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Chapter 198: The Two’s Intended Stay

「… Is there a gathering today? 」
Dean and the other guys are drinking tea with me in the rented house when Butler came.

「Goodmorning, ah no, it’s already noon. 」
Reid said with his signature bright smile.

「Don’t mind us, we’re like this because this guy here tore our clothes off. 」
Dean is wearing a white jinbei, a short Japanese-style jacket and trousers. He’s not the only one; the other guys aside from Reid and me are all clad in the same thing.

「Hey, I never imagined none of you have anything to change into. You got way too much laundry piled up. 」

I pulled all the sheets and other laundry stuff and put all of them together earlier. Now I’m fumigating the upper floor with insect repellent herbs.

They also spray the mixture onto the clothes in this world. It doesn’t stain and leaves only the scent. This world doesn’t have electricity so I use insect repellent herbs without any hesitation.

「Don’t you know it’s normal not to have any change of clothes for one to two months? 」
「Stop doing that in hot places. 」
And I wish you won’t do that during winter too.

「This is cool and comfortable. 」
Retze just finished briefly studying the jinbei’s structure.

「I don’t have anything to do outside for today, save for dinner! It’s such a sweet deal having great food and getting all cleaned up! 」
The one who prepared brunch for the guys then waited for them to get up and go to the common room is me; the one who pulled their clothes off is also me.

And the person who froze after getting caught in the act by Reid is also me. I totally forgot he exists.

I prioritized debunking whatever misunderstanding he had, before explaining where these clothes came from. I told him it’s Es’s white national costume that I copied after recalling I saw them before.

Actually, these white jinbei’s are made from the linen I bought when I went to Es. They’re brandnew so still a bit crisp and stiff, but they’ll eventually get used to it. It doesn’t stick to the skin during summer so it’s also cool.

They’re supposed to be my summer pajamas though, you know! They’re made in big sizes so that they’ll be nice and cool, so no one had any issues wearing it. The trousers are a bit short for Dean and the others, but that’s probably because they’re insanely huge.
Ahh, when will the results of me drinking milk show?

Reid has his own changing clothes. When I told him today is laundry collection day, he got the clothes he wore while traveling and crammed them into Chris’s bag.

He’s an independent guy so that’s probably why he is neat. Well, Chris likes to keep things clean compared to Dean. Ah, no, maybe it’s more accurate to say that Chris and Reid are good at grooming compared to Dean rather than say they’re cleanliness loving guys.

They aren’t particular when it comes to laundry, but they do pick their clothes, brush them, fix the shape and hang them nicely, so they’re better than me in that aspect. Most of the time I just take my clothes off and hang them on the chair.

Reid is here so today’s meal is vegetable soup, bread and grilled vegetables. I’m glad he finds it delicious, but behind my grin I’m actually drenched in cold sweat, questioning myself whether I added ingredients that aren’t found here.

We eat the bread I brought and enjoy it with some olive oil dip and some salt. The trio start drinking while Retze and I have some tea. Retze’s tea is a little bit on the earthy side but it’s fragrant and delicious once you get used to it.

「So? Did something happen? 」
「Lilith-sama asked me to give the payment to Reid-sama, so I came here. I am also tasked to relay her message; she wants to dine with you once before you leave the town. 」
After saying that, Butler hands a parchment with a wax seal and a bag to Reid.

「You can have this money order encashed at the Merchant’s Guild, and she also converted part of the payment into silver coins with the consideration that it might be more convenient for you. 」
「It would be fine even if Lilith-sama did this when we’re to part…」
Lilith will be staying here for about a week before returning to the royal capital, and Reid will be accompanying her till then before he sets out on his journey.

He’s taking a break for today and then he’ll be off to the fortress city because of ‘the incident’. Seems like he is feeling restless because of that.

‘How about you coming with us to a brothel?’ — Dean and Chris invited me too but no thanks, don’t wanna go to the fortress city.

Reid accepted in the end and with that Butler’s business with him is done. I wonder where he’ll spend it — will this be a part for the brothel or a part for the conversation with the spirit at the 『Fae’s Bough』?

The fumigation ended, so I left the rental house. I hurried away since I felt like I might make a slip of tongue in front of Reid if I stayed there any longer.

Should I also make a fumigation regulation on the island? It’ll mostly depend on the sanitary conditions, but maybe we can exterminate fleas and lice at least four times a year.

Can’t do that in Nalluahdid because there’s a lot of people coming and going out of there, but if I did it several times on the island, maybe I can exterminate the fleas and lice. Yeah, I look forward to that.

The builders were going to spread a mixture of herbs, soft rush and straw in the hallway of the fortress so I stopped them. It’s supposed to absorb dirt and rain from the outside, and also drinks spilled on the floor and even the humidity indoors. They say it also acts as a cushion for when walking on stone paving but…am I the only one thinking this is way too unsanitary?

They often throw the entire thing with all its grass and herbs several times a year, but you can find all sorts of things underneath like food scraps and rat droppings, apparently… Ugh, why don’t you at least plait the soft rush and turn into a rag!? And don’t spill stuff, don’t just leave the spilled stuff as is!

I should probably start hacking at their deep-rooted habits of throwing stuff on the floor first. If we consider this, then does that mean Dean counts as a neat person… Does it?