The Unwanted Undead Adventurer: Volume 5 Read online

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  The steaming bowl contained jiggling eggs covered in a gelatinous substance. They were transparent enough to see the gigantic tadpoles inside. That was solest. Next to it was a big plate of not just five or six but twenty or thirty fried mantises in a large pile. That was quite the sight to see. In fact, I wasn’t hungry anymore just looking at it. I didn’t want to touch the gettamba.

  Seated next to me, Lorraine loaded her plate and ate them like any other food. “What, Rentt, are you not eating? Well, maybe it won’t taste good for you without any blood,” she said, considerate enough to whisper the last part.

  That wasn’t the problem. I simply didn’t like how the food looked. Hathara never had cuisine so flagrantly uncivilized. We barely had winter frogs or curtis mants around Hathara, though, so that was probably part of it. They ate these monsters around these parts partially to cut down on their numbers while they were still small, but there was no need for that when they weren’t present to begin with.

  “No, that’s not it. I’ll eat some, I swear,” I insisted, crying internally as I put a paltry amount of frog eggs on my plate. They were firm, and I could see that the giant tadpoles were still moving around inside. Remorseful about taking their lives, I put them in my mouth and touched the gelatinous substance with my tongue. It had a strange texture, soft but soaked in juices from the stew that gave them a fine flavor. I worked up the will to eat more, biting into a tadpole. A gentle taste filled my mouth, contrary to their sickening appearance. It was mildly sweet, while the juices were savory. I could never get enough of these, if only they looked like anything normal.

  Next was the fried curtis mants. Surprisingly, there were only so many of those left too. I was at the same table as Lorraine and the other passengers, all of whom ate without a fuss. I heard all the crunching sounds and knew they came from the mantises, so it should have been obvious. I reached out to grab a curtis mant and made eye contact with it. Disturbed and unable to tolerate staring at this bug in silence any longer, I shoved it in my mouth headfirst and chomped it in half. The crisp sensation spread throughout, along with a refreshing taste atypical of fried food. I thought it was good, perfect to go along with some beer, and the coachman and middle-aged man did happen to be drinking ale with it. I worried about how tomorrow’s drive would go, but giant tortoises were smart enough to drag us along fine, even if the coachman’s whipping was haphazard.

  I eventually got over my revulsion and ate the food like I would anything else. Next time I came to this town, though, I would probably go through this all over again. Lorraine said she wanted to come eat this again sometime, so we would likely stop by on the way home. I had to mentally prepare myself before then.

  ◆◇◆◇◆

  “Thanks to you two, we got to eat tasty food this whole trip! If we ever see you in Maalt, we’ll treat you to something nice!” the young woman said after she got off the carriage.

  “We owe you,” her father added, standing next to her. “I heard you fought off some monsters one night, too. This isn’t much, but here.” He presented us with a bronze coin.

  “No, we were only defending ourselves. If you want to do something for us, you can buy us a nice meal when you’re back in Maalt, assuming you’ll be back,” Lorraine suggested.

  We talked to the middle-aged man and the young woman a fair bit, enough to know they were returning to the village where the woman’s mother and grandparents lived. They stayed in Maalt for work most of the time but went back to their village when they had a vacation. The mother took care of the grandparents. It was a common story.

  “Are you sure? Normally you’d pay a Silver-class adventurer in silver coins, even,” the man said.

  Silver-class and Bronze-class were convenient titles in that they provided an estimate of the price for the adventurer’s services. Silver-class adventurers used to take one or two silver coins, but now they were even more expensive thanks to inflation. Bronze-class adventurers once took one bronze coin, but of course, their asking price had since increased as well. Still, we made one or two silver coins at the most. A Bronze-class adventurer’s wallet was never in the best of states.

  “It’s fine. We weren’t here on a job. It wasn’t even out of the kindness of our hearts. We’re traveling too, and it was nice to have people to talk too. See you later.”

  “Dang, you don’t see a lot of generous adventurers nowadays. Fine, until next time, then,” the middle-aged man said. He waved goodbye and entered the village with his daughter.

  “Time to go,” the coachman said and got the carriage moving. We were still on the third day of the journey. There were three or four more to go. The only passengers left were us, the coachman, and the old couple.

  ◆◇◆◇◆

  “I know I kept making fun of how rural your home is, but maybe I didn’t go far enough,” Lorraine said as she popped her head out of the carriage.

  She was right. We were surrounded by nothing but mountains and forests. Up to where the father and daughter had disembarked, there were still roads like you would see around villages. But now there were mountains, mountains, mountains, forests, and more mountains. The road was leveled out enough a carriage could cross it, but only just barely. The coachman had the skill, and the carriage had the durability to handle it, but this part was always scary. If the carriage broke down, we would have to walk.

  The old couple got off yesterday, by the way. The distance between the road and their destination would require them to walk a ways, so Lorraine and I carried them the rest of the way there. Thankfully the coachman said he would wait for us to get back. He even said he’d camp right there and wait for us to return if we didn’t make it back that day. That was one nice advantage to country roads; the westbound carriages were never so flexible. They were often filled to capacity, and city folk were always concerned about getting to places on time. Late arrivals garnered tons of complaints, with passengers demanding their money back. On this road, no such thing was possible. That might have been partially because country people were lazier, but the coachman didn’t expect to make much money no matter what happened, and the passengers were willing to go with the flow.

  “Well, yeah, if it weren’t so far out of the way, I’d visit home more often. It takes time to get here, time I didn’t have. Thankfully now I can get by without working constantly, but I had to toil every day to put food on the table until recently,” I said.

  That was typical for Bronze-class adventurers. If you had a party, you could work more efficiently and avoid such poverty, but I didn’t. Although, maybe I liked to waste money a little too much, too. I was obsessed with seemingly useless magic items.

  “If you just told me you were going through rough times, I would’ve given you a loan with no interest.”

  “How could I ask for that? I want to be your equal.”

  I was afraid my destitution would leave me socially isolated too, but if Lorraine said she’d offer money, then she probably would. Even so, I didn’t want to ask for some. Not while I still had other options, at least. If worse came to worst then I might have been forced to abandon my pride, but then I would strive to pay her back for the rest of my life. Long-time friends were precious to me.

  “You don’t need to be so stubborn. Well, maybe that’s just how you are,” she acknowledged.

  It was true, I lived life how I wanted. If I gave that up, it would be the death of me. That’s why, even though I was undead, I still thought of myself as alive. My will lived on.

  ◆◇◆◇◆

  The carriage continued onward for another half a day or so. “Almost there,” the coachman muttered.

  Lorraine and I looked outside and saw the road gradually becoming more open. We reached the point where the road was used by the villagers of Hathara, so it was maintained to some degree. A river ran alongside the path, so that was probably why. I recognized the scenery around here.

  “Finally,” Lorraine said, exhausted. Even she had tr
ouble with all the shaking. She was from the city, so I doubted she ever rode a carriage that rocked so much.

  “I can see it now. It’s the village of Hathara,” I whispered.

  Lorraine looked straight ahead too. “A wooden fence? Seems kind of primitive.”

  “It might look that way, but Hathara’s medicine woman coats that fence in a drug that’s extremely effective at warding off monsters. And if some monsters do get through, there are hunters that can take care of it. Their defenses are fine.”

  If anything too powerful appeared, they would have to call adventurers, but they had enough people who could take down goblins or slimes. Even deep in the mountains, life was possible.

  “I already heard as much, but this village is a bit strange. There are autonomous cities with their own defenses against monsters, but not many small villages in the mountains can boast the same. Or maybe I’m just ignorant, and this is normal for mountain villages.”

  “I’m not sure. I used to think it was normal, but when I think about it now, it is kind of odd. The medicine woman’s drugs are unusually effective, and the hunters seem stronger than they have any right to be.”

  “There’s also that mysterious shrine where you were blessed. I told Hilde I was coming with you out of curiosity as an excuse, but it does sound interesting. I can’t wait to investigate,” Lorraine said with excitement.

  I didn’t mind, but to me, it was an ordinary village. I couldn’t imagine she would find anything outside the shrine, but I could think about that after we got there. With that in mind, we waited for the carriage to reach the village.

  Afterword

  Thank you for reading The Unwanted Undead Adventurer, Volume 5. This is the author, Yu Okano. The fifth volume was published without a hitch, much to my relief. The light novels and the manga version are both ongoing, something I’m deeply thankful for.

  But even after five volumes, I’m still worried about writing this afterword. I was never good at talking about myself, and even sitting here with my manuscript in front of me, I have no idea what to write. When it comes to novels, no matter how bad my writer’s block gets, at least some sort of story will come out naturally once I sit down at my PC and write a few lines. It’s just the afterwords that are a problem. I’ll never get used to them.

  Should I write about recent events in my life? I don’t know if anyone cares about that. Should I write a behind-the-scenes story about this novel? I can’t think of anything special to say. What if I wrote about my hobbies? I don’t have much in the way of hobbies.

  That’s what runs through my head until, in the end, I write something worthless and call it a day. I’d like to write something more meaningful, but it’s extremely difficult. I’ve checked to see what other authors write for reference, and they all have nice, genuine afterwords. They impress me, but I never get as far as figuring out what to do for my own afterwords, sadly.

  Anyway, I thought this complaining would bring up my word count a decent amount, but I’m only about halfway to where I need to be. I have to write something more, but I can’t think of anything. All that comes to mind is the aquarium in my room. One tiny hobby of mine is taking care of tropical fish. It used to just be tropical fish, but a lot of people have been obsessing over the layout of their aquatic plants lately, so I did the same thing. I have a fish tank with tropical fish and beautiful plants that’s like a little garden. Just looking at it brings me peace. It feels like I’m creating my own small world, and that’s kind of fun and exciting.

  My novels are the same way. I set up characters, countries, and events to produce a whole world. Most of what occurs in that world is according to my intentions, but things have happened that I never expected when I started writing. That also applies to this afterword. I want to savor this work and the surprises that come with it, so that might be why I write novels. If I get to release another volume, maybe I’ll write about those feelings in that afterword.

  Anyway, I hope you’ll continue to read The Unwanted Undead Adventurer. I have another novel coming out alongside this one called The Middle-Aged Underdog Adventurer is Still Trying His Best. If possible, I’d like it if you could give that a look too. That’s all for now, see you next volume.

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Color Illustrations

  Chapter 1: Off to Adventure

  Chapter 2: Making a Catalyst

  Chapter 3: Existence and Status

  Chapter 4: The Journey

  Afterword

  About J-Novel Club

  Copyright

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  Copyright

  The Unwanted Undead Adventurer: Volume 5

  by Yu Okano

  Translated by Noah Rozenberg

  Edited by Suzanne Seals

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Copyright © 2019 Yu Okano

  Illustrations by Jaian

  Cover illustration by Jaian

  All rights reserved.

  Original Japanese edition published in 2019 by OVERLAP, Inc.

  This English edition is published by arrangement with OVERLAP, Inc., Tokyo

  English translation © 2020 J-Novel Club LLC

  All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher is unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property.

  J-Novel Club LLC

  j-novel.club

  The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.

  Ebook edition 1.0: March 2020

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  Yu Okano, The Unwanted Undead Adventurer: Volume 5

 

 

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