JK Haru is a Sex Worker in Another World: Summer

by Ko Hiratori

  Behind me, someone screamed. As if that were the switch, my sluggish legs got kicked into gear.

  I planted a foot on Baseball Mob and leaped.

  {T minus 00:00:02 to being transported to another world}

  “Koyamaaa!” When I called her name aloud for the first time, I felt a rush of adrenaline.

  Haru Koyama was standing there frozen like an idiot, and I sprinted toward her with all my might.

  What am I doing? Why am I running? What do I do next?

  I knew only one thing for sure.

  I had gotten past every other guy in the world and was aiming for Haru Koyama.

  I was sure I would regret it if I stopped—because if I was going to be a hero, this was the time.

  {T minus 00:00:01 to being transported to another world}

  Nah, it couldn’t be the only time.

  Actually, a similar thing happened when I was little.

  It was summer, and I was visiting my grandma’s house. I made friends with a girl who seemed straight out of a slice-of-country-life type of manga, and when she nearly drowned in the river, I pulled her out.

  She thanked mesomuch and said she owed me her life and everything. I thought,Okay, sure, I’ll let you thank me, and went along with it. But after a while she started putting some space between us, or rather, she started being cold to me. I told her that was no way to treat the guy who saved her life, but she stayed sassy, and in the end I stopped playing with her.

  After that, a lot happened—I got more hobbies, like anime and light novels, and stopped going to my grandma’s house, but I wondered how that girl was doing. Was she happy? I forgot about what I did for her, but she didn’t, did she?

  But wait, why am I suddenly remembering all this stuff that happened a zillion years ago? Why does time seem to be going on and on?

  It’s just like what happens before you die! It’s the thing everyone talks about when they miraculously make it back alive.

  But I couldn’t stop now. Haru Koyama was right in front of me. The truck’s tires were skidding as it approached.

  Nah, I’ll make it by a hair. There’s no way I could just suddenly die.That’s what the dopamine whispered to me.Who is the hero of the day? Me. Not the boyfriend, not the mob, and not Sekiguchi. It’s Seiji Chiba. The me of today is different than the me of yesterday. Don’t ever look at me the same way again. Don’t make fun of me. I’ll stare right back at you. That’s right. That’s why I’m running. I’m going to change my world.

  I called Haru Koyama’s name once more. I don’t know if I managed to actually say it or not, but I screamed. Slow-motion. And yet my senses seemed sharp. I knew the girls behind me were shrieking and trying to escape. I held out my hand to her. Like a movie, like the first episode of an anime, I reached out to grasp the moment my destiny would change.I’m right beside you now.

  Then Haru Koyama, who had been watching the truck dumbstruck with her phone in her hand, finally noticed me—and the look on her face said,Who’s this guy, again?

  The world turned gray, and I tasted iron.

  {JK Haru is a Sex Worker in Another World: Summer}

  Murder at Blue Cat Nocturne

  If I told my friends I got hit by a truck and transported to another world, it would be hilarious, but since I’m in another world, my phone doesn’t connect.

  At first I thought,You gotta be kidding me!too. But after that there were a whole bunch of twists and turns that were no joke, so I had no choice but to just live my life. It’s pretty insane how people can get used to just about anything as long as they’re alive, or more like, life is a force to be reckoned with. Not that it makes it easier.

  I even got used to being a sex worker. And I’m even proud of what a pro I’ve become. Plus, I understand pretty well how this other world with a god, demons, and heroes works.

  But I still have the feeling somewhere in a corner of my mind that I’m walking around in a dream. Maybe the cheat skills we were given are a lifeline too thick. They’re what makes everything seem so removed from reality. Life feels too much like a game.

  It’s a rough time, so I tend to use whatever powers are handy to get by. I always think it’s cowardly to rely on them so much, but actually, they save my butt pretty often.

  That’s why I’ll never fully be one of these people. I can tell, even as I feel bad for enjoying my not-at-all-ordinary life like I’m still the high schooler I was that day, waiting for the school festival to come.

  This is a story of something that happened one day in another world.

  “You lost your underwear at Blue Cat Nocturne? While you were drying them?”

  “Shhh!” Kiyori blushed. Lupe hunched her shoulders, conscious of the people around us.

  We were having a breakfast meeting at Sumo’s cafe. I got a little over-excited because I smelled a mystery. The old dudes sitting nearby all clicked their tongues in annoyance.

  The terrace seating created at our request had been recognized to the extent that other people now used it too, but the customers were still practically 100 percent dudes; the number of women cafe-goers hadn’t really increased at all. The road to turning Sumo’s joint into the type of cafe I knew was a long one.

  Well, that was an issue we could deal with later.

  “Actually, sometimes a pair or two does disappear. I figured someone was messing with us, so I said not to worry about it. We get harassed and teased all the time.”

  “...Oh.”

  Kiyori looked surprised, but as Lupe said, this wasn’t the first time something like this had happened. For some reason people—both men and women—tended not to take sex workers seriously. Of course it was frustrating, and it pissed me off. But it also wasn’t specific to this world.

  Kiyori hung her head. Everyone had experiences with harassment. If we got upset about every little thing that happened to us, there’d be no end to it.

  Still, though.

  “That’s going too far. It’s robbery at that point! Let’s tell the soldiers!”

  “It won’t do any good. The lost item is a sex worker’s underwear. They won’t even give us the time of day.”

  The soldiers are like a combination of my old world’s police and self-defense force. I was pretty sure their duty included protecting the people’s panties. But depending on the situation, a sex worker’s status is lower than a pair of panties. Wait, “lower” is going too far. I’m a sex worker too, after all.

  “But if we just leave it, then the victims will keep having problems.”

  Kiyori said, “Shall we try asking via the Church?” But if we did that, it could cause trouble for Kiyori and the people of the Church, so we said thanks but passed.

  “Our only option is to catch the perp ourselves.”

  “Huh? You don’t have to go that far, do you? Don’t do anything dangerous.”

  “Crying yourself to sleep is worse. You can’t just grin and bear it when something important to you gets stolen. Women and sex workers have to speak up and say something is unforgivable when it’s unforgivable.”

  “I think you’re exactly right!” This time it was Kiyori who was getting over-excited. The older dudes around us told her to “Pipe down!”, so she shrank into herself.

  “Lower your voices, you two. I can just buy more underwear. In fact, I’ll buy replacements for every—”

  “Lupe, you don’t need to do that. Leave this to me. We can catch the thief without doing anything dangerous. My buddy Ukyo says the culprit always returns to the scene of the crime.”

  “Who’s that...?”

  “Now that they’ve got a taste for our panties, when they realize the soldiers aren’t doing anything, they’ll come back to Blue Cat Nocturne’s drying spot. We’ll set a trap there. So, hmm, well it’s pretty cheesy, but how about we dig a pitfall?”

  We caught the criminal right away.

  Filling in the hole—which I’d used my Dig skill craftsmanship at full throttle to create—was an underwear-laden Chiba.
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  “Oh, it’s you? You walking sexual curiosity.”

  How disappointing.I had a feeling this outcome wasn’t completely outside the realm of possibility, but for it to actually happen was a real bummer. Chiba used to be so hopeless, but lately he had started to get to know the other girls, and with Lupe’s training, I thought maybe he was changing for the better. Actually, his true nature of not living up to expectations hadn’t changed at all!

  “W-Wait a sec. Listen to me!”

  “Shaddup. I don’t care if we know each other—a crime is a crime. I’m sorry your fetish got the better of you, but it doesn’t justify breaking the law.”

  Right, Ukyo?

  “You got it all wrong. I’m carrying these because”—Chiba seemed like was trying to defend himself, but when he saw all the contemptuous looks of the sex workers peering down at him, he gave up, and his shoulders slumped—“...because I couldn’t control my...sexual curiosity...”

  “Okay, we’ve got a confession. Someone call a soldier. Let’s ask for a proper other-world execution, cruel and merciless. Like an orc funeral or something!”

  “Haru, calm down. Chiba must have his reasons. Let’s hear what he has to say.”

  “Lupe, you’re going too easy on him. The more you spoil a fetish, the more it grows. A fetish is a monster that nests in your heart. The whole reason he’s stuck in this hole with a bunch of panties right now is that he lost control of it. People are doomed when they get this bad.”

  “It’s true that one time, Chiba tried to uncrumple the underwear I took off to look at them, but when I told him to stop, he stopped. He has the kind of fetish that listens when you talk to it.”

  “He did that to mine once, too. He’s just a total panties man. He always peeks when we’re going up the stairs, even.”

  “Yep, if you ever wear a short dress, he’ll be staring at your thighs. You can tell he’s just waiting. And when he’s trying to catch a peek from behind, he stares as if he thinks we’ll never notice.”

  “Huh? Wait a sec. Isn’t this perv totally lucking out at this angle? He’s probably thinking he wants to stay buried in the dirt forever!”

  “Cut it out already! I refuse to discuss this in front of everyone or be a party to this call-out spree. I’ll explain later, so just let me outta here!”

  “Listen to this high-and-mighty jerk... We have absolutely no intention of discussing anything with you!”

  “Haru, let’s just listen to him first. Please?”

  Lupe, are you his mom now or something?

  If she was going to say that, then I couldn’t fight her. I was definitely going to tie him up so he couldn’t run away, though.

  I unleashed my Bind skill—the one I got from the chokey dude’s little twin brother. I needed to reform Chiba before his fetish was sublimated into a skill like theirs.

  “Did you really have to do this?!”

  I bound his upper body with a criss-crossing turtle shell pattern and pushed him into the shed. It was a musty spot for keeping barrels of alcohol and old parts and junk. Chiba was kicking and screaming, but I locked the door.You can simmer down in there for now.

  There was no telling what Chiba had done with the stolen underwear, so we washed each pair before returning them and explaining to everyone. Then I decided to go to Sumo’s place. I thought I’d buy a cake for all the girls to apologize for the racket. Of course, I’d make Chiba pay me back later.

  As I was scraping together some cash in my room, Lupe showed up and said she would come with. “It’ll be hard on your own.”

  She really is everyone’s mom. Even I’m letting her spoil me now. As she helped me carry the cake home, I ended up venting to her as usual.

  “I’m really so pissed this time. Why should I have to go to all this trouble? It’s like being ashamed of a relative. I was half-serious about executing him, by the way.”

  I dunno why, but Lupe was smiling. She almost always smiled when listening to what I had to say. “You’re so nice, though, Haru.”

  “Huh? What did I ever do that’s nice?”

  “You said ‘like being ashamed of a relative.’”

  “What? Nah, I mean, it doesn’t have any profound significance or anything. I just say that ’cause we happen to be from the same town. We never talked or anything. We’re weren’t friends.”

  That’s true. And even now, I don’t consider us pals or anything. We were just in the same class, and he was calling me some kinda paste thing I didn’t understand. None of our friends even overlapped. Or LINE groups. At least, I don’t think they did.

  My friends always made fun of Chiba and his friends as gross otaku, and sometimes I laughed too. No, maybe I made fun of them the most. I never knew what was so funny, so I was always thinking what a pain it all was while I just matched the other girls’ mood without caring. I didn’t even know what kind of guy he was. I wasn’t interested in knowing.

  But what I learned since ending up in this world together, and talking and sleeping with him, is that he communicates incomprehensibly and his boundaries are all fucked up. It’s creepy how one second he’s timid, the next he’s acting like he knows you inside and out, and then he’s suddenly touching you. I don’t know if he’s smart or not, but for all his obsessive attention to detail, he sure won’t listen to anyone else’s opinions.

  But then he gets hurt really easily and is quick to anger. It’s annoying how he plunges into depression whenever someone gets mad at him. He can’t accept anyone saying something different from what he expected. That part of him can be really gross, and it pisses me off.

  He’s no relative of mine. Only shame.

  But one time Lupe gently told me I was too cold to him, so I do try to pay attention to that. But honestly, if I’m not overly cold, I don’t think my emotions get through to him.

  “It’s funny how you know Chiba the best, but you say you’re not interested.”

  “Nah, I don’t really know him. I just end up hearing stuff I didn’t even want to find out. It’s just because we’re from the same town.”

  He’s an otaku, and a weirdo, and a perv, but that’s all. You can explain him pretty well with just those three words. But in this world there aren’t any smartphones, and even if there are things like newspapers, they just report in a matter-of-fact way, so the only sources of real info are word-of-mouth and gossip. And you only really talk to people whose faces you know.

  I don’t know if that’s the reason or not, but for example, they don’t really call people “gross,” here, and there’s no word for “otaku.” They just don’t have those categories. If I say something like “like a virgin” then someone will finally say,Ohh, I getcha, but I think that’s only because we’re sex workers.

  They don’t have those shared categories, so they don’t stick labels on people so easily. It’s not as if stereotypes and prejudice don’t exist, but maybe they’re less common. Everyone’s attitude is that you don’t know someone until you talk to them. It might just be because this city is on the front line of the war with the demon lord, so a lot of people come and go. Although if I know one thing for sure, it’s that this world is more misogynistic.

  “Let’s talk to him. If you start to go too hard on him, I’ll stop you. And in return, if I go too easy on him, you can stop me. No angry yelling, though. If we keep ourselves in check, I think Chiba will actually tell us why he did it.”

  “...Yeah.”

  But when it comes to communication, people in this world are more mature, or like, sometimes I’m not really that much better than Chiba, which freaks me out. I was always confident about that kind of stuff before, but it’s like a difference of caliber. In this world it’s about how much you can take, not how much you can dish out. And I’ve always fought my way through by dishing out.

  If only we had phones. Chiba might be thinking the same thing as me—maybe it was stress making him act out. If this were a classroom, thanks to Lupe, me and Chiba would be in a common LINE group an
d be able to maintain a proper distance as classmates. That would have been just right.

  We’re two people who couldn’t become friends just by sleeping together. Inviting him in the beginning was a mistake.

  That’s what I was thinking with a mix of nostalgia and regret on the nice walk home with Lupe carrying the apology cake.

  Then came the shock.

  Chiba was dead.

  “Whaaaaaaat?!”

  I was so freaked out I collapsed, and Lupe’s knees gave out too. The shed was already a mess to begin with, and now Chiba was lying right in the middle of it, in front of some boxes and stuff piled in the back.

  He was still wrapped up from my Bind power, lying face down with his feet pointing our way. In the slice of light that shone through the open door, we had a clear view of the blood he had coughed up and his pale face.

  “Ch-Chiba!”

  “Wait, Lupe! Don’t go near him.”

  She tried to run to him, but I grabbed her shoulders. Preserving the crime scene is elementary in a scientific investigation. Right, Ukyo? Rokkaku?

  I approached carefully, so as not to step on anything lying on the floor, and touched the nape of his neck. No pulse. I put my ear to his back. His heartbeat...well, I couldn’t hear anything.

  I cleared my throat and collected myself as much as possible before informing Lupe in a way that hopefully wouldn’t upset her too much. “He’s gone.”

  “Nooooooo!” She crumpled into my arms. The shuddering of her narrow shoulders told me this was just reality, and we had to accept it.

  I realized that on some level I had been trying to enjoy the weird little incidents that happened on the regular in this other world. Frankly, I figured today was just another day of messing with Chiba, and hadn’t thought any more of it than that while tying him up and imprisoning him. I never thought he would die. I never thought he would puke blood.

  I didn’t know what I could ever tell his parents.

  The question was, how did it happen?