Transition to Another World, Land Mines Included. 051

ACT 2: UNION
051: Let’s Get a House! Part 1

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“Wow~! I know you already told us that Inspeel sauce tastes great, but I didn’t imagine it was THAT good!” Tohya gushed.

“Exactly. Who could have imagined a strange recipe like that can produce such an amazing sauce?” Haruka smiled in agreement.

We were back at the Slumbering Bear, dressed in our sleepwear after receiving Haruka’s Purification and chatting about the pot of sauce we received from Aera.

“I don’t know for sure… But I guess it must have taken a long time to come up with the recipe,” I added.

Much like okonomiyaki sauce and Worcestershire sauce, Inspeel sauce must have taken years of research to perfect.

“With this sauce, mealtimes will be so much more fun now,” Natsuki said with a smile.

“I know! I think finding Aera-san’s store has been the best move we’ve made since transitioning here!” Tohya grinned.

“That’s a little extreme… Not that I disagree,” I grinned back.

“We started off eating the food back in Saarstat, and were on the point of giving up totally, but I guess there is good food to be found after all,” Yuki added.

“But we still have to be aware, because most of the food here is not that great. I’d say that of all the dishes we’ve tried in this city, I don’t ever want to eat about 80% of those ever again,” Haruka warned.

Though we hadn’t had many meals around town so far, aside from our inn, the only other place I’d probably eat at again was that expensive cafe we visited the other day. In fact, now that we’d found Aera’s place, I don’t think I want to go back to that place either.

“So even with this sauce, we should still cook our own meals. How goes our house-hunting, Haruka?”

“I’ve only just completed my backpack-making class today, so Diola-san said that she can show us some houses she’d found tomorrow. Let’s all go together?”

“Wow, sounds fun!! It’ll be like a dream to have our own place!” Yuki said wistfully.

“I’d love to build our own place from scratch, but I guess we’ll have to leave that to the future for now,” Natsuki added.

“Erm, aren’t we a little too young to own a house…?” I countered.

“Not in the countryside. Besides, we’re almost adults, remember?” Haruka said.

Sounds like a heavy responsibility to me. But I wouldn’t say it was an impossible dream for us… I mean, we actually had about 10 million yen up until about a week ago.

On the other hand, all that money was so quickly spent on buying equipment, so it might be near impossible to save enough money to build a house so long as we remained adventurers.

“By the way, how are things going on your side, Tohya? Is everything OK?”

“Yeah! Look!”

With that, Tohya went to his side of the room and returned with what appeared to be a metal plate and rod.

“That’s… Not a shield, right?”

“…Is it a shovel?”

“Yep! You got it, Yuki! It’s a portable shovel,” Tohya grinned as he pushed the end of the metal plate into the rod to assemble what was now obviously a shovel.

“Our original plan was to make a foldable one like the ones the self-defense forces use, but Tomii’s skills weren’t at that level yet, so he made me this one. He said that this was the type used by the old Japanese army back in the day.”

Tohya passed the shovel to me so I could take a better look. The metal plate was about the size of a book, just wide enough to allow someone to place a foot on it when digging holes. The metal tip also seemed well-made and durable, but other than the removable handle, it looked just like an ordinary shovel.

“So, is this a gift from Tomii for helping him find a master?” I asked doubtfully.

Indeed, Tohya had been hard at work these past few days, going around introducing Tomii as a serious worker and vouching for his personality, but so far, he’d only managed to convince Gantz to engage Tomii’s services.

That said, making a plain shovel as a gift still seemed too little?

“Hey, a shovel is quite impressive, you know! I’ve heard of people using it as a weapon to achieve chain kills.”

“Really~? But that’s not the point.”

Gantz’s store specialized in selling weapons and armor. I doubt he’d want to add a shovel to his inventory.

“It’s also a useful tool to dig holes,” Tohya continued his defense.

“Even if Gantz doesn’t sell shovels, I’m sure he already sells something similar.”

“Nope, a shovel of this design is quite a new invention, derived from spades which were used in the past.”

I remembered seeing spades in a textbook; wooden tools with a large metal plate attached to one end. The plate had a sharp tip, so one could put one’s foot on it to dig deeper into the ground.

If such a tool didn’t already exist in this world, then maybe it would be an item worth selling. It could be useful for civil engineering work, and for adventurers as well, since we’d need a tool to dig holes when relieving ourselves in the wild or during camping. We’d been using a hoe so far, but it was honestly not the best tool.

“Whether it can be sold in Gantz’s store is one thing, but more importantly, I wanted Gantz to see how hardworking Tomii is. I’m sure that was the key reason why he decided to take Tomii on as his apprentice.”

“Oh, he’s accepted Tomii?”

“Yep! Tomii’s glad, I got to practice my Smithing Skill, and even got a free shovel. Won’t you say it’s a good deal?”

It was much better than I’d imagined. To be brutally honest, it was totally unexpected. Who would have thought that an idiot so focused on brawn over brains could execute such a great plan?

The girls were nodding in amazement as well as they examined the shovel. I guess I shouldn’t underestimate Tohya in the future. I mean, he’d always been great at taking care of his friends.

“Well, it’s good to hear that Wakabayashi-kun… I mean, Tomii, has found a stable job,” Yuki said,

“Yes. It’s good that some classmates have not become our enemies. In fact, we may even get the chance to help each other out in the future,” Natsuki added.

“Yep, as long as they’re not land mines,” Haruka reminded with a wry smile.

“It’s sad that we can’t look for more classmates just because of that,” Yuki frowned.

“Because even the slightest contact can spell trouble…”

The girls looked at each other and heaved heavy sighs.

So far, we’d met up with Wakabayashi and Umezono, and it’d been a 50% success rate… Wait, there was also Tanaka and Takahashi, as well as seven or eight others who’d died before we even met them face-to-face. Taking all of them into account, it seemed like our chances of finding a ‘safe’ classmate was less than 10%.

It was just too risky to seek more classmates out.

Though to be optimistic, maybe the land mine Skills had killed off most of the dangerous people, so the classmates left were probably the harmless ones.

~

The next day, we sought out Diola during a lull in her workday, and went to look at some houses. She’d found three suitable places for us, and we followed her to view them one by one.

…The first house.

“This one has a large garden, so I think you should have enough space to swing a sword or spear around, or even have a mock battle.”

“Erm, Diola-san, the garden sure is large… But that’s because the whole property is just a garden?”

“Oh, no. Look, there’s a house over there.”

“Well, that’s just a storage shed, right?”

The first place Diola showed us was a large piece of land, about five to six times the size of the Slumbering Bear.

It was a large, vacant lot overgrown with vegetation, and while there was a house as well, just like what Haruka said, it was more of a storage shed than an actual living space.

“There used to be a large house built right here, but after the owners moved out, it started to get overgrown and crumbled. Soon, it was demolished to deter any criminals from using it as a hideout,” Diola shared.

Abandoned homes were a big problem back in Japan too. In fact, since housing lots were so tightly packed, a crumbling house was actually quite a hazard for the neighbors. I’d also heard of criminals or homeless people living in abandoned hotels, but never of them hiding in private properties belonging to ordinary civilians. Maybe because most homeless people congregated in the cities, or because the police were successful in keeping them out…?

“I know we said we wanted a big garden, but we’d also like somewhere with a house that we can live in?” I suggested.

Diola nodded as if in understanding.

“Well, this lot doesn’t come with a house. In fact, the owner told me that you can remove that shed if you don’t want it.”

“In other words, we’d have to build our own house here?”

“Yes. You’ll be free to build a house to your liking. Besides, the rent for such a large piece of land is only two gold coins a month!”

Two gold coins, or 2,000 Reas. It definitely sounded cheap, though I didn’t know the market rate for land in this part of the city.

“The only condition is that when you move out, you’ll leave the house intact.”

“So if we’re told to move out, we can’t take the house with us…”

So we don’t have to pay someone to demolish the house, and the owner gains the building as an asset. Sounds like a win-win to me.

I shared these thoughts with the group, but Natsuki shook her head.

“No, Nao-kun. When we rent land in Japan, we usually have to restore it to its original state, which means demolishing all buildings and returning it to the original condition.”

“Really?”

“Yes. Of course, an old house can be rented out again, but that’s a rare case, since people normally move out of houses because there’s something wrong with it.”

She was right. People usually didn’t move out of houses if there was nothing wrong with it. Once a house got old, people would move out anyway, so there was no point in keeping the building around. The same goes for businesses; if a store was profitable, the owner would not give up the location. If the store wasn’t doing well, it was pointless for another owner to start the same type of business in the same location, hence there was no need to keep the building in that case as well.

That was why landlords wanted all buildings demolished. In Japan, there was also a thing called property tax, which owners needed to pay to keep the building intact.

“Well, lots with houses in residential areas get a reduced tax, so leaving a lot vacant isn’t the best either,” Natsuki continued.

“Things sure are different in this world…” I murmured.

I knew nothing about taxation in this world, though I could imagine it was nowhere as complicated as in our previous world. In fact, the only tax we’d paid so far were the big silvers required to enter the city. Maybe there were other ‘invisible’ taxes as well, included in the fee we paid to join the Guild, or the rent to stay at the inn.

“Hmm, this place does look promising, but we may not have enough money,” Haruka picked up the conversation.

“Agreed. Diola-san, if we were to build a house similar to what we described, how much do you think that’d cost?” Yuki asked.

Diola pondered for a minute before answering.

“Well… If we can compromise on a few things, maybe 100 gold coins.”

“Whoa! That’s too much!”

“Agreed. It is just too much…”

Yuki and Natsuki were quick to react in shock at the amount, but Tohya, Haruka, and I remained silent.

I mean, we did possess that much money just a while ago, so as long as we could keep up the sale of high-demand goods like Dindle, it wasn’t an impossible amount to earn…

I was sure Diola was well aware of that, which was the reason why she’d shown this lot to us. She’d been the one who had been dealing with us all this time, after all.

The three of us looked at each other and sighed.

“We’ll keep this place in mind, Diola-san. May we see the next place, please?”

“Sure. There’s no need to make a quick decision when so much money is involved,” Diola smiled in understanding.

“Ehh!? Haruka, we’re not dismissing this place? But it costs too much,” Yuki argued.

“Not really. Anyway, we’ll keep this as a last choice. Let’s go see the next place.”

“O-OK…?”

Yuki and Natsuki still looked doubtful, but we all trooped quietly after Diola.

…The second house.

“This mansion was once the house for the lover of a royal. The lot is smaller than the previous one, but it has a grand two-storied mansion, and with a little clean-up, a beautiful garden.”

“A beautiful garden? But this place looks worse than the first one,” Tohya muttered.

“Oh, it used to be beautiful a long time ago. The owner planted many trees around, that’s why it’s a little overgrown now,” Diola explained.

Hmm… Of course, I understood that even a grassy lawn needed to be mown to stay neat, but if someone had planted trees here, it would become a mess if left untended. Just the fallen leaves alone were enough to create a decaying mess on the ground, not to mention the weeds that would grow.

And with so much vegetation, we couldn’t even see the house. Right now, we were all standing at the gates to the mansion, and the forested garden was all we could see.

“Can we go inside, Diola-san?”

“Would you like to?”

“We’ll need to go inside to take a good look, right? I know it’s a hassle to force our way through all the vegetation, but we gotta do it.”

Besides, we had Tohya and his sword to lead the way.

“Would you really like to go inside?”

Diola remained still, not even moving to open the gates.

“…You seem hesitant. Is there a problem with this place?”

“The rent for this place is five gold coins per month.”

“I can tell where this is going, but can you tell us more?”

“This mansion was once the house for the lover of a royal, but some things happened, and this place was abandoned.”

“Erm, so what exactly happened here…?”

“Some things.”

“But-”

“You know… Some things! You know what I mean?”

“Yes, I see.”

Diola’s smile did not reach her eyes, and it was just too scary. Since this had something to do with the royals, I guess saying too much could get her into trouble.

“So, Diola-san… When you said ‘some things’, is it something bad?”

“No, it’s nothing much… Just that the previous people who rented this place fell ill a lot.”

“That’s not ‘nothing much’!”

“There’s no need to worry. There’s no proof to link their illnesses to this place.”

“Now I’m even more worried! Will you live here, Diola-san?”

Diola shook her head, no trace of hesitation in her voice as she answered.

“No, because I believe in those things.”

Well, since magic exists in this world, I guess it wouldn’t be a stretch for things like curses and grudges from beyond the grave to exist either.

“Then please don’t suggest such places to us… This one’s a miss, a total miss.”

“Agreed. I’m glad you guys aren’t interested to take a look inside. Let’s go see the next house, shall we?”

With that, Diola started walking away.

If Diola wasn’t really recommending this house to us, why did she bring us here in the first place? I wondered if she had some sort of quota to fill. Or had she been forced to make this suggestion?

——

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