The Croton Family from the Neighboring Village

We're currently in the city of Astrantia.

I'd just made a rather expensive purchase at a suspicious old woman's shop: a magic tool and a grimoire. Still, they were investments in the future.

The magic tool looked useful for synthesizing various chemicals, and the grimoire might let me use magic.

However, according to the old woman, I wouldn't be able to use the grimoire if I had absolutely no talent for magic.

If that happened, I could always sell it to someone else. Apparently, grimoires retained their value because they were rare and could be sold for a high price.

The grimoire I bought contained the Fireball spell—a general-purpose spell, so there were many grimoires for it.

That's why I could buy it for ten gold coins (2,000,000 yen), but grimoires containing powerful or unusual magic apparently cost one or two orders of magnitude more.

The meat at the Adventurer's Guild wouldn't be ready until evening. I had a little time to kill before then.

I could go home once and come back on the motorcycle, but Anemone wanted to stay in the city.

She was probably enjoying herself because it had been so long since she'd been in a city. She was still very much a child in that respect.

We all walked around the market to pass the time.

But after our feet grew tired, I was wondering where we could sit down when I spotted a figure in an alley.

I happened to glance over, and the face seemed familiar—.

It was Croton, the man who lived in the fishing village of Santanka on the lakeside—the same man who had bought a blanket and picture book from me.

It looked like he was being hassled by some rough-looking thugs.

But he wasn't the only one being hassled. A child about the same age as Anemone was clinging to his waist.

She was a girl with long, wavy chestnut hair tied in a ponytail, wearing a hemp dress.

She was probably the daughter around the age he had mentioned.

There were three rough-looking thugs—Shorty, Skinny, and Fatty—the stereotypical trio.

I was wondering what to do when Anemone grabbed my sleeve.

"Aren't you going to help them?"

She was making that sad face again. Uncle Kenichi was weak against eyes like those.

If the person being hassled had been a beautiful, well-endowed woman, I would have rushed to her rescue in a flash.

Besides, I wasn't really the sort of person who went around using violence... Though after slaughtering a bunch of villains because of those drugs, it was a little late to say that.

"Damn it, fine. Myaree, can I count on you if things get dangerous?"

"Leave it to me, nya."

I had made up my mind, but it might be bad if my face were recognized. I didn't care so much about myself, but I couldn't let those thugs turn their attention toward Anemone.

I searched Shangri-La for something to hide my face. I found masks of the sort people wore at masquerade balls—300 yen. Cheap.

I had no idea they were called Venetian masks. I learned something new.

But among the products on display, I found a plague mask shaped like a black bird's beak.

This is it! It cost a whopping 7,500 yen. Of course, it was a waste of money, but it stirred the long-forgotten chuunibyou spirit inside me.

There are times when a man simply has to buy something.

"Click."

I put on the plague mask that dropped into my hands and warned Anemone.

"It would be bad if the villains saw my face, so stay hidden."

"...Okay."

Anemone looked like she was completely put off by my awesome mask, but that was just my imagination.

I headed toward the men with the beak still on my face.

"Hold it right there!"

All three men turned their gazes toward me at once—ugh! What pressure!

"Who the hell are you?" "What the hell is this guy?"

The thugs also looked completely put off by my plague mask, but that was probably just my imagination.

"That's no way to treat a good father and daughter."

"Hahaha, you call him good?" "Hahaha!"

What did they mean? There seemed to be some sort of story behind this...

"I see. Well, even if there's nothing to be done for the father, I suppose I'll save the girl."

"What? You looking for a fight? Huh?"

"I'm warning you. If you don't back down now, my magic is going to go off!"

"What? Magic?"

I took some firecrackers and a turbo lighter out of my Item Box, lit the fuse, and tossed them in front of the thugs.

The firecrackers' deafening string of explosions echoed off the alley walls, amplifying the noise until my ears rang painfully.

Their legs gave out, and the thugs fell on their backsides.

"Eeeeeek!"

"How do you like my magic? Next time, it'll explode inside your bodies! Hahaha!"

"R-Run!"

Driven by fear, the three thugs fled like rabbits. One of them apparently tripped over his own feet and went spectacularly headfirst into a wooden crate.

The other two carried the limp man away and fled the scene.

I expected the usual line in scenes like this—"Remember this!"—but they hadn't even had time for that.

Unfortunately, the incredible noise also drew the townspeople over.

Croton was standing there frozen, looking terrified. His daughter was already on the verge of tears—it seemed my magic had been a little too effective.

I hurriedly gathered the unexploded firecrackers scattered around, then took Croton and his daughter by the hands and escaped the scene.

------◇◇◇------

Once I had taken Croton and his daughter somewhere deserted, I removed the mask and showed them my face.

"Getting mixed up in trouble while looking after such a cute daughter?"

"It was you? You saved us. Thank you."

"Papa, who is this man?"

"He's the merchant who sold you your picture book."

"Oh! Thank you for the book!"

She bowed energetically, her ponytail swinging back and forth.

Following my scent, Anemone and Myaree arrived too. A beastfolk's nose was useful at times like this.

"You were a mage?"

"Yeah. Keep that to yourself, all right?"

"Of course. You're our benefactor. I promise."

Standing around talking seemed pointless, so we went into a nearby diner. It was an old, two-story wooden building with a deeply weathered appearance, but it had a certain charm and seemed to possess a long history.

The children and Myaree sat at a separate table and drank milk—milk was rather expensive at five small square copper coins (500 yen) a glass.

The two of us men decided to talk. Croton was drinking ale, while I had milk.

Ale was something like beer, but to put it bluntly, it was awful—not fit for anyone who knew the beer of my original world.

Still, there seemed to be a misunderstanding. Ale itself wasn't bad, nor was it inferior to beer. They simply lacked the technology to make it taste good like the beer of my original world.

"Why were you surrounded by those guys? From what they were saying, you seemed to know each other."

"Well... When I was working as a government official, I sold them information to make a little extra money, and showed them various favors."

"So they took advantage of that and started extorting you?"

"That's right..."

"People like that only put on a friendly face at first. So you fell on hard times in the city and ended up living in a place like that?"

"That's about it."

"Well, in my case... The trouble with merchants was a lie. I'm being pursued by nobles because of that magic you just saw."

"That makes sense. Nobles wouldn't ignore someone with powerful magic. You were right to run. If you have a child like that, they might even take her hostage."

"The same goes for you, doesn't it? Shouldn't you escape somewhere far away? Your wife and child could be in danger. Or are you still attached to the city?"

"..."

The fact that he didn't answer meant he still had something tying him to the city.

According to him, those men had contacted him because they wanted to use his old connections to drag him into some criminal scheme.

People like that never stopped until they had wrung him completely dry.

But this was his problem now. It wasn't my place to tell him what to do.

When I looked over at the children, Anemone and Croton's daughter seemed to have hit it off completely.

There hadn't been any children of a similar age nearby. This might be Anemone's first friend.

"You know, I helped make that book too."

"Really? Can Marie help when you make your next book?"

"Sure!"

Anemone answered and toddled over to my table.

"Marie wants a new picture book! Kenichi, are you going to make another one?"

"I see. Then I suppose I will."

"Yay! Marie, Kenichi's going to make a new book!"

Anemone hurried happily back to the table and began talking with her.

"Did you make that book?"

"More or less. I was actually an artist."

Croton silently drank his ale, but...

"You have such a cute daughter and a wife—Marie doesn't look anything like you, so she must take after her mother, right? Then your wife must be beautiful. With treasures like those, what could you possibly still be attached to in this city?"

"...The thing is... there's a woman I love."

"Huh? Someone besides your wife?"

"Yeah..."

"You're unbelievable. Let me guess—she's some unreachable woman, so you don't have any chance with her?"

"Laugh at me for being a fool..."

Croton held his ale cup between both hands and looked down.

I was dumbfounded. His daughter was such a good kid, too...

We left the diner and parted ways with them. They had to walk all the way, so if they didn't leave now, it would get dark before they reached Santanka.

Unlike us, they didn't have bicycles or motorcycles, and if they encountered a monster on foot, they wouldn't be able to escape.

Croton's daughter, Marie, waved at us. It seemed she and Anemone had promised to play together.

The fishing village of Santanka was on the other side of a river without a bridge. The river was shallow and only about three meters wide, but it would still be a little dangerous for children alone.

They would have to be careful when crossing back and forth.

As the sun began to slope toward the horizon, we went to the Adventurer's Guild, collected the meat that was ready, and started back home.

After leaving through the gate and walking along the road to the forest, the space between the trees was already changing from blue to black.

I took the off-road motorcycle out of my Item Box, started the engine, and turned on the headlight.

Myaree could apparently see well enough even in this darkness.

I put the helmeted Anemone on the back and set off toward home.

As long as I kept the cliff to my right, we'd arrive without fail, so there was no chance of getting lost even in the dark.

"That light is so bright, nya~!"

"Don't look at it. It'll dazzle you."

According to her, there were no signs of monsters nearby.

Well, we'd reach home in about thirty minutes. Surely we could manage that much—at least, that's what I thought.

"Whoa! This was a bit of a mistake!"

Since we were riding through the forest with the headlight on, more insects than expected began gathering around us.

This was an unforeseen problem. I'd replace the bulb with an LED later.

There should have been LED bulbs that could directly replace the halogen bulb used in the headlight.

Even with insects swarming us, we made it safely through the forest.

Normally, nobody would travel through a forest after dark. This was only possible because we had the scientific light of electricity and a motorcycle.

"Phew, we finally made it."

"There sure were a lot of bugs."

"Insects mistake lights for the sun and fly toward them."

"Is that so, nya?"

"Ohh..."

"But they don't fly toward magical light, nya."

"They don't fly toward blue light."

"Is that so, nya?"

It was a rough explanation, but that was what we'd go with. There was no point trying to explain LEDs to her.

It was already pitch-black around us when something came rushing out of the darkness.

"Whoa!"

I was knocked down and licked in the face, and realized it was Bell.

"What the heck? Don't scare me like that."

I already knew there was no danger because Myaree hadn't become alert, but a sudden attack was still startling.

I stroked the Forest Cat's back and looked around. It was pitch-black—there was no way to cook outside like this.

We decided to use the cassette stove inside the house, boil some water, and eat instant food.

And their request was—

"Curry!" "Curry, nya!"

"You two really do love curry, don't you?"

"But it's delicious!" "Nyaa!"

And so curry it was.

I felt like we ate curry all the time, but since they were happy with it, there was nothing I could do.

The instant curry didn't contain much meat, so I decided to fry some of the Horned Rabbit meat we'd gotten that day and add it.

Even instant food could become fairly tasty if you put in a little extra effort.

Myaree added pepper and red chili peppers to hers. It looked extremely spicy.

Anemone and I ate rice, Myaree ate bread, and the Forest Cat got two cans of cat food.

"It's delicious." "Nyaa!"

The girls stuffed their mouths with curry, looking truly happy.

Once we finished eating, I thought I might draw a new picture book... Anemone had apparently promised one to that girl.

What would make a good subject?

I asked Anemone while she was eating curry.

"I want Cinderella."

"You already have that book, don't you?"

"I want to show it to Marie!"

"I see. That makes sense."

Then Cinderella it was.

A story where the heroine ended up with a prince would probably appeal to girls.

The original was actually a pretty gruesome story, though. They cut off their toes to force their feet into the little glass slipper and all that.

After we finished eating, Anemone studied for a while, but she looked extremely sleepy.

She must have been tired from walking all over the city.

We decided to go to bed early.

------◇◇◇------

――The next day.

Since Anemone kept begging me to draw the book, I decided to finish it quickly.

I wanted to experiment with making biodiesel fuel using the magic tool I'd bought from the old woman, but I had no choice.

Well, I still had nearly 100 liters of biodiesel fuel, so there was no need to hurry—.

With black-and-white pictures, I could finish about three a day even while preparing meals.

While I was drawing, Anemone shouted from outside. Croton had rowed over in a boat with his daughter, Marie.

Coming here by boat was probably faster.

Before Croton went fishing on the lake, he left Marie with me, then came to take her home when he finished fishing.

Marie seemed happy to have made a friend her age. Myaree was also having fun playing with the children, but was her mental age close to theirs?

Perhaps because they were tired from playing outside, the children came inside, so I gave them milk for a snack.

As they drank the milk, Anemone and Marie stared intently at me while I drew inside the house.

The kind of profession that involved drawing was rare in this world, and limited to things like court painters. It was probably unusual to see.

"Is it really that unusual to see someone drawing so much?"

After taking a break, I asked Marie.

"Yes... It's amazing. How can you draw such beautiful pictures?"

"Well, I studied drawing a lot and drew a lot of pictures."

"I see."

"Studying a lot costs a lot of money, doesn't it?"

Anemone's opinion was remarkably practical, but she had a point.

"That's right. Studying takes both money and time."

I had told Anemone not to show anyone the picture books from my original world, so she hadn't shown them to Marie either.

That was probably why she wanted me to make a Cinderella picture book and show it to her.

For several days after that, Marie kept coming over to play, and the Cinderella picture book eventually reached the point where all that remained was printing. Then, one afternoon around three o'clock—

The beastman who had been with Croton, along with a beautiful woman and Marie, arrived by boat.

They suddenly set a burlap sack in front of me and begged for help. From the sound it made, it seemed to be full of coins.

"Sir, please help us!"

"What? What happened? This is all so sudden—I have no idea what's going on!"

"C-Croton hasn't come home!"

"What?"

The woman who had come with them was Croton's wife. Marie really did take after her mother. She had similar long chestnut hair tied back behind her head.

She was beautiful! And she had a great figure, too.

How could he be dissatisfied with such a cute daughter and beautiful wife, and still be unable to forget some unreachable woman...? But this wasn't the time to say that.

Apparently, the thugs Croton had once associated with had taken an interest in him again, so he was trying to flee Santanka.

But moving required money. He needed a horse-drawn cart to carry his belongings, and on foot he could take only the bare minimum.

Dalia, the nearest city, was 100 kilometers away, while Akimenes on the opposite side was nearly 200 kilometers away... Apparently, he had decided to make some money in one fell swoop.

Croton had somehow learned that spices were hidden in the thugs' hideout, and planned to pocket them—.

But he had apparently been caught when the plan failed. A messenger from the villains had come and said they would release him if they were paid.

Well, of course. When you keep losing at gambling, you start wanting to make it all back in one big win—but that fails ninety-nine times out of a hundred.

"Damn it! I should've stopped him, even if I had to use force..."

There was no use saying that now—the carnival was over.

Croton's wife opened the burlap sack, which apparently contained their money, and showed me what was inside.

"This is everything we own. We understand that we have no right to ask this of you, but... we beg you to help us."

She must have heard from Croton that I could use magic. But still...

The sack contained a pile of silver and copper coins, along with a few gold coins—probably 700,000 or 800,000 yen in total.

I see. If they used that money to buy a horse-drawn cart and move away, it wouldn't leave them with much. That must have been why they had gambled on a desperate stroke of luck.

But Croton's ransom was twenty gold coins (4,000,000 yen). They couldn't possibly have that much money, so they had come to me in desperation.

"If that's not enough, then I could..."

Croton's wife, holding Marie in her arms, said that, but... Well, she was beautiful and had a great figure. Hmm... But this wasn't the time to hesitate, and there was no way I would ask her for something like that.

"No, no. If I did that, Anemone would hate me."

Anemone didn't seem to understand what the conversation between her and me meant, but she clung to my waist.

"Kenichi! Please save Marie's father!"

Anemone was making that sad face again. She didn't need to—I would save him even without that.

She knew how weak I was to that expression and was using it against me, wasn't she?

"Please save my father. I'm begging you."

Marie was also pleading with her little hands pressed together, but—

Ah... If such a cute little girl begged me like that, there was no way I could refuse her.

"Sigh... Myaree, I suppose this calls for another preemptive night raid?"

"I suppose so, nya."

"They won't expect us to attack today."

"Nyaa."

Myaree's eyes flashed.

"If you're planning a night raid, I'm coming too."

The Siamese-patterned beastman narrowed his eyes fiercely.

"There's no reward, you know. Are you sure?"

"Croton's done a lot for me. Sainelia and Marie have both treated me kindly. If I don't repay that debt now, I'd lose all honor as a man."

Sainelia was apparently his wife's name. I began preparing to rescue Croton.

But a raid on their hideout...? This was anything but slow living.

Why did things always turn out like this?

Had I gotten carried away just because I'd successfully defeated Shaga?

If this were Japan, it would end with, "Leave it alone. Let the police handle it." But this was another world—that wouldn't solve anything.

Even if we managed to prepare the money, they wouldn't release him. They would only demand even more.

Croton's wife and the beastman knew that, which was why they had come to me, the one person with the power to save him.

Fortunately or unfortunately, I had the cheat that was Shangri-La.

From what I'd heard, they were fewer in number than Shaga's group and weren't particularly formidable villains—in other words, small fry.

Well, I was already involved, so I might as well see it through.

'Honestly, you really are too kind for your own good!'

I could almost hear Amana scolding me.