第四回：无脑打怪乃上上策，小城受困怪女出计
"Yeah! Run! Run you cowards! That's all you are good for!"
Those lines would have more weight if delivered from a less compromising position, Madi-san. The [Exposer of Conspiracies] is bent over kneeling on the ground, with her head down and bottom up, her gyatt still slightly sore from the recent beating.
After the cancellation of our humanity, followed by having the constitutionally enslaved (whatever that means) debuff slapped on us, Ducky-Wucky deigned to have those funny guards enact parts of a 『ryona』[1] manga on us. Madi-san got the worst of it, taking the brunt of the assault for me; the doujins write themselves, so I won't go into detail.
Thus we find ourselves on and off the pain-train. We must have been travelling for hours while unconscious, for when I woke up inside the totes comfy cage with Madi-san's breasts pressed against my face, the pain-train was already travelling past a desolate and deserted region completely foreign to me.
The good thing is that the jelly-like restraints eventually melted into nothingness on our journey, I guess even the 【Dao of Ryuu】 obeys time limits for their sorcery. It was only when the pain-train suddenly jerked to a creaking stop, and the visor-faced guards roughly flung Madi-san and (me) out of the cage that I realize our journey had reached the end.
"Argh...!" My left shoulder bounces off the rough sand as I attempt to roll off the damage, to no avail. Madi-san didn't really do better, landing on her gyatt, yelling and hollering before ending up in the current position she finds herself in. About half a dozen faceless prisoners are dragged out of their cages and flung to the ground in the exact same fashion.
As parting supplies, the guards tossed a pair of beaten sticks and a single, rough stone the size of a fist at the ground near our beaten bodies, doing the same for the other pairs of prisoners. Finally, they toss us a simple, tiny, triangular flag, the kind you might wave at a circus show, with a familiar ducky face imprinted on.
That's about it.
We now return to the present.
"You know what I really crave for right now, Aya-chan?" Madi-san says, one foot driving Lord-of-the-Ducks' image deeper into the sand with pouty twists of her bare feet.
"Oh no, not another food metaphor..."
"A nice braised duck meal! The kind that's plated with sweet and dark sauce you can only find in {Liyxe}!"
"I am unsure where that is, but I can get the feeling." Folding my arms across the loose rags that barely cover my dignity, I have my own grudges against the avenkind now. Shuddering from repeated bad experiences with weirdos in bird-themed skinsuits, I have to wonder if I offended some vermillion bird in a past life or something.
Between Madi-san's oaths of turning our nemesis into chopped liver, I also have to wonder what's the meaning behind sending us "cancelled humans" into the badlands, and expecting us to wave Squire Duckford's flag while at it. Surely no human is dumb enough to believe that after thoroughly abusing their captives, their captives will suddenly turn around and start throwing up salutes in their name, are they? No, that's something I expect out of a yabai manga with the 「turning into combatants」[2] tag!
"Besides, what's with them??" Madi-san quizzically asks, jabbing a thumb at the dirty half dozen, huddled and shivering nearby. Dressed in shabby rags not unlike ours, their identical faceless demeanors are not helped by their long, overgrown hair falling over their eyes, making it difficult to make them apart. I can only guess that they have been through the same treatment we got.
Giving a small wave, I try to make contact with the beaten group. "Hellos? Have you guys had your humanity card cancelled as well?"
There is no response.
Madi-san is more direct, striding on foot forth with one finger pointed at the group:
"Scram! I don't need more accomplices! Aya-chan's all the accomplice I need!"
I'm glad to hear that, though I don't think they are listening. They stay still and silent as statues, their slight, occasional heaving the only proof that we are not dealing with zombies here.
"Hmm, hmm!! Don't tell me... these are [NPCs]?!"
"What are you on about, Madi-san..."
"Not everyone in the geimu world gets to be a voiced and named character, Aya-chan!" Madi-san puffs her chest out, while putting both hands on her hips. "Some people are just background characters! No backstory, no funny moments, zilch, nada~!"
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Yes, I get that having a name and a Fxxxxh cap makes you oh-so-uniquely-important, Madi-san. What does that have to do with anything?
Madi-san advances towards the group, stick in hand, slapping it in the palm of her other hand like one would do before putting down a terrier in the back of a shed.
"That means they are free EXP bags...!"
"... NO! Stop! Madi-san, 『yamero』!! 『yamerooo』[3] !!!" I tug at Madi-san with all the tiny strength in my body as she casually drags my tiny body forward, the soles of my feet making two long trails in the yellow sand!
"Why shouldn't I? We might ACTUALLY figure out what that [Dao of the Ryuu] thing is if we level up from this!"
As much as I want to know what the Dao of ryuu is for myself, casually committing acts of immorality to do so HAS to violate an ethics code somewhere! I spin my mind around for an excuse, ANY excuse to stop Madi-san from violating multiple peace convention treaties at once...!
"Wait, Madi-san...! WAIT!" Madi-san has already raised her wooden stick up high, and I notice not a single member of that group flinched in fear; they all just stand there with like emotionless murder victims whose speech and motions have been stripped away.
Like puppets...
"Madi-san! MADI-SAN! Listen!! This group..." I motion towards them with a dramatic gesture in one hand, while unsuccessfully trying to stop an overly excited Madi-san from her imminent seal clubbing activity, "... this pathetic group will give us too little EXP!"
Oh thank all the good gods in the world Madi-san stopped in her tracks! Is speaking in /v/ the only way to get through that thick skull of hers?! I prefer not to delve into the overlaps between our thinking as much as possible, but preventing a serious case of pre-meditated first degree murder seems to be a worthy cause to do so!
"Eh... You're probably right. Looters aren't much EXP after all."
"Am I finally getting through that thick skull of yours?"
As if she had a sudden epiphany, she slaps the coarsely made stick in her palm and points to the sky.
"We SHOULD be hunting dragons after all!"
Well, that's a slight improvement at least.
"No, I mean, why can't we start with something small..."
That was when we heard the suddenly loud sound of rock crashing against stone in a distance.
"It came from... that a-way!"
Madi-san points west, to a high sand dune where the noise came from; scrambling, scurrying and finally reaching the summit of said dune, Madi-san instantly lurches forward in prone position, crawling forward through the sand with all the grace of a hardboiled snake. Putting a hand vertically above her eyes to cast out the midday sun, she points excitedly at the activity going on below.
The sand dune rises up above the sandy plateau like a semi-triangular cliff; a crossbow's shot away below us, a small camp has been erected. A pair of black tents have gone up in a fenced enclosure, trampling on what little green grass is left in this barren land. Faceless, black bandanaed girls are standing guard in the camp. I can count at least a good dozen with my eyes, maybe more hiding inside the tents. There's a cage at the center of the encampment, with something faintly orange and curled up inside.
What caught my eye wasn't the tents, but the wheeled implement which was rolling out of the tent.
A catapult.
It joins a second catapult in front, which had just fired its load at a distant walled gate at least three hundred paces ahead. A rock-sized indent can be seen in the walls, even as far away from here, and the black bandanna girls appear to be readying the catapults for a second shot!
image [http://static1.squarespace.com/static/62cd15458bbca47144469710/62cd15995860f00f7cf2cc5e/669497f39c8807329051163a/1721014425241/20240715112848_1.jpg]
> "Which part of, 'I don't want no trouble' do you not understand, Madi-san?" - Ayano Sane
"Hmm, hmm! If playing {Pxlxxxxd} has taught me anything, THESE are the baddies!"
"Alright, Madi-san, we back away slowly... We saw nothing here..."
"We can take em'!" Madi-san beams at me with an absolutely unfounded confidence with her thumbs up!
I had just joined Madi-san in crawls-like-snake position and rubbed two handfuls of sand down my face in utter frustration.
"We are outnumbered at LEAST ten to one down there! And I don't want to tangle with catapults without knowing who or what we are going against. This isn't our fight, let's calm down and..."
"The odds aren't that bad, if we count them~"
Madi-san motions at the dirty half-dozen group, which had been silently following behind us the whole time.
"Look, Madi-san, I'm not rushing in without a plan..."
"... and I'm telling you I HAVE one!"
Fine. Let's hear it. Knowing you, it probably is something absurdly difficult to pull off and requires immense luck to even do so...
"My plan is this... ... ... ..."
...
...
...
That might actually work.
"See! I TOLD you!" Madi-san rises triumphant from the sand, specks of yellow dust falling off her rags.
On one condition.
"Nani, nani??"
I do the talking.
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NEXT:『Hai』 Is A Universal Greeting Between Cultures, A Touch Of Madness Is What (You) Need!
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Go Go And Learn Moonrunes With Aya-chan!
[1] 「ryona」- Violence. Extreme violence. You didn't need to know that.
[2] 「turning into combatants」- When cute and funny girls wear skintight latex outfits and make weird salutes. You didn't need to know that either.
[3]『yamero』- It means "Don't do it, Madi-san!!!"