Episode 11: Southern Warrior
The market’s not open today, huh?
It’s only on weekends.
Midford is a reasonably large town, so the market opens once a week.
I hear the Royal Capital has a market every day, but living in a place that crowded sounds like a pain. The land prices and cost of living must be high too…
Yeah, a backwater like this is the easiest to live in after all.
With that in mind, I started buying vegetables at the market…
Of course, I’m not going to eat them.
The vegetables in this world, with their poor breeding, are bitter, hollow, and just plain not tasty.
But not buying any food at all while living in the city would be suspicious, and if I think of it as livestock feed, I can get more cheap stuff than the high-quality goods I grow in my “Garden.”
Besides, I can extract components with magic and use them for dyes and medicines.
The light green of leafy vegetables is beautiful, and the khaki and yellow of root vegetables are easy on the eyes. Purple and blue are good too.
As for fruits, I extract only the fructose or make jam and give it to acquaintances.
I also use them as fragrances or sell them as perfume for the prostitutes as medicine?
Anyway, it’s not a huge amount, but I do buy plants.
I sell meat instead.
Since I’m a Strider, I can sell boars and deer that I hunt in the forest.
I also buy cloth from the cloth shop and knives and such.
I try to buy as much as I can.
It’s not good if only I’m earning money and hoarding it all.
“Oh, Mr. Teacher! We’ve got some good cabbage today! How about it?”
“Ah, I’ll take it. How much?”
“500 Lido each is fine.”
“Cheap, give me two.”
“Thanks for your patronage!”
As I was buying cabbage from the vegetable vendor and walking through the town with my luggage…
“H-hey hey! What a coincidence, Dru! Meeting you in a place like this! Ah, that luggage looks heavy, want me to carry it for you?!”
Shio popped up.
A female Strider from a tribal background.
I can guess what’s up…
“You’re broke and can’t even afford dinner, right?”
“Ugh, how did you know…?”
“When have you ever had money?”
“…Please, Dru! Feed me! I haven’t eaten properly in three days!”
Shio lowered her head while clasping her hands together.
“Aren’t they feeding you at ‘Blue Comet’?”
“I’ve been penniless so many times that the leader is fed up with me… I managed to buy a throwing spear somehow, so I have to hunt Magic Beasts and sell them tomorrow, or I’ll lose my position…”
I can’t help it…
“I’m planning to go hunting again tomorrow, so if you help me, I don’t mind feeding you.”
“Really?! I love you, Dru!”
While dragging Shio, who had hugged me, I went home…
“Welcome home, Andrews-sama!”
“I’m home.”
When I got home, Tris was waiting for me in front of the door.
It’s always like this, I didn’t particularly train her to do it, but since I’m all this child has, she tries to devote everything to me.
She waits for me like this, no matter how cold or hot it is, so she’s adorable.
After gently stroking her head, I wash my hands and gargle, then start preparing dinner.
“Welcome, Shio-san!”
“Oh, you’re the Mazoku girl. How have you been?”
“Yes!”
Shio is talking to Tris.
Shio is also an outsider tribal person and a Strider. She doesn’t discriminate against others… for better or worse.
“Here, Shio, wash your hands too.”
“Yessir.”
Now then… what should I make?
Shio seems to like meat and sweets, so I’ll make something with meat as the main dish.
…Fried chicken.
I want to eat fried chicken, let’s make fried chicken.
The side dish is, of course, potatoes.
Corn sauteed in butter made from canned corn, and pickles centered on sauerkraut to balance it out a little, and ice cream for dessert.
It’s a heavy menu with oil, but it should be just right for a Strider.
I really want to bake roast or pie, but since you came suddenly, I didn’t prepare it…
What I have now is the meat of the bird-type monster I hunted in the forest the other day…
Okay, let’s fry the chicken quickly.
This is it! I periodically play a game of recreating the taste of the most famous fried chicken shop in Kentucky on Earth…!
Right now, it’s about version 0.91, and if I research a little more, I think I can reach that taste in my memory…!
However, even if I recreate the plain chicken, there are many variations such as the hot chili version, the limited-time black pepper flavor, the honey mustard flavor, and the garlic soy sauce flavor.
If I try to recreate those too, one lifetime won’t be enough. I’m glad I was born a long-lived Changeling!
“Hyaa! As always, Dru’s cooking is so good! I can’t stand it! Munch munch…! Delicious!”
Yes.
Shio ate 20 pieces of chicken, ten servings of potatoes, a whole jar of pickles, and about two liters of ice cream all by herself.
Magical Power recovers with calorie intake, so Striders, soldiers, and knights tend to eat a lot.
I eat about the same amount, so I want to conserve the high-quality ingredients from the “Garden” as much as possible…
No, it’s not like it’ll run out, but reviving dead livestock and regenerating harvested vegetables requires a certain amount of Magical Power.
So, it’s not impossible, but…
The Garden is about forty hectares in size, of which twenty hectares are farmland. One hectare can support one person.
In other words, I can take care of up to twenty people.
Hmm, am I just being a worrywart…?
Maybe I should take out more from the “Garden” in the future.
“Dru! I’ll rush to wherever you tell me to go! I’ll entrust my skills as a warrior to you!”
“Yes, yes.”
“Aww! You’re not taking me seriously! I mean, I think I’d be okay with belonging to Dru…”
“I have no use for military strength.”
“Eh?! There’s a war going on in the south, right? Let’s go! If it’s Dru and me, we can take a hundred heads?!”
“No way. I like living here.”
“Tch… Even though you’re stronger than our leader and a magician on top of that. What’s with this ‘slow life?’ stuff…”
“There’s nothing good about becoming great.”
“Honor, isn’t it?”
“I don’t need that. Besides, if I were in such a position, I wouldn’t be able to feed you delicious food like this, right?”
“Ah, I don’t want that.”
While talking about such things and eating, I went to bed with Shio, who had charged into the bed (meaningful), and today is over.