◇

Now then, shall I pay a visit to our magician comes midnight?
I"d hate to get attacked by the army of ants when the morning dawn ...ants are not nocturnal right?

I go inside the wagon alone, and begin to change my clothes. Since Arisa is peeking, I roll up my smelly sweaty s.h.i.+rt into a ball and throw it on her face. Suffer well in that stink.

I"m still wearing a mantle on the outside, but I change into thick trousers and s.h.i.+rt inside, and also knee-high leather boots. Since I will be trekking the mountain, it"d be inconvenient to wear a robe.

"Sniff, sniff, snifff."
"Arisa, stop it, that"s vulgar."

This is the first time I saw Lulu scolding Arisa. Still, what the heck is this girl doing?　No, I understand when I see it, but I refuse to acknowledge it.... Aren"t you too much of a pervert to sniff on a smelly s.h.i.+rt?
I take the s.h.i.+rt away from Arisa and give it to Lulu.

"I"m sorry, but please wash this when you"re doing laundry."
"Yes, master."
"Before that, let me enjoy the teens" scent""Auu."

I poked her forehead before she finished.

"Love is too painful~ please do the punis.h.i.+ng in more sensual way!"
"There are a lot of other girls who cry for being defiled, treat yourself better."
"Uuu~ I"m a maiden too."

A maiden wouldn"t do such things--- At least publicly.

"At any rate, what are you going to do by changing clothes?"
"I"ll do some reconnaissance."

I"m actually going to the magician"s place, but I won"t say it.

"I will accompany master."

And so Liza proposed, but I persuaded her to defend the camp. She insisted that I take Pochi and Tama as bodyguards, but when I said that I"d go back before the sun set, she let me go.

◇

Truthfully, I won"t be going straight to the magician"s place right away. I want to enlarge the search area before the next pursuing armies come, so I"m going to retrace the course until the area where the rat cavalries was devastated. I should be able to reach it before the sun set if I run.

After I reach a place invisible from the camp, I run at the level where the ground gouged. In just five minutes, I"ve reached the place where Arisa ma.s.sacred the ants with her unique skill.
The ants which pile up on one after another are obstructing the road. I lightly jump over it.
A lot of small animals are gathering, perhaps the monsters" corpses are delicious.

Even so, with this many monsters" corpses, it will interfere with the traffic.
If this was a game then it would disappear in time but reality is troublesome.

...Hmm?

...Dang.

""Reality is troublesome", not that!"

I stop my feet, and look back at the mountain of monsters" corpses.

I"m imagining for a bit.
In a highway with scarce traffics, monsters corpses piled up. Corpses which died with no external injury and with only one arrow stuck. Normal person would be interested to know more. And then, the only wagon that has pa.s.sed this route was ours.
If it"s not someone really dumb, they would probably connect the corpses with us.

This is bad.

I change my plan, and indiscriminately stow away the monster corpses in the ants folder inside the Storage. I had thought of dismantling and throw them on the roadsides but I decided to use storage since it"d be too time-consuming.
Since the corpses are not displayed on the radar, I rely on my sight. It was easy to remove the corpses on the open road, but the ones stuck on the thickets a bit away were hard works.
Nevertheless, thanks to me repeating the corpses retrieval with all my effort, the road is cleared from them as far as eyes can see before the sun set.

I"m hiding bloods and traces of battles with suitably long tree branches. They would probably attract attention but it"s better than puddle of bloods in plain sight.
Since I see from the radar that Pochi and Tama are departing from the camp to look for me, I finish hiding the bloods with trees from the Storage and return.

This took more time than I thought, so I couldn"t do my original goal.

◇

With Pochi and Tama hanging on my arms on the sides, I walk down the highway in sunset.
I"m hearing chewing sounds of small animals from the bushes on the roadsides. There are probably some pieces from the corpses, I feel sorry for taking away foods for the small animals. And it was unexpectedly hard to keep Pochi and Tama from pus.h.i.+ng through to the bushes.

In a place 10 minutes walking distance away from the camp, I catch a monster on the radar.

Let"s check the detail.

Gargoyle, level 5. Plainly speaking, it"s a flying stone statue. Noteworthy points are complete immunity to mind attack and night vision. Also, it"s hard, since it"s a stone statue.
It could be an independent monster or a familiar of the magician. It"s probably the latter this time.

Its moving speed is slightly faster than a person.
The gargoyle destination is probably the place where Arisa ma.s.sacred the large groups of ants right?

"Master~?""What"s wrong desu?"

Pochi and Tama pull my hands. I"ve stopped swinging them on my arms.

"Tama, do you have the throwing stones?"
"Aye."

Then, I should drop it with a stone.

"I forgot something, let"s go back."
"Yes nano desu~.""Aye~."

I spin the two like spinning tops while on my arms. Since they demand to do it again, I do it thrice after that.
More, they said but since it"d be troublesome if we can"t secure best location to attack the gargoyle, I promise them to do it again once we get back to the camp site.

◇

The three of us are hiding beside a shelter. Although I said shelter, it"s just a rock as high as a grown man.

The gargoyle is flying overhead us.
After a moment pause, I throw two fist-sized stones with both hands. I throw one more a beat later. All three stones. .h.i.t the target and the gargoyle becomes a mere broken statue.

"Co reco co re.""Core nano desu~."

Is that a core retrieval song? While listening to the mysterious song, I watch over　Tama who"s singing with strange intonation and Pochi who"s interluding her while both of them retrieving the core.
Just like the ants, low level monsters have small magic core with pale color. The price is most likely cheap too.

"Aye.", so she says while presenting the core. I put it in my pocket straight into the storage. And then we head back to the camp site.

Needless to say, the two didn"t ask what was the [Something] that I forgot.

◇

Since I don"t want to needlessly make Lulu and Mia worry, I only tell the gargoyle thing to Arisa and Liza.

And since the probability that the camp would get attacked when I go toward the magician is high, I decided not to do a late-night visit.
Although, even if I don"t go there, I feel like the opponent will come here instead.

The night watch tonight will be in 3 s.h.i.+fts. The first are Liza and Arisa, the second are Pochi and Tama and the last are me, Mia and Lulu. They"re alloted according to the potential of enemy search and fighting equally. I"d be glad to have Lulu together with Arisa, but since I wouldn"t know what to do with just me and the taciturn girl, I made her join us.

Pochi and Tama take position on the left and right of me who"s lying on the sheet. We"ve been sleeping together since the time in Labyrinth. Although I didn"t sleep at all since I was on guard at that time.

"Together~.""Nano desu~."
"Good night, Pochi, Tama."
"Aye~.""Nighty~."

I could hear Arisa grumbling from a distance, but since it"s nothing much, I let it off. Lulu and Mia were at loss finding the place to sleep, but by Arisa"s suggestion, they will be sleeping beside us. It"s a bit crowded but since it"s warm, it"s nice.

I frantically try to retain my consciousness which was almost taken away by the comfortable warmth. There"ll be 3 s.h.i.+fts of night watch, but since it"s almost certain that there will be a night attack, I"ll be careful not to sleep.
While watching the radar, I"m reading the book from the menu to prevent drowsiness. This is going to be a long night.