Worthless Skill Escape (WN)

Chapter 231

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TL: ALT

Chapter 231 – The Fugitive: Yuto Kurashiki Part 3

“You will accompany us quietly. If you resist, you know what will happen, don’t you?”

It was a blatant threat.

Although they didn’t point their guns directly at me, it was clear that they were ready to use them at any moment.

At the same time, it was also clear that they were extremely nervous without having to read their expressions.

I’m sure they’ve heard rumors about me, like the Black Tengu and the Summoner.

You can see that they’re worried about whether they’ll be able to control me if I go on a rampage here.

This is a good opportunity. Let’s try to get some more information out of them.

“Hee, do you think you can do anything to me with that old-fashioned gun?”

That’s what I was wondering from the beginning.

If the person is a member of a special forces unit, then a submachine gun with a high rate of fire and good handling in confined spaces would be the norm.

However, in terms of effectiveness against explorers, submachine guns, which are only effective as ground-based weapons, would not be very effective against explorers of a certain level or above.

“You’re surprisingly uninformed, Kurashiki.”

“What do you mean?”

“Didn’t you hear the news that gun drops were confirmed in the dungeon outside of Gettysburg?”

“Guns?”

It is common knowledge in the industry that guns do not drop from dungeons.

I thought the same thing when I conquered the Kururi Castle dungeon.

Even though the Karakuri Drone and the Karakuri Tank use Gatling guns and cannons, they don’t drop guns or cannons.

Instead (?), the drop item you can get there is the Rapid Fire Bow.

The Rapid Fire Bow may have seemed like a romantic weapon, but it came in handy when I rescued (or rather, robbed) the explorers Clovis had stored in his Item Box using Human Objectification.

If there was an item submachine gun, it would be much more useful than the Rapid Fire Bow.

Or even a revolver-type pistol might be a pretty broken performance as a long-range weapon that can fire continuously.

But,

“I thought guns were too new to be an item?”

Compared to “traditional” weapons like swords and bows, guns have a short history since their development.

It is said that this is the reason why guns do not drop in dungeons.

Well, there’s no way to verify if this theory is true or not.

“Even guns can’t be said to have a short history. America, in particular, has a long history of guns, going back to the colonial period. The history of guns and America are inextricably linked. For better or for worse.”

America had a pioneer era in which gunslingers like those depicted in Westerns were active.

If fighting with swords and bows is romantic for modern Japanese, fighting with guns may be romantic for Americans in some ways.

Historical backgrounds, such as the bloody wars with the Indians and the Civil War that split the country in two, could also be the basis for dungeons.

I have a theory.

I think that the drop items in dungeons reflect the desires of the explorers who venture into them.

In retrospect, it seems odd that the boss of the Black Swan Forest Water Park dungeon, the Gigant Rock Golem, dropped an elixir even though it was in the third slot.

To be precise, I used Plunder to steal it, but the fact is that it was placed in the slot.

Compared to other cases of elixir drops, the fact that an elixir dropped in the Water Park dungeon, which is only a C-rank dungeon, seems rather unbalanced.

Then how did she get the elixir there?

It’s probably too much of a good story to think that it was just a strong reflection of Honoka-chan’s feelings for Haruka-san.

At the time, Honoka-chan was tricked by the illegal explorers and believed the story that the boss of the Water Park Dungeon would rarely drop an elixir.

It might also have something to do with Honoka-chan’s mental characteristics, which later manifested as the unique skill of Empathy.

With all these factors coming together, is it possible that “the elixir was redesigned as an extremely hard-to-obtain drop item in the third slot of the boss’s drop items”?

I don’t have any proof, but that’s what I think.

I’ve also been forced to do things like write the rules of the world into the void that flows from the holes in the world.

I feel that the world we take for granted is actually influenced by human will.

The American gun culture is generally seen as a bad thing, but there must be a good reason why gun control has not progressed despite the tragic incidents that have occurred.

It’s as if they feel they need to be armed with guns to protect their rights in the end.

Ideologically, it’s probably similar to how the women of the Women’s Association tried to protect themselves from male persecution by “arming” themselves as explorers.

Just as the samurai of old used their swords as a symbol of their status, perhaps gun owners in America see the act of carrying a gun as a symbolic sign that they are independent people.

You could say that this is a kind of “faith” in guns.

Or, just as the dungeon system follows the conventions of fantasy role-playing games, it’s possible that the conventions of zombie movies and horror games are what made the guns in the dungeon.

“So that’s why guns dropped in America. And you think that’s what you have?”

Despite all that, it’s not really an American-looking gun.

Judging by how old it is, it’s not hard to believe it was used in the American Civil War.

As expected, Toudou shook his head from side to side.

“No, that’s not it. You’re very ignorant, Kurashiki. Don’t you feel anything when you look at this weapon? Don’t your eyes fill with tears when you think of the blood of the Imperial subjects that was shed for this weapon?”

The man who had been concentrating on his duties suddenly started to talk.

Even if you say things like “tears fill my eyes” to such a gruff man…

Besides,

“What? The imperial subjects?”

“This rifle is a modified version of the Type 30 Infantry Rifle. It was the standard infantry rifle adopted during the Russo-Japanese War, and it brought glory to modern Japan. It was also a rifle that drank the blood of many Imperial Army soldiers. Many Imperial Army soldiers also trusted their lives to this rifle during the Nomonhan Incident. The Imperial Army soldiers, clutching this cannon, fought bravely against the Soviet armored corps and died in spectacular fashion.”

Toudou speaks with passion.

“So that gun was dropped as an item from some dungeon in the countryside?”

There is a clear difference between weapons that exist in reality and weapons that drop as items from dungeons.

The long sword that appears in RPGs is just a sword made of iron.

If the “long sword” that drops from dungeons is just an ordinary iron sword, then it means that it can be mass-produced using modern technology.

However, the iron sword made with industrial technology and the long sword dropped from dungeons are two different things.

A simple iron sword cannot even scratch a monster in a B-rank dungeon.

Of course, the long sword has been analyzed by researchers around the world using modern science.

But no matter how much they analyze the Longsword scientifically, they can’t find anything that makes it different from an ordinary iron sword.

They say that as far as the material is concerned, it is just an iron sword.

It is said that the Longsword is an item that has added some kind of dungeon-like metaphysical effect to the ordinary iron sword.

That reminds me―I remember.

The Kusanagi no Tsurugi that I once held was originally just an ancient treasure sword.

Perhaps there is a similarity between the Kusanagi no Tsurugi gaining the power of a sacred treasure and the dungeon giving a material weapon a meta effect as an item.

“Weapons have started to fall in Japan as well… things are going to get rough from now on.”

In the United States, which is a gun-oriented society, to begin with, there probably wouldn’t be so much chaos.

Whether it’s dungeon guns or real-world guns, there’s not much difference in their ability to fatally injure ordinary people.

But in this country, it’s different.

In this country, where guns are regulated and not easily obtainable, what would happen if guns could be obtained from dungeons?

Of course, there is also the problem of explorers using their status as explorers to commit crimes.

However, the Association’s Inspectorate and other public and private organizations have been working to create appropriate rules to address this.

It can’t be said that there are no loopholes, but they have been able to prevent chaos that would disrupt social order.

The explorers’ abilities can be said to extend conventional crime as a matter of individual ethics.

In a way, it’s the same as saying that a professional boxer or a gold medalist in judo shouldn’t use their skills for criminal purposes.

So, what’s the difference between an explorer’s skills and a gun as an item?

Explorer skills cannot be transferred or sold to others, but weapons as items can easily be.

When guns start dropping in many dungeons, it is certain that they will be resold to people other than explorers.

Even if you are arrested for violating the Sword and Firearm Control Law, you can still acquire the Item Box skill if you earn enough SP as an explorer.

“Huh. As I thought, you don’t have the ability to wield power that can affect the fate of a country.”

Toudou picked up on my muttering about the country falling into chaos and said to me with disdain.

“What?!”

No, I don’t need that kind of ability.

“The deterioration of public order due to the proliferation of guns is only a small matter in the face of the current international situation. What is important is that guns can be obtained as items in domestic dungeons. When you think about the coming war, this should be a situation that we should honestly be happy about.”

“…Shouldn’t you leave such a decision to the cabinet?”

“I will leave the decision to them, but I also have my own thoughts on the matter.”

“I hope you have your own thoughts on how Tozaki is trying to do whatever he wants with the country.”

“That man is necessary for this country. I deeply agree with his ideals. It’s no exaggeration to say that something has changed in me. After all, it’s only natural for a government official to obey the democratically elected prime minister.”

“I see.”

Regardless of the election results, there is room for doubt about the process by which he became the leader of his own political party.

There is a high possibility that he used the Change of Strategy to seize power within the party.

Otherwise, it would be difficult for a politician who was rejected by the voters in a single-member constituency to become president after being elected proportionally.

“Well, Kurashiki. Shall we stop chatting now? Are you so afraid of being taken away by us?”

“Scared? No…”

Even if I was taken away, I could escape from prison if I had to.

The problem is

“…Yuto-san…”

I think it’s Honoka-chan who’s behind me.

If Honoka-chan is in the hands of the authorities, Haruka-san will have no choice but to do what Tozaki says.

On the other hand, if I ran away with Honoka-chan, her social status could become even more precarious than it is now.

I almost asked Honoka-chan, “What are you going to do?”

But I swallowed it at the last minute.

I thought it would be irresponsible to leave such an important decision to Honoka-chan.

By using the phrase “respecting Honoka-chan’s wishes” as an excuse, I might avoid the responsibility of making a decision.

I came here to protect Honoka-chan.

First of all, Honoka-chan has already shown her intention to resist.

She “escaped” from the place where she was “protected” after being separated from Haruka-san.

She then contacted me and asked for my help.

In that situation, trying to confirm Honoka-chan’s intentions further would be like indirectly saying, “I can’t help you, so give up.

While I was protecting Honoka-chan on my back, I remembered something from the past.

It was when I protected Sayuki from Junko Tozaki in high school.

I can say that that decision was the worst thing that ever happened to me in my life.

That decision determined the course of most of my subsequent hardships.

In the end, I also lost Sayuki, even though I had tried to protect her at great cost.

Still, I have no regrets about that decision.

Including the hell that followed, I affirm this helpless, unvarnished me as it is.

Not the me that was blessed in the job world but the clumsy me that cannot escape when I should.

…I’m sorry, Serika. It looks like I’m worrying you again.

The things I can’t give up made me decide to do this.

What did you see in my appearance?

“You’re not going to resist, are you? Don’t do it. If you call that phantom dragon here, what kind of damage will it cause? You can’t be that stupid.”

From the beginning, I’m not sure if you’re trying to calm me down or if you’re trying to provoke me with your words.

Well, maybe that’s how cops “convince” people.

But what really got me was something else.

“What? A phantom dragon?”

“Don’t play dumb. We know you’re the summoner in question.”

“No, that’s not it…”

I didn’t want to play dumb.

“I hadn’t thought of that.”

“Of course not. A black tengu overflowing with chivalry wouldn’t involve civilians.”

Toudou said, looking somewhat relieved.

But that’s not what I meant.

I never thought of myself as a chivalrous, righteous hero.

The problem I had in mind was much simpler.

“Calling him out to deal with you? He’d laugh in my face. He’d say, ‘Don’t call me on stupid stuff like that. Get me a real opponent that’s worth my time.'”

Toudou’s body stiffened at my words.

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