by Blitz Kiva
“But you were happy he bought it, weren’t you?” Felicia asked.
“Well...” Though she seemed to agree with Felicia’s suggestion, Iris wouldn’t admit to it outright.
It really did get under Felicia’s skin, and she was determined not to let the subject continue. She tried to think about something else instead.
That’s right. Ichiro had mentioned a man named Edward, and Felicia was sure she’d heard that name somewhere in the game before.
It was just as she folded her arms and began to think that a sound rang out, announcing that a player had logged in to the guild house lobby. Iris, Kirschwasser, and the other players listening to the story all turned to see who it was.
Felicia looked as well, then stared speechlessly, in shock.
The player who’d appeared was far from the usual humanoid silhouette. Nonhumans were not unusual. Felicia often saw players, like Ichiro, who had horns and tails, and characters who wore full-body plate mail could look quite enormous. But this one was fundamentally different. It had a protruding breastplate that resembled an inverse triangle, large gauntlets, and wore what looked like a full-face helmet over an unusually small head. Instead of eyes, it had two glowing, narrow lenses.
“Hey, Ed,” Ichiro greeted him.
The man froze in his tracks as Ichiro addressed him. His eyes darted about — or rather, his lenses flickered. “M-Mr. Tsuwabuki...”
“Oh, is this person Ed? That is... is he a person?” Felicia looked between them quickly, while Ichiro remained perfectly calm. Judging from Iris and Kirschwasser’s reactions, it seemed this was indeed the Edward in question.
“He’s Ed, yes,” confirmed Ichiro. “He’s a Machina. That’s a premium package-exclusive race.”
“Oh, is that... what a Machina looks like?”
“It is.”
Edward didn’t respond, but from the way he went silent and the light of his blue lens-eyes dimmed, he clearly wasn’t feeling well.
“Ah, s-sorry...” Felicia stammered.
“No, it’s not your fault...” A synth effect overlaid Edward’s voice as he spoke.
The air around them was tense. Ichiro’s presence clearly made Edward ill at ease. The story suggested that the animus must have drawn from Ichiro’s snub of Edward, but that wasn’t enough to explain this atmosphere.
When Felicia looked to Iris for answers, she saw the other girl cringing, as if she was trying to disappear. There was none of her in-your-face attitude from before.
“Oh, Miss Iris,” Edward said. “I’m sorry about before.”
“Oh, yeah, um, it’s okay...” Iris mumbled. “Don’t sweat it. It’s all his fault, anyway...”
The sight of Edward apologizing politely to Iris, and Iris blaming it all on Ichiro, just made things even more confusing.
“...Ah!” Despite her confusion, Felicia traced back the thread of memory in her mind, and at last arrived at her goal.
The name Edward... The leader of the Red Sunset Knights, Stroganoff, had mentioned it when they were wandering the Necrolands looking for King Kirihito.
“I remember now! You’re the one Itchy knocked out with one punch!” Felicia clapped her hands as she finally made the connection in her mind, then realized she had made a fatal mistake.
“I’m sorry...” Felicia apologized again as she saw the light in Edward’s eyes dim once more.
“No, it’s okay... That is what happened...” Edward slumped despondently and shook his head. He was seeming to her like a rather decent person.
Ichiro Tsuwabuki, who had apparently taken out this decent person in one punch, merely set his empty teacup down on his saucer with a satisfied expression. “I was just telling Felicia here about how Iris Brand came to be founded.”
“Though he hasn’t actually gotten to that point yet...” Iris murmured.
“I was just getting to the meat of the story. Ed, would you like to join us?”
“Me?” If Edward had had a normal human face, it probably would have been contorted in horror. Machinas had a variety of facial parts to choose from, and it seemed quite a few of them were human-like. But with Ed, the eyes were the only part from which you could read his emotions. Judging from the way he acted, that might have been intentional.
“Very well. I’ll join in.”
But surprisingly, he accepted the offer, and with a murmured “excuse me,” he sat down in an empty seat.
Judging from the way he was acting, he didn’t seem like he was looking forward to a harmonious discussion. Rather, he seemed to have only joined in because the thought of turning Ichiro down made him uncomfortable.
“Mr. Ed, are you the kind of person who really doesn’t like to lose?” Felicia asked idly.
Edward said nothing.
“I’m sorry...” she said.
“It’s okay...”
The apology-and-dismissal interaction had happened a third time.
Sir Kirschwasser spoke up. “Sir Edward, here. A humble cup of tea.”
“Thanks.” Edward took the tea that Kirschwasser laid before him. He raised the cup to his mouth instinctively, but the cup hit his face-plate and let out an empty clank.
Seeming slightly embarrassed, Edward removed the obstructing plate. There was no mouth beneath it; just a small slot.
“Being a Machina must be hard, huh, Mr. Edward?” Felicia asked politely.
“Well, I’m the one who chose the race...” Edward dexterously poured the tea into the slot.
“Now that we’re all here, let’s continue the story,” Ichiro said, seeming genuinely glad to have Edward around.
He had always been this way. Felicia knew that well. He had a tendency to like someone more the more they hated him, so it was only natural that he had taken a shine to Edward.
But, that meant...
Felicia raised her eyes to the ceiling for a moment. The thought was too frightening to pursue.
“Iris, I’d like to hear the story from your own lips,” Ichiro said.
“Huh? Mine?” The red-haired Elf startled as the conversation was abruptly thrown to her.
“Yes. I’ve told the story up until I met you. I’d like to hear what made you decide to create my equipment.”
“Easier said than done...” Iris’s gaze became rather distant. “Well, don’t expect me to make it sound interesting...”
Despite that, she took a deep breath, and picked up where Ichiro had left off.
4 - Noble Son, Pick a Fight
Airi Kakitsubata was 17 years old, and attending a clothing design trade school. She wanted to be an apparel designer when she grew up.
“What did you say?” Iris asked in displeasure. All the joy she had felt at seeing the accessories she made sell had now passed.
Had he just said, “I like your face”? Was this some kind of new pick-up line? With the decline of crossplaying brought about by VRMMOs, you naturally saw a lot more of that. The appearance you crafted for yourself in a VRMMO had become vastly more important than avatar settings had been in any online community prior.
A handsome man with the kind of blond hair and blue eyes you never saw in the real world was whispering those sweet words in her ear. Even someone as guarded as Iris would find herself swayed by that. You didn’t see as many women hitting on men, but there were cross-players out there. Iris had heard of quite a few young men who had ended up traumatized by come-ons from someone who had turned out to be the wrong gender entirely. Ah, but enough digressions.
What mattered was that the Dragonet standing in front of her now was an extremely handsome man. It was only natural for Iris to mistake it for a pick-up line.
“I was asking if you’d like to make armor for me,” he said.
“Before that.”
“Ah, that I like your face? If that bothered you, I apologize. It’s true that objectively speaking, mine is more attractive...”
What was he talking about?
“Do you always choose who you want to make armor based on
what they look like?” Iris demanded.
“In the real world? No. In this world? Yes. You made your face yourself, didn’t you?”
She was stunned. He was absolutely right.
When she had originally made her character, she hadn’t felt any special inspiration from the countless avatar parts provided. She’d stewed over it for hours and hours, trying out different combinations, but each time something had bothered her about it. After stewing over it for a long time, she had bought some virtual cash from a convenience store in the middle of the night, downloaded some 3D modeling software, and gone right for the character maker.
It wasn’t completely her own design, but she had modified the parts she didn’t like, and fine-tuned a few details in ways that other players wouldn’t be able to. It had resulted in a unique character face that no one else in the world could imitate. Iris was very proud of it, but this was the first time anyone had ever pointed it out.
The man selected several items from his menu window and brought them out. They were the original accessories that Iris had designed.
“Those are...” she began.
“You designed these personally too, didn’t you? Of course, I was a bit worried due to the sloppy renderings on the polygons, but...”
“Th-That’s just... because I was tired after coming home from school! My face is perfect, right?” What was she saying?
“Yes, seeing your face, I feel much more at ease. I want armor designed from square one. I haven’t found anyone here in Glasgobara making such things.”
So this was the man who had bought all of her accessories? While part of her was honestly happy about that, her feelings were still ambivalent. She was happy to see her originality appreciated, but he didn’t seem to care much for the designs themselves. Caught between the two, though, the happy side won out, if only slightly.
The offer from this man — Ichiro Tsuwabuki — was extremely appealing. The proposal of creating an original armor design was slowly revitalizing her waning interest in the game. But...
“My ‘Create Armor’ skill level isn’t very high,” she admitted.
There were quite a number of crafting class Skills. At first, the only ones available were Refining, Ironmaking, and Craft. But once a player’s Ironworking level reached a certain point, they could acquire Create Armor and Create Weapon, as well. She herself had a dream of creating armor someday, so she had bought the Skill itself. Unfortunately, she hadn’t managed to level it up very high just yet. She didn’t know what level armor the man was going to want, but if he was elite enough to be ordering custom-made items, any request by him would probably be too high for her to handle.
If she’d known this was going to happen, she would have gone out of her way to do more grinding.
Regret squirmed inside of her. Even if she started now, she probably wouldn’t make it in time.
And yet, the man’s response was this: “Regardless, you are the only person I can count on.”
He continued, “I don’t know much about the production process of armor, so I don’t know if it’s possible. But I don’t mind paying any of the real money required to create the original design.”
“Well... I don’t think you can do that unless we create a Crafting guild...” She was starting to feel like the conversation was moving on without her.
“Then let’s make a guild,” he said.
“Y-You can’t be serious...”
“Nonsense. I’m always serious. Well, I can’t deny that the things I say often make others believe me mad...”
If the requester was going to offer to pay real money for her armor crafting, Iris wasn’t going to deny him. In fact, if the reverse had happened, if he’d said, “I’ll pay you in galt, but you provide the real funds,” she would have socked him one.
The problem was that Iris’s Create Armor level was extremely low, and the man didn’t seem to understand what that meant. When you tried to create armor and failed, you didn’t just waste the components.
When Iris made her accessories, at least, she first had to put the components on top of a magic circle, then select the design from a pop-up window. Then in her case, she had to drag and drop the .obj file of the 3D model she had made to convert the accessory into a totally original design.
This was the point when the real money fee for optimizing the 3D model came in. In other words, every time she failed to make the armor, that fee would also go to waste. She had to admit it was an extremely unkind setup, but then, creating items wasn’t the main point of the game, and it did force you to click through a warning message of “If you fail to make the armor, you won’t get your money back” three times in a row. Iris didn’t bother to question it at this point.
Applying the design cost money because that was the source of the greatest burden on the server’s data bus. Succeed or fail, the burden was the same. But of course, Iris didn’t know that.
Anyway, that was how one applied an original design. She had never tried an original armor design before, but the process was likely the same.
If Ichiro was going to take on the burden of cost, then he had to know that he would have to keep paying every time Iris failed at the creation. While he appeared to be a whale, he was surely underestimating how many times that might happen. If he could at least give her an upper limit...
“Do you have an upper limit?” she asked.
“Ah, my bank has asked me not to reveal my credit limit,” he said. “But it’s not any amount you have to worry about.”
“I didn’t mean your credit limit! Are you trying to go bankrupt?!” she exclaimed.
“Ha ha ha, nonsense. My, what an amusing joke. If I ever went bankrupt, it would mean the world economy was in ruins.” He really did appear to be mad.
“Oh, darn it... Don’t blame me if it costs a ton, then,” she said.
“Nonsense. I don’t mind spending money for a quality product.”
Iris opened up the menu window and called up the art tools from the Config window. The game’s basic software allowed you to draw simple designs in pencil or chalk, but the add-on allowed for more precise lines, as well as the ability to convert designs to .pdfs and send them to a PC or a smartphone. It was compatible with 3D modeling software, and it was extremely convenient for converting a design to 3D, but on the whole, it was more popular with Achievers and Explorers than Crafters.
“So, what kind of design do you want?” she asked him.
“Let me see. Something to match the brooch,” the man said, pulling out the blue butterfly brooch that Iris had made. The polys really were rough, and it was fairly embarrassing to look at.
“Th-That... was for a woman, actually...” she stammered.
“Oh? It seemed unisex to me. Depending on the rest of the outfit, it could look quite fetching on a man, don’t you think?”
It was true that the main reason she had meant it for a woman was because women’s equipment in the game tended to be more for fashion than for combat. Most men’s equipment was made with an eye towards looking cool in battle, with the most stylish being heavy medieval fantasy armor and superhero-style designs. The butterfly brooch wouldn’t look good on any of them, which meant this man wanted something closer to modern-day apparel.
It was tickling her creative urges. She sat down next to her booth with pencil in hand, and used the drawing software to detail her ideas on the canvas. She cast a glance at the man, and saw that he had opened the same drawing software. Now that she thought about it, his face was also composed of parts she’d never seen before in the game... She doubted he was in the same business as her exactly, but perhaps he was in a fine arts field, at least.
“Oh, I decided to buy this program after seeing yours,” he offered.
Did money simply mean nothing to him?
With practiced movements, the man drew what looked like a design sheet, and swiped it to Iris’s window. “That’s what I wear around in real life. Of course, I’ll give you free rein with the design,
but this is the sort of clothing I like.”
The image he’d sent her was on the line between casual and formal, fashionable without losing its high-class appeal. If that’s what he wore every day, was he some kind of rich heir?
“Oh, sorry,” the man said, suddenly looking up. “I have an appointment. I have to log out for now.”
“Ah, I see,” she said. “Will you log in again when you’re done?”
“I don’t know. I’d like to, if I have time, but I have a great deal to take care of lately.”
“W-Well... could I friend you, then?” Why had she stammered when she’d said that? This might have been her first male friend in the game.
“Certainly,” he said offhandedly, then pressed the friend request confirmation button.
It had been a long time since Iris had spoken to the friends she had started playing the game with. They had supported her decision to live in Glasgobara as a crafter. But by now, they were probably off somewhere making progress through the game. She began to feel a bit sentimental as she wondered where they were.
“By the way, what should I call you?” she asked.
“Whatever you like. Tsuwabuki, Ichiro, or young heir, if you wish. Well, I don’t especially like being called the last one...”
“Young heir, then,” she said. It seemed exactly the right thing to call him, given his snobbish air. Besides, Iris was a fan of that famous Japanese major leaguer, so she didn’t want to call him Ichiro.
The young heir didn’t look especially unhappy, but simply shrugged his shoulders and logged out. When he was gone, Iris turned back to her drawing tool.
She was going to design his armor.
After a few minutes alone with her own thoughts, that reality finally began to hit her.
Her dream was to be an apparel designer; if possible, with a focus on fashion. She knew it would be a rough road ahead, and part of her wondered if she couldn’t afford to be taking time out by playing this game.
But...
What she was allowing herself to do now was surely not in vain. Even if it was just in a fictional realm made of 1s and 0s, she was taking her first steps as an apparel designer right now.