Chapter 190: Something Tomorrow
———Wiina———
<7: 57 pm>
“...That little reveal went pretty well, don’t you think?” I said as I lazed down on my bed while Karra messed around on my computer. She seems to be into researching nowadays. Don’t really know what she looked through. I just hope that she’s not looking for any trouble. It’s already worrying as is that Emmie and Kenni seemed to always actively seek out trouble even when there was no need to. Even if I have a way of tracking her to check on her condition it would still really stress me out if she does wander out like that.
“Yeah. I do think she is still quite shocked and is processing. Hopefully she doesn’t start having doubts.” Karra said, not looking too interested in that topic and even showing some skepticism. At least I wasn’t actually forced to do anything bad, so that’s a good sign. “...Do you know anything about that rabbit lady? In the first place, what is her relationship to the others?”
“Not really something I looked into. I know a lot of things, but more personal matters are much harder to dig up for obvious reasons.” I said, just to make sure she knows I actually can’t answer everything. I can make an educated guess, but that’s about it. “You would think that the Angel being involved would’ve given you some clue, but it really doesn’t. That person always lurked around, hiding in plain sight. You saw them, didn’t you? Back during the buffet?”
“...So I wasn’t just imagining things then?” She muttered. She did take a few glances, but never commented on it until now.
“Yep. You didn’t see wrong. Looking back at the other time we see the guards, they were probably also there, but perhaps more inconspicuous.” It’s pretty clear they have been around Useph’s family more than once or twice. “Now does that mean Useph’s family got something to do with them? Not necessarily. From the little I do know of the Angel, they worked more like hired guns than anything else, just going around working odd jobs for high-end clients. More than likely, someone in the family knows how valuable they are as security, whether they know of all the supernatural powers that come with them… That’s another story.”
“...So does that mean the rabbit lady is one of the clients?” Karra asked. That would be a logical conclusion if all you did was seeing them together and knowing each other.
“From how they talked and acted, they clearly knew each other more personally. If I would hazard a guess, either belong to the same organization, or simply acquaintances that knew each other a little more than others would realize.” There are a few ways to interpret it, but at the moment, there aren’t enough context clues. “It’s certainly way too personal to simply be a client or someone that person was sent to protect for whatever reason.”
“Nothing super specific, but I guess that’s fine…” She muttered as she looked through stuff on different websites. “...It’s pretty nice to see a place that seems so peaceful when it looks like the whole world is still living in paranoia and… you know, trying to not die.”
“There is a lot of depressing news coming in almost every day, doesn’t mean everyone is affected by it. For someone like her, who clearly has good connections, she doesn’t need to worry about anything and just focus on her own interests. We are also like that. This town is under good protection from multiple people. Petty crimes might occur or even something more severe can happen, but this place is never gonna fall into chaos anytime soon.”
“Definitely a luxury most people don’t have.” Karra said while she scrolled through articles. “You’d think there’d be more strong people out there protecting others, right? I mean this town has like… multiple of them, even without you being included.”
“If only it was that simple. Some people just don’t feel like it for one reason or another. Those who lived for an extremely long time are prone to apathy. Unless something literally happens at their doorstep they aren’t gonna step outside and enforce order. With people like me who are much stronger than others despite having the same starting point as most of the world… I don’t think any of us feel particularly obligated to help. Lack of experience, wisdom, all that. Also just naturally not being familiar with how to best quell all this chaos. With Ahdeid they have all the tools in the world to conquer or bring peace, but they also don’t feel obligated because it’s way past their time.” I start explaining things, a few of them are just points I have heard from others that I am now paraphrasing. “Why are you asking, got something on the news that upsets you? I know I said I don’t feel obligated, but if it upsets you that badly, I could go out there right now.”
“Nothing like that. I’m just looking through articles from early in the day. It already happened, so it’s not really something you can really help with.” She answered. So it’s just general curiosity then? Or maybe something else? “...By the way, are we going to the next LAN tournament? It’s gonna start pretty soon, right? It’s being held in Japan this time.”
“Oh, we’re definitely going.” No way I’m missing out on that. People have been begging for a LAN in Japan for a long while now. Bet the place is gonna be completely filled. “I already contacted them about it so you’re already getting free seats there.”
“Awesome! Can’t wait for that!” She said with a grin. “...Do we need to skip school again?”
“I mean with how long the LAN goes for, we’re gonna skip class no matter what.” There’s nothing we can really do about that. “Don’t worry, I can just take notes for you. I’m sure the higher-ups will understand.”
“Yeah. Can’t thank you enough for that. Even catching up to only a bit of homework or assignment is already quite stressful.” She said with a wry smile. “By the way, with how high spec your computer is, are you using it for anything super important?”
“Not really. I only upgraded it because I can. Why shouldn’t I just upgrade it to be insanely over the top? It can store all the games I want to play! And even the trashiest games run smoothly here, so even those sloppily made cash grab games will look extremely smooth.” It’d be a shame to not do it if I have the ability to. “Besides, it’s not the only thing I upgraded in the house itself, as you know.”
“Yeah. I do get that. I’m pretty sure you didn’t get that king-sized bed from before all of this.” She said, showing a bit of sass. “Have you even done much of anything with this thing?”
“You would think I’d be doing a lot, but no. I have been on my phone more than my computer nowadays. And I’ve been outdoors more often than I ever had, so I have done very little gaming or other stuff on the computer.” Hard to imagine my past self ever being so physically active. Of course, it doesn’t feel straining in the slightest with this body of mine, so it doesn’t really feel like I changed mentality-wise, still doing things still in my comfort zone for the most part.
“Well that’s definitely something…” She muttered and continued doom-scrolling. We don’t have much in common in terms of hobbies and other interests, so sometimes the conversation simply stalled out like this.
Thinking about it, I don’t think even the closest of couples can really talk to each other nonstop. It’s not really something I need to mull over. Trying to force things to be a certain way would only cause a divide, and that is something I would never allow.
Now when it comes to my schedule. Tomorrow is free, and Monday is when we’re going back to school. No one has anything to do tomorrow, Karra doesn’t need me for anything, and that means I am left with nothing to do but laze around and be extremely bored…
…Generally I don’t like to cause mischief just to get a kick out of it. That’s more of Kenni’s deal, and I really don’t want to emulate her of all people. And when it comes to something less severe I could do… I guess I could try roaming around as Navi again, Karra already started stoking the flames by posting the picture of her orders from Luna Rice with me barely being in the picture. It was quite a devious little stunt she pulled. Certainly has the making of an influencer.
“Say, Karra. If I were to appear somewhere and wreck shit up, where do you think I should go?” I asked, since I don’t really have any info to go off on.
“What? Why?” She asked, clearly confused at my sudden questioning.
“Bored. I need something to do. Doing nothing seems to accumulate apathy more than doing something no matter how good or bad. I’d rather not let myself stay inactive for too long.” Maybe the reasoning is a bit overdramatic, but it is true that I shouldn’t let myself get complacent and inactive. It'd be a shame to not flex my power every once in a while, no matter who I’m up against.
“Uh… There’s something happening like a town over, if you wanna look at that.” She vaguely stated while looking at the computer screen. Let me get a better look here…
“Hmm… That’s the same town that the giant gang came from. The one Rico destroyed in a single attack. Looks like the period of peace didn’t last too long.” I said while walking over and checking what is on screen. “Completely occupied. Here I thought that gang was the last of those no-gooders. Looks like things didn’t go as well as one would expect for another small town.”
“So are you gonna do something about it, then?” She asked.
“Yeah. I guess I could start right now.” I said before plucking out a strain of hair and throwing it out the window, letting it fly off towards the destination.
“...You’re so weird.” She remarked after seeing what I just did.
“It’s just how I am. This is still just a tip of the iceberg.” I said before walking back to the bed and lay down on it. “There's a lot I can do that I don’t really need to. For now I’m just scouting things out. I can actually go in and do something tomorrow.”
“Do you really need to scout?” She asked as she rested her cheek on her hand.
“It’s more important than you think. You’d never know why violent gangs or crime organizations are left alone for such an extended period of time. Sometimes it’s because someone really powerful let it happen for one reason or another. Maybe a nearby demon cultivating a field of sins, or maybe someone just wanna see how it develops just for shits and giggles. It’d be really bad if we ran into someone who could actually be troublesome.” I explained the reasoning in detail. It’s part of why certain things aren’t taken care of immediately even if that should be possible. It’s not just due to apathy alone, even if that is a big part of it. “Of course, the likelihood of me running into someone I could have trouble with is quite low, but being safe wouldn’t hurt.”
“Didn’t you say something about people around your level not fighting each other anyway? About how that is prohibited?” She pointed out.
“Ah, about that. While that is technically true, that is only as long as we’re on Earth. If need be I can just throw someone into outer space and fight at full strength there. Most people wouldn’t really feel like doing that anyway, but if pressed enough they can also use that loophole.” The only reason that kind of mutual understanding exists is because no one wants to damage Earth in any substantial way, without it in the picture they will certainly get trigger-happy. “There are a lot of reasons why damaging Earth is a bad idea. Like, a lot of reasons.”
“Sounds kinda scary to think about. I don’t think I want to hear it, actually.” She said before I could elaborate on it further. I think that’s for the best. There’s no reason for any of us to really look into things on such a massive scale right now. Let’s just remain modest for the time being.
…I can’t detect anything abnormal. Just looks like a town completely controlled by whatever organization this is. Looks to be a normal group of villains.
Guess that means I can mess around a bit.