Chapter 299:
Feeding Sol
I LOOKED OUT THE WINDOW, and a bright white world expanded before my eyes. The strong winds rattled the windows, and it was dim outside despite it being the middle of the day. Yesterday, the village watch had issued a warning around lunchtime for a blizzard that would begin today and last two to four days, so Salifa and Dola had had their hands full last night preparing for it.
“Wow, it’s true…you really can’t see more than a meter or so away.”
I pressed my hands to the window glass, leaned in close, and tried to see outside…but I couldn’t tell what it was like at all. It really was a bright white world. As I sat there, staring outside, I heard a knock at the door. I said “Come in” without taking my eyes off the snowy scene, and Druid entered soon after.
“The way this is coming down, we’ll be dealing with its aftermath even after it stops snowing.”
“Its aftermath?”
“Yeah, it’s going to snow for a few days straight, so there’s no telling how high it’ll pile up.”
“Oh, wow.”
I remember Druid saying that you couldn’t even move if the snow piled up too high. We might end up trapped inside this inn even after the snow stops.
Seven days had passed since we went into the forest with Guild Master Priya. Since then, we’d hunted as many shiusa and hatsuri as we could. Druid and I had a fun time changing up how and where we set our traps, and with a little help from Ciel, we successfully caught a large number of both kinds of monster.
We were about to sell them to the butcher, but Druid stopped me. “We registered with the merchant guild, remember? It’s safer to sell our meat there.” Then when I told Druid that I didn’t remember registering with the merchant guild at all, he had a little panic attack. He explained to me that we’d registered before we set out, but I still couldn’t remember it in the slightest. It was a good thing that I recalled our family account, though. We couldn’t have one without registering with the merchant guild first, which gave me the first clue something was wrong with my memory. Anyway, we sold our meat to the guild, so all’s well that ends well.
“Huh?” I turned my eyes away from the window to see that Druid was holding a red magic stone.
“What’s wrong?”
“What are you doing with that?” I asked.
We’d told Dola that we didn’t need any magic stones because we’d made our own arrangements. But for some reason, there Druid was, returning to our room with a red magic stone in his hand.
“I told him we didn’t need any, but he insisted we take one just in case.”
It was supposed to get bitterly cold for the next few days, meaning the red magic stones would use up all their magic much more quickly than normal. That was probably why Dola had set aside extra stones for everyone. Druid’s eyes shifted over to the bag on top of the table. I looked at it, too. It held a large stash of red magic stones.
“I told him we didn’t need any, I swear. But I just couldn’t explain why.”
“Yeah, I get it.”
“Te! Ryu, ryuuu.”
Pong!
Even as we spoke, Flame was sitting on the bed and regenerating magic stones. A pile of the red gems glistened on the covers.
We both stared at the scene in silence.
“Well, when this cold snap is over, I’ll give it back,” Druid said.
“Please do.”
“We’ve got problems of our own to deal with.”
“I know. How are we going to feed Sol?”
We’d gone over a bunch of possibilities, but we just couldn’t find a way to gather the magic energy from the dump and bring it back with us. So, for the time being, we had picked up a bunch of discarded magic items from the dump that contained relatively large levels of magic. I wasn’t a big fan of the idea, but we had to do it for Sol’s sake. There wasn’t that much magic energy in the amount of trash we’d collected—it would only last about a day. Yet we might not be able to go back to the dump for the next several days.
“How’s Sol doing?”
“Hm? Oh, it’s been playing around Flame this whole time.” I looked over at the bed, but Sol was nowhere to be seen. “Sol?”
“Pefu!”
I looked toward the sound of its voice…and saw it by the foot of the bed. Had it fallen off?
“What’re you doing? Somebody’ll step on you, you know!”
“Pefu!”
I gently set Sol atop the bed. “Sorry, Sol. We couldn’t get enough food for you.”
“Peh?”
“We put some trash in our magic bag, but I don’t think there’s enough.”
“Pefu!” Sol nodded in understanding.
“When do you think we’ll be able to go back into the forest?” I asked Druid.
“With this snow, it’s hard to tell… Worst-case scenario, we might have to wait until spring.”
That long? Well, now we have a real problem. Isn’t springtime still a month away?
“Oh, wait! What do people do with their trash during the winter?” I asked.
I doubted people would just stash a month’s worth of trash in their houses all winter. There had to be someplace they could dump it.
“They do make temporary dumps in the middle of towns and villages, but those are right out in public.”
Oh, that’s right! Too bad. I got my hopes up, but I guess that won’t work. There’s no way we could let anybody see our magic-eating slime. Do we just have to pray for the snow to stop? Is that all we can do? I looked out the window… I don’t think my prayers would even reach God in this weather.
“Sol, you’re going to run out of food soon… Will you be okay?” Druid asked.
“Pefu!” Sol answered that it would be fine. Its tone was so nonchalant that my neck bent in confusion. I was expecting the creature to freak out. And judging by its behavior, it seemed to understand our conversations just fine. So why had it so calmly said that it would be okay?
“Um…Sol? You might not be able to eat any magic for a whole month. Are you sure you’ll be all right?”
“Pefu!”
That was a yes.
“Let me guess…you can go for long periods of time without eating?”
“Pefu!”
Wait…did we just solve the problem?
“We’ve really been stressing out about this for a long time…was it all for nothing?”
“Yes, Sol, are you sure nothing’s wrong?”
Sol answered with silence.
Hm? It didn’t say anything, so that must mean there is still something wrong.
“Um, do you mean to say that you can survive for a long time without eating but that it might cause you some problems?”
“Pefu!”
So our problem wasn’t solved after all.
“How long can you go without eating before something goes wrong?”
Sol once again went silent.
Apparently not even Sol knew the answer to that.
“Do you know what kinds of problems would come up?”
“Pefu!”
It was probably something that a slime would consider problematic.
“Would you get sick?”
No reaction, so that was a no.
What else is there? Well, Sol said it could survive without eating for the next month, so at least it won’t die… But what could it be? I can’t think of anything.
“Well, we’ll just have to keep an eye on Sol,” Druid said. “So, let’s keep looking for a way to store magic energy.”
“Does that work for you, Sol?”
“Pefu! Pefu!”
It looked like Sol’s problem was not going to solve itself anytime soon. But at least for now, we knew that it would survive, even if it wasn’t able to eat. We would just have to keep a close eye on Sol to see what kinds of problems that would cause…
“Ah, it finally stopped snowing.”
It was the third morning after the blizzard came. At last, the sun’s warm light pierced through the sky. One look out the window revealed that the snow had piled quite high. We decided to head downstairs to see just how deep it was.
“Oh! Good morning, you two.” Just as we reached the bottom of the stairs, we ran into Dola, who was wearing heavy winter clothing.
“Good morning. About to go out?” Druid asked.
“Good morning, Mr. Dola,” I said.
“Yes, I was going to melt the snow by the front door since the blizzard finally stopped, but unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get outside through there.”
Dola was pointing at the front door. I gave him a curious look, so he opened the door to show me. The entrance was completely blocked by a thick wall of snow.
“Wooow, it sure did pile up.”
“Yes, they did say we’d have extra snow this year, but I wasn’t imagining this much of it. Especially when you realize winter’s just getting started.”
Dola heaved a hearty sigh. He was right, winter had only just begun. We were about to enter the worst of it.
“Would you like some help?” Druid offered.
“I hate to ask, but could you please help? I’d love to at least get the front door ready.”
“Sure…but where will we even get out from?”
“We’ll go out from a window on the second floor and melt the snow with a magic item. Then, once a fair amount of it has melted away, we’ll make a path people can walk on.”
Druid and Dola were about to get straight to work on clearing the snow outside.
“Is there anything I can do?” I asked.
“No, Ivy, I’d hate for you to catch cold.” Druid shook his head firmly.
“Oh, hey, if you want to help, could you join Salifa in the kitchen?” Dola asked. “She has to make breakfast, and I can’t help her.”
“Yes, sir.”
“I’ll give you both complimentary meals today and tomorrow, dinner included.”
When I smiled and nodded, Druid gave my head a couple of pats, and Dola did the same. After seeing them off, I went to the kitchen to help Salifa.
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