Once we arrived back in our room, I summoned the door to the Unlimited Bath and made to open it, but then stopped in my tracks.
“What’s the matter, Sir Touya?”
“Did the door get bigger?”
“It’s both taller and wider, now that you mention it...”
It was obvious once I compared it to Rulitora’s size. In the past, he would have had to crouch to get through the door. But now, even though he was fully clad in armor and standing up straight, he’d be able to pass through the door with room to spare.
“I’d expected the inside to change after getting the Goddess of Fire’s blessing, but...”
“The changes are starting with the door itself,” Clena said with an astonished expression while Rium nodded wordlessly beside her.
“Rulitora, if anyone comes by, I’ll trust you to handle it.”
“Understood.”
There was no reason to hesitate. I left Rulitora to keep watch, then turned the doorknob and opened the door in one go. The door didn’t feel any heavier than it did before.
“The door’s tiny!” I exclaimed right after entering. I thought for a moment that the door inside had gotten smaller, but it was simply farther away than it used to be.
“Um, has this area gotten over twice as big as it used to be?” Roni asked as she peered inside.
The distance from the outer door to the inner building looked to be about three stutos now. The pile of weapons and armor that we had stuffed into the one stuto corridor before now had almost another stuto of space on either side.
“Clena, can you check the left side?”
“Got it.” Clena and Roni walked to the left. I took Rium and Rakti along with me to the right.
“It’s so wide...”
“The weapons have fallen over.”
“We’ll need to reorganize them later. There’re a lot of swords without sheaths, too. Be careful to not trip over anything, Rakti.”
“Why did you only address me?!”
“Look at Rium.”
“Huh?”
Rakti looked toward Rium to see her hovering on her flying disc. There was no risk of her tripping over anything in her state.
“Uhhh...” Rakti looked like she wanted to say something, but just clung to my back instead.
Now I didn’t have to worry about getting her injured as long as I put away all the fallen weapons as we progressed.
“Here.”
“Oh, thanks.”
I turned around at the sound of Rium’s voice to see that she had managed to find my gauntlets. Now I could pick up blades without having to worry about cutting myself.
I picked up fallen swords and spears until we reached the far right side of the building. The corridor was still continuing three stutos wide. We kept walking until we reached the back of the building, which was also still three stutos wide. The building itself looked like it had gotten bigger. The pile of weapons we had put away had been cut off in the middle and continued to the left side.
“Um, I think beyond this would be...”
“Hm? What’s wrong, Rakti?”
“N-nothing... you’ll understand once you see it.” Rakti hid herself behind me, her cheeks blushing red. I had no choice but to proceed into the unknown.
“Huh, I see...” I understood what she had meant once we turned the corner.
The left side of the building was larger than the rest, measuring about six stutos wide. It was practically a garden now. There was an altar in a far corner, and on it rested a giant fire stone. Its shape was similar to the crimson pillars of crystal from the blessing ceremony, but it was several times larger in size. It might have been even taller than I was. I was tempted to call it a “fire pillar” instead of a “fire stone.”
“What in the world is that?”
“Ahh... I’m sorry. Sister Fire loves being extravagant...”
So this was being extravagant? Was this giant altar just because she wanted to be extravagant?
“Sir Touya!” I looked back to see Clena and Roni walking toward us.
I could also see the entire left side now. It was a corridor about six stutos wide... no, at this point I could call it a garden. The side closest to the door was concave, or rather, a part of the building was now sticking out. Looked like there was a new room.
There was nothing besides the altar here, and the gravel... no, the ground was wide open. The ground seemed like it was from Mt. Lemnos. Its texture looked similar to what I had seen during the blessing ceremony. Some of the weapons and armor had fallen over, so we lined them all back up along the building.
There was a door in the space we suspected to be a new room, but it was buried in equipment right now. We should probably check it out from inside the building for now.
Clena asked me as we looked around the garden, “So this is all from the Goddess of Fire’s blessing?”
“Most likely. The ground here is similar to the volcano’s.”
“I wonder if the part of the building sticking out is influencing it.”
“It’s close to that fire altar, so probably. That’s most likely a new room that the blessing created.”
“Sister Fire is the second oldest, right after sister Light.” Rakti said as she peeked out from behind me. Come on, stop hiding and talk to us face to face.
I turned around, picked her up, and set her down next to me. She was light as a feather.
Rakti looked surprised at first, but didn’t try to hide behind me and just clung to my arm instead. One step at a time.
“Anyway, do they have some sort of order? Like they have in the reliefs?”
“Sister Fire is the second oldest, so if we were to order ourselves, sister Fire would be right after sister Light.”
“I see, so there is an order.” Clena and Roni looked at the new part of the building as they listened to Rakti.
“So is that why there’s a new room right next to the bathing room?”
“That’s probably it. We’re done inspecting the outside now, so let’s take a look inside.”
We all entered the building at Clena’s suggestion. The entrance and other areas hadn’t changed. The main difference was the new door on the far left wall. It matched where we had seen the building jut out from the outside.
“Is this the new room created from the Goddess of Fire’s blessing?”
“It won’t shoot fire at us as soon as we open the door, right?”
“S-sister Fire isn’t that extravagant... I think?” Rakti sounded nervous. Even she doubted what she was saying.
All five of us looked at each other. Nobody spoke a word.
“...Stand back just to be safe, everyone.”
In the end, I opened the door while the other four stayed back. Of course, I made sure I was in the right position to avoid getting hit by a sudden blast of fire.
“Ready, go!”
I opened the door all at once, but no fire came shooting out. I fearfully looked inside, but then my eyes opened wide. The girls started approaching and peering inside as well, but none of them could tell what this room was. I could imagine why.
“I-it’s finally here...” I muttered breathlessly, staring at the room before my eyes—the blessing from the Goddess of Fire had brought about a spacious, professional-looking kitchen.
The sink and counters were made from carved and polished stone, looking incredibly luxurious. The stove was similar to what we used in modern Japan, so I gave it a thorough inspection first. Kitchens could potentially be dangerous, after all.
Roni and Rium didn’t dare touch anything, but they stared at everything around them with keen eyes. Clena stayed a few steps back. Rakti was hiding behind Clena.
The sink had been carved from natural stone. I knew these details just like how I had known how to use my gift all of a sudden. The stone was granite, a type of stone that the volcano produced.
Not only was there a sink and a stove, but also a wide open counter. It was in the middle of the room so that everyone c
ould gather around it and cook together.
The faucet was producing warm and cold water just fine. There was a control panel next to the sink. We’d been washing our kitchenware in the changing room sink before, but we could move them over here now.
The stove wasn’t an induction cooker, but a gas stove thanks to the Goddess of Fire’s influence. Though technically it was running off my MP, so it wasn’t exactly a gas stove either.
“...What’s ‘godly’ mean here?”
The knobs controlling the flame went from ‘low’ to ‘medium’ to ‘high,’ but then went to ‘super’ and ‘godly.’” It was written in kanji. I tried turning it up to high for now, but I didn’t dare to set it any higher. The girls’ eyes were sparkling in surprise at how I summoned fire just by turning a knob, but my mind was in a totally different place. I told the girls what the words on the scale read and to never turn it past “high.”
“If I turned it to ‘godly’ heat, would I summon the Goddess of Fire herself or something?”
“I-I don’t think sister Fire would do that... probably?” Rakti didn’t sound confident, but according to her, if fire was enough to summon the goddess, then she’d be sticking her head out of Mt. Lemnos right around now.
I looked inside the shelves and found kitchen knives, ladles, and a bunch of other cooking tools. Next to the kitchen knives was a butchering knife perfect for preparing anything we managed to hunt and kill. I opened a large drawer and found another set of cookware. Roni pointed at one, asking, “Sir Touya, what is this?”
“Hm? Oh, that’s a whisk.”
It was even electric. Well, technically it was powered by magic. I picked it up, turned it on, and the motor resounded as the whisk started spinning at a dizzying speed. Roni jumped away from it at the same time. She was more surprised by this than the stove since she at least knew what fire was, unlike this completely foreign object.
There were other various tools I was familiar with from modern Japan. The pots and frying pans looked like they were nonstick, but I didn’t notice anything else remarkable about them.
On the other hand, I couldn’t find a single utensil. There were cabinets to fit them in, but all of them were empty. This wasn’t a problem though, since we already had our own.
“And what are you doing, Rium?”
Rium had left my side and started doing little hops and spins around the room. To a crystal mage like her, this collection of modern Japanese cookware must have been like a treasure trove. She looked cute doing that, so I let her be for now. Rakti joined in the dancing along the way, which I found pretty amusing to watch. After a while, we started organizing our luggage again.
We had moved near the fire altar. This had become the most spacious area in the new and improved Unlimited Bath.
Rulitora and I handled the physical labor, while Clena and Rakti tried to do basic appraisal on our items. As the daughter of a noble family, Clena had been taught about antiques as part of her upbringing. Rakti didn’t have as much of a discerning eye, but she could tell whether an item had been cast with magic and about how strong that spell was. We brought whatever needed touching up outside, where Roni and Rium handled both that and talking to whoever came by.
We lined up the weapons and armor into three categories—valuable antiques, magic items, and normal old items. Roni and Rium were helping clean up the old items that were dirty, but not particularly rusty. They looked much more appealing after giving them a thorough wipe.
In the meantime, two guests visited us.
The first was a cleric who came to deliver a magic textbook. Roni called for me to come out to the living room, where I met with the cleric and received the book.
The second guest, however, was more of a problem.
“Huh? Crissa’s here?”
Crissa, the daughter of Pardoe, the blacksmith we were having tune up our “Magic Eater” armor, had come to pay us a visit.
Had something happened with our order? We decided to all convene to hear her out. A cleric led Crissa to our VIP room. She was wearing a yellow dress over her pure white fur.
“I’m sorry for bothering you so soon after the order. There’s actually something I would like to discuss about it...” she said, then bowed her head. So they really did encounter a problem.
We asked her to sit on the sofa and explain what the issue was. Her small build allowed her to sit on a human sofa without her tail getting in the way, and she almost looked like a stuffed animal doing so. I wanted to just stare at her with a silly grin, but I suppressed the urge and let her talk.
“So what did you want to discuss?”
“The truth is... that armor is far too sturdy for us.”
We looked at each other while Crissa spoke with a solemn expression. Wasn’t it good for the armor to be sturdy? Rulitora spoke for me, voicing what I was thinking in a confused tone.
“...Isn’t that a good thing?”
“W-well... it’s a bit shameful to say, but the task is beyond the capabilities of my father and Mr. Shakova...”
“And they can’t tailor it, either?” Clena with a puzzled expression. Crissa hung her head and nodded in response. She was so small that it looked like we were reprimanding a child, making my chest hurt.
“...What’s the core issue?”
“The fire stones. They can’t get enough heat from the fire stones to be able to modify the armor. My father said that it was the first time he’d seen a metal like it.”
So the problem lay in the fuel source, the fire stones. In other words, it wouldn’t be resolved by bringing the armor to another alchemist. Not to mention he had been introduced to us after we’d emphasized that we wouldn’t mind a demi-human. A better alchemist here in Hephaestusopolis would be hard to find.
“Do you not have enough? Or do you need something other than just fire stones to make it work?”
“We’d need a larger fire stone, or perhaps...”
According to Crissa, the size of a fire stone depended on the strength of the fire spirits residing within. The larger the fire stone, the higher the heat it could bring out. However, to obtain a fire stone bigger than the largest they had now, they would need to mine deeper into the mountain. Fire spirits were more concentrated the closer they were to the center. However, they had no way of predicting what would happen to the still-inactive volcano if they did so. It was effectively an impossible task.
So they’re lacking heat... I remembered something as I thought to myself. I told Crissa to wait a little as I gathered the others and discussed with them whether or not we could use my gift to help solve the problem. We decided it’d be fine, or rather, we had no other option. If we did have another option, it’d be to abandon the armor altogether, but that’d be a poor choice, considering what trials lay ahead for us. The only problem was whether or not they would keep our secret. I may have been overthinking it, but since my gift was more convenient than strong, I couldn’t predict what troubles might come raining down if knowledge of it were to spread. There were plenty of demerits to having word get out that my gift was “weak,” too.
“Uhh, Crissa. Would you mind sending a message to Pardoe?”
“N-not at all, what is it?” Crissa raised her head at my question.
“We might be able to help. But in exchange, you’ll have to keep a secret of ours. Please tell him that.”
“Help...? But how would you...?”
“I can’t tell you the details, but just know that it has something to do with my power as a hero.”
Crissa stiffened up and nodded in reply. Just in case you’re thinking it, I wasn’t lying.
Jumping ahead a bit, Pardoe accepted our proposal. Maybe that was his pride as a craftsman who couldn’t abandon his work talking.
We let the temple elder know that we’d be staying in Pardoe’s workshop starting today. The elder was disappointed, but he somehow became emotional and understanding when I told him that I’d be helping the blacksmiths tune my armor since they needed t
he assistance of a hero. I wished he’d stop posing to express himself, though.
As for my lessons in fire-type clerical magic, I already knew the foundations, so I decided to study on my own for the time being. If needed, I’d go back to the temple for training. Training under this temple seemed like it would be especially stifling, so I wanted to do everything I could by myself first.
We saw two other ketolts besides Pardoe upon our return to the smithy. They were both tabbies, one brown and one orange, both with white fur around their mouths and paws. They were wearing work clothes like Pardoe was, but unlike his messy and sooty appearance, the two of them looked clean and professional. I couldn’t tell how old cats were by their looks, but the orange tabby was a bit smaller than the brown tabby and the white cat. He was still larger than Crissa, though.
Crissa introduced the larger, brown tabby as Pardoe’s friend, Shakova Remus, and the smaller, orange tabby as Shakova’s son, Mark Remus. Shakova greeted us with a confident air, holding out his paw for a shake, but Mark only nodded his head in silence. Pardoe and Shakova had been best friends since they were young, which made Crissa and Mark childhood friends in turn.
Pardoe was the first to come speak to me. “I heard the story from Crissa. I’m nyot into spreading around people’s secrets, but how do you plan to create a heat source stronger than the fire stone’s?”
“It’s easier for you to see it firsthand, but that in itself is a secret.”
Pardoe looked at the other ketolts, who nodded at each other, then looked my way again. “Understood. We’ll keep your secret.”
“In that case...” I opened the door to my Unlimited Bath, which made Crissa cower in surprise behind her father. The other three opened their eyes wide but remained composed—or so I thought, but all of their tails stood stiff and upright.
“Wh-what in the world...?” Pardoe stood in front of everybody. His appraiser mind got to work as he touched the door and observed the inside.
“Not yet, the best part is still inside.” I patted Pardoe on the shoulder and invited him inside. Clena and the others urged the rest of the ketolts inside as well, though they all looked nervous.
The Chaotic Stone Sauna Page 5
