Chapter 28: The Merchant and Magic Grass

 

“Haa!”

Liliella-san ran towards the battlefield.

She killed monsters, dishing out hits with her spear while strengthening herself with body strengthening magic.

“Gyuuu!”

Scampering across the earth, the furball flew at the monsters.

Running in between the monsters’ feet taking advantage of its small size, not only did it confuse them, but mercilessly tore out their windpipes whenever it saw an opportunity.

“Kyuun!”

Then, it began eating them.

Hmm, quite some guts in that one, to be able to leisurely have a meal literally surrounded by enemies.

“Gyuuun!!”

Actually, it almost felt like it was running wild?

“E-erm, I understand the missy is strong, but what the hell is that small thing!?”

An adventurer who was guarding a merchant nearby asked in surprise.

“It’s some newborn monster we found in the forest.”

“M-monster!? Can you really just take one of those along with you!?”

The merchant asked, his face coloured with fear at having found out about the furball’s true identity.

“It’s fine.
The first thing it saw after hatching from its egg was me, and it seems to have mistaken me for its parent, so it’s quite fond of me.”

“I-is that so?”

“And anyway, don’t the Dragon Knights make Dragons obey them and then ride them?”

I brought up the Dragon Knights of the High-Mountain Nation in order to get the merchant to relax.

“The Dragon Knights are the stuff of fairytales, lad…”

The merchant replied to me with a chuckle.

“Eh?”

The Dragon Knights were a fairy tale? What was he talking about?

Wasn’t it obvious that the Dragon Knights rode Dragons?

“It’s oveeeer”

Liliella-san said, coming back to us.

“Gyuuun!!”

The furball was still eating though.

Still running wild, huh.

“Alright, time to collect the materials!”

With the fighting over, the adventurers began disassembling the monsters they had defeated.

I hadn’t participated in this battle, so I dedicated myself to lookout duty while they were all busy collecting the materials.

Liliella-san had made me pretend to have used up a lot of my mana in the previous battle.

She said it wasn’t good to stand out too much.

Heeding her advice, I did as she had said.

In my previous life, I had been targeted by nobles and all sorts of other people due to standing out too much.

And also, she said, I couldn’t just take away everyone else’s jobs.

Just like how hunters and fishermen didn’t cause trouble for each other at each others’ hunting spots, adventurers didn’t steal others’ spoils.

So, I exercised self-restraint and didn’t participate in the battle.

Mhm, as expected of Liliella-san.

There’s so many things about being an adventurer I can learn from her!

“There’s an A-Rank adventurer here in case you get in trouble, so just fight as much as you can.”

“Ah, it feels good to know someone’s got your back.”

My eyes happened to meet with some adventurers chatting amongst themselves, and since they waved at me, I waved back.

To be honest, I didn’t think I was fit to be A-Rank, but if everyone could fight well due to it, I was all right with it too.

As such thoughts were passing through my mind, I happened to overhear the conversation of a merchant nearby.

“There’s an unusually large number of monsters about.”

“You said it.
Especially that first attack, that was baaaad.
If he hadn’t been there, we would’ve been completely obliterated.”

“Was that an unusually large amount of monsters?”

I asked, continuing my lookout duty.

“Yeah, normally, this many of them don’t appear.
And there were some monsters mixed in among them that are too strong to normally appear.”

Said the merchants’ leader, staring at the monsters being disassembled.

“Rogue Raptors.
They wander around in forests, chasing their prey until it’s completely exhausted.
It’s unusual for them to leave the forest.”

Rogue Raptors looked scary, but they were actually quite cowardly monsters.

It was why they only attacked after chasing their prey until it was exhausted even if they had an advantage in numbers.

The reason they rarely left the forest was also because they avoided fighting in places without any cover.

Yet, Rogue Raptors had attacked us.

“Just multiple monsters attacking at once is abnormal.
Something of the sort has never happened before.”

Hmm, unbelievable things keep happening one after the other.

Even for non-merchants, it felt strange.

“I’m getting a bad premonition.
Someone could be behind this.”

“Someone?”

“Yeah, it happens from time to time.
Idiots who just can’t get their heads around basic logic.”

I don’t really get it, but they’re saying something like someone did something and that’s why this is happening?

So, basically…

“So someone deliberately caused this situation to happen?”

“Well no, it’s more like someone brought it upon us unknowingly.”

“Brought it upon us?”

“I guess I have no choice; it’s time to investigate.
Oy, you lot! I’m gonna check your luggage!”

Under the leader’s orders, the merchants nearby all gathered together with a nod.

“Hey now, checking our luggage isn’t very nice of you, bossman.”

“Look here, something abnormal’s definitely going on.
Looking into it is obviously a good idea.”

“Yeah.
Let’s check everything while having the adventurers on lookout.”

“What’s going on??”

The adventurers who had finished dismantling came over to us wondering what was going on.

“Did something happen?”

“Yeah, these attacks from the monsters are suspicious.
So, I decided to take a quick look at everyone’s stuff.
Sorry, but I’ll have to check you guys’ stuff too.”

“Our luggage?”

“Yeah, I’m thinking someone brought in something that irritates monsters.”

Something that irritates monsters, I see.

There are indeed monsters that have rather excessive reactions to certain objects, shapes, or colours.

So in the merchant’s opinion, the monsters are reacting to something of the sort and attacking us.

“Well, if that’s the case, then fine.”

And like that, we all checked each others’ luggage.

“You’re travelling pretty light.”

A merchant said, confused by how little luggage I had.

“It’s all I ever carry around.”

I have a magic bag after all, so there’s no need to carry around all the heavy stuff outside it.

Or if I did carry around something heavy, it would almost definitely be a weapon.

And since items inside the magic bag didn’t interact with the outside world, it was unnecessary to check inside it.

Actually, if they wanted to check everything in there, we’d be stuck there until sundown.

“This is all I have.”

Said Liliella-san, showing them the small amount of luggage she had on her, having deposited most of it with me earlier.

“I see, high-rank adventurers don’t carry around any useless items.”

“They can make fire or water with magic, and mobility is more important than anything.
They’re good role models.”

Some adventurers nearby said, checking our luggage and then nodding to each other.

“No problems here.”

“Nor here.”

The merchants checked each others’ luggage, confirming there was nothing out of the ordinary.

And, even with the last person’s luggage checked, nothing suspicious had been found.

“Seems like you were wrong.”

Since they had thought that someone had definitely brought something dangerous with them, the merchants began a discussion worriedly.

“So wait, were we really just attacked by chance?”

“Seems like it.”

The merchants accepted the results of the search, albeit unhappily.

“All right, I guess we’ll just have to be more cautious until we get to the royal capital.
There might still be some other cause.”

“Right.”

Everyone put their luggage back, and got ready to resume the journey.

“Heeey, furball! Get back here, we’re leaving soon!”

I called out to the furball that was still eating.

“Kyu!? Kyuu!!”

The furball ran towards me due to me having called it.

“C’mere.”

I squatted down, holding my arms open to greet the furball.

“Kyuu!”

And the furball… didn’t come flying into my arms.

“Huh?”

For some reason, it ignored us, running towards the merchants.

“Heeey, furball, what’s up?”

I shouted at it, but it just ran over to the merchants’ carriages and dived under one of them.

“Hey, hey, watch out!”

I crouched down to pull the furball out from underneath the carriage, since I didn’t want it to be run over.

As I did so, I saw the furball acting very strangely indeed.

“Kyuu kyuu!!”

It was standing on its two hind legs, repeatedly jumping and hitting its front paws together.

What the heck is it doing?

I used light magic to check what the furball was doing, illuminating the space under the carriage.

“Hm? This is…?”

There was a rack on the bottom of the carriage with a bunch of sacks on it.

“Hey, what do you think you’re doing!?”

The merchant who was presumably the owner of the carriage shouted at me as I crawled under the carriage, curious about what I had just seen.

“S-sorry, there’s a bunch of bags attached to the bottom of the carriage and I got curious.”

“Wh-wh-wh-wh-! Whatever are you talking about!?”

Hm? What’s he upset about?

“Well, like I said, there’re bags attached to the bottom of the carriage…”

“D-don’t say such strange things!”

But they’re really there.

“What’s going on here?”

The caravan’s leader noticed the disturbance and came over.

“N-n-nothing a-at all!”

The merchant tried to turn the leader away, but he noticed me peeking out from underneath the carriage and crouched down to look underneath it.

“Oh look, a hidden rack.
With something like this here, I guess you’re guilty of something at least.
When’d you put this here.
Oy, you lot!”

“Yessir!”

Under the leader’s orders, the other merchants and employees restrained the owner of the carriage.

“U-unhand me!”

Meanwhile, other merchants brought out the bags from the bottom of the carriage.

“Are these the cause for the monsters attacking us?”

“Gyuu! Gyuu!”

The furball excitedly jumped at the bags.

“Ah, hey!”

Then, it tore one of the bags open.

“Hm? What’s this?”

A pile of purple-coloured grass fell out of the ripped bag.

“Gyuu!!”

The furball leapt at the purple grass and began chewing on it.

“Hey! Don’t just go eating that!!”

The merchant who had been captured shouted at the furball.

But it was a waste of his breath.

“Sorry about the furball.
But if you carry around unprocessed magic grass like this, the monsters won’t be able to help themselves.
You’ve got to properly process it.”

Indeed, what the furball was eating was none other than the grass that monsters really loved, magic grass.

Of course the furball’d get excited with this around.

It must’ve not been able to restrain itself due to the excitement from the hunt and had gone straight for the magic grass.

“Magic grass!? This is magic grass!?”

The leader and the others said in surprise.

“Huh? Have you never seen magic grass before?”

What a surprise.
To think that merchants going to the royal capital had never seen magic grass before.

Ah, I get it.
It’s because they’re merchants.
They know what the processed version looks like.

“By magic grass, do you mean that magic grass? That evil devils’ plant that attracts monsters?”

What’s with that exaggerated explanation!?

It’s just something monsters really happen to like.

Well, I guess it can turn into medicine too.

“Magic grass is grass that gives off a scent that monsters really like.
So the monsters that attacked us up until now were just following the scent of this unprocessed magic grass.”

“Magic grass is contraband, it’s forbidden to buy or sell it.
You were carrying something like that?”

The merchants glared at the tied-up merchant.

“But why didn’t any monsters attack us on our way to Hexi?”

Now that I think of it, there weren’t any signs of monsters gathering when we all met up in Hexi.

Normally, monsters would gather anywhere the smell of magic grass came from, attracted by the scent.

“Hmm… ah, it’s torn.”

Upon closer investigation, one of the bags was torn.

It seemed to have gotten torn while it was under the carriage.

“So basically, if Mr.
A-Rank hadn’t been here, we would’ve all been killed due to this idiot! This idiot!”

The leader hit the tied-up merchant’s head.

“Wait, please! I wasn’t carrying any magic grass!”

The tied-up merchant frantically denied that he was the one carrying the magic grass.

“What are you talking about! It’s right there!”

“That’s just what he claims it is! None of us has actually ever seen any!”

It seemed like the merchant didn’t want to admit to having been in possession of magic grass at all.

“It’s an A-Rank adventurer’s word against yours.
His words have way more credibility than yours, when you were obviously trying to hide the magic grass.
And once we get back to a town, we can have the guild look at it, and they’ll be able to tell in a glance that it’s magic grass.”

“B-but…”

The tied-up merchant looked away from the leader’s glare.

Even if no one had known it was magic grass, a simple investigation by the guild would definitely confirm it as such.

“Anyway, magic grass is contraband.
If it gets out that you were in possession of it, you’ll definitely be taken away by the officials.”

Huh? Magic grass is contraband? When did that come to be?

I remember it being considered dangerous in my previous life, but I don’t think it was contraband.

“P-please wait! I don’t know anything! I was just asked to take it with me because it was an ingredient for a medicine!”

“So you decided to hide it on a hidden shelf in your carriage, huh?”

“T-the reward was good.
I was told I should hide it so it wouldn’t be stolen because it was a valuable herb used in medicines!”

“What an idiot, they were just using you.”

The leader sighed.

“Anyway, dispose of this.
We have no reason to keep holding on to it, and it’s contraband anyway.”

“Please wait! If you do that I won’t be able to get the reward!”

“What an idiot! Don’t get us involved in your troubles!”

“I beg you! I won’t be able to repay my loans!”

“You reap what you sow you idiot!”

“Please save me fatheeeer!”

“““Father!?”””

We were all surprised by this sudden revelation.

It seemed the tied-up merchant, Boz-san, was the leader’s son.

Boz-san said that he had gotten into debt in a gambling den and was about to have his tools of the trade taken away from him to pay back said debt.

Apparently a mysterious robed man appeared and said that he’d pay off Boz-san’s debt if he accepted this request.

Mhm, suspicious as hell.

So, it seemed like he really hadn’t known what was in the bags, but he had guessed it was something illegal.

“So then, who did you accept the request from.”

Boz-san shook his head at the leader’s question.

“I d-don’t know.
His hood hid his eyes and he spoke in an unnatural voice.”

“What should we do? …Hey, Boz, we’ll just throw all this away and act like we didn’t see anything.
If you don’t get rid of it, I’m kicking you out of the caravan.
Choose.”

“B-but…”

Boz-san’s face went pale in despair.

There was no correct answer.

If he didn’t get rid of it, he’d be kicked out of the caravan, attacked by other monsters after the magi grass, and die.

If he got rid of it, he wouldn’t be able to repay his debts and would be in a lot of trouble.

“Why don’t you just confess to the guards? Your debt can be removed if you owe it to someone who made you carry illegal goods.”

Liliella-san’s suggestion seemed watertight at first glance.

However, it wouldn’t work.

“D-don’t way something so stupid.
I’m a merchant who does trade going from town to town along the highways.
If they found out I’d abandoned the job, they’d just ambush me and get rid of me!”

The underworld’s information network and tenacity was amazing.

They held reputation above all else, so if someone threw mud in their face, they’d pay them back whether it was profitable or not.

For merchants who moved around in small groups, it was literally a matter of life and death.

“I guess that’s it then.
We have no choice but to abandon you here.”

“Please don’t!”

He had been acting tough earlier, but ever since he was found out, he had become more and more pathetic.

Well, not only had he been found out to be carrying contraband, he also had nowhere to run to.

Although, it wasn’t very pleasant to see a father say he would abandon his son like this.

Perhaps because of that though, I couldn’t help but say the following out loud.

“Well, it’s not like there’s nothing we can do at all…”

“What!?”

The half-crying Boz-san looked up at the words I had muttered to myself.

He had unexpectedly good hearing.

“Hey! You’ve got an idea right? Tell me, please!”

“Erm, well, couldn’t you just make up an excuse?”

“What do you mean?”

I began explaining to the confused Boz-san.

“Well, erm, they said the magic grass was an ingredient for some medicine, right?”

“Y-yes.
They did.
He did say that.”

“So, what if we actually made medicine out of it?”

“““““Huh?”””””

Everyone made faces that said ‘What?’

“Well, basically, Boz-san was given the magic grass and told it was an ingredient for some medicine.
So, he knew nothing about the contents.
You follow?”

“Y-yes.
I wasn’t told what it specifically was.”

“So then.
I’ll process the magic grass so that it can only be used as ingredients for medicine.
I can also remove the component that attracts monsters during the process.”

“You can even do that!?”

The leader’s eyes went round in surprise.

No, well, it’s not that big of a deal.

“But wouldn’t it be bad if he had the magic grass processed on his own?”

Liliella-san asked, worrying about how it might be bad if it was found out that Boz-san had had the magic grass processed.

“No, Boz-san doesn’t know what’s in the bags, so if he insists he brought it with him just as he was told, it should be fine.
There’s no way he would’ve been able to change out the materials inside the bags, after all.
Furthermore, all I’ll be doing is basic processing, so it’ll still look the same, so deceiving them should be easy enough.”

“Huuh… you can do that…”

“A-Rank adventurers are amazing.”

“They can do anything…”

The other adventurers kept saying it was amazing, but all I had really done was a little research in connection to potions in my before-previous life.

“Look, Boz, he’s gonna fix this for ya.
Nothing to worry about anymore, alright?”

Said the leader, and Boz-san nodded, choking up.

“P-please… Save me…”

“Yes, just leave it to me.”

Now that I had gotten involved with him like this, there was no way I could abandon him.

They say even the great swordsman Raigard was unable to abandon his bad companions too.

“Thanks for looking out for this idiot.
I thank you.”

The leader bowed to me.

With how he said it, it seemed like he hadn’t wanted to abandon his son.

The leader’s eyes were a little teary.

“Ahaha, don’t worry about it.”

Having thus decided to process the magic grass, we immediately took action.

First, I had all the adventurers guard the area, then I took out pharmaceutical tools from my magic bag.

“Wha!? Where the hell did that come from!?”

“A-Rank adventurers are amazing!”

“Hey, focus on your jobs!”

“““Yes ma’am!”””

Scolded by Liliella-san, the adventurers returned to their job.

She was being called ma’am before I had even noticed.

“First, soak the Magic Grass in Crystal Water for just under an hour.
Powder dried Sunlight Grass in the meanwhile…”

I swiftly produced all the necessary materials from my magic bag and put them in the Crystal Water alongside the Magic Grass.

“Now we just wait for it to soak up the solution, and then we’re done.”

“Seems pretty easy.”

The nervous leader said, slightly surprised.

“It’s because I’m just processing them into ingredients for medicine.
It’s only hard because there’s a lot of Magic Grass.”

Then, when they had soaked for long enough, I cast fire magic and wind magic simultaneously, drying the Magic Grass with hot-wind magic.

“Hot Air!”

Then, I checked whether they had dried properly.

“Yep, they’re perfect.”

I declared the processing of the Magic Grass complete.

“Ooh, you’re done already!?”

“That was unexpectedly fast.”

“Monsters won’t come for us due to the Magic Grass’ smell anymore either.”

As I said that, the furball went up to the magic grass and uninterestedly kicked it away with one of its back paws.

“Ooh, we’ll be all right now! I can’t thank you enough, kid! As expected of an A-Rank adventurer! To be able to make the infamous Magic Grass ineffective!”

Then, the leader whispered into my ear while patting me on the back.

“Thanks, and I’ll make sure to off those bastards that did this to my fool of a son.
I don’t want to be more of a trouble to you than this.”

“Not at all, this much is nothing.”

I acted as if I hadn’t heard anything.

The rest was for them to solve.

“Thanks! I owe you one, bro!”

Hang on, why did I suddenly become his boss!?

“I’ll definitely pay you back! Definitely!”

“You’d better, you fool of a son! If this person hadn’t been here, you’d be saying your final prayers around now!”

“I-I’m really sorry father!”

Well, whatever they may say, they seem to get along well enough.

They were both in tears, after all.

“By the way, you said the processed Magic Grass could only be turned into safe medicine, but what kind of medicine would that be, exactly?”

Liliella-san suddenly became curious about what the processed Magic Grass could be used for.

Everyone else also looked at me full of curiosity.

“Well, erm, you see.”

“Yes?”

“The processed Magic Grass…”

“Yes?”

“Works well against the common cold.”

“…Eh?”

“You can turn it into medicine for the common cold.”

“The contraband Magic Grass, turns into medicine for the common cold?”

“Yep.”

Everyone was dumbfounded by the unexpected use for it.

And then…

“Pfft… huhuhu”

“For the common cold…”

““““““Buhahahahahahaha!!””””””

Everyone broke out laughing, unable to endure it any more.

“The thing you can turn this highly illegally forbidden item into is cold medicine!!”

“P-p-people from the underworld who need medicine for the common coldddd!!”

“Buhahahahaha, the evil mafia boss lying in his bed in his room drinking cold medicine!!”

By the way, it works pretty well?

““““““Ahahahahahaha!!”””””””

And like that, the tense atmosphere from earlier turned into a more amicable one.

Mhm, it was the right choice, choosing cold medicine.