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Chapter 210 – Day 41 of Management Life
Today, I borrowed Lipa’s broom again to practice levitation magic.
I can float if I use a broom inscribed with a magic circle, but I can’t without it.
“Humans just aren’t built to float, I guess.”
I can float in water, but not in the air. It must be the water pressure.
I tried infusing the air with magic and pushing my body in all directions, but I only felt a slight pinching. Nothing happened.
“That’s weird.”
Chel, under the devil’s curse, was flying.
She had wings, but they didn’t seem to flap fast enough to lift a person’s weight. You’d have to flap your wings at an insane speed for that. If that were the case, then Chel must have been flying through the air using magic.
“Hey, is Chel building a dragon ranch right now?”
I asked Kahiman, who was nearby. He was using magic rotation to scrape moss off the shell of a Haze Turtle from the swamps. Must be a hobby.
“Probably.”
I guess I’ll have to ask Chel myself.
“Heyyy, breakfast’s ready!”
Katan called to us from the top of the slope.
We rose early and transported supplies to Midgard. A considerable amount of provisions had accumulated in the room deep within the cave where a teleportation magic circle was drawn. It was about time the monsters began preparing for the giant magical beast as well.
“Today, we have bread with dried fruit, steak from the field boars in the east, marsh fish baked with herbs, and root vegetable soup.”
“Are you planning to feed us five steaks for breakfast?”
Katan’s meals have huge portions. But everything is delicious.
“That’s right. Makyo-san, are you eating?”
“The cooking, the saltiness, how filling it is—everything’s perfect. Seriously, Katan should open a restaurant in the demonic land.”
“The demonic land has great ingredients. You can experiment endlessly, and anyone can make delicious food here.”
“Not true. I lived here for months and only ever grilled meat.”
At that, the two dwarves stopped working.
“Oh, right. Makyo-san hasn’t even been in the demonic land for a year.”
“I almost forgot.”
“You two will be just like me in half a year anyway.”
“No way.”
“No way.”
Apparently, I’m different from them. I don’t think I’m that different. The only thing setting me apart is my title as margrave. But titles don’t mean much in the demonic land.
“How do people actually make a living off their titles?”
Living in the demonic land means there’s always too much to do. You can’t just boss people around and live a carefree life.
“I don’t know. I’m satisfied just eating what I like right now.”
“Titles don’t fill your stomach, do they?”
“True.”
For now, let’s focus on eating delicious food.
After the meal, I finish cleaning up and take them both north.
As usual, Katan gathers berries and herbs, testing them for poison. She’s recently gotten better at knowing if plants are poisonous without needing to do a patch test.
“I can tell because the plants around here are different. Of course, even dangerous-looking mushrooms can be eaten if processed properly. But poisonous mushrooms can taste better, so it’s tricky.” Oh, look, that wolf.”
A wolf with sharp, sword-like fur staggered around right in front of us.
“That one’s probably poisoned by mushrooms. Its nose is messed up, too. It hasn’t realized that it can’t find any mushrooms.”
“Food really is important. Treating poisoning is harder than dealing with simple injuries, isn’t it?”
“That’s right. What do you think? Do you want the wolf’s pelt?”
Katan pulled out a small knife.
“Nah, we’ve got plenty of pelts stockpiled in the warehouse. More importantly, can you hunt monsters now, Katan?”
“Easy ones like that, yeah. But I can’t hunt like Makyo-san or Kahiman.”
Kahiman replied, “That’s not quite right.”
“Makyo-san thinks about what kind of meat to eat, but I think about how to get close to the monster. Even though we’re both hunting, we think about different things.”
“True… Now that you mention it, maybe you’re right…”
There might be almost no monsters I can’t hunt in the demonic land. Even flying ones, I figure, I could just throw rocks to bring them down.
“Makyo-san, are there any monsters you can’t hunt?”
“Well, there probably are. I think there are…”
My confidence was fading. Maybe I can hunt anything as long as it’s a monster.
“Dungeons are impossible.”
My dungeon clings to my body like armor. Its core location is easy to find, so it’s not that I can’t hunt it; there’s just no point. The dungeon attached to me grows day by day.
“I wonder…”
Kahiman wasn’t convinced.
“I can’t hunt the green tiger and its cubs that live near the entrance either. They act like gatekeepers.”
“Isn’t that just because monsters with roles are harder to hunt?”
“Ah, maybe you’re right.”
I plan to use the dungeon for experiments eventually.
“Wait a minute. If all useless monsters look like meat to me, then I’m a pretty dangerous guy.”
“Yeah.”
The two dwarves nodded simultaneously.
“I see. I need to be more aware of that.”
After that, whenever I saw monsters passing by or birds flying overhead, I didn’t think about how delicious their meat would be. Instead, I ran while thinking about their potential usefulness. Some monsters might be surprisingly useful.
Lost in thought, I continued north and arrived at the dragon’s new home in front of the magic stone mine.
“Wh-what? What are you doing here? You came to help, right? All right, dig up a bit of the mountain for me.”
Sylvia gave me orders immediately upon meeting me.
“Makyo, you’re just in time. Cut down the trees around here. They’ll get in the way when the dragon lands.”
“It looks like you came to pass the time, but not working isn’t an option, you know. Did you figure out what’s at the end of the earth vein after all?”
They sized up whether the man before them would be useful. They probably never even thought of me as the Margrave.
“The earth vein extends northeast to an iron mine and sinks into the sea. It looked like you could sneak into the Elven Kingdom, but I stopped there. Sylvia, what are you planning to do by digging into the mountain? Hm, think about where to put the cut wood.”
“Oh, right. You did mention that. Iron, huh? That means it could be useful for repairing magical devices, right?”
“D-dragons, obviously. I tried creating a volcanic zone in the mine dungeon, but the dragons just won’t settle there.
“Use the trunks for lumber, the branches for bow materials, and the leaves as kindling. Just leave them where they are after cutting them down. Let’s use everything efficiently.”
“Got it.”
When I started working, the two dwarves looked at me like I was strange.
“Yeah, you’re definitely strange.”
“Makyo-san, you were just talking to three people at once.”
“Oh, right. Hey, you three shouldn’t talk to me all at once! It startles the dwarves!”
“””Hey!”””
A clueless reply came back in unison.
“Sorry. They’re a bunch of weirdos. Cut them some slack.”
“””You’re the weirdo!”””
I ignored the women and straightened my posture as the Sealing Clan had taught me. I sliced through the wood with magic drawn from my fingers. About five branches fell off at once.
“Watch out! It’s falling!”
I didn’t forget to shout the warning. After asking the dwarves to clear the branches, we headed into the mountains.
Referencing the blueprint, I used magic cubes to dig holes into the mountain cliff. Sylvia’s blueprint was surprisingly well drawn. Since she crafts weapons, she might be skilled at translating mental images onto paper.
“Are you planning to turn the entire mountain into a dragon’s nest?”
“Y-yeah. Since the earth’s veins run underground, it should be comfortable for dragons.”
“I see.”
“I-it seems the floor indentations are important, too.”
“You’re doing ecological research.”
In the hole I dug, Chel made indentations tailored for dragons.
“Ah, right. Chel, teach me how to fly. That’s why I came.”
“Huh!? That sounds like something a kid who wants to be a magician would say. I can’t fly without magic tools, you know.”
“But you could fly when you transformed into a devil, right?”
“Now that you mention it, yeah. Hold on, I’ll just finish the hollow.”
Sylvia, Chel, and I hurriedly built the dragon’s nest.
After lunch, I told Chel about my recent trials and errors.
“It’s strange that bodies float in water but not in air. Plus, the ancient Yggdrasil people could even make entire islands float.”
“True, but weight doesn’t disappear, you know.”
The walnut bread with jam made from cam berries was ridiculously delicious and served as a snack, making our discussion and experiments progress smoothly.
As the sun began to set, Chel started flying through the air, hands empty.
“In the end, the initial action is crucial, huh?”
According to Chel, this initial action involves temporarily bringing the water inside your body to the surface of your skin. This recreates an underwater environment, generating buoyancy.
“That’s crazy. Wouldn’t gathering moisture with water magic be faster?”
“Maybe it would.”
I tried gathering the moisture around me, creating a simple bath, and experiencing buoyancy. After that, I just needed to manipulate the buoyancy with magic.
Fluff.
To an observer, it would appear as if the water around my body was suddenly floating, concealed by my clothes.
Once you grasp that initial buoyancy, you can control the direction with magical manipulation. With practice, anyone could probably fly through the air.
“But wait. If you create a water sphere and grab the buoyancy on your arms, wouldn’t you be able to fly?”
“Really? It can’t be that easy…”
I plunged my arm into the water sphere that Chel had created and felt the buoyancy. Using magic to interfere with that buoyancy caused me to float effortlessly into the air. The key was probably not being afraid and letting your body flow in the direction it was carried.
“Once again, you’re effortlessly recreating magic that only existed in ancient Yggdrasil.”
“Well, to witness magic being created in the moment…”
Hel was stunned. Since she should be able to use magic now, I should let her practice, too.
“So, in the end, you were practicing this levitation magic just to make moving around easier?”
“Well. You can’t just drag a giant magical beast across the ground to get it into Cliff Garuda’s ‘Great Hole,’ can you?”
“Ah!”
Everyone present nodded in understanding.
“Huh!? Makyo-san and Chel-san are floating in the air!”
“Without using any magic tools!? How!?”
Suddenly, Jennifer and Lipa appeared from the forest. They were probably checking the transport route from the magic stone mine.
They stared at us with their mouths agape for a moment.
Chel and I could now fly through the air without wings or magic tools. However, that didn’t mean anything had changed in the demonic land.
Still, the logs written by Katan and Kahiman seem to have noted: “The Margrave of the demonic land speaks three times as much, works three times as hard, and floats in the air.”
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