Chapter 208: Vending Machine Detective
Link: https://ncode.syosetu.com/n7583de/
Author: Hirukuma
Translated by Zzonkedd
Edited by Gumihou
Gumihou: Smoothed out some of the text styles to better fit the narrative
To find out more about Shirley’s private life, I enlisted the help of Ramis, Hyurumi, and Suko from the Big Eaters party.
Since the purpose is to gather information about a woman’s private life, I thought that it was better to ask women only to help, resulting in an all-female investigative team.
I also invited Shui, but she was more interested in food than anything else and declined to join us.
“Hakkon, you’re sure this is the right place?”
“Welcome”
We had settled into a small white house with a garden. I had changed the colour scheme of my body to better blend in with the fence post surrounding the house.
I got her address by asking one of her employees. They gave up the information quite easily. Apparently, she would sometimes invite her staff to dinner parties at her place, which was how everyone knew where it was.
The residence was quite close to the wall surrounding the village. Land here was inexpensive since the risk of monster attacks was higher.
Still, considering her revealing clothes and glamorous way of life, it was quite surprising to see this small wooden, single-storey house.
It was surrounded by a white picket fence with a neatly trimmed yard and a flower bed. At a closer look, I realised the flowers there were similar to the ones sold by me.
Hm, looks like she has a surprisingly sweeter maidenly side to her.
“Right, we’ll place you here, just beside the fence. When you see her going out, just give us a shout.”
Hyurumi and the others then entered a house just [1] a couple of blocks away. These blocks of houses were newly built and ready to be sold. We had permission from Director Bear to use one of them for the day.
It was still quite early in the morning, so nothing much was happening yet. Still, let’s keep our eyes peeled for anything.
After a while, I heard the sound of wheels trundling in the distance. I switched my gaze around and saw a young man pulling a two-wheeled cart.
There were rows of glass bottles in the cart containing something that looked like milk. That’s right, I do believe there was a ranch-like place where they milked cow-like creatures for their milk.
Speaking of which, now that I was paying attention, I noticed that the houses here all have boxes at the entrance filled with glass bottles. Well, well, looks like he’s a milk deliveryman. Seeing an earnest young man out so early in the morning makes me want to cheer him on.
When he reached Shirley’s house, he suddenly started to fidget. He checked his appearance in a milk bottle’s reflection and even smoothed back his hair and straightened his clothes.
Ahah. So, he must know that Shirley lives here and spiffs himself up a bit just in case there’s an ‘encounter’. Still, since Shirley worked till the wee hours in the morning, it’s unlikely for her to be awake at this time of the day.
The young man swivelled his head around nervously before tiptoeing to the front door, placing the fresh bottles of milk in the box. Huh, looks like he’s being considerate of the sleeping occupant, how thoughtful.
Then, he took one of the two small empty glass bottles from the box, and slowly lifted one of the bottles to his mouth.
Wait, what are you doing?
Actually, it was clear what he was doing. However, since the bottles had clearly been rinsed out, what he was doing was pretty pointless, but still!!
Grossed out, I used <Barrier> to shoot an energy drink at the young man’s head.
“Ouch, wha-?”
He looked around in a panic, but did not seem to have noticed my presence. I had already made the energy drink vanish the moment it struck his head, so there was no evidence from that side.
The young man snatched up the bottles and hurried off.
It was such a typical prepubescent move that Shirley would probably have laughed if she had known. Still, it was a bad thing to do and not something you should do to a customer. As a vending machine that places high value on service industry manners, I can never tolerate that.
Just then, I noticed a middle-aged man pacing back and forth in front of Shirley’s house.
He was a slightly overweight man in a long coat, a hat pulled down low and sunglasses. The very picture of a suspicious person. Still, there was a possibility that he was just lost or passing by, so I couldn’t do anything to him, yet.
The man leaned over the fence, squinting his eyes at the house. From where he was positioned, I could tell he was trying to stare through the large glass windows across the garden. Still, there was nothing to see because the curtains were drawn.
After staring for a while, he climbed over the fence. He looked around shiftily for a while before shuffling forward. Alright, that’s an out.
“Su-ko”
“Yup, yup, s’up?”
Suko immediately popped up beside me. Since members of the Big Eaters party have good hearing, they could hear me perfectly well even though I used the lowest setting on my volume.
“Th-at gu-y”
“Woah, a suspicious character! Let’s give him a little scare, eh?”
She effortlessly leapt over the fence, circled around the man who was trying to quietly force the glass door open. As I watched, Suko’s chest swelled with air and-
“BOO!”
“Ugh–!!?”
Startled by the sudden sound, the middle-aged man scuttled away from the glass door and somehow managed to climb over the fence and escape without tripping over himself.
Suko, aren’t you being too noisy in the morning?
Her sudden roar was especially loud that morning. Neighbours popped their heads out of their houses, but Suko had already hidden herself behind me, so nothing could be seen.
After confirming that there was nothing to see, the residents retreated back into their homes. Once everyone was gone, the glass door that had been the target of that suspicious middle-aged man opened.
A woman stuck her head out.
Her hair was as scruffy as Hyurumi’s, and she was dressed in plain, navy blue sweatpants and a shirt, and was scratching her stomach rather vigorously even as she yawned widely at the door.
There were traces of drool at the corner of her mouth, and she had a rather slack expression on her face.
“Hm? I thought I heard a scream… was it my imagination?”
She gave the garden a half-hearted glance through half-lidded eyes before retreating back to the house.
Was this what Shirley is like at home? I guess it’s natural to want to relax in your own space since it must have been exhausting to maintain that classy yet sexy appearance all the time.
People who worship that side of her may be disappointed by her dishevelled appearance, but I find her regular default state to be rather cute.
“So that’s what she’s usually like, eh? Well, I get that. It’s normal for women to be like that at home,” said Suko knowledgeably.
To be fair, members of the Big Eaters party had always been rather scruffy-looking regardless. So, I was not too sure about Suko’s point of view as a female of the species.
“Did something happen? We heard a loud noise just now.”
“Heyy~ Gimme a drink to wake me up, yeah?”
The other two also turned up. Hyurumi must have fallen asleep while waiting. She was scratching her head like Shirley had been doing earlier.
From the way the ladies squeezed through the gap to settle down next to me, it looked like none of them had any intention of going home. The four of us ended up keeping watch on Shirley’s house together.
After that, two other suspicious characters lurked around the residential area until the road got busier. It looked like they were keeping each other in check and ended up leaving without causing any trouble.
Personally, I think they were potential trouble. Shirley’s quite skilled, so I’m not too worried, but I did record the appearance of those suspicious individuals. I will show them to the guards later and ask them to keep an eye on these shady characters.
I had heard that beauties have an advantage in life, but I can’t help but feel sorry for girls who attract creeps like these.
“Still not out yet, huh? I guess she’s still sleeping.”
“She works till late at night, so it’s possible she won’t be up until midday.”
“I smelled no food and heard no signs of movement,” said Suko as her sensitive ears and nose twitched.
Since the Big Eaters all have unusually heightened senses of smell and hearing, none of us doubted her words.
It was well past lunchtime before we finally saw some movement.
The glass door opened, and Shirley stepped out.
She was dressed in shorts, boots, a jacket that looked like it was made from leather and a pair of sunglasses. Her hair was tied back, properly out of the way and ready for action.
She also had a fairly large bag on her back.
It was different from her usual look, but I can safely say that she looks good in anything.
[2] “She looks great in that flashy dress, but this outfit’s great too,” said Hyurumi knowledgeably, sounding like an expert. Well, she might be one after having gone through a Miss Dungeon Contest.
[2] “It’s like what we wear,” said Suko excitedly.
[2] “Except she has more cover on the top,” Ramis giggled.
[2] The practical side of the outfit was the shoes and the jacket, with a shirt, of course. Shirley still looks good in an outfit that looks like a combination of Suko and Ramis’s usual style.
Rather than sexy, she has a cool vibe to her look now.
As she disappeared down an alley, Suko waited until there was sufficient distance between us and her before trotting forward. [3] As a gorgeous operator of nightlife shops, she must get her fair share of stalkers. Therefore, she would be extra sensitive to people following her.
[3] Which is why we recruited Suko so that we can tail her from a good distance.
[2] “I think it’s her day off today, but I can’t really imagine what she does on such days,” Hyurumi admitted
[2] “Right, I used to think that she’d be super fashionable on days off too. Maybe have an elegant lunch at a fancy restaurant…” said Ramis.
[2] “Lunches are awesome,” was Suko’s contribution.
Well, there was only one high-end restaurant on this floor, and it was run by Suori. To be honest, I have no idea what a hunter village would even have a high-end restaurant, but it looked like it was doing quite well.
Suori once bragged about the place over orange juice (provided by me) that their fancy restaurant was fairly popular with the locals due to their reasonably priced dishes coupled with the luxurious ambience.
However, Shirley stepped smartly past such upscale places and down back alleyways, completely ignoring the main roads.
We walked quite a distance before Suko suddenly halted at a corner of an alley before turning around and beckoning us closer.
Naturally, we hurried over as quietly as we could and looked towards the direction where her claw pointed. It was a large, square wooden construction.
[Gumihou: Okay, okay, well go on!!]
[1] Additional information, because it was just not there and making things confusing
[2] Adjust the dialogues so that it doesn’t sound like they are just repeating the narrator’s thoughts
[3] Adjust information overflow to something that adds to the drama rather than just more info
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