Part 23: The Miner Teachers Catria How to Negotiate

Part 23:
The Miner Teachers Catria
How to Negotiate

THE ROAD to the coast was called the “Road of Hope,” and it connected the Lactia Republic to the various capitals of other nations. In that way, it was like the main road of the continent. It was also enormously wide; four carriages could have traveled down it at once. As Alan and the others rode along, they crossed paths with caravans and joined streams of people walking to and fro.

While they traveled, Alan tapped his shovel on one of the cobblestones and said in an impressed voice, “They used good, high-density stone for this road. It’ll hold for at least two thousand years.”

“Makes sense. Lactia is the world’s largest trading hub,” Catria explained from the driver’s seat.

She was alone with Alan for the moment, as Riezfeld had remained at the World Tree Castle to use a shovel pen (a pen shaped like a shovel) to put together a thesis on matters far beyond the comprehension of current humanity. Alice and Lithisia were in the back of the carriage, shoveling.

“A good deed is deserving of a good shovel! Rule seven of the Holy Shovel Empire’s Magna Shovel Carta!”

Apparently Alice was getting herself shoveled as a reward for making Raystol talk. Sadly, that meant there was nobody but Catria to ask pertinent questions about this Holy Shovel Empire business.

“No, no! It doesn’t feel good… M-my underarms… Aaaah!!!”

“He he he, hee hee hee! Shovely shove shove!”

“A-amazing! Wait, no! I didn’t mean that!”

The pair’s moans leaked out from the back of the carriage, so Catria quickly closed the door. Beads of sweat rolled down her neck.

“If the guards look inside, we’re doomed.”

“Well, Lithisia is a wanted criminal.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

It was true that in Rostir, Lithisia had been replaced with an imposter and was currently on the run, but that wasn’t what Catria was concerned about. She was worried that as of right now, to an onlooker it would look as though they were kidnapping and committing deeply troubling acts on a young (naked) girl. Yet for all of Catria’s complaints, she knew there was no stopping the shoveling (a major crime) of Alice.

When she had last checked in, Alice was coated in some kind of strange fluid, but also somehow looked happy. Specifically, she licked Lithisia’s shovel with a look of pure glee on her face.

Catria swore to herself to never get involved.

“Alan, we’re almost at the castle gates. If we keep going like this, we’re going to get caught.”

“Indeed. Instead of building a tunnel, let’s try negotiating our way through this time.”

“Why?”

“There are a lot of people here. If I open a hole in the ground, it’ll stand out.”

It was a surprisingly thoughtful response.

“Didn’t you say something about information control being one of your shovel’s special techniques?”

“It’s not perfect. If there happens to be another shovel-wielder or drill-wielder nearby, it’s possible they could break through the lie.”

“I’d say the chances of that happening are less than that of an asteroid falling on us… You know what, pretend I didn’t say that.” Catria let out a deep sigh.

The whole “safety first” thing Alan had going on was as fundamentally broken as the rest of his ideas, but Catria couldn’t do anything about it. She simply directed the carriage toward the castle gates.

“This is Lactia Gate.”

“Hrm. It’s not as big as the Gate to Hell, but it’s still pretty large.”

In fact, it was around ten meters tall. Several guards stood on duty, clad in steel plate armor and equipped with long lances. Their intimidating armaments were enough to put the pressure on any traveler coming through.

Their party was hailed as they approached. “You, with the carriage! Show me your Republic Pass. If you don’t have one of those, then your Holy Alliance Pass!”

Needless to say, the party had neither. In fact, they were wanted by a whole country. The gatekeeper’s sole job was to stop just that kind of person from getting through.

“What’s the plan, Alan? Assuming you have one.”

“Don’t worry. I figured this might happen.”

Was he going to fabricate a travel pass with his shovel or something? Catria had long since given up on trying to find rational solutions. However, even then she didn’t expect what Alan pulled from his pouch. It was a shining, golden shovel. To be fair, it looked nothing like a travel pass.

“What’s the deal with this?” asked Catria.

“Take it. You should be able to use it.”

“Hrm.” Catria had questions, but she found herself wondering most about the fact that the shovel was gold. Was this Alan’s attempt at a bribe? Either way, he seemed filled with confidence, so there was little doubt that there was something to the lustrous tool.

Catria showed the gold shovel to the gatekeeper, who stared at her, then at the shovel.

“What is this thing? Are you playing games with me?” He was clearly angry, and Catria felt like she’d been punched right in the forehead. “I won’t say it again. Show me your travel passes. Otherwise, get out of here!”

Catria turned to Alan, almost in tears. The guard’s words had been a real shock to her system.

“Are you playing games with me?”

The guard was completely right. At some point, her whole brain had been poisoned by shovels. What was she thinking, presenting him with a gold shovel? There was no way you could bribe someone with something like that! Catria dropped her shoulders and began to tremble, feeling truly pathetic.

Then Alan had to go and shovel even more shame upon her.

“Are you tired?” he asked. “There’s no way a shovel could ever take the place of a travel pass.”

Catria’s tears began to fall. You bastard! You damn bastard! How dare you try to play that card!

“This is all your fault, you big dumb jerk! You suck!”

“Calm down. A shovel isn’t meant to be shown. It’s meant to be used to bury things.”

“Bury things?!”

“Exactly. I was hoping you’d figure it out for yourself, but it’s fine. I’ll just show you.”

Alan took the gold shovel and moved back over to the guard. Much to Catria’s surprise, he then began to dig a ditch by the guard’s feet. His movements were gentle, as if he were digging in a garden. For some reason, the flow of time appeared to slow down around him. He probably really was distorting space-time. Eventually, he finished digging a long, thin ditch between himself and the guard.

In response, the guard raised his lance. He was suspicious. Of course he was. How could he not find it troubling that this random guy had just dug a ditch at his feet? “What did you do?! What are you scheming?!”

“This ditch resides between the two of us.”

“Wha?” The guard was utterly confused by Alan’s attempt at explaining things.

“We don’t have travel passes, but I promise you that we’re not suspicious. Let us go through.”

The extremely suspicious shovel man was saying extremely sketchy things. To no one’s surprise, the guard grew even more uneasy. He grabbed the whistle around his neck, planning to call for help. “You some sort of country bumpkin? You ain’t got no common sense! Nobody gets through without a…”

Just as the guard tried to finish his sentence, Alan filled in the ditch with his shovel, and for some reason, the guard let go of the whistle.

“You’re right,” said the guard. “You folks seem totally fine, but rules are rules.”

“We’re not dangerous, I swear. Believe me,” Alan insisted.

“I’m more than happy to believe you, but…”

Something about the flow of their conversation was off. For one, while they spoke, Alan continued filling the ditch. Once half of the ditch was filled in with dirt, the guard’s attitude changed even further. He glanced at Catria. “Hrm, you’re a lady knight, are you not? You seem trustworthy.”

“So you’ll let us through?” asked Catria.

“H-hold on! Let me at least make sure you don’t have any unauthorized goods in that carriage of yours first.”

“!!”

That was no good. Inside said carriage was a naked girl getting shoveled. There was no way the guard could see that without misunderstanding the situation. Well, there wasn’t actually anything to misunderstand, but…!

More importantly, a regular human with no shovel resistance would likely descend into madness on a cosmic level after seeing what was unfolding in there. The guard had to be stopped in order to protect his fragile human mind.

Alan finished patting down the final shovelfuls of earth.

“Actually, you know what? You guys are totally cool. There’s no way you’re packing anything suspicious.” The guard wore a genuine smile as he shook Alan’s hand.

“I’m glad we could come to an agreement.”

“Of course! You folks seem like you’ll be good friends of our humble nation. Welcome to Lactia!” The guard gave the signal, and Lactia Gate began to rumble open.

“Hey, Alan.”

“What?” The miner almost sounded like Catria for a moment.

“What in blue blazes just happened? The nearby merchants looked like they were about to have convulsions.”

“I used my shovel to fill in the ditch, a.k.a., the hole, between us.”

“Excuse me?”

“You know, the ditch that represents our relationship. Get it?”

What are you talking about?! Catria cried out internally.

“The very basics of negotiation. Make sure you remember that.”

“Never! Absolutely not!”

“Don’t worry, you’ll master it soon enough.”

“I refuse!” Catria’s sighs were never-ending. This shovel-bastard could probably bury the entirety of the ocean if he wanted to.

***

It was said that Lactia was the center of all commerce on the continent, and this was no exaggeration. Catria and Alan made their way to the port, leaving the other two back at the inn. Before them stretched a massive market filled with every kind of shop imaginable—beautiful four-story buildings with all manner of accessory shops and outdoor stalls on mats—and with legions of customers visiting them.

Docked at the port was a host of wooden transport ships, designed to carry cargo across the ocean.

“So this is Lactia? It’s so packed.”

“And one of the shops here has the Green Orb in its possession.”

But there were far too many places to look. How were they going to find the orb?

“Alan, can’t you look for it with your shovel or something? You’re good at treasure hunting, right?”

“I can look for gems and the like, but the orbs have been modified. They don’t qualify as gems anymore.”

“What’s up with that logic?”

“Miners unearth gems and jewels. Imperfect natural treasures. Not artificially perfected stuff.”

“Have I ever told you that you’re scarier when you make sense?”

Either way, it looked like they would have to search the hard way.

“Let’s split up and see what we can find,” said Catria.

“Good idea. Take some shovels.”

“Why?!”

“You’ll need them to negotiate.”

“I will not! I’m going to do this the normal way!” Catria had no intention of taking any more shovel-coaching from Alan. Unfortunately, the second she turned around—

“Catria, look over there.”

The lady knight traced Alan’s line of sight to a ship docked in the harbor. It was a mid-sized model capable of carrying tens of people. Multiple men were unloading its cargo. As he stared at it, Alan gripped his shovel, a dour expression on his face.

“Alan? Is there something wrong with that ship?”

“We’re going to investigate it. My shovel’s reacting to something.”

“Oh! Do you think it’s the orb?”

“No, but I’m detecting an evil intent of sorts. One that wants to bury something deep…”

“Bury something deep?” asked Catria. For the bajillionth time, she found herself wondering what the hell he was going on about.

“Basically, somebody with evil intentions is trying to bury something or someone.”

“I’m not really sure I follow, but long story short, something bad is going down, yeah?”

“Correct. Let’s go.”

Catria nodded and followed Alan to a container the men unloading the ship had left behind. Once the workers returned to the boat to report something, the pair drew close. Alan pointed the head of his shovel at the lock.

“DIG!”

Instantly, a mini Wave Motion Shovel Blast erased the lock from this world. It wasn’t worth the time or effort for a Catria interjection.

After using his shovel to unlock the container, Alan again used the tool to pry it open.

“Nngh?!”

Inside the container was a beautiful young girl, all trussed up—not unlike Alice had been, the first time they met. Her arms and legs were thoroughly tied as she shed tears. She looked to be about the same age as Catria, with long hair that reached her hips. Glittering accessories decorated her hair, and she wore an expensive-looking dress. There was little doubt that she was of high upbringing.

Right now, though, said girl was rolling back and forth inside of the container.

“Alan!”

“Right. Looks like they were planning on burying this young lady.”

“Isn’t that kidnapping? No, murder?!” Catria raised her voice in anger.

“Hey, you! What’re you doing?!” yelled a man with murderous intent.

The lady knight turned around to find a group of pirates with sabers surrounding her, Alan, and the girl. Clearly they were the culprits behind this kidnapping.

“We should be asking you that! You accursed kidnappers!” Catria raised her Holy Knight Sword. She would show these criminals no mercy.

“Catria, do me a favor and try not to kill them. I want to get info out of them.”

“Hrmph. That might be a little difficult.” There wasn’t just a single enemy; the fight was bound to get messy.

“Now’s the perfect time to negotiate.” Alan tossed Catria one of his gold shovels.

“Wha?! Why me?!”

“I promised to turn you into the greatest knight in all the land, which means you should learn how to negotiate.”

“This is not how knights negotiate! This isn’t even how humans negotiate!”

Unfortunately for the lady knight, the gold shovel cared little for her resistance and began to move on its own. It pointed its head downward and began to dig into the ground.

“What the hell?! It’s moving on its own!”

“It’s tracing my movements automatically.”

“S-stop it at once! Don’t you dare force me to do your bidding with this thing!”

But there was no stopping the digging. Eventually, the shovel had created a large ditch between Catria and the pirates. Just like with the gatekeeper from earlier, the pirates were quite surprised. The ditch itself was huge. On top of that, a rapid stream ran through it.

“Alan, look at all this water! What are we going to do?!”

Alan simply nodded. “The stream of water running within the relationship ditch is their hostile intention given form. No matter how much we fill in the ditch, if hostile intent is present, the dirt will simply be washed away. This means that filling in the ditch won’t be enough to change our relationship with these pirates.”

His explanation was nuts, but Catria got the general gist of it. In other words, this technique was useless against enemies who wanted to fight.

“Then what was the point of all of this?! C’mon, it’s time to fight!”

“Not quite. All we have to do is stop the flow of water. In other words, the source of their hostile intent.”

“The source?!”

Alan raised his shovel above his head. A flame-like blue aura of energy began to gather around the head of it. He was in the middle of building Shovel Power, a process he repeated uncountable times within a single moment. Target acquired. Safety disabled. Shovel Power full burst.

“DIG!”

Alan fired the Wave Motion Shovel Blast. Blasts of blue and white intermingled and zipped through the port with a tremendous sound. It eclipsed even the wail of a great dragon. The beam of energy pierced the mid-sized ship that was docked at the port.

KA-CHOOOOOOOM!

The ship’s crew threw themselves from the deck, swimming atop the sea in an attempt to escape as the vessel itself sank deep, deep below the water.

“Perfect.” Alan turned around.

The pirates had watched Alan sink the ship, and their jaws were now appropriately on the ground. Alan then pointed down at the ditch. Catria followed his finger with a dead expression on her face, only to find that the fierce current of water was no more. This meant that the pirates’ hostile intent was gone. Alan quickly filled in the ditch and patted the lady knight on the shoulder. “I bet they’ll be more than willing to listen to
you now.”

Weren’t they just threatening the pirates at this point? But Catria knew it was worthless to bring that up with Alan.

After filling in the ditch and patting it flat with his shovel, Alan spoke. “That’s how we negotiate using a shovel. Make sure to remember this.”

Behind them, they heard a noise. The kidnapped girl had passed out, probably from the shock of witnessing the Wave Motion Shovel Blast. She had apparently also wet herself, as her pricy dress was now soaked.

“Hrm. What’s wrong? Wake up!”

“Like hell she will!”

Unfortunately, the human mind was not so strong as to be able to directly witness the Wave Motion Shovel Blast at close range and make it out in one piece.

Catria sighed deeply, the beginnings of a headache forming. That wasn’t negotiation. That was just the usual shovel BS.