A Gacha Addict's Life in Fusionpunk - Chapter 18

WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Haruto

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ A Gacha Addict's Life in Fusionpunk ◈

Chapter 18: Mushroom Factory

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Joker.

A consumable item obtained from the Joker Random Box.

It cost a whopping 30 pt per draw, but its effects truly deserved to be called “a card that changes fate.”

For a clear example, if I had not had the Misfortune-Warding Talisman at the start of this loop, I would have begun as Shanks due to the [ One-Armed Man ] Death Penalty.

The most important thing was this.

Jokers were conceived by the “gacha” in my Status Window.

“...”

「The Hotel Abyss Suite Room Voucher」

Then what was this thing?

Was it an illegitimate child my Status Window had after cheating on me?

While I was standing there in confusion, Areng and Akitt cautiously approached me.

“Guts, what exactly are you?”

“I’ve never seen hotel staff act like that before.”

“They took your side without hesitation.”

Akitt and Areng had been my comrades in the previous loop, but after regressing, we were essentially strangers.

Even so, they were acting awkwardly overfamiliar.

“Hmm.”

I knew exactly what this was.

The “let me get a cut too” routine.

People did this whenever word got around that someone had made a fortune investing.

Was this really that unusual? I looked around.

The fixers gathered in small groups throughout the lobby were staring at me.

Fuck.

I had not wanted this much attention.

I was being pursued, and I had not even disguised myself today.

I had stopped bothering after realizing they were not tracking me by my face.

Wiping it off was a pain, too.

Anyway.

The more frightening fact was that, in front of everyone, the hotel employee had even given me a Joker as compensation.

All the voices around me suddenly sounded like, “That bastard’s a golden goblin,” and “Kill him and take it.”

If this were just the slums, I would turn the tables and rob them.

But this was a hotel.

All kinds of skilled fixers had to be gathered here.

I was getting a little nervous.

Keeping an eye on the people around us, I showed Areng the voucher.

First, I needed to find out what this voucher was.

“What is this, anyway? The thing they gave me earlier.”

“Oh, that? It happens sometimes. Isn’t it a blank business card?”

“A blank business card?”

Areng shrugged as though it were nothing.

“A business card with nothing written on it. I hear hotel employees hand them out sometimes. I’ve never gotten one, though.”

Nothing was written on it?

I looked down at the voucher again.

It had a white background, gold foil trim, and embossed details. It looked extremely luxurious.

No matter how I looked at it, it was an elegantly designed lodging voucher.

“Focus. Don’t just glance at it. Look closely.”

“Why? Is there something on it?”

Areng took the voucher, examined it from every angle, then said,

“It’s a blank business card.”

“I said look closer. Try viewing it like a Magic Eye.”

“Come on, don’t mess with me.”

Akitt gave me the same answer.

To everyone else, this voucher looked blank.

That was why, despite clearly being a lodging voucher, it was called a business card.

“Hey, want to look at this too?”

Something occurred to me, so I took out the Coin Toss of Truth.

“What does this look like to you?”

“Just a coin?”

“Can you see what’s written on each side?”

“...There’s nothing written on it. It’s just an ordinary coin.”

To me, TRUE and FALSE were engraved on opposite sides.

Okay, so that was how it worked.

I was the only one who could identify Jokers as Jokers and use their effects.

Only I knew about the Jokers in this world.

Of course.

Possession-and-regression stories needed a little monopoly like this!

“Hmm.”

But this hotel was also a rift.

It even functioned as a hub for other rifts.

What if it called itself a suite room but was actually a Depth 6 rift? Wouldn’t I just use the ticket and die?

No.

The hotel treated its guests like kings, so would it be fine?

“Well, I’m sure it’ll be useful somewhere.”

There was no time to think too deeply about it.

I had already wasted too much time.

I carefully tucked the hotel voucher into my chest pocket.

After the minor trouble with that nameless extra.

We went through the process of entering the Mushroom Factory.

Like the hotel’s outward appearance, most of the procedure resembled an actual hotel check-in.

First, we went to the check-in counter staffed by a female goat employee.

“Three for the Mushroom Factory.”

For reference, there was no separate charge for rifts up to Depth 2.

Without saying a word, the employee bared yellow teeth in a broad smile and handed us a brass key.

“Wow, Guts, you’re popular. That employee just gave you a full-on flirtatious smile!”

“Guts is handsome, after all.”

“Shut it.”

“Heh heh heh. No need to be embarrassed.”

Maybe because seeing me stand up to Sunming had impressed them.

Maybe the hotel staff’s special treatment of me had seemed extraordinary.

Or maybe they decided that, after falling out with Grade 7 fixer Sunming, their best chance of survival was to stay on my good side.

Akitt and Areng were acting excessively friendly.

Even though I could see right through them, I did not find it unpleasant.

To them, this was our first meeting, but I had a week’s worth of memories with them.

This degree of familiarity felt natural to me.

We took the key and headed for the elevator.

According to the setting, the hotel itself was a rift that had surfaced into reality, as well as a hub leading to other rifts.

Each floor was a rift.

The rulebook said:

27) Board the elevator one party at a time, as directed by staff.

28) The elevator capacity is five people.

The elevator line was long, but there were eight elevators.

As soon as one group went up, another elevator arrived without delay, so we got in right away.

Ding.

When we entered the antique elevator, an employee was standing in front of the buttons.

As expected, the panel had hundreds of buttons.

I was not particularly surprised.

After all, it was common knowledge that the inside of an urban-legend hotel was Hilbert’s Hotel.

“The Mushroom Factory.”

When I showed the key, the female goat employee smiled again and pressed a button.

“Wow, she smiled again.”

“Seriously, Guts, were you always this attractive? Why are you working as a fixer? Quit and become the King of the Night.”

Akitt and Areng snickered as they made a huge fuss.

I scowled.

“Cut the bullshit.”

“Come on, you like it deep down.”

“I know they’re Beasts, but the hotel employees have pretty faces. Their bodies too, whew... If it were me, I’d sweet-talk one and just...”

“What? You’re into that?”

I was horrified to discover Areng’s inhuman tastes, something I had not known in the previous loop.

Was Necropolis really different in every way?

Even as a joke, it was fucked up.

What did a good body matter? They had goat heads!

It was a product nobody wanted, rejected by furry fans and human fans alike.

Just as I stared into the abyss of Areng’s tastes in horror.

Ding!

We soon arrived at the Mushroom Factory floor.

When the elevator doors opened, a vast factory interior welcomed us instead of a tidy hotel hallway.

Hot, humid air washed over us.

It carried the smell of moss mixed with the strange fishy odor of rotting decomposed granite soil.

“Creepy.”

“That’s a rift for you.”

The Mushroom Factory was, true to its name, the inside of a factory.

The ceiling was so high that the concept of a ceiling felt meaningless, and its area was unrealistically vast.

Judging by the enormous furnaces, was it an ironworks?

It was clear that nothing was currently operating.

The lights were out, and the only illumination came from the phosphorescent glow emitted by mushroom caps scattered throughout the factory.

Mushrooms and moss had formed colonies even atop the factory’s rusted steel machinery.

An eco-apocalypse, mushroom edition.

“What are you doing?”

After stepping out of the elevator, I kept looking back until the doors closed.

Just as the rulebook said, the doors vanished like magic as soon as they closed completely.

The hotel elevators randomly dropped checked-in guests inside rifts before disappearing on the spot.

To leave, we would have to find an exit randomly placed somewhere in the rift.

Ding!

A notification appeared.

======

::: Entered New Area (NEW!) :::

Blue life blooming over a graveyard of rusted steel.

A vast mushroom colony covering stopped machines and extinguished furnaces.

This is the rift, “Depth 1: Mushroom Factory.”

Be careful not to stay too long.

You might become part of the colony as well.

TIP

- The rule here is, “People are mushrooms.”

- Never stay in the factory for 24 hours or longer.

- The Mushroom Factory is an ideal place to obtain Fairy Meat.

- It is very difficult to distinguish poisonous mushrooms from edible ones.

::: Challenge Task (NEW!) :::

- Enter a rift through the hotel +1 pt

======

I had already earned 4 Points since the start of the loop.

Since I was proceeding with a play style I had never used before, the Challenge Points were adding up nicely.

The Status Window, which even gave me rough tips, was reassuring.

“Shall we get started right away?”

What we had to do from here was simple.

Kill Beasts.

It was the fastest way to make money.

Why did entering a rift make money?

Why did Aden keep sending fixers into human-grinder rifts?

Because rifts were treasure troves of resources.

A Depth 1 Beast did not drop much Placer Gold.

But lower Depths had less Black Dust contamination, so Beasts could be used as food.

In Necropolis, where food was so scarce that cockroach blocks were a staple, the Mushroom Factory was an excellent source of Fairy Meat.

“Guts, I found it. It’s over there. That’s a Mushroom Fairy.”

“Really? Where? Let me see.”

Mmm... Mmm... Mmm...

Not far away.

Hiding behind cover, we observed the Mushroom Factory’s mascot, the Mushroom Fairy.

“Hmm. It looks fucking awful.”

That was not a metaphor.

I was merely describing what I saw.

Since it was called a Mushroom Fairy, I had expected something like an Orange Mushroom or a Horny Mushroom, bouncing around cutely.

But the real thing looked like a giant button mushroom with muscular limbs attached.

“Fuck, that thing was the Fairy Meat I ate?”

“Mmm, a chewy delicacy.”

“If we don’t get out within 24 hours, we turn into those things too?”

“Ah, we’ll probably be fine. Depth 1 rifts have plenty of exits.”

My stomach suddenly churned.

This was seriously disgusting.

On top of that, low cries echoed from all around us.

Mmm... Mmm... Mmm...

They sounded like old men undergoing sedated colonoscopies, which made it twice as unpleasant.

But apart from how disgusting they were, they did not look very dangerous.

They shuffled around slowly.

More importantly, their cries sounded completely pathetic.

Couldn’t I save bullets and beat them to death without even using Hero?

“Is that thing really dangerous?”

“Of course it is, Guts. Honestly, I feel like I might piss myself. I’m only here because I thought you would do something.”

I rolled up my sleeves and picked up the machete I had brought from the Get Money Office.

“Watch closely, you bastards. I’m going first.”

Even without Hero, I had Laplace’s Eye.

I was a god of counters who could turn even Rock Lee into an ordinary nobody.

I strode toward the Mushroom Fairy.

“Be careful!”

“What is there to be careful about? Just wait. Tonight, we’re having mushroom salad.”

“You really need to be careful! They’re not especially quick, and they move slowly, but they’re disgustingly strong. If one catches even the hem of your clothes... Well, look over there.”

Areng pointed toward a corner between the factory equipment.

I narrowed my eyes and looked where he was pointing.

There was something like an exercise ball between shelves covered in mushrooms.

“Ugh.”

The moment I got a closer look, my stomach turned.

A corpse with its limbs and torso crumpled into a ball, mushrooms sprouting vigorously from it.

It was the sort of grotesque sight Best Gore users would love.

What did those things do to people that their bodies ended up looking like they had been caught in factory machinery?

I turned back around.

“Hey, do they have sharp hearing?”

“I don’t think they can hear sounds.”

“Really? That works out.”