Chapter Two: A Lazy Pig
Just as the Siltvelt emissary had promised, he got us a peddling permit. We finally embarked on our peddling journey.
To start, we prepared to sell the medicine that Father had made, with Keel standing out front to try to attract customers. At first Keel was too shy to do much of anything and constantly asked Father for help, but soon enough she got used to it and started selling medicine without any hesitation.
It was gradual, sure, but we slowly started to make some money. We used that money as capital to buy more ingredients for Father’s medicine, and Father got better at remembering all the different combinations.
Since the filolials were such an unusual sight, word spread and we started to attract more customers. It was just like they were pulling the carriage of the holy saint of the bird god!
“Yuki, can you pull just a little slower?” Father asked. “The carriage is shaking.”
“At once!”
Yuki slowed down according to Father’s wishes, and we continued on.
We had established a solid rotation for the filolials: Yuki, Kou, and then Sakura pulled the carriage. When Sakura pulled the carriage, it shook the least. She must’ve been especially looking out for Father.
I also finished making Sakura’s clothes on the day after we set out. It was a plain, unembellished tunic, like the one I saw Big Sis wearing when we first met. Of course, I couldn’t make Sakura magic armor myself, so it wasn’t the exact same outfit as what Big Sis had, but it still looked cool, like it was made for a dashing swordsman.
I could vaguely remember the sort of outfit that Father had always liked on Big Sis. Was it a shrine priestess outfit? I didn’t think that would particularly suit Sakura.
Father called out to me. “Motoyasu, by the way, it seems like you’ve mastered reading the language here. Should I try to learn it too?”
I thought about it. “I suppose so. You had learned it in the previous go-around.”
I made a chart of the Melromarc alphabet and handed it to Father.
“If you memorize this chart whenever you have some spare time, you’ll be reading in no time, I say! As a matter of fact, you were the one who taught me how to read the Melromarc language. I’m sure it’ll be no trouble for you.”
“So there’s no skill or something that lets you understand the language?” Father asked.
“I don’t believe so,” I answered. “I figured there might be something like that, but I haven’t seen it in any of the weapons I’ve encountered in this world.”
Learning the language was no easy task. Actually, it was very hard, but when I thought about how I could teach it back to Father, it felt like it was all worth it, I say!
“Got it. I’ll just practice a bit at a time.”
Then I heard Keel oink loudly.
We had arrived at the village and Keel was starting to sell medicine.
Father looked outside to confirm and started mixing some ingredients. While he was doing that, we collected some more herbs. We always need more ingredients, I say.
Father had stuck to recording all of our transactions for acquiring herbs from other pharmacies, so we could pay fixed rates. Then, with my spear’s ability, we could make the best medicine out there!
I continued to teach new recipes that were recorded in my spear to Father, and I could tell that he had improved his skill at mixing as we went along. I knew Father would be a natural!
Soon enough, we had a respectable assortment of products. Since we were selling below the market price, we had plenty of demand. Almost too much for us to keep up with ingredient-wise.
For herbs and ingredients, we could always get more by defeating monsters, but we thought that a method like that might result in suspicious eyes cast our way. That made it tough to keep up with our demand.
When I got back to the carriage from harvesting herbs, Father beckoned me over.
“Whatever may it be, Father?”
“So . . .” Father trailed off, a troubled expression on his face. “Well, this girl says she wants to join us.”
Join us? She was probably a spy for some church or other, so I assumed that Father would simply reject her. Needless to say, it was hard to imagine someone in Melromarc wanting to become allies with the Shield Hero. I may need to eliminate her in secret at some point.
“Oink.”
It was an exhausted-looking pig sitting on a stump, waiting.
What was up with that pig, I say?
I examined it with dubious eyes. The pig kept grumbling in a bored voice. It was acting as if it had seen me before, I say.
“Her name’s Elena,” Father said. “She’s a Melromarc noble, and her father told her to help one of the heroes, so she came here.”
Elena? The name sounded familiar, somehow.
Who was Elena? It was oh-so vaguely familiar. I had the sense that she was a close friend of the Crimson Swine.
Which means I had to exterminate her as swiftly as possible!
“Oink oink oink oink,” it said.
“Well, even if you say so, we can’t just believe you,” Father said.
“What is the pig saying, Father?” I inquired.
“She’s saying that she really doesn’t want to, but her father commanded her, so she doesn’t have any choice.”
“Shall I simply exterminate all traces of her from this world, then? I’ll make sure it won’t hurt at all!”
I gripped my spear and pointed it firmly at the pig, but Father pulled my arm.
“Motoyasu, calm down! There’s no need to do anything extreme!”
The pig continued to grumble.
“Now she’s saying that she thought that out of the four heroes, we looked like the easiest to help out, so she came here,” Father said.
I must say, this pig appeared to be completely bored out of her mind.
If I couldn’t kill her, she should return home at once, I say.
I heard more vile, bored oinking fill my eardrums.
“She says that she can be useful to us because her mother was a merchant. She says she can help out.” Father looked at the pig. “But I think Keel is doing just fine for us,” he said.
Keel squealed and oinked furiously in response to that, I say. It sounded like she maybe wanted a companion.
“Huh? Well, you’re right, it could be hard to expand our sales with only Keel,” Father replied. “But still . . . Why did you think it would be easy to join up with us? I mean, as a Melromarc noble, I figured you’d assume that joining us would be the hardest,” he asked her.
Squealing and oinking, oinking and squealing. It went on for some time. Father did me the favor of interpreting.
There seemed to be other reasons that the pig had come to us, besides just the command from her father. According to the pig, there had been a lot of discord within Trash’s faction, and if they continued to support him, then there was a good chance that they would lose their standing. Of course, Trash had a bad relationship with the Spear Hero in addition to the Shield Hero. And furthermore, according to the so-called Elena, the Sword Hero, Ren, had also turned against Melromarc. Since Elena’s family were powerful, well-established merchants, they didn’t have to be too afraid of Trash. It seems he wasn’t powerful enough to be able to confiscate their fortune or bring their family to complete ruin.
Then, besides the fact that it was strategic to her family, she wanted to join us out of personal preference. She said that the most important thing of all was simply that she thought we would get along. The Bow Hero was busy subjugating corrupt nobles across the land, and the Sword Hero was focused on exterminating monsters. Then she heard that the Spear and Shield Hero had started to sell medicine together.
Apparently, the pig had watched all the heroes for some time. She thought Itsuki was too self-righteous. She thought that Ren wanted to work alone for the most part, but even when he did cooperate with others, he often made them do annoying work in the course of monster-killing. Meanwhile, we were just traveling around in a carriage. It looked by far the easiest.
So this pig really did just want to take the easiest way out.
From this day forward, I shall refer to her as Lazy Pig, I say.