"...And that was how it happened."
Jin was explaining the situation to Elsa with everything he had. His desperation seemed to have paid off, as she finally appeared to understand that it had all been a misunderstanding.
"Is that so? But an automata with emotional instability... I've never heard of such a thing."
"Reiko is special in many ways," Jin said, looking up at the sky. The stars were already beginning to emerge. "Let's head back inside soon."
Elsa nodded, and the two returned from the garden to their room.
"Oh, were you out for a stroll?"
They were met by the wet nurse. She cast a cold gaze at Jin before speaking.
"Dinner is ready."
Elsa followed the wet nurse toward the dining hall, while Jin returned to the room to fetch Reiko.
Reiko whispered to Jin that she didn't require food, but he reasoned with her.
"Still, there’s no need to let the Village Chief know you're an automata."
Given that explanation, Reiko nodded obediently.
As it happened, Reiko could perform a mimicry of eating. However, she would have to secretly discharge the contents later. This process involved further compressing the solidified food into beads or needles before ejecting it from her mouth. Since these could also be used as projectiles, she kept a certain amount stored within her body.
Additionally, her mouth was equipped with an analytical function, allowing her to analyze Jin's preferred flavors and apply them to future cooking. Originally, it was meant for detecting poisons, but this was the result of Jin's Reinforce magic.
Dinner that evening was luxurious. To be blunt, almost everything was something Jin had never seen before.
Since he was completely ignorant of high-end cuisine, the names of the dishes meant nothing to him. There was "Sharif's Bruschetta," "Gekbururu's Ajillo," and "Auflauf."
He wasn't a picky eater, so he had no trouble finishing the meal, but he was unfamiliar with local etiquette. He had to eat while mimicking Elsa's movements, which left him mentally exhausted and feeling like he hadn't truly tasted a thing.
That night, while Jin was relaxing in his room, there was a knock at the door.
Reiko happened to be out discharging the excess food, so Jin opened it himself. Standing there was Elsa’s wet nurse.
Up close, she looked to be in her twenties. She had chestnut hair tied back and brown eyes.
"Please, come in."
She declined Jin's invitation.
"Jin-san, I am telling you this as the young lady’s wet nurse. Do not misunderstand the situation simply because she has permitted you to ride in her carriage. If you attempt anything improper, I will wring you like a rag."
"U-Understood."
Jin had no idea what he was supposed to be misunderstanding or what part of him she intended to wring, but his experiences from his previous life had taught him never to talk back to a woman who spoke like that. He simply nodded obediently.
"As long as you understand. Farewell."
With that, she turned on her heel and departed.
He closed the door and puzzled over what she could have meant, but eventually gave up and decided to sleep. Reiko returned just then, so he extinguished the magi-lamp and lay down on the futon. Perhaps he was more tired than he realized, as Jin fell asleep almost instantly.
The next morning brought an early departure. It seemed the distance to the next stop, Moft Village, was quite significant.
After finishing breakfast—freshly baked bread, the milk of livestock resembling goats, and some kind of salted vegetables—the group left Flathead Village, seen off by the Village Chief.
Mount Flathead was beautiful as it reflected the morning sun.
"Ah, in the end, I never did get to make those dampers."
Between soothing an unstable Reiko and clearing up Elsa’s misunderstanding, he had been too busy to develop the shock absorbers. However, Reiko spoke up.
"It is quite alright, Father. Next time, I shall use Heal <Verheilen> on you."
Elsa, who was riding with them, widened her eyes at the comment.
"What? Reiko-chan, did you learn the Heal <Verheilen> magic?"
"Yes, I did."
"..."
Elsa was speechless. It was only natural; reproducing a spell after seeing and hearing it only once was a feat beyond the ordinary.
Normally, magic requires a chant, mental imagery, and mana. In addition, one needs the talent and mental strength to access a Repository where a "magic catalog" of sorts is recorded.
Magic will not activate unless all these conditions are met. Being "unable to use magic" simply means one of these factors is lacking.
The reason Jin was almost entirely unable to use attack magic was that he could not access the Attack Magic Repository. Conversely, he possessed almost unlimited access rights to the Craft Magic Repository. Since this was an innate trait, there was no changing it.
If magic were a computer program, the Repository would be the library of callable functions. It was the difference between calling a function like y = sin(x) versus trying to solve a trigonometric function using only the four basic arithmetic operations.
This leads to the question of why Reiko, a creation, can use attack magic better than Jin while remaining limited in her Craft Magic.
Ordinary spells, including attack magic, have simple results that are easy to visualize. Most of the functions being activated are also relatively simple. In contrast, Craft Magic requires the user to visualize the entire process, not just the result, which makes it far more selective of its users.
Even though Reiko possessed a brain powered by a magi-formula written into the highest quality magi-crystal, her capacity for imagery and creativity could not reach Jin’s level.
On the other hand, even if she couldn't access the Attack Magic Repository, she could learn almost any spell by writing the function into her internal memory magi-crystals. Once written, she simply had to reference it.
The bracelets Jin made for himself worked on the same principle. However, if a spell was too complex to record or if the method was unknown, it remained impossible. That said, with the analytical capabilities Jin and Reiko possessed, they could decipher almost any existing magic.
"Reiko uses a portion of artifact technology, so she's capable of it," Jin explained. He left it at that. It wasn't a lie; "all" was technically a "portion."
Once the word "artifact" was mentioned, Elsa stopped questioning the matter and fell silent.
Jin spent the day looking out the window, as it seemed to help prevent motion sickness.
The highway gradually turned into a climb, with several sections featuring quite steep slopes. The horses of this world were incredibly powerful, pulling such a large carriage with only a team of two.
"Jin-kun, can I move over there?" Elsa asked.
Indeed, sitting backward on an uphill slope meant one might slide off whenever the carriage jolted.
"Ah, sure."
The seat was designed for three, and since Reiko was small, there was plenty of room. Jin shifted toward the window, and Reiko huddled close to him. Consequently, Elsa sat on the opposite window side.
"The road ahead is a constant climb. Moft Village, where we'll stay tonight, is built on a gentle slope below Hanbarf Pass. Its primary industry is cheese."
Elsa provided the explanation. Indeed, though it was already the end of February, the scenery seemed to be regressing back into winter.
"We're in the mountains, but there is almost no snow. The highway was built through specific regions to avoid it."
Elsa seemed to have accepted Reiko’s sudden magical prowess, as she spoke to them just as she had the day before.
Suddenly, with a massive jolt, the carriage tilted sharply and came to a dead stop.
"Young lady! My apologies! A wheel is caught in a hole!" the coachman shouted.
The three of them hurried out of the carriage. The road here cut across a slope and had been gouged out by runoff water; the carriage wheel was firmly wedged into one of those deep ruts.
"Hiyah! Come on!"
The usually quiet coachman cracked his whip to encourage the horses. However, no matter how hard they pulled, the wheel wouldn't budge.
The carriage ahead noticed the trouble and stopped, and four attendants climbed down to help.
"Elsa-sama, please leave this to us."
The three men—excluding the wet nurse—put their backs into lifting the carriage. Despite their efforts, the combined weight of the carriage and the stuck wheel remained immovable.
Unable to watch any longer, Jin spoke.
"Reiko."
"Yes, Father," she replied briefly.
She approached the carriage, pushing the men aside.
"Hey now, little missy, what do you think you're doing?" one of them grumbled.
Reiko ignored him. Without a care for her clothes getting dirty, she crawled under the carriage.
"Heave!"
She lifted the carriage onto her back and stood up.
"Wha...!"
"Are we dreaming?"
The three men stood there with their mouths hanging open as they watched a small girl lift the entire carriage with her hands and walk forward with it. Even the two horses were partially hoisted off the ground, being dragged along as she moved.
Once she reached a section of the road that wasn't ruined, Reiko set the carriage down gently and returned to Jin's side. She had a bit of mud on her, but a single shake of her body sent the dirt flying off. Such was the benefit of rare materials.
"Good work, Reiko."
Jin patted her head in praise. Reiko looked even happier than usual.
"Reiko-chan is an automata, but she has the strength of a golem?" Elsa asked in astonishment.
"Ah, yes. I mean, you saw her before, didn't you? At the docks in Port Rock."
Elsa replied that she had been too distraught after being attacked by golems to notice. She had forgotten until now.
"Ordinary automata are only about as strong as a human, maybe slightly more. I've never seen one capable of that kind of power."
"Is that so..."
As they spoke, the man who had grumbled at Reiko earlier approached.
"Hey, little miss... are you really an automata?"
"I am."
When Reiko answered, the man looked down. "...Can I pat your head too?"
Reiko’s voice was ice-cold. "No. Only Father is permitted to touch me without my consent."
The man slumped his shoulders and backed away, utterly defeated.
"...He's been away from his daughter for about half a year," Elsa whispered. "I think he just wanted to pat Reiko-chan’s head because he misses her."
According to Elsa, the man was one of her guards—and apparently a master swordsman.
Not wanting to be late, the group quickly resumed their journey.