Volume 9 - Chapter 26 – Refrigerator? (2/2)

It ended up being about three meters underground, and as a result was also well-insulated. An additional reason for the good insulation was probably the effect of the dug up soil which had been piled up on top of the icehouse. Later when grass sprouted there it would get even better.

“This is fine. Apart from installing the Magi Lamps which we can do later, snow is what’s essential.”

At this time of the year the snow of Kaina village had all melted by now.

“I guess it has to be brought from the mountains…No.”

Wouldn’t it be fine to make the snow using magic?

Right then Elsa and Hannah turned up together.

“Onii-chan, it’s lunchtime…So, what have you made?”

“Hey Hannah. So it’s that late already. I guess I’ll come back for now. I’ll explain along the way.”

Jin then left the icehouse for later and headed towards Martha’s house. En route, he explained it so that it was easy for Hannah to understand too.

“Huh, storing snow. That’s got to be cool! Food can be stored there then!”

“Yeah, that’s right. From next year onwards it can be filled with the snow that falls on the village. But it’s too late for that this year, so…”

Jin gave a glance at Elsa.

“?”

Elsa couldn’t understand the meaning of it at first, but she realized that Jin was having her think about it by herself. Elsa wracked her brain and pondered.

And around the time Martha’s house was in sight.

“I got it. It’s alright to just make snow using magic.”

She spoke the correct answer.

＊　　　＊　　　＊

After lunch, Jin asked Martha and Hannah to gather the villagers in the plaza with the storehouses.

The villagers who hadn’t heard Jin’s earlier explanation were confused.

“Hey, Jin! Just what is this?”

As it was lunchtime the villagers had all returned to their homes, and as Jin had once more made something they assembled at once. Once Jin confirmed most of the villagers had gathered he began explaining.

“This is called an icehouse, and it’s filled with snow. By doing that, even when summer comes there will be snow remaining. You can then use it to store foods that easily spoil.”

It was a simple explanation, but its usefulness appeared to have been conveyed.

“Huh! That’s great! Meat spoiling quickly during the summers is a problem, so we’ve been drying it or salting it, you see.”

“But, this year there’s not going to be any more snow or anything. Don’t tell me you’re going to tell us to fetch it from the mountains?”

Jin smiled and replied.

“I won’t. As from next year on you can fill it with the snow that falls on the village, this year…”

Jin then looked at Elsa.

“Elsa.”

“Yes.”

Elsa pointed towards the icehouse with her right hand and,

“[Snow Bullet].”

She cast a spell. It was an intermediate water attribute spell. Also, it was had the elementary level ice attribute (derived from water attribute) in it.

Along with her chant, small beads of snow went flying towards the icehouse.

“Ooh!”

“Amazing!”

“I’ve never seen anything like it!”

“As expected of Jin’s sister! She’s a real beauty!”

“Oi, isn’t being a beauty irrelevant here?”

The villagers who saw that were all impressed and raised their voices. Not one of them shirked or seemed to be afraid. Because everyone was already used to Jin being outside the norm.

Incidentally, Jin couldn’t use attack-type magic like this (except by using his bracelet). He could only reach the level of cooling overheated things with [Cooling] or creating ice with [Ice].

As [Ice] could only produce ice it wasn’t suited the use of for putting food into holes dug in it, and to have Elsa impress the villagers he had her do it.

Also thanks to the surplus Magic Energy stored in her bracelet, after about five minutes the icehouse was full.

“Alright, that’s enough. Elsa, good work.”

Jin thanked Elsa while Gon and Gen tramped down the snow.

Then he said to the villagers,

“Now you can use the icehouse whenever you want. If you want to cool something down you can also put it there. However, please make sure you always close the door.”

“Ooh, I understand! Are there any other things to pay attention to?”

“Let’s see. As you’re in the enclosed hole the air may turn bad so please pay attention to it. If you feel like you’re choking then immediately get out.”

While saying this, Jin thought that for now he’d leave an assistant golem behind as a countermeasure for oxygen deprivation. He’d have it pay attention to the health of the people entering, and also it could assist with putting in and getting out the food.

“I understand. It’s already usable, right?”

“Yes.”

“All right! Let’s get all the guys with nothing to do and go hunting in the mountains!”

Said Rock, one of the older men.

“Let’s leave some alcohol to cool down so we can have a few drinks when we return!”

“You! You’re not allowed to drink too much!”

Today too in Kaina Village things were going as usual.