Kui: The author sent me a few ill.u.s.trations to use for the chapters a while back! I"ll put them up in their respective chapters and the ill.u.s.trations page.
Translator: DC & Kui
Editor: Arocks141
Author: しまもん (SHIMAMON)
It was a bit past noon.
The female scholar took off from the plaza, searching for tonight"s to-be bedding.
In her immediate surroundings were mansions which preserved their original appearance, and among them, she was trying to find the safest looking one.
Unlike before, the woman"s expression turned serious as she deployed a wide range search magic from the center of the plaza. The rapidly expanding magic circle enveloped the area in a faint light.
Eventually, she found a suitable mansion from the results of her magic.
She left the empty bottles and br.i.m.m.i.n.g bathtub as is, and made off with the demons to their new residence.
After several minutes of walking away from the plaza, she arrived at her intended mansion. The mansion wasn"t completely beyond disrepair, but the garden was overgrown with weeds, and the gate was rusted shut.
There, the front gate was blown into smithereens by her attack, and any gra.s.s between her and the entrance was also victim to the fire.
Her next move was to pry open the hefty door and trespa.s.s into the building.
The building"s interior was dissimilar to its outside; save for a little dust which had acc.u.mulated, it was nice.
She spread her search magic from the entrance to probe the building and was rewarded not just with the discovery of standard rooms like bedrooms or a kitchen, but also a brewery in the bas.e.m.e.nt as a bonus. A snark smile arose the moment she found the brewery.
"Hey, I should stay in this region for a while…"
Then, she really began to worry. It seemed like the Demon King and G.o.ddess were fighting in her head.
Night fall.
Inside the vast country of ruins, a single spot of light illuminated the land. Under the light, she was happily preparing her next meal.
Essentially, up until now, she had only been eating things like boiled nuts and roasted animal meat. So for her, who had been repeatedly eating a poor diet, this was her first decent meal in a long time. Still, she couldn"t be happy.
Although this is one of the fallen countries, it was still once a country.
If she searched the fields, she could find plenty of thriving potatoes and wild vegetables, and many fish took to the rivers as their homes. Furthermore, left inside the kitchen were glorious sets of utensils and on the ceilings of restaurants were large quant.i.ties of cured meat.
With those, she was able to finally enjoy human"s cuisine. Fortunately, the kitchen could function as smoothly as it did in its golden era.
As to be expected of a n.o.ble"s kitchen, it was a「Magic Kitchen」powered by a magic stone. These magic kitchens were able to precisely adjust a fire, rather than just lighting a simple one; they were something that call cooks coveted.
However, all things convenient must come at a price. Perhaps, this kitchen would have been worth enough to build another house.
There she stood, in this extremely fancy and hopelessly extravagant kitchen cooking by herself. She then dresses her completed dish on a worthy plate and carries it to the yard.
When she arrived, she was met with the sight of her luggage demon patiently seated. The demon"s eyes zoomed in onto the feast atop the plate, drool leaking from its mouth and its tongue now restlessly moving about.
「Hey, sorry to make you wait. I"m quite proud of today"s masterpiece. Are you looking forward to it?」
She spoke to the demon who couldn"t understand human words, before placing a large dish onto the ground. Upon doing so, the demon thrust its face into the dish and began messily eating.
This dish is completely vegetarian friendly. It is a simple dish consisting of a heap of vegetables lightly fried with salt to taste.
Despite the simplicity, the demon merrily flattened the heap and sluggishly rolled over. It was already preparing for bed.
Afterwards, she returned to the mansion to begin eating her own cooking. Though it was a simply prepared dish, it was the first time in a long while in particular that she had a fork, spoon, and knife arranged.
Of course, accompanying her food was the colourful a.s.sortment of excellent liquor found from the brewery poured into gla.s.ses. She immersed herself into this long meal and at the end, placed her hands together in prayer as she stood up.
Thereafter, she filled the magic bath with hot water, and slowly eased and submerged her body into the tub. When she was done bathing until her heart was content, she found a closet with pajamas, which she changed into, and then set off to her bedroom.
Inside this mansion were several bedrooms and from them, on the biggest and fanciest bed lay a couple of bleached skeletal remains still cuddled close.
These remains were of the owner and the family of the mansion. When they learned of the demons breaching the wall, they comitted suicide in this bedroom.
She gently placed her hands together in prayer for the sleeping bodies.
(Beside the bed is a cane for magic, and seeing the last spell cast from the cane, there"s traces of sleeping magic being used.
Plus, next to the cane is an empty bottle with a skull mark drawn on it.
In the mansion there are several chambers for servant use, although no other corpses can be found. It seems that when news of the demons drawing near to the region reached them, the head of the family fired all of the servants. Thus, there are no other remains in the residence.
…These people must have drunk the poison then placed themselves to sleep and pa.s.sed away before the demons could invade into the wealthier area. Since the bed showed no signs of being disturbed, they probably pa.s.sed away peacefully.
If their second hearts stopped beating, then the demons would have no reason to attack this building. That explains why this building was unharmed.)
Then, she quietly left her bedroom.
Eventually, she ended up sleeping in another room that night. The bed was smaller than the one in the room with the remains, yet still notably larger than what ordinary people used.
Although the bed was slightly dusty, she could remedy that with a bit of wind magic. The woman stripped the bed of its sheets and blankets, then carried them out to the veranda and blew away the dust with magic.
The moon had settled well up in the sky but this was an isolated country of the dead. No one was there to complain about the obnoxiously loud winds generated from the magic.
After affirming that she had gotten rid of an adequate amount of dust, she began making her bed. Several minutes later she finished making the bed and then flopped onto it to lie down.
Her luck was running high when she found that the bed was completely intact, apparently, the original construction was an engineering masterpiece. It had been such a long time since she last slept on a decent bed that when she did fall asleep, the corners of her eyes were curled in joy.
The next morning. The sun illuminated her face.
The blue sky seemed remote and far spreading; a perfect day to embark on her journey or to search the country.
…That was only if her body permitted it…
"…This is it…
My life… Ends here…
…Armageddon has come…"
The woman"s face was just as blue as the sky as she inched out of bed like a caterpillar and headed for the kitchen. Occasionally, she would pause, midway down the corridor, but still desperately inching her way down.
Then, she finally arrived at a kitchen with her water jug. Fortunately, she was lucky to have filled up and saved the water in her jug from yesterday. It was only normal water, but looked at it as if it was sparkling.
Normally, she would utilise a cup as a container to drink from, but today, she slammed her head into the jug and glugged down as much water as she humanly could.
(Man, I really pulled it off…
I mean, I did know that things were gonna turn out this way.
So I tried to limit myself at first.
But it"s impossible…
Good drinks… are even more formidable than I thought…
Such a terrifying enemy… is lurking everywhere in this country…
… With this… I might lose…. My original goal… it should be more n.o.ble…. That it….)
"Ugf!! Umph!! Gueeeeeeeeh!!!"
…Ahahahahaha…
(…I almost let a monster loose inside the jug…
I was right to put a wash basin next to the jug…
Right… My goal was…supposed to be investigating the relationship between magic and demons to better the livelihood of humans…
And to think… I would lose to a temptation of this level… I"m pathetic…)
"!!! Ugeh!! Guehhhhhhh!!!"
…Ahahahaha…
(D- Don"t do this.
My head is…
… Alright, it"s decided!! I"m taking today off!! Luckily, there"s still a little bit of food leftover from dinner, I"ll rest for today!!
And let"s leave tomorrow!!
Let"s do that!! Let"s d-)
"GUEEEEEEEEEHHH!!!"
In the end, she took the day off.
Meanwhile, in the garden, the demon ate the weeds, occasionally peering into the window anxiously.
Kui: To be honest, my holiday ended a few weeks back but I was too busy playing Zelda…