Oden.

It is a dish where you’ll simmer various ingredients together with dashi in a large pot.

Yes, only simmer and the taste changes depending on the dashi and ingredients you simmer together.

It is a profound type of food.

Details aside, oden is a good food to eat during winter.

The ingredients prepared were radish, potato, boiled egg, tsukune but minced fish instead of chicken, suji niku modoki because it only looks similar to regular meat skewer, I also tried to reproduce chikuwa but I can’t make one with hole in the middle and became flat so let’s call it chikuwa modoki…..no, this is obviously a kamaboko.

That’s about it but the oni maids tried to add various ingredients.

Carrot, tomato, shiitake, cabbage, chicken, squid, octopus.

All of them are delicious but some people don’t eat octopus….areh?

Why is there no octopus in the pot?

「Village chief, what are you talking about? If you’re a resident of the village, it should be normal for you to eat octopus.」

After saying that, the oni maid added octopus on the pot before me.

Thanks.

And Tier, who already ate a large amount of octopus, is already eyeing it.

It’s pointless to deny it.

There is an informer.

Reginleif, who’s sitting next to Tier, sticks out seven fingers saying Tier has eaten seven already.

Ah, Youko.

The chicken is still raw.

Loo, can you make it hotter?

It was a lively dinner.

-0-

When I was drinking tea after eating, a depressed demon king arrived.

It seems like the plan to connect the royal capital to Shashaato City using the short-range teleportation gate is in danger of being scrapped.

So far, the demon king has laid the groundwork with his power.

Beezel and Glatts of the four heavenly kings are actively supporting him too.

Though Randan and Hou are reluctant, they passively agreed too.

The places where the gates will be installed in villages and cities were steadily being secured too.

However, the civil servants of the royal capital stopped everything.

Of course, the demon king won’t allow that to happen.

However, when the demon king talked to the civil servants of the royal capital, he found out their reason.

It looks like there was a problem in the fundamental part of the plan itself.

-0-

You can move in both directions using the teleportation gate.

The same is true in Loo’s short-range teleportation gate.

Traffic can move in both directions and the size is also similar, which is 3 meters wide.

Whether they use right-hand or left-hand traffic rules, it is possible for people to go in both directions without any problem.

Certainly, given how wide it is, there shouldn’t be a problem even if the people entering and leaving are big.

However, the gates won’t be exclusively used by people.

Carriages and wagons will use it too.

No, it can be said that it is the plan’s main purpose.

It is impossible for carriages and wagons to use the gates in both directions at the same time.

The civil servants asked the military to cooperate and made a fake teleportation gate using frames and curtains and experimented with the flow of horse-drawn carriages and wagons.

The teleportation gate connecting Big Tree Village and Village Five can be used by wagons too but it is impossible for both directions at the same time.

When used by a wagon, people on both sides would go check it first for safety purposes.

The civil servants claim that if they do this every time a carriage or wagon comes, traffic jams will occur.

The demon king said that this will still be more convenient so a little traffic won’t matter. However, the civil servants pointed out that if the gates can’t be used smoothly, there’s not much point in installing them in the first place.

After that, the civil servants started preparing not only useless proposals but also solutions.

They suggested limiting the direction in which the gates can be used with respect to time.

To put it simply, from morning to noon, the gates can only be used in the direction from the royal capital to Shashaato City.

From noon to night, only those who’ll travel from Shashaato City to the royal capital will be allowed to use the gates.

I think it’s not a bad solution but an opposing force appeared.

The merchants.

To be precise, the Dalfon Company.

So far, they have only informed the Dalfon Company about the plan.

The Dalfon Company is in full support in regards to the plan of installing short-range teleportation gates.

However, they strongly oppose the limitation of travel.

They want to be able to freely use the gate regardless of time if possible.

By the way, why is Tiselle’s signature on that document?

Even before the demon king came here, I know that he’s consulting about something to Tiselle but….

By the way, can’t you just change the direction of traffic every hour?

They can’t since clocks are kind of rare.

In addition, there are accuracy problems with the few existing clocks. For that reason, the standard time in this world is set according to sunrise each day.

There will be severe trouble on both sides of the teleportation gate if the clocks prepared don’t tick at the same time.

-0-

Thus, the demon king thought of a simple solution.

In order to make both directions of traffic flow anytime, there should be two sets of teleportation gates in the chosen places.

That will fix the problem of traffic jams due to carriages and wagons.

However, the problem is that the number of short-range teleportation gates required for the plan will be doubled.

The demon king is here to ask Loo if she can prepare more short-range teleportation gates.

「I can as long as I have materials.」

That is Loo’s reply.

They seem to be fairly valuable materials but the demon king said that he will use every power of the kingdom to collect them so the trouble of increasing the number of short-range teleportation gates was solved.

In addition to the manufacturing cost of the short-range teleportation gates, they’ll also pay Loo a considerable amount.

The problem is solved so why….

Why is the demon king still standing in front of me?

Since the short-range teleportation gates to be installed increased, it seems like the necessary budget for the project has increased too.

So, you want me to inject more capital, right?

I don’t mind but….

Youko, who’s behind me, is smiling.

「I want to build new inns and restaurants in the villages and cities with teleportation gates.」

Thus, my talk with the demon king ended and the talk of Youko and the demon king began.

Youko, don’t overdo things. Take a rest.

It is not necessary to control those villages and cities.

You want those villages and cities to produce paper?

I don’t really mind but is there a problem with the existing papermakers?

Only Village Five are making papers from trees?

The rest are only producing parchment?

Depending on how much paper from trees is produced, you want to end the history of using parchment?

But, can we achieve that without mechanizing paper making?