Suppressing my urge, I got up and went to the "messy room" (again) where we keep practically anything (yes, that's where I got most of the iron things), searched a bit until I found a small children's sand bucket with handles still attached.
Went back, opened my inventory and took out all the magic stones I had stored.
With that, I relieved almost 500 grams of weight just in small and medium magic stones, and gave them to the chickens.
"Ah, if you had so many, you shouldn't have gotten so ang-"
My look at her was quite obvious and direct, "not another peep".
In a rare moment of mutual understanding, she did.
A few deep breaths later.
"Okay, and now what are we going to do?"
"The same thing we planned before, go after Mom and Dad."
As expected, but we have some problems now.
"Okay, but we have a little problem now. I've practically run out of arrows, and the best bow we had is gone too. My daggers that I got from the goblins are also gone, and I have less than half of my sai left."
In other words, now I only have my hands (and claws), my spells, and stealth.
Is that little? No.
Is it sufficient? Also no.
An important reminder: even now, Mom and Dad are surrounded by an army of monsters that, as far as we know, has occupied an entire city block around the outpost where they are.
It must have decreased from yesterday to today, possibly. But monsters are generally very stubborn and angry creatures, at least that's how they were in the stories I've seen. Both in classic mythological stories and in web novels.
So going to them without any weapons is not an option.
Mari leaned back and thought for a moment. Lumi, who was also eating, stopped and paid attention (or as close to it as possible) to the conversation. Impeto also stopped pecking at the corn can. Beth and Bel (the turtle from my sister's room, who honestly I don't know when she appeared) continued eating some cabbage leaves that were starting to rot, paying no attention to what we were discussing.
"As for the bow, you can use the second one you like best, and regarding the arrows, I think Pomo and I can figure something out. But as for the fighting weapons themselves, I don't know how we're going to manage."
I don't really like the idea of using the second bow, not because of any aversion to second place or anything like that.
In fact, this second option would be even better than the bow I used before, since it would have a steel frame with a polished mahogany body. But my father made it for himself, so it was a left-handed bow.
I don't even need to explain how irritating it is for a right-handed person to try to use something for a left-handed person (or a left-handed person trying to use something for a right-handed person). With my new body and the strength it has now, I think this shouldn't be a big obstacle, but the psychological aversion remains.
Aaaaahhhhhh, and that's not the only problem.
Strictly speaking, in hand-to-hand combat I can hold my own, especially now after allocating the points after leveling up, but I still prefer to use weapons for safety reasons.
Just because someone has [poison resistance] doesn't mean he has to go to fight a snake hand-to-hand.
"If you really need a weapon, wouldn't it be better to just tie a knife to the end of a broom handle and make an improvised spear?"
"Of course, but are there any knives left over to use as a spearhead here at home, or in practically any other house around here?. Did you, Mom, and Dad find any when you went looking for the dogs?"
"We weren't looking for knives, and it's not like we went into every house and shop on the way to the park. You didn't do that either, did you?"
Fair enough.
Well, in my case, I was a little more worried about getting the large magic stone with as little fighting as possible, but if I said that, she would definitely start complaining something like: "Are you saying my babies aren't as important as some object?" etc.
Even if the object in this case was important to save our parents, but... Well, again, better not to comment on that.
"And you're going to say that after all that fighting against the kobolds, none of them dropped anything like the goblins' stone daggers?"
Well, no, I'm sure I remember seeing some knives and daggers made of fangs or claws scattered here and there during the fight against Drake, but obviously I didn't have time to see much, much less pick them up. But yes, I did get some.
'Hmmmm, let me see here. Ah, I found it.'
[Item Box: 45.3/30 (-10% Agility)
...
3 Shadow Wolf Fang Daggers (230 grams each)
...]
'Hmm, fang daggers, huh? I wonder if they'd be better than stone daggers? And when did I ever get 3??'
Never mind, the spearhead is tarianawui, now the handle.... Wait, are there still brooms here at home?
I don't remember seeing any downstairs, or in the junk room.
"Mari, are there still brooms here at home?"
"Hmmmm, there must be some in the junk room."
"I just left it, and I went there yesterday, and I didn't see any brooms."
"Okay, but wasn't that just because you weren't looking for brooms?"
I crossed my arms and stared at her.
It was possible, yes. And that was probably it, but there was still a primal principle preventing me from recognizing it: the simple fact that I'd been in that damn room more times than I'd like while she just stayed on the couch doing, or playing with, Lumi!!!
Come on, woman, you're going to kill yourself, get up and help look for at least that little thing!!!!
She stared at me for a moment and gave a tired sigh before getting up and coming with me to find a broom or mop.
(10 minutes later)
There was nothing.
Not a broom, not a mop, not a rake, but I had a pickaxe that I picked up (for those who don't know, a pickaxe is the name of a construction tool, it's kind of a mix between a hoe or shovel, if you prefer, and a pickaxe... who am I explaining this to?).
Better than nothing, but I would still prefer something that could reach a little further. The pickaxe had a rather short handle, about 90 centimeters, and I wasn't even used to using it as a tool, and I'm already wanting to use it as a weapon, things wouldn't work that way.
So I still needed something to keep me at a distance, and the best thing, of course, would still be a spear.
"WWWWAAAHHHH!!! When you want something, it simply disappears, where could those old, somewhat precarious brooms have gone, they certainly didn't grow legs!!!!"
Pufff, I couldn't help but think that: considering magic now exists in the world and the tree in our garden gained consciousness, the chances of the brooms also having gained consciousness and walking away, like in that classic Disney musical with Mickey the sorcerer, wouldn't be absolutely zero. Infinitesimally improbable, but not completely impossible.
Once again, reading my mind, Mari gave me a look as angry as I had been. She always did that when she was proven wrong, but I'm not going to boast about it... at least not outwardly.
"Calm down, I'll think of something."
"Ggggrrrr, then think fast, figure it out and get out of here. We're getting Mom and Dad out of that post today, and that's final!!!"
Yeah, she got pretty annoyed.
She practically threw herself onto the sofa and continued muttering under her breath about the impossibility of the brooms walking away, even the possibility of some "fairy" having done something (even though she herself is one now, so...)
She gave me another dirty look, and I promptly started looking around the miniature jungle to see if there was anything that could be used as a spear handle or some other kind of weapon.
'With each passing moment, I become a little more concerned about the privacy of my thoughts.'
Looking around, all I could see was the green of the leaves, the occasional brown of the stems, plus one or two flowers, but nothing that could be used as a handle or some other kind of weapon.
'Hmmmm, what else could you make besides a spear with a knife as a handle?'
Of course, that wasn't all I had available, but my head was fixated on the idea, and when that happens, I have to at least try to make it happen.
'But this doesn't help find a solution, this is very frustrating...'
*Clack, clack.*
'!!!!'
Looking down, I saw that my hand had hit one of the nets of the billiard table pockets.
'Oh yeah, I'd even forgotten there was a billiard table up here. It's been years since we last used it, most of the time it's just for—Wait!!!, The billiard table!!!, so we must still have it..... Ahh ha!'
Leaning against the wall and covered by several vines was the billiard table cue rack with 6 cues of different sizes still intact inside. Cues made of solid wood and slightly heavy.
'Perfect.'