"Welcome to Los Santos!" Issei shouted as we got off the airbike.

"It says Los Angeles on the sign, though." I pointed out.

"It's a GTA reference. Uncle understands at least."

"Five came out literally 20 years ago, dude." Freddy winced, "They brought the franchise back to Vice City in 6."

"Hold on..." Issei gasped, "They finally made GTA6!?"

"Yeah bro, it came out back in like, 2025." He revealed, "It was pretty revolutionary for its time, despite the initial feedback."

"Alright, we'll talk about Gs and Ts at a later date." I stopped them before they got too immersed in the convo, "What are we doing here? Looking at the map, Los Angeles is nowhere near the first World Wonder."

"Gotta refuel." Freddy glared back at us, "Thanks to some two bozos who threw our replacement battery into the ocean, we have to make a pitstop here first."

"Sorry..."

But still, so this is the US, huh? It feels lively. A bit too lively, I'd wager. Los Angeles is a megacity located in the country of Nevada, if we are to believe the map, and from what I've gathered it seems to be quite the popular summer vacation spot. Now it's my first time being here too, dear reader, so please take my words with a grain of salt, but I will admit that it looks absolutely stunning. We may be here just to refuel and all, but I think it'd be a good idea to see what this place has to offer before we move on to the next place.

"Wait, where are you going?" Issei asked his uncle.

"To a shop that sells extra batteries, where else?"

"But you just left the airbike lounging over here." I asked, "Didn't even put a lock on it or anything."

"This is Los Angeles dude. Look around you, everyone has their own, so there's no reason to steal ours." He figured, "Besides, they can't do jack without the keys. They could lockpick it, but then what'll they do if the engine stalls mid-flight? It's tantamount suicide."

"You sound like you really know the ways of the world." I noted.

"I know a thing or two." He joked.

After that, we had begun walking to the shop Freddy previously mentioned. How did it look like? What other things was it selling? My first instinct was to assume the shop is a tinkerer's workshop, but in hindsight, maybe an electrician wiz would also fit the role, given the high voltage items they're working with. Needless to say, both Issei and I were quite surprised to find out the true identity of the shop was actually...

"A skate shop?" Issei was taken aback, "What the hell are airbike batteries doing in a totally tubular place such as this?"

"Why wouldn't they? They're leisure vehicles, just like skateboards, rollerblades and scooters." Freddy then winked at us, "Ah, but then again, the skate shops you're thinking of probably aren't the same as the ones I am. These are future skate shops, so to speak."

"Meaning?" I added.

"Meaning - They sell way more than your standard wheels." He said as he entered the shop to show us, "Airbikes, hoverboards (real ones), hover scooters and even some novelty stuff like wheeless unicycles and super high pogo sticks! They have it all here in LA!"

"What's this? A sponsor?" The punk-looking worker chuckled, "Thanks, bro, but we ain't giving you any discounts."

"E-Entropic!" I actually panicked a bit before realizing, "Oh, that's right. We're not in Japan anymore..."

"Yeah, you can actually understand and talk to the locals here, Lune." Issei smiled, "Isn't that great?"

"Japan? Aww dude, don't tell me you guys flew over the ocean with our merch." The worker guessed.

Crap, we gave away too much! Right, we're technically illegally crossing the transoceanic border right now, so we really shouldn't let anyone know about that. What do we do? Is it game over already?

"Hell yeah we did~!" Freddy dapped him up immediately, "Almost died pulling that stunt too, but we managed."

"No way, dude! That's like, totally radical!" The worker dapped him up once more for good measure, "You three are actually crazy, certainly didn't expect any visitors from good ol' Nippon. So, what do you need?"

"Megavolt batteries. The ones made for airbikes." Freddy estimated, "I'd say aboooouuut... Four should do."

Hm? Four batteries? But if just one is priced for $1500 then...?

"Ahem." Freddy turned to us with a grin, "D'you mind?"

"The hell do you mean d'we mind, you stupid uncle!" Issei fired back immediately, "It's your bike, you pay for the fuel!"

"Oof, not cool, broski..." The clerk shook his head in disappointment, "Hitching a ride without even preparing gas money? That's like, L behavior squared."

"A new slang word?" I noticed, "A-Ahem, anyways! Mister clerk..."

"Rodney."

"Rodney, could you tell us how these batteries are made, perhaps?" I devised a plan.

Right, technically speaking, we don't even need to buy any batteries at all for our journey. Because so long as I know all the materials needed and the blueprints for how to make it myself, I can just cast Materialize as many times as I want for infinite flight. Besides, changing them on the fly will be a piece of cake now that I've gotten a feel for how to do it with Going Solipsistic. A bit taxing on my end, but there's no denying the efficacy of this plan.

"You wanna make your own megavolt batteries?" He actually laughed in my face, "Ahh, you're a riot, dude. Hilarity squared."

"Just tell us how they're made or I'll deck you square in the face." Issei, too, got sick of his mocking demeanor.

"Ooh, shiver me timbers, broseph!" Rodney continued to point and jeer at us, "But for real though, you can't expect me to know that stuff. I'm just a clerk who's high off his ass on weed right now."

Tch, I see druggies are prevalent even in this world... Dammit, just help us out here, man!

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Eventually, the three of us gave up hope in trying to get any useful information from this dope-slinging douchebag and left to go get something to eat. Now you may be asking yourself why we didn't just stop by a pawn shop and Materialize some more gold watches. Now to answer that question - While we COULD potentially do that, our reasoning was that it would be way better to just learn how to Materialize megavolt batteries. It'd cut out the middle man, and also make us not have to store any batteries in the glovebox in advance. We could save on time, weight distribution, and thus fuel.

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"Wait!" Issei stopped right in front of a Green themed coffee shop called Starbucks, "I just remembered something really important!"

"What's with the sudden shouting, nephew?" Freddy groaned, "And why'd you whip out that century old phone now of all times?"

"A-ha! I knew it!" Issei raised the phone that's been with him through thick and thin triumphantly, "Finally, we have Wi-Fi!"

"Oh, it was just that?" I continued walking forward, "You didn't have to cause a scene over that, y'know?"

"Don't you get it, though!? Now that we're not in Japan, my phone doesn't need FRI compatibility and can connect through Wi-Fi just fine!" He pointed out, "Which means we can connect to the internet practically whenever!"

"Hm?" I stopped to hear him out.

"Sigh, you still don't get it?" He typed something into his phone before showing me a step by step video on how megavolt batteries are made in factories, "As the old adage goes: When in doubt, Google it and find out!"

"Gasp!" I jumped up and down repeatedly, "Issei, you're a genius! Give it here-!"

"Oi. That can wait." Freddy snatched the phone from us the moment both of our stomachs started to growl, "Food first."

"But-!"

"You're not gonna watch a how-to video in the middle of the street, are you?"

"Sigh, okay..."

Moving along until we finally found a fine looking establishment named Wendy's which seemed to be the American version of the Japanese McDonald's, we entered and placed our orders before sitting down to eat at one of the tables.

"Ahh, my dear, sweet internet! How I've missed you~!" Issei hugged his phone before finding something sickening on it, "Aw, what? So many messages and missed calls. Ew, people worrying about my wellbeing..."

"You can read through all of those later." I rushed him, "Now show me the video!"

"Hey, by the way, how the hell is that piece of junk still in working condition?" Freddy asked, "You're the type to use up all the remaining power in the first week of being stranded in that other world, so how come your battery's still at 100%?"

"I'll have you know it lasted way more than that." Issei corrected him, "A month, in fact."

"He prayed to the Meditation God and had it magically infused to last forever." I explained for him.

"Wha-! God!? Magic!?" Freddy couldn't believe his ears, "You never told me this other world had all those!"

"Course it does, you think I just went to a steampunk world? No way in hell, I'd have killed myself out of boredom ages ago if that were the case." Issei nonchalantly said something ominous just now, "Oh, by the way, Lune's magic too."

"Huh!?"

"They're just Iro Abilities, it's not magic." I pointed to my glowing Rainbow Eyes, "Like that time when I slowed down time to save you from falling off the airbike, that's it, basically."

"Slowing down time IS magic!" Freddy was still shaking from the excitement, "What else can you do!?"

"Light Sparks from his fingers, spew fire out of his body, Heal himself and others..." Issei listed off, "Oh, and of course our most powerful weapon, he can transmute whatever and whoever he wants as long as he knows how it's made and what it's made of."

"Eh? So like Fullmetal Alchemist?"

"That's exactly what I said!"

After these two bonded over their shared braincell, I also got caught into the whole bonding experience by showing off all of the aforementioned Iro Abilities as we ate our food. Stuff like charring the meat bun of my burger to make it a bit more well-done, throwing the small fries that came along with it and catching all of them in slowed time, stabbing my hand with a fork before Healing it perfectly, and of course Materializing a few napkins from the register after we were done. All these examples proved useful in showing Freddy what my limits and possibilities were, and how to most effectively use them in future expeditions.

"So that's why you wanted to know how to make megavolt batteries so bad!" He snapped his fingers, "But wait, could you try... hehe... transmuting dollar bills?"

"What do they look like? I won't know until I've tried."

"Here's a hundo. Inspect it well, it's basically just paper." He handed me the legal tender.

"Ah, nope." I immediately handed it back, "Can't, it's encrypted."

"What? Already giving up?"

"No, it's just they're made in the same way as Cardinian shils." I explained, "They're not just paper. They're specially minted to not be easily reproduced. Thus, I can't Materialize them."

"Yep, same thing happened with yen, though with those you could actually Materialize the coins." Issei nodded along.

"Then our last bet is the megavolt batteries... Well nephew, what are you waiting for? Show Lune the video."

"Yeah, yeah, I got it." Issei scrolled through before panicking a bit, "Oh dear."

"God, what is it now?"

"I... lost the video."

There's no way. This is so dumb, you do realize we won't be able to travel any further without this one video, right!?

"What do you mean you lost the video?" Freddy asked.

"I mean I lost the video! Dammit, I found it before, so where did it go now!?" Issei kept scrolling through to no avail.

"Just find it in the history tab!"

"I set history to never save!"

"Goddamn your perverted ass, nephew!" Freddy stomped, "Who taught you to do that!?"

"You did, uncle!" Issei revealed a shocking truth, "I remember vividly you helping me set it up back when I was 12! Said it'd save time that way instead of having to delete it every time!"

"Gah, so I'm the real pervert here!" He fussed.

Wrong, you're both perverts. And idiots to boot.