Chapter 128: Setting Sail

In April, exactly one year since I came back to life, when cherry blossoms were dancing in the air, Hiyori and I set out for the Rus Kingdom together to repay the debt for receiving the resurrection magic.

The Rus Kingdom is a country in the former Russian territory. It’s a closed, landlocked country with poor access. We’ll travel 12,000 km by transferring between ships and steam locomotives, walking where there’s no transportation network. According to Hiyori, we should arrive in about two months.

We went to Lake Biwa by steam locomotive, then rented a two-seater tiger magic beast to get to Fukuoka.

Arriving in Fukuoka that same day, we booked a first-class cabin on a passenger ship departing from Hakata Bay for the Korean Peninsula. While lecturing me, Hiyori immediately began departure procedures at customs. The Blue Witch is treated as a VIP, so as soon as she entered customs, she was guided to a separate lane from ordinary people.

After a crisply dressed security inspector bowed to us, I casually hid behind Hiyori’s back.

“Good day. May I see your passports… Aoyama Hiyori-sama and Dairi Kenshi-sama, correct?”

“Yes.”

“That’s us…”

“If you have designated magic tools, please present them right here.”

“Yes. My Transcendent certificate, and this is the seven-layer Dragon Furnace Carved Blue Magic Staff, Kyanos.”

“And my prototype Demon King Staff Reficle and Octameteorite…”

Matching Hiyori presenting her card and staff, I also submitted my staff and the Octameteorite fragment in its protective case.

For this journey, both Kyanos and Reficle have had their security upgraded.

By replacing the fusion-recrystallization parts inside the silent casting mechanism with custom-colored gremlins mixed with the owner’s blood components, they now only respond to the owner’s mana.

In other words, Kyanos can only cast magic with Hiyori’s mana, and Reficle only with mine. A powerful security lock.

This way, even if stolen or taken by force, they become nothing more than sticks with gems attached, with no fear of misuse. They’ll total be useless to the person that stole them. Although I hope they don’t get stolen.

Even Hiyori, who hates letting others hold her staff, was handing over Kyanos with a reluctant face, trusting in the new security lock.

The hands of the security inspector examining one of only three silent-casting mechanism magic staves in the world were trembling slightly.

Mwahahaha, impressive, isn’t it, impressive. It’s like nuclear weapons leaving the country.

Two strategic-level magic staves worth no less than 100 billion yen each, created by an unprecedented, unparalleled legendary master craftsman!

…Thinking about it, can we really leave the country with such simple procedures? Well, it’s much better than being forced through tedious, complicated procedures and detained for days.

After carefully examining the designated magical tools, the security inspector returned them to us, wiped cold sweat from his brow, and made a relieved face like someone who had finally let go of a bomb that could explode at any moment.

“Yes, that’s fine. Then please proceed to the X-ray magic area over there. I’m sorry to trouble you, but please cut any defensive magic that obstructs X-ray vision until you pass through the area. Please be careful.”

“Thank you.”

“Alright…”

My first time leaving the country involved many unfamiliar procedures, but the principles were the same as in the previous era.

In short, checks are performed when taking important cultural properties or nuclear weapons abroad.

They also check for dangerous items.

Naturally, there’s passport checking and identity verification.

It’s just that X-ray inspection is replaced with X-ray magic, and the checklist has been adapted to the magic age. There’s nothing to be particularly nervous about.

After completing the departure inspection, we quickly boarded. The black-painted steamship with its smokestack seemed to reverse time itself, but this is now the cutting edge. Stepping up the gangway and opening the first-class cabin door, a spacious, hotel-like space spread out before us.

One king-size bed, one refrigerator, one closet. A lamp with magic fire was lit on the desk fixed to the wall. Fashionably decorated with avant-garde paintings that I couldn’t really understand.

While I rummaged through the refrigerator, closet, and drawers to see what was inside, Hiyori put her carry-on luggage into the provided safe.

“Not much in here. The window’s huge. But it doesn’t open…? Ah, I guess they’re worried about sea breeze damaging the interior.”

“Is this your first time on a passenger ship, Dali?”

“I’ve been on fishing boats before. Big ships don’t rock much, huh.”

“It’ll rock a bit more once we set sail.”

As we chatted about this and that while looking at the view of Hakata Bay from the window, I spotted something strange.

Plastic garbage was floating on the sea surface.

Not during the immediate chaos after the Gremlin disaster, but with plastic production having ceased 80 years ago, I couldn’t believe such garbage was still floating around.

“Legacy of the previous era’s sins, huh…”

“What are you talking about? …Ah, that’s not it. That’s not plastic. It’s marine ooze carcasses.”

“What’s that? I feel like I’ve heard of it before, or maybe not.”

According to Hiyori, the marine ooze problem has been worsening in recent years, with multiple negotiations held between nations with coastal territories.

Marine ooze are slimes that live in the sea. They drift on the surface like jellyfish and eat any non-living matter they see. The 150 million tons of marine garbage (equivalent to 1.2 million Tokyo Domes) that drifted in seas worldwide in the previous era disappeared cleanly over decades, slowly multiplying marine ooze.

But does this mean beautiful seas have returned to Earth? Not at all.

Marine ooze occupy a lower position in the food chain and become prey for sea-dwelling monsters, but they have thick, squishy skins.

Sea predators eat only the insides of marine ooze and spit out the unpleasant, hard-to-digest squishy skin.

As a result, instead of massive amounts of marine garbage, massive amounts of marine ooze skin drifts in the sea.

The sea is full of translucent, squishy carcasses like dead jellyfish. Walking along the coastline the morning after a big storm, you’re forced to witness an unpleasant sight as if the beach were covered with thick plastic.

Beached marine ooze carcasses suffocate shore life, and they tangle in steamship propellers causing breakdowns. They simply ruin the scenery too.

Furthermore, pouch sparrows greatly dislike the unique smell marine ooze emit, and when made to fly over the sea, they mostly shed tears like sparrow tears while painfully enduring the hardship, desperately trying to complete their delivery missions.

Marine ooze are regarded as enemies by pouch sparrow enthusiasts, and beached marine ooze and their skins are primarily removed by such charitable organizations.

The greatest advantage of these mostly-harmful marine ooze is that their skin contains trace amounts of mana recovery components.

If extracted and collected, it becomes proper mana recovery medicine.

However, the cost to extract 10,000 yen worth of mana recovery medicine is approximately 300,000 yen.

After more than thirty years of research and repeated cost reductions, that’s where they’ve arrived.

Marine ooze are nothing but trouble, and disposal costs keep mounting.

Monster Study scholars and magic medicine scholars have reached the long-term conclusion that “if piled up and left for several hundred to a thousand years, they will naturally decompose leaving blocks of medicinal components,” more or less throwing in the towel on the troublesome sea problem.

“So after about a thousand years, raw material deposits for mana recovery medicine will form like geological strata, huh. That’s romantic. Sounds good.”

“That’s not good. A thousand-year plan is too long for ordinary people. The problem is happening now.”

While I was feeling the long flow of history and getting sentimental, Hiyori calmly retorted.

Well, yes. Even ten-year policies are considered long-term; a thousand-year plan is a dream within a dream.

But being fixated on the small scale of humans is shallow. Geologically speaking, you could even say results appear in the short term.

“Won’t marine ooze carcasses eventually become like guano?”

“Guam?”

“Guano. That thing where seabird droppings like seagulls accumulate and fossilize into nitrate mounds. Mined extensively as nitrogen fertilizer and gunpowder raw material, supporting modern industry. Well, I don’t know that much about it either.”

Coal and oil were originally ancient organisms.

The accumulated activities of organisms bring abundant resources to the future across time.

Whether it’s the Sathayush true core theory, or the replacement of animals with demons, Earth is slowly adapting to the new environment of magic over long years.

The marine ooze problem is just one flow in the long history of Earth.

Since my lifespan has been extended so tremendously, there’s no point getting worked up over immediate problems.

Let’s wait and look forward to seeing the mana recovery medicine raw material deposits that should form in a thousand years.

“You’re making an enlightened face, but this isn’t someone else’s problem for you either, you know? Trade ships sometimes have accidents due to marine ooze and sink their cargo. Last year, the large gremlins I ordered from China didn’t arrive because of that.”

“Damn you, marine ooze!”

Unforgivable. All countries worldwide should unite and promptly address the marine ooze problem!

Why is the response so slow, what are they doing!? The people are in trouble right now!

Though I was seriously angry, Hiyori laughed as if amused.

Strangely, seeing Hiyori’s gentle smile with all harshness gone, my anger subsided too.

The journey has only just begun, but it’s already a bit fun. An overseas trip with just the two of us isn’t so bad sometimes.

Soon, a long steam whistle sounded, and the ship began to move.

Setting sail, and leaving the country.

Rather than the northern route via Karafuto, we’re heading for the Rus Kingdom via the southern route through Busan because there were sightings of Tsubaki in this direction.

If we can successfully track down her whereabouts, I want to deliver the vegetable oil assortment entrusted to me by Sekitan.

Is my pet, the last one raised in Okutama, doing well?

While thinking about the journey that will continue for the next two months, Hiyori muttered.

“I hope nothing happens during the trip. I want to enjoy traveling leisurely with Dairi.”

“You’re such a worrier. Just traveling won’t lead to incidents.”

“I’d like to think so. But when I’m with Dairi, I feel like we get involved in incidents somehow.”

“False accusation!”

Hiyori and I have known each other for about seven years, excluding the time I was dead.

Certainly, various things happened, but it’s not like it was that full of incidents.

Let me count on my fingers the incidents that have occurred so far.

In seven years: giant monster landing, Dragon Witch kidnapping, mushroom pandemic, inheritance fire arson incident, appendectomy, Arataki-gumi attack, demon king appearance, black ships arriving, mermaid witch surgery, Tokyo Nativity Christmas earthquake, zombie panic, death, resurrection, inheritance fire unsealing disturbance, Tiamat’s arrival, Second Generation Iruma sealing… that’s about it.

…

Aren’t there too many incidents? In seven years, that’s about seven lifetimes’ worth of incidents. What the hell is happening with my life?

“Okay, incidents might indeed happen. But let’s try to avoid them as much as possible.”

“Can we avoid them?”

“We can increase the avoidance rate, right? I’ll be careful not to do strange things, so Hiyori, let’s try to go without violence as much as possible too.”

Don’t do strange things. Don’t destroy things. Don’t beat people up.

Let’s keep ‘Ohashi’ in mind.

“Where did that modified slogan come from so smoothly? Well, fine, I understand. I’ll refrain from using force as much as possible. If I can have a normal honeymoon… trip, nothing could be better.”

“Right.”

The discussion is settled. There will probably be some trouble around investigating the Quodentz in the Rus Kingdom, but there’s no need to cause disputes before getting there.

First, ten hours to Busan Port in the True Korean Republic. Let’s stay quietly in the first-class cabin to avoid conflict with other passengers.