After the Storm, and Before the Storm (Premium)

by Sakon Kaidou

  That was the name of an organization from Huang He, but they were by no means mere merchants — it was a Huang Hean mafia.

  It had roots in the underside of the empire’s society and worked with an iron fist to incite people’s greed and gather money. One of its sub-groups ran a casino here in Caldina.

  This wasn’t unique. There were also casinos funded by the likes of the Great Pirate Fleet of Granvaloa — the most infamous of the Four Great Fleets — as well as the vampire clans of Legendaria.

  Hermine’s casinos weren’t even the only places that had monetary support from foreign underground societies.

  In fact, the Caldinian authorities saw them as venerable guests and good sources of money.

  As long as they could tax them, Caldina didn’t care who ran the establishments or what they did there — they even appreciated when other countries made certain businesses illegal, for it increased the number of shops moving here and, subsequently, their tax income.

  Of course, there were those who refused to pay the taxes, but they were not an issue, since they would just die while wandering the deserts between the cities and perish before bringing their money back to their countries.

  They would either die because they couldn’t get a guide, walk into monster habitats because they were given false maps, or simply get taken out by certain professionals.

  There were some guides who claimed to be non-official and agreed to escort those who refused to pay their taxes through the desert, but they sometimes turned out to be Caldinian assassins who led them into Pure-Dragon worm lairs, or worse.

  Regardless of how, the non-paying would regularly lose their lives and money, which would then be picked up by Caldina.

  If you wanted to avoid such consequences, you had to abide by the rules, pay the taxes, and get the official guides.

  That was the kind of country Caldina was — everything was allowed if you paid money, and everything was lost to you if you didn’t.

  ◇

  Back to the topic of Mirage’s casino...

  The establishment had Huang He-like — or China-like, for those from Earth — decorations, both inside and out. Despite that, the gambling going on within the premises was more on the Western side. You had roulette, poker, baccarat... most of the games Masters knew well.

  Servers clad in Huang Hean dresses that emphasized their legs, similar to qipaos from China, walked around the casino, plates in hand, and handed out alcoholic drinks to the gambling customers. Beauty must’ve been one of the job criteria, for they were all either beautiful girls or boys that looked the part.

  Some of the customers were simply enjoying the sight of the servers at work. Many would gather here not to gamble, but to relax after a long day at work while having a meal and drink at the designated eating space. Watching the gamblers and the servers was a strange kind of spice to them.

  Among those eating, there was an individual wearing strange clothes. That strangeness made him attract lots of attention. Perhaps his apparel wouldn’t appear strange in some places, but they certainly didn’t suit this casino. It looked like a mix of a military uniform and pilot suit, and neither Caldina nor Huang He had anything like it.

  Another notable thing about him was his face. He was a handsome man, but for some reason, there was sadness in his expression. That well-defined face combined with grief made for a combo that moved the hearts of many women here, young and old. However, more perceptive folk would notice that his mannerisms were sometimes too feminine for a man.

  The third notable thing about him was the snow-white girl at his side, who was silently eating almond jelly.

  They were Hugo Lesseps and Cyco — ex-member of The Triangle of Wisdom and his Embryo, and together, they really stood out in this casino.

  ◇◇◇

  High Pilot, Hugo Lesseps

  “Haaah...” I sighed, wondering how I’d ended up in a place like this.

  I’d left Dryfe and headed out towards Tenchi, on the other side of the continent, in order to broaden my horizons, so it wasn’t strange for me to be here in Caldina, which was on the way there. But I didn’t know why I was in a casino, of all places.

  Why was I being forced to wait here?

  “I’m underage,” I muttered.

  In reality, I was a girl who’d just turned fifteen, so this shady place was just a bit much for me.

  I felt like I was about to cry.

  Being here was actually harder on my mind than attacking the Gouz-Maise Gang’s hideout.

  But “I”... which was to say, Hugo Lesseps... did my best to not cry, and just look sad instead. Crying in a place like this would just make me stand out more.

  “You’re such a crybaby,” Cyco commented. “And FYI, you’re so handsome that even making a sad face makes you stand out.”

  Shut up, Cyco. Just eat your almond jelly, I shot back.

  “Okay, okay. Ah, also, if you don’t wanna stand out, why not just change your clothes?” Cyco asked as she pointed at my Triangle of Wisdom-made pilot suit.

  You know I can’t, I responded silently. I don’t have any other clothes besides a few sets of these.

  I’d only realized that after entering the desert, and I hadn’t had a chance to buy anything new since then.

  I’d also spent most of my money on repairs, and ToW-quality parts that’d made it to Caldina were more expensive than I’d thought.

  With the money I have left, I can’t get any pilot suits that don’t stand out and have good stats.

  “You can just stop caring about stats,” said Cyco.

  Shut up and just get more almond jelly.

  “Who do you think I am? Nemesis?” she retorted. “One portion is enough for me.”

  I said nothing in response. That name made me remember a familiar face — Ray.

  We’d been enemies at our last meeting, but I still wondered how he was doing right now.

  I’d cut off his right arm, and he’d lost his left against Francesca... Had he gotten them back yet?

  I’d love to meet and talk to him again, I thought. Probably not to apologize, though.

  “Oh yeah,” said Cyco. “When you’re down like this, you should act all smug, like you did when Ray was around.”

  To be honest, keeping up that act has become really hard lately.

  One of the reasons was probably the fact that I’d lost all reservations I’d had for Francesca, but anyway, the Hugo Lesseps character wasn’t as big of a part of me anymore.

  If I remember correctly, even my thoughts were more “Hugo-like” before, I thought.

  “Oh, I get it,” said Cyco. “You turned fifteen on the other side, so that cured your chuuni... your self-conscious fourteen year-old syndrome.”

  “No. I am not in a phase,” I retorted.

  “Ehh? You’re a handsome, pompous gentleman who likes saying hot one-liners.”

  “No. Hugo Lesseps is not a product of adolescent self-consciousness.”

  “‘Lady, we shall stop your tears. I promise that you will greet tomorrow’s morning with a smile on your face,’” Cyco quoted me.

  “You even stopped speaking in monotone to say that! Can you not?!”

  And that wasn’t a weird thing to say, right?! I know I’m the one who said it, but that’s a good line!

  “Ugh... I didn’t expect the very basis of who I am to be put into question at this point,” I complained.

  “Did that help?” Cyco asked with a smile.

  “...Eh? Ah...” That made me realize that I was feeling a lot more comfortable than I had been a few minutes ago.

  So my verbally abusive, monotone Embryo had said that to take my mind away from the pressure of being in a place like this.

  “Thanks, Cyc—”

  “Anyway, I’m gonna write a report about what’s not right about you and hand it over later.”

  “You’ve ruined it in more ways than one,” I muttered.

  Anyway, though she had hurt me a bit in the process, Cyco rea
lly was helping me deal with being in this place.

  Feeling a bit better, I continued to wait for the person I was here with.

  “What’s going on there, anyway?” I said as I looked into one part of the gambling area — the roulette space.

  Just like in reality, the roulettes had all the numbers from 0 to 36, red or black colors on them, and green on 0. They were European-style roulettes.

  Yes — they were almost no different from the ones in reality.

  “That reminds me...” I murmured.

  Francesca believed that the developers had made the tians accustomed to these games ahead of time.

  She theorized that Infinite Dendrogram was the result of someone creating a cutting-edge virtual space from scratch, then using it to simulate an ecosystem of virtual life.

  I wondered if creating a civilization this complex was possible without it taking really long. Even on Earth, this would’ve taken hundreds of years. However, Francesca had said it was possible due to several factors, including the function they used for the war.

  “Also, doncha think that creating an entire world this detailed in no time and from nothing would be way more insane?” she’d added, and I was inclined to agree.

  Back to the matter of games...

  Roulette, card games, and even the board games popular outside of casinos all had their equivalents here in Dendro.

  You could say the same about food and drink, too. The almond jelly Cyco was eating, for one thing, was basically the almond jelly you could get on Earth.

  Francesca thought that this had all been done by the developers’ design to get this world used to Earthly breakthroughs of this kind ahead of time and keep Masters from being the ones to bring them.

  It was to prevent them from using real-world games or food to either make some serious money or impact the cultures here.

  Francesca said that if the world of Infinite Dendrogram had lacked popular entertainment or good cuisine, you would’ve had many Masters bringing such things from reality and acting as if they were their original ideas.

  And if anyone had been successful, it would create many copycats who’d attempt the same thing.

  “The devs were probably worried that it’d divert Infinite Dendrogram from its main point,” she’d gone on.

  I recalled asking, “But isn’t Infinite Dendrogram supposed to be all about freedom?”

  She’d grinned and said, “Sure. At least, as long as it doesn’t stray from the main point — Embryo development.”

  According to her, the devs wanted Masters to evolve their Embryos.

  “They’ve gotta have a goal like that. This game’s just too extraordinary for it to be just for profit. Ha ha! I mean, come on, you don’t need something of this level just to make some money.”

  Then she’d given me her theory.

  “If it’s about something other than profit, it’s gotta be something that distinguishes Infinite Dendrogram from the other games. That would be our Embryos. They’re something the devs force upon us, and something no other game has. That made me conclude that Infinite Dendrogram was made so we Masters, as a group, could nurture all kinds of Embryos. Eh? You think it’s this realistic world that makes it stand out? I don’t think so. I have a basis for that belief, but it’s long, so I won’t say it now. Anyway, I’m pretty damn sure the devs made the game so they could have us grow some Embryos... specifically, Superior Embryos such as my Pandemonium, or maybe something beyond that... not that it matters right now. Eh? You wonder how this relates to entertainment and all that? Isn’t it obvious? If the meta was all about trying to make money by introducing the real world’s features to Dendro, it’d be nothing but a glorified business simulator. You can’t develop a good Embryo under those conditions, right? They set up the entertainment culture to prevent Masters from converging on doing nothing but looking for success through easy breakthroughs.”

  Francesca’s rapid-fire theorizing had been just that — theorizing.

  However, she probably had good reasons for believing what she did.

  Anyway, Francesca’s point was that the devs were making sure that Masters couldn’t just introduce easy breakthroughs, but it felt weird to hear it from her because she herself had actually done something like that.

  She’d brought humanoid robots — a fictional thing from the real world — into Infinite Dendrogram

  The developers probably hadn’t anticipated anyone using the technological architecture here to pioneer humanoid mecha, or they simply hadn’t thought that anyone could do it.

  As a result, Francesca was now living proof that you could bring something revolutionary here and turn it into a business.

  While remembering that, I looked at the roulette table in the gambling area. It was surrounded by an air of expectation... or perhaps fear.

  “I... I shall throw it, then,” said the dealer with a tense voice.

  Something was strange, though.

  Not about the dealer, but the roulette’s betting table.

  There was only one token on it, specifically, the red 1 to 1. It was the cheapest, too, worth a mere 100 lir.

  Despite there being many people around the table, that was the only bet on it.

  Rules were rules, though, and since someone had made a bet, the roulette had to be spun.

  But after the dealer threw the ball on the roulette...

  “Ten million lir on 21.”

  ...someone made an additional bet and placed ten of the most expensive tokens on top of the 21.

  “Me too, me too!”

  “Same here!”

  More additional bets followed as those surrounding the table also bet on the 21.

  The dealer became pale, the roulette gradually stopped spinning, and the ball... ended up on the 21.

  “T-Twenty-one...” he stammered.

  The table was drowned in raging cheering.

  The person who’d bet first — and the most — was given 36 times the original bet, which amounted to 360,000,000 lir’s worth of tokens.

  That was equivalent to 30,000,000 Euros in real life, and it was enough to buy a whole twelve Marshall II’s with add-ons... with ToW member prices, at least.

  “Isn’t that too much?” I muttered.

  I didn’t know whether I was heard or not, but the person took the tokens and left the table.

  The surrounding gamblers looked blatantly disappointed that they could no longer win by simply copying her bets.

  “Ah.” The woman realized something and stopped before pointing at the table, looking at the absentminded dealer, and saying, “This is two hundred lir short.”

  Those were the winnings from the first token she’d bet on the red 1 on 1.

  That was the straw that broke the camel’s back and made the dealer cry. Even so, he forced himself to give her the tokens.

  Not only had she won an immense amount of money — she had even broken the dealer’s spirit.

  This person’s appearance was best described as “red and white.”

  Her hair was red with a few streaks of silver.

  Wearing only hot pants, a bikini-like top on her chest, and a flight jacket, she was brazenly showing off her nice figure. However, the most notable thing about her were her eyes. Each of them had a different color. The left eye was red, the right one silver.

  A closer look into her right eye would reveal that its iris had the pattern of a detailed kaleidoscope, and that it as a whole was artificial.

  I knew that that was her Embryo.

  She casually walked over to the eating space, approached our table, and said, “I made some good money just now, Yu.”

  “You overdid it, teach,” I said.

  She was the person who’d forced herself into the role of my mentor.

  Just like me, she was an ex-member of The Triangle of Wisdom, as well as my sister’s close friend, and the one and only “Blue Sky Songstress” — one of the nine Caldinian Superiors.

  She was The Ace, AR-I-CA.
>
  ◇

  I’d met her about three weeks ago in Dendro time.

  After the incident in Gideon, I left The Triangle of Wisdom and tried crossing the Caldinian deserts to go to Tenchi.

  Using the sea route was the better option, but ever since Dryfe had created a navy and tried to expand into the ocean, the country’s relationship with Granvaloa had become sour. We’d even started stopping Granvaloan merchant fleet ships, so I really couldn’t go to Tenchi by sea.

  I even considered using Altarian ships, but I wasn’t brazen enough to just pass by through the country after causing all that trouble in Gideon.

  That left only one route — the desert in the middle of the continent. There were also the Harshwinter Mountains to the north, but that was no place for people, passing or otherwise.

  The person who’d passed the place most recently was a Huang Hean Superior and his flying fortress, which said everything about how inhospitable the land was and how much you’d need to pass it. That was why I’d chosen the desert, but since it’d be a long journey and I would have to log out, I wouldn’t be able to ride alongside merchant dragon carriages.

  Xunyu the Yinglong had arrived at Altar using a dragon carriage that functioned as a mobile save point, but unfortunately, that was among the best magic items you could get, and I didn’t have anything that luxurious.

  Still, even without anything that fancy, I had ways of traveling long distances.

  Caldina had these so-called “sandships,” and since ships counted as half-buildings, I could travel by setting the ship’s inside coordinates and my logout location. When looking it up on the internet, I’d thought that was the way to go, but then I’d realized that the diplomatic relations between Dryfe and Caldina were so bad that you had no civilian sandships going between the countries.

  I decided I had to give up and go by myself using my Magingear, but then I quickly realized that was impossible.

  There was no denying it: I was naïve.

  Piloting Magingears used MP, even when you weren’t fighting, and the desert was such an unwelcoming place that even the simplest movements drained a lot. It didn’t help that I was using the unit Francesca had gifted me. It was a custom-made heavy-type machine focused on output, so it drained a lot more MP for less movement than standard ones.