Though it was a bit of an exaggeration, this really was the best fish she had ever eaten. Tiona was effortlessly defeated on the spot.
Ritsuka laughed happily. Even if they came from different worlds and could not understand each other's writing, food really did make it easy to connect. Opening a little restaurant like this was not such a bad idea either.
That was right. Without even realizing it, she had turned her snack shop into a little restaurant.
Thank Old Man Matsuzaki for helping me make the menu board.
Because she could not read the words, Ritsuka had no choice but to ask the old gentleman next door, Old Man Matsuzaki, to make a signboard for her. She sincerely thanked him in her heart.
"My ramen is pretty good too. Do you want to try some?"
"My cake is delicious too..."
"Let me try one of Ais's fried potato balls."
"No."
The girls chattered away, seeming eternally full of energy. Ritsuka and Riveria exchanged a smile.
Turning around, Ritsuka returned to the kitchen and took out her treasured tea leaves, a small amount of black tea Old Man Fujimura Raika had given her.
She immediately brewed a pot and brought it outside.
"This is a special complimentary treat. Would everyone like to try some?"
Release Announcement
It will be going premium tomorrow. I always say I'm a newbie, but I'm actually just a flop author who has already written one book with decent results.
I really enjoy the feeling of writing. I had wanted to write Snowbound Oath for a long time, but judging from the number of bookmarks, this book honestly does not look promising. Even though I have put more effort into it than my previous book, its results are indeed far worse.
In a sense, the situation is not great.
When my last book went premium, it had just passed 2,000 bookmarks. Then it immediately dropped to 1,800 after release. After a whole year, it finally reached over 12,000 bookmarks by the time I stopped writing it. That was fairly decent, and my monthly royalties were around five to six thousand.
I'm such an old salted fish...
As for this book, at the time I am writing this release announcement, it only has 668 bookmarks. Even my editor advised me to start another one with a different approach...
At this point, it is not even an unfinished work anymore. It is getting axed. qaq
I will not ask for much. I usually ask for recommendation votes, but for this book, let's just leave it at that--
If it has more than 1,500 bookmarks by the time Volume Two is finished, I will keep updating it. If not, I will axe it and start a new book. Back when I started this one, I came up with quite a few opening ideas.
For example, continuing the same type of infinite-world story as my last book, polishing it up, and getting rid of the complicated and error-prone mountains of data.
Or a multiverse anime crossover starting in Honkai, set in Siberia before the Second Honkai Eruption, where the protagonist would connect with pufferfish Sirin. But that one did not have a concrete main plot outline, so I abandoned it.
There was also a Type-Moon-starting anime crossover, with Mordred as the protagonist, a girl who traveled there from another world. That one did not have anything fancy; it simply drew on Servant Mordred's abilities, along with an ordinary Golden Finger.
Overall, though, I am most satisfied with this current one. Its outline is similar to the Mordred concept, but because the protagonist is an alternate version of Emiya Shirou, she will arrive at the Fifth Holy Grail War in a later volume. That is also the part I expect to be the most explosive in this book.
After all, Sakura is there...
After saying all that, I am not really trying to complain. I do not want this book to get axed either, but I need to eat. As a college student, I have not asked my family for money in almost a year.
I only have 2,000 left. If I lose this source of income after school starts, I might GG together with the book.
I am in Zhengzhou. I just starved to death. Going anonymous.
There is not much saved material either, so I will not open a bounty campaign. The bounty campaign for my last book failed miserably; I was devastated. If this book dies horribly, I will most likely use that Mordred outline.
The main plots of the two books are roughly the same. The difference is probably that Ritsuka is about healing and going home, while Mordred is about rebellion and recognition!
After all, it is little Mordred. Of course she loves King Arthur the most...(Magic Sword warning.JPG)
PS: 1. I hope everyone understands. I do not want to put down this book that I personally think is pretty good, and I do not want to bow to society immediately. If possible, I will keep working hard.
Oh, right, as usual, please vote. Recommendation votes are enough. First-day subscriptions do not really matter. Even if all 668 people subscribed to the first two chapters on day one, there would not be many first subscriptions anyway...
2. No matter what, I will write until I am thirty first. (laughs)
The Familia's Invitation
"You want to invite me to join the Loki Familia?"
Ritsuka tilted her head, a trace of confusion appearing in her mind.
Riveria nodded at that and said seriously, "Yes. By order of our chief goddess, Loki, I have come to invite you to join us."
After the meal, Ritsuka had been invited aside by Riveria for a conversation. She blinked in surprise, her thoughts stirring.
She roughly knew why she had been invited. More accurately, she had sensed it when she saw Lefiya, and Riveria had indicated that it was Loki's intention.
It felt similar to goddess Freya's intentions, but the method of invitation was worlds apart.
The fierce warrior Ottar had wanted to seize her by force, perhaps due to confidence in his own strength. The Loki Familia, on the other hand, had come to understand Ritsuka somewhat after two chance encounters, so they naturally would not make such rash and improper moves.
The only thing confusing Ritsuka now was that she roughly understood why Loki had invited her, but what was going on with Freya?
Why had Freya set her sights on her?
Ritsuka felt somewhat troubled as she looked over the Loki Familia members before her.
Nine Hell, Sword Princess, Great Cut, Angry Snake, Thousand Fairies...
It seemed that the Loki Familia's strongest female adventurers were all here, and they had come to her door as customers. Riveria's decision had to be called a good one.
She could not exactly refuse them harshly and then throw them all out, could she?
"The Loki Familia... I'm sorry, but for personal reasons, I have no intention of becoming an adventurer right now."
Ritsuka shook her head and still chose to refuse.
Her current life was quite good. Even though she now knew that the Falna would not have much effect on her own strength, she had no interest in that power anymore.
To begin with, she was someone who should have died.
Working hard for power was nothing unusual to Ritsuka.
She had even fought herself to death once. Unless she had a chance to return to that world... that place where Human History was about to be destroyed.
But how could that be possible? Even the gods of this world could not leave this world, so what made her worthy of such a thing?
The gods of this world were not weak. That was beyond doubt. After all, even that unreliable Hestia had given Ritsuka an unmatched feeling the first time she saw her.
Hestia seemed to be one of the Greek Twelve Olympians in mythology, right?
Ritsuka recalled that busty little girl with the incredible figure.
"Of course, I believe you are very interested in my power. But you do not need to dwell on it too much."
Projection. The Star Sword was born in Ritsuka's hand.
It was merely an inferior shell, without any inner concept. Ritsuka had no interest in modifying this projected weapon. She simply held Excalibur.
A blue hilt, a golden guard, a medieval one-handed knight's sword, radiating a faint yet powerful glow.
Lefiya stood up at once. Looking at the sword that gleamed just like the one she had received earlier, her eyes widened.
An infinite Magic Sword, created from nothing?
"This..."
Riveria fell into an eerie silence.
The ability to consume a certain amount of magic power and create Magic Swords that could be used endlessly was simply too terrifying. Such an ability had never appeared in Orario. Even those who had developed the extremely rare Mystery ability had never achieved anything like it.
"May I ask, Emiya, whether you have ever received the Falna of a Familia before?"
"I'm from another land. A small number of people where I come from can use magic power, and I'm a relatively weak but rather special one."
"No Familia?"
"An outsider? How is that possible? To possess such power without a Falna... could she be the kind of hero who appears once in a thousand years in Fairy Tales, born to save humanity?"
Lefiya and Tiona both cried out in disbelief.
A wisp of orange-red flame curled around her fingertip. Ritsuka's smile was somewhat forced. "How could that be? At most, I'm a villain. I can't be called a hero."
Ritsuka casually returned the fake Curry Stick to Unlimited Blade Works.
She could imitate Noble Phantasms with Projection Magic, but she could not keep using them indefinitely. The Eternal Distant Golden Sword she had given Lefiya was only an Anti-Fortress Noble Phantasm that could be used three or four times.
Its power was probably around Rank A.
It was the Golden Sword wielded by that king, forever engraved in her heart during that distant childhood of which only fragments remained.
That sword belonged to Emiya Shirou, not Emiya Ritsuka.
"How should I put this? In any case, I will not join any Familia. I no longer need power, nor do I need power to protect someone anymore."
"Everyone, please come again."
Whether it was self-indulgence or something else, Ritsuka's mission had already ended. To be honest, her heart was exhausted.
With the dismissal issued, Riveria sighed and said nothing more.
Everyone had their own aspirations. They could not be forced.
Ritsuka walked into the kitchen, packed up an order of fried potato balls Ais had requested, placed them in an oil-paper bag, and finally handed them to the blank-faced blonde Sword Princess.
As Ais accepted the fried potato balls, Ritsuka placed a hand on her head and gently patted it. "Hold onto them. Eat them while they're hot."
The wind chime rang. The girls opened the door and left, while Ritsuka watched them go.
She could not help letting out a soft sigh, her gaze casually shifting toward outside the door.
"Lady Loki, they have all left. Aren't you coming out yet?"
"Haha, so I really... have been discovered."
The space by the entrance twisted, and the red-haired, single-ponytailed goddess appeared inside the shop as though she had materialized from thin air.
Ritsuka narrowed her eyes.
"Lady Loki, if I remember correctly, gods are not allowed to use Divine Power in the lower world, are they?"
That was right. Loki had used a terrifying power distinct from magic power.
That power had warped space, which was why none of the Loki Familia girls had noticed Loki's arrival, including Riveria, the strongest among them.
"Relax, relax. I didn't use Divine Power... Why not just pretend nothing happened?"
Loki waved a hand without the slightest hint of panic, observing apron-clad Ritsuka through her narrow slit-like eyes.
Then, the fingers of both her hands wriggled as she slowly raised them.
Her pervert nature gradually emerged...
"Hmm, Lady Loki, if you intend to do anything improper, I would not mind having a contest with you."
Her pale golden eyes glimmered faintly as Ritsuka clenched her fists.
A divine aura rose from her body. Centered around her belt, a power entirely different from Loki's emerged, causing Loki to widen her eyes in surprise.
"A Divine Construct? And this feeling... Heracles?"
"No. Alcides."
The Star Sword was drawn from Unlimited Blade Works, and the divine aura surrounding Ritsuka poured into it all at once.
The holy sword, which had originally been little better than a toy, finally revealed a trace of its true edge. An aura equivalent to the Eternal Distant Golden Sword began to awaken.
Though she could not project the true holy sword, she had encountered Excalibur at close range and had even possessed Saber's Class Card. Therefore, she could project an imitation close to the Star Sword, though its power would be reduced by one level.
It just consumed a little too much.
"This sword has something of a holy sword about it. You are truly opposing a god--aren't you afraid of death?"
Loki smiled faintly, her ruby-like eyes watching Ritsuka with great interest.
The claim that lower-world gods were forbidden from using Divine Power was nonsense to begin with. It was true that they could not use all of it, but loosening the restraints and using a portion was no problem.
Before you continue