Published at 5th of August 2023 5:51 pm

Chapter 344: Alkinoko

This chapter is updated by NovelFree.ml

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「Eiii!」

Tickle floats two wooden spoons using Psychic.

The floating spoons are wavering in midair, they are rising and falling like a scale.

Hmm, certainly Tickle can only control a single object right now. I can’t say that she will be able to handle two things at once with this kind of instability.

In any case, there is nothing I can do to help her right now, all I can say is for her to keep on practicing so she can get used to controlling several objects at once.

Tickle is also seriously concentrating that she has no time to converse with me and she also has this atmosphere that makes me hesitate to call out to her, so I decided to play around with the dolls I brought back earlier.

I put the Alkinoko doll on the floor.

Both of Alkinoko’s feet are mushrooms, so it’s obvious that the balance will be bad and it will fall down with a thud.

I make the doll stand up by using Psychic on it. However, its center of gravity is focused on one spot maybe because of the shape of the mushroom legs.

The doll is pitching forward unintentionally and about to fall forward, but I’m able to make it move and stand with Psychic somehow. After that, I move it around to search for the correct position of its center of gravity.

Apparently, its weight is easily placed on the center point of its foot. After grasping that fact, I make it walk while controlling its center of gravity.

The Alkinoko is moving forward while walking at a steady pace with its mushroom legs. Its center of gravity is slanted even though it's tall, and it's hard to balance it because it doesn’t have hands.

Although, when you look at it from a distance, it looks like the real thing because the size is similar to a real Alkinoko.

As I was smiling wryly at that and thinking of such a thing, there was a clanking sound of something light falling.

「Fuwaa……」

The next thing I knew, Tickle’s eyes are already shining as she stared at the moving Alkinoko.

It looks like she doesn’t even realize that she had thrown away her control over her own Psychic.

「……uh, Tickle? What about your practice?」

「Haa!? I, I’m sorry! There is an Alkinoko doll moving like the real thing in front of me so I unintentionally forgot about it!」

After I asked her that while clearing my throat at her, Tickle came to her sense and hurriedly chanted the spell for Psychic again.

Hmーm, I thought I can play and move dolls around here, but it seems like it will make Tickle unable to concentrate.

「Tickle should practice here, alright. You can have some rest if you feel like your magic power is about to run out」

「Ah, yes. Understood」

It’s hard for me to tell Tickle to move to another room for her practice at this stage so I decide to leave the room while bringing the doll with me.

As I went to the hallway, I play around and make Alkinoko walk again.

After walking around the hallway, the Alkinoko stop moving and plopped itself down as though mimicking its real counterpart.

If this were a forest then people who found it will definitely assume that it is an Alkinoko. It may be interesting to control the doll in front of Torr and tease him next time.

As I made the doll move around again while imagining something like that, a door suddenly opened and the Alkinoko was blown away.

「Alkinokoー!」

My magic power that was wrapped around Alkinoko dispersed due to the strong impact of slamming against the wall.

I screamed in shock.

「Alkinoko?」

And Eleonora-neesan - who opened the door and came out - immediately return to the room as soon as she coldheartedly saw the Alkinoko that had fallen against the wall, come out and raised the wooden sword in her hand.

Understanding her intention, I save the Alkinoko by using Psychic on it and pulling it toward me.

However, still not giving up, she ran toward the Alkinoko while glaring at the doll and eyes filled with bloodlust. She was like a carnivorous animal chasing after her prey, just seeing her alone makes me feel like running away.

What the, are you kidding me, this sister! It was just a misunderstanding of seeing something that looks like a monster and yet she released such an amount of bloodlust!?

「Wait, Eleonora-neesan! It’s a doll! This is just a doll! And I’m also here!」

「A doll?」

Eleonora-neesan - who instantly crossed the distance of several meters in a moment - stopped just as she was about to swing her wooden sword down. Along with that, the bloodlust-like aura wrapping around her also disperses.

No matter how much you mistook it as the monster Alkino, don’t you think that your battle awareness was too high?

「See, try touching it. It’s a doll, isn’t it?」

When I raise the Alkinoko and ask her that, Eleonora-neesan poked the doll with her wooden sword to check it.

Can you stop doing that, that manner of poking the doll makes it seem like you’re trying to touch something dirty.

「……it’s true. It’s a doll」

「There’s no way for there to be a real Alkinoko in the hallway, anyway. Take a better look around next time, will you?」

You should be able to understand that it’s a doll if you had calmly observed it from such a distance.

「I, it was moving like the real thing so it was easily mistaken as one, you know! I thought there were monsters prowling around in the hallways!」

「Eh, really?」

「Why do you look so happy now?」

I’m a bit happy that I was able to move the Alkinoko doll to the point that Eleonora-neesan mistook the doll for a real Alkinoko.

「But, don’t you think that you got a little surprised with just a monster like Alkinoko? Even though they don’t do much harm like Slime」

Alkinoko will at most spread sneeze-inducing spores around. In particular, there’s no poison included in the spores. Other than that even if Alkinoko attacks, it will just ram its body toward you and it has a weak attack power that it can at most make a young child tumble.

Even though she mistook the Alkinoko for the real one, it was surprising that she would react seriously like that.

「You’re so noisy. I thought a monster will enter my room so I only want to exterminate it」

Eleonora-neesan put the wooden sword on her waist and said that while blushing a little.

Oh well, that’s also true. You will be flustered if you saw a figure that looks like a monster as soon as you leave your room.

As for me, I really wanted to see her surprised appearance.

◆

As I spend my time moving the doll Viscount Dole gave me like that, it is now time for lunch, and everyone from the Slowlett family gathers in the dining room.

We thought that Viscount Dole will shut himself in the lounge again, but he showed himself normally this time. However, his expression was not as bright as last night or this morning.

He wrinkled his eyebrows and scratches his head, showing an irritated-like appearance.

I wonder just what happened to him?

Everyone notices Viscount Dole’s strange appearance, then Elna-kaasan casually looks at me to make me ask what happened.

Eeh? You want me to ask? Oh well, it can’t be helped, Elna-kaasan and Nord-tousan doesn’t really understand a puppet show after all.

I prepared myself to ask for the time being, then I try asking him casually.

「Viscount Dole, you are making such a difficult look on your face, what happened?」

「Umm actually, the script is not progressing well」

「Nothing comes to mind?」

「No, that part is mostly covered so there is no problem in that part」

「Then, which part?」

I think you should have nothing to worry about if you already have the framework for the story.

「The conversation between the dolls is not going well. Try as I might, it’s like it has no substance and the conversation lacks charm」

I see, there is no problem with the story, but he’s not satisfied with the conversational exchange between the characters, huh?

「Until now, I had only imagined talking with dolls, but I had never imagined conversations between dolls. Even though it was the dolls I love so much, I’m so useless」

「The conversation between the characters is difficult when you write it yourself, right?」

Sylvio-niisan says to encourage the somewhat despondent Viscount Dole.

But, I seem to pick up something from Sylvio-niisan’s words.

「From the way you speak, does it means Sylvio also writes a story?」

And perhaps Eleonora-neesan also noticed that, she grins as she asked him.

「Eeh!? N, no, not at all!」

How suspicious. Such a reaction.

I mean, Sylvio-niisan is a bookworm and often shut himself inside his room during the day like me. So it is possible there will be a pattern of him wanting to write a story himself while reading.

「……Al, let’s search his room next time」

「……leave it to me. It will be as though there is no lock as long as you have my Psychic」

With my magic, there is no place in this mansion I can’t enter. However, depending on the owner of the room there might be the possibility of being cut down so I can’t easily break into someone’s room but......if it’s Sylvio-niisan, then there should be nothing to be afraid of retaliation.

While Eleonora-neesan and I were plotting such a scheme, Elna-kaasan clears her throat to remind us. Oh, we had digressed from Viscount Dole’s worry.

I never wrote a script or a novel before, so I don’t know the specific difficulties in writing them, but certainly, I think that it would be difficult to get the characters to talk to each other.

「Other animals live in the forest aside from Gekota, right?」

「Aah, I’m also worried to choose them. It does not sit well with me even when I tried to write a lot of animals」

There are all sorts of creatures that live in the forest including animals, insects, fish, and birds. So it’s no wonder for Viscount Dole to be uncertain.

While I was troubled about what to do, Elna-kaasan opened her mouth and say.

「In that case would you like to take a walk in the forest near the village? There are all sorts of animals living in there, you know?」

Ah, that’s a good suggestion. You may be able to use the creatures living in the forest as a reference if you actually go into the forest.

「Umm, that’s right. It looks like this territory is abundant in nature so it may become a good reference. Alfried-dono, could you please guide me around?」

Right. It will become like this in the end. There is no way I can refuse and say that I want to laze and lie around in the mansion with this kind of atmosphere.

「Sure, I will accompany you」

Oh well, should I just consider this chance to take a walk in the forest? It’s been a bit cooler recently so it’s not a bad idea.

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