Volume 3 Chapter 14.2 (1/2)

Volume 3 Chapter 14.2

Translator: Reflet

Editor: Weasalopes

「Well, maybe not Haruna, but wouldn’t Tatsuya be a good brake for Hiroshi if they go together？」

「I’m not confident I can totally stop him, but hey, I can try. If Hiro gets caught up on something then I feel it might have something to do with us.」

「Although I don’t think we’ll have enough time to take another detour.」

「Haruna, c’mon. You wouldn’t stop him even if you knew that.」

「Depending on the circumstances.」

Makoto interjected as she stopped the car for the inspection, and Haruna replied with a seriously unreliable answer. Hearing her say that, Tatsuya and Makoto were beginning to give up on preventing detours.

「But the more I look at this place, the more I realize how huge it is.」

「Definitely bigger than Lake Biwa.」

「So what are we looking for？」

Taking permission from one of the people involved, Hiroshi, Tatsuya, and Haruna had come to look around the oasis near the temple. No one was in the area where they arrived, but since bathing was allowed in the bay-like area on either side of the temple, there were many people in the area once the sun set.

「Well first we gotta check water quality, but when it’s this big……」

「Don’t get any ideas about diving underwater and looking for ruins？」

「Nah, we don’t got no permission, plus I ain’t got the guts to do that.」

Hiroshi immediately responded to Tatsuya’s comment. To turn his reply inside out, Hiroshi meant that if he had the permission then he would have no problem diving right in to search for ruins.

「But it’s true that I’m super interested in this here oasis. How should I put it, it’s like the mana or air is extremely different, mate.」

「Maybe that’s because there’s a temple here?」

「Maybe so, but this is a temple of a fire god and there’s water near it with a special aura. Why’d that be?」

As soon as they heard the water had a special aura, Haruna and Tatsuya found themselves exchanging glances.

「I dunno how the oasis is here without evaporating, but if we look at the feng shui or geological features around us, it just ain’t sit right with me that a lake of this size exists. Plus……」

「Plus？」

「The town’s gotta be bigger if they got this much of a water resource. Instead, this town ain’t even as big as Ortem. Even if their surroundings’re all desert not suitable for farmin’, the town should still easily have enough water ‘n food to grow larger than Ortem.」

Attentively listing the things he found suspicious from pure observation, Hiroshi scooped up a cup of water for the water quality inspection. After checking it in many ways, he concluded

「It’s drinkable without any modifications. Also, maybe cuz it’s next to a temple, it seems to be in a holy water-like state.」

「Huh？」

「Well, it’s only a little bit, so it ain’t gonna have the same effect that the special holy water Elle made us did.」

They should probably expect it at this point, but wow, what a crazy discovery.

「Hey, can I ask you something？」

「Hm？」

「If we were to knock Barold into the water, would it damage him？」

「It ain’t that strong. His skin would sting but that’s about it.」

What a half-baked conclusion.

「Anything else you’re looking for？」

「Ton of things I wanna find out, but with the permission we got, all I can really do is……」

He dug up the roots of the grass at his feet, studying it before burying it back in the ground.

「Examine the plant life in this area.」

「So did you find anything different？」