“Before we continue, perhaps it would be a good idea to get rid of your karmic infection with Ablution.”
Carmine’s eyes widened sharply. “You had a skill that can resolve this? Why didn’t you use it sooner?”
I coughed awkwardly. I didn’t want to say that my sudden cure had been so sudden I hadn’t thought of it and that we had been busy up until now. Besides, she had been handling it herself, so I didn’t think about it.
I raised my hand. “Ablution!”
Carmine glowed with a white light, and after a moment, she opened her eyes. “Is it better?”
With that resolved, I turned to the kiosk. Carmine followed me.
“You said something about some kind of challenge?”
“Since I am able to translate the text, and you’re not, it’s best if you don’t try to finish this challenge.” I explained.
“I am capable of translating,” Carmine said, causing me to glance over at her in surprise.
“What? Do you think that a Paladin isn’t prepared the translate obscure text? Did you forget how we met?”
I suddenly remembered that she had been researching Terra’s dungeon. Terra was pretty foggy on how long she had been buried in that dungeon. It predated Aberis, both the country and the demon lord. When I got specifics though, she grew vaguer. She was aware of Shei Gescar, and she knew her parents had even come from there. However, she couldn’t even confirm if they were living in Osteria at the time, the country that existed before the Aberis and the Ost Republic.
However, one thing was for sure, considering Carmine was there planning to break through an ancient dungeon and take control of an age-old clockwork dragon, she had to have some means of translating ancient texts. I seemed to recall meeting her while she was piling through books reading. Could it be that Carmine was a bit of an academic? I had completely forgotten about that aspect of her, but if she had been church educated her entire life, she had to be pretty smart, right?
“Master, the way you’re looking at me irritates me slightly. Maybe I should leave the safe room for a bit and recover that loving personality you seem to like so much.”
“Nothing!” I coughed. “I mean, it’s good you have some means of translating the demonic text. I was just surprised that you didn’t get the Linguist job as a result.”
“You spent a lot of time teaching Miki to read, and she also didn’t gain the job.” Carmine shrugged. “Isn’t it a lot stranger that master seems to pick up so many jobs with ease? I wonder…”
“Most people have a very clear path, with most jobs being the advancement of previous jobs, plus an occasional honorary job or hobby on the side. Only Master seems to have such a hodgepodge of jobs. Is it because you’re from a different world with a different education system? Or… is it because of Master’s inability to commit to a career that leaves him with no specific clear job path?”
“…” At first, I thought she was saying something nice about how I was special, but suddenly it seemed like I was a NEET or something.
I wasn’t a NEET! I was the lord of a country! Besides, my abilities were supportive, so it was good that I had a lot of them. It made me multi-facetted in my skills. I was a jack-of-all-trades! It wasn’t because I was indecisive!
However, the longer I thought about it, the more depressed I got. To distract me, I decided to forget about my woes and check out the mural that depicted the next part of the story. I had not expected anything exciting when I glanced up at it, but when I saw what was drawn, I could only let out a noise.
“What is it?” Carmine asked, growing just a bit concerned.
“I’m not sure I understand the dungeon lore at all,” I said, scratching my chin.