Volume 4 Chapter 10.1
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Translator: Reflet
Editor: Weasalopes
The day of the tournament preliminaries was upon them at last. Evaluating the items in order to carry out their plan, Hiroshi and the others sallied forth to Forre Arena.
「So that was the first day. What do you think？」
「Well, we already know who the top choices are, but how about the third match？」
「I personally can’t rule out that fifth game.」
A battle royale that quickly siphoned out its numbers. Eight matches took place simultaneously, and the workshop team gave their thoughts on their personal favorites.
The preliminary battle royale had around twenty participants per match with a total of around hundred participants duking it out at the same time. With normal arena sizes this would be impossible, but Forre’s gigantic arena’s total area could be shifted to the limit of something like five hundred cavalrymen versus five hundred other cavalrymen. The person who sculpted the arena a thousand years ago had the extra skill of carpentry, enabling them to make large scale monitors, arena structural functions, and plenty of overkill spec features.
Still, even with all these features, it was slightly painful for the management because they couldn’t change much about the number of spectator seats other than add standing room.
「Games three ‘n five are a lil different than what I’m into, so that’s a pass for me」
「What you’re into, huh. Then I guess I’ll ask, what are you into Hiro？」
「Well first lemme emphasize this only relates to the goal of our current plan.」
「No need to emphasize, my guy……」
「Nah, nah. I gotta emphasize here or else it’ll end up pourin’ unneeded fuel on Makoto-san.」
Makoto had a slightly let-down expression on her face at what Hiroshi said, while Tatsuya, Haruna, and Mio could find themselves completely agreeing with Hiroshi. Makoto’s attitude only went to show how justified Hiroshi’s concerns were.
「So, back on topic, from our plan, I’m thinkin’ veterans aren’t gonna be juicy enough」
「I sort of get what you’re going for here, but what’s the reasoning？」
「Half to show off, and the other half is cuz I feel some way about veterans relyin’ on my equipment to get by. Like, get yer own stuff, y’know?」
「I sort of agree, yet also feel like this is extremely biased……」
Haruna had a rather mixed expression on her face at Hiroshi’s reason. Sure, she got what he was saying, but affirming Hiroshi’s actions would also mean admitting that Azuma Workshop also fully relied on their equipment to get by. It would only become a super powerful boomerang that would come back to stab them through the head.
「Welp, first half is more of a joke. But I am gonna stick with the whole idea of given’ a helpin’ hand to younger, decently skilled newcomers who haven’t been blessed with opportunities or proper equipment. Just has a nice ring to it. Besides, if veterans wanna win they gotta do what all veterans do ‘n give us nice compensation fari ‘n square at the established price. Plus ya know them “favorites” are gonna be gettin’ some good quality equipment by their own means.」
「Well, I mean yeah, it’s not like I don’t agree…」
Makoto affirmed what Hiroshi said. As an actual problem, the top contenders all had powerful magic swords made from monster drops or high functioning equipment made by top dwarf smiths.
The majority of heroic tales were, as Hiroshi put it, about young rookies with potential but no results to back it up who either got their hands on some powerful item or succeeded in finding some amazing human connections and used those victories to their advantage to climb up the ranks despite any setbacks.
The equipment that Hiroshi was plotting to throw at these contestants had plenty of functionality to compete with these legendary items in the epics, so rather than helping veterans who were fully prepared from the start, it was much better to lend a hand to less experienced fighters who had to struggle a bit with the equipment while taking slow steps. It was precisely because Hiroshi was aiming for that kind of result that he used plenty of light enchantment multipliers to cover for amateur weaknesses and went to the trouble of adding hidden features.
「So right now we got a young person basically our age who’s maybe at most done some work outside town, mains the longsword, and looks like they’re progressing alright to the finals. All that’s left is to determine what kind of person they are.」
「Sensei, you care about their personality too？」
「Well yeah mate, what if they git all conceited just cuz they got some good equipment ‘n go over the edge ‘n die or become a bragger ‘n start causin’ friction in their community, that’s not gonna be any good right? Sure, they can git a lil carried away, but if they can’t take a critical look at themselves when they suffer for it then I aint’ gonna choose ‘em.」
「Very true……」
Highly agreeing with Hiroshi’s viewpoint, Mio decided she wouldn’t say anything further.
「So who’d you pick out？」
「The winner of the second, tenth, ‘n thirty first matches, I’d say. The twenty third round kid wasn’t too bad, but I kinda feel like we should try gals a different time, if ya get me…」
「Oh? But I personally think it would be kinda cool to have a girl become a hero, don’t you? That twenty third round girl did have a lot of cool moves that might get her quite the exciting future.」
「I can already see some unnecessary flags if we go that direction, so I wanna stick with the orthodox dude route this time around」
Hiroshi countered Makoto’s carefree opinion with his own. He was partially concerned and partially interested in his own idea he had chosen from the start. Makoto couldn’t deny the part about accidentally setting off another flag, so she decided to agree with Hiroshi while grimacing.
「Okay, okay. So how are you going to go about checking them out？」
「Well, therein lies the problem, mate. Could we try havin’ Bro ‘n Makoto-san try to chat ‘em up？」
「There you go again, asking the unreasonable. Welp, I’ll try and do what I can. You fine with that, Tatsuya？」
「Sure am」
Now that they had a rough idea of today’s remaining objectives,
「So that’s all we do today, but what about tomorrow and onward? There are still preliminaries.」
「Right, it was another battle royale tomorrow？」
「Yup. They’re going to apparently shred it down to sixteen people with the two matches after that.」
「Then we’ll look around some more tomorrow ‘n figure out some other person to reach out to」
「Alright」
They set the daily objective and course of action in a smooth manner. The candidates for the weapon would probably end up being six people, but only one of them would be the winner.
「So what are you going to do after this？」
「Right, so since I got permission ‘n all, I may as well set up the suspicious shop in the alleyway ‘n do my best to clear out storage」
「Right on. Haruna and Mio, what about you？」
「We’ll be applying for permission for setting up shop in two days. Apparently there’s still room.」
「And then stocking up alongside that」
「ＯＫ。Then I’ll see you two later.」
Deciding what they all would be doing, the group got straight to work. Hiroshi must have done quite the job getting customers, because the next day around noon, there were already quiet rumors floating around among a small minority of people that a certain dubious shop in the alleyway dealing in weapons had quite the treasure trove of bargains amidst the mass of its inferior goods.
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