"This place is sooo amazing! It's exactly what I expected from ue-sama!" Ichiko exclaid as she spun around on one of the bar stools.
"Indeed," Rinne agreed with a sagely nod, and after poking the noodles in front of her a few tis with a tal spork I'd never seen before, she let out an impatient grunt. "The facilities are great, the beds are comfortable, the food is adequate, and as for the sy… sycop… What is the word?"
"I think Rinne-san wanted to say 'minions'," the little girl pointed out, making the ears of the 'minion' on the other side of the counter swivel around in mild confusion, but he remained silent.
"Yes, Rinne ant minions. They are very polite," she remarked before poking at her food again, and this ti she seed to be satisfied with its consistency, as she let out a content little noise and plunged her eating utensil into the bowl in front of her.
"Refreshnts?" Rabom inquired, pointedly glancing at from behind the counter while opening the door of the minibar. I politely declined the offer with a wave of my hand, but my two companions imdiately snatched at the opportunity.
"Just water," the huntress sitting by my side requested without the slightest hint of reservation, and she was quickly followed up by the youngest looking, yet technically oldest person present.
"Sothing sweet!" Ichiko called out with a raised hand, and the Faun responded with a grunt of acknowledgnt, not even a little bit surprised by how the two of them acted like they were right at ho.
Speaking of locations, the mont the three of us were sitting on the tall, padded bar stools lined up in front of the counter within the lounge area of the main hall, with sandwiched between the two girls. I just finished interrogating Rinne not too long ago, though that might have been a bit of an overstatent, a she was quite forthcoming with her answers.
"I still can't wrap my head around how you were actually the head of a ninja clan," I muttered aloud with just a hint of incredulity, and the no longer creepy (yet just as peculiar) huntress responded with an oblivious nod, her mouth currently occupied with a sporkful of pasta. She apparently shared Brang's taste for the mac-and-cheese MRE's, though she preferred to put them into a bowl instead of eating them right out of the packet.
"By clan law, the head of the clan must bear the burden of Onikiri," she stated after swallowing her food, but half a second later there was another bite in her mouth.
"Wait, so which is it?" She gave an uncomprehending look, so I clarified, "I an, is it the head of the clan who gets to wield the sword, or is it the holder of the sword who gets to be the clan head?"
"Is there a difference?" Ichiko muttered on my other side, but I waited for Rabom to hand her drink over to her before I answered. Or at least I planned to, but then I was baffled for a mont longer by how it was delivered in a tall glass with a long plastic straw and a tiny umbrella in it. I an, the straw was odd enough, but I couldn't for the life of rember ever buying any cocktail umbrellas. Just where the hell did they get it?
Oh my god… Could it be? Is the secret base turning into my kitchen 2.0, with appliances and ingredients mysteriously showing up from thin air whenever I wasn't looking? But then again, maybe I was just overthinking this and it was just sothing the Fauns bought in the city.
...
Yeah, right. Like these guys going into a shop and inconspicuously buying so cocktail umbrellas of all things could ever happen. Anyhow, I forced myself out of this soft-drink induced tangent by shaking my head and facing the little girl blissfully slurping her soda.
"No, it's obviously not the sa," I stated a touch heatedly.
"Rinne cannot see the difference either," Mountain Girl comnted on the side, earning a frowning glance for her trouble. Also, wasn't Japanese girls referring to themselves in the third person supposed to be a cutesy thing for little girls? If so, then how co it's her doing it instead of Ichiko? What sense did that make?
I was tempted to voice my complaint, but then it turned into an entirely different one when Rinne shoved another sporkful of food into her mouth.
"Could you stop eating for just five minutes, please?"
"Rnnm cnntm," she mumbled before hastily swallowing her food and trying again. "Rinne cannot. Eating after exercising by ans of exchanging blows is vital for keeping one's internal energies in balance."
I wanted to argue, but seeing how she was holding onto her bowl as if it was her lifeline, I decided to let it go for the mont.
"Fine, whatever. Eat it quickly, and then we'll talk."
She nodded at once and began to devour the remainder of her food. In the anti, I used this opportunity to collect my thoughts a little. According to what I've gathered, the Kage clan wasn't nearly as extensive as I feared. If what Rinne and Ichiko said was to be believed without any caveats, the 'clan' only consisted of the current wielder of Onikiri and couple dozen of other highly visible ninja types who acted both as scouts, back-ups in combat, and as possible replacent candidates in case the wielder would et an unfortunate end. Beyond them, there were the elders, who were the de facto leaders of the clan while the technical clan head was globe-trotting, and then there were a bunch of financial backers from so eastern conglorates who supplied them with money because of so contracts made hundreds of years ago.
In other words, instead of a large organization, the Kage clan was closer to a small group of secretive types with an unreasonable hate-boner for anything they categorized as 'supernatural baddies'. So... pretty much just a much smaller version of the Knights of the Most Chuunibyo Titles? I wondered if the two had any kind of relation to each other, but apparently Rinne didn't even know about them, even though they were both 'monster hunter' groups centered around people with magical weapons.
But speaking of magical tools of tabolism-interference, I was actually a little worried about the whole situation with Onikiri. Not the part about how, just by holding it, I sohow accidentally beca the alleged head of a ninja clan, but the circumstances surrounding the whole event.
For a start, why exactly did I think it was a good idea to take it with to the eting with the bald elder? Or rather, I knew why I'd thought that; I figured that having it around would give credence to my claims about Ichiko, and would theoretically help to keep the guy in bay if he were to turn hostile, both as a bargaining chip and a sharpened piece of tal I could use to poke him. However, in hindsight, couldn't the little miko prove her identity without it? I an, she did, but I should have figured she could do it either way. If I had decided to leave the sword here, things would not have proceeded down in this annoying direction, so I couldn't help but wonder: was I narratively influenced into this course of action, or was it another one of my ho-grown bad decisions?
While I pondered about these things, Mountain Girl finally finished her al, as well as her drink delivered by the oddly skilled Faun, and she waited for to continue the discussion.
"So," I broke the ice while crossing my fingers in my lap. "I don't suppose you can give an easy loophole that would allow to get out of this whole 'clan head' situation, can you?"
"Rinne still doesn't understand why Leonard-san would want to avoid the honor," my... well, she was not really my prisoner, but not really a guest ether, so... my gesroner? Either way, she said that, and then continued with, "If anyone deserves to be the clan head, it is Leonard-san."
"I agree," the little girl on the other side concurred.
"Please tell it's not because I accidentally fulfilled so ancient prophecy," I whispered under my breath, and to my relief, both of them shook their heads.
"We don't have any prophecies I know of," Ichiko remarked between two sips through her straw. "But even if we had, I would still prefer ue-sama!"
"Rinne agrees," the gluttonous huntress piled on with a serious expression. "Leonard-san has purified our clan's sacred blade, resurrected our honored ancestor, and can wield Onikiri without being affected by the miasma."
Hearing the words 'honored ancestor' made the tiny miko let out a mirthful little giggle, but I ignored her as I considered what Rinne just told . When put like that, it really made what I did sound fairly impressive, even though I didn't really intend for any of it. Still, I wasn't going to give up that easily.
"Fine, I give you that, but Onikiri was your sword to begin with, right?" Rinne pondered my words for a mont, possibly because she thought it was a trick-question, ultimately nodding in agreent. "I have it right now, but it's technically still your sword, so doesn't that an that you are still the clan head?"
Oh, look at that. She just gave a 'Is this guy ssing with , or is he a natural-born idiot?' look. I haven't seen one of those in a while. Not that I missed them, mind you, but still.
"Leonard-san has Onikiri," she stated with an odd sense of finality. "That ans Rinne is no longer the clan head."
"If that's the problem," I began as I reached down and picked up the wrapped up sword I propped against the side of the counter and handed it over to her. "There. Now we don't have a problem anymore."
She took the blade from my hand, as if by reflex, but once it actually registered with her, she imdiately tried to hand it back.
"Rinne cannot accept this!"
"What do you an 'you can't accept'? It's your sword," I argued as I pushed it back into her hands.
"But... But it belongs to Leonard-san now!" she objected even stronger, but I continued to push it towards her without budging.
"No, it doesn't, and even if it did, I'm still giving it to you, so take it already."
Mountain Girl hesitated for a few more seconds, but at last she hesitantly took the blade from . Now, normally it would have been a bad idea to hand a weapon over to soone who was technically my captive, but she was quite cooperative and, more importantly, the usefulness of said weapon was made more than a little questionable by the magical shroud covering the blade, which she couldn't remove without 'turning on' the enchantnts first. Though again, while it could still work as a blunt instrunt, I doubted she would try to whack with it, and even if she did, I was ready to Phase away at a mont's notice, because my middle na was 'Safety', even if Judy refused to believe it.
I didn't need to do that though, as once she finally accepted her weapon, she gave a determined nod, followed up by Ichiko jumping off her stool and skipping over to her side to pat her on the back with an energetic "Congratulations, Rinne-san!" in tow.
"... Okay, before we go any further, please tell there isn't so kind of silly custom in your clan, where giving a weapon is the equivalent of a proposal or sothing?" I asked in a hurry, feeling a little suspicious about the tiny miko's enthusiastic reaction.
"No, of course not," Ichiko denied on the spot, much to my relief. "That would be just silly."
"Good. A dumb misunderstanding like that would be the last thing I need right now," I grumbled under my breath before deciding to move the conversation along. "So now that we have concluded that your sword is actually your sword, I suppose it would be ti I let you out of here and back to your clan."
"Yes. Rinne should discuss this with the elders," the currently oddly ek huntress concluded, only to then pause for a short while and tell , "But before that, Rinne must live up to her previous obligations."
"Such as?"
"Rinne promised to spar with Leonard-dono's retainers from the underworld." Her face was suddenly alight with an odd sense of respect. "Leonard-dono's influence is truly amazing. To think it is possible to ta the evil beasts of the underworld to such a degree... Rinne can barely believe they are evil monsters of evilness."
"It's because they're not," I deadpanned harder than I ever deadpanned, and I found an unexpected source of agreent in the form of the little fox-girl still patting the huntress's back.
"Rinne-san must not be prejudiced! It's obvious that the Evil Minions aren't evil!"
I wanted to question her terminology, but I had a feeling it would lead to another tangent, so I wisely ignored the little one and moved on.
"So you want to spar with them before you leave. How about you take Ichiko with you?" My request fell on uncomprehending ears, so I clarified, "I want to employ her as a bodyguard for my girlfriend, so I would like to see how well she can do in that capacity." I wanted to leave it at that, but then I rember sothing else and turned to the little girl. "Also, please transform into your fox form, since you're supposed to protect her while shape-shifted."
"Understood!" Ichiko exclaid with palpable excitent as she grabbed hold of Mountain Girl's arm and pulled her off her seat. "Co, Rinne-san! Let's find the Evil Minions and show ue-sama how amazing I am! Rinne-san will be the damsel in distress, while I will be the gallant fox protecting her!"
Judging by her expression, the huntress found the whole situation baffling and embarrassing in equal asure, but she still obediently let the young girl drag her towards the sparring area. From a distance, they probably looked like a tomboyish older sister awkwardly indulging their little sis... at least until the latter suddenly turned into a rotund little fox after a small light-show, leaving her empty clothes on the ground in the process.
"[I'll retrieve them, milord. Don't worry.]"
Saying so, the uncannily polite Faun on the other side of the bar rushed after them and began to pick up the discarded garnts with unexpectedly delicate motions.
While I was curious about Ichiko's capabilities, I figured there was no harm in checking on her after they've already ward up a little, so for the ti being, I decided to return to Elly's side and see how the negotiations progressed in my absence. I got off my chair and directly Phased to the sub-basent, just in ti to catch the following outburst.
"What do you an we won't have healthcare coverage?! This is outrageous!" Friedrich complained aloud, his expression a perfect image of indignation, which turned into one of shock when he noticed .
"Your uncle is the school nurse, isn't he? He can patch you up in case of a dical ergency," my girlfriend answered in a calm, cold voice. "In case of an injury requiring imdiate treatnt, we can also allow you to use our very own Celestial healer. I don't see why we should allocate additional funds to this purpose."
"But… erm…" Labcoat Guy stamred for a second, glancing between and the princess, who sohow still haven't noticed that I was in the room, and after I gestured for him to say his mind, he tentatively stated. "What if we catch a cold? Mystical arts can heal injuries, but they can't cure diseases."
"That's a good point," I spoke up while simultaneously grabbing hold of Elly's hand from behind. She stiffened for a mont, after which she aid a slightly petulant look at over her shoulder so I added, "I an, Angie couldn't heal my headaches either, so her magic has its limits."
"True, I suppose," she conceded quite easily, but when her attention returned to the pair sitting in front of us, her eyes were just as focused as the mont I arrived. "In that case, we can supply you with facemasks and hand sanitizers."
"I once again request at least fifteen paid sick leave days," Galatea spoke up, and her comnt seed to be aid at in particular, but Elly cut her off right away, responding in a voice so sharp you could use it to fillet pufferfish.
"I already told you, you're a robot. You can't get sick."
"Now, now, princess. Don't be too harsh," I soothed her, falling into my good cop routine to complent her bad cop act. "While she cannot get sick, she probably needs maintenance. Letting her get a few days off every now or then for that should be fine."
"Hmmm…" My girlfriend considered my words a tad more seriously than I expected, so I squeezed her hand a little to urge her along. At last, she stated, "Very well. Grandfather always said that maintenance is important for sustaining peak productivity, so I can allow it. However, you do not require a recuperation period, so you only get ten days."
"I take it," Galatea jumped at the 'opportunity' right away, but then she was interrupted by an indignant sound from the man by the table.
"What about ?! How co I don't get any sick leave?!"
"You get hand sanitizers and face masks. She doesn't need those, so it balances out," Elly stated as if it was obvious, and for a mont I had a hard ti deciding if she was serious or not.
"Those are not comparable!"
"Whoa there, calm down," I gestured with my bad hand towards the increasingly more agitated man. "Are sick leaves really that important? It's not like you are going to work on a strict five-day, nine-to-five schedule."
This ti it was the princess who squeezed my hand, and when I glanced at her, she flatly told , "Of course they are."
"Really?" I blurted out, and she nodded in the affirmative.
"Of course. How else are we going to calculate their wages?"
"Wait, we are actually paying them?" I asked, half-joking, but Elly took my words at face value and turned on her heels to face before she began her explanation.
"Actually, that's a good point. They aren't going to be leaving the secret base any ti soon, so what is the point in paying them money they cannot spend?" she asked, though it was obviously rhetorical. It still made both of our 'guests' shudder and share an uncertain glance between each other, but I pretended I didn't see it.
"Well, you're making a good point," I mused in a tone that said I considered it a tantalizing idea, just to make the duo sweat a bit more, but then I rembered that I was supposed to be the good cop, so I quickly anded, "But on the other hand, receiving compensation for a work well done is an important source of motivation, isn't it?"
"You're certainly not wrong," Elly stated, apparently much more attached to the whole 'let's have them work without paying them' idea than I was. I wondered if that ca from being part dragon, or from being the scion of a business family. "I've actually thought of an idea, so I might as well ask for your opinion."
"I'm listening."
After organizing her thoughts, she explained, "Since you're going to be bringing in all the supplies and tools necessary for their operation, as well as all food and luxury items they could want, I considered cutting out the middle-man. Instead of giving them money so that they can give us money to buy goods for them, how about we introduce a point system instead? They'll earn requisition points by working, and using them, they can requests goods to be brought here."
"I don't see a problem with that, aside from keeping a tally of these points," I granted her, already seeing the hilarious potential for fleecing in the concept. Only in moderation, of course, but still.
"I'll take care of that!" she declared with a haughty little smirk that always made her about thirty percent cuter, give or take five. "I can bring over one of our spare ledgers, and I'll use it to keep track of the requisition points. It should be good training for my economics classes; mom always says I need to practice my accounting."
"I'm glad to hear you can hit two birds with one stone, but… is it just , or does 'requisition points' sound really clunky?"
"A little," she admitted with just a hint of curiosity. "Any alternatives?"
"Spondulix?" I blurted out the first thing that ca to mind, and she nodded in instant acceptance.
"You can't be serious…" Labcoat Guy complained, but his words fell on deaf ears.
"Can spondulix be used to buy exotic aquarium fish?" the android inquired with a raised hand.
"I suppose."
My response resulted in a small hum from her, followed by "In that case, I see no issue."
"Of course you don't," Friedrich continued to grumble, this ti with an added facepalm for emphasis.
"I'm glad to see that the negotiations are proceeding well," I noted with only a tiny amount of schadenfreude. "How much longer do you think it will take?"
"We're mostly done," the princess answered with a somber look on the face. "We have outlined most of the duties and compensations, but can't really proceed any further without an actual blank contract paper."
"Well, I still have the one Lord Grandpa made, so I can erase that."
"Okay, let's do that tomorrow!" she suddenly declared, and once she noticed that I was giving her a 'What gives?' look, she said, "It's almost three o'clock already! Judy's coming over at four, and that's when my solo-ti ends! You can't expect to spend it writing a contract!"
"Right, I forgot about that," I said, although it would be more accurate to say that it never even crossed my mind. "So you want to co back here tomorrow and write the contract down?"
"Yes. I'll write a draft tonight, and it will allow them to think things through so that they wouldn't have any excuses later."
"Sounds like a good idea to . So, should we go?"
"Before that!" Fred cut in and jumped to his feet, only to imdiately sit back down when Vurrok let out a low growl. He only tried to ask if he should open the door, but our guest must've misunderstood, as he continued in a much more subdued voice. "I just wanted to ask: we technically already agreed to the contract, right? So, could we move to different rooms?"
"I second the request," the fembot backed him up right away, but before I could say anything, Elly shot them down using her business-voice.
"A contract is not a contract until everyone signed it in front of witnesses. Until that happens, you're not going to receive preferential treatnt."
The android let out a disappointed noise without her expression changing at all, which kind of reminded of Judy, except not nearly as cute. Labcoat Guy, on the other hand, was about to argue, but another question from Vurrok about whether I could ask another Faun to change the guard so that he could go to the toilet made his face blanch and he stayed stiffly quiet.
Anyhow, once I promised the Faun to tell Brang, I linked my arms with Elly's and we headed out, back into the sub-basent corridor. I could've Phased up at any mont, of course, but I decided to walk for two reasons. First, it was so we could talk and spend ti together and maybe even flirt a little, if so that I could properly establish the line between that and just being friendly with soone of the opposite sex. As for the second reason, I was simply indulging myself. I an, I was still unsure whether I ever experienced this mind-blowing, worldview-shattering thing people call 'love', but walking hand in hand with just the two of us like this gave all kinds of warm, fuzzy feels, so I took it as the second-best thing.
While we strolled, I briefly explained to her what happened during the short ti we were separated, and by the ti I finished, she was giving a visibly befuddled stare.
"So the Kage clan was about to pledge themselves to you, and you threw them out? Why?"
"It was technically just one elder," I objected, only to receive a scoff for my trouble.
"Semantics! The important question is why you turned them down!"
"Because it was an unnatural developnt that had the fingerprints of the Narrative all over it," I told her frankly, and for so reason this ti I received an outright groan in return.
"But that doesn't an it's a bad thing! You act like the 'Narrative' is your enemy instead of sothing you could take advantage of! I can think of at least ten things to do with my very own ninja clan if I had one, and you just kicked them out because you didn't like the circumstances!"
"Ten things? Such as?" I asked, partially as a way to divert her attention, but mostly out of curiosity.
She imdiately wiggled her hand out of my grasp, while still keeping our arms entwined, and she began counting on her fingers with an expression of utmost focus.
"Observation, infiltration, tailing, reconnaissance, information gathering, sabotage, spreading misinformation, assassination…" She stopped here for a long while, strain clearly visible on her forehead, but at long last she let out a defeated sigh and confessed, "Fine, so I could only think of eight things, but my point still stands."
"True, but those are all things I could already do," I responded by pointing out the obvious flaw in her reasoning. "In fact, with my abilities, I can do all of those things better than any ninjas with dubious concealnt abilities."
My girlfriend turned a pair of disapproving eyes at , and out of nowhere, she suddenly asked, "Leo, what do you think is the most important quality in a leader?"
That threw on a loop for a mont, but I figured she was trying to make a point, so I answered with, "The capability to inspire people?"
"That is important, but no. Dad once asked this question, and the answer he gave was 'the ability to delegate'."
"Delegate?" I repeated after her, and she firmly nodded.
"Yes. Not just to push tasks onto others, but to find the right person for the right job, so that by working together you can achieve a greater goal." She paused for a beat here while closely observing my reaction to her words, then she added, "Leo, think of a general. They order their troops not because they can't shoot a rifle, but because while their soldiers do the shooting, they can focus on coming up with strategies or organizing supply lines. Do you understand what I'm trying to say?"
"… Just because I can do it myself, it doesn't an I shouldn't have other people do it for so that I can focus my attention elsewhere?" I hazarded a guess, and I was rewarded with a huge grin.
"Precisely! You said you can only focus on one person at a ti with your Far Sight, so what if you miss sothing important because two events are happening at the sa ti? Wouldn't having a few ninjas be useful for a situation like that?"
"I suppose…" I granted her, but then I hastily added, "But to be fair, I'm still a little lukewarm about this whole 'leadership' business."
"Oh, don't worry! Judy and I will fully support you!"
"That wasn't—" 'what I ant…' is what I tried to say, but in the anti we already returned to the main hall, and I was rudely interrupted by a small, red fur-ball flying towards us, literally bouncing off the ground once, and coming to a sudden halt right before .
"Ue-sama! Why did you leave!?" the little fox whined while at the sa ti excitedly jumping in place, each leap taking her to my eye-level. "I was doing my best, showing off my amazing distressed damsel protecting techniques while thinking that ue-sama was watching in awe and appreciation, only for Evil Minion Number Two to tell that you had already left!"
My first reflex was to point out that she should have noticed that on her own without needing Karukk to point it out, but eventually I went with a conciliatory, "Sorry, my bad. I'll watch you this ti, okay?"
The little fox stopped bouncing and let out a soft 'Yip!' sound before performing a sorsault that looked entirely implausible considering her rotundness and dashed away, beckoning us to follow after her. My girlfriend let out a soft giggle, apparently finding the foxy miko's antics amusing, and so we headed towards the sparring area, where Rinne and the Fauns were awkwardly standing around and waiting for us to arrive.
At the end of the day, we sat down and watched the show, though to be perfectly honest, I wasn't paying full attention. While Elly's words regarding 'delegation' weren't exactly mind-blowing, they were definitely food for thought, and I decided to use the opportunity to fully digest them, even if they would probably give a stomachache, and now the analogy completely broke down. Maybe Judy was right and I was really bad at these? Oh well, that ant just another thing to digest while having my half-dragon girlfriend leaning on and watching a small bouncy fox bamboozling a bunch of ram-headed musclen while protecting a swordswoman who didn't need protection inside a repurposed bomb shelter.
It was tis like these that reminded that my life was weird even by this world's standards, and more alarmingly, I found myself not caring about that the slightest. I only hoped things wouldn't get even weirder… for a while. Sadly, that was the best I could realistically hope for.
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