“There’s nothing special here, is there?”
Goa, a provincial city of the Kingdom of Celuroa. It was a magical industrial city where many Magi Craftsmen live.
“Every store here is just full of ordinary things.”
It was about 20 kilometers north of the main road, but many tourists visited it because there were many Magi Craftsmen living there.
It had grown into a lively town with the help of the nearby road leading to Lake Azure.
“I can’t feel any originality from this.”
Several shops were lined by the streets. They displayed all sorts of Magi Engineering products for tourists.
Weapons for self defense such as daggers and knives, portable Magi Lamps, and travel goods such as Beastward Bells. Also, accessories such as brooches, rings and necklaces.
“…Second hand stores might be a bit more interesting.”
The face of the girl who had been looking at the stores by the town’s streets for some time ago quickly expressed her dissatisfaction.
She was about 14 or 15 years old. She was a beautiful girl with straight, shoulder-length bright blonde hair, and eyes that looked like jades.
However, her moody, scowling face made it evident that she was not in a good mood.
Her clothes weren’t extravagant, but nothing too simple either, and seemed to be very well matched together.
Furthermore, living up to her young-lady status, she was accompanied by one attendant. He was a young boy, two or maybe three years older than the girl.
“Young lady, that way leads to a back alley.”
“It’s okay. These streets all look pretty, but have nothing of quality. Maybe there’s something good over there?”
The girl turned around the corner and trotted ahead. Her attendant hurriedly followed her.
After running straight for about 20 meters, she turned at a junction, and headed for an antique shop at the end of the alley. She then casually walked through the door.
“Whoa…”
To put it in one word, the shop was “chaotic”.
There were several brooches with designs that had been popular the previous year all sprawled out over a vintage wooden table.
A rusty sword was placed right next to an unspecified number of silver tableware.
Alongside the dolls that children would be happy to play with, there were also helmets worn by soldiers from neighboring countries.
“Uhuhu, this one, this one’s it! I’m sure a shop like this will have something interesting!”
The girl’s face changed completely, and started to look around the shop with a pleasant smile.
“Huh?”
Then, her eyes came across a short sword.
Its light, shiny golden scabbard was finely carved and studded with small Magi Crystals.
Its handle was also golden, and a light-blue Magi Crystal had been embedded to it as well.
“…How lovely.”
She picked it up, and it was lighter than she expected.
She softly drew the blade out of its scabbard.
“…What’s this?”
The blade was about 30 centimeters long. It was definitely made out of Mithril silver. The girl was fascinated by its beauty.
“Young lady?”
It seemed that the young boy who served that girl as her attendant had finally caught up with her mistress.
“…Look, Andro. Look at this short sword.”
The boy called Andro stared at the short sword as he was told. He was impressed with its splendor.
“Ah, it’s a fine article.”
“I want this.”
With the short sword back in its scabbard, the girl walked to the back of the store. There was a shopkeeper there, who had been staring at the girl from a while ago.
“Sir, I’d like to have this short sword.”
“Oh, so you’re interested in it? I found it in Ikasanato, in the Egelia Kingdom, not too long ago. Some soldiers who came from some faraway land were selling everything they had on them.”
“I don’t care where it came from. How much?”
“Right, that’ll be 100,000 Tolls.”
After hearing that, the girl turned to her attendant.
“Uh, ah… Do you really want to purchase that short sword, young lady?”
“Yes. Go ahead and pay the man. Quickly!”
“U-Understood.”
The boy took 10 golden coins out of his purse and offered them to the shopkeeper.
“Thank you very much.”
“Let’s go, Andro.”
“Please wait for me, young lady.”
As soon as the girl went out of the antique shop, she took a good look at her new purchase.
“Ah, now this was a good haul! If I were to order this, it would have cost me no less than a million Tolls!
“Huh? Is that sword really that expensive!?”
The girl laughed.
“Yes. This was a great purchase.”
＊ ＊ ＊
After spending a single night on their investigation trip to the Lenard Kingdom, Jin and the others returned to Hourai Island.
The exploration of the ruins had turned out to be less interesting than expected, and quite mentally enduring as well.
The time was still 10 am because they came back while still riding the special RV “Tortoise” using Condor 3’s warp gate.
“…Well, that didn’t quite go as planned…”
Jin grumbled as he drank a glass of soda in the dining room.
“Should we have a little review meeting?”
Stearleana shared her idea.
“Yeah, that’d be nice.”
Jin agreed. Elsa and Saki had no complaints either, so they decided to have a brief review meeting.
Incidentally, Hanna was playing with Reiko outside.
Looking at what they were doing, it seemed that Reiko was leading her around the fields. She was also eating some Pelshikas.
“I guess I’ll leave her in Reiko’s care for now.”
And thus they started their review meeting.
“How were our safety measures?”
Jin started with a question regarding their vehicle.
“Well, I have no complaints about the camper itself. Except for the luggage falling to its back when we went up that slope…”
“Yeah, that thing. I’ll think of a way to keep our things fixed in place.”
Then, Saki was the next one to give her opinion.
“I’m not really sure I want to go exploring more ruins anytime soon. They give this feeling of uncertainty…”
“Yeah, you’re right. And even more so now that we know that most of the valuables have already been taken. Maybe we shouldn’t have gone there…”
“Yeah, the only thing we’ve got out of that trip was learning the reason behind the Lenard Kingdom’s downfall.”
Everyone nodded to Elsa’s remark.
“Indeed. But to think that everyone fled their country because they were afraid of a plague…”
“Do you think it’s possible they had been under some kind of mind control?”
“Ah…”
Elsa knew that demons could be involved because Jin and Elsa worked together to bring things back in control during the magical exhaustion fever incident.
And when it comes to demons, mind control is always a possibility. This stemmed from the fact that Elsa’s own father had been influenced by the demon Malkosiath.
“I can’t deny that…”
They hadn’t found any evidence of it, but it was definitely possible.
“Master, could I give you my opinion about the time when the door to that basement opened, and when you actually entered that basement?”
“Oh, Ann. What is it?”
Ann had arrived at the place where Jin and his friends were having their review meeting, and said that she had something to say.
“Thank you. First of all, you may have gone outside of the building while the door was being open, but that might not have been enough as a safety measure. The… Tortoise, was it? You should have taken shelter inside that vehicle, and deployed its barrier if possible. And you should have been a few hundred meters farther away.”
“…”
“What if it had been some kind of explosive trap? Please think about this.”
She was right. Jin regretted that if he had been careful enough to build those defensive measures into the Tortoise, he should have actually put them into use.
“And it was a bit careless of you to have actually gone into that basement. You should have been more careful, Master. You are an irreplaceable person after all.”
Ann had given Jin harsh but honest advice. Jin became somewhat remorseful about him being a bit excited to explore those historical ruins.
“Although Quinta was already investigating those ruins, and they were quite frequented by several people, a hidden room like that one should be something to watch out for.”
Ann has pledged allegiance to Jin, but she wasn’t an automata that he had made. Therefore, she was a valuable being who wouldn’t blindly obey him, and would even complain about his methods.
“And finally, Laojun. After confirming with our Master, no, even without his consent, you should have deployed aerial troops to remain standby just in case.”
Even Laojun had been scolded by Ann. Jin and the others reaffirmed that Ann’s existence was something truly precious.
