Chapter 8  : Fallen Fame

One week had passed since then.

I was still hanging around the castle's vicinity.

“Hey, Shield lad.”

“Wah!?”

After storming out of the castle, I was called out by Oyaji from the Weapon Shop, half-naked with nothing but my underwear on...

To be more accurate, I was strolling past the entrance to his store.

“I’ve heard about your exploits. You raped that companion of yours, didn’t you? Mind letting me get a punch in?”

He seemed to have heard the rumors and was boiling over with rage, announcing his intentions while grasping his fist.

“You too, asshole?!”

This guy's probably the same as everyone else, they'll never listen to my side of the story.

Ah yes, I had absolutely no idea what passed off as common sense in this country - or rather - this world when I first arrived. But raping a woman must have been one of the cardinal sins.

Ah, damn... When I saw Oyaji, the face of that slut rose into my mind.

I was about to get beaten into a pulp.

He violently grabbed me and scowled.

“Hu… Bastard…”

“What? Don’t you want to hit me?”

Oyaji loosened his fist and dropped his stance.

“No... I won't do it.”

“That so? Sure was cutting it close.”

I was pretty confident that despite my low attack power, I could still go blow for blow and outlast anyone in a fight.

Unfortunately, pulverizing people would never convince them to believe me. That's why I chose to focus on saving money for any future occurrences.

Although, venting my frustrations on the balloons did help clear my mind.

“Hold on a second!”

“What do you want?!”

I was about to leave through the town gate when was stopped by Oyaji.

A small bag was thrown at me.

“You won’t get very far with that appearance. At least let me give you this parting gift.”

Inside the bag contained some cheap linen clothing and a worn out mantle.

“…How much are you charging?”

“Let's say 5 Copper Coins. It’s on a bargain sale.”

“…Got it. I'll come back to pay you later.”

It was a bit weird moving around in my underwear. Guess the old man never passed up a chance to do business.

“Remember to pay me back in full, since the only thing I believe in is cold hard cash.”

“Ah, sure thing.”

I put on the clothes and donned the mantle, then I headed to the meadows.

After that, I went in and subjugated a horde of Balloons.

“ORA ORA ORA ORA ORA ORA ORA!”[1]

It took roughly 5 minutes to kill one of them, but it wasn't too much of a problem since I received 0 damage no matter how hard they bit me.

In order to distract myself, I fought all day long and obtained some Balloon skins as a result.

Level UP!

I'm now at Lv 2.

Conditions for Orange Small Shield and Yellow Small Shield have been released!

Now then, time to carefully do my various daytime chores[2].

I became hungry as evening approached.

I reluctantly returned to the castle town, and headed straight for the Merchant's Shop where they buy various materials from monster drops.

The merchant was a little chubby, and he let out a phony, unpleasant laugh upon seeing my face.

……Looks like he was looking down on me.

I understood him with only a glance.

There was a prospective customer ahead of me who had come to trade in some goods.

Coincidentally, he was also selling Balloon’s skins.

“Let’s see…… how about I buy these for one copper per two pieces?”

The merchant assessed while pointing at the Balloon’s skins.

pieces for each Copper Coin……

“Please do.”

“Thank you for your patronage.”

The customer left and I was next in line.

“Hey. I’ve brought some monster materials to sell today.”

“I humbly welcome you.”

Thought I didn’t hear your little laugh at the end, you moron?

“So you do have some. Balloon’s skins, I see. How does ten pieces for a copper sound to you?”

One fifth of the original amount! This bastard's looking down on me way too much.

“Didn’t you buy two pieces per copper from that other guy just a little while ago?”

“Did such a thing happen? Why can't I seem to remember that?”

Bullsh*t, he keeps making up some dumb excuses…… so you want to do THAT kind of business.

“Hmph. Fine then.”

I grabbed the merchant’s collar and pulled him toward me.

“Guh, wh-, what――”

“You want to buy THESE guys? They're still alive and are very energetic, you see.”

Gupu![3]

I took one of the Orange Balloons that was hidden inside my mantle and let it bite the merchant’s nose.

“GYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!”[4]

After pulling the Balloon away from his face, I kicked the stumbling merchant down.

“The meadow's a pretty dangerous place as you can tell. So, do you feel like doing some proper business now?”

I flipped open my mantle a little to show him the 5 Balloons hidden underneath it.

Since it doesn't hurt at all when they bite me, I figure that they can be quite useful in case some asshole picks a fight with me.

Regrettably, since my attack power is close to 0, I'm not much of a threat.

But thanks to my ingenious strategy, the negotiations were successful.

This pig understood his position. With this little demonstration, he could picture a future where none of his bones remained once these balloons were done with him.

“I’m not demanding any extravagant costs from you. I just hate being looked down upon with people trying to exploit me.”

“You won’t get away with this――”

“Tell me, if a merchant was extorting money from an adventurer, and others were to find out about this, I wonder what will become of him?"

Trust was a merchant’s greatest ally, so he would have already defeated your average adventurer. But sadly for him, his opponent was me.

Which is why I kindly provided him with the alternative of going bankrupt from lack of customers instead.

“Guh……”

The merchant glared resentfully at me with bloodlust lingering in his eyes. However, he soon gave in.

“……I got it.”

“Haha, please don’t be so obvious when overcharging people in the future. From now on I'll be a regular of yours, so I'll be expecting some reasonable deals from you.

“I'd very much like to refuse your offer, but I suppose money holds no sin, no matter where it's from. I'll look forward to your business.”

I guess he was the type of villain who knew when to call it quits. My Balloon skins were then purchased at a price slightly below market value.

“Haha. Feel free to proclaim my greatness by spreading it to others. It'll serve as a good lesson for the merchant who tried fooling around with the Balloon industry.”

“Yeah, I got it. You, dear sir, are one bloody hell of a customer!”

And thus, I received enough money to pay for the clothes that Oyaji threw at me.

I stopped by at a restaurant for dinner. However, the food didn’t have any taste. At first I thought that I was scammed by the restaurant, but it seemed there was an actual problem with my taste buds.

How about the Inn? Since I didn't have money, I had to sleep in the meadows! But that was no problem since I wouldn’t feel any pain even if a Balloon attacked me all night long.

The next morning, there was also this bird-like creature which joined in along with the Balloons. So I pounded on it to relieve my stress.

And I got myself some morning pennies!

A person will learn how to treasure money once they have struggled greatly to acquire some.[5]

First, I looted some tradable goods from the Balloons.

Then, I saw some herbs clustered together in the meadows.

I remembered that the Pharmacy in town sells medical herbs, so these should add up to quite a sum.

While I was clearing away the surrounding weeds, the shield reacted. I slowly let the shield absorb them.

The requirement of Leaf Shield had been unsealed.

Come to think of it, I totally forgot about the Weapon Book.

I went ahead and checked the shields that were lit up.

Small Shield

True power[6] unsealed! Increases Defensive Power by 3+!

Orange Small Shield

True power sealed……Equipment bonus: 2+ Defensive Power.

Yellow Small Shield

True power sealed…… Equipment bonus: 2+ Defensive Power.

Leaf Shield

True power sealed……Equipment bonus: Collection skill 1+.

I opened the Help menu for more details.

「Weapon Transformation and seals on their True power」

Weapon transformation refers to: the instance where the legendary weapon takes on a different shape.

In order to perform weapon transformation, the owner must place their hand on the weapon and silently conjure the desired weapon’s name.

True power unsealing refers to: the instance where the user receives permanent stats and abilities from the transformed weapon.

「Equipment Bonus」

Equipment bonus refers to: the abilities that will be given to the user if they equip this certain weapon.

For example, when equipped a weapon with ‘Erst Bash’ the user will be able to use the skill ‘Erst Bash’.

If 3+ Attack Force is the bonus when equipping that weapon, the user will be granted 3+ attack power.

I see, so by unsealing their true power I'll permanently receive the bonus even without equipping that particular weapon.

Perhaps in the long run, it would be wiser to gather materials along the way instead of just blindly massacring enemies.

Just how much more game-like will this world get?

After contemplating matters, I became interested in the equipment bonus of Leaf Shield.

Collection skill 1+

This skill will most likely be giving me some sort of bonus when I gather herbs.

Right now I have no money.

With all things considered, this seems like an easy, high paying job.

I equipped the Leaf Shield without a shred of hesitation.

Shun…… a sound like something cutting through air was made, and my shield transformed into lush green, earthy leaves.

……There’s no decrease in my Defensive Power. The Small Shield was too weak to begin with.

Now then, should I begin collecting these clustered medical herbs?

Puchi. [7]

A nice sound was heard as I easily collected one of them.

Pa……[8]

The herb really did glow when I picked it up.

Collection skill 1+

Aero Herb : Normal Quality -> Great Medical Value

Its icon also shined and changed its form.

Heh……a nice, brief description, this will be surprisingly useful.

Sunset came quickly as I wandered around the whole day, stuffing my bag with medical herbs.

By the way, I don’t know if it was due to all the collecting or its short time requirement, but it seems the Leaf Shield’s true power was successfully unsealed.

Other colored Small Shield Series were also unsealed that day.

I returned to the castle town, planning to sell the big bag of medicines in my hand.

“Hou……This is quite a collection here. Where did you get them?”

“From the meadow spreading outside the castle. You don’t know about these?”

“Fumu……you do indeed have a lot of them…… but it seems the quality is a bit bad……”

I then sold the herbs after some small talk. Today’s profits were 1 Silver Coin and 50 Copper Coins.

A considerable amount compared to my previous days: a new record.

On a side note, there was this one fellow that came over to me while I was eating, saying that he wanted to be my companion.

I was getting tired of these guys with their nefarious faces.

……Today’s food didn’t have any flavor either.

Since I couldn't taste anything, I just ordered enough food to fill my stomach.

“Shield Hero-sama, please let me be your companion.”

She came over and spoke to me with an air of superiority.

Speaking as if you’re my boss, that meant nothing but trouble. And after taking another look, she was a goddamn woman like that slut from before.

“Well then, let’s confirm the terms of our contract, shall we?”

“Hai.”

Gah!!!!

Calm down, this is the part where I withdraw, just like how I practiced it beforehand.

"First of all, it'll be a full time job. I suppose you know what that means, right?”

“Nope.”

I want to kill her already!

“We'll be distributing income obtained from adventuring. For example, let's say we get a fund of 100 Silver Coins, I'll be taking at least 40% of it, and the rest will be given out: depending on your efforts. Since you're the only other party member right now, the amount will be divided between you and me. But since we won’t know anything until I see you in action, I'll be distributing the money at my own discretion for now.”

“What the heck, aren’t you just trying to hog all the money with this roundabout talk?!”

“Didn’t I say it depends on your efforts? If you work properly then you’ll get paid appropriately.”

“Well then, I suppose that’s all well and good. Let’s go buy some equipment then.”

“…… Go buy it yourself; I have no obligation to buy YOUR equipment.”

“Tsk!”

Most of the time, these type of people are only after the chance of scamming free equipment off of me.

I can see through their facade. They'll just ditch me the moment I pay for their stuff.

What a dirty method. Just like what the bitch has done.

“Fine then. Hand over all your money.”

“Ah, why is there a balloon here?!”

Gabuu!

“No! Stay away!”

A Balloon was wreaking havoc in the tavern, but it's not any of my business. After pulling the Balloon off of her hilariously bitten nose, I put away my meal and exited the establishment.

In the end, there are no good people in this world.

All they think about is how to prey upon others.

Anyway, I continued earning money as my daily routine. And before I knew it, the second week had already begun.