The Alchemist And The Dispatched Devil (2)

The alchemist I had been assigned to, Mitt Shett, was by no means overflowing with talent.

She was clumsy, and because she panicked easily, she made plenty of mistakes.

On top of that, every single failure sent her into a slump.

But that discouragement was also proof that she had poured everything she had into each and every attempt.

If she had been halfhearted and dismissive, assuming she would fail anyway, she would neither have panicked nor gotten so dejected.

Even so, Mitt had the strength to pick herself back up and start moving again almost immediately after feeling down.

She had plenty of other good qualities too—she was kind, cheerful, and broad-hearted enough to genuinely want to do things for other people.

That was why I had liked Mitt at first sight, and I felt that even Villa, who had mixed and complicated feelings of love and hate toward humanity, found comfort in Mitt’s sincerity.

“Mister, I’ve brought the 300 apprentice healing potions and 200 basic healing potions you ordered!”

Passing through the doors of the Adventurers’ Guild, Mitt called out to the man in charge of supplies.

For the record, I was the one who had carried them here. Mitt had not carried a single bottle.

“Oh, really? Mitt-chan, that’s a huge help!”

The man looked delighted, and Mitt’s smile grew even brighter in response.

Well, of course he was happy.

To begin with, only alchemists could make healing potions that instantly healed wounds, but while basic healing potions were one thing, apprentice healing potions that only treated very minor injuries were cheap enough that few alchemists bothered to make them.

But the kind of medicine the Adventurers’ Guild wanted was the inexpensive sort, like apprentice healing potions.

Many adventurers who were not yet veterans and had little money tended to leave minor wounds untreated until they worsened, and at times that even led to death.

But apprentice healing potions were affordable enough that even those short on money could use them casually, and they prevented wounds from getting worse through neglect.

That was exactly why Mitt, who accepted orders with a smile without worrying about the low profit or extra effort and took joy in being needed, was probably so popular at this Adventurers’ Guild.

I handed the healing potions I had taken out of storage to the man in charge of supplies, then watched over Mitt as the adventurers gathered around her.

Mitt’s growth as an alchemist was by no means fast, and at present she was only just barely managing to complete the monthly assignments the Academy gave her.

Even the intermediate healing potion she was struggling with right now had apparently been successfully made two months ago by Pallas Cook, who was at least nominally her rival.

There was a chance that, from the other girl’s perspective, Mitt did not even register as competition at all… no, more than a chance, really, but that was fine.

It was certainly true that the other girl handled more advanced alchemy, but even so, when it came purely to the number of items produced, Mitt almost certainly surpassed her.

The adventurers who had been helped by Mitt’s potions readily accepted her ingredient-gathering requests, and then came back and bought the potions she made.

After all, the only way for clumsy Mitt to improve was to repeat alchemy again and again until her body remembered it and her failures disappeared.

As she nurtured her ties with people, Mitt kept growing little by little.

Even if her pace was somewhat slow, so long as she was enjoying herself and moving forward, that was what mattered most.

It was fine if they were just enjoying a conversation, but now some ill-behaved adventurer had started trying to invite Mitt out for drinks, so it was probably time to step in.

I moved forward and gave that adventurer an easy-to-understand threat.

Whether a novice, a mid-ranker, or even a veteran, anyone who had exposed themselves even once to a battle where lives were taken and nearly lost could not possibly fail to sense it, and the adventurer turned pale and quickly stepped back.

“Mitt, it’s about time to head back. Or was there any material gathering you wanted to request?”

At my words, Mitt tilted her head and went, “Hmm.”

But apparently nothing came to mind, and she smiled before saying,

“Nope, I’m good. All right, let’s head back then~”

She raised her fist as if telling me to follow her and started walking.

Alchemy in this world covered a wide range of fields, and applying special effects to equipment also fell under the category of alchemy.

This month’s assignment from the Academy was an intermediate antidote, and when it came to making that, Mitt was already having no trouble.

That should give her a little breathing room.

Judging from the pattern so far, next month’s assignment would be an intermediate healing potion, and since being able to make one was said to mark you as fully competent in compounding medicines, the medicine-related assignments would likely end there for the time being.

Which meant that the assignments from the following month onward would inevitably involve applying special effects to equipment—in other words, enchantment-related work.

Since Mitt was clumsy, she would definitely get all tangled up right after starting something new.

If possible, I had wanted to get her to successfully make an intermediate healing potion as early as possible, buy us some extra time, and then move on to enchantment training…

“…Lept-san, Lept-san! Geez, listen to meee!”

Before I knew it, Mitt was desperately tugging at my sleeve while I had been lost in thought about our plans going forward.

Apparently I had missed her calling to me several times.

“Sorry, I was thinking about a bunch of things. What is it?”

When I turned my gaze to where Mitt was pointing, I saw a single food stall.

Because she was intensely curious, she took an interest in just about anything, and that often got her dragged into strange commotions.

Last time, she had said she wanted to keep a stray Cait Sith she had seen on the road, and it had been a real struggle to convince her that we could not possibly keep a shedding phantasmal beast in a place that handled medicine.

Well, if it was just a food stall, eating there would probably satisfy her, and nothing strange would happen. Probably.

“Look, look, that meat is spinning! Isn’t it amazing?!”

Dragged along by the wildly excited Mitt, I approached the stall and saw that, sure enough, there was a vertical column of meat rotating there.

I knew I had seen this before… ah, it was doner kebab.

Of course, it was called something different here, but I could not help being a little impressed that this world had it too.

It was not that the meat spinning by itself was particularly amazing, but the equipment had clearly cost a fair bit, and that part I could honestly call impressive.

I see—so that was how they maintained heat along the vertical axis. They were using flame stones.

Flame stones were alchemical items that produced intense heat when sprinkled with salt.

Together with ice stones, which became extremely cold when salt was sprinkled on them, they were probably among the most common enchantment-category items in alchemy to have blended into everyday life.

Still, alchemists were valuable people, so items like that were basically reserved for the wealthy.

“They’re grilling it with a flame-stone setup. What should we do? It’s still before lunch—want to eat here?”

I could more or less see where this conversation was heading, but there was no point struggling against it now.

If possible, I had wanted to leave enchantment alone until after she had finished making the intermediate healing potion that was likely to be her next assignment.

But there was no way curious, people-loving Mitt would refrain from asking the stall owner all sorts of questions, and once she did that, the old man would naturally answer them one by one… and there it was.

“The meat is one thing, but the flame stones for this grill are hard to get hold of. Once the ones I’m using stop reacting properly, I’ll probably have to close up for a while until I can get more.”

That was the sort of thing he said.

Compared with starting a fire with firewood, flame stones required less labor, made temperature control easy, and did not produce soot.

So even if wealthy people were willing to buy them despite the higher price, it was only natural that someone running a stall for ordinary folk—even one serving somewhat unusual food—would have a hard time affording them.

Mitt stared at me like a dog that had been told to wait, and I could not help giving a wry smile as I nodded.

Watching Mitt’s face light up as she offered to make flame stones for the stall owner, I began reworking our plans in my head.

Well, helping people was a good thing, and more than anything, Mitt looked like she was having fun, so I was sure it would work out somehow.

…Probably.