Volume 5, Chapter 1: The Journey Back (2/2)

At the sailor’s words, the people surrounding them distanced away.

Maomao squinted.

“What’s wrong?” Rikuson who had boarded the ship first came to ask her. It seems he had been carrying the luggage. He was truly diligent. Let’s just call him Gaoshun number two.

“That eyepatch man wants to board the ship, but the sailor is just rejecting him on the grounds that sick people can’t board,” she answered straightforwardly.

Rikuson looked at the youth with an “Hmm.” If that youth hid his pockmarks, he will be quite the lady-killer. Also, his tone was pretty frivolous.

“What’s inconvenient? Isn’t this boat free for anyone to board?” Rikuson asked.

“It looks like he has money, but he has pockmarks on his face, so the sailor suspects that he’s sick,” Maomao answered.

Rikuson squinted. “Is he really sick?”

“Ummm.” From a distance, she had no idea. She could see pockmarks, but there was no pus. It’s likely that what the youth was saying could be true. It seems that it’s been a while even if he had gotten sick.

Then, speaking of why she was not telling the sailor that–

(It’s a pain to get involved.)

It was just that.

Though, the man didn’t look like he was giving up on boarding the ship. He was clinging to the sailor. “Pleaase–. Let me board— Aren’t you a bit of a meany—”

“Let go! Stop it, you’ll spread your pox!”

“So mean. Discrimination! I’m lively as you can see!”

Normally, speaking of the beautiful man with facial scars, he had a shadow of his beauty, but it seems this guy didn’t fall into that category. He had wound himself around the sailor’s rugged legs, showing no signs of letting go.

The other sailors wanted to help their mate, but they didn’t want to get infected with some strange disease so they watched from a distance. At this rate, the ship won’t leave.

As if he read Maomao’s expression, Rikuson grinned at her. “You want the boat to leave soon, right?”

“….” She looked at the deck. Rahan was gazing at the blue sky while clutching onto the pail. It seems he couldn’t obtain horses at this harbour too.

Maomao reluctantly descended the ship and went to stand before the runny-nosed eyepatch man who was clinging to the extremely annoyed sailor. “Excuse me,” she said.

“Yes?”

When Maomao heard the reply that couldn’t be taken as an affirmative, she took off the man’s scarf. She could see that the ugly pockmarks were from years ago. She looked at the eye on the side of the pockmarks. They didn’t seem to focus. The size of the pupils was different on both eyes. He might have lost his vision on one eye.

“This man isn’t sick. He has scars, but it shouldn’t infect other people,” she said.

At least for smallpox. She had no idea if he had anything else.

“…” Looking extremely opposed to it, the sailor gingerly took the man’s money bag with his fingertips. He upturned it and money clattered to the floor. “How far do you want to go?”

“I want to go all the way to the capital! The capital, the capital!” The youth had the undisguised air of a country bumpkin. He made fists and shook them. “And so I made a lot of medicines!”

“Medicines?” It was Maomao who reacted to the man’s words.

“Ahh, I’m amazing despite my looks!”

Saying that, he took out a large sack from his filthy overcoat. When he opened it, a characteristic stench wafted out from the opening. Maomao reached in and picked out a pot. She opened the lid. It contained a salve. She didn’t know its effect, but it has been made extremely conscientiously. The herbs had been thoroughly mashed and the manner of the kneading was of the perfect consistency. Of course, the quality was assured as the combination of the herbs was done so carefully.

Maomao looked at the man again.

The man smiled frivolously as he offered it to the sailor before him. “How about this medicine-? It’s really good for seasickness.”

Of course, the sailor didn’t need to buy such a thing.

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“Stingy–. Isn’t it fine to buy it?” The man passed money over to the sailor. It seems he can finally board the ship.

And then he looked at Maomao and grinned. “Thanks, you saved-saved me? I’ll give you motion sickness medicine as thanks—”

He spoke like a kid. His outside didn’t match with his inside.

“No, I won’t get seasick, so I don’t need that,” she replied.

“Is that so–. That’s too bad.”

Just as the man was going to put away the medicine, she heard a loud “WAIT!!” from behind.

And it was Rahan who was running up with great vigour towards them from the boat.

“G-give me, …the motion sickness medicine,” Rahan said, panting.

(Heard you loud and clear.)

Maomao returned to the boat as she thought that.