Will I End Up As a Hero or a Demon King (WN)

Chapter 291

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Chapter 291 – The Future

“Carla! Forget about dismantling for now. Head to the warehouse!”

“Huh?”

“Zeo too! Forget woodworking. Head to the warehouse!”

“What?”

“Lodge, you’re already here, so you’re good.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?!”

Back at base, I immediately called the three people who were already at their usual spots and told them to gather.

“I brought back a mountain of loot, so everyone help sort it! In return, you can take whatever you want, as much as you want!”

“Hoo.”

“So, you finished that guild request?”

“Even if you say we can take it, it depends on the loot, right?”

“Fufufu. Let’s start with the easy stuff to sort. Equipment first!”

As I took things out of the “Storage,” a mountain of equipment and melted metal piled up near Lodge’s workshop area.

“What the hell is this?”

“Just counting pieces, there’s gotta be over a thousand. Feel free to melt down the crappy stuff. Oh, and set aside any daggers that might be useful for dismantling.”

“Awesome!”

“Hm?” There’s some common metal armor here. Did you fight some soldiers?”

“Ah, some soldiers were involved in some shady business. I took care of them.”

“Hmph, not bad.”

“You… Is it really okay to go through the Mercenary Guild? Normally, you’d avoid getting the country involved, right?”

“It’s fine, you know? They won’t chase me this far, and most importantly, I have the new lord’s full permission.”

“Th-the lord…?”

Lodge was already panicking, but I’d leave him be for now.

The next obvious thing was probably this.

On the opposite side of the supply warehouse, where various monster materials are stored, I started dumping out the massive haul of confiscated materials.

The magic stones are overflowing from the wooden boxes, but they have a use, so that’s fine.

But what should I do with the huge piles of cat materials and mushrooms?

For now, I’ve dumped them out, but the only way I can think to deal with them is to sell them all to Orgu-san.

“Hey, are they all the same monsters?”

“Yeah, you know, the town of Guinier only has one hunting ground.”

“Some are skinned, while others are left whole. Put the ones that need dismantling over there!”

“Gyah, sorry! Just hold on a second!”

“These mushrooms should keep pretty well. Should I move them to the food storage area near the cliff?”

“Ah, then I’ll sort the cats. You handle that, Zeo!”

Carla busily carried materials that needed dismantling to the dismantling area, while those that did not need dismantling were piled up in a corner of the warehouse.

After that, I distributed the loot one by one, getting everyone to work at full force.

“Ah, this is alcohol! A huge amount!”

“Wooooooooooooooooo!”

“There’s also an insane amount of food, but I’m not familiar with this world’s cuisine. I’ll leave the food to Zeo.”

“Then I’ll have everything edible moved to the food storage.”

“And this is clothing. Seriously, way too much.”

“Whoa! Wait, isn’t there a lot of women’s clothing too?”

“Of course there is. I collected everything I could find.”

“You filthy bastard!”

“Whoa, you collected underwear too? You’re quite the one, aren’t you?”

“No, no, I didn’t pick them up on purpose! Oh, and furniture! There’s a ton of that, too. It’s crazy.”

“Ah, a mirror! This is good!”

“There’s a bed that looks good and seems to be good quality. If there are this many desks, I’ll just turn them into workbenches.”

“Go ahead! Go ahead! Take as many as you want!”

One hour later:

“This is… pretty awful, huh?”

“Hmmm, a sight I cannot tolerate.”

“I can’t tell what’s what with this mess!”

“Why did you bring back such a ridiculous amount of stuff?”

As always, Carla’s words stabbed straight through my heart.

Well, if it’s free, I want it. It’s a cheapskate mentality, but that’s just how it is.

Plus, it gives off a “it’s over” vibe, but the storage space is nowhere near full yet.

There are probably several times more than what’s visible now, hidden in secret pockets. I’m not even aware of some of the things being stored.

Given that, this calls for a fundamental overhaul.

“Guess I have no choice.”

“What?”

Seeing Carla’s bewildered expression, I flash a suspicious grin.

“I’d like to start building a new structure right now!”

▽ ▼ ▽ ▼ ▽

By the time the sun had fully set,

I floated in midair and surveyed the entire structure. I nodded deeply, impressed with my own creation.

It might be a bit niche, but since Carla was moving around like crazy, I knew everyone would like it.

The problem with the materials warehouse was obvious. The ceiling was far too high and completely wasted space.

Even Zeo’s shelves only went up about two meters, leaving the space above completely empty.

So, I finally implemented an idea I’d toyed with in the past. The result was a ten-story building, which I suspect is quite rare in this world.

Using earth magic, I erected numerous tall stone pillars, each five meters high, and placed massive stone slabs on top of them.

Repeating this process was surprisingly straightforward.

However, there are no stairs.

Making something like that is too difficult, so there aren’t any.

That’s why it’s for experts.

I gradually made the stone slabs shorter so that only the warehouse entrance has a clear view to the ceiling.

Whether or not you can jump five meters from there, or if you can teleport, this design lets you go to the next floor. Zeo and I had no problem, and Carla easily cleared it with a normal jump.

Even the shaky Lodge could climb up by grabbing onto things thanks to the power level effect. Surprisingly, you can manage in this otherworldly building, even without stairs.

1st Floor: Forge, Monster Material Warehouse, Firewood Storage, Temporary Material Storage

Second Floor: Dedicated Monster Material Warehouse

Third Floor: All clothing and daily necessities

Fourth Floor: General furniture and magic tools

Fifth Floor: Undecided

Sixth Floor: Undecided

Seventh Floor: Undecided

Eighth Floor: Armor Storage, Nobody Uses

Ninth Floor: Artifacts Nobody Cares About, Art Objects, and Miscellaneous Items

Tenth Floor: Storage for Things to Dry/Carla’s Villa

Annex (inside the cliff): Refrigerated Food Storage

I have no idea why I’m doing this when I have plenty of land to spare.

But I’m grinning like an idiot while making a wooden floor guide sign, so if it’s fun, that’s good enough.

“Put this near the warehouse entrance,” I said.

Satisfied with the result, I headed to the upper plateau.

I called out to Alicia and Felin, who were peering into a large pot over the fire.

“Hello!”

“Hello! Welcome back!”

“Welcome back. Did everything go smoothly?”

“Of course! I brought back some souvenirs. Is everyone down yet?”

“Ria and Riste are probably still building their homes. Feeril and Rigal are in the bath.”

“All right, I’ll go get them!”

“Take your time, okay?”

While waiting, I peeked into the pot. Inside were large chunks of meat, the white fat of which stood out prominently as it rolled around.

What on earth are they doing with this?

“Hey, is this for dinner?”

“Well, you could eat it, but we’re actually melting it down to see if we can get some preservative oil.”

“Whoa, wait. This meat isn’t from a local monster, is it?”

“Apparently, Rigal was attacked by a regular boar today, so she caught it.”

“Ah, I see. The monsters around here are mostly muscle and not very fatty. But boar fat, huh…”

Honestly, I’d never even heard of it when I lived in Japan.

Lard comes from pigs, and chicken or beef fat is pretty standard, too. But is boar fat actually any good?

“Is that something people normally eat in this world?”

“It seems to be used in cooking. It’s also sometimes used as a medicinal lotion for the skin.”

“Hoh~ Well, that sounds exciting. You’re getting more and more knowledgeable!”

“Since I can’t move around, I have to gather knowledge from memory and share it with everyone.”

Ugh… They’re becoming more and more like a goddess!

They’re wearing this incredibly smug look that makes me want to ask what they’ve been doing all this time. But if they’re trying hard, I guess it doesn’t matter what kind of face they make!

And then.

“Here, these are souvenirs for everyone.”

“Huh? Liquor?”

“Ah, this is cheese!”

Once everyone had gathered around, I pulled out the cheese and liquor that had been stored at Ash’s house.

The liquor, especially, just from the smell, felt different from before. It was probably distilled spirits, like brandy, which I’d barely touched.

“Yeah, yeah, the stuff the gang boss had. Lodge is more about quantity than quality, you see.”

Honestly, it all looked fancy, bottled up like that.

It shouldn’t be a problem to share a few bottles with the gods.

As I watched, Alicia, Ria, and Felin all had weird looks on their faces while Riste and Feeril nodded contentedly. Ril was laughing and chugging it down.

That elf god definitely doesn’t know what it tastes like.

“Loki-kun, you look weird, too.”

“No, this…it’s a bit too strong…ugh!”

This is dangerous for my body.

While I can still speak normally, I’ll report today’s results and outcomes.

The town cleanup is mostly finished. The lord was killed, but his youngest son is working hard to rebuild.

We’ve converted the warehouse on the lower plateau and stocked up on most daily necessities. If anyone wants something, please get it through Alicia.

There’s also an excessive amount of food in the food storage area, so I want them to eat it all before it spoils.

Since Felin and Ril are motivated, I think the excess will decrease, but if there’s still too much left over, it’s fine to sell whatever can be sold to the Guinier Hunter’s Guild.

If I sell to them, the goods will circulate within the town, right?

Now, on to the main point.

“Well, a lot happened today. I’ve been thinking that maybe I shouldn’t hide this black magic any more than necessary.”

“Are you sure that’s okay?”

Alicia wasn’t the only one who looked confused. The words had just slipped out.

Still, I nodded deeply.

“If I force myself to hide it, I feel like I’ll forget something important someday.”

There were many things I could have done before now, but didn’t because of this black magic.

Take the Varakhan battle I once participated in, for example.

Even back then, with scum like Fidel and the others, if I hadn’t tried to hide my black magic, I might have been able to defeat them before the melee fighters suffered such heavy casualties.

I still regret that I could have handled at least one or two of them before they became casualties.

This time, too, I unleashed “Heaven’s Thunder,” assuming my dark magic would be seen, which is why the town’s damage should be limited to minor injuries.

As I retreated, I finished off the stragglers, but I probably didn’t manage to kill every last scoundrel present.

I fired several “Heavenly Thunder” bolts at once. If they were outside the range of my Investigation, I wouldn’t be able to tell if they were dead or alive.

Had I hesitated, climbed down from the stone wall, and tried to take them out one by one, who knows what would have happened?

“As far as I know, the only one with black magic right now is Zeo-san down there. You understand that, right?”

“Of course. Thanks to that, I was mistaken for a monster for the first time today. I expect this will happen again.”

“Are you okay with that, Loki-kun?”

Felin’s words made me pause for a moment.

“It’s not that I mind, but I’m used to that kind of look. Besides, there are people who understand.”

“True, I don’t think you can hide it forever.”

“Yeah, exactly. With witnesses this time, it’s bound to spread at least a little.”

“”””””…””””””

“Come on. I didn’t come here to talk about such gloomy stuff. More importantly, there’s an interesting magic tool among the spoils—”

I have no idea what’ll happen next.

Eventually, though, the fact that I’m a “foreign element” in this world will be exposed and gradually spread.

When that time comes, what will my position be?

For now, all I can do is try not to think about it too deeply.

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