It would be good if you could do the same with thieves...

◇

After we left the town, it was peaceful for three days, but for two days after that, we were attacked by thieves three times.

Since they were just small scale thieves with 7-8 people, we had Arisa did preemptive attack with Shock Wave, and the beastkin girls to defeat the thieves.

At the first battle, Mia attacked with Acid Mist, but it was too gruesome so I made her use Blind Mist and Mustard Mist on the next time instead.

If I fight right away, I could make short work of them, but since it looked sufficient with just the beastkin girls fighting, I was just standing by while watching them and being ready to cover them anytime if needed. And since the beastkin girls had the advantage of level and fighting experience compared to the thieves, my turn never come up.

We didn't bring the thieves to where people lives after we learned the lesson from the last time. We made them sleep with Arisa's magic, stripped them from all their equipments besides their clothes and leave them tied with ivy rope. If their equipments are taken away, they probably won't be able to continue their thief business. If they tried to force their way, they would get killed instead at best.

I teared off their outer clothes and bandaged them so they wouldn't bleed to death. The earl territorial cavalry who are going on patrol would come across them in several hours, I'm keeping them alive for that sake.

Just in case, I put a paper written with "Thieves" on them.

"We're not getting into the template situation eh~."

"Templa~?"

"Is that delicious nodesu?"

After the second encounter with thieves today, Arisa's mood turns bad.

While grumbling, "I'd like to eat Tempura~", after hearing Pochi's word, she's lazing around on the wagon's floor.

"What kind of template?"

"Usually, shouldn't the theory be the thieves attack carriage with beautiful women or rich man and we come to save them while looking cool?"

I don't know that kind of theory.

"Arisa."

"What is it? Mia."

"Rich man."

Mia points at me while saying so.

"Beautiful women."

Mia points at the girls.

"A blind spot! We are the people who should be saved according to the template!"

Arisa groans while holding her head. Mia looks satisfied after looking at that reaction. She looks expressionless like always, but when I look closer, her mouth is slightly smiling.

Pochi, Tama and even Nana mimic Arisa by holding their head while looking troubled. Nana looks awkward, but let's leave her alone.

◇

"Master, it's the blue men."

Responding to Lulu who's calling me, I go outside to the driver seat. What Lulu means with, "Blue men", are the earl's territorial soldiers. Seems she calls them that since their clothes are all blue.

"We're the knights of Kuhanou-dono, bring me your representative."

"I'm the representative, my name is Satou."

"Hoo, you're young. This highways is often frequented by thieves. It's dangerous to travel without escorts. Go back to the town, and hire some guards."

"Thank you for your concern. We have excellent bodyguards, so it's fine."

I open the wagon's curtain and Liza shows her face.

Liza, please stop that carnivorous smile, it's scary.

"Fumu, quite strong looking escort you have. But, you should keep your escorts outside the wagon so they could see if any thief comes."

After giving that advice, the knights asks for my ID and returns to their patrol after looking satisfied.

◇

"Jaa~an, am I cute?"

Arisa spins around in front of me while saying so. She's looking cute while wearing one piece arranged with frills on its sleeves. When she's wearing that and coupled with her violet hair, she really looks like a character from a fantasy movie.

"Yup, you're cute."

"Ehehehehe~."

She probably has not thought that she would be honestly get praised, she looks surprised and then becomes bashful while looking happy. That feels slightly fresh.

"Cute~?""Look~ nano desu."

Pochi and Tama appears with the similar clothes as Arisa while asking. They spin around like Arisa.

"Pochi and Tama are cute too."

"Wa~i.""Yay~ desu."

It looks like they find the floating skirt fun, they spin around until they become dizzy

"Since you've bought some fabric in the town, I tried adding frills on the clothes we have."

"You're quite skillful."

"I'm experienced with making clothes myself for some events back then~"

It's better not to ask what kind of events are those. She's decided on her pose.

Arisa who's looking proud, suddenly freezes. Nana is posing when I look behind.

"Master, am I cute?"

Cute, or rather, a sight for sore eyes.

"Nana! Wear some clothes, clothes!"

Lulu picks clothes that Nana has left on the ground and cover her with it.

She wears drawers like everyone on her lower-half part, but upper-half has bra.s.siere. They're sewed half-cups. I didn't see anyone selling them in the city, so it was probably something Arisa made.

"Arisa, you're really skillful."

"W, well yeah."

It seems Arisa is weak with getting praised.

"Master, am I cute?"

"You're cute, or rather, s.e.xy. Nana, don't thoughtlessly take off your clothes in front of an opposite s.e.x."

"Yes, master."

I tried as hard as possible to say that calmly. Thanks to Poker Face skill which I've leveled up to expert level, I've succeed on not leaking excitement in my voice.

Nana seems to be satisfied with, "s.e.xy", comment and obediently wear the clothes that Lulu gives her.

If Lulu didn't react, I would probably fixedly stare at her without moving. If the two of us were alone, it could be dangerous. That's why, I should not hold grudge with Lulu's fast reaction. Though, it would have been nice if she were slightly slower...

"Did you only make clothes for three people?"

To keep up my appearance, I talk to Arisa getting back to the topic.

"Yup, it's impossible to make ones for everyone at once. Since Tama and Pochi were looking at my prototype with gleaming eyes, I made for them first."

"Next, for me."

"Yes, yes, the next one is for Mia. Lulu and Liza will be after that, it's fine right?"

"Yes, it's fine."

"I wouldn't look good with such fancy clothes."

"It'll look good I say. Right, should I add frills on your ap.r.o.n? You'll look like a young wife~."

It's rare to see girl's talk happen. It relaxes me.

While listening to the voices as background, I go back preparing lunch. My repertoire has increased after Liza teaches me. You'd get bored of the wolf meat steak no matter how delicious it is if you eat it everyday.

"Carefully scoop it after the lye comes out. Since it'd be wasteful to throw away the soup, please use this cloth to filter it into the the container and put it into the pot."

I thought that you would just cut the ingredients properly, but it's unexpectedly labor-intensive.

Thanks to Liza's teaching, the result tastes quite good.

I've asked Lulu to make steak in place of me, but losing to the appealing looks of Pochi and Tama during the meal, I decide to make the steak later.

Okay, let's check the effectiveness of education skill by teaching Lulu the secret of grilling steak on the next lunch.

◇

"Satisfied~?"

"It was delicious nodesu~."

"Haa, blissful."

The three are lazing around, while I'm compounding beside them. Recently, Nana and Mia have been helping with the clean-up, so they're not around.

I crush a magic core with my fingers, and put it inside the mortar.  Normally, you need nutcracker-like tool to crush it, but this tool is really not user-friendly, so I don't like to use it. Nowadays, I crush cores with fingers in secret.

I thoroughly grind it with the pestle and put it inside a bottle. I sort them inside bottles of various shapes and colors reflecting the effective ranks of the magic cores. I didn't forget to put labels on them too.

Since the magic shop girl has said that even in powder form the magic cores are unstable, I'll try to test how unstable they are.

I put an ear pick worth of powder on top of a wood plank and load it with magic power. Just when I load 1 point of magic power to it, "Pon", it explodes. The three centimeters thick of plank is perforated until the bottom.

Pochi and Tama who were dozing off jumped up and looked over here blankly. Arisa reproaches me with her sight. "I'm sorry for surprising you.", I said and went back to the experiment.

Still, I think it's more powerful than gun powder even with the same amount. Though, the only gun powder I know is from fireworks or firecrackers, so my comparison might be flawed.

Certainly, a normal person would die if one of this explodes.

I put a red powder made from magic core on a plate and mix it with stabilizer. Since the stabilizer is white, it becomes sakurcolored.

I put a small cut of paper on top of a magic bestowing stand, and then put about 1 gram of the mixture powder on top of it.  I operate regulator at the edge of the magic bestowing stand, and set it according to the textbook. After this, I just need to put magic power to the magic bestowing stand.

The reagent is complete in about ten seconds for each. Seen from AR, it's Reagent 1(+5). I wrap the completed reagent with paper like origami as instructed in the textbook, and then put it inside a small bag. I'll put them in the Storage after I've gathered enough.

Since I've gotten the knack, I put 10 grams on my second try and continue on.

I stop after making 100 reagents in 10 minutes.

Next I use those reagents to make recovery potions of magic power, health, stamina, 10 of them each. Since I could make five at once, and I've made other materials besides the reagents beforehand, it doesn't take long to finish.

"Arisa, put these away. Use it whenever you need."

"Ho~i"

I put half of them inside Arisa's item box.

Pochi and Tama who see me tidying the imbuing tools begin to prepare the wagon.

It's Liza's turn to be the coachman this afternoon.

Since there doesn't seem to be any thieves or beasts that are going to attack the wagon, I guess I'll re-investigate the method to make scrolls.

At the time when I got [s.h.i.+eld] magic in my magic column, I immediately searched for the scroll creation method inside the magic books, but I couldn't find it.

I had not only searched in the magic books from Seryuu city, but also the books from Arisa, Zen and Trazayuya, but I still couldn't find it.

When I changed the search words, I did find ways to create magic tools and golem but, there's nothing about magic scrolls.

The next day after that, I always read through magic books looking for hints of magic scrolls creation. There is absolutely no clue so far, but I've became knowledgeable in type of chanting and magic theory.

Of course, I also have interest with magic tools and golem, but since they need large-scale facilities, it's unreachable for now. There are recipes for magic tools with simple structures, so I'll challenge myself by trying making that on the next break.

I'd like to quickly increase my repertoires, not only for cooking but also magic.