[Chapter:29][The Takagi Estate (I) .]

'Hmm? Ah, looks like I got another SP.'

Grace glanced at his Status, and noticed his Points go from 969 to 1,000, making him smile as he reduced them to 1 SP instead.

*whoosh*

And almost instantly, a blue firefly appeared before his eyes, staring into his scarlet eyes with her own tiny yet large sapphire-like watery blue eyes.

'…'

(…)

'…'

(…)

Grace looked at the almost begging expression on the little loli's face and smiled.

'A deal's a deal. One spin.'

(Yay! I love you Grace!)

'I don't need that kind of cheap love.'

Grace rolled his eyes at the loli's sudden confession, making her pout and glare at him before excitedly flying over to his head and settling down in her seat / bed and waving her hands, opening the Lottery window.

Grace looked outside, not really interested in seeing the loli spin the wheel just like the tens of times he had seen already, and noticed they were far less 'them' in this part of the city than beyond the river.

'I see…no wonder the army decided to focus here instead…'

He could also see far less crash sites and human corpses, making him realise that the Takagi mansion was probably filled with quite a few survivors already.

Just then, a squeal of disappointment reached his ears.

(Oh come on! Why is my luck so bad this time!?)

Grace blinked at the high pitched voice that was unlike the normal gentle and soothing and almost 'beautiful' voice Dea-chan had, and took a glance at the reason.

'Ah…no wonder…'

...

(Rubber Duck Incense Burner : E)

Type : Item

Description : An incense burner shaped and coloured like a yellow rubber duck. It is made of a material that is highly heat resistant yet is similar to rubber in texture, thus allowing it to float in the bathtub even as the incense placed inside continues to burn.

...

He chuckled mentally, and before she could even ask, he quipped back,

'Don't even think about it.'

(Please! Just one more! I'm sure I'll get you a…a…SSS+! No! EX++! I'll get you an incredible Ability! Promise!)

Grace paused, and thought about it for a moment, and just as Dea-chan thought he'd agree…

'I refuse!'

(Why!?)

'The one thing I, Grace Godkin, like more than anything else, is finding people who think they're hot shit and saying 'no' straight to their faces.'

Dea-chan understandably snorted and huffed in anger, and proceeded to pull Grace's hair in anger, though it only amused him more.

'Hmm? Ah, looks like we arrived here.'

He blinked at the sight of the faint, nearly invisible thin wires spread around forming a perimeter and smiled as he stood up and stretched his body, making it crack and pop.

'Man now I envy my junior, his Gamer's Body makes him sore-proof even if he sits in the same position for days.'

Cracking his neck, and attracting the attention of those in the Group, he walks forward and and leans towards where Saya was sitting, making her blush slightly at the sudden close contact.

"Please stop the bus, Kyoko-san."

"Hmm? Ah, sure."

Kyoko, while she didn't know why, nodded as she stopped the minibus, and just in time too, as mere inches from the front of the bus, several horizontal lines of wires shone suddenly.

"Wires? Ah, they made a perimeter?"

She blinked, understanding why Grace asked her to stop the vehicle.

"Yes. Looks like quite a few survivors managed to gather up to for a group."

Saya grimaced at that, seemingly realising something unpleasant, while many of the Group winced when Grace called the people 'survivors'.

Grace, of course, noticed this, making him roll his eyes in exasperation.

"Please, get used to it. The world's gone to shit. And I'd really feel hurt it if one of you keeps denying that ends up dead, or worse."

'All of you are either waifus or potential errand boys after all. Hell, the waifus aside, I might even take the errand boys to other worlds just to do the dirty work. Now if only I have something like a low-key slave collar to ensure their undying loyalty…'

Shaking the dangerous thought of slaves out of his head, Grace ignores the complex expressions of the Group members and proceeds to get down.

"We'll wait here, and make some noise. Hopefully, these people who were intelligent enough to make a perimeter are also not idiotic enough to not make regular patrols, so we should be able to get in without cutting the wires. Hopefully."

Grace looked at their only gunner at the moment.

"Kohta-kun, be a dear and get up the roof will you? And use the air guns you assembled in your free time first, we're pretty short on actual ammo."

The fatty nodded as a vicious, almost sadistic grin appeared on his face.

'Man, I really don't get the fatty, one moment he's a timid fatty, the next he's a badass fatty.'

(He's still a fatty though.)

Grace glanced above.

'Your angry tantrum is over?'

(Yup~~! The cure and lovely Dea-chan is back to being cheerful again~~!)

Dea-chan quipped back without a hint if embarrassment, making Grace's lips twitch.

'Whatever.'

He then looked at Takashi and Hisashi, who had taken a few shooting lectures from the fatty back in the apartment.

"Can the two of you use both guns and the baseball bats? Thank you, also, try not to get bitten alright? I won't show mercy since you aren't cute girls."

"We know.", Takashi sighed at the blatant gender discrimination and showed a fake pained expression, making the Group chuckle as the tension lessened a little.

Hisashi shook his head with a smile before handing his rod to Takashi, who held the long, cylindrical object with both hands and felt his heart rate pick up as he imagined what he was about to do.

(Gay~~)

'I'll be sure to make that true. For the greater good.'

Luckily for Grace, he had noticed that the three days the Group had spent in the apartment had caused the boys, who had frequently gone out, to have less contact with the girls and him who stayed behind, meaning Takashi and Hisashi had gotten closer while Rei didn't have the chance to do, well, anything.

And that caused Hisashi's glances towards him to lessen.

'Still, I'm not going to take chances.', Grace thought to himself as he glanced at Hisashi's back and trembled lightly.

'Soon.'

(Wow, you actually sound like a third rated villain now.)

Grace ignored the blue firefly's remark as he looked at Saeko, who gave him a charming grin as she didn't even wait for him to say anything and got down with her bokken that had been warming up, being hugged between her breasts and all.

(Feeling jealous are we~~?)

'Would you shut up?'

(Nope~~!)

Grace blinked before it hit him.

'You damn little twerp, you're taking revenge this way aren't you?'

(Wow, you figured it out~~ What gave you the first clue, Holmes~~?)

Grace sighed, though he was also helpless. It's not like he could shove the annoying pixie into a glass jar and cap it before throwing it into the river right?

'That…actually sounds like a good idea.'

(Don't even think about it!)

She snorted.

(You and the readers might have forgotten, but I am a Supreme Goddess! The highest being in this Universe, even Author-san can only influence me from the outside and can't do anything if I really want to keep him out!)

'Yes, Yes, Whatever you say My Lady.'

Grace then proceeded to ignore her as he looked at Rei and the two best friends Misuzu and Toshimi.

"Rei-chan, and the two of you, you've been learning how to fight right? How about you try it first hand? But stay close to Saeko-chan and especially in sight of Kohta-kun alright?"

The two newbies to fighting nodded their heads determinedly while Rei took her Weapon, a metal spear with several knife blades welded at the end and rough and coarse cloth wrapped around at the other end for better grip, and handed two similar spears to the two.

"Thank you for making these, Grace-san. You even fixed their height and weight for me."

Grace looked at Rei who thanked him sincerely and smiled.

"Don't fret it. Also, I'm technically not that older than you, so just call me Grace."

"Th-thats…"

While Rei, who blushed lightly, hesitated, the cheerful Toshimi didn't.

"Then you can call me Toshimi too Grace-kun!"

"Haha, sure thing Toshimi-chan. Or rather, that's what I've been calling you from the beginning, isn't that right Misuzu-chan?"

"A-Ah, th-that's right Grace-kun."

Grace smiled at the sight of the blushing brown head, and then looked at the orange head, who hesitated for a few more seconds before sighing.

"Fine, I'll call you Grace-kun to then."

"Excellent! And the same for you all too."

He looked back at Saya, Yuuki, Shizuka, and Kyoko, who only nodded, though Shizuka still had her clueless adorable smile on her face while Saya frowned lightly and Yuuki's blushed.

And only Kyoko seemed to hesitate, before asking,

"Is there anything I can do?"

Grace blinked before he understood her reason for asking such a question.

'Ah, unlike Shizuka in the original, who knew she wasn't that good at fighting and instead decide to give the Group moral support, she's probably annoyed that teenagers barely over half her age were risking their Ives while she's sitting here safely.'

Grace looked at her with a smile.

"Well, you need to be here if we end up making too much noise and need to make a quick retreat right?"

He looked at Shizuka, who had the adorable pink haired loli Alice-chan on her laps, and then looked at Saya and Yuuki.

"Shizuka-san…", he began, but was interrupted.

"Mou~~ Call me just Shizuka~! Don't be so formal, Grace-kun~~"

"Shizuka…"

Kyoko sighed at her junior colleague's antics, while Grace, surprised at first, smiled.

"Sure thing. Then Shizuka-chan, can you take care of Alice-chan?"

She nodded her head cutely.

"Saya-chan and Yuuki-chan, can you look around from inside? We need to quickly go away if too many of 'them' appear here, after all."

The two nodded, thought Grace spotted some frustration on Yuuki's face.

'Hmm, look like she's feeling a little useless. And Saya…well, the self proclaimed genius seems fine, but also nervous…guess she's feeling complex about her family.'

Grace walked out of the minibus while thinking about the changes he had caused.

'Unlike in the original, we spent three days in the apartment…and yet we have a much larger and faster means of transportation, a larger Group, and better weapons overall.'

Grace had used some free time to make weapons. Not overly complex ones, just simple weapons, like baseball bats with loads of spikes welded and with a better grip, or reinforcing the bokken with a good grip and some metal layer after much negotiation with Saeko, the custom spears for the three girls, or even the basic air guns he helped the fatty make.

The air guns were actually his best creation, taking up nearly half a day to make even with the parts 'miraculously' and 'luckily' available in some random shops. But they shot small ball bearings that Grace had managed to 'collect' and 'scavenge' tens of thousands of with just enough force to pierce the skull even from a hundred feet or so away.

'I wonder now…'

Shaking his head, he looked at the Group, who appeared ready to fight, and the four corpses of 'them' that were already taken down, and smiled.

"What song do you all want to listen to?"

"Eh? Song?"

Naomi, who had somehow gotten her hands on a spiked baseball bat, blinked her eyes as Grace took out his heavyweight heavy-duty sledgehammer that he had decorated with several knife blades and nails from within the minibus' outer storage and proceeded to open a few sockets.

"Yo! Genius! You asked me what else I crammed into this big guy right?"

Saya looked at him from inside the minibus, clearly having heard him, as Grace flipped a few switches.

*boom!*

And a loud, booming sound ensued.

"…you've gotta be kidding me…"

"I hope you guys don't mind heavy metal."

Grace grinned.

Saya's jaw dropped.

The Group was dumbfounded.

And in a completely ordinary post-apocalyptic day in this part of the City, with the living and the un-living coexisting not-so-peacefully,

"Livin' easy

Lovin' free

Season ticket on a one way ride

Askin' nothin'

Leave me be

Takin' everythin' in my stride

Don't need reason

Don't need rhyme

Ain't nothin' that I'd rather do

Goin' down

Party time

My friends are gonna be there too

I'm on the highway to hell

On the highway to hell

Highway to hell~"

"Man you gotta love the classics."

A blood pumping rock song began to resound throughout the streets, making heads, both fine and not-so-fine, turn.

"I'm on the highway to hell~"