CH 75

Chapter 75 – A Peach Came Drifting By!?

“Alright…I think that’s good enough?”

I looked at the stone pavement that stretched straight ahead.

“Oh! That looks amazing! It is quite a view!”

Ymir and the dwarves raised their voices as they came out of the cave that they lived in.

Five days had now passed since we drove away the Knights Order and the Demon King Army.

And I was now preparing the roads.

First, in order to divide the village into districts, I had roads made of stone pavement that created grids.

Next, along the waterway to the hot spring, I paved a road that led to the village. Now it would be easier to access the home of the Tengus as well as the mines.

I had just finished the road that connected Fendel village with the dwarven mines.

For now, I made the roads five beters wide. This was wide enough for two carriages to drive alongside each other.

Eventually, I might want to have more space for a sidewalk. But I could expand it at a later time.

We would probably want to catch more wild horses and breed more pack horses as a way of improving transportation.

As we had carriages, it would now be a lot easier to send and receive supplies from the dwarves and tengu.

“And it will be a lot easier to travel to and away from the village… Still, Ymir. You and the others have done so much.”

I said as I looked at the stone buildings that had been built outside of the cave.

The dwarves had processed the stone materials by themselves and built houses.

“But this is thanks to you, Joshua! And we’ll continue to mine even better ore! Ah, by the way…”

Ymir brought out a small box from the cave.

Inside, there were an assortment of stones in different colors.

“This…they are gemstones!”

From what I could see, there were rubies and sapphires. There was also some gold and silver mixed in.

“Ah, so they are called gemstones, eh? I thought there was something odd about their coloring. I suppose they’re quite useless then?”

“N-no. Well, they are not the most useful, perhaps. But they are still valuable.”

“I see. They break easily, so I thought they were useless. But if you can do something with them, they’re all yours!”

“Are you sure? They can be sold for a hefty price.”

Well, we would have to polish them first. But if we sold all of them, we would probably be paid enough for one person to live luxuriously for ten years.

“I have no interest in business. Besides, we are friends, are we not? Everything we dig here belongs to the people of the Fendel Alliance!”

“Thank you, Ymir. I’ll try processing them when I get back to the village. If you like any of them, I could make you a bracelet or something of that sort.”

“I will be looking forward to it then! And if we dig up any other strange thing, we’ll bring it straight to you, Joshua!”

“Aye, thank you.”

And so I took the gemstones and said goodbye to everyone before returning to the village.

As I walked down the stone pavement, I cut the gemstones in Magic Workshop. It seemed that some of them were quite large.

…She had dug up something very good indeed.

Once they were processed, I could sell them in the human cities.

And with the money we earned, we could buy things that we couldn’t acquire ourselves… Mostly livestock and crop seeds.

Well, I should make some accessories as a test first, and show them to the others. Perhaps some of them would like to wear such accessories.

As I thought of such things, I reached the river.

The bridge had been made of wood up until now, and so I decided to make one out of stone. Like this, we wouldn’t have to worry about it breaking.

There were also watch towers around the bridge, and some people were fishing along the riverbank, so it was quite lively.

Perhaps I should make houses and a storage house for the fishermen… Huh?

I noticed a voice sounding from the north.

It was upstream. When I turned to look, I saw that a black ball of wool was floating.

“Baaahhh! I’ve really done it now!! We cannot even swim! Somebahhhddy heeelp!”

It was Celes who was shouting.

She was in her sheep form and flowing down the river.

However, thanks to her wool, she floated on the surface and was in no danger of drowning.

But… If this continued, she might drift all of the way out to the sea.

Or the Hell Alligators might attack her.

“Celes!? Just wait, I’ll help you!”

Should I make a net and throw it at her…

“In that case…”

As I ran towards the river I shouted ‘Craft’ and…

“…Boat.”

Five seconds later, a boat appeared on the river.

At the same time, I made a pair of oars and rowed out into the water.

“Baaahhh! Sir Joshua! My darling has come to save me!”

“Celes! Don’t worry, you can’t drown! Just calm down and come over here!”

“Alright!”

Celes moved her front legs and slowly moved towards me.

But that was when it happened.

Right behind Celes, bubbles started to appear in the water, and then there was a sudden splash.

“Wh-what was that!?”

What then appeared, was the giant, gaping jaw of a…Hell Alligator.

It was far bigger than any Hell Alligator I had ever seen.

Big enough to swallow a small house.

“Baahhh!? It’s huge!! But I’m really not that tasty!”

“Celes, keep your head down!!”

I launched a boulder into the Hell Alligator’s mouth.

However, the Hell Alligator’s jaws crushed it in an instant.

“That didn’t work. Maybe… Ah!”

Just as I was about to unleash some iron and purple iron at the Hell Alligator, someone started to shoot arrows from the riverbank.

…Iria.

An arrow pierced into the Hell Alligator’s eye, and Iria shouted.

“Your opponent is me!”

The Hell Alligator roared back in reply, and then began to attack her.

“Iria! Don’t be reckless!”

“You do not have to worry about me!”

Iria said, and then she unsheathed her blade as the Hell Alligator charged.

A second later, the giant Hell Alligator head was severed from its body, and it crashed heavily on the shore.

“In…stant…kill…”

I should never have doubted her. At this point…it seemed like there wasn’t anything that she couldn’t cut…

Cheers rose from everyone around, and then Iria swung the blade to get rid of the blood, and then returned it to its sheath.

In the meantime, I put Celes onto the boat and rowed back to dry land.

Iria rushed towards us with a worried expression.

“Sir Joshua! Ms. Celes! Are you alright!?”

“Aye, thanks to you, Iria.”

“Th-thanks to me… Oh, I… But more importantly…”

Iria suddenly puffed out her cheeks in annoyance.

“Sir Joshua… You must take me with you when you leave. Whenever you leave the village”

“Uh, alright. But you seemed a little busy with the cooking.”

I don’t know why…but I had a feeling that one must never make Iria angry.

I wonder why?

I felt as if I had seen a terrifying dream…

“I would have put it on hold if you told me… Still, I didn’t realize there were Hell Alligators of this size here.”

“Perhaps this one was special. A boss… In any case, it will be necessary to station some Golems here for security. Also…we have to make sure people don’t go into the river by themselves.”

I said, and Celes began to answer frantically.

“I-I’m sorry! But I saw such a delicious-looking peach, and I couldn’t help myself!”

“A peach? Huh. It must have come from upstream. While it would take some time, we could plant the seed, and then we will be able to eat peaches at the village.

“Th-that’s what I thought! It was all so that the villagers could eat their fill of peaches!”

Celes began to make excuses that she had clearly just thought of.

“Well, be careful from now on… Though, I doubt something this big will appear again. By the way, what happened to the peach?”

“I meant to grab it, but…it was so smooth and slippery and went off somewhere.”

Iria muttered quietly when she heard this.

“So you didn’t even get it…”

“B-b-b-baaa… I am so ashamed.”

I turned to the crestfallen Celes.

“Still, we now have a great Hell Alligator here. We will have plenty of meat and skin for some time.”

“Ye-yes! I just used myself as fishing bait! And I will continue to lure out the big ones! Baah! Ahhh!?”

Celes suddenly raised her voice.

“Sir Joshua! I just saw the peach again! I will go and get it!”

“Oh, that! The color is a little strange… I guess we better go.”

As Celes said, a peach wrapped in water weeds was drifting down the river.

And so I got into the boat and headed towards it with Iria and Celes.

“Baaah! This is fun! I can’t wait to eat it!”

“Ms. Celes… It may be rotten, you know? It looks a little pale.”

As Iria said, this peach was not a pretty pink color.

That being said, it didn’t look rotten either. As we got closer, it became more clear. It seemed rather firm and…round.

“This…could it be!? Iria! We must pull it up at once!”

“Y-yes! A-are these…legs?”

This was no peach at all.

It was the rump of a living creature…

And the part we were holding was human legs.

And they were slender, like a woman’s.

We then pulled the entire body into the boat.

“T-this person…”

Iria gasped.

It was a beautiful woman with long, golden hair.

And she had ears that were longer than any human’s.