Kujonin 120

<Previous Chapter] [Index] [Next Chapter>

Kujonin
Author: Hanabokuro
—

Chapter 120

[“There is no such reality.”]

After Seth and I left the bar, we looked for Morales’ church, but there wasn’t one. It couldn’t be helped, so we went out of the town and called God-sama with the communication bag, and when I conveyed this and that about the Water Heroes and Water Spirits in the Great Plains country, the response was the statement from earlier.

“To say such that, that means, for everyone to believe it is…”

[“I’ll say it again, but, ‘There is no such reality,’ that’s such a good statement. It was a statement from Sir Kumoro’s memories.”

“God-sama, why are you looking at my memories?”

[“When you transmigrated, I made a copy. I thought it would be useful when making new Skills. Speaking of which, don’t you think there are a little too many businesses in the world Sir Komuro was in?”

There are, but! This isn’t the time for this right now!

“Please set that discussion aside for later. Rather, so it’s the case that the Water Hero did not increase in number?”

[“Nope~. No matter how much of a klutz I am, if an entire nationality became a country of Heroes, then even I would realize it~.”]

I see. So that means they’re self-proclaimed, that’s good. No, it’s not good. In the end, it’s not good if we can’t search for the Water Hero and Water Spirit, huh? I thought various things like that.

[“Sir Komuro, what kind of job is ‘se’?”]

God-sama’s voice came from the communication bag.

“Ha?”

[“No, not ‘ha’, ‘se’.”]

“Se … … Aaa, do you mean SE?”

[“SE? Eh? You can make that a job? By saying things like ‘Bang!’ or ‘Crash!’ you can make money from it?”]

“No, it’s not sound effects, it’s system engineer. Huh? But there might also be a job for making sound effects.”

[“What is a system engineer?”]

“Hm, I don’t know the details either. Isn’t it the management and build of systems? Ah, it might be someone you can happily leave the management of the Skill System to.”

[“What, I definitely want that! Since Sir Komuro came to this world, new Skills have been welling up like hot water. That’s why I’ve been so busy I haven’t been sleeping, ya know-. In this situations, getting a hold of human resources is way too much of a losing game, ya know-!”]

He’s learned some weird things by looking at my memories. Tired of listening to God-sama’s grumbling, I ended the call.

“Well, for now, the Water Hero and the Water Spirit are 1 person each, right?”

[“Right, generally the Spirit and Hero are a pair.”]

“Well then, I’m about get magic power depletion, so I’m hanging up.”

[“Then, byebyes, pops!”

“Who’s pops!?”

I felt exhausted as soon as I hung up the communication bag.

“Are you alright?”

Seth said, worried about me.

“Aah, when you talk to God, your magic power and mental power get worn down.”

In actuality, I really was running out of magic power from the amount of magic power needed to be poured into the communication bag. It’s because the place God is is too far away.

“So what did he say?”

Seth asked.

“Huh? You didn’t hear?”

“For me, I only heard a ringing sound.”

I see. God and Evil God can not only choose how they appear to people, but are able to make their voices unheard.”

“This country’s people seem to be just calling themselves Heroes by themselves. In the end, it doesn’t change that we have to find the Hero.”

After that, I contacted Ayl, and had everyone meet back up at the inn.

The inn is a round pithouse, and the roof seems to be thatched. The inside is wider than it looks, and there’s a sunken hearth in the very center of it. There aren’t any guests other than us, so it feels very free and easy.

It’s extremely cheap, at a 5 copper coins for 3 days’ time and 5 people. The innkeeper also does a dried food shop next door, which seems to be his home as well. Recently, we seem to have a lot of fate with dried food stores.

“If you need anything, come next door. Then at your leisure.”

So saying, the innkeeper who received the lodging fee left the inn.

Surrounding the hearth, we share the information we’d gathered.

That there are many Water Heroes. That the Water Spirit might be able to make copies of itself.

I reported as such, but when I told them about the Hero’s declaration 20 years ago that all citizens are Water Heroes and Water Spirits, “What the heck! Is with that?!” “Don’t mess with me!” – they raised complaints.

“So what that means is that the investigation on the real Water Hero seems like it’s going to be an ordeal.”

At my words, Ayl gulped down a cup of sake.

“The tale of successive Water Heroes was told by a bard but… ….”

Merumo suddenly began to say, look at Velsa. Merumo and Velsa should have been moving together.

“Aa, that’s right! Naoki, the first Water Hero was Marcus-san!”

Velsa said.

“Eh!? Is that true!? Iya, I see. Marcus-san was the original Hero.”

Was Marcus-san summoned to be the Water Hero?

“It looks like that previous mushroom that increases growth is also on this continent.”

“That’s true! … And so?”

They heard that the Water Hero was succeeded by Bori-san. Marcus-san is no longer a Hero, so this is probably not related to him at all.

“After that. The following Water Heroes’ names were too long so I forgot.”

“We really don’t have enough information. Ayl, did you get anything?”

“There’s a river to the east. On the other side of the river it’s a wetland. I heard from ‘self-proclaimed Heroes’, but it’s the season when water fowl come to the wetlands right now, so things are busy. That’s about it.”

“Hm~ I see……”

I cross my arms and think.

“What is it? There really isn’t enough information?”

Velsa asked.

“Well, that’s also true but… … It’s not like there’s anything troubling happening, is there?”

“Hm? What do you mean?”

“With the Earth Hero, there was the problem with Adel Lake and the Ghoul Disease, but this time, is there any major issue with the Water Spirit playing truant? It’s just the previous Hero making a weird declaration.”

“Certainly, these townspeople are normal.”

Ayl said.

“I wonder if we won’t be able to fire the spirit… well, let’s try investigating a little more.

“Roger.”

“Understood.”

“OK desu”

“OK desu”

If we can’t fire him, will it be okay to report, “The Water Spirit is doing his job,” to God-sama?

Merumo and Seth made a stew full of vegetables by the hearth.

Seems like the vegetables are things harvest nearby. There’s a red fruit like a tomato so the stew is red; the flavor is also similar so it’s delicious.

It’s been a while since we’ve had a roof over our heads when we slept, so I fell asleep quickly.

During the night, I could hear singing from outside. It’s probably the bard Velsa and Merumo were talking about. He seems to be singing a story about the love story of one of the succeeding Heroes and a beautiful village woman, and the story of the Hero whose relationship with his lover was torn apart by a monster. It must be terrible for the Hero to have his own love affairs be exposed.

The next day I wrote a poster advertising for work at the Adventurer’s Guild and handed it to the Guild Master Chino. Other than me, the other employees are already in the town of Morales, investigating and conducting sales.

“For cleaning and extermination, what do you do?”

Chino asked as she pinned the poster to the board.

“Putting a house in order, and exterminating swarms of small monsters and bug type monsters.’

“I see. And you have 5 people, can you make enough to eat?”

Chino asked, concerned.

“Maa, more or less.”

“You have employees with high ranks as Adventurers, right? If that’s the case, isn’t it fine to make earnings from that direction?”

“Is there something up?”

“There’s always shadowick subjugation. The rewards are compensation by goods and benefits, how about it?”
^{<in-kind pay – being paid with room/board/goods/passes instead of money>}

“I understand. I’ll think about it.”

“Ou. There aren’t many adventurers after all. There also aren’t that many requests.”

“Alri-ght.”

Waving a hand at Chino, I left the Adventurer Guild’s tent.

As I walked from the Adventurer’s Guild, while aiming for the pathway that’s like Morales’ main street, there was an “Uwa~” crying of a woman. As I was thinking how could there be such a loud crying coming from an adult woman, I looked in that direction and the one who made her cry was Velsa. What is she doing?

Velsa was flustered as the crying woman clutched onto her clothes. Eventually people began to notice and gather around them. This is a sight I’ve rarely seen, so I hid in the crowd and silently watched for a bit, but I was found out.

“Naoki! Help me!”

As I parted the crowd and approached them, it seems that the crying woman is carrying a basket with all sorts of different types of flowers, like a flower-selling girl.

“Don’t make people cry so much.”

I told Velsa.

“No, I didn’t do anything. I just bought flowers!”

“Then why is that person crying?”

“I don’t know! Help!”

“Why are you crying?”

I tried asking the woman with as gentle a voice as I can make.

“That’s … … she bought all the floweeeers”

So saying, the woman thrust her face into my chest and began to cry. A situation with two women and one man, where one of the women is sobbing. Looking at it from the side, it’s an amazing scene of carnage.

“Is it no good for all of them to be bought?”

“Eh? Is that how it is?”

“No, that’s not it, for someone to come buy all of them never happens, I’m usually unable to sell.”

Looks like she’s crying from happiness. I raised both hands towards the surrounding onlookers and explained, “She’s crying from happiness! This isn’t a fight!” and withdrew.

Calming the woman down somehow, Velsa took the basket with the flowers. The woman is about in her mid-20s, in an indigo blue ethnic dress, and cute, round-tipped shoes. She has black hair and I feel like her face reminds me of someone, but I can’t think of who. Probably an entertainer I’ve seen from the previous world.

“I only want these for research. It wasn’t like I was thinking you were pitiful or something.”

Velsa said, trying to explain.

“Research?”

“I’m a monster scholar. Naoki, you explain too.”

“She’s the monster scholar Velsa. Her appearance is either this sloppy robe, or a blue coverall, that’s it, and she may look suspicious, but looking at her personality… she’s a miser, and strict with money. By the way, how much were those flowers?”

I described Velsa. In a shady, semi-lying manner.

“2 silver coins.”

“You can ask for more.”

“Don’t say unnecessary things!”

She got mad at me.

“Could you tell us where these types of rare flowers grow, perhaps? It’s fine if you’d like us to pay for it.”

There are also rare ones in there. Velsa paid with her own money. Is it going to rain or something?

“I understand. Thank you for buying everything!”

The woman had pure eyes.

“It’s this way. Please come with me, um, Velsa-san and…”

The woman turned towards me.

“I manage an extermination company, my name is Naoki.”

“I’m the flower seller, Rita.”

“Nice to meet you.”

Velsa and I followed Rita.

<Previous Chapter] [Index] [Next Chapter>

<t/n: (1/2)>