Now, Tabitha was never the kind of girl who thought it would be fun to walk through a forest picking all sorts of flowers and mushrooms. Sure, she loved nature, but not that much.

That being said, she ended up filling her backpack with an assortment of different materials before they even reached the grove that Runa was leading them toward. Flowers and mushrooms, sticks and stones, and pinecones and berries all worked together to take up the space in the backpack.

“Ya know, we might not even have to get there,” Tabitha told Runa. “Feel like this pack is gonna be full before we do.”

“I—I didn’t expect you to gather so many things!” Runa replied. “I thought you might pick a couple of mushrooms and flowers. Not… everything you see.”

“Heh. How am I going to turn everythin’ into items if I don’t gather it all first? From my understandin’, ya can basically use absolutely anythin’ durin’ alchemy. Seems like the perfect craftin’ type to throw a bunch of random stuff in a pot to see what happens.”

Runa nodded along with everything that Tabitha said. “You’re really jumping straight into everything even though you only just got here. Summoned are so impressive! I wish I had that same level of determination.”

“Then get it. Don’t let not bein’ born here normally affect how determined ya are. Besides, ya seem plenty determined to me. You’re the one who’s so determined ya want to head off on an adventure with a gal who ya barely know! It takes guts to do that. Guts, stupidity, and determination.”

“Why—why stupidity?”

“Because ya barely know me. Who’s to say that I ain’t actually some serial axe murderer or somethin’ waiting for a chance to get ya alone?”

“Well… we’re alone right now and you’re not killing me with an axe yet.”

“Yet. That’s the key word.”

“Ooh… that’s true. You could be waiting for the right moment to strike!”

“Heh. First ya ran away from me because I had a spear, now you’re jokin’ around about me waitin’ for the right moment to kill ya.”

Runa’s ears twitched as she smiled. “Well, I’ve realized that you’re harmless! I don’t have anything to worry about when I’m around you.”

“Oi, what do ya mean I’m harmless? I’ll have ya know that I’m anythin’ but harmless! Was ridin’ the train once and thought some creepy old geezer was tryin’ to grope me, so I turned around and kneed him in the crotch and sent him to his knees. I uh… I felt real bad when I realized he was knocked over because of somebody bumpin’ into him and he only grabbed onto me to catch himself since there was nothin’ else around. But still, I ain’t harmless. Oh, and then I found out it was his birthday. Took him out to get some coffee and muffins after that to make it up to him. Was actually a pretty sweet guy. Forgave me for the train incident since I reminded him of his daughter.”

Runa held her free hand over her mouth to giggle at the story. “Well, maybe calling you harmless wouldn’t be right. You are more… I don’t know a better word to use. You only hurt others when they’ve hurt you. And you only care about crafting.”

“Well, at least when it comes to people. I’m tellin’ ya right now that I’ll hunt cute and innocent monsters and beasts if it means gettin’ craftin’ materials from them.”

“But you would never hunt me, right?”

“Well, ya are cute, but I’m not sure I’d get any craftin’ materials outta ya. I mean, I can imagine some things, but that’d be too morbid and messed up for me.”

Runa gulped. “Please… please don’t actually hunt me.”

Tabitha turned and winked at Runa. “Ya better keep an eye on me then. Ya never know when I might strike.”

While it wasn’t Tabitha’s intention, she ended up making Runa blush and nervously look away.

Wonder how she’d react if I really try flirtin’ with her, Tabitha thought to herself. The idea of it was tempting to try out, but she resisted. She didn’t want to try pushing her chances or anything so soon into knowing her.

That aside, they reached the grove before much longer.

Tabitha let out a whistle when she saw it. The grove consisted of shorter trees with a clearing at their center, and the clearing was full of multi-colored flowers, spotted mushrooms, and there were even a few different critters hanging out in it. Though, as soon as the critters noticed Tabitha and Runa, they hurried off back into the surrounding forest.

“It’s real pretty here,” Tabitha said. “Too bad that means I won’t have it in me to pick this place clean. Now, if this were a game, I’d pick every single thing in here until there ain’t even a tiny piece of grass left. But since this is a real world and all… I’d rather not destroy an entire patch of flowers.”

“You can pick a lot here,” Runa said. “Everything here grows back really quickly. I’m not sure why, but the grove is fully regrown each time I come here even if it’s only in a couple of weeks. I wouldn’t pick everything, but you should be fine to pick as much as you can fit in the backpack.”

“Well, don’t mind if I do! Wait. Ya said everythin’ here grows real quick?”

“Yeah. I’m not sure why. There’s no obvious reason for it, but I feel like everything here grows more quickly and looks healthier than if they grow anywhere else in the forest.”

“Hmm. And there’s no obvious reason for it?”

“Right. I’ve looked because I thought, maybe if I could find out what’s causing it, I could let the others know and we might be able to use if for growing crops! But… I wasn’t able to figure anything out.”

“Yeah, that’s what I was thinkin’. Might be able to help with the crop situation somehow. But—” Tabitha stopped when she saw a nervous Runa slowly backing away. “There’s somethin’ behind me, ain’t there?”

Runa nodded and said, “W-we… should leave.”

Admittedly, Tabitha was a bit afraid to turn around and see what might be there. She didn’t want to look and see a snarling wolf or a growling bear or anything. She also didn’t want to see a pack of armed goblins or a giant ogre wielding an oversized club if video game logic applied.

But if she wanted to go on an adventure and become the best crafter of everything, she needed to face her fears and gather materials from everything no matter how scary they might be.

So, she turned around.

That was when she immediately understood why Runa was backing away.

“Runa, add a flamethrower to the list of things I really need to craft,” Tabitha said as she looked at the massive, green and brown spider with sharp, thin legs and a lifted, round abdomen. The spider’s fangs alone were as long as her hands from the tips of her fingers to her wrist, and its eight eyes were locked onto her as it lifted its front two legs in a show of intimidation.

“Ta-Tabitha,” Runa stuttered out. “We should—”

“Ya know, my Gramps was one tough guy. A Marine who could kill somebody with a pencil in fifty different ways. That bein’ said, he was terrified of spiders. Made me kill all of them for him. Even findin’ a spider in the same room as him was enough to give him a panic attack. So, I got real good at killin’ spiders.” Tabitha stepped back, but only so that she could take her spear back from Runa. “Would still rather have a flamethrower, but I’ve got this.”

In a strange way, even the slime was scarier than the spider to Tabitha despite it being so small and actually kind of cute.

The slime was a fantasy monster that she had never seen before in real life, obviously.

But the spider? It was just a bigger version of something she killed plenty of times before and got desensitized to. Sure, it was as big as she was, but it was still just a spider.

And seeing as how she imagined herself one day slaying dragons just so that she could harvest their scales and craft it into epic armor and the like, she would never be able to do that if she couldn’t kill a giant spider.

“Like a leaf on the wind, watch how I soar, Runa,” Tabitha said.

Runa tilted her head. “E-eh?”

“I thought now would be a good time to say a cool phrase and it was the first one I thought of. But uh, now that I’m rememberin’ what happened to the character right after he said that… maybe I shoulda picked a better quote.”