…Why? What do you mean?”

I asked as I inspected the thing I was holding .

Hmm . I could touch it and carry it just fine .

‘Uh…the slimes who saw it told me that the humans said you would die if you touched it…’

“…Is that right?”

I asked . And the new slimes answered .

‘They did say that!’

‘The people who brought it had it attached to a stick . ’

‘That stick over there . I think it was a week ago?’

The slimes said as they pointed to a wooden stick on the ground .

It did not look like a stick that had been there for only a week .

It was so old-looking that I would have believed it had been there for a year .

One side of the stick was especially bad .

But there was also an attachment there that looked like it might have been metal…but I was sure it would break if I touched it .

Maybe it was used to secure the magic stone .

“…Oh? Am I actually holding something incredibly dangerous now?”

I began to get a little worried, and so I dropped the magic stone for now .

However, there was no change to my status .

“Uhh…do you know why I didn’t die?”

‘I don’t know . ’

The slimes shook their heads .

The Dryad opened her mouth instead .

‘It might be because of the curses inside of the magic stone? If it is, it would make sense that it doesn’t kill you . ’

“Curse?”

‘Yes . My magic energy capacity should be so large that it’s incomparable to humans . But if you have enough energy to revive me, then maybe you can weaken the effects of the curse . A curse is a type of magic, after all . ’

…Interesting .

So curses were a type of magic .

‘By the way, how much magic did you use to heal me, Yuji? One-hundredth?’

“Uhh…more like half . ”

‘Half…so that means twice as much as me . I don’t think that’s enough to weaken the curses…are you lying to me?’

“I’m not lying . ”

I had no reason to lie .

…Oh, but there was one thing that I was wondering, regarding magic energy .

“Now that I think of it, there was this one time I used magic and my MP went below 0 . Does that usually happen?”

After I said this, the Dryad looked at me as if she were seeing the strangest thing .

‘Your MP went below 0? I don’t think that is possible…but then again, it should also be impossible that a human has more magic energy than me…’

The Dryad said and began to think…then she smiled and said,

‘Yes! I have no idea! You sure are funny, Yuji!’

…Right .

In any case, I now understood that it was not normal for your MP to go below 0 .

Also, it would be better if I didn’t touch the magic stone if I could .

“Alright, enough about that . The problem is how we should deal with this rock…I guess taking something so dangerous with us is not an option?”

Yes . Besides, if you carried something so dangerous as this through the forest, all of the trees will die!’

That’s true .

So then…

“I guess I have to destroy it here then . –Sword Summon . ”

I used magic to call out a sword .

And then immediately swung it down over the magic stone…

“…Huh?”

Just as it hit the stone, the sword broke .

Then it crumbled and disappeared .

…I see . So this was the power of the curses .

I was even more shocked now that I had touched it with my bare hands .

“This…I’ll have to use more high-power magic to destroy it all at once . But I don’t want to damage the forest any more…”

Normally, I might have just used h.e.l.lfire of Death, but this was the Dryad’s forest .

It would be missing the point to burn down the forest in order to destroy this stone .

After thinking about it for a while, I drew a circle on the ground around the stone .

“Alright then . Come over here to this line and surround the stone!”

‘Okay!’

All of the slimes then made a circle where the line was .

It was about five meters in diameter .

At this distance, there was no danger of accidentally touching it .

Once I was sure of this, I activated two spells at once .

“Magic Transfer–Anti-Magic Barrier!”

“Magic Transfer–Anti-Physical Barrier!”

The magic was all transferred to the slimes .

Now the stone was surrounded by multiple barriers .

–In other words, even if I used powerful magic, it wouldn’t affect the rest of the environment .

“Now…let’s try it . ”