Fixation on Tatsumin

Fixation on Tatsumin

Tatsumin-san's barrage of questions continued until the sky turned red.

"That was awful..."

"Don't sweat it!"

In the kitchen, I prepared dinner together with Riko-senpai.

When I glanced at the self-proclaimed gyaru beside me, she was peeling potatoes with remarkable efficiency. With a kitchen knife, no less.

We finished at almost exactly the same time: me awkwardly peeling one potato with a peeler, and Riko-senpai cleanly finishing her second.

I sometimes help Mom out, but her skill level is clearly worlds apart from mine.

"I suppose it's only natural for Tatsumin-san to be interested in 'Water of Rejuvenation,' since so many people around her own fields."

"Fertilizer's gotten expensive too. The temperatures are high, and the weather's unpredictable."

Riko-senpai chuckled as she cut vegetables on the cutting board.

I sighed as I took plates for the curry and salad from the cupboard and carried them to the table in the center of the kitchen.

"Still, getting a close-up of the mascot suit is rough..."

"Tatsumin's shy without the mascot suit, you know~."

"Did you call me, gao?"

"Eek!?"

I nearly dropped the plates at the sudden voice.

Thanks to the body enhancement I'd received as an Ability user, I somehow managed to catch them. I turned toward the voice's owner. If Tatsumin-san had entered wearing the mascot suit, Riko-senpai would definitely have yelled at her.

However, apparently that worry had been for nothing. Tatsumin-san wasn't wearing the mascot suit. Instead, she was dressed like someone from a school lunch center.

She was blue from head to toe. Well, her stomach was white, so perhaps I should call it the "Tatsumin colors." Even her cloth mask had a pattern resembling an open dragon's mouth.

She was okay with that...? By Tatsumin's standards, I mean. Then again, I didn't really know much about the character Tatsumin to begin with.

"Oh, hey. What's up, Tatsumin? Dinner won't be ready for a while yet, though."

"I feel bad letting you work while I sit around, gao. You helped Kota-kun, and I just dragged you all over the place while I rested, gao."

"Makes sense. But it's a little cramped for three people to move around in here... All right."

After putting the vegetables she'd finished cutting into the pot, Riko-senpai pointed sharply at the table.

"Otaku-kun, cut the pumpkin there and peel the eggplants. Tatsumin, could you handle the vegetables for the salad?"

"Understood."

"Got it, gao."

As instructed, I carried the pumpkin and a knife to the table in the center of the kitchen.

It was a little cramped for three people, but the kitchen was still larger than an ordinary home's. I left enough space for one person and took a place beside Tatsumin-san.

This inn must have been designed with larger groups in mind, because there were several knives and cutting boards. It was nice that no one had to worry about who used which one.

Um... How exactly did you cut a pumpkin again?

"Kota-kun."

"Yes?"

Just as I had stabilized the pumpkin on the cutting board and picked up the thick-bladed knife, Tatsumin-san spoke to me.

"When removing the pumpkin's stem, it's easier to drive the knife in at an angle rather than straight down, gao."

"Really? Thank you."

I drove the knife into the pumpkin at an angle around the stem, as she instructed. Oh, it really did slide in smoothly.

"Wow... Tatsumin-san, do you cook?"

"I only know a lot about cutting vegetables. She can make salads properly, but otherwise she eats like Miyu-chi does."

"Ah..."

"P-please don't look at me like that, gao. A grown-up lady is busy, gao...!"

"There are lots of important things about meals besides saving time and maintaining nutritional balance. Honestly."

"B-but anyway!"

Just as Riko-senpai looked ready to start lecturing her, Tatsumin-san raised her voice.

"Sorry, gao. I questioned you right after you got back from the dungeon, gao."

"No, it's all right. Well, it was a little much."

"I'm sorry, gao. I wanted to ask you something. About selling 'Water of Rejuvenation'..."

"I'm not selling it."

"Please reconsider."

"I'm not selling it."

"...Are you angry, gao?"

"No. It's not that I'm angry. I'm refusing because it would be legally impossible."

I answered as I cut the pumpkin in half.

"Oh, Otaku-kun. Wrap one half and put it in the vegetable drawer of the refrigerator, okay?"

"Sure."

I wrapped one half of the pumpkin in plastic wrap and put it in the refrigerator.

Wow, this refrigerator is packed with vegetables...

"Homegrown vegetables, or vegetables for your own household, would be one thing. But if it's used on fields or paddies to grow produce for sale and profit, we'd be breaking the law too."

"Come to think of it, that's true, gao... I kind of forgot about that, gao."

"You aren't using your Ability for profit outside dungeon exploration, are you?"

When I gave her a slightly suspicious look, Tatsumin-san looked away again.

"Huh? Wait..."

"N-no, I think it's probably fine, gao. I have a 'movement-type' Ability, gao, so sometimes I go get medicine or do shopping on behalf of elderly people in the neighborhood. They occasionally give me vegetables as thanks, gao..."

"Well... I suppose that's probably okay...?"

I wasn't well versed in the law, so I couldn't say for sure. Besides, meddling in that sort of local arrangement would be a hassle... I mean, it would be tactless.

I planned to distribute scrolls among my clanmates through barter too. Officially, it would just be framed as 'sharing surplus.'

"So you have a movement-related Ability, Tatsumin-san."

"Did I forget to mention that, gao? I have a cool Ability called 'Twilight Armor,' gao~."

"Ah... I vaguely remember hearing something about that."

'Twilight Armor'

It referred not to twilight merely as a time of day, but to twilight as the boundary between life and death. It was an invisible suit of armor for walking through that otherworldly space... or something like that, anyway.

I vaguely remembered seeing it on a list of Abilities published by the Counter-Spirit Agency. The name was so chuunibyou-esque that it had stuck in my memory.

I'd also heard that, like teleportation magic, it couldn't be used to teleport into buildings enclosed by walls imbued with mana, and that it didn't allow for fine adjustments.

It consumed a great deal of mana and apparently required a charge-up time before activation, but it was still a real winner of an Ability.

"Could you use that Ability to get to the café too?"

"Yep, gao. Master says I'm allowed to teleport to the backyard of his house during the day, gao~."

"Our backyard is basically empty of both people and things. Apparently there was a little slide there when I was a child, though."

"Huh... By the way, can you carry anyone besides yourself?"

"No, gao. It's for one person only, gao. More importantly, back to the subject at hand: would it really be impossible to sell 'Water of Rejuvenation' as fertilizer, gao? Even if it were somewhat expensive, I thought its effects would make it a bargain if they were powerful enough to appear in mythology, gao."

"I'm sure it's something farmers would absolutely want."

"...By the way, would it be all right to give some to the elderly people to drink, gao? As a barter arrangement?"

"No. Other than in emergencies and for human experimentation, I don't give it to people to drink. Abilities are still poorly understood."

"Wait, did you just say 'human experimentation'?"

"Yeah, gao... Too bad, gao~."

"Don't just brush that off! Wait, I drank it earlier, you know? Otaku-kun? Hello?"

"Riko-senpai, don't look away while you're handling fire."

"Exactly, gao. It would be terrible if there were a fire, gao."

"Was it me...? Am I the one at fault...?"

Ironically, I used it constantly to save human lives, so there was no real need to conduct human experiments. Besides, that would be ethically unacceptable.

Still, this was the sort of thing I had to refuse firmly, or I would regret it later. I had no intention of accepting in the first place.

The elixir of agelessness and the pseudo-elixir of immortality had already been made public together with their recipes. An Ability user far more extraordinary than me had already turned the world upside down.

Even so, if a panacea capable of restoring youth were within reach, most people would probably throw away all restraint to obtain it... or so I thought.

That was why, for the time being, I had no intention of distributing 'Water of Rejuvenation' for such purposes. If someone used it somewhere beyond my knowledge, I would simply pretend not to notice.

Anyway, I finished slicing the pumpkin. The pieces were a little thick to really call slices, so I arranged them on a large plate.

"Riko-senpai, is this about the right size for the pumpkin?"

"Hm? Looks good. Then I'd appreciate it if you handled the eggplants!"

"Sure. I should use the ones in the vegetable drawer, right?"

"Yep, exactly. Man, Otaku-kun is as normal as they come, so you're a lifesaver. You're not absurdly meticulous, and you're not wearing gothic lolita into the kitchen."

"Isn't that an excessively extreme comparison...?"

The excessively meticulous Miyu-san and the idiot Rosso-san, who entered the kitchen wearing gothic lolita, were in the living room.

At present, the two of them were preparing materials for the people at the paper mill Tatsumin-san planned to introduce us to. More precisely, Rosso-san was writing them, while Miyu-san was test-reading them to see whether they were easy to understand.

As I peeled the eggplants, I decided to ask Tatsumin-san something that had been on my mind.

"By the way, Tatsumin-san..."

"What's up, gao?"

Tatsumin-san tilted her head as she arranged the salad.

"This may sound rude, or something, but... why did you come to this area? Was it for the sake of the people in the neighborhood?"

To be blunt, this village had a terrible location.

Having as many as thirteen dungeons here was abnormal. The strangely unmanaged fields and rice paddies were probably due to more than simple depopulation.

Presumably, people had left because of the dungeons' appearance. The population had been small to begin with, and the exodus had reduced it even further.

It would have been far too rude to say aloud, but I thought this village might disappear within a few more years.

Powerful Ability users were in high demand wherever they went. There was prejudice, but there were also places willing to accept them—places with better access and greater safety than this village.

"Hmm. I get along well with the people in the neighborhood, but that's not the only reason, gao."

"Is that so?"

"That's right, gao."

Her breezy answer surprised me a little, but I found the substance of it convincing.

However, if that was the case...

"Then, about the character called 'Tatsumin'..."

"Tatsumin is me, gao? Gao? The way you said that makes it sound like there's a person inside Tatsumin, gao. Want me to tackle you, gao?"

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Please forgive me."

The pressure... It was overwhelming...!

Unlike when she was wearing the mascot suit, she didn't suddenly close the distance, but the force in her eyes was unbelievable. Her pupils were dilated as wide as they could go.

...I did think that if she rushed toward me in her current outfit, those magnificent breasts would come closer too, but I quietly locked that thought away in my heart.

"...I understand what you're trying to say, gao."

What? Had she seen through my dirty thoughts!?

Could she read minds...? This was bad...!

"The girl named Ryugu Kaneko is certainly fixated on the existence known as 'Tatsumin,' gao."

Ah, that was what she meant. Safe...!

Even so, I kept my face completely serious. Hang in there, facial muscles.

"I'll tell you why... tomorrow, before you leave, gao."

"...Understood. I'm sorry for asking such a strange question."

"It's all right, gao. It's not something I'm hiding, gao."

"Thank you... Then I've finished peeling the eggplants, so I'll excuse myself for now."

"Thanks, Otaku-kun. Wait a little longer. That aside..."

"Yes?"

Riko-senpai turned only her head toward me and smiled brightly.

Huh? That's odd. It was a beautiful smile, but her eyes didn't seem to be smiling at all.

"You'd better remember this. I'm going to test your durability later, so stay there until we're finished cooking."

Ah, this was the kind of situation where she'd kill me if I didn't properly explain the whole human-experimentation thing later.

Overwhelmed by the force of her gaze, I left the kitchen trembling like a Chihuahua caught in the rain.

I really hope the curry doesn't become my last supper...!