Chapter 19.2

“Well then, good day to you, Gilbert-sama. I’ve gathered nuts, mushrooms, and wildflowers, so now I just need some fish or meat, so I think I’ll explore the forest a little more.”

“I’ll keep you company…”

“Gilbert-sama is probably busy, so I’ll be fine on my own.”

“It’s not safe. I say I’ll keep you company until you’re satisfied.”

“Gilbert-sama… you want to be with me so much. I am sorry that I am not able to feel your affection. I have no reason to reject your feelings.”

I was unaware that I was not being honest in my words, and I was being blunt with Gilbert-sama, who was expressing his desire to enjoy the meeting with me.

I apologize for that.

With remorse, I took his hand, which seemed to be about one size larger than mine, and looked up at him, and he sighed deeply as if he was tired.

“That’s enough. I’ll follow… on my own, and you can move around as you please. But don’t go beyond this lake. It’s dangerous.”

“Master Astaroth said so, too. There are wolves in the area.”

“That’s right. Wolves. I don’t want to argue with wolves. It’s troublesome.”

“Understood. Then, I’ll search while returning to the castle.”

Earlier, Gilbert-sama said that I was reckless, but I am the kind of person who strictly adheres to rules.

“You’re surprisingly honest,” he said with admiration.

It is no wonder, since a beautiful girl is considered dangerous just by being alive.

The path in the direction from the lake to the castle had been cleared to some extent with a knife to cut the grass so that I would not get lost.

I decided to return, following the same path, widening it to make it a little easier to walk.

Gilbert-sama slowly follows me as I walk. He watched me cutting the grass with his knife for a while, then tilted his head and asked me, “What the hell have you been doing all this time?”

“I’m making a path, Master Gilbert.”

“Sure enough, the grass is cleared just where you walked. Did you cut it all with a knife?”

“I made a path because I came here to collect ingredients, not to get lost.”

“I see. Did you learn this kind of thing somewhere in your country?”

“Yes, the children of the nobility go to the Royal Academy. Unlike Gilbert and his friends, we don’t have magical powers, so we go into the forest and use knives and tools to gather medicinal herbs and make them into medicine. In the herbology class, we spent a lot of time practicing gathering herbs.”

“So the academy is a place for children like you to gather and learn?”

“That’s right. Knowledge is power. It’s what you learn that keeps you from getting lost in the woods, and lets you distinguish between edible and non-edible plants. I am glad that the plants here are not so different in variety from those in my country.”

What I learned at the academy was in my first life, but it doesn’t matter if I don’t say it.

I am not hiding it. But I don’t think it’s something that should be actively explained.

“Oh, that is… do you know how big this country is and where it is located?”

“No, I don’t know. That’s one of the things I have to learn.”

“I see. Now that I understand what you want to do, step aside for a moment.”

Gilbert-sama stood in front of me as he said this.

He pointed lightly with his finger, and some unseen force seemed to generate from there.

A gust of wind whipped up from his fingertips, and the strong wind that cut through the grass I had spread out, mowed it down even more neatly, to the point where two people could walk side by side and still have room to spare.

It seemed that there was not much distance from the lake to the castle, and at the end of the single path that had been created, there was a faint peek of what appeared to be the castle’s backyard.

“Oh my, this is wonderful!”

“I thought you’d be mad at me for… going the extra mile.”

“I’m a user of anything that comes in handy, you know. Thank you for saving me the trouble of mowing the grass… Oh?”

Surprised by the forest anomaly, I felt a glimmer of gaze from the shadows of the trees on both sides of the road where the grass had been cleared.

It was a flock of narwhals with small horns in the middle of their foreheads, very cute looking but with rabid fangs. At a quick glance, there must be about a dozen of them.

They are delicious to eat, by the way.

I rummaged through my bag and grabbed a handful of the narwhal hare’s favorite food, black hunted bamboo, from my bag and gently tossed it to the side of the road.

The animals in this forest might be less cautious because they were left alone for a long time.

They immediately come up to the black-humped bamboo. I carefully aim for the one at the far end, because if I carelessly touch it, it will bite me with its rabid fangs and hurt me badly.

“No way, you…”

“Sometimes you have to hunt to survive. To put it plainly, I want to eat good meat. Next time I will set a trap properly, so I will use a primitive method this time, please understand.”

I threw the knife.

It drew a beautiful trajectory and pierced the targeted narwhal hare.

The blue eyes of the other narwhal turned red when it sensed danger. I picked up the rabbit that had fallen down with the knife in it, and Gilbert-sama picked me up at the same time.

“What were you going to do if I wasn’t here against these numbers of hares!”

I felt my body float away, and I was back in the backyard of the castle, still in Gilbert-sama’s arms.

I was being yelled at while still in his arms, and in my hand was the prey that I had neatly caught.

I’m glad I didn’t drop it on the way to the castle. I had to make good use of the life I had taken.

I could have made it if I’d just run. Besides, if I couldn’t manage it, Gilbert-sama would protect me.

“You think you can convince me by saying that?”

“I’m going to serve you a delicious rabbit stew tonight. You can look forward to it.”

The narwhal that was killed by me looks suitably fleshy and very tasty.

It was my first foray into collecting, and I’d say it was a pretty good achievement.

When I smiled happily, Gilbert-sama seemed to have stopped being angry and let out a deep sigh.

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