BXBX NOVEL Chapter 387
Edited by Gumihou
The delivery order for Lambert-san was achieved without a hitch.
A total of 1,000 sets of Divine Medicine, Hair Power, along with twice the regular amount of shampoo, soaps and other orders was [6] personally sent over by me, the guy with the (probably) infinite capacity [Item Box], to Lambert’s shop.
Suffice it to say, Lambert-san was delighted and I received a small bag of shiny platinum coins in return.
[4] “I’ll be leaving for the Royal Capital with these within the next week,” said Lambert-san as he patted the crates of Divine Medicine.
[6] “That soon?”
[4] “I got word that the Guild Master will be going to the Royal Capital too with at least two escorts. I have already contracted the [Phoenix] to escort me and my goods, but it will be much safer if all of us travel together.”
[6] “I see, that sounds like a good idea. Safe travels, Lambert-san.”
[6] “Hohoho, I shall, thank you for the prompt delivery as well.”
Once that was concluded, I left Lamberts and was making my way home when suddenly...
““Oi, don’t you think it’s time?””
Fer’s voice suddenly echoed in my mind.
““Eh? What?”” [5]
“”Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten? Our dungeon trip.””
“”Ah...””
[8] “”Hohou! The super high difficulty dungeon? Let’s goo!!””
““Hm?”” Sui poked a tentacle out from her leather bag. “”Dungeon? Pew pew?””
“... ...” here I had been hoping that they would forget about the stupid-
[5] [5]
““Ahem, didn’t we send some Magical Tools to be valued at the Adventurer’s Guild? I’m still waiting on that...””
“”Mu, they need 5 days to evaluate, right? It’s been 2 days. It should be done in 3 days.””
Tch, you even remember that?
“”Ahem, well, there are lots of other preparations as well...””
“”Do it in those 3 days.””
““...fine,”” [5]
It was kind of difficult to argue with Fer, especially when I had sort of promised them...
A telepathic cheer resounded in my mind.
Please read this at dot com ~
Now that there was no way to avoid the dungeon trip, I decided to dedicate the 3 days to preparing for the trip. Which for me meant coking up lots of pre-made food.
I really don’t know how Fer and the others would react if I don’t have enough food for them. [6] I mean, I could feed them ready-bought food from [Net Super] but I really don’t want to wake up to a mountain of dead monsters next to me again...
The trip to that country would take a pretty long time, therefore I plan to prepare everything with care. [1] This included giving my servants everything they would need while we are away for three months.
Even though my people kept saying things like, “It’s fine, we still have plenty left from last time,” I still want to buy more things for them.
Aiya and Teresa received more ingredients (meat especially) as well as seasonings for the next three months, with extra money for flour and vegetables that cannot be harvested from the field. [5]
Since they have a magic bag, it’s fine to give them things like fresh meat.
For Bartel and the twins, I gave them some drinks, which they could enjoy slowly if they restrain themselves during those three months.
[4] “Don’t drink all of it in one go, or you’ll run out before you know it,” I advised, [6] thinking of the Deplorable Goddess and her sweets.
I think they are too busy cheering to hear me...
Ah well, with Tabasa here to maintain discipline, things should be alright...
Speaking of Tabasa, she had gotten into her role as a teacher. [2] The children and Peter had nothing but praises for her. [5] For all her gruff and tough exterior, she was really patient when dealing with the many questions thrown at her.
She was a little shy to be addressed as ‘Tabasa-sensei’ but seemed really happy about it too.
There was nothing much for me to do after that. Things that should be bought, have been bought, and money that should be paid has been paid in advance. There was really nothing else...
Ah yes, there’s that monthly obligation thing.
Well, I had already taken their requests and was now browsing through [Net Super]. [1] The requests were mostly the same with Ninril-sama going on and on about ‘Fujiya Cakes’, ‘Dorayaki’ and ‘Limited Edition’ [6] as though I could forget about her order. [5]
Hmm, looks like there’s a [9] Hinamatsuri Fair going on.
I wonder, is it that time already in Japan?
Anyway, as I mentioned earlier, it was all sweet things as usual for a certain Depolorable Goddess.
Today, Fujiya’s main promotional item was a gorgeous-looking shortcake made with marzipan and filled with yellow and white peaches. [6] The yellow and white peaches looked very pretty against the white cream and light sponge.
There was also a chocolate cake filled with plenty of chocolate cream. The light brown sponge and dark cream were set off very nicely by a white filigree napkin.
Aside from these two main promotional items, there were also strawberry tarts topped with a generous amount of strawberry compote as well as all kinds of whole cakes for sale.
I picked out 10 pieces of sliced cakes as well as an assortment of Dorayaki and Scotch Cakes. I thought it would be a good idea to prepare many small items for her rather than a single huge cake, which she might treat as ‘one piece’ and eat the whole thing in one sitting.
When I finally checked out Ninril-sama’s offerings, I stared at the boxes of cakes and desserts in a daze.
Well, if this doesn’t last her a whole month... there’s really nothing much I can do about it.
None of my business, that’s what. [5]
Beauty Products for Kishar-sama.
Since she tended to use up her skin care products quickly, I got her a set of facial care, facial foam, lotion cream etc as well as [1] the premium beauty essence made from lots of expensive ingredients.
She had complained about how dull her skin was, so I bought a mud pack that’s said to be effective at removing sebum as well as other impurities from the pores. [1] It was a little pricey, but it claimed to be very gentle on the skin so, I think she’ll be happy with this.
Beer for Agni-sama.
In addition to the usual crates of S Company’s black label beer, Y-bis beer and Company S premium beer, I included a set of overseas craft beers.
She seemed to enjoy the hotdogs from last time. I received a repeat request for those as well as ‘other food that goes well with beer’. So I had to grill some sausages and include [1] other izakaya food such as fried Beef Cutlet, Pork Cutlet, Menchi Katsu and Karaage which I had made earlier for our upcoming travel.
Ruka-sama’s request this time was Ice-cream, Cakes and a Hotpot.
[6] At least she showed a little variety in her requests. Since she seemed to like small portions and a wide range of flavours, I bought shortcakes and [1] little ice-cream in cups.
As for the hotpot, I decided to [5a] go with the Cockatrice Tomato Hotpot and a Layered Chinese Cabbage & Dungeon Pork Hotpot.
Unfortunately, while I was preparing the hotpot, that brought the monsters to the yard. [5b] [6] I managed to get away with the hotdogs by grilling them quickly with the oven but ended up having to feed my familiars some snacks before they were willing to go away.
Finally, whiskeys for the Gods.
Naturally, they want a bottle of the Best Whiskey in the World (low end) each, as per the usual, while leaving the rest up to me. [2] While poking around the site, I noticed that I could set the page to show both the highest-ranking and [6] cheapest options so that the cheapest ranked whiskeys would be shown at the top of the list. [5]
Woah, this seriously improved my speed.
There were quite a few familiar names, random whiskies with reasonably good reviews yet still not too expensive to buy.
Rank No. 1 was a peated scotch, smoked with peat that contained plenty of seaweed and moss which gave it distinctive notes of disinfectant and seirogan. Personally, I don’t think it sounds very good, but there were some strongly positive reviews here, so I guess it should be decent.
Rank No. 2 was a scotch from the United States, said to be delicious when mixed with soda water to make highballs.
Rank No. 3 was some best-selling brand from Scotland [10] which had won a gold medal in international competitions. This whiskey should be drunk straight or on the rocks.
Rank No. 4 was a whiskey that leaves finishing notes of chocolate and biscuits. It was very popular as a gift item. [11]
Finally, Rank No. 5 was a triple malt whiskey blended from three single malt whiskeys from different distilleries. One of its unique features was the three monkey motif on the bottle. This whiskey is said to be easy to drink even for those who are not used to whiskey. [12]
Aside from these top 5 whiskies, I picked out a few random brands that caught my eye. Since I was already here, I might as well pick out the offerings for Demiurgos-sama too.
[6] Thus, after filling up the 8 gold budget, I switched over to the saké section and picked out three bottles of Kyushu saké. Since Kyushu is famous for its potatoes, aside from the rice-based saké, I chose a sweet potato shochu brewed with black koji [13]. It was described as having strong umami flavours and a refreshing aftertaste.
The other potato sochu was described as ‘profound and solid’. [8] However, I must admit I mostly picked this one for its name. After all, for a brewery to name a drink after a [14] famous horse from The Three Kingdoms must be pretty awesome, right?
Naturally, I included the premium canned snacks set to Demiurgos-sama’s portion.
After checking everything out, I boxed and labelled everything accordingly, making sure that everything was properly packed before tonight’s delivery time.
Tomorrow, after collecting money for the magic tools, we will leave for the next dungeon. [5]
Ahh, I’d like to rest a little more...
[Gumihou: Kind of filler-ish, but okay.]
[1] Structural Change: Combine 2 paragraphs
[2] Structural Change: Combine 3 paragraphs
[3] Structural Change: Combine paragraph & dialogue
[4] Structural Change: Change passive sentence to dialogue
[5] Delete Repetitive or Pointless Information... starting to delete pointless scenes now
[a] Deleted Mukouda’s speculation on why Ruka-sama would want hotpot. It was just a repeat of ‘must have seen us eating, t/4...’
[b] Deleted drooling scene. Reason: no follow up
[6] Additional Information for Aesthetic Purpose
[7] Add Dialogue Tag
[8] Creative Licence Taken
[9] Hinamatsuri – Also known as Girl’s Day or Doll’s Day
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hinamatsuri
[10] Best-selling scotch in Scotland. Unclear which it was, but here’s the top 10 list from the real world.
https://scotchwhisky.com/magazine/features/20897/top-10-best-selling-scotch-malt-whiskies/
[11] Can’t actually find it on the English language website, but the description チョコレートやビスケットを想わせる余韻のウイスキー aka whiskey with an aftertaste reminiscing of chocolate and biscuits yielded the ‘Singleton of Dufftown Luscious Nectar 12 Year Old’.
https://whizzky.net/whisky.php?ref=34571-The-Singleton-Of-Dufftown-Luscious-Nectar-12-Year-Old
[12] Triple malt from 3 single malts with 3 monkeys...
https://www.licorea.com/monkey-shoulder-triple-malt-speyside-p-1740.html?language=en
Some whiskies are easier to identify than others
[13] Koji – a type of fungus for brewing saké or fermenting food such as miso or soy sauce.
https://media.magical-trip.com/what-is-the-difference-of-black-white-and-yellow-koji-explain-about-koji-which-is-the-essential-part-of-sake-brewing/
They deliberately mentioned using black koji for sochu here, because sochu is usually fermented with white koji.
Unclear which sochu Mukouda-san bought.
[14] Famous horse from The Romance of the Three Kingdoms
Has to be the Red Hare aka ‘Sekitoba’. The horse that belonged to Lu Bu.