by Dojyomaru
“...I did indeed swear loyalty to you, my lord,” Castor set down his tea and said with an all-too-serious look on his face. “However, I would like nothing more than to see the lord I’ve devoted myself to leave behind descendants who will prosper. I cannot get in Duchess Excel’s way. I can only bite back tears as I ignore my lord’s request for aid.”
“You say that, but you just don’t want to get caught up in this!” I shouted.
He pretty blatantly averted his eyes.
I hit the nail on the head, didn’t I, you jerk?!
“Now, sire, shall we be going?” Excel took a firm hold of the back of my neck, then began dragging me towards the door of the parlor.
I was bracing myself to run for it, but I couldn’t even put up the slightest resistance. Even factoring in my own weakness, her strength was incredible. Where did that slim body of hers have that kind of strength?
“No, wait, please, Excel, come on,” I begged.
“Yes, yes. You can just leave everything to this big girl here. I’ll teach you real good.”
“No, I mean... Okay, I’ll take your lessons! Just the lessons! None of that hands-on stuff, okay?!” I screamed.
“...Good grief, I suppose it can’t be helped. But if you find yourself wanting to get physical with me, do tell, okay?”
“As if I would!”
In the end, I was subjected to Excel’s lengthy lectures.
Having to take health and physical education classes from Excel, who looked so much like Juna, was so embarrassing that I thought I might die.
Intermission 2: Researching a Certain Line of Research
The research institute in the former slums of Parnam, the royal capital of the Kingdom of Friedonia.
Ginger’s Training Facility, which had been opened with King Souma’s sponsorship as one means of securing talented personnel and making it so that slavery became a thing that existed in name only, now had a great many subjects which could be studied at it.
With more land being given to the facility, it had come to be called Ginger’s Vocational School. While retaining the elementary school, they had also established schools dedicated to various specialized subjects. If a field of study achieved results here, there would be schools dedicated to it established in other cities.
There were already a number of fields of study that had gone independent, and specialized schools for them were being built in other cities; but the schools of farming and medicine were still here. This was because the appropriate teachers were here: the Minister of Agriculture and Forestry, Poncho Panacotta, as well as doctors like Hilde Norg and Brad Joker. It also showed that Souma, who knew that, historically, the production of food and knowledge of medicine were directly linked to the maintenance and growth of the population, placed great importance on those fields.
Now, there were two man-and-woman pairs facing one another across the threshold at Ginger’s Vocational School’s main gate. The first pair consisted of a rotund man who was almost thirty years old, and an intellectual beauty who was elegant in everything including her appearance. The other pair consisted of a young man whose face was so gentle in appearance that he might be mistaken for a girl, and a beautiful raccoon girl who had an unyielding look in her eyes that left a lasting impression.
The strange thing was, the woman in each of these pairs was wearing a classical maid uniform with a long skirt.
The two who were about to enter the school grounds were the Minister of Forestry and Agriculture Poncho Panacotta, and Serina, the head maid of Parnam Castle who was also the personal attendant of Princess Liscia.
The two who were greeting them at the threshold were Ginger Camille, the principal of Ginger’s Vocational School, and Sandria, who served him as his secretary and maid.
Poncho and Ginger smiled and shook hands.
“Greetings, and thank you for coming, Sir Poncho.”
“S-Sir Ginger, it does my heart good to see that you are in such good health, yes.”
“Um... There’s no need to be so formal, you know? You’re older than me, and a minister, too.”
Poncho stuttered, “I-It’s a habit of mine. I just can’t seem to shake it, yes.”
“He is a timid man, you see. Please, give up on him,” Serina chimed in as Poncho was awkwardly trying to explain himself. “Honestly... Considering that he’s saved so many of this country’s people with his knowledge, I wish he would have gained at least a little more self-confidence.”
“Um, and you are?” Ginger asked.
“Pardon the lateness of my introduction. I am Serina, the head maid at the royal castle.” She gave an elegant bow.
“Th-Thank you kindly for that. I am Ginger, the principal of this school.”
When Serina bowed her head to him, Ginger panicked.
Seeing his reaction, Serina chuckled. “Now, Lord Ginger, you needn’t be so formal when addressing a mere maid like myself.”
“Th-That’s not...”
“My master has a weakness for attractive older ladies, you see,” Sandria chimed in.
Ginger was bewildered by what she said. “San?! What are you saying so suddenly?!”
“Nothing that is not a fact, I assure you. When you are in the presence of Lady Hilde, you are always so tense... Oh, pardon me, I hadn’t introduced myself yet.” Sandria lifted up the hem of her apron dress and curtsied. “Greetings. I am Lord Ginger’s secretary, maid, and pet slave, Sandria.”
“Hey, you’re making me sound way too bad! I only tasked you with being my secretary; you started doing the maid work on your own! Also, what do you mean, pet slave?!” Ginger protested, but Sandria pretended not to hear him, bowing deeply to Poncho.
“You must be Lord Poncho. I hear about you from time to time. It’s thanks to you that my fellow slaves didn’t starve when things were at their worst. On behalf of everyone, I would like to thank you.”
“N-No! You don’t need to do that, yes!” Poncho panicked when Sandria bowed to him.
Serina watched him with a slightly chilly look in her eyes. “Sir Poncho, even if she is one of those ‘underage girls’ you so like, please, don’t lose your head over a little praise.”
“I-I wish you wouldn’t go putting any weird labels on me, yes!”
“Oh? Is it not the truth, though? I know these things, you realize?” Serina smiled, but her eyes were not smiling. “Earlier, there was that dish you developed with His Majesty, the ‘toasted sandwich.’ You only served the dish to Lady Tomoe, did you not? Without bothering to invite me.”
“Is that why you’ve seemed so upset lately?!”
If one were to ask who was the biggest glutton in all of Parnam Castle, that would be Aisha, of course; but Serina would have to be the runner-up. But there was a slight difference in the nature of their gluttony.
Unlike Aisha, who would eat anything (especially sweets), the more of it the better... Serina didn’t demand quantity, but she had developed a taste for the junk food and B-grade cuisine that Souma and Poncho created.
Souma and Poncho had put together a lot of different dishes. To be precise, they were recreating dishes that had existed in Souma’s former world. Of those dishes, it was things like spaghetti and yakisoba buns, the sort of things you wouldn’t see in a fancy restaurant, that had captured Serina’s heart.
The thing was, Serina came from a distinguished family that had turned out many maids and butlers who went on to serve the royal family. Because of that, they had worked to instill cultured tastes in her from a young age, to ensure she would be presentable and wouldn’t embarrass herself in front of royalty. They’d paid close attention to her diet, and she had always been expected to eat good food, and to use the proper etiquette. Of course, that meant she’d never been allowed to just go out and buy food from a cart and eat it there. For Serina, having grown up in a house like that, Souma and Poncho’s dishes had made quite an impact on her.
There’s a staple food on top of another staple food!
When Serina
had first came into contact with a spaghetti bun, that first bite had destroyed all established notions she had about food. How could such a vulgar dish be so delicious?
Ever since, Serina had made a habit of following Poncho around. That was because if she was at his side, she was treated to delicious samples. The dishes Poncho made were the one thing other than cute girls that caught Serina’s interest. Which was why, when she was unable to try them, she held a grudge.
Sensing her displeasure, Poncho hurriedly tried to explain himself. “I-It was still just an experimental dish, so there weren’t enough of them...”
“Knowing you are unused to going out in front of people, under the orders of His Majesty and the princess, I have worked with diligence and sincerity to assist you,” Serina said coldly. “Yet, you did not allow me to sample the dish. Could it be because I am already a grown woman?”
“When we get back! When we get back, I promise I’ll make one for you, yes!” Poncho hurriedly said.
The somewhat sad expression disappeared from Serina’s face.
“That’s a promise,” she said, looking perfectly fine.
It had apparently all been an act to get him to agree to it. Poncho’s shoulders slumped.
Ginger wasn’t sure how to react as he watched this exchange, but Sandria was nodding along.
“I can see your relationship has a lot in common with ours.”
“Oh? But my master is Princess Liscia,” Serina said.
“I didn’t mean it in that way...”
When Serina tilted her head to the side quizzically, Sandria just smiled, not sure what to say. That exchange left question marks floating over the two men’s heads.
With the formalities out of the way, Ginger took Sandria, Poncho, and Serina to a place outside of Ginger’s Vocational School. There was a building for studying farming techniques at Ginger’s Vocational School, and they mostly focused on the study of crops, compost, and selective breeding. However, there were no fields on the school grounds to demonstrate their results. The former slums were near the city walls, so the fields had been planted on the opposite side. The research building and fields were separated by the city wall, but in terms of distance they were close, and it was easy to get from one to the other.
Once they passed through the gate, Ginger led Poncho and company to the fields owned by his vocational school. When they finished greeting the guards who watched the fields, the four arrived in front of two particular fields. Neither field had anything planted in it, but one looked like ordinary black soil, while the other was dry and cracked.
With these fields in front of him, Ginger asked, “You’ve come here today in regards to that line of research, right, Sir Poncho?”
“Yes,” Poncho nodded. “Both His Majesty and I have great hopes for that line of research, after all.”
Ginger shook his head apologetically. “...Let me say this up front. We were unable to achieve the sort of results you’re hoping for.”
The field of research Souma and Poncho had great hopes for was research on one of the “failed experiments” of the overscientist, Genia Maxwell.
Back when the former king had ruled the country, Genia had developed arrowheads with seeds inside them with the hope that the sites of battles would be covered with greenery. With the effect of the light elemental magic the arrows were imbued with, the seeds grew at an alarming speed, and it’d been a massive failure that had resulted in half of her research building nearly being engulfed by plants. The result was that Genia had been transferred to the Forbidden Army, and her research suspended.
However, after the throne had changed hands, Souma had seen a practical use for her research and ordered Genia to resume it. He wasn’t so interested in the arrowhead part; but with plants that grew so fast that they could engulf a building, he could make the desert bloom, and he’d had hopes that it would lead to an increase in the food production rate. However, Genia the genius had already lost all interest in the subject, so Souma had ended up ordering the School of Agricultural Technology at Ginger’s Vocational School to do it instead of her.
But... Ginger explained that they hadn’t been able to produce results.
“We were certainly able to make fast-growing plants. Those plants had two special qualities: growth and proliferation. We were able to eliminate just the proliferation, which meant that the area would no longer be engulfed in green.”
“You were able to control them? Isn’t that a success, then?” Poncho asked, seemingly mystified: but Ginger shook his head with a wry smile.
“We were carrying out this research in the hopes of increasing food production and making the deserts bloom, but... from the results of our research, we learned this won’t be of any help with either of those things. Genia’s spell only speeds up the growth of plants. Sir Poncho, do you know what is needed for plants to grow?”
Poncho thought for a moment, then replied, “Fertile soil and water... as well as sunlight, yes.”
Ginger nodded. “Yes. Of those, the sun is no problem. With some work, the water issue can be managed well enough, too. The problem was fertile soil. Though we’ve accelerated the plants’ growth, the quantity of water and nutrients they require from the soil hasn’t changed. Madam Genia must have known that, too, because her spell included a function for sucking water and nutrients out of the soil.”
With that said, Ginger pointed to the dried and cracked field. “This is what the field looks like after we harvested our fast-growing wheat.”
“...It’s almost like a sandy desert, yes.”
“No matter how much we can accelerate the plants’ growth, fertilizing the soil takes a lot of time,” said Ginger. “As a result, the plants suck all the nutrients and water out of the soil, leaving it dry and cracked like this. Nothing will grow in soil that’s ended up like this.”
“Is there no way to provide a steady supply of nutrients to the soil?” Poncho asked.
“I doubt it. Water, maybe. But continuously supplying fertilizer at a rate that matches their growth just isn’t realistic. I mean, we have a limited supply of fertilizer, anyway. If we exhaust it to raise growth speed, we may not see any growth in productivity at all.”
“Well... That’s no good,” Poncho said.
If the plants that grew were allowed to rot, they would return their nutrients to the soil, but they couldn’t do that with crops that were meant to be eaten. They couldn’t possibly have people return all of the excrement from what they’d eaten to the field, after all.
“That’s why we determined it was a poor fit for growing food,” Ginger said. “Now, as for making the desert bloom, there isn’t the water there to begin with, so it’s impossible. Even if we were to install aqueducts, the speed at which the plants grow would present another bottleneck. They’re just as fast to rot, you see.”
“We can’t always get our way, I suppose, yes...” Poncho slumped his shoulders. With the high hopes he’d had for this research, he couldn’t help but be disappointed that there had been zero payoff for it.
But Ginger shook his head again. “No, it’s not like we have absolutely nothing to show for all our work. Look at the field next to it.”
“...I’m not seeing anything other than soil in it, though?”
“Yes. The only thing here is ordinary soil. We’ve made it into ordinary soil.” Ginger bent down and scooped up some of the soft soil in his hands. “This soil was brought from a dungeon inhabited by many undead monsters. Naturally, when we first brought it here, it was contaminated by the miasma that undead monsters release.”
“D-Did you say miasma?!” Poncho cried out despite himself, his voice unsteady.
Just by existing, undead monsters like skull dragons and zombies gave off a miasma that was harmful to living creatures. Miasma caused disease to spread and things to rot, making it impossible for living creatures to live in that area. What was more, it would get into the soil and stay there for a long time. Because of that, lands where a skull dragon h
ad gone on a rampage or where a horde of zombies had appeared would become unproductive lands where crops wouldn’t grow for a long time.
However, Ginger had picked up a handful of that soil, which should have been dangerous, without any hesitation.
Poncho looked carefully at that soil. “Is this soil... safe?”
“Yes. The miasma is completely gone from it now.”
“How did you do it, yes?”
“It was an applied use of those fast-growing plants we were talking about earlier. There are flowers that bloom only in dungeons with a lot of undead-type monsters.”
Having said that much, Ginger had Sandria go and fetch a single flower. That flower was reddish-purple with greenish-black spots; colors that screamed it was poisonous. It wasn’t the sort of flower you’d want to receive on a celebratory occasion, not even by accident.
“The adventurers who go dungeon crawling call these miasma flowers. They say that if these flowers are growing somewhere, it’s proof that undead-type monsters are active there. That’s why, when they find these flowers in a dungeon, they know to take precautions against miasma.”
“Hm, so there are flowers like that out there,” Poncho said. “I never knew.”
Poncho knew a lot about edible plants. He also knew a lot about plants that were similar to edible ones, but that weren’t edible themselves. That was because Poncho’s knowledge was rooted in his appetite.
That was why, when it came to plants like this one, which was and looked blatantly inedible, he had no interest in them, and wasn’t that well informed about them.
Ginger chuckled. “These miasma flowers, like their name might suggest to you, are nourished by the miasma. That’s why they grow in clusters in dungeons where there are undead monsters. If we use Genia’s spell to accelerate plant growth on these miasma flowers and plant them in contaminated soil...”
“Oh?! I get it! They quickly suck all of the miasma out of the ground!” Poncho clapped his hands.