According to Lazy Pig, it was important that not just the Shield Hero, but also the Spear Hero, was involved. She chose us because we were working together, so it seemed.
I supposed if it had been just Father, then it was possible she’d get more criticism for working with the Shield Hero.
If I’m not mistaken, in the first go-around, it had taken Father a little bit longer to start really boosting his reputation with his peddling.
“And Elena also says that when the Queen got back to Melromarc, she said that the Shield and Spear Hero would eventually have the best social status. Well, that’s pretty much it. She seems like a good person. What do you think?”
“I think it would be best to immediately exterminate her,” I advised.
“What? Motoyasu, were you even listening? Please be reasonable. Aren’t we trying to make sure that there’s no war?”
“You’re right,” I agreed. “For that reason, I shall exterminate her in a coolheaded and reasonable manner, I say.”
“W-what! Wait!” Father groaned.
Lazy Pig oinked in confusion.
“Listen, we’ve got a lot to do, and we can’t afford to be spied on,” Father said to her.
“Oink.”
“Huh? You’ll become a slave if it helps us trust you? Since a slave wouldn’t be able to spy?” Father glanced at me. “In return, she just wants us to put in a good word for her family when the Queen eventually comes out on top. Well, if that’s really what you want . . .”
Hmmm. As a slave, she wouldn’t be able to betray us, so it reduced the risk on that end. A slave wouldn’t be able to reveal any of our secrets, true. But why would she want to join us that badly?
“Oink oink oink.”
“Well, we have a lot of plans, and it’s definitely true that we’ll need more help to accomplish them all. If you become a slave, you won’t be able to betray us so . . . All right. I still don’t really trust you, but if you really want to, you can join us. If we can talk more, from merchant to merchant, I’m sure we’ll start to trust you.”
She oinked in agreement. So Lazy Pig joined us as a slave.
The biggest problem was that now the inside of the carriage was really starting to turn noxious with the heinous stank of pig.
“Oiiiiiink!”
Lazy Pig—Elena—when we weren’t selling anything, spent all of her time on the hammock inside the carriage, dozing off. But in that sublime trembling of the carriage that my noble filolials’ rapid pace on the road caused, a bit of dozing off could mean certain death. And yet, somehow, she slept.
Even I couldn’t fall asleep while we were on the road. I, Motoyasu Kitamura, admit that I felt envy, I say!
Lazy Pig was taking advantage of Father’s kindness! Even though she was supposed to be a slave, she was acting as if we hadn’t even activated the slave seal. She was mocking us!
Well, even though we did register Keel as a slave with a seal, I’d never seen the seal itself.
If I were in charge of registering Lazy Pig, I’d kill her as quickly as I could instead.
As I stared angrily at Lazy Pig resting, Father called over to me.
“Oh, Motoyasu, by the way, I heard that you have a secret plan, but what are you thinking?”
“Yes, I do.” I thought about it. “It’s almost time.”
It had been about five days since we started peddling. We were going around Melromarc, selling our wares in different villages and cities. I opened my map of Melromarc and thought about our potential route. I needed to select an area that we could get through in one day.
“I propose that we go about in this area at a distance that we can do a full loop back in a single day,” I said to Father, pointing at the map.
“That’s fine with me, but why?”
“That’s my secret plan, I say!” I declared. “It’s a plan to go off and level up while pretending like we’re still in the carriage the whole time!”
This was my infallible method! Since the trip would require Portal Spear, we needed to devise some sort of scheme. I supposed that even if there was someone watching us, they simply wouldn’t realize that the hero that they were supposed to be watching was no longer there.
“Sounds like that will take a lot of work. So what’s the plan?”
“Since we’re usually shut up in the carriage for days at a time anyways, I think that will make for the perfect smokescreen,” I explained.
“Pretty much all the time.” Father sighed. “Well, we do stop at inns from time to time.”
In our five days on the road, we had killed a few monsters that showed up, but besides that, our leveling up had really slowed to a halt. If Father didn’t start leveling up more soon, it would be a cause for concern.
“We can just leave it to our sales team and the filolials while we’re out, I say!”
“So let Keel handle things? Or Elena?”
I shook my head. “We can’t trust Lazy Pig. But we need Keel to level up too.”
I heard an oink from the other side of the carriage. Lazy Pig had woken up and was now looking over at me. Yes, you heard me right, Lazy Pig! I’ll never trust you!
“We never asked the likes of you to join us! Beat it, swine!” I quipped.
Lazy Pig had but a meager oink in response.
“Well, let’s not get all riled up,” Father said. “I applied the slave seal and everything, so there’s nothing to be worried about, Motoyasu. Let’s just make sure Yuki keeps a watch on everything. That’ll be enough, won’t it?”
I nodded. “So for now, Kou will pull the carriage, Lazy Pig will handle the peddling, and Yuki will keep a close eye on her.”
“Whatever you command, Motoyasu!” said Yuki.
“Woohoo! More pulling!” shouted Kou.
I didn’t know what level Lazy Pig was, but I figured she was strong enough to fight. The only real situation to be worried about would be if thieves attacked and realized that there was no one actually inside the carriage. Actually, since Yuki was keeping an eye on things, even if Lazy Pig tried to poke a hole in her slave seal or something, Yuki would dispose of her swiftly.
“Let’s get on our way then, I say! First, I’ll use Liberation Fire Mirage to keep us hidden, and then as soon as we create some distance, we’ll use Portal Spear.”
Yes, our objective here was to keep all enemy eyes on our carriage and our peddling. Filolials have great instincts for sensing hidden enemies, and I can pretty much sense the presence of anyone hiding with magic too. I double-checked that there was no one hiding inside the carriage. That meant that from now on, it should be enough for Yuki to keep an eye on the outside of the carriage. Plus, our carriage was moving so fast that it would be hard for anyone to even get a grasp on what we were doing. Ultimately, I decided that even if there was no one left inside the carriage, outsiders likely wouldn’t realize that we had left.
With that, Father and I embarked on our leveling-up mission.
“Wow! That was crazy,” Father said.
“Oink,” agreed Keel.
We had just arrived in Siltvelt. I supposed that this was Father’s first time in the portal in this go-around.
“What would you like to do, Father? Should we head toward the castle?”
Father scratched his head. “If you don’t mind, let’s focus on leveling up first. I’m also getting a bit worried that I haven’t leveled up at all.”
“Agreed. So why don’t you go do that with Sakura?”
“Sounds good. Keel, you can come too!”
Father leapt up onto Sakura’s back and helped Keel up. He looked like he was enjoying himself mightily, I say.
“In the meantime, I’m going to go pick up a few things that I wanted to give to you before,” I said. “Be careful!”
“Thanks,” Father said. “We’ll go level up a ton and see you later.”
“Leeeeet’s gooooo!” Sakura sang, taking off into a sprint with Father and Keel on her back.
While they were out, I went to get the drop items that I had collected and hidden the last time I had gone to level up with the filolials. I wondered if Father would come back with some good drop items. I figured whatever they were, we could always use them to make more medicine.