Surviving in a World Teeming with Monsters with the Useless Skill 【Everyday Items Master】! I Was Just Hunting Wild Animals with a Crowbar, So Why Is Everyone Screaming It's an S-Rank Monster? - 105

Chapter 105: Children’s Ignorance

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I doubted my eyes, wondering if I was seeing some kind of nightmare. I had only stopped by that warehouse on a whim. With Ui, Shachimaru, and Luna all disappearing one after the other, I was just walking while thinking I should go out and call them back.

But what I saw was so bizarre that it left me stunned. It was a strange sight. Luna, Ui, and that fashionable goblin from before were all getting along like best friends, while Shachimaru lay collapsed at their feet, foaming at the mouth.

And surrounding them, human-sized tea sets clattered and puffed as they danced around. It looked like something out of Alice in Wonderland—a grotesque and surreal scene. Luna’s eyes sparkled at the sight of me and she ran toward me.

“Onii-sama! Onii-sama, please praise me!”

“Uh, what? What did you do, Luna?”

“Yes! I stopped Shachimaru and Ui when they were about to start fighting! And now, they’re in the middle of making up!”

I looked at Shachimaru. He was writhing in agony. The ground beneath him bore marks of his struggle. Some of his nails looked as if they had been ripped off from clawing the floor.

Ui, on the other hand, was cheerfully hugging Luna like nothing had happened. Ui then said.

“Geez! Princess-sama? I’m not Ui right now, remember? I’m March Hare~! You can’t mess up your own naming~!”

“Ufufu. I’m sorry, March Hare. Onii-sama! As you can see, from now on, please call Ui ‘March Hare,’ okay?”

“…Ui.”

Her eyes gleamed with a pink light, clearly not normal. Even I wasn’t dull enough not to realize something had happened. Whether I wanted to believe it or not, I had to act.

This was Luna’s doing. I looked at her.

“…Onii-sama?”

Luna looked puzzled, not understanding the intent behind my gaze. My mind connected dots from various moments.

Koufukuji had used forceful means to try and retrieve Luna. Luna had easily blown up the Shadow Wolf’s base. Rick had warned me about Luna’s true nature.

All of it pointed to Luna being an extremely dangerous entity. A threat to humanity that must be neutralized. But still. Even so…

“Onii-sama…?”

Seeing the pained expression on my face, Luna looked anxious. She showed not a shred of guilt about what she’d done or the consequences of it.

How could I reprimand her? How could I teach her that this must never be done again? What even was this? What had she done?

She had said, “Please praise me.” She truly believed she had done something good. She didn’t even recognize this abnormality as abnormal.

“Onii-sama, d-did I do something to upset you…?”

Luna asked fearfully.

“What was wrong? Was the name I took from ‘Alice’ bad? Or maybe the tea set designs? —Ah, I know!!”

Saying something off the mark, Luna suddenly looked at Shachimaru.

“It was because Shachimaru is still in pain, right? I-I’ll do it over properly now—”

“Stop it!!!”

I shouted without thinking, and Luna flinched. Tears began to well in her eyes. Like a child struggling with a question that had no answer, she looked bewildered and grabbed at her apron dress.

“O-Onii-sama…! I-I don’t understand… What should I do? Please say something, or I won’t know what to do… Why are you angry…?”

Despite her tears, Luna still tried to reach out and talk to me. However, that was what confused me all the more. I couldn’t be wrong. There was no way it was right to twist people, make Shachimaru suffer, and turn corpses into tea sets.

But because Luna acted so maturely, it made me feel like I was the one in the wrong. I forced my scattered thoughts into coherence and spoke to her. 

“…Luna, please don’t ever do anything like this again.”

“Do what? What exactly are you talking about?”

Her response made me pause.

“…I should be asking you. What happened? How did this come to be?”

“Huh…? Onii-sama, you’re angry even though you don’t know what I did?”

Suspicion entered Luna’s eyes. She was a smart girl. Astute. Which was why she never missed the hypocrisy of adults and pursued it relentlessly.

“That’s right! I don’t know exactly what you did! But look around! Ui is acting strange, that Fashionable Goblin is weird too, and Shachimaru is suffering!”

“March Hare and Mad Hatter aren’t acting strange at all…! And yes, Shachimaru is suffering, but when I tried to fix it, Onii-sama, you got angry instead!”

“Isn’t that weird!? You changed their names and thought that was okay! And you were going to do the same thing to Shachimaru! That’s not ‘fixing’ him!”

“It’s not weird! What’s weird is you, Onii-sama! Why are you angry just because we got along!? That’s what’s weird!”

“This is ‘getting along’!? Luna, you—“

Are you insane?

I almost said those awful words but stopped myself just in time. That pause brought me a moment of clarity and in that moment, I realized what kind of face Luna had as she argued with me.

“Ugh… Hic…!”

Luna was sobbing. Tears streamed down her face, her body trembled, and she looked at me with emotions tangled in anger, sorrow, and loneliness.

I recognized that expression. That emotion. I couldn’t continue speaking. Because Luna looked just like—

“Enough…!”

She clung to Ui.

“I don’t care about Onii-sama anymore…! March Hare, please fly us away! Somewhere far, where Onii-sama can’t come!”

“Ehh…? Hmm, well, okay. If it’s your order, Princess-sama~”

“Ui! Stop—”

I stepped forward and reached out, but a flash of killing intent made me reflexively pull out my umbrella.

【Open Umbrella】

Clang! A jarring impact rang out as I blocked the Fashionable Goblin’s cane strike. Apparently just a warning, he quickly sheathed his weapon and said.

“No can do, Aniki. Princess-san said it. So I’m afraid I con’t let you touch her so easily.”

“Fashionable Goblin…!”

“Ooh, scary, scary. Well then, here you go.”

He pulled out a flask filled with silver liquid from under his top hat and dropped it to the ground. It shattered, releasing a silver mist.

“Wha—Cough! Cough cough cough!”

“Okay, March Hare! That should give us cover to escape. Don’t breathe too much of it in, though! It’s mercury mist. Take in too much, and you’ll go mad like the Hatter! Gyahahaha!”

“Well then~ Tacchan, until Princess-sama calms down, bye-bye! Let’s meet again~!”

A deep, noise-laden hum spread. The mist distorted space, and then they were gone. As the mist cleared, all that remained were me and the wildly dancing tea sets.

“Damn it! Luna…! What am I supposed to do now?”

Luna’s face from earlier, her emotions, clung to me and wouldn’t leave. I grit my teeth, realizing the naive idea of stopping her just by scolding may have been the wrong move. Because that expression…

“Luna is just like the old me.”

When I was little, I used my abilities to ruthlessly beat up a thug, thinking it was the right thing to do. It was goodwill. A well-meaning use of my talent. But my parents rejected me. That began a long stretch of suppression and neglect. My talent was smothered. I stayed a NEET for years, with nothing good happening.

“…And I…”

I had just hurt her, using harsh words.

“I have to apologize to Luna…”

And then I had to talk to her calmly.

Right. I kept putting it off with cooking and parties, thinking I’d talk to her slowly when it was all over. But that was wrong. I should have started sooner.

What’s good, what’s bad—neither Luna nor I really know.

So I needed to take my time and think it through with her. Not order her around, but stay by her side.

“I need to talk to her now.”

But I didn’t know where she went. Thinking of tracking her, I remembered that was Shachimaru’s specialty and then I realized.

“…Wait, where’s Shachimaru…?”

I looked down. Apparently, he had crawled out, leaving behind traces of blood and occasional vomit. I left the warehouse and followed the trail at a run. Then, it started to rain. Drip, drip, drip drip, drip drip drip, the rain picked up.

“This is gonna turn into a storm fast. I have to get back to the main building…—”

Looking up, I froze. A massive water magic circle was etched into the sky. The rainclouds were even darker than before, heavy and brooding.

“Shachimaru did this.”

Rain poured down all at once. A torrential downpour. Before the traces washed away, I ran after them. It led to an open area.

Just beyond the gates of the Ferocious Shark Gang’s base there was Shachimaru. He was at the center, curling up as he soaked in the rain. 

“Shachimaru…? What are you doing there? You’re gonna catch a cold…”

Sensing something was wrong, I forced a casual tone. Shachimaru spoke.

“I am Shachimaru. Ryouta Shachimaru.”

“Y-Yeah. You are…”

“Yes. I’m Shachimaru. Not Bill the Lizard. Not the poor guy who got kicked by Alice in Wonderland.”

His words were clear, but he remained huddled in the rain.

“You don’t need to say it. I know. Come on, let’s get inside. Change before you catch a cold.”

“I told you. I’m Shachimaru. Don’t call me Bill the Lizard. I’m Shachimaru. That’s who I am.”

“I get it. You’re Shachimaru, not some Alice character. So come on, get up—“

“I SAID!!! I AM NOT BILL THE LIZARD, DAMN IIIIIT!!!”

With Shachimaru’s anguished cry, the rain around him gathered toward him. Still crouched, his body was lifted by the mass of water. A torrential current wrapped around him.

The water rose, taking the form of a massive dragon. A water dragon, no smaller than the Big Ape Junior we fought before.

It soared into the sky with Shachimaru at its core. All the rain was drawn into it, growing its power and size.

“Aniki. Please.”

Shachimaru lifted his face. Blood poured from his eyes. As if trapped by his own skill, he pleaded.

“Every time someone calls me, it sounds like ‘Bill the Lizard.’ My mind is getting all twisted and it hurts so much… Aniki, please. Kill me. End this…”

“ROOOOAAAAAAR!!”

The water dragon roared, unleashing its rage. Gritting my teeth through the confusion and pain, I drew both my crowbar and umbrella.

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