Chapter 253: Yggdrasil’s Roots

A few months before Yggdrasil grew at Halt’s mansion —

The mansion’s bath’s drainage pipe broke.

Normally, the water from the bath would be released as sewage into the river nearby after passing through the septic tank.

However, after the plumbing broke, the water leaked into somewhere else.

Tina was in charge of the mansion’s management, so she headed towards the cellar to inspect the degree of impact it caused.

Various food and stocks were stored inside the storage in the cellar of Halt’s mansion.

Fortunately, the leakage didn’t reach the storage.

“...The food is safe for now.”

Tina confirmed that the food ingredients weren’t affected, so she opened the door of the stockroom and took the stairs that were ahead. She went deeper underground.

There was a vast space underneath the cellar stockrooms.

This was the space that Tina created with earth magic so that Halt could have a place to train.

Tina knew back then that somebody had transmigrated into Halt’s body. She was also aware that he would train in magic behind her back.

He was hiding a secret that he couldn’t share even to her — but still, Tina was willing to patiently wait until Halt was ready to open up about his secret.

She hoped that Halt would turn out to be the Guardian Hero, and she anticipated it.

However, she was afraid to confirm the truth.

She waited for him for a hundred years.

That’s why she believed that it wouldn’t hurt to wait for a bit more.

He just recently transmigrated, so his memories were probably not yet stable. She decided to believe that someday, there would be a trigger that would awaken his memories of her.

That’s the reason why even though Halt was already admitted to the academy of magic, she still secretly created this space for him so that he could train his magic.

Of course, she repeatedly reinforced the walls and ceiling with layers and layers of defense magic as thickly as she could.

This underground space was created by a Level 250 Magic Swordsman who was considered the strongest person in the entire world in the absence of a Hero, so it was definitely very sturdy.

However, Halt never used this place, in the end.

Halt was already using his magic to the fullest from the very first lesson he had after being admitted to the academy of magic.

Because of that incident, Halt vowed that he would never train his magic in secret.

— No, it was possible that he still wanted to practice magic secretly.

Nevertheless, Tina couldn’t let Halt use this space anymore.

That’s because the magic he cast was far stronger than the defensive magic barrier that Tina put up, even enough to wipe them all out.

For the sake of his safety, Tina decided to keep the existence of this space a secret from him.

　──＊＊＊──

Tina had also carefully waterproofed the underground space because of the possibility that it might get submerged by rain and inflow of groundwater.

Thus, ordinary rainwater and groundwater could not leak into this space.

However, the water leaking from the bath of the Ernol mansion wasn’t any ordinary water.

Mei, who’s power already belonged to the Spirit King class, had heated the water with Primordial Flame

When Seira, possessing the power of the saintess, entered the water, it obtained the properties of holy water.

Not only that, the body fluids of the nine-tailed fox, dragonoid, and even the demon king were mixed into it, transforming it into water that could store copious amounts of mana.

If someone who lacked mana entered this bath, his mana would be completely replenished, but if somebody who had excessive mana entered, he would become somebody who could store as much mana as he wanted into himself.

If Halt, whose status had been fixed by the Evil God and thus had infinite amount of mana, entered, then —

It would result to [Super Water] that could heal any kind of injury, extend lifespan, and gave the ability to store a huge amount of mana within the body.

It would not be an exaggeration to say that this [Super Water] could be considered one of the best class items in the entire world. And yet, the Elnor family would pour this same water down the drain the next morning.

However, when the drainage pipe of the bath broke, the bathwater naturally flowed into the underground space that TIna had created.

The bathwater slowly dripped and eroded the underground space that had been ‘waterproofed’ by Tina using earth magic.

As a result —

“Is this orichalcum? Then, this one is adamantite. And there are magic ores…. Eh, perhaps, this is —”

The wall in front of Tina had the same sheen as the ring she wore on her left ring finger.

It was made from the immutable metal called scarletite.

It was an extremely rare ore. And yet, even just the visible part of the wall had already stretched on for several dozen kilometers.

The underground space she had created had been eroded by the [Super Water], and all of its walls had transformed into various rare ores.

It would be possible to create any kind of armor if they were to mine the rare ores in this space.

H&T Corp, the company that Tina ran, already possessed several mines; however, the total amount of ore they could mine was less than half of what could be found here.

Moreover, the company didn’t own any mines of scarletite — no, even the existence of such a mine was unheard of.

Not only that, all the ores here in the underground space were all ready to be harvested, almost to the point that there was no need for mining.

The place where the leftover bathwater flowed had turned into a treasure trove where you could get as many as you wanted.

──＊＊＊──

Back to present day.

A gigantic tree had appeared out of nowhere, and it was now growing in the courtyard of the mansion.

“N-No way —”

Tina was overwhelmed by the presence of the huge tree. After she recovered her senses, she realized something and hurriedly rushed to the underground place.

The underground space that Tina created was right under this courtyard.

“Oh, dear, it’s just like I imagined…”

She had a bad feeling about it.

And true to her premonition, the roots of the giant tree in the courtyard had already encroached into the space.

The giant tee had already taken root in the rare mine and was sucking the mana found in it.

Most of the rare ores such as the magic ores and orichalcum had already turned back into ordinary stones.