bookworm

Chapter Thirteen: Take Everything but Life

“Oh wow… To think that I’m riding in a carriage pulled by a bird-god! What a treat!”
“Bird-god?”
A passing merchant had asked for a ride to the next town down the road, so we had given him a ride.
“Haven’t you heard of it? Hm, well… Hey, aren’t you the owner of this carriage? Even if you hide, I can tell.”
He had been chatting with Raphtalia, but now he pointed his finger at me.
We’d been pretending that Raphtalia was in charge, and I stayed in the back making medicines.
“That’s true…”
“You are famous around town. They say there’s a cart pulled by a bird-god that showers people with miracles everywhere it goes.”
The carriage was rattling down the road. I turned to look at Filo.
So people thought she was a god! In truth she was a hungry little pig, spoiled everywhere she went.
But what was this miracle the guy was talking about?
Hm?
“Gwehhhhh!”
Filo looked suddenly startled, and she took off running.
“Woah!”
The merchant, Raphtalia, and I all flew out of our seats and had to throw our arms out to stabilize ourselves.
“Ahhhh!”
“Yasuuuuuu!”
RATTLE, RATTLE!
The carriage was rattling so loudly that we couldn’t hear what was happening outside. Sometimes Filo would just run off like that for no real reason. This was probably the fourth time since we’d started this traveling gig. She kind of just did whatever she wanted.
“I’m not the only passenger here. Take it easy Filo!”
“Okay! But that’s not it… Gweh!”
We whispered to each other so as not to be overheard by the merchant. We didn’t want to attract more attention than necessary, as that would only spell trouble. But I felt like people were paying attention to us anyway.
The merchant was already staring at me with a shocked expression on his face.
“I’d heard she could understand language. That’s amazing!”
“I think so too.”
Think about it, if people were so surprised that she could understand language, what would they think about her being able to speak? Her specs must have been really high.
I should think about it as a potential that monsters have… when you look at it that way, she must have been very rare indeed.
“Even still, we’re just normal traveling merchants, we give people rides now and then, but nothing out of the ordinary.”
“People are saying that a holy man arrives in a carriage and blesses the sick with special medicine. They are saying you cure people.”
“Really?”
Sure, it was pretty good medicine, but if you saved up a little anyone could have bought it. But I’d discovered that you could tweak the recipe specifically for the needs of the patient as well. The original recipe worked on everything, but not particularly well. I’d been adding different herbs to the recipe to help it treat more ailments.
I’d made it to work on fevers, lung infections, and skin infections. Still, it was just one medicine.
The method had been written out explicitly in the intermediate recipe book. The recipes I’d gotten from the shield had also suggested a few recipe tweaks.
“It’s just normal medicine though.”
I opened a box and took out the medicine to show him.
“This is the miracle medicine?”
He lifted the lid from the jar and sniffed at it.
“Well, it does smell like normal medicine, that’s for sure.”
“You can tell?”
Was he an apothecary? I was curious, so I asked him. But he shook his head.
“No, I can just kind of tell.”
Sure he could.
“So what sort of merchant are you?”
“I’m a jeweler.”
Right, a jeweler… I guess they existed in this world too.
I guess that he normally sold necklaces and stuff to rich people.
“Jewels, eh? So I guess you tend to work with wealthy people.”
If he was carrying around expensive jewels and looking for customers, he would probably need some powerful protection. So it was odd that he was traveling alone.
“You hit where it hurts.”
He gave a light chuckle and then went on.
“Oh, I sell everything there is, from small to large. You could call me an accessories dealer.”
“What’s the difference?”
“Care to take a look at my products?”
He took out a large bag of accessories for my inspection.
I looked inside. It was filled with broaches and necklaces. And bracelets.
But it looked like most of them were made from iron or bronze. And there were jewels imbedded… technically. They weren’t so nice. The word jewel seemed too grandiose to describe them.
“I mostly just sell cheap stuff.”
“Huh… Did you run into some kind of trouble?”
“Not exactly… my current product line was from a rather poor adventurer.”
“Huh.”
According to the accessories dealer, different accessories could be imbued with magic to give different effects to their wearer.
“And how much does one of those things sell for?”
“Right… right… Well, this iron bracelet will raise the wearer’s attack power, and it goes for about 30 pieces of silver.
That was pretty expensive. I couldn’t sell any of my medicines for near that much.
“If we were to apply magic to it we could sell it for near 100 pieces of silver.”
“Really?”
“Of course.”
Heh.. That might be worth thinking about.
I had pretty much reached the ceiling of what I could accomplish by selling medicines. We were close to selling out, and that was making us some money, but not a lot. I was also thinking about selling some to different apothecaries—and that wasn’t good for much profit. If I started collecting materials to make more, I would run out of time.
I could have started before I’d moved on to selling things, but if you make things and collect things at the same time, your efficiency starts to go down.
“You a craftsman?”
“I suppose… It’s easy enough to just make the pieces… but once I go ahead and add the magic power to them, yeah, I guess I’m a craftsman of sorts.”
That made sense. He’d make the pieces, and once they had magic put into them they would give their wearer certain powers.
But how do you imbue something with magic? That was the trick…
I didn’t like the sound of it. “Imbue with magic.” That had been all over my medicine recipes, and I’d seen it pop up in the recipe for magic water too.
It meant that if you couldn’t use magic, you couldn’t make any of those medicines or objects.
“Master! Something is coming!”
Filo sounded tense, and after calling out to me, she stopped in place.
Raphtalia and I quickly jumped from the carriage to see what was going on.
We saw someone walking out of the deep forest.
There was a crowd, and they all had weapons in hand. They didn’t look friendly, and they were coming straight for us.
They were all dressed differently, but they all had armor on. They were bandits, probably coming down from the mountains.
“Bandits!”
The accessory dealer let out a shrill shout.
“Ehhehe… leave the valuables behind and just be on your way.”
Hah… what a cliché.
I’d heard of this kind of thing before… Why didn’t they just sneak up and attack?
But Filo had seen them first, so they must have just decided to give up on the surprise and come right at us. They must have thought they could win. They looked haughty. Either that, or they had another plan.
That reminds me, when we were in the last village I’d heard about some cruel faction of bandits forming out in the wilderness.
“We know all about you! And we know that you’ve got a jeweler in there too.”
The bandits were gathered in a crowd, and they were all shouting at us. I looked at the accessory merchant in the back of the carriage.
“Didn’t you say that you weren’t carrying anything of much value?”
“Yes… nothing like that at the moment.”
He slowly slipped his hand into his pocket, and seemed to be fingering something there.
“Though I do have a rather valuable accessory I’m holding for someone else.”
“I see. So that’s what they’re after.”
I’d picked up a troublesome customer.
“I thought that if I pretended that I didn’t have anything of value, then I could cut costs by getting out of needing a body guard.”
“You idiot! I’ll bill you for this later.”
“All right.”
He looked troubled for a minute, and then nodded.
“Raphtalia, Filo. We’ve got trouble.”
“Okay!”
“Right.”
At my signal, Raphtalia jumped down from the carriage and readied herself for battle.
I pulled the accessory dealer with me and followed her out.
“You stay next to me. Got it?”
“Yes, yes!”
I switched from the shield I’d had on to unlock its ability to one that was better for combat.
“What… What’s with your shield?”
“Oh…”
When the accessory dealer realized that the owner of his bird-god, miracle cart was none other than the criminal Shield Hero, he looked visibly shaken.
“What’s this, you’re gonna fight us?”
“Sure. I didn’t think it would be right to rain fire down on you from back here.”
I glared the bandits down as I threatened them.
The most important thing about the fight would be preventing the enemy from getting what they were after. Basically, I couldn’t let them get away with whatever the accessory dealer was carrying.
“Raphtalia, Filo, are you ready?”
“Yes. I’m ready when you are.”
“Yes, I was just getting bored.”
“Great. Let’s do this!”
When I shouted my signal, the bandits also readied themselves and ran at us with their weapons out.
I quickly looked them over, and there seemed to be about fifteen of them. That was kind of a lot.
“Air Strike Shield!”
I aimed for one of them running at us, and the shield appeared in mid air to halt his advance. I prepared for my next skill.
“Change Shield!”
Change Shield was a skill that would let me change into any shield I needed instantly. I chose the Bee Needle Shield. The Bee Needle Shield had a special effect of Needle Shield (small), Bee Poison (paralysis).
“The Shield! Watch out! Ugh!”
One of the running bandits collided with the shield and fell to the ground, dazed and apparently paralyzed. The skill had worked well.
“Shield Prison!”
“What?!”
The cage expanded to enclose one of the bandits.
That had a time limit on it though.
The Change Shield skill took thirty seconds to charge back up, so you couldn’t use it a few times in a row. Having said that, while it did take time to recharge, it was all the more effective because of that. So it wasn’t all that bad.
Suddenly three of them were right in front of me. They probably thought I looked the fool, standing there with only the shield at the ready.
I jumped in front of the merchant and covered him from an attack.
Fireworks fell away from my shield, repelled with a metallic clash. Apparently their attacks weren’t strong enough to get through my defenses.
Now I had the Chimera Viper Shield out.
Its special effects were Poison Fang (medium) and Hook.
The snake engraved into the front of the shield came to life, and bit at the bandits attacking me. It counter-attacked anyone that came at me, and poisoned them in the process.
“Gaaahhh!”
“Dammit… That’s it?! Ugh!!”
“I don’t feel well…”
The Viper Shield had poisoned someone. If they’d had a resistance to poison it wouldn’t have done much.
I hadn’t tried it on a person yet… though it seemed to be pretty powerful—not that it would take anyone down on its own.
I chose Hook next. The snake flew out from the shield and wrapped itself around someone.
It had a range of two meters, and it was useful for wrapping up an enemy (though it didn’t deal any damage), pulling things closer, or climbing up cliffs or walls. I watched the bandits, and now some of them seemed so sick and unstable that they were falling over.
“This guy… He’s the Shield Hero!”
The group of bandits suddenly appeared intimidated.
They must have just realized they’d run into me and were now starting to think back over all the various gossip they were sure to have heard. A shudder of fear rippled through the crowd, and you could see the realization cross their faces.
“Arghhhh!”
“Hiyaaaa!”
Raphtalia had her sword out, and whenever a bandit showed a weak point she lunged at him. I had managed to fend off their attacks up until then, but they were shocked at Raphtalia’s strength. One of them flew back and hit his head as he fell to the ground.
Filo was running quickly through the group and kicking at them any time she got a chance. Just like Motoyasu, they flew through the air at her kicks, five… no, twenty meters!
That must have killed them
Their numbers were thinning, and it seemed like there were only six or them left that were capable of standing.
Still, they were acting pompous and confident. Like they didn’t understand the situation they were in. That they didn’t retreat yet meant something… I was sure of it.
“Come at us already!”
“Ahhhh!”
Reinforcements rushed in. There were fifteen of them.
What a pain in the ass. They were all weak, but there were a lot of them.
And while the original group hadn’t tried to surprise us, the reinforcements had.
“Heee!”
The accessory merchant let out a shrill cry, and I threw my cape open to protect him and block the arrows that had been shot at us.
Luckily, none of them were powerful enough to overcome my own high defense rating.
“There’s more!”
I looked around to see a new crowd of bandits flooding from the woods towards Raphtalia.
Dammit! Where were they all coming from?
I wasn’t sure anymore if we would be able to take them all down. In the worst case scenario, we could always get back in the carriage and have Filo get us out of there… couldn’t we?
“Ugh…!”
There was a loud clang, and one of the bandits had taken the full brunt of Raphtalia’s sword attack… only to laugh it off.
What did that mean? He was a bandit, but seemed much more composed than the others. He brandished the same sword as the others, but his seemed to be made from a different material.
He looked older than the others too, like a guy in his late thirties. Had he been Japanese, I’d have said that he looked like a wandering samurai. Anyway, he was wearing full, western armor, so he wasn’t a samurai, but still, he looked strong.
“That’s the one.”
“Ha, looks like you’ve got the Shield Hero for a bodyguard. But I can still take him.”
“Yeah.”
I turned to the accessory dealer, but he quickly looked away.
“I believe that this man may have been hired to kill me.”
“Heheheh… that one’s after a class up! I don’t care if the Shield Hero is watching over him, I can still win.”
Class up? There’s another thing I didn’t understand.
It must have been some kind of powerful power-up, one that ordinary people couldn’t use.
“We won’t lose to you!”
“Raphtalia, hold off!”
“That all you got?!”
The bodyguard’s sword glanced off of Raphtalia’s.
Damn… He really was strong.
Lately Raphtalia was growing reckless. I needed to find some way to control her.
“Ah…”
The bodyguard grabbed Raphtalia by the chest and threatened her with his sword.
“Ok Shield Hero, here we go. You give me that merchant, or I’ll kill this girl of yours.”
He was going to kill her anyway. I don’t know why he had to make up this deal.
But what should I do? If he held her hostage, I couldn’t even move, much less fight.
“You let her go!”
It happened in the blink of an eye. Filo ran up from behind, at full speed, and slammed into him.
“Wha…”
He wasn’t able to get out of the way in time, but he had managed to brace himself for the impact.
When he turned his attention to Filo, he had to release Raphtalia.
But the force of Filo’s impact had knocked the sword from her hand, and it clattered away. She ran to retrieve it, but in her sudden absence the bandits all turned their gaze to me.
“Die!”
“Take this!”
Clang! The shield repelled their attacks with a metallic sound.
All the attacks bounced off, except for the bodyguard. His attack had hurt.
“Hiii!”
“Don’t you move!”
I was holding the accessory dealer against my side while I blocked the incoming attacks. I wasn’t sure how long I was going to be able to hold out.
The guy was brushing off Raphtalia’s attacks, and had managed to keep his footing when Filo slammed him. How were we going to win?
I could use Shield Prison to hold him, but the skill’s time limit would be a problem.
The rest of the bandits were little weaklings, so we could pick them off one by one, but what should we do about that bodyguard?
Did it make sense to enclose him in the Shield Prison while we took care of the others? If we did, there was a chance he’d get away.
I was thinking it over when Raphtalia retrieved her sword. She was concerned about something.
What was it? Her tail was huge and bushy.
“I am the source of all power. Hear my words and understand them. Form a mirage and hide us!”
“Hide Mirage!”
Raphtalia shimmered, wavered, and then disappeared.
“She… She’s gone!”
The bandits that had been running in her direction stopped in their tracks and appeared to be at a loss.
“Don’t be a fool! She’s just used magic to conceal herself.”
Raphtalia’s magic had improved to the point where she could use it in the middle of battle!
Damn… I couldn’t use mine at all yet. I felt so behind!
“What the… Filo too?!”
Wha? Filo had crossed her arms and seemed to be concentrating.
“I am the source of all power. Hear my words and understand them. Blow them away!”
“Fast Tornado!”
A huge tornado suddenly appeared around Filo, and the nearby bandits were blown through the air.
“What?”
Even the bodyguard was surprised by all this magic, and he backed away from us to get some distance.
But he was out of luck.
Raphtalia readied her sword and approached him from behind.
“Ugh…”
“You were very strong, but that’s why I have to do what I can to win.”
She finished speaking, and the sword sliced through the back of his neck. He fell.
So we had managed to fight them off. I couldn’t believe that the both of them had been able to use magic. I mean, I didn’t even know that Filo COULD use magic. She should have said something. She was a monster though. Maybe it had just been instinct.
“Damn! Retreat!”
After seeing the bodyguard fall, one of the others assumed leadership and called for retreat.
“Yeah right!”
I captured that leader in a Shield Prison, and Raphtalia jumped on Filo’s back to chase down the fleeing bandits.
“All right…”
We tied them up and looked them over.
“If we drop these guys off with the police somewhere, you think we could get an award?”
“With how things are these days, I don’t know if there is money…”
Raphtalia looked concerned.
“What about you, what do you know?”
I asked the accessory dealer, but he shook his head.
“But you should still probably drop them off with the police.”
“Yeah… I guess…”
The new leader was looking at me and laughing.
I could picture what he was thinking.
“‘We were just peaceful adventurers when the Shield Hero attacked us.’ Is that what you are thinking?”
He quickly stopped laughing.
“Exactly. The police would rather believe what I say then listen to you. Think of your reputation!”
“Well, you may have a point there.”
Why did my reputation precede me this way? The more I thought about it the angrier I got.
That Trash and his Bitch princess had really made me look bad, and everyone believed them.
Sigh…
“Fine then. We’ll just have to kill you.”
I hadn’t given it much thought, just said it. But the bandits had a visceral reaction. Their faces paled, and some of them began desperately working at their ropes to get free. Filo ran over and kicked them, and they fainted.
“Yeah, I’ve got this dangerous monster here. Might as well teach her what human tastes like.”
I grit my teeth and snarled quietly and forcefully at them.
“Food?”
Filo was drooling as she looked from one bandit to the next.
“Hiiiiii?!”
“Hm… What to do?”
“But you’re the miracle working merchant with the bird-god carriage! You wouldn’t kill someone!”
“I don’t ever remember being called that. We are all responsible for our own fates. Now you all have lived by sucking off of others. Now it is your turn to pay up. Do me a favor and just accept it.”
“Please! Spare our lives!”
“Fine. Give us all your valuables and equipment, and tell us where your hideout is. Go ahead and lie if you want. But I get murderous when people lie to me. And my bird-god here will tear you limb from limb. She will tear you to shreds. All I have to do is give the signal.”
The bandits were shaking, and they spoke slowly, and their voices were filled with fear. My reputation was doing me some good.
“Okay! Okay”! Out hideout is…”
I unrolled a map and checked where they had indicated.
It was close by.
“All right. Let’s negotiate.”
I lowered my hand and Filo charged up a kick strong enough to knock them out. And then she delivered it.
“Take their valuables. And look how nice their equipment is! Raphtalia, that will be yours.”
We had already stripped the bodyguard of his possessions. His equipment was quite good. We’d take it as payment for our troubles.
“If we steal from them, we’re no better than they are.”
Raphtalia protested but still followed my orders and briskly relieved the bandits of their equipment.
“All right. Now give antidote to anyone who is poisoned and load them into the carriage. Better make it quick, we still have to swing by their hideout.”
“Okay!”
We went to the hideout to confirm that it really was where they had said and found someone there on watch. We tied him up and stripped him of his valuables and equipment. Then we went inside and took all the treasure and jewels they had stored and loaded them into the carriage. Finally we unloaded the tied up bandits and left them at their hideout.
We’d gotten our hands on a large variety of treasures.
Like money, food, alcohol, weapons and armor, gold and silver, healing medicines, and other cheap stuff.
They’d had way more than I had been expecting, so it turned out to be more compensation than I had thought.
“That was very… smart.”
The accessory dealer was reflecting on the event of the day and looking me over.
“Yeah… anyway, how much do you think our troubles on your behalf were worth?”
The merchant suddenly snapped back to reality, remembering where he was.
“Those bandits even had a bodyguard to protect them, and we defeated them all to save you. That’s worth more than a few bits of silver, you know.”
I gave him a little threat.
This was all his fault. I wasn’t going to let him off so easily.
We agreed that I would receive one of the accessories he was selling. He said it was worth at least 20 pieces of silver.
“To be faced with such adversity and yet meet it head on! Yes, you’ve impressed me, Hero.”
He did seem moved. He was looking at me again, more carefully than before.
I didn’t think he was lying.
“Well enough. I’ll give you this artifact, and imbue it with magic. I will also share my business routes with you.”
“That’s a little much, isn’t it?”
That was far more compensation then we needed, which seemed suspicious.
He might have been trying to punish us for taking one of his accessories.
“No, there aren’t many merchants left like you—the kind that will demand profit even in the face of a horde of bandits.”
“There must be plenty of greedy folks out there.”
“That’s not what I mean. Most people will wring money out of someone and then toss them aside, but not you. You know how to keep them alive so that you can continue to profit from them.”
“Keep them alive for profit…”
I looked over at the tied up bandits.
They might have been a powerful group of bandits, but here they were tied up. Their clothes and equipment were all very nice, and they had evidently stolen it all from others. If we were to steal all of it back from them, what was wrong with that? Don’t they say that you reap what you sow?
“You mean because of all this?”
“Those men came after us to steal our money and our lives. But you compromised, and took all their possessions but left them their lives. Normally you’d have to kill them. If you think about it, this is the best ending they could hope for.”
I did have a really bad reputation, so there really was a chance that the police would have taken the word of bandits over my own. Then again, they might have believed me.
“They paid for their lives with all their material possessions.”
“You could put that way…”
“And once they build up their loot again and come for revenge, you’ll beat them and take it all again!”
The accessory dealer flashed a wicked smile.
What was with this guy? He was starting to freak me out!
“Anyway, we’ll drop you off at the next town.”
“No thanks. I have so much to tell you. I won’t leave until I’ve shared it all with you.”
He thought I was his apprentice or something!
Something was off-putting about all this. What was he up to?
Anyway, we warmed our pockets and wallets with the bandit’s stash and set out on the road again.
This might not be immediately relevant, but apparently there was a merchant’s guild, and a corrupt member of it had sold the bandits the information that this accessory dealer had gotten a ride in our carriage. That guy was later removed from the guild.
Chapter Fourteen: Magic Practice

For whatever reason, the accessory dealer insisted on riding with us from that point on.
He was paying us for the trouble, so I couldn’t think of anything to complain about. Still, I didn’t know why he wanted to come with us.
After the incident with the bandits he apparently had grown fond of me, and he started to reveal things about himself, and he took to lecturing me on various topics when we were on the road.
Anyway he said that there were traveling merchants messing up trade in the area, and that the merchants guild sent him out to keep an eye on things. Basically, the guy was one of the guild’s assassins.
And he had seen potential in me, wanted to see how I developed. Furthermore, this guy was apparently a pretty powerful member of the guild, though afterwards I heard from other members of that guild that he wasn’t well known for sharing and teaching others.
The first thing he started talking about was how to procure the materials you would need to imbue jewels and things with power. One of his acquaintances at a mine was able to help us with that.
Next he spoke about how to form precious metals into accessories. Apparently you could chose from a number of different designs. I have always been a bit of an Otaku, so I picked a design that sort of fit my sensibilities. It turned out a little differently than intended, but I still liked it.
We were also able to get tools necessary for the process, and we got them cheaply.
Some of the tools didn’t exist back in my world, such as a material for burning like coal. It was called a magic stone.
The shield started to respond to it, but the material was too expensive to just let the shield absorb it.
There were things that, back in my world, would have been called grinders. There were also things like burners, too. They were used to form the accessory.
Iron and other hard materials could be brought to a forge where metal molds could be used to form smaller items. Anyway, my crafting skill made the process a bit easier than it would have been otherwise.
There were other tools that were needed for making higher-level items, but they were too expensive to think about buying now. That’s how our finances were looking.
That brings me to the main problem: how to imbue something with magic.
If you couldn’t use magic, you couldn’t do it.
I couldn’t use magic yet, so I was sitting there with the book in one hand, muttering along, when the accessory dealer started talking again.
“Hero, are you unable to use magic?”
“That’s right. I’ve asked my helpers here how they do it, but they just say to ‘synchronize with my spirit.’ I don’t know what they are talking about.”
“Ah… yes, I think I am beginning to understand.”
The accessory dealer reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, translucent piece of something.
“What’s this?”
“It’s a piece of very valuable ore.”
“Huh…”
“Can you read?”
“A little… if it’s simple.”
I’d been studying the writing for about a month now, and if I focused hard enough, I could read it. If it was very complicated then I couldn’t follow it, but if it was simple enough, I could.
“Then let’s work on your magic practice. If you can learn to feel the power, that’s enough.”
Ugh... This sounded like torture to me.
I was worried about the prospect of study, but I reached out my hand and took the shard of ore. It began to glow.
What… What did it mean? It was like… like feeling a hand move that you didn’t know you had—yes, it was like that.
Or it was how a bird must have felt when it opens its wings for the first time and flew.
“Something feels weird.”
“You can actually feel your magical power without the aid of that stone, but you were raised without knowing that. I thought it might help you, so I handed it over. Turns out it was a good choice.”
“I guess so.”
I thought back to a concept I had translated from the magic book and began to recite it.
I imagined magic as another arm, and then I tried to image that that other arm was MY arm.
Some words appeared. It was only for me—my own, private magic.
“I am the source of all power, hear my words and understand them. Protect them!”
“Fast Guard!”
I became aware of a target marker blinking in my field of vision. I chose myself as the target to practice the spell.
I was suddenly covered in a soft light.
I checked my status screen to see that my defense had risen dramatically.
“Woah…”
“Looks like you were able to figure it out. Now allow me to show you how to imbue an object with magic.”
The accessory dealer ignored my impressed reaction and immediately moved into his lecture.
It had been a big step for me, but apparently he wasn’t impressed.
I listened to his lecture, and pretty soon I had learned how to imbue an object with magic.
I tried imbuing the jewel that we’d made with magic, which involved controlling the natural tendencies of the stone.
It was a little difficult at first, but I could use magic now, and the skills from the shield were helping. Eventually I was able to produce a few pieces. Apparently there were more advanced techniques, like using different stones and mixing their properties, or absorbing the magic from different plants and then imbuing other objects with that magic.
“Well, that’s the gist of it. I think you can figure out the rest by yourself. I hope it helps you and your business.”
The accessory dealer gave a final farewell and then climbed down from the carriage.
Now I had another skill besides compounding—I could craft magical jewels.

We would need different ores to use in the crafting, so we visited the mining town we’d stopped by earlier.
“Ah… so he sent you here, did he?”
A large man, a miner, was looking me over suspiciously, but I showed him the letter of introduction the accessory dealer had given us.
“Yeah, that’s his handwriting. But to think you’d be introduced by him? He’s very strict about money.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?
I listened to the miner’s gossip. Apparently the accessory dealer was well known as a miser.
He’d thought it suspicious that a guy like that would introduce me, but he accepted it once he saw the letter.
“Well, if he sent you here then sure, you can buy from me. How much are you looking for? I think I can accommodate you.”
“You think I could go mine them out myself? That should help keep costs down, right?”
“Huh? Oh, well… If you want to do it yourself, then it would basically be free, but…”
We talked it over, and before long Filo, Raphtalia, and I were down in a cave with pickaxes in our hands. The rhythmic clanging of our pickaxes echoed in the silent cave. Honestly, it was a real racket.
The air was so stuffy and hot—I couldn’t stand it.
The walls rippled with glowing veins of ore—much different from the last mine we’d been in.
“This is a pretty safe and stable cavern, so you should be fine to dig and mine anywhere you want. Having said that, there is always a chance of a cave-in, or of falling rocks, so do be careful.”
That only made sense.
From the way he made it sound, there were a number of caves, but he had led us to the richest one.
I raised my pickaxe and brought it down against the stone wall. When I did, a glowing cross appeared on the wall.
It was just like when we were looking for Light Metal.
“Hiya!”
I swung the pickaxe with all my might.
The impact echoed in the cavern, and the wall cracked. The crack slowly expanded, creaked, and the wall fell apart.
“Huh?”
The miner was staring at me, wide-eyed.
“You broke through that hard stone with one hit?”
Was it so hard?
Thanks to my collection skill, I was able to break through the rocks easily, and pretty soon there were piles of ore rolling out from the cracks. And yet, no doubt because of my level, I still came upon walls that I couldn’t break into, no matter how severe my effort.
“Please take this.”
“Oh, okay.”
We stuffed the ore into a bag and hurried from the mine.
By the way, even outside the mine itself, we were able to find ore pretty much anywhere we swung our pickaxes. Apparently it was really easy to find in the area.
The only problem was that any ore found near the surface tended to be of poor magical quality.
Back in my world, I think I had heard that if you find a place rich in ore, it would be everywhere, and easy to take too. Maybe things were different here, and good ore was somehow a function of its depth below the surface.
You made a Ruby Bracelet!
Ruby Bracelet: quality: good to excellent

I tried out my new skills and, I guess, because the original materials were good, ended up with something very nice.
Now it was time to try imbuing it with magic.

Ruby Bracelet (fire resistance up): quality: excellent to normal

Damn… I was able to imbue it with magic, but I lowered the quality rating in the process.
We went on with our travels, and I tried crafting different accessories in the back of the carriage.
You know, crafting in the back of a moving carriage is not an easy thing to do. When I thought about how long it took compared to the relative ease of compounding medicines, I wasn’t sure if it was any more profitable. And on top of that, I let the shield absorb both finished pieces and raw materials but was never able to unlock anything. Apparently my level and tree were not advanced enough.
I’d have to focus on sales.
By the way, that bracelet that I made sold after only two days for 80 pieces of silver. But it took a long time to make the base of the bracelet.
And it seemed like jewels were less valuable in this world than they were in mine.
I wondered if the design of the accessory, and how in-line it was with the current fashion trends, would affect the price I could get for it? Would its design affect its price? The very idea struck me as ironic.
But apparently they were in the midst of a popularity boom, and apparently there were fashionable trends in this world too.
I guess I just didn’t know what jewels could be sold for a good price. Even still—I was making money. Pretty soon it would be time to buy all new equipment.

Iron Ore Shield: conditions met
Copper Ore Shield: conditions met
Silver Ore Shield: conditions met
Lead Ore Shield: conditions met

Iron Ore Shield: ability locked:
equip bonus: metalworking skill 2

Copper Ore Shield: ability locked:
equip bonus: metalworking skill 1

Silver Ore Shield: ability locked:
equip bonus: damage from demonic monsters reduced by 2%
Lead Ore Shield: ability locked:
equip bonus: defense 1

I was unlocking a bunch of abilities that seemed better left in the hands of the guy from the weapon shop. It didn’t make sense to try and do EVERYTHING on my own.
The Lead Ore Shield seemed to be taking the place of something else.
I don’t think that skill will see much use.

We had been traveling like that for a few days when we arrived at a town in the South. That’s when it happened.
The accessory dealer had told us that there was an area that was desperately in need of large quantities of weed killer.
We’d have to travel quickly to reach them in time, but that’s what the bird-god… That’s what
Filo was for.
If we stood to make a lot of money, then there was nothing to debate. We hurried to the Southwest.
Chapter Fifteen: Why it Was Sealed

So there was a village that needed a large quantity of weed killer. We hurried there.
“Master!”
“What is it?”
“Um… These plants are amazing!”
Raphtalia and I craned our necks to look outside. The street was covered in writhing vines so thick they threatened to cover the entire street.
“What the hell?!”
It was moving slowly, but if you watched closely you could see the vines crawling out further and spreading over the road.
“The village…”
I looked around to get a sense of our surroundings, and I saw something in the distance that looked something like a refugee camp.
“Filo, take us over there.”
“Okay.”
We arrived at the camp and quickly started selling our products.
“All right, so what price should we set for the weed killer?”
They must have needed it to try and control those vines we’d seen.
I was starting to understand why the accessory dealer recommended this place to us—sure enough, we should be able to do some business here.
But how much? How much money would we make off with?
“There might be a specialized buyer.”
“Good point.”
We climbed out of the carriage and started asking around.
I changed my shield into the Book Shield. Then I rotated it around to the inside of my arm and pretended to be a merchant just walking around with his book. If they didn’t notice my shield, they wouldn’t think I was the Shield Hero.
“I heard that you were in need of weed killer, and were willing to pay for it.”
I found someone in the camp dressed better than the others. He seemed to be in charge.
“Ah… A merchant? You’re just in time.”
“What happened here?”
I looked off in the distance to see the whole area covered in vines.
“Yes, well… Our village was experiencing a severe famine.”
That reminded me… I think I’d heard about this place. But didn’t Motoyasu take care of it?”
“The Spear Hero was able to release the seal on an ancient miracle seed for us. That solved the famine, and yet…”
“You mean this is from the miracle seed?”
I looked back at the vines. Looking closely, I saw various fruits and vegetables growing from the twisting stalks.
So the refugees had plenty to eat, and the famine was solved. They were able to get potatoes from the roots. They were digging at the vines with shovels.
So apparently they were able to fix the famine problem, but the vines were too powerful, and they ran out of space to live?
How stupid can you get?
Thinking back on it, that must have been the reason the seed was sealed away in the first place. If they had just left it there, everything would have been fine.
Motoyasu, the fool! What was he thinking?
Oh yeah… We’d been nearby a little while ago, when we were with the witch.
“To he who would break the seal of the seed. It is my desire that this seed never be released into the world. It will play with the people’s desire to be freed from famine, granting their wish in the worst way imaginable. The seal is not so easily broken.”
Yeah, that’s what it had said. Why would he break the seal on the seed?
He must not have read it. He must not have known that from all his game experience.
“Out here on the periphery there is no major problem. But if you head into the village, the plants have begun to turn into monsters.”
So the plants could mutate… Great.
He really was an idiot.
It was so easy to put me in a bad mood. It had happened so quickly this time.
He was very skilled. He knew how to ruin my mood.
“So that’s why you want weed killer?”
“Yes.”
If these people were famers, you’d think they already knew how to control weeds… but whatever.
“At first we were all so happy. But once the vines came over our fields, and then our houses… Well, we went out with axes to try and hold the vines at bay, but they were too fast.”
“When did all this happen?”
“Once the Hero moved on, we didn’t have any trouble for two weeks. But about half a month ago, things started to…”
“Uh huh. Didn’t you report to the Crown?”
“Yes. But they said that it would take a while before a Hero would be able to make it out here. Therefore we have been forced to do what we can with weed killer for the time being…”
Huff… I let out an involuntary sigh.
“Why don’t you try burning it?”
“We’ve tried everything that we could think of.”
“So I guess you tried burning it…”
They had probably tried reaching out to adventurers for help too.
I looked around the camp, and sure enough—there were a bunch of people with weapons and equipment there. They would not be villagers.
“Ahhhhhhhhhhh!”
An ear-splitting shriek came from the direction of the village.
“What was that?!”
“We tried to stop him, but there was an adventurer that wanted to fight in the village to raise his levels. That must be him.”
The villager sighed his answer, as though he’d done all he could.
“Damn! Filo!”
“Okay!”
I pointed in the direction of the village. Filo had been stuffing her cheeks with fruit from the vines, but immediately took off running at my signal.
She ran, full speed, right into the village and came back shortly with three adventurers. They were beat up pretty badly.
“How did the village look?”
“Hmm… Well, the monster plants were wriggling over everything. There were some cool ones that spit poison and acid and stuff. Weak adventurers shouldn’t go in there! Stupid!”
“That last part wasn’t necessary.”
“Okay!”
The villagers were shocked when they saw Filo talking.
“Oh, we’ve heard of you! You’re the miracle-working saint with the bird-god carriage!”
As if they just noticed me, they ran over and shook my hand.
“Well I don’t know about saint… but I have a bird and a carriage.”
“Please save our village! There are people even that have been consumed by the vines!”
“You mean they are parasitic? Oh jeez…”

I took some restorative medicine and some weed killer and then was led over to a tent. Inside there were a number of people laying down, and their bodies were half-transformed into plants.
“I can’t promise that I can cure them. And besides, I’m no philanthropist. I expect to be paid.”
“Yes…”
I went over to the closest patient, a child that seemed to be having trouble breathing, and administered the restorative medicine.
The child was enveloped in a soft light, and his breathing seemed to stabilize. I then applied weed killer to the affected areas of his body.
The child was in pain for a short time, but then the leaves withered and fell off, and the child seemed to be cured.
“Oh…”
“That’s a saint for you!”
Everyone was whispering in amazement. I administered the same medicine routine to the remaining patients.
Once everyone had been treated, the atmosphere around the camp improved greatly. I guess anyone would be happy to see their lot improve, however little.
“Thank you! Thank you so much!”
Everyone thanked me.
“Time to pay up.”
I asked for a price that was higher than the average market price.
Here’s why: if they had already appealed to the Crown for help, then there was a chance that another Hero might show up at any time. And if he did, then pretty soon they would know who I was too, and then they’d be singing a different tune.
The villagers happily paid me. Everything was going according to plan.
“All right, I’ll sell you the weed killer. Let’s try to make this quick. Once you buy it, I’m out of here.”
“Um… Saint… Could you please save our village?”
“What?! I thought you’d asked for a Hero to come.”
“Yes, but…”
Ugh… All the villagers were throwing themselves at my feet and begging me.
I wasn’t exactly all-powerful here. And besides, it’s not like I had any responsibility to them.
“No thanks.”
“Please. If you need money, we’ll find a way…”
“You need to pay upfront. And if anything happens, I don’t want to hear any complaints. Now, if you know anything about the seed that the Spear Hero unsealed, you better tell me about it now.”
The villagers called out to one another, and soon I was surrounded by people pulling money from their pockets. I spent the time trying to find out all that I could.
Apparently the seed had been sealed away in some nearby ruins, and had been watched over by a powerful guardian.
If the vines were overtaking everything, someone must have wondered what had happened to the guardian. No? I sighed… These villagers weren’t good for much.
The villagers believed that the seed was the masterwork of an alchemist that had made his hideaway in those ruins. And that the seed was sealed away some time later on. According to reports that they had, the area had, sometime in the past, been overtaken by vines.
“If you have a legend like that around here, why would you remove the seal from the seed? Didn’t anyone notice?”
Everyone turned their eyes to the ground.
They must have thought it was safe because a Hero had brought it to them.
We were talking all this over when they announced they had raised the money I’d requested.
It was quite a lot of money. I could have taken it and just run off.
“Ok, I’ve got it. I’ll do what I can.”
I changed my shield to the Chimera Viper Shield. That would be better for battle.
“Sh…The Shield Hero?!”
I ignored the shouts of the villagers and pressed on further into the vines. Raphtalia and Filo followed close behind.
I put all the money into a pouch and tied it around my waste then moved deeper and deeper into the vines.