Store in Danmachi- Side Story: 9

Title: The Miraculous Confession

A Deity’s Blessing on one’s Falna comes in four categories—Basic Abilities, Development Abilities, Skills, and Magic.

Basic Abilities refer to an adventurer’s raw growth from physical enhancement to magical and mental development through excelia. These abilities work in response to physical stress earned during the heat of battle, taxing exercises, and even mental and emotional breakthroughs in case of metaphysical growth. Simply put, excelia is the currency of development—holistic growth.

Development Abilities are where things fall in the range of specialties—professions. Blacksmiths, Mixers, Alchemists, Mages, Swordsmen, Spearsmen, Axmen, and Hunters, are just to name a few. And these abilities include physical and magically-inclined superior traits such as Abnormal and Magic Resistance. An adventurer increases the ranks of these abilities by focusing on the special tasks of these Abilities.

A Blacksmith needs to smith more and better items, for instance.

As a Level 4 Adventurer, Asfi Al Andromeda is one of the fortunate few to gain Development Abilities at every Level-Up. Most adventurers try to earn practical development abilities by entering a phase of narcotics right before their Level-up to gain Abnormal Resistance as soon as possible. It’s one of the most known abilities, after all!

Maybe it is Asfi’s inherently intense desires that rarely surface in her expressions or her family’s mystical background that she has one of the rarest Development Abilities since her first level-up!—Mystery.

*Sizzle*

Maria’s orphanage is spacious enough, allowing Asfi and Hermes each to occupy a room. A wooden board hangs from Asfi’s door—Do Not Disturb For Any Reason.

The bold Koine print is deterring to other children, while Hermes’s stories of Asfi conducting Black Magic ruin most of their nights, including a frightful Rye. And Hermes is not wrong in a way.

*Sizzle*

Portable magic lamps illuminate Asfi’s bedroom as a blinder on the window keeps every prying eye from her apparatus consisting of a large oak table hosting several glass tubes, a strange metal plate heating a brilliant red under the ministration of a magic stone, and a layout of several hieroglyph-inscribed vats on the floor.

*Sizzle*

Asfi drops another drop of brilliant blue liquid on the hot metal plate, watching the liquid sizzle and evaporate into a thin stream of bluish mist before she leans forward, not minding the heat radiating to her chin and sniffing the smoke.

“Amazing,” she whispers. “The drop of liquified alloy smells exactly like a Blue Papilio’s spores.”

She pulls back and stares at the vial of blue liquid—melted Butterfree Era.

“But my intuitions should be correct. All I need to do is figure out the recipe with the collected materials.”

She retrieves three diaries from her Frollet and starts flipping through them. The Diaries have seen better days. Their leather covers are worn and scratched, and the edges of the book are blunt and pressed in. Their condition is poor to the extent that glue holds their spines together.

“Hmm. No, not this reaction. Not this either,” Asfi starts mumbling under her breath.

Mystery is not an easy Development Ability. There is a reason why Asfi suspects her lineage may have something to do with it, including her knowledge about another ‘Mystery’-holder, Airmid Teasanare’s, lineage. No mortal can readily utilize the ‘miracle’ of the divine through the Mystery Development Ability.

The scope of this ability exceeds and comprises other specialties like mixing, smithing, metallurgy, and even runecrafts!

“It should have a strong mixing and stabilization reaction,” Asfi contemplates, setting down the first diary and picking the third one. The sound of paper flipping echoes in her room as she skips through the relatively new journal.

These three diaries represent her life’s work.

‘I’m not as great of an item maker as Orario calls me to be. I don’t have Airmid’s family’s inheritance that trains her control and expertise over ‘miracle,’ allowing her to excel in prosthetics, nor do I have the elven superiority to use Heriogylphs to my advantage. The Spirits’ blood also has synergistic effects on the creation of an item using Mystery.’

Asfi stares at the small collection of Frollets and Butterfree Eras.

‘But I have this nagging feeling again. It WILL work.’

The more one develops their specialties, the more they develop an instinct about the process. It’s as if the world around them helps them understand the intricacies which were too technical before—one of the greatest benefits of Falna and Divinity’s support.

“There it is. I almost forgot about it,” Asfi stills and stares at her journal, which records many materials and their effects under different conditions. Her second and third development abilities—Mixing and Metallurgy—work well with her Mystery. It’s possibly the only advantage she has over another renowned item maker, Airmid since the latter is a Level-2 Adventurer with only one Development Ability.

Asfi carefully stores her diaries inside the frollet and gets to work. She retrieves several brick-shaped bronze-colored alloys alongside weird floral materials ranging from brown, circular leaves with spiral blue veins, bundles of green stems glowing red from their cut spots, four blue carrots with wriggling green roots, and a lot more!

Inspiration bursts in her mind as Asfi trusts herself confidently—something she learned to do the hard way after multiple failures in her early years.

Item making is a dangerous profession because it is just as easy to get hurt due to an accident as it is to create a new item by accident—it’s a Miracle and a Mystery, after all!

Asfi places seven Frollets into seven different vats she had commissioned from one of the less hostile Black Elven settlements before dripping the liquified Butterfly Era into each vat. She tosses Magic Stones from Blue Papilio inside the vats. She continues to heat the leaves and other materials before extracting liquids from them through the several glass tubes connected to the magical burning plate and dividing them into the vats.

Once done, she glances at the rings of different hieroglyphs on the earthen vats before muttering to herself, “The crushing method, the assimilation method, the mixing method, the alloying method, the spirit imitation method, the elven ritual method, and the blood craft method. These are the seven most renowned methods of runecraft before the arrival of Deities. It took me millions to commission each vat. I wouldn’t have used Hermes’ tricks to sell defective Hades Helmet to earn Valis at the time otherwise.”

Asfi doesn’t spend long reminiscing about the old days before using her Mind and activating one magical vat at a time. There is no point in trying to act cool and consume her Mind to trigger seven of them at once. One of the methods will bear some results or produce a definitive product.

As Asfi uses her Mind, she also experiences a strange source of energy mingling into her back. It’s warm and feels contradictory. An overbearing sense of pressure threatens to take over her mind before understanding her existence and soothing into her control instead.

Dangerous.

An entity that isn’t what it seems on the surface, a man who hides his cards close to himself—a God that plays mortal for fun—is what Asfi has to depend on for her item creation.

But only the users of Mystery, like Asfi and Airmid, might know more about Falna than the rest.

‘It’s like the usual,’ Asfi feels sweat draping her forehead. The divine pressure isn’t there to force her. It’s there to suppress the overwhelming force breeding from WITHIN her—her Falna. Miracle does not stem from Divinities alone—it stems from oneself and one’s innate desire. It is proven that two Mystery Adventurers will never produce two similar products using the same materials and process.

Asfi is different from Airmid in the sense the former craves adventures and the ‘Sky.’ Her products shape into a similar sense of adventure, attuned to battles and support instead of orthodox healing and daily use items.

‘Maybe Airmid will use the same items to create a product that boosts Butterfree Era, but I doubt I will construct something similar. My works tend to be more mobile and temporary, if not easy to use.’

Asfi works silently, waiting for a miracle to materialize, birthed from her intuition and aspirations.

---

Her bespectacled cyan pupils observe their reactions, especially his. A feeling of pride washes over her, relieving the stress from pulling multiple all-nighters as she watches his expressions change animatedly. Like him, Eina, Rose, and Misha dress in the store’s undoubtedly tasteful uniform.

Unlike Lili, whose tailcoat melds with a hoody, the other three wear vests made from silver-stringed black material and pants fashioned from the same print that fit their lower bodies snugly. Unlike Jackal, who folds the sleeves of his white shirt around his bulky, muscular forearm, the rest wear button their sleeves around their wrists. The circular silver crystal on their dark pink tie looks great. While Jackal combs his hair 3/4th to the right during work hours, Eina, Rose, Misha, and Lili wear their hair down. It’s not like the store doesn’t have cooling units, so their hair does not bother them at all.

“So,” Jackal stares at Asfi with amazement, “You’re telling me this item stores the ten bursts of Butterfree Era’s effects indefinitely? And once consumed, you can spend more Mind and Magic to store more healing pockets worth one radius in size.”

Asfi nods calmly, sitting on the other side of the counter as she basks in his amazement.

“But can you have the constant passive regenerative effect of the Butterfree Era?” Lili questions after a moment.

“You cannot,” Asfi sighs, “It’s a trade-off for preparation of a Healing item that won’t use your Mind and Magic in the heat of battle and the constant use of Mind to rouse the passive regeneration of Butterfree Era.”

“And,” Jackal continues with a smug grin as he looks at Asfi like meat on the chopping board, “This item only works optimally for Level 2 Adventurers at best, but it costs at least one Frollet. It’s too expensive!”

Asfi works her jaw, nodding, “It is.”

“Hoho, can you smell it, my dear employees?” Jackal leans forward on his counter, licking his lips while Asfi vibrates in frustration on her seat. “I smell a desperate Adventurer who can only strike gold with our help,” Misha grins, easily vibing with Jackal’s shameless behavior. Eina frowns disapprovingly while Rose questions, “Are you here to negotiate with Jackal?”

Perseus exhales loudly, admitting, “I am.”

“First,” Jackal retrieves one Valis coin from his counter, “I’m purchasing this for One Valis as per our deal~!”

“Fine,” Asfi smiles internally. She lucked out and created five such items so she didn’t feel any heartache.

“One Butterfree Burst Pouch costs 156000 Valis, including the risk of failure in the item creation.”

‘I have yet to use the other seven Frollets, so this cost is apt, with almost 20000 Valis in immediate profit. I can increase the price slightly once the item attracts good attention,’ Asfi calculates internally.

“I will probably sell it for 69000 Valis,” Jackal hums. It should be a price range just above the usual Level 2 Adventurer can earn in a few months after deducting Orario’s living costs. One starts earning a large margin of profits during the creation of items for Level 3 Adventurers and higher, or almost all the items if you abuse Humble Store like Jackal just did by purchasing the Butterfree Burst Pouch for one valis.

“It’s not feasible,” Asfi frowns. Her good mood diminishes by a grave margin as Jackal shrugs. “Then you have to work better, I suppose. Or find another buyer. Of course, I’m thinking of selling it as a restricted item like the Butterfree Era to small Familia Members. But you could probably sell it outside Orario using Hermes’ connections.”

“W-What do you want?” Asfi sighs. She would like to procure a steady supply of Frollet if his demands aren’t unreasonable.

“Don’t everyone know it already?” Jackal looks toward his employees in confusion, “I thought I said multiple times I want a harem. I have everything else I could possibly want.” He shrugs.

*Meeaaa*

Anya whines loudly, glaring at the four women beside Jackal as they have different thoughts in their heads.

“You can’t have a harem just by speaking about it,” Eina scoffs, crossing her arms.

“Then it’s great I’m working for it,” Jackal grins, winking at Eina and Rose before staring at Misha, “And you… don’t stare at me weirdly. It’s disgusting!”

“You’re the one who walked into me while I was showering!”

“You were using MY shower!” Jackal retorts, “And I thought it was Eina or Rose trying to surprise me!”

“Why would we?!” Eina gasps.

“I hadn’t thought of that,” Rose hums, her furry red ears twitching.

“Are you all done?” Lili chews her lips in frustration, “Asfi-sama is waiting for your attention.”

“Ah, right,” Jackal smiles apologetically toward Asfi. “I’m sorry, but I cannot reduce Frollet’s price. It’s one of my key items that works too well in assisting deep-dungeon dives for strong Familia like Loki and Ganesha. I even had some maggots from Freya Familia sniffing around, and the bits of Ishtar Familia came crawling back for Frollets, too. Needless to say, I charged them triple.”

Asfi sighs deeply, “Is there no way? I can bulk purchase 200 Frollets for 80000 Valis.”

Jackal blinks before shaking his head, smiling sincerely, “I cannot. Please understand.” He demonstrates genuine sincerity as he offers, “I am willing to sponsor more of your experiments if you’d like as long as it’s feasible for me and I get something out of it. Maybe you will get lucky and create something that can help both of us earn profit. But these Butterfree Burst Pouches will only cause losses.”

Asfi contemplates before smiling slightly, “Well, thank you for considering my offer in the first place. And thank you for your good wishes.”

“Of course,” Jackal smiles widely, “I wouldn’t have a wink of sleep if you weren’t there protecting Maria and the kids. And about my rude behavior the first time we met, I do apologize for it. I shouldn’t have vented my anger for Hermes on you.”

All the girls look at Jackal in surprise while only Anya casts a dubious glance over at her ‘owner.’

“It’s alright,” Asfi’s smile widens. “I empathize with where you came from. And as I said before, I don’t see eye to eye with Hermes for his association with Olal or the remaining two merchants of the No God’s Land.”

The duo achieves a sense of cordiality—

---

“I take back what I said. You’re as worse as Hermes!” Asfi hisses as she glares dagger at the foolishly grinning Jackal, who boasts a new product. It’s a green pouch similar to a Frollet with the print of the Blue Papilio on its belly—Butterfree Burst Pouch!

Worth 69000 Valis.

—Only 20 pouches for immediate sale. The rest will appear after OIal’s Departure, so share any news you might have—states the bold banner.

“Didn’t you know?” Jackal grins as others dodge Asfi’s glare. Even they cannot imagine how Jackal created the same product when it was proven years ago that no two adventurers could create the same products using Mystery!

“Everything’s fair in love and war~!”

Asfi grits her teeth before her mind stills.

‘Love and war? Our Familia is not at war with Jackal. And no two men could construct the same items. Love… is that how he created the same product as mine?’ Asfi takes a step back momentarily while Anya covers her face with her paws.

“You’re a shameless freak!” Asfi hisses loudly before stomping her way out of the store, deeply flustered and unsettled by her discovery!

‘Who confesses to someone else after frauding them?’ She grits her teeth, facing such a situation for the first time. ‘And how could he cut the cost to such an extent? I must know the truth!’

***

A/N: Needless to say, my work on Mystery and Miracle is AU, and I don’t know if it goes into detail in the current volumes. But I always wanted Mystery to be all-encompassing with some lore behind it and deep dangers attached to it, like Welf Bloodline (which is dangerous for elves, lol.)

***

Alternate Title: Asfi Gets Dat Hephaestus Confession Treatment!; Jackal Scoring Frauds And Harem—Making Ja Sun Proud; Asfi’s Black Magic; Asfi: I Thought You Were a Good Guy!; Jackal: No Good Man Can Ever EARN A Harem!; The Store’s Uniform Drip; The Great Influence Of Cute Naruto Wallets; Asfi: Hehe, I Can Create More Items Without Jackal’s Knowledge. *Jackal Retrieves The Legendary Uno Reverse Card*; The Lineage and Mystery; The Miracle of Falna; The Divine Help; A Contradictory God; Asfi Reaching Her Current Position With Talent Alone; Jackal: 69000, hehe; Jackal Getting Surprise in His Shower *Rose: Furious Note Taking*; Misha: My Innocence is Ruined! Jackal: Hah, You didn’t Have Any!; Asfi: I See, We Can Be Good Friends. Jackal: Of course *Betrays Her The Next Day, Confesses To Her Somehow, Refuses To Elaborate, And Boasts His Drip Forearms*; How To Hustle a Harem Member 101