Chapter 19 - <11>
Having entrusted the Arlie to the Saradio merchants and delivered the criminals to the village chief, the party returned to the Goddess's Palm Inn.
Morris and the others wanted to hear the whole story of the herb theft, but they asked to postpone it until the next day. Anna ate dinner and went straight to bed. Franz was in a similar state; both of them were unconscious the moment they got into bed.
The next morning, when she went down to the dining hall with a finally clear head, she found the only energetic one, Ritz. And with him was, surprisingly, the village chief, Morris. For some reason, the village chief was having breakfast facing Ritz.
"Good morning, Mr. Village Chief!"
When Anna approached the two and bowed her head, the village chief smiled broadly.
"Good morning, Anna-kun."
"You're up early."
"You think so? Farmers are early risers."
"That's true."
When Anna lived in the village, she usually woke up at 4:30 every morning.
"I've already finished one job. The processing of the Arlie has begun, and the handling of the criminals is also taken care of."
"Huh?"
She was speechless at how quickly he worked, and Ritz shrugged.
"…So he says. I just heard myself."
"You really were up early this morning, weren't you?"
"Well, yeah."
Anna pulled out a chair and sat at the table. Fragrant, freshly baked bread was placed in a basket in the center of the table. As she was deciding which one to take, Ritz asked while tearing off a piece of bread.
"Where's Franz?"
"Hmm, still fast asleep."
Franz was at the peak of his exhaustion, so she felt sorry for him and didn't wake him up. Unless he was woken, he probably wouldn't show up.
"Was the Arlie alright?"
When Ritz asked the village chief while tearing his bread, the chief answered with a smile.
"It was fine. The condition was good, so it was a real help."
It seemed the well-dried state was a good thing. She was truly glad it didn't turn into a disaster.
"The village is in an uproar right now with everyone pitching in. It will take about three more days before we can give you the herbs."
"Three days…"
It seemed they would be able to stay in this village for at least three more days. She had been unconscious when she first came to Tushil, and with all the commotion, she hadn't really seen the village properly, so she decided to spend the three days sightseeing.
"Mr. Village Chief, what about the criminals?"
When Anna asked, the village chief said cheerfully.
"The criminals are on display in the plaza. Come and see them later."
On display? She tilted her head and looked at Ritz, who also seemed not to know and shrugged. She didn't really understand, but Anna promised the village chief she would go see them later.
"Well then, I'm off to process the herbs. I just wanted to thank you all."
The village chief said, finished the rest of his breakfast in one go, and stood up.
"Well then, see you later!"
After the village chief left, she enjoyed breakfast with just Ritz for a while.
"This bread is so fragrant. I really do prefer whole wheat."
"Me too. But it's hard to pass up that fluffy white bread made from refined flour."
"I know, I know! But it's so expensive."
"It is."
While savoring her breakfast, she looked out the window and could see the lively hustle and bustle of people. Anna was incredibly happy to have been of some help.
By the time their breakfast was over and they were having their post-meal tea, Franz finally woke up.
"Good morning, Ritz, Anna."
"Hey. It'll be three days until the herbs are ready. Take it easy and get rid of your fatigue completely."
Perhaps feeling sleepy after being full, Ritz said this while stifling a yawn.
"You too, Ritz."
So saying, Franz yawned. Was Ritz's yawn contagious, or was he still not getting enough sleep? Which was it?
"Kee!"
At the sudden voice, Anna and Franz looked under the table. At Franz's feet, Sara was sitting with her mouth wide open, seemingly trying hard to say something.
"Oh! Good morning, Sara-chan!"
At Anna's voice, Sara, who had been mumbling for a while, finally managed to speak after a moment.
"G'morn, kee."
It seemed she was starting to learn a few words.
"S-so cute!"
Anna's face broke into a smile. If she could touch Sara, she would pick her up and nuzzle her. The fact that she couldn't was a little disappointing.
"Hey, hey, sleeping is fine, but why don't we go for a walk?"
Giving up on fussing over Sara, Anna looked at the two of them. She couldn't stop thinking about what the village chief had said earlier. But the two of them had contrasting expressions.
Ritz didn't seem to have any particular objection, but Franz looked openly displeased.
"Let's go. A walk is a form of rest too."
When she pushed with a smile, Franz reluctantly agreed to a walk.
After a short rest after breakfast, the three of them, who hadn't had a chance to leisurely look around the village, were finally able to do so.
Everywhere they went, they were surrounded by a crowd of people, but that was probably unavoidable. After escaping from the villagers, the three of them finally arrived at the village's central plaza, which the village chief had told them about.
There was a circular fountain there, and a crowd had gathered around a pillar nearby.
"Look, look, Ritz! That!"
Peeking into the crowd, Anna couldn't help but let out a cry. Ritz, being tall, must have spotted it earlier, as he was stroking his chin with a grin.
"What's there?"
Unable to see, Franz muttered in a grumpy tone.
"The criminals, they're tied up!"
Seeing the three of them, the villagers made way, and they were finally able to get close to the criminals.
At the pillar near the fountain, the three criminals were tied up, stripped to the waist, and a large pile of wheat stalks was placed nearby. A sign hung around each of their necks, with something written on it. Anna read it aloud.
"These men are great criminals who stole the Arlie. Therefore, all villagers have the right to torture them with these wheat stalks… it says!"
Even as she spoke, the villagers were taking turns tickling their upper bodies with the wheat stalks.
"S-stop it! Bwahahaha, heeheeheehee!"
The three brothers were laughing while drooling, snot running down their faces, and tears streaming from their eyes. The village chief, true to his character, had come up with a carefree and, moreover, a good idea that allowed all the villagers to equally vent their resentment and stress.
"H-help us!"
Noticing them, the three of them pleaded for help. Being tickled by all sorts of people all day long must be quite unbearable.
"You're being punished because you did something bad. You have to endure it!"
Even Anna, who was weakest to pleas for help, couldn't listen to this one. Because if you do something bad, it's only natural to be punished.
"No way…"
The Scott brothers hung their heads in dejection. If only they would change their ways after this.
"Help us!"
The three of them's screams continued to be heard for the next three days, until Ritz and the others left the village.
Three days later. The three of them, having finished packing, were to depart from the Goddess's Palm Inn, which had taken such good care of them. Philia had once again made them those meat pies for their meal that day.
"Thank you very much, Philia-san."
On behalf of the three of them, Anna gratefully accepted the meat pies.
"Don't worry about the bill! You don't have to pay."
Thanks to Morris's kind gesture, their week's worth of accommodation and meals were all free. On top of that, the couple even gave the three of them some souvenirs. She felt a little bad about it.
"Come and visit again."
Hugging the teary-eyed, sad-looking Philia, Morris saw them off with a smile.
"Thank you for everything. You were a great help."
If it weren't for them, Anna's life would have been lost. If that had happened, his reputation for having taken her in would have been completely ruined.
Even before that, losing Anna, who still had a long life ahead of her, due to his own mistake was unforgivable.
To Ritz's deep bow, Morris made a troubled face.
"Come on, now. This village was the one that was saved. This is the only way I can thank you. I'm the one who feels sorry."
Morris moved away from Philia and extended his right hand to Ritz.
"We're the ones who are sorry for being helped."
Ritz shook his hand in return. Next was Franz, and finally, Anna.
"Thank you, Ritz-kun, Franz-kun, Anna-chan. Stay safe and do your best."
Waving goodbye to Morris and Philia with a smile, the three of them left the Goddess's Palm Inn. Anna continued to wave vigorously, filled with gratitude, until the two of them were out of sight. Eventually, Anna looked up at Ritz with a light skip in her step.
"Ritz, they were such nice people!"
Anna must have been incredibly happy to have been treated so kindly at the first inn she had ever stayed at.
"They were."
Anna happily waved at the people passing by who were seeing them off. When they finally reached the village-run herb shop, the village chief was already waiting with the herbs packed. She had thought it would be a large load, but it was surprisingly compact, which was a relief. If the three of them divided it, it would likely fit in their bags.
"These are all top-quality. They're twice as effective as other herbs, so you only need to use half the amount."
The three of them nodded at the village chief's explanation.
"Also, it's not much, but please take this."
What the village chief handed over was a cloth bag filled with a large quantity of vegetables. Vegetables as a souvenir… it seemed she had a knack for ending up in these situations.
"Sorry to put you to trouble."
Shouldering the vegetable bag, Ritz bowed his head. It was heavy, but helpful. They wouldn't have to worry about going hungry for a while.
"You all helped us out a lot. I thought about giving you something else, but I didn't want to burden you with too much luggage, so please take this."
What the village chief handed them was a book about medicinal herbs.
"This book has instructions on how to use this herb, as well as other herbs, so please make good use of it."
Anna respectfully accepted the book.
"Well then, we'll be going now. Please take care, everyone."
The village chief nodded at Ritz's words.
"I shouldn't keep you. You all take care as well."
The village chief shook Anna's and Franz's hands, wishing them a safe journey and expressing his gratitude. When Ritz extended his hand, the village chief hesitated for a moment before shaking it.
Ritz felt a sense of unease at that strange hesitation, but the village chief acted as if nothing had happened, showing his usual kind smile.
"Thank you, truly. Thanks to you, all the villagers said they've found the strength to grow even better herbs next year. Be careful on your journey."
"You take care too, Chief."
At Ritz's words, the village chief looked as if he wanted to say something, but he quickly suppressed it and put on his usual smile.
For a moment, something nostalgic flashed through Ritz's mind, but he couldn't remember where it came from.
But this was no time for sentimentality.
While the village chief and the three of them were having this exchange, a large crowd of people had gathered and begun to pray for their gratitude and future safety. In no time, it became a huge commotion.
They didn't think they had done anything particularly special, but from the townspeople's perspective, they were heroes. The more they were thanked, the more embarrassed they felt, and they started to want to hide somewhere.
For the three of them, it was a two-birds-one-stone situation where they had repaid the people who had helped them and also secured their travel funds, but at this rate, it was as if they had accomplished something incredible.
The three of them's steps towards the Traveler's Highway unknowingly quickened. If they were revered any more than this, they would be too embarrassed to know what to do. In the meantime, more and more villagers appeared to bid them farewell. It might have been better to act like heroes and be dignified, but they were not in the mood to take on such an attitude.
After all, they had forgotten to buy medicinal herbs, rushed to the village, been saved, and then made their travel funds with the money they had extorted from the merchants.
Finally, at the outskirts of the village where the crowd of villagers had thinned, the three of them let out a big sigh.
"That was embarrassing."
Anna also looked troubled, scratching her cheek and smiling shyly.
"You can say that again."
"Yeah."
The three of them looked at each other and laughed.
"We can't be heroes, personality-wise."
Anna and Franz also nodded at Ritz's pathetic comment. 'Not cut out for it' was the perfect description for them.
"Alright, let's set our sights on the Royal Capital once again."
Ritz shouldered his luggage and gazed at the still-unseen destination far ahead. Naturally, Anna and Franz also looked in that direction. At the end of this road was their first destination.
"Well, shall we go?"
"Yeah."
"Yay, the sea!"
Just as they were about to take a step, they turned around at a desperate voice calling out from behind them.
"Wait, Ritz-kun!"
Running towards them was the village chief. He was out of breath as he finally reached them. Had he forgotten to say something? Come to think of it, when they parted just now, he had seemed a little different.
The three of them patiently waited for the village chief to catch his breath. Finally, with his breathing settled, the village chief said in a small voice.
"I was hesitant. I thought it would be better not to say anything, but I really wanted to."
Something was bothering him. It was so close he could almost touch it, but he couldn't remember, which was frustrating. To this Ritz, the village chief, with a determined look on his face, continued, word by word.
"But I didn't know if that was a good thing. I've changed too much, and you, big brother, haven't changed at all."
The village chief's eyes were looking straight at Ritz. Their gazes met.
"Big brother…?"
The village chief looked at the muttering Ritz as if he were looking at something dazzling. That face… he had thought it before, but it really did feel nostalgic.
"Chief, have we met before?"
The village chief nodded. The hazy memory felt like it was gradually becoming clearer.
"Ritz-niichan. It was good to see you again after forty years. At that time too, I told myself I shouldn't hold you back, but I ended up holding you back, didn't I?"
At the village chief's words, Ritz stared at him intently. Forty years ago… come to think of it, he had helped a boy who was crying after losing a fight in this village.
'Why are you being bullied?'
'I don't know. They say I'm a weakling even though I'm the village chief's son.'
A scene from the past came back to him.
'So, you're going to be the village chief in the future?'
'…Yeah.'
That boy's name was Nors…
"…You're Nors? That…"
"That's right, niichan."
At that time, Ritz had just started his journey. He was even more ignorant of the world than Anna was now, and he was a hopeless travel beginner who didn't know about money or how society worked.
He had come to this village because it was the herb shipping season and there seemed to be work.
While looking for a job, Ritz met Nors. The small, weak boy who looked up to the unreliable Ritz, who had just started his journey, calling him 'niichan,' and followed him around for the few days he was in the village. That boy had now grown up and was standing before Ritz as the village chief.
"I see… you've grown up."
When they parted, at this very spot, Nors had cried and held Ritz back.
'Don't go, niichan! Stay in this village forever!!'
Ritz knelt before the crying, shouting boy Nors and gently patted his head.
'Men don't cry so easily. It's okay, we'll meet again. When you get stronger at fighting, I'll come see you again.'
But the promise was never kept, and moreover, he had completely forgotten about it until now. After that, Ritz, due to his ignorance of the world, came close to death, and thanks to that, he met a friend he could trust from the bottom of his heart.
In the midst of his friendship with that friend, Ritz forgot about Nors. His surroundings were changing so rapidly that the encounter of a few days had faded away.
And yet, Nors had remembered him all this time. It was only for a few days, but for him, it was a memory of a lifetime.
Time flows. The long time that passed while he had closed his heart flowed equally for everyone.
"So, when you said you had met a member of the spirit clan once before…"
To Anna, who asked from the side of the stunned Ritz, the village chief nodded gently, tears welling in his eyes.
"Of course, it was him. When I realized he had forgotten, I thought I shouldn't say anything, but then I thought I might not see him again, so I just blurted it out."
Nors, who smiled shyly, also smiled sadly.
"If you come again in forty years, niichan, I won't be in this world anymore. So I wanted to say thank you one last time. And that I became the village chief."
At those words, Ritz looked up. Looking at the village chief's face, Ritz smiled as if he were speaking to the old Nors and asked.
"Did you get stronger at fighting?"
"I found many better things than fighting, niichan."
The village chief smiled shyly, like a young boy. To Ritz, that smile overlapped with the Nors of the past.
"I see… you're right."
For a moment, he smiled at Nors, then turned his body towards the Traveler's Highway. Nostalgia, happiness that he was remembered, and guilt for having forgotten.
And… the pain that he was the only one who hadn't changed at all passed through his heart.
"Do your best, Nors."
"Thank you. You take care too, niichan."
Without looking back, Ritz started walking down the Traveler's Highway.
"Hey, wait up, Ritz!"
Franz and Anna, who had been listening blankly to their exchange with surprised faces, hurriedly chased after Ritz, not wanting to be left behind.
"Come on, or I'll leave you behind!"
"Okay!"
Towards their destination, the journey of the three begins once again.
An aside.
--A few weeks later, at Orphe's house on the outskirts of Saradio.
"Oops, did I sell the wrong thing again?"
Orphe gave a shy laugh and looked at the tool the Saradio merchant had brought.
Inside was, of course, the crystal bottle and stake set. And a letter of scolding from his one and only beloved apprentice, Franz.
*Master Orphe,
Please sort your important items properly.
Be careful not to sell them under any circumstances!
For the most part, you are too sloppy, Master.
This is what happens when you don't separate what you need from what you don't.
Do you have any idea how much trouble you caused people?
Please make sure this never happens again! Franz*
"Oh my, did I make Franz angry?"
Orphe laughed happily to himself.
This concludes the second volume of the series. Did you enjoy it?
In the next volume, 'Protect the Mysterious Treasure,' a great commotion started by Anna's meddling develops into a town-wide incident, continuing the same slapstick comedy as always.
The wacky journey of these three will continue. I would be honored if you enjoy it.
Next time will be Episode 2.5, 'Charge! The Roadside Dinner 1,' which was included as a bonus book with the third volume when the doujinshi was published. It's a comedy about them just cooking and eating, so please enjoy.