"..."
I once woke up in my dark room to find a knife-wielding burglar wearing a black mask.
So, a mere ghost doesn't scare me at all. I wasn't scared one bit. Really.
I wasn't scared, yet my legs gave out, and I slumped to the floor. I had no idea why my legs lost all their strength. Maybe my body was stiff from staying up past my bedtime.
It felt like if I closed my eyes, that blue face would suddenly be right in front of my nose. I couldn't even blink, keeping my eyes wide open until they were bloodshot. My body was trembling slightly.
'I need a way to deal with ghosts. Right now.'
For now, I decided to act like everything was perfectly fine... just playing it cool as if it were an everyday ghost I always see.
I turned my body slightly to the side, keeping the ghost in my peripheral vision, and slowly slid away as if I were moonwalking.
'...Fuck, it's following me...'
The blue-skinned man slowly drew closer, his feet seemingly hovering just above the ground.
This was no joke anymore. I felt a sense of crisis that went far beyond mere fear.
'What about my Belsus?'
It might be one thing for a ghost to attach itself to me, but I couldn't let it pass on to Belsus. What if my kid's energy gets drained and he can't fight?
Thinking that I had to resolve this somehow... I threw away my dignity.
Dirty thoughts... let's think dirty thoughts. I heard ghosts don't target perverts.
"I-I want to see a naked woman."
Far from widening, the distance between me and the blue male ghost only grew shorter...
It's not working! I'm even trying to imagine it! But damn it, of course it's not working. I'd need to have been interested in that stuff in the first place to imagine it realistically!
Then what if I imagine a man's naked body? Wouldn't he get disgusted and leave?
The only male naked bodies I know are mine and Belsus's. I had no choice but to picture Belsus naked.
'Belsus has been bulking up incredibly well lately... He's practically back to his prime physique. Is that what they call horse thighs? ...And that thing hanging between his legs... honestly, it was so absurd that I even dreamt about it the first night I saw it... Ever since then, I make sure not to go near him when he's taking a bath...'
Without realizing it, I drifted off into a daze, completely lost in thought. To the point where I momentarily forgot about the ghost's existence.
When I suddenly snapped out of it, the spot where he had been following me was completely empty.
The ghost was gone!
'No. Don't let your guard down.'
To avoid the cliché of turning around slowly only to find a blue face shoved right against my nose, I blindly swung my fists around behind me a few times.
Still not feeling safe, and figuring ghosts wouldn't attach themselves to a crazy person, I stood in place, did some national calisthenics, and danced around wildly for a bit.
...The ghost didn't reappear.
'Belsus's club... strong enough to drive away even ghosts.'
I quickly exited the building, and right before entering my subspace, I sprinkled a handful of beans I had stolen... no, borrowed from the theater troupe over myself.
Then I threw salt all over my body, took off my shoes, and wore them backwards. Anyway, after performing every superstition I had ever heard of, I entered the subspace.
Sure enough, Belsus was standing by the doorway waiting for me, long past his bedtime.
"What are you doing up?"
"You're very late."
Belsus took off my hat for me, and then even took my coat. (Even though I ended up snatching them back immediately).
"Did someone push you into a salt field?"
Belsus asked with concern upon seeing the white particles stuck to my coat. Passing by his side, I patted his forearm.
"I chased away a ghost thanks to your naked body. Thank you. You're my lifesaver."
"What...?"
Belsus made a bizarre expression. I wasn't entirely sure, but a moment later, it looked like he was lightly biting his lip.
As I headed toward the cabin, I glanced back and saw Belsus rubbing his forehead, though I didn't know why.
---
Following his landlord's recommendation, or rather, demand, Belsus immediately went into the barn and turned off the lights.
The lights in the cabin where Heean stayed finally went out about an hour and a half later. Even then, the landlord, still clinging to the lingering desire for chore EXP, rustled around for a while. Only after a bit did it fall into complete darkness.
The blue-skinned man was standing in the middle of the field.
---
It had been over a month since Belsus came to my farm.
He still hadn't paid his first month's boarding fee, and now with a new tab running, Belsus was pacing nervously, anxious and restless.
'It should be fine for him to venture into minor dungeons now.'
Belsus had grown strong enough that he wouldn't go out and just get beaten up. Especially since the guy was such a pushover, he was prone to getting stabbed in the back, so I had generously boosted his stats with the assumption that he would need to survive a betrayal and return safely.
'That's just a plausible excuse; the real reason was that we had no way of getting a Hunter's Token until now.'
If this were the Belsus route in the original game, it wouldn't have even been an issue. After killing Calain, Belsus would have just taken the Hunter's Token Calain had and possessed it from the start.
Anyway, because of the lack of this crucial item, I had to offer a painful deal promising a +6 enhancement to the Bard. I received his mandolin on the spot and stored it in my inventory to enhance it at my farm.
'When did I get hired as a blacksmith?'
Last night, I had a fitful sleep after stealing something from the theater troupe and encountering something I shouldn't have seen... It wasn't until the next morning that I took out the mandolin.
It was an instrument similar to a guitar but slightly smaller. I held the long, stringed neck and turned it this way and that to inspect it. There was a small inscription on the instrument's body.
[Perius ♡]
A heart? My thoughts halted for a moment at the appallingly cute doodle.
It didn't seem like the artisan who made the instrument would leave a signature like this. Besides, this round, bubbly handwriting... no matter how I looked at it, it seemed like something Persephone would write herself, didn't it?
Then was Perius the name the Bard had given his character?
Suddenly, the words the Bard had said when handing me the instrument came to mind.
-It's an instrument Persephone bought for me. If you break it during the enhancement, I'll make you pay three times the penalty.
-...Look here. That's not up to me. It's all RNG.
-That is a condition of the deal. If you don't keep it, there is no deal. Use your life skill level to assist it.
Up until then, the Bard had been acting all dignified, but he suddenly turned dead serious, his eyes changing as he forced the condition on me.
It wasn't like it was made from some legendary White Deer Wood, of which there are only ten trees on the continent. It was neat, but it looked like a perfectly ordinary instrument. So why was he so obsessed with it?
'A heart, huh...'
Persephone was the most beautiful woman in the game. And the Bard was the man who had chosen Persephone as his partner.
But he was middle-aged. Their age gap was at least twenty years.
'Nah. No way.'
What is this lukewarm, unpleasant feeling? Even though I knew it was none of my business, it still bothered me considerably.
Clang! Claaang! A light erupted from my hands and spread brightly over the mandolin. Consecutive enhancements didn't trigger even once, so unfortunately, I didn't get any bonus gains.
[Failed to enhance to +5.]
[Successfully enhanced to +5.]
[Successfully enhanced to +6.]
Still, failing only once meant I got off cheap.
'To think I already have to give a +6 weapon to another ranker. And I even paid the enhancement fees out of my own pocket.'
Well, my kid's weapon is already at +9. Even if it's just a sickle...
Now all I had to do was return the instrument and get the Hunter's Token.
But there was a problem. A token can only be used if the owner transfers it directly to the recipient.
'The Bard has to meet Belsus and give it to him.'
You couldn't just steal or snatch any token and use it. Especially if it was a token the Bard had already registered under his name.
...Why am I so reluctant to show Belsus to him?
I didn't like him much to begin with, but after seeing that doodle on the instrument, my favorability towards him plummeted drastically.
'We agreed to meet at the same tavern tonight at 7 PM. Will the Bard even show up on time?'
It had been a month since the possession. Not just me, but many rankers were slowly starting to feel the difficulty. Namely, the absence of mobile phones.
The chat system, which served as our only means of communication, didn't have a private message function. If two people were supposed to meet, writing something like "Something came up, let's postpone~" in the global chat would cause an uproar with people asking, "Did you guys form an alliance?"
Besides, I can't even type in the chat. If I fail to make it tonight at seven, I have no way to contact him, and I'd just be standing him up.
-It's just like when I was young. Back then, we only had pagers, so it wasn't easy meeting up at designated places.
-...Is that your actual real age? Or is it a concept?
The Bard had just laughed it off.
...Somehow, I have a feeling he might actually be a middle-aged man in real life too. That peculiar old-man vibe wasn't something you could just fake by acting.
Then what about Persephone...?
I felt even more uncomfortable. Praying that I was just overthinking things, I headed out to meet that Bard exactly on time.
With Belsus.
'Haa... What if our pushover gets tainted by that old man's vibe...'
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