Tamana considers this for a moment. “The guild is a mixture of RPCs and a few mid-level NPCs. I heard one of them speaking about that. They didn’t really say much though, and I was in and out because of my low HP. One of them did mention something about the basement of the guild, and a powerful source of energy there. Whatever that is, it may be fueling the Shinigami.”
“Then we should destroy it,” Ryuk says firmly. “We should do what they least expect us to do. They expect us to run, and if we run, they will chase us like dogs. But what if we level up and then bring the party to them? There’s five of us now and you’re a healer and a warrior.”
Tamana’s eyes soften. “Something has changed about you.”
He feels embolden by the way she now looks at him. “We have Hiccup, a Shield Thief; FeeTwix, a Berserker Mystic; and Zaena, an Assassin Brawler. Now we have you, a White Warrior – it’s a well-rounded guild if you think about it. About the only thing we don’t have is someone exclusively casting magic, but my skills make up for that, at least a little. Let’s turn the tables on them.”
“What do you mean?”
“Let’s go after the Shinigami and do so on our own accord. It is the only way to emphasize the difference between our guilds. We play to our strengths, and our strength should be the patented sneak attack due to our low levels. They won’t be expecting us; they’ll be out looking for us.”
Tamana nods. “If that’s what you think we should do, I’m in. If we can figure out what is going on and why resetters are being attacked by NPCs in the real world, it’ll help everyone, both here and in the world out there. I don’t think it is a stretch at all to say the Shinigami are behind it.”
“Let’s go then, now.” He stands, ready for anything.
“Now?” Tamana laughs. “Tomorrow, Ryuk, I need to rest. That’s another thing about being an RPC – suddenly, I have to rest in-game and I need to eat whereas before, those things didn’t really matter as much. Speaking of which, I’m starving. The only thing they fed me was some terrible-tasting broth.”
“I’ll tell the others to bring us something and the concierge must have some snacks for sale. That settles it. Tonight, we rest. Tomorrow we’ll level and armor up, and tomorrow night, we’ll bring the fight to the Shinigami.”
Ryuk turns to the door.
“Last question: did you ever come up with a name for our guild?”
He hesitates for a moment.
“What?”
“The Mitherfickers,” he says, and surprisingly, it doesn’t pain him much to do so. “Our guild’s name is the Mitherfickers.”
Chapter 20: A puppetless puppetmaster
Kodai silently follows Gorira through the door to the back office of the Hinomaru soapland in Yokohama. The day has not progressed well, and the trip to Tachikawa to personally survey the damage done by the American airmen has added nothing to it.
A pigtailed eighteen-year-old sitting on an extra sukebe isu – a pervert stool – leaps to her feet as he enters, and bows deeply.
“I do not pay you to sit on your shiri!” Kodai kicks the stool and it flips down the hallway and smacks into a shelf stacked with cans of nuru gel.
“Hai!” The young woman scrambles to retrieve a rag and begins scrubbing the nearest surface she can find.
A soapland is a uniquely Japanese combination of bathhouse and brothel, and the back office is a perfect example of what goes on behind the scenes. From industrial-sized boxes of condoms to mundane supplies such as toilet tissue and disinfectant – everything needed to run the business is kept on hand. A fresh load of laundry starts up in the adjacent room.
This is yet another one of Kodai’s additions.
The previous manager outsourced all of the laundering, which was incredibly stupid. Why fork over yen for a third party to do laundry when Hinomaru has no less than four girls on the clock at all times?
A chime sounds and a red light on the wall flashes, interrupting Kodai’s brooding. The holoscreens on the manager’s desk flash and display the feed from the front room.
Kodai takes a seat and watches as the new manager he’s hired as of today greets a gaijin customer, politely instructing the thick-necked gaijin to remove his shoes. Kodai hears a door shut as the woman he has just chastised steps into the bathroom to freshen up before greeting the patron.
“Rooms.” Three of the screens in front of Kodai change, showing a bird’s eye view of the rooms that are currently in use.
In the first two rooms, a man lies nude on a massage table as a woman slathered in nuru gel slides herself up and down his body. The soapland experience in the third room has just begun; the man perches on the pervert stool as a bored-looking young woman attends to his personal hygiene with soft hands and a removable showerhead.
The young woman unsuccessfully stifles a yawn.
Hiring college dropouts and pretty girls from the countryside still makes good economic sense, but the high turnover and low morale always manages to bite him in the ass. One day when it does become more economical, he’ll hire humandroids for the job…
“Hey,” he calls over to Gorira. The big man quickly approaches him and peers over his shoulder. Kodai taps on the screen. “See yawning beauty here? Have the new manager handle this, now.”
Gorira fires off a message to Okami, the new manager, who then fires off a message to the woman. Kodai watches in the live feed as she suddenly feigns excitement and enjoyment.
“Better.” He stands from the desk.
As Kodai moves towards the door to the basement, he eyes a handwritten, heart-shaped, pink posterboard sign that reads: Did you check for stains? Are they all gone? Make sure the towels are clean! A kawaii drawing of a happy young girl with her thumbs up is tacked to the bottom of the reminder.
He waits for Gorira to open the door, and he descends into the basement. A single LED bulb at the base of the stairs provides the only light; the muffled sobs of Meosa, the soon-to-be former manager of Hinomaru, the only sound.
Kodai enters the room and nods at one of his triggermen. After he inserts a pair of foam earplugs and dons a pair of latex gloves, the man hands him a suppressed, small-caliber handgun. Gorira takes his place on the opposite side of the door and puts his fingers in his ears; the triggerman does likewise.
Kodai steps onto a blue tarp, in the center of which former manager Meosa is naked and duct-taped to a pervert stool. Tear tracks moisten his cheeks; his fear-filled eyes are wide above the red rubber ball gag that’s encrusted with his snot.
As Kodai raises the weapon, an acrid yellow puddle forms around the base of the stool and he grimaces in disgust. Gorira and the triggerman avert their eyes, embarrassed to witness Meosa’s cowardice and loss of face – when all that is left is for one to die, one should at least die well.
Even with the suppressor, the report in the enclosed room is surprisingly loud.
The subsonic .22 caliber hollow point bullet enters Meosa’s skull but does not exit; instead, it ricochets through his brain tissue and gives him a more merciful death than he deserves. Other than the shameful loss of bladder control and a small trickle of blood around the entrance wound, there is almost no mess, of which Kodai approves.
He considers the now empty meat sack for a moment. After clearing his throat, he hands the weapon to the triggerman and motions for Gorira to follow him up.
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