Chapter 100

While hunting the goblins and the occasional slimes, I started thinking about lunch.

"Should we have lunch soon?"

If there was prey around, I thought about adding meat, or if not, simple preserved food and a light soup would do. Riz immediately went into hunter mode and started looking for prey.

The rest of us would search for ingredients. I gathered chat and firewood in a slightly open area, started a fire, and checked the fire magic.

"The parameters of fire magic are scale and speed."

Hearing Chat's explanation, I tilted my head in confusion. "Scale?"

"The size of the flames gets bigger."

Hmm, is that it? Does the god side want to imagine large fireballs or slow-moving firewalls?

"What about the syntax?"

"Attribute: Fire. Size and shape of the flames. Location of appearance. Speed."

Let's give it a try. I aimed at a random tree nearby and pointed my right hand at it.

"Attribute: Fire. Shape: 8 cm diameter sphere. Fixed 20 cm above my right hand. Shoot forward, speed: 50 km/h. Execute."

A flame about the size of a baseball flew at a speed faster than a catch, hit the tree, and burst. When I went to check, there was no change on the surface where it hit. Can this be used for attack? The flame was bright red. Hmm, I feel like my imagination is lacking.

This time, I clearly imagined a higher temperature and a white flame. I felt like if I imagined too high a temperature, I might get an overload, so I increased it cautiously.

I aimed at a tree at a similar distance again.

"Attribute: Fire. Shape: 8 cm diameter sphere. Fixed 20 cm above my right hand. Shoot forward, speed: 50 km/h. Execute."

The fireball flew and hit the tree, bursting. When I checked, the color had changed slightly. Hmm, is it a temperature issue? I want to know how others imagine it...

While I was thinking about this leisurely, I suddenly felt the sensation of an overload, and a headache and nausea came on. Feeling sick, I turned pale and tried to hold back the nausea. Did I raise the temperature too much? But if I don't raise it to this level, I can't use it for attack, right? I thought about this while enduring.

"Are you okay? It seems like an overload is coming back."

Chat looked at me worriedly.

"I'm fine. It's my first time trying fire magic. By the way, how do others imagine fire magic?"

"At school, we were taken to a steel mill and shown molten iron, and told to think about it like that."

Ah, I see... Magic is ambiguous and depends on imagination. Indeed, Watis' flames were sticky and clung. That must be based on the image of molten iron. I need to consider the actual temperature, properties, and state separately.

I only imagined a high-temperature flame, which is why I got this result. The spot it hit was briefly scorched by high heat, but there was no significant effect. And this level of heat caused such an overload. I wasted a lot of energy.

Now that I have a rough idea of the basis for the image, I'll proceed with lunch preparations until the overload wears off.

Once I've calmed down, I'll try again. It's dangerous, so I'll start with a small scale. I dug a small hole and piled soil around it. Preparation complete. Now, I'll imagine the ignition point of cooking oil, about 370 degrees, and the shape of molten iron in a blast furnace. I supported my right hand above the hole.

"Attribute: Fire. Shape: 1 cm diameter sphere. Fixed 20 cm below my right hand. Shoot downward, speed: 6 km/h."

I don't want it to be too big. I don't want to get burned by a slow speed, and I don't want it to scatter if it's too fast. So, I'll try this.

"Execute."

The moment I whispered it, a ball of flame fell into the bottom of the hole. Upon contact with the ground, it spread slightly like a viscous liquid. After a while, the sound of the soil's moisture evaporating could be heard. It was dangerous, so I covered it with soil to return it to its original state. The sound continued faintly for a while but soon stopped.

There was no overload, so it was a success in terms of usage, but fire magic is quite risky. Honestly, my knowledge from Japan makes me afraid of creating overly powerful flames. I might end up imagining incendiary bombs or thermite reactions, which I know the temperature of and have seen in real life. The image is easy to form. If I specialize in killing, it's not a problem, but there will be secondary damage. I need to think about it.

While I was doing this, Chat efficiently made the fire larger and prepared to hang the pot.

"Sorry, I feel bad for not helping."

"It's fine. You were trying something out, so I thought I wouldn't get in the way and prepared."

As we were talking, the other three also returned. Thanks to the heightened 'alert,' Riz brought back four birds as trophies. She had already bled them and quickly prepared them.

The offal parts went into the soup, and the meat was skewered and grilled. I quickly seared the surface and then skewered them around the fire, rotating them as I watched.

The wild herbs included cilantro, so the bird offal soup had a slightly ethnic flavor.

When the skewers were done, I started dividing the soup. Chat's cup had a design of a rabbit with ears.

"From now on, we'll move until evening. Let's eat."

I muttered, "Itadakimasu," and started with the soup. Personally, I like cilantro. The first time I went to Thailand, I couldn't accept any of the dishes, but I quickly got used to them because they all had a cilantro aroma. Since then, I've had no problem eating them.

"Ugh, it's delicious, but I don't like this smell."

Fia, who brought back the cilantro, complained unusually. The other three were eating it happily.

"I picked it because my mother said it was edible, but from now on, I'll ignore it!"

Fia shouted something terrible.

Other than that, there were no particular issues, and the skewers were juicy and delicious. We spent the rest of the time chatting around the fire until it burned out.

If bears come, I don't want it to be after evening. I started thinking about the rest of the day.