Valencia ushered the boy through the wilderness, tripping several times in the mud and over tree roots. She seemed really unused to the outdoors. However, strangely, throughout their descent they never once came across another hidden camera.
“I joined the dark side and teamed up with the AI all so that I could find you, you know. I know how they work, both in the virtual world and the real one.”
“…Thanks, but what are we going to do once we get off this mountain? I can’t leave Midori like this, but there’s too many cameras back in town. Even now, the AI are probably manipulating the authorities into coming after us. Police, security guards, patrolling gym teachers, young people with too much time on their hands—there’s no limit to who they could send after us.”
“I don’t think you have any right to say that after the stunt you just pulled.” Valencia sighed, reaching for her smartphone. For a moment, the boy thought she’d sealed their fates by recklessly calling a cab, but he was wrong.
“Here,” she said. “I’ve bought ten buildings all over town. Pick whichever you like and go hide out there. The rest will serve as decoys. Whatever you do next, it will involve Money (Game) Master, right? If so, then you’ll need a place to log in without being disturbed.”
As she spoke, Valencia grabbed a large tarp covered in leaves and twigs and pulled it aside to reveal a bright-red Italian sports car. It looked like it probably cost as much as a house.
“…”
“What, after all you’ve been through, this surprises you? I know it’s not exactly my style, but limousines aren’t built for Japan’s narrow roads.”
The car boasted a tinted windshield, totally illegal in Japan. In fact, Valencia didn’t look a day over eighteen. Was she even old enough to drive?
The boy looked puzzled, but Valencia didn’t seem interested in entertaining any more questions. She jerked her slender jaw, motioning for him to get in. There wasn’t a lot of space in the two-seater car, so Midori and the piglet had to make do with what little room there was behind the seats for luggage.
The static around the girl was extremely unsettling. What could possibly cause such a thing? She was in the real world. She had mass; the boy could attest to that. And yet it seemed like if he took his eyes off her for a second, she could vanish.
Valencia gripped the steering wheel and revved the engine.
“At any rate, you surprised me,” she said.
“Surprised you?”
“You’ve never used the power of money in the real world. For yourself, I mean. I’m not talking about anonymous donations to charities. I can’t believe the famous Kaname Suou lives like this.”
Kaname gritted his teeth. This turn of events almost made him feel like he was playing the game again. Midori was still asleep in the back—surely now he could allow his mask to slip, just a little?
As he watched the streetlights pass by in their fixed procession, the boy took on a sullen expression and finally decided to speak his mind.
“…I was scared. I thought if I used that money for myself, my whole value system would come crashing down.”
“Cherry boy.”
“Call me what you want. But isn’t that exactly what happened to you? I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a gun in the glove compartment of this foreign luxury car. We’re in Japan, you know.”
“This foreign luxury car just saved your life, thank you very much.”
“Actually, you surprised me, too.”
“Hmm?”
Valencia glanced at the boy in the passenger seat. He was actually quite competitive by nature, though in the game he never allowed his disappointment to show. Perhaps when it came to shootouts and speculative trading, he had to know when to quit. But that wasn’t the case here.
His lips curled downward as he spat, “The lone wolf, Lily-Kiska Sweetmare. You wear glasses in-game but not in real life. And you’re a lot smaller, too. I don’t mean your height, by the way.”
Valencia spluttered all over the dashboard, bringing her arms up to hide her meager chest. The low-riding foreign car swerved left and right, causing her to panic and quickly put her hands back on the wheel.
“Wh-wh-why would you say that now?! Of all the…”
“I never said anything specific, but the fact that you knew what I was talking about implies you went into the character creator looking to fudge the numbers a little. Well, it’s not like I can talk. You’ve seen my hair, haven’t you? No matter what I tell the hairdressers, I’m never happy with the result. Maybe it’s just the shape of my head I don’t like.”
The boy toyed with his hair in the rearview mirror for a while, before giving up and laughing in defeat.
In Money (Game) Master, these two were top-class Dealers who could whip up a billion snow in a flash. Peel back the veneer, though, and they were just ordinary people.
It was the game that turned them into something else. There, they had been given a power far greater and far more sinister than any magic. All those who craved more, it drew in. It gave them what they wanted, and without them ever realizing, it took control.
“Anyway, where am I going? You need to pick one of those ten buildings already!!”
“In that case, we need one with lots of exits, where we can communicate without the AI spying on us.”
The bright-red sports car ripped through the city streets, soon arriving in an underground parking garage.
“A shopping mall?”
“On the surface, yes. But before it was bought up and renovated, this place used to be a command center for disaster response. If we dig up the old lines, we can make use of the emergency services network. It’s not monitored by the AI like the service provider everyone else uses, and we won’t have to worry about monthly data caps, either. What do you think?”
“…”
“It’ll be like a spy movie. Reality isn’t too far off from one these days anyway. Come on, I’ve got something else to show you.”
The lower floors of the building were dedicated to serving customers, while the upper floors served as a luxury apartment block. Inside the elevator, Lily-Kiska lifted a panel and entered some kind of code. Apparently, it prevented them from stopping on any intermediate floors, ensuring no well-meaning residents would notice the unconscious girl and try to interfere.
“With money, you can do anything, bypass any lock,” said Valencia. “You can even turn invisible. It’s like modern-day magic.”
“Except for the things money can’t buy,” the boy replied, adjusting the static-covered girl in his arms.
They headed straight for the top floor, the entirety of which had been converted into a single luxury apartment with multiple bedrooms, bathrooms, and kitchen spaces, as well as a home theater, bar counter, and even a pool and squash court. In terms of sheer area, it was probably bigger than a schoolhouse. The place was so fancy, the boy doubted the residents had ever done a day of housework in their lives.
Midori hadn’t stirred once since Kaname had found her. As the boy laid her down gently on one of the many beds, her Pocket Piglet came up and whined at her side. The trusty swine was starting to look a bit tired. Perhaps the two usually slept together.
“I’ll go activate the network bypass,” said Valencia. “Let’s meet up in the game afterward. I don’t know what it is you plan to do, but you’ll need all the Legacies, correct? In that case, you’ll be needing my assault rifle, #swallowdive.err.”
“…”
“I believe the wine rack and refrigerator are both fully stocked, but if you need anything else, you can drop by the lower floors. They’ve got over three hundred stores, so you should be able to find almost anything you require, and it all belongs to me. That means I control the security cameras here. However, I can’t do anything if you get caught on somebody’s smartphone, so if you’re going out, remember to at least hide your face. There’s a walk-in closet for you to change clothes in, too.”
“Lily-Kiska.”
The boy called out to the woman just as she was about to leave. She turned and looked back quizzically.
“…Thank you,” he said, bowing his head. “I would have been screwed without you.”
Valencia initially looked surprised by the boy’s honesty. Then she winked and blew him a kiss. The girl he had once been forced to kill shot him an earnest smile.
“I’m just living life however I want. I’ve dreamed of this day for a long time.”