By the Grace of the Gods (LN) - Volume 4 - Chapter 5

Chapter 3 Episode 5: Spreading Rumors

The next day.

“Good morning. Did something happen?” I asked when I popped into the store and saw people gathered in the kitchen.

“Oh, Boss.”

“Good morning!”

“Look at this.”

The three village girls moved out of the way so I could see what they were looking at. There were plates on the workbench that held piles of sausages. They were linked together across three plates in all. Even if they were to store these sausages, they would take up a lot of space.

“The lady next door wanted to celebrate your contract with the limour birds!”

“She also wanted to thank you for the deodorizing fluid with something better than slime food.”

“Apparently it helped them out a lot. She looked delighted when she left these for us.”

“I see. I must have just missed her.”

“I’ll use these for today’s lunch,” Chelma declared. I didn’t know if she would fry them or put them in soup, but either way, I was looking forward to it. The three girls got back to work after that, so I headed to my office to get a report from Carme.

“It seems our rumors have been doing the rounds.”

“Ours are the whole truth, so it wasn’t that difficult. Now we’ll have to wait and see what happens next.”

“And how has business been?”

“Nothing much has changed. Even the obstructions have stopped. There was a woman who asked if we would put deodorizing fluid on sale, though.”

“Pauline, probably. I can guarantee it’s safe and effective if you think it’s worth selling.”

“There do seem to be people who want it, and it’s not entirely unrelated to our services. I think it’s worth putting up for sale.”

“How much trouble would it be to sell?”

“If we just have to put it in bottles, anyone can do that. Caulkin’s team has been researching a variety of subjects in their free time, I believe. I’m sure you can ask them to look into it.”

“In that case, just to be safe. I’ll work with them to make sure there’s no danger. If it turns out that there is none, we can sell some of it.”

During the time period before lunch was ready, I stayed in the back of the store and worked on plans to sell the deodorizing fluid.

■ ■ ■

“What to do now?” I asked after lunch, when I had no work left to do. I didn’t have much work as it was, and today even that was taken by Caulkin’s team so they could train to run new stores in the future. Setting up traps at home seemed more worth my time, so I headed back to the mine. On the way there, I ran into someone.

“Well, if it isn’t Ryoma.”

“Hello, Asagi. Are you taking the day off?”

“Yes, sometimes you have to give your body a chance to rest. Are you working today?”

“I just ran out of work to do, so I was on the way home.”

“Perfect,” Asagi said and took a bottle out of his bag. “You have the God of Wine’s blessing, I believe? Take this.”

“It smells like alcohol. Wait, is this sake?”

“Oh! You know about sake? This is daiginjo from my homeland. It’s a type of sake.”

“Thank you so much.”

“I wanted to share it. I hear that giving alcohol to one blessed by the God of Wine will bring good luck.”

“Then I’ll pray that it brings you good fortune when I drink it,” I said. It had been a while since I’d last had sake, and I was eager to drink it again.

“I’m surprised you know so much about my homeland.”

“I heard all about it from my grandparents.”

“Is that right?”

“Well, not to change the subject, but where did you get your katana?” I asked. I wanted to avoid any questions that might reveal my history, and I had wondered about this for a while anyway. I had a need to defend myself, so I was hoping to get a proper katana at some point.

“I use goods that are periodically sent from my homeland. Do you want a katana for show, or do you want one to use as a weapon?”

“I’d like one I can use,” I said. I was trained in how to handle a katana, but the most common weapons in this country were longswords and other Western-type swords. Even when I went to Tigger’s weapon shop before, there were no katanas.

“Unfortunately, you won’t find any around here. Your best chance would be to check some stores in the capital. Katanas are weapons of war in my homeland, and prized works of art in the rest of the world. They are the symbol of the samurai, and our very souls. Katanas are exported from my homeland, but they go for a high price. I know your store is quite profitable, but you could go bankrupt buying enough katanas. There have been times where I had to pick up replacements from weapon shops in the capital, and every time I did, I hardly had enough money left to live on.”

Asagi went on, “I hear that only select blacksmiths are allowed to learn katana smithing as well. I don’t know any katana smiths myself, so you most likely won’t get the chance to negotiate personally.”

“Is there any way to periodically get katanas for cheap?”

“Perhaps if you became someone’s disciple and officially trained in some school of swordsmanship, you could be provided some. It’s been known to happen, but unfortunately, I’m still in training myself and cannot take on any disciples. Nor do I know anyone who could.”

Asagi left his homeland for training to begin with, and had limited contact with people back home. They were only allowed to rarely exchange letters to tell each other they were safe, and to send gifts such as alcohol. Even when it came to katanas, he was only allowed to get them because of their necessity.

“Where did you learn the ways of the katana, Ryoma? Looking to your school for help would be fastest, I imagine.”

“My grandfather forged katanas. I learned from him.”

“I see. That would explain why you know so much about products from my village. But in that case, all you can do is buy or trade for an expensive katana.”

“All right then, thank you.”

“I’m sorry I couldn’t help more,” Asagi apologized, but I didn’t blame him. I thanked him for the rare sake, then we parted ways.

As I left the city and walked down the peaceful road, I wondered if I could make a katana myself. Modern katanas were forged from tamahagane, a type of steel used in many weapons in Japan. Creating tamahagane would require charcoal and iron sand, and I knew how to produce charcoal. Like many Japanese office workers, I dreamed of one day retiring and living a simple life relying on a charcoal fire for warmth more times than I could remember, and charcoal was precious to me during winters in the Forest of Gana. Iron sand would be even more simple to make, with the most key component being black triiron tetraoxide. It had a different structure from the ferric oxide I fed to my metal and iron slimes, but it was still a compound made from iron and oxygen. I could get all the iron oxide I needed from the mine and use alchemy to turn it into the required materials.

I also had all the knowledge I needed, thanks to having a katana smith as my father. I often watched him work when I was young, and he brought me to the smelting furnace on some occasions too. He also made me help when I got old enough, secretly teaching me how to forge a katana. But he determined early on that I had no talent for it, so he gave up on that.

I had the materials and the knowledge, but not the skill. I probably couldn’t make a katana that would work in battle, and even if I could, it wouldn’t happen overnight. I could train under someone if I wanted to take this seriously, but that would take a long time too. Besides, trying to teach myself could be fun. I decided to ask Asagi if there were any regulations about that next time I saw him. With that settled, it occurred to me that I had a different weapon I could use.

■ ■ ■

As soon as I got back to the mine, I let my familiars roam freely, then searched my Item Box for something I left there ages ago. Eventually, I found the spear I had gotten from Melzen. It was a bit long, but well-crafted and free of rust or deformities. Despite the size, it felt light and couldn’t have been made of iron. I thought it might be blazing ore, but appraising the spear didn’t help me figure it out. I decided to ask someone about that later. In any case, it seemed like it would be a fine weapon. I checked to see if any slimes were nearby and confirmed they were going about business elsewhere, such as my metal slimes rolling down and climbing back up a slight incline for fun. Now I knew it was safe to test the spear. It handled fine, but not as well as I wanted.

The techniques I learned from my father originated from a samurai who survived the Sengoku era. He came from a fairly illustrious lineage, excelled in combat, and even had some interest in academics. But he wasn’t the family’s heir, giving him the freedom to live as he pleased. After he either ditched his family or got driven out, he lived a life of destitution for quite some time. He didn’t mind it when he was young and energetic, but his mind changed as he aged. He had no money, wife, or children. He had talent, but no fame. When he reflected on his life, he realized he had nothing to leave behind for the world when he passed away, so he decided to pass on his knowledge and techniques. The samurai spent the rest of his life searching for disciples and giving them guidance.

As a samurai from the Sengoku era, his main weapon was a spear. Katanas were only a backup weapon in case one’s spear was lost. And because I inherited that samurai’s techniques, I could use a spear too. But honestly, I found katanas easier to handle. Maybe that had something to do with the era we now lived in, but it was more likely my father’s fault. He taught me to use katanas, spears, clubs, wakizashi, bows, shurikens, chain sickles, and hand-to-hand combat, an addition to a variety of concealed weapons. When he passed on these skills, he prioritized some over others. The ones he valued the most were hand-to-hand combat and katanas. I had to become adept enough with those before he even let me play around with the other weapons, and even later on, I was strictly ordered to spend most of my time training with the katana. This wasn’t because he was a katana smith, but because they were the most practical for use in the modern-day. Learning to use weapons was only useful if there was a chance to wield them, but walking around with weapons was illegal in modern Japan. They would even be caught by metal detectors in some places. It was hard to even walk around with a stick without being questioned by the police. But hand-to-hand combat didn’t require a weapon, and katanas could still be bought and owned as works of art in the modern-day. They were also shorter than spears or clubs and possible to hide, so I think that was why my father focused on those, but I couldn’t say for sure. I never asked him myself, but he tended to see things in a way that defied common sense. But he hid it well, so he was viewed favorably by the public.

“If my katanas were used to kill people, just how well could they kill?” I heard from out of nowhere. It sounded like my father’s voice, but nobody was around. I didn’t sense anyone either. My familiars were going about their business, so they must not have felt anything was amiss. It seemed like I surprised my limour birds, but that was all. I walked around and found nothing out of the ordinary, so I assumed that I imagined it after thinking about my father.

I should have asked for one of my father’s katanas before I was reborn in this world. He always wanted to know how they would work in practice, but he wouldn’t be allowed to make katanas anymore if that ever happened. His personality problems aside, my father dedicated his life to forging the best katanas. He was highly regarded as a katana smith, so he must have been excellent. I wished that I had one of those katanas right now, but it was too late for regrets and it wasn’t worth thinking about any further.

As I recalled, this spear was a magic weapon. Filling it with magic energy was supposed to unleash some sort of spell, so I decided to investigate. I experimented with it until fire came out. The spear cast the Ignition spell. I messed around with it some more and found that it could also cast Fireball. The amount of energy I put in didn’t seem to have any effect on the output, and any element of energy worked. But using the same element as the spells seemed to be somewhat more cost-efficient.

I kept playing around with Melzen’s spear until the sun had set. In the end, it didn’t seem to have many useful functions. Magic weapons made it easy to cast spells, but they were inflexible. For someone who couldn’t cast spells, it might be useful against a monster for which only magic was effective. But I could cast stronger fire spells of a wider variety on my own, so while this weapon was interesting, it might as well have been an ordinary spear to me. I put the spear back in my Item Box and began to prepare dinner.