Death March kara Hajimaru Isekai Kyusoukyoku (LN) - Volume 23 - Chapter 3

Hero’s Rest

Satou here. I worked at a drugstore once. The most difficult part about it wasn’t managing the storage of important items or working on the cash register, it was actually dealing with complaints. Though, they were pretty rare.

“Give me ten days’ worth of dry meat.” A regular customer ordered with a clink of copper coins as he spread them on the counter. It had been three days since I’d left the others at the fortress. I spent most of the time fixing up our living quarters and working at Hero’s Rest as a shopkeeper.

“You know, it’s not good to only eat meat all the time,” I advised the customer.

“Really? In that case, I’ll take ten of those disgusting preserved foods, too.”

“Are they really that bad?”

“Sure are. They’re bitter, and they have a weird texture when you’re eating them. If I could boil it, I’d put them in a soup and dump a lot of salt in to hide the flavor, but I can’t really do that in the Jungle Labyrinth, or I’ll soon be surrounded by monsters.”

Huh, I didn’t know they were that bad. I had an idea that the monsters in the labyrinth had a strong sense of smell.

“I can eat the preserved foods from Ussha Company, but they cost more than three times the amount they do here or at the guild. I just wish they were cheap and delicious.”

“If I can find some time, I’ll do some research into making even tastier preserved foods.”

“That’d be great, young lad. Make sure to earn lots of money and let Roro and the others take it easy, eh?” said the regular bear man customer before he left the shop.

“Are they really that disgusting…?”

“Want to try one?” Roro asked me. She looked like a child trying to play a trick on me.

“I guess I’ll give it a shot. I can’t improve the flavor if I don’t know what I’m working with.”

I immediately regretted it.

It wasn’t that different from the bread with gabo fruit I’d had in Seiryuu City or the nilbok I’d had in Parion. The preserved foods here were better than those by a slight margin, but it’d be rough eating these all the time.

“It’s not good, right? Since it’s so humid in the Jungle Labyrinth, normal preserved foods spoil quickly and end up attracting bugs, apparently.”

“I see…”

I made a joke to Roro about how any adventurer worth his salt would simply eat the bug along with it. However, she shot right back, telling me that if they don’t chew it properly, the bug starts flapping around in their stomachs, causing them pain—she told me this with a straight face. I didn’t know how to respond.

If anything, I knew I had to come up with a delicious equivalent. Of course, it was paramount that I made it from goods one could get here in Arcatia. As I was lost in thought, someone entered through the shop door. I wondered what kind of customer this would be…

“Stay back.”

I noticed immediately that it was a skeleton, so I moved in front of Roro, protecting her.

“Uhm,” Roro squeaked out.

…Uhm?

I felt something soft touch my hand, so I immediately moved it away. I wasn’t about to get lucky with Roro holding my hand while I was trying to protect her.

“It’s fine, Satou.”

Roro moved from underneath my arm and headed over to the skeleton.

“Thank you for delivering this. Please put it over there. I’ve left a receipt in the basket.”

I had a closer look at the skeleton and noticed he was carrying items, which reminded me that here in Arcatia, the skeletons were put to work by the necromancers. The skeleton took the receipt from Roro, made a motion like he was bowing, and then left.

“Wah!”

“Huah!”

“Ahhh!”

I could hear the small hamsterfolk girls’ yelps of panic coming from the storage room.

“Huh? They should be out weeding the garden.”

Roro and I headed into the storage room to see what was happening, when we found the hamsterfolk children buried under a pile of items.

“Oh no! How did this even happen—?”

I helped Roro rescue the children. As we cleared the items, the cause behind the situation became clear. The basket of evil broccoli—which was on top of the bookcase—was buried along with the hamster children. The youngest of the three was holding it in their hands, meaning we could guess what had happened.

“Didn’t I say you’re not allowed to sneak food?”

“Sorry, Roro.”

“Misunderstanding, Roro.”

“Not allowed to eat them, Roro?”

The three hamster children apologized, tried to fool us, and then straight up begged to have it. The broccoli was presented to them as a souvenir, and it seemed the three hamster girls enjoyed it.

“Hello, is Roro here?”

We heard a voice come from the front of the store. It seemed we had a customer.

“I’m here! I’ll be right with you!” Roro responded, running out to meet the customer. I cleaned up the storage room with the hamster girls and headed to the front of the store. It was someone I knew.

…Why is she here?

“Satou, I’ll introduce you. This is Tia, a regular here. She often places large orders with us.”

“W-wait a sec, Roro. Who’s this? When did you get a humanfolk lover boy?”

“Y-you’ve got the wrong idea! Satou is staying in the basement under the store and helping out here.”

“Staying in the basement? So you’re living together?” Tia responded, her remarks dripping with romantic fantasies. Considering her age, she might have been someone who enjoyed such lovey-dovey tales.

“It’s not just me staying here; my friends are, too.”

“What’s that? And here’s me thinking Roro finally struck out. Nice to meet you… Satou, was it?”

“Satou, Tia is simply amazing! She’s a pupil of the Great Sorceress!”

“Oh, is that so? That’s amazing.”

I realized that Roro wasn’t aware of Tia’s true identity. I had no intention of exposing her, so I just kept quiet. Even so, it was a classic example of a trope from a period drama or a light novel. I just never thought I’d see it play out in real life.

“So, what’s the Great Sorceress like, Tia?”

“A stubborn old woman. She’s always working her pupils to the bone.”

“Agh! Tia! You’re always so negative. Satou, the Great Sorceress is an almost goddess-like woman who has looked after Arcatia for hundreds of years. I’ve never met her, but I’m absolutely sure she’s a wonderful, graceful woman!”

Roro insisted. However, Tia was making an array of incredible expressions as she did so.

“Tia, your face looks a little red, but—”

“Ah, red? N-not at all. It’s not red at all!”

Tia seemed visibly uncomfortable.

“He’s right! You are a little red. Do you have a fever or something?”

“That’s it! A fever! I’ve had a fever since this morning.” Tia jumped right on Roro’s explanation and used that as an excuse.

“No, woodland colds are going around lately, but make sure to look after yourself!”

“Yeah, it’s all right. I’ll make sure to rest properly.” Tia looked a little guilty. Roro genuinely cared for her well-being.

“That reminds me, I forgot to ask you if you needed anything. Or are you all done for today?”

“If I need anything?”

In response to my clutch save, Tia simply looked at me with a blank expression.

“…Oh, right, yes. Is Seiko here? She did a fine job making some magic medicine before, so I came to offer my compliments. Even though I’m only a temporary teacher who gave her a few pointers, I feel it’s good to offer compliments where I can aid my pupil’s growth.”

Seiko was the horsefolk woman who led me to meet Roro.

“Uhm, Seiko actually quit. She was headhunted by some big company.”

“Really? Well, as long as she quit after she finished her orders, at the very least seeing out her duty—”

Tia could tell what happened from Roro’s expression alone.

“Don’t tell me she left during an order?”

“Yeah. Well, it wasn’t even during an order. She left before she even began…”

“Good timing, I guess. It was a pretty tight deadline, huh?” Tia spoke, looking at Roro with a concerned expression.

…Huh? Didn’t Roro say it was a new customer?

Roro hadn’t noticed it, but it seemed Tia had helped get Roro that customer.

“Satou and his friends helped with the order.”

“Oh wow, aren’t you wonderful?” Tia’s eyes glinted in the light. “Did Seiko leave a recipe?”

“No, there were only fragments and scribbles left.”

“And yet you still made it? Here, take this,” Tia said as she took a small book out of her Item Box.

“Is this a recipe book?”

“Yeah. It has recipes that are only made public to the Alchemy Guild, so you should have no trouble only using it here,” Tia explained.

“Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it. I’ll have you work for me as payment.” Tia smirked as she produced a large amount of order slips.

Roro cried out in despair when she saw the number of orders, but it was no problem for me. While the timing was tight, the rewards matched it. All of the materials were sold in Arcatia, too. If I didn’t want to buy them, I could just gather them in the labyrinth.

“So? Think you can handle that?”

“Yeah. Absolutely.”

“Aren’t you confident? Well, I will be waiting.”

Roro was frozen with surprise, yet she yelled out for Tia to wait, only for it to be ignored as Tia left the store. I spent some time consoling the teary-eyed Roro, then finished up Tia’s orders with zero issue. I spent some time buying all the materials, but there were hints hidden in the recipe book about having a bigger output, so I had an easy time crafting them. By the end of it, Roro and the hamsterfolk children were pale in the face with exhaustion, but along with the very helpful recipe book, and having received the funds to make it, I thought it was a good order.

I knew I would be free in the coming days, so I decided to tackle researching how to make delicious preserved foods.

“There’s so much monster material here.”

“Arcatia does have Woodland Labyrinth at its center.”

A day after we finished the order, Roro and I went to the Arcatia marketplace together. Hero’s Rest was temporarily closed, but customers rarely came around this time, so it seemed to be fine. Plus, we had the hamsterfolk girls looking after the place while we were gone. I checked on them using Clairvoyance—they were sleeping peacefully under the cool shade of a tree.

“There’s your usual vegetables and fruits inside, but they’re so expensive, they’re not something we ordinary people can buy.”

Magical food products were incredibly cheap, yet normal fruits and vegetables were expensive. Even their dried versions cost around five times more, and getting them fresh would cost ten times that amount. They probably cost a lot to transport, so it made sense—it was a high-risk high-reward situation.

“In that case, we’ll have to make our new preserved foods using magic-infused materials.”

“Okay!”

Roro smiled as she went on to explain the taste of foods and how to use them. It felt like I was spending time with Lulu. My friends had been at the camp in the fortress for around five days now. They said they would give it another day and then head back. We contacted one another every morning, afternoon, and evening. They were pretty ecstatic, claiming they felt they had gained a few levels.

…Hmm?

I noticed something in my field of view, so I took a glance around.

…There. I know that face.

It was the young wolf man we’d seen before who was hunting monsters—the one Ms. Tia called “Fen.” However, he wasn’t looking at me. He was looking at Roro. I wondered if he was a stalker. He seemed to notice me looking at him, and he quickly diverted his gaze before disappearing into a crowd of people.

“Is something wrong?” Roro asked.

“No, I’m just a little worried about people getting miasma sickness from eating magic-infused food items—” I didn’t want to worry Roro, so I quickly came up with an excuse.

“The ones here in the market are fine. They only put them out to sell after they’ve been stored in the Purification Storage that the Great Sorceress made. No matter how cheap it is, don’t go buying stuff on the black market instead, okay?”

I checked the items being sold on the market, and sure enough, none of them were tinged with miasma. I was relieved we didn’t have to worry about miasma poisoning, at least.

“So the food here in Arcatia is supplied safely, thanks to the Great Sorceress, huh?” I inquired.

“Hee-hee-hee. Not just food, but water, too. The water we gather from wells is filled with miasma. If you drink that, you’ll either have a sore stomach or end up sick.” Roro giggled.

It seemed the Great Sorceress took care of all their necessary needs. She put up a barrier that stopped monsters from getting in, too. I guessed that was why they were able to have a city within a labyrinth.

“So is there some sort of water Purification Storage or something?”

“There is. It’s the reason why Arcatia has so many towers. We call them ‘clean water towers.’”

So that’s why there are so many towers here.

“Ah, Mr. Satou! Look here!” Roro found something in an open-air stall and ran over with it.

“This is a vegetable called ‘gobo potato.’ You have to really cook it to get rid of its bitter taste, but it’s got a nice texture and is pretty cheap,” Roro explained as she picked up a thin black vegetable.

“All right, let’s buy it.”

We ended up buying a lot of Roro’s recommended food items and seasonings without paying much attention to their prices. Even if we used only a little bit of the more expensive items, we should have been able to get by without raising the prices too much.

“I can taste a smooth-skin on the air!”

I turned around in the direction of the jeers and saw a group of otterfolk adventurers kicking an old human man.

“Stop! Have some pity for the elderly!”

“Useless smooth-skins need to stay silent!”

A female adventurer wearing a helmet adorned with sheep horns intervened.

“Ms. Nona!” Roro recognized the adventurer.

“Is she a friend of yours?” I asked.

“Yeah, she’s a regular at the store.”

“Gyah!”

“Ms. Nona!”

The female adventurer—Ms. Nona—jumped between the old man and the otterfolk adventurers, taking the blow instead. I didn’t know if it was due to a difference in their level or not, but Ms. Nona seemed weak.

“Heh, bargin’ in, even though she’s weak.”

“You’re fired, smooth-skin. Don’t ever show your face around us again.” The otterfolk adventurers kicked the old man again, laughing out loud. It seemed they were in the same party as he was.

“Ms. Nona! Ms. Nona, are you all right?”

I poured some magic potion into Ms. Nona’s throat, deciding to intervene in the troublesome situation.

“She’s fine.” I handed Ms. Nona over to the worried Roro.

“…Hmph. Outta the way.”

I heard a somber voice say this as the otterfolk, who were beating up the old man, flew through the air. The culprit for this was the young wolf man who’d disappeared into the crowd earlier: Fen.

“The hell you doin’?!”

“You working with the smooth-skins?!”

The otterfolk men threw around such labels in an attempt to get others on their side, but there was no point in trying that in front of such a strong character as Fen.

“You make me sick. Disappear.” Fen hadn’t used any threatening magic or anything, but his threatening presence was so strong that the otterfolk men went into a panic and stumbled over themselves as they tried to scurry off together.

“…Hmph.”

Fen then came over to where we were standing.

“No need to cry. Are you injured?” Fen asked Roro.

“N-no, I’m fine.”

“I see.” Satisfied that Roro was safe, I noticed that for a slight moment, Fen shot Roro a kind look before leaving. I wondered if he’d heard Roro’s concerned scream for Ms. Nona and had come running over.

“Mr. Satou, want me to take over?”

“It’s fine. I’m quite strong, despite how I look.”

Not wanting to leave the unconscious Ms. Nona, we stopped our shopping trip for the day and headed back to Hero’s Rest. I was carrying Ms. Nona on my back.

“Roro, looks like there’s a customer.”

In front of Hero’s Rest, there stood a lizardfolk lady.

“Mr. Satou, this is your first time meeting them, right? This is the owner of the candle store. They supply us with candles.” Roro introduced them.

They weren’t carrying anything with them, so they weren’t delivering anything, so I wondered if they were going door-to-door and taking orders, or here to pick up a payment.

“Hello, miss.”

“Welcome back, Roro. Sorry to disturb you, but would you happen to know where my son is?”

“Son… You mean Shashi? Isn’t he usually at the Necromancer Guild around this time?”

“He hasn’t come home in three days. I thought with you being old friends, you might have an idea where he could be…”

Judging from Roro’s expression, I doubted she kept in touch with this old friend much. I checked my map and found the person in question in a corner of the entertainment district. He’d been drinking with two older necromancer coworkers since the morning. He’d probably already be rather drunk.

“While I’m not sure it’s your son, I did find a lizardfolk necromancer in the entertainment district.”

The lady seemed desperate to find her son as I told her the name of the establishment he was drinking in.

“With it being that sort of place, I’ll head there with my husband. Thank you, Mr. Roro.”

“M-miss?!”

The lady completely ignored Roro’s attempts at rectifying the misunderstanding as she hurried off. She must have cherished her son a lot.

“Agh, everyone just assumes the wrong thing…,” Roro lamented, her face a bright red. Though I could see the corner of her lips rise ever so slightly—she wasn’t all that mad.

“By the way, Mr. Satou.” Roro looked up at me as she smiled. It was a little scary.

“When did you go to the entertainment district, huh?” Roro asked, putting her hands on her hips. She was putting herself in older sister mode, readying her lecture. It seemed that Arisa and Mia had asked Roro to keep an eye on me in that regard. I’d decided to go home ahead of them while we were in the labyrinth, so how on earth did they manage to agree on that?

The Fearsome Iron Wall Pair…

I laid Ms. Nona down on the couch and then headed into the kitchen to begin developing the preserved foods. I had made some before when we were in Labyrinth City Celivera, so I carried on with my work while using the Space Magic spell Telephone to get advice from an elfin chef, Ms. Neyr, and from Lulu when she was on a break.

“…Like this?”

I used the Everyday Magic spell Dry to process the materials for the food rations. It was different from Mia’s Water Magic and Arisa’s Space Magic in that if you were careless, it could dry the materials out to the point that they resembled dried bonito flakes. It was hard to find a balance.

“Satou, it’s hard.”

“Satou, it’s sweet.”

“Satou, they’re rolling around.”

The hamsterfolk girls gathered up the hardened leftover bits of dried fruit and popped them in their mouths.

“I’ll give you some better ones, so please don’t spit them out.”

The hamsterfolk girls spat out the leftovers they found on the floor—the youngest one was a little greedy and took most of them, so I gave more of them out. They stared at the completed rations with greedy expressions on their faces.

“Satou, are they delicious?”

“Satou, are they all yours?”

“Satou, can we have some?”

“Once I make sure they’re safe, you can.”

I then popped the tester product into my mouth. They tasted fine, but they were a little too dry—they sucked up all the liquid in my mouth as a result. It would be safer not to eat these when lacking water.

“Next is to work out mass production…”

I made the trial products with magic. I could have mass-produced them with magic, but for Roro’s sake, I wanted to come up with a method that didn’t require magic so that they could continue to sell it even when I wasn’t here.

“Ms. Nona!”

I could hear Roro’s voice coming from the direction of the couch. It seemed Ms. Nona had woken up. The hamsterfolk girls tumbled over one another running over to where she was, and I followed.

“Oh, you guys are here.”

Ms. Nona gave the hamsterfolk girls a ton of pats. I only had just realized it, but Ms. Nona wore a rather revealing outfit. It was probably due to Arcatia having a tropical climate, but she wore a chest strap, short-shorts, and bone armor. She had covered herself in oil to ward off insects, so her skin was glossy, almost resembling a powerful Amazon warrior’s.

“…Who are you?”

“I’m Satou. I work here at Hero’s Rest.”

Ms. Nona looked surprised when she asked me, so I gave a simple introduction.

“He healed your wounds and brought you here, Ms. Nona,” Roro added.

“Huh, really? I bet I was heavy.”

Ms. Nona turned red while looking at me with upturned eyes.

“Not at all. I’m rather strong.”

I could pick up a several-ton stone, after all.

“Fair enough. There’s a weird sweet taste inside my mouth.”

“That’ll be because we had you drink a magic potion. I made it taste sweet.”

“A magic potion? Did…did you feed me mouth-to-mouth—?”

Ms. Nona looked at me, her face beet red.

“Don’t worry, I poured the potion out of the bottle and into your mouth.”

“O-oh, okay, yeah, that makes sense.”

Ms. Nona wore a complicated expression, a mixture of both relief and disappointment, as she let out a sigh. She seemed surprisingly young.

“Oh, that reminds me. I’ll pay you for the medicine. When my leader kicked me in the stomach, I thought I was a goner, so you must have used up a lot of good medicine.”

“You’re fine. I just used a low-ranking healing potion.”

Its effects were similar to a mid-level healing spell, but there was no mistaking the fact that it was still a low-level potion. It was just very high-quality.

“Oh really? I guess that Seiko improved a lot.”

“Uhm, well… It was Satou who made it. Ms. Seiko quit.”

“Really? You found yourself a nice husband, I see. I should really tie the knot soon, too. Though, at the very least, I’d be happy to take anyone’s seed and have kids.”

According to the AR display, Ms. Nona was around twenty-three years old. I thought she wasn’t at the age to start worrying about that just yet.

“Oops, got onto a bit of a weird topic there, apologies. I’d like to buy five more of those potions before I go. Including the one from before, that’ll make it six. I’d also like ten Candles of Direction and thirty of those awful preserved foods you have.”

Ms. Nona ordered enthusiastically.

“…Uhm, Ms. Nona.”

Roro told Ms. Nona about how Ms. Nona’s party fired her earlier.

“Huh, you don’t say? Well, I planned on leaving that damn party anyway, so I’m glad I got them off my case.”

Ms. Nona spoke without putting on a strong front.

“I’ll be heading off once I’ve paid for the items.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah, I heard there was an outbreak of goblins in the Demon City, and the Adventurers Guild is putting together a group to deal with it urgently, so it’s fine if I leave their party.”

Roro seemed relieved.

She wasn’t happy she was able to secure some sales, but she was more relieved that Ms. Nona had somewhere to go.

“If they’ve gone so far as to ask for a smooth-skin like me, I wonder if they are approaching all starving wolf–rank adventurers? The Demon City is big, and goblins are good at hiding.”

I asked Roro about the Demon City later on. She told me it was the name for a hunting ground that was known for having incidents like a huge outbreak of goblins every few years.

“Roro, candle.”

“Roro, provisions.”

“Roro, compliment.”

The hamsterfolk girls brought out Ms. Nona’s order from the stockroom. They looked cute as they trotted out, holding the goods high above their heads—I almost wanted to take a picture and store it away in a photo album.

I was worried about them dropping the medicine, so I had stored that behind the counter in a storage case under the floor.

“…Huh? That’s a lot of preserved food.”

Ms. Nona paid for the goods and noticed some extra goods that were hidden away when she picked up the order.

“The food wrapped up in the white cloth are some trial items. I’ve also added in some insect repellent, too. Please let us know what you think.”

I had developed the insect repellent for when my party did separate activities from me. I’d just used the Everyday Magic spell Bug Wipe when they were with me.

“Are these those ridiculously high-priced foods they have at Ussha Company?”

“I think we’ll be able to offer it at around twenty percent higher price than usual.”

“Hmm, all that’s left is how good it tastes, then. Looking forward to giving it a shot.”

Ms. Nona shot us a confident smile as she left the store. I left looking after the store to Roro while I returned to developing new products. Now and then, I got distracted by dissecting the magic that the Goddess Karion gave to the paper golem performers, letting the hamsterfolk girls taste my new creations and secretly contacting the house fairy Lelillil, asking how the chimera restoration was going back at Ivy Manor located in Labyrinth City Celivera.

This was an excerpt from our evening call.

“Master, everything is going fine here. Today, we went to the lower Castle town and hunted a lot of Tauruses there. But we’re running out of the materials you left, so we’re considering coming back the day after tomorrow.”

“That’s fine. I’ll treat you all to a nice meal. Do you have any special requests?”

“Hey, guys! Master’s asking if we have any requests for food when we get back.”

I could hear Arisa relaying our call to the other girls.

“Master, they can’t decide among themselves, so is it okay if you get in touch with them all individually?”

It seemed Arisa couldn’t get them under control. I decided to start with the smaller girls first.

“Master! It’s Pochi, sir! Pochi is doing her absolute best, sir! Today Pochi—”

It might have been a mistake contacting Pochi first. She spent most of the call telling me about what she had done and what kind of food she found delicious.

“Pochi’s been filling her tummy with Taurus meat every day, sir! But Pochi has a separate stomach for Master’s cooking, so I’d be happy with more meat, sir! I like Mr. Hamburg, steak, whole roasts, and sukiyaki, too, sir! Pochi likes anything, sir! Even just being with Master is enough for Pochi, sir!”

It cheered me up to hear how happy Pochi was. I then contacted Tama, Nana, Mia, Lulu, and Liza, asking their preferences and listening to what they had been doing. I didn’t have enough ingredients, so it looked like I needed to go shopping. It was about time I showed my face at the Echigoya Company, and I thought I should go see how Hikaru and Shizuka were doing.

I told Roro that I would be heading out until around afternoon time tomorrow and used the Return spell to head back to Shiga Kingdom. Considering the time zone, it was close to dawn in Shiga.