167. You are my taste
In the evening, the adventurer’s guild’s pub was empty.
If it’s natural, it’s natural. Due to the recent raid on the rendezvous point, the adventurers near Haire were wiped out, and those who remained were mobilized to block the waves that occurred earlier.
The fatigue of the few remaining adventurers in this country estate must have reached its peak by now. What they need is sleep, not alcohol.
So, the only ones hanging out in the bar now were those who couldn’t sleep without alcohol.
“Damn it, damn it…”
“Now, calm down. Let’s have another drink.”
The inside of the bar, which would normally be full of people at this time, was depressing. Between the exceptionally loud screeching of lanterns, only the voices of people who suppressed their sobs spread quietly.
“Calm down?! I can calm down!”
The man who was drinking her shouted that and jumped her up. The violent movement overturned the glass in front of him, and drops of beer, thick like urine, splattered at the man sitting across from her.
The man who jumped up had one arm missing.
“Sit down.”
“Look at me now! I, who was doing so well in Teper, is now in a situation like this…”
The man yelled at her so that her face turned red, but she couldn’t even stand the tavern, no. It was impossible to shake off the gloomy atmosphere that permeated the entire city.
The man’s voice, which had been shouting, gradually faded and then stopped. The drinking partner of the drunken man just stared at him with calm eyes.
Soon after, the man sat down on her seat without saying anything. The bare sleeves fluttered.
“Isn’t everyone in the same situation?”
The companion spoke quietly to the man who lost his arm. I didn’t notice it at first because he was with his back to us, but soon his miserable situation caught my eye as well.
Like a man without an arm, his companion also had one of his legs cut off below the knee. Supporting that crooked back were poor crutches that could hardly be called good workmanship even with empty words.
“Whoa, sorry.”
The brief commotion died down as quickly as it had happened, and the two men resumed drinking in silence. I looked at him and talked to Cream.
[The atmosphere is not good, how about going somewhere else?]
“No, it’s okay.”
Well, there is no better place than here. At most, a self-made wine warehouse? According to Cream’s liking, we took a seat in a corner that was roughly appropriate.
Tsk tsk, by the way, I feel sorry for those writers. Contrary to prejudice, the level of medical care in this world is rather higher than in modern times. Because even if knowledge and technology fall behind, there is the divine power of the source.
Cut off limbs? Do you have an incurable disease? Or are you just low on energy? Ah! Here’s the best answer for you! Such savage advertising phrases are only true here.
In addition, no preparation is required to exercise ‘power’. That meant that if Cream wanted, she could always mend their defects.
[What would you like to drink?]
“Mmm.”
“No, you’re buying with the owner’s money anyway! Why are you pretending to be patronizing?”
[Caught.]
But in a situation like this, it’s human nature to want to try a line like this at least once. Cream lightly went to the counter and ordered her drink. Because she’s too low-key to be called a bar.
There is often a prejudice when it comes to adventurer’s guild pubs, but in reality, the beer sold here isn’t that bad. There is no food hygiene law in this world, but there are many customers with knives instead.
Besides, being treated as a lowly job by an adventurer is a job that is treated fairly regardless of whether it’s the same grade or silver or gold grade. Of course, there were plenty of high-end drinks for such people.
Of course, it’s only at the level of a country estate. I emphasize it once more because it is important. Country estate level.
Chin.
The tavern owner, presumably a retired adventurer by the looks of his clothes and scars on his face, silently put down two beers in front of us and turned his back. Wait, two drinks?
“Me too, I will drink too!”
[Apart from Cream, you look like a real criminal.]
“Ugh, noisy! Also, don’t say anything that only you can understand.”
I’m not calling Choco her guy, not her. Honestly, he’s too young. Fairies and beastmen grow and age slower than humans, but even taking that into account.
But no matter what God says, now I was nothing more than a sword. In the end, I had no choice but to watch as the red liquid overflowing from the wood-carved glass mercilessly poured into his mouth.
“Kiya, it tastes better than I thought.”
Choco gave a more positive review than she thought after drinking alcohol. Do you think that is delicious? What Cream ordered was like trash that adventurers drink, no. I remember it as a slightly better beer than trash.
“That is, this.”
The other cup, which Cream pointed to, certainly did. Ugh, that familiar yellowish color. Wait, then what did Choco just drink?
“Order, when, properly, not, heard.”
[Sorry…]
“That was, originally, Karbal.”
What?! I don’t usually buy drinks for swords, so of course I thought I ordered one for cream and one for chocolate. Surprised, I belatedly recognized the sense I had been missing.
What I could feel from the empty glass of chocolate was the faint smell of blood. Somehow, that guy with an animal taste ate it deliciously. What popped into my head was the name of a certain drink.
[Could that be Bloody Raoul?]
“Yes. Know?”
[Of course! It was my favorite!]
Contrary to its grandiose name, it was actually not that silky. Rather, it should be said that it is a goeju for lovers of minor tastes.
A drink made from fermented troll blood. Contrary to what is commonly known, troll blood does not have any regenerative powers, rather it is full of venom.
However, after the venom rots until it is gone, then it transforms into something that has an alcohol component, which makes you intoxicated by drinking it anyway. The taste is quite different though.
Someone who didn’t like this drink misunderstood Bloody Raoul as tasting like drinking stale water straight from a swamp, but it was also my favorite drink in my human days.
“Somehow they said it was delicious, but it was more because they stole someone else’s and ate it.”
And Choco was talking like that. When I was gripped by an intolerable murderous intent, Cream stood up.
Then she went back to her barkeeper. The gold coins that came out of the subspace pocket made a jingling, light sound.
“Bloody, Raoul. A drink. No, one bottle. More.”
However, even the brilliance of the gold coins did not reveal the time-soaked face of the owner. The man, who was like a wooden stone, silently nodded once and got up from his seat.
Do you know that Chi-Chim is a warrior? You probably know. Also, the attitude he showed just now was extremely rude to a hero.
There were people like that. Those who live only because they are not dead, who no longer feel value even in their own lives. Yes, like the man named Raul who left his name on my favorite drink.
He was a troll hunter with a good reputation. However, unlike the perception that his prey were stupid, they were quite intelligent, and one day. While Raoul was gone, the village he lived in was raided.
“Master, can I have one more drink?”
“Choco is young.”
“Eek, the owner sounds like a carbal.”
Returning to the village with the newborn baby troll in its corpse, Raul saw only ruins with no survivors and the skull of his first son, whom he had teased for being hard.
I don’t know if his head was really hard enough for the troll to chew on, or if it was just to make fun of him, but the missing son and the traces left as if mocking him were enough to make Raoul angry.
Well, what follows is obvious. Under the efforts of a renowned and vengeful troll hunter, the entire troll population was wiped out.
Boom!
“Karbal, that’s it.”
Unsure of which troll among them was the one who harmed his family, Raoul decided to identify his enemy through the taste while eating all the trolls he hunted.
However, there was no such thing as refrigeration in another world, no, there was something similar, but it was filthy expensive, so countless troll corpses were left unattended, and in the slaughterhouse of vengeance.
This sake was born. With mouth-watering eyes, I looked at the wine bottle that the host put down with a brusque hand.
[I’ll eat well!]
By the way, by the way, your eyes are a bit annoying. Whether it’s Raul in the story or the owner of the curse, people who seem to have given up on life have one more thing in common.
If you are really put in front of the threshold of death, you become more servile than anyone else. No one is truly detached from a certain desire, and the fact that someone pretended to be detached in front of a certain desire was, in fact, just an ugly self-confession that they were swayed by desire more than anyone else.
My little hobby was to see the bottom of those people who pretend to be lofty. What. Let’s decide the owner’s fate after tasting the sake.
The cream, which blew the neck of the bottle with the blade of my hand, stuck me in the bottle.
[Kuh.]
I groaned involuntarily the moment the dark red liquid, resembling the sludge of a swamp, wrapped around my sword body. As expected, it was as Cream expected.
As a swordsman, of course I can’t drink alcohol. But, what if it’s not bloody, but made entirely of blood? Like a demonic sword that absorbs souls, I can additionally absorb blood as well.
That’s why blood wine made with blood is also drinkable.
“How is it, taste?”
[Hmmm…]
I rolled the taste again and again instead of the answer. Eh, the taste of the alcohol was the same as I drank when I was a human. No, rather, it became a sword, and the senses were more detailed than when they were human.
Yes, but.
From noble mtl dot com
[Honestly, the taste is okay, but that’s how it is.]
I couldn’t lie to Cream anyway, so I said it honestly. The taste of Bloody Raul was the same as I enjoyed drinking it when I was a human. However, I was no longer inspired by the taste.
To be honest, fresh blood squeezed from a person’s throat tasted better. It was natural. As I became a sword, my sensory standards were also adjusted to the sword, not to a human.
What suits the taste of a demonic sword is not blood that has rotted to such an extent that the soul is blown away, but blood obtained from a being that was alive a while ago, with even the slightest hint of the scent of a fresh soul.
“Sorry.”
[No, I’m not going to apologize.]
Personally, I’m a little moved. In the end, it might be a coincidence, but anyway, wasn’t Cream served my favorite drink when I was a human? It is enough to be moved by that thought alone.
If you think of Cream’s personality, it would not have been easy to think of the ‘consideration’ that she feeds her drinking sword with alcohol made from her blood. Truly a great development.
“Then, Karbal, what do you like?”
[No, didn’t you come out for a drink?]
“Quickly, answer me.”
Eolssigu, now he even gives orders. Even though I grumbled at her words, I answered meekly.
[It’s also a person.]
“People. Just finished?”
[Are you asking about conditions? Mmm. If anything, the younger the better. Still, if you’re too young, it’s a bit like that. Between your late teens and early twenties? A woman rather than a man, especially a chaste virgin. It’s better to have a certain level of ability than a normal person.]
Ah, write. I’m salivating again as I speak. Human blood. Even as I’ve never drank blood with the conditions I mentioned, I can count it on my hands. I don’t know if it’s one or two things, but it’s extremely rare to meet all those many conditions.
Instead, as rare as it was, the taste was amazing. I murmured, lost in a hazy recollection.
[Yes, just like you…]
Ah, it was right after I said it that I realized I was mistaken. We were talking about food, not rational taste.
“Like me?”
Cream asked back in an emotionless tone as usual, but somehow with a hint of laughter mixed in.