CH 20

The Taste of Meat

Zawa… Zawazawa…

(nn…? …Annoying…) 

I woke up from the strange noise that was bugging me in my sleep.

When I looked around, I was surprised to see several children I didn’t know looking up at me as if they were looking at some strange creature.

(…embarrassing…) 

Thinking this, I climbed down the tree, shaking my head.

That’s right, I climbed down from a tree.

After all, although I had money in my wallet, it was the first time I realized that I had no money from this world at all when I was looking at that stall.

That’s right.

It wasn’t like there was a stall in the forest, and I had never really thought about spending money before.

When I was a student, I would never have been conscious of what was in my wallet while buying something unless I was shopping for tens of thousands of yen, so I didn’t pay attention to anything, even the food stalls.

So, it can’t be helped. I’d like to believe that it can’t be helped…

I couldn’t find Zink-kun and his friends after that, and I stepped out to go after Hunter Guild or something, but I proposed, “Why don’t you hurry up and show your face to your parents?” and I was also hesitant to borrow money from Gatekeeper-san.

From a Japanese point of view, asking a stranger for money is too high a hurdle to overcome.

In the end, I gave up, found a tree on the outskirts of town that lacked the smell of food, and slept on it with my bag in my arms.

Without money, I couldn’t even stay at an Inn, and I didn’t want to fall asleep on the street and wake up to find my bag and watch missing.

In a way, it was probably a more difficult environment than in the forest, since I could not go for a dip in the river and there were no fruits to be found.

I really like that cave! 

So for now, I moved to a different place and sat down in a suitable open space to think about the future.

There are so many things I want to do and research.

But the first priority is money.

Or rather, the food I can buy with that money.

As expected, I am too hungry, and I am suffering from a feeling of weakness that I have never experienced before in my life.

It’s even harder because my stomach has been stimulated by the smell of food around.

If I were to take the straight and narrow route, I would like to head back to the forest, hunt some Horned Rabbit, and go home….

But now, I am too lazy to walk even the over 1 km distance to get to the forest.

I am afraid that I will get injured in vain if I fight against the enemy in this condition.

Or, I maybe I should go to the Hunter Guild and meet up with Zink-kun and the others.

With the money from the sale of the sword and the contents of the basket, I can fill my stomach and then head back to the forest.

Yes, this is more realistic.

The downside is I don’t know if I can meet up with Zink-kun and the others, but at least if I wait at the entrance to the Hunter Guild for half a day, I’ll probably be able to meet up with them.

If everyone is tired and on a holiday at home today, I’ll most likely starve to death.

In that case, I would have to do my last resort.

I don’t think there will be any pawn shops in this town, but I think I can make some money by selling my phone and other modern products that I don’t plan to use, either in stores or at food stalls.

If you take pictures and videos with my phone, it should be ridiculously popular in this world that is said to be behind in civilization.

Even if I tell people that the phone cannot be used when it runs out of charge, someone is bound to buy it out of sheer curiosity.

At the very least, they would trade it for a meal.

“I finally found you!”

I’m sure they’re going to ask, “What the heck is this? Where did you get this?” I’m sure it will be a pain to explain, so I will save this option as a last-ditch effort until the very last minute…

“Hey!  Loki kun!”

“Hm?”