I’m a humiliated, incompetent person, but I alone can talk to dragons, so I can choose all the SSS skills and loophole items I want to. I’m going to become famous and respected, so, to the people who humiliated me – Go die in a ditch - Chapter 5

Translator: Jasper Kadowaki | Editor: NovelMultiverse

After the princess’s identity was confirmed, the government office immediately paid me the reward.

The amount was 1000 reals.

It was nearly twice as much as what I had paid for Louise, and it was about a month’s earnings for an average adult male.

Nothing beats getting paid, I thought to myself and put the money away in my inside pocket.

After I received the money and made my way outside the government building, Louise said, “Let’s go buy a sleeping stall.”

“No,” I said.

“Hey, wait a second! You promised, didn’t you?”

“No, listen. With this kind of money, we can buy you something even better than a sleeping stall.”

“Something better than a sleeping stall?” asked Louise, her eyes sparkling with wonder at what I had just suggested. “What do you mean, something better?”

“Something proper. Come on, let’s go to the store.”

“All right!”

I jumped on Louise, and from atop her back, I directed her down a route that took us to a dragon tool shop near the dragon market.

A dragon tool shop was, as the name suggests, a store that sold tools related to dragons in some way. It was a store that had all kinds of things, from tools that helped with daily life, to tools used for work, and even toys that even the most reticent dragons might enjoy playing with.

“Wow, I didn’t know a place like this existed,” said Louise. There were some dragons that got extremely excited when coming to a dragon tool store, but it appeared that Louise was not that kind of dragon.

She sat staring at the many goods on display behind the glass windows of various dragon tool shops, and seemed to be judging and admiring them, in awe.

“Let’s go in that shop with the black door,” I said.

“Okay,” said Louise. She followed my lead and we came to the shop with the black door.

Most dragon tool shops had their doors made wide so that small-sized dragons could enter. This was different from the doors of the stores at the dragon market. Those stores dealt in the buying and selling of dragons, but it was rare for a dragon to actually enter the building through the front door. They usually stayed in a backyard, and when they were bought or sold, they simply went through a back gate, behind the building.

On the other hand, at a dragon tool shop, dragons were considered “customers”, just as much as their owners. Since they were customers, it went without saying that they would enter through the front door, and that was why these doors were usually widened.

This shop, called Shadowroll, was no exception.

I jumped off of Louise’s back, and we went to enter the shop together, and were about to step over the door’s threshold, when…

“Well, hey, if it isn’t Cyril!”

I turned around to see who was calling my name. There was a man standing there by himself. On his face was a grin that was practically dripping with evil intentions.

“Rui,” I said. This guy was a dragon knight that I knew from Lindworm, the guild I was in.

“I was shocked, you know? When I came back, you were gone!” said Rui.

“…Oh, yeah,” I said.

“It broke my heart. Hey, how about I put in a word for you? I could ask Lindworm to take you back.”

“You would do that for me?” I asked. I had no intention of going back, but still, I was surprised at Rui’s offer.

“Yeah. Well, of course. I’d want you to quit with your hang-ups, though.”

“Hang-ups?”

“You have good technique, man, so why do you obsess over this Dragons First philosophy? If you just got rid of that kind of talk, it wouldn’t be impossible for you to start over at Lindworm.”

“…Ha, all right,” I said, shrugging and smiling, “I’ve gotta decline your offer, then. I don’t see myself getting over that particular hang-up.”

“Hey, come on, man. You don’t have to stand your ground, like that. It’s hard to make it alone, you know?”

“I’ll do my best.”

“Man, come on,” said Rui.

“Hey, what are you guys talking about?” asked Louise, cutting in on the conversation between Rui and me.

“Hm? Oh, this guy was telling me that I should stop letting you sleep for 12 hours a day,” I said. Strictly speaking, we weren’t talking about that, specifically, but it was pretty much the same idea.

“What?!” Louise said, and began to growl. Up until that point, she was giddy with the thought of being in a dragon tool shop, but all at once, she flipped her switch, and she bared her teeth at Rui to intimidate him.

“Wh-What are you doing?” asked Rui.

“I’m not doing anything,” I replied.

“That’s your dragon – make it stop.”

“I’m not doing anything,” I repeated, “Did you see me give a signal?”

Rui scowled, but he couldn’t respond.

When a dragon knight used a gesture to give an order to a dragon, this was commonly called a signal. Dragon knights trained their dragons to perform certain actions when flashed a certain signal. Most dragon knights even beat their dragons to get them to obey signals.

Of course, I had never done any of this with Louise, and I had not used any signals just now, either. [Read this novel and other amazing translated novels from the original source at the “Novel Multiverse dot com” website @ novelmultiverse.com]

Rui didn’t have the best personality, but he was still a first-class dragon knight of the Lindworm guild. He wouldn’t overlook any signal I may have used.

“Psh,” spat Rui, annoyed with the realization that I really hadn’t given any signal. “You’ve always been like this. What the hell kind of magic are you using, anyway?”

“I’m just treating her well,” I said.

“The hell?” said Rui, scoffing. He looked at me like I was beneath him, with an arrogant glint in his eye, and then he walked away.

“What is up with that guy?” asked Louise.

“What is up with him, indeed,” I said, shrugging. My way of thinking just didn’t mesh with his, at all. There was no use worrying about it, though.

“All right – Let’s go in, shall we?” I said.

“Yeah!” said Louise.

We reset our moods, and Louise and I stepped into the shop.

“Welcome,” said an employee. He came over to us as soon as we had entered. He was a young man, still in his twenties, and because of his demeanor, I guessed that he was a recently hired employee.

“A Balaur-type, I see,” he said, “Are you looking for anything in particular?”

“We’re looking for a bed,” I said.

“Ah! Well, those would be over here,” he said, and led us to the back of the store.

I say store, but really, this “Shadowroll” place was, like many other dragon tool shops, set up like a warehouse. The ceiling was about three stories high, and the entire shop was an open space. The products were divided into different aisles for different general categories, and all the products were stacked into large shelving units. Small-sized dragons could easily make their way around.

The employee showed us to the back, where we arrived at a corner reserved for products related to sleeping. There, we could see that the shop had all kinds of furniture for sleeping in. These “beds” were completely different in size and shape from human beds, and they were tailored specifically for dragons.

“Whoaaa!” said Louise, excited. She promptly leaped onto a bed and started rolling around in it.

“Ahh! Sorry, she just jumped in,” I said.

“It’s quite all right,” said the employee, “All of the things on display here are meant to be tested out.”

“Oh, I see,” I said, slightly relieved.

“Oh, this is great,” said Louise.

I looked over at Louise and saw the bed she was lounging in.

“That’s a… Slime Bed, isn’t it?” I asked.

“You are correct, sir,” said the employee.

The Slime Bed got its name from slime monsters. It was a large, light blue mass, jiggly like a slime monster. Just like a slime monster was, it was a single mass, but it was elastic, and so when laid upon, it fit snugly against the body and was said to be supremely comfortable for sleeping in.

These beds were also called “Lazy Beds” and “Water Beds”. Incidentally, these beds didn’t use actual slime, but they were filled with a substance like it.

“This is really great,” said Louise.

“Hm,” I said.

“This is really great,” she repeated, continuing to roll around on the bed.

“You like it, huh?” I asked.

“Yup! This is way better than a sleeping stall!”

“Hm… How much does this cost?” I asked, turning to the employee.

He had been watching Louise and I go back and forth, but seeing Louise like this, rolling around in a state of contentment, he didn’t need to understand Louise’s words to see what was going on in her head. So, the employee didn’t question me about it.

“This one here is 1200 reals.”

“1200, huh,” I said looking over at Louise, again. “Are you sure you want that one?”

“I want this one! …But, we don’t have enough money for it, right?” she asked.

“It’s fine,” I said, “We’d be overspending a bit, but it’s fine.”

“Oh, really? Thank you!” said Louise.

It was true that the 1000 reals that we had just earned wouldn’t quite cover the cost, but I had been working with Louise for a few days, now, and so I took that into consideration, too.

I would be splurging it all at once, but I figured it was worth it if Louise liked it that much.

“All right, I’ll take this one,” I said.

“Thank you, sir… But it’s strange, isn’t it?” asked the employee.

“Strange?” I asked, tilting my head and looking back at the employee.

“Well, there are many dragon knights who talk to their dragons, but this is the first time I’ve ever seen a dragon knight seem to be actually having a conversation with their dragon.”

“Ah, yeah,” I said. I knew what he meant. If I substituted dragons with cats or dogs in this situation, I would be thinking the same thing. I’ve seen many pet owners talk to their pets, but I’ve never seen any of them seem to be truly conversing with them.

“If you treat them like family, you kind of just get to know what they’re trying to say,” I said. It was what I always said. I told people that since I treated them like family, I could pretty much talk to them, at this point. I had said it to many people, but not many people had really taken it too seriously. But, that was fine.

I went to the counter with the employee, and coughed up 1200 reals (almost all the money I had), and bought the bed for Louise.

“How would you like us to handle the delivery?” the employee asked, glancing at Louise. His expression suggested that he thought that since she was a Balaur-type, she might transport it by herself.

“What do you think, Louise? Should we have it delivered? Do you want to carry it back?”

“I’ll carry it,” she said.

“We’ll handle it ourselves,” I told the employee.

“Yes, sir. Understood,” he said.

With that, we packed the slime bed onto Louise’s back and left the store. When we got out of the store, Louise, who had been giddy with excitement up until that point, suddenly became calm and serious.

“…Hey,” she said.

“Hm? What?” I asked.

“Is this really okay? This bed, I mean.”

“What, why?”

“I just realized that I was kind of acting like a brat for it.”

I laughed and patted Louise on the head. Dragons’ bodies were large and much harder than humans, so getting hit on the head with force by a human was like being petted, to them. Actual petting would end up feeling like a feather being touched to them.

“Don’t worry about it,” I said, “I promised, didn’t I?”

“Yeah… Thank you, master!” Louise said, smiling joyfully.[Read this novel and other amazing translated novels from the original source at the “Novel Multiverse dot com” website @ novelmultiverse.com]