The integration of the village up on the mountain took another two months, and it was rough.
“I-I’m exhausted.”
“Master, please sit here. These are hot-spring-steamed carrots. Please enjoy.”
“Thanks, Nomariora.”
When I returned to the survey hut after using up every last bit of my stamina, Nomariora guided me to a couch lined with cushions.
On top of that, she cut up the sweetly steamed carrots into easy-to-eat pieces and offered them to me together with a fork.
In my previous life, I didn’t really like vegetables that were that sweet, but since becoming Asha, glacé and the like were served normally, so I’d come to like sweet vegetables.
“Hey, hold it! Give me some carrots too! I’m even paying for them, and I got permission from the prince, but that maid over there absolutely refuses to hand any over!”
The moment I put a sweet carrot in my mouth, General Wageris came storming in.
Apparently, he had already had some kind of exchange with Nomariora.
“These are a particularly sweet variety transported from the imperial capital as Master’s favorite. They only have meaning when they enter Master’s mouth.”
“Even you have to admit that snatching a child’s favorite food is too pathetic. Besides, you’re a major reason His Highness is this tired in the first place, you know?”
Helkof looked exasperated with his former colleague as well.
General Wageris seemed aware of that too and fell silent, but his eyes stayed fixed on the carrots I was eating.
Honestly, it made them hard to eat, and I was the one who had given permission beforehand but failed to pass it on to the maid.
“Well, yeah. This steamed dish can only be eaten here, and the hot spring steam makes it taste even better, so I understand how he feels. Share some with him, Nomariora.”
“Yeah! Big shots have to be generous, after all! Improving food conditions is important when you want to move people. I’ll record the amount you provide by weight or number, and put it down as cooperation.”
The fact that something like that would be treated as an evaluation in military action made me smile wryly.
They had already been on edge over a deployment they resented, one for which preparations had been inadequate. Since arriving here, they had endured an unfamiliar environment and the cold, all while mediating fights day after day without laying a hand on the villagers.
Thanks to the bedrock baths, the steamed food, and most of all the fact that a solution was finally in sight, the atmosphere had softened not just around General Wageris, but throughout the entire army.
Apparently, some soldiers were even talking about settling here permanently, saying they had been driven out to the frontier with no hope of returning.
And recently, even Wabiri, which had refused integration, was showing signs of yielding.
“Oh, right. It wasn’t just the carrots. The construction schedule for the White Road’s been extended by about ten days. The young men gathered to help apparently went off to dig holes for the hot springs. They say they can’t afford to lose any more. Anything hot spring-related is your domain, isn’t it?”
“General Wageris, have you forgotten that the reason Lord Asha now has to create a new bathing-type hot spring is because you let your tongue slip?”
When Wearerel’s ears and tail stood straight up as she reproached him, General Wageris shot back.
“That ain’t just my fault. And besides, the one who actually made the bedrock bath was the First Prince. It’s not a lie that he developed a new way to use hot springs through alchemy.”
“That’s true, but because you told the villagers of Wabiri that I’d have to do something about it, the villagers of both villages met face-to-face here, started fighting, and we nearly had injuries on our hands.”
In the end, I had to go all the way down to the town again and give instructions to the blacksmiths.
The people of Wabiri had said that if the villages were going to integrate, it would be unfair for only Karuu to receive the benefits.
So, separate from the drinking water, we ended up making a hot spring for bathing on the Wabiri side.
Because of the danger of volcanic gas, it was planned as an open-air bath with good ventilation.
In the end, for the parts that could be handled with stone materials, I had them carry stone from the mountain, and since we would process it using the power of steam, I replaced the mechanism for making gravel with one for splitting and shaving stone.
The wives also requested more places where hot spring steam could be collected for cooking steamed dishes.
For those, the army, accustomed to building hearths while on the march, helped us, so it took less effort.
“If General Wageris uses the bathing one, maybe I should open up the bedrock bath we’d reserved for the army to the women.”
“I’ll bathe in water, but there are sand-bath types in the army too. If they can’t use it anymore, you’ll get complaints from that side.”
At General Wageris’s matter-of-fact response, Helkof nodded as well.
Apparently, among beastmen and dragonkin, people tended to be extreme: either water was fine, or they hated it.
And beastmen, covered in fur and not sweating, had no custom of baths or wiping themselves clean.
Instead, they apparently had water bathing and sand bathing.
In that sense, the bedrock bath supposedly stimulated not sweat glands but sebaceous glands, and it had gained a reputation among the beastmen for improving the luster of their fur.
In other words, beastmen who disliked water but took sand baths, and dragonkin who disliked water, were in the bedrock bath faction.
“This is difficult. Separating men and women will have to wait until after the army withdraws.”
For now, we had separated men’s and women’s usage times by shifts.
“Lord Asha, I apologize when you are tired, but it is almost time to instruct the volunteers on the facilities’ mechanisms, maintenance, and so forth.”
Wearerel said it apologetically.
Wageris’s gaze had been too insistent about the carrots, so I had already given him half, and there were none left.
Thanks to the cushions, even just sitting had relieved a little of my fatigue.
In terms of my previous life, I was still only an elementary schooler, so I felt like I was working too much, but no one except me could teach alchemy, so it couldn’t be helped.
“The unexpected workload has increased, but the result is just as anticipated, so I have no complaints.”
“As anticipated? What do you mean?”
General Wageris, who had looked ready to leave when I did, asked me that.
“I read the documents left by my predecessor in the imperial capital. From them, I learned that the issue was the rights to the hot spring water created in ancient times. Since local lords sometimes use it as medicine, they go so far as to dispatch soldiers to assert those rights. But if there’s another source, I thought the dispute would disappear if we made one more.”
That was why I had prepared pipes for drawing the hot spring in the imperial capital and brought them here, and why I had tools and chemicals to investigate the nature of the hot springs and minerals for safe use.
“It was unexpected that even the things I made as a test would be accepted because they were novel. I thought they’d be more conservative and would be revering the hot spring water more.”
Though I was honestly impressed by the wonder of nature that made all the harmful gases sink downward while hot spring water at a suitable temperature for drinking flowed to a place where you didn’t have to crouch.
“This place is geographically closed off as well. They may fear new things, but when there is practical benefit, precisely because they live with limited resources, they may also seize upon it.”
“I don’t get it.”
At Ikuto’s explanation, it was General Wageris who voiced his doubt.
“Then why are you leaving your bad reputation alone? You’ve got more than enough ability to deal with it.”
“It’s not as though I’m leaving it alone…”
“You are. No matter how you look at it, that ability of yours isn’t something that should be buried in the palace.”
That might have been General Wageris’s way of praising me, but that was exactly why.
“It has to be buried. I’m a prince, but I’m not the legitimate heir. Or do you think it would be better if all the princes disappeared from the palace again?”
When I said that a little strongly, General Wageris merely shrugged.
“With primogeniture, leaving things as they are is what’s bad for the country.”
“You have a point, but the ossified factional struggle has already changed because an outsider, His Majesty my father, entered it. In that case, the next generation should aim for stability. If I stand up, then it will be another generation of change, and stability will be pushed to the generation after that. That would waste an entire generation.”
General Wageris looked at me as if he didn’t agree, so before he could say anything, I gestured around the room.
“Besides, I want to do alchemy. I don’t want to become emperor.”
Magic was fun, martial arts were fun, and learning about this world was exciting.
If I combined all of those, alchemy was probably the technique that would let me dabble in the widest variety of things.
“What’s here is an accumulation of knowledge that once shaped the imperial capital. Now, it’s said to be an inferior derivative of magic. But it is the fruit of technology and knowledge different from magic. I want to realize it again with my own hands.”
“Then all the more reason to step forward—”
“No. I only want to do it; I don’t want to come out into the open. It doesn’t have to be me who presents it. If anything, it’d be fine if someone from this village awakened to alchemy and brought the tools here out into the world.”
To do that, it would be absolutely necessary to overturn alchemy’s current poor evaluation, and if that became the opportunity, that would be fine too.
“Actually, if I come out into the open, there’s a possibility alchemy itself will be crushed, so I’d rather alchemists other than me make names for themselves.”
“I still don’t like your way of doing things. If you were born to stand above others, then be aware that you’ll drag those around you into it. If you think pretending to be harmless counts as self-defense, that’s no different from throwing your life away.”
It was probably advice precisely because I had already nearly been assassinated.
“If you can prevent something, prevent it. If there are measures you can take to prevent it, take them. Only then will the other side think twice. Listen. What makes people cause conflict is desire or honor. But what invites conflict is obvious openings, or an advantage over the weak.”
So people decide to fight precisely because there is a situation they can exploit, or a weak opponent before them.
(If General Wageris is saying that to me, does that mean he’s blaming me for showing openings?)
(There is some truth to it. It is believed that when their master’s tent was placed outside the camp, the guards grasped both their own advantage and the situation in which their master was isolated from the army, and judged rebellion to be feasible.)
Sefira pointed out that I had created a situation that made them think rebelling against me would be acceptable.
And that was because I had been content to remain in a weak position.
“I think things are only just beginning, but they won’t wait for that, huh?”
“If you’ve got something hidden, lay it bare.”
“Whoa, whoa, why does it have to sound so dangerous? …Anyway, I won’t become emperor, and I don’t intend to be penned up here. To that end, I’m going to have the army earn some achievements, so keep that in mind.”
I said that, pointing my finger at General Wageris, who looked thoroughly suspicious.
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Next: How to Use Alchemy 5