Anyway, putting my random thoughts aside as usual, the rooms each cost 2 silver per night, around 40 dollars, which was reasonable, I suppose. Any meals would have an extra charge. Like room service, huh. They charged us a deposit of 1 silver, which we used our adventurer cards to pay for since we still did not have cash. Once we received our room keys, we went to check out the rooms. They were pretty basic, with just a bed and a desk in the corner. There was no toilet! I was stunned for a moment before Daryl informed me that there was a shared toilet and bathroom down the hall. Phew. Well, I could probably pop back to the mansion to use the facilities...in fact, we could have just stayed there rather than booking a room here. Um...

I guess Masa was curious about how the town looked like at night? He certainly hadn't objected when I brought up booking a room here. I had to admit I wanted to experience staying in an actual inn too. Did it come with free healing too? Yeah, right. I doubted Masa would get the reference so I just stayed silent.

Meanwhile, the Australian siblings returned to rest in their room while the two of us left the inn to go hunting. Our strategy was simple--we would prioritise searching for the Sayge and hunt any monsters we encountered on the way. Masa had inquired about the preferred food plants of the caterpillars and we heard that the leeches weren't that common but would seek out any warm bodies so they would probably come to us instead. Right. That didn't sound like much of a problem.

...So how did we end up facing four hungry leeches at the same time?! Weren't they supposed to be uncommon? I mean, I was glad that we didn't have to go looking for them, but couldn't they have come one after another instead of all at once? To think our hunt had been proceeding well until this point. We managed to find some Sayge soon after entering the forest and had defeated a couple of caterpillars too. Then for some reason we were suddenly surrounded by these four slimy black things.

I wasn't squeamish by nature, and yet seeing leeches as long as the height of an adult man made my skin crawl. Masa had created earth walls to block their approach, but they simply crawled over them. He couldn't create fires large enough to faze them and water only made them slimier. Ugh. I suddenly recalled someone telling me that salt was effective against leeches. Could I create salt? Only one way to find out.

Concentrating on my palm, I imagined a small pile of salt on it. Sodium chloride. Table salt, rock salt, sea salt, any kind of salt! C'mon!

It worked! The moment I saw white crystals appearing on my palm, I hurled the entire handful at the nearest leech. Several chunks struck its body and the leech reared back in response. Masa grabbed the chance to slice it in half diagonally. As usual, the cut appeared in the opposite direction of his slash due to Roku's effect.

Great, now that I knew it worked, I started creating more and more salt on the spot and threw it all at the leeches. "Salt Splash!" I shouted, unable to resist the chance. Good thing Masa probably didn't recognise the reference. Unlike how this technique had been more or less useless in the original work, it was actually super effective here. The leeches actively tried to get out of my way, but I cut them down in one stroke with Eins.

Wow. No matter how Deux complained that the German longsword was a failed prototype, one couldn't fault its proficiency at cutting what it was meant to cut. Thanks to Eins' sharpness, I only had to swing once for each leech, unless my aim was terribly off. It even impressed Masa! I caught him staring at me when I dispatched the final leech. He smiled and gave me a thumbs-up as I sheathed Eins.

The monsters here all conveniently disappeared, so there was no need to clean our swords. Masa had given me some tips on maintenance though. My Void was moisture-free for storage purposes as a matter of course, so there was no need to worry about them rusting. Deux would probably talk my ears off if there was even a tiny hint of rust though.

We continued through the forest searching for herbs and defeating any monsters that we encountered on the way. Reading about adventuring was fun and all, but books seldom mentioned how tiring it actually was. Especially if one had to constantly bend down to inspect the undergrowth for herbs. I stood up straight and put my hands on my hips before bending backwards, stretching my back for the umpteenth time. Masa noticed and suggested that we take a break. I heartily agreed.

Come to think of it, we had totally skipped lunch, hadn't we. I met Masa in the late morning, but we forgot about eating in the excitement of coming back to Shyi'eld and taking quests. Oh dear, the poor guy must be starving by now. Maybe he didn't mention it because I hadn't said anything? Even if I had been hungry, anyone would have lost their appetite fighting gross giant worms. Oh well. I wordlessly handed Masa a granola bar.

He looked surprised, but smiled and thanked me. "No problem, I should have suggested we stop for a break much sooner. Sorry," I told him, taking a bar out for myself too.

"Nah, I should have thought about eating when we were in town earlier," he demurred. "Preparing food out here when there are monsters is far more risky."

I chuckled. "We could probably throw the hot water at the monsters in an emergency."

"Ah, like your 'Salt Splash' just now," he noted with a nod. "That was a pretty good idea."

I choked on my granola bar. So he had noticed that after all!