The Vagrant Mage's Inventory

"I seriously think I don't understand women," Sora said as he watched both girls, who looked like they were about to unleash their ultimate skills.

The battlefield had been moved to the table in the kitchen. In the center were several dishes of different origins—some were takeout food, others appeared to be homemade.

Sora looked at his own plate, which was empty. Literally. He hadn't been able to take a single bite because every time his chopsticks approached a piece of meat, a wooden spoon or another pair of chopsticks intercepted it with superhuman click speed.

"Don't even think about it, knockoff Mage!" Mochi exclaimed while placing a piece of boiled broccoli that coincidentally had a somewhat deformed heart shape on Sora's plate. "My husband needs vitamins to recover from the attack you provoked!"

"Your so-called vitamins have a 30% chance of causing a poison status effect," Shiori responded while using her own chopsticks to steal the eel sushi she herself had ordered. "Tank, according to my calculations, your brain will process information better if you consume this high-quality protein."

Sora let out a heavy sigh, feeling his real-life stamina dropping to critical levels. He couldn't stop thinking about what had happened just minutes ago, when he froze up remembering the game. What he didn't know was that, while his mind was in the Crystal Dungeon, Shiori had been injecting a jealousy trojan directly into Haruka's heart.

[Shiori's Perspective - 10 Minutes Ago]

While Sora stared into space with a blank look, Shiori had leaned close to the ear of a furiously trembling Haruka.

"Do you know what he's remembering right now with that face, Cleric?" Shiori whispered into Mochi's ear, while her glasses reflected a violet light. "He's remembering our Private Raid. That night when the magical penetration was so intense that his shield was useless. He was always a very... accommodating Tank when I cast my spells on his digital body. Without protection, of course."

"P-p-p-penetration...?!" Haruka felt her sanity bar hit zero so quickly.

"Let's just say that physical contact in our guild always had low latency," Shiori finished.

It was at that moment when Haruka, incapable of processing technical terms mixed with perverse insinuations, lost strength in her legs and collapsed, just in time for Sora to "wake up" and see Shiori whispering to him: "You remember, right?"

[Return to the Present]

"Agh! Enough already!" Sora shouted, tapping the table lightly. "I'm going to end up eating nothing but air if you two keep this up! Shiori, you've talked enough. Haruka, put down the spoon. Now, Shiori... why the hell is there a bunch of stuff piled up at my entrance? Don't think I didn't notice—you brought it when you arrived."

Shiori put down her chopsticks, and her experienced hacker demeanor deflated instantly, revealing the 17-year-old girl who clearly didn't know how to manage her life outside a command terminal.

"Tank..." Shiori said, looking at her tablet with a hint of genuine shame.

However, Shiori did what no one in the room expected her to do. Without waiting for any response, Shiori rolled on the floor and started crawling toward the exit.

This action caused both shock and confusion for Sora and Mochi.

Shiori didn't run normally; it was a tactical retreat that went disastrously. She rolled on the floor as if dodging an area attack in the game, but when she stood up, her hacker legs—which had never left a chair—didn't respond with the same speed as her fingers.

"I won't let the data trail disappear!" Mochi shouted, whose patience had just reached its limit. "Take this, knockoff Mage! Active Skill: Final Purification Spoon!"

Mochi threw the wooden spoon with a precision that, for an instant, seemed to defy the laws of physics. The spoon, now transformed into a projectile, spun in the air, buzzing like an out-of-control drone, until it impacted directly against the back of Shiori's head.

"Gyah!" Shiori screamed, at the same time falling face-first right onto her own pile of belongings at the entrance. "A critical... hit!" Shiori closed her eyes, almost declaring it a definitive Game Over.

Sora and Mochi quickly approached. Sora didn't know whether to call an ambulance or ask for a technical explanation of how a spoon could knock down a person.

"Alright, Shiori," Sora said, crossing his arms as he looked at the girl lying on a bundle of fabric. "Now, tell us what all this is. And don't give me that line about it being a dungeon reward or something taken from a video game."

Shiori, with her glasses askew and a slight blush of pure embarrassment, pointed with a trembling finger at her inventory scattered across the floor:

The Futon: A thin mattress that had clearly seen better decades and smelled faintly of coffee and instant ramen.

The Pillow: An old pillow with a 90s anime pillowcase, worn out from years of use.

The Junk Monster: A laptop that looked like it had been rescued from a fire and reconstructed with industrial duct tape and exposed cables. However, upon impact, a small LED light turned on, revealing a processor humming with the power of a top-tier server.

The Bracelet: A metallic device on her wrist, strangely clean and futuristic, emitting a faint blue pulse, contrasting with the junk surrounding it.

"Tank..." Shiori whispered, burying her face in her pillow. "My financial security suffered an attack... I bought a supposed hacking program, and the seller turned out to be a bot that emptied my bank account. Tomorrow I'm getting kicked out of my room... and since you're my Guar—"

"DON'T YOU DARE FINISH THAT SENTENCE!" Mochi protested, brandishing a second spoon she pulled from who-knows-where.

For his part, the only thing Sora thought was: "This is turning into a disaster..." He found the situation somewhat ridiculous, yet deep inside, he also found it comical.