#500 A Young Excavator’s Troubles

Author’s Note: This marks our 500th chapter.

I’ve been able to continue this series this long, all thanks to your support.

I intend to keep going, so I hope you stick around!

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My name is Kinmarie from the demon race.

I have an ancient and venerable profession—well-digging.

Wells are important. In fact, they are indispensable.

We cannot live without water, so we need wells to obtain water.

We go to villages and towns across the nation, digging into the ground using trade-secret methods to find water veins and reinforce the holes we dig to create magnificent, long-lasting wells.

For this reason, the Well-Digging Guild was established, all the while keeping the unique methods confidential.

In order to learn the art of well-digging, one must first join the guild and take an oath never to disclose the secret.

I, too, joined this guild at the age of 15, and after completing a rigorous apprenticeship and learning the guild’s vast knowledge and skills by heart, I was finally able to become a full-fledged member.

I am proud of my job and feel secure in knowing that as long as I have it, I will never lose my livelihood.

After all, it’s a job closely connected to people’s lives.

As I mentioned earlier, people cannot live without wells, so there is no end to the work of building new wells and maintaining existing ones.

I had planned my life with peace of mind and even thought of settling down when a strange request came my way.

It came from His Majesty himself.

Demon King Zedan, ruler of the Demon Kingdom, has already made his mark in history by destroying our archnemesis, the Human Kingdom, becoming the supreme ruler of the earth in the process.

Since it’s a request from such a heroic man, we at the Well-Digging Guild are both grateful and elated.

What kind of well does His Majesty want us to dig, I wonder?

Alas, the requirement was completely different from what we expected.

He wanted us to dig out “hot water.”

Needless to say, we were puzzled by how strange it was, even though it was from His Majesty himself.

Hot water from underground?

How could such a thing possibly exist?

What comes out from under the ground is ordinary water.

Hot water is...well, heated water.

If there’s hot water underground, that means the ground is sweltering hot—we won’t be able to stand, and the soles of our feet would burn.

But the client is our benevolent lord. We couldn’t just turn him down, so we accepted the request for formality’s sake, and I was selected as the person in charge.

To be honest, I don’t know whether to be happy or not. It’s an honor to be involved in a direct request from His Majesty, but the job itself is too erratic.

If I carelessly make a mistake, I would incur the displeasure of our highest authority.

It could also mean the loss of the stable job that I painstakingly worked for.

Perhaps that’s why they handed off this problem to different artisans till it reached me.

Again, we can’t just turn down such a request.

Refusing to comply with the highest authority's wishes could jeopardize the Well-Digging Guild's survival.

After much deliberation, I made my decision and took the risk.

No matter how successful I become, I still owe everything to the guild, so if no one else is willing to do the job, I will.

I could think of it as a way to repay the guild for giving me this position and teaching me the skills I know.

Thus, I took on the ridiculous challenge of digging underground hot water, but as a matter of course, it proved to be extremely difficult.

First of all, finding naturally hot water is impossible.

I investigated again and again and dug out water veins, but all that came out was normal underground water.

In addition, the water flowed deep underground, far from the sun, so it was freezing cold.

As I thought, there’s no way I’d find hot water.

Even after a year or two has passed continuing such futile work, I have not been able to produce any results.

The mental burden only increased the more wasted expenses there were.

Unable to submit a satisfactory report to His Majesty, the feeling of being driven to a wall intensified by the day.

The guild leader even advised me to stop, but I won’t.

I’ve already spent so much time and effort on this job; I can’t just throw in the towel now.

I will dig out hot water from underground and live up to His Majesty’s expectations with my life and pride as a well-digger on the line!

People around me seem to think I’ve become desperate, and they might be right.

But then, someone like a goddess of salvation broke down this very obstacle of mine...

* * *

“...Are you the envoy brought to us by His Majesty’s will?”

“That is indeed correct. My name is Horkosfon.”

The person in front of me is a maiden of tender years, so gorgeous she belongs at a ball for aristocrats.

What would such a beautiful woman want to do with a bunch of sweaty well-diggers?

“Master has given me orders to dig a hot spring here.” 

“Hot spring...?”

“I have heard that you are here on the same mission. Master has instructed me to cooperate with you to achieve our goal.”

“When you say Master, do you mean Demon King Zedan?”

“No, Master is Master.”

“???”

I have no idea what this young woman is talking about.

But I dare say she was sent to assist us in our work.

Nonetheless, that fact itself is discomforting.

The fact that her “Master” sent a helper our way means that they think we can’t fulfill our objective alone, which in turn means that they don’t trust our abilities.

Not only have we been unable to complete the request over several years, but we have not made significant progress.

Thinking again, it’s only natural people would doubt our abilities, but such is a bitter pill to swallow.

It’s a no-brainer I feel a bit annoyed, taking my irritation out on this beautiful woman who’s supposed to be our helper.

“This isn’t a playground, young lady. This is a serious workplace where we get covered in dirt and mud to secure water. There’s also the danger that the well could collapse.”

She looks so frail she might cry just from getting covered in mud.

I don’t want such a delicate maiden to invade our workplace.

Dispatched by His Majesty or not, we, as professionals, will prioritize our work and ask her to leave.

“One correction. You are supposed to be digging for a hot spring, not a well.”

“What is this hot spring you keep mentioning?”

“A hot spring is a hot spring. However, I think it’s impossible to make it gush out with your current excavation methods, as the depth you can dig is naturally limited. You have to dig deeper to find a hot spring.”

What is she talking about?

For a lady this gorgeous, her tone of voice is bizarre.

Her voice has the power to overwhelmingly persuade me, a veteran digging wells for more than ten years.

“...That being said, your skill at finding water veins is very precise. I can feel the flow of liquid far below the ground. It’s no wonder you’re a professional.”

“Huh?”

Well, we are searching for underground water veins assuming a much greater depth than usual.

Digging for normal groundwater would only make it colder, so I decided to go for something out of the ordinary.

But how did a maiden like her notice that?!

“Your point of excavation is somewhat off, though. No matter how much you dig here, no hot spring will gush out. I advise you to change digging sites.”

“Nonsense! We, professional well-diggers, decided this based on careful investigation! We can’t be told by amateurs what and what not to do!”

But deep inside me, I found myself agreeing with her.

This time, in my obsession to excavate differently than usual, I searched for a deeper water vein. But the deeper it was, the more difficult it would be to survey, and the more likely it would be that I would miss my target.

“Allow me to conduct a more thorough survey. I can calculate a more accurate excavation point where you should be able to dig out a hot spring with certainty.”

“What are you talking about? How will an amateur like you survey without expert help?!”

“I will be using this.”

She then takes out something.

“Natto.”

“Nuttoh?!”