I fell asleep without realizing it, then suddenly my eyes snapped open. It was so early that I could tell I had woken up before dawn.

What a surprise. In the pitch-black darkness with no lamps to light the surroundings, only the gems embedded in the dryads’ equipment twinkled like stars in the early morning. The dryads, sensing I was awake, stopped pretending to sleep and one by one rose from their spots to look at me.

Everyone’s expression seemed to say, ‘What’s with that person?’ Mesquite worried that I’d had a nightmare, Elder teased me about feeling burdened to wake up early, and even Daisy, the dryad in charge of the 28th Terrarium office, looked like she had caught on to the reason.

What woke me—someone who sleeps so soundly that even an earthquake wouldn’t stir me—was, simply enough, the sound of trickling water. It was so faint it was barely audible unless I listened closely, but it was oddly grating.

“I never thought about water because of the fire? Since the 26th also had a severe drought, I assumed this place would have burned down entirely without a single drop left.”

“Ah, you can hear the water sound? Actually… there was something strange I noticed, but I didn’t think it was significant enough to mention.”

“Water?”

I asked the dryads if they couldn’t hear that trickling water sound.

Amidst bewildered expressions, Daisy the dryad said she had an idea of where it might be and asked if I wanted to go check. Mesquite worried about me not getting enough sleep until morning, but right now, my mind felt oddly clear.

“Let’s go, let’s go. Is it far from here?”

“No. There’s one nearby. When you go out past the orchard, you’ll see it right away.”

The place Daisy the dryad led me to was the center of the village. As we got closer, the ground underfoot was flooded.

After the fire came the water. I wondered if it had rained, but aside from the area near the village center, there was no moisture. The water wasn’t gushing out haphazardly like flood damage, but flowing along strange patterns on the ground. Daisy the dryad pointed ahead and spoke.

“The ground there suddenly rose up.”

Splashing through the water, we arrived at a spot where the earth had bulged upward. Like a volcano just about to erupt, the ground swelled up to my waist, and water was streaming down from its top.

“Is there a water vein here or something? Why did the groundwater suddenly burst out?”

“It’s not ordinary water.”

Mesquite bent down, cupped some water in her hands, and brought it up. Then, looking at me, she poured the water over her other arm. When the water touched the black gauntlet, it sparkled and polished the path it flowed over, making it shine.

Whoa… I had a suspicion.

[Master! Why did you come only now!]

When I woke up my phone, the screen of <Infinite Diamond> was in a mess. It seemed they had decided to use the wooden bonsai shaped like the number 28 instead of the diamond cart, and the diamonds the dwarves had piled there were overflowing.

Why is it going wild…? No, how much had piled up for the world tree branch, which was sipping through a straw, to fail to keep up? It’s overflowing, isn’t it?

Even after creating that mess, the dwarves looked cheerful. They said they were happy because, with a fixed outflow of diamonds… the dwarves who had lost their jobs when diamonds piled up in the cart had returned.

That couldn’t be. I had maxed out all the content in <Infinite Diamond>. Moreover, the number of hired dwarves was MAX.

[Master! Give me one more of those!]

[Master! Give me more of those diamonds that disappear so quickly!]

The dwarves pointed at the number 28 bonsai. The bonsai had grown so well under the dwarves’ excessive care that, no matter how many pages I swiped, there were extended branches.

[Master! While you’re here, take some diamonds too!]

[Master! More workers mean we can mine more diamonds!]

“What? Why has it increased more? ”

In response to my question, the dwarves all stretched their arms toward one spot in unison. With the tips of pickaxes or shovels, and the empty-handed dwarves poked with their fingers. That spot was a tab button showing the dwarves’ upgrade information.

They gestured for me to touch it, just like in the tutorial when I first started <Infinite Diamond>.

Filled with suspicion, I pressed it… Surprisingly, the spot showing the number of hired dwarves had changed to MAX+1Lv. Isn’t MAX the end? Why is there a +1 attached?

“What is this?”

[Master! The mine has expanded, so we need more workers!]

[Master! Do you need more workers? Do you need more diamonds?]

The fact that the mine expanded… Originally, I could see the entire <Infinite Diamond> game screen in vertical mode at a glance in this small phone that fit in one hand. After the bonsai appeared, when I slid the phone, the mine screen extended along with the rails pulling the cart. On and on…

Even now, I haven’t used half, let alone a part of the diamonds I have—what if the production capacity increases further here? The dwarves make a fuss every time I wake up the phone, saying to take some because I use so little!

The sound of all the dwarves in the Diamond Empire rejoicing over the creation of jobs for them wasn’t heard. Faced with the endlessly piling diamonds, I couldn’t bring myself to speak.

When I pushed diamonds into the nearly dead branch of the world tree in the orchard, it seemed so excessive that sap flowed profusely. Somehow, the water rising from the ground here now seemed like an aftereffect of that.

“If you overwater a plant, it dies, right? Am I going to save the World Tree’s branch and then kill it again? It looks like I’ve been stuffing too many diamonds into the World Tree’s branch! What do I do?”

No, if you think about it, it’s not really my fault. You should pull the straw out at the right level, not just keep sucking it all down like an idiot, right? Too much of anything is bad. I nearly killed it by overfeeding it. I fed it so much that the ground is bursting!

“So that’s why it’s discharging like this to avoid dying. Normally, it should be released through transpiration, but it’s so excessive that it’s coming out this way…”

“But, Jae, it’s not just this one place. There are a few more spots like this that have sprung up in the village…”

So ‘one nearby’ was what that meant. Are the other places flooding like this too?

“Has there been any rumor of a terrarium being ruined by flooding? The 28th might be the first. How long has it been since I became a provisional administrator, and I’m already messing it up? I’m doomed.”

“My master, Jae. You don’t need to blame yourself like that. It may look like this, but the single-digit terrariums each have a fountain like this where water springs up. That’s because they have many residents and gather a lot of diamonds. They even build them on purpose to show that the terrarium is thriving and to flaunt their skills. Of course, those fountains are only one per place. Here, you’ve created several fountains by yourself… But for now, building structures to contain the water should be the top priority.”

Beside me, Daisy the dryad chimed in, delighted that it would become a landmark of the 28th. She doesn’t understand my worries. Just a moment ago, I was so anxious thinking I’d ruined everything.

Come to think of it, Elder is quiet. He must know what’s causing this flowing water, so why is he silent?

“Elder… are you crying?”

Elder was staring at the water spewed out by the World Tree’s branch after gorging itself on diamonds, his eyes reddened. The shock seemed immense.

Seeing him on the verge of tears with that delicate face made my heart ache. Crying with that pretty face is a crime. It’s harmful to my heart.

“Sap… coming out of the World Tree… evaporates quickly…”

Elder bowed his head deeply toward the ground and spoke in a despairing voice.

“If it’s puddling and flowing without being able to evaporate… that means how many diamonds… And it’s not just one place, but others like this too…”

Elder, sniffling, looked like a white flower branch holding dew. A single bloom, a flower. I’m a sinful woman. I made a handsome man cry. With this, I realized. A handsome man’s tears are a weapon. I wanted to comfort Elder even if it cost me everything I had. Of course, it doesn’t mean my diamonds will all be drained.

While handing out handfuls of diamonds instead of handkerchiefs and coaxing Elder not to miss the diamonds that had already left, I noticed the little dryads doing adorable things.

Wolfsbane lightly splashed the water, watching as their robe, touched by it, became clean. Daisy, pretending not to, was secretly kicking water with her feet to spray Wolfsbane. Was it because the essence of all this was diamond, too grand in scale for the children to fully grasp?

“You don’t need to worry about a flood. As that dryad said, the sap evaporates quickly. If there’d been a flood, the path here would have been all wet. But it’s only this area, isn’t it? Still, I think it’s best to install a fountain. Build one grander and nicer than those in the single-digit terrariums. I hope a technician moves here soon. A stonecutter to carve the rock would be nice too.”

Mesquite gave a peculiar smile as she watched Daisy the dryad, excited at the thought of decorating the terrarium.

“My lord Jae. You know that the sap released through transpiration turns into diamonds when it meets a druid’s soul, right?”

“Yeah, you mentioned that before.”

“In places where transpiration is active, more diamonds will form on the druid’s soul. Everyone wants to go to the single-digit terrariums not only because they’re the safest zones with the World Tree’s blessing, but also because of another benefit.”

Mesquite’s words were meant to show that, unlike Daisy the dryad, I shouldn’t be distracted by building a fountain but focus on something more important. In short, the 28th terrarium had received a buff.

It wasn’t just a village where special fountains serving as free potions burst forth everywhere, but a village with a diamond production buff too. Of course, I’m the one handing out those diamonds, but…

“Though its number is higher than the single-digit terrariums, this place has become a terrarium with benefits on par with them.”

Mesquite praised me as truly remarkable, but that only deepened Elder’s gloom, so I stopped him. Judging from the fact that he didn’t stop immediately, it seemed half of the intention was to tease Elder.

In the meantime, my dryads quickly gathered nearby building debris and piled it around where the water was gushing. It was a temporary measure until a technician skilled in making fountains could visit. Water trickled through the gaps, but not enough to wet the ground as widely as before.

While moving through the village to administer first aid, I learned that there were a total of five places where water was gushing out.

After building the embankments, morning arrived, and I prepared to leave immediately. Daisy the dryad, brimming with things to promote, wanted to emphasize that there were no taxes and as many as five rare landmarks, the kind you’d only see in single-digit terrariums.

She also boasted that while I was away, she would come up with all sorts of fountain designs to the best of her ability.

“Once the fountain is finished, may I decorate the area around it with red daisy flower pots?”

“Do as you please.”

It seemed as if, without realizing it, I had developed a competitive spirit against the single-digit terrariums.

More splendid, more magnificent. Well, I’m fine with that.

Waving goodbye to Daisy Dryad, I quickened my pace to leave. I felt that if Elder stayed here too long, his gloom would dig into the ground.