Chapter 184 - Tiol Wakes Up (1/2)

Translator: Athena13

Editor: Silavin

Proofreader: p4553r

After cleaning up the rest of the monsters, Sonoda and the other Hunters were taking a rest while getting their injuries looked after.

“So, how’re your injuries?”

“No problem. Although that guy is a cunning greedy bastard, his skills are top-notch… Anyway, sorry for getting you into trouble back then.”

Sonoda gave a serious apology, but his teammates replied with a small laugh.

“That’s what it means to work as a team, no? So don’t worry about it. Furthermore, he treated our injuries for free. Though, to be honest, I’m still bothered by the fact that he looked rather happy when he told us so. But it’s way better than getting told to pay because we failed the request.”

Sonoda and his team lightly laughed off their fairly serious situation as they continued chatting.

“…But still, although it’s a good thing that we got saved by it, I didn’t expect the clinic to come for us. I really don’t know what that guy is thinking.”

“So, where is that Yatsubayashi guy now?”

“No idea, I bet he’s out there looking for the other injured Hunters or something.”

“And leave the clinic just for that…? Well, I guess it doesn’t really matter, huh.”

Sonoda and his team laughed, celebrating their survival.

While on the other site, Yatsubayashi was checking the units that the Hunters had just defeated with a wide grin. He was dissecting a young boy robot using his suspicious-looking machines. He took a unit that still had its body relatively intact and opened its head with some kind of tool, he then pulled out something from its head and smiled.

“Transmitter device. But this isn’t mine, it’s some kind of imitation, huh?”

Yatsubayashi could not hold back his smile.

“…Then these are… All of these are primitive terminals, huh. It should only be able to do low-level autonomous action. In that case, are these some kind of makeshift remote control? I see. But still, he shouldn’t be able to reach this level only by eating monsters with this kind of function. Tiol-kun, it seems that you’ve gotten yourself some old-world knowledge, huh. Honestly, I’m so envious of you. Well, I guess I didn’t come all the way here for nothing.”

Yatsubayashi actually did not come there to pick up Sonoda and his team. He was only chasing a signal that might have come from Tiol. The reason why he did not wait until the situation calmed down was simply because he could not hold himself back. Also, depending on how bad the situation was, the City Management might order them to retreat.

That was also the reason why Yatsubayashi sent Sonoda to that place. He faked the SOS signal in order to dispatch Sonoda to investigate the area.

Yatsubayashi looked at the head scattered around him and laughed.

“In case you’re listening, I’m more than happy to welcome you if you show yourself, you know?”

Of course, the heads did not give any reply at all.

—*—*—*—

Inside a white space, Alpha was standing face to face with Tsubaki. Alpha had a displeased face as she was sending a stern gaze at Tsubaki.

“I’m waiting for your excuse.”

Tsubaki replied back flatly with an unfriendly face.

“I have none.”

Alpha’s face turned sterner and her gaze colder.

“So basically, you’re picking a fight with me, correct?”

Tsubaki suddenly started oozing an ominous aura.

“I don’t think I’m being that hostile to you. If you want me to apologize, I shall apologize. If it’s needed, I’m even willing to swap places.”

Alpha and Tsubaki just stared at each other in silence. Due to their accelerated time perception, their moment of silence was actually longer than it seemed. Alpha opened her mouth first.

“…I’m here to hear your excuse regarding the subject under me and the subject under you trying to kill each other.”

“First of all, in order to keep the safety of the region under my supervision, what I did was just a rewrite of the system configuration of a unit that had unstable software based on one of the security drones defending my area. So to be more precise, that unit is not under my supervision. It just picked the subject under you as its target by chance when it tried to follow its software to protect the region that it’s responsible for. Well, I did not specifically tell it to not attack the subject under you, but again, I have no obligation to do that in the first place.”

“Is that so?”

Alpha seemed to have accepted that excuse and her stern face slightly relaxed. Tsubaki also toned down her intimidating aura. Now that the mood had returned to the point that they were able to negotiate calmly, this time, it was Tsubaki’s turn to complain.

“I’ll at least give you this warning. Even if it’s someone under your supervision, I will have to take him out if he steps into my territory without the proper permission. So keep that in mind.”

“Sure, I’ll be careful.”

Alpha only said so with an emotionless face before vanishing.

Hearing that, Tsubaki’s face distorted with displeasure.

“…Good grief, what a pain in the neck!”

Then Tsubaki also vanished from that white empty space. Now that there was no one inside that space, the space itself vanished shortly after.

—*—*—*—

Since Akira had almost used up all of his ammo, he asked Sara and Elena to accompany him back to the forward base. He set his bike to run on autopilot to follow the vehicle as he hopped into Elena and Sara’s vehicle.

Akira was enamored by the scene of his bike running just fine without anyone riding it. Sara, who saw Akira like that, smiled and said to him.

“Although it’s a common feature for advanced bikes made to explore the wasteland, when you look at it, it looks like a ghost is riding it, doesn’t it?”

“Ghost, huh. You’re right.”

“Talking about ghosts, Akira, have you heard about them? There’s an urban legend in Kuzusuhara ruin about a beguiling ghost.”

“Yeah, more or less. Although I don’t know the details, it’s about a ghost that uses old-world relics as bait to lure Hunters and kill them, right?”

Since Akira had some guesses about that rumour, he could not help but make a conflicted face. He then continued.

“…Well, putting the ghost aside, it’s nothing rare for Hunters to get killed when they try to go to the deeper part of the ruin for relics.”

Elena, who was driving the vehicle, jumped into their conversation.

“It seems that in the past that urban legend had a completely different content.”

“Is that so? What did the rumour say in the past?”

“Honestly speaking, I don’t know for sure since there are a lot of different versions of it. Some say that it’s nothing but a rumour spread by Kugamayama City Management in order to scare Hunters from going to Kuzusuhara ruin. At that time, there were still a lot of good relics around the outskirts of Kuzusuhara ruin. So it might be a rumour spread to keep Hunters away from the ruin except for those Hunters employed under the City Management.”

Akira was listening closely to Elena’s story when Alpha suddenly swooped down from the sky and sat next to him.

“I’m back!”

“Welcome back. That took some time, I thought you said that you would be gone only for a bit.”

Alpha smiled mischievously.

“Oh my, you were missing me that much? I’m happy to hear that.”

“…It’s just that your interpretation for ‘a bit’ is different than mine.”

Akira only said so and dropped the subject there. Alpha just smiled like usual.

—*—*—*—

There was a certain room inside the forward base designed to prevent any type of information leakage, it was mainly used by those of high standings. Inside that room, Inabe, the head of the forward base, was sitting face to face with Sheryl and Viola.

Although Inabe was being careful with Viola, he was not taking her seriously. He was also looking down on Sheryl.

“So then, what is it? It’s pretty impressive for you to manage to get a connection to contact me, but if it isn’t worth my time, I’ll leave right away.”

Viola took out a certain old-world relic and placed it in front of Inabe. Inabe looked at that relic and smiled mockingly.

“So?”

“And this is the result from the appraisal. It’s from the Kurogane Corporation. Since I was using a backdoor, it has no Kurogane insignia on it. But what’s written here is the actual result from them.”

Inabe took the document handed over by Viola and skimmed it.

“It’s the old-world terminal from an unknown source that everyone was talking about not too long ago, huh. Are you trying to bribe me with this? What a joke!”

Inabe looked pretty calm while still eyeing the relic. Looking at that, Viola said with a wide smile.

“It seems that your investigation is not going well.”

Inabe’s expression immediately turned serious.

“…What do you mean by that?”

“You’re free to interpret it any way you want.”

“…Where did you hear that from?”

“I might be just making blind guesses, you know.”

The more Inabe’s face turned sterner, the wider Viola’s smile got.

Building a secured route into the inner part of the ruin starting from the forward base was a serious endeavour and the City Management placed significant effort into doing that. So of course, there were many people interested in it which caused infighting between different factions.

The one who was responsible for the planning was Yanagisawa. Since the construction and the maintenance of the forward base was doing fine, as well as the relic collection around the secured route, Yanagisawa was cementing his standing among the interested parties. Of course, it was not a good period for the people who were against Yanagisawa.

If there was anything that they could use to reproach Yanagisawa, it would be the fact that he was so focused on extending the secured route instead of collecting the relics around the secured route. The factions who were against Yanagisawa did not let that slide as they kept using that as an excuse to criticize him.

When someone got assigned to watch over a territory with expensive relics, of course, that person would gain a considerable amount of influence too. It was possible to disrupt Yanagisawa’s position using such a method. That was why Inabe spent a lot of his resources investigating the area under his supervision.

But unfortunately, he did not get a good result from that investigation. The weapon dog and humanoid monster swarm that he discovered practically forced him to stop the investigation, and he was unable to find any expensive relics.

When the area under his supervision proved to be pretty dangerous and without any worthwhile relics, the City Management had no reason to keep investing in it. At this rate, the City Management would completely stop its investment and Inabe would lose all the money that he had already invested in that territory as well as his influence among the competing factions. In reality, he was getting nervous.

When he saw the relic that Viola brought with her, Inabe thought that if that relic could be found in his territory, it would definitely kick up the value of his territory. At least, it would be enough to solve his current trouble, buy him some time, as well as bring in some money for him to get more resources. Thus luring in more potential investors.

Inabe’s gaze naturally wandered to that old-world relic.

[…To be honest, I’m sure I can make it sound as if this relic comes from the area under my care. But I’ve heard all kinds of rumours about this woman. Moreover, even if I can do that, I only have one relic here. It’s far from enough in order to increase the value of my territory…]

While Inabe was still contemplating what to do, Viola put her hand on top of that relic and slid it close to herself. Inabe’s expression turned slightly sterner. Viola then pulled out the same type of relics and lined them on the table.

[…W-well now, if there are this many, it should be enough, but… It’s this woman we’re talking about here… There are already so many people who met their demise after getting involved with her…B-but, they do say that she never lies…]

Inabe made a conflicted face which was a mix of his hope, expectation, doubt, and desire. His expectation that this might be the way to his bright future started to bud.

Viola watched Inabe’s reaction with a smile. She then said to Sheryl in a blatant act.

“Boss, it seems that Inabe-san is not interested. I’m sorry, it’s my fault.”

“I see, alright then.”

Sheryl stood up calmly and lightly bowed to Inabe.

“Inabe-sama, thank you very much for your time today.”

“W-wait!!”

Inabe thought that Sheryl was not faking it and she was really about to leave, so he could not help but stop her by pure reflex. It gave him the final push.

“…Sit down, what do you want in exchange?”

Viola waited for Sheryl to sit back before she answered that question with a smile.

“We are running a relic shop, that’s why we want you to help us get old-world relics.”

“You said that as if it’s an easy thing to do, or is that you already know there are many people interested in collecting relics?”

“It’s not like we want you to get us all the expensive relics out there. We just want you to share some of the relics you collected with us. You can at least do that much, right? We will also pay for them, of course, we won’t be stingy with the rate.”