Chapter 9:
Coffee and Tending the Shop
CHOTOS’S MANA TOOL SHOP was, just as the name implied, the shop where Mr. Chotos sold mana tools. Two days after the large-scale dispute that unfolded on that very spot between Gol and the debt collectors, business resumed. Even so, there hadn’t been a single customer.
As usual, there was a certain lack of goods within the shop, but the interior did feel a bit different. For one, a pale young girl, a white Greek statue of a beautiful elf goddess, and a man wearing an olive-brown robe hung around a large table inside. Of course, their true identities were Teru, Gol, and me.
Teru and I ate baked snacks while Gol sat quietly beside me. The snacks were like sweet cookies with a light, crunchy texture, and they tasted faintly of milk. How delicious. It was quite a popular snack in these parts, and it was sold at a neighborhood stand.
As I chewed, I turned to find Mr. Chotos standing behind me. “Hey, mister, even though you have no customers or employees, you’ve still got chairs and tables prepared. It really lets you relax.”
“Well, before business turned bad, I had plenty of regulars—customers, guards, and so forth. I tell you, this place was bustling.”
“Eh, are you serious? It doesn’t look like that to me.”
Mr. Chotos pouted grumpily.
Like I said, what’s with that face? Even if a middle-aged man could pout, absolutely no one would be asking for it.
The pouting old man planned to leave the shop this afternoon. He got really into putting his outfit together that morning, so I admit he looked a little neater than usual. Well, no matter how he dressed up, there was honestly a lot of room for improvement.
He was putting so much effort into his appearance because apparently he had found a buyer for those sorcery cores. It was truly reason to celebrate.
There did seem to be a steady demand for sorcery cores. But what exactly did buyers do with those weird rocks? Make them into women’s accessories?
“Hey… So, what exactly are sorcery cores used for?” I asked Mr. Chotos as I placed a handkerchief on Teru’s lap. She was dropping cookie crumbs all over herself.
I didn’t put much thought into the question, but Mr. Chotos’s reaction was more astonished than I had expected. His mouth was fully agape, and at length he frowned at me, doubtful. “Huh…? What are they used for? Are you mocking me?”
“No, not at all. I really don’t know.”
“It’s obvious. Golems! They’re for golems! Of course, there are other uses, but a sorcery core’s most valuable function is as the core of a golem.” As Mr. Chotos spoke, he looked over at Gol sitting next to me. “I mean, you have a sorcery core inserted in your Goretaru’s chest, right?”
“Wh-what…? Is that so? I really had no idea.”
Had I put such a thing inside Gol? I had absolutely no memory of such.
“Wait. You’re a spellcaster, yet you didn’t know something this basic?” he asked. Seeing my eyes widen at this revelation, Mr. Chotos’s eyes also widened at me. Suddenly, he looked like he understood what was going on. “Ahh. Could it be you inherited the right to control Goretaru? So you didn’t create it after all. You really are a fortunate young master born to a good family. Hm, but then again, it’s strange to see how well you control it while knowing so little…”
Mr. Chotos took a hard look at my face, as if he were gazing at a pitiful person. Eventually, he put on a pained, sympathetic smile as he plopped a hand on my shoulder. “Nemaki, I thought you were only ignorant about market prices and lacked street smarts because you were an aristocrat raised in a foreign country, but…you’re actually more that kind of man than you look.”
“Hey, what do you mean by ‘that’?!”
You bastard, if you’ve got something to say, say it to my face!
In any case, sorcery cores were used for golems, huh? Could it be this was the secret to creating a golem that wouldn’t crumble like the ones I used for training?
But no matter how I tried to recall, I couldn’t remember inserting such a thing into Gol. In the first place, I had picked up my first sorcery core long after I created her. In fact, Gol had been there with me to help me pick it up.
Could it be I hadn’t been paying attention during her creation and had mistakenly mixed a sorcery core into her raw materials? I tilted my head, puzzled.
Mr. Chotos gave me a concerned side-eye and began to explain as if he were lecturing a small child. “Listen, Nemaki. Golems use the sorcery core inside their chest to move the mana inside their base body like blood. This is what we call ‘mana circulation.’”
“Mana circulation…” I sat up in my seat and obediently listened to the lecture. He’s already realized I’m totally ignorant, so I might as well make use of this. This is only a fleeting embarrassment.
“Simply put, mana circulation operates on the same principle mana beasts use to control their mana flow via their sorcery core. As a creation of an Earth spell, a golem’s base should crumble into particulate matter upon the cessation of the spell; it only doesn’t because the circulating mana strengthens the spell binding the particles.”
“Huh, so that’s the mechanism…”
That had to be the reason the monkeys could wear stone armor, too. Their stones were just like a golem’s base.
“Mana circulation has a secondary advantage in that it prevents foreign mana from interfering with a golem. This is more technical stuff, so I’m not too versed in it… But as I understand it, the flow of circulating mana repels and disperses external spells, rendering foreign spells to their original particulate.”
“Ah, I know that! I learned it in Master Speria’s class.”
“Master Speria?”
“Ah, my bad. Just talking to myself.”
Anyway, as I listened to Mr. Chotos’s explanation, it became clear Master Speria had used extremely simple language in his explanation for his beginner pupil.
Could it be that from the start my teacher had already figured out I was below kindergarten level…? I rested my elbow on the table and thought about that for a while. Gol sat beside me and kindly observed my pensive state. She never did seem to get bored of watching me.