Chapter 63 - The Benefit Of A Charm (1/2)

Kibayas.h.i.+ finished explaining the summary of what happened. But of course, he could not tell Akira the complete story behind that deal, after all, Akira was still an outsider in the end.

“Well, I guess that’s the gist of it. If you want to know more about the detail, you can ask me anytime, but it’ll cost you. And since it’s a piece of insider-information only known among the city staff, it’ll cost you a lot of money. So?”

“Nah, that’s enough.”

Akira said so since he felt that he had heard enough information.

To be honest, Akira did not care if the city wanted to twist the truth. To him, it was something that lay in a world that had nothing to do with him.

Akira had been living in the slum city near the lower district of Kugamayama city for all his life. As such, matters pertaining to the Kugamayama city, the other cities and the corporate government were on a whole different world that was not related to him at all. Or at least, that was the case as long as it did not cause any harm to him.

“I see. Do you have anything else you want to ask? Just go ahead and ask anything you want here. Once either you or I leave this place, it would be too late to ask anything. Ahh, although I said you can ask me anything, just don’t ask for more reward money. It’s not like the city has a bottomless treasury, you know. If you have any complaints about your reward money, you should’ve complained before you signed that doc.u.ment. But on the other hand, if it has nothing to do with money, I’ll try my best to grant anything you ask. I’m very much interested in you. So I’m planning to support you the best I can.”

Kibayas.h.i.+ was telling the truth, he was really interested in Akira. But Akira did not understand the reason why.

“Which part of me piques your interest?”

Kibayas.h.i.+ smiled widely while telling Akira the reason.

“What, you ask?? Your way of living, of course!! The level of recklessness!! Just go out there and die or go out there and live!! That’s really something!! I’m also a part of the Hunter Office, so I can access information about Hunters, and that includes information that is not made public. Have you ever seen your own battle record? You fought against Cannon Insects with just your AAH rifle. You charged into a building full of Yarata scorpions all alone and returned back alive. And you even took out more than 500 scorpions in the underground city. Then to top it off, you took out 3 relic thieves alone, although all of them were cyborgs and 2 of them even had powered suits. These feats are not something that a Rank 20 Hunter can normally accomplish. Not even possible for a Rank 30 Hunter. Although, it seems that you got all beaten up to be able to do these. It’s great that we can patch you up, though I’m sure that you’ll get all beaten up again in no time.”

Akira looked rather disturbed as he asked.

“…Was my body that bad?”

“Yeah, that’s why it took 60,000,000 Aurum to fix your body. I did say to you that the medical bill does make sense, remember? One of the treatments that we used to fix your body was limb regeneration, it’s a treatment that we normally use on people who have lost their limbs, you know. Without all of those treatments… Well, it’s not like you’ll be dead tomorrow or something, but I bet you won’t survive another year. So thanks to those treatments, your body is basically as healthy as most of the people who live in the middle district.”

Akira was speechless when he heard what Kibayas.h.i.+ said. But Kibayas.h.i.+ just smiled and continued.

“You feel like you’re in your tiptop shape right now, don’t you? That’s thanks to all those treatments. You’re from the slum city, right? So I bet you mostly eat those foods that the city distributed freely in the distribution area. Those things sometimes contain nasty stuff, you know. Like monster’s meat which no one knows if it’s okay for consumption, or food produced from old-world relics which we don’t even know how they work. Of course, it’s not like it’ll kill you the moment you eat those foods. But it’s definitely bad for your health if you keep consuming those foods for a prolonged period. There were even reports of cases where they caused immediate effects, I heard that it was because of the nanomachines which they couldn’t fully clean-up from the monster meat or some unknown nanomachines that were mixed in the food produced by suspicious-looking old-world relics. I wonder if you ever noticed it yourself.”

Akira frowned. If asked whether he had noticed it himself, the answer was definitely yes.

Akira was able to connect to the old-world domain, that in itself could be considered as an immediate change. It was an ability that the current technology could not explain yet. Although he was able to meet Alpha thanks to that, it was not like he could honestly feel happy about it.

“…So the City Management is distributing those kinds of foods, huh?”

“Well, it’s just like what people say, there’s nothing more expensive than free stuff. You can get them for free, but they’re unhealthy. So I hope you understand that part. By the way, it’s basically written in the wrapping of the distributed food and the signboards in the distribution areas, you know? But well, I bet there are not many people in the slum city who can read those warnings though. On the other hand, I’m sure those who can read the warning decide not to say anything since they’ll be troubled if the city stops distributing free food. Although there are good people out there who give out healthy food for free, I bet they are not the majority. Moreover, if such information leaks outside, big influential people in the slum city would immediately monopolize those people. Well, that’s just how it works in the slum city. It’s not like I can do anything about it even if you complain to me.”

The City Management mostly kept its hands clean from the slum city. As long as the slum city did not cause any bad influence on the rest of the city, the City Management would leave the slum city alone. It could even be said that the order in the slum city was guarded by the people of the slum city.

Even if the slum city was technically a part of the lower district, people regarded it as a part of the wasteland. That was why people had no problem robbing under the daylight just like those thugs who attacked Akira the other day. Even if those thugs killed Akira, no one would try to capture those thugs. But it also worked both ways, no one would try to capture Akira even if he fought back and killed all of those thugs as long as those thugs were not affiliated to any organization.

But then, if someone said that that slum city was lawless, that was completely wrong. If power was everything, then the ruler of the eastern district was the Corporate Government, while the ruler of the slum city was Kugamayama city, and both the Corporate Government and the Kugamayama city hated unruliness. If the order in the slum city worsened to the point it even caused damage to Kugamayama city, the City Management would not hesitate to clean the whole slum city together with everyone inside it.

That was why the people of the slum city at least kept the minimum level of order. And the gangs in the slum city were overseeing that by maintaining the order in their respective territory.

“I don’t know whether it’s because of those foods or not, but the nanomachine residue in your body was pretty bad. Although I know all Hunters rely on drugs, you particularly consumed a huge amount of medicines, didn’t you?”

“Yeah, that is my only choice if I don’t want to die after all.”

“I’m sure you’ll keep doing that in the future no matter what I say. So make sure that you check your nanomachine residue and get them cleaned at least once per month. Most drugs for Hunters contain nanomachines no matter whether it’s healing medicine, accelerator, stimulant or any other kinds of drugs.”

“Is it bad if I get residue inside my body?”

“Well, there are exceptions and it depends on the type of nanomachine. The effect also differs for each person. But the baseline is, the residue is basically a contaminant, so it’s better if you think of it as harmful to your body.”

Kibayas.h.i.+ then explained to Akira the dangers of the nanomachine residue.

There were rare cases where the person had very good compatibility with the nanomachine inside his or her body, in which case, the nanomachine stayed effective and brought positive effects for basically forever. In contrast to that, most of the time the nanomachine residue acted as a contaminant as it bought a negative effect on the body.

Sometimes the body would not be able to expel the nanomachines from inside even after they had stopped working. Some Hunters, unbeknown to its risk, think that those nanomachines would not cause any harm since it had stopped working anyway. But in reality, it often interfered with the effect of the new drugs that they consumed.

And when the effect of the drug that they consumed reduced, these Hunters tend to consume the drug in a bigger portion which in turn increased the amount of nanomachine residue inside their bodies. Then the cycle continued until the drugs that they consumed had barely any effect at all on their bodies. Moreover, the residue might even harm their bodies when they consumed drugs with nanomachine with the opposite effect.

While working as a Hunter, Akira ended up having to consume a huge amount of medicines. He consumed medicine while ignoring the consumption warning. And so the nanomachine residue had been slowly piling up inside his body without him even knowing it.

Kibayas.h.i.+ sincerely warned Akira since he still wanted to enjoy watching Akira.

“Basically, for a Hunter, the body is their main a.s.set. There are Hunters who think that they only need guts to do impressive feats and end up neglecting their bodies. If you want to survive for long, be sure to take good care of your body just like how you take care of your rifles. If you don’t take proper care of your rifles, the bullet that it spews might fly in the wrong direction, it might even explode too. There’ll be a good chance that the rifle itself will explode any time you pull the trigger. Same is the case for your body as well. It’s not at all funny if you die because of something as stupid as that. So make sure to be careful.”

“Okay… Hm? Speaking of rifle…”

Akira remembered about his own equipment. At the moment, he had nothing other than the clothes on his body.

Akira scanned the whole room one more time, but he could not find his stuff anywhere. So he then asked Kibayas.h.i.+.

“Where are my equipment?”

Kibayas.h.i.+ did not know where Akira’s equipment was as well, so he used his information terminal to contact another staff member. After that, he then conveyed the bad news to Akira.

“…Nothing?”

“Yeah. Rather than your equipment, your current personal belonging itself is zero. It’s not like we could recover all of your belongings from where we arrested you, as for your belongings that we recovered like your rifles and augmented suit, they were confiscated and broken down by the City Management for inspection in order to clear your name. Right now they’re under the custody of the City Management as evidence. You can have them back, but all the processes will take you at least 1 month, not to mention that all of them were already severely damaged.”

“Did you find my Hunter ID at least?”

“I don’t know. Either your ID is left behind where we arrested you or it’s confiscated as evidence. Whichever it is, it’s faster if you ask for a reissue.”

“Alright then, so here is my request. Reissuance of my Hunter ID, an information terminal that I can immediately use and some Hunter clothes that I can wear. After all, if I go out like this, I’ll look like a patient running from the hospital.”

“Roger that. I’ll have them sent to this room later. Anything else?”

Akira turned to Alpha.

“Alpha, do I need anything else?”

“Aren’t you going to ask for a rifle or an augmented suit?”

“For the equipment, I want to buy them from s.h.i.+zuka’s shop if it’s possible. It’s not like that’s a must though.”

Alpha knew that it was only a matter of preference, but if it was something meaningful for Akira, she had no plan trying to carelessly change his preference.

Although it would mean that Akira would have to walk from the hospital to s.h.i.+zuka’s shop without any weapons, Alpha thought that it would be alright as long as he had her support. If he could not even avoid problems on this level, then he might as well never step outside.

“In that case, let’s have him introduce us to some real estate agent for Hunters. You need to step up from living in inns soon.”

Akira agreed with her opinion and conveyed it to Kibayas.h.i.+.

“Introduce me to a real estate agent. I’m not sure if I can rent a good house with my Hunter Rank, so please find me a cheap but decent house. And also, hmm, right, hurry up with the payment. I want to buy new equipment with that money. I guess that’s all I have to ask.”

“Alright. About the payment, it should’ve been directly transferred to your account. Just check it once you get your Hunter ID and information terminal. Just to be safe, I’ll leave my contact in your information terminal after setting it for standard first-use. As for the real estate agent, I’ll try to connect you with a real estate agent under the City Management. I’ll send the details through your Hunter code later, so check your terminal once you get it. So, anything else? If you have nothing else, I’ll leave the room. Once I’m outside, you can’t ask me for anything more. So, do you really have nothing else to ask?”

“Yeah.”

“I see, alright then, take care and good luck in your hunt. I’ll be looking forward to your next reckless feat.”

Kibayas.h.i.+ waved his hand and left the room.

It was only a few minutes after Kibayas.h.i.+ left the room when Akira could feel his empty stomach. He had not eaten anything for a whole week. He bet that he was fed through an I.V tube during his treatment.

The moment he realized that he had an empty stomach, his stomach started to grumble. But at the moment, Akira had no money at all, and even if he had some money, it was not like he could leave that place before he could get his Hunter ID. Akira regretted the fact that he did not ask Kibayas.h.i.+ for food.

“…Oh great, I should’ve asked for some food too.”

“Now that you mention it, it has been a week since your last meal. You didn’t notice it earlier?”

“You didn’t notice it either?”

“I don’t need food. Since you didn’t say anything, I thought that you were okay at the moment. It’s not like I can tell if you’re hungry, you see. So let’s just wait, I’m sure that your stuff will come soon.”

“…Ah, I should’ve also asked when they will arrive here. You only remember things like this once you miss your chance.”

“That’s true.”

Akira had no other choice but to keep waiting while enduring his empty stomach. It took about an hour before a city staff member came to that room, bringing all the stuff that Akira asked Kibayas.h.i.+.

—*—*—*—

s.h.i.+zuka was managing her shop just like always.

As usual, she was spending her days selling ammo and other equipment to the Hunters for her living. But, s.h.i.+zuka herself noticed that she had been sighing more than usual lately. She even understood the reason behind it, it was because it had been a week since the last time Akira visited her shop.

There had been occasions when Akira did not visit her shop for more than a week in the past. But right now, he should have just finished his request to take out the Yarata scorpion nest in the underground city.

s.h.i.+zuka’s shop was quite popular. It was selling a pretty good collection of equipment and it had a lot of regular customers. As such, she knew a lot of Hunters who bought their equipment from her shop and never returned.

There were Hunters whom she got acquainted after they bought equipment for a few times in her shop. There were also those whom she knew well after coming to her shop for consultations or getting recommendations for buying equipment. There were even some Hunters who flirted with her or even asked her hand in marriage. All kinds of Hunters went to the wasteland chasing after money and fame just to end up dead. s.h.i.+zuka knew that all too well.

But s.h.i.+zuka was running a business, and in order to protect her sanity, she was intentionally trying not to let herself be bothered by their death. After all, she was doing business with the people who might die practically anytime. If she let herself be bothered by their death, she would not be able to continue the business. Although she might feel sad, she did not let it interfere with her calm life. People might call her heartless, but she had decided to accept that too.

That was exactly why it was extremely rare for her to be sighing just because one of her frequent customers did not visit her shop for an extended period of time.

[… I guess I’m too emotionally invested this time, I wonder why I did that.]

s.h.i.+zuka kept thinking while managing her shop, to be honest, she could come up with many reasons. It might be because Akira was a small boy and she felt like it was her responsibility to watch over him. Or maybe that it was because of her feeling of grat.i.tude toward Akira who saved her close friends, Elena and Sara. Or maybe it was because she once saw how Akira’s body was riddled with scars. Or maybe because Akira bought his equipment from her shop and she hugged him before he headed to the wasteland. But in the end, none of those reasons was conclusive.

As s.h.i.+zuka was about to get absorbed into her thinking, the source of her worry suddenly appeared and stopped her midway. Akira looked a bit surprised when he entered s.h.i.+zuka’s shop.

“Welcome, Akira. It has been quite a while.”

“Eh, ah, yes, it has been quite a while.”

s.h.i.+zuka was smiling as she was welcoming Akira with her usual self. Or at least, she was trying to act natural.

But Akira replied back awkwardly as if he was overwhelmed by her smile.

Although s.h.i.+zuka found that a bit weird, she continued just like usual.