by Hiro Ainana
“Why, it’s been two years since I last had blue-green tea.”
Two years?
That seemed strange; it wasn’t as if they couldn’t import anything here.
“How delightful… Between this and that truly delicious meal, you must be rather wealthy.”
“Really?”
I was wealthy all right, but the ingredients for the food were mostly things we’d bought locally, so they didn’t cost any more than the average person’s meal.
“But of course. That was a more luxurious meal than what they serve in the castle.”
“Are you sure? We didn’t use any particularly valuable ingredients.”
As far as I remembered, the meal we ate as guests at Count Seiryuu’s castle was much more extravagant.
“Our territory is in the midst of a famine. If the baron was to indulge in luxury at a time like this, he could hardly face the common people. Thus, our meals at the castle have consisted mostly of bean soup and sweet potatoes.”
I was impressed that she could cultivate such a large chest on that kind of diet, but she seemed to be telling the truth.
If the lord of the land was really that honorable, then the only explanation for the corruption of the top bureaucrats and soldiers must have been that the hell demon was plotting something behind the scenes.
“Incidentally, what were you doing out in the forest?”
Miss Karina looked a little embarrassed as she opened her mouth to speak.
“I had hoped to speak to the giants that live deep within the forest to borrow their aid, but I’m afraid I lost my way. I thought it best to leap to the top of a tree, but…”
She must’ve used Raka’s Bestow Strength Enhancement function, then.
Charging into unfamiliar territory without a map struck me as a reckless strategy, though.
“What did you want to speak to the giants about?”
“I had hoped to request their help in defeating a hell demon,” Miss Karina replied in a clear voice. “The demon has disguised himself as a magistrate and a fake hero, and my father and elder sister are completely fooled. And so, Mr. Raka and I set out into the forest in the hopes of meeting a giant that could defeat the demon.”
She seriously thought the giants would take on a demon just because some random stranger asked them to?
Not only was she overly honest; this young lady was extremely sheltered.
“Lady Karina, you’ve said too much.”
Raka woke up to offer some blunt advice.
“So you’re awake, Mr. Raka.”
Miss Karina’s pendant blinked blue as it spoke. “Forgive me, but I must request that you keep what you’ve just been told a secret.”
“Sure, I won’t tell anyone.”
Raka’s request was easy enough to accept.
“You have my gratitude, mighty one.”
Raka had called me “mighty one” when I first found them, too. He probably knew I was strong because of that Perceive Mightiness function, although I wondered how much specific information it gave him.
“Mighty one?”
“Indeed, you are mighty. I do not know what level you might be, but you are strong enough that my lady Karina could not defeat you even with my Strength Enhancement.”
“In that case, perhaps this gentleman could defeat the—”
“Do not ask the impossible of him, Lady Karina. He may be strong, but he is still a human being. The only humans who possess the power to defeat a demon are those chosen as heroes or a select few who do not conform to the common understanding.”
My “Poker Face” skill let me respond with a simple smile, but inwardly I was puzzled.
The demon in this territory was only a level-40 lesser hell demon, wasn’t it?
The giant I’d seen on my map was above level 30, so I couldn’t help thinking that he was exaggerating a bit…
Maybe his “Perceive Demon” skill just enabled him to detect a demon’s presence, not determine what class it was.
After all, it seemed able to judge “mightiness” only in relation to Lady Karina’s strength.
“Sir Satou, if you are a traveling merchant, do you perhaps know where the village of giants might be?”
“I’ve never been, but I have a rough idea of how to get there.”
“I-in that case, is there any chance you might be able to guide me?”
Lady Karina clasped her hands together pleadingly in front of her incredible chest, which was terribly persuasive.
I was about to nod involuntarily, but then Arisa cut in.
“A thank-you would be nice.”
“Yes, of course, I will certainly reward you with payment.”
Lady Karina misunderstood her statement, and Arisa raised her eyebrows.
“No, no. You still haven’t even thanked my master for saving you when you were collapsed in the forest, have you?”
“Ah…” Lady Karina was speechless.
As I’d suspected, she must have simply forgotten.
“I-I’m terribly sorry. I sincerely thank you for your aid, Sa— Um, sir.”
Quickly changing her attitude, Lady Karina held the ends of her skirt in a very noble curtsy.
Behind her, Tama and Pochi immediately imitated her gesture by pinching the ends of their wide pants.
Her arms still folded, Arisa nodded self-importantly. She’d be a good mother when she grew up.
“Oh, don’t worry about it.”
I stood and bowed. I’d seen a young nobleman do this in a movie once.
> Skill Acquired: “Etiquette”
“As for your request, we happen to be heading to the village of giants anyway. Would you like to join us?”
“Are you sure it’s quite all right?”
“Yeah, one more person is no big deal.”
I sort of made a unilateral decision, but none of the kids raised any objections.
There were a select few who seemed a bit threatened by Lady Karina’s bust measurements, but at least they were willing to accept the traveler herself joining our party.
“Kyaaaaah!”
Miss Karina leaped into the air with a scream and then tumbled along the ground until she crashed into a tree.
It was the kind of pratfall that would be the envy of any young comic actor, but thanks to Raka’s scalelike barrier, she was completely unharmed.
When the advance guard team had begun their training after the meal as usual, Miss Karina had announced that she wanted to participate, too. However, she couldn’t control herself very well under the influence of Raka’s Strength Enhancement, and instead she kept crashing and burning.
Since she hadn’t changed out of her dress to participate, the skirt kept flipping up to reveal what was underneath in an extremely unladylike fashion.
However, since she was wearing long drawers, the standard undergarment in this world, there wasn’t much to get excited about.
“Karinaaa?”
“Are you all right, ma’am?”
Tama and Pochi hurried over to Miss Karina where she lay tangled upside down in the roots of the tree and peered at her face with concern.
The two weren’t very good at remembering titles, so Miss Karina had given them permission to simply call her by her first name.
I called out to Lulu, who was watching the training with Arisa and Mia.
“Lulu, could you lend Lady Karina some of Nana’s spare clothes?”
“Yes, of course.”
I would’ve suggested Liza’s or mine, but I thought the chest might be too tight on Miss Karina’s figure.
Accepting the clothes, Miss Karina said a few words to Lulu and turned her back to her. Apparently, she couldn’t undress without help.
Lulu immediately started assisting her, so I quickly spun around.
I wished they’d be a bit more modest about doing this with a guy around.
“What’s this? You’re not going to enjoy the show?”
“Arisa…”
Mia,
always sensitive to this sort of remark, shot Arisa an accusatory glare.
When they were done with the process, I turned back around.
The shirt was about to burst open at the chest. There wasn’t enough fabric to cover everything, so the bottom edge of the shirt was hiked up, exposing her navel.
Embarrassed, Miss Karina vigorously yanked the hem lower, which only dragged her breasts down in an uncomfortable-looking manner.
“Satou.”
“If you like boobs so much, get a load of this!”
Arisa and Mia had noticed my eyes wandering, drawn like magnets, and the two girls latched on to obscure my vision.
Arisa’s bony chest pressed against me rather painfully.
In the end, while my view was being blocked, Miss Karina changed into Nana’s loose pajama shirt.
I made sure to mentally file away the spectacular sight from earlier, though.
Really, it’s a pity that my menu doesn’t have a screenshot function.
“Sa— Um, you aren’t going to participate in the training?”
Miss Karina walked over to me, still catching her breath.
The combination of her sweaty brow and breathless voice was pretty sexy. I would be tempted to make a pass at her if she weren’t the daughter of a baron.
She kept starting to call me by name, then getting embarrassed and sticking with “you” instead.
“Liza said the strongest member of the group is you, Sa— Um. Perhaps you’d be so kind as to have a bout with me?”
“Sure, I can do that.”
I stood up and headed over to the dry riverbed where the girls were training.
Along the way, I picked up a pebble and gave it a toss.
Not at Miss Karina, of course.
The pebble made direct contact with a half-horse, half-fish kelpie that was starting to emerge from the water in the mostly dry riverbed, and the creature disappeared with a small geyser.
Pochi and Tama, who’d noticed the kelpie, lowered their wooden practice swords with an air of relief.
“Now, shall we get started?”
I smiled brightly at Miss Karina, who was still stunned by the sudden sequence of events.
“V-very well… Here I go, then!”
Although her movements were clearly amateurish, she came at me with an immediate high jump kick.
The move was something out of a fighting game, but since I’d seen her use it in her training with the other girls, I was able to avoid it easily enough.
Still, she was fast. Her speed was on par with Pochi’s.
“Hmph! You may have dodged that one, but I’m just getting started!”
Miss Karina left tracks in the riverbed as she skidded to an abrupt halt, then kicked up a cloud of dust as she attacked me a second time.
This time it was a flying roundhouse kick, but I crouched to avoid it.
Looking up, I saw that the momentum was carrying her magic breasts around in a dynamic dance as if they were separate creatures entirely.
“Goodness, your movements are simply too smooth!” she complained.
I was frankly concerned that she might tear the ligaments in her chest, but she didn’t appear to be in pain, so maybe Raka’s Pain Resistance or Strength Enhancement functions were coming into play here. In the back of my mind, I sang the praises of whatever pioneer had created Raka. What a wonderful piece of equipment.
Miss Karina punctuated her frustrated shout with a dropkick, so I dodged to one side.
Since all her attacks were so dramatic, it was easy to avoid her as long as I didn’t become distracted.
Still, we wouldn’t get anywhere if I continually dodged them, so I decided to take one of her assaults head-on.
This time, Miss Karina was charging at me with an elbow strike, so I caught the blow with one movement and killed her momentum as if I’d caught her in cotton.
It was a rather heavy strike, on par with Liza’s spear. I wouldn’t have expected this much strength from a level-2 opponent.
Apparently, Raka’s Strength Enhancement added about five levels. I guess an artifact like that was bound to give some pretty amazing buffs.
I was impressed, but now that her momentum was gone, it was easy to toss her aside.
Miss Karina rolled away on the riverbed with a cute little squeak.
With the protection of Raka’s white defensive barrier, landing on the rocky surface of the riverbed wouldn’t harm her at all.
Still, she seemed too dazed to stand, so I walked over to her and offered my hand.
“Are you all right, Lady Karina?”
“I-I’m perfectly fine!”
Avoiding my hand, Miss Karina scuttled to her feet suspiciously.
I was a bit hurt, but with her flustered state and trembling voice, it wasn’t so much that she disliked me specifically as that she was overly conscious of men in general. She had doubtless led a sheltered life; maybe she was just afraid of germs.
She made no effort to change her tactics after this, and instead continued to throw herself at me with straightforward attacks and special moves, which I dodged or parried.
At some point, it became less like a training match and more like a drill.
“Lady Karina, you won’t be able to beat an opponent who’s good at dodging if you just keep using such bold techniques.”
“Master’s right, ma’am! You have to break down their defense with smaller moves, then finish them off with a big move, ma’am!” Pochi complemented my advice.
I think Liza taught her something along those lines before.
“Small moves?”
Miss Karina was clumsier than Pochi; she tried to use feints and foot sweeps, but these were so obvious that her defense was even more full of holes than before.
Clearly, someone like me who always relied on skills had no talent for training others.
“Sorry, Liza, but would you mind taking over to teach her for me?”
“Please leave it to me, master.”
I handed my role as instructor off to Liza and went back to observing.
“Lady Karina, Pochi and I will give a demonstration fight. We will start out without using any small moves and then incorporate them later. Please examine Pochi’s movements closely. Pochi, please fight with slower movements than usual, so that Lady Karina can follow them.”
“Yeeesss, sssiiirrr!”
You don’t actually have to talk more slowly, too, Pochi.
The pair’s dance-like training performance imparted to Miss Karina the importance of small moves.
They continued training for about an hour with more practice battles, ending only when nobody could stand any longer.
They might catch colds if they stayed all sweaty, so I used the kettle-style magic tool to prepare hot water and had them wipe themselves clean. Of course, this took place inside an igloo-shaped Shelter wall to ward off the wind.
“Is that a magic tool that boils hot water?”
“It is. They don’t use these in the castle?”
“A maid told me that hot water is restricted to mornings only because of the high cost of firewood, so I suppose they mustn’t have used such a thing.”
Sounds like a rough life.
Still, if the maid considered even firewood to be expensive, the demon or some bureaucrats must be embezzling most of the tax revenue.
I charged up the floor heater in the carriage, and as I worked, I could hear the others’ happy voices as they washed up with the hot water.
I realized with a bit of regret that I should’ve made an open-air bath at the river’s edge. I’d have to make sure to do so when we came back from the giants’ village.
Once everyone was refreshed, I made a bed for myself out of the kotatsu and put everyone to sleep. From inside the carriage, I heard a cry of “goodness me, the floorboards are warm!” from Miss Karina.
I didn’t like being left out, but I figured I couldn’t share a bed with a baron’s daughter.
Since I’d ta
ken an interest in strengthening equipment, that evening I sat next to the kids on night watch and read through Trazayuya’s documents.
Apparently, making this kind of equipment required just as much complicated setup as Holy Swords, but I did notice something while reviewing the materials.
All these processes seemed to involve a good deal of trouble in preventing the magic circuit from collapsing during forging or casting.
Since it seemed like I had the means to make the magic circuit that was the first step for all this, I used the Holy Sword Excalibur to cut a wooden practice sword in half and tried carving the circuit into that.
I didn’t get any skills or titles, but I was able to make an imitation Magic Sword easily enough.
It was much easier to infuse the magic wooden sword with energy than it was an ordinary wooden sword.
Complicated circuits would be impossible, but it was easy enough to incorporate simple circuits like these for strength or durability improvements.
I completed two swords that evening: the wooden Magic Sword and a wooden Holy Sword. When they were charged up, the former emitted a red light while the latter emitted a blue one.
I went out and found a ghost-type monster on which to test the wooden swords and discovered that both of them exhibited the same level of power as the mithril sword I’d found in the fortress.
On my way back, I tried them on an ordinary monster, but they both broke apart. They’d be useful only on monsters without a corporeal form, which wouldn’t be affected by ordinary weapons.
They were good conductors of my “Spellblade” skill, however.
This wasn’t particularly useful to me, since I could use “Spellblade” even with sticks or my fingertips, but it might come in handy for training the advance guard.
By dawn, I was able to complete three new wooden Magic Swords for the girls to use for skill practice.
It was the morning of our fifteenth day in the Muno Barony.
After warming ourselves up with some soup, we set off into the large forest, which was shrouded in a chilly morning mist.
Incidentally, I stowed our carriage away in Storage from a slight distance so that nobody would notice. At the very least, I was confident that Raka and Miss Karina hadn’t noticed during her exuberant departure.
