ch21-ch40 · 038-ch37

Chapter 37

"Once more, we have arrived, yo—! Please do not close the door like it is the door to your heart, Toru-bro-sama! I am not a suspicious character, you know!"

A very loud voice echoed from beyond the closed door, so Toru reluctantly opened the front door again.

Standing there were, once again, a young lady and a butler.

He wished it had been some kind of mistake.

The young lady had... drill-shaped blonde hair and a pale blue day dress. An assertive chest, sharply drawn eyebrows like a single brushstroke, and oddly endearing large eyes.

A picture-perfect young lady, as if she'd stepped straight out of a manga.

Standing diagonally behind her was a lean man in a black suit. Tall, probably over 180 centimeters. Despite being a young lady's butler, his hair was disheveled and his expression had a strangely smug look to it. Depending on the suit, he could pass for a host or a thug, but he was probably a butler. He was wearing white gloves, after all.

"Uh... who might you be, and what's your business...?"

He asked reluctantly, for now.

The young lady's reaction was, as expected, large.

"Oh-ho-ho-ho! I truly thank you for opening the door once more! I am Kujo Reiko. I am an A-rank explorer, and having witnessed your exploits, Toru-bro-sama, I have taken the liberty of paying you a visit to speak with you!"

"Taking the liberty" meant pushing forward uninvited.

In other words, showing up unannounced without being called.

So this young lady knew her words.

Whether she knew common sense was another matter.

"Uh... yeah. First off, could you maybe lower your volume a bit?"

"Oh my, my apologies. My butler Joichiro scolds me for this quite often too."

She responded to the criticism by bowing her head normally and showing apology, which made things a bit awkward for Toru. If she were just rude, he could close both the door to his heart and the front door at the same time.

"An A-rank explorer... are you connected to Anthem? The elf just left, sayin' she had to answer a summons."

"No, I am an independent explorer, so I have no connection to Anthem. An elf—you mean Ilseria? She has been staying at your residence until now...?"

"...Well, it'd be a problem if you made a scene out front, so if you don't mind a poor guy's rundown apartment, would you like to come in?"

At this hour, the cat beast-person Mika's mother next door should be sleeping. She might have been woken up by that "Oh-ho-ho!" earlier, but it wouldn't be fun to have complaints later.

Besides—how to put it—the young lady's attitude and atmosphere were haughty, but he didn't sense any condescension.

"I would very much like to impose upon you, if I may. Oh, yes. Joichiro, would you bring out that item?"

The moment the young lady—Kujo Reiko—finished speaking, the butler called Joichiro pulled a paper-wrapped box from his breast pocket like magic and offered it to Toru.

"These are dungeon cookies from NINELINE. They are quite delicious. Please accept them as a token of our acquaintance."

"...Ah, well, thanks."

She was hard to deal with.

For Toru, who was used to being looked down on—well, not quite looked down on, but treated lightly as a matter of course—Kujo Reiko's attitude seemed quite strange.

He had a feeling this woman was like this with everyone. It was just an impression, but he thought so. Whether it was Toru or the Prime Minister.

◇◇◇

He'd let Kujo Reiko and her butler Joichiro into his apartment, but not knowing how to deal with the obviously rich type, Toru was a little stumped, then concluded he didn't need to entertain them.

Tia, who was sitting at the table-turned-dining-table relaxing, tilted her head with a blank look at the young lady and butler who had barged in. Since Toru couldn't explain any of it, all he could do was shrug casually.

"Well, have a seat wherever. If you've got somethin' to talk about, go ahead."

He poured a coffee drink from the fridge into a glass for himself only, and prompted the two who were looking around the rundown apartment's living room with curiosity.

"Let me see—yes, first of all, let me reintroduce myself properly. I am Kujo Reiko. An A-rank explorer and a daughter of the Kujo zaibatsu. And this is my butler and secretary, Kashiwazaki Joichiro. Toru-bro-sama, and the holy sword wielder Tia-sama, I do hope we shall become acquainted!"

With her hand near her cheek, Kujo Reiko declared this with more confidence than anything else. Her bearing had a different kind of brilliance from Anthem's members.

Saito Megumi and Kagurazaka Chizuru... they seemed to shine by receiving the goodwill and curiosity directed at them. An idol explorer probably meant something like that.

Kujo Reiko, on the other hand, emitted light from within herself.

A presence born from the confidence of having no shame in being who she was. It was a radiance that even the S-rank explorer Ilseria didn't possess.

"Uh... hello there? I'm Tia. So you want to talk with Toru, right?"

Tia seemed unusually caught off guard by someone else's rhythm, which surprised Toru a little.

"That is correct! I witnessed your exploits, Toru-bro-sama, on Anthem's stream, and I thought I simply must make contact before anyone else did!"

"And why is that?"

"With such remarkable exploits, the world will not leave Toru-bro-sama alone. That is why I wished to speak with Toru-bro-sama before anyone else could. However—yes, might I make a proposal?"

She thought for a moment, then raised her index finger with a pin-straight smile, blooming like a flower.

Despite being a rich young lady, there was no trace of offensiveness about her. Toru thought he understood why Tia was thrown off, and could only smile wryly.

There was no malice.

He didn't have strong evidence for it, but his intuition told him so. Because in Toru's life, the only people with such an unguarded atmosphere were small children. No, maybe Mika actually had more guardedness than this.

"—Would you care to do a stream? I believe it would be better for many people to know about Toru-bro-sama's current situation. It would also serve as proof that I have nothing to hide in speaking with Toru-bro-sama."

"I see...?"

He could understand what Kujo Reiko was saying, but he couldn't quite grasp the idea of broadcasting a conversation to the whole world.

"Ah, Ojou's also a dungeon streamer, y'know. She's not really an idol type like Anthem, but she's pretty popular. She also does product promotions for companies under the Kujo zaibatsu on the side. Those cookies from NINELINE earlier are a product from one of Kujo's subsidiaries. They're pretty good, I'd recommend 'em."

The butler added a casual explanation.

"Huh, is that so... I can see how she'd be popular."

"Oh, you get it? Ojou's a lovable goof, y'know. That's what the viewers like about her. She says she doesn't wanna be popular, though."

When Toru nodded casually, the butler latched on more than expected. He must like Kujo Reiko. Not romantically, but as a person. Well, not that Toru had any way of knowing if it was romantic, and he wasn't interested anyway.

"What do you think, Toru? I think streaming is a good idea."

"You sure like being on camera, don't you. I don't mind... but yeah, I guess it's better to have everything out in the open anyway."

He didn't know what Kujo Reiko wanted to talk to him about, but he felt it was better to get what kind of person Toru was out in the public eye quickly.

The "rampages" at Sugai Dungeon and Noumi Dungeon—and the fact that he had taken down monsters equivalent to upper S-rank that resulted from them—must have established him as the "cursed blade user" in public opinion. Being praised as a great man or hero for that would be extremely problematic.

Because—Hayasaka Toru's personality was definitely not something to be praised.

It was better to show his ugly side before a public image formed.

If possible, without causing a firestorm.

"Fine. Let's talk on stream."

"Thank you very much, Toru-bro-sama. Then—yes, Joichiro, I shall leave the setup to you."

"Got it."

Kujo Reiko clapped her hands with a crisp sound, and Joichiro the butler responded in a tone that didn't convey much enthusiasm. But despite his tone, Joichiro's movements were fast.

First, he pushed Toru's table and things to one side of the room. He took white cloth from inside his suit—somehow—and set it up against the wall and windows. He laid a rug over the carpet, returned the table to its original position, tore open the packaging on the cookies Toru had left out, tossed the individually wrapped cookies into a wooden bowl he'd also produced from his breast pocket, and as if that wasn't enough, set out a tea set for three on the table.

In no time at all, a simple filming studio was complete.

"This oughta do it. Camera goes around here... and Hayasaka-sama and Tia-sama on that side of the table. Ojou on this side. I'll make some tea now. Oh, Hayasaka-sama, mind if I borrow your kitchen?"

"Uh... help yourself."

He had no choice but to be amazed at the efficiency, and nodding was the only option.

Apparently Tia was surprised by this too. She came up next to Toru, who was standing out of the way so as not to bother Joichiro as he worked, and whispered, "That's amazing, Toru." But her amazement was clearly different from when she'd been impressed by a parfait.

Well, it was certainly amazing.

It was also very, very strange.

"Now then, Toru-bro-sama, Tia-sama, would you please take your seats on that side of the table? I shall sit on this side. And please, help yourselves to the cookies. They are delicious, you know?"

Kujo Reiko sat down first, cheerfully tearing open the wrapper on a cookie. There really wasn't a trace of malice in her.

...What the hell did these people come here for?

Thinking that, Toru sat down at the table as prompted, tore open a cookie wrapper, and popped it into his mouth.

"Whoa, that's good. What is this?"

It was about three times as good as he'd expected, and he was genuinely surprised.

The fact that Kujo Reiko, sitting across from him, was smiling with such obvious delight—that surprised him too.