Chapter 137
Compensation
Translator : PolterGlast
After heading to the Imperial Capital and asking around
among my classmates, it seems the person I was looking for had already secured
a large inn for himself. When I arrived at an inn called Night's
Illumination, which was apparently quite a high-class establishment even
within the Imperial Capital, the innkeeper guided me to the back without even
questioning who I was for some reason.
「There is no one in the human nations
right now who does not know of Masaru-sama, after all.」
I decided it was too scary to ask what kind of rumors were
spreading about me.
The room I was shown to was a so-called suite, one with an
exceptionally high rank even among the rooms here. Whoa, this might be a nicer
place than the inns I usually stay at... Looks like he's making bank.
「Hm, I wondered
who it was... So it's you, Kazuno. You need something?」
When I knocked on the door, it slowly opened. The person who
appeared from within was Mitsukawa Akira-kun,
his hair wet as if he had just gotten out of the bath.
As a result of the discussions between Emilia and Alice,
everyone in Class 1-1 was permitted to stay in either the Kingdom or the
Empire, whichever they preferred. That said, the people who were in the Empire
had already established their foundations here, and Kazuma-kun's party
in the Kingdom wasn't moving, so hardly any movement actually occurred.
The exception was the few guys and girls who got dumped by the knights and
maids now that Izel II was gone and the honey traps were no longer necessary;
almost all of them came to the Empire out of desperation.
Of course, Mitsukawa-kun is one of the classmates who
chose not to move and continues to stay in the Empire. According to him,
he's in the Empire because the pay is better than in the Kingdom and
the danger level is higher. I think his reasoning makes it sound way too brutal.
「Yeah, I wanted to talk to you about
something.」
「It ain't anything weird, right?」
「What exactly do you think of me?」
Come on, I want you to trust me. I think it's not a bad deal
for Mitsukawa-kun, who willingly throws himself into danger just to get
stronger.
♢♢♢
「...Heh, hunting down demons who slip
in, huh.」
「Yeah. The Grust Kingdom,
which lags behind the Empire in various magical technologies, apparently
still has an influx of demons.」
「So you're saying I just gotta defeat
them... Honestly, I ain't feeling too enthusiastic about it.」
Of course, I am fully aware that Mitsukawa-kun won't
just nod along for nothing. After all, Mitsukawa-kun, who was
continuously pushed to the front lines by Izel II in the hopes that he
might die, has abundant experience fighting demons. I figured that just
fighting demons who try to sneak in now wouldn't be enough to satisfy him.
「Actually, the demon who made it
possible for us to distinguish between humans and demons is incredibly strong.
I got permission from that demon to have a sparring session with you, Mitsukawa-kun.」
「Heh... Just how strong is she?」
「I think she's about as strong as the
Revenant party that appeared on the eleventh floor of the Holy Corpse
of the Knight. Please don't get mad when I say this, but I think she's
genuinely stronger than you right now, Mitsukawa-kun.」
Since there supposedly isn't much work for a demon feudal
lord to do, we're having Priola-san stay in the Kingdom with Lirica
for a while. I got permission to have her train Mitsukawa-kun during her
free time. Her ability is considerably high; after all, she's the strongest
living creature I've seen, at the very least.
「It's just for a certain period until
the political situation stabilizes, but could I ask this favor of you?」
「The reward?」
「An amount with a little extra added
to what you're currently earning, Mitsukawa-kun, and training with Priola-san.
Also... how about cigarettes and alcohol?」
「—!?」
Mitsukawa-kun,
who seemed to have been calmly calculating the pros and cons in his head until
now, had his face colored with astonishment for the first time. In my
negotiations with him, I intended to use the strongest card I possessed right
from the start. Since the people this card works on are limited, and among my
classmates it's pretty much only effective on Mitsukawa-kun, I have no
intention of holding it back.
「You... I'll ask just in case, but
you ain't jokin' around, right?」
「Of course not. I won't go into the
details, but I have a way to regularly supply those to you... Do you understand
what this means?」
「What the... I see. I can guess, but
I won't ask for the details.」
He probably realized that this power is related to my Gift.
But even so, Mitsukawa-kun didn't pry any further, took a step back, and
accepted the job to hunt demons. Until now, I had been reluctant to supply
goods from Home to my classmates, but we decided that it should be fine
to do it for Mitsukawa-kun.
「I brought some samples just in case.
HomeSpi 12mg and Kuroshu 18 Years... How's this for starters?」
「Seriously, man... This is stronger
than what I used to smoke... and a damn expensive whiskey on top of that...
You're really going all out.」
When I handed him the cigarettes and alcohol, Mitsukawa-kun
received them with careful hands. Ah, since the perpetual motion machine (it's
not perpetual) won't be complete unless I refresh them to replenish the
contents, I transferred both of them into containers from this world. By the
way, the amount is four packs worth of cigarettes and an entire bottle's worth
of whiskey.
Mitsukawa-kun
clamped a cigarette between his fingers and used Fire Magic at the tip
of his index finger to light it.
「Cough, cough! This is... strong. And... nostalgic...」
He choked at first, but after taking a second and third
drag, he seemed to get used to it, and the coughing stopped. If I remember
correctly, you don't inhale cigar smoke into your lungs, but you do inhale
cigarette smoke, right? His figure as he sat on the chair smoking a cigarette
was honestly incredibly picturesque. It's a demeanor that feels more like a Real
Man than just a guy, something you'd see in the hardboiled novels by Kenzo
Minakata, which I absolutely love.
(...I kind of feel like trying a smoke too, but if I did it,
it probably wouldn't look like that.)
I didn't know what the 12mg meant, but apparently, it refers
to the amount of nicotine. The one my dad had was the HomeSpi brand, and
even among that strong brand, it was the one with the highest nicotine content.
I see, so that's why he was choking.
「How much of this can you get your
hands on?」
「Well, if it's this much, about once
a week should be fine.」
Once he uses goods of Earth quality, he'll be dying to get
his hands on the cigarettes, cigars, and alcohol my dad used to have. Since
getting used to the stuff from Home made me lose my appetite for the
food in this world, I understand his feelings perfectly well.
—If I become the one supplying the cigarettes and alcohol he
desperately wants, Mitsukawa-kun will become favorable toward us. And
even when push comes to shove, the probability of him completely ignoring our
wishes and betraying us can be drastically reduced. From what I've heard about Mitsukawa-kun's
Overlord Gift, it seems he's going to keep getting stronger, so I
want to keep him on our side as much as possible. What do you mean, 'acquiring the power of defeated opponents'?
A learning ability or whatever, put a limit on these cheats! I intend to do at
least this much for that purpose.
(It feels like I'm doing something a bit bad, but well, as
long as he stays our ally, it's a win-win, so I hope he forgives me.)
I once heard somewhere that a person who smokes needs to try
quitting over two hundred times before they successfully stop smoking. And once
you drink alcohol matching Japanese standards, the ale full of impurities or
the wine that's just bitter in this world will become undrinkable. After all,
even someone like me, who has only drank a few times, can tell the difference
in quality.
Supplying luxury items to Mitsukawa-kun and getting
him on our side. This is the strategy I devised—the Overlord Drug Addiction
Strategy! Yeah, that sounds incredibly sketchy!
(Well, we'll talk about Home again another time.)
He snapped when Miku was taken away, and he stood up
to Kazuma-kun and sided with us. He's quite favorable towards us, so I
believe I can trust him fairly well. However, I don't intend to tell him about Home
just yet. Because if I told him about the training room or something, he'd
definitely start practically living at my house. Coming home to rest only to
find a sweaty, muscular macho man walking out of a door I set up is far too bad
for my mental health. Besides, Home is the only place I can relax
without keeping my guard up. I don't intend to let anyone inside unless they
are someone I truly trust... Well, it looks like I'll end up letting Lirica
in through a gradual breakdown of my rules, though.
「If that's the case, I'll gladly do
it.」
「Mhm, sorry it feels like I'm baiting
you, but I'm counting on you.」
「Nah, you ain't wrong at all. You're
completely baiting me.」
「Ehehe.」
「Smiling cutely ain't gonna fool me,
you know.」
And so, I safely secured Mitsukawa-kun's cooperation, successfully hiring him as the 'Kill Demons Who Come to the Royal Castle Man.'
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