Location: library. Time: 9:49 a.m
"Nine! What are you doing here again!!!" Marie, yelled to Nine is his favorite seat in the library.
"Why are you here again! Stopped bothering me, I thought we were already done with your story!" Nine, revolted, not willing to lose the screaming competition.
As the two were having a yelling contest on the second floor, the brown haired librarian lady on the first floor looked in the direction where they were, with a dumbfounded expression.
"Those two are at it again." She muttered, after that emotional night when Nine confronted Marie's point of view in herself, the two relationships had changed into this.
Unlike back then, where the two relationships were like a romantic one without being one, the two current relationships are now a mother and child.
Where the mother is scolding his son for not doing his homework or did something horrible for her to scream like this.
"Sigh, I really miss my chance to make a relationship with him....." Sandra has been watching Nine all this time, since he had been going to this place.
Back then, when Nine first appeared in here, she thought for sure he was the same as those noisy adventurers who were simply here to meet up with a woman they wanted to be with. And not even read the book they pick up and even ruin them only.
But when Nine continued to come here without a stop, and actually doing work to improve his situation. Sandra couldn't help but cheer him on in her mind.
When the takers of his quest came, her opinion on her shifted and she wanted him gone completely. But even after all those takers tried to scam him, Nine still continued studying here.
At some point, when Nine kept coming back here after all those horrible takers of his quest, her opinion started to go back to before, and she started cheering for him again.
The day when Rhea was the one who took the quest of Nine, Sandra found out that he even went out of his way to buy her a weapon for her to start her real adventurer life.
That night, when she was in her bed, she realized that all those times when Nine was coming to the library, not once did she ever greet him back to his greetings.
So she decided at that very moment that she would start a conversation with him and even help him with his studies.... But that very morning, Marie was already there, helping him with his studies.
As a result, she wasn't able to start a conversation with him till a few days ago.
"..... Oh well, I may not have been there to help him with his study, but thanks to that, I'm now having these great snacks!" She said, feeding herself with a slice of flan.
After Marie started making sweets from Nine instructions, she would bring one of them to the library and give it to her. With this, each time Marie came here she would receive something from her.
"Tasty!" She exclaimed, tasting the flan cake. "Haha, I bet Nine doesn't know, I know he's not from this world, and he's from earth."
Sandra, who's been watching on the side all this time, learns that Nine was originally from another world, but this information wasn't gonna do anything to her, so she decided not to talk about it.
***
"She finally left." Nine muttered, as he went down the stairs in the library. Looking around on the first floor, he spotted Sandra having fun eating the flan cake at her table.
Seeing this, he decided to leave quietly so as not to disturb her. Getting closer to the door, Sandra called out to him, making him answer: "Yes?"
"Nine, you're that rumor slime salt killer, right?" She said, pointing her fork at him.
"What? I don't know what you are about..." Nine replied, avoiding the truth.
"Hmmm. Why are you doing this? Don't you know, I know most of your secrets since I can hear all the things you say in this library. So, be honest, how did you kill those slimes with salt?"
Seeing the confidence in her words, Nine moved closer to her table and whispered: "Mana and healing potions."
"What?" She whispered back.
"So, you know how we obtained salt by filtering salt water." Sandra nodded, knowing the process.
"Well, I've been mixing salt, mana, healing potion, and rune of shock together, giving me those salt killing slime of mine."
"How does that work?" Sandra asked, not understanding how this logic works.
"Slimes are in the same category as slugs, and salt is lethal to them. Since I can use the Rune spell, I would make a shock rune on paper and melt it down with the salt water I have. The damage that salt will have is the amount of HP recovery a healing potion can give, so the more healing potions I put into that pot of mine, the more damage it can give, and using the mana potions to give energy within the melted rune I put into that salt water."
"Now, since I'm the one who made the rune within that salt mix with potion, I can then activate the rune at will. So each time I splashed those slimes in the plains, I would send out the command on the runes, activating them."
"The salt weakens their resistance, healing potions are the total amount of damage the rune makes, while mana potions act as the battery for it."
Hearing his explanation, Sandra answered: "... That's possible, with your explanation. But this is only something you and those who know the Rune spell can make use of then."
She looked at Nine. Questioning whether he knows this or not, but the expression on his face told her what she wanted to know.
Nine fully knows this is something he can fully utilize on his own, and even if other people can use the Rune spell, the chance of them finding this will be slim.
Unless, someone gave them pointers on how to do it. In this case, the only people who know about this are: Nine, Marie, and Sandra herself.
Saying goodbye to Sandra, Nine left the building, with a promise of giving her a flan and two when he comes again. Recalling his explanation, Sandra said:
"The moment the salt touches the slime, Nine would activate the rune in them, sending a shock within the slime's entire body, killing it..."
"From the rumors, he only needed a pinch of it to kill even those 5-meter-tall slimes." Once again, she couldn't help but admire his creativity.
"And using that, he doesn't need to hit the core of the slime, ensuring a higher price for them."
*****
End of chapter 20.