S*ave Harem in the Labyrinth of the Other World - Volume 6

「Ah, Roxanne, since I am here with you now, you do not have to worry about buying these things from your allowance. This time, I am going to buy all of them and just take the necessary amount of money from our usual expenses.」

「Uhm, While I am glad that master is willing to do so, then I am afraid that then it could no longer be classified as a present from me for Sherry, so….」

「Oh, I see.」

「This is also a gift….. from me to master.」

Roxanne said while handing me the shirt that she chose for me earlier.

I see now. She does not want me to be the one buying the clothes, because even if they were bought for Sherry, al long as I was the one paying for them, it would be considered as my property, and that is not what she is aiming for here.

Roxanne wants to buy the gift for Sherry with her own money and then give it to her herself so that Sherry could become the officially recognized owner of the clothing that she would receive from Roxanne, because the way it would normally go off, it would be something like that:

If I would be the one to buy the thing that Roxanne wants to give to Sherry with my own money, then even if I then gave that thing to Roxanne and she handed it down to Sherry, the game’s system would still recognize me, the master of my two slaves, as the official owner of these clothes, because the slave system it programmed in such a way that no matter what I might be buying for my slaves or if it was done with the intention of giving it to them, as long as I am the one doing the buying, the game is going to have me designated as the owner of the thing that was bought.

That is because in this world, just like in my old one, slaves are technically not allowed to have their own material possessions, so even the weapons that they’re using I the Labyrinths or the clothes they’re wearing on their backs are not considered to be their own things, but rather the ones that I am graciously lending to them out of the goodness of my heart.

But if Roxanne were to buy that gift with her own money, that would make her the owner of the gift instead of me, so once she gives the gift to Sherry, the right of ownership of said gift should be transferred from Roxanne to Sherry without any issues, thus accomplishing Roxanne’s aim of buying Sherry a present that she could truly call her own.

Now that I think about it, the same rules that I have listed above apply to this shirt that I have just received from Roxanne. This is not something that she bought with my own money, but her gift to me that she paid for with her own allowance.

「Thank you for always being so kind and thoughtful towards us, Roxanne. It might not be much in the way of saying thank you for all that you’ve done for us, but allow me to buy you some clothes today as well.」

「Thank you master, but are you sure that it is really going to be all right? After all, it was not my intention to get anything back for giving you this gift.」

「Don’t worry about it. You may choose whatever you like.」

「Thank you, master. I am going to do exactly as you say.」

Because Roxanne is my slave, all her belongings are considered my possessions until the moment of my death, and that is why I have decided to alter Sherry’s will so that it wouldn’t have to be like that with her as well.

After Roxanne finally chooses the clothes that she wanted to buy, which took her a good chunk of time again, we walked to the counter with three articles of clothing in total, and because my thirty percent discount worked due to us buying more than one thing, when everything was said and done Roxanne still had a bit of her allowance available to her.

When we went out of the clothing store, I tried holding Roxanne’s hand.

「Shall we go to the next shop over there?」

「…Y-Yes, with pleasure, master.」

Holding a girl’s hands outdoors in broad daylight somehow seems embarrassing, even though we weren’t doing anything scandalous.

Is this how people on dates feel like all the time?

Both Roxanne and I were carrying swords so there seems to be a sense of incompatibility somehow. Nevertheless, I still grasped Roxanne’s hands to feel their softness. Hers are smooth hands of the highest value.

Roxanne also grabs my hand back as I invite her inside a nearby general store. Turns out it was a Woodworks Shop that deals primarily with wood products, many of which were placed on display.

We looked around the shop while holding hands.

「What is that?」

「It’s probably a Wooden Basket.」

I stop in front of a certain product. Just like Roxanne said, it was a basket, but its bottom was ridden with holes like in a grid so that water would come out when poured into it, and its sides were firmly enclosed with boards.

「So they even have something like this here, huh?」

「I’ve never seen it before in Quratar, but it’s probably something unnecessary to us.」

It’s an instrument for draining water, so I guess it really isn’t necessary for us? Is it more like a luxury item only used by rich people?

A drainer made from wood, huh?Appearance wise, it is looking something like a basket made out of bamboo. If you were to slap a dragon brand onto it, then I wouldn’t be surprised at all if this would be something that you could see in one of the many Chinese restaurants that were present all around in my old world.

If it’s made reliably enough, then I am pretty sure that it could be used as a steaming device with just a little bit of proper preparation. All that you’d have to do in order to pull it off would be to join the two lids together, put a piece of cloth in between them and then cover the lid properly so that none of the water or steam would be escaping outside, preventing the food from being properly cooked. After that, all that you’d have to do is to boil the water in the bottom lid and voila, you’d have yourself a perfectly functional steamer!

「This is  going to be a good purchase, I can already feel it. All right, it’s decided! We’ll buy it and then its back to the home with us!」

Since I never expected to find something like this world’s equivalent of a bamboo steamer in such a shop in Imperial City, I was feeling very excited about this stroke of luck that has found its way to me by sheer coincidence. Even though this thing seems to be intended as just a colander and not a steamer, then I am sure that with just a little bit of creativity and ingenuity I should be able to make it work as a steaming device as well.

「Ah, yes, of course!」

「Now that we have our hands on it, let’s make some dessert with it today.」

「Desserts? What kind of dessert are you going to make, master?」

「I would like it to remain a secret for the time being, but trust me when I say this: you can definitely look forward to it trying it.」

When it comes to desserts or other kinds of sweet, sugar-based treats, this world really doesn’t seem to have all that much going for it in that department. The best things that I can think of off the top of my head are most probably dried fruits at worst and hard biscuits at best, so as you can see, that’s not what I would call an awful lot of variety, right?

Though people like the Duke & Cassia, that is to say nobles, royalty and the members of this world’s ruling class are probably going to have access to something unique to just them, us commoners are probably going to have no choice but to suck it up and make do with what we have available to us.

Roxanne really enjoyed that caramel candy that I bought for her when we were in the Imperial City sometime earlier, and she also did not seem to have anything against the makeshift honeycomb toffee that I prepared back home, even though it was my first time making something like that without the tools and cooking appliances offered by the technology of the modern times.

That is why I would like to allow her to try and experience even more things when it comes to sweets.