CH 6

The merchant attribute cannot use magic. This is a common knowledge among the people in the school and in this game world. This seems to be true, but in fact it is not. In the book I got, “Merchant’s Secret Art Compendium,” there is a magic that only merchants can use, which is unknown to the people of this world.

The Merchant’s Secret Art Compendium is a book that systematically describes the magic, swordplay, and special skills that only merchants can learn, including how to acquire them. It was kept in the guild’s vault in Monsell, where I grew up, as a “book of secrets” that no one could read because it was written in an ancient language.

I was able to obtain this book because my family’s Alford Trading Company became the head of the Monsell Guild, and my father, Salz, took control of the guild. He had been looking for me to join the academy for a long time, so he took out “Merchant’s Secret Art Compendium” from the guild’s vault.

“I don’t know if you can read the old language, but I want you to copy it as could as possible.”

Salz then handed it to me. When I opened the book, which I wasn’t sure if I could read, I couldn’t help but blurt out, “What kind of ancient language is that?” When I opened the book, which I didn’t know if I could read, I was blown away by the fact that the ancient language described in the book was Japanese.

I was prepared for a difficult book that I didn’t even know if I could read, and I was let down at the beginning, but that’s when it got really bad.

The first written was this.

–Time has changed in the fullness of time.

–The soul unleashed shakes the world.

What the hell is this thought-provoking preface? I thought, and turned to the next page.

“The enemy is at Honnōji​”

It was written in large letters.

(敵は本能寺にありIt’s an idiom for [The true objectively lies elsewhere!] https://tinyurl.com/2u4bw8rw Honnoji Temple is best known for being the place where the warlord Oda Nobunaga met his end.)

What does that mean?

What the hell is the Honnōji Temple is in this world? There is no such thing as a Japanese temple in this westernized world! I’m grasping at straws to get back to the original world, but this is just too much of a joke.

“They’re the ones who did it!”

I yelled out. The culprits are the creators of the game world, “Eleanore! It had to be the creators of the game. I was truly stunned by their unfathomable malice.

“Who is this? Who is this prankster on the staff!”

It’s a total joke. The more I learn about this game world called [Elenore!], the more I feel that it’s a joke at every level. The unintelligible status society that doesn’t seem to be of any use to the world is a typical example of this.

I’m serious about living, my livehood, my family depends on it! I should get rid of this joke of a world and go back to where I belong. But I’ve been struggling alone for years, with no clue what should I do. But I feel bad that my efforts are being laughed at by the settings of the game world and these incomprehensible books.

What’s the fun in writing the Book of Secrets in Japanese, anyway? It’s like a mockery of my having wandered into this world! But then again, there was no clue as to how to get back. I had no choice but to turn the page, suppressing my annoyance.

What was written in the book, despite the joking start, was very practical, dense and meaningful. Some of the Chinese characters were difficult to read and some of the nuances were hard to grasp, but the sword fighting section was illustrated and I was able to learn about the secret arts of the merchants in this world. The only regret I have is the joke of the beginning.

As Salz had instructed, I quickly copied the book and returned the “Merchant’s Secret Art Compendium” to him. Once I had copied it, there was no need for the original. When I returned the book, Salz did not ask me how it was or if I could read it. It was just like Salz to accept the book without saying a word. This is a manly and fatherly thing to do. He is very different from me.

I was able to decipher “Merchant’s Secret Art Compendium” easily because it was written in Japanese. Or rather, it was natural for me to be able to read it. This game world is really a madhouse, as it is difficult to understand simple Japanese descriptions.

In the book, “Merchant’s Secret Art Compendium,” there were several spells that only merchants could use. The most common type of magic is “additional magic,” which adds attributes such as fire and lightning to swords, and is familiar in RPG games in the real world. However, there was no such magic in the otome game “Eleanore! and as far as I know, it’s not known in the Eleanor world either. So “additional magic” is a “lost magic” here.

Moreover, learning this magic requires a high level of skill, and it is not a level that can be attained while living a normal life as a merchant. In addition, I would like to point out that you don’t need to reach that level to live as a merchant. In this world, it is basically unnecessary for a merchant to raise his level in order to survive.

In addition, it was also stated that merchants have a harder time leveling up than other jobs. The fact that the abilities they can learn are not necessary for living may be a factor that makes it difficult for them to level up. If that were the case, it would be even more difficult to reach a level where you could learn magic.

That’s why merchants can’t use magic. They can’t use it because they don’t need to reach the level to be able to use it. In addition, if the magic that can be learned is “additional magic,” which is subtle in terms of necessity, it is inevitable that even if they knew they could use it, they would not bother to learn it.

However, as I was planning to go to Sarun Afia Academy, I was still grateful to have magic that I could use. This [Eleanore!] is an ADV + RPG game. Even though it’s an otome game, there’s a battle mode to make it more of a game. If you enter the school, you’ll have to fight duels, battles, and dungeons.

I wanted to have a way to fight with magic, any kind of magic, even if it was additional magic that seemed less necessary. And I’m not averse to the use of add-on magic in various games. Starting a battle in its natural state with no attributes, and being able to change the attributes of your weapon depending on who you are fighting, is a good match for me, a routine worker who is good at building a level playing field and keeping things repetitive.

First, you need to know the enemy’s attributes, then add the best attributes for enemy attacks to your weapon, and win by hitting your opponent efficiently. All you have to do is repeat this to level up, so you can fight while switching attributes in any situation. Merchants will have a hard time raising their basic level, so they will have to construct tactics to fight by standardizing while utilizing their limited magic. This is a task that I prefer, as I am not good at atypical tasks.

There are several ways to overcome the difficulty of leveling up compared to other jobs, such as training in merchant swordsmanship and doing big business. In the case of me, I’ve been handling all the paperwork for the Alford Trading Company for the past three years, so I’ve been able to increase my level by handling the business to a great extent, and I think I can raise my level just by this method.

Since entering this school, I’ve been using my knowledge of the game to make money by trading the beet crop, and I’m making a killing. The more money I move in the market, the faster I gain experience. It’s been a little over a month since I put all of the 300,000 rand I received from Salz into the beet market, and now my total assets have grown to 250 million rand.

The merchant’s “special skills” were very useful in this technique of playing with the market. By using “haggling” to lower the price of goods when purchasing, and “dumping” to add to the selling price of goods, it was possible to trade at eight times the price when purchasing, and at 20% more when selling out, thus making sure to make a profit without losing money. In other words, a cheat. Because I’m a merchant, I’m able to gobble up the profits.

Merchants also have a variety of other special skills, such as [Appraise], which allows you to see the attributes and level of your opponent. They can also find hidden treasures, rare items, and hidden doors in dungeons. There is also a strange skill called “Napping” that allows you to sleep with your eyes open. In some ways, they may be more useful than magic, such as [Storage], which is the most commonly used skill, and [Putting on], which allows you to instantly change clothes stored in another dimension.

In addition to magic and special abilities, “Merchant’s Secret Art Compendium” contains detailed information on swordplay. I’ve been playing the piano for a while now, but I’m not sure if I’ll ever be able to play again.

I started learning to play the piano when I was in kindergarten. It wasn’t my idea, but my older sister was taking piano lessons, so I just started taking piano lessons along with her. I quit when I was in the second year of high school, so I have been learning for about twelve years, but I don’t think I really improved for the number of years I was playing.

This is because I liked to repeat the same thing over and over again, and because I was so focused on precise speed and key touches that I was missing out on essential skills such as inflection and emotion. I guess you could say that my innate lack of sensitivity and dullness had a profound effect on my playing. I was unable to break out of my shell, or rather, I had no intention of breaking out of my shell from the beginning.

But I still had a soft spot for the piano. That’s why I brought in an upright piano from my parents’ house for my daughter Aira to learn to play, but she quit after about five years, probably because she was bored. Since then, I had been playing the piano a little bit, but I had been so busy with work lately that I can’t even play anymore because I come home late at night.

This changed when I came to this world, and I started to play the piano again when the Alford family had an upright. However, the level of piano teachers in this world is unusually low, and there is no proper music notation, so I have to pull out the memory in my brain, score the music, and then play and correct the music based on that. It’s funny how repeating this kind of work every day brings back the score in my brain that I had forgotten about.

This kind of real-world memory training allowed me to recall the scenario of [Eleanore!] in more detail. Ironically, it was the piano that gave me the means to learn how to live and fight in the Eleonore world.

I never thought that the piano, which I was told many times to my face was useless for living, would help me in this way, but “Merchant’s Secret Art Compendium,”, which gave me the opportunity to highlight what I have been doing, is like a bible for me.

However, this “Merchant’s Secret Art Compendium”. There are many mysteries, including the wording of the first sentence and the fact that it was written in Japanese. For example, the publishing company that published the book, Minpo Shobo. Did a publishing company with a kanji name actually exist in this world of Eleanore? How can there be a publishing company in this world where there is no concept of a company? I also wondered if such a maniacal book could really be reprinted until the third edition.

But there is one thing that is certain. Whatever form it takes, the existence of “Merchant’s Secret Art Compendium” itself is proof that “Japanese” people once existed in this Elenore world. My encounter with this book has convinced me that there is some kind of “gate” that connects the game world and the real world.

In the past, Japanese people were involved in the “Merchant’s Secret Art Compendium”. They once passed through the “gate” that connects the game world and the real world, and came to this Eleanore world, leaving behind books in Japanese. It would be natural to assume that my soul came to the Elenore world through the same “gate”.

Then it should be possible to reverse it. I don’t know what it looks like, but if I can find the “gate” that connects the two worlds, I can return to the real world. I can’t wait to find the “gate” and meet Kana. Then I’ll go back to the real world. No matter who, what, or what they say, this line is non-negotiable. That’s why I’m risking everything I’ve got.