What, Failure to Transition!? Volume 4 Chapter 8

Chapter 8 – For a Safe and Peaceful City 1

“Oooh. It suits you well, Mr. Todou.”

“Thank you.”

“Hehehe… Well, enjoy the show. I’m looking forward to seeing your awestruck reaction to your companions later on.”

“Ahahaha…”

That night, Yoichi came to see the circus with the ticket that Ed had prepared for him.

Since he couldn’t wear work clothes or tracksuits there, he bought a formal outfit at the hotel’s boutique.

Yoichi was wearing a tweed three-piece suit, with his hair slicked-back and tucked neatly.

Naturally, the ladies were also getting dressed for the party.

“Yoichi, what do you think?”

Karin was the first to appear.

She was wearing a Chinese dress that looked easy to put on.

It was black with a red floral pattern and a slit that went all the way down to her waist, exposing Karin’s beautiful legs.

Her hair was tied up as usual, but the red flower ornament that was attached to it made it look even more glamorous.

“I wonder if I’m showing off my legs a little too much for my age?”

“No, I don’t think so. You look very beautiful.”

“Mmm-hmm. Thanks. You look cool too.”

Next to appear was Misato.

“Uhm… how is it…?”

Misato was wearing a slightly more casual dress with a slightly shorter skirt, which also generously showed off the slender, white legs.

“It’s very cute, and very much like Misato’s.”

“Hau…. Thank… you…”

Misato, who received the compliment straight away, slumped down in embarrassment.

“Sorry to keep you waiting, everyone.”

Alana was the last to appear.

She was wearing a blue-gray-colored bare-top dress that exposed her breasts from the shoulders in a bold manner.

Her large breasts swayed with the slightest movement.

The fabric of the dress only covered the lower half of her breasts, and Yoichi was a little worried that they might spill out.

“Well, well, well. Why don’t you look at that… aren’t you wonderful!”

Ed, who was standing by Yoichi’s side, let out a few words in an unintentional tone. Even for him, who had seen many celebrities over the years, Alana and the others must have been exceptionally beautiful.

Unlike the two women, whose legs were exposed, Alana has hers covered in a long, flouncy skirt, which she spun around in front of Yoichi.

“H-how is it… I wonder?”

Was it embarrassment over the outfit itself, or was she suddenly embarrassed by the fact that she was showing off her outfit cutely to Yoichi?

Alana’s cheeks were blushing, and she looked at Yoichi with an upward glance as she asked him this question.

“…Ah, yes. It’s very beautiful.”

And Yoichi, who was even more stunned than Ed, managed to squeeze out those words.

“Is that so… I’m glad…”

Perhaps satisfied with Yoichi’s response, Alana smiled at him, and her beautiful smile captivated everyone present, men and women, alike.

The dresses they are wearing were recommended by the boutique staff, with Karin’s opinion seeming to have been included to some extent.

in contrast to the earlier two, Alana is accustomed to wearing dresses as she is the daughter of an aristocrat. Still, she usually leaves the formal attire, which is different from her armament, to the maids. Misato is not that knowledgeable about fashion as well, so in the end, it was all left to Karin to provide the management of the girls’ outfits.

“I’m sorry, Yoichi. Even though I lost all my winnings yesterday…”

“It’s fine, it’s fine. To me, it’s more worth it to see how beautiful everyone looked.”

As for the cost of the dresses, as he originally planned to drop yesterday’s winnings at the hotel to keep Ed happy, he had no problem with this.

Yoichi was dressed in something he was not accustomed to wearing, but the women were dressed beautifully.

“Then I hope you enjoy your stay.”

Ed bowed graciously and left in a good mood. Yoichi invoked [Appraisal+] just to be sure and confirmed his feelings, and there he found out that he still had doubts about Misato and Alana, who did not have passports, but he no longer wanted to pursue the matter deeply.

〇●〇●

The circus was a sight to behold, performed by the world’s best stage set and cast.

Misato and Alana enjoyed themselves with sparkles in their eyes, and Yoichi also felt like he had returned to his childhood for the first time in a long time.

“The part where people jumped up so high on the seesaw-like thing was amazing!”

“I knew that the person on the long trapeze that almost hit the ground would be fine, but even though I’ve already seen them a couple of times, it still made me nervous.”

“For me, that big loop spinning round and round while they’re performing on it was awesome!”

“Fumu… I still can’t believe such a huge production was done without magic or magical tools, but only with stage sets and human actors…”

The four were walking around, each giving their own impression of the show until Yoichi had to leave the group.

“I think it’s time. I’ll see you all later.”

“Alright. I’ll take care of Alana and Misato.”

“Ok. I’m counting on you.”

After saying this, Yoichi [returned] them to the cheap motel and went out into the town after dark.

In addition to the magic tool that inhibits recognition that enabled him to walk around the town without being noticed, Yoichi also used [Appraisal+] to search for hostilities.

After passing through a number of deserted, unsafe-looking streets, he arrived at an abandoned building.

“Oh, they’re really doing it.”

Inside the building, a large-scale drug deal was about to take place.

(I want to make a small contribution to the security of this city. And with that, some information as well.)

This is the request Yoichi has given to Charlotte in addition to her silence.

Yoichi chose gambling this time as a way to raise money, but he also knew that if he won big, he would be noticed.

With regards to the fact that Ed had probed him, it was Yoichi’s fault as he went too aggressive, but more than that, he felt it troublesome that he was being watched in whatever he wanted to do.

So, he decided to go back to the basics and ‘borrow’ the money that the bad guys were using to do their evil deeds.

“Is there any bad business between illegal organizations around here?”

“If that’s what you’re talking about, then…”

From there, he was told about some of the areas that were being used for such evil and the groups of bad people involved in it.

After [Appraising] the “backgrounds” of those bad people and identifying their upcoming anti-social dealings, he confirmed that a million-dollar deal is going down at this location tonight.

And when he went to the sight, several people dressed like businessmen or workers were trying to exchange aluminum cases for Boston bags. Just like in the movies.

A dozen men were standing guard around them.

The aluminum case was found to contain one million dollars, and the Boston bag was found to be filled with ‘white powder’ as a result of [Appraisal+].

(Oh, shoot, I forgot to prepare a replacement for the white powder. Let’s see… this will do.)

Yoichi approached the location of the case and bag, hiding in the shadows of the wooden pallets and crates of unknown use piled up in the abandoned building where the transaction was to take place.

(Almost there…)

When he was a few more steps from the desired location, Yoichi took out an empty soda bottle from the [Infinite Storage+] and tossed it.

CLANG! The sound of the glass bottle cracking echoed, and the men were in an uproar.

(Wow, they’re holding guns and stuff like in the movies!)

Yoichi, who moved quickly as if weaving through the gazes of these men, succeeded in approaching the case and the bag.

Under normal circumstances, he would have been spotted already, but with the men’s attention completely focused on the sound, and due to the effects of the perception-inhibiting magic tool, he wasn’t noticed even though he had grazed their field of vision.

(First, let’s see what’s in the Boston bag…)

Upon confirming the contents of the Boston bag that was captured earlier within the 10-meter range of the [Infinite Storage+] effect, Yoichi immediately replaced it with something else.

He didn’t need the contents of the bag whatsoever, nor did he intend to use it. However, he seized them without mercy in the hope that reducing their circulation as much as possible would still be an enormous contribution to society.

(My main goal is the aluminum case, though.)

But when he was almost a few steps away from grabbing the case filled with the money in his area of effect,

――VVvvvv!!

The smartphone in his pocket beeped.

“Hey! There’s someone over there!”

Yoichi hurriedly put his smartphone in the [Infinite Storage+], but it was too late, as the bad guys had already determined his approximate location.

The effect of the recognition-inhibiting magic tool would be drastically reduced if they were made aware of its presence, no matter how many of the similar equipment he was wearing.

――BRATATATATATATA!!

(Whoa! They’re immediately shooting at me!)

In order to intimidate them, Yoichi took out a heavy machine gun, quickly set up the tripod mount, quickly calculated the surroundings and ballistics with [Appraisal+], then fired bullets for about five seconds in a direction where no one would be hit.

“Hiiii!!”

“What the hell?”

“That caliber… the cops are here already!?”

Wooden pallets were ruthlessly destroyed, concrete walls and pillars were mercilessly chipped away, and the villains were frightened by the appearance of heavy weapons that far exceeded their expectations, temporarily halting their movements.

(Okay, this is my chance!)

There, Yoichi took a flash bang grenade from the [Infinite Storage+] and threw it at the center of the bad guys.

A violent flash and a tinnitus-inducing roar exploded throughout the abandoned building.

Thanks to the darkness of the night and the concrete walls that reverberated the sound sufficiently, the flashbang grenade was fully effective, even though the space was somewhat huge.

Yoichi, who had closed his eyes and covered his ears solely at the moment of activation, began to move immediately.

Although both the flash and the reverberation of the roar were still present, he was hardly affected by them thanks to his [Health Body α], which had the effect of preventing abnormal conditions, and he slipped between the motionless villains and ran up to the aluminum case.

(Okay! I’ve taken it!)

Then, having caught the aluminum case in his area of effect, Yoichi replaced its contents just as he had done with his bag earlier, quickly activated [Return+], and returned to his hotel suite.

“Phew, that was a close one….”

After taking a break in the empty suite, Yoichi took out the contents of the aluminum case on the living room table.

“Oh, what a spectacular view!”

It was a bundle of bills totaling one million dollars, mainly of used ten and twenty-dollar bills.

Using the [Infinite Storage+] function, which allows the user to freely insert and remove items within a 10-meter radius of the user’s center, he could select it so that he could take only the case’s contents.

Incidentally, the contents of the Boston bag were also snatched in this way, but since he did not want to see them, he decided to keep them in the [Infinite Storage+] and dispose of them if he could find a better way.

Of course, no matter how bad the people you’re dealing with are, it’s not a ‘good idea’ to just take from them one-sidedly. To this, Yoichi took out a ‘replacement’ for each of the contents of the aluminum case and the Boston bag.

“Sigh… that was tiring as hell.”

Yoichi, feeling exhausted from the sudden outbreak of the firefight, laid himself on the bed and took a short rest.

“What was the phone call all about?”

After calming down to some extent and remembering the incoming call that triggered the firefight, Yoichi took out his smartphone from the [Infinite Storage+] and checked the history.

“Karin, huh.”

The smartphone was a rental, and Karin was the only one who knew the number.

“What’s wrong?”

Yoichi called Karin back from the call history.

―― Meanwhile, at the transaction site.

“What the hell was that?”

The remaining villains were perplexed.

An unidentified entity suddenly appeared, and when they threatened them, it opened fire with heavy weapons and used a flashbang grenade to block their movement.

After that, however, they disappeared without doing anything.

The aluminum case and bag were still intact, and none of the people gathered were injured.

After a while, the leaders of both parties regained some of their composure after seeing no further activity and sent several people to search the area.

But even so, nothing suspicious was found, so the transaction continued.

Both parties exchanged the items they had brought and checked the contents.

“…oi. what kind of a joke is this?”

A worker-looking man who opened the aluminum case flaunted the open case to his opponent while suppressing his anger.

Inside the aluminum case was blank sheets of copy paper, on top of which was a single piece of paper with the image of the Statue of Liberty on it, with ‘1 million dollars’ written on it as if it was a makeshift bill.

“You want me to trade a joke item like this for our product, huh!?”

 “And the same goes for you! Just what is this!?”

The businessman-like man on the other side opened the Boston bag, only to find that the insides were stuffed full of steaming white rice.

This is what Yoichi always keeps in his [Infinite Storage+] so that he can have freshly cooked rice anytime he wants.

One million dollar joke bill instead of real one million dollars worth of paper money, white rice instead of the ‘white powder’.

Yoichi was probably the only one who thought this was not a bad deal.

The transaction that day almost turned into a bloody feud, but it was amicably broken up on the grounds of “mutual mismanagement”.

On a side note, the Boston bag filled with rice was thrown away on the way back to the hotel, and the homeless people who happened to find it ate it all up.

〇●〇●

“Since we are here and all, how about we take a view of the cityscape at night?”

At Karin’s idea, after the show, the three women left the hotel and went out for a night in the city.

Since the weather was still warm, the three women were still in their dresses, not wearing anything over them.

“Oooh, what a splendid place!”

The buildings lining the main street(strip) were beautifully lit, with images playing on the walls in wide places, fountains, and even street lights, making the whole city look like one big show.

Alana, who saw the show, was amazed and gawked at the various parts of it, but Misato looked somewhat frightened.

“Hey, is it all right? I mean, we are all women, walking down the city streets on this busy night…”

Everyone knows that this country is not as safe as Japan, and in particular, the place where they are now is the City of Desire, which is often used as a stage for crime dramas.

It was no wonder Misato was frightened, but Karin remained unconcerned.

“It’s okay. This main street(strip) is safe, at the very least. As there are many tourists from foreign countries, they have to put more emphasis on their security, or they would put their customers in danger.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes, though I think this is the only place in this city where women can walk alone at night.”

“I see…”

It was true in a sense. Looking around, they could see a few people here and there walking down the strip, dressed as they were.

At first, Misato was reluctant to step out of the hotel in her dress, but when she realized that it was apparently a natural thing to do here, any semblance of embarrassment was gone from her soon after.

Karin gave a mischievous smile to Misato, who seemed to have relaxed a bit.

“But be careful, though. It only applies to ‘this street’. When you go off the strip, it gets really dangerous. So, pay attention, okay?”

Saying this, Karin winked lightly at Misato.

However, Alana, who had been looking around with an amazed expression on her face like a country bumpkin, raised her eyebrows all of a sudden.

Then, her relaxed expression tightened, and she gave a sharp glance around the area.

“Alana? What’s wrong?”

“Shhh!”

When Karin noticed the change in Alana’s mood and called out to her, she put a finger to her lips and instructed her to be quiet.

“I heard something…”

“What is it?”

“Someone is being attacked… over there!”

After saying that, Alana ran down the street, the long skirt of her dress fluttering.

“Wait a minute, Alana! That way is ……!”

Alana ran out of the main street and went to the back streets.

Karin and Misato followed her.

“Hey, stop it! Get off me!”

What Alana rushed into was a place where a woman was about to be forcibly abducted into a minivan.

The woman, dressed in a tight black dress, struggled to resist, but she was almost dragged into the car as if she was no match for the man’s strength.

But then Alana rushed in.

“Let go of her, you insolent brute!”

“Buhoo!!”

Having arrived on the scene on time, Alana rushed to the scene and delivered a straight left to the man, also using her right arm to grab the woman’s body as she pulled her out of the minivan.

A sharp, heavy blow, unbelievable from that slender arm, blew the man who was trying to drag the woman to the other side of the car, and his back was hit with a deafening thud.

“Fuck! What was that!?”

The man in the driver’s seat, who was probably watching the scene through the rearview mirror, swore a few words, but when he saw that they were compromised, he immediately stepped on the gas of the minivan with the door still open.

“…!!”

Alana hurriedly secured the woman in her hug and jumped off the moving vehicle.

After scraping the tires on the ground several times, the minivan disappeared deeper into the back alley.

“Alana!”

“Are you okay?”

In the meantime, Karin and Misato caught up to Alana, a little out of breath, to check her safety.

“Yeah. I’m fine.”

After Alana replied, she gently called out to the woman in her arms.

“Are you all right?”

Although they could not understand each other’s words, Alana’s intention must have been conveyed through her tone of voice and demeanor.

But for some reason, instead of being grateful, the woman that was rescued scowled at Alana.

“Are you okay?”

“Geez, that was totally unneeded. Thank you very much!”

And what came next was the woman cursing at the person who was supposed to be her savior.

〇●〇●

“An undercover police officer?”

Karin, who speaks English, had a conversation with the woman she rescued.

She was an agent with the city police department, and her name was Donna Valentine.

She had a well-defined nose and eyes, and her black, wavy hair was pulled back in an updo.

She was dressed in a tight dress, which generously showed off her well-defined figure.

Her breasts were a little smaller than Alana’s and Charlotte’s, but they were still enough to be called big breasts and were taut and elastic at first glance.

Her legs, which stretched out from a short skirt about 10 cm above the knee, were moderately fleshy, albeit somewhat muscular, and combined with her youthful brown skin, she was very attractive.

“That’s right. I don’t have an ID on me, so I can’t prove it right now, but I’m a full-fledged investigator.”

“Then perhaps you were trying to get kidnapped on purpose back then?”

“Yes! There’s been a lot of tourists going missing lately. And there, I was just about to finally catch the tail of what I thought might be a group of nasty kidnappers, but…” Donna cut off her speech bitterly.

Then, she looked at Alana with resentment.

“B-but… isn’t this city safe?”

Misato, who had heard Donna’s dreadful tale, asked Karin. She was clearly scared.

“Like I told you, the main street is safe. But once you leave that street, you’re on your own. You’ll definitely get caught in a crime as the security level there drops significantly.”

In response to Misato’s question, Karin lowers her eyebrows and shrugs her shoulders deliberately.

However, no matter how much it was one’s own responsibility, there would be no difference if you were already a victim of a crime, which meant a tarnish to the city’s reputation for the tourists even if it didn’t get into the news.

This is why the city police here must work hard to avoid these damages at all costs. After all, tourism is one of the major sources of income for this city, to the point that it was already the backbone that holds it in place.

“Sigh… at best, it’s a pay cut. At worse, it’s a demotion for me after this…”

Donna’s shoulders slumped.

That was when Alana, who had been watching apologetically, suddenly opened her mouth.

“But I’m sure Mr. Yoichi can handle this, can’t he?”

“Yoichi? Ah, yes!”

Using Yoichi’s [Appraisal+], it should be easy to determine the destination of the fleeing car.

“Hey, Donna.”

“…what is it now?”

When Karin called out to Donna, Donna looked up grimly and replied weakly.

“Do you remember the license plate of the car?”

“More or less. It’s probably a fake one anyway.”

“We have no problems even if it’s a fake one.”

If the user is to be determined from the plate number registration, a falsified license plate number is of no use, but with Yoichi’s skills, he can find out in real-time where the car is located, even with the false license plate.

Even if you change the license plate on the way, it is still possible to find it with further research on the vehicle.

“Let’s see… Yoichi… Yoichi… there. Eh? It was cut off.”

Karin immediately searched and called Yoichi, but the line on the other side immediately hung up.

“Well, I’m sure we’ll hear back from him soon.”

Knowing her boyfriend’s antics, Karin tucked her smartphone into her pouch and walked over to Donna.

“Hey, Donna.”

“Hm?”

“Let us help you with your business.”

“What? Are you serious?”

“Of course.”

Donna gave Karin a hard look for a moment but then turned her head away and shrugged her shoulders.

“As if. I mean, what can a mere tourist do?”

“Oh? But you look more of a tourist than we are.”

“Huh?”

Karin’s somewhat provocative words made Donna sound a little annoyed.

“I mean, how can a mere tourist fight off thugs and rescue you so easily?”

“Ugh…”

It was then that Donna remembered what had happened earlier, albeit reluctantly, when she had been rescued.

The sequence of quick rushes, grabbing her in a fluid motion, and even knocking out one of the kidnappers in the car certainly did not seem like an amateur’s work.

“Do you belong to… some kind of organization, by any chance?”

“Well, let’s just say we are and that we just happened to be here today for sightseeing.”

Karin and the girls are adventurers who belong to the Meilgrad Adventurers’ Guild, which was somewhat an organization that handles combat, so it wasn’t like she was lying.

“You think I can rely on you? It will definitely put you at risk, you know?”

“Yes. We know.”

“Also, I no longer know where the enemy is, so we might not be able to do anything at all.”

“Don’t worry. We have a leader we can count on.”

“…I haven’t reported that the infiltration has failed yet. That’s why you won’t be getting the support of the city police from here. You can report it now, but then they would definitely cancel the operation altogether.”

“Don’t worry. We’ll be fine. We are enough.”

Donna thought for a moment, then held out her hand to Karin.

“The first sign that we’re in trouble, I’ll call for backup and retreat immediately.”

“I guess I’ll leave it to you to make that decision then.”

Karin then squeezed back Donna’s hand that was offered to her.

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