Normal and Special

——Somewhere in the Northern Nations.

A caravan was marching down a travel road, guarded by knights on all sides. Refugees crowded the road, many of them looking like bandits. They wantonly watched the caravan, but the knights violently drove them away with their weapons.

“Make way! Stand back!”

“Beggars... Stay away!”

The knights were on guard, knowing full well the danger of stopping in a place like this.

Akane looked out from within the carriage in the center of the caravan and sighed. “It’s a tough world out there, isn’t it...?”

“Just where do you think you are?” a well-built woman answered from across the carriage. “And you were trying to walk through all of that alone... What rock were you raised under?” The woman was wearing all black, including a black veil over her face, lending to a peculiar air about her.

“Refugees, huh... It’s sad losing your home.”

“And it’s about time you told me about yours. Your daddy a noble?”

“I’m not nobility. Just a regular rags-to-idol story!”

“There you go with the nonsense again... Nobles shelter their daughters too much.” The woman in black pinched her brow. She had rushed to pick Akane up as she was starting to walk down the travel road without a care in the world. While Akane’s clothes were unfamiliar to the woman, their quality was good enough for her to take notice. Combined with her smooth hands, well-kept hair, and untanned skin, Akane convincingly looked the part of a sheltered rich girl.

“What are these people going to do, Mama?” Akane asked.

“Worry about yourself, girl,” Mama shut her down. Despite her alto voice and muscular build, there was a certain sensuality about her.

“Excuse the interruption,” a knight called from outside the carriage. “I’ve something to report, Big Mama.”

“What is it? Open the window already,” she sharply answered. If she weren’t clad in mourning, she might have passed for a bandit herself.

“The Madam’s caravan has already reached the town ahead.”

“Bad news for us... Great news for the folks here, I’m sure.”

“Shall we change course?”

“We’re going back to Icaros. Looks like we’re going to be disappointed everywhere we go.”

The Madam’s influence was on the rise as her enormous caravan toured through any town and village in its path, buying practically anything they came across. This was nothing short of a godsend for those who made their living by selling. On the other hand, it was nothing short of a disaster for any looking to buy; imagine a giant whale leaping out of nowhere and swallowing their entire catch. The brighter the light, the darker the shadow it cast. And so the world turned.

“The butterfly of Holylight... I don’t hate her style, but she needs to learn some moderation.”

“Holylight? That’s where Hakuto is. I bet he’s hatching all sorts of schemes again.” Akane laughed.

Mama looked up. “You’re from Holylight? I hear rich nobles run the show there. What were you so unhappy about that it made you run off?”

“I didn’t so much run off as come to look for something no one else could do...”

“What no one else could do, huh...? Spoken like somebody who hasn’t struggled a day in their life,” Mama chuckled.

Many young men and women—and perhaps even herself, Mama had to admit—thought themselves special and searched for their own unique purpose. Of course, only a handful of people were truly special. As they ventured out into society, most grew to long for the stability of a normal life. Perhaps that’s what it meant to grow up.

“Akane, was it?” Mama asked. “You’ll learn about the world soon enough. Then maybe something about yourself.”

“Mm... It’s true I don’t know much about the world and all that, but I’ll always be me.”

“Ha! How naive you unspoiled nobles can be...”

“But tell me about you, Mama! What do you do for work? Why are you dressed in all black? Where are we going? Is an Icaros tasty? Is the town we just passed—”

“Stop buzzing, little girl...! Ask one question at a time!” Mama cried in annoyance. Still, she felt a strange urge to tell Akane whatever she wanted to know.

This was thanks to one of Akane’s special skills, Secret Agent—a balance-breaking ability that made people want to leak all sorts of details to her. At times, Akane simply stumbled across important information that would benefit her. Back in the game, this ability weakened all stealth skills, greatly helping Akane detect and attack players first.

Naturally, Mama couldn’t help but explain, “People call Icaros the city of evil. It’s the garbage heap of the north.”

“City of evil?! That sounds kind of cool!”

“If you’re not joking, kid, your naivety is starting to get funny. I manage a bunch of working girls there. Some of them are drowning in debt, some are there for extra cash. Some girls were practically kidnapped, but there are plenty of noble girls like you, fallen from grace.”

“You run a business in such a dangerous city? Awesome!”

Mama’s brow cinched behind her black veil, seeing how unbothered Akane was by her job description. She had seen plenty of noble girls who’d never known any troubles nor seen the darkness of the world. Part of her work entailed training those girls from the ground up, preventing them from going mad or becoming suicidal when faced with their new harsh reality. The girls soon learned that, once they fell to Icaros, all that would come from lamenting or fighting their fates were cuts, bruises, and deeper dread of tomorrow.

“You just got caught by one of the faces of that scary city. You understand the situation you’re in?”

“It’s nice not having to walk! Oh, I don’t have anything for cab fare though.”

“You’re a tough nut to crack...” Mama sighed, seeing Akane as beaming as ever. She was unlike any other girl Mama had come across.

“You seem nice, Mama. I’ll go with you to Icaros.”

“Don’t be silly... It’s not a place a girl like you should be anywhere near... Unless you want to be a prostitute.”

“Nah, I’m a pure idol. Girl next door. No couch interviews for me.”

“More nonsense again... Pure, huh?” Mama stroked her chin and gazed out of the window. The word seemed distant to her. Shapeless.

Seeing the concern in her face, Akane rushed to say, “Oh, don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with girls who do.”

“It’s a rotten world. A girl’s gotta survive somehow.”

“I suppose,” Akane replied pensively.

Luna, who climbed all the way to the position of Holy Maiden from nothing as an orphan, as well as Yukikaze and Mikan, who earned their way out of poverty by adventuring, were undoubtedly special cases in this world. Normal women had to survive by any means necessary.

Akane was familiar with class division, having lived under the Empire’s rule, where God’s People lived drastically different lives from the rest of the population. As happy-go-lucky as she acted, Akane knew well the dark side of humanity.

Mama chuckled, seeing Akane’s smile fade. “Akane, wasn’t it...? Don’t get it twisted. We take advantage of men, preying on their small, simple minds. Put a man alone in a room with a girl he fancies, and watch him turn into a boy, no matter his birth. It’s cute.”

Akane’s eyes glimmered, showing obvious interest in Mama’s claim. “R-Really...? Is it the same with an older guy? Like, like, a forty-five-year-old dandy, stoic type?”

“That’s rather specific...”

“I’ve never really dated, so I want to learn from your decades of experience!”

“Decades?! How old do you think I am?!”

As they continued their conversation, a forerunner of the caravan hurried to the window. “Big Mama, there are countless bodies strewn about on the road ahead.”

“How many are we talking?”

“We haven’t done a count... But there must be a hundred or so.”

“Didn’t think there were any potential warzones on our route.” The air in the carriage shifted. A handful of bodies would have been one thing, but this number of corpses indicated a large-scale clash.

The knight tensely added, “This road does lead to Icaros. Who would be stupid enough to start a skirmish here?”

“Maybe a sheltered rebel...”

Icaros, true to its moniker of the city of evil, was rife with illegal drugs, human trafficking, bootlegging, arms-dealing, prostitution, deathmatches, dangerous gambling, and any other debauchery imaginable...all in broad daylight. Naturally, many powerful figures from around the continent frequented the city, including those who maintained a saintly image for their own people. Considering that there were also many mercenaries based in the city, one would have been hard-pressed to find anyone willing to start a conflict with Icaros.

The caravan carried on until Mama’s carriage came to the devastation the forerunner had reported. She silently surveyed the site for some time, before quietly calling to the knights on guard, “Stay here.”

“Y-You mustn’t go alone, Big Mama!”

Mama waved the knights away and walked into the field of corpses, followed by Akane.

“You stay in the carriage too, girl.”

“No way Superstar Akane, private eye, is going to pass up on a crime scene!” Akane puffed her chest, holding up a magnifying glass.

“It’s all fun and games to you, isn’t it...? Don’t get sick from seeing the dead.” Mama seemed to have given up talking sense into Akane. “Doesn’t look like any human did this, though...” Mama muttered, inspecting the bodies, all sliced up and down through their armor.

Akane, too, could see how powerful the killer must have been. She whistled a tune and concluded it with, “I’m not loving it...”

“What are you doing?” Mama asked while Akane continued to sniff for something in the air.

They both heard a faint grunt and turned to find a beautiful lady knight on the verge of death. She was about as tall as the other knights, with luscious golden locks. In another life, she might have seen success as a fashion model.

Mama approached the knight and remarked, “They call you a monster on the battlefield... What did this?”

“I wish you hadn’t seen me like this. It was a devil with a large scythe...”

“I see... Do you have any last words?”

A fatally deep gash ran from the knight’s shoulder down to her side, and she was missing her left leg from the knee down. As far as Akane could tell, she was as good as dead, only hanging on by a thread. No item or skill—maybe not even Yu’s—could have saved her.

“Tell my comrades...it took Entre Ix’am...”

“That’s why you’re missing your armor...”

The gears in Akane’s head turned as she listened in on the conversation. The faint scent, the devil with the scythe, the bizarrely named armor... All of the pieces were coming together.

“Eureka!” Akane cried. “Isn’t this the armor you’re talking about? Or something super similar?” She produced the armor Belphegor had been wearing from her Backup Backpack.

The knight and Mama stared in astonishment; it was nearly identical to the armor in question, save for its color.

“This one’s called Final Exam,” Akane added. “Yours must be Entrance Exam, huh?”

“Amazing... There were two iterations of Entre Ix’am,” the knight muttered, curling her lips. While she didn’t quite understand what Akane was talking about, she was clearly amused. “Heh... That devil...can suck it...”

“If you’re talking about the stupid-looking devil with the pumpkin, I’m going to kill him. Promise. Sweet dreams.” Akane gently stroked the knight’s cheek. In this gesture of kindness glimmered Akane’s cold grasp on life and death.

“Funny girl, you are. Take this... I have some money... Take care of it, will you, Mama?” The knight tore off from her neck what looked like a dog tag, enchanted it, and handed it to Akane. Then she closed her eyes, embracing death without a trace of remorse on her face.

“Another one gone... The world isn’t fair, is it?”

“Did you know each other, Mama?”

“She was a mercenary. Lived a man’s life, always wearing that full set of armor. Said that was the only way to get respect in the business. Tons of girls like her in Icaros.”

“Gotcha...” Akane held up the dog tag, shining with fresh blood. In fear of their bodies being damaged beyond recognition in battle, many knights and mercenaries chose to wear a dog tag, a representation of their humble wish to be known as who they were when their bodies were put to rest. “Mama, this dog tag is lit up.”

“A sign she left her estate to you... All those mercenaries think about what happens after their death so they’ll be ready to go when the time comes.” Mama closed her eyes in a short prayer. When she opened them, she simply commanded one of her knights to bury the body and started to leave as if nothing had happened.

“Hmph. Let’s go. You have the right to her estate now.”

“Huh? I don’t need anything like that.”

“Those were her last words. You’re not going to ignore this.” Big Mama gave Akane a spine-chilling glare that pressured even her to agree.

“There’s not much I’ve figured out about you, Akane, but there is one thing.”

“Oh yeah? What’s that?” Akane asked, rather disgruntled that she let this bizarre woman in black instill a second of fear in her. Perhaps a product of her life experience, rather than raw strength.

“You’re unbelievably lucky. Starting with me finding you.”

“I’m Lady Luck incarnate. If anything, you’re on a lucky streak, Mama.”

“Let’s see how long you can keep it up,” Mama scoffed and returned to the carriage.

Chasing after her, Akane gave the dog tag a second look...and found on it two inscriptions.