WE TRIED TRANSLATIONS
Translator: Abood
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◈ The Saviour Embarks on a Nameless Journey
Chapter 31: Mud Dumplings
I draped my cloak over Alina and listened to her steady breathing.
Her cheeks were still soft and round with childhood. Beside her, Io already had the kind of face one might compare to porcelain, but the slender line of her neck still gave away her youth.
Hero, witch, priest, swordsman. Myself, Marius, and Io were already set. As for Alina, I’d known she bore the qualities of a hero, as well as the swordsmanship I carried. If possible, I’d wanted her to inherit the latter, to become a swordsman like me. But with the goddess’s descent and her words, the matter was decided.
A hero is also a vessel for the gods.
I’d wished they could remain children to be protected a while longer, but that morning’s reproach still echoed in me. They said there would be no Demon King subjugation this generation, yet—
“......”
Marius stirred.
He pressed his fingers neatly together to the space between his brows, as if fighting off a wave of dizziness.
“What’s wrong?”
Most likely he had been forced into sleep by the goddess, and for a moment lost track of where he was and what he had been doing.
I could guess as much, but I left the thought unspoken.
“No… I’ll be resting now.”
Still looking unconvinced, Marius put away his cards and set up his bedding.
It had probably been a long while since he’d camped outdoors, yet he did so with practiced ease.
“Pyaa.”
“Aye. We should sleep as well.”
I leaned against the trunk of a tree, cradling my sword, and Pyaa against my stomach as I drifted off.
The next morning.
“Grandfather…”
“My apologies. For a lady to present herself in such a state…”
Alina and Io, still lying down, trembled slightly as they spoke.
“It was your first night outdoors. Can’t be helped.”
Having never spent the night anywhere but a soft bed, the two seemed unable to rise, their bodies sore all over.
They both slept so neatly, barely turning in their sleep. Perhaps they’d even gone a bit numb.
“If I cast a recovery spell, they’d be fine immediately. But since this will happen again, it’s better to let them get used to it.”
“True enough. Wouldn’t do to need magic every single morning just to get out of bed.”
I agreed with Marius.
“That level of magic doesn’t even count as real use,” Io said.
“Perhaps. But if you’re in enemy territory, using magic can reveal your location.”
Marius cautioned her as she moved to cast the spell.
“Stretch yourselves bit by bit, get the blood flowing. Once you can move properly, then you can use magic. Marius himself used recovery spells constantly until he got used to it.”
Marius averted his eyes at my words.
It was only because they lacked experience. But rather than curing every ache at once, it was important to know how to recover without magic, as there would be times when spells couldn’t be relied on.
And it was good to learn how the body responded to different actions, to know one’s own limits.
Breakfast was smoked eggs, bread, and cheese, with soup made from finely chopped boar fat and edible greens gathered nearby.
As for the smoked eggs, Pyaa had tried to beg for other food, so I confiscated his share for the morning.
“Now then, let’s be off.”
Mounting our magic horses, we set out along the highway.
“You’re scattering seeds, aren’t you? Is that really alright?”
Alina looked up at me from between my arms.
Today she was riding together with me. Since we were on a journey together, sometimes it was nice to share the saddle.
“Aye. If even a few of these vegetable seeds take root, that’s good enough. The rest will serve as food for birds and beasts.”
“Though it looks like we’re just tossing them around, quite a lot of them actually take root this way.”
Marius added, flinging seeds wide into the forest on the opposite side of the road.
It was a careless and simple method, yet travelers with the luxury of time often sowed vegetable seeds along the roadside like this.
“The greens we ate in the soup this morning were from radish leaves.”
“Radish? They looked so different from what I saw in books,” Io said, puzzled, turning her gaze toward me.
“With proper care, the leaves grow straighter and upward, larger and cleaner. But wild radishes in the forest spread flat across the ground like dandelions. The roots are tough and stringy, and the edible part ends up thin and hardly recognizable as radish at all.”
Still, having something safe to eat along the journey was no small thing.
“Here now, there are seeds even more likely to take root. Try tossing these. Yhe farther, the better.”
They were small mud dumplings with seeds sealed inside. Wrapped in earth, the seeds were less likely to be eaten by small animals before sprouting.
“Yes!”
Alina happily took the bag of mud dumplings.
I glanced over and saw Marius handing a bag of seeds to Io as well, with a look that said he was conveniently passing off the troublesome task.
“What kind of seeds are these?”
“Lettuce.”
“Please grow up tasty, Miss Lettuce.”
Smiling, Alina made her wish to the mud dumpling resting on her palm, then threw it into the forest.
As expected. Or rather, beyond expectation, she threw with a force that would put many adults to shame. Where Io’s mud ball arced gently and landed with a rustle nearby, Alina’s shot straight through the trees, even tearing leaves from branches along its path.
Wait a minute… if that hits a tree head-on, won’t the mud ball just shatter? …I was the one who told her to throw it as far as she could, but still.
Footnotes:
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