"Can't you get it anywhere else?" (Yuna)
"Moss that has been attached to monsters for a long time is different from other moss. Besides, even if that monster existed, you would probably slash at its body when defeating it. It will be covered in blood and mud, making it impossible to collect." (Marne)
Ah, certainly.
If you slashed at it with a sword, blood would spurt out.
If you casted fire magic on it, the moss might burn, and if you cut it with wind magic, it would be the same as a sword.
When monsters moved around, they got mud.
"Besides, it's not like I have many uses for it, but it would be a problem if I didn't have it when I needed it..." (Marne)
Marne-san saw a crocodile.
"Well then, I'll go and defeat them quickly." (Yuna)
"Yuna?" (Marne)
"Just make sure I kill them without attacking the moss, right?" (Yuna)
"Yeah, but it's hard." (Marne)
Well, I'll figure something out.
"Marne-san, please don't leave Kumayuru and Kumakyu." (Yuna)
I headed towards the crocodiles alone.
If I didn't have bear gear I would have been too scared to go near them.
Since I found out that it's okay if I get bitten by a black tiger, I felt a sense of security.
I approached the crocodiles, and they turned towards me.
I couldn't attack the moss on their back. I couldn't attack them from the outside. So, I had to attack them from the inside, as usual.
As I walked towards the crocodiles, thinking about how to defeat them, one of them opened its mouth wide.
"Yuna! It's dangerous!" (Marne)
As Marne-san shouted, a ball of water spews from the crocodile's mouth.
I quickly thrusted out the bear puppet and smashed the water ball.
That's right. It wasn't a crocodile, but a monster called a gator.
It looked like a crocodile so I didn't even think about spitting water out.
When one gator spat out a ball of water, the others spat out balls of water too.
The water that was being spat out towards me was crushed by the bear puppet. The water balls that missed me left holes in the ground.
It seemed to have quite a lot of power.
It might be as hard as a softball.
I ran, avoiding the water balls.
My black bear puppet was enveloped in electricity.
Aiming at the gator's wide-open mouth, I unleashed an electric shock spell.
I threw a blast of electricity into the gator's mouth one after another.
Seeing their friends fall, the gators, who were standing at a distance, ran away into the pond.
I didn't force myself to pursue them.
There were about four gators lying on the edge of the pond.
"Yuna, are you okay?" (Marne)
Marne-san on a Kumayuru approached.
She would be safe riding Kumayuru, but she might be attacked from inside the pond.
"Marne-san, they're still in the pond, don't go near it." (Yuna)
"Yeah" (Marne)
I put the gators I killed in the bear box.
Then, I moved a little away from the pond and let the gators out.
"They're really dead, aren't they?" (Marne)
Marne-san asked while hiding behind Kumayuru.
Looks like she was afraid of gators.
Even I was scared the first time I saw a real monster in a game.
Getting used to something was a scary thing.
"It's okay. They're dead." (Yuna)
Marne-san grabbed a branch she had picked up somewhere and stretched out her arm, poking the gator's body with the branch.
When I saw that, it made me want to do it.
I quietly walk around to the back.
And…….
"Wow!" (Yuna)
"Kya!" (Marne)
Marne-san crouched down and hid behind Kumayuru.
She moved quickly.
Marne-san looked at the gator from behind Kumayuru, then looked at me.
"Could that have been Yuna?" (Marne)
"Sorry. I was watching Marne-san and it made me want to do it." (Yuna)
I apologized sincerely.
"Yuna, don't you know that there are some things you can and can't do, even as a joke?" (Marne)
Marne-san puffed out her cheeks and began to get angry.
"Sorry" (Yuna)
"And I have to say, gators are scary for any adult. Therefore I'm not ashamed of my actions." (Marne)
Marne-san was right.
Most people were afraid of crocodiles.
There might be a very small minority of people who like reptiles or keep crocodiles as pets.
"And you dare threaten me? If you do it again, I'll be angry." (Marne)
She said, pointing the branch she was holding towards me.
It's behavior that didn't seem like that of an adult.
"I won't do it again." (Yuna)
"That's a promise, right?" (Marne)
Marne-san was an older woman. I should be careful.
However, the way she poked the gator with a branch as if she was scared of it was so cute that I felt like playing a prank on her.
Once Marne-san was sure the gator was dead, she began to remove the moss that had clung to its body with something like a spoon.
The collected moss was placed in a jar.
"Uh, this is for the medicine. Do your best, Marne." (Marne)
She collected moss as if to convince herself.
"Shall I help?" (Yuna)
"This is my job. And this is my selfishness. Yuna, please be careful of our surroundings." (Marne)
I kept an eye on the surroundings so that Marne-san could work in peace.
I might find gators that had escaped into the pond.
I thought I could defeat them by casting an electric shock spell on the pond. If it sank to the bottom of the pond, I wouldn't be able to retrieve it. It's not impossible to do it with magic, but it's a pain.
Furthermore, if an electric shock spell was cast on the pond, it would kill other living things as well.
If fish or other living creatures died and were left alone, they would rot and cause a big problem.
So, if they didn't attack, I would just leave them alone.
Together with Kumayuru and Kumakyu, we kept a watchful eye on our surroundings while waiting Marne-san to finish.
That being said, it's just a job to observe the detection skill.
After a while, the moss harvesting was finished.
"Good job."
She looked satisfied with having collected the moss.
Marne-san seemed to be able to use water magic, as she washed her hands with magically produced water.
I put the gators in the bear box.
Now we had a souvenir for Fina.
It's crazy to buy a gator as a souvenir for an 11-year-old girl.
"So, which way should we go from here?" (Yuna)
"I heard they moved around the pond in a clockwise direction." (Marne)
For now, we decided to walk around the pond clockwise.
"There's another ribbon." (Marne)
Now we could move on.
I checked the direction the nails were pointing and moved forward.
It was going well.
As I was thinking about this, Marne-san said something strange.
"Kumayuru, you're turning. Go straight." (Marne)
"Kyuu~n" (Kumayuru)
Marne-san gave instructions, but Kumayuru shook his head.
"Yuna, Kumayuru isn't listening to me. If this keeps up, things will go in a weird direction." (Marne)
Skills, view bear map.
It's going straight, not curved.
"Kumayuru is moving in a straight line." (Yuna)
"Really?" (Marne)
Marne-san looked around.
"No way." (Marne)
"What happened?" (Yuna)
"Yuna, just to confirm. Do you feel there's something strange about the direction these kids are heading?" (Marne)
I thought for a moment.
"I don't feel anything. Does it feel strange, Marne-san?" (Yuna)
"We're not sure yet. Kumayuru, try going a little further." (Marne)
"Kyuu~n" (Kumayuru)
Kumayuru and Kumakyu started walking.
"As I thought, it's no good." (Marne)
After a while, Marne-san shook her head.
"Marne-san, are you okay?" (Yuna)
"It's okay. It's just that the direction we were heading in was being denied in my head." (Marne)
"......?" (Yuna)
I didn't know what Marne-san was talking about.
"It feels like Kumayuru is walking around turning to the right. I've experienced this before. Maybe there are confusion flowers[1] nearby." (Marne)
"Confusion flower?" (Yuna)
"It's a flower that gives off a powder that disorients people who enter the forest. The powder disorients people." (Marne)
Such a flower...
"If we get lost and wander, we will keep walking the same place, gradually losing our strength and even dying. It's a dangerous flower." (Marne)
Continuing to walk around in circles in the same place would not only wear you down physically, but it would also be mentally exhausting, and you might run into food problems or even be attacked by monsters.
"Kumayuru is going straight, but I feel like the right is straight ahead. Sorry, Kumayuru, but head to the left." (Marne)
"Kyuu~n" (Kumayuru)
Kumayuru started walking to the left.
"I feel weird. My brain is trying to make me go to the right. Is Yuna okay?" (Marne)
"I'm fine. This hood will protect me." (Yuna)
Maybe it's probably because of the bear hood that I was not affected.
Even fairy sleeping powder had proven ineffective.
"That bear wasn't just cute, huh?" (Marne)
Marne-san wrapped the wind in her palms, and the wind blew around her along with Kumayuru.
"It's a way to deal with it. If it's magic of this level, even I can use it." (Marne)
If you followed Marne-san's instructions, you would come to a place covered in blue flowers.
"Confusion flower"
"These flowers..."
Four blue petals opened.
"Is it okay if I come closer?" (Yuna)
"The flowers themselves are not dangerous. They only confuse you." (Marne)
"But the way you named them is just like that, huh?" (Yuna)
"It confuses monsters, animals, and people, and keeps them from getting close. That's why adventurers called it confusion flower, and we started calling it that." (Marne)
Well, the easier it was to understand, the easier it was to remember.
"Yuna, can I pick these flowers too?" (Marne)
"Okay. By the way, what kind of effective medicine will it be?" (Yuna)
"Motion sickness medicine. Some of the people riding in the horses and carriages will get sick." (Marne)
"Yeah" (Yuna)
It's the kind of thing that made you felt sick when you shook it.
"It's also effective against alcohol hangovers. Of course, there are substitutes, but this medicine made from lost flowers is more effective." (Marne)
In other words, it's like an advanced motion sickness medicine.
This was unnecessary for me since I didn't ride in carriages or drink alcohol.
Marne-san took out a basket from her item bag and began picking flowers.
But there were really a lot of plants and flowers that had a variety of benefits.
To my ignorant self, they just looked like weeds or pretty flowers.
Marne-san grabbed a flowerpot and a small shovel and began digging up confusion flowers.
She dug it up neatly and carefully replanted it in a flowerpot.
"You're good at it, huh?" (Yuna)
"My job isn't just to compound things. I also grow plants." (Marne)
"You don't leave it to other people?" (Yuna)
"Sometimes I delegate it to other people, but some plants are difficult to grow, so there are some things I can't delegate." (Marne)
It reminded me.
In my observation diary from summer vacation as an elementary school student, I wrote about growing morning glories.
That was a hassle.
When I first started elementary school, I was just a normal elementary school student.
Author's Note
*I wondered if it was written shovel and then scoop, so I looked it up and found out that the meaning is reversed in Kanto and Kansai.
In Kanto, we use shovels for big things and spades for small things.
In Kansai, we use shovels for big things and spades for small things.
Apparently many people say this. I didn't know that.
* According to the JIS standard, something that you can push with your foot is called a "shovel." Something that you can't put your foot on is called a "shovel."
*Upon closer investigation, it appears that a "shovel" is something with a pointed tip that is used to dig into the ground, while a "shovel" is something with a square (flat) tip that is used for shoveling snow, etc., and is used to scoop up things.
*So, since the purpose this time is to dig, we will call it a "shovel."
*Please note that this is an amateur study, so it may be incorrect. The author will not take responsibility for any mistakes[2], so please be careful (lol)
*Sorry. For the time being, I will be posting once a week on Sundays.
[Book release schedule]
Book volume 20.5 was released on May 2, 2024. (The next volume, volume 21, is planned and in the works.)
The 11th volume of the comic was released on December 1, 2023. (The 12th volume is scheduled for release on August 2, and is currently in preparation.)
The second volume of the comic spin-off was released on March 5, 2024.
The paperback version of volume 10 was released on May 2, 2024. (The deadline for the campaign to win a big acrylic stand featuring Yuna and Sanya on the cover is August 20, 2024. 20 lucky winners will receive a prize.) (The next volume, volume 11, is currently in the works.)
Thank you to everyone who reports typos.
Some of the kanji have been corrected to match the book, so please understand that there are some parts that have not been corrected.
Translation Note
[1] 迷い花 (Mayoi hana), alternative translation: stray flower.
[2] The translator will not take responsibility too.