The Town of Mon Hunters: Part 1
Satou here. Stories about antihero protagonists are pretty popular, but if I had to choose, I think I prefer the traditional good-versus-evil stories you see in prime-time TV anime. You can’t beat the classics!
“Satou, I shall await your letter.”
“I’ll be sure to send one when I’m settled in Labyrinth City.”
“Oh, Satou… Can’t you send me one whenever you reach a big city? Even a short one is fine.”
Sara looked a little pouty.
“Well, if you insist.”
It wouldn’t be too much trouble if I sent them along with Zena’s letters, so I agreed to her request.
“Please come back to the old capital sometime, too.”
“Yes, of course.”
Sara took my hands and gazed into my eyes.
For a second I thought she was going to give me a kiss good-bye, but she probably couldn’t in front of this big crowd.
“Lady Sara, may I?”
“My apologies, Viscount Emerin.”
Sara stepped aside, and Viscount Kirk Emerin and his second daughter, Rina, approached me.
“Sir Pendragon, you have saved our family from great peril.”
Sales for the lulu fruit were booming, with orders not just from old-capital nobles like Marquis Lloyd and Count Hohen but even from merchants from the royal capital and other nearby regions.
It was even rising in value as a high-grade fruit, like the muskmelon in the Showa era.
“This is all thanks to your skills at cooking and promotion, not to mention your willingness to share your research materials with the public.”
“I’m the one who should be grateful. The orchard you’re starting in the Muno Barony is a greater gift than I could ever have hoped for.”
Viscount Emerin had offered to make an orchard of the now highly profitable lulu fruit in the Muno Barony.
On top of providing seedlings, he’d sent over an experienced instructor from his own orchard to support proceedings there until everything got on track.
“S-Sir Satou… Once you finish your training, you will be returning to the Muno Barony, correct?” Miss Rina asked.
“Yes, that is the plan,” I answered.
After I revisited the Muno Barony, I planned to leave the Shiga Kingdom and travel around the world.
“A-all right! I’ll do my best.”
“…Very good. I’ll be cheering for you, then.”
“Thank you!”
I didn’t know what she was referring to, but I had to cheer for a young girl doing her best.
“Oh, Satou, you’re so cruel.”
“Tolma, keep your thoughts to yourself.”
As the Emerin family retreated, they were replaced by Tolma and Viscount Hosarris Siemmen.
They were accompanied by Mr. Djang and Miss Natalina from the scroll workshop.
“If anything interesting happens on your trip, make sure you write me about it, all right? Here’s some extra info for you.”
Tolma handed me a bundle of paper tied with string.
It seemed to contain information about important nobles of the royal capital and even Labyrinth City.
“Sir Pendragon, do be careful in Labyrinth City. This is a letter of introduction to the guildmaster there. She is a bit of a difficult individual, so if she gives you any trouble, please turn to her adviser, Miss Sebelkeya.”
I bowed to the polite Hosarris and the somehow-hard-to-dislike Tolma and said my farewells to them.
Of course, other good-byes were going on around me, too.
“Mia, say hello to Lady Aaze and everyone in our hometown for me.”
“Mm, okay.”
Mia nodded to Cyriltoa the Songstress, who had come out to see us off.
Bolenan Forest, in the southeast of the Shiga Kingdom, was the site of Mia’s hometown, the elf village. The journey to bring Mia home would be over soon.
“You’ll come back, won’t you, Nana?”
“Nana and Nana’s master, comin’ back?”
“Larvae, my master and I shall visit this place again, I declare.”
Nana tightly embraced the sealfolk children, who flailed around adorably.
“Lulu, come by anytime if you want a job.”
“…Th-thank you, Chef.”
Clearly, the chef of the duke’s castle still hadn’t given up on recruiting Lulu.
“Arisa! We came to see you off!”
“Take care, Miss Arisa.”
“Let’s play shadow tag again!”
“Aw, you came to say good-bye!”
The lively voices surrounding Arisa belonged to the children from the orphanage, who’d become friendly with her during the sympathy calls with Sara.
They made sure to wave at Nana and me, too.
“Liza, Tama, Pochi, I know you can get even stronger. Defeat monsters and gain all the experience you can.”
“Yes, sir. We won’t forget your teachings, Sir Kajiro.”
“Take care, everyone.”
“Ayaume, too?”
“Yes, sir!”
The two Saga Empire samurai who’d been training the beastfolk girls, Mr. Kajiro and Ayaume, came to say good-bye as well.
Because of them, the vanguard team had gotten even stronger.
As thanks, I gave them three times the gold coins I’d promised for their pay.
“Sir Satou! It’s not too late. You can still become the head chef of the Lloyd family!”
“No, no, Sir Satou must marry a daughter of the Hohen family and become the head chef and a member of our family!”
The chummy pair of noble gourmands, Marquis Lloyd and Count Hohen, came to see me off, too.
Each of them gave me a dagger with their respective family crests, saying to use it if I got into trouble on my journey. I didn’t want to take advantage, but each would be useful if there was a situation I couldn’t deal with on my own.
There were lots of other familiar faces, too, like our hosts, the Worgochs; the future duke Tisrado; and other nobles I’d met in the old capital.
“Sir Pendragon, please try to avoid getting into danger. If things look impossible, turn back at once… And don’t die.”
“Don’t worry. I won’t do anything reckless.”
Sir Ipasa Lloyd, the imperial knight, made a serious face and took my hands in his own.
It seemed overdramatic to me, but journeys in this world were actually quite dangerous, so partings like this could sometimes turn into final farewells. I should know that, since I’d encountered a hydra on the road between Kuhanou County and the Muno Barony.
So many people came to say good-bye that we ended up delaying the departure of our ship. I’d have to apologize to the captain and the other passengers later.
Eventually, the ship set sail, and we waved to everyone at the port until they vanished over the horizon.
As the ship started to head down the main river, Arisa approached me.
“So are we taking the land route over the mountains to Mia’s hometown? Or the sea route?”
“Viscount Emerin told us not to take the sea route.”
“Oh, right. His fleet got destroyed near the Seadragon Islands, didn’t it?”
“Yes, and that’s the only way to get to the Bolenan Forest by ship.”
I could probably handle it, but I didn’t have anyone to give me a ship.
“So we’ll be going through the mountains, then?”
“Yeah. Lady Cyriltoa said she went that way, too.”
When I’d brought everyone to the music hall for her performance, the songstress, who was an elf like Mia, had told me about the journey.
“But is there a highway through there?”
“It’s probably better to assume that there’s not.”
I’d actually asked the traders who sold me coffee in the city, but they said it had been over a hundred years since anyone had traveled across the Black Dragon Mountains to the Bolenan village.
“Mountains, huh…? I wasn’t much of a hiker in my past life, just so you know.”
“I wasn’t planning on walking, of course. Don’t worry—I’ve got a plan.”
With that in mind, I’d been testing out the possibility of aviation in the old-capital labyrinth ruins for a while now.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to make an aircraft with a skypower engine because the output was too difficult to adjust, but I did manage to use the Electronic Control and Lightning spells to make hydrogen, so I made a small blimp-style airship instead.
It might look soft, but the balloon was covered with giant-monster-fish hide, so it would be next to impossible to damage even with mithril-alloy weapons.
To ensure a safe and comfortable journey, I sealed it very carefully.
Of course, I updated my party’s equipment with new materials and technology, too.
Their new armor was made mainly with the aforementioned monster-fish hide.
It boasted better blade resistance than even mithril, was as fireproof as hydra leather, and was even shock resistant, so they’d be safe going into battle even with somewhat stronger opponents.
It would be a pain if someone analyzed them, so I camouflaged the armor using the thin white shell of hard newts.
Everyone had different weapons, too. For starters, Pochi, Tama, and Nana were now equipped with Magic Swords that looked like simple bronze swords.
These Magic Swords could be switched between two effects: Soft Stun for dealing with people and Sharpness for exterminating monsters.
For Arisa and Mia, I provided new staffs made with the wood of the Mountain-Tree. Instead of making them myself, I had them crafted at the best staff workshop in the old capital.
I gave Lulu a muzzle-loading musket with the Shooter Version II function built in.
Like Japanese swords, the gun itself was considered an “ancient weapon,” so it might be rare but shouldn’t be thought of as too unnatural.
They probably just fell out of use because of the convenience of magic weapons like Fire Rods and Thunder Rods.
I didn’t notice it when we went to the museum, but apparently there were some on display there.
“What is that?”
It was our third day on the ship, the morning after we’d been stuck inside all day due to heavy rain, when I spotted something in the southeast.
“What do you mean? There’s not a cloud in the sky.”
“Spider threeead?”
“It’s thin and stretchy, sir.”
Arisa couldn’t see it, but Tama, Pochi, and I all saw what looked like a thin white thread.
“World Tree,” Mia mumbled.
“Is that what that is?”
“Mm.”
Mia nodded at me.
I knew she wouldn’t lie, but I didn’t see anything treelike about that thin line.
If anything, it was like a sci-fi space elevator in the distance.
…Is this actually a sci-fi world, not fantasy?
Doubts arose in my mind, but I figured they would become clear when we reached Bolenan Forest, so I put those thoughts aside for the time being.
By the next afternoon, we arrived in Couka, the southernmost town aside from the port city Sutoandell, to switch to a ship that would take us upstream on a branch of the river.
The only place with ships big enough to hold a carriage was in Kuuche, upstream of Couka, so we started our land travel from there.
This road was overgrown with grass, with very little traffic. As far as I could tell, the local residents preferred to get around with small canoe-like boats.
Both Couka and Kuuche were enjoyable towns—lively despite the small population.
“Master, do you think the black dragon they mentioned in that town is around here?”
Arisa looked out the window at the scenery with a worried expression.
We heard stories while we were passing through Kuuche that a black dragon had attacked the town, so she was probably somewhat nervous about that.
Since the outer wall was a little charred, not burned down, I thought it must have just been a demi-dragon.
I searched my map for demi-dragons above level 30 in the area. Aside from the large amount of wyverns in the Black Dragon Mountains, there was a lamia in the northeast of the duchy, a few hydras at the western edge, and a sea dragon in the southern ocean.
Of course, there were no real dragons in the territory.
The marker I’d put on the black dragon was on another map far to the south.
“There aren’t any demi-dragons nearby, so perhaps they mistook a wyvern or a large snake monster for a dragon?”
“Wyverns are scary, too… Will Lulu be okay in the coachman’s seat? And the horses?”
“Don’t worry. I’m always on the lookout for enemies.”
I patted Arisa’s head, and she finally gave me a relieved smile.
“Master, the village up ahead seems to be in a rather strange state.”
“Master, I recommend battle preparations.”
Liza and Nana were fully armed on their runosaurs as they came over to report.
We’d sold our surplus horses in the old capital, so we had only the four that were pulling the carriage and the two runosaurs.
So the four younger kids and I were riding in the carriage Lulu was steering.
“Liza, come with me.”
“Understood.”
I called Nana over, borrowed her runosaur, and headed toward the village with Liza.
This village was positioned between a branch of the river and the highway, so they specialized in fishing and agriculture.
“Do you have some business in our village? You’re riding runosaurs, but you sure aren’t dressed like thieves or eastern savages.”
An elderly man who was likely the village head stood waiting at the crossroads leading to the village, along with ten or so armed villagers.
The weapons they held were unbelievably crude even for a last-minute situation, from sticks with pointed ends to spears made with shards of obsidian. Their eyes were full of hatred and fear.
“No, we weren’t really planning on stopping by.”
My flippant answer did nothing to relax their vigilance.
When I saw the state of the village behind them, I understood why they were being so cautious.
“It looks like some buildings have burned down back there. Were you attacked by bandits?”
At least half the villagers had burns on their hands and feet, and the rest sported various other injuries. I didn’t notice at first because of the ragged cloth bandages wrapped around them.
“No, much worse than that. It was a nobleman and his friends,” one of the young men next to the village chief spat angrily.
I felt eyes peering at me from inside the distant houses.
We didn’t seem to be welcome here, so I thought I’d better leave once I got the information I needed.
“Was this noble from around here?”
“No, we’d never seen him before.”
“Yeah, I didn’t recognize the crest.”
“They asked if we were sheltering any beastfolk, and when we said we didn’t know what they were talking about, they used magic to burn down our houses.”
“One guy held a fireball in front of my face and demanded a confession.”
The youngsters answered my question one by one.
A nobleman using fire, tracking down beastfolk…
This sounded a little too familiar.
My suspicions went right to the pyromaniac nobleman who’d tried to use Fire Magic at the dark auction in Muraas.
With a quick map search, I discovered that he was in Puta, the town we were heading toward next.
And the tigerfolk he was after were hiding in a corner of the same town.
This smells like trouble.
We could technically just avoid staying in that town to keep out of danger, but it was the closest town to the Black Dragon Mountains, and I was hoping to gather information about the mountain range for our trip.
For now, I just added markers to the lot of them to help avoid trouble.
“I’m sorry to hear that. We’ll be careful not to get mixed up with them, then. Here, please take this as thanks for the information.”
I reached into a compartment of the carriage, pulled out some salves and five potions that worked well on burns, and handed them to one of the young men.
“These are very effective for burns. Perhaps you can use them for the young ladies in town and such.”
He looked dumbfounded at first, but when he heard the words effective for burns, he practically threw himself down to thank me. The reason I gave him five was because there were five girls in the village with the condition Burns: Mild.
At that point, the carriage caught up to us, so I traded off with Nana and got back in.
“Well, aren’t you generous.”
“I made those with a special recipe, so they’re actually quite inexpensive. The cost might even be less than a single copper per vial.”
“Dang, that’s cheap!”
They were watered-down magic potions I’d made while consulting the shady alchemist’s handbook I’d bought at the dark auction. They were stored in cheap store-bought potion vials, too, so their shelf life wasn’t very long.
They were made by diluting my handmade lesser magic potions to a twentieth of the original strength, but they were still on par with a store-bought lesser potion.
The diluted liquid didn’t require any magic cores for production, but that was the only difference, so considering time and effort, it would probably be faster to just mass-produce normal potions.
However, the watered-down potions were low-cost and low-effect, so they were useful for selling or giving away to people.
These potions also contained freezing-flower powder from the black dragon incident, so they should heal burns without a trace.
After this, we passed more villages that had been attacked by the pyro nobleman.
In some towns, they said that a black dragon appeared right after the noble left, making them fear for their survival.
Suddenly, I remembered how Princess Menea had described the pyro noble’s Crimson Cane: a cursed staff that attracts fire monsters.
Maybe this black dragon was chasing after the pyromaniac noble.
“Slashy slashyyy?”
“Master’s Magic Swords are amazing, sir!”
“This sword is three times sharper than ordinary blades, I report.”
I’d let the vanguard group fight a level-20 naga that was hiding in the mountains to test out their new weapons, and they ended up winning even more easily than I had expected.
A naga turned out to be a large snakelike monster with bat wings and four legs.
Since we were testing out close-combat weapons this time, I cut off its wings before I had the girls challenge it.
“It seems you had no need of me for this battle.”
“Easy peasyyy?”
“We’re invincible, sir.”
Liza’s words struck a chord with Tama and Pochi, who promptly assumed a victory pose.
“Have a seat, you two. Listen…”
Before I could say anything, Liza gave the pair a good scolding for their pride, so there was no need for me to step in.
In the middle of the night, I had snuck out to dispose of any dangerous monsters that were above level 30 or had poison, petrification, or anything else that might pose a threat to my comrades. Maybe I should have left some stronger opponents for them, though.
“Say, do you think that naga was the black dragon we’ve been hearing about?”
“Dark brown.”
Mia shook her head at Arisa’s theory.
I also thought that misunderstanding was a possibility, but just as Mia said, the naga’s scales were dark brown. More importantly, it didn’t breathe fire.
The villages we passed were one thing, but the town of Kuuche definitely had burn marks.
And soon…
“Found iiit.”
“It’s flying over the top of that mountain, sir.”
Tama and Pochi pointed south from their perch on the coachman’s seat.
Beyond the lower mountains nearby, I could see the outline of the Black Dragon Mountains.
Near the white-peaked summit was something like a black string coiling around.
I couldn’t say for certain, since it was on a different map, but it was in the same direction as the marker I’d put on the black dragon, so they were probably one and the same.
“Great job, you two.”
I gave Tama and Pochi a pat on the head, praising them for spotting it at such a long distance.
We’d spotted a real black dragon, but it was probably unrelated to these incidents. If something that big had been flying around here, I would think it would have done much greater damage to the terrain.
I explained this reasoning to a worried-looking Arisa, then went back to evaluating the new equipment.
“The musket bullets didn’t seem to be working.”
“Mm. Nope.”
“I’m sorry; I’m not a good shot…”
“It’s not your fault, Lulu. The weapon just wasn’t strong enough.”
I’d used normal bronze bullets, but it seemed like the shooting magic circuit simply wasn’t strong enough.
Besides, unlike with a bow and arrow, the power of a gun had little to do with the strength of the user.
I reassured Lulu, then called our tank, Nana, over.
“Nana, let me see your shield.”
“Yes, master.”
“Huh. Not a scratch.”
This large shield was made by stretching giant-monster-fish hide over a Mountain-Tree wooden frame.
It was considerably sturdier than the shield I’d made with an ironshell fruit casing before.
I was glad that it seemed safe.
Incidentally, the naga meat was delicious when I broiled it in soy sauce. I decided to hunt them whenever I saw them.
Later, we were conveniently attacked by robbers near the town of Puta, so we got to test out the Soft Stun effect of my handmade Magic Swords.
It would be a pain to take them with us, so we just tied them to the nearest tree.
We weren’t far from town, so I figured we could just have the guards there collect them.
The town of Puta came into sight beyond the trees.
It was sandwiched between two mountains, with the constable’s castle built on the slope of the western mountain.
There was a mithril mine site on the mountain to the east, where they were now mining small amounts of tin and lead.
The population was a little less than the average around here, with slightly more beastfolk, like lizardfolk and ratfolk, than humanfolk.
The only nobles in the town right now were the constable Baronet Poton’s family and Marquis Dazaress, aka the pyromaniac noble from the Makiwa Kingdom, and his crew.
According to the information I got from nearby villages, the town of Puta was famous as a gathering point for mon hunters. If any demi-goblins or other monsters were seen wandering near the local villages, the town would hire the mon hunters to exterminate them.
This was very important, since the town’s constable refused to take any real action until serious harm was already done.
As I thought about this, I searched the map and found dozens of demi-goblin nests in the nearby forests every mile or so. Most were small nests with less than ten demi-goblins.
Whenever their numbers got too large, they would get preyed on by other monsters or exterminated by the mon hunters, so there were no huge colonies like in the Muno Barony.
Even now, there were ten-odd parties of mon hunters prowling the forests in search of demi-goblins.
One of those parties was just on its way back into Puta and was having some kind of dispute within view of our carriage.
Honestly, this world had way too many issues.
Four women and one young man were arguing in front of the gate.
“Like I said, I can’t pay the entrance tax unless you pay me in advance!”
“Why should we have to do something like that?”
“Exactly! You said you’d come in handy if we brought you along, but you haven’t done a damn thing for us so far.”
“You can’t even carry our baggage, and you drink all our water.”
“Worst of all, you sliced up the fire fox we worked so hard to take down and ruined its coat!”
The women scornfully dismissed the boy, who had only one arm.
They clearly saw him as a burden, but he refused to back down.
I had to admire the boy’s guts.
“Hey, Kena, wait a sec.”
“What?”
The guard, who’d been standing around like it was none of his business, spoke to the leader of the women.
“A fire fox, you said? Did you go all the way to the Blighted Valley?”
“Pfft, ’course not. If we went to a place like that, we’d be the ones getting hunted.”
“Then where…?”
“We found it in our usual spot in the Twin Mountains.”
“You did?”
I didn’t recognize the place names, but evidently something was odd about the location of that monster.
“Yeah, we saw a goblin that used Fire Magic, too. Pretty crazy.”
“Was that in the Twin Mountains, too…?”
“Yeah, ’sright.”
Maybe I was reading too much into it, but I had to wonder whether all this was because of the pyro noble’s Crimson Cane attracting fire monsters.
I wasn’t sure of the range or conditions of the curse, but someone could wreak havoc on an enemy capital using an item like that.
However, it seemed like I was the only one with this theory. The guards were just confused about the unusual monster activity.
The mon hunter women waved to the guard and started to head through the gates, but the boy hurried over to stop them.
“Hey, we weren’t done talking yet!”
“Fine. Come to the bar next to the buyer’s shop by sunset today. If you show up, we’ll give you three coppers for the six days, just like we originally promised.”
“Wait a minute! I defeated four goblins, too. You owe me four more coins for the commission for those!”
“Why, you little… You just snuck in the final blow on goblins we’d all but finished off, didn’t you?”
“You’ve got some nerve trying to claim a reward for that. Cheeky brat.”
“That still means I beat them!”
The tall leader of the women shrugged scornfully.
“All right, all right. But you didn’t kill those four alone, so you get half the commission. That means two extra coppers. Just make sure you get to the bar before the end of the day.”
The women snickered at the relieved smile on the boy’s face.
“Heh, you better hurry, or we’ll spend it all on booze.”
“Okay, let’s make a bet on whether we can drink everything away before the kid gets there.”
“Great idea! I’ll put one large copper on yes.”
“Me too—five coppers on drinking it away.”
“Gah-ha-ha, c’mon, put some real money on it!”
They were probably joking, but I got the feeling it’d turn into reality if they drank for long enough.
The boy seemed to have the same hunch, as he hurriedly tried to negotiate with the gatekeeper.
“You heard them, right? Just let me through now and I promise I’ll come back to pay later.”
“Ha! If I believed every word you mon hunters say, I wouldn’t be fit to be a gatekeeper. Why don’t you just go hunt some game to pay in kind before sunset?”
“How am I supposed to catch a beast without tools to set traps?”
“Well, you better give up, then.”
Oh? You can pay in kind here? I didn’t know that.
Noticing our carriage approaching, the guard pushed the boy aside. The kid tried to charge into the town while the guard was distracted, but the second guard stuck his foot out and tripped him easily.
“Hey, welcome to Puta. Never seen you around here before. Are you a peddler?”
“No, we’re just stopping by on our journey.”
I showed my identifying silver plate to Gatekeeper A.
Since I was just wearing plain robes instead of the fancier clothes I wore in the old capital, he didn’t seem to have recognized that I was a noble.
“My sincere apologies. So you are a noble, sir?”
“Hate to be rude, Sir Noble, but did you say you’re on a journey? This town is pretty much the end of the line, y’know. So where exactly are you going? Planning to head over the mountains to steal some wyvern eggs or something?”
“Cut it out, Jitts.”
Gatekeeper B must have been referring to the three or so wyvern nests on the other side of the Black Dragon Mountains, not the ones in the mountain range itself.
I had cleared out the latter last night to make sure my party would be safe, but I hadn’t found any wyvern eggs.
“Are wyvern eggs good to eat?”
“Really good, probably. They sell for a high price anyway. If you bring them to the royal capital or Siruga Kingdom on the other side of the mountains, rumor has it you can trade them for their weight in gold.”
“They say the spawn are raised as mounts for the Flying Dragon Cavalry.”
If one egg weighed over a pound, that would mean about 140 gold coins. Pretty impressive, since that was about the price of a single Magic Sword.
But the wyvern egg at the dark auction in Muraas sold for less than that, so they were probably exaggerating.
According to the info I got in the old capital, the Siruga Kingdom was close to the Black Dragon Mountains, with Makiwa Kingdom to its northeast.
Princess Menea’s home of the Lumork Kingdom was farther north, with two smaller countries in between.
Incidentally, our destination, the Bolenan Forest, was just beyond the Black Dragon Mountains to the south.
As I was mentally sorting out my geography, the boy from before spoke up.
“Hey, Mr. Noble!”
“Quiet, you.”
Gatekeeper B quickly silenced the boy with the butt of his spear.
I didn’t think that was necessary, but I guess it made sense to be that harsh. Another noble might demand worse punishment for a commoner speaking to them out of turn.
“It’s all right. What is it, young man?”
I waved away Gatekeeper B and spoke to the boy, who was still lying on the ground.
“Mr. Noble, I need your help to get into the city. Please lend me a copper! I promise I’ll pay you back.”
“Speak a little more formally, would you?!”
“I don’t know all that fancy language. Isn’t ‘Mr.’ formal enough?”
Still, if he borrowed a coin from me and paid me back, wouldn’t he end up with only four coppers?
“Sure, I’ll lend it to you.”
“Really?!”
“Sir Knight, this kid is a mon hunter, you know. They never have enough money to last through the next day. He’s never going to pay you back.”
“Hey, stay out of it, will ya? He already said he’d lend it to me. I swear I’m gonna pay him back!”
The boy crawled out from under the feet of Gatekeeper B, so I handed him the copper.
The stench wafting off him was pretty powerful. Maybe he hadn’t bathed in a long time?
No, I could detect the smell of goblin blood and guts, too.
The boy practically snatched the coin from me with his only hand, then shoved it at Gatekeeper B.
“Oh hey, Mr. Noble! If you don’t know where you’re staying yet, you should go to that inn by the gate. It’s pretty expensive, but the food there is famous for being super good!”
The boy waved brightly as he sprinted up the main street.
Now, what to do about the disapproving looks these guards were giving me?
“Sir Knight, kindheartedness is surely a virtue, but there are lots of people in the world who’ll take advantage of ya…you…without a word of thanks, you know?”
“All right, that’s enough. Don’t insult his lordship.”
“It’s all right. Thank you for your concern.”
He actually did seem worried about me, so I nodded to him in thanks.
As Lulu started to move the carriage, Gatekeeper A spoke up as if he’d just remembered something.
“Sir, a noble from a rather troubled country is currently staying with our constable Baronet Poton. Please be careful of him.”
Evidently, the pyro noble was already up to no good in the town of Puta.
I gave two large coppers to the friendly Gatekeeper A as thanks, then asked for a bit more detail.
“The noble is called Marquis Lloyd Dazaress of the Makiwa Kingdom. He—”
“He goes around asking questions and setting things on fire if he doesn’t like the answer, if you can believe that.”
Gatekeeper B suddenly interrupted with his own explanation.
The pyromaniac had started threatening people with Fire Magic while asking about the beastfolk.
“I’m surprised the lord is willing to allow that.”
“He’s got Count Bobino’s support, you see.”
Count Bobino was a former noble, having lost his standing when he was found out as a supporter of the demon lord–worshipping cult Wings of Freedom. From what I’d heard, he hadn’t been demoted, but he was removed from office and would soon be replaced as head of his family.
However, according to Tolma’s information, Baronet Poton was aligned with Marquis Lloyd, not Count Bobino.
So I asked for a bit more information.
“It’s all about the bribes, see.”
“Shh! Jitts!”
Gatekeeper A scolded Gatekeeper B.
“My apologies, Sir Knight. Those are only rumors—”
“Yeah, but he suddenly got all that power half a year ago, and he’s been bringing in boxes with the Bobino crest on them that we don’t get to inspect? He’s gotta be smuggling for someone, right?”
This information concerned me, so I checked again, but neither Baronet Poton nor the pyromaniac noble were Wings of Freedom members.
They were probably more like collaborators who provided them with money and accommodations.
I preferred to keep things peaceful, but if any trouble came up with the pyro noble or the baronet, I could probably deal with them by mentioning the bribes or showing them the crested dagger I got from Marquis Lloyd.
Incidentally, the reason this had been going on for half a year was that the black dragon I drove out with Hayato and company had been blocking the main road.
“Thank you. I’ll be sure to avoid getting involved with Baronet Poton or Sir Dazaress.”
I gave the pair a silver each as an additional thanks.
Unfortunately, though, as a noble myself, it would be considered rude not to greet the local nobles. The best I could do was make a minimal introduction to fulfill my obligation, then avoid them as much as possible.
Considering that he was hosting the pyro noble and all, I decided to put a marker on Baronet Poton.
Before I left the gate, I also reported the thieves we’d left tied to a tree and the curse on the pyro noble’s Crimson Cane.
Then I had Lulu take the carriage to the inn by the front gate.
“Welcome to our gatefront inn!”
When we rode the carriage into the courtyard, a girl who seemed to be a maid came rushing over.
I left Lulu and the others with the carriage and followed the girl into the inn, bringing only Arisa with me.
As soon as he saw me, the proprietor of the inn looked as if he’d discovered the goose that laid the golden egg.
That was strange, since I wasn’t wearing particularly expensive-looking clothing today.
“What a pleasure, young master. We just happen to have an excellent room open for you.”
The man rubbed his hairy hands together as he led me to see the most expensive room.
It was actually an entirely separate building with three stories, with the bottom floor serving as a warehouse that could hold one’s carriage, horses and all.
There was a bathroom on that floor, too, but there was only one small bathtub, probably with no hot water.
Because it took a long time to boil the water, the proprietor asked that we try to avoid bathing during mealtime.
We were allowed to use the water from the irrigation canal for anything but drinking, but I was a little concerned that it might be mixed with the sewage.
Well, that would be fine as long as I cleaned it with Pure Water first.
“Because of its remote location, this town is not the most orderly…”
The innkeeper said that it would be best to pay an additional fee to hire a nighttime sentry to prevent robbery.
The lodging house was one silver per night, and the sentry cost an extra two coppers. I decided to pay for the sentry for the sake of getting a sound sleep.
The sentry was free if you stayed for more than five days, but I had no intention of staying here long, so I just paid for two nights in advance.
While I was at it, I asked the innkeeper to send a letter requesting a meeting with Baronet Poton.
I put the letter I got from Marquis Lloyd with it, too.
“Whoa, so this is where the noble’s staying, huh?”
A hunter who looked like a mob boss swaggered into the courtyard of the inn, carrying a large sack.
He spread the contents, which appeared to be cuts of venison, on a cloth.
“Oh-ho, pretty big prey for you, pal.”
“Yeah, haven’t had a catch like this in ages. How ’bout it, young noble? It’s ripe for the eating. Just no entrails, ’cause I ate those the day I caught it. Gah-ha-ha-ha!”
The guffawing hunter seemed to have come to sell his venison.
His asking price was two silvers, less than half the price in the old capital. He must not be a very good businessman to start at a price lower than the market value.
It was a little suspicious that he knew about me already, but he had probably just gotten the information out of the gatekeepers on his way back into town.
Our building didn’t have a kitchen, so I bought the meat and entrusted the cooking to the inn’s chef.
It would be at least a few hours before I got a response to my letter, so we decided to get dressed up and explore the town.
We put our valuables in Storage and the Garage Bag, so we were able to go out together without a fuss.
I thought about putting on something plainer but decided I’d probably have an easier time if I looked like a noble, so I kept the same outfit on.
“Where are we goooing?”
“Sir?”
Tama and Pochi looked up at me, holding hands.
“To the harbor. I heard they sell some rare fruits there.”
“Fun.”
Mia took her mouth away from her grass flute long enough to voice her approval.
This was a small town, so it was only about a ten-minute walk to the pier.
According to the innkeeper, there wasn’t an official market, but there would be a few carts and stalls selling food and drink to seafarers.
As we walked along the dirt road, I looked at the sparse buildings on either side.
Since this area had high heat and humidity, there were a lot of well-ventilated one-story houses.
All of them were raised a good foot or so above the ground, though not on high stilts like a beach house or anything.
The people in the streets were all pretty lightly dressed, too, many of them wearing short skirts.
Women in their twenties or older tended to have longer skirts but never long enough to cover their ankles. For minors, skirts that ended just above the knee seemed to be the fashion.
Not that I cared much either way about this, but many of the men were wearing wide-open shirts or were going shirtless altogether.
And most of the elementary school–age children had shirts that didn’t quite reach their belly buttons.
This seemed to be more of a case of outgrown clothing than a matter of fashion.
Of the children too young for school, about half were wearing baggy shirts much too big for them, but the other half were practically naked. These ones were wearing loincloths and happily running around barefoot.
Maybe this was ignorant of me, but I kind of enjoyed the tropical atmosphere.
“Master, there are many larvae here. We must adopt them at once, I advise.”
“Yeah, no.”
I lightly dismissed Nana’s straight-faced yet ardent plea.
The young ratfolk and lizardfolk children innocently running around the town had clearly activated Nana’s protective instincts.
“Our destination is in sight, master,” Liza reported from the front of the group.
Peddlers were gathered in the streets and storehouse entrances, their wares spread on top of mats on the ground.
“Not a lot of salespeople out here in the sticks, huh?”
“Arisa, hush.”
I chided Arisa for her rudeness before walking up to the nearest vendor.
The mat was lined with baskets full of fruit, from miniature melons to citrus fruits to peach-colored pears.
Using a map search, I determined that these fruits grew naturally in the nearby forests.
“How about it? They’re all just a penny each. I just picked ’em in the forest, so they’re fresh and tasty.”
Damn, that’s cheap.
I bought a lot so I could share with everyone.
Some were a bit underripe, but the melon was pretty delicious, tasting like a less-sweet watermelon.
“Yummyyyy?”
“So crunchy, sir.”
“Mm. Yum.”
Tama, Pochi, and Mia were especially big fans.
“I wish it were just a little sweeter.”
“Really? I think it’s sweeter than the Kuvork melons you loved so much, Arisa.”
“Well, there was hardly anything sweet to be had in that country.”
Arisa and Lulu reminisced as they munched on the melon.
“This fruit has quite a pleasant crunch to it.”
“E-excuse me, miss. You’re supposed to cut that and then eat it, you know. Don’t blame me if you chip a tooth…”
The fruit Liza was eating was about the size of a baseball, with a palm-fruit-like exterior.
It smelled good, so I cracked one open to try for myself.
Milky white juice flowed from inside, so I hurriedly tipped it into my mouth.
It was sort of like a thin yogurt, with a goopy texture but a pleasant aftertaste.
“I’m impressed you were able to crack that pearl fruit without a knife, young man. Are you a knight or something, perhaps?”
The surprised shopkeeper handed me a wooden spoon with which to eat the flesh of the fruit.
Unlike the juice that preceded it, this portion was dense and sticky.
“Is it yummy, sir?”
“Want to try it?”
“Aah, sir.”
Starting with Pochi, I gave everyone a taste of the fruit.
After it had gone around the circle once, I turned to Nana, the only one who seemed preoccupied with something else.
“You don’t want a bite, Nana?”
“Master, I have located the criminal unit who assaulted the larvae, I report.”
Nana pointed toward the harbor.
There was a white tigerfolk man. He seemed to be having some kind of disagreement with a merchant.
I didn’t see any children around, so judging by Nana’s reaction, she must have identified him as the tigerfolk man who’d kicked the sealfolk kids back in the old capital.
“Permission to annihilate immediately!”
“No, Nana.”
That had just been an unfortunate accident, and a runaway horse had trampled him shortly thereafter, so he’d already been sufficiently punished.
It would be ridiculous to beat him up now.
“Please!”
“I told you: We don’t have any in stock.”
My “Keen Hearing” skill picked up the conversation between the white tigerfolk man and the merchant.
The white tigerfolk man’s pronunciation was difficult to understand, so I mentally adjusted to compensate.
“I just need medicine for burns. It doesn’t have to be a potion.”
“I sold my last salve yesterday.”
“Then tell me who bought it. I’ll get them to give me some.”
“Not a chance. Can’t have you harassing my regulars.”
The tigerfolk man clung desperately to the curt salesman.
It looked like there weren’t any alchemy or magic shops in town.
A little concerned, I searched the map for white tigerfolk.
There were two of them with burns in the area.
It was the pair from the black auction: the white tiger princess Luniya and the knight Gargaolon. The former was in a normal Burn state, but the latter was in the state Burn: Severe.
“Damn it— Hey! You there! This is no play for your amusement!”
When his gaze met mine, the tigerfolk man shouted angrily.
“Master, target has taken hostile action. Commencing annihilation.”
“I told you—no.”
Nana tried to take a step forward, so I grabbed her shoulder.
“Please reconsider! I must avenge the sealfolk larvae, I entreat.”
Um, they aren’t dead.
They’re running around downtown in the old capital.
“…Sealfolk?”
The white tigerfolk man frowned for a moment, then gave a gasp of recognition.
“Wait, did those children die…?”
“No, we treated them quickly, so they’re all right now.”
“I—I see… I got knocked out by that runaway horse myself, so I’ve been worried about those children ever since.”
The white tigerfolk man sighed with relief.
He had a scary face, but it seemed like he was actually a good person on the inside.
“Are you all acquaintances of those children? I’m very sorry. I wanted to go apologize to them myself, but I wasn’t able to do so. Please forgive me.”
The tigerfolk man rolled over on his back in front of us in a show of submission.
I was a little tempted to rub his tummy or something, but this was probably his race’s way of showing their highest penance, so I didn’t want to mock him.
“I forgive you, I declare.”
Nana nodded, so I offered the man a hand to help him up.
I hadn’t intended to demand an apology in the first place, so I changed the subject by indirectly asking about the medicine he needed.
“My comrades are near death because of their burns.”
“Burns?”
“Yes, Brother Gar and the young miss tried to save some people from a fire…”
There were no other white tigerfolk women on my map besides Princess Luniya, so she must be the “young miss.”
“Would lesser-grade potions be all right? I have enough of those to spare.”
“R-really?!”
“Sure. I have salves for burns, too, if you like.”
“Thank you… I’m in your debt.”
I gave him five of the watered-down potions and salves for burns.
I knew these would work, thanks to the villages where I’d handed them out along the way.
The guy pressed three gold coins into my hand for the medicine and sped off toward the mountain with the mining site.
He was tailed by a man with the “Spy” skill from a criminal guild.
As if to block the spy off, a couple of mon hunter men started fighting in the street.
“I’m telling you, Norma is my wife!”
“Just marry Gonzo instead!”
“But he’s a man!”
Ah. It was on purpose, then.
They were deliberately having their tussle in the criminal’s path.
Once the white tigerfolk man had gotten a good distance away, the spy finally managed to get past them.
Not long after, the two mon hunters exchanged looks, grinned, and headed back into the bar with arms around each other’s shoulders.
From the looks of it, the white tigerfolk must be getting support from the mon hunters in town.
“Satou.”
Mia tugged on the hem of my robe.
“What is it?”
“Buy.”
Mia pointed at a white horse tied up behind the trading shop.
“A horse?”
“Unicorn.”
On closer inspection, there was a stub on the horse’s forehead where a horn had been cut off.
I remembered seeing a unicorn horn for sale at the auction in the black-market district Muraas.
This probably wasn’t the same unicorn, but it was definitely a victim either way.
“You wanna buy the no-horn? This thing’s got a bad temper, y’know. Dunno what you’d use it for.”
The price the merchant offered was no more than the cost of a donkey, so I agreed to buy it.
“Can you ride it?”
“Mm.”
Mia easily hopped onto its bare back.
The hornless unicorn seemed to have no objections to letting Mia ride it.
“Well, I’ll be damned! I never thought I’d see that thing let anyone ride it.”
The merchant looked rather dour, so I bought a bunch of fruits and paprika-like vegetables from him and had them delivered to our lodging.
When I finished my business and left the trading post, an unfamiliar young man was standing next to my group. It was a humanfolk boy with the tan and physique of a manual laborer.
“Master, this person says he wants to buy potions from you…”
“Please, won’t you sell me some burn medicine? I’ll pay any price.”
This must be for another victim of that pyromaniac noble.
I asked the young man what had happened, and he said that his older sister had been seriously burned when she’d tried to help a beastfolk child.
On top of that, it turned out that the so-called protector of the peace, Baronet Poton, was throwing people in jail when they tried to submit complaints about the noble’s unchecked violence. The frustration of the townspeople was reaching a breaking point.
I had no obligation to clean up after Baronet Poton and the pyro noble, but Tama and Pochi were looking at me with eyes that said Please help them! so I gave in and agreed to the young man’s request.
I could give him as many potions as he needed, but instead I told him “the prescription might differ depending on the degree of the burns” and had him bring me to his home.
Magic potions were expensive for low-income families, so I wanted to make sure they actually reached all the people who needed them.
“Sis, I brought a doctor.”
The voice that responded to the boy sounded like it belonged to a hoarse old man.
But according to the information I’d found on my map, I assumed his sister was a twenty-two-year-old single woman…
…Erm, not that the “single” part mattered. At all.
I had my party wait in the room by the entrance while I followed the boy into the back room.
This is terrible.
The girl’s skin was burned from her right shoulder to the lower half of her face.
The boy sent the younger children who’d been watching over his sleeping sister into the other room to play with Tama and Pochi, clearing a space for me.
The burns were bad in places, but my watered-down burn potions should be able to heal them without a trace.
Swallowing seemed to be painful for her, so I used a feeding cup to pour it down the back of her throat.
Then I used Liquid Control and See Through from the magic menu to make sure the potion didn’t go down her trachea.
“…Ohhh!”
Standing beside me, the young man gasped.
I understood the feeling. No matter how many times I saw it, watching the quick effects of a magic potion at work made me a little queasy. Even the areas where muscle tissue had been visible were growing fresh pink skin.
Healing potions didn’t do anything for physical exhaustion, so I also gave her a high-calorie nutritional-supplement potion I’d formulated for seriously ill patients in Muno Castle. This way, she should be fine by morning.
The nutritional supplements were made with gabo fruit and gold-orange fruit from the Mountain-Tree, so the cost to make them was incredibly low. And I’d mass-produced a bunch back in Muno Castle, so I had several barrels’ worth to give away.
“Thank you, Doctor! I’ll scrape together the cost for the medicine, no matter what it takes!”
“Ah, wait a minute…”
The young man looked like he was about to charge out of the house, but I stopped him and asked if he could show me where the pyro noble had gone on his rampage as payment.
“This is awful.”
“Mm. Bad.”
Before our eyes was a row of three tenements that had been completely burned down.
Several beastfolk were lying on planks in the shade of the houses’ remains.
“What do you want with us, humans?”
As we approached, the beastfolk who were tending to their wounded raised their hackles.
An apefolk man who seemed to be a mon hunter blocked the young man’s path.
“Wait! I’m Hyona’s younger brother. I brought a doctor.”
“Right… I thought you looked familiar. Well, forget us; just have him treat Hyona. These guys aren’t gonna make it. Even if we sold ourselves, we couldn’t afford to buy them medicine.”
I’d forgotten just how expensive the potions in stores were, since I’d been making them myself for a while now.
The cause of the high price was the cost of the monster cores. Without a high “Transmutation” skill level like mine, it was impossible to make potions with anything less than high-grade cores.
Judging by the levels of the mon hunters in this town, their main prey was probably demi-goblins, which wouldn’t yield high-enough-quality cores to make potions.
“Hey, you…”
I glanced over the prone beastfolk to see what kind of shape they were in.
Their burns were much worse than Miss Hyona’s had been.
Their only relief seemed to be large leaves that were wrapped around the worst burns.
“Hey! Quit starin’ at ’em!”
“Don’t be rude to the doctor!”
It took some arguing between the apefolk man and the young boy, but eventually they allowed me to heal the children and elders who were hidden inside.
Personally, I was fine with leaving them alone if they refused to accept treatment, but the young man was so desperate that I ended up playing the role of the softhearted pharmacist.
“Thank you, sir.”
“I never thought I’d move this hand again! It’s all thanks to you, Doctor.”
“Thanks, mister.”
The people I healed, their families, and even people who seemed totally unrelated came up to thank me.
Some of the beastfolk were hard to understand because of the structure of their mouths, so I mentally adapted like with the white tigerfolk man.
“Sorry I doubted you before, Doctor. This is just us poor folks’ food, but I want you to have it.”
The standoffish apefolk man, who’d disappeared for a while, returned to offer me a basket of red fruit.
“Geh! You’re giving him redfruits?”
“Watch it, kid! We have an old saying, ‘A redfruit a day keeps the doctor away.’ He might be able to make medicine with it or somethin’, right?”
Like cats and dogs, the boy and the apefolk man were at it again.
But I would never use this redfruit for medicine.
“Thank you very much.”
To show my appreciation, I picked out one of the redfruits from the basket and took a huge bite.
It was a bit overripe but still juicy and delicious. I hadn’t tasted this in a long time.
“I want a bite, too!”
“Sure.”
Arisa zoomed over and made grabby hands at me, so I handed her one.
“Do you two want to try it, too?”
“Aye!”
“Of course, sir!”
I handed one each to Tama and Pochi.
“Mrrr?”
“I prefer meat, sir.”
The two of them eagerly bit into the fruits, but their faces scrunched up as they chewed on their first mouthful of tomato.
They probably didn’t like the strange jellylike texture of the inside.
Arisa, on the other hand, munched away happily. “Mm! A little overripe maybe, but it’s been sooo long!”
“Finiiished?”
“It’s bad to waste food, sir.”
“Very good, you two.” Tama and Pochi managed to eat the rest of their tomatoes anyway, so I patted their heads and praised them.
The other children seemed interested, too, but hesitated when they saw Tama’s and Pochi’s reactions.
Lulu was the only one who worked up the courage to try it, although judging by her expression, she didn’t like it much, either.
“Are tomatoes a specialty of Puta?”
“Tomatoes? If you mean redfruits, the only villages that grow ’em are ours and a few birdfolk tribes.”
Using a map search, I confirmed there were only three villages that cultivated them, but they grew wild in huge numbers along the mountains to the south.
The apefolk woman I had treated turned out to be the man’s sister, who’d come from their home village to marry here.
“Are these the only redfruits you have? I’d like to buy more, if you have them.”
“We don’t need yer money, Doc. If we can even begin to repay you with these things, I’d give ya as many as ya like…”
But then the apefolk man’s face clouded.
“…But these are the only ones ripe enough to eat. The rest still need some time…”
I actually wanted some less ripe than these, so I asked him to deliver them to our inn.
“Sure! I’ll go pick ’em all right now!”
With that, the apefolk man sped off eagerly.
I didn’t want to take all their food, so I sent a young apefolk boy after him to tell him half would be fine.
The man had said they didn’t need money, but I was worried about how they’d get by, so I decided to pay them the market price anyway.
Now I could make ketchup, tomato sauce, omelet rice for the kids, and maybe even some whale-meat stew.
But all that could wait! More importantly: pizza!
I could make pizza!
I had over twenty different kinds of cheese from the nobles in the old capital, and in large quantities, too.
And for toppings, I had all sorts of veggies, meat, and seafood in stock.
Making a pizza oven in the middle of town would be a bit too conspicuous, so that would have to wait until we set out on our travels.
But I could start working on my tomato sauce until then.
“Hee-hee~?”
“Master looks happy, so Pochi’s happy, too, sir.”
Tama and Pochi, who were clinging to my legs, nuzzled against me gleefully.
Oops. I got so excited about making tomato-based dishes that my “Poker Face” skill must have cracked.
That was the power of tomatoes for you.
Clearing my throat and wiping the grin off my face, I thanked the beastfolk, perhaps a bit too enthusiastically, before we headed back to the inn.
“Are you Sir Pendragon?”
“I am. A pleasure to meet you, Baronet Poton.”
I had everyone wait in a nearby vacant plot while I returned to the inn alone.
This was because I’d seen on my radar that Baronet Poton had just made a grand entrance at the inn with an entourage of about ten guards.
He was a plump, balding middle-aged man whose gaze kept wandering around restlessly behind me.
It was as if he suspected that his enemies might come charging in through the door of the inn at any moment.
“Marquis Lloyd’s letter said to treat you as I would the marquis himself. However, I have never known the marquis to have an associate such as yourself…”
He seemed to think that the letter might be counterfeit.
But he probably didn’t want to insult the marquis by asking him, just in case it was real, so he came out to see me and judge for himself.
“Quite understandable. I have only had the pleasure of his acquaintance for roughly a half-moon now.”
I reached into my robe and pulled out the dagger with the Lloyd family crest, presenting it to the baronet.
“A dagger with Marquis Lloyd’s crest…”
Baronet Poton held the dagger and flowed magic power into it, and the crest glowed faintly with some ancient letters that must have been the family motto.
I believe I’d seen a plate engraved with the same words in the entrance of the marquis’s home.
“I-it’s real!”
The blood drained from the man’s normally ruddy face.
He must have been expecting me to be a fake.
“F-forgive my rudeness, Sir Pendragon. Please, you need not stay in such a miserable shack as this. Won’t you come to my castle instead?”
The innkeeper scowled at this rude comment.
But he obviously couldn’t complain to a noble in front of all those guards.
At any rate, I didn’t really want to stay under the same roof as that pyromaniac.
Oh, I know.
I could decline and threaten the baronet into doing something about that pyro at the same time.
“I am truly humbled by the invitation, but it may be in my best interest not to visit Your Excellency’s castle.”
I made a show of glancing toward the galley, where the flames could be seen burning on the kitchen range.
The whole-roasted deer looked quite delicious.
“S-Sir Pendragon, did Marquis Lloyd by chance give you some secret assignment…?”
Baronet Poton widened his eyes and made a clumsy attempt at sounding me out.
Good, he misunderstood me perfectly.
“No, not at all.”
The baronet breathed an audible sigh of relief.
“…However, I cannot imagine he would think kindly of a foreign noble harming innocent citizens. Not everyone is as forgiving as Your Excellency.”
At that, the man froze as suddenly as if he’d rusted over.
If he’d had a tail, it would’ve been between his legs.
I hadn’t been planning to use my connections like this, but I might as well keep pushing now.
“Baronet Poton, I have heard that you are…”
I paused for a moment, looking straight into his eyes.
“…an excellent constable, so I am certain you would never knowingly allow a foreign noble to terrorize your townspeople.”
“B-but of course. Of course not! Please tell Marquis Lloyd that as long as I, Porolo Poton, yet breathe, the town of Puta shall always be secure!”
The baronet was sweating visibly now.
“I expected no less, Your Excellency. As it happens, I intend to write a letter to Marquis Lloyd tomorrow. I hope that I can inform him of Your Excellency’s hard work.”
“I-indeed. I thank you for your consideration, Sir Pendragon.”
Baronet Poton practically tripped over his own two feet as he hurried out of the inn and threw himself into the waiting carriage, which quickly carried him away.
I might have been a bit too blunt, but he seemed to have understood my message: Deal with that pyromaniac noble by tomorrow, and I’ll tell Marquis Lloyd only good things about you in my report.
Hopefully I could expect quick results.
If I had to meddle any further, it would only make Baronet Poton look bad, so this way was better for everyone.
“That was amazing, Mr. Noble! I’ve never seen that stuck-up constable look so scared!”
A boy with one arm, who’d been peering in from the back door, entered the room in high spirits.
It was the mon hunter boy who’d been arguing at the gates before.
“Hey, kid, if you’re looking for alms again, go around back.”
“N-no, not today. I came to return the money I borrowed from Mr. Noble here.”
The boy looked flustered by the innkeeper’s assumption.
“Mr. Noble, thank you again. Here’s your copper back. You really helped me out there.”
I accepted the copper he handed me. It must have cost him another fight to get his reward from those women. There was a cut on his lip and a bruise coming in on his right cheek.
This boy must lead a pretty violent life.
“Hey, innkeep, I got cash today. Gimme some of that tasty-looking deer!”
“Don’t be stupid. That stuff’s not for a greenhorn mon hunter like you.”
“Psh, whatever.”
“Why don’t you get our famous grilled fish with white sauce special?”
“Yeah, that’s fine, I guess.”
The grilled fish meal set was two coppers. Considering what I’d heard about his income earlier, that was probably over budget for him.
“If you spend that much, how will you have enough to get back into the city?”
“I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it. You never know when you’re gonna die, so you gotta at least make sure you’re eating good food, right?”
Was he being philosophical or just reckless? I was a little worried.
As we were talking, Arisa and the others came back, so we left the main inn building for the separate house where we were staying.
“Looks like you took care of that problem.”
“Yeah, no worries.”
I nodded.
Arisa had the Space Magic spells Clairvoyance and Clairaudience, so she knew the whole story. I explained the situation to everyone else.
“Well, I hope the constable does his job right…”
“It should be fine, don’t you think? He seems very concerned with self-preservation, and he thinks I’m working for Marquis Lloyd.”
“Yeah, but small fries like that can do crazy stuff sometimes. I’d be careful.”
It would probably be best to keep Arisa’s advice in mind.
Just to make sure we didn’t get caught up in any trouble, I decided to do my information gathering tonight so we could leave the next day.
In the end, it wasn’t like I actually had any obligations toward this town.
“Master, I believe dinner is ready.”
A servant had come and informed Lulu that our food was ready, so we all headed to the dining hall.
No one seemed to have a problem with letting the beastfolk girls join us. Maybe it was because of the incident with Baronet Poton earlier.
“Hungry, hungry~.”
“Hungry tummy, sir~.”
Pochi and Tama held my hands on the way to the dining hall and swung them back and forth, singing their “hungry song” complete with musical accompaniment by Mia.
The hungry song’s lyrics seemed to change every time I heard it. I’d lost count of how many variations there were at that point.
“Looks like we’re at this table in the center.”
Arisa pointed at a large table in the middle of the room with eight chairs and food already laid out.
The meal was a simple whole-roasted deer.
From the looks of it, you were meant to shave off some meat, add white sauce from a small bowl, and eat it wrapped in lettuce-like leaves.
There was also a separate plate with steamed vegetables and pilaf that I’d ordered for Mia.
The white sauce turned out to be mayonnaise.
They didn’t seem to have it in the old capital, which I’d assumed was for health reasons, but I was glad to see that it existed.
Maybe it was a specialty of this region.
However, this particular mayonnaise…
“Wow, this lettuce-wrap thing is really good!”
“Mayooo?”
“It’s mayo, sir!”
“Yes, the mayonnaise is delicious, but I think the meat is best enjoyed on its own first.”
“Hmm? The mayonnaise does taste good, but…”
After taking a bite of the venison wrap with mayo, Lulu looked to me for confirmation. She was right: The mayonnaise here was extremely heavy.
Maybe they used a different kind of oil, or maybe the proportions of their mixture were off, but I felt like I was going to have heartburn by the time I finished eating.
As I prodded Mia’s cheeks, since she was looking sulky while she ate her vegetable pilaf, I warned everyone not to eat too much mayonnaise.
“Sir, is the white sauce not to your liking?”
“It’s quite tasty, thank you. Is it of your own devising?”
The innkeeper, who’d been watching from the galley, came over.
“No, this was taught to me by a one-armed mon hunter some half a year ago. Got me to pay out the nose for the recipe, too. He was a shrewd one, unlike that little dolt Kon over there.”
“Hey, don’t lump me in with that creepy-looking dude.”
Having thoroughly cleaned the meat off every last bone of his grilled fish, the young mon hunter Kon glowered at the innkeeper.
“…Did you happen to catch that man’s name?”
“Yes, he called himself John Smith.”
John Smith… A common pseudonym back on Earth.
I asked the innkeeper what the man looked like, but all he remembered was that he had black hair, no left arm, and rather flat facial features.
Since he was missing an arm, I strongly suspected he was the unaccounted-for third man who Princess Menea’s kingdom had summoned.
“Come to think of it, he just up and disappeared outta town one day.”
“He was a mon hunter, right? He probably just got killed by a monster.”
“I don’t think that man would’ve gone down so easily.”
Even as he chatted with the innkeeper, Kon’s gaze was locked firmly on the venison.
I felt bad just letting him gnaw on a picked-clean fish bone as he watched the beastfolk girls eat, so I gave him a plate of the lettuce-wrapped venison.
“Are you sure?! Wow, thanks! You’re the best, Mr. Noble!”
The boy accepted it reverently with both hands, savoring it with tiny, careful bites.
After each bite, he mumbled things like “Damn!” and “Tasty!”
Watching him out of the corner of my eye, I set about enjoying my venison as well.
Just then, Nana, who’d been watching the entrance alertly, suddenly stood up.
She carefully hid her forehead and used Body Strengthening on herself, then zipped over to the door faster than the eye could follow.
Then she returned proudly, carrying two ratfolk babies under her arms.
The babies struggled frantically, but with Body Strengthening enhancing her already powerful arms, they didn’t stand a chance against Nana.
“Master, I have taken custody of these larvae. Permission to force-feed?”
Wait, why force-feed?
Well, everyone but the three beastfolk girls was done eating, and there was still food left, so no harm done.
I gave Nana permission to feed the children, and she happily gave each of them a venison lettuce wrap.
They seemed confused at first, but once they realized they were allowed to eat, the babies started gulping the food down like little birds.
As it turned out, they had lived in the orphanage in town until Baronet Poton closed it down, leaving them homeless. Today, at least, I made sure they could eat their fill.
“Mrrr, I won’t lose, sir— Urk!”
“Pochi, waterrr?”
Feeling threatened by the new challengers, Pochi started eating even faster and ended up choking on her food.
Tama quickly handed her a cup of water.
“Mmph.”
“Mrp-mrp.”
The ratfolk children stuffed their cheeks like hamsters, filling up on meat and vegetables alike.
Liza tried to teach the ratfolk to savor their food slowly, and when I saw Kon watching them jealously, I invited him to join us at the table. It made for a pretty hectic dinner, but overall, it was a lively and enjoyable evening.
“…The Black Dragon Mountains?”
I was alone in the bar at night, gathering information.
Fancy noble clothes stood out in this town, so I dressed as a novice merchant instead.
This bar’s claim to fame was a sweet alcohol called trunk liquor. For such a light taste, it had a high alcohol content. It paired perfectly with the salted mystery fish snacks.
“I’ve been to the Farthest Village, and all there is beyond it is an old, overgrown highway, y’know.”
“I’m pretty sure there’s a mon hunter who specializes in that area.”
I treated the merchants to some alcohol, committing the information they gave to memory.
“Isn’t there a pioneer village at the foot of those mountains?”
“No, I think that village got wiped out twenty years ago by a huge avalanche of earth urchins.”
Land-based sea urchins, big enough to destroy a village? That sounded…delicious. I could go for a giant helping of that over rice.
Tuna would be nice, too. There were flying whales in this fantasy world, so there ought to be flying fish, right?
Anyway, putting aside such stupid thoughts, that was about all the information I was able to gather about the Black Dragon Mountains.
But I did find out about something else…
“Man, a silver just for participating in some inn siege?”
“That’s crazy. How many goblins is that?”
“One silver is twenty coppers, so…that’s a lot.”
“But that arsonist freak is gathering a buncha followers, right? Are we really gonna get paid?”
“C’mon, think, ya moron. We’ll just steal anything of value when we attack the damn inn!”
“Should we really be attacking a nobleman, though?”
“Eh, we’ll let the arsonist take the fall for that.”
…A very concerning rumor.
From what I gathered, a man from a criminal guild was hiring up a bunch of the town thugs.
There were two inns in this town, but the only noble staying at an inn was me.
I thought I had talked Baronet Poton into dealing with the pyro noble, but either he failed to persuade or arrest him or he got talked into siding with him instead.
Still, I didn’t think I’d done anything to make the pyro noble angry with me directly…
The gossip at the bar soon cleared that up, though.
“But what’s the arson guy got against the noble at the inn?”
“I heard he’s hiding the beastfolk the fire freak is looking for. They’re with him at the inn.”
“That makes sense. I heard he bought a ton of food supplies.”
I must have purchased a little too much food at the trading post.
So the purpose of hiring the thugs was probably to surround the inn and prevent the white tigerfolk from escaping.
I left the tavern, ducked into an alley, and used Telephone to explain the situation to Arisa.
“Hmm. What a pain. Think that constable’s got anything to do with it?”
I wasn’t sure, so I did a map search.
Most of the guards who weren’t on duty seemed to be in their homes, so it was unlikely that the constable, Baronet Poton, was involved in this incident.
“Then how about instead of preventing it, we let them pull off the siege and catch that stupid noble in the act? If it gets out that he gathered a bunch of thugs and attacked a sleeping noble, he’ll never be able to talk his way out of it.”
I contemplated Arisa’s proposal.
It would be easy to crush them before the attack began, but that might prompt him to send an assassin or poison my food or something instead.
As long as things like poison and snipers weren’t a factor, my party could easily handle the pyro noble and his thugs. Perhaps it would be best to set a trap and round them all up at once.
“Good point. Let’s deal with this pyromaniac once and for all.”
“Okey-dokey! We’ll get ready, then. The great Arisa will demonstrate how much she learned about sieges from reading tons of Warring States manga!”
I was a little concerned about how gleeful Arisa sounded, but I agreed to leave her in charge of the inn while I headed to the tavern where the mon hunters gathered.
I was going to pay a visit to the mon hunter who specialized in the area of the Farthest Village.
“Come on—wait a minute!”
“Outta the way, Kon.”
As I approached the mon hunters’ tavern, I heard the boy Kon outside arguing with the leader of the mon hunter women.
“That noble is a really good person! He wouldn’t hurt a fly.”
“That doesn’t matter one bit.”
“She’s right. We get a silver each just for surrounding an inn!”
“Yeah, do you have any idea how many goblins that is?”
“Even a good-for-nothing like you could get in on this, you know! You’d have to be a fool to let this chance go by.”
The man from the criminal guild seemed to be gathering forces here, too.
Unlike the thugs at the other bar, the mon hunters had real weapons and were pretty high-level, so that was a bit of a problem.
Checking my markers, I saw that around two dozen thugs and hunters were gathering in an empty lot near the constable’s castle. As of now, the common thugs outnumbered the mon hunters.
The only people in the vacant lot were the criminal guild’s crew; the pyro nobleman and his friends were all still in the castle.
I activated Clairvoyance and looked inside the tavern.
“Hey, Ordo, put the drink down and get them to stop!”
“Why? Let those ladies do what they want.”
“C’mon, Ordo!”
Inside the tavern were eight mon hunters, including Kon, the women, and a group of assorted beastfolk.
This “Ordo” fellow was a one-eyed rabbitfolk man, and his group ranged from levels 7 to 9, high even for mon hunters. The rest of the bunch inside wasn’t much different from the mon hunters at the vacant lot.
The beastfolk group was staying neutral, refusing to help Kon.
“You better back off, or it’ll be more than just a punch this time.”
“C’mon, miss, please.”
Kena, the leader of the female mon hunter group, raised a fist, but then Ordo called out to her. “Kena, I’d think on that a minute.”
“What do you want, Ordo? It’s not like you to stick your nose in other mon hunters’ business.”
“Just a piece of advice, lass. We’re siding with the noble in the inn. He saved Borsch’s sister’s life, and besides, we got a request from the beastfolk alliance to protect him.”
Oh? Maybe this was their way of thanking me for earlier.
I wasn’t sure who Borsch’s sister was, but she must have been one of the burn victims I healed.
If I hadn’t overheard this, I might’ve just assumed that their group was with the pyro noble and taken them out from a distance.
“Are you serious, Ordo? I know you guys are strong, but there’s more than just a couple dozen mon hunters here. The constable’s guards are coming, too, y’know.”
All right, standing outside listening wasn’t going to do me much good.
I pushed open the well-worn door and cut in on the pair’s conversation.
“I wouldn’t worry about that. The guards aren’t going to show up.”
“Says who? Your mother? Just stay out of it!” Kena snapped at me without even turning to look.
She must have mistaken me for a fellow mon hunter.
“I used some connections in the old capital to put Baronet Poton in his place. Unless he’s self-destructive or an even bigger moron than I thought, he won’t send any guards.”
As I continued, Ordo gestured toward me, and the others stopped to listen. Kena and her group stood up, hands on their swords.
Kena was holding back Kon, and I waved at him and introduced myself.
“Hi, nice to meet you. I’m Satou Pendragon, the hereditary knight.”
I looked around the bar calmly, watching their reactions.
Most of them were less hostile than I expected.
“I wasn’t trying to eavesdrop, but I happened to hear what you were talking about. Miss Kena, was it? I wonder if I could ask you and yours to stay here and keep drinking tonight.”
“Drinking? You’re not here to recruit us for your side?”
“No, nothing like that. I just came to get the latest information about the mountain range and the Farthest Village.”
“What?! If you were listening, you must have some idea of what’s going on, right? Shouldn’t you be leaving that inn and running for the hills? I’m sure Ordo could open the gates for you if you ask nicely.”
Well, that was a surprise. I wasn’t expecting anyone to give me advice. These folks weren’t actually that bad; they were just won over by the promise of a silver.
In that case, maybe I could get them to take part in blocking the pyro noble’s escape route instead.
“Can we talk for a minute? I might have a job for you.”
As I explained my plan, the mon hunters all stared at me, dumbfounded.
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