Gold and Silver Coins
Captain Kerioyl left looking pretty bummed out.
If you ask me, I think refusing was the right choice. The Menagerie of Fools may be a famous team, but joining would mean more fighting. I know that even being a lone hunter means you’re side by side with danger. But right now, rather than being tossed around in a group of powerhouses, I think—one-sidedly anyway—that she should hunker down and work on her abilities.
Anyway, that’s only my opinion. Why did Lammis actually refuse, though? That’s a mystery to me.
“Hey, you, why did you turn down an invitation to the Menagerie of Fools?!”
Oh, it’s the short-haired hunter. Nice assist! That’s what I wanted to know.
“Hmm… Well, we’re in the middle of rebuilding the settlement. We have to make sure we have enough hands, right?”
The hunters’ mouths hang open. Ah, Lammis…I don’t think he meant right this instant. If you said so, I’m sure he would wait until the reconstruction was finished.
“Okay, let’s all keep doing our best!”
Everyone aside from her sighs and goes back to work. Cocking her head in confusion at the situation, Lammis gets back to clearing the rubble away, too.
No particularly interesting events happen after that, and noon comes. I sell several cups of ramen and cans of oden to the inn reconstruction group, and then Lammis puts me on her back and moves me in front of the Hunters Association.
I sell one item after another to the people who were waiting for my arrival. If this keeps up, I’ll make back my losses from yesterday in no time.
Most of these customers have purchasing experience, but a good handful are entirely new. I don’t recognize their faces, which means they must have come to the Clearflow Lake stratum just today.
All the new people have one thing in common—they’re wearing cloth headbands, long sleeves, and pants with lots of pockets. They look very craftsmanlike. With just a quick glance, I see around a hundred of them. That would mean the settlement’s population has at least doubled.
What a bother… I’m going to sell a ton of things again, aren’t I? What a bother, seriously—such a pain… I’ll have to add up all these points later.
“Okay, Boxxo, I’m going back to work!”
“Welcome.”
I’ve been returned to my usual spot in front of the inn, and as I’m interacting with customers, a person suddenly steps in front of me.
I see this world has glasses and businesslike clothing as well. A lady with black-rimmed glasses, a green button-down, and a skirt that only goes a little above her knees is watching me closely.
If this were Japan, I’d say she looks like an accountant or a lawyer. The corners of her eyes are angled slightly upward, making her look a little scary, but she’s a beauty.
A large man, about six and a half feet tall, stands behind her. An acquaintance of hers? He’s top-heavy with hulking muscles and long arms, and he has wrinkles on his brow, downward-slanting eyes, and a low nose. My honest first impression of him is that he looks like a friendly gorilla.
He’s wearing something like a suit, but it’s bulging in places and looks about to tear open at any moment. He’s wearing something similar to a giant backpack.
“Would I be correct in my assumption that you are the box with a mind? I believe you were called Boxxo.”
Suddenly, the woman is speaking to me. Wait, how should I reply? F-for now, I’ll give her my usual greeting.
“Welcome.”
“According to the information we received earlier, that would be a yes, am I correct?”
…This woman is hard to deal with! Her expression is completely unchanging, and she’s staggeringly intimidating. Her gaze is enough to make me stiffen up. Then again, I am a vending machine.
What’s she after? It seems serious. Wh-what should I do?
“Huh? What’s wrong, Boxxo? Oh, um, who might you be?”
Lammis pops out from behind me and openly addresses the glasses-wearing lady.
“You must be Lammis. I apologize for my rudeness. My name is Acowi, and I work in the money-exchange business. It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance. The one behind me is my aide, Gocguy.”
“Pleased to meet you.”
Acowi speaks in a cold, clear voice, while Gocguy’s tone is warm and relaxed. They’re polar opposites.
Anyway, the money-exchange business? The modern version of that would be converting yen to dollars and the like, right? From what I recall, a long time ago it was a business that would exchange gold coins for silver coins and vice versa. I think I heard it was the origin of banks.
“We’ve received word that this stratum is running short on silver coins. That’s the reason for our visit.”
All right, who’s the one hoarding all the silver coins? That’s simply disgraceful.
“Oh, well, everyone pays Boxxo in silver coins, after all!”
Shh! Lammis, you can’t say that. Er, wait, are they here to file a complaint because I’m blocking the flow of money by hoarding all the silver coins?
Even if they are, I can’t give them back. I converted them into points. There’s nothing I can do now.
“I see my suspicions were correct. We decided this would be a good opportunity to come to you, Boxxo, with a proposal. We’ve brought about one hundred gold coins with us. Could I exchange them for several of the silver coins you have?”
Business talks? I’m not opposed to converting between silver and gold coins, but one gold coin is the same as about a hundred silver coins, isn’t it? In yen, that would make a single one worth ten thousand. Disregarding fluctuations, of course, but it would come out to around that. They brought a hundred of them, too—that’s a sizable sum. Is this going to be all right?
I’d like to exchange them for her if I can, but what should I do?
Do I have a money-exchanging feature? Normally, vending machines don’t have any. Um, I just did a quick skim of the list and didn’t see anything.
“Too bad.”
“Does that mean you cannot comply?”
I’m sorry. I’d like to, but I have no way to.
“Oh, but if you can’t exchange them, can’t you just buy something with gold coins? Won’t change come out?”
Lammis’s casual suggestion causes Acowi’s disappointed face to light up. Her eyes begin to sparkle in the first display of emotion I’ve seen from her.
I wonder what would actually happen if you put in a gold coin. Nobody’s ever tried it before. Since I don’t know if I can give change, no one has been foolhardy enough to test it.
“I see! Gocguy, we’re buying in bulk. The gold coins, please.”
Ah, the first insertion. Wh-what should I do? If they don’t get change, I’ll give them back the gold coin.
Ohhh, the first gold coin of my life as a vending machine is inside my body. If she buys something that costs one silver coin, ninety-nine silver coins will come out. I just have to man up—you never know until you try.
A sensation I’ve never felt before bubbles up inside me, and my vending machine body vibrates. So this is what it’s like for a gold coin to enter your body. Wait, now’s not the time to be basking in the afterglow. What happened with the change?
Silver coins clatter down in a stream into the change saucer. The coins overflow and begin dropping to the ground. The hunters watching from farther away are gulping, I see.
Change came out normally—if it hadn’t, they might have treated me like a thief.
“This should be good. Let’s go on a shopping spree, shall we?”
One after another, the gold coins are inserted, and one after another the silver coins are expelled. The giant Gocguy bends down and collects every last silver.
After putting in ten gold coins, Acowi seems satisfied. She stares at the backpack filled with silver coins, looking quite pleased. She must get more expressive when money is involved.
“Any more than this and we may put a burden on Boxxo, so we’ll stop for now. I will be back at a later date to purchase more. I look forward to working with you again.”
She looks like she’s about to start skipping away. Gocguy is carrying the pack stuffed with coins without struggling. He seems as strong as his appearance would suggest.
I wonder if I’ll be seeing them frequently for a long time. Well, they don’t seem like bad people.
“Boxxo, you’re really rich, huh? We better be careful nobody takes your money.”
“Welcome.”
She’s right. Well, I’m not sure anyone could get money out even if they destroyed me and broke me down. The items I sell are part of a system that just makes them, so it doesn’t feel like I have coins inside me. It’s more like they appeared when the situation called for it.
Meanwhile, several enthusiastic pairs of eyes are staring this way. For the younger hunters, my body—having swallowed ten gold coins—must look pretty appealing.
Come to think of it, it’s unwise to put vending machines in unsafe places. That goes to show how peaceful Japan is to allow them to exist almost everywhere.
For a while, I should be on my guard around people who look like they’re having any dumb ideas.
“Oh, right. Sorry, Boxxo! I kept forgetting to tell you. It looks like we won’t be able to see Hulemy for a while. I sent her a letter, but I didn’t get a reply… I think she’s still relaxing somewhere in the stratum. We’ll have to stay here until I can get in touch with her. Is that okay?”
Lammis puts her hands together and bows to me. I tell her, “Welcome.” For a moment, I wondered who Hulemy was, but that’s her magic-item-engineer friend she talked about when we first met, isn’t it?
I think to myself, in a detached way: Oh, right, that was the original goal, wasn’t it?
The day was filled with strange meetings, but the first day of reconstruction is now about to end without any problems in particular. Night falls, and after settling into my regular spot in front of the Hunters Association and selling dinners, I watch mindlessly as the settlement’s lights go out, one by one.
There’s a magic item that’s pretty much a light bulb, and there are a few of them scattered about the settlement, too, but it’s still very dark compared to nighttime in Japan. Magic items apparently fetch high prices, and most normal households don’t use them. Generally, most of the tents have lanterns or even torches set up.
The spots around those lights are illuminated, but a deep darkness lingers just a few steps away.
The spot that I’m in is away from those lights as well. Normally, I’d be easily missed, but I’m a vending machine. I give off my own light, so I always stand out to an unnatural degree.
But today, I turn off the lights, and then I purchase the Paint-Change feature and paint myself all in black. Partly because of the hunters who watched the exchange earlier but also because of the incident with that low-life villain trying to steal my money during the expedition. I decide that at night, I’ll blend in with the darkness to avoid any unnecessary quarrels.
“What? Isn’t it always around here?”
“Maybe they moved it. That crazy-strong girl is always carrying it around, remember?”
“Shit. Let’s head around to the inn.”
Speak of the devil. They aren’t the same hunters we were working with before, but a group of three men seems to be searching for me.
If they actually make a move on me, I do have Force Field, and if I play my voice at maximum volume, several people from the Hunters Association would burst out, so it wouldn’t be a problem. But I suppose peaceful resolutions are the best.
