Growth

Chapter 5: Growth

"Slaves. I could have gone the mercenary route but I decided to buy a slave. Although assuming how expensive Sakura is alone, I don't think I'll be able to hire any mercs at this time. Sakura may be an unfair comparison though, especially with the price of monsters."

Naofumi stays down on the desk in his room and takes out a few supplies. "The world is basically ending. Even if I refuse to fight these waves, I still have to fight other monsters in the pursuit of securing a comfortable life, so I can't truly be in the wrong for doing this right?"

He waits for an answer as he pours some liquid from a bowl into a cup, but looks over as he hears snoring, finding Sakura who has fallen asleep on the bed.

"I should really start talking to people who speak," Naofumi complained as he let out a yawn. Being tired himself, he puts away all of his supplies and gets in bed.

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Later in the morning, he is woken up by Sakura pecking him on the arm. Annoyed, but knowing the routine since Sakura has been doing this every time she's hungry, he gets up and places some of her food on the desk for her to eat. While Sakura is eating Naofumi browses through his shields menus and starts experimenting with some of its features, finding out many useful things that he got from other shields.

He also grabbed the cup he stored yesterday and poured in some of its contents into the gem, unlocking a new shield.

Small Medicine Shield conditions met

Small Medicine Shield equip bonus: equip bonus: medicine efficacy up

Naofumi heard from the medicine shop owner that he can make some minor recovery potions from the herbs he has been gathering, and ever since he's been attempting to make them, With this attempt making his first low-quality potion.

"If what the man said was correct I can easily sell these for a large amount. And with this shield form, they'll be more potent than ever. Maybe I should grab more herbs to make another one. Especially one with much higher quality than this one." Naofumi shakes the cup around a bit before setting it back down on the table.

Grabbing his cloak, Naofumi removes his usual barricades and opens his room door.

"Alright Sakura, let's head out."

"Gaw". Sakura chirped as she jumped on Naofumi's head, sending him off balance a bit, having to quickly regain his footing before he fell onto the ground.

"Woah, not to be rude Sakura but you're getting pretty heavy, and a lot larger too."

"Gua!" Sakura pecks Naofumi's head in an attempt to hurt him but to no avail.

"Alright sorry, just expect no extra food tonight. I'm not trying to fatten you up so you can be taken to the slaughterhouse for fried chicken. Shit, now thinking of housing, I never really thought of a place to keep her once she's fully grown. Maybe I could try staying outdoors or finding a stable, most ranchers don't pay attention to the exact number of their flock right?"

Naofumi looks up to Sakura waiting for an answer, but she just gives him a confused look.

"You're no help."

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In the forest, Naofumi uses his leaf shield to gather herbs for his blend while Sakura wanders off to kill some balloons in the nearby area. She has grown enough to the point where she can kill them in about a hit or two while being nimble enough to dodge the attacks now.

"Damn, am I feeding her steroids or something, her growth is definitely off the charts."

Naofumi watches on as Sakura decimates the balloon population once more. A few even try to run at the sight of the bird, but they are immediately chased down and popped for some exp. Even the red balloons stood no chance against the bird menace.

"If balloons are no longer a challenge, then maybe we can try something else?"

Picking up Sakura, Naofumi went even deeper into the forest. Looking around, he attempts to find one of those many creatures they encountered before but soon stops as they encounter a white ball of fluff.

Looking at the monster, Naofumi remembers it as one of those rabbits he couldn't kill before and left to fight another day. And today was another day. Using the bushes as cover, Naofumi slowly sneaks up onto the unsuspecting creature and tackles it to the ground, and holds it between his arms to prevent it from escaping.

With an easy kill right in Naofumi's hands, Sakura attacks the rabbit with all her strength. Pecking, clawing, and even an attempt to pick up a stick and try to stab the rabbit with it, but she quickly sees how ineffective it was, and decides to continue pecking at the rabbit.

22 Exp gained

After what felt like an eternity, which was actually just six minutes of constant attacks. With a final scratch against the face, the rabbit that was struggling to escape ceases to move its body. With a screen to finally confirm its death. Sakura jumps up and down to celebrate her kill, as Naofumi gets extremely annoyed at how long that went for an extremely minuscule reward.

"Well, that was quite useless. Better Experience than balloons but the time to kill it is stupid. Actually, let me try something.

Grabbing some vines he found in the area, Naofumi made a few snare traps and hid in a bush.

A couple of minutes later, alone Usapil wanders the forest happy about a carrot it just found. Once it got close enough, Naofumi shocked the bush a bit to gather its attention and captured the rabbit in the snare after it came to investigate.

"Alright, it worked." Dropping Sakura on top of the trap, she immediately starts to peck the trapped rabbit.

"Okay, I'll start breakfast, that'll attract more of these… Rabbits to the traps, so you can kill them."

"Gua!" Sakura continued her attempt to kill the creature as Naofumi gathered some sticks around the area to start a fire.

Taking out his Knife, he realized after buying some tools that he can use them for utility reasons, but never to attack, giving him a slightly better idea of how the shield system works with other items, making things a lot easier for him when it comes to the usage of other items later.

Naofumi gathers the two rabbits he killed and starts to prepare them for cooking, even absorbing some of the rabbit's fur in his shield.

Shield Unlocked: Usapil leather and Usapil meat Shield. Equip Bonus: Agility +3.

"Agility huh, you can make me more dexterous but not able to attack," Naofumi complained.

Grabbing the rabbit meat, he tosses it into a pot to let it boil with some other spices, as Sakura came back with more and more rabbits as time went on. He soon ran out of space and started to grill the remaining pieces of meat in an attempt to satisfy Sakura's endless hunger, while the main dish is cooking.

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After finishing his cooking, Naofumi made bowls for both him and Sakura to eat from. Sakura as Naofumi guessed, immediately ate everything in the bowl and drank the soup before asking for more. Making a rather impressive display of her eating ability in front of the hero. Only leaving him to imagine how much food she can actually eat before she even understands the concept of being full, but that would only be something he would probably never find out.

"Filolial are weird."

Picking up the remaining stew he pours it into her bowl and packs away all his stuff before looking at his trap, only to find them all empty. Checking if he set them up incorrectly, he tosses a rock inside that activates the trap.

Still confused he searches for the other traps to see them all chewed through. Inspecting even further, he finds a set of eyes in the bush and enters a staring contest with them. After a few seconds of staring, Naofumi starts to back up as the bush starts to shake. Raising his shield, the rabbit jumps for his leg, but Naofumi catches it and throws it into a tree, and starts to run.

Around him, several other rabbits start to appear behind and chase him back to the camp.

"SAKURA, GET ON NOW!."

Passing through the camp, he quickly throws Sakura into his bag and sprints out of the forest with the rabbits following, only being able to escape by running through two other adventures he assumed were high level due to their expensive-looking armor, and left them to fight the platoon of rabbits while they escaped.

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Back in town, and safe from the army of rabbits. Naofumi sits down for a bit to catch his breath, as several others watch on from a distance.

"Holy shit, that was crazy! What the hell is with the bunny swarm… herd…, Damn it!? What's that group of rabbits called again?" Naofumi gets up from the ground and checks his bag, finding a dazed Sakura inside.

"Why do I keep asking you? And I'm never attempting that again, At least I got some result from it though."

Naofumi Iwatani: Level 8

Sakura: Level 6

"Well there's not much to do now, so let's see how much I can get for this." Naofumi takes a cup out of his bag. "Already used most of its contents when unlocking the shield, but I can assume this will get me something. Like that plan Sakura."

"Gua!" Sakura jumped up and down.

"Maybe I should do something first?"

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"A slave huh, Did the world finally corrupt you, or do you just not care anymore?" Erhard asked.

A couple of minutes ago, he was doing his job as usual. But took a second when Naofumi came in wanting to talk. Not wanting to ignore the kid, he decides to take a break and take them into the back room to hear him out.

"I just wanted to hear your thoughts on it before I go ahead with the deal. Honestly, I didn't see much of an issue with it assuming this world's laws and my situation. But since you do live here, I think. You'll have a better say than a person who talks to birds for some reason." Naofumi said

"That is quite an oddly specific description, but personally I don't utilize slaves. It's kind of a low-life thing to do, and truly something only nobles would buy when they need servants for their two thousand gold castle with a mansion built inside, or something more sinister.

"So is that a no then?"

"Not at all. Truly, I don't really care what you are gonna buy with gold unless you're planning on torturing or using as a sex slave, then that would be an issue I can't let slide."

"I shouldn't be surprised that that happens in this world, the same thing happened in mine a long time ago. Possibly in the present-day as well but just more hidden from the public eye."

"Most people are just corrupt like that. Anyways, why are you buying one in the first place? I thought Sakura would have done the job just nicely, possibly even more effectively assuming how strong most monsters are?"

"That may be true, but Sakura is still a baby, two days old to be more specific. The best thing I killed today was an Usapil, and that took about six minutes to constant grapples to scratches to do. I'm going to need more backup.

Naofumi kicks his legs up on the counter. "Besides even if she were an adult she is still limited to what a monster can do, so it wouldn't hurt to have some extra party member to assist in combat and other important activities, usually the ones that require hands to do."

Naofumi then looks behind him to see Sakura sleeping in the corner.

"Sakura is helpful and all, but she is limited by how effective a monster can be in most situations, and it's starting to get annoying."

"Then if you have a valid reason to get a slave and have no ill intent, why go through the struggle of asking me during my work hours?"

As Elhart says this, a man walks through the door only to exit immediately after seeing Naofumi.