“Tek here, where I hear of the beach, I think of playing in the sea, of sunburn and burning sand. It’s fun, but painful.”

 

Two days after we departed the Kirik Earldom, we arrive near Taltumina, the trade city. I decided not to enter the port this time, so we ended up disembarking on a beach. There didn’t seem to be any life around, and it was evening.

 

Our plan was to travel by horse and carriage.

 

The horses were happy to be back on the ground that they hadn’t seen in quite a while.

 

There’s no nearby Human habitation, probably due to the many Monsters that I could see on my map. Though, the is a desolate highway beyond the nearby mountain, which I will take to the trade city--then continue on to Labyrinth City following the main highway.

 

“Master, night marching is dangerous. I request a repose on the sandy beach.”

“Fireworks?”

“Fireworks are nice! Swoosh is nice too, but crackles are good!”

“Nn.”

 

The repose that Nana is referring to is to stay the night and play with fireworks.

 

I hand short wands over to everyone, putting the Fireworks Magic on it.

 

“Kururun!”

“Beautiful.”

 

Tama and Mia swung their fireworks around.

 

“Watch properly!”

“Okay.”

 

Arisa and Lulu are writing letters in the darkness of the night using their fireworks.

 

However, she isn’t writing normal messages. Her’s reads--‘When can we ****’…I need to censor it.

 

Lulu, however, wrote a sweeter message: ‘Love you so much’.

 

“I wish for a chick.”

 

Nana?

 

“I wish for a chick.”

 

She said it twice, emphasizing herself with imploring, teary eyes--and pulling the neck of her shirt down a bit, and exposing a deeper valley…She’s learning some good--bad--things from Arisa.

 

I couldn’t change the shape of the fireworks themselves normally, so I had to use one of the features of the Spell that I added as a contingency--I had expected something like this to happen.

 

To do this, I had to focus on the required image while pouring in the Magic. I would also have to teach this to the girls if they asked after seeing Nana’s new wand.

 

The preparations took some time, but I tried my best to meet the expectation in the excited eyes, on a mostly expressionless face, of Nana.

 

“It’s a wonderful chick, so I complement. Master, it disappears when I touch it.”

 

“Because they’re illusions.”

 

Suddenly touching it like that, what a troubling girl--if it wasn’t Light Magic, she’d have gotten a burn. I put the same Magic on the short wand once again, and warn her not to touch it.

 

I sit on the same and watch the girls, before feeling a warm body lean tentatively against me. Looking over, I see Liza has sat next to me and leaned her body on me, her head on my shoulder, as she watched the others with a relaxed smile.

 

“This is nice.” She speaks with a warm tone.

“Yeah it is.” I smile at her and stroke her hair.

 

Some annoying Monsters are trying to intrude from the sea and the forest, but I easily kill them with Remote Arrow.

 

The next morning, we decided to spend time enjoying ourselves and swimming in the ocean. We’re not really in a hurry, but if we stay like this, it’s likely that we’ll end up camping here for several days--so, at noon, I manage to drag myself away, and we return to the journey.

 

***

“What’s this carriage. There’s no shaking, it’s eerie.” Arisa is complaining about the lack of shaking this time. This girl can’t seem to make up her mind.

 

This carriage isn’t like the wagon that we used before, but instead a small box-shaped carriage, like the one we ride inside towns. Now only does it have a self-propulsion function, but there’s also a slim Aerodynamic Engine loaded below the passenger section.

 

The Aerodynamic Engine has a low power output, so it can only fly several meters above the ground for a short time at the most. However, it can semi-permanently float 10 centimeters above the ground, removing any shaking. Of course, it’s designed to look like a normal carriage, with the passenger section barely attached but specially designed boards hide it.

 

Nana and Liza are riding horses, fully armed and armoured, running side-by-side with the carriage.

 

As expected of a desolate highway, we met Monsters several times, but since they were just small-fries, they were easily eliminated by Liza, or by Nana’s Nature Magic Arrows. I was surprised to see that Nana was now capable of firing five Magic Arrows simultaneously.

 

By evening, we could see Taltumina. This city is under the direct control of the King, just like Labyrinth City. Just like the Duchy Capital, the outskirts of the city are overflowing with differing neighbourhoods.

 

Outside the main gates, I can see a long line of people and carriages that have been waiting for their turn to enter the city. They have until evening before the gate closes. Luckily, we barely made it in time--though it was evening, it wasn’t very late.

 

***

Since inns that are too high-class will refuse to let anyone besides Humans stay there, I ask the gatekeeper to refer an inn that will allow Demi-Humans to stay.

 

The certainly looks good, and the room is also spacious, but I don’t like the superficial attitude of the clerk. We’ll stay here tonight, but next time we will use a different inn.

 

“Really, who does he think he is? Saying things like: ‘sleep on the floor, since the fallen hair of the Beastkin will dirty the bed’.”

“It’s terrible.”

“I express dissatisfaction.”

“Mwu.”

 

Arisa and the others seem offended, yet Pochi and Tama themselves are--

“The floor is also fluffy?”

“Arisa, you’re going to get hungry if you’re mad?”

--They don’t seem to care.

 

Liza is quite satisfied just by the fact that the inn doesn’t make them stay in the barn, like when they were slaves to their previous master.

 

When I complained about it to the manager of the inn, he scolded the clerk, so it doesn’t seem to be the policy of this inn. Since Tama and Pochi replied with, ‘Do as you see fit.’, and ‘I forgive.’, when the clerk apologized--I won’t hold any grudges.

 

 

***

I had slight expectations, since the port is the international trading port of the Shiga Kingdom, but there were only cheap things from foreign countries, and the goods themselves weren’t any different from the normal port towns.

 

The sole difference I noticed was that they paid more money for equipment made from Monster parts. They aren’t too popular in the Shiga Kingdom, but it seems that they sell for high prices outside.

 

It seems that there are stagecoaches which depart to Labyrinth City, and the Royal Capital, at fixed intervals. They depart once every three days, but since about five carriages depart at the same time, it’s relatively safe.

 

There are also a lot of peddlers who depart at the same time.

 

Since the next stagecoach will depart in two days time, the gatekeeper recommended that I stay for another day before departing. But, since it’ll be annoying to deal with trouble if we’re with other people, we keep going.

 

After we crossed three mountains, barrier pillars begin to stand out more. It’s the Kingdom’s grain-producing region, and this is the first time in this world that I’ve seen fields extending as far as the eye can see. Since the climate is warm, they’ve already started planting.

 

After passing through several towns, we came to Kelton, the city that functions as an intersection that connects the Duchy Capital, Labyrinth City, and the Royal Capital.

 

There wasn’t really anything worth mentioning in this city, but it sold clothing that was in fashion in the Royal Capital.

 

Since the nearby villages all have windmills, for milling wheat, the scenery is pretty idyllic. If there were tulips growing, it would feel like we were travelling through Holland.

 

After we passed through a city called Fusra, which sits between Kelton and Labyrinth City, the number of villages have started to decrease. The wasteland starts to stand out.

 

Although the, rare, villages we sometimes come across have windmills and barrier pillars, the soil is obviously barren when compared to the villages before.

 

Then, after we crossed the last mountain before Labyrinth City, it could finally be seen…Of course, I’m the only one who can see it clearly from this distance.

 

Even though the area between us and Labyrinth City is several hundred kilometers, there aren’t any villages. Though, it does look like there are rest areas along the highway, one every few kilometers.

 

I stopped by one of those rest area’s once, but it was just a simple building to keep out the wind and rain, with an almost dried-up well nearby.

 

“Sand?”

“The wind is gritty.”

 

As we leave the mountain, I notice that the wind has yellow sand mixed in. Since there’s a vast desert beyond the mountain range on the other side of Labyrinth City, it’s blown in from there.

 

For the sake of the girls’ skin, I use Air Curtain to prevent the sand from coming near the wagon and horses. Of course, I move Liza and Nana close to the carriage.

 

Although it’s a wasteland, it’s not like there aren’t any plants growing. Not only are there weeds, there are also short bushes, and something like tumbleweed…however, the tumbleweed looks like it’s made from razor wire, and I saw it slice a little bunny into pieces…

 

There are also cacti.

 

When we get closer to Labyrinth City, I can see some Holy stone monuments, like the ones that contain the labyrinth in Seryuu City, built at regular intervals.

 

I can see a jet-black mountain beyond Labyrinth City. According to the traveler’s journal, there seems to be a labyrinth below that mountain.

 

On both sides of the city’s gate, there are stone golems with grim faces standing there. Each of them are level 40. They look like they are constructed from marble, which matches with the marble gate.

 

“Giants?”

“Huge!”

“Announcing that those are Stone Golems.”

 

Pochi and Tama, who have their heads out the window, are surprised to see the golems. Come to think of it, I don’t thing that they had seen the golems in the Duchy Capital. They’ve only ever seen Living Dolls and the many-legged Tank Golem in the Elves’ town--so this is probably the first time they’ve seen normal golems.

 

“They look quite strong. I’m not confident I could injure them even with my Magic Spear. However, if I attack after breaking its stance with Magic--”

 

I can’t help but smile as I hear Liza begin to think of a way to defeat them.

 

“It was really far.”

“We’ve finally arrived, haven’t we?”

 

Arisa and Lulu, who are sitting on the coachman seat, sound and look moved.

 

“Now, let’s go. Our fight begins from here!” Arisa continues with a determined look.