Ch.153Dwarf (5)

After Magni became a part of the village as a “food guest” (unpaid labor force).

Thanks to my active guidance, the once dejected and restless man disappeared at some point, and now he truly became an isekai cheat dwarf, taking charge of all sorts of tasks and rapidly advancing the village’s development.

What made Magni’s contributions particularly beneficial to me was that most of the tasks he took on were ones I would have found difficult to handle myself.

In reality, many of the issues he addressed had slight problems, but the cost of fixing them couldn’t definitively be said to exceed the benefits gained from the changes.

In this situation, Magni used his dwarven technical skills to reduce these “improvement costs,” and furthermore, he began to excel in various fields by taking matters into his own hands.

Thanks to him, he complemented the microscopic aspects I couldn’t address while investing in the overall development of the village—a pleasant miscalculation that, while intended, exceeded my expectations…

“…Hmm.”

Disappointed by the failure of my recent experiment, I lay down on a sunbed-like reclining chair, sighed, and recalled the past.

The day after gaining the troll’s regenerative ability, I belatedly remembered the additional trait acquisition through corpse consumption and had a sudden thought.

It was an experiment about what would happen if I consumed a corpse after already selecting a trait, since consuming a certain percentage of a corpse before trait selection allows for an additional trait choice.

Conveniently, our village had stored the troll corpse I had secured, and according to Gretel, who had passed it on for use as material, they had already harvested everything useful from it.

The internal organs of the fallen giant’s belly, heart, lungs, eyes, and brain—all valuable parts used in witch’s dark arts. Even the troll’s blood was used as an ingredient for healing potions.

The body parts of a troll that contain the mystery of regeneration retain that regenerative property even after death, making them the finest materials for creating magical tools for recovery and regeneration.

However, almost the only exception to this trend is the troll’s flesh—fat, muscle, and cartilage.

If left unattended, these parts begin to proliferate under the influence of the regenerative mystery that runs wild without direction, and there’s reportedly no way to use them for anything.

If eaten, they could expand in your stomach and cause your abdomen to burst open. Even though the stomach interior is highly acidic, the rampaging flesh isn’t affected and regenerates—no, it proliferates.

Since this useless flesh was difficult to dispose of anyway, I took it and consumed it, aiming to acquire additional traits.

And the result was… failure. Overwhelming failure.

That night, after consuming the massive amount of flesh (excluding the internal organs and bones), I gained nothing except the remnants of miscellaneous creatures hunted by my subordinates.

Of course, it wasn’t completely without benefit…

If I were to explain the specific gains, it might be that after consuming this corpse, my compatibility with “troll regeneration” increased.

In other words, as the proteins and fats produced from the troll’s flesh were used as energy to form my body, the efficiency of the troll’s regenerative power applied to my body seemed to improve.

Previously, if the energy consumed for this regeneration was about 150 and the regeneration amount was around 80, now the energy consumption is about 120 with a regeneration amount of roughly 90.

While I was quite pleased with the fact that I hadn’t suffered any loss, I was lounging on the reclining chair, passing time when…

“…Hmm?”

Suddenly remembering Magni’s recent brewing project, I got up.

Although I had previously agreed to his alcohol improvement business, leaving it completely unattended wasn’t a good option either.

In short, I was now dragging my reluctant body to inspect and check on the brewery.

Well, I don’t think dwarves who love alcohol so much would do anything problematic with brewing, but still.

※ ※ ※

Perhaps because dwarven society developed in such a masculine and macho form.

For these dwarves, alcohol—specifically, liquor—is an essential element that cannot be separated from their lives in the slightest.

Among these, beer, or “dwarf ale,” is a complete food (by dwarf standards) that cannot possibly be evaluated as “just alcohol.”

When dwarven society speaks of beer, they don’t mean the cloudy rice wine of this era with its varying quality and ingredients, but rather alcohol made using the three ingredients commonly used to make the highest quality beer: barley, water, and “hops.”

Here, barley refers to malt (germinated barley), and “hops” is a spice that gives beer its unique fragrance and distinctive bitter taste.

This is what dwarves recognize and acknowledge as “beer”—made using only pure ingredients without any additional impurities for volume expansion, using just these three components.

But this is merely beer that’s close to an ordinary beverage (by dwarf standards). What they truly take pride in and love is Dwarf Ale.

Despite being called ale, it has absolutely no connection to actual ale—it’s a tremendously strong liquor made from barley and “dwarf hops.”

This drink, which even notorious drinkers often cannot take a single sip of, is best enjoyed ice cold. While it sounds like vodka, its aroma is distinctive rather than colorless and odorless.

In dwarven society, Dwarf Ale is more than just an alcoholic beverage—it’s a culture and a material used for various purposes.

Thanks to the mystical elements involved in the brewing process, Dwarf Ale is nutritious enough to serve as a meal substitute, and simultaneously, its high alcohol content makes it highly flammable, allowing it to be used as fuel.

In fact, many of the dwarves’ rune-engines use runes and Dwarf Ale as power sources, and their flamethrowers likewise use this strong liquor as fuel.

And despite being eccentric, Magni Brunz, a dwarf who loves beer from a preference standpoint, was sincerely trying to improve the quality of beer in the domain.

Of course, his desire to drink something more delicious is quite strong, but it also seems that Magni as an individual dwarf wants to show humans what proper beer tastes like.

To use an analogy, it’s like wanting to feed foreigners your country’s food and receive praise for it.

Anyway, driven by this personal desire, Magni wanted to establish a proper brewery, but at the time, I opposed his choice for some legitimate reasons.

While homemade alcohol could somehow be justified as a meal substitute, essentially, brewing alcohol is nothing more than converting a massive amount of grain into something that cannot become a meal.

Additionally, the Dwarf Ale he so loves is something he doesn’t know how to make himself, and even ordinary beer by dwarf standards is difficult to brew due to lack of technical knowledge, making it quite expensive.

However, I wasn’t just blindly opposing it. After several discussions, we finally approved the establishment of a brewery under certain conditions.

We organized the brewery, which contained several dwarf-made oak barrels, as a direct facility under the lord’s jurisdiction, using its products for export and distributing only the remainder within the domain.

As for the grain consumption issue, it could be resolved relatively easily—or rather, it was unlikely to be a major problem.

This is because barley has an ambiguous value and proportion as a food crop in the Western Continent.

If you have no money, you can just eat dirt-cheap rye, and if you have some money, you’d rather eat wheat than mediocre barley.

For this reason, the proportion of barley cultivation has decreased, but coincidentally, barley was included in the four-field crop rotation system I was preparing to introduce.

Wheat, turnips, clover, and barley. The first three have definite uses, but barley, with its relatively low demand, could be diverted to beer brewing without major issues.

Additionally, when something is labeled as “dwarf-made alcohol,” its value is typically inflated in the market, so honestly, just making and selling beer from that barley would be like printing money.

For these reasons, a malt production facility and brewery were established in one corner of the village’s manufacturing district…

Judging by the alcohol frequencies spreading throughout, it seems the smell of alcohol won’t be leaving the village anytime soon.

They loved their alcohol.