Chapter 8
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Translator: Xrecker
Chapter: 8
Chapter Title: Valendia (8)
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"Huh?"
Shasha stared at me with her mouth slightly agape, blinking her eyes.
She had a thoroughly dumbfounded expression on her face.
If I had seen this in Lu-Fan, it would have been an expression worthy of taking a screenshot and posting it on the community's popular posts.
The notification clearly said that it had pierced Shasha's doubt.
If that was the case, I would push forward with this.
"You must have misheard me. Trust me. That's all I have to say."
"Is that all you have to say?"
"Yes. You and I just met today. So all I can do is tell you to trust me. I'll show you the rest with my actions."
Shasha was silent for a moment, then...
"Pfft... Puahahahaha! Mister, you're really funny~!"
She burst out laughing, clutching her stomach.
"Ahaha, hahaha, well, that's true! I guess it was unreasonable of me to ask you to prove your trustworthiness when we just met, pffft. But still, to say 'trust me!' Khhh, that's just like you, mister, who hates lies."
"Don't worry. I keep my promises. It may be hard to believe, but."
"No. I'll believe you. Of course, I'll believe you. In the first place, a contract has to start with a foundation of trust. Well~ if you betray me afterward, there will be a price to pay for that betrayal, but..."
Shasha sent me a wink.
"Somehow, I feel like I can trust you, mister."
"On what grounds?"
"A hunch. It's a hunch I've developed over my life as a merchant. It's quite accurate, you know, mister~."
Hearing her say that so confidently made me feel a little sorry.
Because I was the one who had pierced the doubt that made up that hunch.
'Well, it probably only pierced her doubt towards me.'
It was surely that.
Because along with the notification sound that said 'pierced,' I somehow had that feeling.
"Yes, your hunch is probably right. Because I have no intention of betraying you in this contract."
I gently pushed the apple pie to the center of the table.
"Huh?"
"Now that the contract is settled, I'd like to move on to the equipment I want you to support me with."
"Yes."
"It would be better to talk at your shop."
"That's true, isn't it? We have the goods at the shop, after all."
"If we eat together, we can finish the apple pie we ordered more quickly."
"Yes."
I added, to Shasha who was staring at me with wide, innocent eyes.
"It's delicious, so you should try some too."
"Pffft! Yes, mister. I'll enjoy it as well~."
After finishing the apple pie and tea, I left the cafe with Shasha.
"Please follow me, mister~."
I followed Shasha towards the east district of Valendia.
As I walked, I occasionally glanced at Shasha's gently swaying tail, and before I knew it, we had arrived at her shop.
Many people were coming and going in front of Cat's Commerce Guild, which had a cat's face as its trademark.
Just by looking at the Cat's Commerce Guild employees dealing with customers, I could tell that it was thriving in Valendia.
"How is it? The best commerce guild in Valendia! This is Cat's Commerce Guild."
"Indeed. It's flourishing. So, where is the equipment you're going to support me with?"
"My, my~ you're in such a hurry. But from a merchant's perspective, I like that! It's best to do business quickly."
I followed Shasha into the guild.
"Ah, Boss. Welcome back!"
"Yes, yes~ don't mind me and carry on with your work~."
"Yes!"
We passed the working employees and arrived at what seemed to be the guild's warehouse.
Various boxes were stacked here and there, and various pieces of equipment were displayed on the walls.
'That's the Blue Scream Sword. That's the Golem Shield, and there's a Flame Hammer too.'
And the equipment and weapons all looked exactly the same as their images in Lu-Fan.
There was no weapon gacha in Lu-Fan.
Instead, it had a system where you could craft weapons and equipment by asking a blacksmith after defeating enemies to get drops, or by gathering monster drops and collected materials.
And a point that was truly a blessing was that upgrading the performance of weapons and equipment in Lu-Fan was done through leveling up, not an enhancement system.
Instead, there was an alchemy breakthrough system where you could visit an alchemy shop and synthesize the same weapon or equipment to increase its performance up to five times.
However, since there was a limit to the number of monsters and gathering materials that regenerated per day, it was bound to take time.
In the end, grinding was necessary to obtain fully stacked weapons and equipment.
'But what about here?'
The character status window had stats but no level value.
Then wouldn't it be the same for weapons and equipment?
This was a world that couldn't be said to be exactly the same as the game.
It was highly possible that they were at their max level from the moment they were created.
'It's hard to judge since I don't know the exact values.'
Even when I tried to focus on and look at the superior spear I had newly acquired, which wasn't a common spear, as if to see its details.
[Superior Spear: A masterpiece created by a skilled blacksmith with high-quality materials.]
Only text like this would appear, and no values like attack power were displayed.
'Well, I do remember the game's attack power values, though.'
In the first place, thanks to the Penetration skill, I could generate enough power to pierce a bandit's body even with a common spear, so it was even harder to judge.
"Mister~."
Shasha called out to me as I was lost in thought looking at the equipment.
Being suddenly called by a voice that was a delight to my ears almost made me break my "unusual man" persona.
For a user who had played Lu-Fan for 10 years, a beloved character appearing in reality and calling me "mister" had become a reality.
'I need to steel my heart a bit more.'
"What is it?"
"You seem to be thinking very hard. Can't you decide what to choose? If you'd like, I can give you a recommendation."
"No, it's fine. I'll choose."
"Hmm~ In times like these, it's good to take the advice of a merchant who has seen a lot of goods."
"First, I'll choose, and if I think it's not right, I'll ask for your advice."
"Well, if you say so, mister. Alright. Then think about it some more."
"There's no need to think. I've already decided."
Having looked around once, I had already decided on a setup that suited me right now.
"This, this, and... this."
I chose the Wind Leather Armor set, which was green leather with light armor plates on the chest, shoulders, and knees, the Ring of Critical, and the Crescent Moon Spear.
They couldn't be called end-game equipment.
But they were not bad pieces of equipment.
In the first place, while Lu-Fan did allow for overpowering enemies with money, it was an action game that required control, so the story and event bosses could be cleared sufficiently with just the basic permanent characters and equipment and accessories that were obtained with a little effort.
However, that wouldn't make money for the company, so while weapons and accessories could be obtained through grinding in the game, the performance difference gained from limit breaking by pulling duplicate characters was quite significant.
'I also enjoyed posting videos comparing the damage of a base character and a fully limit-broken one.'
[Video comparing the damage of the new gacha character at base and fully limit-broken]
-Video
-Behold, this is the power of a fully limit-broken character. Bow down, you base-character-users.
ㄴ It's perfectly fine to play with a base character.
ㄴ OP: So, can you deal this much damage? Can you kill the boss in 5 seconds?
ㄴ Wow, fuck, is that damage for real? Why is there such a huge difference? Isn't this too much of a cash grab?
ㄴ OP: If you don't like it, pull more lol
Pleasant memories of the past.
That was what made spending money feel worthwhile.
"Oh~ you have quite an eye, mister."
Shasha looked at the equipment you had chosen and placed her thumb and index finger on her chin.
"Well, since you're a spearman, it's probably best to focus on speed."
The equipment I chose was a set focused on increasing critical hit damage in Lu-Fan.
If I had the Penetration skill, defense would be ignored.
Besides, considering the realism of this world, all my attacks would probably be critical hits if they landed.
However, since there was no critical hit stat in my stats either, I didn't know how much the game settings would be changed and reflected in this world, but at the very least, it wouldn't be a bad choice.
I grabbed the Crescent Moon Spear, which had a sub-option of increasing critical hit damage in addition to attack power, and focused my mind.
[Crescent Moon Spear: A masterpiece created by the craftsman Kantz, with a crescent moon pattern engraved in the center of the spear. Potency increases by 60% when striking an enemy's weak spot.]
'Oh.'
The critical hit damage increase of the Crescent Moon Spear was indeed 60%.
Unlike Penetration or Spearmanship Mastery, this was displayed with an effect similar to the game.
I checked the Ring of Critical and the Wind Leather Armor, and likewise, the effects related to critical hit damage were written as a percentage increase in potency of 15% and 30% respectively when targeting an enemy's weak spot and when attacking an enemy's weak spot.
However, the Wind Leather Armor had a sentence that seemed to be an additional function different from the game.
[The imbued wind energy makes the user's body more agile.]
Looking at the sentence, it seemed to have a bonus effect on my agility.
Shasha had also just mentioned a focus on speed, so it was certain.
This was a vague description, not a percentage like the potency increase, so it was difficult to grasp properly.
'And it's not like the equipment's stats are displayed as +??? next to my stats when I equip a weapon.'
To confirm, I would ultimately have to try it on and judge by moving around.
"Is it okay if I try it on right now?"
"Yes, yes~ by all means."
The Wind Leather Armor set, like the leather set I was currently wearing, also included gloves that covered up to the middle of my fingers, so I took off my gloves first.
"Hmm...? Huh?"
When I had taken off all my gloves, Shasha, who had been watching me with a smile, tilted her head.
"What's wrong?"
"Mister, did you take off your subspace ring?"
"Subspace ring?"
"Come on~ don't pretend you don't know. The extremely expensive ring that can store items in a space of a certain size. Even if a ring can be a nuisance in battle, it's best to always wear that one~. It would be a huge problem if you lost it."
Could it be that in this world, the inventory function wasn't a standard feature?
But when I took out the bandit's head in front of Deishee, she was only surprised by the head, but as for the subspace ring...
'No, that was after I had already gotten new equipment. Before that, the bandits I had caught were only minions, so all I farmed were their money and daggers that I could sell at the blacksmith.'
Even with daggers, it was a hassle to take them out one by one, so I had roughly torn the bandits' clothes to make a bundle, put it in my inventory, and took it out beforehand when I arrived near the blacksmith to hand it over.
And after getting new equipment, the bandits' weapons I farmed were not just daggers but also longswords and slightly higher-quality bows, so I couldn't wrap them all in the temporary bandit-cloth bundle, so I had taken the items out directly from my inventory at the blacksmith.
At that time, the blacksmith didn't have any particular reaction... no, he did say something that could be interpreted that way.
-Hah, that bandit had something beyond his means.
'I thought he was saying that because it was the first time I had brought in items from a bandit elite, and he was looking at the bandit elite's equipment....'
But what if he had said that thinking I had farmed a subspace ring from a bandit?
Then I could understand Shasha's reaction now.
I looked at Shasha, who was still smiling brightly at me.
What should I say to Shasha?