“B-But…I think it’s amazing that you defeated a Slime by flinging a booger at it with your finger. It seems like you can use something else too…There isn’t a need to have such hatred.”
When Rex followed up with this, Kagami scratched his head and let out a sigh.
“Certainly, it doesn’t mean I can’t use it, but I’m talking about comparing it to normal Skills. Should I be satisfied with what I got, with just my fingers getting stronger?”
“Isn’t it just fine that you can use them? I have yet to learn a single one, you know.”
“Well, it’s good that you have a dream. I can’t learn any more of them, right? It would be good if the Skills Rex learns can be used for our plans. Also, if they’re Skills that are hopeless for our plans…Well, I’ll treat you to your favorite meal.”
Rex and Krul simultaneously imagined 『Exotic Full Burst Act 5』in their minds and showed him a look of pity. Only Alice felt something when she heard the word ‘Plan’, and although she tried to ask him by tugging on the hem of Kagami’s clothes–
“You’re here! Kagami-chan! Geez…It took a while to find you, since this dungeon is so wide, you know?”
Suddenly, a giant called Takako, who could be mistaken as a Monster, hurriedly appeared from the far end of the dungeon. After reconsidering the words that had not come out of her throat yet, thinking ‘Well, it’s not like it’s enough to ask about it’, Alice rushed towards Takako.
“You surprised me, what I thought was a new Monster turned out to be Takako-chan.”
“Geez, Kagami-chan…I’ll punish you, you know?”
“I’m sorry.”
Takako, who always had a happy smile on her face, instantly made a gaze as sharp as a thorn, causing Kagami to reflexively sit down in a dogeza.
“So, what’s wrong, Takako-chan? Taking the trouble to come here, is there an emergency?”
After Alice gave an amused smile at seeing him sitting in a dogeza, she turned towards Takako and asked that question.
In answer, Takako made a troubled expression while saying ‘There’s a bit of trouble’, and began to look around, as if she was frantically searching for someone. Then, her gazed stopped on David, who stiffened, and she rushed towards him while showing a face that was beaming with smiles and wriggling her body.
As a Kagami, who was sitting in a dogeza, came into view, David muttered, ‘This is already hopeless, so I don’t know.’
“Please listen to me, David-san, I have a problem…David-san?”
“…Hohehi!? T-Takako-sama, is it? What’s wrong? To be here in such a place.”
“It’s a bit of a problem. Although we brought in the alcohol that we planned to serve at the Casino Bar and Taverns…I’ve forgotten to order the alcohol that was to be used as service drinks for the guests who come to our casino, as well as the drinks we were going to use as casino commodities…The amount we have at my bar aren’t enough.”
Although Takako, who had appeared suddenly, had a worried expression, David switched to a serious expression after listening to her, and with a ‘Fumu…’, he thought about it. When he saw this, Kagami concluded that he should also participate and rushed towards the two of them.
“Isn’t it fine to buy them from the merchants?”
“Using service drinks is slightly expensive, but we are capable of using a substitute. However, since we planned to use slightly high-grade alcohol as a commodity item to serve people, even if we buy it from merchants, we won’t have enough. We also need to figure out the brand names.”
Kagami lightly grabbed his head and showed a troubled look. There were wine cellars even in Balman, and although they could brew alcohol, it would be a lower quality when compared to the goods they had originally planned to have, and there wouldn’t be enough to make the commodities they were planning to use to serve people in the casino.
It was because the guests they would have at the casino would mostly be nobles. Since there was a possibility of having select nobles suspect the Casino’s dignity if they were served cheap commodities, they had gone with David’s plan of preparing the highest class items.
“It’s fine already, Takako-chan has done a lot for us. If we were to wait to bring the next shipment in, it would be one week later…even if I went to pick it up myself, I would need three days to do it. Let’s give up and make do with the commodities we have at the moment. It will be fine to obtain it later, even if it doesn’t make it in time for the opening.”
“Please wait a moment, we might still be able to do it somehow.”
At this time, David, who had been absorbed in his thoughts, muttered that.
“It might be possible…We would take the highway, pass through the nearby forest, and take a carriage towards Salumeria, which has a wine cellar managed by the Kingdom. If we offered to negotiate with them, perhaps…we should be able to request them to sell it to us without needing to go too far.”
Kagami shuddered a bit when he heard this. Since the Kingdom was a land where a lot of nobles gathered, there was fierce competition, as there was a lot of alcohol with improved qualities from high-class cellars. It didn’t mean that all of their alcohol was sellable though, and there were often stories about them leaving to sell it to various parts of the world on expeditions.
However, it was too strange for one to know about the routes they took, as well as their agenda for these alcohol sales.
Normally, this information couldn’t be acquired unless one was a local who often dealt with stores that managed this alcohol. Yet David, who didn’t seem to have any particular relations to it, knew about this.
“Why do you know about such things?”
“Well, no matter what kind of information it is, I’ve looked it up beforehand. I still don’t know if we can actually properly pass through it though.”
After David said this, he let out a light laugh, ‘Hohoho’, as if deceiving Kagami.
Although there had been many instances like this already, due to him helping out with the Casino, David had decided to look up information he didn’t know that could be useful later on.
Even if David had looked it up beforehand, Kagami didn’t know the process of obtaining this information, which was enough to wonder why on earth he would do so. However, when compared to themselves, David had an information network that they didn’t have.
This was what Kagami thought. In other words, it meant that the reason David was borrowing power from somewhere to observe Kagami, as well as what kind of information he was spreading to whom, was because he was placed in a situation that he could not control.
“Nevertheless, as expected, it’s probably…a wait-and-see.”
However, even if that was the case, David was useful. Since David was on Krul’s side, he was unable to bluntly refuse. He didn’t know what David was thinking about, but he couldn’t complain about a situation where he wasn’t being grabbed by the tail, so Kagami decided, in his heart, that he would be saddled with a superior staff, since there hadn’t been any disadvantageous events that could lead to their tails being caught.
At this time, after Kagami looked at Takako and wondered as to whether David was capable of doing a lot of work, he turned towards David, who was in a dreadful trance, and said ‘Then, I’ll leave the rest to you’, deciding that the two of them were enough to do it.
//
The next day. In the morning, after waiting for the carriage to carry the alcohol via the highway route suggested by David’s information, it had begun transporting alcohol from cellars famous even in the Kingdom, and they were successful in purchasing everything, due to David’s negotiation.
Kagami’s group had solved their problems for the moment, and became very busy with the preparations for the Casino opening, which had been deferred to the next day. Today, without taking on a single quest, each and every one of them had been preparing inside the newly built casino.
“Hmm…As I thought, this was meant for Alice-chan. Yeah, it’s this.”
“To have such an idea with this…Kagami-san, are you a genius!?”
Meanwhile, Kagami, Takako, and Krul had decided to spend their time inside the Casino by dressing up Alice, who was helping out as the Casino’s Mascot.
Currently, Alice was wearing a cute, fluttering dress that was hand-picked by Krul, a hair ornament chosen by Takako, and a stuffed animal which Kagami had forced her to hold. She had been played around with as if she was a dress-up doll.
By the way, Krul and Takako had been coordinating the outfit seriously, but Kagami was half amused by it.