Chapter 23: Fishing at the River
Ren stretched his neck slightly and peered into the river. It didn’t look like any fish were about to leap out at him this time.
“…Maybe it’s fine as long as I don’t get too close?”
He gathered his magic again, concentrating it at his fingertips, then pointed his index finger toward the water’s surface.
“This is kind of like a water gun… huh? A water gun?”
Saying it out loud felt oddly unfamiliar, and he wondered what a strange word it was as he pictured water shooting out from his fingertip.
“Here goes!”
Pew—! Splash!
A small amount of water shot straight from his fingertip toward the river.
Splash!
Right where the water hit, the iridescent fish appeared again, slapping the surface with its tail before diving back down.
“Huh? …Maybe it thinks it’s food or something?”
Whenever the water from Ren’s magic hit the surface, the fish seemed to gather.
To test it, he tried casting water magic again at a slightly different spot.
Splash!
“Oh!”
Just as he expected, fish gathered where the water hit. The corners of Ren’s mouth lifted.
“Maybe I can… catch fish?”
Ren began to think up a plan.
- Prepare a long, narrow small-box (about the size of his bow) in advance.
- Use water magic to drop a splash near the riverbank.
- When the fish gather, plunge one end of the small box into the water.
- Once the fish enter the box, pull it out and bring it onto the shore.
- Drain the water, then suffocate the fish.
“…Perfect, I think?”
His heart pounding, he summoned a long, narrow box. It was about as wide as he could carry, and as long as his height. Leaving it beside him, he gathered magic with one hand.
“Here!”
A lump of water shot out and struck the river surface. Immediately, he saw shadows of fish gathering. Grabbing the box with both hands, he waited.
The moment an iridescent fish opened its mouth and surfaced, he aimed carefully and slammed one end of the box into the water.
Splash!
The fish was caught inside the box.
“I did it—… huh!?”
More fish shadows gathered toward the box still in the water. Several fish slipped inside.
“W-what?”
Startled, Ren pulled the box out of the water. Placing it on the riverbank, he saw about five fish thrashing inside.
“That’s amazing! …Oh right, I need to drain the water.”
Though surprised by the unexpected result, he followed his plan and removed the water from the box.
As he watched the fish flop around, another thought crossed his mind—maybe they’d stay fresher if kept in water.
“If I had a wooden tub… but that’d be too heavy to carry… Oh! What if I just take them right away?”
He pulled out an empty burlap sack and stuffed the still-flopping fish inside. Abandoning the plan to suffocate them, he decided to take them to the Adventurers’ Guild while they were still alive.
Feeling the fish thrashing against his back inside the sack, Ren broke into a run toward the guild.