Chapter 594: Beatrice’s way forward
Spent a few days or so slutting around. I wandered around the streets of Polka, having sex with the cat beasts and female slaves I met there as often as I had a light cup of tea, but generally nothing much happened and the days went on and on. There is always something going on, always something happening……from such days of being chased, my mind slowly adjusts to the everyday life.
“It’s done!”
Beatrice’s florid voice echoed in the Smithson family’s living room. When I looked up to see what was going on, I found Beatrice holding a misshapen stuffed animal in her hand. It was the first 「Work of art」 Beatrice had made under the guidance of Naris and others.
“You made it?”
“……Wh, What?”
When Beatrice saw me, she hugged the stuffed animal with both hands to hide it. No one tried to take it. No, maybe she thought I would complain. But a girl who, until recently, only knew how to swing a sword with brute force has, in a roundabout way, made a thing. I don’t want to say anything wild about that.
“Making things takes time, but it’s fun, isn’t it?”
I draw water from the water bottle, put the pot on the leftover fire in the kitchen and boil the water.
“……Don’t laugh or say it’s childish”
“You know, kids’ clothes, kids’ toys and of course stuffed animals are made by grown-ups, right?”
“……That’s true, but”
“I’m a blacksmith, so I don’t do much sewing. I’ll never forget the thrill of being able to make something I like with my own hands and I’m still savouring it”
My dad used to make me all sorts of things out of pieces of iron. Seeing broken pieces of metal with no value turned into beautiful knives, forks, buckles and little knight statues with my name on them after a day, I used to get excited thinking that when I grew up I would be an adult who could make anything like that.
I remember just before I left Polka, I used to grab a hammer and make things with my dad, even a paper knife. What I only thought was being made by someone else, somewhere I can’t see, in a way I don’t know, can be created from……my own hands and from the materials in front of me. From the moment I discovered that, I never doubted that I would become a blacksmith. ……Well, what I ended up becoming was a soldier.
“Maybe I didn’t make what I wanted, but……you made one thing. You are someone who can make stuffed animals. That alone makes you a lot more respectable than you were yesterday”
“……Y, Yes”
“Congratulations on completing your first one. Keep making more and more and you’ll get better and better”
I make tea from boiled water and offer it to Beatrice. It’s a sweet and gentle tasting elven herb tea made with sugar that Tetes magically created from silver pears, a fruit that is a specialty of the forest. Of course, it doesn’t contain the stimulant ingredient that made Christie drink it before and get all funny.
“……Th, thank you. ……And I just made it anyway, so I don’t know if I’ll make another one”
“Well, there’s no need to rush. There are still decades to go in your life. And there are still lots of things you can make”
“……You’re a weird guy, aren’t you?”
“What’s with that all of the sudden?”
Beatrice hugged the stuffed animal and sighed.
“You always talk like you’re reliable in a weird way……you’re weak and half-hearted about everything, but when I think about it, I wonder if there’s anything you can’t do and it seems like there isn’t”
“That’s quite a high opinion of you”
I laugh bitterly. So that’s how I look to younger people. ……Ah, I just thought of 「Young」 naturally. It’s like proof that I’m getting old and I don’t like it.
“It’s not like you can’t cook.”
“Well, if you’re a man trained to cook in the military……”
“You’re a blacksmith, so you can probably make all sorts of things with iron. And it doesn’t mean you can’t sew, does it?”
“……I’d have to do at least some light mending of clothes myself, because it’s expensive”
At least in the crossbow corps, everyone did it to save money. A lot of the ogres weren’t very good at it, but there were some who would do it for a fee of about pocket money.
“I’ve never done anything before
“……Well, there are quite a few people in Trot who are around 15 years old and have no experience”
“You’d probably do things like building a house one way or another……fighting or business, too, if you had to, you’d probably be able to do anything
“……Well, in that sense, there’s not many things you can never do. But we all are, aren’t we? You might think you’re different, but you just haven’t tried, have you?”
“Uh……to be able to say it so smoothly like that”
With lips buried in the stuffed animal’s head, I hear her muttering something small like 「It’s cool……」and her cheeks heat up with embarrassment. It’s not just me. There’s nothing anyone can’t do. The human hand is not only capable of holding a sword. The human foot can’t just go where it’s supposed to go. As 100-man commander Grantz once said, there’s more than one thing you can do.
“There are a lot of female slaves with various skills, so you should learn a lot of things. I’m sure it will be useful. You can become anything from now on. That’s the era, Kalwin”
“……Anything?”
“Yeah”
I don’t want to be seen with cheeks that would have turned red, so I reach for Beatrice’s head and stroke it a little messily. I think I’m acting like a father now. I remember my father doing the same thing when he received a look of respect from me. I’ve only just realized that parents probably stroke the heads when the children are embarrassed and want to block their gaze.
“……Emm”
Beatrice accepts the hand, tickling it a little. Then, she spins the words gingerly from under her hand.
“……Even being your wife?”
“!?”
My hand stopped suddenly. I felt like I was being ambush from an unexpected angle. No, calm down. In the first place, Beatrice was in a country without a clear system of marriage. Normally in a scene like this, saying something like this would be an approach, but in her case it might be a bit different.
“W, Wife?”
“……S, see, that……child or whatever……she has with her, that’s called a wife, isn’t it?”
“Uh, yeah, well”
“I don’t know if I can……be one”
“We, Well……you usually become a wife when you get married”
“……Co, ugh”
Beatrice frowns softly. Maybe she can’t think of a partner……or maybe she doesn’t really understand the institution of marriage in the first place, so she can’t imagine what the act would mean.
“……You had kids, right?”
“Ah? Yes, I do”
“Are you married?”
“……I’m not”
“……That’s difficult. Someone who has kids but isn’t married……isn’t that a wife……?”
Ah. I see. She’s interpreting 「Wife」 as 「Woman with children」. It is because she is from Kalwin, for whom being a mother does not immediately lead to being a woman who raises children, that you want to distinguish between the two by using the expression 「Becoming a wife」 instead of 「Becoming a mother」. The point may be that the existence of raising children by oneself is disconnected from the term 「Mother」. Well, we can learn the difference in nuance slowly.
“Well, you can become one. If you are a woman, you can usually become a wife, especially if you are a pretty girl”
“……I, see”
Beatrice nods with a bit of joy.
“Then I……want to be that”
“N, ah, ah……yes, I think you can be. Eventually”
“Eventually what?”
“That’s why people get married, normally. Someone promises to be with a man forever……and then have a child. And then raise it together. That’s what a normal wife is”
“……?? You, didn’t promise to stay with a woman who made a child that you’re not married to……and you didn’t promise to stay with her forever?”
Beatrice is clearly hitting on my weak point. Yes, that’s right. It’s funny.
“I, I’ve promised to be a female slave, so……also, in the current Trot, a commoner is only allowed one wife. I’m that……lot, so there’s a lot of them”
“…………”
Beatrice’s questioning gaze hurts. It hurts.
“I, It can’t be helped! I love them all! Everyone says it doesn’t have to be in the form of marriage! And then there are those who I doubt would even recognise as a marriage partner in the first place!”
Dragons and Breakcore.
“Why are you angry……?”
“Sorry. I was just thinking”
“……I mean, I don’t really care about those things. What am I supposed to do in the end? Become a wife?”
“Cough. ……It’s not a good idea to ask me to explain, so you can ask Naris or……Naris”
I tried to come up with other candidates after Naris or, but realised I couldn’t come up with any candidates. Because Tetes is going to say something intentionally crazy. And Almeida and Sharon have questionable values. And the dragons don’t seem to be interested in 「Wife」. The townspeople don’t speak the language in the first place.
“Okay, but……why is it not a good idea if it’s you?”
“There are things even I can’t……!”
The only thing I can’t seem to do is make a convincing case for this.
——————————————————-
I was taking a walk today, thinking about who I’m going to have sex with……no, I’m going to see someone, when I saw a dragon flying in the sky. If I look closely, I can see its body shimmering blue. It must be one of the blue dragons. As I was wondering if someone had somewhere to go, its huge body grew bigger and bigger as I watched it and it flew over the town and into the meadows outside the town. I was curious, so I followed it.
From the dragon body back to the human body to see who the dragon was. She was apparently Airi, with a full-limbed but neutral appearance. And.
“Ah……!”
She dropped off an old dwarf. I rush over to him.
“Hmm. What”
“Old Dan!”
“I thought you were late getting here, but I hear you’ve been up to all sorts of mischief again. This dragon told me”
Dan Crux. Jeanne’s grandfather, the great blacksmith, has landed in Polka again.