kscans

Chapter 47 - A Knitter's Tale. Leather Pants

Yuri joyfully wore his new sweater and went out under the winter sky, but his warm upper body made the coldness of his lower half all the more apparent, and he soon gave up and retreated back into his house. The material of the clothes Yuri was wearing was Mao. A material similar to ramie or linen from Earth. It had a crisp feel that was comfortable in summer, but it was not a material one would want to wear for long under a winter sky.

"That said, I have no way of getting cotton... I might be able to get some if I go to town, but I don't have the funds for that..."

In the end, Yuri decided to give up on going to town, at least until he could stockpile enough food to be used for trade. In that case, he had no choice but to make do with what he had. However, knit pants...

"Rejected."

That was out of the question. The makeshift Ulvac fur vest he had made had been surprisingly comfortable, so he also considered making fur pants, but...

"I have the skin of the Monocorn Bear left over after plucking the fur..."

Could he tan that and make leather pants? However, as he had worried before, leather is a stiff material compared to cloth. There was a risk that his movements would be restricted until it was broken in.

"Hmm... I'll try making a prototype by tanning the leather... but my main plan will be woven wool pants."

He had the materials for another Monocorn Bear in his [Storage], and he had other bear-type monster materials as well. For some reason, monsters would charge at him the moment they saw him. The number of individuals he had hunted in self-defense had accumulated to a considerable number in the last six months alone. In addition, monsters were generally large in stature. The amount of material that could be obtained from a single one was also correspondingly large.

"Yeah. Woven wool fabric will probably take time, so I'll start by tanning the hide first."

Tanning a hide is not a task that can be completed overnight. Normally, it would be necessary to perform tasks such as pre-treating it by soaking it in limewater, then soaking it in a mud-like solution to carry out a fermentation process, and then further soaking it in a tannin solution in sequence. However, Yuri's unique skill, `Rural Life Guide`, contained several secret techniques to substitute these troublesome processes with magic, and basic magic at that. Yuri had used these secret techniques to quickly complete the processing of pelts and the pre-treatment when spinning fur into thread. And in this hide tanning process as well, these secret techniques would play a major role.

"Hmm... when I processed the Ulvac pelt, I could use a secret technique that applied the life magic [Cleanse]... but for full-scale tanning, it's different..."

Incidentally, for processing pelts using the application of the life magic [Cleanse], basic water magic and light magic were also required.

"The secret technique for tanning hides is... huh... it uses corrosive dark magic, purifying light magic, and cleansing water magic... it really feels like a secret technique..."

In this way, Yuri proceeded with the tanning process in a manner that an ordinary craftsman would never do. It could be said that this was something unique to Yuri. Yuri had received these magics at a high level from God at the time of his reincarnation. He had been using them for half a year, although in a manner quite different from their general use, and as a result, they had all reached a decent level. Not only was their power, backed by his ridiculously large magic power, considerable, but he was also accustomed to precise control from having used them for processing work. It was only because he was such a person that such secret-technique-like work was possible. So, what about craftsmen other than Yuri? In general, there were hardly any craftsmen who had light magic, dark magic, and water magic all together, and such individuals made a living as magicians. As a result, the secret-technique-like tanning method that Yuri was doing was either unknown to anyone or had been lost to time.

"It's become soft, but... is this really okay...?"

The material, which had been softly processed as a result of a series of tasks, was properly displayed as "tanned leather" by [Appraisal], indicating that the tanning process had been completed without any problems. All that was left was to cut this and sew it.

"It's softer than I thought... but it's not very comfortable to wear. It's waterproof, but its effectiveness as insulation is unknown... I really need to hurry up and make some woven wool cloth."

After all was said and done, the woven wool pants were completed ten days after he started spinning the new thread.