by Aneko Yusagi
Give me a break! It was right there in my menu. I’d been able to read about it from the moment the Shield of Rage was unlocked.
“It might not show up until you unlock the weapon.”
“Do internet games tend to have lots of really powerful cursed weapons available?”
“Of course not. That growth adjusting shield seems pretty suspect too.”
“If you’re going to lie to us, you should think of better lies—just like Ren and Motoyasu here.”
Ren completely lost his cool when he heard what Itsuki said. He leapt to his feet and jabbed his finger at Itsuki.
“Who the hell are you to talk?! You’re the worst lying hypocrite here!”
“Is that so? What about you, always pretending to be so cool! You don’t look so cool now, do you?!”
“Yeah, exactly.”
Ren and Itsuki both turned and shouted together. “You’re just a womanizing fool! Looking for another hussy yet?!”
“What was that?!”
“All of you! How long are you going to run around pretending this is a game? You need to act like actual heroes or we are all going to die!”
Honestly, I don’t even want to remember what happened next. The room collapsed into vulgar name-calling.
The queen shouted in protest, saying whatever she could to try and get the room under control, but it was already too late. There was no stopping it.
The shouting and fighting continued until the door flew open, rattling on its hinges as a crowd of soldiers filed in.
“What happened?”
The sudden appearance of the soldiers somehow brought me back to reality, and my head cleared for a second.
“The heroes’ party members have started to argue downstairs!”
“What?!”
Those idiots . . . what had they gotten themselves into now?
We all hurried out of the room and down the stairs.
“You better take that back!”
“I don’t think so. That ugly thing—he’s a scar on the world! My eyes don’t lie.”
“Are you sure you aren’t talking about yourself?!”
“Ha! Like the servant of an arrogant fool like him would have any idea!”
By the time we arrived in the hall, Raphtalia was in a shouting match with Bitch and Armor, the flashy armor guy.
Ren’s party, along with Filo and that Rishia girl, stood back and watched helplessly.
Raphtalia was furious. I’d never seen her so upset. What on earth had happened?
Bitch sure was looking energetic though. She’d just been poisoned and come back from the hospital, and she was already getting into fights?
Motoyasu’s party, including Bitch, consisted of three people.
One of them was standing next to Bitch and participating in the argument. The other one was standing off at a distance, watching the battle unfold.
“Ha! How could anyone hope to survive with party members like dirty demi-humans and nasty monsters?”
“Oh just die and get it over with already! This is punishment for causing a ruckus.”
The queen snapped her fingers and the slave curse activated.
“Kyaaaaaaaaa!”
A glowing seal appeared on Bitch’s chest and she fell to the floor, writhing in pain.
Itsuki’s teammate, the armor guy, was shocked at the queen’s actions. He stood back and his face went pale as he watched.
“I swear . . . . Why do you have to do these things?”
The queen looked exhausted as she looked down on the writhing Bitch.
She wasn’t going to kill her . . . was she?
“Raphtalia, what happened?”
“We were talking to the others about how to best cooperate from now on, when Bitch and the others came over and started saying that there was no need to team up with us, that only bad things could come of it. Then she started insulting my village and making fun of Filo . . . . Then she started insulting Melty, saying that she knew how to read her parents’ faces so she could manipulate them. She was boasting of all the horrible things that she’s done!”
I sighed and glared at Itsuki and Motoyasu.
“You mustn’t! These two are friends of a hero, and they fight to save this world!”
Itsuki, sensing the direction things were going, turned to Armor and scolded him.
“But Master Itsuki . . . aren’t these people wandering around and causing problems everywhere they go?”
That was rich. This coming from the guy who was causing a problem right here, right now.
“That has been shown to have been a misunderstanding. Please make your peace with them.”
“Very well.”
“Myn . . . I mean, Whore! Why are you treating her like this?”
Motoyasu cradled Bitch in his arms and glared at the queen.
“This is the punishment she receives for inciting disorder. It’s as simple as that. From all that I’ve heard, the problem seems to lie with her and her alone.”
The queen snapped open her fan and covered her mouth as she spoke. Motoyasu’s displeasure was evident—he stared at her, hate burning in his eyes.
“Mr. Kitamura? Take the time to properly think this over. This girl just got back from her convalescence in the hospital, and this is the first thing she did.”
“Urm . . . .”
“Did you hear what just happened here? Is it not obvious where the blame lies?”
Motoyasu, clearly sensing that he was over his head, said nothing else. He simply cradled Bitch in his arms and left the hall.
Itsuki had his hands full trying to calm down Armor.
The man was showing respect enough for Itsuki, but then he’d participate in actions like these.
“I think the feast has gone on long enough. Let’s call it a day. Later, on another day when tempers are not so high, I’d like to attempt a conversation with you all once again, one with the heroes all present.”
“Sure.”
“Agreed.”
Ren and I nodded.
Itsuki nodded his agreement and then left the room.
Give me a break . . . . Things were growing tenser by the minute. How were we supposed to learn to cooperate now?
The heroes had to cooperate, or else Fitoria would come and kill us all. We were already in dire straits, but our problems were continuing to multiply.
Chapter Three: Power Up
“Hmmm . . . .”
The hall was quiet now, and I was thinking over all they’d said. I’d already sent Raphtalia and Filo back to the room.
Thinking over it all with some silence, I realized I would just have to treat the heroes with suspicion.
I think I had already gotten all the information out of them that I could realistically hope for.
But I didn’t know how to figure out what was actually true and what was just another elaborate lie.
There was one thing on which they had all agreed: when you absorbed a defeated monster, the monster released a drop item.
They had also all agreed on the weapon copy system.
The rest must have been differences between the games that they had all played back in their home worlds.
They said that if you held a weapon then you could make a copy of it, and that once you met the requirements you could equip it normally.
They’d also said that they weapon you used could perform certain tasks for you, like crafting.
Yeah, they’d all agreed on at least those points.
But they’d disagreed on how you were supposed to power up your items. I decided to try and figure out what their positions had been.
Let’s say that everyone’s weapons behaved differently—that’s fine, except that I didn’t know how my shield worked. Everyone else had experience with a game that reflected the way their weapons seemed to behave, but I didn’t. Sure, I’d read a book about the heroes back in my world, but the section that was supposed to describe my own weapon was blank!
I took out a memo pad and tried
to sum up what they’d all said about the power-up system.
★ Ren
Strength is basically determined by your level.
Mastery: using the same weapon would improve your proficiency with it.
Energy transfer: when you finished using a weapon, you could reset its mastery level and release the amount of energy you had invested in it. Finally, any items that you had absorbed into the weapon could also be turned into energy.
Increasing rarity: by imbuing a weapon with energy, you can increase its rarity level. This tends to increase the weapon’s abilities.
★ Motoyasu
Everything is based on your weapon. The most important thing is spirit enchantment, and the original stats of your weapon are not very important. All you need is enough strength and experience to use the weapon.
Smelting: you can power up a piece of equipment using ores. There is a chance of failure.
Spirit enchantment: pieces of monsters’ souls, or items, that have been absorbed into a weapon can be used to imbue the weapon with special powers. This has no chance of failure—maybe.
Status enchantment: stats can also be increased in the same way.
★ Itsuki
A weapon’s rarity is the most important thing. The enchantments are just an extra boost. When you have something rare, it makes more sense to call it a rare weapon.
Power up: the power of a weapon can be raised by equipping it with certain ores. This never fails.
Item enchantment: items that have been absorbed into a weapon can be turned into energy, and that can be used to raise the percentage of various stats. The success is based on probability, and therefore there is a chance of failure.
Job level: you can increase your stats by using the energy contained in absorbed monsters or items.
That should be it.
They really had nothing to do with one another at all.
They all sort of involved energy power-ups, smelting, and rarity of some kind.
If I translated it into words I understood, it sounded like Itsuki was talking about unique weapons and rare weapons dropped by bosses.
Ren was talking about the rarity inherent in the actual weapon. Like a rare example of an iron sword or something.
As for enchanting, there were apparently three different versions.
The three of them were all familiar with this world from games that they had played, but those games must have been different from one another.
They’d called them VRMMO, then a normal MMO, and the last one was a consumer game.
I’d never heard of VRMMO, and MMO and consumer games certainly didn’t sound like they were referring to the same system. If they had anything to do with one another, the consumer game might have been a fan-produced copy of an MMO.
Back in my own world, I’d played different games that had exhibited qualities similar to the systems the other three had all described.
It sort of made sense in a way. If they were all playing different games, then their descriptions wouldn’t match up, and of course they’d think the others were lying.
They’d all said that there was no such thing as the curse series.
When I’d first looked at my growth tree, I didn’t see it either. In fact, that whole branch of the tree hadn’t appeared until I thought Filo had died and I got really upset. This was just another instance of us all having different opinions on how the world worked.
But . . . what did it really mean?
I looked down at the shield on my arm.
Could it be that the legendary weapons somehow reflected the heart of its user?
The heart? What did that even mean?
Refusal . . . right. Somewhere deep inside, I was refusing.
Fitoria had warned me that the heroes had to work together. That must mean something.
Weapon copy . . . . The three of them had all agreed on it, so it couldn’t have been a lie.
The drop items too.
But I hadn’t known about those things, and they hadn’t been listed in my help menu either.
I opened my weapon icon and looked through the options. Sure enough, those things weren’t listed.
But now that I think about it, I think my menus had included more options before I was framed and cast out of the castle. I wasn’t imagining it. I was sure of it.
Alright! I had to try something.
There MUST be a section on item drops! There MUST be a section on weapon copying!
All three of them had confirmed those items simultaneously, so they had to be listed in their menus.
I tried to imagine a screen that listed all the dropped items I’d acquired up until this point. What would it look like?
I opened up the shield menu. There was a soft beep as the window opened before me.
There it was, with a flash—a long list of all the items dropped by monsters I’d defeated up until that point.
“What the hell?!”
You had to believe in it for it to appear. By guarding myself from others to keep myself safe, I’d limited my options.
It looked like there was an item box, and it was filled with monsters. When I clicked on the monster, the item it dropped would show up.
Hey, there were some medicinal herbs that you needed to make magic water. And there were lots of materials for making soul-healing water too.
And there was a lot of . . . garbage. And there were plenty of monster organs and guts too.
I’d been so angry, but they’d had no reason to lie. If I just thought that and opened the shield menu, but nothing showed up.
That meant that I was refusing it somehow.
I’d really never thought that those liars could be telling the truth.
Did I just not believe enough? Ha! This was starting to sound like a kid’s show. But it was true. I believed it.
“Mr. Iwatani?”
The queen was calling for me. I decided that if I wanted to survive, I had to believe. I’d have to have a staring contest with the shield.
This is the legendary shield. What did it matter if they’d lied to me before?
Belief is another kind of power. What did I have to lose? I had to remember what I’d learned from my merchant life.
If you’re too afraid of being tricked, then you’ll miss your chance to really make a big deal.
I had to BELIEVE! Itsuki was right about powering up. There really WERE item enchantments.
If there weren’t, then we would be just like other adventurers.
I believed it, and I pushed the shield icon. ZizZap—for a second, the icon flickered.
A moment later there was a soft beep, and a new menu item appeared. “Power up.”
“Yes!”
I’d use the ore that was set in the shield, I just needed to find a shield that was compatible with it.
Bee Needle Shield 0/20: ability unlocked: equip bonus: attack 1:
special effect: needle (small): bee poison (paralysis)
To try it out, I attempted to power up the Bee Needle Shield. There was a soft beep, and the displayed denominator changed to one.
I was starting to get it. It was easy enough to power up, and the numerator was 20. Back in my world, this power up system was used in a game where you hunted monsters.
While I was at it, I decided to try turning absorbed items into energy.
It looked like there were a whole bunch of different possible effects.
I found one that looked interesting. It would cut damage received from usapil-type monsters. I decided to give it a try.
The probability of success appeared to be 100 percent for the first attempt.
Bee Needle Shield 1/20: ability unlocked: equip bonus: attack 1
special effect: needle (small): bee poison (paralysis)
item enchantment level 1. usapil-type monster damage down 2%
I still had more energy to work with, so I decided to try again.
Damn! I failed. And the number dropped to zero. I decided to try again
.
The counter moved up to two.
I kept trying again and again, and eventually the number rose to seven. The chance of success when moving up to level eight was very low.
Bee Needle Shield 1/20: ability unlocked: equip bonus: attack 1
special effect: needle (small): bee poison (paralysis)
item enchantment level 7. usapil-type monster damage down 16%
I felt like I could take on usapil-type monsters by myself now, if I needed to.
But there was another gauge that hadn’t moved.
Itsuki had said something about a “job level.” I decided to try experimenting with that next.
Out of a large number of status, I decided to focus on my defense—considering my class, that only made sense.
defense job level 1
defense gauge 0/5
I’d apparently acquired a lot of monster bits and organs when I broke them down following battle, so I chose some of them and kept entering them in the available slots.
The gauge filled slowly though, and by the time it reached one, I’d used a number of different items.
defense gauge 5/5
gauge up! “defense +1”
defense job level 2
Then the defense gauge changed to say 0/6.
I was about to try adding more items, but a cool-down timer appeared.
Apparently you could only raise the gauge a certain amount over as set period.
It wasn’t so impressive. But if you filled the gauge time and time again, it would probably end up being a force to reckon with. I wonder if I could learn skills this way too?
Regardless, I'd learned some important stuff here. I’d have to talk it over with the others.
I decided to try Ren’s system next. Just like I had with Itsuki’s system, I made sure that I really believed in the idea, and then opened the menu for my favorite weapon, the Chimera Viper Shield.
