Chapter 294: My Girl Power is 530,000

So basically, there's no time like the present. Bilac had completely frozen up, so I needed a spark to heat both her and Areadbhair up. It felt kinda scary leaving the maintenance of a weapon—especially one that isn't even the Togetsu—to Vysache... Not in terms of trusting his skill, but in terms of affection rating drops.

"So with all that being said, Emul, we're flying over to Thirdrema for the first time in a while."

"Waaaah............ I really don't have any particularly good memories of that place, desu wa."

"The moment we arrived, we got chased around by that Fiend (Pencilgon), after all..."

Yeah, I really should deliver a proper, thorough Divine Punishment to her at least once... No, bringing Bakumatsu logic into another game is bad manners and warrants committing seppuku. Besides, watching someone get surrounded by multiple top rankers and getting kaishaku'd (decapitated) from an outside perspective is terrifyingly horrifying, after all...

And so, we teleported. I initially considered dropping by the Crystal Nest Cliff to cancel my gender-bent state, but considering I had to pass through Thirdrema—which is currently packed with new players—it'd probably be more convenient to just stay like this.

"Alright Emul, it's time for some Girl Talk."

I would come to regret the fact that I forgot to take a screenshot of Emul's face the exact moment she heard those words for a very long time───

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"Emul, you're lacking Girl Power! Boost it up and shift into high gear!"

"I-I don't wanna hear that from you, Sunra-ko-san...!"

In ShanFro, no matter how much you try to dress up your appearance, the one thing you can never fake is your vocal cords. That is exactly why the Chalice's power—which completely inverts both appearance and voice—is absolutely top-tier class when it comes to camouflage.
Even if my name displays as "Sunraku", the established impression of "Sunraku (Male)" that I've built up until now will protect me.

"More importantly, why exactly do you have clothes meant for women, desu wa...?"

"Well obviously, if you get a gender-bending item, you're going to craft some... obviously."

Because I asked Bilac to make them while I was still in my male state, even I—who has absolutely zero inclinations like that—got a look from her that sent a bit of a shiver down my spine. But by demonstrating it right in front of her, I managed to avoid unwarranted slander.

"Come on, come on! We're pumping up our Girl Power!"

"U-Uuuu... Sunrako-san acting completely like a normal woman is incredibly unsettling, desu wa..."

Hah— You know, if Sunraku-san really put his mind to it, he could even become a little girl, alright?

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"Woah, I've never seen that equipment before... It's cute, I wonder where you can get it."

"Wait, is that Sunraku...?"

"Nah, wasn't that guy playing a male character?"

"I guess they just have the same name, then."

"...More importantly, why is that person smoking?"

"Who knows? Maybe it's armor with that kind of effect?"

"Both her and the kid next to her have insanely high-quality character creation..."

"Judging by the voice, it's a legit female player. Hey, you go talk to her."

"Don't be an idiot, she's obviously a high-level player. What are you even going to do if you talk to her?"

"You know, kinda take her hand and step-by-step..."

"If it was the other way around, there might have been a chance."

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Should I be proud of my character creation skills that resulted in this appearance after my looks were inverted, or was Ctarrnid just that kind of guy...? The truth remains at the bottom of the sea.

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The moment we had gotten a fair distance away from Thirdrema, I broke into a full-power dash using Overflow. I feel bad for Emul, but she's going to have to deal with the numbness again... Ah, hey, stop kicking my cheeks with those rabbit legs, I'm going to die! I only have 1 HP, you know!? I could easily die from that!

"S-S-S-S-S-Sunr-r-rako-ko-ko-sa-sa-san..."

"Alright, calm down and drink this."

After curing her status ailment, I turned around and saw the volcano—which had ceased activity... or so it was thought—proudly displaying its towering figure.
Well, apparently the highest point on this continent is the Heavenly Sanctuary of High Aspirations, but even ignoring height, a mountain simply imparts a certain kind of intimidating pressure on anyone looking at it.

"Well, to be fair, I'm the one scattering intimidating pressure right now, though."

"Waah... This looks like it's going to be a very carefree mountain climb, desu wa..."

Thanks to Lycaon's Scar, which causes monsters with a lower level than me to avoid me, we were experiencing virtually zero monster encounters... Meaning it really was just a literal mountain climb.

"But, but, how exactly are you planning to reach the bottom of the lake, desu wa?"

"Spamming Inventoria."

"Ah..."

Looks like another page is being added to the Legend of the Strongest Inventory Key... I mean seriously, no matter how much they nerf it, there's no way an ultimate ability like "Evacuating to a separate dimension that completely shuts out all interference" could ever become useless.
Even if I become unable to use it during combat, it's still insanely useful for things like catching my breath, like right now... And personally, I think the fact that it can reset kinetic energy governed by physical calculations is absolutely, utterly broken.

".........Nyu?"

"What's wrong, Emul?"

"Don't tell me... I'm staying behind to watch the house again, desu wa?"

"........................................................................................................................You noticed, huh..."

I looked away.
Emul puffed out her cheeks.

No, I mean, Inventoria is strictly for one person... And to begin with, I don't really fully understand how the ShanFro system handles being underwater...

"I feel like recently I've just been treated as a convenient teleportation taxi, desu wa!"

"I mean, come on, if you came with me to the Crystal Nest Cliff, you'd die, right?"

"The fact that you happily keep going back there over and over again is what's weird, Sunraku-san-!!"

The ecology of their mob beatdowns is so incredibly awful that I'm practically monopolizing the area, and that feels great, you know? Recently, that bastard OiKatzo has been subtly trying to coax the strategy out of me, but like hell I'd tell him! You go experience the feeling of being a volleyball getting blown away by a scorpion mob beatdown yourself, and then figure it out on your own!

"More importantly, Emul."

"Yes, desu wa."

"Thinking about it carefully, once I retrieve the target item, I'll probably just Death-port (Respawn) anyway, so either way, we'll end back up in Rabituza, right!?"

"That makes eighty percent of all the effort it took to get here completely pointless, desu waaaaa!!"

"You're absolutely righhhht........."

A somersault launched from a leap nailed me right in the jaw, and losing my balance, I ended up rolling down the mountain for about ten meters.

"I knew it would be, but this is heavy... Actually, if I equip the Mech-Beast on top of this while underwater, isn't my mobility going to just completely die...?"

If you mixed a gorilla, an American football player, and heavy machinery together to make a robot, this is what you'd get. It was the very definition of a "Heavyweight"... Heavy armor primarily colored in deep green resembling moss thriving in the shade, and pitch-black. That was the appearance of the Non-Standard Special Enhanced Armor [Fugaku].

Fugaku... Fugaku... Memories of a challenge that felt more like ascetic training flashed through my mind, but that swordmaster probably had nothing to do with this. The naming was almost certainly literally referring to a "Mountain."
But if that's the case, then another question pops up. However, as someone who has stepped fairly deep into the truth of this world through Unique Scenarios, I already have a rough idea of the answer.

In the end, it's an issue of perception. They say sufficiently advanced science is indistinguishable from magic, but strictly speaking, that's wrong. To be precise, it should be, "As long as you don't reveal the trick, you can make people believe science is magic"... And that's probably the underlying logic of this game's world setting, too.

"Alright, let's go!"

"Have a safe trip, desu wa! I'll be heading back to Rabituza first, desu wa!"

"Sorry for making you do all that for nothing. I'll buy you something later."

I am incredibly filthy rich right now, after all.

"T-Then, how about that insanely expensive magic..."

"That thing has a completely unhinged price tag, you know..."

A hundred million for a single grimoire? Wait, you want me to buy that? Are you perhaps still angry?

Well, I can casually afford it, so maybe it's time to restart the Emul Enhancement Project for the first time in a while. Thinking about that, I dove into the Crater Lake of Rise and Fall... the massive lake situated at the summit of the mountain.

The truth of this area spoken by Vysache. With a mysterious power similar to turning a tiger into butter, Siegwurm physically used the Generation Before Last's "Red Dragon" as a lid to completely halt the volcanic activity... Which means there is no such thing as "shallows" in this extinct volcano.
If I had to describe it, it's like stabbing your finger straight down into a massive lump of cookie dough until you hit the cutting board underneath. I mean, the system-level physics engine in ShanFro is absolutely flawless, but the world-setting-level physics are full of holes... I mean, you can get gender-bent just because a cup glowed, so there's no point sweating the small stuff.

The sinking [Genbu] harbored no light of activation. Naturally, since OiKatzo holds the Reactor, this is quite literally nothing more than exceptionally heavy armor.
Of course, it doesn't have a system to supply oxygen underwater, meaning I'd suffocate to death in about a minute, but...

"This is so convenient I could honestly place self-imposed restrictions on it..."

Teleport into the storage dimension, take a deep breath of air, spam the MP recovery gacha, and dive back out.
The rest was just pure routine work. Sinking deeper and deeper under the sheer weight crushing my buoyancy, periodically retreating into the storage dimension to replenish oxygen and magic power... And finally, in real space, my feet landed on something.

"Sorry about stepping on you."

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If Vysache's words were true, then the very thing I was stepping on right now as the ground was the wretched remains of the "Red Dragon Creptoculm," slaughtered by Siegwurm in the distant past.

Author's Afterword
This is absolutely perfect Girl Power, desu wa...

• Red Dragon Creptoculm
  Unlike Dreadhowl, it originated from the Old Continent. It got a little too cocky, but mostly it was because it unknowingly tap-danced right on top of a landmine, resulting in Siegwurm delivering a severe punishment. Its physical body remains as a "Lid," but it is completely dead, meaning the passing of the torch to the next generation has already occurred.