NOVEL WEB Arc 1: The Meeting – Chapter 7
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Cross-over from various games, books, anime, manga, and movies.
The familiar characters you see here belong to their respected authors and owners.
"Speech"
Arc 1: The Meeting - Chapter 7
It's a new day, and I've decided to go with the Housekeeping Mastery first before anything. Massive changes upon getting this cheat.
For one thing, my cooking skills felt like I'd cook throughout my entire life and learn under numerous famous chefs. Using the Delayed Effect has pushed what should be the average master level of cooking under the influence of the Housekeeping Mastery into a near-godlike level.
I was very tempted to absorb the set of superhuman cooking abilities of Food Wars, but stopped myself from doing so. Because, again, I don't know what the Boss would do to me if I were to cause Nyarla to perform an erotic scene due to eating the foods I made under the effects of the Food Wars.
Instead, I grab one about the Old Ways from the Soul Eater universe.
The Old Ways is a system of various martial arts practiced by House Hoshi and the Star Clan in which its practitioners are taught to utilize techniques and martial arts in a manner that's designed to kill though they can be applied non-lethally. The style emphasizes quickly incapacitating opponents and taking down an opponent as quickly as possible.
And, of course, this is also modified like the others. Something I could tell straight away with how I can subconsciously think of the best way to kill non-human targets. Now, I can kill non-human things faster without having to blast everything around me to death via the Stillness of an Object's Time. Actually, I should be able to use the Old Ways together with the Stillness of an Object's Time in a more effective killing direction instead of relying on the raw killing force on default produced by the Stillness of an Object's Time.
Of course, I didn't want a repeat and stopped trying to absorb another cheat. Even now, I can feel a slight headache forming. Of course, I made the headaches disappear via the Delayed Effect and Lion's Heart used together. Honestly, I don't think the Boss thought of me making the Delayed Effect as my first Nen ability and for it to go so well with Lion's Heart, especially since the latter isn't the original version.
On another note, something I should have done or maybe was too scared to do. I stored away all the glowing books in my shadow, and to my relief, they didn't stop glowing nor were they taken away by the Boss. So now I have many glowing books with me wherever I go and need a quick plot armor boost in case my present set of cheats doesn't work against a very powerful opponent. Something I highly doubt would happen because no intelligent person would allow me to read a glowing book in the middle of the fight. But, better to have all the glowing books with me than not.
Anyway, we're outside again, mainly for Nyarla's new video games, which she plans to buy today since she couldn't buy any yesterday. So far, no luck in finding one like yesterday, and I'm already dreading what would appear today. It is one monster after another.
I've already given up trying to figure out which world is which and go with the flow until something or someone shows up to clue me in on what kind of world I'm in with Nyarla temporarily.
"How come we haven't found any game store yet?" Nyarla looks at me with a sad face.
"Maybe this place doesn't have it?" I ignore the stares Nyarla is getting from the crowd.
I swear it better not be like yesterday, or I'll send this entire town into an early grave.
"Hey, what's that?" Nyarla point ahead.
I look, then curse and pick Nyarla up and start running while carrying her like a sack of potatoes.
Do you want to know why I'm running instead of fighting off what Nyarla just pointed out? For any crazy voices still left in my head that are wondering.
The world is fucking ending with multiple large meteors coming down from the sky. Fuck this shit. I rather fight off an army of creepy silent people.
Soon, I reach the nearest unlocked door and have Nyarla open it to lead us back to the apartment, then close the door before anyone else gets any bright idea of following us.
"Nyarla, be truthful with me. How did you survive up to this point whenever you go outside?" I stare at Nyarla mentally tiredly.
Seriously? A fucking meteors? Not just one, but so many that it covers the whole damn sky!
I don't think I can last long enough to survive everything with the Delayed Effect and Lion's Heart. And what is worse is that there won't be any intact doors for Nyarla to use; therefore, making it impossible to leave that world. So even if we survived the meteors crashing down on us, we would be forced to live a harsh lifestyle afterward due to many things that would make life easy. Like a working oven and a fridge to keep our food fresh compared to leaving it outside.
"What do you mean, Jin?" Nyarla replied in a confused tone.
"Let me rephrase my question." I sweatdrop, realizing Nyarla wasn't joking around. "Do you often go outside? And are you in any danger whenever you're outside?"
"Yeah, I go out to have fun, eat, and buy new video games." Nyarla nods, "As for dangers? I didn't experience anything like that."
"I see-"
"But, every time I do, I black out and find myself back here afterward." Nyarla continues off without missing a beat. "At first, I was curious, but then I couldn't figure out the answer and decided to just go with it since I couldn't think of any good answers. I just let it be."
"I... see." I didn't need to know the actual answer to realize Nyarla would switch back to her original ego before changing to the present Nyarla.
As if reading my mind. Nyarla's eyes glow briefly and her smile takes on the edge of creepiness, sending a chill down my entire body and causing my mind and body to freeze.
This lasted for a few seconds, but it felt like years before Nyarla's eyes and smile changed back to normal.
Okay, it looks like Nyarla's original ego is still there and watching through Nyarla. That means she has also observed my movement during the night while I'm in bed with Nyarla.
That's not frightening at all... fuck! I don't think my poor little heart could handle this much longer. Forget Lion's Heart making my fragile heart even more fragile than it already is. Just knowing Nyarla's original ego and the Boss watching my movement is enough to give me millions of heart attacks if I didn't have Nen and other cheats as mental support, but even that is barely enough.
Ah, my delicate mind is already at the brick of collapsing and it was just slowly recovering a few days ago, but now this is my life.
"Is something wrong, Jin?" Nyarla looks at me in worry.
That's sweet of her, but I don't think I'll forget her glowing eyes and creepy smile anytime soon.
"I'm fine. Nothing wrong." I replied weakly. "Do you want to try going out again to search for a video game store?" I rather stay in the apartment, but one of the abnormal conditions for this caretaker job is always to keep Nyarla happy as long as possible, and I can easily guess many reasons why so.
"Sure!" Nyarla smiled at me, not showing the slight concern of nearly being hit by a meteor not that long ago. If anything, her mind is more focused on finding a video game store as soon as possible.
So, we're back outside the apartment again; this time, it was different from the previous ones. For one thing, I don't see many people within my line of sight and through En.
No, to be more precise. Unlike the other worlds, I've come with Nyarla. I don't know which worlds they are or if it's fictional ones. In this world we're in now, I know straight away which one it is and I don't know what to feel upon finding myself in this world, especially with Nyarla on my side.
So far, not even a week in, I realize that Nyarla's presence alone would cause many terrifying events to happen around her without her having to do anything.
Therefore, I will be extra careful in this world, aka Worm, and not a good place for someone like me to be in. I'm very tempted to go back to the apartment and take my chance in another world, but going by the look on Nyarla's face. I don't think that's an option any longer once there is a video game store not too far away from us.
Great, just great.
I should look on the bright side of things. Finding the best Tinker that can make the best video games for Nyarla to play and won't require her to go out of the apartment for a while as I take that time to adapt to all the previous and new cheats.
I made sure to use En and make sure any gang members nearby were pushed away via Ren; that way, we won't be disturbed. But life can't just be easy as people are screaming about Capes fighting nearby, and in panic, people begin running away.
"Jin, how will we pay if the cashier runs off?" Nyarla asks me as she holds many video games and is ready to pay for everything. Too bad there was no one at the register to ring us out.
I pull Nyarla to the side without saying a word as the wall next to where Nyarla was standing is destroyed by a random attack caused by one of the Capes outside.
"Just leave the money here. I'm sure the employee will return and be happy to be paid for the video games taken instead of having nothing in return with the missing products." I said to Nyarla, who took a few seconds to think about it before doing as I said.
To make things less complicated than is needed. I use Delayed Effect on En to affect everyone that steps within my range, which is very big and can stretch for miles, and make everyone unable to detect Nyarla and me. Or more on the line of making them treat us as unimportant and be ignored.
However, this won't last long, and I can feel my aura dropping quickly due to affecting everyone in my En. The En alone is already enough for me to worry a bit about long-term use on a large scale. Adding the Delayed Effect on the same distance size is pushing it harder for me.
I cursed under my breath as I stopped using the Delayed Effect and reduced the En's range to a 10-meter radius. Once I discovered the number of Cape within my En's range was too many and consuming too much of my aura at an alarming rate, I would be empty of aura within a few minutes.
Well, at least I can affect so many Capes, powerful or not, for a few minutes, which is very long in high-speed fights. Nonetheless, time to get Nyarla to a safe space and find the best Tinker available that can make the best video games possible. Then, leave this cursed world afterward because I will not stay around too long with how chaotic this world is. Adding in Nyarla will make it even worst, so the longer we remain in this world, the worst it gets. I just know it.