Chapter 54: I decided to go to the neighboring city

After returning to the hideout, we decided to take a nap for awhile. After about five hours, we got up, get dressed and prepared the things we need as we’ll leave the hideout. Of course, our destination is Mana City. When we went to the vegetable area in the miniature garden, the skeletons were busy working in the fields.

“Suketarou”

When I called out, Suketarou, who was packing the harvested vegetables in a box, turned around. It seems that they are in the process of packing the vegetables to be wholesaled in the market.

“Katakata”

And apparently, this is the last batch to be boxed. I put the packed boxes in the bangle and help on Suketarou’s work.

These big white radishes are not for me, but when I think that it will go into someone else’s mouth, it makes me feel a sense of fulfilment. After we finished putting them in the box, we wrapped it up and we are done. After storing it in the bangle, I went to see the soybeans.

“Katakata”

In the second vegetable field, Lich A was in the process of sowing the soybeans in the field. In the corner of the field, the replanted parent soybean had already spread its leaves. So far, I don’t feel that there’s a problem of having a soil variance. I’m looking forward to the harvest day one week later.

We then moved to the second miniature garden. There, some skeletons, and Lich B as the leader, felled the excess trees in the area and cultivated the soil. The range they are working on is about 20m in radius with the big balm tree on its center. Then after that, the skeletons bury balm seeds in the cultivated soil.

That’s right, I’m thinking of growing additional balm trees. I’ve already got Super Sensation skill, but the balm tree has excellent fruit. So I decided to increase the number of balm tree. Orange is one of my favourite fruits too. Even if there’s a lot, there will be no problem. Next, if we can have a kotatsu, it will be wonderful.

“Ah right. Freya should also eat some balm fruit. It should be useful in the future.”

I take some balm fruits from the skeleton, I throw about four of them to Freya. After Freya received it, she stared at the fruit puzzlingly.

“…This is…?”

“It’s a balm fruit. As it will enhance your senses, you can acquire the Super Sensation skill if you eat it.”

“Oh, that would be wonderful. I’ll get started then.”

Freya quickly peeled one and chewed it. Pero, who was nearby, held his nose and began to run away. The truth is, Pero does not like balm fruits. Kobolds do not seem to be bad with citrus like fruits but Pero seems to be an exception. Rather than as a tribal thing, perhaps it’s just that it is not to his liking.

Thus, Pero doesn’t seem to have the intention of acquiring the super sensation skill.

“You’re right! This fruit is delicious! I like its taste!”

Freya doesn’t even notice that Pero has escaped, and happily eats it with matching chewing sounds. Then, something strange happened to her senses.

“This is……!?”

Apparently, she already developed the super sensation skill. She acted suspiciously as she looked around the area restlessly. It seems that she is perplexed by the unfamiliar sensation she’s having.

“Once you have acquired the skills, you will soon get used to that feeling. You should eat the fruits until you acquire the beginner level of the skill.”

That said, one can get the beginner level of the skill with about four fruits. I gave Freya about four more fruits and then we moved towards the third miniature garden.

“Katakata”

Lich C looks at us and gives a bow. Mushrooms are cultivated in the third minature garden. And the person in charge here is Lich C. The other skeletons were working on building a mushroom nursery by bringing in the felled trees.

Cure Mushrooms are useful as a recovery medicine, so I should avoid consuming them all. Thus, I thought about raising them myself too. Their number is easy to grasp and can be stocked too. If they grow too much, I can sell it somewhere far too. Besides, various mushrooms have been breeding here since before. Well, we can also grow mushrooms and sell them to Mana City’s market. Of course, the cure mushrooms are not included.

“That’s……”

Incidentally, I noticed that a hut has been built. It looks like the skeletons made it. When I looked inside, there were many wooden boxes with some soil on it.

“Katakatakata”

According to Lich C, magical beasts came to eat mushrooms too, so it seems that only precious mushrooms will be cultivated inside the hut. I’m even amazed when I saw the mushroom he’s talking about. Lich C took out a golden mushroom from of his pocket. Lich C found the second golden mushroom. However, nearly half of the mushroom is gone. It must have been eaten by the other magical beast as Lich C said.

However, that also means that what is currently being raised inside the hut are golden mushrooms. I was impressed with Lich C’s idea. If he’s my employee, I want to promote him as an executive.

“I’ll leave the mushroom cultivation to you. Do it well and show me what you’ll produce.”

“Katakata”

Lich C knelt on one knee and bowed his head.

◇

Once we are on the ground, adventurers are lined up at the entrance to the dungeon as usual. Most of them are young people, and as they eventually advanced as adventurers, you can get this impression that they are excited about such opportunity. Ah, the day when corpses will disappear from the Mohed’s Great Dungeon may not even come.

On a closer look, several adventurers seemed to be scared when they saw Freya. Well, Freya’s appearance drastically changed due to her evolution. Passing by with such unusual four arms, she would look strange indeed. I immediately took out ocher-coloured robe out of the bangle and handed it to Freya.

“Thank you. I completely forgot that I had evolved…”

“Um, it’s better to keep only two of your arms out of the robe.”

This case is not only for Mana City’s residents. Humans in general hate unorthodox things. They will even try to eliminate those that are different from their selves. Therefore, to avoid troubles, it is better to hide it for now.

“Now for the mail…”

I searched inside the mailbox installed in the Temple of Teleportation. There was one letter in it. The sender is the Lord of Mana City. The content is about him thanking me for repelling the Estent Empire’s soldiers. Well, even though he says that I repelled them, there’s only one person who escaped. In a sense, it is close to annihilation. It was also written that he sent me some gold coins as thank-you gift and it was given to the guild so I go receive it there.

“I didn’t fight for money though…”

“Isn’t that good? Shinichi did that much too you see.”

Erna looks happy with a grin plastered on her face. Looking at such expression, which is such a happy-go-lucky look, makes me feel uncomfortable. Anyway, I think she’s just thinking about buying a lot of clothes.

“That’s right! If you get the money, buy some clothes! That would be good!”

“Rejected”

At this point, we can’t afford to buy many clothes. Now that we have additional companion, we need to be more frugal.

“Eeeh! Shinichi’s so stingy!”

“Yeah, yeah. Say whatever you like.”

We then start walking towards the city.

“It’s sunny today and it feels good.”

I agree with what Freya had said. The weather is pleasant and it’s a nice day for a walk. Well, unlike when we’re inside the dungeon, I don’t feel something like stuffiness here after all. If we have a lunch box, we can go have a picnic.

When we arrived at the City, a soldier we’re acquainted with bows to us when he saw me.

“The weather is pleasant today. Do you have some business with the guild?”

“Yeah, I think it’s about time for me to show up too. Ah right, take this.”

I take out a boxed vegetable from the bangle. We harvested a lot of vegetables this time so I thought it would be too much to sell. There is also a surplus of watermelon so it would be just right to give it to the soldiers’ as a reward for their work.

“Is it okay to take this…?”

“Yeah. There’s a surplus of it, divide it among the other soldiers.”

The soldier bows again then he calls the other soldiers and they joyfully huddled together. My heart is getting full just by looking at them. Saying goodbye to the soldiers, we head straight to the guild.

We entered the guild like usual, but what came into my view was the several adventurers crowding together.

“Is Homeless really in this city!?”

“We came from the Royal Capital and we want to be part of Homeless!”

“Hey, where do those Homeless guys live!? It’s fine so just inform me where!”

More than 500 adventurers crowded inside the guild. Moreover, they are not just beginners, but rather, there are intermediate and advanced adventurers too. The corresponding guild staff looked like they are about to cry.

“Isn’t it amazing?”

It was Bud who said that as he hit me on the shoulder. He holds a bottle in one hand and seems to be drinking alcohol from daytime.

“What’s going on here?”

“Somehow, these guys have all heard the rumors about Homeless. Thanks to that, the guild is in tumult. Well, as these guys eat and drink here, the city benefits from them too.”

“Is it because I defeated the Estent Empire’s soldiers? I’m so surprised seeing how fast the rumors go.”

“If someone killed fifty Dragoneuts alone, would you normally want to befriend that person? Or is it me who is the odd one?”

Bud laughs and drinks his alcohol once again. Well, it is as he had said. Everybody wants to befriend a strong person. For a life-threatening profession such as this, it’s only natural to form a party with strong individuals.

“Bud, you must have kept the money from the Lord, right? We’ll leave the guild right after we get it.”

“Hahaha, that would be a wise choice. You shouldn’t come for a while until this cools down.”

After I received the ten gold coins from Bud, we quickly went outside so that the adventurers wouldn’t notice us.

“Father is very popular.”

“Indeed. With about fifty dragoneuts… No, forty-nine to be exact. Haist, anyways, we’ll be inconvenienced if we got famous to that degree.”

When I said so, Freya forced a smile.

“Dragoneut seems to be weak for Tanaka-dono, but they are actually a fairly strong race. One soldier from the Estent Empire can beat 100 human soldiers you know.”

“Does that mean that ten of them can defeat a thousand people? It’s no wonder that their Empire is in good shape.”

In that case, since I was able to beat the 49 people alone…

“Ahahaha! Shinichi is a monster!”

I drop my fist on Erna’s head. Don’t just speak what someone is worried about! And like that, we decided to go in the market and head to Arnold’s shop.

“Fuhahaha! It’s about time you come! I’ve been waiting!”

The owner, Arnold, is still shirtless and is laughing energetically. Looking at the items in his store, I couldn’t find the vegetables that I sold to him before.

“It seems that the shipped vegetables before sold well.”

“Of course! The customers were very happy with its rarity and quality! I hope you will continue to do business with me!”

I know it could be sold, but it is a pretty good result with it being sold out. Besides, I was planning to do business with Arnold in the future, so his offer is convenient.

“I was thinking of that too. Thank you for your continuous patronage.”

“Fuhahaha! Likewise!”

After shaking hands with him, I take out the boxes of vegetables from the bangle.

“This will be the vegetables we’ll sell this time.”

“Everything is good! The customers will be very satisfied again!”

He laughs loudly while knocking on the watermelon with his fingers. With him being so cheerful and unrestrained, I feel like I’ll be laughing too.

“Alright then, I will come back in about a week’s time.”

“Yes. I’ll be waiting!”

We left the market after I received the money from Arnold.

“Tanaka-dono, what are we going to do now?”

“We’ll be going to the next city in the meantime. I have to deliver the Lich’s skull to the researcher who requested it.”

Listening between my conversation with Freya, Erna joins in.

“The neighboring city is relatively far you know? I think it will take half a day to walk…”

“There’s no problem with that. We have our ride you see.”

After saying that, I summoned my familiars. Three unicorns appeared from the light that appeared on the ground.

“A unicorn! As expected of Shinichi!”

Erna gets on and checks the ride’s quality. Horse saddles are already attached to them so they look like a domesticated horse no matter where you look at it.

“Whoa! The Homeless brought weird creatures again!”

The children in the City gathered around us.

Saying it’s a “weird creature” is rude you know?

“This is a unicorn, it’s a very good horse.”

“Unicorns are white and beautiful! This is not a unicorn!”

One of the children argues.

….Hmm, doesn’t it look like a unicorn?

This would be a problem then. I would like to argue, but it will take some time to explain to the children that they are indeed unicorns.

“Children, this is a special unicorn. It’s not like the ones you see around here.”

Freya’s words convinced the children and almost immediately, “Amazing–! It’s a strong unicorn!”, the child seems to be susceptible to the word “special”.

“Shall we go?”

After we get on the unicorn, the horses start galloping dashingly. Its feet were as fast as the wind, in a blink of an eye, we already moved far away from the Mana City.

I’m the one at the lead and Erna follows behind me. Freya and Pero stick next to each other. Since I only turned three unicorn as my familiar, I asked Freya and Pero to ride together. Pero’s face seems to be a little scared though.

“Haa-haa-,  together with Pero-sama…”

As expected, Freya is getting so excited. Her slovenly appearance ruined her beauty. Fortunately, even without Freya’s guide, the unicorns are smart enough that they’re able to take us to our destination.

“By the way, Shinichi, didn’t you also give the forked centipede to the person living in the neighbouring city?”

“Yeah, I think he was called Duffy. He said that centipede would be turned into a medicine.”

Duffy said he would use that centipede as a medicine to help a girl suffering from an incurable disease. I wonder what happened after that.

“Grrrrrrr!”

A wolf-like magical beast jumped out of the road. However, the unicorn I’m riding kicks it off without even stopping. Immediately after, Erna’s unicorn trampled down on the wolf, it also hurried over as if nothing had happened. I was impressed with that successive cooperative attack.

It’s strong even if it’s alone, but the three of them can cooperate well too. It seems that my decision to turn these unicorns into my familiar is correct after all.

In about three hours, we arrived at the neighboring city known as Crent City.

This is translated by Yume Neiji. Kindly read at yumeineijiworks.wordpress.com.

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