Tensei Reijou wa Shomin no Aji ni Uete Iru

No cheating, ever.
After the tasting, we each ate our lunch and resumed collecting.

“Oh, this is it!”
“That is correct, Adry-sama.”

I nodded my head in confirmation as Adry-sama showed me the herbs he had picked, and then raised his hands up.

“I did it! I can finally tell them apart!”
“Keep up the good work.”

I determined that it was time for Adry-sama to be on his own, so I looked around to collect some additional herbs as well.
As Ruby said, there seemed to be a lot of herbs growing around here, so I gathered enough not to disturb everyone.
Oh, I found lemongrass. This is also a considered a medicinal plant, isn’t it?
Was it used as a stomach remedy or fever reducer?
I wish I had learned more about herbs in my previous life.
I only have knowledge of the basic ones used for cooking.
Well, just knowing about them is a lifesaver…

“Oh my, I found something good♪”

Ruby bounced excitedly to the base of a nearby tree, where he found a familiar mushroom.

“Ruby… what are these mushrooms? The color is… quite poisonous-looking, no?”

Mariel-chan, who was staring at Ruby with a suspicious look, was beckoned over a little bit, and when Ruby whispered something into her ear, Mariel-chan’s face turned bright red.
Ah… I guess he told her that it’s an aphrodisiac mushroom.
Ruby and Mariel-chan nodded at each other and started picking the mushrooms.

“Mariel-san, Ruby. Those are not what we came here to look for.”

Mariel-chan got startled when I called out to them, but Ruby continued on with his mushroom gathering.

“Uuuuummmm, this mushroom can be used in various ways…”

Mariel-chan, who was making up excuses as she went along, was quite suspicious.

“You don’t need this, do you, Mariel-san?”
“… Yes.”

It’s just to advance your wild delusions, right? You don’t have a use for this, right?

“Oh, geez~ don’t be so stiff, alright? You know what this is, don’t you?”
“Ugh.”
“As you know, you can also make a use of this when in a pinch. Having a little bit is fine. Well, Mariel will be fine with this much. I’ll take some more for myself.”

Ruby, who was going at his own pace, told us to go back to gathering medicinal herbs, as he continued picking the mushrooms.
I urged Mariel-chan, who seemed to be still unsatisfied, to resume herb gathering.

“Sheesh that Ruby, what does he plan on using it for?”

I can’t think of any good situation where Ruby would use aphrodisiac mushrooms.

“W, who knows…? Rather than that, Cristea-san, what did he mean by u, u, using… err, using that mushroom in a tight spot?”
“Ahh, that’s…”

After casting a soundproofing spell around us so that the others couldn’t hear us, I recounted in a few words what had happened when I had caught Kaguya.

“Eh…? T, then, when you met the black cat Kaguya for the first time, she was aiming to eat you?”
“Yes, well… I was just in the middle of harvesting, so I fed her that mushroom, you see…”
“Cristea-san… have you ever been told that you are too reckless?”

How rude. Don’t call me reckless.
… Although I won’t deny it, since I got reprimanded by Otousama and Oniisama.

“W, well, isn’t it fine? Kaguya is currently living with our family peacefully as a cat. So everything turned out all right.”
“This mushroom… I thought selling this mushroom to my Father for a high price, but… Cristea-san, shall I give it to you for self-defense?”
“No, thanks.”

There are no young noble ladies carrying around aphrodisiac mushrooms for protection, okay!?
I politely declined and advised Mariel-chan to get rid of it or turn it in to her Company as soon as possible.