"Well, I guess I won't be bathing in the river for a while."

Some of the townsfolk eventually arrived at the scene long after my bullfight ended. I was lying on the ground, tired and unable to move because I had just exhausted all my mana, while almost everyone else was busy looking at the cooked bull nearby. It felt rather annoying that they seemed to care more about that thing in the river than me, and even more so when a few townsfolk asked a question or two to check whether or not I was okay, only to turn their attention towards the river before I could answer in a complete sentence.

Two of the townsfolk eventually went back to town and returned to where I was with a stretcher in order to carry me back to my companions. During the time I was being carried, I learned from the townsfolk that Casath was a bit disoriented after getting flung into the air earlier but was fine otherwise, with no major injuries of any sort. If anything, it was the roads that the bull charged down on that got damaged more. Amber was busy helping treat those who got wounded when trying to get away from the bull, and Hanung finally shut herself up and kept clinging onto Casath. Apart from the short summaries about the status of my traveling companions, the few townsfolk walking alongside my stretcher back to town kept quiet so as to let me rest.

Now I think I'm more bothered by the silence than the fact that these people cared more about the dead bull earlier.

"Are you free tonight?"

Ignoring the fact that what one of the two men carrying my stretcher just said sounded a little strange, the silence finally got broken after a couple minutes.

"I'm not sure. I'll probably still be on the road to Mitana city, though…"

Traveling in large groups usually led to slower travel speeds, after all, so the merchant group we were going to hitch a ride with would most likely take more than 6 hours to arrive.

"That's a shame."

"Hm? Is something wrong?"

"The festival has a rodeo riding competition scheduled for this afternoon. You didn't break any records when you were holding onto that bull earlier, but the show was good enough that we decided to give you an honorary prize!"

"Eh…"

"Besides, we want to properly thank you in some way for taking down that mad animal. There would've been a lot more damage if you didn't stop it."

Couldn't you have brought that up first?

"I'll talk to the others to see if we can stay for a few more hours."

I couldn't help but wonder why the townsfolk found riding on a bull fun. The one I took down was twice as big as others of its species, so that meant the people in this town have competitions involving giant animals that were 5 meters tall and 3 tonnes heavy for entertainment purposes. Such large animals could easily break someone's bones or even kill them should they step or fall on one of the townsfolk.

Well, I figured the people in this town were already quite abnormal for still wanting to host their festival activities despite all the mayhem and destruction that took place over the past 20 hours.

* * * * *

"So, about that ride to Mitana city…"

"Is something wrong?"

"Well, the bull destroyed half of our carriages when it rampaged through the town earlier, so unfortunately we can't go anywhere today until we find replacement carriages…"

"…"

"We can try to squeeze you in if we find enough carriages tomorrow, but here's the money your friend paid us since we can't fulfill your request today. We apologize for that…"

After the merchant group's leader refunded me 1600 doviti, I turned to look at my companions.

"Looks like we're stuck here for another day."

"I can try to find other people going to that place."

"That would be nice. Actually, hold on. Don't find anyone going to Mitana."

"Huh? Why not?"

"Even if we take no breaks, it'll take at least half a day to head there and back here. We won't be able to get back to Sachiru town in time, since it's unlikely that whoever you manage to find would depart immediately."

"Should I find people going to Sachiru, then?"

"It might be hard finding anyone going that far, so I think it's best to look for a carriage headed for a neighboring town. See if you can find anybody going to Dasota town, and then we can figure things out once we get there."

"Alright."

I passed Amber the refunded transportation fee, and she took off to find another ride for us to hitch.

"Blaze."

"Yes, Casath?"

"Could you come with me to buy some new clothes?"

"I have nothing to do so I don't mind, but what's the occasion?"

Casath may have been roughed up a bit from the bull fight earlier, but his clothes didn't seem to be in a bad condition. There were a couple of minor tears, but they could all be easily fixed, and he still had one change of clothes inside the inn.

"The town wants to honor me tonight along with you, so I want to get something that looks nicer."

That makes sense, a plain colored beige shirt and brown shorts were too casual.

As for me, I never had to worry about dress codes. Apparently, mage robes could be used for both casual and formal occasions.

"Ah, so the townsfolk want to give you thanks for helping take down the bull, too."

"Um… Actually, they said they wanted to introduce 'cow tipping' as a new festival event after seeing me knock the bull off balance earlier, and wanted to crown me as the town's first cow tipping champion tonight…"

"…"

Now I'm convinced the people of this town were completely abnormal.

* * * * *

In the end, I had no idea what looked good on a reptilian like Casath, and there were no tailor shops in this town due to its primary focus on agriculture and lack of facilities for tourists, so I had him buy a new white shirt and an overall to look somewhat like the rancher and farmer townsfolk, since that was the only type of clothing available in this town.

I considered getting myself a new robe after Casath told me that baseless rumor about bulls hating the color red, so the clothes merchant gave me directions on paper to a shop in Mitana city since that was the only only place within the western provinces that had spell-casters, and thus was the only place that stocked mage robes, since there was no demand for it anywhere else.

I probably could just hire a tailor to make custom clothing when I get home, but I figured it would be a waste of money since I somehow kept getting into situations where my clothes got torn. Besides, knowing that there was a shop carrying stuff I wanted gave me another reason to visit Mitana city, since my only purpose so far was just to get a few beers with the general living there.

After the milking competition ended later that day, as thanks for eliminating the giant bull, the townsfolk gave us a week's worth of milk and invited us to an outdoors evening feast at the plaza. The people were concerned about the dead giant bull blocking the flow of the river, so they managed to somehow pull its body out of the river a couple hours prior. Since destroying it would take a while, and since it was already mostly cooked, the townsfolk decided to cut up the bull and serve some soggy steak in addition to all the alcohol and barbecued meat that was already being offered at the feast. That thing was all muscle and no fat, so I opted not to have any since I knew the meat would be too tough, and neither did my traveling companions. They were much more fond of the juicy barbecue.

Well, there was also the fact that I used a curse spell on it, and I had no idea what side effects it would have had. I didn't feel like telling that to the townsfolk after all the effort they put into hauling the massive body and cutting it up, although I'm sure it was relatively safe to eat. It was classified as a basic spell, after all, and those kinds of spells normally didn't have any major negative effects.

"Hey big guy, we could use some help on our ranch."

"Um…"

"Want to come over to my ranch house and take a look?"

"I… Uh…"

After receiving some thanks and a few toasts from the attendees, I was mostly ignored for the rest of the night. Casath, on the other hand, wasn't. Apparently the muscle-headed townspeople were quite attracted by his physical prowess, and several female minotaurs were trying to flirt with him.

"Hey, get away! He's mine!"

"That's a shame."

Hanung wasn't quite happy about all the attention her brother was getting, so she chased away all the women approaching him by claiming Casath to herself. They haven't told anyone that they were half-siblings, and Casath didn't retort to anything Hanung said, so it really looked like the two were a couple. For once, he was actually glad that his half sister kept clinging onto him.

Suddenly, I felt some light breathing on the back of my neck, followed by a familiar fuzzy feeling.

"I'm tired…"

I quickly swallowed my beer and turned my head to the side to find Amber leaning on me.

"Amber? Are you alright?"

"Tired… Hiccup!"

"Hold my beer, please."

After giving the beer mug I was holding to a random person standing nearby, I carefully turned around and grabbed hold of Amber by her arms. I had a hard time holding her up since she was ready to collapse at any moment, so it didn't seem like she was exaggerating about being tired. Her face was bright red, and she looked like her head was up in the clouds somewhere.

"Are you drunk?"

"I was thirsty, and the stuff… hiccup… they gave me looked like apple juice… hiccup!"

I'm not even sure how she even managed to mistake beer for apple juice, so I'll probably have to ask her when she sobers up. Her breath didn't smell like alcohol, though, so just how low was her tolerance, anyways?

Casath was still being pestered by the townsfolk, so I figured it was up to me to get Amber back to the inn safely. I turned back around, and let her collapse onto my back. I chanted and used a strength buff on myself, then piggybacked her down the street. Our inn was a five minute walk away.

"Zzz…"

As I got away from the plaza, the festive sounds eventually died out. Everyone was at the plaza, so the streets were rather empty. All I could hear now was Amber's snoring, the rustling leaves under the gentle evening breeze, and the echoing of my footsteps as I walked through the cobblestone road. Soft flames from the street lamps faintly lit up the way, and I thought to myself how walking down this tranquil path under the starry night sky could be considered somewhat romantic if the girl on my back was awake right now.

When I reached the inn, the innkeeper was already there, and he helped me with the door without saying or asking anything. From the looks of things, the inn's workers didn't seem to be around, so I assumed that everyone went to the celebration at the plaza, and the innkeeper had to stay behind to keep an eye on the place as a result.

I carried Amber into her room, carefully set her on the bed, then tucked her in. This was supposed to be our shared room, but apparently one of the beds in Casath's room was large enough that he and Hanung could both fit in it, leaving the other bed empty for me to sleep in. I didn't want to risk getting clawed by Amber again, after all.

I quietly walked to the door to leave the room.

"Mm… Wait…"

When I was about to set foot outside onto the hallway, the girl's quiet voice seemed to be calling me back. Was she still awake, or was she having a strange dream? I turned back around to look, and Amber's eyes were still shut. Her ears, however, were twitching somewhat.

Figuring that she was probably just having a dream of some sort, I moved one foot backwards, into the hallway.

"Don't go…"

If she really was dreaming, then it sure was a bizarre coincidence that she was reacting to me leaving the room. I quietly pulled my other foot onto the hallway.

"Don't leave me… Mom…"

As I gently pulled on the doorknob, she called out to her mother in her dreams.

A teardrop was running down her pale white cheek. She must be having quite a bad dream.

Come to think of it, what was Amber's past like? I had never heard her talk about her childhood or her family before. I don't even know why I never asked her about it. Was she also an orphan like me?

Feeling a bit bad for her, I decided to come back into the room and sit down by her bedside.

"There, there…"

I gently stroked her hair for a while, until she calmed down from her nightmare.

"Well, I guess I can't leave this room tonight…"

After Amber stopped making noises in her sleep, I decided to retire in the other bed in this room.

* * * * *

The next morning, I ended up waking up too early for no apparent reason. To my side, Amber was still fast asleep in her bed.

I wasn't sure if she would still remember anything about last night, and I wasn't feeling tired enough to go back to sleep, so I got out of bed and walked out of the room to avoid making things awkward later on. I gently opened the door of the opposite room, stuck my head in, and saw that Casath and Hanung were also sleeping as I peeked inside.

Well, I guess I'll just take a walk on the streets for a while, then.

"Oh, good morning."

"Morning."

Apparently, a chambermaid was also awake, and she greeted me as I came down the stairs.

"Would you like some breakfast before your carriage comes?"

Based on her question, I would assume that Amber found us a carriage to Dasota town yesterday.

"I'd like some, but maybe in about half an hour. I want to take a stroll first."

"Okay."

Today was supposed to be the last day of the town festival, but the only event scheduled was a cattle race taking place on the vast fields outside of town. After the nonsense involving the stampede and rampaging bull, the people in this town weren't as thrilled over watching some giant cows and goats run anymore. As a result, even though that last event hadn't started yet, some early risers were already taking down banners and decorations hung on the building walls, and a few were sweeping trash off the streets. The cheerful festive mood was all gone, and this town was now back to being a peaceful, quiet agricultural town once more.

The sun rose higher and higher as I walked through the tranquil wide streets, dying the cobblestone road and several stone houses on the way a brilliant yellow. The gentle breeze rustled the trees blooming with flowers, and the chirps from birds that just woke up filled the air.

After everything that happened so far, I quietly hoped that the days after I go home would be as peaceful as this scene.