I Became a Mesugaki (4)
If I had one complaint about this world ever since I arrived in it, it was that there was no status window.
In any game-transmigration story, shouting "Status Window" and having a screen pop up is basically the bare minimum, isn't it? You stare at it, agonize over how to build your character, and plan your growth accordingly. So why don't I have a status window?
On my first day in Lucy's body, I was so convinced I'd have one that I threw every desperate tantrum I could think of. I thought about it, said it out loud, screamed it, wrote it down, even asked one of the maids what a "status window" was on the off chance I needed to speak the local language to trigger it.
That was a day of trying absolutely everything — and while I was writhing in shame, the status window never appeared. Three days later, I've half given up.
Fine. Maybe there's just no status window. That doesn't mean the skills I picked when creating my character have vanished with it.
...Right? They didn't disappear, did they? Please tell me everything wasn't wiped except the Mesugaki skill.
Assuming my skills were intact, then what I had to do was obvious: get strong enough to kill the monsters that spawn in dungeons. In Lucy's current body, I couldn't even take down a single goblin.
The body that wheezes and gasps just climbing three flights of stairs is supposed to clear a dungeon how, exactly?
Thank goodness I loaded my mesugaki character up with skills for fun when I first made her. Imagine the catastrophe if I'd decided to play like a min-maxing veteran like I usually do — stuffing nothing but penalty skills onto this frail mesugaki body without a single benefit skill in sight?
Yeesh. If that had happened, I'd be weaving a noose out of the frills in Lucy's room right now.
Lost in those thoughts, I pulled the elixirs I'd received from the head butler out of my pocket and lined them up on the vanity. Whatever was inside those glass bottles, it did not look appetizing by any stretch of the imagination. The closest comparison would be that chalky children's medicine your parents dissolve into water when you're too young to swallow pills.
'When you consume an elixir, you will experience pain as if your body is being twisted apart.'
...Yeah, right. As if I can't tell a blatant scare-tactic lie when I see one? Ignore it. Ignore it, Lucy.
I uncapped the stamina elixir and snuck a sniff. Nothing. No scent at all, as if the bottle contained nothing more than ordinary water.
Somehow, that made me even more anxious. It's always like this, isn't it? Just as the night before a storm is the stillest, this odorless draught would probably deliver the most extreme experience imaginable the moment it hit my tongue.
I hesitated for a while, but there was no real choice here. I had to drink it anyway. Stop whining like a little kid, me.
Steeled with resolve, I downed the liquid in one go. Amazingly, the elixir had no taste whatsoever.
Is this really an elixir? It's way too plain for a magical draught—
The change came without warning. Was it one second after I swallowed? Suddenly, my body twisted in on itself. Not in one or two places — the pain came from everywhere at once. It felt like some unseen pair of hands had seized my muscles and wrung them out, like my flesh was being torn from my bones across my entire body.
The pain was so extreme I couldn't even scream. All I could do was roll around on the floor.
How much time passed before I came to? When my senses returned, I was crawling across the floorboards.
...Goddammit. What the hell. What WAS that?
There was no "this process is agonizing" description when you drink an elixir in the game! Then why does it hurt this much?! Huh?!
Did something go wrong? Is this actually an elixir? The head butler wasn't trying to poison me and call it an elixir, was he... No, no way that's it. If anything happened to me, Benedict, who dotes on his daughter beyond all reason, would have the man's head. He'd never take a risk like that.
Wobbling to my feet, I caught sight of Lucy's reflection in the mirror. A chaotic tangle of hair. Eyes bloodshot from what must have been hours of crying. Hands trembling, legs drained of strength and buckling under her. Clothes a complete wreck.
In other words, a mesugaki who had just been thoroughly put in her place.
Goddammit.
Swear words kept leaking out of me. The pain I'd just felt refused to leave my head.
Once, I'd accidentally burned my own flesh. I hadn't meant to — I was camping, building a bonfire, tripped over something, and rolled right across the flames. Having your skin seared is a horrific thing; it feels like someone is steadily carving your body apart. The fire went out quickly and I wasn't badly hurt, but the memory of that day remained the worst pain of my life.
And today, that record had been shattered. What I'd just experienced was worse by far.
My breathing ragged, I buried my face in my hands and took deep, slow breaths. Part of me wanted to throw in the towel, flop onto the bed, close my eyes, and dream of all the pleasant things from my old life. Really, truly, this had been awful.
But I couldn't afford that. I had things I needed to do.
Something strange was happening. The old me would have collapsed right here, no question. I was never a strong person.
Today was different. Something inside me kept shouting that I had to push on.
It's okay. You're not dead. You're not even hurt. It just hurt, that's all. It's okay.
Once I'd steadied my breathing again, I lifted my head. Two elixirs remained, but before touching those, there was something I needed to verify: whether that liquid really had been an elixir at all. If I'd gone through near-death agony for nothing, I'd never forgive the universe.
The simplest test was to move my body. I'd just drunk a stamina elixir, so if it had worked properly, my stamina should have increased. The method was simple — climb from the first-floor lobby of the mansion up to the third. Before the elixir, just reaching the top floor left me utterly spent. If my stamina had truly grown, the results would be different.
I slipped out of my room and headed down toward the first floor. A maid tried to speak to me on the way, but I ignored her. I didn't have the energy for replies — just moving my body was enough of a struggle as it was.
Reaching the lobby, I took the stairs one step at a time. My body felt lighter than usual, as if I'd been carrying weighted sandbags all my life and had finally shrugged them off.
Or was that just my imagination? To make absolutely sure, I pushed myself up the stairs at a full sprint. Normally I'd have collapsed from exhaustion halfway up a single flight, but this time was different. When I arrived at the third floor, I was short of breath, yes — but nowhere near the wrung-out rag I used to be.
The elixir had worked. There was no room for doubt.
Confirmed, I returned to my room and stared at the two elixirs sitting on the vanity.
Drinking those is going to hurt like hell, isn't it.
It hadn't mattered when I'd drunk the first one blind, but now that I knew exactly what that pain felt like, I was afraid to lay a finger on them. Still, with the future in mind, I had to drink both. If I'd known this would happen, I should have just chugged all three at the start — then I wouldn't be agonizing like this.
After glaring at the motionless little glass bottles long enough to lose the staring contest, I ruffled my hair into a birds' nest and stepped up to the vanity. Then I grabbed for an elixir.
Or tried to. My hand wouldn't move. Whether my body remembered the pain from before or not, my trembling fingers flatly refused to bring the bottle any closer.
It's okay.
The pain I'd just felt flashed through my mind.
It's okay.
That pain — every muscle in my body twisting, tearing, and being stitched back together anew.
It's okay.
It was NOT okay. If I went through that again, I'd go insane before I even got the chance to take the academy entrance exams. I can't. I can't do it. I—
Huh?
The moment my terror seized my entire body, the word "fear" abruptly vanished from my mind. I hadn't overcome it. It was as if someone had reached into my brain and stolen the emotion right out of me.
What just happened?
My thoughts scrambled in an entirely new way, and then one possibility surfaced: Fear Overcome. The passive skill I'd picked when building my mesugaki character.
It had activated. It had to be — it had scrubbed the fear right out of my head.
So my other skills work fine too, not just the Mesugaki one. Who knew I'd find out like this?
Alright. That's actually convenient. Thanks to it, my hesitation is gone.
I'll do the regretting later. This isn't going to kill me, right? It'll just hurt like hell. For the sake of my future, I can endure a moment of pain.
I uncapped both elixirs and poured their contents down my throat in one go. Just like before, they had no taste at all. Before long the pain came hunting for me — and when I came to, an entire day had passed and it was evening.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
I'd burned a whole day against my will, but the elixirs' effects had unmistakably settled into my body. My stamina, my strength — both had soared far beyond what they'd been before. I could climb up and down the stairs any number of times without feeling a thing, and the heavy doors of the mansion that used to make me grunt and strain every morning now swung open with ease.
That meant I'd cleared the first hurdle I'd set for myself, so I'd come looking for the supplies I needed for the next step: my weapon of choice.
Soul Academy was a game with remarkably well-balanced weapons. Some were comparatively better and some fell a bit short, but there was nothing so useless you'd never equip it. So when I chose my weapon, I didn't worry about stats — I only asked myself which one I could actually handle well.
One-handed shield was already locked in. With Iron Wall — the pinnacle of all shield skills — in my build, NOT using a shield would be a crime. That left choosing a one-handed weapon for my other hand, and there were exactly three candidates: spear, sword, or blunt weapon.
First of all, no matter how I looked at it, the sword was out. Not that there's anything wrong with swords. They're cool, and their performance ranks near the top — what fault could a sword possibly have?
The problem was that I had zero confidence in my ability to wield one. The only sword I'd ever swung in my past life was a kitchen knife, and I barely cooked, so I'd barely even held that. Would someone like me handle the most technique-demanding weapon class with grace? Not a chance.
The spear was rejected for similar reasons. Spears are supposedly the most beginner-friendly weapon there is — but that's when you're fighting in open ground. Combat in Soul Academy mostly happens in narrow corridors and choke points. Could I handle a spear in a space like that? I could see the future clearly: I'd clonk the shaft against a wall, flail helplessly, and die. Not ideal.
Which left me exactly one option.
"What weapon did you say the young lady was looking for?"
"A mace and a shield."
"Are your ears broken? I'll say it one more time. A mace. And a shield."
The soldier guarding the armory made me repeat myself to be sure he'd heard right. Apparently a girl like me asking for a mace struck him as more than a little odd.
Granted, it's not exactly the weapon for me. A mace in the hands of a brat who barely clears 150 centimeters? Yeah, I can see the disconnect.
But whether it suits me or not matters absolutely nothing right now. So hand it over. Now.
Not wanting to provoke the notoriously ill-tempered young lady, the soldier wisely didn't ask a third time. Instead, he hurried inside and returned with the shield and mace in the best condition the armory had to offer.
"Um, Lady Lucy? These are... rather heavy."
"Just give them to me."
"This chump soldier talks too much, hm? When I say hand them over, you hand them over."
"Yes, my lady."
The shield and mace the soldier passed over were seriously hefty. Heavy, huh. The old me couldn't have held onto these for two seconds before dropping them.
But the current me is elixir-doped, you see? Something like this is light as a feather!
The moment I stood there holding the mace and shield in both hands without so much as a wobble, the soldier's eyes went wide and he started blinking in open astonishment.