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28.45% Life Travelling Through Fiction / Chapter 26: Chapter 26

Chapter 26: Chapter 26

After breakfast, I followed Kawaguchi for several blocks before we reached her office building. Her company was actually large enough to own the building. I guess they need a lot of space for manufacturing, testing, and development. Her office is on the 6th floor she has an entire workshop complete with a load of power tools and other machinery that I don't recognize. She sees me looking at the machinery.

"Are you interested in working in the support industry?"

"Yes and no. I'm interested in support item design, but not necessarily for a career."

"Alright, how about you hop up on this platform so I can get your measurements

Then we can finalize designs and I can get to work making them."

"Alright, so do I need to take my shirt off or anything"

"NO please keep all of your clothes on. The last thing I need is for one of my co-workers to walk in here with you half-naked."

"So why are you doing this for me?"

" Worst case scenario your designs aren't chosen, but I'll probably get some tailored outfits out of the deal. Or your designs will be selected in which case I have an in to professionally model your clothing line or maybe you'll need an assistant once you get your higher laying promotion. In hoping for the second option, but no real downside for me."

"I guess your right, but the way you're saying it makes it sound kind of bad."

"So you're saying its more altruistic to not mention how I personally benefit from this. I personally don't think a person can be altruistic if they know the actions they're taking will greatly benefit them. I know that this is a no-lose scenario where I stand to benefit meaning no interpretation of my actions can be solely selfless."

"I guess that makes sense, but maybe you should just lie instead of delving into the philosophy behind intent."

"Don't worry if they ask me any questions at the costume contest I'll stick to true answers if they make us look good, or smart-sounding redirections if the answers will make us look bad.

" Great thanks. I'll make sure you field no questions"

She then continues to take my measurements, before shifting her attention to actually making the clothes which she does by altering the digital designs and then printing them using one of the machines in her office. While she is doing that I use one of her extra computers checking my email and looking for places to take of advantage of until I have some money. Takoba Municipal Beach Park despite being covered in trash has a free public changing room with showers. Also, I might be able to find something worthwhile in the dump. Then there are some homeless shelters/soup kitchens but they are further away from the area I'm trying to stay in. For dinner, I was thinking about asking a food cart for a meal in exchange for cleaning up. After a little while, my web searching is interrupted by the sound of printing. I sign out and clear my search history.

"Ok so for my clothing I wanted to use this incredibly resilient and stretchy material we use it in the lower tier hero costumes. I wanted to make a luxury civilian version."

The clothes look nice and are made of two parts, leggings and a long sleeve shirt. The leggings are a little weird for men, but I may be using non-relevant fashion criteria not that I was ever into fashion.

"If it's so stretchy why did you measure me?"

"While it can stretch out a good deal it might distort the proportions of the designs. Plus we want you to look your best which means clothes that fit perfectly."

"Well if you leave the room I'll try these on"

She steps out giving me a moment to change my clothes. Which I can now do extremely quickly probably form Quick Pockets. I then call her back in. She comes in looking me over before yelling out "OH!" And covering her eyes.

"What's wrong?"

"The pants are too tight"

I look down and sure enough, these pants do not leave much to the imagination. I also look behind me and check what I look like from the back.

"If it any consolidation these pants make my ass look fantastic"

"It's not. Please change back"

When she comes back in after I change I also make another suggestion.

"I don't know if you already have this but the shirts should come in a variety of sleeve lengths short sleeve, 3/4, or long."

"That's not a bad idea I'll add that in after I'm done redesigning the pants."

"The pants would be fine for women, but there is a reason men don't usually wear tights."

"That's it. Men don't usually wear tights, but the men who do wear leggings are usually superheroes. I'll incorporate some superhero style pants for the men line or at least aspects of those designs so the pants fit differently."

"Sounds good while you work on that I'm going to take a nap" I'd prefer not to sleep on the streets again so I'll sleep now and get some work done during the night.

She eventually completes her redesign which after trying on again meets our approval. We part ways at the end of the day, and I'll be meeting her back at 10 am to finish testing the rest of her designs. Then the day after that is the costume contest or design showcase whatever. Later time on the internet provided me my solution for food without paying for it. Food challenges. 2 in particular one is a ramen challenge which I will be doing tonight. The other is a curry challenge. Completing either means I don't have to pay for my meal, but there are additional prizes. For the ramen challenge if I eat it all in under 30 minutes I get 50,000 yen. If I complete the curry one 5 times the next month I can eat off the regular menu for free. Two different restaurants but the pocket money is more important right now. It's pretty out of the way, but I can run at speeds comparable to cars so it not truly too far away. When I get to the ramen shop I check just to make sure they offer the challenge. They confirm that they do. There is a wall of failures with hundreds of pictures and a success wall with only 3. The challenge consists of 3 cups of spicy broth, 9 lbs of bean sprouts, 4 servings of noodles, 4 mega pieces of karage fried chicken, and it was delicious. Demolished all of it in under 20 minutes got my picture taken, my meal comped, and paid 50,000 yen.


Chapter 27: Chapter 27

With 50,000 yen I had significantly more options. However, I earmark a significant portion of that money for rent. There was a dorm/hostel near the outskirts of the city that was super cheap, but I had written off any places I would have to pay too much for. It's popular with students who move here for school specifically UA. Kids will move here months before the UA test then leave. Either because they didn't make it and no longer need to be here. Or because they did make it in and therefore can afford a better apartment. This means outside of summer it sees very little business. It's right next to the train station if I get a train pass or I can continue to run everywhere. But I should be able to get a room there for 30,000 a month. In the morning I have some free time before meeting back at Kawaguchi's office. I think I'll go rent a room there at least for this month.

My night is incredibly unproductive as I don't know what I can productively do. I head the dump/beach looking around for anything cool, but it is just a dump and without some serious digging I couldn't find anything. I spend most of the night just relaxing by the ocean. Thinking about what I've done so far. What I will be doing.

There's nothing forcing me to be a hero, but I'm not going to be a villain especially with the power structure that the league of villains has. Also, they're basically just anarchists with no real goal besides overthrowing hero society. Not that I think it's perfect or even good. Just thinking about Endeavor makes me furious, but the solution isn't to replace a bad system with no system or an even worse system. With Villain eliminated as an option that leaves Hero, Civilian, and Vigilante. Vigilante is out because it's like being a hero, but with none of the legal, financial, or training support just worse than being a hero in every way. I guess you're hypothetically more free with methods, but heroes are already pretty free to do whatever they want. As long as someone poses a clear and imminent danger a hero can kill or maim them with no real legal repercussions. They don't for a moral reason and because it makes them look bad for the public. But the fact that heroes can do that means there are very few of any benefits of being a Vigilante. Then the final alternative is being a civilian. Which poses 2 problems first I'm only marginally safer. I'm still pretty likely to run into villains during their attacks, however, now they'll be taking me by surprise. I won't have any information and my most legal recourse is to run away. I'll only be switching chasing danger as a hero for danger finding me as a civilian. That's not to mention hiding away as a civilian might cause me more forced drawbacks for my next jump. The 10 years of being significantly disadvantaged are enough for me. I know with all of my physical and mental abilities I have abilities equal to or greater than most quirks, but I have nothing truly exceptional at the moment. I'll have to handle people with moderately strong quirks intelligently working around their specific weaknesses. Then there are people with truly strong quirks like All for One or One for All. I need to figure out some way to compete with powers at that scale or at the very least find a way to reliably run away from them.

As the sun starts to rise I go on a bit of a shopping spree. I go to a pharmacy/corner store and buy essentials like toothpaste, toothbrush, deodorant, etc. Then I go to a cell phone carrier and try to purchase a plan for a flip phone with texts and calls only. That kind of plan was cheap back in the early 2000s but now that plan doesn't even exist. Cellular data is so ubiquitous I can't even find a plan without it. For 3,000 yen a month, about what I was expecting to pay for the flip phone with only texts and calls, I got an older model smartphone with 20gb of data a month. Happy with my phone plan I set out towards the out of prefecture student housing. Its run by a surprisingly nice old couple renting the building after their kids moved out. This time of year is usually their slowest time and this year is especially bad. As in no renters at all bad. The new school year just started, so the kids who were accepted to nearby schools moved into nicer and closer buildings. The kids who weren't accepted just moved out and back home. I look around and the only thing really wrong with it is the location. The room I'd be renting is kind of small. Just enough room for a bed, desk, closet, and dresser. However, even though it's small it is an individual room. Plus it has communal amenities. Large shared living room, bathroom, laundry room, and kitchen. I need a place to stay and this place isn't bad so I pay for a 30,000 for the month. My room technically isn't safe from being rented to someone else next month or even to me but at an increased price, but I've got a couple of months before that starts becoming an actual concern. And when my money situation becomes a bit more stable I'll sign an actual lease.

After filling out some paperwork I drop off my stuff in my room get a quick shower before heading back to the offices for day two.


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