“S-Sure. Then if you don’t mind, c-can you lift up your—”
“Whoa, whoa, hold up. Did I ever say they were my boobs?”
“Huh?” He froze mid-motion, with a pathetic expression on his face.
“Now stay right there and do as I say. The world’s changing, you know—these days, it’s not just men who are in charge. First, some preparations. Open your hand slightly like this, and raise it upward.”
“L-Like this?”
“No, turn your palm— Right, like you’re grabbing an imaginary breast in the sky. Yes, just like that.”
The man raised his hand to the sky, just as I instructed. With this, preparations were complete.
“All right, now turn your hand like a drill. Wait, you don’t know what a drill is, do you? Here, fix your wrist in this position and twist your arm from the elbow up. Twist so hard that your elbow moves too!”
“O-Okay!” Again, just as I’d ordered, the man quickly twisted his arm from the elbow up, his arm pointed toward the sky. He looked like a complete idiot.
“Good. So how does it feel? Feeling anything soft and pillowy?”
“Whoa! Now that you mention it...”
Yes indeed, there was a way to fondle breasts whenever and wherever you liked. A divine miracle that, with some spatial magic and a little centrifugal force, could turn the atmosphere itself into your own funbag fantasy.
“I call it... ‘Sylph’s Knockers’!”
“This is...!” The man’s eyes opened wide, deeply moved. Wait—never mind, he just looked confused. “Er, are these really breasts I’m feeling, though? I can’t tell.”
“What, you’ve never felt the real thing? Then just this once, you can touch mine to confirm that it’s the same sensation.” Indeed, using the feel of my own breasts as a reference, I’d tested and perfected this trick beforehand to make sure it felt as close to the real thing as possible.
“Huh?!” He was able to confirm that the sensation of Sylph’s Knockers was indeed remarkably similar to my own. “So this is how a real breast feels...”
“Same as Sylph’s, right?”
“Yeah.”
Excellent. Now that he agrees, he should be satisfied. Wait—shit, I ended up letting him feel mine anyway! Well, just one time shouldn’t hurt. After all, it was only after feeling them countless times myself that I became desensitized to where I started wanting more. Yeah, just once won’t be a problem. It’s not even like I let him touch my nipples or anything.
“All right, here’s your two large silvers as promised, so I’m going to need that cotton now,” I told the man, who was opening and closing his hands as though trying to relive the sensation of feeling those breasts.
“O-Oh, right. Actually, my grandmother next door sells the cotton. Do you have sewing tools? If not, she can do the sewing for you. She’ll probably charge you extra, but I can, er, cover that as well, as thanks.”
“Oh, I’m good on needlework. I can do all the stitching myself. I just need the materials right now.”
Of course, I didn’t plan on doing any stitching at all. I was going to use spatial magic to piece everything together.
“Do you have a pillow, then? It’s better for pillows to be firm, so you might want to use straw for that instead. I have a few straw pillows already made, so I’ll throw in one of those too if you’d like.”
“Ooh, sounds good. Thanks!”
Right, I will need a pillow, won’t I? Negotiations sure are easier when the other party does all the work for you! Now that the merchant was in high spirits and eagerly willing to help me out, I was able to gather the materials for my futon just like that—and for only two large silvers! And I got a pillow and even more jerky as a bonus! You’re the best, dude! He’s trying so hard for me that I should at least thank him to show my gratitude. I grabbed the merchant’s hand with both of my own.
“Thanks, mister! You were a huge help!” I said, beaming at him.
That’s right, I’m giving you a girl’s beautiful smile—a priceless gift—for absolutely free! Aren’t I generous?
The merchant managed a dopey grin back, obviously smitten. Heh...too easy.
I stuffed the newly bought materials for my bed in my backpack. Without my space of holding they probably wouldn’t have all fit inside, but seeing me successfully shut my backpack, the merchant crossed his arms with an impressed look.
“Whoa, I can’t believe that all fit,” he said. “So where are you taking all that to? The whole load has to be pretty heavy, so I can help carry some of it if you want.”
“No, that’s okay. I can carry this home by myself, so don’t worry.” I effortlessly lifted the backpack onto my shoulders. It was light—obviously, since there was almost nothing actually inside.
“Mgh... Well, okay. Be sure to come and visit again. I’ll give you more jerky!”
“Sure, I’ll be back—if there’s something I want to buy.” Oh, maybe I should blow him a kiss for good measure. Pfft, his face got all red again. He must be a total virgin! Ah ha ha!
Now then, where would be a good place to put my personal pocket of space? As I was looking around the area, a familiar voice called out to me.
“Yo, if it isn’t Karina! Out shopping today?”
“Oh, hey, Blade. What’s up? Yeah, I was buying some material for my bed.”
“Your bed? So you decided to rent a place, eh? Well, considering the long term, that’s the more preferable option. With large silvers, it was probably easy to afford.”
Hm? I reflected on Blade’s words. I see—most people wouldn’t have an infinite pocket of storage space to live in, so saying “buying material for a bed” probably made him think I’d found a place here in the town to live. Huh, it never even occurred to me that renting a room was an option. Since I have to look around for an inconspicuous place to enter my closed space every time I want to go back home, renting a room might be more preferable.
“But you live by yourself, right? Be careful, then. Women living alone are easy targets for thieves. And be sure to greet your neighbors. If you can, you might want to bring them gifts too. The more you get to know them, the more likely they’ll be to help you out in case of an emergency.”
“Oh, that’s not a bad idea.” Indeed, greeting and maintaining a friendly rapport with one’s neighbors was critical. So critical, it was written in Japan’s oldest encyclopedia. Probably.
Really, though, Blade sure does like to help me out. What is he, my mom?
“Oh, and you’ll need to buy things for the rest of the room besides your bed, I’m sure. For instance, a scavenger slime that both sexes could use. I can help you shop for what you need if you’d like.”
“Hmm, I’m kind of just focusing on one thing at a time right now. Though I never would’ve considered a scavenger slime, so thanks for that.”
At present, if I needed to use the bathroom in my pocket of space, I created a black hole to do my business in and then erased it to dispose of the waste. Yeah, maybe I should at least set a toilet bowl in there.
“I really don’t have enough money to shop for anything other than my bed today. So if you’re free, could you go logging with me again tomorrow? At least until I earn one gold?”
“Sure thing! Then we’ll meet bright and early tomorrow at the guild. In the meantime, I’ll ask Shildon and Sekko if they want to join. We’ll split the earnings the same as yesterday.”
With that, Blade waved in farewell and walked away.
All right, now that I’m set to earn more money tomorrow, let’s do a little more shopping. I sauntered around the market with my backpack, browsing the wares. Wow, there sure are a lot of vendors lined up. Reminds me of a flea market.
“They’re selling all sorts of things too,” I mused. Vegetables, fruits, knives, scissors, cudgels, plates, and utensils... Whoa, they even had books here. Oh, what’s this? “Getting into Alchemy”? Huh, now that might be useful.
“Hey mister, can I take a look at this book?”
“Hm? Sure, but don’t ruin it. Tear even so much as a page, and you’re buying it.” The middle-aged merchant crouched down to pick up the book and stared at me intently. Hm? He’s not looking at my chest, but farther down. That’s odd. Oh—I guess he can see my panties. I subtly put my legs together and adjusted my skirt to conceal them. I may have been a guy at heart, but having your underwear seen was a little embarrassing, even for me.
The book was tightly bound with leather. Upon opening it, I saw letters written on parchment. Looked like I could read it just fine—excellent. It seemed to detail the proper way to make potions. Huh, potion making wasn’t a skill but a technique? Wait, no, apparently if you mastered the technique, it then became a learnable skill. Interesting.
Rather than healing the slave with a hodgepodge of spatial magic, it would look less conspicuous if I used a potion instead, so that might have been better anyway. And look, the method for such a potion was written right here!
“How much is this book, sir?”
“Three silvers.”
“You wouldn’t take one silver?”
“It’s a memento of my grandmother, so I can’t just give it away for nothing. But tell you what, I’ll throw in some magic stones for free. They can apparently be used as potion ingredients.”
Magic stones—a material harvested from monsters. They could apparently be used for a variety of things—or so Blade had told me. You could also get junk magic stones from goblins. In fact, the reason Blade had told me this was that we’d killed some goblins on our way back from logging, and Blade and his party had grabbed some for themselves.
“I may not look it, but I’m an adventurer. I can get magic stones on my own. Anything else you can offer?”
“Hmm... How about three potion bottles and a cauldron?”
A cauldron was apparently an indispensable magic tool for crafting potions. It was smaller than the cauldrons I was familiar with—about the size of a softball—and had a magic circle inscribed on it. This, along with some herbs and a few magic stones, was considered the starter set for potion making. I guess that works. All right, deal. I handed him one large silver and took the change and goods. It did feel a little bad to essentially be used as a change dispenser, but to be honest, I did feel my mood lift a little when I took the silver coins he handed me.