My 【Repair】Skill Became an Almighty Cheat Skill, So I Thought I’d Open Up a Weapon Shop

(TL: Sorry it’s late! Enjoy and remember to wash your hands properly!)

The following day, I woke up on my familiar, comfortable bed to an unusual smell stimulating my appetite.

My shop was far away from  the other homes, so it was impossible for the smell of somebody’s breakfast to reach here.

I had the ridiculous thought that somebody was camping outside of my shop as I got out of bed and headed for the dining room.

「Oh. I used the ingredients that were laying around, don’t mind me.」

…For some reason, Garnet was in the kitchen. Not to mention she was making a simple breakfast.

As I tried to understand what was happening, Garnet frowned at me like she was unsatisfied with something.

「What’s with that face? You got a problem? I got hungry, so what do you expect me to do? Be glad that I didn’t wake you up to get you to make me breakfast.」

「No… I don’t have any complaints, it’s just, well, surprising…」

「A knight should be familiar with cooking because they have to camp outside sometimes. Adventurers are the same, aren’t they?」

Just as Garnet stated, there were quite a lot of adventurers who got sick of preserved foods and hard bread and learned to cook.

For big parties, they usually hired a person specifically to cook for them, but even then there were only a few groups that did that.

「I made you some too. It’s nothing compared to Silvia’s cooking, but it should be good enough to fill your stomach with right after waking up.」

「…I appreciate it. Thanks.」

After eating the light breakfast Garnet made for me, I began preparing for today’s opening.

「By the way, how did the conversation go? The one about hiring.」

「I asked the guild house to look for someone. They’re going to set up a hiring notice for short-term work, so I can only wait.」

「A request, huh? I wonder if anybody took it right after they put it up?」

I asked Mareeda to put up the notice yesterday night right after dinner.

Mareeda said she would put it up as soon as possible, but even if she did so right after our conversation, only a single night had passed.

If she posted it along with the regular quests in the early morning, then mine would’ve put up right about now.

I should assume that I wouldn’t be able to hire anyone before we opened shop today.

「Excuse me!」

…Or so I had thought, when I heard a young girl’s voice from the shop front.

There was a girl and a boy who both looked like adventurers standing by the entrance.

「We accepted a request at the guild house. Is this the White Wolf shop?」

The girl was somewhat tall and had long, pale-colored hair. Her eyes resembled chestnuts, and she showed off a friendly smile.

On the other hand, the boy was smaller than Garnet, and was about a head shorter than the girl.

He had short hair that was darker than black ink, and his eyes made him look scary and unapproachable.

Since they were the exact opposite of each other, it created a good balance and made me feel reassured.

「I’m surprised. You took the request already? I haven’t seen you two around before, did you just come to Greenhollow?」

「Yes, that’s correct. We arrived late last night, and our wallets are getting pretty empty. That’s why we picked a job that we can start right away.」

Even though the girl was talking in a friendly and respectful manner, the boy kept quiet and didn’t attempt to speak.

「Oh, I’m Melissa. This here is Nagi.」

「…Nice to meet you.」

The boy finally said something. His voice was rather low for someone of his size.

「Melissa and Nagi, right? I’m the owner of the shop, Luke. The person over there is Garnet, one of my employees. We’re the only official workers here, so it’s troubling when things get busy. 」

「Please leave it to us! We worked at a weapon shop in a different town before, so we’re used to jobs like these!」

「That’s reassuring. It’s only a short term contract from today until the next day off. I look forward to working with you.」

We had been so focused on talking that it was almost time to open up the shop. I got Melissa and Nagi to get to work straight away.

Although Melissa mentioned that they were used to it, they actually worked quite efficiently.

Melissa spoke to the customers with a sparkling sociable tone, while Nagi emotionlessly moved quickly and helped restock the merchandise.

They worked so well that it felt like a waste for them to work short-term here.

However, they only came here to earn money for their travels, so I couldn’t keep them here long-term.

Adventurers were like that.

「Melissa… That’s your name, right? Is that Nagi kid an easterner?」

During work, Garnet went up to Melissa and started chatting.

「He is, but what about it…?」

「That’s unexpected, but what’s even more unexpected is that he’s the 『second』one to come to this town.」

「The second one? Does that mean there’s another easterner here besides Nagi?」

「Yeah, she’s a friend of ours. She comes to the shop to help often.」

Garnet was talking about Sakura.

Easterners rarely come to the Westland Kingdom. Most of them weren’t permanent residents, and would only come and stay for a while when they had a specific goal in mind, like what Sakura was doing.

Sakura and Nagi… It was rare for two easterners to show up so quickly one after another.

As I thought about it, the aforementioned person showed up at the shop.

「Good morning, Luke-dono. How is work…」

Right as Sakura swung the door open with full force, she saw Nagi.

They both stopped in their tracks and looked at each other with a serious expression. Then, they both spoke at the same time.

「Kirigakure?! What are you doing here?!」

「The shrine maiden of Kakuen?!」

I didn’t understand the words that Nagi said, but I figured that he was referring to Sakura.

Not to mention, he called Sakura a shrine maiden. I thought she was a samurai.

「…Do you know each other?」

I decided to ask them a simple question to start.

Sakura sighed a bit like she was troubled, and began explaining while choosing her words carefully.

「He’s an acquaintance of mine from my hometown. His name is Kirigakure Nagi. In the eastern regions, we say the family name first, so Kirigakure is his family name. I never imagined he would come to Westland though.」

「That’s my line, Shiranui Sakura. I was wondering where you ran off to with the hihi’irokane. To think you came all the way over here.」

Based on the atmosphere, both of them were likely thinking, 『I ended up running into the one person I didn’t want to see.』

In any case, they didn’t look like they were on the best of terms.

You could probably say that they were hostile against each other.

「To begin with–」

Nagi was going to continue, but Melissa got in between them.

「Wahh! Stop, stop! Come on, we need to work! Please?」

「…Tch, fine.」

Nagi got pushed away by Melissa, and he reluctantly went to restock the spears.

Just when I’d thought the two of them went back to work, Melissa turned around and looked at Sakura, showing obviously on her face that she was wary of her.

Sakura didn’t seem to notice the problem. However, Melissa’s reaction was completely different from the friendly manner she had shown us since early in the morning.

「I see, it’s obviously that.」

Garnet came up beside me and smirked.

「Melissa’s worried that the guy she has a crush on just ran into an old friend who happens to be a woman. She’s being cautious so he doesn’t get snatched away.」

「No matter how I look at it though, Sakura’s and Nagi’s reaction was something along the lines of, 『I ran into my enemy outside of the battleground.』…In any case, that’s surprising.」

「Is it? Just because she acts friendly on the outside doesn’t mean she’s as optimistic on the inside.」

「No, I wasn’t talking about Melissa. I just found it surprising that you could understand the subtleties of love– 」

Behind the counter, nobody noticed that my leg had received a sharp low kick.