Chapter 125 -- I Tried Out the Oven
I borrowed the inner courtyard of the Labyrinth City Inn and set up my newly-purchased "Latest Model Black Magic Cooking Stove" while I gave some thought to what sort of meals I could prepare with it. Since Fer, Sui and Dora-chan insisted they were dying of hunger I got some fried pork cutlets out of my Item Box and put them out for the starving creatures. I had been so busy shopping we had missed lunch so I felt a bit guilty but it couldn't be helped.
Once everyone was eating I fired up the stove's oven as I had decided to make a number of dishes using it. Oven baked recipes with meat and vegetables would be simple and not take much time. I opened the Net Super and bought cooking parchment, olive oil and herb salt to start with then I started preparing vegetables.
I kept things simple, a recipe I had made before with potatoes, onion and carrots as the base vegetable ingredients. I added shimeji and eringi mushrooms and some paprika for colour and a little spiciness. I had to buy the mushrooms and paprika from the Net Super. I looked over the ingredients and nodded. Yosh, that would do fine.
For the meat, I figured I'd use Rock Bird. I cut it into large bite-sized pieces and punched holes with a fork before adding salt and pepper and then I started preparing the vegetables. The more solid veggies like potatoes and carrots I scraped and peeled then I cut them up into pieces so they would cook more evenly. The onions I sliced into circles after peeling them. I broke up the shimeji mushrooms and split the erengi mushrooms down to an appropriate size too.
Now for the baking. I put down cooking sheets on the top shelf of the oven and arranged the meat and vegetables, topping them with the paprika and mushrooms before adding olive oil and finally sprinkling everything with herb salt. I closed the oven door and fired it up with a touch of my finger and a little magical energy on the ignition button. I didn't know just how this oven behaved since the controls were unfamiliar so I cooked while anxiously watching the condition of the food on the parchment sheets inside, judging the food was ready when the vegetables seemed a little scorched.
"Oh, that looks like it's working well." I mused, peering in through the oven's glass door. "The vegetables and meat are nicely baked and, yup, ready now." I took the cooked vegetables and meat from the oven and dished them out to Fer, Sui and Dora-chan.
"Took you long enough..." Fer grumbled and then he caught sight of the food. "What, vegetables again?" Fer, don't complain about eating vegetables. They're good for you, honest.
"Something smells funny..." Dora-chan's muzzle was twitching as he sniffed at the food. That was probably the herb salt, I reckoned. I pushed the dish at him. "Go on, try it." I said, watching darling Sui-chan diving in as usual.
"This isn't just salty, yeah-? It smells nice and it's delicious." Sui thought it was good, obviously.
Dora-chan ate the roast meat and vegetables in his dish with growing enthusiasm as his suspicions of the herb salt flavouring wore off. It was clear his one serving would fill him up but I knew from long experience that Fer and Sui would be demanding "Seconds!" soon. I'd be able to satisfy them with one more serving of roast meat and vegetables, probably. This time around I melted a lot of cheese on top after cooking, letting the remaining heat do the job. It looked really delicious. I ate my portion while the second batch cooked and planned out what to do next. The oven was working out well, I mused as I helped myself to a mouthful of the roast Rock Bird meat. How would it do as a stove though? Time to find out.
Fer and Sui gobbled up the oven-roasted vegetables and meat covered in melted cheese until they were finally satisfied.
"It was delicious-" Ah, Sui-chan...
"Well, it was okay." For Fer that was high praise, I told myself. I noticed he had actually eaten all his veggies like a good boy, ummm puppy? uh ravening country-destroying invincible boss monster... I resisted the temptation to pat him on the head and scratch his ears. Time to do some more cooking.
"It'll be a while before it gets dark so I am going to prepare food for our dungeon exploration." I explained. Everyone went off for a nap, their bellies full. I would have liked to join them but I had work to do and getting them out of the way would simplify things for me. I knew that if I was cooking with them around they'd be hanging over my shoulder, asking questions and drooling.
Rice. First I have to cook rice, a lot of it. I'm Japanese after all. Rice is important.
I had been using a big earthenware pot to cook rice before but just one wasn't going to be enough to cook the amount of rice I intended to cook. I opened Net Super and bought another ten pots just like it. I also bought a lot of rice and stored it in my Item Box to save me from having to buy it from the Net Super in the dungeon. I washed the rice in water, letting it soak while I prepared some fried food. Both Fer and Sui liked fried foods and Dora-chan probably would too given his eating habits. Kaarage would work very well as stored ready-to-eat food for the dungeon exploration.
For the meats I used up most of the remaining Red Serpent, Black Serpent, Rock Bird and Giant Dodo in my Item Box, dressing them with a soy sauce rub and a salt based rub alternately. I put pots of rice on three of the stove's burners to cook while I dedicated the fourth burner to deep-frying meat. I also fried up all the minced meat cutlets I had left over in my Item Box while I was at it. I cooked rice, I deep-fried meat, I cooked rice, I deep-fried meat, I cooked rice...
"Fuu," I said, finally finished putting all the cooked food away in my Item Box where it would stay fresh and hot. "That's enough fried food and rice." What next? It still wasn't dark, I could cook something else. How about gyuudon beef bowl? My three contracted monsters seemed to like it, and Elland-san too, I remembered. I wondered how he was getting on with the disassembly of the Earth Dragon. OK then, beef bowl it is. Nice and easy and a real treat over rice.
"What sort of beef bowl should I make?" I had lots of Bloody Horn Bull meat which was the obvious choice but I decided I'd use Wyvern meat as well this time as an experiment. It seemed a bit wasteful to use such high-quality meat in a cheap dish like gyuudon beef bowl but I had lots of it, even more than my stock of Bloody Horn Bull meat so it wouldn't be a disaster if it didn't work out.
I looked at my Black Magic Cooking Stove. The burners were a lot bigger than the little gas-bottle portable cooking stoves I had been using before so I could use a bigger stockpot to cook the meat for the gyuudon. Sadly the Net Super didn't offer a real restaurant-sized cooking pot, the largest pot I could find was about half that size. They were still quite big though so I bought two of them to start with. I might buy more stockpots later if I needed them, I decided depending on what I might cook next. Stew? Fer had really liked the stew I had made for him before. However I was making gyuudon today. I cooked up a half-size pot full of Bloody Horn Bull meat beef bowl and used the other half-sized pot to prepare Wyvern meat beef bowl. I tried undercooking the Wyvern's meat a little since it was so tender compared to the more robust Bloody Horn Bull meat.
After that I made a roast for dinner. I still had some Giant Deer meat left over and I decided to use that up. I cut the meat into large pieces, covered them in olive oil and added more herb salt before laying them out on a cooking sheet and putting them in the top shelf of the oven where there was plenty of space so the meat would cook evenly. I turned the temperature up high to scorch the surface and once that happened I took the meat out and wrapped it in aluminium foil to let it cook through with residual heat. Once it had cooled a little I sliced it thinly. The meat was cooked through but still pink in the middle as it should be, soft and tender to the touch. Yosh!
I could have left it as it was but I added sauce, a commercially available sour-citrus ponzu and onion flavoured steak sauce since I didn't want the hassle of preparing a sauce from scratch. It was totally dark by the time the Giant Deer roast was completed.
"Dinner's ready..." I announced, rather pointlessly since when I turned from the stove all three were waiting attentively behind me.
"Oh, isn't this delicious?" Fer said after swallowing his first mouthful of sliced Giant Deer roast.
"This sour-tasting sauce is yummy." Dora-chan liked the flavour of the ponzu sauce, it seemed.
"The meat is soft and delicious-" Sui commented. Hearing sweet gourmet Sui say that made me happy as I bit into my own serving of Roast Deer, letting the meat juices fill my mouth. MMMMmmm! Not overbaking it and let it cook through with residual heat was the way to go and using the oven made that easy to achieve.
Although Fer and Sui requested "Seconds!" several times I could serve them immediately since I had roasted a lot of Giant Deer meat to start with. It was a big help not having to make more servings from scratch as I usually had to with the small portable stoves I had relied on before. Buying the Black Magic Cooking Stove had turned out to be a really good move on my part, I congratulated myself.
Thursday, 21 February 2019
Thursday, 14 February 2019
Ch 124 Tondemo Skill de Isekai Hourou Meshi
Ch 124 -- Latest Model Black Magic Cooking Stove
We went strolling through the streets of Doran. The folks we passed took less notice of Fer and Dora-chan than I had expected, with fewer startled looks and exclamations compared to the other cities we had visited. Doran was a Dungeon City, of course so there were lots of Adventurers around. Although Tamer isn't a common job, contracted monsters accompanying their Adventurer masters were not an unfamiliar sight to the locals. Fer and Dora-chan were something special of course but still not enough to cause the sorts of alarmed shouts and brandishing of weapons that had happened elsewhere. It was something of a relief.
"There sure are a lot of people around." I muttered, looking around with interest at the crowded streets. "Then again Rodolpho-san did say Doran is this country's fifth-largest city so I suppose that's not too surprising."
I noticed quite a few shops as we wandered through the city. Many of them were selling weapons and armour, not surprisingly since this was a Dungeon city. I looked at some of the items on offer in such stores with interest but I didn't really need such things myself, having Fer and now Dora-chan with me. Besides, since Sui-chan had been blessed by the God of Blacksmiths she could make things like weapons and armour for me for free. The knife she had made as an experiment was of excellent quality, "[ Mithril knife + ], a high-quality Mithril knife" according to my Appraisal earlier. It felt good to hold, something I had learned to appreciate from the cooking knives I had bought from time to time at home. A knife that felt good in the hand was a knife that made it easier to do a good job preparing food.
I would have liked to carry the knife Sui had made in the sheath on my belt but being a high-quality blade and made of Mithril it was incredibly sharp. The knife sheath was made of strong Giant Deer leather but the knife's keen edge would easily slice through that leather so unfortunately I had to keep it in my Item Box for the moment. I had an idea though, if the inside of the sheath could somehow be coated with a thin layer of Mithril then that would probably protect the leather. I'd ask Sui-chan if she could do that to the sheath if I took it off the belt and gave it to her to "tickle", as she described it, maybe tonight. Thinking about that I idly wondered about maybe getting her to make me a Mithril sword too as part of our preparations for entering the dungeon. A helmet as well? Caves often have low ceilings so a protective Mithril helmet might be a good idea, stop me bumping my head and hurting myself. Safety first after all. Hmmm...
While strolling around aimlessly and thinking about various things a shop front display caught my eye. It appeared to be a store which sold magic tools of various sorts rather than weapons and such. Oh? Was that what I thought it was? I stopped to take a closer look after reading the large sign above the item in question.
"Latest Model Black Magic Cooking Stove"
In terms of size the stove on display was about 2 metres long and about 80 centimetres wide, with four cooking rings on the top in a row and a very large oven below. I knelt down to peer into the open oven. This looked interesting...
"Welcome. I see you're interested in our new magic cooking stove." The shopkeeper came out out to greet me.
"Excuse me but how well does this stove heat things up?" I inquired. Because it was a magic stove I surmised it would be using a magic stone to power it but would it provide enough heat to cook things properly? It wasn't worth considering if it was too feeble to do a proper job.
"As you can see here," the shopkeeper pointed to the central part of the stove, "the magic stone installed in this latest model black magic cooking stove was specifically chosen and perfectly inlaid to provide all the heat required."
There was a black manastone about 2cm in diameter embedded in the centre of a deeply-inscribed magical circle on the top of the stove. Ah, 'Black Magic' referred to the colour of the manastone used. As the storekeeper explained, the magical circle invoked Fire magic and the manastone provided the energy to create the fire. Clever, I thought to myself.
"In addition to that the temperatures it produces can be easily adjusted from low heat to high heat." When I asked how long it would last he added, "A manastone of this size can be used every day for ten years before it needs to be replaced." Ten years? That was truly incredible.
"Please watch while I demonstrate how it works." he said. He touched a button on the front of the stove and the burners lit. "You push here and put a little magical energy into the stove to start it up. After that it runs off the manastone and you don't need to add more magical energy. When it's lit you can adjust the heat with these knobs. It's very simple."
Turn the knobs next to the button to the left for a low heat, turn it to the right for a high heat. There was a knob for each burner on the top. As the owner said it looked easy to use and the heat from the burners was more than sufficient to cook on.
"Since you can adjust the heat on each burner you can make various dishes at the same time." he explained. Hmmm, this was looking better and better. The gas-bottle portable cooking stoves purchased from the Net Super I been using till now were serviceable enough but I was attracted by the sheer awesome firepower of this magical stove. It didn't need replacement gas bottles on a regular basis either.
"Then, under the stove-top burners it has an oven." The shopkeeper pointed to a remarkably familiar-looking control panel at the right side of the open oven door. "Here's a button to light it, just like the burners, and a knob for heat control which works the same way. There's even a timer device so you won't overcook things."
He waved his hand around inside the oven, demonstrating how spacious it was. "With this size oven you could even roast a whole Cockatrice." I peered into the oven again, remembering the Cockatrices Fer had subjugated back when we were travelling with the Iron Will party of Adventurers. A Cockatrice's body was about 1.5 meters long so yes, it would just fit once the head was removed. Mmmm, roast chicken, that sounded good.
"I've made soup with this cooking stove while baking bread in the oven below," the shopkeeper went on, obviously noting my increasing enthusiasm and interest. Fresh-baked bread? That sounded good as well. I can get bread-making flour and bread yeast from the Net Super so baking my own bread was a possibility too. Having something like this would allow me to increase my range of cooking possibilities enormously. I wanted this stove, I decided.
"Sounds good. So, how much is it?" I said. That was the most important thing. It used a magic stone and that would mean it was expen---
"It is 860 gold coins." The shopkeeper said with a smile.
"...Huh?"
"It is 860 gold coins." he repeated.
Even if he was smiling he had still said, what was it, 860 gold coins? That was mind-bogglingly expensive. But I wanted it. But it cost 860 gold coins. But I wanted it. But- my mind ran in circles as the shopkeeper stood waiting patiently.
"Hey, you finished here yet?" Fer grumbled.
"Yeah, let's go back. I'm getting hungry." Dora-chan added. Fer and Dora-chan's comments brought me out of my stupor. (by the way, Sui-chan was asleep in her leather bag as usual.)
"Hold on, I'm just wondering if I should buy this stove or not." I explained, still unable to drag myself away. It was a wonderful stove, but 860 gold coins?
"Nuuu, why are you wanting such a big useless-looking thing to drag around with you? It looks like it would just get in the way." Fer said.
"It's not useless. This is a magic cooking stove, I could use it to cook lots of dishes." I sighed. "The problem is that it's incredibly expensive."
"So it's just something to cook on but you've been managing to cook really well already?" Dora-chan inquired.
"Yes, but you see if I get this stove I could cook more and different things even better. It's got an oven, I can roast and bake and, well, but it costs 860 gold coins. That's why I can't decide."
I had the money to just buy it, I was incredibly rich by any standard this world might use to measure my wealth by, but being asked to pay 860 gold coins for one thing like this was almost painful. It's more than twice as much as I paid for my bath and I thought that was expensive. Should I-
"Okay then, buy it." Fer said bluntly.
... ....? What?
"Can you use it to make delicious new dishes for us to eat?"
"Well, yes, but..."
"Then there isn't a problem. You have the money to buy it? Then buy it." Fer ordered firmly. Well, I have the money but I'm still undecided, Fer. But as you said, if I buy it then we can all eat more delicious food.
"I've eaten the delicious food you've cooked for us and you say you can cook even better food with this thing? Then buy it, like the big guy said." You too, Dora-chan? That settled it, I wanted it, they wanted me to buy it. Let's buy it.
"Excuse me, but I'll buy it." I announced out loud to the shopkeeper.
"You'll buy it?" he replied, surprised. I presumed he thought I couldn't afford such an expensive thing going by my appearance.
"Yes, I will buy the stove. 860 gold coins, right?" I got three cloth bags of gold coins out of my Item Box, 300 gold coins in each bag. I took out 40 gold coins from one bag and handed the bags over to him.
"There should be 860 gold coins in these three bags, please confirm." I said.
The store owner wiped the surprised expression from his face at the sight of the heavy bags and started counting the gold coins they contained, ten in each stack as seemed to be the common way to verify payments in this country. It took a bit of time, not surprisingly.
"Sorry to have kept you waiting," the shopkeeper finally announced, a broad smile on his face as he stacked the last few coins from the final bag. "I confirm I have definitely received 860 gold coins." He glanced at the stove. "Where should we deliver the magic cooking stove to? Delivery within the city of Doran is included in the price."
"Oh, that's not needed. I can get it into into my Item Box, just about." Actually I could fit a lot more in there but I didn't want too many other people to know how big it really was.
"Oh, is that so?" the storekeeper was still smiling as he started to put the piles of gold coins away in an iron lockbox. "This is a big city so there's more than a few folks around with Item Box, Adventurers and Merchants mostly but yours is really big if you can fit that stove in there."
Many of the monsters Fer and Sui had subjugated were much larger than the stove but I only brought such monsters out of my Item Box in front of people like the Guild Masters and the disassemblers who also worked for the Guild. I had to be more careful around other people I encountered outside the Guild.
After being shown how to extinguish the magical burners with a touch of the button and another small amount of magical energy, I put the "Latest Model Black Magic Cooking Stove" in my Item Box and left the store. The shop owner's broad smile accompanied his fulsome thanks and a wish for me to return any time to see his other wares.
After that, I went looking around an area where the shops mainly sold food. I was looking for raw materials for cooking and I had a sudden desperate urge to economise for some reason. I spotted various vegetables that looked familiar, cabbages, carrots and small onions and even what looked like potatoes. They were not as fresh as the vegetables I could buy in the Net Super but they were very cheap. A big sack of these vegetables cost about one silver coin each.
My plan was that if I was in the dungeon I could cook with these vegetables, taking them from my Item Box which a lot of Adventurers would know of and accept rather than having to use my Unique Skill of Net Super to buy them. And they were cheap too. I decided that I'd buy these kinds of vegetables from such shops in the future. It was good for the local economy after all I told myself, and I would save money.
I also bought lots of black bread. It was hard and chewy and not very tasty but it would last indefinitely in my Item Box and again it wouldn't be a surprise if I had to take it out from there in front of others in the dungeon.
I looked in some more shops in other streets without buying anything more. Both Fer and Dora-chan were getting bored by this time so I declared "I'm hungry too" and we headed back towards the inn. I'd give the "Latest Model Black Magic Cooking Stove" a good workout right away, I decided. Now what to cook...
We went strolling through the streets of Doran. The folks we passed took less notice of Fer and Dora-chan than I had expected, with fewer startled looks and exclamations compared to the other cities we had visited. Doran was a Dungeon City, of course so there were lots of Adventurers around. Although Tamer isn't a common job, contracted monsters accompanying their Adventurer masters were not an unfamiliar sight to the locals. Fer and Dora-chan were something special of course but still not enough to cause the sorts of alarmed shouts and brandishing of weapons that had happened elsewhere. It was something of a relief.
"There sure are a lot of people around." I muttered, looking around with interest at the crowded streets. "Then again Rodolpho-san did say Doran is this country's fifth-largest city so I suppose that's not too surprising."
I noticed quite a few shops as we wandered through the city. Many of them were selling weapons and armour, not surprisingly since this was a Dungeon city. I looked at some of the items on offer in such stores with interest but I didn't really need such things myself, having Fer and now Dora-chan with me. Besides, since Sui-chan had been blessed by the God of Blacksmiths she could make things like weapons and armour for me for free. The knife she had made as an experiment was of excellent quality, "[ Mithril knife + ], a high-quality Mithril knife" according to my Appraisal earlier. It felt good to hold, something I had learned to appreciate from the cooking knives I had bought from time to time at home. A knife that felt good in the hand was a knife that made it easier to do a good job preparing food.
I would have liked to carry the knife Sui had made in the sheath on my belt but being a high-quality blade and made of Mithril it was incredibly sharp. The knife sheath was made of strong Giant Deer leather but the knife's keen edge would easily slice through that leather so unfortunately I had to keep it in my Item Box for the moment. I had an idea though, if the inside of the sheath could somehow be coated with a thin layer of Mithril then that would probably protect the leather. I'd ask Sui-chan if she could do that to the sheath if I took it off the belt and gave it to her to "tickle", as she described it, maybe tonight. Thinking about that I idly wondered about maybe getting her to make me a Mithril sword too as part of our preparations for entering the dungeon. A helmet as well? Caves often have low ceilings so a protective Mithril helmet might be a good idea, stop me bumping my head and hurting myself. Safety first after all. Hmmm...
While strolling around aimlessly and thinking about various things a shop front display caught my eye. It appeared to be a store which sold magic tools of various sorts rather than weapons and such. Oh? Was that what I thought it was? I stopped to take a closer look after reading the large sign above the item in question.
"Latest Model Black Magic Cooking Stove"
In terms of size the stove on display was about 2 metres long and about 80 centimetres wide, with four cooking rings on the top in a row and a very large oven below. I knelt down to peer into the open oven. This looked interesting...
"Welcome. I see you're interested in our new magic cooking stove." The shopkeeper came out out to greet me.
"Excuse me but how well does this stove heat things up?" I inquired. Because it was a magic stove I surmised it would be using a magic stone to power it but would it provide enough heat to cook things properly? It wasn't worth considering if it was too feeble to do a proper job.
"As you can see here," the shopkeeper pointed to the central part of the stove, "the magic stone installed in this latest model black magic cooking stove was specifically chosen and perfectly inlaid to provide all the heat required."
There was a black manastone about 2cm in diameter embedded in the centre of a deeply-inscribed magical circle on the top of the stove. Ah, 'Black Magic' referred to the colour of the manastone used. As the storekeeper explained, the magical circle invoked Fire magic and the manastone provided the energy to create the fire. Clever, I thought to myself.
"In addition to that the temperatures it produces can be easily adjusted from low heat to high heat." When I asked how long it would last he added, "A manastone of this size can be used every day for ten years before it needs to be replaced." Ten years? That was truly incredible.
"Please watch while I demonstrate how it works." he said. He touched a button on the front of the stove and the burners lit. "You push here and put a little magical energy into the stove to start it up. After that it runs off the manastone and you don't need to add more magical energy. When it's lit you can adjust the heat with these knobs. It's very simple."
Turn the knobs next to the button to the left for a low heat, turn it to the right for a high heat. There was a knob for each burner on the top. As the owner said it looked easy to use and the heat from the burners was more than sufficient to cook on.
"Since you can adjust the heat on each burner you can make various dishes at the same time." he explained. Hmmm, this was looking better and better. The gas-bottle portable cooking stoves purchased from the Net Super I been using till now were serviceable enough but I was attracted by the sheer awesome firepower of this magical stove. It didn't need replacement gas bottles on a regular basis either.
"Then, under the stove-top burners it has an oven." The shopkeeper pointed to a remarkably familiar-looking control panel at the right side of the open oven door. "Here's a button to light it, just like the burners, and a knob for heat control which works the same way. There's even a timer device so you won't overcook things."
He waved his hand around inside the oven, demonstrating how spacious it was. "With this size oven you could even roast a whole Cockatrice." I peered into the oven again, remembering the Cockatrices Fer had subjugated back when we were travelling with the Iron Will party of Adventurers. A Cockatrice's body was about 1.5 meters long so yes, it would just fit once the head was removed. Mmmm, roast chicken, that sounded good.
"I've made soup with this cooking stove while baking bread in the oven below," the shopkeeper went on, obviously noting my increasing enthusiasm and interest. Fresh-baked bread? That sounded good as well. I can get bread-making flour and bread yeast from the Net Super so baking my own bread was a possibility too. Having something like this would allow me to increase my range of cooking possibilities enormously. I wanted this stove, I decided.
"Sounds good. So, how much is it?" I said. That was the most important thing. It used a magic stone and that would mean it was expen---
"It is 860 gold coins." The shopkeeper said with a smile.
"...Huh?"
"It is 860 gold coins." he repeated.
Even if he was smiling he had still said, what was it, 860 gold coins? That was mind-bogglingly expensive. But I wanted it. But it cost 860 gold coins. But I wanted it. But- my mind ran in circles as the shopkeeper stood waiting patiently.
"Hey, you finished here yet?" Fer grumbled.
"Yeah, let's go back. I'm getting hungry." Dora-chan added. Fer and Dora-chan's comments brought me out of my stupor. (by the way, Sui-chan was asleep in her leather bag as usual.)
"Hold on, I'm just wondering if I should buy this stove or not." I explained, still unable to drag myself away. It was a wonderful stove, but 860 gold coins?
"Nuuu, why are you wanting such a big useless-looking thing to drag around with you? It looks like it would just get in the way." Fer said.
"It's not useless. This is a magic cooking stove, I could use it to cook lots of dishes." I sighed. "The problem is that it's incredibly expensive."
"So it's just something to cook on but you've been managing to cook really well already?" Dora-chan inquired.
"Yes, but you see if I get this stove I could cook more and different things even better. It's got an oven, I can roast and bake and, well, but it costs 860 gold coins. That's why I can't decide."
I had the money to just buy it, I was incredibly rich by any standard this world might use to measure my wealth by, but being asked to pay 860 gold coins for one thing like this was almost painful. It's more than twice as much as I paid for my bath and I thought that was expensive. Should I-
"Okay then, buy it." Fer said bluntly.
... ....? What?
"Can you use it to make delicious new dishes for us to eat?"
"Well, yes, but..."
"Then there isn't a problem. You have the money to buy it? Then buy it." Fer ordered firmly. Well, I have the money but I'm still undecided, Fer. But as you said, if I buy it then we can all eat more delicious food.
"I've eaten the delicious food you've cooked for us and you say you can cook even better food with this thing? Then buy it, like the big guy said." You too, Dora-chan? That settled it, I wanted it, they wanted me to buy it. Let's buy it.
"Excuse me, but I'll buy it." I announced out loud to the shopkeeper.
"You'll buy it?" he replied, surprised. I presumed he thought I couldn't afford such an expensive thing going by my appearance.
"Yes, I will buy the stove. 860 gold coins, right?" I got three cloth bags of gold coins out of my Item Box, 300 gold coins in each bag. I took out 40 gold coins from one bag and handed the bags over to him.
"There should be 860 gold coins in these three bags, please confirm." I said.
The store owner wiped the surprised expression from his face at the sight of the heavy bags and started counting the gold coins they contained, ten in each stack as seemed to be the common way to verify payments in this country. It took a bit of time, not surprisingly.
"Sorry to have kept you waiting," the shopkeeper finally announced, a broad smile on his face as he stacked the last few coins from the final bag. "I confirm I have definitely received 860 gold coins." He glanced at the stove. "Where should we deliver the magic cooking stove to? Delivery within the city of Doran is included in the price."
"Oh, that's not needed. I can get it into into my Item Box, just about." Actually I could fit a lot more in there but I didn't want too many other people to know how big it really was.
"Oh, is that so?" the storekeeper was still smiling as he started to put the piles of gold coins away in an iron lockbox. "This is a big city so there's more than a few folks around with Item Box, Adventurers and Merchants mostly but yours is really big if you can fit that stove in there."
Many of the monsters Fer and Sui had subjugated were much larger than the stove but I only brought such monsters out of my Item Box in front of people like the Guild Masters and the disassemblers who also worked for the Guild. I had to be more careful around other people I encountered outside the Guild.
After being shown how to extinguish the magical burners with a touch of the button and another small amount of magical energy, I put the "Latest Model Black Magic Cooking Stove" in my Item Box and left the store. The shop owner's broad smile accompanied his fulsome thanks and a wish for me to return any time to see his other wares.
After that, I went looking around an area where the shops mainly sold food. I was looking for raw materials for cooking and I had a sudden desperate urge to economise for some reason. I spotted various vegetables that looked familiar, cabbages, carrots and small onions and even what looked like potatoes. They were not as fresh as the vegetables I could buy in the Net Super but they were very cheap. A big sack of these vegetables cost about one silver coin each.
My plan was that if I was in the dungeon I could cook with these vegetables, taking them from my Item Box which a lot of Adventurers would know of and accept rather than having to use my Unique Skill of Net Super to buy them. And they were cheap too. I decided that I'd buy these kinds of vegetables from such shops in the future. It was good for the local economy after all I told myself, and I would save money.
I also bought lots of black bread. It was hard and chewy and not very tasty but it would last indefinitely in my Item Box and again it wouldn't be a surprise if I had to take it out from there in front of others in the dungeon.
I looked in some more shops in other streets without buying anything more. Both Fer and Dora-chan were getting bored by this time so I declared "I'm hungry too" and we headed back towards the inn. I'd give the "Latest Model Black Magic Cooking Stove" a good workout right away, I decided. Now what to cook...
Wednesday, 6 February 2019
Ch 123 Tondemo Skill de Isekai Hourou Meshi
Ch 123 -- A Small Problem at the Dungeon Entrance
Fer and Dora-chan headed off towards Doran's dungeon with me following behind carrying Sui in her bag. Elland-san had given us simple directions, go out the gate we had come in, follow the city wall to the right and we'd arrive at the dungeon entrance.
About 500 meters from the gate we reached a place where a lot of people were gathered. There was what seemed to be a marketplace with stalls and small stores selling all sorts of food, goods, weapons and the like. What I took to be the entrance to the dungeon was surrounded by a stone wall with an opening guarded by two knights in armour.
"This looks like it." I said, looking around. It wasn't like the small dungeon Fer had dragged me into to face Kobolds and such, that had been a simple cave entrance out in the countryside. This was, well, organised, almost like a business operation.
"Umu, no doubt about it." Fer said, licking his lips, his eyes focussed on the opening.
There was a long line of Adventurers at the gateway waiting to enter the dungeon. Next to them was a small building and as I watched more Adventurers came out of the building's doorway and joined the end of the queue. Elland-san had mentioned in passing that there was a branch office of the Adventurers Guild where Adventurers were required to register otherwise they would be refused entry to the dungeon. That building was presumably the branch office.
"It seems we can't enter the dungeon unless I register at the branch of that Adventurers Guild so we'll have to go through there first." I said as I led the way into the building. Inside there were three windows and I stepped up to one that was not in use.
"Excuse me, I'd like to register please." I said to the receptionist, handing her my Guild card.
"Yes, dungeon entrance registration, oh, would you be the Tamer, Mukouda-sama? We've been expecting you." the receptionist said.
Tamer, me? Expected? Huh? What?
"Oh, I'm sorry." the receptionist hurried to explain, seeing my confused face. "We were informed by our colleagues in the Adventurers Guild in the city that a certain strong Adventurer named Mukouda-sama accompanied by his Tame contracted monsters was expected to come here, wishing to enter the dungeon."
Eeh, really? Being expected like this was kind of troubling...
"Well, in my case, it's not me that's really strong but my contracted monsters." I explained. I was no match for Fer or Dora-chan or even Sui, really.
"Despite what you say, Mukouda-sama, they are part of your party's assessed strength and are counted as such by the Guild." the receptionist explained. "Moving on, I see you don't have much baggage with you. Is that right?"
Baggage? How was that a problem? The receptionist noticed my expression and continued.
"Perhaps this is the first time Mukouda-sama has planned to enter a dungeon?" Well, there was that time a certain Someone, I glanced down at Fer pretending to sleep beside me, dragged me unwillingly into a small dungeon to level-up my Earth Magic against a horde of Goblins and Kobolds but this was my, well our first big dungeon.
When I nodded, the receptionist explained that certain preparations were necessary to enter Doran's dungeon since even a short journey exploring only the upper reaches of the dungeon would take at least three days. A full exploration of a large dungeon with many floors like this one might take up to a month depending on the abilities of the Adventurers in question. Collecting valuable drops meant a lot of searching, defusing traps and locating hidden passages and that added to the time spent underground, not to mention the encounters with various monsters along the way. There were no convenient supply points or places to obtain food etc. in the dungeon either thus any party of Adventurers had to take sufficient supplies with them to support themselves. Indeed, parties sometimes failed to come back out of the dungeon having perished there -- it was not an uncommon story for such parties to have run out of food if they were insufficiently provisioned.
"The street vendors and shops in the market outside sell preserved food and other essentials for Adventurers who are intending to enter the dungeon. There are also maps of varying accuracy covering the first fifteen levels for sale. If you go beyond the fifteenth level you have to be much more careful, of course, but taking sufficient food with you is a basic necessity."
I see. I asked if we couldn't get our own food in the dungeon such as meat from monsters but it depended on them dropping meat randomly after they were subjugated -- dungeons absorbed the monsters killed within them, I recalled from my own combat experience in the small dungeon a certain Someone had dragged me into. Rather than relying on lucky drops it seemed better to prepare enough food to take with us before we entered the dungeon in the first place. That sounded like the proper thing to do, I agreed. Safety first, after all.
The helpful receptionist went on to tell me that this dungeon consisted of thirty floors. One high-ranked Adventurer party was fighting on the 22nd floor at the moment, well ahead of all the other Adventurers currently exploring the dungeon but it had never been totally conquered. It seems that there had been a party of particularly strong Adventurers which had almost conquered the dungeon in the distant past. The receptionist's description of that party's members suggested to me that Doran's Guild Master, Elland-san had been one of them along with his companion Rodolpho-san who was of course now Claire's Guild Master. They had apparently reached the last floor's final room and discovered the Last Boss was a Behemoth. They discussed what to do before entering the room and triggering the boss fight and sensibly chose to make a strategic withdrawal at that point. Wise decision, Elland-san, Rodolpho-san, I agreed. A Behemoth, brrrr... that was a top-rated Last Boss in many games.
"Huh, a Behemoth? That might be fun." Fer's intrigued thought resonated in my head as I saw his ears prick up at the receptionist's words.
"Fer, the words 'fun' and 'Behemoth' don't go together," I answered him telepathically but I feared that a flag had been raised.
I considered what the receptionist had told us. Fer and Dora-chan had rushed off here ready to enter the dungeon right away but it seemed we weren't actually ready to do so. We'd have to go back to the inn and return here later. I was fairly confident Fer and Dora-chan (and Sui-chan too) could deal with any strong enemies within the dungeon but we had to eat. Our real enemy would be hunger and the only weapon I had to defeat that kind of boss monster was cooked food.
In the worst case we wouldn't starve because I had Net Super but I couldn't use it in front of other Adventurers we might encounter in the dungeon. For that reason I'd have to make lots of food beforehand and store it in my Item Box before we entered, I decided.
"Excuse me," I said to the receptionist, "but we won't be entering the dungeon today. Listening to your explanation made it clear our preparations are insufficient and we need to take some time to get ready. You have been most helpful, thank you."
"I'm glad you agree, preparation is important if you wish to succeed in exploring Doran's dungeon." She handed my Guild card back to me. Fer and Dora-chan objected telepathically to my decision, of course.
"What?!"
"Well, we've come all this way and we're not going into the dungeon?! Meanie-!"
"You both heard what the receptionist said, didn't you, Fer, Dora-chan? We need to prepare properly or we'll not have enough to eat when we're in the dungeon."
"What are you talking about?" Fer complained.
"Yeah," Dora-chan interrupted. "The big guy told me we eat food from another world that you can just order when you want. Right?"
"Ah-" Fer looked down guiltily. Blabbermouth, I thought at him.
"Hmm?" Dora-chan looked between us. "Oh, is it that square box thing that always appears before you? I thought that was part of your magic."
"Right, I haven't explained things to you yet, Dora-chan. You see, I was Summoned from another world. As for the box thing, Net Super, it's a Unique Skill I have, I can buy things from the world I came from and have them delivered here. I use a lot of condiments, spices and sauces from that other world to make the food you like so much. They're the reason the meals are so delicious. However-" I raised a warning finger, "what do you think would happen if I used my Net Super skill in front of others in this world, people like Adventurers?"
Dora-chan thought for a moment. "Greedy humans, they would threaten you to get their hands on other-world things you could get for them, I suppose." I was surprised, Dora-chan seemed to have a better grasp of human beings and their habits than I had expected from a creature that mostly stayed out of sight. He brightened up, continuing "Just don't let them threaten you then!"
If Fer was around all the time it wouldn't be a problem but in the dungeon I couldn't be absolutely sure he'd be able to protect me all the time. There could be blind spots, we might get separated or Fer might be busy fighting while I was being targeted. I explained all this to Dora-chan.
"I don't even know how many Adventurers are in the dungeon so I don't want to use the Net Super skill down there unless I absolutely have to." I decided to appeal to his stomach, and Fer's stomach too. "We can buy lots of the food they sell here in the market and enter the dungeon right now but it's things like preserved salted meat, raw vegetables, powdered soup, hard bread and the like. Are you OK with eating that sort of food for the next few weeks? If so-"
That 'offer' convinced Fer and Dora-chan. They'd wait and let me cook lots of food for the dungeon exploration so they could eat delicious meals rather than having us subsisting on basic travel rations.
"So just wait a little. I'd say it'll take me about three days to do a good job of the preparations and then we can go into the dungeon. How does that sound?"
"Isn't waiting three days too much?" Fer complained. He wanted to go to the beach- the dungeon right away! It wasn't fair! Waah!
"I think so, too." Dora-chan chimed in. "Surely one day's cooking will be enough? We can come back here tomorrow." C'mon Dad, why wait? Let's hurry!
"Eeh-," I tried to explain to the two kindergarteners. "Look, I don't know when we're going to be coming back out when we enter the dungeon. I want to look around Doran and do some sight-seeing before we go in. Besides we're going to need a lot of food and I absolutely need three days to cook it all and get it ready."
"Nu, making meals is fine I suppose but what is this 'sight-seeing' you're talking about?" Fer was still annoyed.
"Fer, I noticed how you reacted when you heard there was a Behemoth in the dungeon. You're planning to go all the way to the bottom of the dungeon, to the 30th level and fight that Last Boss, aren't you?"
"Of course." Fer's simple agreement was tinged with excitement and bloodlust, more than I'd ever felt him express before. Never mind, I'd deal with that situation when it happened.
"The Guild receptionist said it could take a month to get there. I don't know when we'll be able to return to the surface in that case." I suspected it might not take Fer that long to clear the dungeon but it was still going to take a week at least, maybe two. "I want to look around before we enter the dungeon. I was really looking forward to exploring this place all the way here, it's such a big city." I wasn't planning to cook for three days morning and night and then enter the dungeon immediately afterwards while I was tired out after all that effort. I intended to take it easy instead, wandering around the city streets and seeing the sights between bouts of cooking.
"You can wait for three days, can't you Fer, Dora-chan? That way we can all eat delicious food even when we're in the dungeon."
"Nuuuu, It can't be helped," Fer moped, finally giving in. "But only three days though."
"We can't say no when you promise us delicious food, boss." Dora-chan finally agreed. "It can't be helped like the big guy said but just three days, right?"
"Now that's decided, I'm going to explore the city of Doran today." I declared. I started on the way back to the city gate and the streets of Doran. Fer cast a single long glance back at the gate to the dungeon and turned to follow me with Dora-chan buzzing along beside him. I caught a faint telepathic thought from him as he caught up... "Behemoth".
Fer and Dora-chan headed off towards Doran's dungeon with me following behind carrying Sui in her bag. Elland-san had given us simple directions, go out the gate we had come in, follow the city wall to the right and we'd arrive at the dungeon entrance.
About 500 meters from the gate we reached a place where a lot of people were gathered. There was what seemed to be a marketplace with stalls and small stores selling all sorts of food, goods, weapons and the like. What I took to be the entrance to the dungeon was surrounded by a stone wall with an opening guarded by two knights in armour.
"This looks like it." I said, looking around. It wasn't like the small dungeon Fer had dragged me into to face Kobolds and such, that had been a simple cave entrance out in the countryside. This was, well, organised, almost like a business operation.
"Umu, no doubt about it." Fer said, licking his lips, his eyes focussed on the opening.
There was a long line of Adventurers at the gateway waiting to enter the dungeon. Next to them was a small building and as I watched more Adventurers came out of the building's doorway and joined the end of the queue. Elland-san had mentioned in passing that there was a branch office of the Adventurers Guild where Adventurers were required to register otherwise they would be refused entry to the dungeon. That building was presumably the branch office.
"It seems we can't enter the dungeon unless I register at the branch of that Adventurers Guild so we'll have to go through there first." I said as I led the way into the building. Inside there were three windows and I stepped up to one that was not in use.
"Excuse me, I'd like to register please." I said to the receptionist, handing her my Guild card.
"Yes, dungeon entrance registration, oh, would you be the Tamer, Mukouda-sama? We've been expecting you." the receptionist said.
Tamer, me? Expected? Huh? What?
"Oh, I'm sorry." the receptionist hurried to explain, seeing my confused face. "We were informed by our colleagues in the Adventurers Guild in the city that a certain strong Adventurer named Mukouda-sama accompanied by his Tame contracted monsters was expected to come here, wishing to enter the dungeon."
Eeh, really? Being expected like this was kind of troubling...
"Well, in my case, it's not me that's really strong but my contracted monsters." I explained. I was no match for Fer or Dora-chan or even Sui, really.
"Despite what you say, Mukouda-sama, they are part of your party's assessed strength and are counted as such by the Guild." the receptionist explained. "Moving on, I see you don't have much baggage with you. Is that right?"
Baggage? How was that a problem? The receptionist noticed my expression and continued.
"Perhaps this is the first time Mukouda-sama has planned to enter a dungeon?" Well, there was that time a certain Someone, I glanced down at Fer pretending to sleep beside me, dragged me unwillingly into a small dungeon to level-up my Earth Magic against a horde of Goblins and Kobolds but this was my, well our first big dungeon.
When I nodded, the receptionist explained that certain preparations were necessary to enter Doran's dungeon since even a short journey exploring only the upper reaches of the dungeon would take at least three days. A full exploration of a large dungeon with many floors like this one might take up to a month depending on the abilities of the Adventurers in question. Collecting valuable drops meant a lot of searching, defusing traps and locating hidden passages and that added to the time spent underground, not to mention the encounters with various monsters along the way. There were no convenient supply points or places to obtain food etc. in the dungeon either thus any party of Adventurers had to take sufficient supplies with them to support themselves. Indeed, parties sometimes failed to come back out of the dungeon having perished there -- it was not an uncommon story for such parties to have run out of food if they were insufficiently provisioned.
"The street vendors and shops in the market outside sell preserved food and other essentials for Adventurers who are intending to enter the dungeon. There are also maps of varying accuracy covering the first fifteen levels for sale. If you go beyond the fifteenth level you have to be much more careful, of course, but taking sufficient food with you is a basic necessity."
I see. I asked if we couldn't get our own food in the dungeon such as meat from monsters but it depended on them dropping meat randomly after they were subjugated -- dungeons absorbed the monsters killed within them, I recalled from my own combat experience in the small dungeon a certain Someone had dragged me into. Rather than relying on lucky drops it seemed better to prepare enough food to take with us before we entered the dungeon in the first place. That sounded like the proper thing to do, I agreed. Safety first, after all.
The helpful receptionist went on to tell me that this dungeon consisted of thirty floors. One high-ranked Adventurer party was fighting on the 22nd floor at the moment, well ahead of all the other Adventurers currently exploring the dungeon but it had never been totally conquered. It seems that there had been a party of particularly strong Adventurers which had almost conquered the dungeon in the distant past. The receptionist's description of that party's members suggested to me that Doran's Guild Master, Elland-san had been one of them along with his companion Rodolpho-san who was of course now Claire's Guild Master. They had apparently reached the last floor's final room and discovered the Last Boss was a Behemoth. They discussed what to do before entering the room and triggering the boss fight and sensibly chose to make a strategic withdrawal at that point. Wise decision, Elland-san, Rodolpho-san, I agreed. A Behemoth, brrrr... that was a top-rated Last Boss in many games.
"Huh, a Behemoth? That might be fun." Fer's intrigued thought resonated in my head as I saw his ears prick up at the receptionist's words.
"Fer, the words 'fun' and 'Behemoth' don't go together," I answered him telepathically but I feared that a flag had been raised.
I considered what the receptionist had told us. Fer and Dora-chan had rushed off here ready to enter the dungeon right away but it seemed we weren't actually ready to do so. We'd have to go back to the inn and return here later. I was fairly confident Fer and Dora-chan (and Sui-chan too) could deal with any strong enemies within the dungeon but we had to eat. Our real enemy would be hunger and the only weapon I had to defeat that kind of boss monster was cooked food.
In the worst case we wouldn't starve because I had Net Super but I couldn't use it in front of other Adventurers we might encounter in the dungeon. For that reason I'd have to make lots of food beforehand and store it in my Item Box before we entered, I decided.
"Excuse me," I said to the receptionist, "but we won't be entering the dungeon today. Listening to your explanation made it clear our preparations are insufficient and we need to take some time to get ready. You have been most helpful, thank you."
"I'm glad you agree, preparation is important if you wish to succeed in exploring Doran's dungeon." She handed my Guild card back to me. Fer and Dora-chan objected telepathically to my decision, of course.
"What?!"
"Well, we've come all this way and we're not going into the dungeon?! Meanie-!"
"You both heard what the receptionist said, didn't you, Fer, Dora-chan? We need to prepare properly or we'll not have enough to eat when we're in the dungeon."
"What are you talking about?" Fer complained.
"Yeah," Dora-chan interrupted. "The big guy told me we eat food from another world that you can just order when you want. Right?"
"Ah-" Fer looked down guiltily. Blabbermouth, I thought at him.
"Hmm?" Dora-chan looked between us. "Oh, is it that square box thing that always appears before you? I thought that was part of your magic."
"Right, I haven't explained things to you yet, Dora-chan. You see, I was Summoned from another world. As for the box thing, Net Super, it's a Unique Skill I have, I can buy things from the world I came from and have them delivered here. I use a lot of condiments, spices and sauces from that other world to make the food you like so much. They're the reason the meals are so delicious. However-" I raised a warning finger, "what do you think would happen if I used my Net Super skill in front of others in this world, people like Adventurers?"
Dora-chan thought for a moment. "Greedy humans, they would threaten you to get their hands on other-world things you could get for them, I suppose." I was surprised, Dora-chan seemed to have a better grasp of human beings and their habits than I had expected from a creature that mostly stayed out of sight. He brightened up, continuing "Just don't let them threaten you then!"
If Fer was around all the time it wouldn't be a problem but in the dungeon I couldn't be absolutely sure he'd be able to protect me all the time. There could be blind spots, we might get separated or Fer might be busy fighting while I was being targeted. I explained all this to Dora-chan.
"I don't even know how many Adventurers are in the dungeon so I don't want to use the Net Super skill down there unless I absolutely have to." I decided to appeal to his stomach, and Fer's stomach too. "We can buy lots of the food they sell here in the market and enter the dungeon right now but it's things like preserved salted meat, raw vegetables, powdered soup, hard bread and the like. Are you OK with eating that sort of food for the next few weeks? If so-"
That 'offer' convinced Fer and Dora-chan. They'd wait and let me cook lots of food for the dungeon exploration so they could eat delicious meals rather than having us subsisting on basic travel rations.
"So just wait a little. I'd say it'll take me about three days to do a good job of the preparations and then we can go into the dungeon. How does that sound?"
"Isn't waiting three days too much?" Fer complained. He wanted to go to the beach- the dungeon right away! It wasn't fair! Waah!
"I think so, too." Dora-chan chimed in. "Surely one day's cooking will be enough? We can come back here tomorrow." C'mon Dad, why wait? Let's hurry!
"Eeh-," I tried to explain to the two kindergarteners. "Look, I don't know when we're going to be coming back out when we enter the dungeon. I want to look around Doran and do some sight-seeing before we go in. Besides we're going to need a lot of food and I absolutely need three days to cook it all and get it ready."
"Nu, making meals is fine I suppose but what is this 'sight-seeing' you're talking about?" Fer was still annoyed.
"Fer, I noticed how you reacted when you heard there was a Behemoth in the dungeon. You're planning to go all the way to the bottom of the dungeon, to the 30th level and fight that Last Boss, aren't you?"
"Of course." Fer's simple agreement was tinged with excitement and bloodlust, more than I'd ever felt him express before. Never mind, I'd deal with that situation when it happened.
"The Guild receptionist said it could take a month to get there. I don't know when we'll be able to return to the surface in that case." I suspected it might not take Fer that long to clear the dungeon but it was still going to take a week at least, maybe two. "I want to look around before we enter the dungeon. I was really looking forward to exploring this place all the way here, it's such a big city." I wasn't planning to cook for three days morning and night and then enter the dungeon immediately afterwards while I was tired out after all that effort. I intended to take it easy instead, wandering around the city streets and seeing the sights between bouts of cooking.
"You can wait for three days, can't you Fer, Dora-chan? That way we can all eat delicious food even when we're in the dungeon."
"Nuuuu, It can't be helped," Fer moped, finally giving in. "But only three days though."
"We can't say no when you promise us delicious food, boss." Dora-chan finally agreed. "It can't be helped like the big guy said but just three days, right?"
"Now that's decided, I'm going to explore the city of Doran today." I declared. I started on the way back to the city gate and the streets of Doran. Fer cast a single long glance back at the gate to the dungeon and turned to follow me with Dora-chan buzzing along beside him. I caught a faint telepathic thought from him as he caught up... "Behemoth".
Tuesday, 29 January 2019
Ch 122 Tondemo Skill de Isekai Hourou Meshi
Chapter 122 -- Divine Protection of the God of War and the God of Blacksmiths
Next morning after we ate breakfast I told Fer, Sui and Dora-chan what had happened the night before.
"So to sum it up, Fer and Dora-chan received the protection of the God of War Vulcan-sama and Sui got the protection of the God of Blacksmiths Hephaestus-sama."
Well, they hadn't exactly 'received' the blessings, I had dumped them on my contracted monsters instead. My excuse was that such blessings would have been too much for me to cope with and I already had Wind Goddess Ninril-sama's blessing (small) to deal with and that was quite enough for me, thank you.
The God of War's blessing, well I'm no battle maniac despite Fer's best attempts to teach me how to fight by dragging me into Goblin villages and dungeons full of Kobolds. I'll quite happily leave any fighting like that up to Fer, thank you. He seems to enjoy it anyway so that's why I passed on that live hand-grenade of a blessing to Fer and Dora-chan.
"Really?! I've been given the God of War's divine blessing? That's totally cool, woohoo!" Dora-chan appeared to be pleased with the outcome of last night's negotiations, flying around in circles and performing aerobatics like a miniature stunt plane.
"The War God's protection?" Fer mused. "That sounds pretty good to me. Well done, you." He seemed more than satisfied with the blessing he had received too.
As for the blessing of the God of Blacksmiths, I've never been very handy making things (other than food, of course). At the time I named Sui to receive that blessing in a bit of a panic but now I was worried if I had done the right thing. Would it hurt Sui somehow maybe?
"Blacksmith God's protection-?" Sai said tentatively. "I got a blessing from the Water Goddess and Water magic. What can I do now, aruji-?" Sui seemed intrigued as to what she could do with that particular blessing but I couldn't really help her.
"To start with I'll Appraise everyone and confirm the blessings." I announced.
I started with Fer since he was my first contracted monster and the largest and greediest and- anyway, lessee.
[ Name ] Fer
[ Age ] 1014
[ Type ] Fenrir
[ Level ] 910
[ Stamina ] 9877
[ Magic Power ] 9523
[ Attack Power ] 9106
[ Defence Power ] 9807
[ Agility ] 9726
[ Skill ] Wind Magic, Fire Magic, Water Magic, Earth Magic, Ice Magic, Lightning Magic, Sacred Magic, Barrier Magic, Claw Slash, Physical Strengthening, Physical Attack Resistance, Magic Attack Resistance, Magic Power Consumption Reduction, Appraisal, Battle Enhancement
[ Protections ] Wind Goddess Ninril’s Blessings, War God Vulcan's Blessings
There's Vulcan-sama's blessing added to his Status, with a new Skill called Battle Enhancement. That sounded... well, kinda sketchy. I wondered what it actually involved and I wasn't sure I really wanted to find out. I had a feeling I'd find out anyway. I noticed all his other stats had risen since the last time I had looked at them.
"Hey Fer, did you notice you've levelled up?"
"You saw that? Hmmm." Fer thought for a moment. "The higher the level you reach the harder it is to increase it further. Although I've not levelled up over the past few years, after we met and I made my submission contract with you my level has risen by four. Eating the delicious food you cook has done it, I think. Smartest decision I've made in five hundred years." Fer grinned, a scary sight to anyone who didn't know what he was thinking like I did. The level up and the blessing he had just received had put him in a really good mood. I looked over his Status once again, it never failed to amaze me. I was no match for him but he was totally on my side, thankfully.
Next up I Appraised Dora-chan.
[ Name] Dora-chan
[ Age ] 116
[ Type ] Pixie Dragon
[ Level ] 126
[ Stamina ] 895
[ Magic Power ] 2879
[ Attack Power ] 2652
[ Defence Power ] 865
[ Agility ] 3269
[ Skill ] Fire Magic, Water Magic, Earth Magic, Wind Magic, Ice Magic, Lightning Magic, Recovery Magic, Bombardment, Battle Enhancement
[ Protection ] War God Vulcan's Blessings
Yup, Dora-chan also had Vulcan-sama's protection as well as that dangerous-looking 'Battle Enhancement' skill, just like Fer. Looking at it again, Dora-chan was clearly very strong even though he was deceptively small.
Finally I Appraised Sui, expecting she'd be stronger too.
[ Name ] Sui
[ Age ] 2 months
[ Type ] Big Slime
[ Level ] 16
[ Stamina ] 989
[ Magic Power ] 980
[ Attack Power] 964
[ Defence Power ] 973
[ Agility ] 985
[ Skill ] Acid Bullet, Restorative Medicine Creation, Growth, Multiplication, Water Magic, Smithing
[ Protections ] Water Goddess Rusalka's Blessings, Blacksmith God Hephaestus' Blessings
Sui had levelled up and now had Hephaestus-sama's blessing along with the Smithing skill. That would be Blacksmithing, right? since the blessing was from the God of Blacksmiths but how could Sui use that Skill? It wasn't a Magic skill like her Water Magic or my Fire magic and Earth magic. How would it work? She didn't have hands to make things with after all.
"Sui, Hephaestus-sama's blessing has given you a new Skill. Do you know what it does?"
"Ummm, wait a moment." Sui wobbled thoughtfully. "I think- uh, mmmm, maybe I can make different things with metal." With metal? So she was a blacksmith now? That sounded right considering the source of her blessing.
"Really. So, exactly how do you make things?" I couldn't picture a big muscular Sui-chan sweating in a forge, hammering red-hot iron on an anvil. It had to be magic in some way but what sort?
"Let me see-" she wobbled some more, "iron and other things, Sui can put them in her stomach and tickle them and stir them up and, well, make them into things." So it would all happen inside Sui if she swallowed iron ingots or even ores as a start? I was still unsure how this would work. I wanted to try it out but I didn't have any ingots or iron ore with me. That is, I didn't have iron ore but I did have... hmmm. I removed some Mithril ore from my Item Box. I had collected the ore as an afterthought from the cave where Fer had subjugated the Mithril Lizard back when we were staying in Carerina, with vague plans of getting armour or a sword made from it later.
I held out the lump of ore to Sui. "Sui, can you make something with this?"
Sui studied the glowing lump. "Yeah, I think I can make something-"
"Well, then, uh, how about...?" I pulled out my knife from its belt sheath. "Can you make a knife like this using this ore?"
"Yeah, that's fine-" Sui agreed. "However it might take a bit of time." Sui swallowed the Mithril ore, saying "I can make it, aruji-"
10 minutes passed. Sui-chan told me whatever she was doing would 'take a bit of time' but this long? Is she OK? Was the Mithril ore having a bad effect on her? It had magical properties after all, swallowing something like that-
"Nuuu, are we going to the dungeon any time soon?" Fer grumbled as I watched Sui-chan worriedly.
"That's right, let's get going soon." Dora-chan chimed in. "I wanna find out what the War God's blessing is gonna do for me."
"Hang on hang on." I said. "Sui is experimenting with her new Smithing skill she got from her Blacksmith God's blessing."
"Nuuu, it can't be helped." Fer settled back down unhappily like a kid being told the family trip to the beach was delayed for a little while.
"I wanna get there..." Dora-chan grumbled too. Was he picking up bad habits from Fer? However he settled down to wait too without further mutterings.
"Sui, are you OK? You don't have to force yourself to do this." I asked anxiously.
"No, it's okay. Sui will be finished in a bit so please wait, aruji-" Sui reassured me.
"Oh, I'll wait. You don't have to rush."
"Yup, okay."
What Dora-chan had said earlier prompted a memory from the discussions around last night's offerings and the blessings my contracted monsters had received, specifically the War God's blessing. To distract myself from Sui's efforts I explained what I knew to Dora-chan.
"You said you wanted to know about the War God's blessing, Dora-chan? He told me it boosts your Status values by 50% if you're in a fight."
"Oh really?" Dora-chan started flying around excitedly. "Amazing-! I'm gonna be sooo much stronger, yay! The War God's blessing is perfect for me!" Dora-chan was quite pleased hearing about his 50% status boost.
"Hou, that's sounds useful." Fer said, grinning. "I'm looking forward to trying it out in the dungeon."
I didn't think it was something to be happy about myself and I didn't feel like smiling like Fer. Rather I was getting a bad feeling about our forthcoming trip to the city's dungeon. Had I made a mistake dumping the War God's blessing on Fer? He was already mega-strong, what would adding another 50% more on top do to his powers? I felt kinda sorry for any monster he might face from now on. Just be careful Fer, don't go on a rampage...
I turned my attention back to Sui. It had been ten minutes surely, how much longer...
"I made it-!" Sui suddenly announced, bouncing happily.
"Huh, Sui, are you finished? Are you OK?"
"Yeah, I did it. See, this-" Sui extruded a tentacle and presented me with a knife glowing a pale colour. I took it from her and used Appraisal.
[ Mithril knife + ]
A high-quality Mithril knife.
The way the metal glowed there was no doubt it was a Mithril knife. And 'high-quality', I assumed that meant it was well-made. Was that what the plus sign beside its Appraisal meant? Anyhow it was unbelievable. Making a such a good knife, my Sui-chan is really amazing. I was speechless.
"Aruji, how is it-? Sui made a knife-" Sui asked anxiously.
"It's made really well, thank you... Sui is really amazing, making something like this." I praised her.
"Really? Sui, amazing-?"
"Sui is really amazing." I agreed.
"Uhufufu, Sui, Sui is amazing. Sui is happy-." Sui-chan bounced up and down, pon pon pon. Ah, Sui-chan is soooo sweet, she heals me so much.
"Nuuu, if we're finished here then we can go to the dungeon, can we?" Fer interjected.
"That's right." Dora-chan buzzed around my head distractingly. "Dungeon, let's go to the dungeon yay!"
Yeah yeah.
Next morning after we ate breakfast I told Fer, Sui and Dora-chan what had happened the night before.
"So to sum it up, Fer and Dora-chan received the protection of the God of War Vulcan-sama and Sui got the protection of the God of Blacksmiths Hephaestus-sama."
Well, they hadn't exactly 'received' the blessings, I had dumped them on my contracted monsters instead. My excuse was that such blessings would have been too much for me to cope with and I already had Wind Goddess Ninril-sama's blessing (small) to deal with and that was quite enough for me, thank you.
The God of War's blessing, well I'm no battle maniac despite Fer's best attempts to teach me how to fight by dragging me into Goblin villages and dungeons full of Kobolds. I'll quite happily leave any fighting like that up to Fer, thank you. He seems to enjoy it anyway so that's why I passed on that live hand-grenade of a blessing to Fer and Dora-chan.
"Really?! I've been given the God of War's divine blessing? That's totally cool, woohoo!" Dora-chan appeared to be pleased with the outcome of last night's negotiations, flying around in circles and performing aerobatics like a miniature stunt plane.
"The War God's protection?" Fer mused. "That sounds pretty good to me. Well done, you." He seemed more than satisfied with the blessing he had received too.
As for the blessing of the God of Blacksmiths, I've never been very handy making things (other than food, of course). At the time I named Sui to receive that blessing in a bit of a panic but now I was worried if I had done the right thing. Would it hurt Sui somehow maybe?
"Blacksmith God's protection-?" Sai said tentatively. "I got a blessing from the Water Goddess and Water magic. What can I do now, aruji-?" Sui seemed intrigued as to what she could do with that particular blessing but I couldn't really help her.
"To start with I'll Appraise everyone and confirm the blessings." I announced.
I started with Fer since he was my first contracted monster and the largest and greediest and- anyway, lessee.
[ Name ] Fer
[ Age ] 1014
[ Type ] Fenrir
[ Level ] 910
[ Stamina ] 9877
[ Magic Power ] 9523
[ Attack Power ] 9106
[ Defence Power ] 9807
[ Agility ] 9726
[ Skill ] Wind Magic, Fire Magic, Water Magic, Earth Magic, Ice Magic, Lightning Magic, Sacred Magic, Barrier Magic, Claw Slash, Physical Strengthening, Physical Attack Resistance, Magic Attack Resistance, Magic Power Consumption Reduction, Appraisal, Battle Enhancement
[ Protections ] Wind Goddess Ninril’s Blessings, War God Vulcan's Blessings
There's Vulcan-sama's blessing added to his Status, with a new Skill called Battle Enhancement. That sounded... well, kinda sketchy. I wondered what it actually involved and I wasn't sure I really wanted to find out. I had a feeling I'd find out anyway. I noticed all his other stats had risen since the last time I had looked at them.
"Hey Fer, did you notice you've levelled up?"
"You saw that? Hmmm." Fer thought for a moment. "The higher the level you reach the harder it is to increase it further. Although I've not levelled up over the past few years, after we met and I made my submission contract with you my level has risen by four. Eating the delicious food you cook has done it, I think. Smartest decision I've made in five hundred years." Fer grinned, a scary sight to anyone who didn't know what he was thinking like I did. The level up and the blessing he had just received had put him in a really good mood. I looked over his Status once again, it never failed to amaze me. I was no match for him but he was totally on my side, thankfully.
Next up I Appraised Dora-chan.
[ Name] Dora-chan
[ Age ] 116
[ Type ] Pixie Dragon
[ Level ] 126
[ Stamina ] 895
[ Magic Power ] 2879
[ Attack Power ] 2652
[ Defence Power ] 865
[ Agility ] 3269
[ Skill ] Fire Magic, Water Magic, Earth Magic, Wind Magic, Ice Magic, Lightning Magic, Recovery Magic, Bombardment, Battle Enhancement
[ Protection ] War God Vulcan's Blessings
Yup, Dora-chan also had Vulcan-sama's protection as well as that dangerous-looking 'Battle Enhancement' skill, just like Fer. Looking at it again, Dora-chan was clearly very strong even though he was deceptively small.
Finally I Appraised Sui, expecting she'd be stronger too.
[ Name ] Sui
[ Age ] 2 months
[ Type ] Big Slime
[ Level ] 16
[ Stamina ] 989
[ Magic Power ] 980
[ Attack Power] 964
[ Defence Power ] 973
[ Agility ] 985
[ Skill ] Acid Bullet, Restorative Medicine Creation, Growth, Multiplication, Water Magic, Smithing
[ Protections ] Water Goddess Rusalka's Blessings, Blacksmith God Hephaestus' Blessings
Sui had levelled up and now had Hephaestus-sama's blessing along with the Smithing skill. That would be Blacksmithing, right? since the blessing was from the God of Blacksmiths but how could Sui use that Skill? It wasn't a Magic skill like her Water Magic or my Fire magic and Earth magic. How would it work? She didn't have hands to make things with after all.
"Sui, Hephaestus-sama's blessing has given you a new Skill. Do you know what it does?"
"Ummm, wait a moment." Sui wobbled thoughtfully. "I think- uh, mmmm, maybe I can make different things with metal." With metal? So she was a blacksmith now? That sounded right considering the source of her blessing.
"Really. So, exactly how do you make things?" I couldn't picture a big muscular Sui-chan sweating in a forge, hammering red-hot iron on an anvil. It had to be magic in some way but what sort?
"Let me see-" she wobbled some more, "iron and other things, Sui can put them in her stomach and tickle them and stir them up and, well, make them into things." So it would all happen inside Sui if she swallowed iron ingots or even ores as a start? I was still unsure how this would work. I wanted to try it out but I didn't have any ingots or iron ore with me. That is, I didn't have iron ore but I did have... hmmm. I removed some Mithril ore from my Item Box. I had collected the ore as an afterthought from the cave where Fer had subjugated the Mithril Lizard back when we were staying in Carerina, with vague plans of getting armour or a sword made from it later.
I held out the lump of ore to Sui. "Sui, can you make something with this?"
Sui studied the glowing lump. "Yeah, I think I can make something-"
"Well, then, uh, how about...?" I pulled out my knife from its belt sheath. "Can you make a knife like this using this ore?"
"Yeah, that's fine-" Sui agreed. "However it might take a bit of time." Sui swallowed the Mithril ore, saying "I can make it, aruji-"
10 minutes passed. Sui-chan told me whatever she was doing would 'take a bit of time' but this long? Is she OK? Was the Mithril ore having a bad effect on her? It had magical properties after all, swallowing something like that-
"Nuuu, are we going to the dungeon any time soon?" Fer grumbled as I watched Sui-chan worriedly.
"That's right, let's get going soon." Dora-chan chimed in. "I wanna find out what the War God's blessing is gonna do for me."
"Hang on hang on." I said. "Sui is experimenting with her new Smithing skill she got from her Blacksmith God's blessing."
"Nuuu, it can't be helped." Fer settled back down unhappily like a kid being told the family trip to the beach was delayed for a little while.
"I wanna get there..." Dora-chan grumbled too. Was he picking up bad habits from Fer? However he settled down to wait too without further mutterings.
"Sui, are you OK? You don't have to force yourself to do this." I asked anxiously.
"No, it's okay. Sui will be finished in a bit so please wait, aruji-" Sui reassured me.
"Oh, I'll wait. You don't have to rush."
"Yup, okay."
What Dora-chan had said earlier prompted a memory from the discussions around last night's offerings and the blessings my contracted monsters had received, specifically the War God's blessing. To distract myself from Sui's efforts I explained what I knew to Dora-chan.
"You said you wanted to know about the War God's blessing, Dora-chan? He told me it boosts your Status values by 50% if you're in a fight."
"Oh really?" Dora-chan started flying around excitedly. "Amazing-! I'm gonna be sooo much stronger, yay! The War God's blessing is perfect for me!" Dora-chan was quite pleased hearing about his 50% status boost.
"Hou, that's sounds useful." Fer said, grinning. "I'm looking forward to trying it out in the dungeon."
I didn't think it was something to be happy about myself and I didn't feel like smiling like Fer. Rather I was getting a bad feeling about our forthcoming trip to the city's dungeon. Had I made a mistake dumping the War God's blessing on Fer? He was already mega-strong, what would adding another 50% more on top do to his powers? I felt kinda sorry for any monster he might face from now on. Just be careful Fer, don't go on a rampage...
I turned my attention back to Sui. It had been ten minutes surely, how much longer...
"I made it-!" Sui suddenly announced, bouncing happily.
"Huh, Sui, are you finished? Are you OK?"
"Yeah, I did it. See, this-" Sui extruded a tentacle and presented me with a knife glowing a pale colour. I took it from her and used Appraisal.
[ Mithril knife + ]
A high-quality Mithril knife.
The way the metal glowed there was no doubt it was a Mithril knife. And 'high-quality', I assumed that meant it was well-made. Was that what the plus sign beside its Appraisal meant? Anyhow it was unbelievable. Making a such a good knife, my Sui-chan is really amazing. I was speechless.
"Aruji, how is it-? Sui made a knife-" Sui asked anxiously.
"It's made really well, thank you... Sui is really amazing, making something like this." I praised her.
"Really? Sui, amazing-?"
"Sui is really amazing." I agreed.
"Uhufufu, Sui, Sui is amazing. Sui is happy-." Sui-chan bounced up and down, pon pon pon. Ah, Sui-chan is soooo sweet, she heals me so much.
"Nuuu, if we're finished here then we can go to the dungeon, can we?" Fer interjected.
"That's right." Dora-chan buzzed around my head distractingly. "Dungeon, let's go to the dungeon yay!"
Yeah yeah.
Wednesday, 23 January 2019
Idle Talk 9 - Tondemo Skill de Isekai Hourou Meshi (post Ch 121)
Idle Talk 9 -- 3 Heroes, Clouds on the Horizon
Kanon and Rio and I along with our knight companions went into the dungeon again and again to level up and eventually we reached the 25th floor. We had gotten to the point where any of us could easily defeat a single ogre we encountered within the dungeon. It was then that our knight companions suggested we try facing monsters outside the dungeon as Adventurers normally did.
As the three knights explained, the monsters found in a dungeon and the monsters found outside were different and we needed to learn the methods of fighting and subjugating such monsters. Of course the only way to learn was to actually do it. The dungeon was like fighting in a game and it was fun but I expect fighting monsters out in the real world will be more challenging.
As for my Status, it now looks like this:
[Name] Kaito . Saitou
[Age] 17
[Type] A Hero from another world
[Level] 10
[Fitness] 1010
[Magical Power] 978
[Attack power] 988
[Defense force] 961
[Agility] 953
[Skill] Appraisal, Item Box, Holy Swordsman, Fire Magic, Water Magic, Earth Magic, Wind Magic, Light Magic, Lightning Magic, Ice magic
Amazingly my physical fitness exceeds 1000. I had been told that normally any Status value cannot exceed 1000 except for extraordinary capable individuals so seeing that figure in my Status gave me a very good feeling. Right now only I have such a high rating but both Kanon and Rio have been levelling up too so I expect, since they're Heroes like me their own fitness stats will soon also exceed 1000.
It was becoming harder to raise my level though, each increase was taking more effort than the earlier steps. Still it hadn't even been a month since I came to this world and I was already level 10! My Status declared me to be a Hero so maybe that's why I had done so well so quickly. I still get embarrassed when people call me "Hero" but it is nice too, in a way.
Tomorrow we will finally fight monsters outside the dungeon. We accepted a request from the Adventurers Guild for the annihilation of a pack of Kobolds. That's normally a C-rank request and we're still D-ranked Adventurers but our knight companions are C-ranked so we've formed a six-person party with them to qualify for the subjugation. I want to show off how much I've improved to Louise... I'll exterminate those Kobolds, just you wait and see!
* * * * *
We were in the forest to the south of the Royal Capital, carefully approaching the cave where the pack of Kobolds had made its home. Because Kobolds have a very good sense of smell, like dogs, we had to be cautious and stay well downwind of the entrance.
"There are two Kobolds on guard at the entrance of the cave." Leonard explained in a low whisper as we peered through the undergrowth at the target area. "That's as we expected so we'll proceed as planned." He looked at Louise who nodded. "Two of us will deal with the guards then you drastically reduce the number of enemies by shooting Fire magic into the cave. The survivors will come charging out the entrance and you'll cut them down as they try to escape. Sounds okay?" We all nodded in agreement.
"Right then Louise, come with me and help me dispose with the lookouts." Aaron said. "After we've done that we're relying on you three Heroes to fill the cave with Fire magic." We nodded again. Aaron and Lousie moved off and disappeared from sight. We watched and watched, unable to spot them and then suddenly they stood up behind the two guard Kobolds and...
Slash. Stab. Aaron swung his sword and the Kobold's head leapt from its neck as the body collapsed. The Kobold Louise was standing behind was stabbed through the heart by her rapier and it too collapsed, killed instantly before it could raise the alarm. Watching the skills of two accomplished swordsmen took my breath away. Leonard, who had been teaching me the sword was similarly amazing. I put my hand on the hilt of my own sword, promising myself that someday I would be as skilled, possibly even more skilled than the three knights. I'd work hard to learn such skills from them, I swore to myself. Later though, we had our own job to do now the guards had been eliminated.
Kanon and Rio and myself immediately positioned ourselves in front of the cave and prepared to shoot Fire magic into the entrance together.
"Blazing orb of fire, burn our enemies to ash! Fireball!" chanted Kanon and Rio while I chanted, "Fierce-flaming arrow, pierce my enemy. Fire Arrow!"
Our combined Fireball and Fire Arrow magic punched into the cave followed by a terrific explosion.
"It's too much! Get out of the way!" Aaron's loud voice made us leap to the side as flame spewed back out of the cave's entrance with a loud roar. It seemed that we'd overdone our Fire magic by quite a lot. I rolled back onto my feet as the flames died down.
"Everyone OK?" I asked, but Rio and Kanon were already getting up, seemingly unharmed. I looked into the cave entrance, now burnt black but as expected I couldn't see any signs of surviving Kobolds. Leonard and Aaron and Louise came to us and peered into the cave as well.
"It looks like you've completed the subjugation request." Leonard said with satisfaction.
"Well, that level of Fire magic isn't going to leave any survivors, is it?" Aaron smiled.
"Yes, I can't detect any signs of life. I agree that the Kobolds have been exterminated." Louise finished.
"All three of you did really well." Leonard complimented us. "The Kobold pack was completely obliterated in one hit." Kanon and Rio cheered at Leonard's words.
"Well, we're all Heroes after all." I said deprecatingly. "Something like this should be easy for the likes of us." I tried to present a cool facade but inwardly I was delighted. Fighting real monsters outside a dungeon had done wonders for my confidence. Bring on the next challenge!
* * * * *
The next day we were headed towards the Adventurers Guild to take another subjugation request when I glimpsed a bracelet on Rio's wrist that I hadn't see before.
"Rio, what's with that?" I asked. Rio noticed where I was looking and smiled happily.
"Eh, what are you talking about?" Kanon inquired. "Let me see!"
Rio held up her arm, showing the bracelet off to Kanon and me.
"Actually, I got it from Leonard..." Rio said, blushing.
"Eeeeh, that's great!" Kanon squealed, hugging Rio.
"Yup." Rio agreed shyly.
"Wonderful. I'm soooo envious."
"It's okay." Rio said, fiddling with the bracelet. "I see Aaron's always looking at you, Kanon and, well..." Kanon wasn't averse to casting looks at the knight in question either, I knew. The two girls chattered on about their love interests while I considered the situation. Rio was calling Leonard-san "Leonard" now and he had given her this gift. I wished them both well, and wondered if gifting such accessories was a common mark of affection between men and women in this world. Maybe if I offered a similar bracelet to Louise...
The bracelet was made of a thin strip of silvery metal, about a centimetre in width with a translucent purple stone in the centre. It seemed to fit closely on Rio's wrist with no obvious catch or closure. It looked quite pretty. Rio explained that it was a magical tool, raising her physical abilities a little.
"I told Leonard that I was worried that I had less physical strength than Kaito and Kanon and he gave me this." Rio explained with a smile. Such a magical accessory would be expensive, I surmised. Leonard must really care for Rio.
(Knights' Conversation)
"Leonard, did you get her to accept that item?"
"Of course. When I told her it was a magic tool that would increase her physical abilities she was more than happy to put it on."
"Oh, so you sweet-talked her into wearing it?"
"No point denying it. But you're going to do the same with your Hero, aren't you?"
"Well, I don't know. The Heroes can use the Appraisal skill after all. If I try and get him to wear the same sort of thing as his companion he's likely to get suspicious and check it out. I'll just have to bide my time and take my chance when it presents itself."
"I simply whispered the right words in Rio's ear and got her to put that bracelet on her wrist herself. Surely you can find a way to assuage his doubts and get him to do the same?"
"You really are a bad man."
"Totally disreputable. A deep-dyed villain, just like Aaron and yourself, of course."
"You had it easy though, didn't you? Your target was a woman. A man giving such an accessory as a gift to a woman is not strange. Me, on the other hand, it's going to be a struggle to get Kaito to accept it willingly."
"Come now, you're a woman renowned for your ability to seduce any man you set your eye on. The boy's smitten with you, how difficult would it be for you to succeed in your assigned task?"
"Maybe you're right, I should really make an effort. The lad's easy to flatter and not too smart, after all..."
"Yeah, I think so too. Persuade your Hero to wear a Bracelet of Slavery like I did with Rio and we've nearly achieved our mission. That means promotion is guaranteed for the three of us."
The future of the Three Heroes is darkening...
Kanon and Rio and I along with our knight companions went into the dungeon again and again to level up and eventually we reached the 25th floor. We had gotten to the point where any of us could easily defeat a single ogre we encountered within the dungeon. It was then that our knight companions suggested we try facing monsters outside the dungeon as Adventurers normally did.
As the three knights explained, the monsters found in a dungeon and the monsters found outside were different and we needed to learn the methods of fighting and subjugating such monsters. Of course the only way to learn was to actually do it. The dungeon was like fighting in a game and it was fun but I expect fighting monsters out in the real world will be more challenging.
As for my Status, it now looks like this:
[Name] Kaito . Saitou
[Age] 17
[Type] A Hero from another world
[Level] 10
[Fitness] 1010
[Magical Power] 978
[Attack power] 988
[Defense force] 961
[Agility] 953
[Skill] Appraisal, Item Box, Holy Swordsman, Fire Magic, Water Magic, Earth Magic, Wind Magic, Light Magic, Lightning Magic, Ice magic
Amazingly my physical fitness exceeds 1000. I had been told that normally any Status value cannot exceed 1000 except for extraordinary capable individuals so seeing that figure in my Status gave me a very good feeling. Right now only I have such a high rating but both Kanon and Rio have been levelling up too so I expect, since they're Heroes like me their own fitness stats will soon also exceed 1000.
It was becoming harder to raise my level though, each increase was taking more effort than the earlier steps. Still it hadn't even been a month since I came to this world and I was already level 10! My Status declared me to be a Hero so maybe that's why I had done so well so quickly. I still get embarrassed when people call me "Hero" but it is nice too, in a way.
Tomorrow we will finally fight monsters outside the dungeon. We accepted a request from the Adventurers Guild for the annihilation of a pack of Kobolds. That's normally a C-rank request and we're still D-ranked Adventurers but our knight companions are C-ranked so we've formed a six-person party with them to qualify for the subjugation. I want to show off how much I've improved to Louise... I'll exterminate those Kobolds, just you wait and see!
* * * * *
We were in the forest to the south of the Royal Capital, carefully approaching the cave where the pack of Kobolds had made its home. Because Kobolds have a very good sense of smell, like dogs, we had to be cautious and stay well downwind of the entrance.
"There are two Kobolds on guard at the entrance of the cave." Leonard explained in a low whisper as we peered through the undergrowth at the target area. "That's as we expected so we'll proceed as planned." He looked at Louise who nodded. "Two of us will deal with the guards then you drastically reduce the number of enemies by shooting Fire magic into the cave. The survivors will come charging out the entrance and you'll cut them down as they try to escape. Sounds okay?" We all nodded in agreement.
"Right then Louise, come with me and help me dispose with the lookouts." Aaron said. "After we've done that we're relying on you three Heroes to fill the cave with Fire magic." We nodded again. Aaron and Lousie moved off and disappeared from sight. We watched and watched, unable to spot them and then suddenly they stood up behind the two guard Kobolds and...
Slash. Stab. Aaron swung his sword and the Kobold's head leapt from its neck as the body collapsed. The Kobold Louise was standing behind was stabbed through the heart by her rapier and it too collapsed, killed instantly before it could raise the alarm. Watching the skills of two accomplished swordsmen took my breath away. Leonard, who had been teaching me the sword was similarly amazing. I put my hand on the hilt of my own sword, promising myself that someday I would be as skilled, possibly even more skilled than the three knights. I'd work hard to learn such skills from them, I swore to myself. Later though, we had our own job to do now the guards had been eliminated.
Kanon and Rio and myself immediately positioned ourselves in front of the cave and prepared to shoot Fire magic into the entrance together.
"Blazing orb of fire, burn our enemies to ash! Fireball!" chanted Kanon and Rio while I chanted, "Fierce-flaming arrow, pierce my enemy. Fire Arrow!"
Our combined Fireball and Fire Arrow magic punched into the cave followed by a terrific explosion.
"It's too much! Get out of the way!" Aaron's loud voice made us leap to the side as flame spewed back out of the cave's entrance with a loud roar. It seemed that we'd overdone our Fire magic by quite a lot. I rolled back onto my feet as the flames died down.
"Everyone OK?" I asked, but Rio and Kanon were already getting up, seemingly unharmed. I looked into the cave entrance, now burnt black but as expected I couldn't see any signs of surviving Kobolds. Leonard and Aaron and Louise came to us and peered into the cave as well.
"It looks like you've completed the subjugation request." Leonard said with satisfaction.
"Well, that level of Fire magic isn't going to leave any survivors, is it?" Aaron smiled.
"Yes, I can't detect any signs of life. I agree that the Kobolds have been exterminated." Louise finished.
"All three of you did really well." Leonard complimented us. "The Kobold pack was completely obliterated in one hit." Kanon and Rio cheered at Leonard's words.
"Well, we're all Heroes after all." I said deprecatingly. "Something like this should be easy for the likes of us." I tried to present a cool facade but inwardly I was delighted. Fighting real monsters outside a dungeon had done wonders for my confidence. Bring on the next challenge!
* * * * *
The next day we were headed towards the Adventurers Guild to take another subjugation request when I glimpsed a bracelet on Rio's wrist that I hadn't see before.
"Rio, what's with that?" I asked. Rio noticed where I was looking and smiled happily.
"Eh, what are you talking about?" Kanon inquired. "Let me see!"
Rio held up her arm, showing the bracelet off to Kanon and me.
"Actually, I got it from Leonard..." Rio said, blushing.
"Eeeeh, that's great!" Kanon squealed, hugging Rio.
"Yup." Rio agreed shyly.
"Wonderful. I'm soooo envious."
"It's okay." Rio said, fiddling with the bracelet. "I see Aaron's always looking at you, Kanon and, well..." Kanon wasn't averse to casting looks at the knight in question either, I knew. The two girls chattered on about their love interests while I considered the situation. Rio was calling Leonard-san "Leonard" now and he had given her this gift. I wished them both well, and wondered if gifting such accessories was a common mark of affection between men and women in this world. Maybe if I offered a similar bracelet to Louise...
The bracelet was made of a thin strip of silvery metal, about a centimetre in width with a translucent purple stone in the centre. It seemed to fit closely on Rio's wrist with no obvious catch or closure. It looked quite pretty. Rio explained that it was a magical tool, raising her physical abilities a little.
"I told Leonard that I was worried that I had less physical strength than Kaito and Kanon and he gave me this." Rio explained with a smile. Such a magical accessory would be expensive, I surmised. Leonard must really care for Rio.
(Knights' Conversation)
"Leonard, did you get her to accept that item?"
"Of course. When I told her it was a magic tool that would increase her physical abilities she was more than happy to put it on."
"Oh, so you sweet-talked her into wearing it?"
"No point denying it. But you're going to do the same with your Hero, aren't you?"
"Well, I don't know. The Heroes can use the Appraisal skill after all. If I try and get him to wear the same sort of thing as his companion he's likely to get suspicious and check it out. I'll just have to bide my time and take my chance when it presents itself."
"I simply whispered the right words in Rio's ear and got her to put that bracelet on her wrist herself. Surely you can find a way to assuage his doubts and get him to do the same?"
"You really are a bad man."
"Totally disreputable. A deep-dyed villain, just like Aaron and yourself, of course."
"You had it easy though, didn't you? Your target was a woman. A man giving such an accessory as a gift to a woman is not strange. Me, on the other hand, it's going to be a struggle to get Kaito to accept it willingly."
"Come now, you're a woman renowned for your ability to seduce any man you set your eye on. The boy's smitten with you, how difficult would it be for you to succeed in your assigned task?"
"Maybe you're right, I should really make an effort. The lad's easy to flatter and not too smart, after all..."
"Yeah, I think so too. Persuade your Hero to wear a Bracelet of Slavery like I did with Rio and we've nearly achieved our mission. That means promotion is guaranteed for the three of us."
The future of the Three Heroes is darkening...
Saturday, 19 January 2019
Ch 24 Sakyubasu ni Tensei Shita no de Miruku o Shiborimasu (Because I Reincarnated as a Succubus, I’ll Squeeze Out Milk)
Ch 24 -- The Truth About Levelling Up
~ What has gone before ~
· My second day of life in a different world began.
· My curfew is at 17:00.
* * * * *
"This is the second day of your reincarnation, Richy-chan. Do you feel any different, is your health the same?" Sumirena-san asked as she poured more alcohol for Minoko.
"Well, let me see..." I had been a man, now I was a woman. I had been reincarnated as a demonic creature, a Succubus and I was no longer human. So, different, yes definitely. I'd had a night's sleep and woken up and it wasn't a dream or a nightmare, it was real so I had to accept it. Rather than fretting over it and stressing myself out about my new body I had given up worrying about it.
Even though I said that I had given up, it was still a problem. I've seen my new form naked. The weights on my chest were distracting and frustrating. Going to the toilet in the forest near the little hut had made the changes to my body's plumbing down there very clear to me and thinking about THAT brought my attention to the fact I needed to go and urinate again sometime soon. I wasn't sick though, in fact I felt better than usual. Sumirena-san was still looking at me, expecting an answer so I said "No problems."
"I'm glad. Myself I often have a bad time on the second day so it's a relief to know you're not experiencing it the same as I do." she answered.
What is it about the second day? Her comment confused me, what was she talking about? I almost asked her outright and then decided I probably didn't want to know the answer.
"Oh, one thing did happen." I suddenly remembered.
"What is it?" she said, looking at my crotch again for some reason.
"Last night, some time after the bath I checked my Status and my level had gone up to 2 but I don't know what caused it to go up."
"Oh, your level. It increased? My goodness, well well..." Sumirena-san's reaction suggested to me she knew something about it.
"Possibly you know something about how Succubi level up?" I asked.
"Well, I suppose, yes I do know a little about it." Sumirena-san put down the bowl Minoko had been drinking out of and settled back down on her stool. "I think I mentioned yesterday that I knew someone else besides Richy-chan who is a Succubus and she told me once about what levelling up entailed for her."
"So can you tell me what it was!?" I was excited to find out, to understand how and why I had levelled up myself last night.
"I don't mind informing you but from what I know of you, Richy-chan, it's definitely going to come as a shock when you hear what I have to say. Is that OK for you? After all levelling up for a Succubus is kind of a special process."
I thought about what Sumirena-san had said for a few moments. It sounded worrisome, but- "Still, it's about who I am now I'm a Succubus. I want to know." I took a deep breath. "I have to know." I tried to look brave as Sumirena-san studied my face keenly, then she nodded.
"Very well then." she turned to the bar counter and gestured to her younger brother. "Erim, you come here. This concerns you too." Erim had told me he was studying the ecology of demons and it seemed Sumirena-san was taking this opportunity to pass on some of what she had learned to further his education. Erim and myself lined up before Sumirena-san as she sat on her stool.
"This information, it's not just about Richy-chan." She sighed. "It will be very painful for Erim too."
"For me too?" Erim inquired.
"Yes, it depends on the feelings you have for each other. In the worst case you'll reject each other and it may be impossible for you to return to being friends like you have been. Are you still ready to hear the truth? "
Is learning this information really that serious? Knowing how I level up as a Succubus balanced against being friends with Erim, well if I had to choose, then... I didn't realise how hard I had been clasping my hands in worry until Erim reached over and gently patted them.
"Rest assured." he said, smiling. "No matter what truth my older sister reveals to you, to us my feelings for Richy-san will not change." He patted my hands once again. "Please trust me."
"Erim ......" I couldn't say anything more.
"Well said." Sumirena-san went on. "Believe in your younger brother, Richy-chan."
Believe in Erim? I had believed in him, I trusted him, could I trust him further? Yes, I decided.
"...I believe in him. Please continue." I said firmly, unclasping my hands.
Sumirena-san and Erim both said "Thank you." but it was I who was truly thankful to them.
Sumirena-san began to reveal her knowledge of Succubi to us. "First, the level of a Succubus represents magical power. It increases with each level up."
"Magical power? Isn't that the same as Elves?" Erim inquired.
Sumirena-san shook her head. "In the case of Elves, the strength of their magical power has a quality and purity of its own, different to that of Succubi." She smiled at Erim. "It's a bit like the taste of the excellent food you cook, it's not the quantity of food you serve to our customers that brings them back to this tavern time after time."
"No, what is more clearly different from Elves," Sumirena-san continued, "is how the experience points needed for a level up are achieved. Elves accumulate experience points through training and study and learning but a Succubus gains experience points in a totally different manner."
"If Succubi are like the stories I've heard I've got a bad feeling about this..." I muttered, dreading the worst. Succubus and experience, well what sort of "experience" counts towards levelling up for a Succubus like me?
"Well, your guess is almost correct but it's more complicated than that." Sumirena-san said, her face stern. "Anyone can see their own level as a number and see when it increases. It's very clear and easy to understand. Can you take a look now at your own Status, Richy-chan? "
"Oh, yes." I concentrated and my Status started to appear, floating before my eyes. My job title was as usual [unemployed] and the other items hadn't changed either.
"Look at the level item, did you say it was something like (0/2) or (1/2)?"
"I am seeing: level 2 (0/2). Yesterday it was level 1 (0/1)." I explained.
Sumirena-san nodded. "As I thought. You see, Richy-chan, the first number is the experience points you currently have and the second number is the number you'll need to accumulate to level up again." Sumirena-san caught my puzzled expression and continued. "Yesterday you were at level 1 and the Status read (0/1). When you, ahem, earned an experience point the Status message would go up to (1/1), your level went up to 2 as you can see now and the message reset showing you the requirements for another level up, in this case to level 3. You need two more experience points to do that."
"So the next time when it reaches (2/2) my level will go up to 3 and my Status display will show (0/3)? " I asked.
"No," Sumirena-san said, "The Succubus I know told me that the amount of experience points necessary for a level up doubles on each step. The next display after you level up to 3 will be (0/4) and I expect the one after that will be (0/8)." So it was the same as a typical RPG, levelling up becomes harder and harder the higher you go, I mused.
"So, what does this figure actually show?" I asked. What did the experience points I needed for levelling up mean and why had I levelled up overnight?
"Let me check some things with you before I go into that, Richy-chan. How many men did you encounter yesterday?"
Ummm... "Should I include the Orc in those numbers?"
"Tell me regardless of their race please."
"Well," I went through yesterday's events in my memory, "there was a single Orc, four shitty Adventurers, oh and I encountered a guardsman at the town's gate, plus Erim of course, so that makes ummm a total of seven people. Men, that is."
"Considering the time when you levelled up, the Orc, the guard on duty isn't..." Sumirena-san mumbled to herself, concentrating deeply and ignoring us for the moment. "Some of the Adventurers, hmmm..." She started counting on her fingers.
Left to our own devices for the moment Erim I looked at each other. I tilted my head, puzzled while he smiled reassuringly.
"... Haa. So that's how it is." Sumirena-san finally said, raising her eyebrows. Her expression... I started wringing my hands again.
"So tell me, why did my level go up?" I couldn't bear the suspense as Sumirena-san sat silently for a moment.
"The experience points of a...Succubus," Sumirena-san explained, not meeting my eyes, "are acquired by exploiting fresh targets." What did she mean? "For experience points only one point can be obtained from any person. To go from level 1 to level 2 you needed an experience point from a single person and you got that last night."
"What do you mean by a 'fresh target'?" I didn't understand...
"Once you get a point from a target it means you can never get another point from that target ever again, even if you repeat the same things with them over and over." Sumirena-san said, further confusing me.
"I still don't understand what you're telling me. What is a 'target'?"
"I'm talking about men, well males." Sumirena-san said.
"Men? If I get a man to do something I get a point?" What did they have to do?
Sumirena-san sighed and then said out loud, "Ejaculate."
"Is that all... wait?" What? She couldn't have said...
"Ejaculate. You know, splush!" Sumirena-san repeated what she said with a sound effect, to make it clearer to the idiot she was explaining things to.
"Eh, w- wait... Please! I have not done anything perverted!" Erim shouted, declaring his innocence.
"It's true!" I added vehemently. "Even when I was attacked by the Orc and the Adventurers Minoko intervened and saved us before anything happened to me."
"Calm down, calm down, you do not have to have done anything directly, Richy-chan." she glanced at her younger brother. "Whether directly or indirectly," Sumirena-san explained, "if you, ummm, are responsible for an ejaculation in a male, no matter where you are, that event is converted into an experience point for you, Richy-san."
"So you're saying I was a trigger for..." I stopped, unable to say it.
"Basically Richy-chan, you were someone's wet-dream material last night and..." Sumirena-san was going to continue her explanation but I threw up my hands.
"Stoooooop! I get it! You don't need to say any more! No more!" Because I'd been reincarnated as a Succubus I had been expecting (and dreading) Sumirena-san to tell me that "experience" for me meant having sex. As I calmed down a bit I understood that it actually did involve sex but not totally the way I had imagined it to be. But what about last night, when I had gained an experience point and levelled up? Wet dreams, uh, did someone do that kind of thing? Beating off, masturbating while thinking of me? I shuddered. That felt worse, somehow than the very unpleasant idea of me having sex with a man at all. So who could it have been? I counted on my fingers, much as Sumirena-san had done before.
The Orc? Nope, because Minoko ate him before he could rape me. The Adventurers, well two of the four were seriously injured and wouldn't be able to do such a thing in their condition. The remaining two, they were terrified by Minoko and certainly wouldn't be excited in that way by me. Guardsman-san, he said he was on a night shift so he'd be on duty until morning and so he couldn't have done it. Six out of the seven possibilities were eliminated, there was only one left. I looked at the finger still standing in my hand like a... then turned my head to look at Erim's face, the sweat running down his grey bloodless features like a waterfall.
* * * * *
Succubus 101: Maths
Question: Since the number of fresh 'targets' a Succubus requires doubles for each levelling up, derive a formula expressing the total number of 'targets' required to reach a given level.
Answer: level n = (2 to the power (n-1)) minus 1 'targets'.
For example, Richy-san requires three 'targets' in total to reach level 3, seven 'targets' to reach level 4, fifteen 'targets' to reach level 5 and so on.
Supplementary question for extra credit: How many 'targets' would Richy-san need to reach Level 100?
Answer: Level 100 would require 63,382,530,011,411,470,074,835,602,687 'targets'...
~ What has gone before ~
· My second day of life in a different world began.
· My curfew is at 17:00.
* * * * *
"This is the second day of your reincarnation, Richy-chan. Do you feel any different, is your health the same?" Sumirena-san asked as she poured more alcohol for Minoko.
"Well, let me see..." I had been a man, now I was a woman. I had been reincarnated as a demonic creature, a Succubus and I was no longer human. So, different, yes definitely. I'd had a night's sleep and woken up and it wasn't a dream or a nightmare, it was real so I had to accept it. Rather than fretting over it and stressing myself out about my new body I had given up worrying about it.
Even though I said that I had given up, it was still a problem. I've seen my new form naked. The weights on my chest were distracting and frustrating. Going to the toilet in the forest near the little hut had made the changes to my body's plumbing down there very clear to me and thinking about THAT brought my attention to the fact I needed to go and urinate again sometime soon. I wasn't sick though, in fact I felt better than usual. Sumirena-san was still looking at me, expecting an answer so I said "No problems."
"I'm glad. Myself I often have a bad time on the second day so it's a relief to know you're not experiencing it the same as I do." she answered.
What is it about the second day? Her comment confused me, what was she talking about? I almost asked her outright and then decided I probably didn't want to know the answer.
"Oh, one thing did happen." I suddenly remembered.
"What is it?" she said, looking at my crotch again for some reason.
"Last night, some time after the bath I checked my Status and my level had gone up to 2 but I don't know what caused it to go up."
"Oh, your level. It increased? My goodness, well well..." Sumirena-san's reaction suggested to me she knew something about it.
"Possibly you know something about how Succubi level up?" I asked.
"Well, I suppose, yes I do know a little about it." Sumirena-san put down the bowl Minoko had been drinking out of and settled back down on her stool. "I think I mentioned yesterday that I knew someone else besides Richy-chan who is a Succubus and she told me once about what levelling up entailed for her."
"So can you tell me what it was!?" I was excited to find out, to understand how and why I had levelled up myself last night.
"I don't mind informing you but from what I know of you, Richy-chan, it's definitely going to come as a shock when you hear what I have to say. Is that OK for you? After all levelling up for a Succubus is kind of a special process."
I thought about what Sumirena-san had said for a few moments. It sounded worrisome, but- "Still, it's about who I am now I'm a Succubus. I want to know." I took a deep breath. "I have to know." I tried to look brave as Sumirena-san studied my face keenly, then she nodded.
"Very well then." she turned to the bar counter and gestured to her younger brother. "Erim, you come here. This concerns you too." Erim had told me he was studying the ecology of demons and it seemed Sumirena-san was taking this opportunity to pass on some of what she had learned to further his education. Erim and myself lined up before Sumirena-san as she sat on her stool.
"This information, it's not just about Richy-chan." She sighed. "It will be very painful for Erim too."
"For me too?" Erim inquired.
"Yes, it depends on the feelings you have for each other. In the worst case you'll reject each other and it may be impossible for you to return to being friends like you have been. Are you still ready to hear the truth? "
Is learning this information really that serious? Knowing how I level up as a Succubus balanced against being friends with Erim, well if I had to choose, then... I didn't realise how hard I had been clasping my hands in worry until Erim reached over and gently patted them.
"Rest assured." he said, smiling. "No matter what truth my older sister reveals to you, to us my feelings for Richy-san will not change." He patted my hands once again. "Please trust me."
"Erim ......" I couldn't say anything more.
"Well said." Sumirena-san went on. "Believe in your younger brother, Richy-chan."
Believe in Erim? I had believed in him, I trusted him, could I trust him further? Yes, I decided.
"...I believe in him. Please continue." I said firmly, unclasping my hands.
Sumirena-san and Erim both said "Thank you." but it was I who was truly thankful to them.
Sumirena-san began to reveal her knowledge of Succubi to us. "First, the level of a Succubus represents magical power. It increases with each level up."
"Magical power? Isn't that the same as Elves?" Erim inquired.
Sumirena-san shook her head. "In the case of Elves, the strength of their magical power has a quality and purity of its own, different to that of Succubi." She smiled at Erim. "It's a bit like the taste of the excellent food you cook, it's not the quantity of food you serve to our customers that brings them back to this tavern time after time."
"No, what is more clearly different from Elves," Sumirena-san continued, "is how the experience points needed for a level up are achieved. Elves accumulate experience points through training and study and learning but a Succubus gains experience points in a totally different manner."
"If Succubi are like the stories I've heard I've got a bad feeling about this..." I muttered, dreading the worst. Succubus and experience, well what sort of "experience" counts towards levelling up for a Succubus like me?
"Well, your guess is almost correct but it's more complicated than that." Sumirena-san said, her face stern. "Anyone can see their own level as a number and see when it increases. It's very clear and easy to understand. Can you take a look now at your own Status, Richy-chan? "
"Oh, yes." I concentrated and my Status started to appear, floating before my eyes. My job title was as usual [unemployed] and the other items hadn't changed either.
"Look at the level item, did you say it was something like (0/2) or (1/2)?"
"I am seeing: level 2 (0/2). Yesterday it was level 1 (0/1)." I explained.
Sumirena-san nodded. "As I thought. You see, Richy-chan, the first number is the experience points you currently have and the second number is the number you'll need to accumulate to level up again." Sumirena-san caught my puzzled expression and continued. "Yesterday you were at level 1 and the Status read (0/1). When you, ahem, earned an experience point the Status message would go up to (1/1), your level went up to 2 as you can see now and the message reset showing you the requirements for another level up, in this case to level 3. You need two more experience points to do that."
"So the next time when it reaches (2/2) my level will go up to 3 and my Status display will show (0/3)? " I asked.
"No," Sumirena-san said, "The Succubus I know told me that the amount of experience points necessary for a level up doubles on each step. The next display after you level up to 3 will be (0/4) and I expect the one after that will be (0/8)." So it was the same as a typical RPG, levelling up becomes harder and harder the higher you go, I mused.
"So, what does this figure actually show?" I asked. What did the experience points I needed for levelling up mean and why had I levelled up overnight?
"Let me check some things with you before I go into that, Richy-chan. How many men did you encounter yesterday?"
Ummm... "Should I include the Orc in those numbers?"
"Tell me regardless of their race please."
"Well," I went through yesterday's events in my memory, "there was a single Orc, four shitty Adventurers, oh and I encountered a guardsman at the town's gate, plus Erim of course, so that makes ummm a total of seven people. Men, that is."
"Considering the time when you levelled up, the Orc, the guard on duty isn't..." Sumirena-san mumbled to herself, concentrating deeply and ignoring us for the moment. "Some of the Adventurers, hmmm..." She started counting on her fingers.
Left to our own devices for the moment Erim I looked at each other. I tilted my head, puzzled while he smiled reassuringly.
"... Haa. So that's how it is." Sumirena-san finally said, raising her eyebrows. Her expression... I started wringing my hands again.
"So tell me, why did my level go up?" I couldn't bear the suspense as Sumirena-san sat silently for a moment.
"The experience points of a...Succubus," Sumirena-san explained, not meeting my eyes, "are acquired by exploiting fresh targets." What did she mean? "For experience points only one point can be obtained from any person. To go from level 1 to level 2 you needed an experience point from a single person and you got that last night."
"What do you mean by a 'fresh target'?" I didn't understand...
"Once you get a point from a target it means you can never get another point from that target ever again, even if you repeat the same things with them over and over." Sumirena-san said, further confusing me.
"I still don't understand what you're telling me. What is a 'target'?"
"I'm talking about men, well males." Sumirena-san said.
"Men? If I get a man to do something I get a point?" What did they have to do?
Sumirena-san sighed and then said out loud, "Ejaculate."
"Is that all... wait?" What? She couldn't have said...
"Ejaculate. You know, splush!" Sumirena-san repeated what she said with a sound effect, to make it clearer to the idiot she was explaining things to.
"Eh, w- wait... Please! I have not done anything perverted!" Erim shouted, declaring his innocence.
"It's true!" I added vehemently. "Even when I was attacked by the Orc and the Adventurers Minoko intervened and saved us before anything happened to me."
"Calm down, calm down, you do not have to have done anything directly, Richy-chan." she glanced at her younger brother. "Whether directly or indirectly," Sumirena-san explained, "if you, ummm, are responsible for an ejaculation in a male, no matter where you are, that event is converted into an experience point for you, Richy-san."
"So you're saying I was a trigger for..." I stopped, unable to say it.
"Basically Richy-chan, you were someone's wet-dream material last night and..." Sumirena-san was going to continue her explanation but I threw up my hands.
"Stoooooop! I get it! You don't need to say any more! No more!" Because I'd been reincarnated as a Succubus I had been expecting (and dreading) Sumirena-san to tell me that "experience" for me meant having sex. As I calmed down a bit I understood that it actually did involve sex but not totally the way I had imagined it to be. But what about last night, when I had gained an experience point and levelled up? Wet dreams, uh, did someone do that kind of thing? Beating off, masturbating while thinking of me? I shuddered. That felt worse, somehow than the very unpleasant idea of me having sex with a man at all. So who could it have been? I counted on my fingers, much as Sumirena-san had done before.
The Orc? Nope, because Minoko ate him before he could rape me. The Adventurers, well two of the four were seriously injured and wouldn't be able to do such a thing in their condition. The remaining two, they were terrified by Minoko and certainly wouldn't be excited in that way by me. Guardsman-san, he said he was on a night shift so he'd be on duty until morning and so he couldn't have done it. Six out of the seven possibilities were eliminated, there was only one left. I looked at the finger still standing in my hand like a... then turned my head to look at Erim's face, the sweat running down his grey bloodless features like a waterfall.
* * * * *
Succubus 101: Maths
Question: Since the number of fresh 'targets' a Succubus requires doubles for each levelling up, derive a formula expressing the total number of 'targets' required to reach a given level.
Answer: level n = (2 to the power (n-1)) minus 1 'targets'.
For example, Richy-san requires three 'targets' in total to reach level 3, seven 'targets' to reach level 4, fifteen 'targets' to reach level 5 and so on.
Supplementary question for extra credit: How many 'targets' would Richy-san need to reach Level 100?
Answer: Level 100 would require 63,382,530,011,411,470,074,835,602,687 'targets'...
Wednesday, 16 January 2019
Ch 121 Tondemo Skill de Isekai Hourou Meshi
Ch 121 -- Secret Drinking Exposed (second part)
"Ignore those noisy Goddesses for the moment while I introduce myself. They call me Hephaestus, the God of Blacksmiths." The deeper male voice resounded in my head.
"Me, I'm the God of War. Name's Vulcan." The first male voice chimed in.
Oh, the two Gods the Goddesses warned me about, the ones who liked to drink. The secret was out, it seemed.
"You're making offerings to the ladies, aincha? In that case we want offerings too. Booze, of course." Hephaestos-sama got right to the point.
"Lots of other-world booze and we want it right now." Vulcan-sama followed up. Hey, these people (gods) are really selfish and demanding, aren't they?
"Muu-," Deplorable-sama screeched, "you guys, what are you doing butting in here? We don't get these offerings for free, you know!"
"Yes, we have granted this other-world-guy our divine blessings in return for him making offerings to us once a week." Kishar-sama explained. "It's the rules."
"That's right." Agni-sama added. "You guys haven't done anything for him so you can't get anything from him, see?"
"...you two, can't get." Ruka-sama declared.
Just as I had decided that the God of Blacksmiths and God of War were being selfish, the Goddesses stopped bitching at each other and jumped in unnecessarily to explain how things worked to their fellow dieties. I had a bad feeling about this...
"Hou, so that's how it is. Hmmm..." the God of War mused, "Okay then, we'll give our divine protection to the other-world-guy too. That way we'll be entitled to get booze from him, right? Whaddya think, Blacksmith God?"
I now had a really bad feeling about this.
"Sounds good to me, War God. Right then, here's my blessing-"
I couldn't begin to decribe how bad I was feeling about how this was going. I was going to receive yet more divine blessings I didn't want from a couple of musclebrained Gods just so I'd have to offer them booze on a regular basis. Really. Not. Want.
"Hold it, hold it, hold it, I do not need any more blessings." I burst out before they could do anything.
"No? You refuse our divine protection~!" the God of Blacksmiths exploded. "To say that to the likes of us? In the name of Heaven I will punish you! Mega-hammer chastisement strike-"
Woah, woah!! He seemed a bit angry for some reason.
"Wait, what I said was inexcusable, I should have been clearer, oh mighty God of Blacksmiths." I grovelled (insincerely). "Why don't you give your blessing to my contracted monster, this Slime here since I've got all the divine blessings I really need for myself. I will of course make offerings to you in return for the bestowal of your divine blessing." I pointed to Sui -chan who was sleeping in the futon on the bed. S- Sorry, Sui...
"Well, I see, so that's what you meant." The God of Blacksmiths deflated. "All right, I understand. I'll give my divine blessing to that Slime." There was a pause. "Right, it's done."
"I'm next then." the God of War announced. "Do you want me to grant my divine protection to this contracted monster too?"
I thought quickly, Sui had already received the blessing from the God of Blacksmiths but somehow I didn't want darling Sui to have the God of War's protection too. She was enough of a battle maniac as it was, how she would be with that particular blessing... I shuddered. Too risky. And I didn't want it myself, either. Safety first, after all. I might turn into a battle maniac too and get killed. Nope, not gonna happen. Dora-chan didn't have any divine blessings though and he was a Dragon so...
"M- Maybe my other contracted monster, a Pixie Dragon..." I offered hopefully. I could go down to the beast stables and get him, bring him up here if the God of War was willing to wait...
"I understand." There was a pause. "Ohoho, you also have a Fenrir as a contracted monster? Then I'll share my divine protection between the two of them. They're both creatures that are compatible with my blessing, after all." The God of War knew about Fer somehow? "It is done." Ah... So Fer and Dora-chan have both received the God of War's blessing.
I figured Fer would be OK with this God's blessing, after all he liked to fight. Dora-chan I didn't know about but Fer seemed to think that Pixie Dragons were good fighters too so it shouldn't cause him any problems. Maybe.
"Fuahahaha, they're received a great blessing even if I say so myself." the God of War went on to explain. "My protection provides a 50 percent boost to their Status when fighting." 50 percent boost? That much? "Of course it makes them more belligerent for a time but then again who doesn't like fighting? Fuahahaha!" I don't, I thought to myself. I had dodged a bullet, it seemed. It would have been helpful to know that at the start, God of War-sama. Still, what's done is done, I decided. Time to open up the Net Super and order up what everyone wants.
"Now that's out of the way, I wanna drink some booze in return for granting my protection." the God of Blacksmiths announced.
"What he said. Booze, liquor preferably, something strong, like me. Fuahahaha!" the God of War added.
These two are super-annoying... Just then Ninril-sama interrupted again.
"My fellow Gods, there are rules about the offerings you can receive from this other-world-guy, you know?"
"That's right." Kishar-sama explained. "To be fair to everyone there's a limit of up to three silver coins in value."
"Oh yeah. No cheating, no trying to get more from the other-world-guy than the rest of us get. Arguing with him is right out or else he'll stop making offerings completely." Agni-sama added.
"Don't be greedy. Up to three silver coins each." Ruka-sama's summary was blunt and to the point as usual.
The Goddesses laid out the rules quite clearly, didn't they? Especially the favouritism thing. I decided to sweeten the deal for the two Gods who were new to the offerings setup.
"That's how it is, Vulcan-sama and Hephaestus-sama." I explained. "Offerings worth up to three silver coins each keeps it fair for all the others. However just for today I have increased this to four silver coins to apologise for being delayed in making my offerings as I had promised."
"Che-, how annoying but-" I heard the God of Blacksmiths sigh. "Very well, today we get offerings worth four silver coins, right? In that case I want to try lots of different kinds of other-world booze since I don't know what I'd like."
"I want to try various sorts of liquor too, like Heffy says." Heffy? Ah, Hephaestus-sama. "Just pick some booze for us will ya? Up to four silver coins worth each." The Goddesses were spot-on when they told me Vulcan-sama and Hephaestus-sama would want offerings of booze...
"Yeah, just pick some for me too." Heffy- oops, Hephaestus-sama agreed.
"Haa~" Agni-sama sighed. "I give up. Now these two have shown up you're stuck with them, other-world-guy. Oh, and can I have what they're getting?" She didn't seem that concerned about how this was going to affect me.
"It looks that way. We didn't want these two to get involved but... Sorreee." Kishar-sama said insincerely.
"These two, nose too good." Ruka-sama added. Just like that the Goddesses gave up and left me holding the bag. Thanks, all-powerful Deplorable-samas. I added my own sigh to the collection from Heaven and bowed to the inevitable. Booze, they all wanted booze right?
I started with cans of beer, one of each of a different type, a well-recommended dry lager, a premium beer and a dark stout, each costing 2 copper coins. A 720ml bottle of top-quality sake was a silver coin, a 700ml bottle of imported whisky another silver coin and a 640ml bottle of brandy for yet another silver coin. A bit of searching in the Net Super located a reasonably-priced bottle of Spanish red wine for the remaining four copper coins.
I got three of each for the three drunkards, oops deities who had requested booze as their offerings, total cost twelve silver coins.
"Finally is Ruka-sama."
"Same as before. Sweets and food. Extra food."
Coming right up. Something warm perhaps... ah, the beef bowl, I had it ready anyway. How much should I charge? I know it's cheap enough back in my own world but here? I put the price at five copper coins. Did I have any gyoza left? Ah, yes, here they were. I put out a dozen gyoza and set the price at five coppers too. Side dishes, I'd get them from the Net Super, lessee, a platter of assorted kushikatsu mixed meat and vegetable skewers with dipping sauce, there were chicken, peaches, scallions and liver. I added a couple of fishcakes and some deep-fried marinated meat tatsukage. The rest of the offering for Ruka-sama was bread and confectionery as usual.
Yosh, I had everything. I set up all the offerings on cardboard altars as usual, six this time thanks to the over-sensitive noses of a certain God of Blacksmiths and a certain God of War. I realised as I lined up the assorted lotions and tubes on Kisha-sama's altar that she'd need a little help with the items I had chosen for her.
"Kishar-sama, I'll explain how you should use your offerings. Oh, can you can see them as I point them out?"
"Yes, I can see them perfectly." she reassured me so I continued.
"The facial cleansing foam here is squeezed out this way," I demonstrated, "and lathered up with some warm water to wash your face. Rinse it off thoroughly afterwards though. After washing and drying your face use the mosturising lotion here. Put a spot of lotion about the size of..." ummm, umm, what does a 100-yen coin look like in this world? ah, "the size of a silver coin on your fingers and apply it gently to your face. Repeat if your skin is particularly dry."
After putting the skin lotion back on the altar I held up the tube of eye wrinkle cream. "Just a small amount on the tip of your finger and apply it around your eyes. You might want to put a little more on at night before you sleep." Do Goddesses sleep? I didn't know but that's what the instructions on the back of the box said to do. The rest of it was based on memories from watching my sister hard at work fighting the onis of bad skin and acne with her arsenal of chemical weaponry in the bathroom cupboard. As I put the tube back on Kishar-sama's altar my eye caught the bottles and cans on three of the other altars. I should maybe give some advice about them too.
"Oh yes, I should explain to Hephaestus-sama, Vulcan-sama and Agni-sama about their offerings. Please be careful as the alcohol content is high in them." I said, pointing out the bottles of sake, brandy and whisky.
"Because they're strong you should pour them into a glass and drink them like that, maybe with some ice. It's similar stuff to the liquor I offered up to Agni-sama last time. It still tastes delicious even if you add water as well."
"I get you. Strong booze is especially welcome, yeah." Hephaestus-sama said.
"That's right. I'm looking forward to drinking this booze real soon. " Vulcan-sama added.
"War God, let's partaaay!"
"Oh yeah, time to get it on."
Hephaestus-sama and Vulcan-sama sounded like they had been drinking already. I sighed (again) but it was out of my hands now. Time to send the offerings to their recipients and call it a night.
"Then, here are the items you wished for. Please accept them." I couldn't be bothered with saying anything more elaborate. The goods on the cardboard altar disappeared promptly nevertheless, accompanied by the voices of the Goddesses (squealing) and the Gods (roaring) as my offerings arrived in their realm.
Haaaa, somehow the number of deities looking over my shoulder had increased. I couldn't refuse them, the God of Blacksmiths and the God of War were just too intimidating and besides I was exhausted after spending most of the day dealing with the Dragon-maniac Elland-san. I worried about how the Status of Fer, Sui and Dora-chan would change now they had the blessings of Hephaestus-sama and Vulcan-sama but I was too tired to investigate immediately. I'd get a good night's sleep and check on them to see what had happened tomorrow.
"Ignore those noisy Goddesses for the moment while I introduce myself. They call me Hephaestus, the God of Blacksmiths." The deeper male voice resounded in my head.
"Me, I'm the God of War. Name's Vulcan." The first male voice chimed in.
Oh, the two Gods the Goddesses warned me about, the ones who liked to drink. The secret was out, it seemed.
"You're making offerings to the ladies, aincha? In that case we want offerings too. Booze, of course." Hephaestos-sama got right to the point.
"Lots of other-world booze and we want it right now." Vulcan-sama followed up. Hey, these people (gods) are really selfish and demanding, aren't they?
"Muu-," Deplorable-sama screeched, "you guys, what are you doing butting in here? We don't get these offerings for free, you know!"
"Yes, we have granted this other-world-guy our divine blessings in return for him making offerings to us once a week." Kishar-sama explained. "It's the rules."
"That's right." Agni-sama added. "You guys haven't done anything for him so you can't get anything from him, see?"
"...you two, can't get." Ruka-sama declared.
Just as I had decided that the God of Blacksmiths and God of War were being selfish, the Goddesses stopped bitching at each other and jumped in unnecessarily to explain how things worked to their fellow dieties. I had a bad feeling about this...
"Hou, so that's how it is. Hmmm..." the God of War mused, "Okay then, we'll give our divine protection to the other-world-guy too. That way we'll be entitled to get booze from him, right? Whaddya think, Blacksmith God?"
I now had a really bad feeling about this.
"Sounds good to me, War God. Right then, here's my blessing-"
I couldn't begin to decribe how bad I was feeling about how this was going. I was going to receive yet more divine blessings I didn't want from a couple of musclebrained Gods just so I'd have to offer them booze on a regular basis. Really. Not. Want.
"Hold it, hold it, hold it, I do not need any more blessings." I burst out before they could do anything.
"No? You refuse our divine protection~!" the God of Blacksmiths exploded. "To say that to the likes of us? In the name of Heaven I will punish you! Mega-hammer chastisement strike-"
Woah, woah!! He seemed a bit angry for some reason.
"Wait, what I said was inexcusable, I should have been clearer, oh mighty God of Blacksmiths." I grovelled (insincerely). "Why don't you give your blessing to my contracted monster, this Slime here since I've got all the divine blessings I really need for myself. I will of course make offerings to you in return for the bestowal of your divine blessing." I pointed to Sui -chan who was sleeping in the futon on the bed. S- Sorry, Sui...
"Well, I see, so that's what you meant." The God of Blacksmiths deflated. "All right, I understand. I'll give my divine blessing to that Slime." There was a pause. "Right, it's done."
"I'm next then." the God of War announced. "Do you want me to grant my divine protection to this contracted monster too?"
I thought quickly, Sui had already received the blessing from the God of Blacksmiths but somehow I didn't want darling Sui to have the God of War's protection too. She was enough of a battle maniac as it was, how she would be with that particular blessing... I shuddered. Too risky. And I didn't want it myself, either. Safety first, after all. I might turn into a battle maniac too and get killed. Nope, not gonna happen. Dora-chan didn't have any divine blessings though and he was a Dragon so...
"M- Maybe my other contracted monster, a Pixie Dragon..." I offered hopefully. I could go down to the beast stables and get him, bring him up here if the God of War was willing to wait...
"I understand." There was a pause. "Ohoho, you also have a Fenrir as a contracted monster? Then I'll share my divine protection between the two of them. They're both creatures that are compatible with my blessing, after all." The God of War knew about Fer somehow? "It is done." Ah... So Fer and Dora-chan have both received the God of War's blessing.
I figured Fer would be OK with this God's blessing, after all he liked to fight. Dora-chan I didn't know about but Fer seemed to think that Pixie Dragons were good fighters too so it shouldn't cause him any problems. Maybe.
"Fuahahaha, they're received a great blessing even if I say so myself." the God of War went on to explain. "My protection provides a 50 percent boost to their Status when fighting." 50 percent boost? That much? "Of course it makes them more belligerent for a time but then again who doesn't like fighting? Fuahahaha!" I don't, I thought to myself. I had dodged a bullet, it seemed. It would have been helpful to know that at the start, God of War-sama. Still, what's done is done, I decided. Time to open up the Net Super and order up what everyone wants.
"Now that's out of the way, I wanna drink some booze in return for granting my protection." the God of Blacksmiths announced.
"What he said. Booze, liquor preferably, something strong, like me. Fuahahaha!" the God of War added.
These two are super-annoying... Just then Ninril-sama interrupted again.
"My fellow Gods, there are rules about the offerings you can receive from this other-world-guy, you know?"
"That's right." Kishar-sama explained. "To be fair to everyone there's a limit of up to three silver coins in value."
"Oh yeah. No cheating, no trying to get more from the other-world-guy than the rest of us get. Arguing with him is right out or else he'll stop making offerings completely." Agni-sama added.
"Don't be greedy. Up to three silver coins each." Ruka-sama's summary was blunt and to the point as usual.
The Goddesses laid out the rules quite clearly, didn't they? Especially the favouritism thing. I decided to sweeten the deal for the two Gods who were new to the offerings setup.
"That's how it is, Vulcan-sama and Hephaestus-sama." I explained. "Offerings worth up to three silver coins each keeps it fair for all the others. However just for today I have increased this to four silver coins to apologise for being delayed in making my offerings as I had promised."
"Che-, how annoying but-" I heard the God of Blacksmiths sigh. "Very well, today we get offerings worth four silver coins, right? In that case I want to try lots of different kinds of other-world booze since I don't know what I'd like."
"I want to try various sorts of liquor too, like Heffy says." Heffy? Ah, Hephaestus-sama. "Just pick some booze for us will ya? Up to four silver coins worth each." The Goddesses were spot-on when they told me Vulcan-sama and Hephaestus-sama would want offerings of booze...
"Yeah, just pick some for me too." Heffy- oops, Hephaestus-sama agreed.
"Haa~" Agni-sama sighed. "I give up. Now these two have shown up you're stuck with them, other-world-guy. Oh, and can I have what they're getting?" She didn't seem that concerned about how this was going to affect me.
"It looks that way. We didn't want these two to get involved but... Sorreee." Kishar-sama said insincerely.
"These two, nose too good." Ruka-sama added. Just like that the Goddesses gave up and left me holding the bag. Thanks, all-powerful Deplorable-samas. I added my own sigh to the collection from Heaven and bowed to the inevitable. Booze, they all wanted booze right?
I started with cans of beer, one of each of a different type, a well-recommended dry lager, a premium beer and a dark stout, each costing 2 copper coins. A 720ml bottle of top-quality sake was a silver coin, a 700ml bottle of imported whisky another silver coin and a 640ml bottle of brandy for yet another silver coin. A bit of searching in the Net Super located a reasonably-priced bottle of Spanish red wine for the remaining four copper coins.
I got three of each for the three drunkards, oops deities who had requested booze as their offerings, total cost twelve silver coins.
"Finally is Ruka-sama."
"Same as before. Sweets and food. Extra food."
Coming right up. Something warm perhaps... ah, the beef bowl, I had it ready anyway. How much should I charge? I know it's cheap enough back in my own world but here? I put the price at five copper coins. Did I have any gyoza left? Ah, yes, here they were. I put out a dozen gyoza and set the price at five coppers too. Side dishes, I'd get them from the Net Super, lessee, a platter of assorted kushikatsu mixed meat and vegetable skewers with dipping sauce, there were chicken, peaches, scallions and liver. I added a couple of fishcakes and some deep-fried marinated meat tatsukage. The rest of the offering for Ruka-sama was bread and confectionery as usual.
Yosh, I had everything. I set up all the offerings on cardboard altars as usual, six this time thanks to the over-sensitive noses of a certain God of Blacksmiths and a certain God of War. I realised as I lined up the assorted lotions and tubes on Kisha-sama's altar that she'd need a little help with the items I had chosen for her.
"Kishar-sama, I'll explain how you should use your offerings. Oh, can you can see them as I point them out?"
"Yes, I can see them perfectly." she reassured me so I continued.
"The facial cleansing foam here is squeezed out this way," I demonstrated, "and lathered up with some warm water to wash your face. Rinse it off thoroughly afterwards though. After washing and drying your face use the mosturising lotion here. Put a spot of lotion about the size of..." ummm, umm, what does a 100-yen coin look like in this world? ah, "the size of a silver coin on your fingers and apply it gently to your face. Repeat if your skin is particularly dry."
After putting the skin lotion back on the altar I held up the tube of eye wrinkle cream. "Just a small amount on the tip of your finger and apply it around your eyes. You might want to put a little more on at night before you sleep." Do Goddesses sleep? I didn't know but that's what the instructions on the back of the box said to do. The rest of it was based on memories from watching my sister hard at work fighting the onis of bad skin and acne with her arsenal of chemical weaponry in the bathroom cupboard. As I put the tube back on Kishar-sama's altar my eye caught the bottles and cans on three of the other altars. I should maybe give some advice about them too.
"Oh yes, I should explain to Hephaestus-sama, Vulcan-sama and Agni-sama about their offerings. Please be careful as the alcohol content is high in them." I said, pointing out the bottles of sake, brandy and whisky.
"Because they're strong you should pour them into a glass and drink them like that, maybe with some ice. It's similar stuff to the liquor I offered up to Agni-sama last time. It still tastes delicious even if you add water as well."
"I get you. Strong booze is especially welcome, yeah." Hephaestus-sama said.
"That's right. I'm looking forward to drinking this booze real soon. " Vulcan-sama added.
"War God, let's partaaay!"
"Oh yeah, time to get it on."
Hephaestus-sama and Vulcan-sama sounded like they had been drinking already. I sighed (again) but it was out of my hands now. Time to send the offerings to their recipients and call it a night.
"Then, here are the items you wished for. Please accept them." I couldn't be bothered with saying anything more elaborate. The goods on the cardboard altar disappeared promptly nevertheless, accompanied by the voices of the Goddesses (squealing) and the Gods (roaring) as my offerings arrived in their realm.
Haaaa, somehow the number of deities looking over my shoulder had increased. I couldn't refuse them, the God of Blacksmiths and the God of War were just too intimidating and besides I was exhausted after spending most of the day dealing with the Dragon-maniac Elland-san. I worried about how the Status of Fer, Sui and Dora-chan would change now they had the blessings of Hephaestus-sama and Vulcan-sama but I was too tired to investigate immediately. I'd get a good night's sleep and check on them to see what had happened tomorrow.
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