Chapter 184 - Rookie Actor (2)

The Earth Spiritfolk have an excellent cultural tradition.

The strongest guy is the guy who's right.

If you have a complaint, speak with your fists, not your tongue.

"Let's start by cleaning, seniors."

And here, I was the strongest guy.

"Look at the state of this theater. What is this? Are the cobwebs decorations? Are you designing the interior with mold? Good grief. Just smell that rot. This place is a garbage can. Customers walking in would mistake themselves for food scraps."

"No... But..."

"Are you stronger than me? Better at acting than me? Better at handling aura than me?"

"No..."

"Then pick up some rags, seniors. We're not amateurs. Rehearsing Cavefire plays and all that shit comes after we've got a suitable environment. Your surroundings reflect your mind. Just how trashy are your minds for the theater to be a trash can? I said pick up the rags. Not listening? Want a beating?"

I wasn't the sort of person who made empty offers of a beating.

A gentleman doesn't threaten. He simply beats people up.

I picked out the particularly lazy Hobgoblin and treated him to a complimentary fist massage.

"Want another beating?"

The actors picked up their rags with miserable faces. Their expressions said, "We thought our new rookie was a pushover elf, but it turns out she's a tiger."

"Damp is fine. That's an Earth Spiritfolk thing. But who likes stagnant water and rotten smells? You're just lazy. And when you try to gloss over it with bullshit like [Earth Spiritfolk naturally like humidity] or [A true actor doesn't concern himself with his surroundings], everything becomes a complete fucking mess. Are you dogs, seniors?"

"R-rookie, ma'am. I think you're being too harsh..."

"Hah. You still haven't said you're sorry, so you really are dogs. You've got little bastards living in your heads. From now on, whenever I say something, you answer 'Woof.' Understood?"

"W-woof..."

"I can't hear your barking."

"Woof!"

"Good. Equip your hands with rags. As you scrub the theater, you're each going to scrub your own minds. Scrub hard until the little bastards lurking inside run away. Understood?"

"Woof!"

We spent that entire day and the next—two whole days—doing nothing but scrubbing.

The one-eyed actor carried a water jug back and forth between the well and the theater district without a break.

"Senior, don't just draw water from the well mindlessly. Draw it as though you've become a noble's servant. Immerse yourself in the part, is what I'm saying. What a precious opportunity! You clean the place, drive the little bastard out of your mind, and get used to playing a servant in the process. Three birds with one stone."

"W-wooof..."

The one-armed actor bailed out the stagnant water pooled on the theater floor and dug out the rotten soil.

"There's a reason 'digging ditches' means pointless toil. It's the height of absurdity. Congratulations. You're getting to experience three thousand sixty-year cycles of absurdity for free."

"Woof... I'm delighted..."

"Imagine it. You're a warrior on the battlefield. You've lost an arm in the war. Okay? The fighting is so fierce that your commander won't let you rest even after you've lost an arm. You have to build palisades and dig moats. On and on. A warrior's duty is not to retreat from the battlefield, but does digging ditches even after you've become one-armed really count as being a warrior? No. It's just filthy."

"Woof... Filthy..."

"Duty is beautiful. But pushed to certain extremes, it can stop being beautiful. There are moments when duty turns ugly and virtue becomes filthy. At those times, the more faithfully you fulfill your duty, the stranger things become. A strange filthiness. A filthy strangeness. That's absurdity. Dig, senior. Bail out the water. Keep doubting whether you're a warrior, keep being plagued by doubt, and dig those ditches hard."

"Woooof... I'm digging..."

The one-eared actor followed my instructions exceptionally well.

"Have you thrown out the trash?"

"Woof. Rookie, ma'am."

"Now we're going to cut fresh logs and make chairs. Sound good?"

"Woof."

"These are the chairs our guests will sit on. Say a Cavefire play lasts an hour. The audience won't stare at your face for the entire hour. But their asses will be planted on those chairs the whole time. The chairs are the only things in this theater serving the audience from beginning to end. If the chairs are uncomfortable, the play becomes uncomfortable, too."

"Woof. I understand that this is a very important mission, rookie, ma'am."

"Let's make a whole batch of brand-new chairs together today. While we're at it, we'll make both regular and special seats from scratch."

"Woof, woof. At your service."

And the troupe director was good at catching spiders.

"Now... Sonia, I may not look it, but I am the troupe director..."

Some extremely harsh profanity.

"On second thought, having bugs crawling around is wrong! I'll clear them out at once!"

[The members of the theater troupe 'Mud and Dust' submit to your authority.]

[The theater troupe 'Mud and Dust' recognizes you as its real power!]

Even after the big cleanup, I didn't stop.

Hearing the Tower's voice had reminded me of something else that needed fixing.

"Um, Sonia..."

"Yes?"

"Can I ask what you're doing with that ladder... No, may I ask?"

I propped a ladder against the theater entrance and climbed up, aura emanating from both hands. Right in front of my nose was a sign engraved with [Mud and Dust].

"As you can see, I'm changing the sign."

The Hobgoblin troupe director looked flustered.

"Ch-changing the sign?"

"Yes. A hundred and thirty years of tradition is nice, but honestly, our troupe is the bottom of the bottom tier. Rather than a name that tries to sound impressive like [Mud and Dust], we need one that actively appeals to audiences."

I flipped the decrepit sign over to its blank back. Channeling aura into my fingernail, I scratched letters into the wooden board.

"Okay. Looking slick."

I gazed at the new sign with satisfaction.

[Theater Troupe: Bullshit (Dog Sounds)]

"..."

The Hobgoblin looked back and forth between my face and the sign.

"Um... Sonia?"

"Go ahead."

"Surely Bullshit is going too far? We have a hundred and thirty years of tradition..."

"I heard from the senior actors, Director. Apparently you owe quite a lot to various fairy merchant companies?"

The director flinched.

"They said fairies come to collect at least once every fifteen days."

"Th-those bastards. Telling the rookie everything, true or not..."

"Tradition isn't what makes you impressive. You need to take responsibility for your own people first. You're the owner of this troupe. Draw customers in. Become popular. The actors should be resting in proper lodgings, not sleeping curled up in the dressing room. Don't you agree?"

"..."

"I'm a fairy. I probably know more about business than Earth Spiritfolk do. Right now, we need every single additional customer we can get. Keep going like this, and the troupe will go under."

I headed out onto the street with an armful of printed play flyers.

"Theater Troupe [Bullshit]! Next Saturday evening, Theater Troupe [Bullshit] presents Wild Dance of Flaming Swords!"

"Ugor."

Hobgoblins passing by snickered. Elf ticket sellers out promoting other troupes snorted with laughter, too.

"What? Bullshit?"

"Where'd that kid come from?"

Good. A response. Far better than complete indifference.

The floodgates were open. Steering that response in the best possible direction was the purpose of promotion and a ticket seller's job.

"Woof! Woof! A feast of bullshit unlike anything you can hear or taste anywhere else in this city! Sick of hearing that the Flame Emperor was actually a good guy? Think a bad guy has to be properly bad to be worth watching? Come on over! Ah, there's no other son of a bitch like him anywhere in the world! A genuine bastard is coming your way!"

"Ugor."

"Fairies certainly are entertaining."

"Such a delicate little kid. Cute."

Hobgoblins chuckled as they passed along the street.

"..."

The troupe director, who had followed me out, was staring at me blankly.

Once a few passersby had gathered, I unveiled my trump card.

"Now then! You magnificent warriors! This isn't a Cavefire play you get to see every day!"

I snapped my fingers.

DING!

A bright note rang out in midair. The sound, like a piano key being struck, startled the people passing by.

"Ugor?"

"What was that?"

The source of the sound was simple. I had sent out two streams of aura simultaneously and made them collide. The aura quivered, vibrating the air and producing a sound similar to a piano note.

It was fairly advanced aura manipulation, but it wasn't difficult for me.

"Look forward to it!"

I went on producing waves with aura.

DING DING DING, DING DING DING.

It was a tune even a musical ignoramus like me could imitate: "The Flea Waltz."

"Come one, come all! Even our fairy ticket seller can wield aura this well! Theater Troupe Bullshit! Just how close to divine mastery will the Cavefire they show you be?"

Under a bright sky, on a street flooded with sunlight, I played a tune with nothing but the movement of my fingers.

It worked.

"An air-splitting sound?"

"Impossible. Good heavens."

"Is that... making sound with aura?"

At last, the passersby stopped walking and began staring only at me. Not just the passersby, either. Ticket sellers from the major troupes widened their eyes.

"There isn't a single line of dialogue in Theater Troupe Bullshit's performance! The Flame Emperor! Kekereukker! None of them speak any lines! Fire does not speak. It only burns! Witness the first dialogue-free Cavefire play in history!"

"Dialogue-free...?"

The Hobgoblins watched my dazzling finger movements in a daze, their mouths falling open.

"Can a Cavefire play have no dialogue?"

"Well, not saying even a single word..."

Some were astonished by my aura performance. Others were suspicious of the advertisement for a dialogue-free Cavefire play.

The amazement of [How is that possible?] and the doubt of [That can't be possible] mingled in the air at the three-way intersection—the two best emotions for publicity.

"If the actors speak even a single line, we'll give you a full refund! One line, a full refund! Two lines, twice your admission price! Three lines, and I'll give you everything I own!"

Beaming and grinning, I handed flyers out to the crowd.

"This isn't a Cavefire play you get to see every day! Bring a flyer and one accompanying guest gets in free! One free companion per person! Free admission available! Here's a performance where you don't spend money—you make money! Thank you! Yeees, thank you!"

The passersby no longer had the strength to refuse the paper I offered them. Slightly dazed, as though intoxicated by a heavy fragrance, they promptly took the flyers.

I ran out in no time.

"Thank you! Until the day of the actual play, I'll perform here every day! Naturally, the concerts are free! Ah, we're in trouble. Our theater's owner owes the merchant companies a fortune, and at this rate he really will go bankrupt! He's desperate!"

I seized the troupe director's hand. He was a little startled, but willingly accepted my hand. When the passersby's attention turned to him, he even managed an awkward, genial smile.

Good.

"What makes a great actor? Nobody gives a greater performance than actors on the brink of bankruptcy! None of them even have homes! Now they truly have nothing but the stage! It's an established academic fact that acting ability is inversely proportional to the state of your wallet! Theater Troupe Bullshit—I'll be performing, too. Next Saturday evening. The performance is next Saturday evening! Thank you. Bullshit! Next Saturday evening!"

I bowed to the passersby. With his hand caught in mine, the troupe director naturally wound up bowing, too.

Nobody clapped or cheered, but the mood wasn't bad. It was excellent. Scattering the sales smile I'd learned from the Black Dragon leader, I quickly left the street.

"Wow," the attendant spirit muttered. "Aren't you embarrassed?"

'I'm doing my job. What's there to be embarrassed about?'

"You're still the Demonic Cult's Young Cult Leader, you know."

'The Demonic Cult was founded by farmers who'd been driven out and miners who'd fled. What's wrong with handing out flyers on the street? This is work, too.'

"Seriously... This bastard would manage just fine even if you dropped him in the middle of a jungle or a desert. That Flame Emperor really was something. Releasing someone like you into the world."

"Lord Kekereukker..."

Sonia, now a spirit, wore a peculiar expression, unable to decide what to do. Her face was a half-and-half chicken platter of admiration and self-loathing.

"You are amazing, but how should I put it... You're amazing in a very different sense from the Lord Kekereukker I always imagined... No... Is this actually more like you, Lord Kekereukker...?"

That's right.

This is who I am.

Meanwhile, once we were completely off the street, the troupe director spoke.

"Are you serious?"

"Hm? About what?"

"The dialogue-free Cavefire play. How can you perform onstage without speaking a single line?"

"Of course I'm serious. Do you think I'd bullshit our prospective customers?"

"But..."

"Don't worry. I'll pour my heart and soul into putting on a performance worth paying for, one way or another. If all else fails, I'll go onstage by myself. You don't need to worry at all that we've lied to our customers."

"..."

"More importantly, there's work to do. By now, our theater should have a full set of new chairs. Pick out the VIP seats... the special seats, and make some neat tickets for them. Price them at twelve times the regular seats."

"T-twelve times?"

The director was shocked.

"That much...?"

"We've spread flyers everywhere. Nine times out of ten, our customers will bring one. That means we'll have loads of free guests, so we need to make up the revenue with special seats."

"B-but isn't that too expensive?"

"It is. And only customers who don't consider it expensive will buy them."

DING.

I lightly flicked my aura, producing an A note.

"They all watched me wielding aura back there. Any warrior with a competitive streak will want to watch my performance from as close as possible. To observe and learn."

"..."

"It's far too expensive for [customers coming to watch a performance], but cheap for [warriors coming to learn aura]. We'll draw the former in for free and make our profits from the latter. Director. Trust me and jack up those prices."

The next day, around noon, three or four Hobgoblins began hovering outside the theater.

"Is this Theater Troupe Bullshit?"

"I heard there's a performance next Saturday. I'd like to reserve a front seat."

"I heard that fairy over there is performing onstage, too... Is that true? I want a ticket for the performance with that fairy."

Even after hearing the price, the Hobgoblin warriors readily bought seats. After selling VIP tickets to four people, the troupe director still looked at me in disbelief.

He probably hadn't experienced anything like this since opening the theater.

"Well?"

I gave him a bright smile.

"I was right, wasn't I?"

Two days later, every VIP seat was sold out.