Absolute Shopping Addict- Volume 1

by Way Woo

  But despite what it looked like, Jake wasn’t running away from the Snapper; he had something else up his sleeve.

  Jake was playing a long game with the monster, a game which, if he played correctly, would end in the monster’s defeat.

  He never bothered to look back to see his turtle ship getting crushed by the Snapper’s roots and feet.

  It was a life-or-limb decision for Jake, as he couldn’t find anyone on Brino who loved his possessions as dearly as he did.

  If Jake had the time to think, it would be like if a drunk pedestrian keyed his brand-new sports car.

  He never had a sports car but thought the analogy was appropriate – if he got his hands on the pedestrian, he would regret doing such a stupid thing.

  Obviously; to Jake, messing with his property was the quickest way to gain his ire. If it was something as expensive and beautiful as a sports car? You’d make a lifelong enemy of him, if he didn’t take you out where you stood.

  “You just signed your own fucking death warrant by crushing my precious turtle ship!” Jake yelled, and continued his escape. “I swear, this is going to end with me dining on giant turtle soup!”

  To Jake, the Cherry-Shell Snapper had crossed that line, and his rage would not be sated with anything but the life of this monster.

  I’m not leaving this place until the Cherry-Shell Snapper is dead meat.

  With Jake providing himself as bait, the game was afoot.

  Guess what? I’m Admiral Yi right now, and you’re going to pay for my boat with your life. My turtle ship will only rest in peace as soon as you’re resting in pieces.

  ***

  Thanks to the tutors and other, more experienced of their kind, the adventurers in Brino organized themselves into teams of seven, and started the task of looking around the village in search of their so-called fugitive.

  “How far has he gone, do you think?”

  “Pretty far – I can’t find anything close by, not a trace of him.”

  As soon as the teams were organized, morale was high that justice was going to be served by catching the criminal, and tended to their duties with due diligence.

  They searched high and low around Brino – mountains, dungeons, caves – taking turns as they did so.

  And while one team searched, the other teams trained and hunted down monsters, their power and confidence growing as they believed they could deal with Jake or someone stronger should they appear.

  It was also a chance to show off their newly acquired power.

  However, all their attempts had so far ended with Jake not being found.

  “Maybe he’s gone for good,” one of the search team leaders said after another failed expedition to the Swiftstone Peak, “he could have abandoned any plans to return and just went away as far as his feet could take him.”

  “We’ve gone through the usual dungeons, but all the trails were old. Jake went elsewhere.”

  Despite their efforts, they could not find anything they could follow up on, probably because the area they were searching in was quite extensive; not to mention the monsters they had to defend themselves against, every now and then.

  “Let’s still continue the search. Maybe one day he might suddenly appear. “

  But after finding traces of Jake leaving Brino south, they turned towards that direction, and through their tireless searching, was able to stumble on a few clues as to Jake’s location.

  The adventurers didn’t want to admit it to themselves, but the thought of Jake at large, alone in the wilderness outside Brino, made them feel uneasy to the point of near paranoia.

  Even when the monster attacks on their village continued, the search teams assisted when they could, and continued the search as soon as the last monster breathed its last.

  The search team’s attention to detail finally paid off, as they found an important clue roughly three or four hours’ walk away from Brino, in the form of worn-out and shattered golden leopard fragments.

  “Whenever we defeat a golden leopard, these golden pieces fall on the ground,” the leader of the search team declared. “And this leopard looks like it was hunted quite a long time ago – Jake must have gone through here. “

  The rest of the search team nodded their assent and went to work finding the trail, which they did, thanks to the gold fragments left behind by the leopards when Jake defeated them quite some time ago.

  “We’re about half a day’s walk from Brino.”

  “The fragments here also show a lot of wear and tear, so it would have been quite a long time – at least two weeks or so – since Jake passed by.”

  “So,” the team leader declared, “he was heading south, after all. It seems we caught the trail too late because we were searching the spots on the north end of town. “

  The tracker was more or less correct – Jake had indeed passed by this place twelve days ago, based on the gouges on the ground his sword left behind.

  “Now we know we was going in this direction,” the team leader continued, “I say we make base camp here, and have different search teams rotate here as an outpost.”

  “That’s a good idea,” the tracker said.

  “We’re going to continue searching around here, as well.”

  “South of this spot is a river, but he probably didn’t go towards the river, right?”

  “There is no ship, and the river is difficult to cross, let alone travel on. We don’t need to search near the river.”

  It was decided to make a base camp on the site close to where they saw the golden leopards, and continued to explore the surrounding area, hunting monsters when they could.

  An uneventful seven days passed by, and the search team had thought of this spot as a dead end already. However…

  ***

  “FUCK YEAH!”

  A familiar shout roused the search party from their daily preparation, only to see a large turtle ship make its way down the churning river.

  “The king of shop, who? The king of shop, what?“

  And standing on the prow of the turtle ship, was a man bearing numerous scars, a sword tied to his waist, and… his birthday suit.

  “The king of shop, who? That be my hobby and job!“

  He looked more like a third-rate copy of a Sistine Chapel sculpture with his heavily scarred physique, his sword, and the microphone in his hand melding incongruously with the turtle ship he was on.

  “And when I bring the ruckus, suckers duck and then dodge!”

  “Where did that ship come from?”

  “What is that mic?”

  “Who the hell is that guy?“

  Episode 19

  ***

  A few hours before Jake made his triumphant return to the shores of the river from his successful trip to the Island of Delusion, he was standing on the deck of his turtle ship and pondering about the time he had spent hunting monsters on the isle.

  He mindlessly ran a thumb over his arm, feeling the thickened scars that had formed from all the fights he was in.

  Not going to lie, it was extremely tough.

  Some people may think two weeks isn’t that long. Others think two weeks isn’t long enough.

  But to Jake, it was a slog from the starting line all the way to the finish; he only managed to catch up on sleep as soon as he got on board the turtle ship, and in his exhaustion, forgot that he was supposed to feel seasick.

  …yeah, one of the longest two weeks I’ve ever been through, because I barely had the time or peace of mind to get enough sleep.

  The grind was such that Jake could not even recall parts of his stay there, because if he wasn’t fighting off the monsters appearing from nearly everywhere, he was training.

  It was only the thought of “the little turtle ship that could” that kept me going.

  Every chance he had, whenever he got to a place with little to no monsters, he trained and trained to fulfill the requirement needed to gain the Cherry Blossom Weapon Skill.

  If I had to choose w
hich was harder between hunting monsters and training for the Cherry Blossom… I’d say it was the training.

  Jake started off by thinking that improving his agility stat would help solve the problem… but that wasn’t it.

  For the first two days he started practicing with leaves, and early on, when he figured out he needed to swing his sword faster, he used the points he gained from the monsters he hunted to raise his Agility stat to 35… except that didn’t work out at all.

  Jake quickly figured out that an adventurer who can go head-to-head with a ton of monsters but can’t even cut a bunch of leaves in midair is a joke.

  But some time during his third day on the island, Jake eventually came onto the fact that he wasn’t supposed to rush this skill: he just needed to train how to wield his sword better and not rely on brute force swings alone.

  A little over a week later, he cut a leaf into eight pieces after his Great Sword Mastery had gone up to level 2. And two days after that, he had accomplished the heretofore-thought impossible: the cherry blossom was thrown into the air… and cut into sixteen pieces.

  Just like that, Jake obtained the skill, and completely changed his fighting style.

  His Great Sword Mastery skill only helped him wield weapons like the Swiftstone, but the Cherry Blossom Skill worked with all weapons.

  “The difference between them and me?” Jake asked to no one as he used the skill and the scent of flowers spread through the air, “I don’t just make it look elegant. I make it SMELL elegant, too.”

  ***

  After taking a few hours off to further test out his newly-acquired means of monster destruction, Jake quickly made his way back to where he escaped from the Cherry-Shell Snapper, his intent to make the giant turtle pay for wrecking his turtle ship written all over his face.

  It was quite a sight to see the giant turtle crying at me. You remember me chopping off that branch, huh?

  Normally, you needed to defeat the Snapper first before learning the Cherry Blossom, but again, Jake was the type of adventurer who, when he sees convention, gives it the finger and goes about his own way to finish a task.

  Even with my new skills, it still wasn’t easy, though.

  Thanks to twelve days worth of buying and saving up healing items, Jake was able to fight toe-to-toe with the Cherry-Shell Snapper.

  Well, I remember what you did to my poor turtle ship, which is why I saved up healing items for twelve days, just for you!

  And two days after Jake baited the Cherry-Shell Snapper into battle, the monster finally stopped moving.

  Jake Smithson burst into joy at the sight of the huge form of the Cherry Shell Snapper lying dead in the meadow, and when he saw a whopping twenty-two thousand points show up on his account in the corner of his eye.

  He didn’t waste any time and paid to have his poor turtle ship returned to its previous, pristine condition.

  Additionally, Jake bought a little something with the points that remained as a reward for himself.

  [BlissTone Microphone and Amplifier: A two-item set for the aspiring singer! A microphone and a portable speaker are included so if you’ve always want to sing, now’s your chance to belt like a pro and flow for show!]

  [Be warned, though: the amp is calibrated to inflict maximum auditory annoyance on nearby monsters. Should you choose to sing, be prepared to fight off hecklers.]

  Though Jake did read the fine print and knew it was monster bait, it still didn’t stop him from buying the item.

  “Once again, after much hardship and effort… I’m on a boat! I’m on a boat! Everybody look at me, I’m sailing on a turtle boat!”

  It was typical of Jake to make an impulse buy after going through what he had been through.

  He thought of catching up on all the sleep he missed out on while on the turtle ship, and after several hours, he was back in fine form, standing on the prow of his ship, spitting out rhymes, the joy never leaving his system despite his nap.

  [Arriving at the previous departure point: shores of the river due south of Brino Village]

  With the widest smile on his face, he stepped off the boat onto terra firma and took in the sights.

  In his state of happiness, he seemed to have disregarded the pointed glares his fellow adventurers were sending his way.

  Wait, they made an outpost here? How convenient, Jake thought. Wait a minute, why is everyone bringing out their weapons?

  ***

  At the Hero Shop back office, the door to the manager’s office opened not with a bang, but with a whimper.

  And from the darkened doorway emerged the back office’s highest-ranked employee – the manager called Keldarian.

  He took slow steps out of the office, trembling hands reaching for the railing so he could make it down the stairs without falling, and when he reached the production floor, nearly everyone in the back office could see just how ghastly he looked – nearly all the color on his face was gone, except for two black circles under his eyes.

  “We’re done,” he whispered, and when no one could read his lips he yelled. “WE’RE FUCKING DONE! CLOSE THE DAMN SHOP, I AM FUCKING OUT OF HERE AS SOON AS I WRITE MY RESIGNATION LETTER.”

  Pandemonium ensued.

  “What?”

  “What’s going on, sir?”

  The rant seemed to bring Keldarian back to life, and he stomped towards the hapless analyst who had to ask him the question.

  “This, minion,” Keldarian replied, venom dripping out of every word, “our resident nutjob just happened to accomplish this.”

  He motioned to the projector, and when the rest of the back office saw what was going on, it looked like there was a fire or earthquake drill about to happen in the office.

  Granted, where they were, there was a slim to none chance of that happening, but they were all still running around like chickens with their heads cut off.

  Five minutes of confusion later, Keldarian managed to wrest control over his office.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, our beloved customer, Jake Smithson,” he began, sarcasm heavy on his tone, “has just acquired the Cherry Blossom Weapon Skill in just two fucking weeks.”

  “But other areas have already defeated the Werecrocodile by now –“

  “And, not only that, he has also managed to defeat the Cherry-Shell Snapper…”

  “He would need at least a team of five adventurers to do—“

  “…by himself.”

  For a minute, there was the most uncomfortable silence in the Hero Shop back office.

  One of the analysts let out a word that summarized how everyone was feeling.

  “...Fuck.”

  Obviously, this wasn’t something they planned for.

  What they were expecting was that Jake would defeat the Snapper before getting the Cherry Blossom Weapon Skill.

  Unfortunately, what they got was an adventurer getting the skill first, and THEN defeating the boss monster.

  One of the senior analysts tried to mitigate the situation.

  “This isn’t wholly our fault. We’re just going according to how the Hero Shop on another branch sells it. If we ever get nailed for this, that’s the only good defense we can mount.”

  “True,” another analyst added, “The Black Label catalog does have the Cherry Blossom by default. I think we did make a mistake by promoting it as an event. That got this guy to focus on getting the skill.“

  “We knew he was good, but we never expected him to be THIS good...“ a junior analyst chimed in.

  “Okay,” Keldarian declared. “Scenario time: our favored customer is now wielding a Swiftstone Sword and is using the Cherry Blossom Weapon Skill. Imagine the kind of reaction other adventurers will show when they run into him. “

  “Only those with a death wish would not run and hide,” an analyst remarked.

  “That’s right,” Keldarian said. “Back in his home world there’s a story about how a scientist made a monster who inevitably destroyed him. I dare say we are in the same boat
as this Frankenstein fellow. We made someone so strong that things such as game balance are no longer relevant. Face it, we just broke the game.“

  “So instead of griping about it, how about we throw some ideas together so we can fix it?”

  “Fix it? Other than exterminating Nohas as a whole, I can’t think of anything!”

  “We send in a request to IT and ask them to balance the monster stats or something?”

  “Then he’d be the only one who could fight them!”

  As the analysts argued, Kelderian remained silent as his thoughts about how to stop this customer from ruining the simulation deeply troubled him.

  He came to a decision just as two of the junior analysts were about to come to blows.

  “Team building,” he declared loudly, and the comment was so out of left field the analysts about to punch each other’s lights out just dropped their fists and turned their open-mouthed stares to their boss.

  “Team building?” a senior analyst asked, unsure if her boss had already gone off the deep end.

  “Yes,” Keldarian said. “Team building.”

  “What?!”

  “Let’s close down the shop for a week. if I’m a damned nervous wreck right now I can only imagine what you guys are going through. I’ll put in the petition to management for a week off for team bonding and decompression.“

  “Well if we do that, we’re not going to stop this guy from buying right? We’re only delaying the deliveries of whatever he purchases.“

  “Why not just put all his purchases on a time delay, while you’re at it?“ another analyst snapped, and Kelderian considered his options.

  Because if he was honest, this Jake Smithson’s purchasing savvy was, quite frankly, frightening to him.

  So, Kelderian decided to make a managerial decision and make a momentary retreat so he and his back-office team could figure out what to do next – and work the stress of this Smithson fellow’s antics out of their systems.

  “Sir, you do realize that you’re supposed to give management at least a week’s notice before taking any leave of at least 3 days or more, right?” Kelderian’s beleaguered assistant asked.

  Kelderian’s face fell.

  Fuck me. If I go through with this, Corporate is going to get on my ass so hard I won’t be able to sit for a week. I have to do this via official channels. Wouldn’t do to torpedo my reputation out of stress… I am a service provider, after all.