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Log Horizon © Mamare Touno

This work provided under section 107 of the copyright act of 1978

Chapter 17

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"Are you serious?!"

Shoryu tried to appease her with a grin, but Henrietta was having none of it.

"You, out of all the Swashbucklers in Akihabara, get chosen to represent the Akihabara Round Table in general and Crescent Moon in particular, and you get taken out by an Enchanter!?"

"Henrietta, you're being so mean to poor little Shoryu! He needs to be comforted, not yelled at!"

Marielle tried to reach past Henrietta, who'd cornered Shoryu, to hug him.

"No!" Henrietta pushed Marielle away.

Shoryu looked torn between reflexively agreeing with Marielle and cowering harder.

Minori barely stifled her giggling, and some of the Crescent Moon members were outright laughing.

Marielle might have the title of guild leader, but anyone who'd been in Crescent Moon knew Henrietta was the one to look out for.

Still muffling her laughter, Minori sidled out of the room, waving to her former guildmates. The shouting cut out once she closed the door to the guild hall's pocket dimension, but she could have sworn she heard echoes.

Having heard Shoryu's account from him personally, she made her out of the Guild Building and back to the Log Horizon guild house.

Merchants waved at her as they set up their stands and dead leaves crunched under her feet as Minori walked. Sunlight passed over the dilapidated buildings that made up Akihabara. Miinori found herself marvelling at how empty the city was.

More people lived here than ever, but the population was so spread out that in many of the city's districts only abandoned buildings kept her company.

Log Horizon's guild house didn't stand in one of these districts. While a ways away from the most heavily populated part of Akihabara, it had become the center of something of an administrative and financial district. An enterprising Lander had set up an actual bank, as opposed to the storage-only bank in the guild building. A moderately famous auction house, one of the newest structures in the city, took up almost a block by itself.

There was even startup insurance company, although Minori though they would have trouble finding things to insure when everyone was immortal anyways. Maybe they planned to sell their services to Landers?

She pushed open the door to find Akatsuki and Naotsugu playing a game of chess as Tetra cheered them on. Isuzu's faint singing and Tohya's less-than-faint drumming carried through the walls.

"Hey guys."

"Welcome back." Akatsuki smiled at her, as Naotsugu muttered something unintelligible at the board.

"Hi Minori!"

"Ghhk!"

Tetra had been right in front of her! How did that even happen?

Getting surprise-hugged from behind had never really gotten old. That wasn't a good thing.

Naotsugu swore vehemently that Tetra had an overskill she'd kept quiet about.

Tetra swore, just as vehemently, that she was secretly a pink party pony. They were still at something of an impasse.

"Where's Shiroe, by the way? I need to talk to him before I go."

Minori could have, or course, used telepathy, but there was something about face to face conversation that a voice in her head couldn't replicate.

And anyways, it tweaked Akatsuki's nose. Minori had more or less given up on getting Shiroe romantically interested, but that didn't mean she had to lose gracefully.

"He left fifteen minutes ago, heading towards Roderick's office. Had some burst of inspiration." Naotsugu answered her as he made his move.

"Darn, I'll just call him then."

Minori walked upstairs to the office. Nestled inside the densely packed space, she initiated the telepathic link. After a little bit, Shiroe answered.

"Minori?"

"Just checking in with you before I go. Evidently Shoryu's death was more or less his fault due to the wording Nureha used."

"Ahh, that's unfortunate. And of course, he only respawned late at night after we were all asleep, too… Well, there's nothing that can be done, I suppose."

Minori inhaled, as the conversation paused.

"Is there... anything you need me to do, today? The stuff I transported over has been doing pretty well on ebay."

"Not immediately, no. In the long term, we'll need to hire a lawyer to make us an LLC, but in the meantime I don't… actually wait. I don't have anything for you to do right now, but just in case, pick up one of the Adventurer Contracts and put it in your bag. Alright, see you later."

"Bye."

The telepathic link shut off, and Minori got up.

Browsing the shelves that surrounded the office, she grabbed a hollow brass bookstop.

Their secure storage place was actually a pretty novel bit of magical engineering- a small pouch with similar properties to a magic bag. The holding capacity wasn't very high, but it didn't need to be, as it was mainly to store a few small items Shiroe thought were prudent to have on hand, rather than in the guild bank.

Sure, it was a little less secure, but it wasn't like Adventurers were very prone to thievery-anything valuable tended to be either stored in the bank, or kept on one's person. Banditry was a problem, but not as much as it had once been.

Reaching into the pouch with her fingers, she gingerly pulled out a scroll. Minori put the scroll into her bag, and then set the brass doorstop back in its original location, but rotated one hundred and eighty degrees so Shiroe would know that she'd accessed it.

She walked back downstairs. Waving goodbye to her guildmates, she left the building.

The amount of foot traffic picked up as she walked to the city's main thoroughfare. Food stands sold their breakfast food at clearance prices, preparing for the lunch rush hours ahead. Shops, indoor and outdoor, saw heavy activity.

Leaving the city gates, Minori used her horse talisman. She fed Giraffe a carrot, before climbing on top of her.

"Please, wait!"

She watched curiously as a uniformly green Adventurer jumped from a roof onto the ground.

Being a kannabi was great, but honestly she was a little jealous of the more mobile classes who could do stuff like that. It just looked so fun!

"A letter to my brother. His name is Michael. Earlier, he came from the United States and made it to Japan." His voice had the stilted quality that the automatic translator imparted, and Minori had a little trouble deciphering what he said.

"Oh!" Minori realized who this was- one of Krusty's friends. "Sure, no problem! I was going to talk to him anyways."

He bowed. "I am thankful. Can you be an escort?"

Minori blinked, offended, before realizing the translator had screwed up. He was asking to escort her, not, well… "Sure, It's a little ways away though."

"It is not the problem."

"Then, thank you."

She pushed Giraffe to a steady trot, as the assassin (Leonardo, wasn't it?) sprang into the trees.

They made it to Minori's destination without incident, a small building on a rocky field.

Minori dismounted and dismissed her horse. Unlocking the building, she stepped inside.

She closed and locked the door behind her.

The interior was bare except for a fist-sized metal contraption and Minori's talisman, moved here in an effort to prevent monsters from spawning in Akihabara.

She pumped mana into the contraption, filling it until the runes on it glowed a soft blue. Leonardo had already disappeared, so Minori merely stood in place until it activated her talisman for her.

As always, she re-appeared in her house. Maybe it would have been more convenient to appear at Krusty's, but after two years apart from her parents she wasn't going to go right back to not interacting with them.

"Welcome back, Minori."

Her parents smiled warmly, three plates of toast and grapefruit on the table.

Minori kneeled across from her mother, her father to her left.

"Sorry! I already ate breakfast today. Everyone gets up a little earlier on the other side; we got into the habit back when the only decent sources of light were mages.

"Whoops, we keep forgetting." Her father chuckled, as he moved the toast from Minori's plate to his. The grapefruit went to her mother. "Well, I'm glad you're turning out to be a real go-getter. How's Tohya doing?"

"Good. Actually, he went up a level yesterday, which puts him two in front of me. I'm a little envious, to be honest."

The crunching of toast paused, as her mother and father traded looks.

"About that, you guys mostly fight monsters, right?"

"Yeah. Mostly."

"But it sounds like you fight humans too. When does that happen?"

Minori had to think about that for a little while. She didn't really participate in many player versus player fights, for the simple reason that she wasn't particularly well specced out for them. Tohya fought in duels occasionally, but they were usually pretty informal.

"Probably… about two months or so ago. We, that is, me, Tohya, Serara, Isuzu, and Rundelhaus, dueled a D.D.D party down to ten percent."

"Ten… percent?"

"Well, obviously we don't want to incur the experience penalty for no reason, so most duels go down to an agreed on percentage of a player's health, which is usually ten percent."

"So, adventurers don't just duel to the death at the slightest provocation?"

"No, why would you think that?"

Her dad idly peeled the crust off his toast. "We got called by Shoryu's parents last night, who said he'd disappeared. There were rumors that he'd fought the mysterious Kitsune in charge of Plant Hwyaden. And as a result got, well…"

"Killed." Her mother fiddled with a spoon, rolling it between her thumb and index finger.

Minori rolled her eyes. "Yeah. Nureha- she's a fox tail by the way- killed him in a duel. I talked to him this morning about it, actually."

"She just- Killing him? Just like that? Why? What justification could she-!?"

Her mother's knuckles grew white as she held the spoon in her fist.

"We don't really know. Nureha's kind of erratic. Though really, we were all pretty disappointed with Shoryu for losing."

"Disappointed? With him? He just died!"

Minori shrugged. "Everyone dies. Some more often than others. And anyways, Nureha was an enchanter. He really should have been able to handle her." She looked curiously at her parents, both of whom had set their food down.

Softly, her mother said, "you don't think you're being a little harsh on him?"

Minori shrugged. "He kind of brought it on himself. Nureha probably cheated somehow, but he really should have noticed. So now we're down one person that could be helping out."

"That's remarkably callous of you," she replied.

Minori's mouth opened, but sound didn't come out. Out of the responses she'd expected, that hadn't been one of them.

"Immortality is a huge gift, Minori. Don't treat it like a toy. Don't treat it like you're entitled to it, or like it's valueless. I'm thrilled we won't outlive you, but at the same time, you can't let yourself become someone who doesn't care about the misfortune of others."

Minori's head bowed, her lips set into a line. She knew her mom was right. She had known all along, really. But it had been too painful to think about the lives lost on earth every minute. Or the lives that wouldn't be saved, if Shiroe couldn't refine his contract.

Her mother sighed, then reached over, embracing Minori.

"Don't stop being the sweet, kind girl you've always been just because of the experiences you've had in Elder Tale. It's fine to be changed by them, but make sure it's for the better."

"Sorry, mom," Minori mumbled.

Her mother disengaged from her hug, and her father removed the hand he'd placed onto her back.

"Though I have to ask, because nobody filmed it and honestly I'm a little curious, how did Shoryu lose, anyways?" Her dad's tone had returned to its regular unforced joviality.

"Well, he's not quite sure, because he was asleep for it, but it sounded like Nureha just got off an Astral Hypnos- that's a spell that-"

"-makes an opponent go to sleep for ten seconds after a five second cooldown, yeah. I've been reading some of Elder Tale wiki."

Minori blinked, a little surprised. She'd never taught her parents the ability to use magic, as it was something they'd never asked about. Still it was probably be prudent to show off at least a little bit more.

"That's basically it, yeah. So long story short, he went to sleep and woke up in the cathedral. We're not really sure how Nureha, an Enchanter, did enough damage on him to do that, but she did, and that's what really matters."

Matters, matters, there was something she needed to take care of… Oh!

"By the way, I received another letter to deliver." Minori fished out Leonardo's letter. "Could you please add it to the rest of stuff we need to buy postage stamps for?

"Not a problem." Her dad lifted himself up and grabbed the letter. Bringing it to a repurposed shoe stand, he unceremoniously dropped it into one of the many filing cabinets.

"Is this Leonardo guy foreign? He sounds like it."

Minori nodded. "Yep. He's from New York. His brother is the one flying over here from the US; he'll get here around one or two days from now."

"Huh." Conversation petered out as Minori and her mother rose from the table to deliver food preparation to their original places.

Minori allowed her mind to wander a bit. She had to discuss Shoryu's mistake with Krusty, as well as how exactly they were going to handle the princess when her and her handmaiden Ellissa made the trip to earth today. BologneseMaster had also invited her to appear on his stream, although this was thankfully a much lower priority. None of these things were a big deal individually, but she have a lot of trouble cramming them down into her four allotted hours.

Still, she'd try her best to make it work. She was no stranger to working hard, and wouldn't stop now just when things to difficult.

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A/N: if anyone else is interested in making an Adventurers-in-the-real-world story, here's a starting premise: if you die after being banned from your previous cathedral, you get shunted back to earth, but with your powers intact. Initially it's political dissidents and criminals, but then Plant Hwyaden makes their move, and a whole lot more people start coming through… (Bonus: this is an excellent setup for street-level heroes and villains.)