I Decided to Search for Fish

“…Yes, it’s all there.”

I said after counting the money.

“Good. I’m very happy about this purchase.”

He said as he put the precious gemstones away in the back of the store—then he came back and said,

“Now… About this monster armor that I’m going to make for you—it should prioritize speed?”

“Yeah.”

“So you don’t need defense ability or anything… Then how about I make a collar for the Proud Wolf and a hat for the slimes?”

“I’ll leave it to you.”

I didn’t know anything about monster armor.

And so I thought that it would be better if the knowledgable master made what he thought would be good.

“I’m glad to hear you say that. Sometimes, people like to dictate every single little detail, and that prevents me from really testing the limits of its ability.”

He sounded very enthusiastic about what he was doing.

So, now that that was settled…I should ask about the price, just in case.

As he would be handling very special materials, I had a feeling it would turn out very expensive.

“So, how much is it going to cost to make it?”

“…Indeed. How about 1 million for both?”

1 million for both, huh.

It was cheaper than I was expecting. Perhaps it was because I had brought the materials in.

At least, it was a lot less than the money I had made off of selling the gemstones.

“All right. That’s fine with me.”

“Good. It’s a deal then. …I’ll be working on it all day tomorrow, so you can come and pick them up the day after that. They will be the best monster armor you can find.”

He said as he rolled a gemstone between his fingers.

…I was looking forward to it.

I thought about this as I spent the night at the inn. Then I left town the next morning.

My destination: the river with the Maneater Bass.

“So, here it is.”

I left the town and moved towards the volcanic mountain for quite some time until the river came into view.

It was about 10 meters wide. …Not particularly wide, but not that narrow either.

And both sides were cliffs.

It looked like it would be hard to get down.

As there was a bridge over it, I decided to look down into the water from there.

‘Maneater Bass… See anything like it?’

‘Hmm… It’s hard to see in the water…’

The slimes said with disappointment.

Apparently, their detection ability did not work well underwater.

I had heard that the monster I was after was close to 1 meter in length. That should have made them easy to detect.

If they were the kind of fish that jumped out of the water, then maybe the slimes would detect them the second they broke the surface—but there was no guarantee that the Maneater Bass would do anything so convenient for us.

‘How far are you able to detect things that are in the water?’

‘Hmm… We can if it’s close by! Like up to there!’

The slime said as it pointed to a rock that was a short distance away.

…So, that suggested they had a range of about 10 meters when it came to detecting monsters that were in the water.

‘In that case, we’ll use your numbers to our advantage.’

‘Do we scatter?’

‘Okay!’

And so the slimes started advancing to the river’s edge.

Slimes were creatures that could stick onto flat, vertical surfaces, so they made it look easy…but it would have been very hard for a human like me to go down there.

“Magic Throwing Net.”

After thinking about it for a minute, I hooked ‘Magic Throwing Net’ onto a tree and used it as a rope.

‘Magic Throwing Net’ was very strong, and so it could carry my weight.

“Oomph.”

Like this, I was able to go down into the ravine.

Of course, there was still no road by the riverbed, and so I had to travel over rocks and boulders.

And the boulders would often move…which made the trek even more difficult.

“Huh! Umph! …Ooph.”

‘Yuji. You’re so slow!’

‘You can do it!’

As I struggled with the unsure footing, the slimes continued to move past me.

They even had enough time to cheer me on.

They were light and could stick to walls, so this terrain did not even count as an obstacle for them. I was incredibly jealous.

‘I’ll support you with attack magic, so you guys go on ahead!’

‘Okay!’

And so I continued to move upstream along the river.

Now…if only this Maneater Bass would hurry up and show itself.