Chapter 84
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 84
Chapter Title: A Very Good Choice
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"A very good choice."
Of course, it was true that both Melissa and I craved someone's warmth, making it impossible to push away the girl who had so naturally slipped into our little fold.
She was the one who had breathed life into the lonely House Cascadia, and even though she had asked, it was still us who had brought her along.
Once I filled her fridge to the brim, she finally seemed satisfied, hugging it tightly.
"If you have a sub-space, just store it there. Why bother with a fridge?"
"There's a special taste to eating things ice-cold."
So she says.
It had been about two weeks since we returned to the Cascadia mansion.
The first few days passed in fairly monotonous peace.
But such a vacation wasn't meant to last long.
"Give me your opinions."
That day, Melissa was waiting for us with a gravely serious expression.
It was our usual meeting time, filled with pointless chit-chat.
It was also a regular gathering for the three of us: Melissa and me as family members, and Luna, who was technically just a freeloader but might as well have been permanent.
"Something go wrong? The mines?"
She shook her head at my question.
"No, the mines are progressing smoothly. It's just..."
The issue she raised wasn't that.
"The knights and soldiers monitoring the Demon Realm are exhausted."
It was the most serious problem.
Troop morale was directly tied to combat effectiveness.
"There have been recent incidents, and many knights who left the territory have returned..."
Manpower was short, and the systems to care for them had largely collapsed.
"So, what do you want to do?"
"At the very least, I want to create something that lets them rest comfortably when they're off duty."
That was her thinking. They couldn't slack on surveillance duties.
Besides, the nature of the Demon Realm made it impossible to just hire random humans willy-nilly.
So, at least for those already there, she wanted ways for them to relax after their shifts.
I closed my eyes at her sentiment.
Personnel attrition had been a longstanding custom, practically.
I wasn't ignorant of their hardships, so I could empathize to some extent.
That was when it happened.
"I'd love to give them vacations, but..."
"Saw this in the noble travel guide. Vacations mean beaches. Like lying on the sand after hard work, sipping a drink."
The book Luna pulled out was illustrated in vivid detail with images of vacation spots.
They seemed a bit too refined for knights to enjoy, though.
"Ah, the sea... I used to like it. I've hardly ever been myself, but... I can't just like it anymore."
Melissa's face hardened. To her, the sea was where she lost her family.
"Or there's beautiful natural scenery. Says there's a massive waterfall on the next continent."
"Wow, I've never been anywhere like that... Wait, how did we even get on this topic?"
"Leon, sounds good?"
Luna turned to me and asked.
"Sounds good. Lounging on the beach, listening to the waves. But what's the point? Send the knights and soldiers there on vacation? That make any sense?"
"We'll make one now."
I stared at her in stunned disbelief at her bold demand.
"What?"
"What do you mean, what. Hurry up and make it."
"Cascadia's inland, you know. How the hell do you make a sea?"
"That's for Leon to figure out."
"What kind of lunatic are you?"
Luna giggled playfully, and Melissa nodded along.
"Exactly. Whatever it takes, create some welfare for the knights and soldiers to enjoy."
Watching the two of them perfectly in sync as they ganged up on me, I fell into thought for a moment.
Now it was clear they were just picking on me.
I stood up without hesitation, grabbed one of the consumable artifacts from the side table, slammed it down on the table with a thud!, and declared boldly,
"Let there be light."
"Ack!"
Bang!!!
"Gah!! My eyes!!"
A massive burst of light exploded from the artifact with a deafening roar.
It was a flash artifact.
The Cascadia territory housed a Demon Realm.
As such, House Cascadia had long dispatched knights and soldiers in groups to monitor specific sections.
In the process, if anomalous monster behavior was detected, they would guide or subjugate them.
To that end, Cascadia periodically rotated knights and soldiers to live in the mountain lodges there and keep watch.
The key point was this.
For knights and soldiers in typical territories, off-duty restrictions weren't severe.
Their range of activity was mostly within the territory anyway.
Knights would hit taverns or spend personal time off-duty, and some even visited brothels.
But in Cascadia, that was impossible.
Their only entertainment was the snacks brought by periodic resupply teams entering the Demon Realm.
And lately, the knights' amusement had been moonstone collecting.
"Senior, check this out."
"Oh. This one's pretty big, huh?"
Moonstones. Mysterious, colorful stones occasionally found in the Demon Realm, ranging from nail-sized to fist-sized.
No one knew their origin, but the theory that they were fragments of the moon fallen from the sky had enough credibility to earn them the name.
Of course, their only difference from regular stones was their pretty colors, so aside from being hard to obtain, they weren't particularly valuable.
So why would grown adults—knights and soldiers in the Demon Realm—take up such a hobby?
Sheer, utter boredom.
The first few months might be tolerable, but deployments lasted three to six months.
For that stretch of time, they had to conduct surveillance in the forest, enduring mind-numbing boredom as the biggest challenge.
Having tried everything else, they'd latched onto moonstone farming lately.
"Knight Vallin, take a look at this."
"Whoa... that's a decent size. Where'd you snag it?"
"Pfft. You think I'd tell you on an empty stomach?"
Some might call it a childish pastime. It was meaningless collecting, after all.
But the knights and soldiers were desperately bored!
True, monitoring and subjugating kept them tense, but even that got old after a couple times—continuous duty brought soul-crushing tedium.
So even those who dismissed it as nonsense at first had started getting into moonstone collecting before they knew it.
Rattle!!
The firmly shut door burst open, letting in a chill draft.
This damn Demon Realm stayed perpetually cold.
No one visited except the resupply teams.
Who the hell could it be?
"Huh?"
Those in the middle of chatting eyed the sudden intruder curiously, then widened their eyes at the sight.
They shot to their feet.
"You... Young Master?! How are you..."
The one who had shown up at the mountain lodge out of nowhere was none other than Leon.
Leon Cascadia, the eldest son of House Cascadia.
"Everyone's working hard, I see."
His eyes gleamed with interest as he stepped inside calmly.
"Actually, I heard some interesting news from the knights who rotated out recently."
"Interesting news, sir? What..."
"Rumor has it moonstone collecting is all the rage among the on-duty knights and soldiers?"
Leon's lips curved into a sly grin. A chill ran through the knights and soldiers, who hastily shoved the moonstones they'd been proudly showing off under the table.
Trivial as they were, some instinct told them to hide them the moment they saw Leon.
But Leon wasn't about to let their little hobby slide.
"Bring them all out."
Leon was merciless.
"Aaaah! Young Master! Please! Not that... anything but that!"
"Ah! We'll get you better ones later!"
The savage raider showed no mercy. He stormed in and plundered every last moonstone from the soldiers' lockers and scattered around the lodge.
The knights and soldiers, who had scraped them together over endless boredom, could only swallow their tears as their treasures vanished before their eyes.
All the surveillance team's hard-earned moonstones were sucked into a massive sack.
The knights watched Leon depart with the forlorn expressions of parents who'd had their child stolen away.
About two hours before I raided the mountain lodge.
Pondering Melissa's request for knight welfare ideas, I came up short.
Lack of materials. Lack of time.
No matter how I twisted or reshaped things, most required time or resources.
Thus, my options were limited.
Even the one idea I had came with a hitch.
The absence of moonstones.
Moonstones—known as moon fragments, dismissed as useless rocks—but actually tough to acquire in quantity.
The problem was that this "useless" stone was the key piece in my plan.
Processed specially, its molecular structure changed, reacting with certain metals to form unique patterns—only moonstones could do it.
"Where the hell do I get moonstones..."
Even merchants didn't stock them easily.
Especially not in the bulk I needed.
"Moonstones? There are plenty in the Demon Realm, but collecting them yourself would take forever. What're you planning?"
"What else? You told me to build a welfare system for the knights."
If I was doing it, might as well make something no one on the continent had ever seen.
"Flip the whole Demon Realm upside down?"
"How much do you need?"
"If I grab every one I see... it'd eat up a ton of time."
Using undead could cut that dramatically, but moonstones weren't that abundant in the Demon Realm—clear limits.
Honestly, without a stockpile already, it'd be tough.
That was when I spotted a group of knights entering the territory.
Riding back, their faces lit up with the joy of homecoming.
They'd finished their Demon Realm monitoring rotation.
Having performed such noble duty, Cascadia usually held welcome ceremonies for returning knights and soldiers.
Unlike Melissa, who planned to do the same, my eyes drifted to something else they carried.
"Kuhuhu. Look at this shimmering hue."
"Heh heh, elder. Still can't beat mine, though."
"Tch. Kid just got lucky..."
I hurried over to the weary group eager for rest and asked the knights,
"Moonstones?"
"Pardon?"
"Young Master?"