SIAW Vol. 2 Chapter 6
Chapter 6 – ALA Improvement Session
I went to the building I had made the day before.
Just as I arrived, Sil came back too.
He was covered in mud and showed bruises here and there. His stamina was less than 10% too.
I used Clear and Heal on him, to clean him up and cure his wounds, then used Stamina Heal to replenish his energy too.
Heal recovered HP, while Stamina Heal refilled the STA bar. Both of them were Holy Magic spells. I didn’t use them during Misha’s training because I didn’t want her to become reliant on spells only I could use. She had to become able to stand on her own, after all.
Sil was full of energy again, so I gave him some cuddles.
All giddy, he wagged his tail.
“You’re a hard worker, Sil. As expected of my new family!”
“Woof!” (“I worked hard!”)
“So you can go for another round, yes?”
“W-Woof…” (“I-I can…”)
“Good! Go on then!”
Sil, looking a bit sad, ran off into the distance.
◇ ◇ ◇ ◇
I watched Sil run off, then went to the second floor of the building.
I planned to use the ground floor for a rest area, so I used Earth Magic to pave the floor in stone. Then I put out a table and chairs — made back on the training island — and added a couch for more comfort.
I then went to the room made for the toilet. Here I put a WC and equipped it with a Clear magic tool.
One of my greatest gripes during training was the pit toilet. It cleaned itself automatically every day, so there were no actual hygiene issues, but being used to the toilets from my past life, I couldn’t get used to it.
I had first made a magic tool to wash your nether parts after using the toilet…but thinking about it, Clear made it obsolete, so I switched it with a magic tool that casted Clear. Activating it after doing your business would clean both yourself and the WC.
I then added a door, and the restroom was complete.
I was climbing the stairs, thinking of working on the second floor next, when Misha came back.
“Tenma! I need to pee!”
Have you no sense of shame, girl!? — is what I first thought, but she had come at the right time.
“Perfect timing! I just finished setting up the toilet.”
I wanted to explain in detail how magnificent an invention it was, but Misha seemed to be very close to her limits, as she shouted.
“I need to go now!!”
I opened the door and just explained the bare minimum.
“Sit there and go. When you’re done, let some magic power in that magic tool and it’ll clean everything.”
“Okay!”
Misha went inside immediately.
“Tenma! Get out and close the door!”
I hurriedly complied.
A little while later, Misha came out.
“Did you understand how to use it?”
“Yes, no problem.”
Misha just said that and left.
◇ ◇ ◇ ◇
I went to the first floor to start working.
First, I made a bedroom, equipping it with a double bed, a desk, and chairs.
Then I set up a restroom, just like the one in the floor below.
In the wider room on the terrace side I put a sofa and table, also adding some fine decorations to create a pretty classy living room.
Soon enough, as I was working on this and that, it was past noon.
I looked down from the window and saw Misha practicing Throwing.
(“Misha, what do you want to do for lunch?”)
I talked to her via Mental Massage and she looked around, confused.
I hadn’t told her about this function, after all.
“(Sorry, I forgot to tell you that I attached Mental Massage to the bracelet. If you picture the person you want to talk to in your head and speak, you can communicate with them mentally.)”
Misha immediately put my words into practice.
“(Can you hear me, Tenma? Where are you now?)”
“(Yes, I can hear you. I’m on the first floor of the building, looking at you from the window.)”
I waved at Misha and she started walking in my direction.
(“I’ll go there!”)
(“Okay.”)
I moved to the terrace and sent another Mental Massage, to Sil this time.
(“It’s time for lunch, are you coming back?”)
(“Right away!!”)
Sil was coming back too.
I looked outside from the window, and saw Sil coming closer to the building, without stumbling or falling down. Via Mental Massage, I told him to use the rear stairs.
“Wow, where did all this stuff come from…”
Misha arrived on the terrace, expressing her incredulous admiration.
Sil quickly joined us too, so I made preparations for the meal.
We were going to eat on the terrace that day.
The menu was sandwiches and tomato soup for Misha and I, raw Horned Rabbit meat and offal for Sil.
We sat down at the table and started eating, but Sil let out a grumble.
(“I want to eat the food Tenma makes!)
(“Maybe later! You’ll have to make do with that at lunch.”)
Sil continued eating, dissatisfaction painted on his face.
On the other hand, Misha found it difficult to eat, because of all the potions she had drunk.
I had a hard time eating food too when I was doing my “doping”…
I checked her status and saw that her stats were growing at a good pace. She was training hard, clearly.
“I see you’re training seriously, Misha.”
“It’s tough, but it’s really fun!!”
“Fun?”
“Yes! I can tell that I’m getting stronger, so it’s fun!”
Misha replied while showing me the bracelet.
She might get even stronger than I expected…
Results are always easier to see at the beginning, so keeping a steady motivation gets harder and harder: that’s when she’ll have to prove herself, though.
(“This food is not delicious!!”)
Our little Sil has become a bit of a gourmet…
(“I’ll make you something for dinner, so you’ll have to eat that at lunch”)
(“Ah…okay…”)
◇ ◇ ◇ ◇
After lunch, Misha and Sil resumed their training.
I had other things to do in the meantime: the truly crucial mission of…improving our meals!
I flattened a section of terrain between the grasslands and the cliff, then made a pile of cube-shaped boulders. In the middle I placed magic tools, split in three rooms.
I set up a chimney and filled the gaps between the blocks, thus completing the smoking shack.
I was going to go down the cliff, to start butchering monsters…but there were no stairs.
That’s when I recalled that Dimension Area cannot duplicate man-made objects.
I made the stairs myself and went down, towards the river.
I made a table out of rocks and secured a space for butchering animals and monsters.
I cut into pieces a previously caught Forest Boar and immersed it into liquid seasoning: I planned to make it into bacon. I put the seasoned meat in the Item Box and used the time acceleration function, so it could soak up the flavor quickly.
Then I skinned a Forest Wolf and extracted the meat. I cut it into thin slices and put it into seasoning liquid, to make jerky out of it. Again, I put it into the Item Box and sped up the process.
Rinse and repeat until there was enough to fill the smoking shack.
I went back up the cliff and hung the meat from the ceiling of the shack.
Good, now all the preparations are complete.
I put some wood chips on the magic tool for smoking and activated it.
I then blocked the entrance to the shack with Earth Magic: the meat should be smoked nicely by the next morning.
I often made such processed meat back on the training island.
Forest Boar bacon was much more delicious than any bacon I ever had during my past life. Forest Wolf meat was always hard and smelled strongly, no matter how it was cooked; if you made it into jerky, though, the particular flavor turned extremely delicious.
On the training island, after I gave up on exploring the dungeon, I did all sorts of things in order to have more comfort in my daily life. Barely a month and a half had passed since I came to this world, but all the effort I spent on the island was proving useful. The smoking magic tool and seasoning liquid for bacon and jerky both came from the storeroom where I put the various stuff I had made on the island.
I was enjoying the view from the cliff, when Sil came running to me. He wasn’t as dirty as before, nor was he hurt. I checked his status, and he still had plenty of stamina too!
Was the little rascal skipping on training?
I was going to scold him, but on second thought, Sil was still just a baby: he was 10 days or so old. Since we could communicate and he was already as big as a middle-sized dog, it was easy to forget how young he was. Moreover, differently from Misha, he hadn’t said anything about wanting to become stronger.
I used Clear on Sil to clean him up, then I petted him a little, to his delight.
His fur was really pleasant to touch…I felt like I was being healed.
(“Tenma! I’m hungry!”)
…I seriously had to do something about his bottomless stomach, though.