An unfortunate poisoning incident had occurred on the very first day, but thankfully, no one else was poisoned afterward.
There was a shallow stream flowing nearby as well, so no one else had drawn water from the same place.
In other words, that man had gone out of his way to fetch water from somewhere farther off and ended up suffering for it. In the end, he survived, so he was lucky.
Not long after the small commotion, voices in the campsite died down. The sooner they slept, the sooner they could wake and set off early again tomorrow.
The crackling of the campfires mingled with the occasional loud snore, making it seem far too noisy to fall asleep easily.
That is, if one were outside.
Around me, thanks to the transparent soundproof barrier I had set up, none of that racket could be heard. At most, only the faint chirping of small insects I had selectively allowed through reached us.
Thanks to that, Cassian and Illiana were both fast asleep, breathing softly. When I opened the backpack a little, Rutina was also buried among the clothes, sleeping comfortably.
After confirming that everyone was asleep, I pulled my blanket over myself and closed my eyes. Soon, drowsiness crept in little by little, and my consciousness drifted away.
Being treated like a child was uncomfortable, but it was nice that I could cleverly avoid night watch like this.
And when I opened my eyes, it was the next day.
I woke before dawn had even broken and began preparing.
Though by preparing, all we really had to do was eat breakfast and line the wagons back up on the road.
For breakfast, I quickly shoveled into my mouth a stew made by tossing in salted meat and dried vegetables, then seasoning it roughly enough.
Then, once the wagons that had been arranged in a circle were lined back up on the road, preparations were complete.
It sounded easy enough when said aloud, but pulling each wagon loaded full of cargo, turning it in the right direction, moving it into place, and hitching the horses back to the wagons was truly heavy labor.
It was said that people who used mana could exert several times the strength of ordinary people, but exhausting work was exhausting all the same.
We started just as dawn was beginning to brighten, yet by the time we finished preparing to depart, the morning sun had already risen.
The caravan began moving forward again, continuing from yesterday.
Unlike yesterday, even though it was still a road, it was now a bumpy mountain path, so our pace seemed to have slowed a little more.
As we walked slowly, almost as if taking a leisurely break, our speed was nearly the same as the wagons’, which made it convenient to teach Illiana letters and magic from time to time over the cargo bed.
“Yes, like that. You’re doing well.”
“Uuumm……”
What I was teaching her now was how to manipulate mana outside the body.
Mana sight was applied to one’s own eyes, so she had learned it relatively easily, but handling mana outside herself seemed as though it would still take a little more time.
“Mm. It’s not… working.”
“It’s all right. You can take it slowly.”
When I smiled faintly and stroked Illiana’s head, Cassian cut in from beside us as though dumbfounded.
“Wow, when you first taught me, you attacked me with magic out of nowhere. Isn’t that unfair?”
I wondered if I had really done that and briefly recalled when I first taught Cassian, then sighed inwardly and said,
“What are you talking about? You were the one who said it was boring and wanted to learn faster.”
In truth, I had not intended to push him that far at first either, but whenever I tried to teach him calmly, he quickly lost interest, so it had been a drastic prescription.
“I clearly told you it would hurt a little. You were the one who said it was fine if it meant you could learn quickly.”
It might sound insane, but as a result of my experiments, pain was clearly the fastest way to raise one’s level in magic.
That did not mean causing pain indiscriminately had any meaning; the modifier “proper, within what one could endure” had to be attached in front of it. Still, the truth was the truth.
Though whether the efficiency gained was enough to be satisfying compared to the pain suffered was another matter, and a method that made one shake one’s head on its own.
“What, do you want me to teach you gently too?”
“…No, I’m good.”
Judging by his eyes, his heart seemed to have wavered tremendously, but the words that came out of his mouth were that he did not need it.
Thanks to that, it seemed I could keep pushing him without worry from now on.
◇
The sun had tilted, but there was still a little time left before sunset.
We arrived at a village that had formed at the foot of the mountain, yet was fairly large in scale. It was a village that had expanded around an open space where the trees were absent in the middle of the forest.
And by the caravan’s decision, we would spend the day here.
They were probably thinking that rather than going a little farther only to camp, it would be better to spend the day here comfortably and safely, then move again tomorrow.
I preferred that as well.
However, there was still quite some time before it grew dark.
So, thinking we might as well take a walk, I took Cassian and Illiana and wandered around the village.
Though it was called a village, compared to the usual villages built in places like this, it seemed quite large.
The land was mostly flat, but because it was uneven, the houses had been built far apart, which also made it look even wider.
There was nothing in particular to see, but time spent leisurely like this from time to time had a way of giving the heart some ease.
As we slowly walked around the village like that,
I discovered an object I had never expected to see in a remote mountain village like this.
In one corner of a field where crops seemed to have only just been planted, there was a low pillar with a crystal sphere the size of a fist embedded in its end.
It was not neatly carved, nor was its surface processed, so if one did not look carefully, it might simply seem like decoration. But it could not fool my eyes.
“Master, what is it?”
“This is a magic tool. Though it looks a little crude on the outside.”
No matter how I looked at it, it was a magic tool containing mana. It was inactive right now, but that much was clear.
When I looked at it using mana sight, I could see a fairly advanced formula. There were many inefficient parts, but it seemed to have been made by a rather skilled mage.
Judging by the shape of the magic circle, its effect was probably magic that gathered water from the air and sprinkled it.
It might not look like much, but considering similar magic tools were bought and sold for fairly high prices, this was not the sort of thing that should be in a village like this.
Just then, the voice of a somewhat older woman came from behind us.
“Oh my, you children are new faces. Did you come with the caravan that arrived today?”
When I turned around, what I saw was a middle-aged farmer woman one could find anywhere.
She looked at us, then noticed the staff Cassian was holding and widened her eyes slightly in surprise.
“That staff… You’re a mage too! At such a young age, how impressive.”
The woman slowly walked over, stood beside the magic tool we had been looking at until just now, and tapped the top of it.
“There is a mage in this village as well. Do you see that mountain over there? He lives that way. He made this tool that produces magic for us too.”
Where the woman pointed with her fingertip, there was a peak with a towering rock. It did not look extremely high, but it looked quite rough to climb.
As such, it might be a good place for someone who wanted to live alone and do the research they wished. I knew well enough, since I had once lived alone in a place like that too.
Though it was a somewhat sad memory that after I settled there and lived for about two hundred years, they called me a witch and came hunting me, forcing me to leave my home half against my will.
“That’s right, sometimes an illness that makes people’s stomachs hurt goes around this village, and each time, that mage treats them for us. He makes tools for us and treats people too—how grateful we are to him!”
Since we were listening to her, the woman grew excited on her own and began pouring out words like a waterfall.
It felt a bit awkward to cut her off flatly, so I simply nodded along appropriately and listened. Then, as if she suddenly came to her senses, she waved her hand and said with a smile,
“Goodness, I must have been talking too much by myself again. I’m always like this when people come from outside. Well then, rest comfortably while you’re here!”
After the woman left, a surprising amount of time had passed, and the sunset was slowly sinking over the western peak.
Since we were sleeping in the village this time, there was no need to go through the trouble of moving the wagons, so we slowly circled the outskirts of the village and headed down.
But in one corner of the path down, I saw a priest treating someone, just like yesterday.
Her name was, let’s see, Bella, I think. I remembered over a hundred Bellas, so it was confusing, but anyway.
In front of Bella was a man sitting on the ground, rubbing his stomach while drool trickled from his mouth.
It seemed to be abdominal pain again, just like yesterday.
“What happened?”
When we approached, Bella, who had finished the treatment, looked this way and smiled. I felt a slight aversion, but I did not show it outwardly…
“Ah, it’s you! Perfect timing! There’s something I wanted to tell you.”
Bella placed a hand on a tree where the forest began and pointed toward the slope leading downward.
“There’s a small stream over there, you see? Can you see it? If you can help it, don’t drink that water. It looks clean, but I think it’s dirty.”
When I looked in the direction Bella pointed, there was indeed a stream flowing below the slope, carving out a shallow valley.
It was not very deep, and by sight it would barely come up to my knees, but even considering that, the water was clear enough to see all the way to the bottom.
“I’ll tell the others as well for now, but if you happen to see anyone, let them know too.”
“Yes.”
Just like yesterday, Bella stroked my head a few times, then supported the drained patient and went down toward where the wagons were gathered.
Once they had gone far enough that it was hard to see them clearly from over there, I looked down at the stream once more and used mana sight.
It felt almost the same as what I had seen yesterday. It was slightly fainter than that, but it was definitely the same kind of mana poison.
And as far as I had heard, there was only one person in this village who handled mana.
I turned my head and looked at the mountain peak behind the village.
I should pay a visit tonight.
It would surely be an enjoyable gathering.