The Weakest Tamer Began a Journey to Pick up Trash - Volume 5 - Chapter 241

Chapter 241:

Getting Slime Food!

“Be careful out there; it’s cold. And look for a place to take shelter if it starts raining. When the rain is this cold, you may suddenly find yourself freezing to death if you’re not careful.”

“Thank you.”

We trekked into the forest on the tail of some stern warnings from the gatekeeper. I wanted to give my creatures a chance to play for a really long time today. Ever since we arrived in Hatow, we’d been busy every waking moment with winter shopping and visits to the guild.

Too bad it was so cold.

“My head hurts.”

“Can’t you do something to keep your face warm?” Druid asked.

“You mean, like wrap cloth around it?” I responded earnestly.

“Actually, you shouldn’t. If you cover your face, we’ll be driven away from the village.”

“Oh, that’s right!” I had forgotten that covering your face was forbidden in Hatow. If we did cover our faces, they’d think we were intruders and might not let us back into the village. 

“Well, if you get too cold, I’m sure it’d be okay to cover your 

neck and chin. But probably not in this milder level of cold, I’d assume.”

It already felt quite cold to me. Would it really be wrong for me to cover my face? This was going to be a tough winter.

I looked over my shoulder and saw that we had walked pretty far away from the gate. After I checked to make sure nobody was near us…

“Okay, you can come on out!”

I opened the bag and out jumped Sora with a big bounce. Ciel followed with a much more graceful landing than Sora. Then came Flame. It looked like it was about to fall out of the bag like it usually did, so I gently lowered it to the ground.

“Pu! Pu, puuu.” Sora bounced gleefully around us. Ciel returned to its adandara form and gave a big stretch.

“Sorry we kept you guys cooped up for so long.”

Ciel and Sora really did look more at home in the forest. And Flame…well, Flame looked most at home on top of a blanket. Ciel took the lead and walked us deep into the forest. I looked at the three creatures. Back in its true form, Ciel had grown more dignified than before. Maybe it was its firmer muscles? And Sora was just as crazy as ever about Ciel, slamming affectionately against the adandara as it walked. Flame sat atop Ciel’s back, looking quite satisfied. Let’s just say that Sora and Flame were more than carefree.

“Where do you think we’re going?” I asked.

“I’m sure we’ll be safe wherever we go.” Druid checked for creature tracks as he followed Ciel. “I’m not seeing any big animal or monster tracks near the village.”

“Yeah, neither am I. It’s mostly field mice and wild rabbits.”

After a while, we arrived in a spot that smelled sweet.

“Flowers at this time of year?” Druid asked.

“I don’t see any.”

We looked around us but saw no flowers. I gave Ciel a questioning look and found the adandara was also examining the area.

“Ciel?”

I gave the area a soft search for auras, but I found none that were moving.

Mrrrow.

“What’s wrong?” Druid and I both asked in unison, which surprised me a little. Feeling a bit embarrassed, I approached Ciel. Sora had also jiggled over to the adandara and was watching something. I followed its gaze and saw a patch of tiny white flowers. They were quite pretty.

“Yikes!” Meanwhile, Druid had a look of disgust on his face. Were these flowers poisonous? 

“Mr. Druid, do you know what these flowers are?”

“Yeah. People call them corpse blooms.”

Corpse blooms…what a morbid name. “Is that the name of this flower?”

“No, the flower’s name is just snow.”

Snow… That’s a cute name. But people call them corpse blooms? They were about fifteen centimeters tall, with tiny blooms of five white petals.

“Why do people call them corpse blooms?”

“Because on years when they bloom, there’s extra snow and more people die than usual.”

So that’s why they’re corpse blooms. “How do you think they got such a bad name?”

“Huh?”

“I mean, these snow blooms are doing a good thing, warning us of the snow.”

“Warning us?”

“Yeah. Wouldn’t seeing these flowers give people time to get ready for a snowy winter?”

“Oh, that reminds me, they do go by another name. I think they’re also called messenger blooms.”

“See, I like that name better.” Calling these flowers corpses was just cruel. They were too pretty for that.

“The more provocative name probably made a bigger impact.”

I guess he was right; the word corpse would get people’s attention. Still, I wondered if these flowers blooming really did mean that this winter would be harsher than normal.

“We’re ready for a harsh winter, aren’t we?”

“Let’s check when we get back to the inn. We’ll also need to let the guild know that we saw these blooms.”

If we tell the guild about the flowers, would they help everyone get ready for the winter? Well, I guess it’ll all be in the guild master’s hands.

“Thanks for showing us these flowers, Ciel.”

Mrrrow.

Druid made a note of where the flowers were, then we headed for our true destination: the dump. After a while, it came into sight.

“Huh, this village’s dump is smaller than the others I’ve seen.”

“It is,” Druid agreed. “Judging by Hatow’s size, they could probably stand to have a dump that’s twice as big. Maybe the village has a tamer on retainer?”

The dump was indeed much smaller than I thought it would be. It made me worry that there weren’t many potions, but at a quick glance, I saw there were plenty. That was a relief.

“Sora, Ciel, don’t stray too far, okay? Also, we don’t need any special potions or magic stones, all right? You hear that, Flame?”

After making that request of my creatures, I got to work picking up the things we needed.

“How many more swords do we need?” Druid asked.

I thought back to the number of swords I’d counted the night before. Since I fed Sora two swords per day, we had enough to last another ten days. I wasn’t sure how many more swords I should pick up, though.

“We have ten days’ worth back at the inn. We should be okay as long as it doesn’t snow.”

“Yeah, if it snows, the swords will get buried.”

He was right—whenever the snow got too thick, there were times when you couldn’t pick up anything from dumps at all.

“Should we just take as many as we can? I don’t think it would be a waste of time.”

He was right. Sora would never let swords go to waste. “Okay, let’s do that.”

I let Druid handle the swords while I collected potions. Once my bag was full, we were ready to go. If we came here one more time before it snowed, we could probably gather enough to last us through the winter. I’d have to count everything once we got back to the inn.

“Okay, I’m back,” Druid announced. “I think I picked up over thirty swords.”

“Thanks.”

Druid’s bag looked just as full as mine.

“Okay, do you think the kids behaved today?” he asked.

“Don’t worry, I asked them not to make anything.”

My heart raced a little as we headed toward the creatures. “Hey, guys. I just got lots of meals for you.”

My eyes darted around Sora’s and Flame’s general area…and there were no treasures on the ground. I was so relieved by the sight that I could just feel the tension melt from my muscles. Oh, thank goodness. I didn’t want to have to add anything else to the magic box.

Mrrrow.

“Hm? What’s up, Ciel?”

Ciel was rubbing its face against mine. That was its way of saying “I’m going away for a little while.”

“Are you going hunting for lunch?”

Mrrrow.

“Okay, be careful out there. We don’t know what kinds of monsters live in these parts.”

I gave Ciel’s head a little pat, and it closed its eyes and smiled.

“I haven’t heard any news of monsters more powerful than an adandara out there, but do be careful,” Druid told the creature, giving it a light pat on the head.

Mrrrow. With a cheerful swish of its tail in reply, Ciel elegantly bounded off into the forest.

“Dang, what a fast runner.” By the time Druid finished that sentence, the fiercely running Ciel was already out of sight.

Okay, maybe we’ll do a little exploring in the forest until Ciel gets back. Sora has looked kind of antsy since we got here.

“Sora, would you like to explore the forest?”

“Pu! Pu, puuu.”

“…ryuuu,” Flame groaned as if to say, “I’ve had enough.”

“Flame, you’re so lazy,” Druid said.

Flame stretched up tall in reply. Was it doing that in protest? If so, it was the cutest little protest I’d ever seen.

“Pu! Pu, pu, pu, pu, puuu.”

“Okay, okay, just a minute!” I picked up Flame and walked over to Sora. I wonder if we’ll find anything before Ciel comes back?