“Am I right in assuming that this is an important matter for a male such as yourself?”
“Put that aside for now. Ms. Kaori, Ms. Mimi... There have been a lot of people coming on to me recently.”
“That is an appropriate assumption.”
“I’m a healthy high school student. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t interested in stuff like that.”
“Then, wouldn’t it be better for you to get experience while you still can?”
“Hmm... I mean, it kinda freaks me out to be told something as pelvically blunt as ‘we want strong seed,’ you see.”
Gabriel sighed, clearly a bit fed up with me. “Then what about Ms. Kaori?”
“Wasn’t she just joking?”
“I believe she was telling the truth.”
“Ha ha. No way! She’s so beautiful, and she’s way older than me. She’d never go for someone like me...”
Gabriel’s piercing gaze made me flustered. “I believe she was telling the truth.”
But what was the truth? I wasn’t particularly attracted to older women, but I didn’t hate them either. Ms. Kaori was undeniably an extreme beauty. It was only natural for a man to be weak to people like her.
Besides, in many ways, I preferred people who had it together. Ms. Kaori, by definition, had it together because of her job. Not many people could pin fault to a police officer. For people like her, personability and personality were the most important things. How did she compare in those regards? She was certainly a perfect fit for law enforcement. She’d seemingly been putting a stop to other players rampaging in this world, after all. And, thinking economically, while being a part of the police was tough, they got paid pretty well. As government officials, they were more secure than anyone.
Money wasn’t the only issue, though. If I were to have kids, I’d want the parental responsibilities to be shared. My ideal would be for us both to have jobs that allowed for good maternity leaves. I was pretty sure government officials definitely had that part down.
Ah, shit. Ms. Kaori fits right into the mold of my ideal woman.
“A-Anyway!” I swallowed my anxiety. “I don’t like talking about stuff like this!”
“Is that so?”
Gabriel’s ears pricked up. She’d probably sensed something outside of the door at the same time that I did.
“...Cerberus?” My voice wavered.
“Yes, sir. He seems to have returned from gathering information on your sister.” She nodded and snapped her fingers.
No longer a puppy, Cerberus entered with his silver hair and black armor—the sheer image of a beautiful, respected knight. The task I’d given him was simple: interrogate the enemies from the mansion, who were all brainwashed, rounded up, and currently being held captive in the cells of Izanach.
“How’d it go, Cerberus?”
He bowed to me. “She will be presented at an auction two weeks from now. This information came from the owner of the mansion himself.”
“An auction? Give me the details, please.”
“It will be held at a hidden auction venue with the Lions of Patriotism’s dignity on the line, where authorities from all around the world will gather. The leaders of the five grand guilds will of course be attending, sans Ms. Kaori.”
“Wasn’t the girl who looks like Megumi originally kidnapped to be presented to that bastard? Why’s she being put up for auction?”
“She had been managed very carefully at the mansion, so perhaps he is attempting to display her to as many people as possible? He could, for example, bid on her for an exorbitant amount to show off.”
Is that bastard trying to tell people what his preference in girls is so they can search for more to get his money? The thought was almost funny, but as you can imagine, I couldn’t laugh. The bastard was the type of man who’d not only delete all of my character data from this game, but also boasted about climbing the rankings by being a whale. He was nothing but childish—or crazy, more like. His goal might’ve been to get as many girls as possible who looked like Megumi—or more specifically, my mother—presented to him. Was he also telling everyone not to sexually assault any cute girl who looked like that? There was nothing more disgusting. The thought of him creating his own harem full of girls with similar facial features to my sister sent chills down my spine.
“Well, this is good news either way. By the time of the auction, she’ll naturally still have the virginity mark on her, right?”
“Yes sir. I believe her safety is guaranteed until that time.”
Well, that’s one less thing to worry about. On the flip side, we were now on a time limit and would have to hurry some things up.
“I feel bad for making Tsukuyomi work so hard on all this.”
Cerberus shook his head. “No, sir. We are all participating to the best of our abilities, so I believe there is nothing for you to worry about in that regard.”
“Will Imabayashi be at the auction too?”
“According to the mansion owner, the ‘king of the Gods’ was the person who’d ordered them to give your sister special treatment, and they will be bidding on her themselves. Pairing that with the information that the grand guildmasters will be attending as well, there seems to be no doubt that he’ll be there.”
All right. We found out where he’ll be in two weeks. I now had all the information I needed to take him down.
“Master Shinobu.”
“What’s up, Gabriel?”
She pointed at the crystal ball on top of another table. “Ms. Kaori is contacting you.”
“She is?” We’d already done our periodic contact to make sure everything was going well. Did that mean this was something urgent?
I moved to the table with a bad premonition and put my magic into the ball. Ms. Kaori’s face popped up on it, like usual.
“Hi, Ms. Kaori. What’s the matter?”
“Bad news, Shinobu.”
It was common sense that a sudden call meant bad news. Having predicted it, I wasn’t surprised.
“What happened?”
“I got a call from Mr. Imabayashi. He’s requesting to speak with you.”
Well, that’s a surprise.
I began breathing deeply in order to calm my beating heart.