kscans

Chapter 13 - Rock Salt

The next day, Yuri spent the morning searching every house in the village with a fine-toothed comb. And his efforts paid off. He was able to find what he was looking for in about three houses.

Fragments of rock salt.

He had searched around, thinking he might find some, and his gamble had paid off. He had successfully found it in the corner of an abandoned house.

"Just as I thought... This village was probably built as a base for mining rock salt... or perhaps as a camp for constructing that base."

To state the obvious, this "abandoned village" was located extremely close to the mountains. In other words, it was utterly isolated from other villages. Why?

Yesterday, while thinking about salt as a seasoning, the question of how this village obtained its salt had popped into his head.

Salt is an essential substance for human survival, but unless you live by the sea, it is not something easily obtained. A normal village would likely acquire it through trade, but a place as remote in the mountains as this was too inconvenient for ordinary merchants to visit. If they were to specifically request a visit, they would have to offer a suitable reward in return. It was unlikely that a small-scale settlement like this would have that kind of leeway. Even if the villagers went to buy it themselves, the inconvenience would be the same. To go so far as to build a village in such a mountainous area despite this meant there had to be a good reason.

...In that case, there was only one possibility.

There must be a mine... or a rock salt deposit right here. And judging by the fact that fragments of rock salt were just lying around, it was highly likely that this place had a rock salt deposit.

"Considering the size of the village, it was probably a base for test drilling, or a forward base for constructing a full-scale mining operation... I would guess."

The fact that they abandoned the village probably meant it was no longer cost-effective or something.

"If that’s the case, there should be a rock salt mine, or the remains of a test pit, somewhere around here..."

He had already found a few suspicious locations.

He had collected what looked like maps drawn on wooden boards from about three abandoned houses, and there were several places that were marked on all three.

"The road on the map... it must be this one..."

In a remote place like this, where human presence was scarce, the power of time was great. The path that should have led to the mark indicating the rock salt mine on the map was now completely hidden under a thicket of weeds and shrubs. From the faint traces of what seemed to be a trail, he could barely tell that this was the "road" in question.

"Still... not following it isn’t an option..."

Yuri started to push his way through the thicket, grumbling, but gave up within a few minutes. ...No, he decided to resort to other means.

"...Come to think of it, why am I so foolishly pushing through this thicket... when this world has something much more convenient..."

No sooner had he said it than he activated the wind magic Wind Cutter and mowed down the obstructing plants. Perhaps because he had twice the magic power of an ordinary person, the path cleared at a considerable pace.

After three hours of mowing down plants, taking occasional breaks and checking for traces of the path, Yuri finally arrived at what seemed to be the place. He felt the vegetation gradually thin out as he went.

"Is this... it..."

On a somewhat rough slope, a tunnel that looked to have been artificially dug was open. The tunnel had been... or rather, had been reinforced with wooden frames in places, but now even those were decaying, and he hesitated to step inside carelessly. So Yuri...

"...There! That’s the tunnel wall reinforcement done... Now, let’s go in."

He reinforced the tunnel walls with the now indispensable earth magic, and once the risk of collapse was gone, he went inside.

"...Yep, even after using Appraisal, it’s definitely rock salt. So this is what they were planning to build a village for..."

Once he knew this area was a vein of rock salt, there was no need to stay in the tunnel. He could just use earth magic to dig out a suitable chunk of rock salt from underground. Being careful not to cause a landslide or destabilize the slope, Yuri dug out a lump of rock salt. He collected far more than he could consume on his own, with the intention of using it for bartering or selling later.

Now that his business was done, he was about to head back, but he happened to notice animal tracks scattered all over the ground.

"...Come to think of it, animals come to places like this for salt, don’t they..."

Yuri thought for a moment, then broke down the slope a little more, exposing large and small rocks containing rock salt. He did this to make it easier for the animals to lick the salt. Of course, he was careful not to dig too excessively, considering the possibility of causing salt damage.

(I’m not trying to be a good person... it’s just a whim, yeah.)