「See an exhibitionist's obscene body! Full color print! Multiple page spreads! Only one gold coin!」

Straf shouts, waving around a magazine with Athea on its cover covered in droplets of water, and looking demurely at the viewer.

「What? An exhibitionist?…」

A man peels away from the crowds of passersby on the street and walks up to Straf's ad-hoc stand with stacks of magazines.

「That's right! She gets off on the idea that you're looking! Why else would she be dressed like that!?」

Straf replies, grinning smugly as he flips the magazine open and shows Athea splashing someone out of frame with sea water, smiling a little amidst flying, glittering droplets.

「C- Can I see?-」

「Yeah, if you pay a single gold coin! If you don't have one, or don't want to, get lost!」

Straf shuts the magazine, pulling it away from the man's reach. A handful of other men leave the flow of the crowd on the street, and join the stand. The first man hesitantly reaches into his coin sack, and pulls out a gold coin. He reluctantly hands it to Straf.

「There you go! Keep it out of reach of children, or they might get unrealistic expectations!」

Straf says, throwing the gold coin into [Portable Storage] as he hands over the magazine. The man quickly opens it as he walks a few steps away, and intensely stares at its contents.

「This woman is naked!?」

Another man comments, looking at one of the magazines in the stacks.

「Nope! But she almost is! Kind of makes you wonder if you can't see a little more than intended somewhere, doesn't it? One gold coin and you'll find out!」

Straf reaches for one of the magazines, and presents it to the men. A few more peel away from the crowd to see what's the commotion.

「Wha-!? What a beauty!」「Is this a drawing?…」「So indecent…」

The growing crowd mumbles amongst itself, staring at Athea on the cover, completely enraptured.

「And it's not just huge udders on display! There's also stock news and opinion pieces inside! If you don't have an opinion on things, why not repeat someone else's thoughts!? Seriously, it's great value for one gold coin!」

Straf exclaims, flapping the magazine around, wagging it like a bone for the dogs. The gathered men quickly reach into their coin sacks, and hold out a gold coin each.

《Heh. I knew this would sell》

「Here you go… Enjoy. Keep the pages clean, or they'll stick.」

Straf hands the customers the magazines, and they immediately open them up. They stare at a page for a few moments, and quickly flip to the next one.

「What a filthy woman…」

One of them comments, and wipes drool of his chin.

「If she told me she's Mercia, I would have believed it…」

Another one says as his eyes dart across one of the pages with Athea sitting on the sand, dripping wet, and abashedly looking elsewhere.

「I want to lick her feet…」「What?」

Yet another man remarks, causing the others to snap their heads to him with their brows furrowed in a mix of disgust and confusion.

「Hey! No need to make your weirdo shit public!…」

Straf exclaims, pointing his finger at the odd man.

「…Feet and armpits are going to be in the next issue. Keep an eye out, buddy.」

He adds, leaning on the man's shoulder with a smug grin. Straf then returns to his stand, but not before giving the weird man two friendly pats on his chest. The man nods energetically, and walks off somewhere with a hasty step, clutching onto his magazine.

「I'll take one!」「Me too!」

An even larger crowd forms, and they begin calling out towards Straf, raising their palms. Smug and satisfied, he smirks with his fists on his hips.

《She must be the cheapest gravure model in existence. I don't know what the spot price of copper was back home, but it sure as damn wouldn't pay for this.》

Straf chuckles away with a massive grin on his face, slowly shaking his head as he takes the coins and hands out the magazines to the hungry horde of men…

…

An hour later, on one of the capital's main streets…

「Sold out! Sold out! That means I don't have more! This isn't an auction!」「Five gold!」「Five and five silvers!」

Straf shouts, waving his empty hands at the rabid, shouting crowd bidding higher and higher. He clicks his tongue, and shoves his ad-hoc stand into his [Portable Storage].

「I'm out of magazines! There might be another print, who knows! Ask a pal to share, or something! If you don't like used goods, you should have been faster!」

Straf keeps shouting as he squeezes his way past the crowd.

「Keep an eye out for issue number two! If you're weird and like everything except the things you're supposed to like on a woman, you're going to love that one!」

He adds, pointing his finger at the horde as he walks backwards. He turns around, and continues onward as he places his hands in his pockets, chuckling with a wide, snide grin.

「Riiiight. Now, to the bank to dump the coins, the market for materials, and then it's off to the warehouse again…」

Straf thinks out loud, navigating through the thick afternoon crowd. A small, hand-sized [Portable Storage] whirl opens, and he reaches in as he walks. He pulls out a printed photo, and looks at it.

Depicted on the photo, a frozen moment of Cycelia grinning happily, very obviously having a lot of fun splashing Athea with copious amounts of water. Her own face also being dripping wet, she watches Athea recoil with one of her emerald eyes closed.

Straf hums, momentarily lifting his eyes off the photo to watch where he's going. He grimaces heavily, thinking, and his mouth jumps left and right.

「This one is going to my private collection, I guess…」

He shrugs, and throws the photo back into his inventory. Straf places his hands back in his pockets, and continues onward, weaving and bobbing through the crowd…

…

Near the market square, right at the beginning of a long, straight road amidst the buildings…

Intensely focused, a young girl applies delicate brushstrokes to a canvas on an easel. She peeks out, and looks at the bell tower dwarfing the buildings around itself. Biting her lower lip, she slowly moves the brush closer to the canvas to apply another stroke.

Thud.

Someone walks into the easel, hooking it with their foot.

「Ow, fuck!」「Careful!」

A man goes stumbling as he lets out a discomforted grunt with a curse, and the girl cries out a half plea, half warning.

Thwwack.

The easel collapses onto the street with the canvas face-down. The small, opened containers of paint go with the easel, and splatter the cobblestones. As the canvas hits the ground, it makes an almost tangibly sad, disappointed sound.

「Aa…Aahhh…」

With a frown, the young painter lets out a soft, dejected sigh as she lowers her arms, helpless to stop the sudden events that happened before her. Blinking sadly for a few seconds at the canvas on the ground, she rights the easel back up, then turns her eyes in search of the man.

「…Are you okay?-」

She asks, and a man much taller than her angrily rushes up to the easel with his hands in his pockets.

「What the fuck is this shit!?」

He shouts, shoving her aside with his body as he walks to the front of the easel. He quickly glances at the painting, then turns his angry scowl to the young girl.

「Ah- Um… It's my paintin-」

She turns her gaze down at her feet, mumbling, intimidated by the man's frightening face.

「Huh!? Speak the fuck up! Explain yourself! Why is this shit here, in everyone's way!? Huh!?」

He leans down, irately shouting in her face.

「Ahhh… It's my painting of the bell tower… The view here is really good and I thought it looked pretty in the evening-」

The girl anxiously replies, twiddling with her thumbs as she continues staring at her feet.

「Huh!? And how the fuck does that answer my question!? I asked you, why is this shit here!? What gives you the right to block my fucking way!?」

The irate man leans further into the young girl's face, causing her to lean away a little and bring her hands close to her chest.

「I- I- Um… I'm an artist, so I-」

The girl blinks rapidly, still avoiding eye contact with the furious man. She bites her lip again as her hands tremble from the unexpected and unusual conflict.

「An artist, are you!? And you think that gives you the fucking right to put this shit in everyone's way!? Huh!?」

The man shouts in her face again, and straightens out to look at her smeared, dirt-coated painting.

「What the fuck is this shit? You call this art? It looks like shit! What the fuck is this even supposed to be?」

The man angrily asks, looking at the girl.

「I- It's the bell tower… It's not finished, and the paint smeared when you knocked it over…」

The artist meekly explains, lifting her gaze a little, but not enough to meet the man's eyes.

「Huh!? So it's my fault you got in the fucking way!?」

He angrily shouts, once again leaning in her face. Some passersby and people at the market look at the commotion, but all ultimately ignore it.

「N- No… But it fell on the ground, and-」

The painter tries to explain, but the irate man cuts her off with a shout.

This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

「That's right! I didn't knock shit over!」

He shouts, and puts his hand on the easel.

「Ah!」

The girl notes his body movements with despair on her face, holding her hands out as if to beg him not to do it.

Thwack!

He forcefully throws the whole easel with the canvas back onto the ground. The young girl doesn't dare to try to catch it and risk infuriating the man further.

「Now I did. And it doesn't matter, because it's shit. You call this piece of shit art? You ever see any art? I know what art is, and you're a fucking disgrace.」

He continues berating the girl. She remains silent, and clutches onto her skirt while looking down at her feet, blinking rapidly while biting her lip.

「Hey.」

Another man approaches, and calls out to the irate man berating the girl.

「Hey what the f-!? Get your fucking hands off of me!」

The angry man abruptly shouts at the other, calm man. Confused, the young painter lifts her eyes. The man berating her just now is being held by his shirt, twisted in some stranger's hand as he holds him up and off his feet.

The stranger is casually holding his other hand in his pocket, and looking at the now shaken man. Though she can't see his expression, it seems to have greatly frightened the art critic.

「You are absolutely fucking right, buddy. I hate it when people think they own the street. They're fucking assholes, I can't stand them. Don't make me go around you, when I'm just trying to get something from the fucking store. Have some consideration for others…」

The stranger says in an odd tone, sounding almost amused, yet something is off.

「…R- Right, so if we agree, why are you-?」

The frightened man asks, holding onto the stranger's hand and looking at him with nervous eyes.

「…That being said, I don't think I like your attitude.」

The stranger adds in a cold tone, causing the art critic to freeze from the pressure. The young painter watches on with furrowed brows, and her eyes dart between the two strangers.

「Say, you ever made something?」

The stranger asks, and the other man becomes confused for a moment. He furrows his brows, and gently shakes his head.

「Y- Yeah? I make myself food sometimes-」

The man hesitantly answers, but a loud, annoyed click of the other man's tongue causes him to freeze in panic again. The calm stranger lets out a long sigh, turning his head away momentarily, before his gaze returns to the man.

「Tsk… I meant other than things, that have inherent value for your own ass. Art. Music. Poetry. Fiction. Anything?」

The stranger asks, and the previously irate man scoffs.

「I have better things to do.」

He answers with a light smirk full of ridicule.

「Right… Like making money?」

The stranger asks another question.

「Yeah! What else!? You don't need money!? You don't like to eat, or something!?」

The previously irate man asks irately, shrugging his shoulders. The stranger scoffs.

「You could make bullying little girls an art form, which brings me to my point…」

The calm stranger says, and casually starts walking with the man, still held high by his shirt, towards the market's more open area. Confused by the exchange, the young artist skittishly follows them.

「Huh?…」

She utters out when the stranger turns around, and looks at a building's wall some distance away. The handsome stranger's face is completely calm, but his eyes are seeping hatred at the man in his grasp.

「…Being an NPC aside, you're a pretty disgusting person, so I feel like turning you into an expressionist piece. That wall looks like a good canvas for it.」

The stranger remarks with a set of bizarre words, looking once more at the clean, white wall behind the man he's holding.

「…Huh?」

The young painter blinks, sensing something bad coming from the building tension.

「…What are you talking about? What the fuck do you mean?」

The man nervously asks with a slight grin on his face.

「I mean that I feel like splattering you on that wall. It's just a little whim of mine, call it wish fulfillment if you want…」

The stranger nonchalantly declares, and shrugs his shoulders. As if the man had absolutely no weight to him, the stranger cocks his arm back, preparing to throw him by his twisted shirt collar.

「Wha-? Wait… Wait, wait, wait! I'm sorry!」

Initially taking the stranger's words as some sort of joke, he quickly comes to realization that it isn't, simply by the stranger's uncanny and frightening ease that he moves him with.

「…Let's see if your life earns critical acclaim.」

The stranger growls, tightening his grip on the man's shirt, entering a throwing pose.

「Wait! Don't hurt him!」

The young girl jumps in and hangs her hands on the stranger's throwing arm, looking at him with huge, wide-open eyes.

「…Why?」

The handsome stranger asks, frigidly glaring down at the girl with a neutral expression on his face.

「…I don't want you to hurt him. Even if he had nothing nice to say about my art, at least he said something.」

The girl answers with huge puppy eyes. The stranger lets out a large sigh, and the corner of his mouth scrunches heavily. His cold eyes turn to the terrified man in his grasp, causing him to tremble.

「You sure are lucky she knows how to take criticism, buddy.」

The stranger says, and drops the man onto his feet. He stumbles backwards in panic, and his eyes dart across them both. He turns his head left and right, and sprints off down a street in the opposite direction. The stranger then shrugs, and puts his other hand in his pocket.

「So… You're gonna finish that?」

He asks, approaching the easel on the ground.

「Ahhh… I can't, even if I wanted to…」

She replies with a sighful voice, righting the easel to standing once more. Her brows rise, and her head tilts when she looks at the canvas.

「Why not? You can always continue tomorrow, if you're demotivated today.」

The stranger asks, shrugging his shoulders a little. He takes a look at the canvas, his then eyes jump to the bell tower in the distance, and return to the young artist.

「I can't afford new paints… I'd have to work for a few months again… But it's illegal now…」

She mournfully looks at the spilled colors on the cobblestones with a frown on her face.

「Ahhh, man. I told her it would be like this.」

The man sighs, shaking his head with a slanted mouth.

「Say… What do you think about my art?」

She asks, looking at the messy, blurred colors vaguely resembling the bell tower in the background.

「…Do you usually get critics like that guy?」

The stranger asks with a light sarcastic grin, looking into the young artist's eyes as she looks over her shoulder at him.

「No… Most people don't even care, that's the worst part. At least if someone has something bad to say about it, that means he looked. Everyone else just doesn't care, no matter how much work I put into my art…」

The girl glumly says, looking at her messy art piece, then looks at the stranger once more over her shoulder.

「…That's why I want to know, what do you think? Be honest.」

She asks, and turns her eyes back to the dirty canvas.

「Honestly?… It's kind of shit…」

「Ah… Figured.」

The young painter's shoulders slump, and she lets out a soft sigh with a little smile, full expecting the stranger's blunt answer.

「…But, I can also see something going on here. I think you should keep going. Finish this as-is, maybe it'll have its own charm. The most important thing is to keep trying, and don't get demotivated by shit like this.」

He continues and shrugs his shoulders.

「It's easy to tear down days, weeks, months, years of someone's work in seconds. It takes a few words, but I don't think you should give a shit about those. When someone spends at least half the time it took you to make something to tear it down, then you can start caring.」

The stranger adds, and looks into the young girl's eyes. She smiles, and returns an understanding nod, but then frowns again.

「But like I said, I can't keep going. I don't know what to do, the paints are expensive…」

She sighs, looking at the dirt on the canvas.

「How much are they?」

He asks, and she quickly peeks at him over her shoulder.

「I paid eight gold for everything, but that was with the canvas, easel, the paints and the brush… I think a full set of fresh paints is around two or three gold.」

She sullenly replies, and sighs.

「Wow, that's fucking expensive. You can have three cookies for that.」

「Huh?…」

The stranger scoffs, shaking his head, and the girl looks up at him with her brows furrowed. An odd, purple vortex appears in the thin air, frightening the girl and causing her to jump back. The man sticks his whole arm in, and appears to dig around within it.

「Tsk… Man, I only have the big ones?… Whatever, it should be fine once.」

He mumbles to himself, and pulls out a gold-colored piece of paper in his fingers. The purple swirl disappears as suddenly as it appeared, and the stranger holds the paper out for the young artist.

「Here. Consider this a patronage, I guess. If you buy property and live a slow life with this, I'll never forgive you.」

「What?…」

The young girl furrows her brows, taking the piece of paper from between his fingers. She examines it, a bold 100 appears in each corner of the paper.

「I've got a busy day, so I gotta go. Remember what I told you. Maybe I'll commission a portrait from you one day.」

The stranger snaps his fingers, and points at the young artist with a smirk on his face as he's walking away down the street, slowly merging into the crowd.

Even if a mere weak what-if, his words warm the young girl's heart, and a huge smile appears on her face.

《Ah. Wait! I forgot to ask!-》

Just as the man disappears in the crowd, the young girl realizes an important detail.

「Wait! What's your name!?」

She shouts into the crowd, and receives no answer in return. Her brows furrow a little, and she looks down at the odd paper the stranger handed to her.

《What?…》

Her eyes widen when she sees the stranger hold his thumb up and grin at her on the paper. Her eyes are naturally drawn to the proud, bold text below, Straf Katastrof Vindict…