Chapter 182 Yatsubayashi’s mobile clinic (1/2)

On the next day, Akira once again had a talk with Kibayashi in the temporary’s base cafeteria, and just like usual, he looked pretty annoyed.

“So, don’t you think it’s about time I’m done with this request?

“Good grief, there are not many Hunters out there who want to end their rank up request themselves, you know?”

“Don’t know, don’t care!”

Kibayashi smiled wryly. He found it amusing that he said his real feelings instead of negotiating with Akira and thinking how amusing it would be if Akira challenged an even fiercer battle than before, but he remembered to do his job to at least try to calm Akira down.

“I’ve been telling you this every time we meet, I don’t have the right to decide that. But well, at least I’ll let the people above know that you don’t want to keep doing this request, though I can’t really say for sure what they think about it.”

Akira sighed, Kibayashi immensely enjoyed his reaction.

“Now then, just like I said, I’m here because there’s something I want to talk about with you. It’s about the cost of your supply that you keep bringing up as a form of harassment.”

Akira’s expression immediately turned stern.

“No, I won’t pay for them. If you’re telling me to pay even a part of it, you can go ahead and cancel the request.”

“Well, it might be weird for me to say this, but because of that condition, the credit you get from selling relics and hunting monsters are significantly reduced. You’ll get more rewards back even if you only pay a small part of it, you know? So are you still fine with that?”

“Yeah, I still won’t pay.”

Akira showed no chance of negotiation for that matter. Seeing that, Kibayashi gave up trying to convince him.

“Alright, got it. I’ve at least notified you. Although it’s because of the contract, the money you’re spending on supply is actually a bit too high. So, I just wanted to let you know that there’s a way to solve that. To be honest, it’ll be faster if you just pay a part of it, but if you don’t like that idea. So let’s do something else instead. First option, you can work under our order for the time being, that would include following the orders of the other commanders from the City Management.”

“What are you going to make me do this time?”

“It hasn’t been decided yet. Well, I’m pretty sure it’s for something like patrolling, guarding, or securing a part of the ruin. So basically, you can camouflage that exorbitantly high supply cost for one person as the team expense. Like I said, the request itself is basically close to compulsory, so at least you can make this much compromise, no?”

“What’s my other option?”

“Limiting your activity to only a certain area where no one would complain if you spend that much money for your ammo. To be more precise, it would be the area past the end of the highway, or in another word, the frontline. Although most of the Hunters working there make sure to bring along their powered suit, I’m sure it’s no problem for you since you’ve won against a powered suit even without using one, right? Personally speaking, I recommend you take this option instead of the first one.”

Kibayashi smiled with full expectation, in contrast to that, Akira obviously looked annoyed.

“…Do I have any other options?”

“Nothing, if you have any good ideas, feel free to let me know.”

“…I’ll take the first one.”

“Roger that. Well then, I’ll take care of the administration. I’ll let you know once I’m done and you’ll get the next order sent to your information terminal later, so you can just follow that instruction.”

Kibayashi stood up and was about to leave when he glanced at the sighing Akira and smiled.

“You can tell me anytime if you want to change your mind.”

“Sure sure.”

Although Akira sounded as if he just gave that reply without thinking about it at all, that was enough to make Kibayashi leave that place with a big smile.

Seeing how Akira replied back so apathetically there, Alpha could not hide her smile.

“Personally speaking, I also recommend the second option though.”

“Why?”

“For the sake of your growth, it’s better if you fight strong enemies.”

“…Give me a break.”

Akira thought that he got this request because he fought that black powered suit back in Ezont Family’s base. For him, it was nothing but a pure coincidence. So honestly speaking, he wished that the City Management would understand that it was not his actual skill. He did not want people to think that it was because of his real strength when it was actually thanks to Alpha’s full support.

While at the same time, Akira himself had no wish to take it easy for his training, but on the other hand, he had no plans to be jumping into dangerous places where he might not be able to survive without Alpha’s support. So he was thinking during this rank up request to just raise his rank high enough to reflect his real strength when he had no support from Alpha. He honestly wanted to avoid doing anything that might disrupt that plan.

Akira did not think of all the hard battles that he had gone through because of pure coincidence, and it was simply because he did not have enough self-awareness.

—*—*—*—

Akira rode his bike coursing through Kuzusuhara ruin. After a few days, a notice reached his terminal right after he arrived at the forward base. That notice contained an order for him to guard a clinic plus the location of that clinic, and its coordinate was basically deep inside the ruin.

At first, Akira thought that it would be a clinic temporarily erected inside a dilapidated building or something, but the coordinates that he received smacked right in the middle of the road with no building around. Akira thought it was weird and once again checked the coordinates when he noticed it was moving. And so, currently, he was chasing that moving clinic.

Akira had to fight monsters along the way too, but he eventually was able to catch up to it. There was a big white trailer parked on the road close to the frontline. It was a big armoured trailer and its big back door was wide open. Akira stepped off from his bike and peeked inside the trailer, there he saw Yatsubayashi treating some injured Hunters lying on a patient bed.

“If it’s just a light injury, wait there for a bit. And if it’s a bad injury, wait there for a bit as well. If it’s an emergency, I don’t mind treating you now, but it’ll cost you more.”

“Uh, I’m actually here as an escort, is this the right place by the way?”

Yatsubayashi stopped, his hand was still holding a weird, or more like, suspicious tool as he looked at Akira and made a suspicious smile.

“It’s you, huh? Welcome to Yatsubayashi clinic, Kuzusuhara ruin branch.”

He finished treating the Hunter in front of him and handed over a cloth soaked in blood to that Hunter.

“That’s it. I don’t mind if you want to keep using the bed, but it won’t be for free.”

“…You’re going to charge me for that? It’s fine, isn’t it? It’s not like anyone is using it anyway.”

“No. I would need to move the bed in case of an emergency. So you’ll have to pay me money even if you just want to lie on that bed.”

“…Alright alright.”

Due to his injury, that Hunter could only slowly drag himself off from that bed before he put that bloody cloth back on and left the trailer. After taking a few steps away from that trailer, he put his butt down to take a short rest.

Akira frowned and said to Yatsubayashi.

“You’re not going to take that man back to the forward base?”

“Sure, if he wants to and if I accept that request. Of course, it won’t be free. Just to warn you though, don’t escort him back without my permission. It’s not like I’m telling you not to do that no matter what, but if you do that, you’ll have to pay for the cost. So just be careful about that.”

“Why would I have to pay when I’m the one escorting him back?”

Akira seemed to be extremely confused there, but then Yatsubayashi casually replied.

“Well, that’s because you’ll be doing work outside of guarding this clinic, which is your main job at the moment, you see. Not to mention, you won’t be able to guard this clinic while you’re escorting that guy back to the forward base. So it’s a given that you would have to pay, no?”

Akira seemed to understand that argument although he also looked exasperated at the same time.

“That sounds to be a huge pain in the neck.”

“That’s just how it is.”

Yatsubayashi only casually said so while cleaning up his medical tools.

Akira was not alone, there were other Hunters who were assigned to guard the clinic too. But since Yatsubayashi actively moved around his clinic to pick up his patients, those escorts usually spread out not too far away from the clinic. Once they entered areas with a lot of monsters where Hunters even sent SOS requests, Akira and the other escorts spread out to clean up the monsters while carrying any injured Hunters back to the mobile clinic.

Akira with his incredible (bad) luck spent his days fighting swarms of monsters and carrying injured Hunters that he saved back to the clinic. Although the injured Hunter was so badly injured to the point that he was barely able to move his finger, he was still fully conscious. Maybe it was because of something that he prepared beforehand to make sure that he would not faint even during an emergency.

That man had a pale face as if all of his blood was sucked out of him, but his pale face was not because he had lost that much blood.

“Whoah!! This bill is too much no matter how you look at it, isn’t it?! I know that stuff in the wasteland is more expensive than usual, but not this expensive!!”

Yatsubayashi just laughed that off and casually replied.

“That is a wasteland fee plus a ruin fee. Considering how dangerous this place is, it’s normal to be that expensive, no? I won’t force you to pay that, but if you’re not going to pay it, good luck going back to the forward base on your own.”

“Shrewd bastard…”

That man was only barely able to escape certain death, so he had no energy left to drag himself back to the forward base. But if he splurged his money on treatment there, it would definitely affect his Hunter activity later.

Of course, there was nothing more valuable than one’s life, but considering the debt later and what kind of debt hell that he might face, sometimes, death was the better choice. That man knew that fact very well as he was at loss on what to do there, seeing that, Yatsubayashi smiled suspiciously at him and pulled out a container filled with green liquid.

“Well, I can understand your predicament. Better the treatment, higher the cost. But wait! If you take this medicine that I made, you can get the same healing power with one-tenth the price, you know!! So, do you want to try it?”

The Hunter glanced at the glowing green liquid and frowned. But the 90% less cost would really reduce the effect of treating his injury there on his money, which in turn would reduce its effect on his future activity as a Hunter. Although it was not a formal one, Yatsubayashi was trusted enough by the City Management to be asked to work in the forward base, so there was no way he was a fake doctor. The Hunter eventually came to a decision.

“…I’ll pay everything, so I’ll take the usual treatment.”

Yatsubayashi looked disappointed.

“…If you’re willing to take my medicine, I’ll escort you back to the temporary base for free, you know?”

“Just give me the normal treatment.”

Yatsubayashi lightly clicked his tongue and started treating that Hunter’s injury. He then lightly said to Akira.

“Good grief, these guys are no fun. You did use my medicine and had no trouble at all, right? It was alright, right?”

“Don’t ask me.”

“You too, huh? It’s such a waste to refuse using such an effective healing medicine that I worked really hard to make just because of some superstition, you know. Geez, this world is really no fun at all.”