Kochugunshikan Boukensha ni Naru

Translator: SFBaka

That was amazing! The flame arrow released by Cleria wasn’t a normal one, but something with a homing feature added in. I can’t believe Cleria managed to do that!

Nah, that’s a bit rude of me. I’m sure she managed to achieve it through her meditation earlier to solidify her image. That’s pretty impressive. I didn’t even think of doing that. Seems I was unknowingly bound by common sense as well before I noticed. I’ll have to learn from this experience.

Beck was surprised when Cleria suddenly cast a spell and stopped the carriage. Cleria and I went down the carriage and retrieved the rabbit. It was a nice, round and plump rabbit. Rabbit meat was quite gamey, so I’ll have to drain its blood right away.

Beck and Thor again made a huge fuss. Cleria was again keeping her “cool and collected” act. Her lips were twitching in a half-smile though. Anyway, we got ourselves some dinner!

The carriage drove on until it was close to evening, and Beck finally stopped when we arrived at a place that looked like the camping spot he mentioned earlier. It was a clearing right next to the highway. There was a small stream of water trickling down from a rock wall nearby, forming a pool below. This seemed to be a good place to camp for people who can’t use magic to create their own water.

“Let’s rest here for the night. There’s no other place to set up camp out here,” Beck suggested.

“Alright. I’ll go and prepare then. Keep a lookout, Ria.”

“Understood.”

Collecting firewood for the bonfire was easy because we were in the middle of the mountains. I’m gonna go collect some more. I managed to finish the task without much issue.

“What kind of food did you pack, Beck?”

Let’s check the food items out for the time being.

“All the food’s in this bag.”

I was handed a rather large bag. It was packed quite full. The items were dried meat, lots of bread, potos, the salad leaves called “sappa”, other assorted vegetables, salt and dried herbs.

There was no problem with the amount. But I wanted to avoid using preserved food as much as possible.

“Are you going to cook, Alan-san?” Thor asked as he drew near. Beck was busy unloading some of the luggage.

“Yeah. I like cooking a lot. If you guys are okay with it, allow me to prepare tonight’s dinner.”

“Then I’ll help out as well. Shall I start preparing the rabbit? The folks back home said I had quite the knack for it.”

“That sounds great. I’ll leave that to you then.”

Tonight’s menu was rabbit meat stir-fried with potos and other assorted veggies as well as rabbit meat sandwiches. I’d like to eat the bread before it hardens up after all.

I’ll use up all the rabbit meat. If there would be some leftovers, I’ll just save them for breakfast tomorrow.

Let’s start by washing the vegetables. Thor had already started butchering the rabbit. Looks like he wasn’t kidding when he said he was good at it.

“How do you want me to cut the meat?”

“Slice them as small enough to be eaten in one bite. I’m planning to let you guys finish it all tonight.”

Rabbit meat’s almost entirely of the red variety. Therefore, there’s no meaning to separate it into various parts.

“Amazing! It’s gonna be a feast tonight as well. I never imagined I’d get to eat a lot of meat again so soon!”

I also helped with cutting up the meat, because the rabbit was fairly large. I wonder if this is enough to satisfy Cleria’s appetite.

I put the meat in a large pot and seasoned it. The seasonings I used were plenty of garlic, herbs, salt, and pepper. Since rabbit meat had a strong smell, I had to use plenty of flavorings to counteract it.

“Where do you want me to put the fur, Alan-san?”

“Isn’t it fine if you just throw the fur?”

“Eh, but that’s such a waste. This is such a fine rabbit’s fur. You can definitely sell it for some money. Well, it might not sell for very much though.”

Nah, no thank you. I don’t know how to prepare fur after all.

“Then I’ll just give it to you, Thor.”

“Great! Thank you very much!”

I wanted us to have dinner early, but Beck requested a sword practice session. Thor also joined in as well.

“Can I ask you to teach them the basics, Ria? I’ll leave them to you.”

The two young men seemed to be in agreement. Looks like they were really impressed by Cleria’s performance today. Cleria didn’t seem against teaching them as well. She nodded in agreement and made a stance.

The two young men had prepared their own wooden swords. Cleria first taught them about the proper way of gripping one’s sword. The sword practice session continued for about an hour. Looks like their sword handling skills did improve a bit compared to before.

Since it was getting dark now, I guess it’s time to have dinner. The meat should have already absorbed plenty of flavor from the seasonings.

The two young men raised a cheer after Cleria lit up the makeshift outdoor hearth that was already pre-made and placed in the middle of the clearing with fire magic.

I first fried the potos in a large frying pan brought by Beck. After frying it for some time, I put in the meat next.

When the meat started to brown, I proceeded to add the other vegetables. I want to preserve the crisp texture of the veggies after all. With this, the dish is complete.

I served a large helping of the dish on a large wooden plate brought out by Beck. It turned out a lot more than I expected. Alright folks, dig in!

Everyone placed some of the food on each of their plates. I proceeded to heat up the bread which has been cut up into two halves on the frying pan.

The three of them stared curiously at what I was doing. After the bread got slightly burnt at the edges, I removed them from the pan immediately. They’ve managed to soak up plenty of oil and were looking great.

I placed some sappa leaves on the warmed bread and poured plenty of meat in between. With this, the rabbit meat sandwich is complete. I placed a sandwich on each of our plates.

Oops. I nearly forgot to boil some water for the tea as well.

Alright! Let’s get to eating! I’ll start with the stir-fried meat. Yep, it’s tasty. Rabbit meat is also a type of red meat like the Big Boar’s, so it was plenty delicious.

A large amount of garlic, herbs, and pepper managed to eliminate the gamey smell of the meat. Looks like marinating the meat with them managed to do the trick.

Next is the sandwiches; a combination of lightly toasted fluffy bread which soaked up plenty of flavorful oil from the frying pan, crispy sappa leaves and tasty stir-fried meat. It was, of course, delicious.

Everyone else ate like crazy. Looks like they really liked the dishes.

Looks like even Cleria didn’t manage to finish the food this time around. A good amount of stir-fried meat remained. Let’s have it for breakfast tomorrow.

I made some after-meal green tea from the leaves Zack packed with him.

“Man! That was delicious, Alan!”

“Did you use a lot of salt and pepper? It’s my first time eating such a fancy dish!” Thor inquired.

Yeah. It seems salt and pepper were valuable commodities. Speaking of which, they didn’t use much pepper in the village’s food, so the taste was a bit on the lighter side.

“Yeah. I’m glad you guys liked it.”

“Course we did. That was great! Why don’t you open a shop when you get to the city?”

“Cooking’s just my hobby. I don’t want it to be my main occupation.”

“Okay. But can you continue cooking for us during the trip?”

“That’s fine, I don’t mind.”

“Aw yeah!”

Beck and Thor loudly cheered. It’s already well into the night. Shall we go to bed now so we can wake up early tomorrow?

“Go ahead and rest up, you two. We’ll keep watch.”

“But…”

“It’s fine. We’re your escorts anyway. We’re just doing our job.”

“Understood. Thanks.”

I told Cleria I’d be able to detect if something is amiss and wake up using my magic, so she proceeded to sleep without worries as well.

With this, the first day of our journey ended without much trouble.