There Is No Place For Fakes [EN]: Chapter 104

“Le Guin?”

There was no reply.

Philomel called out the names of those who had been with her until just now, raising her voice slightly.

“Le Guin! Jeremiah! Lexion! Cardin!”

She called the four names several times, but the surroundings remained silent.

‘We were all together just a moment ago… Could it be that I’m the only one who moved to a different place?’

If so, the cause must be the light emanating from the meteorite rock.

Clearly, the light seemed to be pushing others away. It was an unconscious moment, but even the master of the magic tower, Le Guin, couldn’t react.

‘What on earth is that rock…?’

Philomel pondered the identity of the rock, standing still and waiting.

If she was stranded, she thought it would be best to wait where she was until others came to rescue her.

However, even after what felt like a considerable amount of time, there was no sign of anyone.

“I’m scared!”

Being alone in the thick fog made her feel terrified.

Feeling like she should do something, she started walking aimlessly.

She hadn’t taken more than a few steps when ‘it’ appeared. It was a fox walking upright, wearing clothes.

‘A beastman?’

But its appearance was too bizarre to be called a beastman.

Its face seemed to be half the size of her kidney, and its eyes were large. In a word… it was cute.

Looking closely, it felt more like a fox drawn in a fairy tale illustration than a real fox.

The fox quickly approached Philomel and tilted its head.

“Bug?”

This time, it tilted to the other side.

“Player?”

The fox repeated the action for a while.

“Bug? Player? Bug? Player? Bug? Player?”

The fox’s voice was very cute, just like its appearance, but Philomel felt uneasy for some reason. Especially when it said the word ‘bug,’ its face seemed quite scary, perhaps because of the shadows.

She didn’t know exactly what the concepts of ‘bug’ and ‘player’ were, but she felt like she shouldn’t be judged as a ‘bug’.

Philomel shouted without realizing it.

“I, I’m a player!”

Instantly, the fox’s face brightened up like a clear sky.

“Welcome to the store, Player!”

At the same time, the thick fog that had been surrounding them completely cleared away. And a small, pretty building, as if drawn in a picture, appeared.

Philomel read the large letters written on the sign.

“…Starlight Store.”

It was a store with a distinctive pink exterior. It had an open structure that allowed a clear view inside, and it seemed to sell products on display stands.

“Welcome!”

The fox, who had been standing next to her just a moment ago, was already inside the store.

‘…Is that the salesperson?’

Philomel cautiously approached, but the fox kept smiling brightly.

She glanced at the items on the display stand and then turned around to head to the back of the store.

She decided to investigate from the back first. It’s not because she was afraid to face the fox head-on.

At that moment, Philomel, who was taking a deep breath behind the empty store, heard footsteps.

There was someone other than the fox.

“Welcome to the store, Player!”

Someone shouted at the fox, who was giving the exact same greeting as when it greeted Philomel.

“When will the megaphone sales ban be lifted!”

Philomel gasped.

Elencia’s memories, which the Eye of Truth had shown her a little while ago, flashed in her mind. At the end, she looked around the pond and said.

“Here, here is… !”

It’s not the novel I wrote, nor is it .

“It’s the Doki Doki Palace Life of the Returned Princess!” [A lighthearted romance simulation game].

The place was in front of the Starlight Store.

The fox politely replied to Elencia, who was looking for a megaphone and getting angry.

“I’m very sorry. This question cannot be answered. If you have any further questions, please use the Q&A board…”

“Create a bulletin board and then say that! Where is that bulletin board anyway?”

“I’m very sorry. This question cannot be answered. If you have any further questions…”

“Aaaargh! This damn game!”

“Profanity detected. Please promote a healthy gaming culture through proper language…”

“F–”

“Profanity detected. A penalty will be given for accumulating 50 instances of profanity.”

“What? No way!”

“The favorability of the characters will be randomly reduced.”

“My favorability! F, don’t do it!”

“Profanity detected. Please promote proper language…”

“You foxy bastard!”

“Profanity detected. Proper…”

“Aaaargh!”

Elencia fumed for a while, then finally uttered words that weren’t curses.

“…Forget it, just give me a mid-grade potion of wisdom.”

“How many would you like?”

“One!”

“That will be 3 gold.”

A clinking sound of coins colliding was heard.

“Thank you for your patronage!”

Instead of replying to the fox’s greeting, the sound of angry footsteps was heard.

Philomel waited for quite a while, and when she was sure that Elencia had completely disappeared, she came out from behind the store.

Standing in front of the display stand, the fox gave the same greeting again.

“Welcome to the store, Player!”

Philomel sensed it. One of the secrets of Elencia that she had been curious about was here.

‘I have to find out.’

She pondered the cryptic conversation between Elencia and the fox, looking at the fox. The fear of this strange creature had long since faded.

Philomel carefully opened her mouth.

“…Um, hello?”

“Hello!”

“What kind of place is this?”

“This is the Starlight Store.”

Just hearing the store’s name didn’t give her a sense of what it did.

Philomel’s gaze turned to the display stand. Items were placed in evenly spaced compartments. Strangely, more than half of the items were stained black.

She decided to examine the items with intact shapes first.

Food, accessories, potions, and even strange objects she had never encountered before.

‘What a random assortment of goods… Wait, potions?’

An object that looked familiar came into her view. A yellow liquid in a star-shaped glass bottle.

‘That’s the magic potion Elencia was drinking!’

The moment Philomel reached out to take a closer look at the potion.

A square window popped up with a ding. Clearly, in the empty air.

She looked at the top line of the string of characters listed on the window.

[■■ ■■■ ■■ (■/■■)]

It was the same characters that were in Elencia’s diary.

In the very next moment, the window flickered and shook.

The unidentified characters slowly transformed into characters that Philomel knew well. It was the language of the Belleroph Empire.

‘Does it change to the language that the viewer is most familiar with?’

Since she had been continuously surprised since a while ago, Philomel quickly understood and moved on, even in front of the bizarre window.

Soon, all the characters on the window changed to the imperial language.

She read the top line again.

[Mid-Grade Wisdom Potion (3/20)]

The text continued below.

[Description: Increases the user’s intellectual ability upon consumption.

Duration: 30 minutes

Price: 3 gold]

The increase in intellectual ability and the efficacy matched Elencia’s potion.

‘The source was right here!’

Philomel moved her gaze to the next compartment.

There was a potion that was similar to the mid-grade wisdom potion, but it was a bit smaller and had a lighter color. When she touched the potion, a window appeared in the air without fail.

[Low-Grade Wisdom Potion (7/30)

Description: Slightly increases the user’s intellectual ability upon consumption.

Duration: 10 minutes

Price: 2 gold]

The difference from the mid-grade was that ‘slightly’ was added to the description, and there was a difference in duration and price.

‘If there are mid-grade and low-grade, there must be high-grade too.’

However, the space next to the mid-grade, where the high-grade was expected to be, was occupied by a black object.

Crack!

Philomel tried to touch the object, but an unknown force blocked her. Still, the description window popped up.

[High-Grade Wisdom Potion (?/?)

This product has not yet been unlocked. Meet the conditions to get the product in your hands.

Unlock Condition: Favorability 200 or higher]

‘Favorability? What is this?’

Come to think of it, when Elencia received a profanity penalty, it was said that her favorability would be reduced.

Philomel asked the fox, hoping it would tell her.

The fox replied cheerfully.

“Favorability is a numerical indicator of the degree of affection that three target characters and one service character feel towards the player.”

Target characters? Service character?

She didn’t know any of the terms.

The fox continued to explain. “The more favorability you accumulate, the more store items will be unlocked. In addition, the favorability status of all characters can be found on the information board on the right side of the store.”

As it said, a small information board was attached to the right wall of the store.

Next to the small faces of the four people drawn, their respective names and bar graphs were visible. They were all people she knew.

-Eustace (Family): 82%

-Nasar: 0%

-Jeremiah: 0%

-Killian: 76%

Total Favorability: 158

Philomel blankly stared at the four red bars. More precisely, two of them were closer to lines than bars.