Chapter 1-14: Omen of Disaster

About two years had passed since the king came to inspect Kukuri Village, and spring had arrived once again.

One major change over those two years was that Margrave Haust had established a military outpost near Kukuri Village, bringing soldiers and doctors into the area.

At first, the villagers welcomed them. However, most of the soldiers were rough, arrogant, and overbearing, and before long, relations between the villagers and the soldiers deteriorated.

One of the main causes was the establishment of restricted areas within the forest.

Some of those restricted zones were close to the village, relatively safe, and rich in high-quality medicinal herbs. Naturally, many villagers opposed the restrictions, but the officer in charge of the dispatched troops ignored their objections and imposed the rules on his own authority.

Worse still, some soldiers began gathering medicinal herbs themselves and secretly selling them to merchants who supplied the unit, earning extra money on the side.

As a result, a clear rift formed between the villagers and the soldiers.

Kukuri Village was home to many former adventurers, and plenty of them were more experienced at dealing with monsters than the soldiers were. From the villagers’ point of view, the soldiers did nothing but reduce their sources of income and deplete the village’s medicinal supplies.

It was only natural that they resented them.

“Mom, I brought back a ton of medicinal herbs!”

Lately, I had been putting a lot of effort into gathering herbs.

The reason was simple: because of the soldiers, the village’s stockpile of medicine had begun to run low.

Since I could use Skyflight to travel long distances quickly, I was put in charge of gathering medicinal herbs. Mom and Grandpa handled the compounding of medicines, while Dad took care of hunting.

From time to time, I also helped with the medicine-making while they taught me, so I had acquired a basic knowledge of most common medicines.

“Good work. It must have been hard gathering this much, wasn’t it?”

Mom asked me that, but since I could use Detection and Appraisal, it honestly wasn’t all that difficult.

I gave her a vague answer.

She didn’t pay much attention to it, simply accepted the herbs and went back to work.

When Dad returned home, Mom stopped preparing medicine and began making dinner.

That was how our days passed.

Then one day, Mom fell ill.

Fortunately, we still had medicine in reserve, so her condition soon stabilized. However, her strength did not return, and she had to spend several days resting.

I wanted to get her something nutritious and easy to digest, so I left the village to dig up some mountain yams.

Unfortunately, just outside the village, I was stopped by a couple of particularly unpleasant soldiers.

“Hey, brat. Hold it.”

“You’ve been hoarding a lot of medicinal herbs, haven’t you? Hand them over.”

These soldiers were seriously picking a fight with someone who looked twelve years old.

It was too much trouble, so I ignored them and tried to walk past.

One of them grabbed my shoulder.

“Don’t ignore me, you little brat—Gwoof!”

I grabbed the hand on my shoulder, twisted it, and slammed the soldier into the ground, knocking him unconscious.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing, brat?!”

The other soldier flew into a rage and swung a fist at me.

I showed him no mercy.

“Secret Technique: Son Killer!”

I unleashed the forbidden strike.

Leaving the soldier writhing on the ground in agony, I used Flight and headed toward my destination.

To be honest, I might have gone a little too far.

But I didn’t exactly have warm feelings toward the soldiers either, so I decided to call it self-defense.

Once I reached my destination and found some mountain yams, I immediately got to work.

First, I used earth magic to turn the soil around the yams into sand.

Next, I carefully dug them out while making sure not to break them.

Finally, I washed them with water magic, burned away the fine root hairs with fire magic, and stored them in my Magic Bag.

That was it.

In about two hours, I managed to harvest five mountain yams, each roughly a meter long.

In my previous life, digging up just one yam like this could sometimes take more than two hours.

Magic really was convenient.

The mountain yams in this world usually had a texture somewhere between wild Japanese yam and Chinese yam. They were nutritious, good for restoring strength, and easy to digest, although they were not commonly eaten in large cities.

The usual way to prepare them was to slice and grill them, or cut them into small pieces and use them as ingredients in soup.

At our house, we sometimes grated them, seasoned them, and poured them over rice—which was cultivated here, though it was not a staple food. We also sometimes diluted the grated yam with broth and drank it like soup.

Naturally, those were my ideas.

People in this world had never really had the custom of pouring grated yam over rice, but the dish had now begun quietly spreading throughout Kukuri Village.

Incidentally, most rice here resembled indica rice, so boiling it in plenty of water was more common than steaming it in the Japanese style.

While I was out collecting yams, I also hunted a few rabbits and Maru Birds, drained their blood, and stored them in my bag.

When I returned to the village, the soldiers at the entrance bothered me again.

So I knocked them unconscious with the lightning spell Stun.

It was self-defense, so there was nothing I could do about it.

At night, Shiroumaru—who had now grown to a full two meters in length—was around, so if anyone tried to attack our house, we would know immediately.

I prepared dinner that evening.

The menu was rabbit soup, grated yam soup, and boiled rice.

Dad, Mom, Grandpa, and I sat around the table together.

The village may have changed, but for our family, those changes still seemed insignificant.

Surrounded by the same smiles I had known for years, I spent those peaceful days believing that our happiness would continue, now and forever.

At least…

That was what I believed until disaster struck one month later.

This chapter is a little short, but I decided to end it here because the story is about to shift to a new scene.

Next, I plan to insert a chapter that connects Chapters 14 and 15.