Chapter 13— Familiar

"Oh, good. It seems that you kept the numbers as promised. That helps."

　A peddler who bought the bricks I made by magic.

　He says the brick market is hot right now.

　He said that he would buy as much as I had.

　The plan to mass-produce the high-class tableware that I had in my mind disappeared in the blink of an eye, so I wanted to at least make a lot of money from a peddler who boasted that "I will buy as many bricks as I can now." ..

　So I said, "When you come next time, I'll prepare several times as many bricks as this, no ten times as many."

　Apparently, because I had delivered sandals so seriously so far, I didn't have to deal with his words that treated me like a child, and it seems that the peddler's side was also preparing well.

　He had to transport a rather heavy item called bricks, so he secured a means of transportation to move it, and came back to the village.

"What's that creature ... Isn't it a bakemono ..." (TLN: Translations of "Bakemono" )

　I muttered when I saw the transportation means prepared by the peddler.

　It is impossible for a person to carry a heavy brick on his back.

　So the peddler brought a cart bigger than usual.

　However, it is neither humans nor horses or donkeys that move the cart.

　A bipedal creature with squinty eyes, scales all over its body, and sharp claws on its hands and toes was connected to the cart.

　Its appearance was like a big lizard or something while looking like a crocodile standing on its two hind legs.

　When the creature opened his mouth, which protruded in front of his nose, I could see large jagged teeth.

　Should I be bitten, I would die.

　There was definitely no such creature in my life on Earth.

"Well, is this your first time seeing a knight dragon? It's cool. You said you were preparing a lot of bricks, so I brought a powerful guy to help me with transportation."

"Is this a dragon? Is this a real dragon?"

"Hmm? No, it's different from a real dragon, because this guy is a kind of causative beast."

"Causative beast? What is that?"

　I heard an unfamiliar word, so I asked a question.

　I get on the cart and the peddler picks up the bricks on the ground.

　The peddler taught me about the causative beast while I was helping to receive the bricks and loaded them neatly so that they would not collapse when the cart started moving.

　As the name implies, a causative beast is a creature that a person uses. (TLN: I don’t know if “causative” is the correct name for the beast. I may change it later on.... )

　However, it seems that a causative beast is not like a wild animal that was caught and used by people.

　Because the causative beast is raised by humans from when it was still in its egg.

　It seems that if you hold the egg of a causative beast, the egg will absorb the magical power of that person.

　The eggs grow on the absorbed magical power.

　And, a creature is born from the grown egg, which seems to have the characteristic of being very obedient to the person who is the provider of the magic.

　That is not all.

　The way the causative beast grows depends on the magical power it feeds.

　Some are like bipedal reptiles, like the causative beasts in front of us, while others are completely different.

　In other words, it seems that what kind of causative beast is born depends on the person who raises the egg and may be completely from other causative beasts.

　Therefore, those who can raise unusual causative beasts and highly practical causative beasts are very important.

　On the contrary, it seems that there are many people who can only raise useless beasts.

　In fact, many people cannot even make the beasts hatch from their eggs.

　The knight dragon seems to be one of the most popular beasts.

　Strong, sturdy, and brave.

　Actually, it seems that there are also real dragons in this world.

　It seems that having an appearance similar to a dragon with overwhelming ability is also one of the factors that boosts the knight dragons’ popularity.

　Not only the knight dragons, but also horse-shaped ones with endurance and bird-shaped causative beasts that fly in the sky are also popular.

"Hmm. Then, are these causative beasts expensive to buy?"

"That's right. You can say it's an important item. I'll tell you, if you’re not mischievous, I’ll bring some eggs here next time."

　No, I can't.

　However, I heard that they were really popular.

　The peddler had said that bricks would be sold as much as possible because there is a special demand now, but I don't know if that will continue in the future.

　I wanted to be able to secure multiple items that could sell.

　Isn't there always a demand for a causative beast that can be mounted, or a type of causative beast that can carry heavy luggage?

　People say that no one knows how a causative beast might look after hatching and don’t want to take the risk, but on the contrary, no one knows unless they try.

　Then I also want to raise the egg of a causative beast.

　If I win this lottery-like thing, I will definitely make a lot of money.

　So I asked the peddler to bring the eggs of the causative beast the next time.

　Little did I know that just trying to buy one egg of a causative beast would spend up all of the money I had saved up until then.

TLN: This link, Click me!, told me that causative had a few different meanings.