Chapter 176: The Sphere Of Understanding (1/2)

Akira was enjoying the bath back in his house. Usually, he would lean back on his bathtub to let his soul melt into the warm water, but that was not the case that day.

In his augmented view, Akira was seeing the information of multiple rifles floating in front of him. He was basically browsing the rifles that he could buy with 1 billion Aurum. Shizuka sent the list of the rifles that she recommended and all the additional data of those rifles was gathered by Alpha through the network based on the list from Shizuka.

Each rifle had an extra explanation beside it containing a small annotation that Shizuka added for each rifle, the ammo type compatible with that rifle, and the price of each rifle written in big characters…

Akira stared at that information and hummed.

“…They are all equally expensive.”

Alpha, just like usual, was also taking a bath together with Akira, then said.

“That’s a given. Considering how many features each rifle has, not to mention that the small market demand preventing corporations from mass producing them. In the first place, when you go for expensive but better rifles, it’s normal for their cost-performance ratio to get worse.”

“In that case, if I focus more on the cost-performance ratio instead, what kind of rifle can I get?”

“The first rifle that comes into mind would be the AAH assault rifle. That rifle is basically mass-produced in the eastern district after all, so its price is incredibly cheap considering its performance. You were able to buy it when you were just a novice Hunter and it has served you very well up until now, no?”

“Now that you mention it, that’s kinda true. It’s indeed a cheap yet very useful rifle. I guess it’s no surprise there is a big fanbase for that rifle.”

Akira then shook that off from his mind and continued browsing the rifles. But to be honest, all the available options in front of him prevented him from making any meaningful progress. Although the price alone was enough to make him hesitate, Shizuka also added a note listing the summed up prices of the individual rifles that basically had the equal amount of functions of each multi-type rifle that he was browsing.

The reason why Akira was doing that by himself was because Alpha reminded him that being able to choose suitable equipment based on his ability was one of the important skills for a Hunter. But with all the available information flooding his brain, Akira kept ‘hmming‘ without being able to make any decision.

Alpha suddenly stood up, the water droplets that ran down her silky skin only served to enhance her already beautiful body. She then took a few steps and grabbed one of the rifles, or at least the image of it, that was floating in the air. That big gun, which was shown there as a price comparison for the other guns, looked extremely heavy. But since both Alpha and that gun were nothing more than images, mass had nothing to do with both of them.

Alpha, who was standing naked showing off her beautiful body, did not suit the excessively big gun that she was carrying. But she then started taking aiming stances as if to show some examples to Akira.

“For example, what do you think about this gun, Akira?”

Just like usual, Akira was not bothered by her naked body. Heck, he was not even tempted to look at her naked body as he was focused on the gun that she was carrying, evaluating it.

“That’s out of the question, of course, I won’t choose that gun. Even putting the price aside, I still would not choose that gun. Though it does look powerful, it looks super heavy. I know I have an augmented suit that would help me carry that gun, but still, it’ll definitely impede my mobility. I feel like it would crush me the moment my augmented suit runs out of energy.”

“If you’re worried about the weight, this is actually pretty light, you know. It’s made of a high-quality metallic nanomaterial that is durable but light. Moreover, it would automatically expand its force-field the moment it shoots to reduce the kickback. So its weight should not give you any trouble.”

“Ohhh, it even has that kind of feature, huh? But that would mean it’ll consume energy packs on top of its original ammo, right?”

“The higher the firepower, the stronger its kickback. So a lot of powerful guns are actually consuming energy packs in order to soften their kickbacks, you know.”

“Hooo.”

Akira nodded, he looked simply amazed by that gun, but even so, he then still shook his head and said.

“…Even if that’s the case, the answer will still be a no. It’s too big for me to carry around and I don’t think I can take that gun with me through narrow passages in the ruins. Or more like, I want to buy a multi-type gun to reduce the number of rifles that I’m carrying, so buying that big gun will defeat the purpose as to why I’m looking for a multi-type gun in the first place.”

Alpha smiled, nodded, and then threw that gun away. The gun flew in the air for a few seconds in a beautiful arc before disintegrating.

“Yep, that’s basically how you do it. You should start by eliminating the rifles that you obviously won’t choose. You can’t make any progress if you just keep ‘hmming’ there without making any decision, right?”

“Hm, you’re right, I’ll do that.”

Akira started discarding the options that he obviously would never take just like Alpha suggested him. When he already discarded about 90% of his options, Shizuka suddenly called him. So he asked Alpha to let him pick the call through her.

“Akira speaking.”

“It’s Shizuka, do you have some time?”

“Sure, what is it?”

Akira once picked a call from Shizuka when he was in the middle of a tense negotiation with Shijima, so him being inside the bath right now did not stop him from picking up that call.

Shizuka was calling Akira regarding the relics that Akira brought to her the other day, basically, about selling the lady’s underwear old-world relics. Shizuka did not forget to put emphasis on how she was able to get very good deals thanks to Elena and Sara’s help.

“So then, I ended up making deals with multiple traders. But some of them are offering 50% more money if you would tell them where you got those relics, so, what’s your plan here?”

“I see, I’m sorry but I can’t give any information regarding that. Even if they’re offering to buy the relics for 100 times the price, I still can’t tell them that information.”

“I see, alright then.”

Akira sounded a bit apologetic when he said that, so Shizuka also immediately stopped pursuing that subject. But because of that, Akira found it a bit weird.

“Eh? Is that really okay? I’m pretty sure those traders will keep pestering you though…”

“Don’t worry, I’m a merchant too, you see. So I have to prioritize my own customer.”

Akira smiled faintly.

“Thank you very much. But still, I didn’t expect them to offer an extra 50% just for telling them where I got those relics. Is it normal for this kind of information to be expensive?”

Akira thought that it was for the case where there were other Hunters who were looking for information where those relics come from, so those traders are offering an extra 50% in place of the information fee for buying that information. But Shizuka replied with something that he did not expect.

“It might be to allow them to sell those relics at a higher price, something like a brand-fee.”

“Brand-fee?”

“Yup. Brand-fee, basically they can reel up the price of a high-quality article by putting a brand on that article. After all, depending on the brand, even the same kind of article can have a completely different prices range. If they know where those relics come from, they can investigate which old-world company produced them or which old-world company sold them. And if it’s from a popular company, more people would want to buy it with a higher price tag.”

Akira was listening closely to Shizuka’s explanation with full of interest. It was a different aspect of selling relics compared to the explanation that he heard from Katsuragi.

“And to top it off, there are people who sell imitations of this kind of relic, you see. There are many ways Hunters can do that, one of them is to make an imitation using the current era’s technology, put it in the ruin, get Hunters to ‘find’ them as an old-world relic in that ruin, and then get a normal trading company connected to the perpetrator to buy it and resell it as an old-world relic.”

Akira then thought, no one would be crazy enough to go all the way to the Tsubakihara building to place fake relics, but it would not be strange for someone to do that in Higaraka Residence ruin. And right now, Higaraka residence ruin was flooded with Hunters. Although Akira and Alpha were the triggers of the rumour that caused it, there was also a good chance someone actually intentionally spread that rumour even more.

“But like, it should not take that long for those fake relics to be found out, right? After all, the reason why old-world relics are valuable is because they’re created using some amazing technology that we can’t replicate yet even now, no?”

“That depends on the type of the relic. Of course, it would be difficult to fake high-tech mechanical relics, but that’s not exactly the case for fabrics. Not to mention, if the Hunters demand to make the deal on-site, merchants can only make a relatively cheap offer based on a short inspection, so a fake relic with a good appearance should be enough to trick those merchants. In the first place, it’s not an easy thing to decide the value of relics even for those specialists. So if they know where those relics come from, they can easily decide whether those relics are fake or not without the need of inspecting those relics first. After all, relic inspections are not free, you know.”

Akira smiled bitterly thinking that there might be some Hunters who brought back fake relics from the Higaraka residence ruin.

“What can I say… It seems that selling relic is not that simple, huh?”

“Yup, that’s why people tend to get suspicious when they make deals regarding relics. I’m sure there would be people who will get suspicious of you too. So when that happens, just keep calm and handle it calmly, okay?”

“Okay, I’ll be careful.”

“Well, we ended up talking longer than I planned, so yep, later then.”

Akira dipped back to his bathtub and lightly sighed.

“…There are a lot of things that I still don’t know out there, huh. Alpha, to be honest, did I ever bring back fake relics?”

“Not really, although, it depends on how you define fake relics.”

“Define?”

“For example, let’s say that someone from the old-world era made a fake article, will it make that article a fake relic according to this era or not? Or is it solely decided based on whether it’s made during the old-world era? Which in that case the fake article from the old-world era would be a not-fake relic in this era. So yep, it’s not that simple.”

“I see, you’re right about that. It really is not that simple, huh.”

Akira kept thinking about the definition of fake relics while enjoying the bath, but it did not take that long before that thought dissipated into the warm water too.

—*—*—*—

Inside a slightly high-class clothing store located in the Kugamayama lower district, Kashua, the manager of the store where Sheryl once shopped in the past, lightly sighed.

That other day when a Hunter with enough money requested a refit for an old-world dress, effectively throwing its value as an old-world relic, came to her shop, her little sister who was talented in refitting dresses completed that request with amazing results. Thus, there was no surprise that Kashua was expecting that story to spread around and lure in other customers with at least that much money as that particular Hunter. So in order to prepare her store for it, she decided to order some high-quality goods. But unfortunately, that type of said customers never appeared.

Although it did not exactly put her book in red, the high-quality articles stuffed back in the warehouse were putting some pressure on her. Fortunately, Kashua could get someone to buy them bit by bit thanks to her talent as a seller, but it would take some time before she could sell all of them.

Kashua then mumbled.

“What a blunder…”

Sheryl and Akira praised the refitted dress that much, so although Kashua did not get more customers after that, she could at least expect Akira and Sheryl to come there again sooner or later. Or at least, that was what she had thought, but unfortunately, that was not the case too. Kashua was in the middle of lamenting her current situation that could not be further off from her expectation.

Suddenly, someone entered the store. The bell fixed on the store’s door rang to let her know that she got some customers. Kashua immediately changed her expression back to her usual seller’s smile and headed to the door to welcome her customers.

They were several young boys and girls led by a lady. The lady did not seem to have any trouble with her dress, while the young boys were donning suits that looked like augmented suits. But the young girls were using rather shabby dresses, or at least, that was the case from Kashua’s point of view.

Looking at that, Kashua was not sure whether to ask them to leave or not, but the moment she noticed some familiar faces among those young girls and boys, she could not help but raise her eyebrows. She then immediately replaced her surprised face with a big smile as she welcomed them.

“Welcome! Welcome! Thank you very much for visiting our store!!”

They were Akira and Sheryl’s gang.

Starting from Sheryl, Alicia, and the other officers, the girls from Sheryl’s gang started to look around the store. A few of them were looking really nervous, the rest, excited. After all, it was a rather high-class store that some children from the slum would normally never be able to visit. They had their eyes sparkle with excitement from the dresses lined up inside the store that they never even dreamt of using. The only girl who was taking it calmly was Sheryl.

While not too far from them, Akira was sitting together with the other boys from the gang on the tables provided inside that store. Viola, who was looking around the store with the other girls until now came to that table and sat next to Akira.

“Well, this place is pretty good for a store in the lower district. I didn’t expect you to know a store like this.”

“It’s not like I’m that knowledgeable about the stores around this place, I just picked this store since it had some good reviews when I was browsing through the network.”

“Oh my, and that was enough of a reason for you to request refitting an old-world dress that even cost you 1,500,000 Aurum in this store? I’ve never thought you’re someone who would splurge your money like that.”

“That money is the money that I earned, so it’s up to me how I use that money.”

“Geez, it’s not like I’m criticizing you or anything, I just thought that was unexpected of you.”

Viola was actually prodding Akira for a reaction to guess if he actually was just simply that lax regarding money or he did that because he was that invested in Sheryl.

But Viola was not able to get any meaningful information from there. Of course, she could never have guessed Akira only did that in order to check his own fashion sense.

That was when Kashua approached Akira with her seller’s smile. She was working hard recommending dresses to the girls until just now. But she decided to go to Akira since those girls, who did not have enough money to buy any of those dresses, always came up with excuses to refuse her offer. Since Kashua thought that it would be meaningless to keep pushing in that direction, she recommended the girls to explore the store on their own and shifted her focus to the people who seemed to have the capital to spend.

“Akira-sama. Is there any kind of dress that you want to get for your companions? We’ll be happy to comply with any of your requests.”