Hideout in Another World: I Tried Building a Secret Base in the Middle of Nowhere

Chapter 112: Vaintz Village Part 1

Four days have passed since arriving at Vaints Village.

The reconstruction is progressing smoother than expected.

The villagers’ motivation is high.

They are genuinely happy to have returned to their village.

They are eager to quickly restore their former way of life.

Above all, they find it significant that they can swiftly eliminate monsters.

However, when they conducted preliminary investigations and consideration on the Bonus Trading Company’s strength, it’s somewhat as expected.

Nevertheless, it seems to have also come as quite a shock on the members of the Piri Mercenary Corps.

Kuro, especially, being small in stature, was initially not expected to be much of a fighting force.

Most of the mercenaries were indifferent until they arrived at the village.

However, come dinnertime, the members were all excitedly praising Kuro’s actions.

Kuro casually pats shoulders and strikes up conversations with everyone.

Unless they have been long-time companions, most wouldn’t understand what she’s saying.

Yet, few can resist her cheerful and charming smile, even if they don’t understand her words.

She quickly became the most popular member of the mercenary corps, admired for her incredible combat prowess and infectious brightness.

It’s quite something that Kuro, who cannot speak, became the most popular…

As usual, it’s hard to believe she’s an imp.

Of course, Shiro and Gisella must have also made significant contributions.

From the second day onwards, the mercenaries started looking at them with a mix of fear and admiration.

For some reason, Zamza chuckled wryly at this, but he might be somewhat similar.

And unexpectedly, Laura also made significant contributions.

Magic indeed proves to be quite useful, not just in battles but in various other ways.

Firstly, incinerating monster corpses.

Initially, we dug holes to bury them to conserve firewood.

But Laura’s magic made it surprisingly easy, so the mercenaries, who were initially reserved, started asking her one after another.

Handling half-rotten corpses poses hygiene issues when moved improperly.

With group actions, diseases are scary.

Therefore, it’s quite helpful to quickly incinerate them while disinfecting.

It also helped when making sun-dried bricks for building materials.

It can’t be used to directly dig soil, but it makes the work more efficient by indirectly expanding the voids in hard soil.

Additionally, when the iron belt reinforcing the wheels stretched, it was repaired by heating or cooling, showing detailed utility.

She seems capable of manipulating heat and pressure quite finely.

As Laura herself mentioned, she seems quite adept at magic.

Surprisingly, whenever she uses magic, Pink opens its mouth in surprise.

Well, Pink isn’t the type to use subtle magic… its aim is often off…

And seeing Laura’s magic, Pink seemed to sulk for a while.

But after Laura made iced coffee once, they seemed to have decided to get along.

Apparently, Pink likes both hot and cold things.

During meals, it received ice from Laura and alternated between the kiln and ice water, like someone who loves a sauna.

Depending on how you look at it, it could be torture, but is it really pleasant…?

Anyway, since coming here, she has been quite popular for various reasons.

“Gyagyagyagyagyagya!”

“No, no, Kuro-san, wait! Ahhhhh, stopppp!!!”

“Hey, over here~”

“Gugyau~!”

“Hii!”

However, unfortunately, she lacked stamina.

Voices calling for her help were heard everywhere, but she couldn’t quite make it.

She walks slowly, and gets out of breath quickly.

Just walking a bit faster makes her look like she’s finished a full marathon.

Even so, she never complained and did her best despite getting worn out.

One time, Kuro, seeing this, put Laura on the cart as if it was the most natural thing to do.

Laura seemed quite tired, and for some reason, when she got on the cart, she relaxed and sat in a triangular seat.

And then, she was carried away quietly like baggage.

It might be because of the time I carried Kuro for the cart experiment.

She certainly seemed to enjoy it a lot…

But although Kuro has excellent reflexes, she doesn’t have strong muscles.

Kuro seems to enjoy the fear-inducing driving quite a bit, but watching her sway around at a scary speed is worrying.

Is this really okay…?

Laura screams every time, but it seems better than walking.

Whenever called, she quietly got on it herself.

“Although I can’t help but think if it’s okay as a noble… well, it’s far better than being useless and sulking about it.”

Hajiramu, who had seen that attitude once, stood frozen for a while, then started to say something but ended up shaking his head and walking away without a word.

“K-Kuro-san… you’re too quick… I’m falling…”

“Gyaau~?”

“Laura-sama, please handle this.”

“Ah, th-this will be burned, right?”

Kuro was clearly enjoying herself, and from Laura’s expression, she didn’t seem to dislike it as much as she said aloud.

Rather, she seemed to somewhat enjoy this situation.

However… whether it was from burning monsters or getting covered in dust while softening the soil, she was dirtier than anyone else present, already giving off a worse smell than before.

It seemed Laura wanted to get closer to the villagers and mercenary group, but for reasons different from what she was thinking, maybe she couldn’t.

Well, in any case, she was a person with much more responsibility and patience than I had expected.

“Should we make a steam bath today?”

“Oh! That sounds great! I couldn’t stand the smell anymore.”

“Alright then, Boss Oscar, could you do that? I’ve roughly decided on a place. If we renovate the storage shed, it should be quick.”

“Master Bonus, that’s a great idea!”

“Wow, Laura is amazing. Honestly, I didn’t think she’d be this helpful.”

“It’s my first time directly helping people… it’s really fun!”

“Yeah, seriously… and magic is amazing, isn’t it? It’s incredibly useful, but does it ever run out of magic power?”

“Magic power? What’s that… um, yeah. Using magic feels like doing calculations. So it makes me tired, and if I lose concentration, efficiency drops and mistakes happen. But I’m not actually consuming something specific to use magic… so, I can’t really run out of it.”

“Wow, that’s how it works?”

“I’m good at calculations and using magic feels similar for me. But in return… I need a lot of sweets!”

“Alright then, here you go! Today it’s banana bread.”

“Yay~! Thank you, Mil-sama!”

So, for the past few days, Mil had been presenting chocolate and sugary snacks made at the hideout to everyone. It started with her making them for the children, but by the second day, it became everyone’s delight.

Well, adding sugar when baking bread does make a really nice smell… can’t be helped, huh?

Admittedly, the amount per person decreased, but even so, sweet treats in this environment brought a great sense of satisfaction.

“Hey, Bonus. The steam bath’s good and all, but have you figured out what to do with the crane?”

“Oh, uh… um―――”

By the way, thanks to the efforts of Gisella and Boss Oscar, fifteen carts were prepared.

Oscar turned out to be surprisingly well-organized, and Gisella had high adjustment and technical skills.

And then, there was the crane.

While pondering how to build and place the roof, I inadvertently muttered, “It would be easier with a crane.”

When Gisella and Oscar asked about it, the conversation expanded, and they decided to make a wooden crane.

Initially, I planned something simple, like a large scale.

But, pushed by Gisella and Oscar, I ended up drawing plans for an elaborate winch crane using wheels.

From there, in no time at all, they repurposed one of the existing carts, and the crane was quickly completed.

Thanks to this, work efficiency and safety improved significantly.

Still, I had never seen a wooden crane in person, and the drawing was just an image.

Naturally, one problem after another arose.

And each time, Gisella and Oscar urged improvements.

It seemed they found joy in trial and error like that.

Furthermore, in the process, they seemed to enjoy digging up new knowledge from me.

Well, it’s true that it’s interesting when concrete formulas and numbers are applied to things you intuitively understand.

Even simple principles like leverage were thrilling to them.

Since both of them seemed to have better intellects than me, they might eventually create something on their own, surpassing my knowledge.

“I’m back, Bonus.”

“Welcome back, Shiro.”

“Bonus, give me some of that bread.”

“I want coffee too.”

“Azir, you should ask Mil for bread while kneeling. As for coffee… Hajiramu, make it yourself. I’ll bring Shiro’s… Ah, it looks like Kuro already brought yours.”

“Gyaa~uu~”

“Bonus, Kuro, thanks a lot.”

Shiro sat down next to me, eating bread and drinking coffee with a smile on her face. Despite having slaughtered countless monsters as usual, she didn’t look tired at all.

Alongside Shiro, Azir, and Hajiramu, a few skilled mercenaries had ventured out from the village to subjugate monsters a bit farther away. They seemed to be heading towards the Tamir Mountains where monsters were concentrated, and there were still plenty of them around.

Most of these monsters weren’t much of a match for experienced mercenaries, though occasionally there were stronger ones mixed in. According to Shiro, compared to the Kidanakemo and the strange bird from the other day, these were so weak they weren’t even worth comparing.

“Ah, that was delicious! Thank you, Mil-sama!”

“Yeah, I’ll make it again tomorrow. But once Menas and the others return, it might be difficult to cook for everyone…”

“Now that things have settled down a bit here, I think we should return to our hideout for a while.”

“Yeah.”

“Gyau gyau!”

“I want to take a bath~”

“I also want to procure some new ingredients. We’re running short on vegetables and fruits.”

Everyone seemed to agree.

By the way, currently the Menas Caravan, the Vaintz Mercenary Corps, and half of the Piri Mercenary Corps are not here. They went to Savoia to replenish supplies.

Unexpectedly, the construction of the base and the rebuilding of buildings progressed smoothly, quickly depleting our building materials. Well, partly because we made cranes and such…

By the way, shovels seem to be unexpectedly useful, even used as weapons. Particularly Hajiramu seems to like them, having commissioned a custom one from Gisella. When I asked if he wasn’t supposed to be retired, he said he wanted to use it for gardening in the yard.

Is it common in this world for people to want to grow vegetables as they get older?

“By the way, Mil, where did Zamza go?”

“He’s helping to build fences around the perimeter of the village. He should be back soon.”

“Oh, right…”

Since the second day, Zamza has been involved in making fences around the village. Occasionally, monsters still wander in, so he’s perfectly suited for working away from the village center.

By the way, Zamza is incredibly popular among the villagers. Especially among the women. From young girls to old ladies, they flock to him.

Mil always looks somewhat conflicted watching this scene.

Well, it’s understandable. With his originally good looks and physique, plus recently tidied-up hair and clothing, his expression has softened considerably.

It’s no wonder he’s popular.

I often walk side by side with Zamza, but the only ones who come to me among the villagers are sweaty men like Miles or little kids.

The kids probably come to play with toys. They must remember when I made a seesaw using a prototype of the crane. I became popular for half a day back then.

Sometimes adults get on it too. I once saw Piri and Oscar enjoying themselves on it.

“――――Bonus, it looks like we’re running low on materials for the fences.”

“Welcome back, Zamza. Well, Menas and the others aren’t back yet, so we might pause fence-building until then. Switch to making sun-dried bricks in the afternoon, and let’s all return to the hideout tomorrow.”

“Yeah, got it.”

“So, Hajiramu, will it be okay for us to return tomorrow?”

“Yeah… no problem. Thanks to Shiro, we’ve managed to wipe out monsters over a wide area. It should be safe for a few days.”

“Hey, Bonus! Let’s hurry up and make a steam bath!”

“Ah, yeah, that’s right…――――”