An Arcanist in Karakura Town 10 (Patreon)

An Arcanist in Karakura Town
Chapter 10

-VB-

Ting Tong!

… Since when did our warehouse-house have a doorbell?

(Hidemasa probably installed it just because he can, greedy greedy ex-emperor.)

I got up from the bed without making any noise, pulling myself off of Orihime. It was a quick walk from the bedroom to the front door, and I opened the door.

Just like yesterday, Urahara stood in front of my door at an ungodly hour with a cheeky grin on his face.

“Good morning, Marris-san!” he said cheerfully, even though I knew that he wasn’t cheerful at all, not when he was here to recruit me into his club.

“Morning.”

“So, have you thought about my offer?” he asked me.

“I did.”

“And?”

“No.”

He blinked. Then his head tilted just a bit back and he lost his smile. “No…? But I thought we had reached an understanding yesterday.”

“You told me the situation as you saw it from your end, but I have a few more things up my sleeve that made your proposal unnecessary.”

He blinked again. “I… did not expect you to turn down my offer.”

“What made you think that I would accept your offer?”

“Well, you obviously know about me and the other ex-captains who reside in this city-.”

How did I give that away?

“-with how you interacted with us. When you encountered Shinji, you weren’t like the rest of the human mortals who saw competition; while acting cautiously, Shinji saw that you were trying to be respectful to a degree.”

Damn souls with their long life and mountains of experience. Was it that easy to derive that much information from two meetings?

“The only reason why I made that offer to you was because you seemed like a good man-”

I couldn’t help it; I laughed.

“What’s so funny?”

“I am not a good man.”

My bluntly honest statement made Urahara pause. He looked at me, truly looked at me, before nodding slowly. “If that is what you see yourself as, then I cannot dispute you. My opinion, however, remains unchanged. Your action earlier this week is evidence that even if you do not consider yourself good, you are good - to a degree.”

“My action earlier this week? I was just standing on top of the most hotspot for Hollow attacks and just killed Hollows that got close.”

“Certainly, you were doing it for your own benefit, but you see, there were better spots within the immediate area, but you chose to defend a high school filled with teenagers unable to defend themselves.”

“My woman was there.”

“You could have taken her away.”

I did think about just carrying Orihime away but knew that she would be upset if her school was damaged or her classmates - seniors, peers, or juniors - killed by my negligence and uncaring behavior.

“No, not really.”

“If you truly were ‘not good,’ then you wouldn’t have done half of what you did.”

I supposed that his words were true even when viewed without the full context that I had.

“Bad men don’t cater to their women’s desires.”

Okay, so he did have most of the context.

“Still, the answer is no. I don’t want to fight in your war.”

“Ah, giving yourself away again, Marris-san.”

I grunted irritably. “So is your business done? I’m not joining.”

“Very well. I suppose I won’t interfere in what’s to come. But if you are willing to get paid for some services…” he said as he pulled out a business card from within his left sleeve.

“Wait, you were about to get me to join you without paying me?”

“You hadn’t asked,” the cheeky fucker grinned.

I glared at him.

-VB-

After Urahara left, I found myself cooking breakfast. As much as Orihime’s dishes were edible and tasty, I wasn’t in the mood for experimentation when I needed to think.

Because despite my refusal of Urahara’s offer of alliance and employ, I really did lack a lot of options when it came to dealing with spiritual creatures.

First off, due to the mechanics of how I was dropped into this universe, my magic worked on spiritual beings without much problem. The real problem was the scale of power. I had just begun using 6th Tier spells, but arcane spells weren’t for power; they were for utility.

Or, as a regular DnD player calls them, hax.

To be an arcanist, wizard, or sorcerer was to bypass the regularity by literally twisting reality to my whims to solve my problems.

I, unfortunately, still thought like a brute using magic as a big stick, which was not a good thing. I needed to start thinking about properly utilizing the myriad of spells I had at my disposal.

I had to remember that I wasn’t a shounen protagonist like Kurosaki Ichigo. He and his fellow trope protagonists would simply gain more and more power with very little flexibility to go with it, powering through obstacles with just a bit of training. I knew that I couldn’t achieve anything like that. I was barely achieving a steady barely noticeable growth of my internal magical/spiritual reserve by cannibalizing Hollows.

I had to go for dirty tricks.

When Orihime walked out of the bed, I put on a smile for her not just because I didn’t want to ruin her morning mood but also because she was half-naked. Seeing her firm and large boobs jiggle with each step taken and wearing my shirt? 

Just ...

Perfect.

What?

I’m a pervert.

-VB-

As soon as Orihime went to school, I hit the spellbook.

I spent hours formulating spell combinations, material costs, and even changing some of the spell’s verbal components so that I wouldn’t give myself away to whichever opponent I might come across.

“What are you doing?”

I looked up and saw Hidemasa.

“Planning for battle.”

He grinned. “Oh, good. I was wondering when you were going to start properly planning for combat.”

My cheeks twitched. “I keep you around as a shield and advisor, Hide. Couldn’t you have, you know, told me instead of waiting for a self-enlightenment?”

“No, I quite couldn’t.”

“Why not?”

“You were too busy fooling around with girls.”

I threw my hands up in frustration and defeat and went back to planning out spell combinations.

“So what spell combinations have you thought of so far?”

I paused before I decided to speak to Hide. “The first combination that I wrote down is ‘Hold Person’ and ‘Toll the Dead.’”

“What do they do?”

“‘Hold Person’ is a spell that holds a person in my line of sight, and ‘Toll the Dead’ is a cantrip spell that …”

I think I spent the rest of the morning just discussing each spell combinations I thought of while considering new ones Hide suggested.