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“The heck’s this!? So expensive!”
“Sensei, is this a clump of wax, mineral or stone?”
“It is deplorable how very little you know despite having been my pupils. This is ambergris.”
“Pardon? The incense of what? Does that mean it comes from a dragon?” 1
“At least that is what the people of old believed, but in reality, it is a calculus produced by the intestines of a serpent. Among natural aromas, it is the single-most expensive.”
“Hoh, I see.”
Today was yet another day of us strolling through the city with Mall’s group while sightseeing. Mall got very surprised when he discovered an ingredient that was ridiculously expensive in a certain store.
That store was filled with nothing but expensive goods which explained why there were no other customers but us in here.
The merchandise in question looked like marble that combined various colors such as gray, amber, black, white, etc. It had a texture making it appear similar to wax, but its price was outrageous. I mean, they slapped a price tag, which reflected a value that was manifold its weight in gold, on something I didn’t even know how to use.
Arnest knew its identity and informed us about its name. Actually I also heard about it in my previous life, but it was my first time to actually see it with my own two eyes.
After all, it used to be fairly expensive on earth as well since you could only obtain it if the ocean carried it on-shore after a whale spat it out. It’s definitely surprising for it to exist in this world too.
“(I think sperm whales produced ambergris… But, if it’s this world…)”
Oh, which reminds me, Arnest mentioned earlier that it could be obtained from serpents…so that’s a difference to Earth.
“You have a very discerning eye, dear customers. We actually managed to get our hands on ambergris for the first time in three years.”
“Is it that hard to get it?”
“Yes, you can count yourself lucky if you can collect one ambergris from the bowels of a serpent after killing many of them.”
Does that mean something like that could have been inside the guts of the serpents I killed before? Also, serpents are much more like dragons than whales, I’d say.
“Earl Baumeister, you cannot get your hands on ambergris that easily.”
“So it seems.”
“Or to be precise, it is impossible to obtain it from the intestines of a healthy serpent. Fish, shellfish, whales, and other aquatic creatures, which have been eaten by a serpent with a sick stomach, stay in the intestines while undigested and eventually crystallize together with the intestinal fluids. As for its fragrance, it is said that it tastes heavenly. I hear that you can sell it for ten times its weight in gold in the demon country.”
So both humans and demons fork over big money for ambergris, huh?
“You won’t find any in healthy serpents…? Then, wouldn’t it be possible to produce ambergris by having Wend catch a serpent and then ruin its health by making it drink tons of alcohol?”
Erw…I don’t think it’ll be that easy.
“Umm…Erw-san, even then you must keep the sick serpent for many years.”
“Oh, I see!”
No, I mean, everyone except for Erw has realized that part even without Elise pointing it out. If you could make a profit by producing ambergris so easily, someone would have adopted that method long ago.
“We managed to obtain some of it after three years, and even before that, we did not receive a new batch for around five years. How about, dear customers? Would you be interested in buying it?”
Is it something so rare? In such a case, it’s only logical for it to be expensive.
Though, I don’t need it. And as might be expectable, no one else felt like buying it either.
“Naturally, we won’t buy it!”
“I mean, we’re jobless.”
“We got no money.”
Although that’s certainly true, it sure sounds saddening to hear it out Mall, Lamru, and Silas’s mouths. For me personally, nothing was as painful as the term jobless. I felt that it’d still be better to be a corporate slave than to be unemployed.
“Even if I had the money, I still wouldn’t buy it though.”
“Indeed. If I’ve had so much money at hand, it’d be a better investment to spent a life of lazing around.”
“I mean, it only smells nicely, right? Some sort of mental relief then? In such case, it’d be much smarter to avoid working in a place that exploits its workers than huffing some weird incense, I’d think.”
“””””””””…”””””””””
ïŒ
Maybe it was triggered by that conversation, but the old fisherman, who was acting as mediator between me and the fishermen renting my boats, approached me about a certain topic on the next day after Elise and my other wives got astonished by the words of Mall and his two friends.
“A serpent nest?”
“Rather than a nest, it’s an island located slightly beyond Sirius’s port…well, as a matter of fact, it’s just a plain, big rock to be fair, but the serpents have started to stay there.”
“They started to stay there? Why?”
“Maybe because it’s a nice spot for them? They spend most of their time lazing around on the rocky surface, and only dive into the sea to catch some food. At first, it was just around two to three serpents, but…”
I heard that even in Hokkaido, sea lions would occupy islands and rocks situated close to fishing grounds, causing big monetary harm to the fishing industry. I guess serpents are their equivalents in this world.
A few dozen sea lions is already an overwhelming sight, but a dozen serpents living on a rock has to be incredible to watch. I’m pretty sure the fishermen stay clear from there out of fear.
“Didn’t you file a request for extermination with Margrave Holmia?”
“That’s…right after we put forth the petition, the demons showed up, so…”
So it’s been simply impossible due to a shortage of people to handle it, huh?
“How about asking adventurers?”
“Adventurers loathe to exterminate serpents.”
“I see.”
“Wend, it’s because serpents are half-baked,” Ina provided the explanation, “Serpents are big, so it’ll be dangerous unless you send out a party of skilled adventurers. Or in short, it’d be reckless for unskilled adventurers to take a serpent on. They’d end up in their stomachs in no time. But, in relation to the necessary firepower, the rewards are low, so…”
Serpents aren’t monsters, but they are almost as strong as wyverns or other flying dragons. You have to exterminate them with a big group of people, and it sucks that you won’t get any magic stones even if you kill them.
Wyverns and other flying dragons are much more rewarding in regards to loot for the same level of danger you have to brave. On top of that, their materials such as meat and scales generally sell for a lot more, too. Of course, serpent materials aren’t exactly cheap either, but they still fall behind.
Because of such reasons, many adventurers appear to hate serpent subjugations. Given that they’d need to fight on a ship, something they wouldn’t usually do, on top of steering the ship itself, they’d also run the risk of possibly suffering an unexpected, embarrassing defeat.
Serpents often cause havoc to the fishing grounds of humans. And if the tax revenue for a lord plummets because his fishermen can’t catch any fish, it’ll cause a serious blow to the fief’s budget, so it’s often the duty of a lord to exterminate or drive away serpents who have appeared in waters used by humans.
“Are they so difficult to handle?”
They can’t fly, nor can they fire a breath at you. They aren’t as tough as wyverns either. Their bodies might be big, but they’re fairly weak against magic, so they shouldn’t be that hard a target as long as you don’t take profit into consideration. At the least, that’s my take on serpents.
“Wilma chopped the head off with one swing in the past, didn’t she?”
“But, that’d be difficult for any ordinary adventurer.”
“You got a point there.”
Even if fishermen specialize in catching fish, that doesn’t mean they can kill serpents. In that case, I guess we’ve got no choice but to take care of it ourselves.
However, I had a worry.
“The extermination of serpents would originally be the task of the Margrave Holmia House. Wouldn’t it anger the Margrave if I, as Earl Baumeister, arbitrarily went ahead and did their job?”
Many people would probably wonder why I worry about something as silly as that, but we’re currently inside the Holmia Margravate. Disregarding the margrave, the lord of this fief, and selfishly killing serpents as I please could lead to House Holmia taking a hostile stance towards our family in the future.
When I expanded on my concern, Katia asked, “Aren’t you exaggerating, hubby?”
“No…it enters the category of being possible…”
Katia thought that I was going too far, but Elise understood the annoying parts of high-ranking nobility as granddaughter of Cardinal Hohenheim.
Even in my previous life, there was a situation where I forgot to contact a certain superior about going ahead with a new project, resulting in him getting totally pissed and afterwards constantly getting in the way of the project because he felt butthurt. His position within the company was fairly high and he wasn’t a youngster either, but sometimes such people will haunt you for a long period of time, if you hurt their pride once.
And even though anyone could see that the new project would be a big hit, he used his position in the hierarchy to obstruct the project’s progress with all he had, just because I hadn’t informed him about it in advance.
Even though a child would understand that him acting like that would only cause damage to the company, he still opted to go through with it for the sole reason of having his pride hurt once.
So, assuming I exterminated the serpents that jeopardize the fishing grounds out of good intentions, my not informing Margrave Holmia in advance could drastically worsen my relationship with him.
Of course I’m in a different world right now, but I do believe that it’s possible for him to react like the superior in my past.
“Well done, Wendelin. Thou noticed it without any help.”
“Don’t treat me like a child!”
That was all I could retort to Therese.
“But, if it had been Milord from before…”
“…he’d have probably exterminated them first and then reported about it afterwards.”
“Uuhh…”
I couldn’t deny Lisa’s guess.
“Nobles sure are a pain to deal with.”
“Isn’t that the same, no matter where you work?”
“Who knows. We haven’t worked before.”
“Figures.”
“There were some nasty seniors and professors at university, too.”
“…You heard him, nasty professor,” Luise teased Arnest.
“You mean me? I was not nasty or anything like that.”
“Yeah, he’s right, Luise-chan.”
“He’s a bit of an oddball..”
“He couldn’t arrange a workplace for us either.”
“Huh? That’s some very casual dissing there, no?”
“I-Indeed…”
For a change, Arnest’s expression became rather gloomy when having this pointed out by Luise.
As we were chatting like that, another old fisherman showed up, “Earl Baumeister-sama, it’s actually about the permission by Margrave Holmia-sama… He judged that he wouldn’t mind it if we entrusted this matter to adventurers. So, could we have you somehow take this request on?”
“Hmmm.”
As Earl Baumeister, I’d need to write up a letter and send it to the margrave. The reply would take a few days and in the meantime, the fishermen wouldn’t be able to get anywhere close to the rock infested by serpents.
Of course, you could argue that this was the situation before we even arrived here in Sirius, but now that the fish haul all over the margraviate has clearly decreased because of the demons, I think it’d be best to make fishing around that rock available as quickly as possible.
“If there’s too many serpents around, they quickly run out of food. Usually it’d be impossible, but under these circumstances it’s also possible that some of the serpents plan to get closer to Sirius and attack the city or its vicinity.”
“Okay, I understand. We will handle it.”
With that said, we accepted the task of exterminating the flock of serpents on the rock to make fishing in its vicinity possible again as adventurers.
ïŒăăăïŒăăăïŒ
“So, you’re going to come with us as well?”
“Of course.”
“These sorts of things also count as experience. Though its novelty also plays a role.”
“We’re going to exterminate huge serpents. Doesn’t that sound like lots of fun?”
On the next day, he headed for the rock that had become a sunning spot for the serpents. Given that we’d be hard pressed with the steering of the boat and the navigation, I hired one of the fishermen and left it to him. He appeared somewhat worried since the opponents would be serpents, but I accordingly raised his pay.
It shouldn’t pose much of a problem since Doushi, Burkhart-san and I are present. Moreover, all of our women are taking a day off to give their attention to baby care.
For some reason, Mall and his two colleagues came along as well, but since all three possess mana in the upper ranks of the intermediate level, it should be alright. Rather than security issues, the reason why they’d accompany us seemed much more mysterious. I mean, they look mildly motivated, if at all.
“Can these three fire spells?” Erw, who had come along as my guard, suspected Mall’s group to not have practiced how to use magic decently, despite having a reasonable amount of mana.
He likely doubted the usefulness when we’d start the extermination of the serpents. In my eyes, it won’t be much of a problem even if they don’t add anything to the combat, though.
“Huh? You’re evaluating us surprisingly low, aren’t you? Even though we’ve got quite a bit of mana.”
“Mall, Erwin probably believes that we can’t aim our spells since we haven’t practiced our magic enough.”
“Oh, so that’s it.”
“Though I don’t think it’ll be a particular problem since we can simply shoot our spells normally.”
Mall, Lamru, and Silas declared that all demons could cast spells.
“It’s just that we don’t have many opportunities to use our spells under normal circumstances. But, since that’s related to our social environment, it’s inevitable, I guess.”
“If we suddenly started to unleash our magic smack down in the middle of a city, we’d be arrested by the police right away.”
“Moreover, it’d quickly turn into a debate why we’re doing something like that in the first place.”
Makes sense. They’ve already outgrown the era when demons would wreak havoc all over, and now that their civilization had advanced, something like meaninglessly releasing magic all over the place had become obsolete. Though, it’s clearly going against any prejudice one would have of demons.
“But, since you’re going to deal with the serpents anyway, you won’t really need our impromptu magic, right?”
“How about getting ready just in case?”
“We’re going to only watch.”
“If nothing happens to Wend, it’ll result in me just watching too…but, it’s such a rare chance, so how about you try releasing some spells?”
“So you’re saying we won’t get many chances like this one to release our magic?”
“Though you can apparently practice your magic if you enter the defense force.”
“I guess I’ll give it a try.”
Going along with Erw’s incitement, Mall planted himself at the boat’s bow and released his magic towards a serpent which was lazing around on the rock.
“Only once around five years ago did I practice my magic deep in the mountains. I don’t know whether it’s a secret killing technique, but ăWind Cutteră!”
His ăWind Cutteră was fairly powerful in correspondence to his mana capacity. If this hits, things shouldn’t end nicely for the serpent…
“Well, first you gotta hit something. Your control is…” Burkhart-san commented, looking quite perplexed.
But that’s only natural. Mall had cast his ăWind Cutteră so exaggeratedly, but it missed the serpent by leaps and bounds. To be honest, this was a level of aim that didn’t even justify talking about hitting a target.
Burkhart-san and Doushi appeared to be disappointed by the clear difference between Mall and the demons as they were described in old documents.
“Huh? That’s weird!”
“It’s meaningless to cast a spell if you don’t hit anything with it, isn’t it?”
“Well, yeah…” I couldn’t possibly deny Erw’s sound argument.
“It is bad to not train your skills!”
“I’ll eventually get to it if I find some time. Probably.”
The amazing part about Mall was him staying so indifferent even when dealing with Doushi. Even though magic should be their strong point, they aren’t practicing it since it’s unnecessary. In some respect, that’s quite incredible.
“Okay, I’m next!”
Following Mall, Lamru went up to the boat’s bow and released his magic. This time the spell was heading for the serpent properly, but…
“You idiot! Don’t fire a ăFireballă at this sort of prey!” Burkhart-san shouted angrily.
But, that was only natural. This time’s request was about us spontaneously hunting down the serpents as adventurers because of the serpents’ materials. Because of that, we wouldn’t get any rewards from House Holmia. Since we’d get our reward by selling the materials of the serpents we hunted, it’d be a bad idea to use fire magic which would scorch the prey, or rather, it was close to taboo.
Even if we could take them down with fire magic, we’d come out at a loss if the price of the materials went down the drain due to quality loss.
“Well, the other side appears to be more skilled though,” commented Burkhart-san with a bitter smile.
The aim of Lamru’s ăFireballă was fine, but as expected, he wasn’t accustomed to using magic. Because his spell was far too slow, the serpent avoided it with ease.
“Raise the speed of your spells!”
“In short, the same as Mall, huh…?”
They certainly fall short when it comes to mana capacity, but they still enter the region of being in the upper top ranks. And yet, they sucked at shooting their spells. Seeing them like that as demons, Burkhart-san pulled a troubled expression. After all, it was completely different from the belief that demons were experts at magic, a belief shared by many people, including Burkhart-san.
“Lamru, I’ll go next!”
“Oh, you are nicely motivated there, lad!”
The third demon, Silas, proudly planted himself at the bow, and seeing him act like that, Doushi put some hope into his performance. His mana capacity was big…but the same could be said about the two others as well…
“Why are these guys getting all heated?”
“Maybe they’re in the process of reverting back to be wild creatures?”
“You make it sound like they’re animals. Are they possibly targeting the ambergris?”
“””*gulp*”””
What an easily understandable reaction. I thought that demons were more proficient at hiding their schemes, but their bodies easily revealed their true intention here when Erw made a guess about the ambergris.
“Are you going for the money?”
“Rather, who wouldn’t?”
Well, usually anyone would take that chance, I suppose. But, if it’s about a too big amount of money, like it’s happened thus far, it stops feeling realistic instead and your desire of wanting that money actually decreases, I believe.
“If we harvest some ambergris from a serpent, we’ll be able to get a share of the money!”
“In such a case, I’ll be able to harden my heart, even if I’m told by my mother, ăGive it already a rest and get a proper job!ă once I get back home!”
“I’ll be able to stay calm even when my nephews and my small cousin tell me, ăUncle, what sort of job are you doing right now? Please give me some pocket moneyă.”
I wonder why? Listening to those three demons causes my heart to ache.
“Okay, I get that part, but first you have to hit the target, otherwise it’s meaningless.”
I think they’re pitiable, but please hit the target at least.
“A barrage of ăPebbleă! ăLet me explain! Pebble barrage is a spell rising the hit rate by showering a target with large quantities of pebbles!ă. Yahoo! I hit!”
“It’s not about just hitting, you know…?”
“Why? I hit the serpents.”
“But you didn’t kill them!”
“You just angered them!”
It wasn’t as though the serpents remained completely unhurt from Silas’s ăPebbleă. Several serpents had their skin torn and were bleeding now. However, that didn’t mean he managed to bring down a serpent. Rather, he pissed them off, resulting in them sliding off the rock into the ocean to head our way.
They were fully intent on destroying the boat and eating us.
“Oh, did they become angry?”
“We’ll be eaten!”
“What should we do?”
Mall and his two friends panicked, unable to do anything as the serpents approached. If you didn’t actually experience surmounting dangerous situations, even demons won’t be able to react to spontaneous events, huh?
“Earl-sama, please take care of it.”
“Got it.”
Burkhart-san apparently gave up on our three guests, leaving the killing of the serpents to me. I created several ăWind Cuttersă simultaneously and used them to behead the closest serpents.
“Earl-sama, don’t miss.”
“You sure are strict as master of my master…”
“That much counts as the basics of the basics, doesn’t it?”
As soon as Burkhart-san said so, Mall, Lamru, and Silas looked embarrassed.
“It is as Burkhart-dono has said! It is impossible to miss even one shot!”
Doushi also hurled harsh things in the direction of the three demons.
“Okay, we’ll need to pick up the defeated serpents afterwards.”
Since I lopped off their heads, large quantities of blood spread in the sea. Because of that, even serpents, who hadn’t been on the rock, were drawn in, resulting in us hunting more than twenty serpents on that day alone.
ïŒ
“Earl Baumeister-sama, I couldn’t see any serpents around that rock anymore. I don’t know how to thank you for this.”
“We made some profit out of this as well, so it’s a win-win for both of us, right?”
As we were watching the serpents being dismantled, the elderly fisherman from before approached us to express his gratitude. He apparently sailed out earlier to check the rock, just to find it completely deserted. According to him, he and his colleagues would be able to safely fish over there from now on.
“Luring more serpents in by spilling their blood in the ocean was unexpectedly smart.”
“It’s the result of Master and Burkhart-san’s teachings.”
“Mine as well, right?”
“Of course.”
“I am glad to see that you have grown into such an outstanding magician, Earl Baumeister!”
Oh shit! I forgot about Doushi. However, this man didn’t teach me anything remotely close to knowledge required for adventuring or magic. All he did was drag me through rigorous combat training. I recall that I got most of my knowledge from Burkhart-san…
Then again, in his case old-man’s wisdom might have played a big role in this. But, since he’d get pissed if I voiced that out in front of him, I decided to keep it to myself.
“So, where are Mall and the other two?”
“That’s…it sounds like they hated watching the dismantling, so…”
Well, I can relate to that. The time I spent in my previous life and here are almost identical, and only now I got so used to it that it didn’t irk me to watch stuff like this.
“I thought demons would be more…well, completely different.”
“I heard they would cut open rabbits while alive and suck out their blood and intestines!”
Doushi, you’re talking about vampires…
In the past demons were savage and possessed a strong urge to kill other creatures. But even those demons, who had acted on their desires, spent many years on this planet and ended up changing their civilization into one going beyond those of this world’s humans.
I think it’s great how easy it is to get along with the current demons.
“Isn’t it great that the demons aren’t like that, Doushi?”
“Why?”
“Do you want to go to war that much? Personally, I’d like to avoid it though…”
“You got a point. The demons being peaceful is preferable!”
I believe it’s just as Erw says. If the past version of the demons had invaded the Terra Harrez Archipelago, this city would be the frontline around now. From Erw’s point of view as someone who would be forced to swing his sword at the forefront, it’d be a matter of life and death. After all, we’d be fighting demons who were said to be all magicians.
“Earl Baumeister-sama!”
As we were talking about this, a young fisherman, who had been dismantling a serpent, carried something over to us. It was a stone similar to a clump of wax that had a marbled pattern of white and black.
Luckily, we got an ambergris from one of the serpents we hunted today.
“That’s huge luck as typical for you, Earl-sama.”
“So now you don’t call it bad luck anymore, eh?”
“Ambergris is extremely valuable. So much so that a commoner could easily spend a life in luxury. Being able to find something like that meant you got big luck, Earl-sama.”
“Ah, but…”
“What’s wrong?”
“Earl Baumeister-sama, there exists another reason for ambergris to be so valuable and expensive. Isn’t this actually a ăStinkstoneă?”
“A ăStinkstoneă?”
“It is a type of ambergris, but it stinks nastily if you burn it.”
So there existed winners and duds among ambergris…? Since you could use a stinkstone as material for magic potions, it wasn’t a complete dud, but its price was no more than small change when compared to the nicely smelling ambergris.
“In other words, you’re saying it’s very likely to encounter a stinkstone, even if you finally loot an ambergris?”
“Yes. The chances are fifty-fifty.”
Half, eh…? It’d be great if this was a proper ambergris with a nice aroma.
Thinking that we had to check on it, we grabbed the ambergris and headed over to yesterday’s store.
ïŒăăăïŒăăăïŒ
“Fifty-fifty, eh…?
“Please, let this be a winner.”
“Huh? No one’s here.”
“According to the rumors, a stinkstone smells so much that it’s not even funny anymore, so everyone’s keeping their distance. It’d also have an influence on the babies since they identify their mother by smell, so Elise and the other women haven’t come along either.”
“Doushi and Burkhart-san have stayed away as well, huh…? I’d love to take refuge too…”
“As if I’d let you get away by yourself!”
“Hey, don’t get me involved in every bullshit that happens!”
“But, if it’s ambergris, it’s going to be some very nice extra income, Erw.”
“That’s definitely very appealing…”
Mall, Lamru, Silas, Erw, and I went to the store from the other day. The question was now whether the stone we luckily looted from a serpent was a winner or a dud. As you apparently couldn’t tell without shaving off some of it and igniting it, we came here to get it appraised.
Moreover, Elise and the other women opted to be absent from this. After all, a stinging stench would spread across a wide area, even if they took some distance or if we lit it inside a closed room. In the worst case, that stink would stick to their bodies for several days and that would become a bad influence for the baby-care, I judged.
Burkhart-san and Doushi ran away at once. They said they wouldn’t participate in the appraisal since they didn’t want a share of the profits anyway. I ended up wondering just how much stench could waft over when doing the appraisal in a completely airtight room.
The three demons wanted a share of the profits, so they’d naturally participate in this.
Erw wanted to scurry away, arguing that he wouldn’t be able to approach Leon for several days if this proved to be a stinkstone, but I forced him to participate.
I mean, I won’t be able to meet my children for several days straight either in the worst case. We’re close friends and share a lord-retainer-relationship, so we should go through thick and thin together.
“It’s mostly 50%. Think about it positively.”
“A 50% probability of landing a winner, but getting punished terribly for the other 50%? I get a really bad feeling about this. Didn’t Doushi and Burkhart-san run away already? Isn’t that proof of their special intuition as veteran adventurers?”
“Such bad thinking is wrong.”
“Yep, you have to believe in your win here.”
“It’s okay, it also follows reason!”
“Oh? What sort of reason are we talking about?”
Silas clearly declared our find to be ambergris.
“Despite advancing all the way to university, we weren’t able to find a job and had to spend every day in a moratorium.”
Moratorium…I’d say they’ve simply been unemployed…
But, since you couldn’t be jobless on the Lingaia Continent, unless you were the heir of a fairly rich family, Mall and his friends are blessed in a certain way, aren’t they? Over here, unemployment would normally equal starvation, after all.
“Considering the total amount of our luck thus far, it should have accumulated quite a bit by now.” (T/N: Gacha logic)
“So you’re saying, your bad luck is going to be balanced out with an ambergris?”
“Correct!”
“To add to this, I’m single and don’t even have a girlfriend.”
“Lamru, the same applies to all three of us, right?”
“If you calculate all our bad luck until now, it’s only logical to expect something good to happen very soon.”
“What a flimsy reasoning…,” Erw rejected the whole train of thought.
But, despite that, I also felt like they could be right about it. I often heard about luck accumulating, but no one could prove anything like that.
“It’s alright! We are certain to become wealthy through the ambergris!”
“What are you going to buy with all the money?”
“Maybe it’ll make it easier for me to marry.”
Our three guests were already certain of this stone being ambergris, seeing how they had started to seriously plan the spending of their share.
“I’ve got a bad…the heck is this!? It stinks! My nose hurts!”
“This stench is terrible!”
I supposed I was just now able to smell the incense of the ambergris that had been ignited in a minuscule amount inside the room behind the shop’s counter. The door was firmly closed and yet it stank so much after igniting just a tiny amount of it.
I see. It doesn’t betray its name of stinkstone. The whole store is now filled with a revolting stench.
“Ooeeehhâââ!”
“Well…”
We could hear the shopkeeper puking from the other side of the door. But, considering how nasty the smell was over here, it was only reasonable for him to be unable to endure the stench, when confronted directly with it.
“…It’s a stinkstone…with this weight, it’s 5,000 cents worth…”
So 1,000 cents per person, huh…? In that case, the serpent’s raw materials are more valuable.
Still, what magic potion would use this sort of thing anyway?”
“I’m fine with that…”
I immediately agreed, hating the idea of negotiating with another store as it’d probably mean another confirmation of its smell.
After selling the stinkstone for 5,000 cents, I equally split the cash among the five of us.
ïŒ
In the evening, Erw, the three demons, and I were preparing our camp in a forest a slight distance away from our airship. Because of the stinkstone’s burning, a nasty stench had permeated our clothes and bodies, so we couldn’t go back to the airship until the smell had dissipated.
“Well, that’s the reason why Burkhart-san and Doushi ran away.”
The stench of the stone was quite intense and persistent, so we would apparently need to camp out for around three days. Otherwise, we’d just spread the smell around to our family as well. And because this stench would negatively affect our babies, Erw and I ended up camping out.
The same applied to Mall, Silas, and Lamru. They tried to help us with the camp preparations, but as city boys, they weren’t accustomed to camping out in the wild. Even though they set up one tent, they weren’t much use otherwise.
“Ooohhh! You truly smell quite badly!”
“Sensei.”
“Did you come here to check on our situation?”
“Are you going to camp with us, sensei?”
“No way I would do that. I just came here to check whether that stinkstone really smelled as badly as mentioned.”
In a certain sense, this was expectable for a research nut like Arnest. After checking the stench clinging to his former pupils, he went back to the airship. A decisiveness you could even call refreshing in a way.
Given that Arterio had recently succeeded in starting the mass production of curry powder, we used a sample of that to make curry for tonight’s dinner. Once we started cooking it together with whale meat and various veggies, a fragrant curry aroma started to spread from the big pot.
“It looks delicious!”
“Curry is the standard for camping, yep.”
“It does remind me of my school’s camping trip.”
So the demons also went on camping trips as an extracurricular lesson at school with curry being a standard dish during such events, huh?
“So, is this going to be spicy?”
“Mall, I’m bad with food that’s too spicy.”
“Eeâââeh!? I can’t agree with you on that one, Lamru! I prefer curry to be as spicy as possible…”
“Huh? Does it actually matter?”
“Erwin, do you lack a sense of taste? It’s weird to be okay with whatever, you know?”
“I can enjoy the food either way!”
“How fickle a man you are…”
“Aren’t we just talking about the spiciness of curry here…?”
It’s difficult to adjust the spiciness when eating curry with several people. I went with a neutral approach of ămedium-spicyă.
“I guess it’s bearable with this much spiciness.”
“It’s great for it to be not too spicy!”
“It’s nice that it’s not too sweet.”
“Curry is a dish that tastes great whenever you eat it outside for some reason.”
After we had our fill of curry, we discussed what we would do for the coming three days. The stench of the stinkstone clung to our bodies, so we had to stay away from other people as much as possible.
“Sightseeing is out of the question then, right?”
“Erw, do you want to be seen as a smelly nuisance by the residents of Sirius?”
We can’t tell anymore because our noses have already adapted to the stench, but initially it was such a nasty stench that we thought our noses would fall off. Because we’d only cause trouble to other people by coming close to them, we’ve got no choice but to obediently sit this one out.
“Oh right! Earl Baumeister, please teach us magic.”
“THat’s a good idea. We got more than enough time on our hands anyway.”
“I’d like to become capable of hitting a target at the very least.”
“What a low level, considering you’re a demon…” Erw mumbled in appall, but Arnest had explained that common demons almost never practiced offensive magic on the pretext of being able to pour mana into magic tools.
As for Arnest’s case, his strongest attribute was darkness, and because that was yet another quite special magic attribute, he’d only started to properly train his magic after he took shelter at Duke NĂŒrnberg’s place. Given his talent, the rate of his improvement was somewhat terrifying, but it lacked a thorough polish. Because of that and his lacking experience, he probably failed at dodging Elise’s ăOverheală.
“You should become able to at least hit targets with your spells in no time. Okay, I’ll show you how to do it.”
“I think I should also use the time to practice my swordsmanship and katana arts.”
We couldn’t appear in public, but thinking of this as having three days off proved to be productive. I taught Mall’s group about magic while Erw practiced his sword and katana arts by himself. We cooked together and camped out all the time.
We didn’t have a single woman with us, but it was fun as it felt like playing with school friends after a long time.
“Converging ăWind Cuttersă to make them as small as possible raises their power. If you take on serpents, it’s best to aim for their long necks. If you manage to sever their artery, you can aim to bleed them to death.”
“I see…like this? Oh, that was close!”
“You’ve mostly become able to aim properly by now.”
Mall had aimed a target placed a few dozen meters ahead and released a ăWind Cutteră. Unfortunately for him, he only managed to graze it, but it was clearly an improvement compared to the other day on the boat.
Demons sure are prodigies at magic, I must admit. It’s just their instincts became dull after they got too used to convenient tools making life easy for them…I’d say.
“Alright! I hit!”
“Me too!”
After training them for just three days, the three had reached a point where they could hit targets with their spells. With this level of skill, they should be okay even if they have to handle another serpent subjugation.
When I told them so, Erw commented, “Requests for serpent subjugations don’t come around sooo often, you know…?”
He was swinging his katana next to us while labeling the serpent subjugation from a few days ago as a rare case.
“Unlikely stuff does happen sometimes, too.”
“As if.”
ïŒ
“Sorry, but we got that exception on our hands right now. A swarm returned to that spot from the other day, making it impossible for the fishermen to head out fishing over there again.”
“””””Burkhart-san!”””””
Because Erw raised a flag…is probably not the reason, but Burkhart-san suddenly showed up, bringing a request to kill serpents at the previous spot with him.
Even now the smell hasn’t dissipated from our bodies, so Burkhart-san has been pinching his nose all the while.
“We can’t meet Elise and the others until tomorrow anyway, so let’s head over and quickly get rid of the buggers.”
“This time we’re going to finish them off with our magic!”
“We’ll show them the fruits of our training.”
“This time for sure we’ll obtain ambergris…okay, I won’t get my hopes too high, but we’ll take down the serpents with our magic!”
“Earl-sama, this sure is a weird sight…”
It’s not that I can’t understand what Burkhart-san wants to tell me. Demons, who ought to be experts in magic, are being taught magic by me, who is a human youngster.
Even Burkhart-san hadn’t seen any demons until he met Arnest. But, old documents contained many depictions of demons unleashing massive spells. This knowledge had edged itself into Burkhart-san’s memory, now giving him a feeling of misalignment when seeing Mall and the other two act like this.
ïŒ
“Is it going to be alright this time around?”
“Their spells pack enough of a punch now, so it won’t pose any problem as long as they hit their targets.”
He must wonder about the difference in their power. After all, you’ll only piss off the serpents if you hit them with a weak spell, no matter how great your magic control might be.
“Look, it seems to be okay.”
“I hit!”
“Earl Baumeister, I’m properly aiming at the serpents’ necks.
“I also took down a serpent!”
Ten-odd serpents had gathered on and around the rock from the other day, but this time they were all defeated by our three demon guests, now that they’d become able to aim their spells accurately.
Unlike the other day, I could take it easy.
“Okay, let’s pick up the serpents and head back, huh?”
On the last day of our self-inflicted isolation, we experienced an unforeseen event where Mall and his friends showed off the magic they learned, but this was fine since it allowed us to kill some time.
Tomorrow the smell will probably be gone completely and I’ll be able to meet my wives and children. It’s one thing when I can’t meet them because I’ve departed to the battlefield, but not being able to meet them because I stink is odd.
ïŒ
“The proceeds from the serpents’ material sale has turned into nice extra cash, hasn’t it?”
“You got a point there.”
“It’s wrong for humans and demons alike to be too greedy. Steady work without hoping for something like ambergris is the best.”
“I wonder what I should buy with the money?”
“Umm…once again I found this in a serpent…”
With that single comment of the young fisherman, who had been dismantling the serpents, Mall, Silas, and Lamru became all excited.
“I think this one smells nice.”
“Getting a miss twice in a row with a chance of 50% would be plain weird going by probability.”
“For us to successively encounter serpents with ambergris…we sure are fortunate.”
Even though they just talked about the value of steady, honest work, we ended right back where we started once the three heard about ambergris having been found in a serpent. If this one is the real deal, we’ll be able to strike it rich.
The chance for it to be a stinkstone or ambergris is around fifty-fifty, so they seemed to harbor even higher hopes in this one being a genuine ambergris this time.
“Huh? What about Doushi and Burkhart-san?”
“They said they’ll skip out on this one as well. They also said they don’t need a share. Aren’t you getting a bad feeling about this, somehow?”
“If you put it like that, I certainly can’t deny it…”
Just as pointed out by Erw, you couldn’t underestimate the intuition of these two older men. Maybe this one is a stinkstone, too?
“Should we skip out on this?”
“That won’t work. Mall, Silas, and Lamru aren’t adventurers.”
I was the one who accepted the request to subjugate the serpents, so it’d be impossible for Mall and the other two to sell the ambergris by themselves. Given that it was also possible for their identities as demons to be exposed on top of that, we had to accompany them.
“Well, I don’t really need to come with you guys. It’ll be enough for you to handle it, Wend. The stench will be gone by tomorrow and I’ll be able to see Haruka-san and Leon, so… Personally I think that it’s common to draw a series of misses when the chance is around 50%.”
“…I feel you have a point there.”
But, someone needs to accompany Mall’s group and I can’t ask anyone else to do it either.
“Oh well, I’m sure this time it’s going to be a winner.”
“You’re confident in that, Wend? I’m not, so… Hey! Wend! Let go of me!”
“As if I would! This is an order as your lord!”
“That’s plain power abuuuuuuse!”
“You’ve got to go either way since you’re my guard, right!?”
I headed to the store while pulling on Erw’s hand.
“Another ambergris? Just how much luck do you have?”
The clerk was surprised by us bringing yet another ambergris. Considering it normally, it was very improbable to find two such stones in a row.
Moreover, we had no trouble with entering the store as the clerk was also stinking from the previous stinkstone. However, that wasn’t clear to us since our noses weren’t working anyway.
“Will your other customers be okay?”
“The story about the stinkstone has spread in the city, so people have been staying away. I think they’ll start coming back tomorrow. This store doesn’t deal with daily necessities after all.”
All of the goods in this store are extremely expensive and you can find many different types of luxury items here. As such, I guess it won’t have much influence even if the sales fall flat for two or three days.
“Hmm, I’d really like this to be an ambegris.”
“It’s fifty-fifty, right?”
“Approximately. I don’t know about other stores and regions, but going by the records of our appraisals, around 60% have been ambergris.”
So it actually was 60% instead of the 50% he mentioned before? In that case, the probability for this one to be a stinkstone decreases even further.
“Sounds like we can expect good news.”
“Erw, you now sound quite hopeful as well, don’t you?”
“Wouldn’t a special bonus be really great? I could go back with some nice presents for Haruka-san and Leon.”
Erw immediately became quite motivated as soon as he heard about the probability actually being 60%. I considered him to be a calculating man, but then again, the possibility of consecutively pulling duds with a chance of 40% isn’t all that high. In short, it’s very likely for this to be a nice-smelling ambergris.
“Very well, I will appraise it.”
The clerk went into the inner room again, scraped some of the stone off, and set it on fire.
Is it ambergris? Or a stinkstone? Tension spread amongst us.
“Should I buy a new car?”
“A house…is nothing I need, I suppose. For the time being, I’m going to get lots of new books.”
“Let’s go to some expensive restaurant.”
“That’s a great idea, Silas.”
Mall and the others got all excited as they imagined what to do with the money if they got their hands on a big sum of money.
“Aren’t you a bit too hasty here?”
“Only those who believe will be saved. Elise said so as well.”
“Come on, man. Don’t rely on God only during such times…”
I can’t help it, can I Erw? I’m a former Japanese.
“What, this time for sure…gaha! Agaaaain?!?”
“It stinks! My nose!”
How could it be? For us to miss twice in a row with a chance of 60%…I got way too little luck!
“No way…”
“My money for dating the girlfriend I don’t have yet…”
“Is it because of us?”
“It was another stinkstone…this one was on the bigger side, so it has a value of 8,000 cents.”
The clerk offered us the money to buy the stone with teary eyes after deciding the fate of our bodies stinking for another three days. As for the purchase price…even if we went to other stores in hope to get more money out of this, it’d only lead to misfortune for us, so we had no choice but to accept what he was going to give us.
This allowed Mall and his two friends to get their hands on a slightly bigger sum of money, although it wouldn’t allow them to spend their lives playing around.
Besides, I wonder whether they’ve realized.
ïŒăăăïŒăăăïŒ
“Silver and copper coins can’t be used in our country!”
“The exchange rate for the currencies hasn’t even been set to begin with!”
“We got our hands on money we cannot use!!!”
Unfortunately for them, the Helmut Kingdom and demon country were still in the middle of negotiations. Deciding on an exchange rate was still a matter of a distant future, so the three dropped their shoulders in disappointment while staring at their share of silver and copper coins.
“Now that it’s come to this, I’ll party in the city of Sirius!”
“Time for fish n’ booze!!!”
“Buying-A-Huge-Amount-of-Souvenirs-Jutsu!”
Still, you could say this or that about the whole ordeal, but it was great that they seemed to enjoy the sightseeing of Sirius. It meant that we became friends.
“What weird demons.”
“They are not violent, so they are fine like this!”
Burkhart-san and Doushi appeared to be puzzled in some way after watching Mall, Silas, and Lamru, three demons who weren’t quite like demons.
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