Chapter 629: An Edgy Revelation and a Red Message

The time goes back about two hours before the release of the divine elephant... rewinding to roughly four o'clock.

In ShanFro's Rabituza, where the time of sunset differs from real life, a man was meeting with a rabbit...

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"Here, bringin' in another outrageous piece of work like this..."

"I mean, it's just a rhinoceros beetle, right?"

"Just 'cause they look similar don't mean they're the same thing! Combinin' it with 【Quad-Shell】 was pure coincidence!! Geez... the Battle-Horn Helmet 【Quad-Shell】 is now the Supreme Horn Helmet 【Dread】."

Both the look and the name are super edgy... Part of it is that it just looks exactly like a robot head now, but with that turret-like protrusion sticking out from around the forehead, it's impossible to see it as anything else. For now, equipped.

"While yer wearin' that, ya can use the Cross-Mortar, so just do whatever ya want with it."

"Cross-Mortar? Ah, so I can attack from my head by consuming MP... No, this is definitely gonna snap my neck."

"Ain't my problem."

This little... Still, I doubt it's a piece of trash armor that'd instantly snap my neck after a single use... Wait, hold on, if it scales off VIT, isn't that actually highly possible? Hmm, this is definitely suspicious. I'll have to test its performance in the arena later.

"Also, try usin' this for a bit."

"What's this, clothes?"

"Nah, while he was takin' Responsibility, I squeezed the Jewel Weavin' technique outta Dulnyata, so I tried applyin' it a bit."

I got a free accessory, hell yeah. Let's see? The equipment name is the Stone Cloak of Obsidian CladdingAmursidius Uniform... Hm? It's obviously a long coat, so why is it a uniform... a school uniform?

"It's made from the ridiculous amount of materials ya left behind anyway, so use it however ya like."

"No... ah, yeah, I'll ask just in case, but why this shape?"

"...? If I had to say, a revelation."

"I see, a revelation, huh. Well, if it's a revelation, it can't be helped..."

Revelations are amazing, giving me a headpiece that looks exactly like a regent (or was it a pompadour?) along with a long-hemmed gakuran-style accessory... No, no, no.

"Was that really a revelation? What did you eat yesterday? Did you eat something off the ground?"

"Ya wanna get thrown into the forge?"

"It'll taint the fire."

Let's see... An additional 300 bonus to VIT... What!!?

"A-An accessory that acts like armor...!?"

"What? It ain't exactly somethin' rare, right?"

At this exact moment, the existence of a moron who had unknowingly continued playing with paper-thin armor was brought to light. But surely, that moron must have had unavoidable circumstances, yes, that must be it. Therefore, treating that certain someone as a moron would be premature, pure nonsense... Yep, hi there, I'm the moron.

"Ugh... This is the kind of thing you're supposed to learn in the early game..."

No, but it applies a slight—no, a pretty significant negative modifier to AGI... F-Fufufu, well, if it has a demerit like this, there's always the option not to equip it, so I have no choice but to say that making myself look like a moron was actually a genius move!!

...I think I'll look into the accessory effect trees later, seriously. Given that specialized accessory crafting jobs exist, and that accessories with absurd properties like the Sealed Amber series exist, I probably should have been on my guard.

Accessories in this game aren't just mere decorations or bonuses to armor. They're an expansion of your base stats that can basically be considered a second set of armor.

"Ah, but it's pretty heavy."

"If yer gonna swing weapons around with zero restraint, it oughta be fine to have at least one solid, heavy-hittin' tactic, right?"

"Hmm... Well, I suppose it's not impossible."

Especially with fist-brawling builds, no matter how hard you try, it's pure infighting, so the probability of getting hit goes up. Even if I focus primarily on evasion using the Fugaku Style, even a real-life Sword Saint wouldn't be able to dodge an area-suppression AoE attack.

"Yeah, I'll gratefully take it."

"...Yer holdin' onto a Great Masterpiece of Calamity Cleansing, so if ya die some stupid death, I ain't gonna be able to look the pop in the eye."

"Is that thing really such an amazing piece of work?"

"No matter how many of yer lives ya bet, it wouldn't be enough!!"

Apparently, an un-drawable katana is worth more than my life (plural). Just what the hell was I handed?

...

............

..................

"...Sunraku-san, correct?"

"Dwaah!!?"

The moment I returned to the frontline base, a strange sound slipped out of my throat at the voice calling out to me from behind. Turning around, an unfamiliar player was standing there. No matter how many times I looked, this should have been our first meeting, but carved into his waistcloth were the letters "RPA?" along with a red pencil—a logo that probably only an extremely limited number of people would feel an ominous presence from... No, wait, it couldn't be.

"You bastard, you're a CommunistPencil's Minion...!!"

"Fufufu... It's been a while, Sunraku-san... You might not remember, but you pierced me straight through the heart from behind...! In that castle...!!"

"Ah, thanks for your time back then."

"No, no, I don't intend to let it spill over into a completely different game either. I'm just here today to deliver a message from Pencilgon-san..."

While lightly exchanging words with a player named Death Emperor Pepper—an exaggerated name that left me unsure if it was meant to be domestic or not—who was nine times out of ten a former member of the End-of-the-Century Round Table, I thought about this message he had brought... I can't see this as anything other than a guaranteed disaster seed.

"Is it possible for me to just reply 'You fool' without listening to the contents?"

"In that case, I'd have to self-destruct right here on the spot..."

"Wait, why???"

"The grudge of being stabbed in the back makes up thirty percent..."

You totally are letting it spill over! Your soul was left behind in the post-apocalypse, so your remote-controlled ShanFro avatar is practically made of grudges!!

I reflexively took a fighting stance and backed away, but since the scale of his self-destruction was unknown, and I could just ignore it after hearing him out anyway, I decided to listen for now.

"...So, what's the message?"

"She says to show your face in Thirdrema. The situation looks like it's about to move..."

"It's about the coup d'état anyway, right?"

Wait, what do you call stacking a coup d'état on top of a coup d'état? It definitely doesn't sound like it'd be called a resistance or anything like that... Infighting?

"No, no, by having King Torvante restored to power, we can establish friendly relations with the inhabitants of the New Continent, you see."

"Too long, give it to me in four words."

"Puppet Government... No, I'm joking, apparently she won't go that far this time, so maybe Privileged Class?"

In terms of sheer shadiness, that basically means the exact same thing. Oh well, I have a lot of mixed feelings regarding the royal family (mainly because of the Princess's face), but I've also built up a fair amount of flags with the New Continent races. Having all of that crushed by a hostile event isn't exactly what I want either.

"Got it, I just have to go to Thirdrema, right? Where are we meeting?"

"Ah, if you go to the Grand Duke's mansion and drop Pencilgon-san's name, they should let you in."

She's already climbed high enough into the political core to have her name act as a free pass...

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Author's Afterword

As a general rule, the climate in the ShanFro world is fixed around April weather.