Chapter 44

I dug for clams with all my might. It was a bountiful catch, and they were coming up from all over.

"Quack quack!"

"Ah, did you find one?"

Amelia tapped the ground with her toes where she thought clams were buried. Digging there would yield a large clam with a high probability.

While I was digging, it seemed Amelia had found the next target.

"Quack quack!"

"Just a moment, please."

It seemed to be buried quite deep and wasn't coming up easily.

"Quack~"

"Me?!"

Amelia seemed to be asking Liette to dig for clams. In some places, the ground was too muddy to dig with claws. However, I thought it would be impossible for Liette, who had been raised as a lady, to dig for clams—but—

"Quack quack~"

"Ugh..."

"Quack quack?"

Amelia seemed to be saying something like, "There are clams here, can you dig them up for me?"

Liette, asked with wide eyes, had turned bright red.

"Quack~"

"O-Okay, I'll dig it up!"

She squatted down and started digging with her staff, which had a beautiful golden handle, making it even muddier.

I felt bad, but I was grateful because I wanted to bring back as many clams as possible.

The clams seemed to be buried in shallow spots and were found quickly.

"I found it!"

"Quack~"

Liette, covered in mud...

I felt bad, but seeing Amelia's happy face, I relaxed and thought, "Well, it's okay."

I had been worried that Amelia would only trust me, but it seemed that wasn't the case, and I was relieved. I hope she continues to get along with many people.

There was no time to be idle. I resumed my work.

I finally managed to get a clam in my hands.

It was the largest one I had dug up today.

When I washed it in the lake, bubbles started to rise from the middle.

Could it be a super giant clam?

Peering into the lake—

"Quackkkk!!"

Amelia let out a low quack. The moment I heard it, I snapped back to reality. This wasn't a clam.

By the time I realized, it was too late. A geyser of water shot up.

"Ahhh!"

I was drenched from head to toe.

More shockingly, I was staring at the scene in front of me.

A giant mud catfish had emerged from the lake.

It was long and slender like a snake, with a wide mouth and long whiskers. Its eyes were round.

When it was small, it could be fried and enjoyed, but this size was a bit much.

Perhaps it had grown so large because it had no natural predators.

No, this wasn't the time to analyze it.

The mud catfish was facing us with a flat face.

Could it be angry because we were digging for clams?

"I-I don't need the clams, I'll give them to you!"

I threw the clams I had just dug up into the lake. But the mud catfish didn't react at all.

It raised its long tail out of the water and swung it towards me.

It's over. That's what I thought—

"Quack!"

Amelia jumped in front of me and deflected the tail with her claws.

There were no wounds, but it seemed to be an unexpected attack, as the mud catfish shuddered and returned its tail to the water.

However, the attack wasn't over. This time, it opened its mouth wide and came towards us.

Amelia will be eaten!

I instinctively covered her.

I was scared, but I thought I had to protect her, and my body moved on its own.

I braced myself for the impact, but the pain I expected didn't come.

In an instant, something exploded in front of me. It was fire.

--- The heat of the blazing flames that break the thaw

A calm voice was heard.

A magic circle appeared, and a ball of fire was born, burning the mud catfish to a crisp.

The charred mud catfish sank into the lake.

Once I realized it was safe, the tension in my shoulders melted away.

I was shocked. I never expected there to be a giant mud catfish in the lake.

Even though it had sunk, it floated back up. With such a large mouth, I would have been swallowed whole. It was terrifying. And it smelled a bit aromatic. No, I shouldn't think about it.

Regaining my composure, I went to thank Liette.

"Thank you, Liette. You saved us with your magic."

"..."

"Liette?"

When I looked at her face, Liette shed a tear.

"What, um..."

"It was scary."

She dropped her staff and hugged me.

"Ugh, what was that? It was so big and had such a menacing aura, it was disgusting."

"I'm sorry."

She seemed to be quite scared despite her brave appearance.

I patted her back and waited for her to calm down.

"I'm glad the incantation was in time."

Liette, who had finally stopped crying, sighed deeply.

"Thank you. Thanks to you, we were saved."

"Well, it's nothing..."

I had confidence in my hearing, but I hadn't noticed anything. Perhaps I was too focused on digging for clams. It was terrifying.

"Surely, you're not going to eat that, right?"

"No, I won't eat that."

I had been warned by my mother not to eat exotic foods.

Liette seemed relieved to hear that.

We decided to end our search for ingredients.

We needed to return to our base and prepare dinner.

---

"--- Still, that was terrible."

"I agree."

Liette and I were covered in mud. We had only gone to search for ingredients.

However, we couldn't worry about our appearance. We needed to prepare the meal. I took off my wet and heavy coat.

I picked up some stones and made a makeshift stove. I put in solid fuel and tried to light it with a flint, but the surrounding moisture made it difficult to start a fire.

"Hey, let me handle it."

Liette tried to make a fire with magic—

"Ah!"

"Whoa!"

She miscalculated the strength, causing a huge fire. It took time to calm the flames.

"I'm sorry. I'm not used to small-scale magic."

"Well, magic isn't something you use in daily life."

I took a deep breath and resumed my work.

We had gathered about twenty-seven clams. First, we rubbed the clams with salt to clean them.

I had to use quite a bit of force, and I was out of breath.

"Should I help?"

"No, it's fine."

I declined, but Liette helped me.

"My hands are so cold and red."

"I'm sorry."

"It's okay."

As a lady, she had probably never done anything like this.

She worked hard to clean the clams.

Once that was done, we removed the mud.

We poured warm water into a bucket and mixed the clams, rubbing them together. After a while, they would spit out the mud.

"You can remove the mud with hot water?"

"Yes. When you put them in warm water, the clams are surprised and stick their heads out of their shells. By mixing them together, they spit out the mud."

"Hmm, I see."

I had learned this method from Gar.

We took a short break and enjoyed some biscuits and herbal tea from my personal stash.

"I'm sorry, but these are cheap biscuits and homemade tea. I hope you like them."

"They're delicious. Maybe it's because we were so active, but I was really hungry."

"I'm glad."

We munched on the biscuits and washed them down with herbal tea.

I also gave Amelia a piece of sugar and some fruit as a reward.

It was getting dark, so we lit the lanterns and resumed our work.

We put twenty of the twenty-seven mud-free clams into boiling water.

We added some wine and let it simmer. Once the broth turned milky white, we tasted it.

I was surprised. The broth was incredibly rich. It was worth the effort to find them.

We seasoned it with spices.

"Quack?"

Amelia looked into the distance. It seemed the captain and the others had returned.

Perfect timing. I added dried noodles to the pot.

The first to arrive was Uargas, looking tired.

"We're back~"

"Welcome back."

Seeing us covered in mud, he was taken aback.

"Hey, Riris, what happened?"

"Something happened."

We were more dirty than Uargas and the others, who had gone to fight the man-eating lizards. How did this happen?

"What happened?"

"I'll tell you later."

First, we needed to eat.

I asked Gar to put the pot on the ground.

The remaining clams were steamed with the pot lid.

We lined the lid with leaves we had gathered, placed the clams on top, added the captain's premium wine and dried fennel, and covered it with a large leaf. We let it steam for a while.

"Hey, that's my wine, isn't it?"

"I'm sorry, I did it without thinking."

"You didn't think, did you?"

The wine was confiscated.

Feeling down, Liette came to my defense.

"It's fine. A little bit is okay."

"It's not a little. You poured it in like a waterfall."

"Then, I'll give you some of my father's wine next time. We have