CHAPTER 57: IS THERE A NAME FOR THAT FEELING WHEN YOU’RE DRAGGED TO VISIT PEOPLE YOU DON’T REALLY KNOW, BUT THE GUY WHO BROUGHT YOU THERE DOES AND OMG WE’VE BEEN HERE FOREVER, BUT I CAN’T REALLY SAY ANYTHING…

It seems like the 7 other people who had been transported to this world at the same time as me were all transported to the same place as each other.

That place was the outskirts of Jornia, the royal capitol of Carnus.

It seems the Second Prince was leading a military operation in the area where they woke up. It was apparently quite a serious operation, where a pack of migrating wyverns took residence a little too close to civilization.

The entire army was shocked to see Masaki and the others easily annihilate the wyverns. Not only did they easily annihilate them, Masaki and the others split up to fight the wyverns one-versus-one.

That’s right … all of those people are high-ranked PvPers, huh?

The Second Prince also apparently fell in love with the fighting figure of one of the Japanese high-school girls, a WarBow Scout, at first sight, and on understanding that Masaki and the others were lost, confused, and without a way home, the situation eventually led to the Royal Family taking care of them.

… You guys had a lot of luck too, it seems.

“Iyaa~ in some ways it’s good, in some ways it’s bad. To be honest, although you’ve had it tough, I think I would have preferred to be in your situation. Even though Carnus took us in and provided for us, in the end, we’re still existences who could defeat their military forces with just 2 people if we felt like it.”

Seimei-san frowns, leaning his head on his hand.

… What a heavy silence. Yeah, I am relieved I ended up in Unaffiliated territory. I’m horrible with high school social politics; I don’t think I’d last a day dealing with real political pressure.

Seimei-san sighs, sitting upright.

“Maa, I guess it’s how you’d expect. On one hand there are powerful people to win as allies, on the other they are people who could easily destroy the country. For those reasons, how should I say it, I was made to become a Noble to be a fetter to keep us Japanese in line?”

“What? What do you mean?”

“Being a Noble isn’t just getting a title and some land, like it used to be in some countries in the past in our world. Because places with mana were fertile places with lots of resources, people gathered around places with large concentration of mana, and that’s how the major cities came into being. Wizards and mages sought to tap into the mana streams below the ground, and they made the devices called City Cores.”

City Cores … I think I heard about that before.

“It’s kind of like a giant computer for an electric power station, but magic based. With the City Cores, you can control the flow of mana within the region the Core affects. The people who are given the rights to the Cores and the spells to control the Cores are the Dukes, Marquesses, Earls, Viscounts, and Barons. Baronets and Knight Captains are Nobles without Land Peerages, but they get some magic skills or something called Duty Peerages.”

Ok … so where is this going?

It must have shown on my face, because Seimei-san laughed.

“Sorry sorry, I got a little carried away, because it’s kind of interesting. Well, basically, you’re magically registered to a City Core when you come of age in order to be a true citizen of the country, and you can only get true Peerage if you’re a citizen. I, who am not a citizen, am a fake Noble that only the Country Core, that controls the privileges to the City Cores, can create. Without the Peerage, I am registered to the Country Core, and they can oversee me, and therefore the rest of us Japanese, far more easily.”

“Wait… that means…”

“If we run or try to rebel, they will be able to easily track me down. Like I said, it’s a fetter to keep us from doing anything against them.”

“What’s with that?!”

I bang my hand on the arm of my chair. Isn’t that like holding someone hostage?!

“Aaaah, calm down, Jun-kun. I forgot. Masa-yan said you were this kind of person, right. There’s no problem right now; at the moment it’s a relationship of mutual benefits. To be honest, this way is better. I would trust them even less if they brainlessly tried to coexist without some wariness, and I did it willingly as a sign of goodwill, so it’s not like the others were forced to use me as a scapegoat or something. It’s a political play, that’s all.”

“Is that so…”

“Even though I’m not truly a Noble, by giving me the status of a minor Noble, the other Japanese are considered as part of my house. It gives us some political immunity to the power-play among Nobles. At the same time, with that status, there is some expectation for us to be of some use to the country. Like I said, there are mutual benefits, and the effort we have to give from our side isn’t something we need to worry about yet.”

Fumu. I wouldn’t do well in that situation by myself… I’m really lucky I ended up in Nyl City! … Well, if the gamers ever decided to rebel, I don’t think Carnus would be able to stop them just because they could track one of them down.

Seimei-san suddenly smirked.

“Actually, you know, they wanted to make Masa-yan the Noble. He’s a Dragon Knight, see, and since the Paladin-types lost their healing spells, it’s the only class that uses magic and melee evenly. Masaki’s class apparently exhibits the most perfect combination of magic and swordsmanship that everyone in this world is striving for, so…”

“Eh? … Pffft-! Ah, sorry. I’m just trying to imagine Masaki dealing with people idolizing him…”

“You know him too well. He ends up hiding in my room whenever he has spare time, since people don’t look highly upon me.”

Oh, that’s right. There was something that was bothering me.

“Why wouldn’t they look highly on you, Seimei-san? And you said you were weak, but I just can’t see that if you’re part of Masaki’s party.”

“Aaaaah… That’s … you know how I said all our equipment came over too?”

“Ah, un. Yeah.”

Seimei-san pulled out a necklace that he was wearing under his shirt. It had a thick, beaded chain with gaudy looking pendants hanging off it.

“This is why I’m weak. This is the Necklace of Disempowerment. In the game, it’s a cursed weapon that reduces your level and stats to Level 10. You can’t remove it without Purification. In this world, it just reduces my MP to 800 and my MP regeneration to 6 per hour, and it’s not cursed. I can remove it whenever I want.”

“…Ok, I have so many questions about that … First of all, why the hell would you equip that in game?”

“Fufufu. Even if it reduces my character stats to Level 10, I still had all the bonuses from my equipment. Also, you still have all your Skills from the higher levels. I would put this on and wander around the dangerous starting areas, and when the PKs attacked, a really well-placed Dark Explosion will wipe out an entire 6-man party of any PKs under level 30, even with reduced stats! Hahaha! Well, I’d have no MP afterwards, though.”

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… Oi. So he would go around pretending to be low-level to attract the malicious PKs that enjoyed attacking beginner players. A PKK, huh? Reckless, childish middle-aged man… Though he isn’t actually that old, I guess.

“So why aren’t you removing it now? 800 MP is above average for the people in this world, but that’s probably not enough for your spells you got from the game, right?”

“Ah… you know, people in this world can’t see our MP. They judge how much magic people have by how much extra magic flows out of you … basically, they can’t see the capacity of a person’s magic, but they can measure the magic regeneration.”

“That sounds so … half-assed. It’s not a good estimate at all.”

“Nn, well, they aren’t 100% wrong. After all, even if you had a lot of MP, if you regenerate too slowly, it doesn’t seem like it would be very effective.”

“Hmm. Maybe. Anyway, how does that relate?”

Seimei-san shifted his glance away. How suspicious.

“Ah… that’s … If it was at least at the degree people would think, ‘Oh, he could destroy the country,’ it would still be ok…”

“… Hai?”

Sorry, I don’t understand.

“That is, my MP is at the scale where I would instantly be labeled a threat.”

“Huh. How much MP do you have?”

“I don’t really want to say.”

“… 2 million?”

Seimei-san’s face doesn’t change.

“… 3 million? 5 million? 8 million?”

“Jun-kun, if you keep increasing it by such small increments, we’ll be here all day.”

Ooookay, and we’re done here! I fully understand that Seimei-san has a lot of MP and a ridiculous MP regeneration.

“I see, so that’s why you’re pretending that you don’t have much magic. Although 800 is still pretty good for the people of this world.”

“Haa… even though I want to carefreely throw around my OP-ness like the others, it’s a little too much, right? If I broke off on my own, maybe it would be fine to be reckless and let my magic run loose, but I don’t really want to leave the others on their own in Carnus. Even if the country is treating us well for the most part, there are always corrupt politicians in any country, ne? Even if I feel like letting my guard down, I’m the only one with experience dealing with that kind of rotten adult, so I have to deal with it!”

A-are? When did this turn into a rant? W-well, I guess he must have been really stressed, having to bear the brunt of all the political messes in order to let everyone else live freely without worries. … So that means he’s the oldest out of all of them, if he feels this strongly about having to take responsibility for the others…

Masaki and company, please don’t do anything to make Seimei-san’s life more difficult.

“Pretending to be weaker than the others is also beneficial for that purpose, though. With my fake Noble status, all the Nobles and people trying to curry our favor have to come to me before approaching the others, but since I look like I’m so much weaker than Masa-yan and everyone else, sometimes their true natures come out as they try to force me to do what they want… kukuku.”

Ah, a kind of dark aura came out. It’s kind of like Dobin-san’s dark aura when he’s about to trap someone into a deal.

“Anyway, I’m undergoing a lot of stress. I’m not really a Noble, but my existence is more important than a Noble’s… see?”

“Yeah… keep up the good work, Seimei-san… Please don’t go grey-haired too soon.”

“Ugh…”

Hm? His existence is more important than a Noble’s… Eh. Then if anything like an assassination happens here, then won’t that be really bad? No, before that, doesn’t that mean that the terrorists, or whoever’s behind all the recent incidents, actually WILL try to attack Seimei-san?!

I’m not sure whether Ragnall and the others want me to reveal everything, but I don’t think keeping the information secret here will accomplish anything.  Besides, this is something related to Seimei-san’s life. I’m sorry, but I will value my acquaintances’ lives over their trust.

I tell Seimei-san about the strange occurrences going on in Nyl City, and why we think someone might be aiming for a VIP from Carnus.

“Haa… even after getting permission to come all the way out here, I still can’t get away from the mess that comes with being a Noble…”

“You’re taking the fact that someone wants to kill you pretty lightly.”

“It’s might want to kill me, right? And there’s no use in worrying about if it will happen or if it won’t. I’ll just have to prepare myself to deal with the worst and take it from there. Though I’d feel more comfortable if I could use my full MP if it came down to having to protect myself…”

Fumu, that’s true, huh? Of course you’d feel uneasy if you can’t use your full power…

“Hm. I’ll try to do something about that, but I can’t guarantee anything. I’m only good at smithing, so if it’s something more than that, I might not be able to do it.”

“Jun-kun, you can craft?!”

Whoa, that scared me. Seimei-san leaned forward excitedly.

“E-eh? M-maa, somewhat.”

“… Ah, is it something you could do back in Japan?”

“Kind of. My grandfather had a small forge in the backyard.”

“I see… I told you about how all our healing spells don’t work anymore, but all our crafting skills don’t work either. Even though they’re listed as traits, none of us could craft a bit. I see, the game skills won’t work, so if we want to craft, we’d have to actually learn how to do it from scratch like we would back in Japan…”

… Wasn’t that obvious? Though I guess we’re people who got transported here from another world, so maybe ‘obvious’ isn’t really obvious at times.

“Hey, Seimei-san, we should compare the Skills and stuff. There might be things you guys figured out that I don’t know about and vice-versa.”

“I agree.”

At that moment though, the bells from the Guild Hall rang.

The Return Watch. We’ve been speaking that long?

“… I see. So that spell earlier keeps the sound from going out, but not from coming in.”

“Yeah. There are all kinds of problems otherwise. But are the bells here set every 3 hours too?”

“Yes.”

“Then we’ve already talked too long…”

Yeah. We’ve been talking for 2 hours. There was a lot to catch up on. But Ragnall’s been waiting upstairs for 2 hours…

“Well then, let’s do this…”

◇◇◇

Extra

Seimei’s POV:

[“… … *Beep* Sei-chan? What’s wrong, everything ok?”]

“More or less. Masa-yan, do you have a minute?”

[“Ah… un. It’s just us gamers here. We were just discussing what we should do while you’re away right now. Do you need me to put you on Broadcast Mode?”]

“No, that’s fine. Masa-yan, I found Jun-kun.”

[“… Hwaaa!? What, really?! Where?!”]

Ouch~. Mou, Masa-yan, we’ve already determined Friend Chat can’t do anything about controlling volume … but I understand his feelings. Not even knowing if Jun-kun made it here or not, not evening knowing if she had the abilities to defend herself, it was a very stressful time for Masa-yan.

In the background, very faintly, I hear Midori-chan and Ta-kun saying something like, ‘Are you talking to Sei-chan?’ and ‘What what what? What happened?’

“Calm down, calm down. She’s fine. Actually, it seems like she’s doing really well for herself in Nyl City. Although there seems to be a lot of people helping her out without expecting anything from her. Most of them seem to be looking at her with eyes like their watching their daughter grow up, but I’m still a little worried~.”

[“Daughter… oi. Ah, but that’s not too surprising. That’s something like Jun’s ability, or should I say part of Jun’s personality? For some reason, Jun has always made people think, ‘That guy has potential, we should nurture it!’ or something like that. It’s a relief that superpower is working in this world too…”]

“Hmm… if that’s all that is, then it’s fine~, but it won’t be funny if we let our guard down and something happens~. To tell the truth, the random events that Jun-kun seems to keep getting caught up in are a little worrying~.”

[“… That’s another thing that’s part of Jun’s personality. Haaaaaa… it would have been fine if that superpower stayed in the other world…”]

“Whaaat. Don’t tell me she was the kind of high-schooler that would walk down the street and find delinquents, no, yakuza picking on people and beat them up! Hahaha!”

Of course not. Modern Japan doesn’t have those sorts of flags all over the place like manga leads you to believe…

… Masa-yaaaan, why aren’t you saying anythiiiing?

[“… As you might expect, it’s never gotten to yakuza level, but delinquents picking on old men and girls …”]

… Seriously?

[“You know, the ossan-hunting that shows up on the news? He’s come across some instances of that several times … though it’s never as violent as the media makes it sound. Same with shady guys are trying to pressure girls. Jun usually just talks to them without backing down, and they’ll usually leave.”]

“W-well, you know, the media likes to make things sound more dangerous than things actually are …”

Or like, Jun-kun’s come across the ossan-hunting that you would usually never come across … and several times at that?

I see. A superpower, huh?

[“Anyway, I’m going to come over to Nyl City too.”]

“Haha, you’re still worried in the end…”

Oya? I hear a commotion coming from Masa-yan’s end.

[‘Oi, Masaki, you trying to steal a march on us?’

‘No fair no fair!’

‘Don’t just run off to play in the Labyrinth on your own!’

‘I was going to bear with not going, because it couldn’t be helped if it was just Sei-chan, but if Masaki gets to go, I’m not going to stay here and be quiet!’

“I’m not going to play, jeez!”]

Oh dear. They’ve all been wanting to go to a Labyrinth since they’ve found out Labyrinths existed … even though Masaki really isn’t coming for the Labyrinth. At least, he’s not coming solely for the Labyrinth.

Maa, they’ve been accumulating a lot of stress with dealing with the Nobles and other people jealous of their talents, so it would be fine if they had some time away from the capitol.

We can’t just all leave the capitol though, just in case some crazy Noble blames us for abandoning Carnus. Even if the King is more or less on our side, it won’t do if we recklessly brought trouble to him.

Listening to them argue back in the mansion that we were given back in the Carnus capitol, I can’t help but wonder if they’ll figure out it would be ok if they split up into 2 groups and take turns …

Well, if they don’t figure it out by tomorrow morning, I guess I’ll tell them.