WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Haruto
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◈ A Gacha Addict's Life in Fusionpunk ◈
Chapter 22: The Eight-Foot Widow (2)
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1.
A luxurious restaurant in District D-1.
A reunion with Ceres, with whom I had spent the night after selling Arbel’s corpse during my first run.
Getting here had not been free.
I had invested four days’ worth of effort, the money earned from it, and every scrap of information I had gathered into a meal date with her.
Like a die-hard big spender who worked construction sites for a female streamer.
Of course, what that big spender wanted and what I wanted were a little different.
Definitely different.
Anyway, this was a cold, calculated investment.
The reason I avoided Ceres during my second run was because I had mistaken her for a snitch.
After that, I figured I had nothing to offer her without Arbel’s corpse as tribute.
What was a Mage?
Unlike normal people like me, every last one of them was insane in some way.
Even if she had shown me some goodwill, arranging a meeting while risking my life was deeply uncomfortable.
But after everything I had experienced, I changed my mind.
I was weak enough that I needed to make “dying well” part of my strategy.
And if things went wrong?
Activate the effect of Paltry Indulgence! “Forgives one mistake or wrongdoing committed against a being clearly stronger than oneself.”
End the turn!
That should be fine.
“Cute little boy. Do you know something? This time is very precious to me. Far too precious for you to interrupt.”
Ceres leisurely wiped her mouth with a napkin.
Honestly, when a woman... No, when a person was 2.4 meters tall, every movement they made was bound to look somewhat ridiculous.
“But in consideration of your commendable courage...”
Yet when Ceres set down the napkin stained with red lipstick, I felt something entirely different.
“I’ll give you one minute.”
Scary. My knees were shaking.
It felt like sharing a table with a savage beast that had learned table manners.
Then again, that made sense.
What I had learned about her while wandering the black market was not merely that she rented out her favorite restaurant every day at ten in the morning to enjoy brunch.
The Eight-Foot Widow, Ceres Cassian.
One of the eleven directors who ran Twilight Resource Development.
A Mage who handled death-aligned magic, estimated to be at least 250 years old.
Her exact Rank was unknown.
But she was estimated to be at least Fourth Rank.
Ceres was a monster of the labyrinth who ruled over Necropolis, where life and death were tangled together.
I quietly swallowed, trying to look as calm as possible.
“What happens if I fail to convince you within a minute, Director?”
“Who knows? At the moment, I feel like gouging out your pretty eyes, castrating you, and selling you to the sodomy quarter.”
W-W-Wow. What a taste!
That’s one hell of a joke!
“Ha ha. Are you planning to send the two bodyguards outside to the sodomy quarter too?”
“...”
Ceres smiled at my icebreaker joke.
I prayed the atmosphere would shift into one of those hearty hahahas and hohohos.
But Ceres’s smile was only her mouth splitting wide like rotten cheese.
Don’t do that....
It’s seriously terrifying.
This thing really works, right? Paltry Indulgence?!
I couldn’t picture this woman saying, “Well, these things happen. Get home safe!”
Still, I had something to give me confidence.
During my first run and now, Ceres said the same thing the moment she saw me.
“You’ve got good eyes. Mad eyes.”
Thinking back to the first run...
“I didn’t speak to you at the ossuary because of your sister. Back then, I noticed you first.”
She had said that, too.
Ceres definitely had some kind of expectation of me.
If I really had potential, couldn’t I serve under her and make it bloom?
“I want to work under you as an attendant, Lady Ceres.”
“Is that so? Why?”
“Because you’re beautiful.”
“Thank you. Twenty-eight seconds left.”
Why?!
We had it good during the first run!
You said you liked me!
You said that if I soaked myself in madness, I could become like you!
Before it was too late, I should use Paltry Indulgence and end the turn!
======
「Exhumation Monocle」
- Effect: You may glimpse up to three events from the past month that the target most wants to hide.
- Note: You may glimpse only actions the target recognizes. Remaining uses: 2.
======
That was what would have happened if I did not have the Exhumation Monocle.
“Hm. That’s unexpected.”
“Twenty-two seconds....”
“To think a director of Twilight Resource Development has such poor judgment of people.”
“Julien. Politely see that little boy out.”
“Yes, Director.”
Julien strode toward me to “see me out.”
His tailored suit and expressionless face made him the perfect image of a model watchdog.
Well... on the outside.
Even Cedric could not stop himself from vomiting after learning that bastard’s secret.
“I wouldn’t want an attendant who carefully collects their boss’s discarded stockings.”
“What?”
Ceres’s eyes narrowed.
Julien, who looked fit to serve as the principal of a butler academy, spectacularly stumbled.
“What else was there? Ah... Do I really need to say this?”
“Go on.”
Julien’s eyes rolled back as he rushed at me in a panic.
“Silence!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You wretchhhhh!!!!!!!!!!! Do not dare insult my loyalty with that deceitful silver tongue!!!!!!!”
Good lord, old man. You shouldn’t react like that just because I hit the mark.
“Stop.”
At Ceres’s gesture, Julien’s body froze.
Instead, he desperately pleaded with Ceres.
“Lady Ceres!!! My loyalty comes from reverence and respect purer than white snow...!”
“That’s bullshit. It comes from pitch-black lust and desire.”
“You bastard!!!!!!!!!”
Ceres lowered her raised hand with a perfectly blank expression and asked me,
“Anything else?”
“That bastard fucks goats, and the goat’s name is Ceres.”
I was genuinely shocked.
They existed. Goat lovers.
As soon as I obtained the Exhumation Monocle, I had planned to slander Ceres’s close aide and fill the vacancy...
...But I had not expected him to be this deep in the abyss.
Ceres took a slow breath, then asked quietly.
“...Anything else?”
I drove in the nail.
“He fucked it yesterday, too.”
“...”
Ceres’s eyes turned cold.
They had always seemed lifeless, vaguely unfocused, and eerie. Now even their faint glimmer was gone.
“Stop! Stop! Lady Ceres! It’s all slander! All lies!”
He was so flustered that his denial was closer to a seizure.
His desperate screams almost made me feel sorry for him.
But it wasn’t like I made any of this up.
Honestly, Ceres might have forgiven the stocking thing.
Who told him to name a goat after his boss and get intimate with it?
“This is absurd! You doubt my loyalty over the slander of an outsider I met today? I have served you as your attendant secretary for three years! My loyalty outweighs my life!”
Honestly, I expected Ceres to interrogate him with magic, or at least investigate.
But Ceres’s reply to his desperate defense was simple.
“Really? Then kill yourself.”
“Pardon?”
“You said your loyalty to me outweighed your life. Kill yourself here and now.”
“Th-that... Lady Ceres! I did not mean it in that sense....”
“If you cannot keep your word, you should not have spoken it.”
Without questioning him further, Ceres lightly raised a hand as if calling for a waiter.
“Eat.”
Julien’s face went pale.
“Lady Ceres!!! I truly...”
The goat-fucking attendant secretary Julien disappeared.
His explanation, nearly a scream, was muted as though a cassette tape had been abruptly cut.
As though he had never been there in the first place.
The sudden silence gave me chills.
It would have been less frightening if Julien had been torn apart or the restaurant had been splattered with blood.
So this was magic from someone at least Fourth Rank? Was there even a way to respond to it?
Cold sweat ran down my forehead.
Still... the previous attendant had vanished.
Who was going to hand things over to me now?
“Hoo.”
I naturally lit a cigarette for Ceres as she pulled one from her cigarette case.
“I don’t fuck goats.”
Ceres gave a hollow laugh and blew out smoke.
“You do seem capable enough to act so boldly. You want to become my attendant?”
“Yes, I do.”
“What Grade are you?”
“I’m Guts, a Grade 9 fixer with the Get Money Office. I set up shop not long ago.”
“Grade 9?”
A faint light entered Ceres’s eyes.
“Well, violence is not the only measure of competence.”
From her perspective, I was a Grade 9 who had uncovered misconduct by an attendant secretary even she did not know about. Of course she would be interested.
It was proof of competence, too.
“Can you drive?”
“Yes!”
“Good. Julien used to drive. You seem useful enough as a driver.”
Nice!!!
I had used the monocle to approach Ceres because I wanted to try a new Route and play style.
No matter how I looked at it, there was no answer if I started from the bottom with nothing.
There was a saying: if you were going to be a servant, serve in a great lord’s house.
First, I would take on her back-channel jobs directly, build up trust and favor, crawl into her bed, and settle down as her kept man!
I would make my potential bloom beneath Ceres’s warm skirts!
That had been the aim of this run.
But I never imagined I would land such a huge catch as becoming her driver!
“I’ll work hard!”
I bowed at ninety degrees.
“Before that, there’s something I need to confirm.”
“Give the order.”
“When I choose an attendant, obedience is what I value most. Given my position, I never know what kind of wicked person might approach me.”
“If you tell me to bark, I’ll bark. If you tell me to show my belly, I’ll show it.”
“Is that so?”
Ceres rose from her seat and walked over.
In her hand was a long, narrow-tipped fork.
The very fork she had used moments ago to pull snails from their shells.
She caressed my cheek and whispered in a sweet voice.
“Can you truly obey no matter what I do?”
“Of course. I am not a scoundrel like Julien, who only talks a big game.”
I answered immediately, but....
Ah, fuck... Why do I have a bad feeling about this?
“Then shall we see how well you listen?”
The fork in Ceres’s hand slowly approached my eye.
Its sharp tip shone in the sunlight.
Ah, don’t joke around. This isn’t funny. You’re joking, right? We’re doing WWE, right? You aren’t serious, are you?
You’re going to stop just in front of it, right?
“Who sent you?”
“Pardon?”
Squelch.
A wet sound rang out.
“...Ugh?!”
You fucking... Crazy bitch!!!! Are you insane?!!!!
How could you stab someone in the eye with a fork?!!!!
My vision disappeared beneath the pain of an iron skewer scraping the inside of my skull.
Wet sounds followed one after another. Sticky liquid ran down my cheek, whether tears, blood, or vitreous fluid.
“W-wait, wait, wait! Aaargh! Why are you doing this?! Aaargh!”
“If you tell me the truth, I’ll stop at one eye. Do I look like an idiot?”
With my remaining eye, I could see Ceres stirring the fork as though pulling a snail from its shell.
Did this bitch think I was a mole?
“I already know everything. Talk. You’ll feel better once you do.”
“...Grrghhh!!!!”
“Why did you approach me? With entertaining information in hand, no less.”
There was nobody behind me anyway.
But if I showed even the slightest sign of backing down, that bitch would make me disappear like Julien.
I would die either way.
I clenched my teeth, forced my eye open, and shouted.
“Money! Money! Money! I came here to make money! I weeded out a guy who fucks goats, so why the fuck are you stabbing me in the eye, you crazy bitch?!”
Ah, I should not have cursed.
“Hm~”
Ceres pulled the fork from my eye socket with a satisfied hum.
Thick red liquid dripped onto the floor.
“As I thought, you...”
Ceres’s lips curved into a smile.
Whether or not she did, I was in unbelievable pain.
Ah, my head hurt. My eye hurt.
Fuck. Fuck. I felt like I was going to throw up. This crazy bitch.
“Sorry, I guess I was mistaken. Come here.”
“You think this can end with a ‘my mistake’... Huh?”
When her hand caressed my eye again, my vision returned.
Apart from a faint ache, the pain had vanished as though it had been washed away with water.
Healing? Regeneration? How had she done that?
Thud.
Ceres tossed something to me, and I caught it by reflex.
A heavy car key with elegant silver decorations, along with gold coins.
Three gold coins worth 100,000 Bios each.
I felt a little better now.
“Go prepare the car. That is compensation.”
“Yes!”
“Hehe, did it hurt much?”
“No! When you live long enough, you might mistake a job seeker for a mole!”
Bitch.
Was that really something to say after gouging out a person’s eye with a fork?
If she thought a little pocket change could calm my anger, she was mistaken.
I would never forget this humiliation, Ceres. I would take revenge.
Count Montraven’s House repaid favors with bunny girls and grudges tenfold.
I would use her filthy past as bait and make her obey me.
I touched the monocle.
Though I said that, it was not just personal feelings.
Now that I was officially her driver, this was also the perfect time to investigate Ceres.
When you got a job, you were supposed to collect your boss’s weaknesses and bleed them dry, not collect your boss’s stockings.
On the way to the restaurant garage after receiving the car key, I aimed the monocle at Ceres, who had resumed her meal as calmly as if nothing had happened.
[「Exhumation Monocle」 Remaining Uses (1/3)]
[The following are the events Ceres Cassian has most wanted to hide over the past month.]
1) Two days ago, Ceres Cassian researched a way to break a Commandment.
2) Fourteen days ago, Ceres Cassian threw away all the high-heeled shoes in her dressing room.
3) Twenty-eight days ago, Ceres Cassian leaked Twilight Resource Development’s Project Z plan to Overnus Pharmaceuticals. (Biological and chemical weapon dispersal in Necropolis, estimated 250,000 deaths.)
“...”
Excuse me?
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