kscans

Chapter 139 - The Legendary Alcoholic

"...Hey."

It had been six days since I’d subbed in to look after the kids when I finally met up with Satou. We planned to meet at the closest station after my shift, and we just got together now... but this is bad. His eyes are completely dead.

"Y, you..."

I figured he had gotten busy after running into some kind of trouble. He probably had a confidentiality agreement, so I did not ask for details, but seeing him like this, he probably had not even been home, had he? Maybe it was the salesman in him. Despite his utterly exhausted air, his personal appearance was impeccable, which only served to highlight how tragic he looked.

"H, hey... Satou, you... shouldn’t you just go home and sleep...?"

To avoid disrupting their surface lives, powerful people unconsciously lower their bodies’ performance levels. Satou is no different, which is precisely why his current state is dangerous. His eyes are unfocused and the dark circles are awful. He could probably recover by easing his body’s restrictions, but that would only be physical. To relieve mental fatigue, the best thing to do is loosen those restrictions and sleep.

"What’re ya talkin’ about... you’re the one who told me to treat you to some expensive booze to make up for it, right?"

"I did say that... but I’m not such a monster that I’d make you hang out with me when you’re in this state..."

"Don’t worry about it. You say it’s to make up for it, but I wanna drink too."

"Yeah, but..."

"If I go home lookin’ like this, I’ll just make Saku-chan worry. C’mon, just hang out with me."

He slung his arm around my shoulder. Well... if he was going to be like this, I had no choice.

"Alright, I get it. In that case, let’s go to my place."

His request was for expensive booze, but we were not going to a bar. The drink was apparently a secret stash Satou had obtained privately, so we decided to drink at my place.

"Yeah... I brought some snacks too... so look forward to it..."

"Okay, okay."

I took the incredibly low energy Satou back to my home. Now that I thought about it... this was the first time I had ever invited a guy over.

"Hoh? Might be rude to say it’s unexpected, but it really feels like a girl’s room."

"That is really rude."

"Heh heh, my bad, my bad."

Satou immediately shed his suit jacket and dove facefirst into the sofa. He was making himself at home as if it were his own house, but I could not say much about that, so I ignored it.

"For now, uh, get me some tea. Cold tea. With a ton of ice."

"You’re a demanding one... alright, just a sec."

He probably wanted to wet his whistle before we started on the alcohol. I could understand the feeling. It looked like he was dry in more ways than just his throat.

"Here you go."

"Thanks."

I handed him a glass of iced barley tea, and Satou downed it in one go. His complexion improved slightly as he drank the tea, goku goku sounds coming from his throat.

"Phew... I’m alive again..."

"Well, uh, good work out there."

"Yeah... seriously, what a pain."

"Looks tough, even for a manager."

"Don’t be an idiot. The people at the top are the busiest when things go sideways."

Forcing the grunts to solve problems does not benefit the whole. Satou said that you get a result closer to the best outcome because the higher ups take the lead and shed blood, even if it means taking a hit in the short term. Things like that about him... were different from how he used to be. My heart skipped a little beat.

"Alright, I guess it’s time to unveil my pride and joy."

...A treasure he considers his secret stash, huh. I wonder just how good it is. I was a little... no, I was pretty excited.

"This is it."

"...Sake?"

He set an isshobin, a large bottle, on the table with a thud. The label just read "Sake." Was this something from the black market? Even so, it was really simple...

"Heh heh heh, well, you’ll know when you drink it."

With the bottle in hand, he gestured with his chin, and I held out my glass. He poured the Japanese sake, topu topu. ...What a rich, mellow fragrance. With my limited vocabulary I could not describe it well, but I could tell just from the smell that this stuff was incredible.

"...This is delicious. What is it?"

I have had my share of sakes that are easy to drink despite their high alcohol content. But this was on a completely different level. It did not catch in my throat at all, just slid down smoothly. If I did not have any self control, I could see myself drinking it until I literally passed out.

"Is it black market sake?"

You can usually tell by the vibe when something is made on the other side. That is because it is imbued with supernatural power. But this sake... I could not quite tell. It felt like it might be, but also like it might not. To my question, Satou replied,

"You could say it is, and you could say it is not."

"What’s that supposed to mean..."

"It’s made by a supernatural being, but the supernatural power has been removed."

"???"

"Then I must tell the tale. A story of a certain alcoholic, a tale tearful to hear and tearful to tell."

How can a story about an alcoholic have any tearful elements?

"Was it three, or four years ago? I was asked to exterminate a vengeful spirit living in a certain mansion."

"A vengeful spirit... one that was on your level?"

Vengeful spirits are originally human souls. Even when they are freed from their mortal shackles and become maxed out with regret, they are honestly not that big of a deal. Among vengeful spirits there are some exceptionally dangerous ones like Sugawara no Michizane, but their kind are rare. It is a different story if a superhuman becomes a vengeful spirit, but even then, there are limits.

"Nine extermination requests had been sent out, and all nine were repelled."

"Whoa whoa... seriously?"

You can generally tell how much of a threat something is after one or two attempts. So by the third... or at most the fourth time, you can send in a suitably strong force. But it happened nine times? And they must have sent stronger forces with each attempt... that is crazy. Was it on the level of the Three Great Vengeful Spirits? If so, I can see why Satou got the call.

"And what’s more. Every single one of them was sent back alive. Do you know what that means?"

"...It means there was that much of a difference in power."

"Yeah. And the guys who got beaten had something in common. Every one of them was in a state of such severe intoxication that they could barely hold a conversation."

Apparently, those who were repelled remained that way for over half a year. ...What? Was it some kind of vengeful spirit that harasses people with alcohol?

"I immediately headed to the location. It was a huge samurai mansion standing on the outskirts of town, and since it was evening, it had a pretty intense atmosphere. I wondered what kind of thing would appear. I stepped into the mansion full of excitement, but there was no reaction. Not only that, but while there seemed to be a spirit present, I couldn’t sense any powerful presence at all. That’s already pretty bad at this point, right?"

Yeah, I nodded. A vengeful spirit is an existence consumed by its regrets from life. There is no such thing as reason. In other words, they are not capable of clever tricks like hiding their power. They are constantly leaking it. The fact that even Satou could not sense anything was not normal.

"I thought, how strange, how very strange, as I headed for the basement where the spirit seemed to be."

"Stop talking like you’re telling a ghost story."

It is annoying.

"...And there, I met the legendary alcoholic."

"The legendary, alcoholic..."

Even though he was saying something ridiculous, I felt my body tense up without realizing it.