"...Brazen little kid. New hire?"
"...No. He has been with us since the early days."
"The early days?"
Songha let out a bitter laugh resembling a sigh and pressed down hard on Odysseus' head. If one had to call it something, it was an extremely rough stroking.
"Ah, what is it."
"Because it is preposterous that you are already working an angle."
"It isn't an angle."
In fact it was. But a brazen boy generally fetched a better price than a bashful one, did he not? And this way the odds of leaving a good impression were higher too.
"Hah, cute little thing. So what's the reason for introducing this kid now?"
"Because you will be seeing him often from now on."
"Hmm. Anything to do with him pulling something off?"
"Yes."
Miniweaver's eyes looked down at Odysseus intently. The mechanical lens set over one of her eyes adjusted its focus with a whirr.
"All right, if Songha introduces you herself you're no ordinary kid. Miniweaver Grice. I hold a spot in this trade doing Air Bike maintenance and modification."
"As I said a moment ago, I'm Yul. I serve as magician, alchemist, and combatant."
Odysseus took Miniweaver's outstretched hand naturally. Her eyebrow twitched at the word magician.
"Good. Yul, I look forward to working with you."
"Likewise."
"Right, right. So, Songha. Are you selling all of that off?"
"All but one, the one in the best condition. That one goes to this brat."
"Scrawny as he is, can he even drive one?"
"The outside may be feeble, but the inside is packed full of the ferocity of the god Ares. It's fine."
"Hah, he's funny with his words, at least."
Miniweaver cackled and twirled a finger. Only then did the chubby man over by the storage depot move.
"Megas, check from the left!"
"Yes, Sis."
"You lot wait. With this many it takes a fair while to work up an estimate."
"I know, so do not worry."
Songha waved a hand and then turned her gaze to Odysseus.
"Do you want to look around?"
"Am I allowed?"
"Just do not touch anything rashly."
The owner of the workshop was plainly Miniweaver, so why was Songha the one granting permission? Judging by the way she helped herself to beer from the small refrigerator, it seemed to mean they were that close.
So the captain did have a friend, Odysseus thought as he began looking around. Since Yul had had little knowledge of Air Bikes either, this workshop was no different from another world to Odysseus. Odysseus' feet wandered every corner of it.
"You fucking bastard! Who gave you permission to guzzle my beer?!"
"Then allow me the cigarette."
"Plague-ridden son of a bitch......!"
"Deduct the beer from the payment as you see fit."
This one was rather fascinating. Odysseus squatted down in front of a monster bike that did not look to be for sale. The Air Bike was so large that its wheel was the size of the crouching boy.
"More to the point... quite a lot of these are intact. Did you hunt them one-sidedly?"
"The little shits picked the quarrel; what could be done?"
"This one hardly has any bullet marks... patch on the plate you stripped off and it'll pass for nearly new. Same with this one."
"Hmm. Leave one aside... and how much will you give for the other?"
"550?"
"It's barely scratched. Give more?"
"Fine. 570."
But 570? Odysseus, who had moved on from the monster bike to examining the varieties of tools, glanced over. Judging by the shape of the scratches, the Air Bike Miniweaver was examining was the one guaranteed as his share.
"Sis, with a bearing as noble as the god Hera's. Rather than that, how about spending a little more heart, as much as those splendid forearms? With the generous, benevolent feeling of the goddess Demeter watering a young sprout?"
"......?"
If it was the Air Bike that was his share, then it was right to get a little more for it.
When Odysseus cut in brazenly at the end of that judgment, Miniweaver blinked for a moment. She seemed unable to gauge what his last words implied.
"Songha?"
"Yul took it. Single-handedly."
"Him?"
"Yes. Besides that one, that, that, and that one are the work of this impish whelp as well."
"...You're joking?"
"Astonishingly, it is true. If you add the ones he holds a share in by lending a hand or landing the last hit rather than taking them alone, half of these are his."
But with Songha's explanation following on, Miniweaver's eyes could not help filling with shock. The hands holding a spanner and a screwdriver dropped limply.
"...So you didn't introduce him for nothing."
"Of course not."
"Hmm... fine. With Songha saying that, dragging it out further would be no fun. I'll make it a clean 600."
"The rest too?"
"...Up to that one. The rest are too badly marked by bullets, so no."
"Good."
Before Odysseus could react at all, Songha hammered the deal shut. Judging by her satisfied expression, the price given had truly been a proper one.
"Damn. Now that I've named it, I regret it."
"Think of it as making a connection with a talented magician and it will not be so bad."
"Goddamn it, that kid had better be a proper magician. Otherwise your next deal will be conducted at the bottom of that sea."
"Yes, yes."
Songha smiled thickly and held out a hand.
"What's the hand for."
"Hand over the payment. So I can go and buy some weapons while we wait."
"What kind of thuggish son of a bitch—"
"For now I will take only the price of the two that are settled. Twelve million Pi Π. Hand it over."
"Plague take it! If only you weren't a yellow dog!"
"Fellow Arayans ought to help each other, no?"
"Help each other my ass! I've never once set foot on Aragaya soil to begin with!"
Aragaya was the name of the Eastern Continent. Arayan was the word for a person of Aragayan origin, used politely, with no feeling of scorn or contempt.
Though what actually got used more in reality was not Arayan but slurs like yellow dog or slit-eye.
"Piss o... no, when did you grab more beer?!"
"I will enjoy it. See you later."
"You f@#%@—!!"
"You lot wait here. Aran, guard them properly. Flag, you follow me."
"Yes."
"Yes, Captain."
"Yul, you come too."
"I'm coming as well?"
"You need to buy arrows and bullets. Or do you want to keep looking around?"
"No. I'll come."
Arrows were certainly a resource he needed to replenish. And unlike last time, when he had little money, this time he also wanted to examine the weapons properly.
"Are we going where we went last time?"
"No. This time we go somewhere bigger."
"Somewhere bigger... Redwing?"
"Yes."
"Redwing?"
"It's the name of the shop. The owner there is named Buff Redwings."
Odysseus, wedged between Flag and Captain Songha, trotted along after them. Neither of them walked fast, but their legs were long, so he, still in his growing years, had to quicken his steps.
The boy's hurried steps trod on neon light stretched across a puddle.
"There will be more to look at here. The last place specialized in rifles, but this one handles a wider variety of goods."
"Oh."
"But there are as many customers to match. And more dangerous bastards. So do not stray from that flighty one or from my side, not for a moment."
"I'll keep it in mind."
Odysseus nodded for her. He was confident he could break the arm of any average bastard or throw him the instant contact was made, but there was nothing bad about being careful.
"Ooh. The captain's attentiveness. But doesn't saying that always make more trouble happen instead?"
Flag snickered over his assurance, though. It was the kind of remark that made the captain's face go flat at once.
"Do not say unlucky things. Every time you do, trouble happens."
"No, it was a joke."
"Tsk. Yul, do not leave my side. Not for a single step. Understood?"
"Yeees."
Odysseus looked with a subtle gaze at Songha's hand gripping his tightly. He understood that she was worried, but this was too much... was it not treating him like a child? As far as he knew, he had never once held even Telemachos' hand after his son passed ten.
"I don't think you need to go so far as holding my hand."
"No back talk. Before I send you back."
"Yes."
Sadly it was a problem that could not be solved at once. Odysseus shrugged and followed her into an alley full of Graffiti. The acrid smell of cigarettes, the foul stench of garbage, and junkies rolling about greeted him as a set of three.
"Here it is."
Redwing was in the middle of that alley. And not even on the first floor, but in the basement.
A hulk climbing up the narrow stairs flinched at the sight of them.
"Why aren't you moving."
"...I'm going. Going."
At the urging of the people behind him the hulk moved his halted legs again. THUD, THUD, THUD. Every step the hulk climbed sent a hollow sound ringing loudly.
"Why are you dawdling like......."
Odysseus' group stepped a pace aside from the entrance so the hulk and those behind him could come out easily. Thanks to that, the hulk's party only spotted them after emerging from the stairs.
Before the yellow-tinged skin, the bodies of the white men trembled all at once. It was a trembling closer to disgust than to fear.
"Ah, fuck, what are these yellow dogs......."
"Shut it, idiot. That's the Sword Master."
One lump among them spat a thick curse. On the forearm bared by his sleeveless shirt were all sorts of miscellaneous tattoos and a skull mark. The same mark was engraved somewhere on the bodies or clothes of the other bastards as well.
"Hey, white dog. Unless you're picking a quarrel, get lost."
At that Captain Songha brought her arms together and folded them. The sabre that always hung at her waist showed a weighty swing at even the lightest sway.
The white lumps flinched and finally retreated in a mass. Spitting on the ground and spouting curses to salvage a bit of pride to the very end was truly impressive.
"...What does Sword Master mean?"
Odysseus asked quietly after confirming that the white lumps had gone. He knew the meaning of the words themselves, but not why they called Songha that.
"It is nothing. Let us go in."
But Captain Songha did not explain. TUMP, TUMP, TUMP. Her feet descended the narrow, steep stairs.
"Bro Flag."
"It's the captain's nickname. You know, back when the captain... ah, you were little then, so maybe you don't remember?"
Flag tapped his back as though telling him to lead the way. Odysseus obediently went inside.
"Anyway, waaay back our captain once wiped out an entire expedition team practically on her own with nothing but a sword. Now, on the Eastern Continent maybe, but here on the Western Continent few people take a sword as their main weapon, right? And even fewer carry out a massacre with a sword alone."
"And so the nickname became Sword Master?"
"That's about it."
"Surprising. I learned that cold weapons are at a disadvantage in naval battle."
"Ah, it wasn't a fight over the sea."
TAP. The long, long stairs ended and a door appeared. Beyond the already opened door, pale lights could be seen here and there. Counting pure floor area alone, it was light illuminating a space larger than Miniweaver's workshop.
"It was a hunt she carried out by storming the building the bastards had taken over."
Steel display racks with goods laid out like an ordinary store gleamed bluish under the lights. Every product laid out was a tool for hunting and for killing.
"Well, these days the 'rules of the bottom' have gotten tight and the public order corps stricter, so it's become something you can't do anymore... but back then, that's how it was. Hah, you should have seen the captain slicing three men at once."
"Did you see it yourself, Bro?"
"From a distance. Back then the captain cut me out for being weak. I think she took along Vice-Captain Aran at most."
"Flag, that's far enough."
"Ah, yes."
Flag, who had been chattering away while gripping his hand tightly, shut his mouth at once. Captain Songha, a step ahead, was already standing in the passage between the counter and the display racks.
"I thought I heard a familiar voice; so it was the Sword Master. It has been a while since you came in person. What brings you?"
Just then a person carrying a box popped out of the back door connected to the counter. It was a middle-aged man going bald at the crown.
"Is there any reason to come to an arms dealer other than to buy weapons?"
"True enough. So what have you come looking for?"
"A few rifles and rounds for the FSS... and arrows?"
"Arrows for a longbow. Better still if the heads are the broadhead type."
"So he says."
"Bullets I have plenty of... but it's been a while since a bastard came looking for arrows."
"So you do have some?"
"It's mostly fellows from beyond the sea who buy them. Over there they can recover their arrows. Well, even so, few are in straits desperate enough to buy them here."
"I see."
"Anyway, wait a bit. The arrows are stashed in a corner of the storeroom and I have to dig them out."
"And live rounds?"
"Over there."
The middle-aged man set the box on the counter and went back through the rear door. He seemed not the least bit worried that a buyer might steal the goods.
'Well, with this many cameras, perhaps it's fair enough.'
Odysseus stroked the back of his neck as he looked at the camera that had been on the stairs and the CCTV arranged so that the room had no blind spots.
There was no way a man dealing this quantity of weapons had no ties to violent organizations, so from where that fellow stood he could go about without much worry. It was control by fear.
"Over here, Yul."
"......?"
As he was peering about here and there, Captain Songha beckoned. The display rack in front of her was full of grubby boxes.
"From the left: powder rounds, standard magic bullets, special magic bullets. If you want another kind of live round, say so in advance. I would have to look again."
"Well now... you'll buy me special magic bullets too?"
"A few, at least."
Looking inside the grubby boxes, they were full of rounds meant only for sniper rifles.
Powder rounds, with gunpowder packed into yellow metal. Standard magic bullets, which replaced gunpowder's function with magic. And special magic bullets, which went beyond replacing gunpowder to add a special ability.
"How much is this one?"
"It is a 14.5, so... it will differ by type, but most will run about ten thousand Pi per twenty rounds."
Pisti, shortened to Pi Π. The currency used in the union city of Thesenia counted anything from ten thousand Pi up as a high-denomination note. Which meant five thousand Pi per ten rounds was a price anyone would call expensive. Especially considering that powder rounds were consumables.
"I knew powder rounds were expensive, but the price range is higher than I thought."
"There are few defects and the power is uniform, so it cannot be helped."
But the merit of powder rounds came, as Captain Songha said, from having few defects and uniform power.
Compared with magic bullets, whose defect rate and power varied wildly by maker, whose performance differed subtly from piece to piece even when made by the same person, as befit handmade goods, and whose power weakened the more time passed from the date of manufacture, powder products, expensive as they were, had tremendously high stability.
"Hmm."
But expensive was one thing; this was far too expensive.......
After deliberating, Odysseus chose one set of powder rounds, three sets of magic bullets, and, for research, three types of special magic bullets with added effects, two rounds each.
"Is magic something you can work out just by looking at the engraved circuit?"
"If that worked, you'd have bought these for me long ago, wouldn't you?"
The magic circuits engraved on alchemical products always had dummy data or random-number encryption and the like mixed in to prevent analysis and plagiarism. Which meant copying one perfectly did not accomplish anything.
"Then why buy them?"
"There's no rule saying you can't even try just because it's hard."
"Oh......."
But this purchase was about this. Odysseus did not possess higher knowledge himself, but in place of that he had a record of watching several magicians at close range. And one of them had even been the god who presided over magic and sorcery—goddamn it, he had not wanted to think of the witch again—at that.
'If I do it right, it seems I could strip out the dummy data.......'
And every magician he had encountered had said that in all magic, an individual's own habits and mannerisms seeped through. At least in ancient times that had been so.
"Anyway, these were made by the same person, right?"
"Probably? There aren't many around here who know how to make special magic bullets."
"It has to be certain."
In that case, would the circuit engraved on a bullet not also carry traces particular to its maker? If only he could find that, he might reap a fairly decent harvest.
"No... I'm not the owner here. Ask old man Buff about that."
"Did you call me?"
"Oh, old man."
"Hello, mister."
Odysseus smiled amiably at the old man who had come over at some point. The brown-skinned old man set down the box he was carrying with a thud.
"The little shit looks to have promise. Yes, I am well."
Yes, and you look to have no manners.
Odysseus swallowed the rest of the words and held out the special magic bullets he had chosen.
"Were all three of these types made by the same maker?"
"Yes. A wreck of a son of a bitch holed up in District 5 makes them."
"Thank you for the answer."
He had no interest in who made them. It was enough that it was the same person.
"The arrows are here. All the types are mixed together, so pick them out yourself."
But who stores arrows like this?
Odysseus clicked his tongue inwardly that this was why the humans of this era were hopeless. Even so, his body bent down diligently and rummaged through the box.
"Anything decent?"
"Mmm."
If told to use them he could, but rather a lot of them did not suit the bow he now used. Whenever the length seemed right, the head was for target practice or crescent-shaped.
"It seems I was truly lucky last time."
No wonder the fellow who sold him the bow had worn an expression along the lines of 'why is something like this in my shop?' In a world where guns had become universal, the bow had apparently become a relic of a past age. Odysseus' hand pushed his glasses back up.
"This is all that's usable."
"So there are many kinds of arrows... I never knew."
"Of course there are."
Taking compatibility regardless of purpose as his standard, he salvaged exactly twenty-three. A truly feeble number for the result of digging through a whole box.
"How much for all of it?"
"Let's see... shall we call it about seven thousand Pi?"
"Hmm. Cut it down a bit. The arrows won't sell anyway."
"Hah, cheeky little shit. I already took that off."
"At seven thousand Pi? I don't think so."
"Then don't buy them."
"Fine. I won't. I'll just make my own."
"Uh, kid?"
Odysseus raised a hand at the flustered Flag. In negotiation it was vital never to give up a weakness. Well, in truth, rather than pay seven thousand Pi for twenty-three arrows, having them made to order seemed likely to come cheaper anyway.
"Are you threatening me?"
"Threatening, hardly. I'm simply saying the unit price doesn't add up. The essence of a deal is exchanging goods at the end of a mutual compromise. Even the god Hermes wouldn't bless a deal this raw."
"Hah, I take back what I said before. Now I see you're a little shit whose sprouts have gone yellow through and through, with no promise at all."
"Thank you for the compliment."
This much would satisfy even the grandfather who gave him the name Odysseus¹.
The boy's lips lifted in a grin.
¹Odysseus
It means 'one who receives wrath' or 'one who is wrathful.'