

Salty. It was extremely salty.

While the fungus was resistant to salt, it hadn't reduced the high salinity of the barrel. Originally meant to prevent the fish from rotting, the salt content was way too high for fermentation.

He'd pushed through it, combining his skills and the special properties of the fungus, but it didn't make for the most palatable experience.

Granted, it would be better with bread or using the paste as a cooking base, but he believed he could improve the recipe.

If he was going to spend days going through each barrel here, he might as well make the paste the best he could.

Div closed the barrel and fetched a fresh one. Well, 'fresh' wasn't exactly accurate since the fish inside was infected by fungus and slowly rotting away.

After thinking it over for a moment, Div opened a third barrel and got to work on his salt removal plan. His first idea was to simply manually remove salt from the barrel. To do so, he scooped it from the first into the second while moving the fish from the second into the first.

It wasn't complicated, but it was extremely tedious. At least, the cellar was equipped with wooden scoops, so he didn't have to use his hands for the salt.

Since the first birthday he spent in Camboaci, Belilamos and Carmeta had regularly replaced the gloves they had gifted him as his hands grew in size. Still, even with his hands protected, moving salt with them wouldn't be convenient.

After working for a longer time than expected, Div had finally emptied the salt of the first barrel and the fish of the second.

The salt-to-fish ratio had been so high that he could fit the fish from three barrels into one.

"I'd better try with smaller quantities before I commit to that…" Div muttered as he pondered how much salt he should add to his concoction.

Each fish was already imbued with salt, but for the paste not to spoil, he decided to err on the side of caution. For each fish, he added two full scoops of salt.

"Okay," Div said, talking to himself. "Now that I've done everything I could on the mundane side of things, let's see what my skills are telling me."

The rot-attuned mana concentration didn't look much different, but he could see that the reduced salt content had allowed the fungus to accelerate. It wasn't completely immune to salt, merely resistant.

Div nodded and started shaping the mana. He had expected his new skill, Coax Rotlife, to remove any need for spells, but it wasn't exactly the case. As he watched the mana move under his will, he had the distinct impression that the correct way to use his skill was to let it guide him as he weaved his magic.

In a way, it was like having the teacher Div sometimes yearned for. Coax Rotlife inspired him to make minor adjustments in the flow of his mana that would improve the quality of his spells. It was like reading a grimoire directly from his subconscious. Humbling, as he now noticed an uncountable number of flaws in his spellcasting. Yet empowering, as he now knew how to fix them.

It was almost exhilarating. The more flaws he could find, the more he could fix. He wasn't experimenting blindly anymore, but moving with intent, purpose.

It no longer mattered that no one else knew rot magic. The world had heard his plea and gave him what he needed. A way to improve.

It would only work on spells that were centered on influencing rotlife, but coincidentally, that was his entire repertoire.

He only knew two spells, but still. He could worry about other forms of rot magic once he mastered the one centered around controlling rotlife.

Quietly, the fish started breaking down under the gentle touch of the pacified fungus. Soon, Div had a finished product inside the barrel.

There wasn't much, but it was there, sitting at the bottom. Div revised his estimate; he could probably fit six or seven barrels worth of fish inside a single barrel. Once turned into mush, fish were a lot more compact.

Div was about to stop when Coax Rotlife birthed a final thought inside his head. Now that the fish had turned into paste, he had to change the fungus' behavior once again. Otherwise, the paste would quickly turn into a liquid.

Adding more salt would work, but as he tried the mixture, he realised it was still slightly too salty. His Preserve spell wasn't suited for the task. It was too crude, merely directing the rotlife away.

But he didn't want to remove the fungus. His experience with cheese told him it would degrade the paste's taste and conservation. His Preserve spell was meant for fresh products, not fermented ones.

Div needed a new spell. One that would slow the fungus down so it preserved the paste instead of ruining it.

And Coax Rotlife was the perfect skill to help him achieve that.

Skill leveled up: Coax Rotlife Lv1 -> Lv2


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