I Got a Gallery in the Wild - Chapter 166

Summer.

A season where various bugs run rampant alongside the sweltering heat.

In the Republic of Korea, mosquitoes are the prime example.

Calling them "rampant" doesn’t even do them justice; they are bugs specialized in driving humans up the wall.

If you get bitten, it’s insanely itchy; when you try to sleep, they buzz in your ears; and they’re ridiculously hard to catch.

If cockroaches evoke disgust, mosquitoes are often described as pure annoyance.

It’s reached the point where whole guides on ’creative’ ways to kill mosquitoes exist.

Well, recently, summer has gotten so hot due to global warming that you didn’t even see many mosquitoes.

You could say it had gotten to the point where you’d only see a buzzing mosquito or two around late summer or early autumn.

However, the bugs in the Forest of the Four Seasons...

...were beyond words.

Winter had blizzards, spring had pollen dust storms, and summer had swarms of bugs.

As if heralding the arrival of summer, an immense swarm of bugs surged forth, completely blotting out the view.

’Where on earth are this many bugs popping out from?’

I guided Lackey—who had been chewed, bitten, sampled, and thoroughly enjoyed by the bugs—back inside the cave.

After hastily applying insect repellent to him, the bugs didn’t come near him anymore.

It was an insect repellent with decent reviews, but the results were even better than expected.

Wieeeeeeng!!!

After rescuing Lackey, I looked outside the cave.

A terrifying number of bug swarms had erupted, blanketing the entire Forest of the Four Seasons.

Not only was my vision completely blocked, but the noise was so loud that it was profoundly grating.

It was at a level where you’d wonder if a helicopter was hovering overhead.

’When I first started living here, it was mid-to-late summer at the latest. Even then, there wasn’t a swarm this big.’

Was it because it was early summer? Or was this time unusual?

Was this written in Rice Craone’s journal as well? Various questions kept popping into my head.

’Is the raccoon family doing alright? I’m worried.’

If this situation was abnormal, I was deeply worried about the raccoon family.

If I hadn’t rubbed insect repellent on Lackey, he wouldn’t have been able to shake them off yet either.

It would be even harder for the raccoon family.

Thank goodness these bugs weren’t locusts; if they were, flesh could have been torn off completely.

’...Come to think of it, if it were a swarm of locusts, we’d be in real trouble, wouldn’t we?’

The notoriety of locust swarms was already infamous.

In the Republic of Korea, winter exists so the threat of bugs isn’t that immense, but regions warm all year round are different.

Once a swarm of locusts sweeps through, farming gets completely wrecked.

If grasshoppers in Korea are merely annoying pests, locusts in a climate that stays warm all four seasons are practically a disaster.

’Thank goodness the temperature variations here are quite large.’

If it were warm weather year-round, those swarms of bugs would be popping up all the time. Just imagining it is horrifying.

Anyway, since I couldn’t do anything until that swarm of bugs disappeared, I made do with smoked meat for breakfast.

What about Lackey’s food? I asked Bbareumbo directly about this.

Jeolle- jeolle-

He shook his head, indicating not to feed him. It seemed he intended to establish firm discipline.

Besides, Lackey was currently dazed from the aftermath of being attacked by the bugs anyway.

’The fish are outside, will the bugs try to eat them?’

If I’d known this would happen, I would have at least closed the lid.

If luck was against me, I might have to throw away all the fish I’d gathered so far.

Though our food supply had become plentiful after hunting a wild boar yesterday... waste was still waste.

’I have to protect the Inner Cores at least.’

Partly because it would be a waste, but a bigger reason was not knowing what might happen.

What if a bug ate an Inner Core and grew massive? That would be truly horrifying.

At least winter existed, so there shouldn’t be such a drastic shift, but I couldn’t be certain.

Watching the bug swarm that raged strictly outside and never entered the cave, I opened the Auction House.

I had previously bought the insect repellent with the best reviews from the Auction House.

I had applied it all around the cave just in case, but it was baffling that such a huge swarm didn’t even dream of coming inside.

’Is it really because of this?’

Time to test it out. I picked up a suitable stone and smeared the insect repellent on it.

Just in case, I slathered it thick so it was sticky to the touch.

Hwiik!

When I threw it in an arc, the bugs scattered along that same arc.

The stone that landed on the ground rolled a bit and came to a sudden stop.

Eeeeeeeeng!

Before long, the bugs began avoiding the area around the stone.

Whether they hated the scent or not, the clear radius grew wider and wider.

’The efficacy is really good, huh?’This chapter is updated first at nоvelping.com.

No wonder it had such high ratings.

An insect repellent that even worked in the Forest of the Four Seasons. By the way, the snake repellent was also made by the same fixed handle.

I bought more repellent from the Auction House and posted a thread.

It wasn’t to advertise, but to show the current situation.

Title) What on earth is going on.

Wild Grylls

(Video of the bug swarm completely blocking the view)

(Photo of Lackey after getting attacked by bugs)

I woke up and saw it was pitch black outside, checked, and it’s all bugs;;

At this point, I can’t do any activities or anything at all. So I’m just staying stuck in the cave.

Ah. Also, does anyone know something good for bug bites? Lackey this bastard got bitten by bugs and is fucking scratching his body like crazy.

↳ Heavenly Demon) I have seen swarms of locusts before, but this is my first time seeing one so thick you cannot see ahead.

↳ Wild Grylls) Heavenly Demon-nim, how do you handle things like that?

↳ Heavenly Demon) This seat does not particularly like bugs either. Does one avoid dung because it is dirty, or because it is scary?

↳ Sword Matstar) People who say things like that are always the ones who are scared, though?

↳ Heavenly Demon) Laughable. Me, scared of mere bugs?

↳ I’ll upload photos of cockroaches or house centipedes, try commenting on those then lol

↳ I feel like you’ll get blocked right away lol

↳ Cockroaches aside, don’t post house centipedes; I almost passed out seeing one.

↳ Isn’t a money bug a house centipede?

↳ Yep, the east calls it money bug, the west calls it house centipede

↳ Starlight Lady) I can make medicine for you. Grylls-nim, were you bitten too?

↳ Wild Grylls) No, I applied repellent so I’m fine. It’s just that Lackey slept outside.

↳ Starlight Lady) Got it! I’ll give it to you soon, so please wait just a moment!

↳ Wild Grylls) Thank you. Should I give you an Inner Core?

↳ Starlight Lady) It’s not like I’m crafting an Elixir, so I’ll respectfully decline.

↳ Allfather) For a swarm of bugs that large to appear. What a truly bizarre yet mysterious phenomenon. A similar situation was recorded in the diary as well.

↳ Wild Grylls) A similar situation?

↳ Allfather) Yes. An account describing a specific region covered in a pitch-black swarm of bugs. It appears the area Rice Craone stayed in was outside the sphere of influence.

↳ Wild Grylls) So it’s only like this here?

↳ Allfather) Yes. According to the journal, it mentioned it dissipates quickly, so there should be no need to worry.

If so, that was a relief, but I had one question.

By what mechanism would a swarm of bugs that huge disappear?

It wasn’t like someone was sucking them up with a vacuum cleaner, so hearing that they’d vanish quickly was hard to believe.

↳ But aren’t they coming into the cave? Even if you covered it with a tent, it must be hard.

↳ Wild Grylls) I applied repellent. The one I’m using is seriously effective.

↳ What are you using?

↳ Wild Grylls) I’m using the one with good reviews. It was made by the Icon Merchant Guild, is it okay to mention this?

↳ Don’t Abandon the Hero) A simple advertisement is fine! After all, you will bear the full reward or consequences yourself anyway!

↳ The Orange Badge is here. What are you up to these days? Still being chased around?

↳ Don’t Abandon the Hero) I came to the harbor and I’m fishing! Things have been quite relaxing lately! Ah! And Grylls-ssi! Has Ludwig-ssi not arrived yet!

↳ Wild Grylls) Still no news yet.

↳ Hey Grylls. Show us how well it works. How good is it?

↳ Wild Grylls) (Video of the bug swarm flying around to avoid the repellent-coated stone) It’s this good. Pretty awesome, right?

↳ That’s fucking awesome though? lololol

↳ I should buy one too. Adventurers and explorers must use this often.

Somehow, it felt like it had turned into an unintended advertisement.

Still, this was a genuine real-user review. I decided not to mind since it shouldn’t cause any problems.

I killed time browsing the Gallery for a bit, but...

...In the end, the conclusion was to just wait until the bug swarm vanished.

’Or should I smear repellent on my body and head out?’

That might be a better idea. As soon as the thought occurred to me, I applied repellent to my body.

Following that, I peeked my arm out of the cave to test it.

Eeeeeeeeng!!

The bugs didn’t even come near my arm. It was the same when I stepped my entire body outside.

Even when I reached out to grab them, they dodged away like a single superorganism.

The effectiveness is insane. It seems I’ll have to stick strictly to this repellent from now on.

’Let me see. The fish are...’

Pudadak! Pudadak!

The moment I looked at the bucket with the fish, I realized my worries were completely groundless.

Why? Because the fish were going wild, having a full-on bug mukbang.

You could say it was like a whale holding its mouth wide open waiting for prey.Follow the newest chapters on novelping(.)com.

It seemed fine to leave the fish like this. All that remained was the raccoon family.

Tadadak! Tadak!

Heading over to the tree where the raccoon family lived, I witnessed a rare scene.

Beneath the tree, the papa raccoon was hard at work building a campfire.

The bugs were avoiding the smoke rising from the campfire.

"Ke-eng! Kkek! Kkellok!"

However, the papa raccoon was in a situation where he had to constantly keep the campfire—and specifically the smoke—going.

He looked so pitiful that I applied repellent on him.

Just in case, I gave them an entire tub to make things convenient for the raccoon family.

Having taken care of what needed to be done, I returned to the cave.

Even as I walked back, the bug swarm veered away from me, giving me a strange sensation.

’Let’s buy about ten tubs.’

Thinking I’d use it very useful in the future, I immediately went into the Auction House.

I thought about leaving a review while I was at it, but...

[Sold Out]

"...?"

The moment I saw the [Sold Out] mark, I couldn’t help but blink in disbelief.

"What is this?"

Where did all my goods go?

Although the Gallery Auction House had atrocious commission fees, it was a system where bypassing logistics made up for it entirely.

However, money earned in the Gallery could not be withdrawn into reality. That was its most fatal drawback.

Thus, most products posted on the Auction House were single items; in other words, the available stock was remarkably small.

Moreover, even these were mostly listed as a form of advertisement.

From a merchant guild’s perspective, it was nothing more and nothing less than that. There wasn’t much merit to it.

"Guild Master-nim! Requests for the supply of insect repellent are pouring in!"

"Uh... wha?"

"Guild Master-nim! A request for repellent from the Adventurers Guild has...!"

"Uh..."

Marshall, the Guild Master of the Icon Merchant Guild, could not comprehend the current situation.

He had been working hard as usual dreaming of the merchant guild’s future, but what on earth was this?

Suddenly, requests for insect repellent exploded, and their entire inventory was wiped out.

An immense volume of purchase requests. This was the first time in his life experiencing insect repellent reaching such booming popularity.

"W-Why is this selling? What on earth happened? The listing on the Gallery was just for promotional purposes, too."

"Well... have you checked the Gallery recently?"

"Not lately, why?"

"Someone using it in the Forest of the Four Seasons posted a review."

"The Forest of the Four Seasons?"

Marshall tilted his head at the secretary’s words.

He knew full well the story of the fixed handle surviving in the Forest of the Four Seasons.

However, it stopped right there.

Busy with real life, and unable to receive goods from the Forest of the Four Seasons anyway, he had erased it from his mind long ago.

"Yes. The Forest of the Four Seasons. That hellscape where no one knows what exists."

"I know someone is desperately surviving there too. But that person wrote a review?"

"He showed a video of even the bugs of the Forest of the Four Seasons avoiding it. Do you understand what this means?"

Of course he did. The Guild Master’s mind spun rapidly.

This was an opportunity. A golden, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

However, there was a problem, and that was the repellent’s ingredients.

’...I was just selling what my father made.’

It was a repellent crafted with the help and wisdom of his father.

In other words, it meant he would have to run around frantically to acquire those ingredients.

In the first place, repellent wasn’t even the guild’s main product. Repellents were dime a dozen, with far too many competitors.

After deliberating, Marshall instructed his secretary. First, put out the immediate fire.

"First, organize the incoming orders in sequence to figure out the total quantity needed. Since demand surged so abruptly, I can’t guarantee we have enough stock."

"Understood."

"And make sure to secure a minimum amount to steadily supply that survivor. That will be the most important thing."

Cautious as Marshall was, he was not one to kick away an opportunity.

"While we’re at it, what if we support him with our guild’s goods?"

"Goods... sir?"

"Yes. Supplies necessary for survival."

While the outside world was turning busily...

"See if I ever write another review again."

Grylls gnashed his teeth as a scalper premium was slapped onto the repellent in real-time.