Typer’s room: One more chapter. (very(Very(VERY))) Slowly getting speed on the updates.
Anyway, today’s chapter is mostly a fluffiness goods one, I guess? Showing a bit of Lia’s interaction with the people on the street and how she started to become known by everyone else.
Well, with that, I also just went back to classes today after a whopping six days vacations (Sarcastic Hooray ensues), and here is where I would point out that updates might slow down, but… Yeah, don’t think it will happen.
And also, for the new Den one who’s concerned. When you post it, maybe I’ll be publicizing it on my Lia’s chapter. What do you say? *wink wink* (For those guys who aren’t from the Den, skip this paragraph… Wait, I should have put this at the beginning, right? Dang it.)
As I said before, this is VASTLY a work in progress, and wasn’t made to be posted initially, so there might be some inconsistencies. If so, please do tell me, as I want to make it an enjoyable read ^^
May your reading be enjoyable.
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“Oh. My. Goodnes. Lia, is that you?”
“Ah… Ha ha… yes...” I replied dryly to the surprised lady manning the stall. Seeing not only hers, but every single other gaze in the vicinity turning to me and my more than exotic clothing. Pulling down the straw hat a bit lower to cover my face, I felt myself blushing heavily. “Hi… Auntie...”
I didn’t even had the chance to say what I had come here before the lady from the stall quickly moved out of the way and grabbed me in a bear hug, spinning me around as she giggled happily.
The others in the area also looked at me with gentle gazes as they saw me being spun around happily.
“What’s this? You look like a doll! So cute! What happened to your usual uniform?” The auntie asked after she finished spinning me.
“Muu… I… Did something silly, and ended up like this...” I said in a small voice. As if finally noticing my discomfort, the auntie finally let go of me and looked at me with a slightly worried look.
“Hmm… Is something the matter? You don’t seem all that lively today…”
“Muu… It’s just… These clothes… Too breezy...” I whispered embarrassed while pulling down the hem of the dress.
As much as I didn’t mind being the center of attentions, I’d usually be using my aide clothes or at least something more boyish that I used on my days off. Heck, I never even batted an eye at using my cuteness as a way to earning freebies!
But… But… Even then… Muu, I hate dresses! How do girls walk around in these things? Could someone tell me? I’m sincerely confused here!
“So you don’t like those?” The auntie asked, and I nodded weakly. “Geeze, and you look so cute in them. What a shame.” She sighed while shaking her head. “Anyway, I guess you came here for the meat the Lon-Ying asked, right?”
“Un!” I replied with a nod, happy that the subject had changed from the sensitive subject it was. “We’ll throw a party for milady today, so we’ll need a lot of meat for all the aides.” I said, to which the lady smiled widely while nodding.
“Then I’ll get my husband to bring the meat. We cut it just earlier today, you know?” She said with a gentle smile before turning to the man who was half asleep on a chair besides her. “WAKE UP YOU LAZY BUM!” She shouted, literally startling the man awake as he fell backwards.
I would feel worried for him if it wasn’t for the fact that it seemed to happen every single time I came here, so it was more of a daily scene than anything. Smiling awkwardly, I decided to wait as they went through their usual banter by going ahead with the other things I had to get.
Leaving behind the small cart I used to bring things from the market back to the house, I skipped to the other side of the street while avoiding a horse to reach a fruit vendor. The old man quickly recognized me and gave a brief nod as I browsed through the fruits, selecting the freshest and sweetest looking ones. Thanks to more than a few years of experience and advices from the unexpected professional in fruit picking Master Roshi, I could even find a few hidden gems that didn’t look all that good, but were in fact at their sweetest point.
Once I asked him where he learned to pick fruits, he simply replied that he had a rough time with his old master when learning survival skills. For some reason I felt pity for him as he put on dead eyes.
Managing to get a discount thanks to picking some uglier looking fruits, I beamed the old man a smile and he replied with a grunt as I passed him the coins. Although he had the usual dissatisfied look, he quickly gave my head a rub when I approached him before motioning for me to get going.
I went back to the cart humming a bit cheerfully, only for my mood to drop again when a gentle cold breeze reminded me of my current attire.
Putting the large sack with all the fruits gently on the back of the cart, I stood on my toe-tips to see that all the meat had already been set over on a large black blanket. As usual I quickly tied it around the meat so that it wouldn’t get dirty. Since it had already been bled previously, the blanket became a bit moisty at most with the little that remained.
I happily licked the little of blood that got stuck to my finger when I touched the meat. While I had the feeling that it should be a disturbing scene through my memory, I had also seen other people on the streets do the same, so I guessed it meant that this was usual in this world.
And meat is good. Not as good as sweets, though. Or petting.
Nothing beats petting.
With the things set and ready, I gave one last look at everything inside the cart, seeing what I was still lacking. I had already picked up some wine and veggies earlier, as well as a good bunch of spices from some earlier stalls and with the meat and fruits now, it meant that only a couple of things lacking. Bread and flour, that I could buy from the same person, and candy.
“Muu… But they are on opposite sides of the market...” I contemplated to myself. While the baker I wanted to go was the one who made the bread of highest quality, the sweet store was the one who I found out that, after a long time of research and repetitive tests, was most likely to give freebies.
For a moment I felt split between which way to go first, but in the end, duty won over pleasure, to I turned towards the bakery and walked away from the sweets stores. Guuh, if it wasn’t for milady’s birthday…
Well, I’ll pass there afterwards anyway.
As before, I lowered my head to try and hide my face out of embarrassment, but thanks to the fact that there was only one child in the entire city that would be able and be willing to pull a cart this size and weight, it wouldn’t take people more than a couple of seconds before they were greeting me. I ran away after a brief greeting every time, feeling as they looked at me confused.
Okay, let’s skip the candies today and put an end to this the fastest possible.
While deciding that on my mind I quickly hastened my steps to an almost run, avoiding people on the street the best I could while avoiding too much movement on the cart.
Reaching the bakery and taking a brief moment to catch my breath, I gave a quick look back at the cart, making sure that everything inside was fine before turning to the entrance of the store. Since it wasn’t a stand on the streets, I’d have to leave the cart behind on the street, but thanks to the uniqueness of its ‘too small for adult, too big for children’ size, I’m pretty sure most of the city knows who it belongs to by now.
Entering the store and trying to avoid the homing eyes of the other clients, I awaited in line for a few minutes while the clerk went through the clients one after another.
“Good morn… Huh?” The girl’s voice echoed as she didn’t see anyone at the counter.
“...Are we really going through this again?” I complained while looking up. The counter being just enough to cover my head, more than once I went through this back-and-forth.
“Ah! Lia!” The girl said surprised before smiling widely. “And you look so cute today!”
“Not you too, Aya.” I complained to the baker’s daughter, who giggled happily for a moment. Being one of the girls I used to play with before I became an Aide, it was annoying how she grew so much even though she was only one year older. “Muu… Anyway, here. It’s for the delivery later today.” I said while depositing some coins on the table. “Twenty pieces of bread and that.”
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Usually it would take some time for someone without proper education to go through the coins and make calculations, but knowing Aya for some time, I’d noticed that she had a talent for the numbers, as she finished the calculations in a few seconds and nodded.
“Okay. I think everything’s right here.” She said with a nod while taking the coins and putting them on a a small jar nearby, separating them by value. “I’ll tell father to deliver the bread and the cake later.” She stopped to think for a moment. “After the second afternoon batch… Is that good?”
“Umu.” I nodded. “Thank as always, Aya.” I said before turning back and making my way to the cart. Once again I quickly ran a list on my head and made sure that I had already finished everything I had to do outside.
Being sure that I already had already bought everything I needed and put them in the cart, and made sure to pay for the delivery of the bread and cake for milady’s birthday, I nodded satisfied. While it was true that we could make our own bread and cake at the mansion, it was a fact that letting it to someone who almost literally spent their entire life working with them could guarantee a much better quality, so it wasn’t strange for us to actually make orders for rare occasions like this one.
That said, cake was a relatively new item introduced recently. Apparently it was something created by a “genius kid” who liked cooking somewhere, then spread around like wildfire.
The first thing that had come to my mind was the reincarnees.
Well, it won’t be me who will complain about more sweets to choose from, though.
Reaching my stationed cart, I froze in place as a scene appeared before my eyes. A man, someone I don’t remember seeing previously in the city, was loitering around my little cart. For a moment I froze in place and eyed him suspiciously once I noticed how he looked around warily.
The moment I saw him approaching the cart, I had no doubt about it. Seems like he’s totally new to the city. While everyone pretty much ignored him as he stood nearby, the moment he touched on the oddly-sized transport, glares started to pierce him without him noticing.
I don’t mean to brag, but in these last years, I’m pretty sure I became one of the most well known persons in this village, you know? One of the reasons I don’t bother trying to put the cart in a safer place is because every single person around knows it's mine, so even if someone tried to steal it, they’d know straight away it’s a thief.
Well, unless the one doing the stealing is new.
Seeing the scene, I sighed annoyed. Well, I couldn’t really blame him to be honest. There’s a cart, filled with food and other goods lying around without a single person watching over it. Of course it would look like a good prey. It seems I might have grown a bit too confident recently.
Seeing the scene, I thought on how I could react to it. For one, while my spiritualist training isn’t all that advanced, I don’t think I’d have trouble teaching a grown man like that a lesson. The other one I could just let him try and take it, then have half of the street stop him one second later. Then, I could always take out the Slingbow version two point tree I always bring with me and give him something to remember.
And then… I could always…
Feeling a bit mischievous, I quickly fixed my dress that was a bit displaced after my earlier run, and skipped towards him.
“Ah! Big brother is going to help me pull the cart?” I asked while eyeing him with my best happy eyes.
“...Huh?” The thief said dumbly while turning to me.
“I mean. Big brother is holding on to my cart, so that means he’s going to help me, right?” I said while tilting my head to the side, faking confusion.
“T-That’s...” The thief started to say something, but once he noticed that the people around started looked at him, he paled slightly. “S-Sure. Big brother is going to help you. It’s bad to let a young girl carry so much, R-Right? H-Ha ha.”
Big brother. You are the only one in this city that would say that to me, you know? While smiling awkwardly to myself, I quickly ran to the back of the cart and climbed on it in a way that I would sit right behind him.
The people around also replied with wry smiles as they looked at me. One other thing that I noticed recently was that I had probably over-used my extra-childish mode, as pretty much no one else would fall for it recently, probably grown used to seeing me when I’m more in a normal mood.
Well, Milady says that I still sound a bit childish when I’m not acting, but it’s a completely different feeling, according to her. Somehow being called childish make me slightly disappointed.
“Then, Big brother. That way!” I said while pointing up ahead. He followed my arm and nodded weakly before starting to pull the wagon. He missed the people looking at him with pity as he tried to not look suspicious. “He he he. Thank you for the help Big brother.” I said in a shy voice. “You are the best!” I said while hugging him from behind.
Gaaah. That made me feel horrible. While looking away in an annoyed expression, I didn’t miss how he flinched and blushed slightly. While I did feel a large undeniable blow to my dignity, I couldn’t help but be satisfied that it had worked.
Still, I acted cautiously, always directing him through the busier streets so he wouldn’t have the chance to think something strange while pulling the cart with me. Of course, I was also taking the chance to advance a bit towards the mansion while not needing to make any effort.
“There. Take a turn there.” I said as we reached our destination. “Stop here, big brother.” I said while jumping out of the cart. He let go while breathing heavily, finally noticing how heavy the cart was. Taking the chance as he took in a breather, I ran to the door of the building and knocked on it a few times.
“Who’s there?” I heard a rough manly voice echoed from inside.
“Dad! Uncles! It’s me!” I shouted.
Not even two seconds later the door was slammed open and the burly bald smithy came hugging me as he raised me to the sky.
“LITTLE LIA! IT’S BEEN SOO LONG!” He shouted.
“It was just yesterday I came here, uncle.” I said awkwardly while seeing the rest of the smithys gathered at the door. Counting to three, the usual started.
“The goddess have descended!” “She’s even cuter today!” “I’m blinded! I can’t look! The halo!” “Forget my son! Marry me!” “Shut up! She’s property of all of us!” “Oi! Dad! That wasn’t what you promised!” “Shut it! She’s too good for you!”
Aaaand a family feud have started.
Well, nothing new to be honest.
“All of you shut up and go back to work! My daughter already said she would marry me!” Father said while brandishing his hammer around and giving a boot to the back of the bald uncle and grabbing me in his arms.
Well… That’s just something I pulled to cheer him up some time ago. Please don’t pay it much mind.
“Good morning, uncles.” I said while waving at them. “Hi dad.” I said while hugging him.
“Aww. What brings my cute daughter here today.” He said while putting on a silly smile.
“Well… I had to tell you some things, so I decided to pass here while I was doing shopping.” I said with an awkward smile as I recalled how Milady had forbidden me to help him with his night shifts. Father raised an eyebrow worried for a moment, but I quickly shook my head and looked back at my cart. “Also, that big brother there tried to steal my cart.” I said briefly.
The man widened his eyes in shock at my sudden words. Of course he wasn’t the only one to react, and soon the uncles from the smithy had him surrounded, with the large uncle already passing his arms around his shoulders.
“Well… It seems that someone here need to be taught on who our little goddess actually is.” He said with the brightest smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes.
The next time I met the thief, he was just one more in the entourage that came to greet me whenever I arrived at the smithy.
There was no other way to explain what happened as anything other than brainwashing.
Let’s not make them mad with me.