Chapter 18 - Halloween Society

Their haggling lasted two whole days.

Akina wanted every last credit she could get, while Santa was determined to pay as little as possible. To Ash, it looked exactly like a contest between spear and shield.

In the end, Akina won.

"All right! Two hundred twenty thousand! Now let me get some sleep!"

"Yes!"

And so Ash and Akina earned the princely sum of 220,000 credits from their first expedition. With the 50,000-credit payment for the mapping commission, their total came to 270,000 credits.

Even after repaying their debt to Santa and covering Akina's breathing fee, they would have 100,000 credits left.

It was an incredible profit for novice Pathfinders.

That alone would have been remarkable enough, but they still had one more source of money waiting for them.

The biggest payout of all.

"Mister, give me a second!"

As they were getting ready to leave, Akina rushed upstairs as though she had forgotten something.

A brief silence followed.

Santa took out a cigarette, lit it, and looked at Ash.

"Ash."

Smoke drifted from his mouth and dispersed in the air.

"Ever been to a corporate-controlled district?"

Ash shook his head.

"This will be my first time."

"I see."

Santa flicked the ash from his cigarette.

"Sanctum, you see, is like a rag doll stitched together from scraps of different-colored cloth."

Ash lowered his head for a moment at Santa's cryptic remark. Then a faint light shone from his optical sensors.

"Are you speaking of the Societies, perhaps?"

Society.

The term referred to a particular autonomous district under a megacorporation's control.

Santa gave a small nod.

"It might look like a single city from the outside, but the reality is completely different. You could call it a collection of domains, each tangled up in different desires."

Ash silently waited for him to continue, recording their conversation as he did.

Santa's words were always helpful when it came to living in Sanctum. Surely these would be too.

Santa went on.

"A Society isn't simply a corporate-controlled district. More precisely... yes. I suppose you'd call it a society bound together by a single 'value.'"

"A value?"

"Let me give you an example. You know Apex Arms, right?"

"Of course."

There was no way Ash could be unfamiliar with that name.

His left arm had been built using Apex Arms technology.

"Apex's core value is 'evolution.' Maybe that's why Apex Society despises the human body. They treat it like garbage. They're lunatics who believe cybernetic modification is the only path to perfection."

"Good heavens. Is that not rather extreme?"

"That's how all the Societies are."

Santa stubbed out his cigarette and continued.

"Vortex Energy is the same. Their core value is 'efficiency.' They consider emotions and desires inefficient and exclude them completely. The funny thing is, living such restrained, efficient lives gives them an almost religious air."

At that point in the conversation, Ash, who had been listening quietly, asked a question.

"... Then what is Halloween's core value?"

Santa's lips curled upward as though the question amused him.

"What do you think?"

His smile seemed to say, Go and see for yourself.

A moment later, loud footsteps rang out.

Akina had come down from the second floor.

"Shall we go, then? To Halloween Society!"

* * *

Neither enormous steel gates nor a formidable security system separated Halloween Society from the rest of Sanctum.

Its boundaries were defined by none other than color and sound.

Unlike the Gateway District, where Santa's Rest Stop stood, Halloween Society blazed with vivid colors from the very entrance.

And that was not all.

Music of every genre kept pouring out from somewhere, loud enough to split their eardrums.

Rather than a city, this place felt more like an enormous outdoor club and a studio set running around the clock.

Bizarrely shaped buildings that had sprung up without rhyme or reason adorned themselves with dazzling neon signs and media facades, as though competing to see which could draw the most attention.

Holographic billboards mounted on every exterior wall played spectacular battle footage of popular idols, occasionally interspersed with cute messages thanking their fans.

The people in the streets were every bit as flamboyant.

Hair dyed in glowing fluorescent colors.

Bodies enhanced with cyberware.

Bold, bizarre fashions.

No one was ordinary, and no one was afraid to stand out.

It truly was another world.

It felt more like a dream or a hallucination than reality.

Which made Ash and Akina stand out all the more. Dressed in practical, colorless clothing, they looked like a black-and-white photograph misplaced on a color screen.

They did not blend in at all.

"Hehe. I knew this would happen, so I came prepared!"

Muttering to herself, Akina pulled something out of her clothes: a bright red lip tint.

Without even a mirror, she dabbed it on and smeared it over her lips.

"Mister, how do I look?"

Blood-red lips on a deathly pale face.

And the color was smeared all over the place.

Ash reached out a hand and carefully wiped away the tint.

"A commendable effort."

"Hey. What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means your effort was commendable."

Just as she was about to reply:

"Happy! Halloween!"

All the music echoing through the city abruptly vanished, replaced by a cheerful yet frivolous male voice.

"Hello, everyone! Your talkative friend Chatterbox is back!"

Had that voice been a signal?

As if by magic, every noise in the city subsided. Everyone stopped what they were doing at once and looked up at the tallest building: Halloween Entertainment's headquarters.

"All right, everyone! It's that moment of truth again! Who will be Halloween's brightest star today? Today's Best! We're revealing it right now!"

At Chatterbox's cry, one entire side of the building transformed into an enormous ranking board. Brilliant holograms appeared over its relatively plain exterior.

[TODAY BEST 100]

Starting at one hundred, the rankings rapidly climbed toward the top.

Whenever a name appeared, the idol's face and performance footage flashed briefly in holographic form, accompanied by cheers erupting throughout the streets.

Ash and Akina also tilted their heads up to watch.

"Where do you think Ifrit will rank?"

"Hmm. Would Lady Ifrit not rank fairly high? She is a veteran Pathfinder with many years of experience."

"Hehe. Right?"

From then on, they watched the rankings a little more closely.

Ninetieth.

Seventieth.

Fiftieth.

The rankings kept climbing, but Ifrit's name never appeared.

Not even when only one spot remained.

First place.

"Who will take today's number one spot?"

No sooner had Chatterbox finished shouting than the people filling the city roared in unison.

"Siren! Siren! Siren!"

Their cries engulfed the city.

At last, the name and face of the top-ranked idol appeared at the very top of the board.

[Witchcraft - SIREN]

"Waaaaah!!"

The woman in the hologram gazed down at the crowd with inscrutable black eyes.

Long, jet-black hair, snow-white skin, and a sword gripped in one hand.

This was Siren, leader of the popular idol group Witchcraft.

"... No way."

Akina's voice came out in a whisper.

She seemed bewildered that Ifrit's name had not even made the top hundred.

Even then, the square was still overflowing with people chanting Siren's name.

Amid that frenzy, Ash considered it all.

Siren on the ranking board, the people chanting her name, and finally Ifrit, whose name had failed to appear at all.

["What do you think?"]

Santa's words came back to him.

Ash thought he understood now.

'Halloween's core value is popularity.'

Ifrit was unquestionably a seasoned Pathfinder.

Her unerring marksmanship made that clear, as did her use of smoke to distract the Sentinels and the way she had more than held her own with an unfamiliar sword.

But so what?

Here, skill and experience were secondary concerns.

The worth of one's existence depended on just one thing: how many people wanted you.

Ash stopped looking at the ranking board.

"Miss Akina. Let us go inside."

At his quiet words, Akina nodded, looking vaguely disgruntled.

The building's interior was just as extravagant as the streets.

It simply felt a little colder and more refined.

Screens scattered throughout played an endless stream of footage of Siren, who had just taken first place.

"How may I help you?"

A female android at the reception desk smiled warmly.

"We're here to see Ifrit."

The android searched her data briefly before answering, her gentle smile unchanged.

"Do you have an appointment?"

"Um... not an appointment, but she told us to ask for her when we got here!"

"Understood. I'll contact Ms. Ifrit now. Would you please wait in the lounge?"

The android pointed toward a luxurious waiting area in one corner.

"Thank you!"

Following her directions, they took seats on a lounge sofa.

Neither seemed at all accustomed to sinking into a soft sofa, and they sat rather awkwardly.

"Wow. How much did all this cost?"

Akina began chattering away as though trying to dispel the awkwardness. Ash merely nodded from time to time.

How much time had passed?

Suddenly, Ash rose from his seat.

"Huh? Mister, what's wrong?"

Despite Akina's puzzled question, Ash walked without hesitation toward a woman sitting alone at the next table.

With her hat pulled low and a mask covering her face, only her eyes were visible.

As Ash approached, she hurriedly put away the PDA she had been holding.

Ignoring this, he stopped in front of her and activated his voice module.

"Good day."

The woman gave a slight shudder at his quiet greeting.

"Uh, yes?"

Her answer faltered.

Ash paid it no mind.

"Pardon me, but may I ask you a question?"

At his courteous request, she gave a small nod.

"Oh, yes. What is i..."

"Why are you drawing closer to us?"

The woman seemed to choke on her breath, unable to answer.

In truth, Ash had noticed her watching them from the moment they entered the building.

There was only one reason he had acted now.

Quietly, but unmistakably, the distance between them had been shrinking.

At first, she had been sitting in the farthest corner of the lounge.

Then she had ordered a drink and casually moved to a sofa closer to them.

Before long, she had stood up again as though to clear away her empty glass. When she returned, she took the seat right beside the sofa where Ash and Akina sat.

She was too close for him to dismiss it as coincidence any longer.

"Well... this seat is more comfortable..."

No one would have found that convincing.

But Ash nodded.

"I see. My apologies for troubling you."

Then he addressed Akina.

"Miss Akina. Shall we move elsewhere?"

Perhaps sensing that something was amiss, Akina quickly rose. Then she shot a glance at the thoroughly suspicious woman.

"That sounds good."

Just as they were about to leave, an urgent voice called out.

"Wait!"

They turned to find the woman fumbling out her PDA and holding up its screen.

It was playing the footage of Ash's battle that Ifrit had uploaded a few days earlier.

"Is this you in the video, by any chance?"

Ash gave a brief nod.

The woman let out a long sigh. Then she stood and bowed to them both.

"I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable. I'm truly sorry."

Though her manner was quite courteous, Ash dismissed her immediately.

"Enough."

His words were polite, but cold.

"What reason have I to listen to someone who hides her face?"

"Oh, that's not why I'm covering my face..."

"I said, enough."

The woman hesitated, then lowered her head. As though reaching a decision, she removed her mask and hat.

Black hair cascaded down like a waterfall.

At the same instant, Akina's eyes widened in astonishment.

"... Huh?"

The woman was Halloween's number-one-ranked idol.

Siren.