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Nightmare grass, so named because it grows in the same mountain ranges as the nightmare flower and shares similar properties, is a green herb with shoots less than five centimeters high that grow flush against the ground. It braves the bitter cold to sprout in the dead of winter, having a growing period of only one month, after which it withers away on its own. The soil nourished by withered nightmare grass becomes extremely fertile, yielding at least double the harvest for any crop planted in it. This inevitable reality dictates the irreconcilable conflict between the gatherers of nightmare grass and the owners of the land.
— Excerpt from *Theresa’s Alchemical Notes*

Theresa woke up bathed in sunlight. Before even opening her eyes, she felt an unprecedented lightness throughout her entire body—that deep-seated, inside-and-out comfort was something she hadn't experienced in a very long time. This sensation was so marvelous that she couldn't help wanting to hold onto it a little longer. However, the awakening of her consciousness was beyond her control; by the time she fully realized this wonderful feeling, the beauty of it had already come to an end.

She opened her eyes and let out a slight sigh. After a brief moment, Theresa realized something was amiss with her current state—

First of all, it was morning! A bright morning right after a heavy snowfall!

Secondly, she was sleeping in a soft, large bed—a strange bed she had never seen before!

Thirdly, the place where she found herself was an unfamiliar room, which, judging by its layout, resembled some kind of inn!

Finally, her memory only went as far as that wonderful lunch; she didn't have the slightest impression of what had happened afterward!

What on earth was going on here?!

"You were drunk," the book spirit "spoke up" in Theresa’s mind, parroting Habata’s previous explanation. It even threw in a "buy-one-get-one-free" bonus by vividly recounting her adorable interactions with Flora after getting drunk...

Hearing this, Theresa couldn't help pressing a hand to her forehead and sighing deeply—her dignity, oh her dignity...

After a silent inner wail, her instincts as an alchemist quickly took over, and she began to ponder her uncharacteristic lapse. Rather than believing she was simply drunk, she was more inclined to believe it was some sort of allergic reaction. Logically speaking, among all professionals, alchemists should have the greatest mastery over their own minds. Theresa had always been very confident in her self-control, but yesterday's events forced her to doubt that very confidence...

To have lost conscious control of herself so silently and completely—how terrifying a thing was that!

As she was pondering, a commotion from outside the window quickly grabbed Theresa’s attention. This wasn't because she was easily distracted, but rather because the voices of the two parties creating the ruckus were so deafeningly loud that it sounded as though the argument was taking place right beside her ear...

She leaned out the window to look down. Directly below, two factions were confronting each other. Since she was on the second floor, the sounds of the argument naturally drifted clearly into her ears.

The dispute was being conducted simultaneously in the Human Common tongue and the Orcish language—one side spoke Common mixed with Orcish, while the other spoke Orcish mixed with Common. They hurled curses back and forth, a continuous stream of various "salutations." The sheer volume of these "salutations" nearly overshadowed the actual subject of the dispute, and Theresa had to strain her mind for quite a while to sort out what they were fighting over—

To put it bluntly, it was a disagreement over territory division.

The human side consisted of adventurers who had come to unearth nightmare grass, while the demi-human side consisted of local hired hunters. After all, winter meant fewer prey, so hunters naturally came down the mountain to pick up some "side gigs" to supplement their income. The adventurers were only willing to cede a twenty percent share of the profits, but the demi-human hunters demanded forty percent. This was the root of the dispute.

Theresa rested her elbows on the windowsill, watching as the people below escalated from verbal abuse to actual blows. Swords flashed and blades clashed, and blood was soon splattered across the ground. It wasn't until both sides suffered casualties and deaths that the town's civil defense force finally intervened—and their intervention was blatantly biased, as they arrested the human adventurers.

Although she had long heard that "human discrimination" was prevalent within the Alliance territories, witnessing it with her own eyes still made Theresa shake her head and sigh. Yet, upon reflection, if it were within the Empire, and a group of humans had brawled with a group of orcs or demi-humans, the city guards would have undoubtedly arrested the orcs or demi-humans instead...

With this thought, Theresa not only failed to find any psychological balance, but she also shook her head and sighed even more deeply.

***

"Oh, Theresa, you're finally up," Flora’s greeting rang out just as Theresa rounded the corner of the stairs, before she could even get a clear look at the first floor. Theresa smiled and turned her head to see Flora and Habata sitting by a window, each holding a beverage, with a large sheet of paper spread across the table between them.

Theresa walked quickly toward them. Before she even reached the table, she could see that the paper was a map, with various regions daubed in different colors into numerous small sections.

"What is this?" Theresa pointed at the map and asked.

"This is the mining map for the Black Rock Mountain range area," Habata explained. "Before the start of every winter, the nearby tribes gather to re-evaluate this map. The red areas are designated agricultural zones designated by the tribes; no one is allowed to enter these areas to harvest plants. The yellow and purple areas are private agricultural zones, and whether one can mine them depends entirely on personal capability. The blue areas are previous years' fallow zones; these places are available for harvesting, but the yield is likely limited. Only the remaining areas are recommended mining zones."

Theresa compared and eliminated each area one by one based on Habata’s explanation, and eventually discovered a rather depressing phenomenon—most of the recommended mining zones were located in high mountains or deep valleys, featuring treacherous terrain, while all the other places with slightly better topography had been incorporated into the agricultural zones. It seemed that if those high mountains and deep valleys weren't completely unusable, these orc tribes probably wouldn't have intended to leave any mining areas for outsiders at all.

Sighing was sighing, but the work still had to be done. Theresa smoothly pulled up a chair, rested her chin in her hands, and asked, "So what do we do next? Should we look for a guide, or what?"

"A guide won't be necessary," Habata immediately rejected her proposal. "Anyone in town with even the slightest bit of capability won't be willing to act as a guide—that's the kind of job that makes enemies. I've been to the Black Rock Mountain range two or three times. Even though we aren't coming from that direction, we won't be going too far either, so we should be fine safety-wise."

Hearing this, Theresa readily went along with the flow, naturally entrusting everything to Habata.

With the serious business settled, Theresa asked impatiently, "Habata, I got drunk yesterday, and I heard it was the combined result of pale ale and stew—do you know what on earth that thing was, the component that got me drunk?"

"I don't know the exact components," Habata smiled a little sheepishly. "I just heard about it while chatting idly with an old tribal shaman. He mentioned it in passing, and I just listened casually without looking into it deeply."

This result inevitably disappointed Theresa, but she stubbornly continued to press, "Hasn't anyone ever researched this kind of situation before?"

Habata scratched his head in thought for a long while, and could only continue to shake his head with an apologetic smile...

At this sight, Theresa couldn't help widening her round eyes in exasperation... (To be continued)