193-Chapter 13-1 The night before arrival

So that's ten wins, two losses and three draws.

''Well you could lose more, couldn't you?　You say it's not in perfect condition, but it's not too pretty.

With about half a day to go before we made our way slowly to Gunjo City, we were camped out.

Since we had traveled three days earlier than planned so far, we took an early rest so that we wouldn't get tired when we entered Gunjo City. Well, the reason they were able to move so quickly was because Chris, Albert and Cain, who were determined not to let Leon catch up with them, worked hard on their party.

The reason why the three of them worked so hard was to get back at Russell City for the trouble they had caused us, and also because, 'If we had finished our own business and started the next trip when Rion arrived in Gunjo City, Rion would have had a very interesting reaction.

Chris suggested that we should check our physical condition in a real battle style match, and we have been doing this several times every time we have camped out since we left Russell City.

The results of the mock matches were one minute from my two losses in the first camp and one minute from two in the next camp. And I've been on a winning streak since the wins came in. This isn't because I'm completely back in shape, but because I've gotten used to the way my body works now and I've changed the way I fight.

When I lost back-to-back fights, I fought in a normal sense, when I fought in a draw, I fought mainly on defense, and now I fought for counters. When he had won consecutive fights, he assumed that his opponent was not Chris, but Ding, so he could move his body and use his mind as much as possible. Because of that, he didn't have much time to relax mentally in comparison to his results.

''Even if you try to take countermeasures, you get better and better with each match, so you keep falling one step short... Temma-kun, that's very unpleasant.

Please don't say anything that could be misunderstood. If it's too much, I'm afraid I'm going to spill my grievances inadvertently... right in front of Mary.

...and you're going to tell me.

Temma, now with me!

As I was glaring at Chris-san, Amur stood up for the position, but with Amur's forceful fighting style, it was unlikely that I would be able to put up a decent fight under the current circumstances, so I had to decline the position for the umpteenth time.

I'd like to say, "Well then, I'd like to say me and.......but I don't think I'd be able to replace Chris-senpai.

Cain ran in Amour's vein, but he decided on his own that he didn't have as much to give as Chris did, and he chuckled as he said something self-deprecating.

'That's not the point, it looks like dinner is almost ready, so why don't you go sweat it out?

Cain's words made me realize it was time for dinner and I gave Chris the go ahead. The first time I said it like it was ladies first, Chris said

'What!　You want to be after me?　You have such a hobby.

I joked about it, so after I ignored Chris for the first day only and I went in first and took over the bath until just before dinner was ready, Chris stopped saying that. He didn't want to eat his dinner smelling like a stone, so he put off his dinner and went into the bath, but by the time he got up, most of his dinner had been eaten, and he didn't want to take a bite of black bread and dried meat alone anymore.

However, if I try to get into the bath after Chris-san gets in, Amour, Aura, and Jeanne clean the bath right away, so it takes a little longer for me to get in. Well, I let them do what they want because it feels good to get into the new hot water, but it's inevitably just before dinner time, so depending on how long it takes to cook and Chris, we may be late getting to our seats.

'So, how long do you plan to stay in Gunjo City?'

'Maybe five days - I know a lot of people there, and it's a place you can go whenever you feel like going, so I'm sure it could be shorter, but not so much for Primera and Albert, right?

Since Primera belongs to the Knights of Gunjo City, she won't be able to leave so easily, and Albert basically has to be in the royal capital, so there shouldn't be much opportunity for the two of them to meet.

''Yeah, well I guess so.''

It didn't seem to be the answer I was expecting, and Cain replied in a distracted manner. Well, as Cain, he probably expected it to be because I wanted to meet with Primera or something like that, but I'm finally getting used to the way I treat women, so I don't have the time to speak so lightly, and I'm not the kind of character who can even say such things.

''That said, I wonder how Rion is doing right now?''

'Oh, yeah ... maybe around the time the frontier count's letter arrived?　Assuming the letter is received, I'm guessing we'll be leaving Russell City tomorrow or the day after.　Given that, it might be difficult for us and Leon to meet up in Gunjo City.

He saw the frustrated look on my face as I obviously changed the subject, but that look quickly returned and he began to predict Rion's behavior. And at the end, he seemed to be enjoying himself very much as he thought of Rion's panic.

'Master Temma, it looks like Chris will be getting out of the bath in a little while. Amur is waiting with a brush, so I'm sure of it... By the way, what is the city (...), of Russell City or Gunjo City?

After talking with Cain for a while, Aura came over to let me know when Chris was done with his bath, and at the same time, she asked me what the city(...) meant. Apparently, it came up in a conversation with Jeanne and the others, but Aura didn't seem to know what it meant. So it seems that she came to secretly ask me at the same time as reporting to me, and she is constantly paying attention to Jeanne and Leni-san.

I heard that they call it 'City' now, but it was called 'Ichi' in the past. It seems that Russell City and Gunjo City were not created as a result of the development of towns and villages, but rather they had markets to sell the crops and handicrafts of the surrounding towns and villages, as well as the hunter's catch. It is said that the name of the place was changed from 'market', meaning a place to buy and sell, to 'market', meaning a busy place. As a result, it is said that the name of the place was changed from 'Ichi', meaning a place to buy and sell, to 'Shi', meaning a busy place.

Huh.........so that's what it meant.

When I spoke while recalling the things I had researched when I lived in Gunjo City, Aura was impressed as she sounded like she was out of the loop.

'As expected, you know a lot about Temma since you lived there. There are a lot of people who know enough to have changed from the marketplace, but not many who can explain it in that much detail.

'Ha!　Could it be that Amur didn't know what the city meant when he prepared to clean up early?

I can't see Amur in the carriage waiting for Chris-san to bathe, but maybe Aura is right.

When Chris-san came out of the carriage while wiping her hair, Amour followed suit. He probably finished cleaning while Chris-san was changing clothes, but the time has definitely been reduced over the past few days, and if we're talking about cleaning the carriage's bath, Amour's ability is probably second only to Aina's.

''Well then, let's go take a bath, shall we?''

I'm glad to see that since Leni-san joined us, there has been no assault from Amur, so I can take a bath in peace. Rather, what I'm worried about is Aura rather than Amour. It's not that Aura attacks me with her dirty mind, but she comes into the bathroom or into the carriage while I'm changing in the middle of a bath or in the middle of a change of clothes, and every time she does so, Chris and Amur get angry at her. As for Jeanne, she seems to be making a note of the number of times Aura has inadvertently entered the bathhouse, and she plans to submit the note to Aina when she returns from this trip.

When I got out of the bath, the meal was ready, and I seemed to have made it just in time. Today's main course was barbecued meat, so if we hadn't made it in time, we might have had a meal without a main course.

They would go to bed early after the meal, but this time they wanted to get into Gunjo City as early as possible, so they decided to leave the guards to Surarin, Shilomar, and Solomon, and they also decided to have Surarin command ten golems. In addition to that, the men would sleep in tents outside the carriage so that they would be ready to deal with anything that might come up.

'Well then, tomorrow we'll leave as soon as the sun rises and try to get into Gunjo City before noon. Then we'll disperse!

At my signal, each of us headed off to our own sleeping quarters. Well, aside from the women sleeping in the carriage, the men had to set up their tents for their own sleeping quarters, so they had to get to work now.

After we set up the tent, we would start to sweat, but we couldn't take a bath in the women's area of the carriage, so we would have to wipe ourselves with a water-wet cloth and wait until the women woke up in the morning. I refrain from doing so unless there's something very wrong. Incidentally, the ones who were seen naked at that time were Grandpa and Rion, and moreover, it was an accident that they were seen from the front when they were in a fit of posing completely naked. This was the only time that Aura was carelessly seen naked, and the two who were seen were criticized by everyone. Well, since their full-on posing was unseemly even for the same s*x, I laughed at them and said it was a good idea.

For those reasons, I just wipe off the sweat, but since it's morning and the ladies use the bathroom first, the men's bath is inevitably late. Moreover, we are scheduled to arrive in Gunjo City before noon tomorrow, so we may not have time to sweat it out slowly.

'It's a race against time...'

I fell asleep, muttering about it....

'I don't know why this is happening...'

Slarin woke me up in the middle of the night. Slarin, who woke me up, is apologetic.

The reason I was woken up is because of Shiroumaru and Solomon. These guys apparently started watching the area after we went to bed, but in the process they found a herd of boars and decimated them. I'm not so sure about the destruction, but since wild boars are recommended to be exterminated as a pest in this area, and the damage they can do to crops is not very fashionable, it's not really a problem. The problem was that there was more than one pack of boars that we had destroyed, and many wolves had approached us, caught by the smell of blood from the destruction.

With Shiroumaru here, the wolves are only asking for us in the distance right now, but it's only a matter of time before they try to attack us.

I'm sure it's only a matter of time before they try to attack us," he said, "but for now, we'll increase the number of golems and heighten the security of the surrounding area, and collect the boars in the magic bag. Solomon, Slarin, leave the bag with some of the boars in it, leave it far away from the others. When you drop them off, we'll split the boars' bellies so they can release their scent. Don't risk going after us if they can get to us safely, if they can find food, some of them will head that way. That should cut down on their numbers by a lot, but don't be shy about knocking down anyone who comes at you!

When I gave the order, Slarin took the bag and rode Solomon. Then, after soaring into the air, Solomon circled above the wolves and then flew away, dangling the boar as if to guide him away.

'I knew a few of them were caught and moved away... Shilomar, you're ahead of the curve!　Go jump into one of those guys and kick them around as much as you can!

Won!

Shiroumaru, who had been lying down with his belly showing, as if he was sorry, just a few minutes ago, listened to my orders and rushed at the wolves with great effort to clear his name.

''The boar, too, but aren't there too many wolves?

As I was thinking about this as I watched the wolves being kicked around, Grandpa came out of the tent.

''Is the battle about to be over?''

Grandpa said he noticed the wolves at the beginning, but they came out slowly and ready to go as I was dealing with them.

'If you were awake, you should have come out earlier.

If I had left in a hurry, there wouldn't have been anything for me to do. I'm sure you'd be happy to do it slowly if you just stared at me.

'Well, you're right. Besides, it was the slarin' guys and the golem that worked, so it's like I was just staring blankly at them too... but yeah!

Most of the wolves had begun to flee, so I asked Grandpa to take care of Shiroumaru and decided to build a bathhouse (...) while I was at it.

'We should have done this all along,'

I made three walls out of clay magic and hung a curtain on the last side to replace the walls. Then, in the space inside, he placed a barrel of sake that had previously been used as a bathtub and filled it with hot water to create a bath. Then he quickly took off his clothes and took a bath.

'Nuh-uh!　It's not fair that you take a bath by yourself while I do your chores!

I can't let you two in at the same time, so you'll have to be patient with me until I get up there.

Well then, reheat the water before I go in!

Yes, sir!　Ah!　Also, when Slarin comes back, tell him to gather the rest of the defeated boar and the wolf in one place.

You're not very good with people...well, just think of it as bath money. I'll call on Albert and Cain as well. It's a pity that they're the only ones without a bath.

With that, Grandpa went to the tent to wake them up. Maybe he was more than half lying when he said he felt sorry for those two, and he was really trying to get them to help him gather the boars and wolves. Maybe they're going to let them do some simple sorting, too.

"Albert, we're up!

Finally, well it's a little overdue.

They were happy at first when Grandpa woke them up and told them they would be able to take a bath, but when he told them that they had to retrieve a boar and a wolf to get in, they looked very uncomfortable. Well, they were woken up out of the blue and made to do some fishy work. It would be hard to get out of bed.

'Well, it's easy because all I have to do is divide what the golem brings me into magic bags according to size, but the smell of blood is too much for me to smell the quicksand. It's on my clothes too.

Albert frowned at the smell on his clothes as he headed for the bathroom.

'For now, we're done with our work, right?

Cain comes to visit me with concern, but as a matter of fact, there are still some boars left. However.

I'll take care of the rest with Slarin and the others and you can go back to your tent.

It's too much to ask to go back and collect the boars after the bath, and there are only a few boars left. I don't like the smell of the boars after a bath, but there's no problem with leaving the rest of the boars in the same group without sorting them. After all, we'll use the rest of the boar for our meals.

I'm not sure if the boar is less than seventy years old. And a mixed pack of ordinary boars and dashboars - I've never heard of that before, but they're the same kind of creatures, so maybe that's possible. So, the wolves are about thirty. Most of them ran away or left, so if you put them all together there might have been about a hundred.

He spread out his 'search' to search for the wolves, but they seemed to have already fled quite far away, and only one pack of a few animals was caught in the 'search'.

''Could it be that the anomaly in the 'Great Old Man's Forest' has affected them so far?''

It was quite far away from the 'Great Old Man's Forest' so it might be overthinking it, but since that was the only cause I could think of, I decided to report it to the guild in Gunjo City just in case.

''Huh ... it was a nice bath.''

As I was thinking about this and collecting the golems I had put out to deal with the boars and wolves, Albert came up from the bath with a look of satisfaction on his face.

'If Albert's up, I've got one last job to do.

Hmm?　Is there anything more you need to do?

I guess he thought he was going to get caught up in the last job, but Albert slowly backed up and asked me as he kept his distance from me...

I don't need your help. The last thing I need is to wipe Shiroumaru and Solomon down.

Then I'll be fine without me.

It's a good thing that you're able to get a good idea of what you're going to be doing," he said with a relieved look on his face, as he hurriedly returned to his tent before I could change my mind.

The next person who took a bath after me, Grandpa, was the first to get out of the bath, and as soon as he got out of the bath, he drank a glass of liquor and was the first to snore in the tent.

I called for Shiroumaru and Solomon, who had just returned from hunting, and he came over to me, but Shiroumaru, who seemed to feel that he was being washed, tried to run off in the opposite direction at once and was stowed away in his slarin'. The most important thing to remember is that Shiroumaru, who was spat out in front of me, saw Solomon, whose body was just being wiped with a wet towel, and he was quiet. I'd like to wash Shiroumaru, but doing so in the middle of the night would take until morning, so I've decided to hold off until Gunjo City. As a compromise, we just wiped Shiroumaru with a wet towel this time.

Sure enough, Shiroumaru was dirty from wild boar's and wolf's blood, as well as from mud and grass that he had gotten from hunting, and the dirt didn't come off in one go. So it didn't remove the smell.

'Surarin, when I get some time in Gunjo City, I'll get Jeanne and Aura to help me clean up Siloumal.

As I watched Shiroumar, who had finished being wiped, pull away from me, I would talk to Slarin in a small voice about my decision. And early that morning.

Oh, hey, Temma. What's that?

I looked at Chris-san's pointing direction, who had stopped to say hello halfway through the greeting, and there was the bathhouse he had forgotten to break down in the hot water.

''Hmmm.......you said you were going to leave early in the morning, but in the middle of the night, just the guys, enjoying the open-air bath.

It's a simple bathroom, so it's not as good as an open-air bath, but for Chris, if he can bathe while looking at the night sky, it's probably worth it in an open-air bath. But.........

'Chris at least stop showing your exposure habits in the streets.

Amur was taken aback by this. However, the idea seemed to be the consensus of not only Amour, but also the women, except for Chris, who all looked at Chris as if pleading with him.

'There's no way I'm of that nature!

'But Chris, if you say something like you wanted to use a bathroom where you could see the whole inside of it with just a bit of wind, and in a situation where the men were nearby, you can't blame me for suspecting that you have a strange taste.

Leni's point made Chris think about it, and he looked at Amour and the others again.

I simply wanted to take a bath in the open!

I exclaimed. And shortly after that, he told Amur, "I knew you had a habit of exposure! I retreated to the carriage bathroom in a huff.

'Well, let's leave Chris's s*xuality aside shall we get on with it?　The meal will be a made up one, but for that, when we get to Gunjo City, we'll say we're going to eat something good.

And so we left the encampment. Of course, we retrieved the bathhouse curtain and a barrel of sake to use as a bath tub, and destroyed the mud walls. Otherwise, it might be misused by some strange people, or it might become a bed for demons.

We talked with everyone that it was a little later than planned, but it would be acceptable, and we ate breakfast at a place other than Gosha's Albert, but in the meantime, Chris-san continued to stay indoors, and eventually Leni-san convinced him to come out.

Mr. Chris, who had stopped withdrawing, had a lot of excuses for what he had just said when he came out, so we didn't say anything, we just listened. It would be a shame if he said something weird and took over the bathroom and toilet again.