Chapter 262: Chapter 262 – Holy Wine of Desires

Translator: DragonBoatTrans  Editor: DragonBoatTrans

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First of all, the interior of the Small Holy Grail of Purity had changed.

 When the female stall owner held the Holy Grail in her hands, ten small, strange black-on-red runes could be seen floating inside. They grew bigger or smaller in size at random as they moved inside the cup.

 When the runes hit the sides of the cup or floated above the mouth of the cup, they would disappear instantly into the air, as if a child weighing 100 kg had collided into a sandcastle on the beach. Subsequently, they would then reappear from the base of the cup, constantly maintaining the number of runes inside the cup at ten.

 Without needing to think much, Ren Suo immediately realized that such should be the visualization of the Desires collected. After all, the abnormalities of the Small Holy Grail of Purity only appeared after he had collected 10,000 Desires.

 Of course, what was more important was that the runes made people feel intriguingly uncomfortable. They looked like words Ren Suo would see when he was squatting in the cubicles of public restrooms—indeed, it looked like words which people would draw blindly with their finger as a pen and their feces as ink, when they had a sudden wave of inspiration after forgetting to bring toilet paper and using their fingers to wipe themselves clean in the toilet.

 As the runes were not a brown color typical of feces, they looked more like words written by those who were about to die using their own blood. It was simply an extremely strange and bewildering feeling.

 Then, in the exchange list, there was a cost reduction:

 [A glass of 1% concentration Holy Water: 1 merit point]

 [A glass of 10% concentration Holy Water: 25 merit points]

 With Ren Suo’s player privilege [Seizing All Opportunities], he would now not need to spend any merit points to purchase the 1% concentration Holy Water—[Seizing All Opportunities] would certainly be triggered for every purchase, and the lowest benefit was ‘-1 merit point spent’.

 Although Ren Suo could generally extract keywords himself by now, he would be more relieved with the assistance of the official system—he could devote more energy to judging the ‘degree of importance’ of each keyword so that he could season the food precisely.

 Two new exchange items also appeared:

 [A glass of 1% concentration Holy Wine of Desires: 5 merit points]

 [A glass of 10% concentration Holy Wine of Desires: 40 merit points]

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 The game seemed to know that the cost was slightly high, so it directly explained the effect of the Holy Wine:

 [Holy Wine of Desires: A strange drink formed after the Supreme Power was influenced by desires. Upon drinking, hints from the Sea of Desires would be obtained, and 1~5 fundamental desires of the customer would be known at random.]

 Ren Suo understood in one glance—it was specially prepared for monsters who came to eat free meals, as well as those without any keywords.

 Compared to the Holy Water of Wishes, the Holy Wine of Desires was more enticing but was also more expensive. Nonetheless, drinking a glass of the Holy Wine of Desires when dealing with a difficult boss could be helpful.

 Moreover, compared to the Holy Water which had to be drunk before the customer told his story, Ren Suo could finish listening to the customer’s story first before deciding if he wanted to drink the Holy Wine. As such, it could be considered a trump card.

 Overall, the changes to the Small Holy Grail of Purity were all beneficial. Ren Suo had 26 merit points remaining at present, so he could not afford to make any mistakes. Now, with [Seizing All Opportunities], he could essentially get 1% concentration Holy Water for free for each customer. Ren Suo somehow felt that he was getting a good bargain from the Mini World game console.

 The Mini World game console was certainly going to make a loss from being so kind!

 That was likely the benefit of meeting the mission requirements before the stipulated deadline, or perhaps it was that… the few cities with the highest [Degree of Concealment] were truly too difficult to clear. The game could only try to balance out the game in such a way so that the player had a higher chance of clearing the city.

 However, what would have happened if the player did not have the [Small Holy Grail of Purity]? Wouldn’t the player have to rely on himself throughout the game in that case?

 Otherwise, was it that the small holy grail simply brought forward the opportunity to use merit points to purchase the items, and decreased the cost of the exchange at the same time? Regardless, how did a reward from an earlier game appear as part of the in-game purchase in a subsequent game?

 Ren Suo put his doubts aside. He decided to exchange for a glass of Holy Water and continued to listen to the Zashiki-warashi spirit.

 The young white-haired girl Mako had already forgotten most of her life as a human. She could only remember what happened after she was revived:

 [I accidentally fell to my death when I was playing in the wild. They seemed to have never found my body. When I awoke, it was as if nothing had changed, except that my hair turned white.]

 [I realized that ordinary people did not seem to be able to see me, and only children who were still ignorant could see me.]

 [I was very scared, because this was the future, 23 years after I died. I did not know anything, I did not understand anything, and neither could I do anything. What’s more, none of the adults could see me…] Mako looked dazed, as if she was a lost child.

 [Then, I walked, and walked, and walked, and then I met Natsuya.]

 Mako rubbed Natsuya’s head and continued: [It was as if we were destined to meet. I immediately recognized that she was my sister’s daughter. When she saw me, she came to me wanting to be good friends, and also invited me to follow her home.]

 [There, I saw my sister who had now grown up—that pesky bug that she once was, who kept imitating what I did, is now a mother. Just like our mother, she is hardworking and busy. She loves to laugh… and she likes to chat with the housewives nearby too.]

 [The person she married is a very ordinary person, much like my father. Although his feet smell, he has a slightly short temper, and he would return home drunk and reeking of alcohol after meeting his clients, he would definitely take his wife and daughter out to play, for picnics, and go on trips…]

 [They are a very ordinary yet enviable family. If I were still alive, I should have been enjoying an ordinary, happy life and growing up slowly, like Natsuya now…]

 [Later on, I hid in their house. When Natsuya wanted to play with me, I would emerge; and when she didn’t, I would hide in a corner.]

 [Ever since I lived there, their family became luckier and luckier, and they made more and more money. However, they became freer and freer, and they had more time to go out to enjoy themselves.]

 [One day, while they were on a holiday, I was watching television programs at home. When I got bored, I took a look around the house and found a diary on the table in my sister’s bedroom. The diary had a passcode.]

 [I tried a few times to unlock it—Natsuya’s birthday, her birthday, her husband’s birthday, my birthday. They were all incorrect.]

 Mako looked at the female stall owner, then continued emotionlessly:

 [The passcode was my death anniversary.]

 [At that time, I was actually quite happy. I flipped open the diary and began reading my sister’s thoughts as she grew up. I saw what she wrote about how she hated the fat kid who sat next to her in class that was perpetually sweating buckets; about how the ignorant her started fancying a senior in middle school; about how she met her current husband in high school; about how she went to university…]

 [… At the same time, I also saw the guilt she felt about my death.]

 Mako’s white hair was growing longer, and the nails on her ten fingers were becoming sharper. She gently rubbed the face of the sleeping Natsuya with her nails and said gently:

 [I did not fall down on my own. It was during my vacation break, my sister wanted to scare me, so she pushed me.]

 [After I fell down, she did not know what to do and did not dare to inform the adults. She was afraid of getting scolded, and yet she did not know what to do, so she simply paced around in the woods. Later on, the adults were finding me and asked her if she knew where I was. She looked down and said that she did not know.]

 [At that time, the weather was bad and the adults could not continue searching in the woods. My sister began bawling, but the adults simply thought that she was acting like that as she could not see her sister. They never suspected her.]

 [Later on, I was confirmed missing. Although my parents were sad, they still had my sister. This incident remained buried in my sister’s heart, and it was only revealed between the lines in her diary.]

 Mako looked at the female stall owner. Her lips were red, her skin was as white as snow, and her eyes had turned white like that of a ghost spirit.

 [I feel so troubled.]

 [I felt that this is where I would be able to wash away my troubles, so here I am.]

 [If you are unable to free me of my troubles…]

 As Mako hugged Natsuya, she moved her left hand gently across Natsuya’s neck, her sharp nails pressing against her throat.

 [I can only find another way for me to reduce my troubles…]

 It was the first time Ren Suo encountered such a situation where the customer brought a hostage along for the meal.

 There were three keywords extracted: Sister, Growing Up, and Happiness.

 However, Ren Suo felt that if he added [Family Love] to the sushi, it might provoke her instead.

 If he added [Understanding] + [Letting Go], the customer might erupt into fury: it’s not you who were killed, do you think it’s that easy to ‘let go’ just like that? Here, let me kill you once first, you would certainly forgive me, wouldn’t you?

 If he added [Happiness]… Well, the phrase “it is most important to be happy” did not apply to ghosts.

 Ren Suo was exasperated. If it were another customer, Ren Suo would have immediately added [Understanding] + [Letting Go] + [Family Love] + [Happiness]—such a garbage meal with feces added on would surely make the customer incensed.

 Now, however, the customer brought along a hostage, and Ren Suo could not simply ignore that. Even if he did not choose to ‘flee ghosts’ in Tokyo, the problem of Mako and Natsuya would still exist.

 Ren Suo knew that there were many tragic situations happening in the world that he could not control; but now, the ‘tragic situation’ was right in front of him. If he continued to ignore it, he felt that he would be letting down the values which nine years of compulsory education had taught him.

 “Tcch…”

 Ren Suo controlled the female stall owner to pick up the Small Holy Grail of Purity again and chose to purchase the [Holy Wine of Desires].

 “I shall give it a go then, let’s see if the Holy Wine is really able to pick out the ‘fundamental desires’ of the customer.”