Chapter 5: Welcome to the Kingdom of Erman

“Is that the border crossing? Sure is crowded, huh?”

I’d heard that trade was flourishing between the Kingdoms of Leonhardt and Erman, and the sheer number of people crossing over the border would seem to back that up. We got in line right away and waited for our turn. Plenty of people were shocked to see my familiars (well, to see Fel, really), but as soon as they noticed me riding on his back, they realized that they were with a tamer and quickly calmed down.

As I continued to observe the flow of traffic, I noticed that in spite of the massive crowd of travelers slowing the process down, those with guild cards were being waved through without much hassle at all. I took that as a sign that this would be pretty easy for me as well, and confidently flashed my own card at the guard when it was finally my turn. Well, mostly confidently—it was a little worrying that the instant I stepped up to the border, the guard who’d been checking everyone up to that point was swapped out in favor of a man who was clearly his superior. What’s going on here?

“S-Sir Mukohda, is it? Welcome to the Kingdom of Erman! W-We sincerely hope that you enjoy your stay!”

“Okaaay?” Everyone else had been waved through without a word the moment they showed their cards, so that was weird. He handed my card back to me, and as I passed through the gate I overheard some of the other guards whispering to each other off to the side.

“Is that the adventurer who has a Fenrir in his party?”

“He’s got a tiny dragon and a slime too, from what I hear!”

“Were you watching the captain? He was shaking in his boots!”

“’Course he was, our orders about that guy came straight from the royal palace! ‘If an adventurer named Mukohda shows up with a Fenrir in tow, take every precaution and employ great care not to offend him,’ they said!”

“Didn’t they also say something about making sure not to treat him like a noble, though?”

“Yeah, that’s right! They said to ‘act natural, no matter what.’”

“And to ‘try to casually talk up our country,’ on top of it. Talk about asking for everything at once, right?”

“Bet the captain’s relieved he made it through.”

“I mean, wouldn’t you be? Gotta give him credit—pulling off orders like that without a hitch when a monster straight outta the legends is staring you down takes some real guts.”

“True enough.”

My level-enhanced ears picked up the whole exchange, clear as day. If they got orders from the royal palace for how we should be treated, does that mean that the Kingdom of Leonhardt told them something about us in advance? I don’t really get what’s going on here, but, I mean, we got into the Kingdom of Erman easily enough. Whatever that was all about, I’m just gonna assume it’s fine.

《The dungeon is in this country, yes? Let us make haste!》

《Yeah! I wanna dive in as soon as possible!》

《Dungeon, dungeon!》

“Okay, settle down, everyone. We’ve still got a long ways to go before we get to Brixt and its dungeon.”

《Hmm? Is that so?》

“Yeah, I’d say we’re just about halfway there now. We’ve been making crazy progress, though—I heard it’d take about two months to make the trip by cart!”

《What, so the dungeon’s not near here after all? Lame.》

《Sui hopes we get there soon! Dungeooon!》 The three of them seemed genuinely let down to learn that we were still a ways off from our destination.

“C’mon, the dungeon’s not going anywhere. Let’s at least try to enjoy the trip, okay?”

◇ ◇ ◇ ◇ ◇

We carried on down the road, heading straight toward Brixt, until Fel sent me a telepathic message completely out of the blue.

《There is a group of humans ahead of us, under attack by a monster.》

《Huh?》

《The monster attacking them is a forest scorpion.》

《A forest scorpion? I’m guessing those are probably venomous, right?》

《Quite. Somewhat clever, as well—they employ two forms of toxin. One, used upon those they do not intend to eat, is instantly fatal. The other, for those they plan to devour, is made to induce paralysis.》

《Gaaaaaah! Holy crap, you could’ve opened with that! Dora-chan, fly ahead and save them!》

《On it!》 transmitted Dora-chan before shooting off like a speeding bullet.

《We should hurry too!》 I sent to Fel.

《Indeed, though with Dora on the way, I doubt there is any cause for concern.》

We chased after him as quickly as we could.

“Heeey! You guys all right?” I called out as we came across a fairly modest carriage with a group of people around it, all collapsed or stunned by sheer terror. 《What happened to the forest scorpion, Dora-chan?》

《Killed it dead, of course! See? It’s right over there.》

“Oh, jeez, that thing’s huge...” Dora-chan had pointed a short ways ahead of the carriage where an enormous scorpion lay dead in the road. Measuring from its head to the tip of its tail, it was easily over three meters long. Just looking at the horrible thing made me involuntarily grimace.

《Heh heh! Skewered the sucker clean through with water magic!》 bragged Dora-chan.

“Yeah, I can see that. Nice work.”

《Nice enough to earn me an extra helping of pudding tonight, right?》

“Sure, sure. I can make that happen.”

《Then perhaps I should remind you who it was that warned you of the forest scorpion’s attack in the first place? I believe I have done exemplary work as well.》

“I know, I know!”

《Pudding? Are we eating sweets?》 The word ‘pudding’ caught Sui’s attention, and it poked its head out of my bag.

“Yeah, but not until after dinner, okay?”

《Aww, not now...? Ah, Sui’s never seen one of those before!》 Sui finally noticed the scorpion corpse, which grabbed its attention even more than talk of pudding had. It bounced up and down with excitement.

《Heh heh, that one was my kill!》

《You beat it up, Dora-chan? Aww, lucky! Sui wants to beat one too!》

That’s the first thing you think after seeing a big-ass, horrifying scorpion corpse? My familiars really are fearless, huh? Ha ha ha... I, in contrast, didn’t even want to get near the thing even though I knew it was already dead.

“Hey,” said a man clad in leather armor. He looked like he was probably in his mid-twenties, and I assumed he was an adventurer. “Is the tiny dragon that did in the giant woodland scorpion your familiar?”

“Yeah, he is.”

“Then you saved our lives. We owe you big time.”

“Umm, wait—what’d you just call that thing? It’s not a forest scorpion?”

“Think I’ve heard people call ’em that before? Probably a regional thing.” Given the sheer size of the abomination, I assumed that “giant woodland scorpion” was its more technical name.

“Looks like everyone around your cart’s alive, huh? Anyone wounded?”

“Just one. One of my party members got a full dose of paralysis poison... Look, I know you just saved us and I know that asking this is gonna make me look like an ass, but do you have any antidotes on hand? I’ll pay good money for ’em if you do.”

Hmm—hate to say it, but I sure don’t.

I gave the honest answer, and the man sighed heavily and mumbled “Yeah, figures...” He hadn’t had his hopes set particularly high in the first place, from the sound of it, but he was still crestfallen.

But, I mean, it’s not like paralysis poison’s life-threatening, is it? Just as the thought crossed my mind, a slender man in a robe ran up to us. He was around the same age as the man in the leather armor, and I assumed they were part of the same party.

“What’d they say? No antidotes?”

“Not a one.”

“Yeah, of course they don’t. Guess we should just be glad he made it through alive and give up on curing him.”

“Not like we have any other options.” Both of them looked really grim, and I was starting to wonder if there might be a big problem after all.

“Umm,” I spoke up, “is something wrong?”

“Right, sorry. Not like filling you in’s gonna change anything, but I guess you’d be curious...”

The men explained that they’d been hired to guard the cart and its owner on their journey. They weren’t on track to fail that quest, but if things kept going the way they had so far it would end up being a really bad look for their party and would probably erode a lot of the trust they’d managed to build up so far. The forest/giant woodland scorpion hadn’t used its instant death poison, thankfully, but their paralysis poison was apparently just as potent in a different sort of way. It tended to put its victims down for the count for at least a full day.

“We’re a three-man party, counting the guy who got poisoned. Having him out of commission for a whole day’s bad enough, but even worse, we’ll have to load him up onto the cart until he can move again, and that thing’s not exactly spacious to begin with...” The entire point of the quest was to protect the cart, so having a full third of their fighting force unable to work did sound like it’d be a big issue. “If we just had a single antidote on hand we might still be able to turn this around, but you can’t exactly conjure the damn things outta thin air.”

The one upside was that the cart itself was undamaged, and its driver—that is, their employer—was unharmed. If they could only cure their third member of his paralysis, then the quest could still be salvaged as long as they managed to avoid any further major issues. That one condition was a major obstacle, though.

I had Fel with me, thankfully, so I’d never had to worry about any of that sort of stuff, but I imagined that for a normal adventurer, keeping up your reputation was pretty darn important. Your ability to keep a consistent workflow might very well hinge upon it. Not that there were any jobs I could think of where keeping your clients’ trust wasn’t important, to be fair.

In any case, I didn’t have any antidotes on hand and there wasn’t anything I could do to change that fact. I only had normal potions—if you could call Sui’s Special High-Grade Potion “normal,” anyway.

Wait a second...antidotes? Ah, right! I might just be able to work something out after all!

I’d just remembered the time I gave an adventurer who’d been attacked by a wyvern one of Sui’s potions. It’d cleared away the monster’s poison, no problem. In retrospect, Sui’s Special High-Grade Potion might have had the effects of an antidote bundled into it.

《Hey, Fel, is wyvern poison lethal?》 I asked telepathically.

Fel replied with a simple 《Yes.》

《How bad is it compared to the forest scorpion’s poison?》

《Though both are lethal, I would imagine a wyvern’s poison would be slightly stronger.》

Okay, that clears that up. Since the high-grade version had cured a wyvern’s poison, I figured it would probably be overkill for a weaker monster’s weakest toxin. I decided to give Sui’s Special Mid-Grade Potion a try, to start, and upgrade to the high-grade one if it didn’t work out.

“Umm, so, I really don’t have any antidotes, but I think this potion might help with the poison too. That’s what they told me when I bought it, anyway,” I said, keeping things vague and covering for myself in advance.

“Really?! I’ve never heard of a potion like that! Hey...” he said, glancing at his party member.

“Yeah, I know. Our party’s rep’s riding on this. We finally managed to rank up and find some regular clients, and we can’t afford to lose their trust. If you can spare the potion, please, we need it!”

They reached a consensus in no time flat, and I handed over one of Sui’s Special Mid-Grade Potions. The man in the robe went right over to their paralyzed comrade and poured some of the potion into his wound. The reddish discoloration on his arm quickly faded as the wound closed up, and moments later it looked like he’d never been stung at all. The man groaned, and his eyes flickered open.

“Hey, can you hear me?! You awake?!” The man in the leather armor leaned over him, clearly worried.

“Here, drink this,” said the man in the robe, helping his wounded friend sit up and offering him the rest of the potion. He drank it down, and the effects kicked in immediately. He was fully conscious in moments, and able to stay upright on his own not long after.

“That stuff clears poison away fast!”

“Closed the wound perfectly too.”

The adventurers were both astonished by the potion’s effects. I was just a little proud of my talented familiar, myself. Not that I was planning on telling them who’d made the potion.

“I think we’ll be able to salvage this situation after all. You really did save us, and I can’t thank you enough,” said the man in the armor before giving a slight grimace. “First things first, though—what do we owe you?”

The potion was more effective than the stuff people usually sold as “high-grade,” and the men clearly knew it. They didn’t look convinced they had enough money on hand to pay for it. I wasn’t looking to bankrupt them, though, and I remembered that the standard market rate for a mid-potion was one gold, so that’s what I charged them, much to their surprise.

They asked me if I was really all right with selling a potion like that so cheaply, but even if it did have Sui’s magic touch, it was still just a mid-grade potion. Not to mention the fact that Sui had made it on its own with ingredients I didn’t pay for, so my total investment in its production was a flat zero gold. I tried my best to convince them that one gold was more than enough, but they were so convinced that would be ripping me off that they finally convinced me to double the price. I gave in and accepted the two gold.

In return for my generosity—not that I saw it that way in the first place—they offered to buy up any mid-potions that I had lying around in stock, and I was more than happy to take them up on that. I had an awful lot of Sui’s Special Mid-Grade Potions taking up space in my item box, after all.

“This is a huge help, seriously! Considering we still have the rest of this quest to get through, having potions that work against poison could make all the difference. Thank you, uhh...” he paused. “Guess we were so panicked we never actually introduced ourselves, come to think of it.”

They rectified that mistake at once, explaining that they were a newly-promoted C-rank adventuring party called Trickster. Their leader was the man in the robe, a mage named Geremia. The one with the armor was a swordsman named Lumir, and the one who’d been poisoned was a scout named Luc. They were on a quest to escort the cart and its owner to the capital of Erman.

I introduced myself as well, and surprised the hell out of them when I admitted that I was technically an S-rank adventurer. Not that anyone would ever guess it just by looking at me. Ha, ha, ha.

“An S-rank, huh? That explains everything—no wonder you’re carrying so many good potions,” said Lumir. “We’d have been up a creek if we hadn’t met you, so I guess that makes us pretty damn lucky.” Geremia and Luc both agreed, and a moment later Luc thanked me repeatedly after it finally hit him that I was the source of the potion that had saved him.

“That thing caught me way off-guard. I never thought I’d run into a giant woodland scorpion in these parts...” The other two nodded in mystified agreement.

According to them, forest scorpions showing up in this area was more or less unheard of. There weren’t any venomous monsters native to the local region at all, for that matter, which certainly explained their lack of antidotes. Now that one giant woodland scorpion had shown up, though, they couldn’t rule out the possibility of running into more. They were especially grateful to get their hands on all the mid-potions I’d sold them, considering that.

We chatted for some time, but it wasn’t long before I had to excuse myself. “I think your client’s calmed down and Luc’s up and about again, so we’d better get a move on.” Fel and the others had been mentally spamming me with “Let’s go, let’s go!” since pretty early on in the conversation, and they were really starting to get on my nerves, so I didn’t have much of a choice. They were way too excited about reaching the dungeon to put up with standing around in the wilderness for long.

“Seriously, we owe you one! Thanks again!”

“The capital’s our home turf, so if you ever wander over that way, hit us up! We’ll give you the grand tour!”

“Thank you so, so much!”

“No problem—see you around!” I waved goodbye to the Trickster trio as we hit the road once again.

The forest/giant woodland scorpion’s corpse was apparently prized for its use in crafting some sort of poison or another, and would sell for a good price, so in the end I snapped it up before I left. It really was weird that a monster like this one would turn up around these parts, though, especially at exactly the same time we did...

Was something chasing it? Nah, no way, right? It’s gotta be a coincidence, that’s all... Right?

《Hey, stop letting your mind wander! Hold on tightly if you do not wish to fall off!》 Fel’s telepathic reprimand crashed right into my train of thought.

“Agh, whoa!” I managed to grab onto his neck barely a second before I would have toppled off his back. “I-I know, okay?!”

《Ha ha ha, careful up there! Unless you wanna eat dirt, I mean!》 It was Dora-chan’s turn to send me a message next. He was flying along beside us and laughing his head off, the little jerk.

《Masteeer, Sui’s huuungry!》 Sui complained from inside my bag.

《We’ll have dinner soon—let’s get just a little farther today first, okay?》

《Indeed. Though I am also famished, we must forge ahead! The farther we run, the closer the dungeon will be!》

《That’s the spirit! I wanna get there as quickly as possible!》

《Okaaay. Sui wants to reach the dungeon soon too, so Sui can be patient.》

The call of the dungeon must’ve been mighty indeed to win out against my familiars’ appetites.

We spotted a town ahead of us right around dusk. I’d done my homework before we set out, and was relatively confident I knew where we were.

“Pretty sure that town’s called Hirschfeld. This is perfect timing—let’s spend the night there.”

《Hmm? You mean, within the town?》

“Yeah, I figure it’d be nicer than camping out. I’d really like to get a good night’s sleep in a nice soft bed.”

《Doesn’t stopping in town mean it’ll take even longer to get to the dungeon, though?》 interjected Dora-chan.

《Quite. We should ignore the town and press on.》

Both of them were against the plan, much to my dismay. “Wait, what? Come on, why not stop in? We haven’t spent a single night in town since we started this trip! And besides, the Adventurer’s guild asked us to take on as many quests as we could from the towns we passed through on the way, right?”

《Perhaps, but regardless—》

“Oh, and stopping in town means I’ll be able to cook a real, proper meal! Don’t you wanna eat something tasty? If we rent a house like we usually do, we’ll be able to soak in a nice big bathtub too,” I said, deliberately targeting Fel and Dora-chan’s interests to sell them on my idea.

《A proper meal, you say?》

《And a big tub...》

“Sounds nice, right? The dungeon’s not going anywhere, so let’s take it easy in town for just a little!”

《Hmph, very well. But not long!》

《And you’d better rent a house with a big bath!》

I managed to secure Fel and Dora-chan’s approval, and we made our way into Hirschfeld. Incidentally, Sui spent the entire conversation fast asleep in my bag.

◇ ◇ ◇ ◇ ◇

I plopped down into a big luxurious chair in the living room of the house I’d rented and took a moment to stretch.

“Finally, a real house with a decent bed!” I said to myself. “I’m gonna sleep well tonight, that’s for sure.”

The moment we got into town, we went straight over to the Merchant’s guild to rent the house I was now lounging in. It had twelve bedrooms in total, which made it larger than the sort of place I’d usually go for, but its massive bathtub had caught my and Dora-chan’s attention. It was nice and close to the Adventurer’s guild too, where we’d have to go the day after.

Unsurprisingly, a house of that size in that convenient of a location came with quite the price tag attached to it. I had no shortage of funds thanks to my familiars, though, so I rented it on the spot without even bothering to tour the other houses that were available to me.

《Hey, Master, Master! Is it dinner time?》

“I, too, grow hungry.”

《Yeah, same here!》

C’mon, guys, seriously? I literally just sat down. “I know, I know! Gimme just a minute, okay?” I grumbled. I wanted to relax at least a little before jumping into cooking.

“Did you not claim that a stay in town would allow you to cook a proper meal? I shall count on you to make good on your word.”

Ugh... The pressure’s on, I guess. Wish you wouldn’t do that, Fel.

I certainly had used good food to lure Fel into town, but I wasn’t in any mood to cook something elaborate. My familiars would definitely give me hell if I pulled something premade out of my Item Box and gave it to them as-is, though. That left me with just one good option: use some of the premade food, but get creative with my presentation and combine a few dishes into something worth more than the sum of its parts.

Let’s see, what do I have to work with...? All right, I know exactly what I can do with this! I decided to use some of the karaage I’d fried up in advance to make a not-particularly-authentic approximation of a yurinchi: a Chinese-style fried chicken dish that’s topped with a special sauce. All my familiars loved karaage, so I’d made more than enough to use some for this dish and still have a ton left over. Faux-yurinchi used to be my go-to meal when I had frozen or leftover karaage in my fridge and felt like spicing things up a little.

My dish picked out, I moved over to the kitchen, and was unsurprised to find that it was just as extravagant as the rest of the house. It almost felt like a waste to use that nice of a kitchen if all I planned to do was whip up a pan of sauce, but the feeling wasn’t quite strong enough to convince me to make anything more effort-intensive. I bought some green onions, garlic, and ginger off my Online Supermarket to use in the sauce, plus some lettuce to serve the chicken on top of. That was all I needed to jump right into preparing the dish.

First up was the sauce. I finely chopped the green onion, then minced the garlic and ginger. All I had to do next was throw them into a bowl and mix them together with soy sauce, vinegar, water, some sesame oil, and a touch of honey. That’s all it takes to make sauce for yurinchi—it’s the easiest thing in the world. You can even use those little tubes of garlic and ginger paste if you can’t be bothered to mince the fresh stuff yourself; it’ll still turn out just fine. Same goes for the honey. I happened to have some on hand, but if you don’t, sugar works perfectly well too.

I gave my sauce a taste test, and decided that it needed just a little more bite. A splash of vinegar later, and it was good to go! All I had left to do was prep the lettuce and get ready to plate everything. I shredded the lettuce into roughly centimeter-wide strips and gave it a quick soak in cold water to crisp it up. Then I dried it off, laid down a bed of lettuce onto the plate, and put the karaage—still fresh and piping hot, thanks to my Item Box—on top. Finally, I poured a generous helping of the sauce over it all, and my faux-yurinchi was complete!

I tried a piece of chicken, and it was out of this world. The sauce was refreshingly tart in a way that really elevated the karaage. I’d made plenty of it too, so I was fully prepared for my familiars to demand seconds. It was time to serve dinner.

“Okay, it’s done!” I called as I walked back into the living room.

“What is this—karaage? Did we not have the same thing merely a day or two ago...? It is delicious, though, so I do not especially mind.”

“Karaage’s part of it, yeah, but the sauce on top makes it a different dish. It’s still really good, though! Give it a try!”

Fel gave the yurinchi a skeptical sniff before taking a bite. He spent a moment chewing thoughtfully, then dug in, scarfing his chicken down at an astonishing pace. The dish definitely passed the Fel test.

《Karaage’s tasty enough on its own, but this sauce makes it even better!》 exclaimed Dora-chan before going back to stuffing his face.

《Sui loves how the sorta sour sauce tastes with the karaage! They’re so good together!》 Sui’s portion vanished in the blink of an eye.

“More!”

《More for me too!》

《And for Sui!》

I served up plate after plate of the faux-yurinchi until they were all finally satisfied, and I somehow managed to secure a moment to have a serving for myself as well. Maybe a little more than just one serving, actually—it paired so well with a bowl of rice, I couldn’t help myself.

After dinner, of course, came dessert time. Fel had his usual strawberry shortcake, which ended up plastered all over his face, while Dora-chan slowly and deliberately savored his pudding. Sui, of course, engulfed its usual slice of chocolate cake whole with a happy wobble. I’d eaten a bit too much and decided to skip dessert, opting instead for a cup of black tea, which I’d recently started to acquire a taste for.

“We’ll head for the Adventurer’s guild right after breakfast tomorrow, okay?” I said to my familiars.

“For a quest, correct? Hmph—I would sooner skip such tedium and make for the dungeon once more.”

“Oh, c’mon, don’t be like that. For all we know, they might have a quest that’ll be fun for you guys.”

《Hah, I wish!》

“Come on, Dora-chan! We won’t know unless we go and check, right?”

《It’ll be okay, Master! If they say we should fight monsters, Sui’ll beat them all up!》

“I bet you will! Counting on you, Sui. Anyway, looks like we’re all done eating, so how ’bout we take a bath?” I drained the last of my tea and stood up.

《Oooh, bath time? All right!》 shouted Dora-chan.

《Yaaay, bathtime!》 Sui, who was just as much of a bath-lover, chimed in with its agreement. It’d been a long time since we’d had the chance to use a nice big bath, and we were all looking forward to it.

“How ’bout you, Fel?”

“Do you truly believe there is any chance I would join you? I shall sleep. Prepare my futon.”

“Okay, okay, coming right up.” I spread out Fel’s personal futon in the master bedroom, and he immediately plopped down onto it.

“Okay, we’ll be in the bathroom!”

“Do as you will.”

As I made for the bathroom I realized that I’d reflexively set him up in the master bedroom with me, in spite of the fact that the house had twelve rooms and we could’ve easily all had our own private quarters. We’d been in the habit of sharing a room for so long it would’ve been pretty awkward to suggest we break it, so I decided to just let it go. Dora-chan and Sui were already having a soak when I arrived at the bathroom, and I was happy to join them and enjoy my first real bath in what felt like ages.