The Loner Who Conquers the Other World
chapter-8

Day 8 – The Cave

During breakfast, the long and heavy story continued. If they skipped bitching, grumbling, and badmouthing, the story could proceed a lot faster, but it looks like for the geeks that was the main point.

The story of being summoned to another world and the week filled with fighting monsters and survival life, was mostly about badmouthing other classmates, did you really have to go to another world to do that?

While eating breakfast they were still bitching…… I mean, continued telling their story. Of course, it goes without saying that we were having mushrooms.

「So when we told them that high Lv skills can’t be used until you saved up enough SP and activated them……」

「Around the third day they suddenly began raising their levels.」

「Yeah yeah, aiming only for weak goblins nearby.」

「Like in an RPG, not going far from the base and grinding weak monsters near the start location. 」

Aah, I think I’ve figured out the culprit. There is no need for deduction or any cool montage showcasing the thought process.

「They really don’t do any good.」

Looks like shinobi investigated, erasing presence and stalking them. Apparently, stalking dudes wasn’t much fun.

Isn’t that great? If it was fun you would’ve been done. In more ways than one.

It seems that they, the wannabe delinquents, unaware of being eavesdropped, kept talking about nothing but lewd stuff and distribution of the girls after brainwashing. Are they idiots? Are they some kind of crappy movie villains? Blabbering out your plans right when someone is eavesdropping on you.

I see, so forced harem is their aim, huh. Or rather, despite bullying the geeks for being geeks, aren’t they pretty geeky themselves? Well, they are only wannabes after all.

Of course, the geeks started working on countermeasures. After they told the president about the effects and dangers of 「Puppetry」and「Charm」, as well as the plans of the idiots, she seems to have resolved herself and also began actively raising her level. By the way, it seems that the president is a real cheat.

While keeping the things running, they built the plan, and while making preparations raised levels.

And on the 5th day after coming to this world. The Puppetry finally manifested. They kept meticulously killing level 1-2 goblins until Lv 15 when they got enough points. For shinobi, that kept observing them all this time, it surely was a sight to behold, or maybe not.

So firm, so tenacious, such admirable wannabe delinquents.

Apparently, they kept laboriously fighting while leaving last hits to either owner of Charm or Puppetry. As shinobi said, it was a true treasure of boredom. Sweet.

On that day they again screamed stuff like 「I’ll make a harem when I get back!」or 「We are having an orgy today!」or 「Yeeeah!」while keeping on killing Lv1 gobs, and finally, Charm manifested as well.

Such pure, serious, and diligent wannabe delinquents. At this point, isn’t it fine to drop the delinquent part already and leave them just as wannabes? You guys aren’t suited to be delinquents.

Then, by well, a pure coincidence, the first beauty of our school, the president, appeared inside the empty forest without a single soul around, all by herself.

That moment, the wannabes smiled, seemingly overjoyed from the bottom of their hearts, which felt just as pleasant as a field of blooming rafflesias.

Grinning, they laughed to each other, and approaching the president, looked into her eyes with disgusting smiles………… The wannabes then fell down all together, and convulsing, stopped moving. Amen?

Or rather, just who the hell is the president?! Eh? You won’t tell me since it’s her privacy?

No, didn’t you stalk some dudes for several days? Didn’t you invade the dudes’ privacy quite deep?

And while the wannabes were out, the geeks applied seals to the two that had the problematic skills. It seems that the identity of the one that used Seal is a secret even from the president.

After all, when they learn who did that, they will surely come after him.

Then, tying up the unmoving wannabes they dragged them back to the camp, and in front of everyone revealed their harem creation plan involving Puppetry and Charm.

And while trembling in fear in front of the female students, who became completely enraged after hearing all of that, the wannabes pleaded with the geeks to release the seals. Of course, the idea wasn’t received that well, so the place erupted into a chorus of criticism.

Of course, the boys, who wannabes said would be made into slaves, also rode that big wave of criticism. Wannabes trembled as the place seethed with anger.

Shouting insults everyone unanimously agreed to banish wannabes from the base. Luckily geeks even managed to hear the line「Remember this」in real life, how envious.

And with this, the matter was finally resolved.

As if.

On the night of that day, during their breaks from patrolling, the four geeks were taking naps and having a discussion in their tent.

The first one who noticed something was the shinobi. The tent was surrounded from a distance, by six people.

Since the mage had a detection barrier in place, it would have immediately given a response if those were monsters. Since it didn’t, those were humans.

There is no way they could pass through traps and fences without getting caught. So someone from the patrol let them pass? What for?

「Shitty geeks! Come out! And don’t you dare bring damn weapons! Move your asses faster!」

Shouts came from the outside and the tent was set on fire.

As the four jumped outside, the guardian erected a barrier. A barrage of magic came at them.

While the saint enhanced the barrier with Light Magic, enduring the attack, the shinobi uses flash ninjutsu, which he prepared in the meantime, blinding the enemies, and the mage rapidly shot air bullets to suppress the enemies.

The exact combination that they discussed in the tent.

Even so, being ambushed and surrounded put them at the disadvantage.

On top of that, while geeks were trying to fight them off with weak spells like air bullets or water whip, the other side was coming with fireballs, or destructive blasts, clearly set on killing them.

It wasn’t going well.

Everyone else just looked, without trying to help them out.

The barrier won’t last for long, do they have no other choice but to seriously fight to the death? Against other humans? The geeks couldn’t make that decision.

Then the group with the president finally came back from patrol. And began providing them with covering fire.

As attackers tried to flee no one made an attempt to stop them.

「Next time we will friggin kill you! Next time for sure!!!」

Yelling so, they ran away.

By the time the president came back, the base was burned, with many injured by the fire and stray projectiles, and the emergency food storage being on fire as well.

As for the boys that were on guard, they apparently were told that「We only came to talk, don’t get in our way」, and threatened, they just let them pass.

Knowing that they are going to be targeted from now on, the geeks couldn’t split up and take any independent action anymore.

Rebuilding the base, defending it, finding food, and caring for their own protection. And considering that they now couldn’t even sleep without someone being on guard, they basically couldn’t do a thing now.

Anyway, while being injured themselves they put out the fires around, healed the wounded, rummaged through the wreckage for still usable tents, and reinstalled them.

While getting blamed by everyone around.

「It’s all your fault.」

「It’s because you got into a fight with them!」

「Take responsibility.」

Though they are healing their wounds, they would get kicked, told that to begin with, it was their fault.

Putting out fires, they would have stones thrown at them, shouted at questions how they are going to fix this mess.

Putting up tents they would get hit, told that it is all because they got too cocky.

Standing on guard they would be insulted and spit on behind their backs.

No allies.

Thus, the geeks had only two options, to run away or to kill.

Protecting themselves 24 hours a day with just four of them is difficult, and sticking only to repelling attacks they are bound to eventually get killed.

If they split their duties as they did in the past, they would surely get aimed at when they are alone.

Staying here would only mean that they will get killed one by one.

Either kill or run away from here.

The president desperately tried to persuade others as well as explaining to them the demerits of losing the geeks.

Let’s protect the geeks and at least try to rotate the food provision duty, so we won’t have to rely on them for that.

They will have to fight those guys, as well as monsters. For that raising their levels is necessary.

She also told them what would happen if the geeks die in the current situation.

Things can’t go on as they did in the past. To survive in the world, they have to cooperate and seek knowledge.

And yet, it seems to have changed nothing.

They are probably under the impression that everything is just like it was at school, treating the geeks like convenient gofers, taking out their anger on them.

Scared of fighting. Opposed to killing. And even more opposed to getting injured or killed themselves.

The geeks that were made light of at school would listen, if one makes their tone firm enough. The power of numbers is on our side, is what they probably thought.

At the very least, they could ask the geeks or attempt to negotiate with them. But, they couldn’t.

If they did, if they pleaded, if they implored, the geeks would’ve at least provided a compromise plan, but there is no way they could do that.

Their pride wouldn’t allow them.

Then go ahead and survive with that pride. That’s all that there is to it.

And so the geeks ran away, with just four of them.

Chased by pseudo-delinquents and the students that they helped alike.

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It was lunch by the time that heavy story was over. Of course, mushrooms. During which we discussed what happened in the white room.

Other than that, we also exchanged various information. I also learned Concealment, since they said it wouldn’t take much time, in exchange, I gave them juice.

When I told them that the only martial art remaining was cane arts, they told me about a famous style of Shintō Musō-ryū, [1. TL Note: Pretty ancient (Coming from Edo period) traditional school mostly known for its practice of using the short staff. The technical purpose is defeating a swordsman by using the short staff. For that purpose or just to make the style stronger, the school also teaches several other arts, including swordsmanship. More information here. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shint%C5%8D_Mus%C5%8D-ry%C5%AB] for which I thanked them with a stuffed bag filled with mushrooms.

And we kept talking until the next morning. When was the last time since I talked so much? More than one or two months, so Loner Lv 2 has nothing to do with this.

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It seems that going to bed immediately after eating might turn you into a cow, but since they are geeks anyway, it doesn’t matter. Class change from a geek to a cow, it could even be called an upgrade.

Feeding them mushrooms for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, it wouldn’t even be an exaggeration to say that I raised those cows! Great, beef secured!

After bathing the geeks seemed to be done with traveling preparations. The only thing left is to sleep.

「So we thought about heading to the city now, want to go with us?」

Recruitment, huh. Is it perhaps a sect?

「Sorry, I’m irreligious.」

I reply, averting my eyes. A perfect answer.

「No, we aren’t trying to convert you!」

They are persistent.

「No thank you, we don’t have a TV.」[2. TL Note: Japan has the same license situation as England. With their national broadcast company being NHK instead.]

How about this. Final answer.

「We are not from NHK! Or rather, if you had a TV in another world that would’ve been scary in its own way!!!」

What?! This didn’t work as well?!

Well, since they are seriously inviting me, teasing them too much would be rude.

「To be serious, becoming an adventurer is impossible with my skills. Thanks for the invite, but I’ll be spending my retirement here at leisure.」

With my cursed status, I’ll only get in the way.

On the other hand, I have no option of stopping them as well. They are obviously itching to go to town. Did they already forget that their lives are being targeted?

I thought about becoming an adventurer in a city, it’s a staple of isekai stories after all. However, in a city, one would have to pay for lodging and food. To earn that pay one would need an ability to fight with strong monsters.

Here, staying in the cave is free, food can be procured on the spot, and with nothing but weak goblins around, it’s safe.

Though it comes in exchange for quality of life, but isn’t it safer in the forest? I also don’t know the crime situation in the town, and since I’m an outsider, it’s all the more important to me.

「Coming to another world and not becoming an adventurer?! What are you even talking about!!!」

「You should just come with us, there is strength in numbers!! Aniki![3. TL Note: a Japanese honorable term for an older brother or a superior.]」

「You will do fine as an adventurer, the town surely will have even weapons with skills.」

「The town has a lot of young girls!!!」

Who the hell is Aniki? The geeks are being pretty forceful, but I’m different from you, guys with cheats. What is so bad about being Hikikomori, NEET, and Loner?! Well, it is the worst, but even so!

And, young girls? You are only 16, why are you talking like a middle-aged man? No, wait, just how young exactly are those young girls that he is talking about? Should I report him to the police?

「No, not happening. All of my skills are crap, and on top of that my titles would get in the way…… With Earth magic alone…」

I actually can use fire magic as well, but that is a secret.

「That is not true, after all, you are already fighting strong monsters of this area……」

「Being an otherworlder is alone enough to make you stronger, even with subpar skills, if you have level……」

「There is also an option of becoming a lord of a city by creating one through Earth Magic, then developing it with modern knowledge and technology.」

「Even this stone furniture, if they are on the middle ages level out there, you will be able to create a successful trading company…… 」

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「Since you have cane arts, how about trying a long club……」

「This might even work with a three-section staff!!」

「You also can use Earth Magic to create walls for cover and snipe from behind them……」

「Health is also important since we have no hospitals here. 」

This got me thinking, isn’t the amount of knowledge geek quartet possesses incredible?

Without them, a crowd of 42 people in the forest, surrounded by monsters on top of that, consisting of ordinary high school students, probably would’ve been annihilated.

Even though they went through such experience at school, they still gathered food for 42 people, distributing it. And also teaching everyone about skills, aren’t they pretty good guys?

「Towns usually build along rivers, so if we go downstream, eventually……」

「Elven town, deep in the forest……」

「No, beastmen, in the forest’s……」

「Observing from a high place to make a map……」

Just listening to them is quite…… Educational?

「No, there must be slaves, preferably cute girls.」

「There are probably noble ladies, attacked by the bandits, waiting for our rescue!」

「Is touching YES or NO? That is the problem……」

「Speaking of towns, inns’ poster girls!!」

「「「「Blah Blah, Yada Yada.」」」」

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「No, beast ears is the way to go! Fluffy and soft to the touch.」

「Eroelves are surely waiting! While being attacked!! By tentacles!!!」

「Dwarven girls are certainly very tiny!」

「I won’t accept anything other than highly prideful women knights disgraced by defeat. 」

「「「「No, this! No, that!」」」」

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I had enough, let’s kick them out.

8th Day – Over