'Marilyn, lobsters are good shrimp.

'Yes. The food Taro buys for me is good.

''Uh ... is it okay for a sea spirit to eat seafood?''



　Marilyn and Urilyn have gotten used to living in the castle, and today they were enjoying a seafood set that I had purchased from 'online shopping'.
　It was a high quality seafood sashimi set and they were eating it without any regard for it, which I couldn't help but ask them what they thought of it as the spirit of the sea.

'It's not a problem,'

'Every living thing feeds on other living things and circulates the world. There is no such thing as not eating them.

But you two are spirits, right?

　We have to eat other creatures to survive, but you two are spirits.
　We don't need to eat or drink to survive, and I'm sure we haven't eaten anything before.

'We live in eternity, so we'd be bored if we didn't do this.

'Besides, we don't eat the sea creatures of this world either. To be frank, the items you purchased, Taro-san, are creatures from another world, and they're not under our jurisdiction.

Taro, I don't care about the details.

　It's not our own jurisdiction, so it's none of our business.
　I felt a certain sense of refreshment as I watched the two spirits say this.



''Great Chief Katoo, new tribes are gathering one by one, and the Confederation of the Southwest Tribes is gaining more and more momentum,''

"Grand Chief Katoo, this is a greeting for you.

"I hear the development around the World Tree is going well, and we will be sending out our own settlers. Here's a little something to say goodbye to you.



　I am the head of the country's leader, the Union of Southwest Tribes.
　Although it's a complete decoration, recently the information that the Polar South Sea and its surrounding area are the safe haven for desert elves has been flying around among them, and the tribes that have been wandering around the world's deserts in mobile cities have been gathering one after another.
　They set up mobile cities in the coastal areas and send their surplus people to the settlements around the World Tree.
　So they would often come to greet me, and dealing with them was one of my few jobs.

'Speaking of which, how many tribes of desert elves are there?'

''Well it's hard to keep track of the mobile cities in other countries, so it's probably about five hundred. As of now, eighty-seven tribes have gathered.

　Mr. Bijur, who had led the people who had come to greet me, answered my question.
　The first one was forty-eight tribes, so that's a quick increase in a short period of time.
　And they still seem to be coming together.

''I don't think all of them will gather. Some of the tribes remain isolated.''

　In other cases, they have a good relationship with the human oasis and don't see the benefit of moving the mobile city so far.

''Anyway, even so, our desert elves were able to get a home called the 'Union of Southwest Tribes'. If there are any troubled compatriots, we can accept them, so there won't be any problems.''

　Rather, with the size of the current territory, the entire five hundred tribes might not be acceptable.
　Do we need to expand our survival area?

In fact, there is another tribe that preserves the seedlings of the World Tree, and we are now selecting a place to plant them. When we plant the World Tree, the land around it becomes richer and collects groundwater, making it easier to dig wells.

''Even a world tree that powerful died when the ancient civilization collapsed?

It's a big proof of how much water people used back then. It's taken over eight thousand years for them to finally recover to this point.

'Did you recover from this desert-only condition...?

　So it used to be even worse than it is now.

'Full room temperature fusion, which powers mobile cities, would have converted water into other matter. It is presumed that ancient civilizations took too much water due to early inefficient room temperature fusion, and they perished by turning the world into a desert. It's strange that water, which should have disappeared, is being resurrected via groundwater.

'We're told that the genie is gradually reviving the water,'

Yeah.

'Mr. Tullow, you're well versed in the phenomenon that was the flower of ancient civilization and the cause of its collapse.

'Oh!　Isn't it the Spirit!

''Grand Chief Katoo, can you really communicate with the Spirit Master?!

The High Elves are back!

　This is where Marilyn and Urilyn show up, a kind of ritual that is always performed when a newcomer comes to greet them.
　The desert elves are just like humans.
　Some of the tribes are planning to take effective control of the Union of Southwest Tribes.
　It would be troublesome if it were to turn into a civil war, so this is a ceremony to show off my power as a great tribal chief in the first place.
　Even if they call it my power, I don't really feel it, since I can just calmly call out to them.

''It takes a long time to recover the water that the ancient humans have turned off.

It's not going to take more than 10,000 years to get there.

　In ancient civilizations, full room temperature fusion was used as an energy source for only about two hundred years.
　It took roughly a hundred times longer to restore the water that had disappeared in two hundred years, and that was the moment when he realized how hard it would be to restore the environment to its former state.

''The High Elves were far more powerful than our Desert Elves. However, they were few in number, and although they were long-lived, their fertility was low, and they are believed to have perished with the collapse of ancient civilization. Our desert elves are a species that responded to the Great Desert after the collapse of the ancient civilization. You could say that we evolved from the High Elves, but it's also true that it doesn't seem very likely.

　The high elves are high-specification and long-lived, but have a hard time producing children.
　The desert elves are superior to humans in magic and technology and have the same fertility as humans, but are slender and inferior to humans in physical robustness.
　It was difficult to determine who was better.

''We are in the process of selecting a place to plant the World Tree, and we would appreciate your help in that case.

I understand.

　As it is, the world tree takes an enormous amount of time to grow.
　But it will grow faster if you give it vast amounts of fertilizer and water, so it needs fertilizer purchased from my 'online shopping'.

'Well then, if you'll excuse me,'

　When I finish my audience, my work as the Grand Chief for today is over.
　But I also have a face as a merchant.
　This time, Lalabelle and the others were flying to Shipland for the 'base transfer'.