CHAPTER 3: Bonds of Servitude

01

Creeeak, thud.

The sound of a door closing woke Mariela.

When she looked in the direction of the noise, she saw an unfamiliar half-naked man holding a pitcher. Well, more than half-naked—all he wore was a loincloth, which left most of his body basically out there in the open.

Is this one of those “shady characters” I’ve heard so much about?

No, it was just Sieg. Siegmund.

“G-good…morning…Lady Mariela.”

Wow, he greeted me. He didn’t say much yesterday. I wonder if having a good cry calmed him down.

Sieg’s impactful “good morning” made the previous night’s anxieties disappear once and for all.

“Morning, Sieg. You can just call me Mariela.”

“I cannot…do that,” he replied as he poured water from the pitcher into a cup and timidly held it out to her. “I f-fetched some…water. If you would like any.”

Slightly embarrassed by his awkward good intentions, Mariela accepted the cup and took a sip. She could immediately tell that only a minimal amount of Drops of Life was mixed in.

“Well water? Sieg, you can’t use lifestyle magic?”

“I…can use a little. But I heard well water…was better for you.”

Groundwater contains Drops of Life, which is imbued with the power of a ley line. The amount is so small that you can’t feel its effects, but it’s enough that there’s a noticeable difference in those who drink it regularly. “A child raised on well water is a well-raised child,” as the saying goes.

So he deliberately went out of his way and drew some water for me. And all while looking like that… I wish I’d given him his new clothes yesterday.

He’d starting crying while eating his risotto, and between comforting him and putting him to bed, she’d regrettably forgotten about the clothes.

“Thank you,” she replied, and she drank the rest. Sieg stood at the ready by the door. His tone was very polite, but his appearance was rather unseemly.

Mariela had him leave the room, then quickly changed into the clothes she bought yesterday. She was a bit bothered by how much leg was showing, but the outfit was just as cute as she’d thought. Furthermore, it was comfortable and easy to move around in.

Mariela brought Sieg back into the room and checked on his injuries. The fever was completely broken, and he seemed to be able to properly move his right hand now. The grip strength in his right hand had recovered only about halfway, and his arm felt stiff, but he reassured her it would soon be back to normal as he flexed his hand.

She knew the brand on his chest would still be there, but it had faded enough that it was less noticeable now.

The serious swelling on his leg had subsided as well, and the discolored burn marks were now covered in a thin layer of pink skin. The gnawed-off flesh hadn’t grown back, so he couldn’t walk normally, but for the time being, she was relieved.

“Soon my leg…will be healed enough for me…to run again.” Sieg was filled with determination, a complete change from yesterday.

Geez, Sieg, you’re flying high now that you’re on the mend. Well, I’m gonna heal your leg once I make a high-grade potion anyhow. But before that!

She picked up her rucksack, and the two of them headed to the inn’s backyard. Ever the attentive person, Sieg took the rucksack and carried it out as if it was second nature.

Mariela borrowed a stool from the livestock shed and had Sieg sit on it. “Today, we’ll cut your hair,” she declared. “I don’t want to get any in your eye, so please keep it shut.”

“Understood… Thank you.”

Yesterday, merely bringing her hand close to Sieg’s face had frightened him, so she was worried about how he might react to the scissors, but he squeezed his eye shut and sat there in docile silence.

Mariela gently touched his hair.

How will this turn out…?

It was stiff, probably caked with soil and dust, and so heavy that it didn’t even look like hair—she couldn’t get the brush to go through it. His hair was like the matted balls of fur that hung from wild yagus. With no other choice, she snipped the mats off.

There were tons of these mats, and she cut them all. Only once she could actually brush his hair would she tidy it up, so she snipped away with vigor.

Shoot… I cut off too much…

Only about an inch of hair remained.

Mariela couldn’t make them, but she’d heard hair-growth potions existed. Apparently, they were specialized special-grade potions that aristocrats with thinning hair bartered for in secret…

Ah well, it’ll grow out in no time!

She left the bangs long and trimmed the back to a short, uniform length.

Mariela had thought leaving just the bangs would more or less get the job done, but it was an unexpectedly stylish look.

Next came the beard, but…

I have no idea how to shave a beard! And I don’t have a razor or a knife, either!

Just as she was wondering whether she should give him the scissors and have him do it himself, she heard a voice. “What’s up? You cuttin’ his hair? Whoa, you’re pretty good. Hey, cut mine, too.” Lynx had appeared. Perfect timing.

“Sure thing. But before that, what do I do with the beard?”

“Eh? C’mon, that’s the kinda thing you should let him do. Oh, you got no knife? Here, borrow mine.”

That was Lynx for you: sensible.

“I’m done with your hair, Sieg. You should shave with the knife Lynx is lending you. After that, I have soap, a toothbrush, a change of clothes, and a hand towel, so you can take a bath.”

She handed Sieg the rucksack as she spoke, to which Lynx laughed. “What’re you, his mom?”

“What sort of hairstyle are you interested in today, sir?”

“Somethin’ kinda…cool?” Lynx’s request was rather vague.

“Whaaa—? Not a chance.”

“That’s harsh!”

Mariela cut Lynx’s hair as they bantered back and forth. He seemed to want it only evened out, so after trimming about an inch total, she was done.

“Here you are! One handsome man, as requested.”

“Whoo-hoo!”

“Wind.”

Lynx blew off the cut hair with wind magic. Although this type was normally used in battle, he adjusted its potency so it sent only the hair flying off his clothes without blowing any dirt around. He was quite skilled.

“So you know wind magic, Lynx.”

“Yup. Everyone in the Black Iron Freight Corps can use magic. But I didn’t have much magic left yesterday, so I didn’t use it.”

She’d heard it was difficult to temper attack magic into lifestyle magic. If someone as young as Lynx had mastered it, the Black Iron Freight Corps must be a highly capable group of individuals. Even so, for Lynx to have almost run out of magic meant traveling through the Fell Forest really was no joke.

As they talked to pass the time while they waited, Sieg returned.

“Huh…? Sieg?”

With a shave, a thorough washing, and a new shirt and pants, Sieg now appeared to be in his midtwenties.

His hair, which had looked gray before, was actually silver and complemented the deep blue of his eye.

Overall, he needed some meat on his bones, but he had a nice, straight nose and full lips, and he was actually quite the looker. The scar over his right eye, now exposed after the haircut, was a gruesome sight, but it made the handsome left side stand out all the more.

The bangs she’d left a little longer than the rest to disguise the too-short haircut were also oddly sexy.

I thought he was middle-aged…

Sieg respectfully thanked Lynx and returned the knife to him. For some reason, Lynx had a look of indifference on his face.

So the half-naked old-timer evolved into a dashing barefoot man.

In Mariela’s eyes, it made no difference whether he was an old man or a handsome young one.

“Let’s grab breakfast.”

More importantly, their stomachs were empty, so the three of them headed inside for some food.

A girl about ten years old whom Mariela hadn’t seen before was working in the restaurant.

“Emily, breakfast pleeease!”

“Oh, Lynx, it’s you. Gooood morning!” After Mariela had greeted her, too, Emily replied brightly, “This is the first time we’ve met, isn’t it, miss? I’m Emily!”

“She’s the owner’s only daughter and in charge of breakfast. Well, more like she just warms the dishes the owner makes.”

“Lynx, you’re so meeean. It’s hard to warm food without burning it, y’know! Here you are!”

Emily puffed up her cheeks at Lynx’s explanation as she rolled over a tea trolley holding breakfast for three.

Breakfast was a piece of bread about twice the size of her palm, soup, a big sausage with scrambled eggs, and a salad.

It was a lot of food for first thing in the morning.

“Ahhh, man, this looks great!”

Lynx took a plate and began to chow down with gusto.

Mariela indicated the seat next to her, and Sieg sat down without objecting. When she said “Here you go” and handed him a plate, he also started to gobble down his food, though not quite as fast as he did yesterday.

Mariela split her bread into three pieces and put one each on Lynx’s and Sieg’s plates.

“Fanks.”

“Fank you…very muth.”

“Swallow first, then talk.”

She ended up splitting her sausage among the three of them, and they all happily finished their late breakfast.

“Mariela, you wanted to buy medicinal herbs, right? Wanna go now?”

Everyone in the Black Iron Freight Corps seemed to still be asleep. With nothing else to do, Lynx invited her to go shopping.

“I want to buy shoes for Sieg first. Know any good places?”

“Hmm. Shoes, huh…? What was that place called again?”

“I got these shoes the other day from Elba’s Shoe Shop!”

Apparently, Elba’s Shoe Shop was Emily’s recommendation. She spun round and round in the shoes that had been bought for her before she began to wobble and say, “I’m dizzy…”

“Let’s go look at Elba’s Shoe Shop, then.”

Emily saw the trio off, saying “Have a nice day!” as they departed the Yagu Drawbridge Pavilion.

02

Elba’s Shoe Shop sold traditional, relatively inexpensive shoes marketed toward a range of customers, from ordinary citizens to moderately experienced adventurers. The inside was overflowing with stacks upon stacks of all types of footwear.

“Welcome. What kind of shoes are you looking for?”

“Men’s shoes, preferably orc leather boots.”

Orc meat was a popular food, which meant a large quantity of orc leather was in circulation, too. Since it was supple and easy to work with, apprentice artisans used it in a lot of their products, making it easy to find at a bargain price. However, it wasn’t sturdy enough to endure combat, and orcs weren’t exactly well liked, so it wasn’t considered good leather. It was commoners’ everyday wear at best.

Shoes were created with leatherworking skills, but they were individually handmade and didn’t run cheap. Orc leather was frequently used in shoes for children, whose feet grew quickly, but adults with money to spare often chose slightly higher quality leather products.

The shop employee—perhaps he was Elba—took one look at Sieg’s bare feet and Mariela’s tattered shoes and brought out several pairs of boots from the back of the shop without a word.

“If you want orc leather, these should do it.”

“What are the soles made of?”

“Orc hide for these two, wood on this one, and creeper on those three pairs. Well, I say ‘creeper,’ but it’s from a sapling. It’ll deteriorate quickly.”

Creepers were climbing plant monsters that inhabited wetlands. After paralyzing prey with its venomous thorns, it twined around them and sucked their blood. The vines it used to quickly catch prey were several yards long and as thick as a person’s arm. Cutting one off with a sharp blade would cause it to leak a gooey, viscous fluid that was used to make creeper rubber, a popular material for high-quality wheels, armor lining, and shoe soles, among other things.

Not only did creepers live in wetlands with poor footing, but their vines were fast and poisonous. This made them difficult to keep under control, so creeper rubber was a luxury material.

Creeper saplings were a cheap alternative to the rubber. They grew in shaded areas of forests and were poisonous as well, but they lacked thorns, and their vines moved extremely slowly. They would wrap around small animals paralyzed from carelessly gnawing on the vines, and they sucked only a little bit of blood.

The vines were roughly the thickness of a human thumb, but they were soft and flabby enough to be torn off by the likes of rabbits. Even children could harvest them with gloves, so the material was cheap and widely distributed. Performance-wise, however, the saplings were inferior to their parent stock, and they consequently tended to be used in disposable items.

“Huh, is something blended with this creeper rubber?”

“That’s one of my prototypes, blended with slimes. I wanted to see if I could make a springier rubber from creeper sapling. It’s well made and doesn’t slip or cause fatigue easily, but the durability isn’t nearly up to snuff. It’d be serviceable if we were elsewhere and could just keep using restoration potions on it, but here in the Labyrinth City, it doesn’t measure up to the longevity of orc leather.”

All the rubber-soled shoes made by Elba were of good craftsmanship and reasonably priced at one large silver coin, so Mariela chose a pair that fit Sieg.

“Thanks for your business. Here’s a freebie for ya. If you take good care of the shoes, they should last you four or five years.”

Elba even threw in some free wax for maintaining the shoes. He was a kind shoemaker.

I’ll buy shoes for myself when the potion payment comes in.

When Mariela finished paying and left the shop, Sieg was holding the shoes very carefully.

“Sieg? You’re not gonna wear them?” Mariela asked as he carried the brand-new boots as if they were treasure.

“I-I’m…still limping… If I was to damage the soles, then…”

He seemed to want to say he’d damage the shoes if he wore them while dragging his leg, so he’d wear them as soon as he could walk properly.

“But if you’re still limping, does that mean your leg hurts?”

“M-my leg is okay… Um, thank you very much…for the shoes.”

Sieg bowed deeply and expressed his thanks, boots still in his arms. His expression was stiff, as if he’d forgotten how to smile, but it cracked just a little. Lynx, who’d been watching and noticed Mariela didn’t seem to understand, said to her, “Let’s go. I bet it’s been a looong time since he had new shoes. Seems like a lotta people don’t provide ’em to their slaves. So, like, I guess what I’m sayin’ is, I get where he’s comin’ from.”

Lynx seemed to sympathize with Sieg, so she let him carry the shoes as he was, and the three of them headed to a medicinal herb shop next.

They went to a back alley in the northeastern district to buy the herbs.

Many shops in the Labyrinth City offered herbs because they could be gathered in the Labyrinth. There were even major enterprises and specialist shops.

Mariela had heard the environment in the Labyrinth differed among the strata, from snowy mountains, to deserts, to tropics, all of which had various kinds of herbs for harvesting. Of course, they had monsters, too. Since Mariela couldn’t fight, she’d be unable to travel through them alone, but some adventurers specialized in collecting herbs.

These adventurers took the collected herbs to the Adventurers Guild or specialty shops. The herbs purchased there were then either sold to customers within the Labyrinth City or dried by specialist shops or businesses to preserve them and then transported out of the city.

Their circulation in this area was the same as for other materials. Most of them were processed in the Labyrinth City and then loaded onto yagus and sent across the mountains.

The Labyrinth City was no longer an independent country but a frontier territory of the Empire, which used to adjoin the Kingdom of Endalsia. No wonder the Empire’s currency was now in use.

If the monsters in the Labyrinth and the Fell Forest weren’t controlled through culling, another stampede would happen and cause catastrophic damage. This was why a monster subjugation army was stationed in the city and was proactive in attracting adventurers. The associated costs were covered by taxes on materials and treasure obtained in the Labyrinth. The tax rate was the same as for other labyrinths, but no route existed that allowed safe transport of large quantities. Since the route that used yagus had a high shipping cost, purchase prices were cheaper than in other labyrinth cities.

To balance this, the tax rate within the Labyrinth City and the costs of items adventurers needed for exploration were lowered, but one would hesitate to say that it was attractive to either adventurers or merchants. Mariela and the others didn’t know this, but managing the Labyrinth City has been a headache-inducing problem for generations of margraves.

Lynx led Mariela to a medicinal herb specialty shop that did business with the Black Iron Freight Corps. Shops like this would purchase herbs and process them through dehydration or other methods to prepare them for transport out of the city. Depending on the shop, the herbs could also be processed into medicine and sold to city residents. While these medicines weren’t as effective as potions, people known as chemists created a variety of them from medicinal herbs, and those who possessed alchemic skills would often run an herb shop while serving as chemists.

The medicinal herb specialty shop Lynx showed her to was on the small side, but it sold a wide variety of herbs, all of which seemed to be good quality.

In the shop’s dim interior was an eccentric-looking bespectacled old man inspecting herbs.

“Ol’ Man Ghark! You alive in there?!”

“Izzat you, Linnie? Y’brought a woman with ye today. Yer really movin’ up in the world.”

“Shut it. She’s your customer today! Show some consideration, wouldja?”

The two were quite close.

The inside of the shop was packed with a large variety of dried herbs lined up next to one another, from familiar items such as curique and calgoran to rare materials used in special-grade and specialized potions.

Unfortunately, though, they were processed poorly. There are proper ways of processing herbs for each kind of medicinal effect, but all of them require taking conditions like temperature and pressure out of the equation little by little. Furthermore, a long time had passed since these had been dried, and the effects of some were completely gone.

Their efficacy’s halved.

She lifted an herb she needed and asked if he had any that weren’t dried.

“Over there. Dryin’ herbs ain’t a job for an amateur. I swear, rookies sure are picky about the oddest things.”

“These fiorcus petals were dried without removing the pollen. The lunamagia here was dried at too high a temperature. And it’s pretty old, too. I don’t want them,” Mariela replied, a little offended by his curtness. Ghark removed his glasses and peered at her.

“You an appraiser? Or maybe a foreign Pact-Bearer? Whatever y’are, nothin’ gets past ye. Ye’ve got sharp eyes. Wait here.”

Ghark headed to the back and brought out some undried medicinal herbs. They were in good shape, as if they’d just been picked.

Appraisal was a skill possessed by around one in ten people and allowed its user to learn about people and objects by accessing the Akashic records. However, despite its name, it mostly targeted things like people, plants, monsters, and weapons, and it was hard to get better at the skill. Information beyond human intellect, such as in the Akashic records, couldn’t be used through ordinary effort or talent.

Incidentally, Mariela didn’t have the Appraisal skill. Her ability to tell what condition materials were in was due to her alchemic skills.

Like a chef who can determine the ingredients and seasoning used in a dish by tasting it, an experienced alchemist could determine the condition of materials through their alchemic skills. Unlike with Appraisal, which could give you information on items you’re not familiar with at all if your level was high enough, subjects were limited to alchemic materials and created items you already knew something about. However, plants weren’t the only alchemic materials; there was also a wide range of other types such as minerals, animal materials, and monster materials, so it was very convenient.

However, even if you had alchemic skills in the Labyrinth City, being unable to make a pact with a ley line meant you couldn’t make potions, so you couldn’t improve. Even if you handled materials daily, you wouldn’t be able to assess their condition at a glance like Mariela as long as your alchemic skills remained low. Alchemists who made a pact in the vicinity of the Empire and had sufficient experience could do it, but if they left the area where they made the pact to a place they had no connection to with a Nexus, they couldn’t draw Drops of Life to make potions. That would take away their source of income, so it was rare for a Pact-Bearer to move to another region unless there was a special reason.

“I’ve only got non-astringent apriore seeds. I’m outta lund petioles today. If ye come back tomorrow, y’can get the rest of what you need then.”

Ghark apparently ventured into the Labyrinth himself.

The apriore seeds were processed flawlessly, but he didn’t have quite enough of them. Considering Lieutenant Malraux’s requested delivery date, removing the astringency herself seemed to be the best option, so she requested trona crystals as well for that purpose.

“I thought ye were a novice chemist, but y’can handle processin’ materials? Yer a lot different from those fools who can only mix herbs together. Need anythin’ else? I’ll put it all together for ye.” He grinned broadly as he spoke, giving her the feeling she’d made a good impression.

“Do you have nigill buds, ones without open leaves? Frozen ones are fine, too. Also, I’ll need leech venom glands. I’d like ones pickled in oil if possible.”

“Got ’em. How’re these?”

Nigill was a bulb plant that budded under snow, and brand-new buds that hadn’t been exposed to the air were used as ingredients in specialized potions that restored muscle tissue. Since there was demand for these potions from adventurers who’d been bitten by monsters, some farmers in the Citadel City specialized in growing nigill. The nigill buds Ghark showed her had been harvested at the ideal time and then frozen. Their quality was just as good as those from nigill farmers.

Parasite leeches are creatures about the size of an adult’s thumb that will latch on to any living thing—human, animal, or monster. They produce an analgesic poison from their venom gland, so when they attach to a part of the body the victim can’t see, such as the back, they will continue to suck blood without being noticed—hence why they’re called parasite leeches. Because the venom itself is hematogenic, the victim won’t become anemic. The leeches are so revolting that, if anything, a goblin covered in them would cause an adventurer more mental trauma than physical danger.

Since paralyzing poison dissolves in water and blood-forming components dissolve in oil, extracting the components was an easy task. But since the leeches were so gross looking, Mariela didn’t want to touch them if at all possible. These ones had been processed with the utmost precision and pickled in oil; they didn’t even register to her as leeches in this form.

“Thank you, Mr. Ghark! These leeches are perfect!” The old man’s professional work impressed Mariela.

“Ye just didn’t want to touch ’em…,” Ghark said in exasperation. He’d seen right through Mariela, who laughed sheepishly as he asked, “Was that all ye needed?”

“Um, besides that…”

Mariela ordered the number of components she needed for Lieutenant Malraux’s request and for Sieg’s potion.

With these, I can make a potion to heal Sieg’s leg!

She looked over her shoulder and smiled at Sieg, who stood at the entrance to the shop with his shoes in his arms. He walked up to her, perhaps interpreting the sudden eye contact to mean he was being summoned.

“Hang on, Sieg.”

“U-understood,” Sieg replied, unsure of what Mariela wanted, and Ghark handed him the bundle of medicinal herbs.

“Includin’ the stuff ye ordered, that’ll be twenty-two silver coins.”

Though Ghark’s work on the herbs was perfect, they cost 20 or 30 percent less than they would have in the Citadel City.

“That’s because I can collect all of ’em in the Labyrinth myself, so there’s no transport fee, and there’re no taxes in the middle of town.”

“Taxes are levied when you leave the city limits,” added Lynx. “But I think Lieutenant Malraux said the tax rates aren’t any different from other places.”

Apparently, Mariela had the Citadel City’s policies to thank for being able to buy the items cheaply. She could get everything she needed for about half the amount of money she had left.

“Do you have any po—medicine vials?”

“The only things I got that ain’t herbs’re over there in the corner.”

The corner Ghark indicated was filled with a haphazard display of alchemic materials other than herbs, such as medicine vials, halite, crystal fragments, and small magical gems, along with a wooden box packed with odds and ends unceremoniously shoved underneath the display on the floor. When Mariela looked inside, she found items used in alchemy—or rather, items that had no use other than for alchemy—such as odd gadgets, paper, ink, and pens. Bags and vials full of unknown substances had also been tossed in. They were all secondhand and covered in dust.

I guess he wouldn’t have potion vials, huh?

Although one might lump potions into a single category, they were often fickle things with disjointed ingredients and effects that had to be managed differently depending on the type of potion. For example, some weakened in sunlight, some deteriorated easily at room temperature, and some lost their efficacy when exposed to air for an extended period.

From an alchemist’s point of view, it was a matter of course for potions to deteriorate easily, since they had an immediate effect on wounds after being consumed. However, for the way they were used, it was too much trouble to change the storage method for each individual potion.

This was why potions were stored in vials created with alchemic skills. Vials that mitigated potion deterioration were made of a special glass tempered with magical gems and Drops of Life. Ones for potions that were expensive or deteriorated easily were etched with a magic circle as well as a magic circle–inscribed seal or label.

Because potion vials were easy to reuse, they were bought and sold in every town.

But without potions, there’s no reason to sell the vials. Guess I’ve got no choice but to make ’em myself.

Creating vials was a time-consuming task, so much so that there were alchemists who specialized in it. Mariela’s master was strict and trained her in vial-making, so she could do it herself, but…

What a pain…

She would have to start by gathering the ingredients. Tomorrow was going to be wasted on vial-making.

Although there were no vials, she fished around in the dusty box in case it had anything else that might come in handy. Ghark noticed and called, “If anythin’ strikes yer fancy, bring the box over.” He offered them for free.

Apparently, alchemists who came to the Labyrinth City from the outside were forced to sell these items when they left countless years ago. Ghark told her it was too much of a bother to throw away these used items he’d already bought, so her taking them was perfect.

The only items left were useless to anyone who couldn’t make potions. For someone who couldn’t appraise them, throwing away unfamiliar powders and seeds with no label would be worrisome. However, not only did Mariela need some of them, she was also grateful to find items she’d normally have to pay a lot for. Of course, there was obvious junk, too.

Mariela bought the items she needed: medicine vials, halite, magical gems, and spare herbs for three silver coins as thanks for Ghark’s generosity. In total, she paid two large silver coins and five silver coins, then left the shop.

“Yer order should be ready tomorrow evenin’. If ye ever need any more medicinal herbs, come back anytime,” said Ghark as he saw her off.

“You’re awesome, Mariela!” exclaimed Lynx with admiration as soon as she exited the shop. “Ol’ Man Ghark’s a real crank and only puts out processed herbs he messed up. He says they’re enough for people who don’t know any better. That was the first time I’ve seen him judge a person capable on the spot. He said to come back anytime, so he must like you a lot.”

Mariela got a box of odds and ends and a large variety of good-quality herbs. She was glad Ghark liked her. It was all thanks to her master’s strict guidance, and for that, she was grateful.

It was long past noon now, and despite her late breakfast, Mariela was hungry. Food carts serving adventurers had popped up in the Labyrinth’s vicinity, and in one corner alone near Ghark’s shop, there were carts selling dried fruit, bread, meat skewers, and other sundries. Mariela ended up purchasing ogre dates, dried apricots, and a small bottle of olives, as well as a skewer to thank Lynx for showing her around. As they ate, the three of them headed back to the Yagu Drawbridge Pavilion.

03

When they returned to the inn, Yuric was waiting for them.

“’Ey, Lynx, skippin’ out on cleaning the carriages?”

“I’m not skippin’ it, man. But c’mon, can’t we do it after lunch?”

“You’re gonna find another excuse after lunch, yeah?”

Lynx tried to put off cleaning the cargo holds of the armored carriages, but his resistance was in vain as Yuric dragged him off. Mariela resisted quipping, “Wasn’t that skewer you just had lunch?” and instead cheerfully waved good-bye to Lynx.

Mariela needed one last ingredient. She went up to the counter of the restaurant-cum-tavern and asked the owner for a bottle of bolka.

Bolka was a cheap spirit so intense it felt as if your mouth was on fire when you drank it. The owner’s expression seemed to be asking what possible use she could have for it, which was why she told him, “I’m using it to sterilize a wound.” That reasoning was apparently enough, and he brought out a bottle from the back.

With this, I have all the ingredients! Now I can finally make medicine for Sieg.

Mariela balled her hands into tight fists. After a quick dusting of the hodgepodge box outside the inn, she and Sieg carried it to their room.

Once they were in the room, Mariela took the implements she needed out of the hodgepodge box and asked Sieg to wash them in the bathtub. Since she’d dusted it off, just washing it with water produced through lifestyle magic would be enough. While he was doing that, she began processing the ingredients.

High-grade potions used lunamagia as a base. Lunamagia was a grass that grew along the banks of underground lakes and didn’t freeze even in wintertime. It could be used in a high-grade potion only if it was bathed in the light of a moonstone, a faintly glowing magical gem, as it grew.

The first step is to dry the lunamagia at ten to eleven degrees Celsius, the same as the environment in which it grows. Any higher or lower and the potion will lose efficacy.

“Form Transmutation Vessel, Tune Temperature to Ten Degrees, Decompress, Crumble, Dehydrate.”

She used her alchemic skills to produce an invisible vessel called a Transmutation Vessel and adjusted its temperature to ten degrees. Then, to quickly dry the lunamagia at such a low temperature, she decreased the pressure and further dehydrated the plant, spinning the air around inside before pulverizing it.

Mariela skillfully and efficiently processed the material, but she was handling only five aspects at once: maintaining the Transmutation Vessel and controlling its temperature, pressure, dryness, and circulation speed. If she were more proficient, she could control an even greater number of alchemic skills at once, but managing temperature was a tricky thing. The ability to control it within one degree of difference was limited to a handful of experts. Even if you said “ten degrees,” it’s not as if there was a thermometer; you had to rely on intuition. Since the flow of air during drying could also cause temperature inconsistency, you ended up having to manage it while keeping an eye on the state of the materials. The craftmanship needed for this process went beyond skills alone.

Such difficult temperature control was Mariela’s specialty. She could precisely match the desired temperature, then maintain that temperature and dry materials evenly—all because of her master’s training, of course. Mariela’s master would buy rainbow flowers, which change color depending on their drying temperature, and make her dry them. The optimum drying temperature for a rainbow flower depended on the number of petals it had. As its name suggests, if dried to perfection, it will turn into a beautiful blossom reflecting all the colors of the rainbow.

If she failed to do it correctly, she’d go without a meal, and if she succeeded, she got to eat an extra helping. Sometimes it was the food that motivated the young Mariela, but the beauty of the finished rainbow flowers enchanted her as well. Day after day until her magical reserves ran out, she dried all sorts of plants, from her garden’s medicinal herbs to weeds in the Fell Forest, and before she knew it, she’d acquired a top-notch skill.

Mariela clearly remembered the beautiful sight of the wall in her room completely covered by rainbow-colored flowers.

Since herb-drying by itself wasn’t a job in the Citadel City, Mariela herself had no idea just how advanced her skill was.

Sieg handed her the implements she’d had him wash.

“Clean Water, Wash, Drain, Dehydrate, Sterilize.”

She put the finishing touches on the prewashed implements with alchemic skills.

Although she had wanted Sieg to wash the other glass implements, too, he was watching her work with great interest, so she had him sit on the bed to observe so he wouldn’t be in the way.

Extracting the medicinal components from the lunamagia was the first step. The cylindrical glass vessel was equipped with a metal tripod, allowing it to stand upright. This was a tool often used for lunamagia extraction, and the diameter of the cylinder was about the size of a thumb and pinkie finger put together. It was a small extraction vessel that could distill one to ten portions at a time.

The lower part of the cylindrical vessel was a thin funnel with a stopcock that could be opened and closed to empty the liquid inside. She set a beaker underneath and closed the stopcock. The vessel narrowed at the top as well, with a hole in the very center that could be closed by a valve and a ventilation hole at the top with a stopcock that was currently in the open position. The valve had a nozzle, and it could spray liquid from the top when the tank was connected to a ventilator.

The cylinder and tank seemed to originally come with a magical temperature adjustment tool, but someone else had bought it. It also lacked a ventilator, but Mariela could adjust the temperature and ventilation through her alchemic skills. As long as she had the vessel, that was enough.

Before putting any herbs in, she tested it. The cylindrical vessel was slightly below the freezing point. She set the temperature of the tank and water within it just above the freezing point and sprayed the water. It was important to control the temperature of the nozzle so the inside wouldn’t freeze. The mist it spouted froze when it reached the inside of the vessel and turned into minute snow crystals. When she controlled the vapor inside the vessel and created a vortex that swirled from the center to the top and bottom, the snow crystals were caught up in the current and danced around and around.

“That oughta do the trick.”

Lunamagia’s medicinal components dissolved in below-freezing water. Therefore, to extract them, the lunamagia needed to make contact with either water that’d had salt added to it to keep it from freezing, or ice. Since it needed to come in contact with something solid, the sprayed water should be frozen into tiny pieces of ice to maximize the contact area, and then the lunamagia and ice should be stirred together in the vessel to cause a reaction.

The powdered snow was pretty as it twinkled and turned. Mariela controlled the temperature of the vessel, the spraying water tank, and the nozzle, as well as managing the spraying vapor, the atmosphere in the container, and the airflow all at once. Most alchemists used magical tools for three-point temperature control and spraying vapor management, and they controlled only the vessel’s atmosphere and airflow themselves. Considering this, Mariela’s alchemic skills were nothing to sneeze at, but she was using the fullest extent of her ability to control all these elements. If she didn’t have the extraction vessel, she would’ve needed to use salt water for the extraction. Since a saltwater extraction weakened the efficacy of the finished product, the vessel was a big help.

She put the finely crushed lunamagia in the vessel and replaced the water in the tank with liquid containing Drops of Life. After she finished spraying one potion’s worth, she focused on managing the temperature and airflow in the vessel. This stage was the most crucial part of making a high-grade potion. She was exhausted.

Somehow, she did it, as the white snow crystals emitted the yellow-tinged light of a moonstone.

She ended her control of the vessel’s interior, opened the stopcock, and collected the extract in the lower container. After that, she would normally let it return to room temperature, but this was for a specialized potion to restore Sieg’s gouged flesh. Next was to peel the still-frozen nigill buds.

When nigill was close to thawing, it sprouted and broke through the snow in a single night. She removed the buds, which were harvested right before they could sprout, and crushed them with her fingertips, then added them to the chilled lunamagia extract. Now, as the liquid returned to room temperature, the medicinal components began to dissolve.

The most difficult part of the process was over, but a troublesome step still remained.

Mid- and high-grade potions were highly potent and brought about rapid recovery. Because of this, certain components were mixed in to regulate the body and suppress any backlash: ogre dates for mid-grade potions, treant fruit for high-grade potions. Ogre dates were commonplace and even sold dried, but treant fruit was rare. Ghark’s shop would probably sell it, but it was too well-known as a high-grade potion ingredient, and a chemist wouldn’t be likely to buy it even taking the efficacy into account.

So she didn’t buy treant fruit this time, instead creating a substitute with ogre dates used for mid-grade potions and medicinal herbs. The recipe called for three roots of mandragora and its subspecies, three leaves, two stalks, one seed, one petal, two mushrooms, and one piece of bark. After drying each of the thirteen materials at the appropriate temperatures, she measured a certain amount of each, mixed them together, pickled them in olive oil, and pressure extracted them for about an hour to speed things up. Normally, this would be a complicated process involving a scale and a pressure vessel, but Mariela skillfully and efficiently proceeded with just her alchemic skills, set on the notion that “going tool-free is fundamental.”

While the hour-long extraction took place, Mariela arranged other liquids. She extracted curique, ogre date, and mandragora components, which were materials in low-, mid-, and high-grade potions, to remove the poison from arawne. This plant’s roots had analgesic components, while its leaves contained anti-inflammatory ones. After processing other materials as well, she either wrapped them in oiled paper or stored them in medicine vials. They would be good for about a month in these conditions.

The substitute ingredient was ready around the time she finished her other tasks. Mariela slowly reduced the pressure while making sure it didn’t drop too far below room temperature. The oil was now an amber color, signaling quality execution. She ladled out a spoonful and dissolved it in a mixture of Drops of Life and alcohol distilled from the bolka.

She carefully mixed the four types of completed extracts together after removing their dregs. Because they had to be mixed in order and there was a large quantity to be mixed all at once, she had to stay vigilant until the very end.

“Anchor Essence.”

The specialized high-grade potion was complete at last.

“Alllll doooone! Applause, please!”

“Ohhh…?”

Sieg, who had been watching Mariela’s process intently, seemed confused at her sudden pronouncement, but he clapped as instructed.

“Man, I’m beat. I didn’t think just one bottle would make me this tired!”

“W-well done.”

Under normal circumstances, the time-consuming substitute ingredient would have been prepared in advance so she could process all the ingredients at once. Today, she made everything from scratch, so it was no easy task.

Mariela tested it immediately.

“Here. Sieg, hold out your right arm.”

“O-okay.”

Sieg still looked perplexed as he held his right arm out with his palm facing up.

“Other way, other way.”

Mariela grabbed his arm and turned it so the spot where the black wolves had bit him was facing up, and she poured drops of the newly made potion onto it.

“Good. It works.”

The sunken scar from the black wolves emitted a faint light and quickly swelled, then disappeared without a trace in an instant.

“Can you try clenching and unclenching? Is it moving properly? Ah, it is.”

Just this morning, his right arm had had no strength and could only move slowly, but now it was moving without a hitch.

“Oh…I can… I can move it…”

“Good, good. Okay, go ahead and kneel— Oh, on the chair, okay? Now turn around and roll up the leg of your pants so I can see your left calf.”

Sieg had been attempting to put his feelings into words when Mariela urged him to show the wound on his left leg.

This wound had been cauterized to stop the bleeding after it was inflicted by the black wolves. He’d received the minimal treatment with healing magic, only enough to form a thin layer of skin over the bite wound. Bacteria had then entered it and further aggravated the lesion as he was being transported to the Labyrinth City. Mariela had cured the inflammation yesterday with a potion, but internally, it was still a mess.

She poured an especially generous amount of the potion on his calf, and the gouged flesh immediately began to regenerate. She could tell that the muscular tissue under the thin layer of skin was healing bit by bit.

“Ngh…”

The toes of Sieg’s left foot jerked slightly. There shouldn’t have been any pain, since the potion contained an analgesic, so the faint noise he made must have been from the discomfort of tissue rapidly regenerating.

In the blink of an eye, the burn marks had vanished, too.

She knew a freshly made potion would be extremely effective.

Although his leg was healed, there was still about a third of the potion left. “Here, Sieg. Drink the rest. All at once, now. Chug! Chug!”

She pushed the potion vessel toward Sieg, who was looking behind him to check his leg.

She’d noticed it this morning while cutting his hair, but Sieg had scars all over his body—possibly whip marks.

Sieg dutifully drained the high-grade potion and shivered.

His whole body shone faintly, and the remaining injuries were instantly healed.

Sieg looked at his right hand, which he could now freely move, and his once gouged left leg. He quietly got off the bed and stood up.

Then he stepped forward with his left leg. One step, then another. He walked without discomfort.

He raised and stretched both hands, and he lightly hopped up and down. He rotated his arms and twisted his waist. He moved around to check how his body was feeling. He had tended to slouch before, but now he stretched his back muscles in a dignified fashion, making himself taller and looking rejuvenated.

“I can…move them… I can move them. My leg, my arm… I couldn’t even turn my shoulder, but now I can. And my back…doesn’t hurt. My stomach cramps are gone…”

Uh, just how thoroughly injured were you, Sieg…? Also, that high-grade potion was, like, super-effective. Labyrinth materials are really somethin’ else!

As she watched the delighted Sieg, who looked ready to burst into tears, Mariela was glad she became an alchemist.

She could think of no greater reward than seeing the joy on someone’s face after they’d recovered from an injury or illness.

After Sieg finished checking himself over, he abruptly turned to Mariela and dropped to one knee.

Was he going to start groveling again?! Mariela braced herself for an instant, but this time he was just on the one knee.

It was the kind of pose a knight assumed when taking an oath.

“Lady Mariela, thank you so much. Never… Never in my wildest dreams…did I think the day would come…when I could move like this again. I truly wish I could properly express my gratitude… Since yesterday, you’ve done nothing but help me, so I…I will serve you with all my heart and soul. For your sake, Lady Mariela, I’ll do anything…”

Sieg stitched his words together, overcome with emotion. His single blue eye was wet with tears, and he expressed his gratitude in faltering sentences as if delirious.

To Mariela, his eye was truly beautiful. It was a shame she couldn’t heal the other one.

“I’m sorry I can’t heal your eye. Just hang in there until I can make special-grade potions, okay?”

“There is no need… This is enough. I thought I was going to die, but now…I’m no longer in any pain. Truly, I will do anything. Anything at all…”

Sieg’s intensity had been dialed up to the strangest degree.

“Hey, Sieg, I have a request.”

He shouldn’t say “I’ll do anything” so easily!

“! Ready and waiting!”

“I want you to wash that glass vessel over there!”

“?!”

Mariela left the cleanup to Sieg and took a nap until dinnertime.

As she napped, Sieg washed and dried the glass vessel, tidied up the scattered medicinal herbs on the desk, dusted the contents of the hodgepodge box, and arranged them on the floor so that they were easily identifiable.

And then when Mariela woke up…

“There’s trash over there.”

“Understood.”

“I’m taking these with me tomorrow, so put ’em in the bag.”

“Understood.”

“Those I’m gonna use again, so put ’em back in the bag and put it in the corner.”

“Understood.”

…Mariela ordered Sieg around while sprawled on the bed.

Ahhh, this is the life. I bet my stupid master felt the same way.

If only she could eat her meals in this position, that would be fantastic. A knock at the door interrupted Mariela’s daydreaming.

“Yeees?”

“It’s Malraux. The contract is ready, so could you come to my room?”

A bit of predinner work had surfaced.

04

Captain Dick was waiting for Mariela and Sieg inside Lieutenant Malraux’s room when they entered. He seemed surprised when he saw Sieg, who just yesterday looked to be in the direst of straits. Now, although he was underweight, this handsome man appeared to be a different person altogether, a feeling Mariela understood well. After all, she’d been surprised, too. However, Dick was easy to read, as always. She worried whether it was okay for the captain of the Black Iron Freight Corps to be this transparent.

On the other hand, Malraux’s expression was neutral. At his suggestion, Mariela sat down on the couch. Sieg remained in the background.

“Considering the confidentiality of this matter, it will not be communicated to anyone other than Captain Dick and myself. Here is the contract; please review it.”

Lieutenant Malraux handed over a number of papers. When she looked at the top sheet, she saw all the demands she’d set forth yesterday written on it. The confidentiality was a given, and in the unlikely event information leaked and Mariela was exposed to danger, the Black Iron Freight Corps would take it upon themselves to resolve the problem and, depending on the circumstances, would even aid her in escape.

This was the first proper business deal she’d ever been a part of. Up until now, she’d always exchanged goods and payments on the spot and never had anything like a contract. The one Lieutenant Malraux just gave her had a magical effect on it from the Merchants Guild and seemed to have been created with great precision.

“Um, what do you mean by ‘close a contract of sale for each transaction’?” Mariela asked, since nothing was written about payment.

“Market prices often fluctuate, which is something that cannot be incorporated into a magical contract,” Lieutenant Malraux replied fluidly. “The price of the goods will change for every transaction. We will execute either a unit price contract or a contract of sale for each negotiation, which will be separate from this basic one. Here is the contract of sale for the current transaction.”

He pointed to a document below the one she was looking at. It seemed to be the current contract of sale, and it included the types and number of potions ordered yesterday as well as the unit price to be paid to Mariela.

The written prices were six silver coins for each low-grade heal potion, low-grade cure potion, and monster-warding potion and six large silver coins for each mid-grade heal potion and mid-grade cure potion. She was astonished by these amounts, but there was nothing written for high-grade heal potions and high-grade cure potions, and the sum total was also blank.

“Um, the spot for high-grade items is blank.”

“That’s correct…” Captain Dick, who’d been silent until now, finally piped up. “High-grade items haven’t been sold on the market for over ten years.”

Apparently, it was unknown how much they sold for because they weren’t in circulation.

Dick candidly explained the situation. “Potions in the Labyrinth City are distributed solely by the Aguinas family except for items managed by the margrave and each respective house. The Labyrinth Suppression Forces are provided with a fixed supply in accordance with an agreement with the margrave, but things like transaction prices haven’t been disclosed.”

Mariela had heard the family name Aguinas before. Two hundred years ago, the Aguinases were the head alchemists in the Kingdom of Endalsia. That meant the family must have survived the Stampede. For them to still have power over potion sales two hundred years after the kingdom’s destruction showed just how formidable they were.

“We would like to determine the price based on the market value, but since we don’t know that, it’s possible the price will be negotiated down. You can set the minimum price you’re willing to sell them for, or if you don’t trust us, you could also attend the negotiations yourself. What do you think?”

Captain Dick folded his arms and plopped down on a chair with an imposing flourish, but the position of his thick eyebrows showed how languid he really was. He was the kind of man whose outward appearance stood in stark contrast to how he actually felt. She knew from their interactions so far that Captain Dick wasn’t a bad person, but he seemed like the type who’d get the short end of the stick in a business interaction. Although she supposed Lieutenant Malraux would step in if that happened.

“There’s something I’d like you to tell me if possible.”

“Mm? What is it?”

“Who will you be selling the potions to?”

“The Labyrinth Suppression Forces. They’ll be heading out on a routine expedition soon. We’ll also buy some of the monster-warding and low-grade potions ourselves.”

She hadn’t thought he’d say who their customers were. Was it really okay for him to tell her that so readily? She glanced at Lieutenant Malraux, who looked dignified as always, but his eyes were smiling as if he was somehow enjoying himself just a bit. Though she wasn’t sure, Mariela suspected Captain Dick’s rugged honesty amused him.

“You’re not selling them to the Aguinas family?”

“If we sell to them, the potions may never reach our forces. The quality and quantity of potions were already decreasing, but we’ve heard that inferior products such as so-called new medicine have been circulating recently. Yet, the injuries sustained by the army just keep increasing.”

This time, he made a face of blatant disgust. Captain Dick didn’t seem to think well of the Aguinas family. And the way he talked favorably about the Labyrinth Suppression Forces made her wonder if he was acquainted with anyone in them.

“I understand. Even if the prices go down, I won’t mind. I’m just happy I can help out.”

Potions healed injuries. She hated the thought of them being used as a tool to make a profit; she preferred they go directly to the user. Since the price of the low- and mid-grade potions would let her make more than enough money, she’d be happy if her potions reduced the harm to the army even a little.

“Is that so? You have my gratitude! Our group will be pleased, too.”

Delighted, Captain Dick held out his hand for a handshake. He had a strong grip that hurt a little, but his large, thick palm was very warm. Mariela thought she understood why Lieutenant Malraux associated with a man as unsuited to business as he was.

“Right, then, let’s celebrate!” he said as he began to get to his feet, but Lieutenant Malraux grabbed the back of his collar and sat him back down. This guy was quick. Dick choked as the collar constricted his neck.

“The contract is not yet finalized. Besides, celebration would undermine the confidentiality, would it not? Do you understand?” Lieutenant Malraux reprimanded the captain as he finalized the contract of sale with a swish of his pen. “Speaking of compensation, Miss Mariela, we will bear the costs of food, drink, and other such items during your stay here. Your stay has been extended by one week, and I have informed the owner as well, so please order whatever you would like. Oh, and we are to provide you with what you need in advance; what should we prepare?”

He was really a wining and dining type of fellow, wasn’t he? She wondered if this offer included Sieg as well.

“This time I don’t need anything in particular. Um, will those costs be covered for Sieg, too?” she asked, knowing it was the question of a commoner.

“Of course,” Malraux replied with a smile. Just as Mariela thought, What a generous man! he added, “Ah, but, Captain Dick, please pay your own way. We do not need to incur any additional expenses.”

He gave this reminder with a smile as well, and Captain Dick hung his head in dejection.

Mariela signed the finalized contract. A magic contract was executed by signing it with ink dribbled with blood. Captain Dick and Lieutenant Malraux signed their names in the space for the Black Iron Freight Corps.

They decided she would deliver the potions in this room at this same time two days from now.

Mariela and Sieg left the room and headed for the restaurant on the first floor. Captain Dick was about to go with them, but Lieutenant Malraux promptly seized him.

He seemed to be saying, “Where do you think you’re going? Do that later.” Seeing that the captain was probably about to get a talking-to, Mariela and Sieg quickly left them to it.

05

It was finally time for dinner. Sieg and Mariela chatted about what could be on today’s menu as they went down to the restaurant.

The sun had just set, so it was a little early still for dinnertime. Just like yesterday, there were only a handful of guests here and there, none of whom belonged to the Black Iron Freight Corps.

Amber appeared and invited Mariela and Sieg to the counter. Since it was still early, she wore a stole over her red dress, concealing her overwhelming cleavage.

Today’s menu offered beef stew made from some kind of bovine monster and meatballs with a vegetable demi-glace. When Mariela asked what kind of meatballs they were, Amber responded with a giggle.

“What kind of meat, indeed. I’m curious… Like the stew, it’s not beef but some kind of cow monster.”

Mariela ordered the beef stew, and Sieg ordered the meatballs.

It wasn’t as if she’d forced the mystery meat on him.

“Sieg, what will you pick? You can ask for whatever you like, you know,” she’d said, and after thinking it over a little while, he had ordered the meatballs.

“You’re a brave man, Sieg.”

“It’s meat, so…,” he answered in a small voice. He seemed to have simply chosen a dish based on which one he thought had a lot of meat.

“Mister, your name is Sieg? You seem a lot better now. I’m glad. How ’bout it? A drink to celebrate your recovery.”

Amber crossed her arms as she recommended a drink to Sieg. The act of crossing them lifted her own two meatballs, which bulged out of the stole. What a pair. The stole acted more like a diversion to needlessly draw the eye to her chest. You might say it was a trap. That stole was really putting in the work.

“No thank you.” Sieg smoothly avoided Amber’s temptation and looked to Mariela.

“Um, Sieg, it’s okay. It’s just one drink, y’know? I’ll have one, too, so let’s make a toast.”

Although he’d recovered from his injuries, his physical strength hadn’t completely returned. However, one drink wouldn’t hurt, and she thought celebrating his recovery was a great idea.

“Lady Mariela, I am a slave. Truth be told, I’m not even allowed to…sit in chairs. Please, please…you needn’t…concern yourself with me……” Sieg spoke haltingly, a slightly pained look on his face.

Come to think of it, Sieg stumbled over his words. Mariela figured maybe there had been a long period of time when he didn’t speak.

I want to do this for him, one way or another…

She didn’t want to act like a master; she wasn’t that type of person. Being waited on bothered her. Sieg could speak only in broken sentences, was underweight, and had sustained a lot of injuries. Seeing him trying his utmost to serve her like this made her heart ache.

He’s under a Contract of Servitude, though, so it’s impossible for us to be totally like friends.

Gradually, they were becoming friendlier with each other, and she wanted him to be a trusted confidant, even if only a little bit. Mariela was unknowingly seeking a relationship like what she had with her master. That’s why she liked the idea of a toast. Ignoring Sieg’s hesitation, she asked Amber for an appropriately celebratory drink.

“The first toast for both of you, huh? Let’s see here.”

Amber picked out a number of bottles from the other side of the counter.

Erm. I dunno anything about these.

Her master used to drink, but Mariela had never had a drop of alcohol in her life.

“Sieg, which one would be good?”

She came to a realization only after tossing the question at him.

Crap. Maybe that was a stupid question. He went from a debt laborer to a penal laborer, so he probably doesn’t know about alcohol brands or anything like that.

However, he calmly asked her, “Lady Mariela…do you…drink alcohol?”

“Huh? Um… I’ve never had any before…”

“If that’s the case…either the Feliz or Mallo Moscato…might go down easily.”

“Which one d’you like, Sieg?”

Sieg scrunched up his face before replying, “I suppose…the Feliz.”

“Wow! You’re pretty savvy ’bout those girly drinks, mister! Speakin’ from past experiences, are ya?”

Mariela was relieved by Amber’s good-natured jab. Sieg had shown a new side of himself. Just moments ago, she’d thought about how she wanted to become close friends with him, but now that she knew Sieg had a kinda cool side to him, she found her heart was pounding in her chest just a little. Shaking her head as she chastised herself, she ordered the Feliz. Amber opened the bottle and poured it into a glass.

The pale-pink liquor fizzed and bubbled in a pretty way.

“Oh, a toast? We’ll join in, too! Hey, Malraux!”

Captain Dick came down the stairs to join them for the toast, forcefully dragging Lieutenant Malraux along with him. “I suppose I have no choice,” Malraux replied with a wry smile and accepted a glass as well.

When all four of them had received a glass, three sets of eyes looked at Mariela. It seemed she would lead the toast.

“To Sieg’s recovery! And to our assemblage!”

Following her lead, the other three responded “Cheers!” and clinked their glasses together.

Her first taste of alcohol was sweet and went down easy. It had a faint smell of wild strawberries. Immediately after the toast came their food piled high, apparently a celebratory gift from the owner.

Sieg gazed at his glass, then leisurely tipped some of the drink into his mouth. Rather than swallowing right away, he savored the taste, rolling it around on his tongue. Although he’d previously been shoveling food into his mouth yesterday and this morning, tonight he picked up a fork with his right hand, now that he could move it, and neatly ate bite by bite.

“Delicious…,” he muttered simply. Sieg knew alcohol brands and table manners. Mariela wondered what kind of person he was. Surely it was the alcohol causing her heart to thump loudly and her cheeks to flush.

At any rate, I’m curious about him…

She stole a few glances at Sieg, who was seated next to her. He was cutting his meatballs into bite-size pieces before bringing them to his mouth and savoring them.

“What kinda meat’s in those? Is it good?” Mariela couldn’t stop herself from asking. This was definitely the alcohol’s fault, too. Her master had mentioned how it could make people franker and more up-front.

Meanwhile, Captain Dick was saying things like “That stole doesn’t suit you at all!” When he tried to tear it off Amber, she pinched the back of his hand. Maybe the alcohol was making him bolder, too? No, he was probably just under the influence of Ample Amber.

“Awww man, the party’s already started! No faaair! We only just got done cleanin’ the carriages!”

Lynx and the others had arrived. They were soiled with the slaves’ excrement and appeared to have been busy cleaning the iron carriages.

“Urgh, it’s pitch-black…,” murmured Lynx when he saw the evening’s dinner specials.

I’m not gonna ask what he’s imagining it is…

She took her eyes off Lynx, who seemed as if he was about to ask more questions, and glanced at Yuric and the others he had been cleaning with. Not just Yuric, but even Donnino and Franz, who looked as though they’d been repairing the iron carriages, had weary expressions on their faces.

“Maaan, I’m so hungry I can’t even deciiide,” said Lynx before ordering both dishes, just like yesterday. Incidentally, the meatballs were a combination of bovine monster meat and orc meat.

Mariela kept glancing at the meatballs, so finally Sieg offered her a bite. In return, she put a piece of the bovine monster meat from the stew onto his plate.

“This meatball tastes great! It’s so juicy with the soup!”

“The meat from the stew…is also delicious. Very tender.”

Lynx added his two cents to their mutual appreciation of the cooking: “Both are great—as long as there’s a lot!”

Quantity over quality for Lynx. He couldn’t appreciate any of the finer points of the food other than the facts that the stew’s meat had been boiled until it was very tender and the beef didn’t stink.

“What’s a ‘bovine monster’ anyway? Maybe it was mystery meat after all,” Mariela said with a laugh. They hadn’t solved the case of the mysterious meat, but the fun party continued late into the night.

I think Captain Dick passed out sometime around then. He was wearing Amber’s stole while Lieutenant Malraux was having a cheery conversation with the owner. Lynx and Yuric complained about cleaning the carriages as they gobbled down their food, and Donnino and Franz got all fired up talking about iron carriages. Even Sieg was smiling, so he must’ve been having fun, too. Yeah. That much I remember.

Mariela recalled last night’s party. For some reason, she didn’t remember going back to her room. Must’ve been one of those old folktales her master used to tell her about a basic liquor spell, What Happened Last Night?

Well, I did change clothes and sleep in my bed, so hey, I must be doing all right! Still, my head really hurts…

She seemed to have woken up very early. It was pitch-black outside the window, and everyone was probably asleep, since she didn’t hear the usual nighttime hustle and bustle.

As she crafted a low-grade cure potion, Sieg woke up.

“Did I wake you? Do you need a cure potion, too, Sieg? It’s not specifically for hangovers, but it’s still kinda effective.”

“No, I…didn’t drink very much.” Sieg looked perfectly well.

Mariela quickly finished the potion using a medicinal herb she’d bought in bulk, and she drank it. Even though this wasn’t its intended purpose, the cure potion was effective at treating her hangover, as her headache dissolved away. However, now she felt the call of nature.

“I’m gonna use the toilet real quick.”

She changed into her clothes, which had been neatly folded, and hurried out of the room.

When she’d finished her business and was climbing the stairs to return to her quarters, the door to Captain Dick’s room opened without a sound, and Amber came out.

Amber looked back into the room and gazed at something, probably the sleeping captain. Mariela couldn’t see very well in the dim light from the small windows, but Amber’s mouth was curved in a gentle smile with a look of deep affection. She wore that expression even though she treated him so coldly in front of the others. Was Captain Dick aware of her feelings?

Amber glanced back into the room for only a few seconds, but in that moment, Mariela felt as if time had stopped. For some reason, it was painful to witness, and Mariela felt her chest tighten.

Amber slowly and quietly closed the door so as not to wake Captain Dick, and then she noticed Mariela. With a smile, she murmured, “It’s still early; you can sleep a little longer,” as they passed each other, and then she descended the stairs.

Wha…? What’s early, exactly…?

Mariela’s heart was pounding.

By the time she returned to her room, Sieg was up. He had even changed clothes and made the beds.

“It’s still early. You can sleep a little longer.” Mariela tried out Amber’s line.

“I was already up,” he answered with a smile. Huuuh? That was weird, she thought in confusion, then prepared to take a bath, which she hadn’t gotten to do yesterday. Sieg seemed to have taken one before going to sleep last night.

“I’ll get you something to drink as well.” Sieg, seeing Mariela getting ready for a bath, casually stood up from his chair. He had a gentlemanly, attentive way about him. Since he was going down there anyway, she told him to ask for some packed lunches and a trowel and hatchet.

Mariela took her bath in a big hurry so she wouldn’t keep Sieg waiting.

He hadn’t returned when she finished but was instead waiting outside in the corridor. Mariela wasn’t used to being fussed over, so although he was probably just being considerate, she felt awkward.

After tomorrow’s deal is done and I’ve got the money, I’m gonna rent a house somewhere, she thought as she sipped the tea Sieg had brought her. The two of them discussed their plans for the day.

“The owner said…he would leave the lunches…on the counter for us. He also said…you’re free to use the tools…you asked for.”

The owner had still been awake, and he had boxed up some breakfast and lunch for them. The trowel and hatchet were at the bottom of the storage closet for them to use whenever they liked.

“All right, let’s head out around the time the yagu rental opens.”

Sieg brought out the rucksack he’d prepared yesterday. It contained various materials from the hodgepodge box such as halite, magical gems, and herbs tucked into a burlap bag, as well as a wooden cup they’d borrowed from the room. Mariela carried some money, scraps of paper from the hodgepodge box, and a hand towel in her pouch. Once she crafted a monster-warding potion just to be safe, their preparations were complete.

The sky grew light. After collecting the lunch boxes and borrowing the trowel and hatchet, they set out.

Today, they would gather the materials to make potion vials.