Survival in Another World with My Mistress!, Volume 3, page 15
“…Good job, Lime.”
If I’d run into Bess or Poiso first, I doubted they’d have carelessly chomped on the gizma meat and proclaimed how delicious it was. First impressions really were everything. If the first time I encountered the slime girls was as they were turning Holy Kingdom soldiers into mincemeat, I probably wouldn’t have been this chill around them either. Lime’s “delish” moment did a lot to lower my guard.
“We’ve arrived,” Poiso said.
“Oh, for real?”
Just ahead of us was a wide open space, and I could hear the sound of running water. What was this place? It just barely had the smell of sewer water.
“This is the castle’s underground sewer,” she said. “One of the septic tanks.”
“But the water looks pretty clean to me, even if it smells a little bit off.”
“Courtesy of yours truly.”
“Nice.”
As we talked, Poiso lowered part of her body into the tank. My light didn’t reach down there, so I couldn’t see what her body was doing underwater, but by the look on her face and the way she was tilting her head, she seemed to be searching for something.
“What’s up?”
“Lots of things are washed down here from the castle,” she explained. “And there’s a fair bit of metal in there.”
“Oooh.”
“If we wanted to, we could melt it down, but it’s a pain in the butt. That’s why we try to catch as much of it as we can in these tanks so that it doesn’t affect the flow. Once enough of it has built up, we absorb it all in one go.”
“Like the junk pile Bess showed me.”
“Precisely. Ever since the Holy Kingdom took over, their waste management has been awful. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve looked at their trash and thought, ‘why would you throw this away?’”
“Such as?”
“Tax forms, suspicious delivery records, even human and demi-human corpses.”
“Whoa. That’s awful.”
They were throwing away some awful stuff… And none of it should get dumped into a sewer, dammit!
Just then, Poiso pulled something up from the water. It was a hard-to-describe brown clump of…something. Poiso must have compressed it into a block shape while she was fishing it out.
“What is that?”
“Something metal that sank to the bottom of the tank.”
“Huh.” I considered it. “Can I even use this…?”
“Give it a try.”
“Might as well, right? Can’t know unless I give it a shot.”
When I put it into my inventory, it was labeled Bog Iron Ore. Bog? Er, this wasn’t a bog. It was a septic tank. But since it displayed as ore, Bog Iron must be a type. I’d be the first to admit my ignorance when it comes to all that stuff… Come to think of it, I’d heard of metals forming at the bottom of lakes, ponds, and swamps. Although that stuff was definitely formed through a different process than this, it had to be kinda the same thing. And one of the slime girls was involved, so it made no sense for me to try and use my old world common sense.
“What’s the matter?” Poiso asked.
“Oh, it’s nothing. I think I can use this, so could you grab more?”
“All right. Just leave the lifting to me.”
Poiso whistled as she fished up brown clump after brown clump, like it was the catch of the day, and I loaded each unidentifiable clump of so-called ore into my inventory. Was this stuff gonna smell when I melted it down? That was a little worrying.
The actual process of procuring the stuff was done in about thirty minutes. I had quite a lot, but it was impossible to say how much iron I was going to get from it all. I asked Poiso if she’d gotten absolutely everything out of the water.
“Yes,” she said. “But if you’d like, there are three other tanks. They’re much farther away, though.”
“I see… If this isn’t enough, I’ll have to look into going out there.”
“All right, are we going home then?”
“Yeah. I want to hurry and give this stuff a try,” I said.
“What are you making next?”
“Let’s see… Parts to upgrade my workbench and smithing station first. After that, I want to make some weapons. Not like I’m gonna be able to make the bowstring I’d need for a crossbow, so a gun might be the best option here.”
“What is…a gun?” Poiso asked.
“Oh, it’s a weapon from my old world.”
On our way back to the slime girls’ room, I told her about the world I came from. I had mentioned making weapons and such when I told the girls about the Liberation Army, but hadn’t gone into much detail. Since Poiso was so interested, I figured that I might as well give her a full rundown.
Poiso was a tremendously good listener, so it just felt good talking to her.
***
It turned out that the bog iron ore was an incredibly useful material. The thing was that it was pretty low-quality, or at least after melting it down, it wasn’t just iron, but also copper, silver, gold, lead, and zinc. That kind of thing would usually lead to a few problems. For normal people. In my case, though, I had no issue using low-quality ore. I used my furnace to exchange it all for various resources, which allowed me to use each metal individually. Meaning my pool of options had just exploded. Perfect.
“I should be all set for iron,” I announced after I finished processing the materials.
“I’m glad to hear it.” Poiso smiled. She’d been concerned about whether the ore would be usable or not.
Just then, Bess came home lugging an overstuffed bag.
“I’m home! I’ve brought you whetstones!”
Bess placed the bag on the stone floor and began pulling out whetstones, leather horse saddles from who knew where, looped leather straps, clean cloth, and a whole lot of other stuff.
“This stuff is incredible,” I said, looking over it all. “Where did you get this from?”
“The Holy Kingdom’s barracks, stables, and smithing workshop.”
“You stole it all?”
“I’d prefer if you called it taking back what’s ours,” said Bess. “They’re the ones who stole the castle and all its things in the first place.”
It had been twenty years, so I thought the whetstones and saddles were probably things the Holy Kingdom brought in, but whatever. No point sweating the details.
“I should be able to make an even better workbench now. Thanks, Bess.”
“I can’t do this sort of thing often, so please keep that in mind.”
“You got it.”
If Bess did this sort of thing all the time, the Holy Kingdom would eventually wise up. Although we could cause a pretty nasty disturbance in the process…
Ah, but Cuvi would probably notice any large-scale sort of theft. He probably already knew I’d escaped.
“Did anyone see you?” I asked Bess.
“Not that I’m aware of,” she said. “Normally when we’re spotted, things get crazy.”
I hope Cuvi hadn’t noticed… He was never one to let his guard down, that guy. I decided to plan my next moves under the assumption that he knew what’s up. Anyway, Bess did an incredible job. I couldn’t use the saddles as saddles, but I could break them down for materials.
There was one other thing I couldn’t use as is.
“So, hm.” I took the gold I’d extracted from the ore, turned it into an ingot, and played with it in my hand. “Gold’s pretty worthless right now…” It was heavy and soft, so it might work pretty well as ammunition, but that was getting into hobby territory. Piercing gold rounds would be kinda cool, though.
“So shiny!” Lime enthused as she watched me toss the ingot around.
“I heard that in the Empire, gold and silver bars are used as currency,” I said.
“Yeah, near the borders of the Empire,” said Poiso. “They even show up in the Holy Kingdom.”
“Wow… Well, even if I molded this stuff into bars, I’d still have no means of using it.”
“Hello, untrue!” Lime said. “You could go to town and go shopping!”
“No, he couldn’t…” Bess started to say, but then stopped herself. “Wait, that’s not a bad idea.”
“Huh?”
Bess agreeing with Lime’s ideas sounded like dangerous territory to me.
“I’m against the idea,” said Poiso. “It’s true that Kousuke shouldn’t be found easily if he’s properly disguised. But if he is caught, that’s it. It’s over.”
“I suppose you’re right,” Bess sighed. “But, if it’s done after he’s cooled, it should be fine. About a week… No, ten days would be enough for them to think he’s dead.”
“Er.” I waved to get their attention. “I’m not following this at all, FYI.”
“The Holy Kingdom fears us, right?” Lime sang.
“They think we’re unintelligent slimes, and that you fled into our domain, right?” Bess said.
“They know full well that we live down here, so what do you think they assume will happen to an escaped prisoner in our territory?” Poiso asked.
“They’d…think I was dead.”
“Exactly.” Poiso nodded. Bess was saying that if we waited an additional ten days, they’d be totally sure I’d been killed. Then I’d be able to go out in disguise without raising suspicion.
“But the risk is still higher than zero,” Bess admitted.
“Exactly,” said Poiso. “It’s not something Kousuke should do unless there’s something he absolutely needs.”
“Yeah,” I said. There was no point taking needless risks. “But at least we have it as an option, so I’ll make preparations just in case.”
“Sounds good,” Lime said, clearly excited at the prospect.
After giving it some thought, I decided I was safest passing myself off as a mercenary or an adventurer back from the eastern front.
“I’m a human male, after all. If I’m going to pretend to be a lone traveler, the easiest way to avoid suspicion is to stick with that.”
“You should think of a proper cover story,” Poiso said. Bess nodded thoughtfully.
“What if you’re going around looking for a position as a military officer, since you’ve raised enough money on your own?”
“That works,” said Poiso. “And with your traveling expenses just about used up, you’re exchanging the Imperial currency you saved to celebrate.”
“Sounds good to me,” I agreed.
Lime kept quiet while we hashed out my cover story. She was a bit busy being a chair… Or more precisely, she was holding me while she napped. I thought that it must be incredible, being able to change your form freely. And man, it felt like I was enveloped in overwhelming maternal energy or something.
Lime was considerably larger than me just then, and it really felt like she was being careful not to hurt me… Like she was protecting me or something.
“…”
I got the feeling that Poiso and Bess were giving me suspicious glares. But surely I must have been imagining things.
“What’s your plan for today?” Bess asked.
“Good question,” I said. “Lemme see…”
Workbench Upgrade: Machine Part × 10, Steel × 5, Leather Strap × 2
Simple Furnace Upgrade: Animal Hide × 5, Brick × 50, Whetstone × 3, Machine Part × 10
I had clay, so I could make bricks. And since Bess got me leather and whetstones, I could upgrade my simple furnace as well. Once that furnace became a smithing station, I’d be able to make iron plate screws, so then I could mod my workbench too. The problem was that it’d take time to make all the parts.
“I think I’m going to stay here for today and just work. I have everything I need, so I’m going to focus on upgrading my workbench and furnace.”
“All right,” Bess said. “Then we’ll focus on monitoring our copies from here.”
“Yup!” Poiso said. “We’ll do recon!”
Once they’d said their piece, they both closed their eyes like Lime had. It looked like they were sleeping, but it must have meant they were focused on their copies.
To avoid disturbing them, I broke free from Lime’s warm embrace and opened my furnace and workbench craft menu. First thing’s first: mass producing bricks and machine parts.
Although, I do have some free time on my hands…
Generally speaking, crafting didn’t take much effort from me. I just reserved the number of things I needed and then waited. Once the process was started, I had nothing to do.
I gazed at my status screen, but since I hadn’t been in any direct combat recently, my level hadn’t gone up. No new achievements either. I thought I’d maybe have picked up some achievements related to my relationships with women, but sadly not. No new ones related to building, and I also didn’t have my brand new workbench… Urgh, being in a holding pattern without being able to make an enchantment workbench sucked.
But finally, my parts were finished, so I quickly moved on to upgrading my furnace.
And then the light nearly blinded me.
“Whoa, wh-what the?!”
“It was so bright!”
“What’s going on?”
The slime girls all startled out of their peaceful-looking reveries. Sorry, ladies.
“When I upgrade the furnace or workbench, it shines super brightly. I totally forgot.”
“How obnoxious…” Bess said. “Are your eyes okay?”
“If I just let them rest, they’ll be fine.”
I stared at the light straight-on before and my eyes recovered without any issues. Already, I could feel them going back to normal, so I was sure it’d be fine.
“This is the real deal,” said Poiso as she looked the station over curiously. She’d get along well with Ira, I’d bet.
Lime hummed sleepily and slid over to wrap herself around me again before nodding off. I looked over at Bess and Poiso, helpless.
“I can’t get out.”
“She’s concerned because you were doing something dangerous,” said Poiso. “Just let her hold you.”
“It wasn’t actually dangerous…”
It just flashed for a second… But whatever. I was just close enough that I could still control the smithing station and workbench, so it was fine. Next, I’d make some screws and work on my disguise. A medium-length, tough-ish sword and a round shield made of wood and metal should be fine. As for armor… A chainmail and light armor set would do the trick.
Keeping it real, I’d love to make everyone’s beloved bastard sword or a two-handed sword, but I didn’t have the muscles to heft something like that. It was already a struggle for me to use the standard infantryman’s short sword. Plus, this was just a disguise. I wasn’t going to fight with it, so it made sense to keep it light.
I already decided to make a gun for any actual emergencies. Making bullets was gonna be an issue, though. I would need to make gunpowder, which meant I’d need a mixing table and a huge amount of glass. And to make glass, I’d need sand. Hopefully I could break apart dirt to get as much of that as I needed. I had a fair bit of dirt in my inventory already.
Putting that issue aside, the next problem was manure… But since the sewer was right outside the door, I should be able to gather some. I’d ask Poiso and Bess about it later.
Now that I had my facilities in order, the next step for me was sussing out how to get in touch with the others and devising a proper escape plan. The former was definitely the priority for the immediate future, which meant I needed a golem communicator… But I didn’t have any mithril. I wondered if I could swap in pure gold or silver for mithril copper alloy…
I should talk this over with the girls. I don’t know jack about magic.
POV: SLIME GIRLS
“DAMN IT! Curse them all!”
The man swore up and down in his radiant, gorgeous office… Actually, it’d be better described as his tacky, nouveau riche office. The man’s name was Bullington Sail Ortlinde, and he was a clergyman, bedecked in a glittering priest’s robe of white silk and gold thread. A man in his position was expected to be incorruptible, a beacon of integrity. The truth was that he was a simple, common-born man who came up from nothing—not in itself damning, but his endless social climb left him with one true god. In spite of his fierce preaching in Adol’s name, money was his only master. And everybody knew it.
Bullington Sail Ortlinde was in a foul mood. It was all too clear why. The Liberation Army that appeared out of nowhere from the Black Forest beyond the Omitt Badlands had given him nothing but grief for the last few months.
***
It all started with attacks and escapes throughout the villages and rock salt mines near the southern border. Some unknown force struck Holy Kingdom soldiers during the night and wiped them out. Villages went silent, and the demi-humans that worked
there were all whisked away. At first the prevailing belief was that it had to be the work of some large-scale mercenary squad or bandit group. I personally found it odd to treat mercenaries and bandits equally, but apparently the clergymen of the Holy Kingdom didn’t see much of a difference.
As the situation became clearer to him, he made a piggish face. Actually, that was insulting to pigs. But for brevity’s sake, I decided to call him Father Swine. Had a good ring to it.
Back to the topic at hand. The situation was so bad that it was enough to exasperate him. As it turned out, the demi-humans weren’t taken away—they left under their own power. The towns had not been taken over—the demi-humans that lived there took everything with them when they left.
In other words, it was a rebellion. That was Father Swine’s conclusion. Nothing he and his hadn’t already dealt with—they’d put down the revolt three years prior. Regardless, that victory came at a cost.
“Again?! Those damned demi-humans! I’ll make sure they never think of staging a rebellion ever again!”
Father Swine sent out a squad of hunters immediately. The rebels had killed dozens of soldiers, but at the end of the day they were just slaves without proper weapons. They’d stand no chance against properly trained and equipped soldiers. Or so he’d reasoned.
