Chapter 9:

Out on the Town (Part 2)

What it Takes for a Loser to Become a Career Isekai Adventurer ダメ人間が本職異世界冒険家になる資格は


Den made his way out of the Silvermoon09 manor and found that just taking the ring road around the hill to the rear farming side brought him right to a convenience store. Entering the doors, he was greeted by Grengalheim’s voice welcoming him. He stood behind the counter wearing a neat dress shirt, tie, and apron, a nametag at the lapel. It looked like he barely fit in the outfit with his broad chest stretching the apron. “Oh, Den! What brings you here?”

Den completed Chloe’s shopping then set down his bags and leaned against the counter. He was the only customer. Here at the top of the hill on the rural side of town, Den got the impression business wasn’t exactly booming. He decided to stay and talk with Grengalheim.

Standing behind the counter with his arms crossed, Grengalheim said, “So Chloe is working on the party website, huh? I guess I could make a social media plan. It is my degree after all.”

Den couldn’t help the smile that formed. “You have a degree in social media? That doesn’t really fit with my image of you as an adventurer.”

“I thought once I could use a social media platform to help advertise my adventurer career. As you know, until now I haven’t had the chance to invest much in adventuring. And unfortunately, since all the work for social media management is based in Starter Town, I haven’t been able to make anything of the degree.”

“Why didn’t you just move to Starter Town then?” Den asked. “You could have done both your goals, right?”

Grengalheim looked down at the cash register and rubbed the back of his head. “Well, perhaps. But someone has to watch the family store. Anyway, I have reasons for sticking around this place.”

Den stood up and shoved his hands into his pockets. It wasn’t hard to guess what would keep a guy like Grengalheim planted. “You have a girlfriend, Grengalheim?”

To Den’s surprise, Grengalheim shook his head.

“Huh,” Den said. “With how fit you are and famous your family is, I would have thought you’d be really popular. Are you not interested in relationships?”

Grengalheim again shook his head. “No. There’s a woman I love.” He sighed. “I dreamed once that we would get married.”

Den grew stiff. From the pain in his friend’s voice, Den knew in an instant that he had tripped a land mine. He had to walk this back quickly. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know. My condolences.”

Grengalheim chuckled but the smile on his face didn’t have much warmth. “No, I apologise. I gave you the wrong impression. My love is alive and well. I slept with her two weeks ago.”

Den stood in silence, his mouth forming a confused O. The doors opened with a happy chime and a customer entered. When Grengalheim finished welcoming them, Den said, “Actually, now I’m more confused. You’re… not married?”

He snorted. “Kind of hard when my girl’s already married to someone else.” He smiled tiredly and shrugged it off. “Not that it really changes anything. We have worked out our love.”

“Oh,” Den said, blinking. “I-- I see.” He didn’t see. Den had never loved someone and couldn’t begin to understand seeing someone already married. “You’re okay with that?”

Grengalheim rubbed the back of his head. “Love and stability are two different things.” He looked down at the ground. “It’s my own fault. I can only give her one of the two. My real problem is my father getting on me to make an heir. It’s not like I’m just going to knock up one of my party members for an heir like he did.”

The fact that that was a consideration alerted Den. He liked his teammates. It was still early, but he hoped perhaps love could form in time. If Grengalheim was on the prowl, Den knew he didn’t have a single chance. It was a relief to hear that Grengalheim had no intention of making any moves. “Why does your dad even care about that?” Den asked.

“He wants to be sure we continue our bloodline so that one day we can fulfill the destiny of the Grengalheims’,” he explained. He grinned wide. “But screw that. With the limits on the Hollows lifting, I plan to fulfill our destiny myself.”

“You mentioned it when we first met, but why did your ancestor leave you such a destiny?” Den asked. His ancestor hadn’t left him anything but a legacy of compromise and settling.

Grengalheim pointed over his shoulder to a large old photo on the wall near the ceiling. “My ancestor was in a party that made it down to the Hundredth Layer and brought back a Monolith-- one of the sixteen that just fizzled out. Even though his hard work gave us one of the greatest Essence Ore hauls of all time, he was only one of thirty in his party-- he never got the fame he wanted. He died bitter and gave his descendants the task of bringing fame to his name in the Hollows.”

He paused when the customer came to the counter. He scanned out their item with a smile while Den looked down and pretended to use his phone. Grengalheim sent the customer on with a thank you, and when they were again alone, he continued. “My family helped settle this suburb, but our wealth dried up in the restricted years of the Hollows. We’ve made ends meet here with the store, but for us, the current circumstances change everything. I want to do everything I can to raise our fame. I’m a fan of your blog idea, Den. I would like to do my part to help. I have a lot to gain from it too.”

“Wow,” Den said, pushing himself off the counter, and kicking the ground. “I just wanted to become an adventurer because I had nothing else… Makes it seem petty when you’ve given it so much thought.”

“Hell, Den. You decided to be an adventurer and entered the Hollows on the same day. I admire you for that. I spent my life waiting. Anyway, we’re both at risk of conscription. Oh, and now the draft too.” The older man pointed with his chin to the shelf of newspapers at the end of the counter. “Every day the situation with the Western Confederation grows worse. Think we’ll go to war?”

“Don’t forget that I live in the stone age. I eat, sleep, work, and run the Hollows. What’s happening this time?” Den picked up a newspaper titled Starter Town-Western Confederation trade embargo tightens. “This is old news.” Den said, rubbing his sore thigh. “Starter Town and the Confederation are always doing this. No one wants a war.”

“Things are different now that the Monoliths have burnt out,” Grengalheim said. “The Confederation feels it too. Those traitors were buying energy off our shared grid despite their big words of independence.”

Den realized too late that Grengalheim was a Unifier. Not too surprising since his family founded a suburb. His great grandfather probably took it as a personal insult when the western suburbs broke off the empire. He should probably end this conversation quickly. “If they’re hurting too, then isn’t that even less reason for war?”

“You would think. They’re cocky despite being so much smaller than us. They say we are breaking the ceasefire agreement because the Densetsu family used imperial power to start building solar fields in the western Great Field. Trade is cut. All talks are off. The Empire isn’t even attempting to avoid war now. It looks like it's just a matter of time.”

“But haven’t we heard that before?” Den said. “Things have been quiet on the western border for decades. I want it to stay that way.” Den dropped the newspaper into the rack. “Where is the Densetsu family hoping to get the resources for the Great Field Energy Reclamation Project anyway?”

“It sounds like there’s trains filled with drafted soldiers and EEC conscripts moving out to the colonies daily. Building out beyond the Mob Wall is one thing, but being shipped out to the colonies is a death sentence. Makes you glad to be a Hollows delver.”

“The colony mines, huh?” Den asked with a shiver. “What does the Great Terraling Alliance have to say about that?”

“What do you think?”

Den shivered. He was glad to be a suburban adventurer. He felt bad for the poor souls that would have to fight any Terralings because of this. “And I thought being sent out to the suburbs was hell.”

Grengalheim laughed. “You got lucky, Den. Let’s make this party successful so we don’t end up dying for the survival of the empire.”

With his mission complete, Den returned to Chloe’s. She accepted the groceries but didn’t let him inside. “Rika has claimed ownership over Den,” she said, lifting her phone for him to see.

Rika’s message to the group chat read: He’s with Grengalheim now!? Why do you all get to hang out together? As leader, I command Den to meet me at the convenience store at five-thirty.

Seeing it was an executive order, he didn’t exactly have a choice. He headed back down the hill and stopped at their downtown convenience store. While he waited for Rika to get off work, he ate a quick dinner. Den waited outside the shop and sure enough, exactly at five-thirty, Rika arrived, running. She slid to a stop in front of him, huffing. She wore a neat, red-collared shirt and dress pants, her hair brushed and brought back in a ponytail. Despite the more professional look, Den thought that she still looked like a kid as she swung her fists up and down in a pout she said, “Deeeen! You hung out with everyone besides me today? Meanie! I thought we were friends!” Rika punched him half-heartedly half a dozen times.

“It’s not like it was my plan. It kind of just worked out that way,” he said, taking the punches without resistance.

She puffed her cheeks out. “You could have just happened to come to my post office and mailed a letter or sent a package too...”

“To who?”

She crossed her arms and humphed, turning away. “Whatever. Let’s get something to eat then.”

“Oh, sorry, I just ate,” he said.

She puffed out her cheeks even more. That made him laugh. It was cute that she was jealous enough to call him out. He joined her for another bite inside. As usual, she downed her meal in record time, so it was probably for the best that he’d eaten ahead. When she finished, she declared, “We’re going shopping.”

“Should we really go shopping when we’re saving money?”

“It’s fine!” She took his wrist and dragged him through the downtown until they came to a bright and well lit 100 doubloon chain store he recognised. She put her hands on her hips and chortled proudly. “See, we can go shopping and not have to worry about spending too much money. Feel free to praise me.”

“It’s a good idea, Rika,” he said, not feeling like coming up with a counter this time.

She blushed at his open praise. “Of course it is.”

They headed inside, walking the bright isles of cheap daily commodities. Despite the world crumbling, the bright lights and cheap prices of the store made it feel like a dream to Den. Rika quickly filled a basket with snacks on the way to finding what she really wanted. She lifted up a roll of duct tape. “You don’t understand how much of this stuff I go through making my Bashy Stick of Destruction.”

In the end, Den settled on dropping several dollars to buy an extra large dress shirt to wear over his tees when he went out to work for GrandPre. He was tired of the old people looking at his Scope Sisters graphics in confusion. They exited the shop and Rika quickly swallowed one of her snacks she’d already opened in order to say, “I know just the place next!” She led them across the downtown again before arriving at a large dark building with the door shut. Rika crumbled to her knees at the sight. “They shut down the game center!?”

“I guess it does probably need a lot of electricity,” Den said. It hurt him too. Some of his only good memories in Starter Town were visiting game centers. “This sucks, but I guess that’s just the way it is now.” He sighed. “Should we call it a night then?”

“No!” Rika said immediately. “I’ll think of something else!” She held her head in thought. It was actually rather cute.

Why is Rika trying so hard to hang out? His heart skipped a beat. From the moment they first met, he’d never thought of Rika as anything but a party member-- a friend-- but could this be…?

“Do you like me?” he asked.

“What?” Rika asked, lifting her head. “You’re a good party member, I guess.”

The utter shutdown stabbed through Den and sent him crumbling to his knees. She looks at me the same way I looked at her then… It was true that she had immediately asked out every member of the party… with him as the singular exception. “Then why are you trying so hard to hang out tonight?”

Rika grew quiet, pulling her legs to her chest. Den was surprised to find her looking off to the side with a blush. “I’m not trying that hard.”

“You literally commanded me to hang out with you,” he said.

“Fine!” She pouted. In a mixture of irritation and embarrassment, she mumbled, “Back in university, I missed a lot of chances to hang out with people because I always stayed in my dorm, drawing.”

“I didn’t know you liked to draw,” he said. He wondered if he could eventually commission her for Scope Sisters art.

“I don’t really draw that much anymore…”

There goes that idea. He punched her shoulder once. “Well, whatever you did in university, you definitely did more than me.”

“That’s not really that hard to do. Weren’t you a shut-in?”

Again, Den was crushed. “I guess I asked for that one,” he said. “I feel where you’re coming from though. It’s so much fun actually being around other people.” He yawned. “But for an introvert like me, I am exhausted.” He pursed his lips. “Too tired to want to hang out, but I still don’t want to go home. It’s our day to rest, so we should probably just sleep early,” he reasoned. “We’ll see each other tomorrow after all.”

Rika seemed to want to resist, but in the end she gave a small pouty nod.

Den laughed. “I feel that,” he said. He let out a long sigh. It really was a miracle that at their age they could say, ‘see you again tomorrow.’ A sudden warmness welled in Den’s chest. “Thank you, Rika.”

She sat up. “What did I do?”

“We can say goodnight and see our friends again the next day. That’s really amazing, you know? If you hadn’t been there at the Hollows that night, I don’t know what I would have done…” He let out a weak laugh. “Just feeling lucky.”

Rika nodded. “I’m glad it was you, too, Den.” She reached out a fist. “Let’s have fun in the Hollows tomorrow too.”

He met her fist. “Of course.”

---

On day eight of the trial period, Den’s team consisted of Rika and Sam. Deep in the Fourth Layer, pools of water sat around every corner. Strange thin trees with branches of hanging vines grew in semi-darkness. Giant beavers slapped the water with their tails, spraying Den and his teammates and making cover for giant otters to spring out and tackle them. Shrews ran out of holes in the walls in some stretches. Rika had been overjoyed before the little brutes lept three feet though the air with massive fangs bared. After all the horrors they were seeing, Den needed his slime potion as a pick-me-up for more than just his physical injuries.

They were closing in on the boss room when a high pitched laugh echoed through the tunnel. A monster flashed from one shadowed pillar to another. Den and his party froze. The laugh echoed again and the same metallic flash rippled across the chamber behind them, disappearing again behind a stalagmite.

“What the hell is that thing?” Den asked, putting his back to the cavern wall and drawing his tools.

“It’s so fast!” Rika said, leaping forward with her newest test Pointy Stick of Destruction-- a sharpened pvc pipe. The point met the stone floor as a silver blob shot away from her, jumping behind a rock. “Is that seriously a slime?”

“It’s gotta be a Silver Slime!” Sam said. With lightning speed, they pulled out their phone, swinging around to snap pictures. The monster zigged and zagged, bouncing rapidly from rock to rock, slipping and sliding like liquid mercury. “I read that in the First Stratum these have the lowest spawn rate! We can’t let it escape!”

“Then maybe this isn’t the time to be playing pocket monsters,” Den said, hefting his weapons. “Though thanks for the pictures. I will definitely use them on the blog.”

Rika ran screaming at the slime, jutting forward her Pointy Stick 2.0. With a high pitched evil giggle, the monster bent and slid around, then bounced in an instant over her head and came down laughing with glinting red eyes onto Den’s chest. It pooled, spreading out, over, and under his makeshift paper-foil chestplate that attempted to save his tee from getting any more eroded..

“Aw shit-- it’s all over me!” He dropped his weapons and attempted to rip off the liquid creature with his bare fingers. The slime laughed as Den screamed at the raging fire licking at his skin and burning through his clothes, making him rip at the monster more furiously. “Get it off!”

With a shout, Rika swung her pvc pipe like a bat. At the very last second the silver slime sprang off of Den’s chest and zoomed away. Rika’s pipe nailed Den. He coughed harshly as he was thrown onto his butt, the air knocked from his lungs.

“Dang! It got away! Sorry Den!” Rika shouted, spinning on her feet just in time to see the slime dive behind a large boulder at the far end of the room.

Groaning and rubbing his chest, Den said, “I don’t think it’s going to be a problem of the slime getting away from us. Are we going to survive this?”

“Just leave it to me!” Sam declared. They reached up and tapped the small dome that held their glowing dice Enchanted Item. It spun midair and when it met the ground, a red flash of light roared out of their finger and crashed into the stone, blasting a chunk out of it. The slime hissed as it zig-zagged away. “Damn,” Sam said following the slime. “Only an eleven.” They tapped again, another smaller red flash gouging the ground just behind the slime, then once again with a slightly bigger blast that the slime just barely avoided. As it evaded another small shot and swung around Sam, they whispered under their breath, “Nine, thirteen, seven… no good shots!”

“Don’t waste all your shots now,” Den begged as he pushed himself to his feet. “We’re going to need at least two or three of those for the boss battle!”

The slime sprung into the air, laughing as it flew for Den.

“Shit! Why me!” Den said, throwing up his hands.

“Don’t worry!” Sam shouted. “This will end it!” Index finger trained on the slime, they tapped the back of their glove. A weak crackle of red light shot from their finger and stung the back of the slime which nonetheless screamed and fell out of the air, sliding out of range of Rika’s stab.

“Oh come on!” Sam said, throwing up their arms. “A one?!”

Den swung off his backpack and unzipped it. “We’re going to pop that little shit. We’re going to have to work together. I have an idea.”

“Oh that again?” Rika asked with a roll of her eyes. “Every time you call teamwork, it always ends up a free for all anyway.”

“Well this time it will work!” he said, pulling a large plastic bag from his backpack. He looked at Sam. “You’re the only one with the power to finish this thing. Stay in the back and wait for the right timing. We need to save your rolls.” He turned to Rika. “Can you chase that thing this way?”

Rika stood up straight and gave a salute. “Leave chasing to me!” She ran to the rock the slime jumped behind, and with a shout she threw her weight forward onto her plastic spear and drove the monster out and propelled herself after it on the pipe. Den stood in the middle of the room with his hands behind his back as Rika’s slightly mad laughter drove the slime toward him. As the slime jumped for him, he threw himself forward swinging the bag up to catch it midair.

“Now!” he shouted, swinging the bag around to Sam.

Eyes squinted and hands forward at the ready, the red crackling light rippled out of their Enchanted Item, striking Den’s bag directly, ripping it from his hands. The slime screamed in pain as it splattered the earth.

“Den! Quickly! Scoop that slime!” Sam said.

“Right. Shit.” He stumbled forward, swinging off his backpack and pulling out a mason jar. He rushed to the already fading slime and set the jar in the pool. The fading slime regained color and vibrated as it lifted off the ground and formed a small vortex to collect itself in the jar. Den sealed it tight with the metal clutch.

The three of them let out a heavy sigh.

“Well, I never thought I would have a heart attack because of a slime,” Den said. He held up the jar and looked at the shimmering liquid. “You better be tasty!”

Rika skipped forward and put her hands on it to look inside, but Den kept a tight grip on the lid and bottom. Rika pressed her face against the glass, eyeing the sparkling silver liquid within. “I love the color. Let me taste it!”

“You remember what happened to the last slime jar we let you hold?” he asked dully.

“I said I was sorry!” she said. “I know now not to juggle jars. It’s fine.”

Still Den did not release his grip as Rika stared into the shimmering silver liquid. He looked at Sam. “Does this slime have any special effects?” he asked.

“This one is a super boost!” they said, lifting an arm and flexing then leaning in to kiss their skeletal arm. “It’s the best type of magical boost we can get here in our home Hollows.”

“That sounds sweet,” Den said, pulling the jar out of Rika’s greedy fingers and walking the jar to his backpack where he wrapped it in a towel and stowed it. “I guess we’ll ask Grengalheim after he's done with work if we should sell it or save it for later.” Kneecaps popping, he got to his feet, swinging his backpack on. He took a swig from his own slime bottle.

After finishing the run, the party met at the Guild at the call of the Guildmaster. Grengalheim and Chloe both showed despite making this being their day off-party. Chloe wore a simple summer dress while Grengalheim was dressed in his convenience store uniform. When the Guildmaster came out of the back room after putting away their Ore, Grengalheim, who hadn’t even sat down, said, “I start my shift in fifteen. What did you need to talk to us about?”

“I had been waiting until you all returned as a full party, but with only a few days of the trial left, paperwork could be left no longer.” The old man pulled out a chair on the far end of their round table and set down his tablet. “We have not yet decided on your insurance policies. That must be completed before you continue onto the full membership.”

“Ugh…” Rika whined, dropping her head to the table. “I don’t want more paperwork…”

“Can we just opt out?” Sam said. “We’re all young and healthyish. It’s not like the First Stratum is all that dangerous. If things get bad, we can always pop out with our Slip Tiara.”

The old man shook his head. “Insurance is mandatory. There are too many accidents inside the Hollows. It proved to be far cheaper than dealing with uninsured accidents.”

Grengalheim sighed and pulled out a chair and sat down. “What is the cheapest plan?”

The Guildmaster turned the tablet around and passed it over to them. The page had an all in one entry package.

“50,000 doubloons,” Chloe read. “Expensive. Perhaps if the party gave up all hope of saving for an Enchanted Item they would be able to pool that amount.”

The Guildmaster grimaced. “I apologize, Ms. Silvermoon09, insurance policies are not taken by the group. Each individual must pay this amount.”

The Guildhall grew painfully silent to the point Den wondered if the air had been completely vacuumed out. If it had, that would explain the pain in his lungs and the sudden pressure difference in his head.

50,000 doubloons. That was more than he was earning a week in his part-time job. They simply didn’t have that kind of money.

“That’s impossible,” Rika shouted, slamming the table. “Why is it so expensive?”

The Guildmaster bowed his head. “The Guild and its tied medical institutions are not a cheap organization. When the number of adventurers were higher, it was not so expensive, but given that the clientele are often wealthy, this was one of the methods the organization has used to earn the funds needed to maintain itself.”

“It’s the freaking rich people again,” Den said, bowing his head. The fire inside him grew.

No one else spoke for a long moment. The Guildmaster crossed his hands and leaned forward on the table. “Is there no way for your party to gain a sponsorship?”

Chloe bowed her head. “Chloe told her mother she would do this on her own. Even if she asked now, she knows that her mother would not invest in a party that is unable to meet their minimum payments.”

The old man bowed his head. “The Guild trial membership collects all funds promised even if the party ends their contract. There is also an exit fee. There are many well-off children in Starter Town that join as adventurers as an extracurricular activity. Many find the hard work is not what they imagined and quit, so this is another funding method the Guild uses.” The man looked them over with tired eyes. “If you were to cancel the trial now, you would not have to file for late payment contracts.” He reached forward and took the tablet with one hand. “I wish this was not the way it is, but if you cannot manage this, perhaps it is best to give up on being adventurers before you’re dropped from the Guild and liable to pay the violation of contract fees.”

A fire erupted in Den and his hand flew forward to grab the tablet. “I am not giving up. I’ll enroll.” He ground his teeth. “It just means we have to make that money, right? So be it. I’ll run the Hollows as many times as it takes.”

Sam next put their hand on top of Den’s. “That was freaking cool, Den,” they said, eyes sparkling. “If you’re doing it, I’ll go too.”

Chloe then put her hand on top. “Chloe has come to like her friends. She will not abandon them. They will die without her.”

Grengalheim rubbed the back of his head. “It’ll be tight, but if we run ourselves half to death, we might just be able to make up that difference.”

Finally the eyes turned to their leader. Rika looked down at her fists on the table with wide eyes. She looked up at them, more haggard than Den had ever seen her, sweating, her face pale. Finally, teeth grinding, she slammed her hand down on top. “We’re going to make it!” she shouted. “There is no way I am going to do all this just to end up more in debt!”

She turned her anger on the Guildmaster. “Sign us up. We’ll make the bill.”