Chapter 30
The next day, Monday, which is viewed as a weekday for most of the world.
As usual, I didn’t expect there to be a lot of people gathered early on a Monday morning, so I logged into WLO but didn’t stream.
Touka-chan also went to school this morning.
In the early morning, together with the lady bodyguard that came to get her, she left bearing a refreshing smile.
I didn’t really remember them but it seems that they remembered me. I was told, 「So you really were still alive」
Could it have been better if Rin-chan had denied my disappearance rumors?
When I said that, she replied while sighing, 「It was necessary, you know」.
Well, in this era where everyone has a phone on them, I suppose I’m at fault too for leaving without telling anybody, so I can’t really blame Rin-chan though.
From now on, whenever I meet acquaintances from the middle school days, will they keep saying, 「you were still alive?」?
I don’t know about anyone except Rin-chan and Touka-chan’s acquaintances, but on rare occasions I sometimes meet with Rin-chan’s parents.
Returning to the topic.
The reason that I once again returned to Dualis was the little girl from 《Street Stall Avenue》,Haruru, whom I had totally forgotten about.
Of course, there was a possibility that she wasn’t there, but this was a matter I wanted to check out whenever I had time. Moreover, I wanted to look around the street stalls again.
I took my time walking towards the street stall avenue, which was crowded. Perhaps because of the influx of new people, there were still quite a lot of players despite it being a weekday.
One of the shops that caught my eye was a stall selling items called potion juice.
Originally, a potion has a taste you can normally drink–supposedly, though I actually haven’t drunk one yet–but the juice-style potion made by the owner of the stall…had written it in such a way.
「Young lady, what unusual equipment you have there.」
Strawberry, melon, blue hawaii-…..while I was reading through the names that you would typically see in festivals, I was called out to by the owner of the stall.
The appearance was that of The appearance was that of a handsome man with red hair that had a mesh of silver.However, hearing their voice, it was certainly that of a woman.
「There still shouldn’t be that many players who can make Eastern clothing…..If it’s alright, may I ask for the name」
「It’s Sukuna. The one who made this equipment is Konekomaru-san」
As I am a streamer, and Konekomaru-san appeared in my stream, if you were to investigate our names, you could easily find them out, so I said them since there was no meaning in hiding them.
And then he(?) nodded, convinced.
「Ah, so it was Neko-san who made it….Oh, I should have introduced myself before I asked your name. My name is Dion. As you have heard, I am a woman inside.」
Based on his reaction, it seems that he is also an acquaintance of Konekomaru-san. That person sure has a lot of connections. (9: I’m going with “him,he his etc” out of respect of her nekama play)
And this person is what you would call a Nekama or a Nenabe Not limited to VR, these players also appear in online games to lie about their gender…although saying like that would be rude.
Essentially, they are people with a play style of, “since it’s a game, let’s use an avatar with the opposite gender.
Although, in VR, that kind of avatar is pretty much hard to move around with, but….once you get used to it, it will be nothing.
The problem is,「You can’t change your voice—」this is what I believe.If you can’t act out at least the voice and the movements, you can’t lie about your gender.
Though due to the dawn of VR, the problem had become one of individuality, and it seems that there were people who did something like playing as an idol.
Like that guy who is the tough life in the world type fox eared loli.
Well, Nekama/nenabe culture is something natural that had been happening way before VR, it’s nothing special nowaday.
「So, which will you buy? Honestly, don’t expect anything from its effects. This is the side product made from an experiment on how I could make something exactly like a drink out of this. Though, I only have the 《Street Stall Shaved Ice series》today…」
「If you made it with ice, wouldn’t you profit more?」
「No, it didn’t work when it was spread thinly on ice. And it also doesn’t get a stronger flavor when you concentrate it.」
「So you tried it out.」
After worrying which to choose, I chose to buy two blue Hawaii-flavored potions. The price was 2000 iris. This is quite expensive, you know.
The taste was…..a little bit of diluted blue Hawaii mixed with mint flavor.
While I was drinking it bit by bit and talking, suddenly, to try accomplishing what I had set out to do, I asked Dion-san.
「Now that I think about it, Dion-san, have you seen any little girls around here? The player named Haruru, it seems that she is always around here」
「Ah, of course, it’s the one right behind you」
Following the finger that Dion-san pointed behind me, there was a little girl right behind me before I knew it.
「hiee」
「Ufufu, it’s been since yesterday…Sukuna-san.」
「Yo, Haruru, how has it been?」
「As of right now, it’s the greatest….since the person I am waiting for is here….」
「That mutual love is envious. Grab the opportunity and buy one.」
「One shaved ice with honey, please…」
「Thanks for buying.」
It seemed the two of them knew each other since I could hear a relaxed conversation from them.
It was the little girl from yesterday that appeared out of nowhere, it felt like a ninja with no presence. Or maybe she was some kind of zashikiwarashi? (9: zashikiwarashi is youkai that gives good luck to the person that lives in the house they live in or something, usually depicted as loli in manga, anime and stuff)
「Now then….Did you have business with me?」
「Ah, yeah. That’s right.」
「That’s fortunate……if that’s so, then I shall lead you to the workshop…..」
Haruru, who smiled happily, swayed her body, turned around, and started walking toward the direction of the alley.
Lightly nodding to Dion-san who was already dealing with other customers, I followed right after her.
So it unexpectedly does sell, that potion juice.
☆
After a few minutes of going through the alley from the north of Dualis.
What I was led to was the residence area after passing through the alleys, then among those houses I was led to the back of a yellow house, and finally I was invited through its back door to her workshop.
When I entered,a space larger than I had imagined spread out.
It looked like it was two storeys, and looking at it, the first floor seemed to have been made solely for the sake of smithing.
Taking a glance at the front door, while it had the form of a door, there is not a single handle.
So basically, it meant something like you could only enter this house though a door that looked like a back door in the alleys.
「Reintroducing myself, I am Haruru……..Yesterday, I am sorry for using such a method…..」
「It’s alright, the weights that I received were quite useful after all.」
「I have seen the stream…..skillfully handling them like that…..I am overjoyed…」
Chuckling as she smiled, Haruru guided me to the 2nd floor.
「Those weights were something less good than the other things I have created…..though Sukuna-san was able to handle it…..as a throwing item, the weight itself was too irregular」
「Well, yeah.」
「Throwing knives, shuriken, kunai, iron balls, stones etc,. etc……There are other good throwing weapons…However, weights have one thing better than other throwing weapons…And that is their weight……」
While listening to Haruru as we went to the 2nd floor, I was overwhelmed by the group of weapons lined up.
Although it would be hard to say that they were lined up orderly. Just how many things did she make, like the swords thrown carelessly in a barrel, or the throwing weapons put on a box, or the great swords and staves hanging on the walls.
Anyhow, it just gave off an impression of being inconsistent.
「From how I see it….I believe that Sukuna-san can handle any kind of weapon…..But this game has the feature where you can’t have that many skills, which is also one of its good points, so…..I shall narrow what I show you down to blunt weapons and throwing weapons.….」
You could say that it was due to the fact that this was a game that Haruru seemed to have superhuman strength despite her looks–she carried a barrel with lots of weapons right in front of me.
「Next, that is, Sukuna-san has the 《one hand mace》skill, right…..?」
「Eh, yeah. Though I don’t use it that much.」
「I see….Ah, this one is a bit interesting, you know….」
Saying that, the one she took out was a pole of around 150 cm. it was what you would call a two handed club weapon.
However, it felt a bit short for that. If there ere 30 cm. more it would be just the right length.
The wick on both ends were a bit round. It looked like the extending rod from some manga, the design was like that.
「This is a compound weapon that I developed, 《Breaking Extending Rod》…..Please try twisting it in the middle…..」
「Like this?」
Twisting the pseudo-extending rod that was passed to me, there was a clicking sound as it separated at the center.
The two-handed pole quickly became two one-handed maces.
「I thought I made something good, but unfortunately…..If you hold two blunt weapon in two hands, one in each hand, you won’t be able to activate your skills….」
「Yeah….」
「Ufufu, looks like weapon development can’t just be done in a day…. 」
Haruru shrugged her shoulders as if it can’t be helped, but her expression said that this was something fun for her.
Trial and error itself was fun too. I’m sure that she was that type of person.
「Returning to the topic…As of right now, Sukuna-san is not using your one-handed mace skills….If so, then how about this….?」
As she said that, she passed me a heavy, black, two-handed club.
The previous one had the weight of wood,, so this one was probably made out of metal.
The length was the same as earlier, being around 150 cm.
Both of the ends were considerably different from the previous one, the other side had ornaments to increase the blunt power and the other is opposite which is cut down to be totally flat.
「Please try twisting it like the one from earlier….」
「hmmm…..waa」
When I twisted the handle, a metallic sound resounded as a blade emerged from the flat part.
The club itself was thin so the blade itself was thin too. it looked like you could thrust and do simple slashes with it.
「Newly developed Cut-Strike-United Hidden Weapon《Kugelschreiber》….」
「Ku-….what?」
「Kugelschreiber it means ball pen in German…..don’t you think it’s like that when you twist the end and a blade comes out….?」
「I get it, but the name just sounds so pointlessly cool…..」
I’m not sure if she had a good naming sense or not. However, this might be quite useful.
When I made a bit of distance and lightly swung it, with its 150 cm. length which was around the same as my height, it was easier to rotate in my arms than I had imagined.
「Just like the Lawres wetlands, the fields like that full of monsters with strong blunt resistance are not few…..its strong point is that you have a blunt weapon that is also capable of thrusting and slashing….The problem is….The durability of the bladed part….No matter what I do, it’s brittle.….」
Was she seriously worrying about it? Haruru had a grimacing face as she said it.
But, this two-handed club, no matter how you try to measure it, its thickness only holds up to 4 cm.
I think it can’t be helped that it would be easy to break.
「You can’t help it because of how thin this is right?」
「It really is, but…..it is my job to do something about that…..for now, I’ll just give this to you cheaply…Is it fine if I have you try it out…?」
It was not a bad proposal to me, but, I’m really curious about the part where she said that she would give it to me cheaply.
「By the way, how much?」
「Right now, including throwing weapons, 10000 iris is fine….」
「That just nearly crossed the line of being cheap, you know!!」
With the results of my bargaining, under the condition that she wouldn’t take a cost for repairing, I bought a Cut-Strike-United-Model Hidden Weapon《Kugelschreiber》for 9900 iris.
Since she had this much good looking workshop, she shouldn’t be having any trouble with money.
Thinking that I might have trouble regarding financial transactions or something in the future, I left for the alley while being sent off by Haruru.