Ch.181To the Sixth City

After transferring the two powers of wind and water to Phyllis, Euclid brought out three large fabric scrolls as his personal compensation for this request.

These fabrics, woven from the threads of the spider monster “Arachne,” are considered top-tier clothing materials for being thin yet durable, with excellent elasticity and breathability.

Additionally, since they categorically belong to monster materials, they are easily enchantable and quite useful as ingredients for magical tools.

Of course, he didn’t forget his promise to send us the elven secret rum and marrons glacés once their reproduction was complete.

The finished alcohol and confections would be delivered to the Adventurer’s Guild in the Sixth Western City, Moon Lake, and we would receive notification when we visited any Adventurer’s Guild.

After that, it would be our choice whether to visit Moon Lake to collect the items personally or have them delivered elsewhere through a transport request.

Even after giving us the rewards, Euclid expressed his intention to host a grand banquet for us, but we politely declined and decided to leave the Oak Sanctuary before the sun completely set.

“Are you really sure? I haven’t even properly hosted the benefactors who saved our sanctuary…”

“It’s already been three days since we left the barrier tower. We’d like to reach Moon Lake as soon as possible.”

“You’ve already spent a lot at the Oak Sanctuary because of the pyroxysite. If you have money for a banquet, please use it to rebuild the farmland.”

“Very well. If that’s your wish, I won’t detain you any longer.”

With those words, Euclid no longer tried to delay our departure, and after saying goodbye to the elves of the Oak Sanctuary, we boarded our covered wagon.

After tonight, our qualification to pass through the elven barrier would disappear, so if we needed to visit the Oak Sanctuary again, we would need Orpheus’s help.

After arriving at the Westpoint Trading Post, we rented a slightly cheaper room than before and prepared dinner ourselves with purchased ingredients.

Although the bounty money was completely gone, we weren’t exactly tight on funds, but the experience of having a large sum of money come and go so quickly made us a bit more frugal.

Jessica, who had consumed vast amounts of magical power in the battle against the elemental, finished her meal, washed up early, and went to bed, while Phyllis also decided to get plenty of rest to adapt to her newly acquired wind and water powers.

So tonight, it was Setty’s turn to spend the evening with me.

“It’s a shame this room doesn’t have a bathtub.”

That was Setty’s comment as she dried her hair after showering.

“So you prefer bathing in a tub too, Setty?”

“Yes. Cat folk usually bathe in filled tubs, so that’s more familiar to me.”

“Ah… come to think of it, I never saw a shower at your house.”

While magical plumbing and showers were common in Grantis, not every inhabited place was perfectly equipped with such facilities.

Especially in the case of cat folk who didn’t interact with settlers, their infrastructure seemed somewhat outdated compared to elven sanctuaries or dwarven mines, probably because magical equipment technology spread primarily through the settler communities.

“Looking back, my first meeting with Setty was when I peeked at you bathing in a pond.”

“…Yes. My heart was really pounding then.”

“Because a man saw you bathing?”

“That too, but it felt like a fateful encounter.”

“Fateful?”

“I liked the expression on Will’s face as he looked at me.”

Setty stopped drying her hair and came to sit beside me.

Sitting side by side on the double-sized bed, she gently leaned against me.

Though we surely used the same soap, she emanated an indescribably wonderful scent.

“Cat folk women have this constitution that easily stimulates men’s desires. And we can easily sense what men are thinking when they look at us.”

“So what was my expression like when you saw me then?”

“…The expression of someone looking at something incredibly beautiful.”

With a slightly reddened face, Setty turned and straddled my thigh.

Beneath her brown eyelids, ruby-red eyes sparkled, clearly reflecting my face.

“Dad told me that men, especially settler men, only desire cat folk women’s bodies. But I didn’t sense any lust at all in Will’s face then.”

“Was that so? Hmm… I think that might have been true at the time.”

In the dark forest, Setty washing herself in the moonlit pond was simply “fantastic.”

The soft curves of a young woman combined with firm muscles creating beautiful lines, her healthy brown skin, and above all, a cat-person straight out of manga.

That surreal visual had something that instantly captivated my attention, though in a different way than Jessica had.

“…Yes. When I saw Setty then, I thought she looked more like a well-crafted work of art than something erotic.”

“It was my first time meeting a settler, but I felt I could trust this man. I was glad I had a pretty body like my mother’s.”

“What if I had been gawking with an excited expression?”

“I might have run away in surprise.”

“Thank goodness I was just staring blankly. I could have missed out on such a wonderful woman.”

As I said that and lightly kissed her small lips, a sweet pheromone scent began to waft around us.

Once, twice. The light kisses gradually intensified until they transformed into sticky adult kisses.

Setty’s tongue, not as rough as a cat’s but with unique bumps, touched mine. It might have been my imagination, but even her saliva seemed to taste sweet.

“…Puha.”

“You’re so cute, Setty. I really love you.”

“Mmm…!”

When I whispered love into her cat ears that stood up on her head, she trembled slightly and snuggled into my arms.

Though she usually seems cool, her reactions in bed are adorably innocent.

“Come to think of it, I don’t tell Will very often.”

“Tell me what?”

“…I love you.”

Thump.

My heart started beating rapidly at Setty’s declaration of love.

Thinking about it, while Setty is quite proactive in bed, she’s generally not talkative, and direct confessions of love are even rarer.

She’s the type to express herself physically rather than verbally saying she likes or loves someone.

So when such a Setty whispered love in a sweet voice even before we began our intimate act, it hit me deeply.

“Will, lie down. Today, Setty will love you lots.”

That night, I completely surrendered control to Setty as we made love multiple times.

It was a night that gave me some understanding of how a cat folk woman in her prime might seduce and “devour” a local young man.

The next morning, looking in the mirror while washing my face, I found my body covered in kiss marks left by Setty.

It seemed to be payback or revenge for what I had done to her in Riverside.

Seeing this, Jessica used her Heal Touch to erase the kiss marks with an exasperated expression, while Setty looked slightly disappointed.

As we traveled toward the Sixth Western City, Moon Lake, we spotted a large caravan of wagons approaching from the distance.

The procession consisted of about 40 wagons, with cargo wagons and covered wagons in a ratio of about 6:4, and even at a glance, it appeared to be heavily guarded.

“Jessica, there’s a huge wagon procession coming toward us.”

“Where? Ah, it’s the Grand Caravan. They started a bit late this year?”

“Grand Caravan?”

“It’s a large merchant group formed by guild merchants and transporters that travels between the western frontier and Mothertown. It’s organized about 3-4 times a year, and aside from bank cash transports, it’s probably the largest movement of money in Grantis.”

“What kind of goods do they handle to warrant that?”

“Expensive luxury goods, treasures and artifacts found in dungeons, rare monster materials, possessions of deceased mages, even rare animals.”

So it’s a large caravan carrying all sorts of rare items discovered on the western frontier and heading far east.

Certainly, with that scale, Jessica’s description of it being the largest money movement in Grantis makes sense.

“If it’s a caravan that handles artifacts, should we try to make contact? They might have items that could help Mina’s research.”

“Unfortunately, the Grand Caravan doesn’t trade directly with the general public. Instead, special auctions are held in cities the caravan passes through, where you might have a chance to bid on rare items the caravan has put up for sale.”

“Heh, a special auction… that sounds interesting.”

“Since we’ve crossed paths here, it means the Grand Caravan was staying in Moon Lake until this morning, so the auction will probably be held tomorrow or the day after. Let’s check the schedule when we reach Moon Lake.”

“OK, then let’s pick up the pace a bit now.”

An auction of rare items left behind by the West’s largest caravan.

I don’t know how much money we’ll need, but it should be fun just to watch.

I increased the speed of our wagon while glancing at the long procession of the Grand Caravan.