31 Goodbye My Smelly Self

-Afternoon, Forest of Magic-

-Me POV-​

Listening when other talks.

It's the basic ethics of politeness toward other in a conversation.

That's also including 'don't cut off other people when word' and 'don't talk over each other when in a conversation'; it's rude to the other person you are speaking with and other people that are listening.

"It's a waste for a human like you to have such powerful weapon."

But right now I'm tempted; I'm tempted to cut his monologue off because I already heard it so many times in this past day.

"Give me the weapon and your life shall be spare."

…Now that I think about it, isn't that the reason why the good guys let the bad guys finished their power up monologue? Dude, that was just too naïve, or the good guys were just too arrogant, thinking they could defeat the bad guys even after they powered up to their next form.

"Or, I, the Golden Mane will end your pathetic life and claim your sword for myself."

As for this situation right now, I do believe that I'm just being polite by letting him finishing his monologue, but now that I have some time to think, I now become curious at this guy.

I raised my hand.

"…Can I have a question?"

"Hmp, if that question is supposed to be your last word, then so be it."

"…Why is there a Lion in a forest?"

"…"

[Lv.45 WereLion]

The one in question is standing In front of me, his figure tower over me, topless, yellow fur and scars all over his body, mass of muscle, lion face and glorious mane, brown color karate pants, and a barefoot.

"It made sense that if a forest animal Youkai or a Plant-based Youkai come out to me, but why is there a Lion in here?"

"…Let us fight."

"…Sorry?"

"We have wasted enough time with our talk; Let us fight to the death."

I narrowed my eyes while expression changed to one of disbelieve. "Don't tell me-"

"Prepare yourself!!" he cut me off as he come rushing toward me.

"Seriously?!" as soon as I finished saying that I become serious.

I create a transparent Telekinesis Wall in front of me, but he still continuing his rush even thought he should be able to see the wall, I said that because it totally visible even with normal eye,

"ROOAAAAAR!!" he moves his body to do what I think to be a shoulder charge.

I brace my mental hold of the barrier for upcoming impact.

*BAMMM* he collided with the wall.

The shockwave of the impact shaken all the vegetation on the other side of the wall, but despite how powerful it look, I only felt a small mental tug that my wall has been hit with something.

"Hump! Typical magician trick, soon you will grovel on the ground after I destroy your little trick!"

"Talk big as much as you want, but I will only giving you 30 second to break my wall before I send you flying toward the Mountain, just like everyone else before you."

"How dare you underestimating my strength! Mine is not the same like the other!"

"Yeah, yeah, you Youkai always come back if I didn't do this, claiming that 'I cheated' by defeating you people with trickery, now with this you can't complain that I never gave you a chance to fight." I picked my ear as I said that.

"...Such Arrogant…" he started to tremble."…Die Human!!"

His muscle start expanding, his face turned more vicious, and his claws further extended.

[Lv.53 WereLion]

'…His level increased…'

I start concentrating more with the wall for safe measure.

"RAAAAAAAHHHHH!!" He roared.

He rapidly slashes the wall using his claws, but I think 'rabidly' is more appropriate than 'rapidly' right now,

*CRACK**CRASH**SCREEEECH**CRUNCH**BAM**PANG*

Trees, ground, rock, leaves, everything else, and pretty much anything that's on the other side of that wall got obliterated by him.

'…Isn't this scene kinda looks like the one from Onepunchman, it was where he fought the lion guy, and he curb stomp him even while the other one keep slashing nonstop? Nah, I'm not him, I'm not dodging, and this guy also only slashing at a wall.'

Time keeps ticking as I thinking about random stuff and keeping the wall from broken at the same time.

He keeps slashing angrily at the wall; he shows no sign of slowing down, his look still how furious he is with me, but despite all of that, it was useless.

"Times up."

Thought Acceleration.

Everything slowed down in motion.

Both of his hand coming closer to attack the wall, I push the wall forward, my action cause his upcoming attack to be deflected to the side, making him vulnerable for a moment.

And all I need is just that single moment to finish this.

I teleported beside him.

My hand touched his body.

"Good bye."

I use Vector Change on him. Making his body went from 0 km/s speed into something else that made his departure accompanied with a sonic boom into the sky.

"DAAAAMMMMM YYYOOoouuuuuuuuuu~~~~~!!!"

And just like I promised, I send him flying into the mountain, the Youkai Mountain; I figured that the Tengu were the one that spread the info about me, so I show my gratitude by showering them with 'gifts' in this couple of days, literally.

"But in the end, the question still left unanswered, why is there a lion in a forest?"

I start looking at my surrounding.

"…Uwaah, this is awful."

It's like a storm just walk in without warning and then it leaves a second later.

"*sigh*All character that could only blow things up can go to hell, the cleanup crew is the real hero of the story."

I pick up all part of the trees using Telekinesis and gather them in one big neat pile of wood.

I fill the earth scar using other earth dirt and then I firm them tightly using Vector Change.

As for the trees splinter, I just thought a good idea to fix this.

I take out my katana, a normal Steel Katana mind you; I bought it yesterday from the System (50 IP), and I cut the splinter off from the tree. If you people wandering how it looks, I choose black color for its sheet and handle, and its handle have white colored diamond for its motif. Unimportant tidbit, my second favorite color is white, don't judge.

With Vector Change and Swordsmanship, I cut that part cleanly, making it into a stump.

'System, proceed to buy Nature Magic'

[Nature Magic Lv.1 = 8.000 AP, need user confirmation to continue]

'One level is all I need to do it, buy it.'

[Applying abilities to User]

Knowledge starts rushing in to me, and I immediately knew what to do.

I point my hand toward the tree stump.

I pour my something, probably mana, into it.

A second after I did that, a sprout start to grow on the tree stump.

I smile.

"This is the first time I use magic and I used it to grow a sprout instead of fireball, I think I should be proud that I'm different than any scrub out there."

With that happy thought in mind, I repeat that process as I continue cleaning up the mess.

-Afternoon, Outside My House-​

After I finished cleaning that mess, I continue walking back to my house for lunch, if you guys asking as to why I walk instead of flying or teleport, it was because those abilities actually make you a lazy person, it make you never move your body enough, which in turn make you not healthy.

I remember this from a manga called "Zettai Karen Children", in one of its omake, they are comparing each other weight, and the heaviest of them all is the Teleporter, which I totally agree with the logic. And that's why I start walking from now on, but of course I still gonna teleport/fly if I'm getting surrounded.

But because I decided to walk from place to place, I need to go when the timer was at between 2 hour and 3 hour mark, and its actually work out better than I expected, I keep resetting the timer as I keep moving to different location and I got to curb stomp any weakling along the way. It's perfect.

"Hm?"

I snapped out of my thought because I already arrived at my house and also because I see someone crouching in front of it, near the house barrier to be exact.

"…What are you doing?" I asked.

That someone flinched and then slowly start to look back at me.

"Oh, Arah, how's it going-ze?"

It's Marisa. I bet she was trying to understand how my barrier works and then rob my house blind after that.

"…I'm fine, how about you?"

"I'm also fine-ze. Say, Arah, do you mind sharing how your barrier works? I'm really interested in it-ze."

'No shame whatsoever, she's the queen of shamelessness. 'I thought. "Gee, I don't know Marisa; someone might hear me explaining this stuff, and then they might start thinking to rob my house because of that." I said it with very monotones voice.

"Then don't worry, I will come to help-ze." she gave me thumbs up.

'Yeah, I bet you would help the fucking robber instead.'

"What?! You didn't believe me-ze?!"

Guess my faces said it all.

"*sigh* I'm not gonna told you it work, you can just figured it out yourself, and you want to join my lunch? It's about time after all."

"Lunch? Of course, I never free food-ze."

"Good, follow me through the front door then."

After I said that, Marisa starts following me into my house.

-Inside the House-

"Wow, it's smaller than I thought and you have nothing inside your house-ze!"

"…" I start kneading the bridge of my nose. '…I'm trying really hard to remember why I invited her in just now, oh wait, it's because she's cute, I hate myself sometimes….'

"Sit there when the food is ready; just don't break anything when I'm preparing our food."

"Understood-ze."

I start moving toward the Kitchen, but stopped midway to turn back toward Marisa.

"…Oh yeah, any preference for any food you like to eat?"

"Japanese food-ze." she said while she's going toward the bathroom.

"Noted, should I going with her menu as well?"

As I start cooking the food I heard Marisa making noise at every part of my house.

"What is this?! It sprays cold water-ze!"

"And now it's warm?!"

"Hot! Hot! Hot!"

"Arah!! Is this supposed to be your bedroom?! It's so dull! You only have a futon and a wall clock in it-ze!!"

"Arah!! Can you open your workshop for me?! I'm curious with what yours looks like-ze!"

'She must be referring to the Simulation Room, sucks to be her because the System explicitly said that the only people that's related with the Pioneer of the Universe program could go in inside those things, even I doubt Yukari could go inside it.'

While I'm having that thought, I almost miss what Marisa just said.

"…should I blow it using Master Spark?"

"DO IT AND YOUR FOOD GONNA HAVE WASABI IN IT, MARISA!!" I shouted.

"Sorry-ze!!"

I finished making our lunch and we eat it together, while we are eating, I suddenly struck with a thought, a though that I actually can't believe I'm having it from Marisa.

'I can't believe that I'm happy that she's happy eating my food.'

"What is this-ze?! This is so good! I'm actually really glad I have your lunch-ze."

"…I see." I said. 'And I'm actually embarrassed when I heard that. Dammit Marisa.' I thought.

Both of use finished our lunch, and we are having tea brake while gazing to the side yard.

"Your yard looks so dull-ze."

"Yeah, I know, I plan to start planning stuff after my smell disappeared tomorrow."

We both drinking in silent, but I broke it soon after.

"Hey, Marisa."

"Hm?"

"Have you already stopped your aging yet?"

"Hmm." She hummed.

"…I'm sorry, I don't know humming language; please use human language to elaborate your answer."

"Yeah, I already did it few years ago."

"…I see."

"Then how about you? Have you done it yet-ze?"

"Nah, I will wait for a few years before I do it, I want to look more mature than right now."

"Hmmm." She hummed in understanding.

Both of use didn't turn our head while we're having that conversation, and we continue to be silent after that.

'That question, I figured that the thing is a private question, so I never hoped she would answered it, but unexpectedly she answered it, so I'm kinda grateful for it actually, and that also proved my theory with why Marisa never look aged in every Touhou series.'

But sadly, the silent didn't last long, it's her turn now to ask question.

"Hey, Arah."

"Hm?"

"What's with the sweet smell?"

I start side glancing to her.

"The first time I noticed this was in a few days ago, I woke up in the middle of the night from some kind of sweet smell, it smells just like yours but it feels stronger, so I turn curious and start searching for the source, and finally I arrived at this place, your house."

"Out there," she pointed to the outside of the house." behind that barrier, all kind of animals bashing their body against your barrier, it was as if they were trying to go inside here. I wondered why they were going frenzy but after a while the smell disappeared, the animals went back to normal and start spreading back to their home in the forest, and this keep happening every day."

We both stop drinking our tea.

"I talked the situation with Reimu but she ignored it with the reason of it haven't really bother anyone with it so she still not gonna do anything about it yet."

"I start searching for you inside the Human Village, but I never encountered you in there in this few days."

"So in the end," she turn her head toward me, resolute says in her face. "Is your thing safe? Because if it's not, then we are gonna have some little talk."

I turn my head toward her now; I stare right into her eyes…and start explaining my bullshit half truth and half lie to her.

"The name of item that caused this is called "Fragrance of Hunger", you can say that it has hypnotic property to it for anyone that smell it."

"…What do you mean by hypnotic-ze?" she narrowed her eyes.

"Remember when I said that it make me smell sweet?"

"You mean…"

"Yup, it tricked whoever smells me to thinking that I smell sweet."

"But even if that's how it works, there's no way it can cause all those animal from going frenzy-ze…Unless…" she starts put her hand on her chin and continue to think.

I waited for her to finish her thought.

"…the name…never inside the village…what happened on the first day …then the duration."

She looked at me with the eye of realization.

I give her my lukewarm smile.

"How long-ze?"

"How long until the smell disappear? Or how long the smell is safe for anyone whiffing it?"

"B-both-ze."

"Tomorrow, the smells will disappeared by tomorrow, as for the duration, its 3 hours before anyone start going mad and then trying to eat me."

She flinched when I mention 'eating me'.

"Don't worry, I make sure I immediately get away from anyone before that happened, I'm not that stupid to let neither case happened until now."

She let out a relief breath.

"…When you mention about karma in Reimu House, what happened when the last time you used it-ze?"

Thought Acceleration.

'What kinda story I should tell her? I wonder. Honestly, I kinda feel bad about lying to her, but I also don't want people to know I 'worked' for something that can easily send me from one universe to another and also the one that created the System…are they the one that created the System?'

[Yes, User, the Creator is the one that created us.]

'I see, back to topic, I should start thinking about my story then, my lies doesn't hurt anybody until now, so I shouldn't feel bad when I do this, but I still feel bad about it, dammit all.'

After a while, I already decided to tell Marisa a story.

I stop using my ability.

"I-If you're okay with telling me about it okay?! I don't wanna force you to tell me about it-ze!"

I smile. "…Fu-fufu-fuahahahaha, that Marisa, that shameless girl actually have a shame right now."

"S-shut up-ze!! There's nothing wrong with asking permission to let someone know about their past-ze!!"

"Sorry, sorry, the last time I used it is it? It's actually nothing really serious, the guy only ended up in a clinic, I misplace placing the stuff from the food to the plate instead, so he ended up also eating the plate when he ate the food."

"…You called that nothing serious?" she said with amazement tone.

"The guy really through when he chewed his food, so he only swallowed the tiny fragment of the plate, which made his treatment really easy to do."

"…I see…"

Seems like she doesn't know what to think about my story, which is okay, confused is better than disbelieved.

Few minutes later, she said good bye and start walking away from my house; I also start to move after the 2 hours mark.

-Early Evening, Nameless Hill-​

I watch the grass and the flowers swaying on the ground, I'm guessing the one that move them is the wind, as for the reason why I said 'guessing', it's because I put my Counter Armor up to block anything from touching me, mainly the poison from the flower. I know that I have the Tattoo, but for safety measure, I still did it anyway.

"This place is windy like always." I said that while holding my trusty Cane of Guidance.

Nameless Hill, it's a meadow that's full of purple and white lilies-of-the-valley, a poisonous flower, it received that name because in the past, this place was used to abandon young children who weren't even given names then later they either died from the poison of the lilies or were abducted by Youkai, pretty brutal for modern standard, but probably not for children parent, they don't want another mouth to feed with their limited resources, and that also considering they don't know what a Birth Control is.

I sprawl my body on the slope and I stared at the skies.

This is the place that I said 'a place that can help me win this challenge'. The place pretty much abandoned by Human and Youkai, the only thing that stays in this place is some Fairies, Phantom, and her. Who's her you ask?

The person in question already is getting to our position as we speak.

I turn my head to the side to look at her.

[Lv.42 Little Sweet Poison, Medicine Melancholy]

She has silver-blue colored eyes and blonde curly hair. She wears a dark red-purple shirt with red seams, a red skirt with red-purple seams, shoes in the same color and a pink bow at her back. She has a red ribbon in her hair. You can see that she have a doll joint along her arm and feet that usually a doll should have in their body.

She also accompanied by a tiny doll that is similar to her appearance.

"Die Human!"

Poison cloud start forming from her hound and then it flies toward me.

I blow it toward her face using the wind.

"Fuwaah!!"

"If it's not working like the last time, why did you even use it again?"

'Shut up! You human should all die by my poison!"

"No, I think you're the one that need to shut up kid, you keep shouting in my ears, I can't appreciate the silent because of you." I retorted.

"Then you might appreciate the silent after you died!"

She continues sending her poison cloud and I keep blowing it to her face.

This stuck up in the ass kid name is Medicine Melancholy.

She is a doll turned Youkai that lived in this poisonous hill, her ability is controlling all kind of poison, its kinda ironic that her name is Medicine but her ability actually to control a poison.

There's nothing notable to be said about her, she's just a Youkai that hated Human, but if you think about her origin, her hatred kinda make sense, she's a doll turn Youkai, an inanimate object turning into something alive, which mean she's a Tsukumogami, a Youkai that born because they desire vengeance for the people that recklessly thrown them away, which in this case, Medicine has been thrown away by her owner, and now, after she became alive, she want vengeance toward this owner, which probably a human based on how she hated me.

And because her hatred pretty much cemented because of how she's created, any effort to make her forgave human is pretty much zero, nada, none, and impossible.

But I still thank her in my heart for creating something to do while I waited the time to run out, and then I repeated this process until that notice appeared.

[Challenge Quest - Complete]

Author note:

Heyo, Author here. Finally, the challenge finished, yay me!!

People keep telling me about possible harem situation in this fic, honestly I don't know, Harem is difficult to maintain, and also difficult to realized because I'm aiming for real world scenario to make it happen, if I happened to going with that route.

Also, I hate it when people start talking over each other, everything get confusing when it happened.