Arriving at the Landslide Site

The city beyond the mountain pass where the massive landslide occurred—Sobana. There is another Imperial city on the other side of the border, positioned back-to-back with it.

Its name is Donkres Westendstadt. Apparently, an otherworlder from the same original world as me is visiting there.

Since they have spread things like abacuses, I suspect they are probably Japanese—but wasn't the abacus originally from the continent?

Once we finished clearing the earth and said we were heading for Sobana, the princess said she would come with us.

When I asked why, she said it was because I might run away.

Frankly, that was impossible.

We had eaten breakfast and gathered some information, so it was finally time to enter the mountain pass.

We went to a nearby stream, bought a large number of plastic containers, filled them with water, and stored them in my Item Box.

Then I stored the house and sheds, brought out the Hi○ce, and filled it with biodiesel fuel.

If we ended up with even more passengers, a T○yota Coaster microbus might be a good option too.

"Kenichi, what is that?"

"This is the summoned beast's food. It only eats a special oil that I synthesize with magic."

"Won't it move without that?"

"No. Even if someone killed me and stole it, it would stop moving immediately."

"Hmm..."

"Princess, what a strange creature this is."

I could hear one of the maids whispering to the princess.

"Exactly so."

I put the princess, who was standing with her arms folded, in the passenger seat, packed everyone else into the Hi○ce, and set off.

The horseless vehicle attracted curious looks as we passed through Agrostemma.

As befitted a town along a thriving trade route, people of all kinds could be seen. There even seemed to be catfolk and dogfolk living alongside each other.

"Hey, it looks like dogfolk live here with you too. What do you all think about that?"

"What do you want us to say, boss? If we've got no choice but to live here, we just have to put up with it."

"That's right, nya."

So the people who couldn't tolerate that sort of thing simply stayed away from towns like this. That made sense.

It was an unusual town whose outer walls also served as buildings. I would have liked to stay awhile if we had had the time, but...

First, we had to deal with the landslide.

Once we left the town, we finally entered the mountain pass. In the mountains of my old world, they would fill in ravines or build bridges to straighten the roads, but of course, none of that existed here.

The road had simply been carved out of the rock and clung to the cliffside. It was so narrow that two carriages could barely pass each other.

In some places, they could not pass at all. The winding road continued endlessly, twisting back and forth like a snake.

There were no guardrails, and the cliffside was completely exposed. Driving through here after dark really would be suicide.

A slip would send us tumbling dozens of meters. No matter how advanced the vehicle was, a fall would kill everyone.

My hands grew sweaty on the steering wheel. Naturally, I proceeded at a crawl of twenty to thirty kilometers per hour.

Even so, it was considerably faster than a carriage climbing the slope.

"This is the famed 'Road to Hell!'"

Just as the princess said, falling here would mean going straight to hell. The mountain pass in my rural hometown had been called the 'Coffin Road,' and this reminded me of it.

Having to travel along a road like this to feed the residents of the royal capital must be incredibly grueling work.

But that also meant it must be profitable as a business.

After all, even if the high expenses drove up the prices, there were still customers willing to buy the goods.

"Whoa! Amazing!"

"This is incredible, nya!"

The beastfolk in the very back were enjoying themselves, but they had no fear of heights.

The other women were clinging to their seats. Since the carriages in this world had no steering mechanism, turning them must be quite difficult...

Along the way, we passed many carriages heading downhill.

"Whoa, watch out!"

"Eeeeeek!"

I could hear the maids screaming. I was the one who wanted to scream.

A speeding carriage coming downhill nearly crashed into us, and I panicked.

Carriage brakes were pathetic. They stopped by pressing a piece of wood against the wheel. Naturally, they had neither drum brakes nor disc brakes.

Instead of a steering mechanism, they seemed to brake only one wheel to change the carriage's direction.

Even those feeble brakes were better than nothing, but if they broke, it was all over—you would plunge straight into the ravine along with the horses.

"You've got to be kidding me. Even getting caught in someone else's accident would send us straight to hell."

I grumbled as we climbed the pass. Then, at the end of the winding road, the landslide site came into view. However, about ten carriages still seemed to be stopped there.

As we approached the line of carriages, we overtook them. I had given the princess the loudspeaker we had used at the castle.

'Testing, testing! This really does make my voice louder! I am Lilith Lala Kadan, princess of the Kadan Kingdom! I have come to direct the removal of this landslide!'

Everyone in the carriages was looking at us. A horseless vehicle that suddenly appeared, and a girl shouting at the top of her voice—of course they would wonder what was going on.

At last, we reached the front of the line. A massive mound of earth and rocks had buried the road at an angle directly ahead of us.

For now, I got out of the vehicle to scout the area.

"Whew, this is incredible. Can we really do anything about something like this?"

"Even so, if we do nothing, the country will be brought to its knees!"

"I understand that, but... What do you think, Grand Archmage of the royal capital?"

"...This looks like it will be quite difficult..."

It was such a tremendous landslide that even Melissa instinctively recoiled.

However, I could not see beyond it, so I had absolutely no idea what the situation looked like overall.

According to the princess, it was just before the post town at the top of the pass. The altitude must have been around a thousand meters.

The engines of cars and heavy machinery were diesel-powered and used fuel injection, so they would operate even when the air grew somewhat thin. They also had turbochargers.

"Let's send up a drone and scout from above."

I took a quadcopter drone out of my Item Box and decided to use it for reconnaissance.

If I raised it about a hundred meters, we should be able to see the whole picture.

When I applied pressure to the controller's lever, the drone rose vertically with a high-pitched whine.

"Whoa! What is that? It flew into the sky!"

"Princess, that's another one of the boss's summoned beasts. It tells us what's up there from the sky. When we wiped out that goblin nest, we could see everything from above too, ha-ha."

Nyamena proudly explained the drone. I could leave that to her. I had to concentrate on piloting it.

If I let it crash into the bottom of the ravine, it would be all over.

"I've never seen anything like that!"

Melissa was shocked, but of course she had never seen one. It was neither magic nor a summoned beast.

The footage sent from the drone showed an enormous landslide stretching for roughly a hundred meters.

The earth had indeed collapsed across a hundred meters, but because the road curved midway, we could not see where the debris ended from our position.

I could see several carriages stopped on the road on the opposite side of the landslide. A post town stood at the top of the pass beyond them.

I brought the drone down and showed the recorded footage to the princess.

"H-how does this work?!"

"The summoned beast flying in the sky can record what it sees. It cannot fly very far, though."

"Good heavens! From up there, one could see the enemy army's deployment at a glance!"

Of course she immediately imagined using it that way. If anyone tried to drag me into a war, I would run.

"We aren't going to use it for war, you know?"

"Ugh—but if the country is in danger—"

"For now, this takes priority."

"Grrr... Still, it seems the landslide is about fifty kan in length."

One kan was apparently about 1.8 meters. The unit had supposedly been determined by the height of the first king.

They said the original measuring rod was still carefully preserved by the royal family.

"Um—Melissa-sama."

A voice called out from behind me. When I turned, I saw a man of about sixty with white hair and a white beard.

He wore the brightly colored clothes favored by merchants, and numerous necklaces jingled around his neck.

"Oh, Zinnia. What a coincidence meeting you here."

"You know him?"

"He is a merchant who also does business with the Nasturtium family. This is Her Highness the Princess. You must not be disrespectful."

"Yes, Your Highness!"

The merchants who had gathered behind him also dropped to their knees and prostrated themselves.

"Rise, rise. This is no time for that."

"We were sent here as an advance team to clear the landslide."

The merchants listened to Melissa with serious expressions.

"But... forgive me for saying so, Your Highness, but this group cannot possibly clear a landslide of this size. What of the other nobles...?"

"Indeed. Gathering workers, making preparations, and marching here on foot would take three weeks."

"Ahh... as I feared..."

The merchants' shoulders slumped at the princess's words. They had probably expected as much.

"Moreover, the landslide stretches for fifty kan. Clearing it by hand would take at least six months, and perhaps a year."

"That could happen."

At my words, the merchants looked as though they had fallen straight into despair.

"What a disaster... Perhaps we should turn back after all...?"

The merchants formed a circle and began a desperate discussion over whether to risk continuing.

I could see a few beastfolk among the people in the carriages behind us. They were probably handling the heavy loading and unloading work as well as serving as guards.

But they were all catfolk. I could not see any dogfolk.

First, we needed to make a campsite so we could begin working.

The road was narrow. If I brought out the house, there would be no room for anything else.

I explained the situation to the merchants and had them move their carriages back a little—but one empty carriage was in the way.

"That carriage over there is blocking us. Who does it belong to?"

At my question, the merchants exchanged glances and answered awkwardly.

"Well... the owner of that carriage became so despondent after seeing the situation that he jumped off the cliff."

"What?"

If they could not transport their cargo, some merchants would go bankrupt...

"No... Even if they returned to the royal capital, they might have exhausted every option and ended up hanging themselves..."

"Exactly..." "This is no joke..." "I had enjoyed smooth sailing until this age, but at last the god of death has caught me..."

"I will never see my grandchildren again..."

Stop it. That sort of talk hit far too close to home.

The merchants were worried that they could be next. Apparently, the dead man's cargo had been divided among the other merchants, while those with spare capacity took in his horses. There was no point leaving them with the dead man.

I wondered how they were feeding their horses while staying in a place like this.

When I asked, I learned that the merchants had pooled their money to charter a supply wagon carrying fodder from Agrostemma.

They seemed to be using beastfolk as messengers. For them, a marathon of several dozen kilometers was easy.

We could not work with the empty carriage left in the way, so I stored it in my Item Box.

"Ooh! An Item Box!"

The merchants' eyes shone. An Item Box was an object of envy to them.

With the empty carriage gone, we had managed to secure some space.

First, we needed to make room to set up the house. But when hundreds of workers arrived, how were we supposed to supply them?

There would probably be many strong beastfolk among them, but we would have to feed them and provide somewhere for them to sleep.

There was no extra space here at all. Were hundreds of people really supposed to sleep and eat on this narrow road?

It looked completely impossible.

"Lilith-sama, supplying provisions would be difficult if hundreds of workers came here..."

"Indeed. This pass was also an extremely difficult construction project, and it is said that countless people died during its construction."

I could summon K○tsu-san, but would there be enough room? If the road collapsed under its weight, we would be finished.

Either way, removing this much earth without heavy machinery was nearly impossible. Doing it by hand really would take about a year.

"All right! Summon K○tsu-san!"

With a rumble that shook the earth, an enormous yellow machine dropped down, making the ground tremble.

The vibration sent a sprinkling of small stones down from the cliff above—but we were safe.

"Whoa!"

"Is it safe?!"

The princess and I looked around, but everything seemed fine. The merchants panicked at the sight of the steel summoned beast.

"I saw it at the castle too, but you're saying this iron monster is a summoned beast?"

Melissa was touching the steel treads. Would she figure it out? Well, if she did, she did.

With Myaree and Nyamena's help, I decided to replace K○tsu-san's bucket with a hydraulic breaker.

"Hey, Myaree, Nyamena, give me a hand."

"Sure! We're changing out its iron claws, right?"

"Leave it to me, nya."

They had helped me change attachments before, so there should be no problem.

"Meow."

Perhaps she was bored, because Bell came over to me. She could not patrol or hunt in a place like this.

It must have seemed like a rather boring place to her.

The beastfolk came over from the merchant caravan that had been watching us work and stared at us.

"Here, Bell. It's your turn."

When Bell sat down in front of the beastfolk, they began bowing and praying to her. A Forest Cat could not possibly be in a place like this.

A female calico beastfolk came forward from among them.

"If you're working for Forest Cat-sama, I'll help too!"

"We don't need your help!"

"That's right, nya."

However, the calico seemed to notice something unusual about Nyamena's body.

"Huh? It's that time for you, isn't it? Did that boss of yours take good care of you?"

"Yeah, plenty. So we don't need your help."

Hey, I could hear this conversation too, you know.

"Oh, come on. If Forest Cat-sama is here, that means he's a good person, right? And he can use that incredible iron monster too. Sounds like you hit the jackpot with your master. Share him with us, won't you?"

"Not a chance."

"That's right, nya."

Once we finished replacing the attachment, Melissa came over to me.

"Kenichi! Bring out my core."

"Got it."

"I can't let you have all the glory."

I was not trying to compete with her. I just wanted to finish the work and return to that place in Astrantia.

Oh, right. Before that, I had to meet the man who was supposedly Japanese, on the other side of Sobana.

I took the giant golem core stored in my Item Box and brought it out beside the landslide.

Melissa began chanting some sort of spell.

'O great one connected to all things, grant this rubble a temporary life.'

The earth and rocks blocking the road gathered around the core, rapidly growing in size until they rose onto two legs.

It was huge! About ten meters tall, perhaps. I had seen it before, but it was unmistakably a giant robot. If I rode on its shoulder, would it be Iron Man 2○ or perhaps G Robo...? No, given its size, maybe V○toms.

When the giant began to move, it grabbed huge chunks of rock and started throwing them into the ravine.

It simply lifted them with both hands and tossed them. It probably could not make a complicated throw like a baseball pitcher.

"Whoa!"

"Amazing!" "Incredible, nya!" "Wow!" "How marvelous!"

The merchants and my family all cried out in astonishment.

It really was incredible! But if something like that could actually move, then it did not seem strange for my heavy machinery to be working beside it either.

"If I could operate that, I could do all sorts of things alongside your Yu○bo-san and K○tsu-san, Kenichi!"

"Yes. With a golem, we might even be able to climb higher cliffs."

"All right! Hmph!"

Anemone was steeling herself. Among the books we had copied from the royal library, there should have been one about golems.

She had talent. It might actually be possible for her.

I could not afford to lose either. I climbed into the driver's seat and selected breaker mode on the LCD panel to the right.

"All right!"

With a tremendous metallic pounding, the steel stake began breaking apart the rock wall.

The breaker mounted on the heavy machinery made the broken rock pile up below.

"Let's keep going!"

I put pressure on the lever controlling K○tsu-san.

I dug into the cliff with single-minded concentration.

"......!!"

Something seemed to be happening outside, but I could not hear a thing over the noise of the heavy machinery.

I created a space about three meters deep and ten meters long. It should be considerably more spacious now.

I stored K○tsu-san and brought out the Yu○bo instead, using its blade to push the excavated rock over the cliff.

The tracks creaked and rattled as it pushed the earth and rocks forward.

Then I brought the house and sheds out of my Item Box and set them up in the newly cleared space.

At last, we could take a breather. At almost the same time, Melissa's golem, which had been working, returned to its original pile of earth and rocks.

We could have made the golem throw itself into the ravine and gotten rid of the earth composing its body, but its core would have fallen with it.

"How long can you operate a golem?"

"About an hour... How about your summoned beast?"

"All day, as long as they have oil to eat."

"...I don't believe it."

"It's true. I finished building an irrigation canal in a short time in the viscount's territory at Astrantia. I'm not lying."

"Melissa, there is no falsehood in what he says. He completed the irrigation project at an inconceivable speed."

As I was talking with the princess, the merchants came over.

"Your Highness! With this iron monster and the golem, won't the road be reopened in no time?!"

"Who can say? One cannot know until one tries."

However, the merchants' faces were bright and full of hope.

Now that we had some room, I took out my binoculars and surveyed the area.

A river ran through the gorge, but it carried only about as much water as a stream and was some distance from the cliff.

There was a risk of flooding if dumped earth blocked the river, but there seemed to be enough room to throw it down here.

As I peered below, I caught sight of the body of the man who had thrown himself from the cliff.

I immediately looked away, but his face seemed strangely familiar...

I steeled myself and looked again. It was the young merchant I had given a ride from the fallen bridge to the royal capital.

"Kenichi! What's that? Let me see it too!"

"Yes..."

"Oh! It makes distant things look close! Is it magic?"

"No. If you stack several glass plates like the ones used in eyeglasses, you can give them that ability. I think Kaldon-san could make a similar mechanism."

"Oh! Then I must have him make one!"

I handed the binoculars to the princess and returned to everyone else, but they seemed to notice that something was wrong with me.

"Kenichi, what is the matter?"

"Kenichi, what happened?"

Primula and Anemone came running over to me.

"The body down there belonged to the merchant I had given a ride from the bridge to the royal capital."

"Oh, man. This is why business is frightening. Profit means heaven, but loss means hell."

"That's right, nya."

"He was probably trying to recover a gambling loss with another gamble."

"I suppose so."

He must have been trying to make up for the loss from being unable to transport his cargo after the bridge collapsed by taking the risky route between Sobana and the royal capital.

It was like losing the main horse race, then staking all your remaining money on the final race.

There were even people who bet their bus fare on the final race and had to walk home empty-handed, or sold their shoes to place a bet and went home barefoot.

I had heard he had a family too... But tomorrow, it could be me.

I had to stay focused. My family could end up out on the street too.

The two beastfolk would probably be fine without me, and Primula could return to her family home if necessary.

That left Anemone... I had taught her a fair amount of practical knowledge, and I had money deposited with the guild. I thought she could manage somehow...

"Did something happen?"

The calico woman spoke to me while I was alone.

"The man who threw himself off that cliff looked somewhat familiar to me."

"Oh, so that's it... Well, things like that do happen. Want me to comfort you?"

Myaree and Nyamena immediately came flying over.

"You've got no part to play here!"

"Exactly, nya! Look away for one moment and this is what happens, nya!"

"What a cheapskate!"

I watched the beastfolk tussle without even trying to stop them, until Primula came over.

She hugged me from behind, and I heard her voice against my back.

"It's not your fault, Kenichi, so you don't need to worry about it."

"Does this sort of thing happen often when you're in business?"

"Yes. I saw it many times while traveling with my father as a peddler."

Apparently, they would sometimes go to collect an unpaid debt and find the debtor hanging in his shop. Namu Amida Butsu, Namu Amida Butsu.

She must have seen countless scenes like this while traveling from place to place in business with Marrow-san...

That was an incredibly harsh environment for a girl. No wonder she had grown strong, and no wonder she never risked her business for the sake of gambling, always pursuing what was practical.

Marrow-san and Primula were both good gamblers. But it seemed their family maxim was the secret to business: never turn commerce into gambling.

Yet even after seeing things like this, did the other merchants still turn their businesses into gambles?

The dead man was unfortunate, but he had taken the risk with full knowledge of it.