CH 86

I grabbed Sword’s hand and pulled the ball of depression along, walking around for a bit longer. And on the way I justified my line of thinking.

“Look, you’re relatively calm for your age, aren’t you? In the other world, men at your age get seduced by any women they come across, even if they know that those women are honey traps. You didn’t feel perturbed when seeing me naked either. That’s why I thought you had reached an age where you’re used to such things. Once men pass their thirties, they grow accustomed to female bodies, and they stop getting jumpy when they see them, you know?”

“…No, well, I doubt anyone would show a reaction to your body, though?”

WHAT!?! How terrible of him.

And here I was trying to console him! I’m not quite sure about this world, but I’m sure you’ll be able to find people with a fetish for loli bodies over here as well! There were some among the leg fetishists! And the small-breasts faction!

After grunting something akin to an approval, Sword scratched his head, “…Your right. Your a woman, and you probably bathed together with me because you thought I was close in age to your father. I s’pose your belief of us having a big age difference led to the comment about you not considerin’ me a guy, huh?”

“No, that was unrelated to our difference in age. It’s because you don’t look at me with horny eyes.”

“…I think that would apply to most guys, though?”

SHUT IT!!!

“Anyway, I’ve understood that anti-aging is important. I thought that the number of guys using such products was low, but maybe surprisingly many guys applied them in secrecy in the other world. I’ll use medical creams and also adjust my diet suitably. I can’t afford to become careless either.”

“You? Isn’t that way too early?”

“What are you saying? Just starting with anti-aging early is already going to have an effect. I haven’t used medical creams or some such to take care of my skin, but I’ve been shutting out ［UV］, you know?”

“Haaah!?”

“I have absorbed the harmful sun rays with magic elements and scattered them with magic, which is the reason for my pretty, white skin, you see?”

Sword stared at me with his mouth agape, “You…I had already wondered why you didn’t get any sunburns and thought that it might have to do with you havin’ been a noble, and yet you’ve been doin’ somethin’ like that…!?”

You’re saying something that’s similar to denying nobles being humans.

“Even nobles get sunburns. They’re humans just like you, after all. What matters the most is how often you’re exposed to sunlight, and right after, what measures of prevention and skin care you use.”

“Let me do it as well. Please!” He clung to me.

＊

We looked around the other stalls and did some shopping over the next few hours. There was also a liquor stall. It was a novel sight for me, but…

“………Okay?”

I got a dreadful feeling from what was being sold there. This has… a somewhat dangerous smell. Is that stuff really safe?

Once I looked back at Sword, he smiled wryly, “This is normal. If your unlucky, you can also run into booze that’s undrinkable thanks to its bitterness and sourness.”

“Ah, then it just has turned into something else after having fermented too much, I’d say.”

…But, certainly! Fermented food might be great for the body, but just as some germs are good for the body, others are bad! If it’s full of only bad germs, it’ll naturally upset your stomach!

＊

After touring the stalls, we went to the adventurer guild.

Somehow we got welcomed there in an exuberant friendly way. They were so humble that I thought I stepped into the wrong place.

The receptionist called the guildmaster, and we were shown into the most luxurious room to date.

When Sword was shown the deferred requests, he flew into a rage, snarling with the voice of a mafia gang member, “…This ain’t anythin’ I gotta do. This one neither. Rather, did you make a mistake in the piles of documents? Isn’t this pile here full of weird shit?”

Hearing him complaining like that, I also took a peek.

It was all stuff like 『Attend the birthday party of Earl X』 or 『Escort Marquis X to his marchesse』.

Yep, figures. Sword would get pissed at that.

＊

“I can take care of those if it’s okay for me to torture and slaughter them if they take an attitude with me, you know?”

Both men froze.

“Haha…ha…you’re saying some funny things, young boy.” The guildmaster answered in a manner of seemingly laughing but then again, not for real.

“You think she’s kiddin’ around? You’ve seen her rank, right? She’s already A-Rank at this age. Much faster than me, you know?”

The guildmaster’s strained, artificial laughter disappeared.

“She’s someone who walks ’round while wearin’ arrogance like a dress. She never got injured or lost either. You believe a brat, who’s completely lookin’ down on life, would bow her eyes to the likes of mere nobles? It’s plain as day that they’d look down on her as 『Luggage Carrier』 with a condescendin’ attitude. I don’t really wanna watch how this girl here peels off their skin in response, okay? We’re definitely turnin’ down all requests for escorts and party attendances.”

“You just don’t need to watch? It’s okay. No matter what I do to them, I’ll patch them back up, no problem. The folks, who used my healing potions and medicines, have been sending me letters of thanks and responses to my questionnaires.” I informed him with a cheerful smile while throwing out my chest and hitting it with a hand, “Just leave everything to me! I’ll make sure to train the super cheeky guys to a level where they’ll happily lick the soles of my shoes! To the extent that they wouldn’t even imagine in their wildest dreams to send malicious intent your way! …Gyaaaah!”

Another iron claw!

“Hey, you still wanna pass 『these requests』 to me? Then I’ll bring ’bout the results desired by you together with this girl, ‘kay?”

The guildmaster withdrew the documents in a hurry.

＊

How boooring. Certainly it’s very likely that I’d have been treated horribly at a noble’s party or while working as a guard, but that’s also exciting in itself. After all, it’d totally match what you’d call a 『template development』!

But, it looks like I become too talkative once I become excited. I readily blabbed about things I should have kept to myself. As a result, it proceeded into the template development of nothing happening, except for me suffering from Sword’s iron claw.

Even though I always promise myself to keep my trap shut…

When I swung my legs around on the chair while booing, I got kicked by Sword.

(Note: 『Luggage Carrier』 is an occupation. Their task is to follow adventurers around while carrying their baggage. It’s a common occurrence for debt slaves to be used for that sort of work. Usually the guild takes care of organizing carriers for adventurers above average. The adventurers have to guarantee the lives of the luggage carriers. If they let them die, the adventurers will be forced to pay a penalty and shoulder the debts, if the carriers used to be debt slaves.

It’s not like there exist absolutely no freelance luggage carriers though. Adventurers with strong legs and loins, who can’t fight for one reason or another, do it, and it often happens that veteran adventurers make rookies carry their stuff if they take them along.

For all these reasons, the job of a luggage carrier is regarded as a lowly job.)