Server Name: Alpha Scarlet. Starting Location: Summer City, Industrial Float #2.
Login confirmed.
Welcome to Money (Game) Master, Suou Kaname.
A wild dance of colorful light seemed to stab deep into a boy’s eyes.
He groaned in his throat as the dizzying and nauseating storm eventually formed a certain scene.
It only took a few seconds. Once his vision came into focus, he found himself inside a sports car with a low ceiling and the steering wheel on the right. Kaname sat in the driver’s seat of the parked car and he glanced up at the face reflected in the rearview mirror. He saw silky brown hair, belligerent angular eyes, a baggy dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up, and a loosened red tie. When he looked down at his hands, he saw a smartwatch on his wrist. Below his hands were his legs in thin blue pants with a mobile pouch attached. He was briefly confused, but his understanding finally caught up.
This was his current self.
And he knew where he was.
He opened the door and stepped out.
The bright tropical sunshine carried a dry heat. This was a coastal industrial region ruled by asphalt and concrete. His small two-seater coupe parked at one end of the coast was colored the bright green of mint ice cream.
And a woman brimming with bewitching charm lay face down on the hood.
She occasionally sipped at the contents of a coconut through a straw.
She almost looked like someone enjoying some sunbathing at the beach, but her outfit was not quite a swimsuit. She wore a thin green miniskirt and a short jacket over a white bikini. It was likely modeled after a race queen outfit. Her sexy bodylines were covered in the logos of various companies – Toy Dream, Megalodiver Shipping, Fiamma Securities, etc. – but these were not simply printed on her clothing. They scrolled across them like an LCD screen or projection mapping.
However, something drew the eye even more than her clothing.
She had long, fluffy hair dyed a mint green, two white horns more like a bull’s than a goat’s coming from either side of her head, bat wings spreading from her back, and a pointed tail that split into two at the end like a man catcher or a stag beetle.
Kaname spoke to the relaxed demon.
“Tselika.”
“What is it, master? You really are punctual, aren’t you?”
The race queen smiled without changing her pose.
“What are you doing there?”
“Filming myself with the drive recorder. Not leaving a record of this unparalleled beauty would be an insult to the world, don’t you think?”
Kaname started to say something, but a light tone came from the spots car Tselika lay on. It was more like a phone’s ringtone than a car’s horn.
Text of various sizes began running across the entire car. It looked like a racecar’s sponsor stickers, but it was not. The entire polished surface was a monitor and a large rectangular window opened on the side giving Kaname the best view.
It appeared to be a video message of some kind. After a countdown in a corner of the screen, a short-haired girl appeared in the window with her eyes darting nervously side to side. She may not have been used to the camera.
Her voice was different from normal too. She was clearly tense.
“Umm, Onii-chan? I think I’m going to go see a movie with my friends Mi-chan and Tanya. It’s Kotemitsu Gold Rush. You know, the one based on the Swiss Panic that was ultimately avoided. I wasn’t sure what to do when they invited me, but I can’t stay at home forever and this seemed like a good chance to change that. So can I go? If I can, please send an approval email. …And hurry! There isn’t much time!!”
There were movie theaters in this city too, but his little sister was talking about something else entirely: the real world. Kaname moved his eyes to operate the digital keyboard and send an approval email to his sister’s address.
Meanwhile, Tselika was exasperated.
“You’re too protective of her.”
“I’m aware of that, but it’s what Ayame wants. She gets upset if I just leave her to her own devices. And the fate of my stomach is in her hands, so I can’t just ignore her.”
“Ho ho? Your little sister cooks for you?”
“No, our parents take turns. But when Ayame’s frustration builds up too high, she starts ‘helping out’ in the kitchen to cheer herself up. Simply put, she adds in a ton of ‘secret ingredients’ that ruin the day’s meal. It’s best to do what she wants.”
And that was not the real topic at hand.
With that minor detail dealt with, Kaname checked the time on the smartwatch synced with his phone and got back on topic.
“What’s happened while I was away? How is my car doing?”
“I did everything on your shopping list. Everything from the gas to the tire pressure is good to go. And with a job coming up, I made sure it was spotless on the inside and out. Ideally, you’ll be buying me a drink to thank me.”
“And the weapon?”
“There is a short-range sniper rifle and ammunition in the trunk. I know it was what you requested, but are sure just the one magazine is enough?”
“How are things with F. Over Industries?”
When he asked that, Tselika rolled over on the hood.
She was now lying on her back. That squished her wings below her, but it did not seem to cause her any pain. She exposed the front of her body as she answered him.
Text continued to scroll along the surface of the bikini top and miniskirt of her race queen outfit, but the words “F. Over” were displayed larger than the rest. Several numbers scrolled by and then some graphs.
The logos on her clothes did belong to companies, but they were not sponsors.
In addition to trending brands and stock price indices, data on product and material transaction prices between related companies was displayed in real time.
Tselika ran a finger along her clothes from her chest to her thigh to indicate the graph displayed along her bodylines.
“As you can see, they’re still falling into the red. Because of the skyrocketing prices of the rare earths they use. But if someone gives them a hint leading to a research breakthrough, that could entirely change, right?”
“Good,” said Kaname.
His basketball shoes stepped on the asphalt as he circled behind the mint green coupe and popped the trunk. He found a weapon there just as the demon had said. It was a Short Spear short-range sniper rifle. It had a collapsible stock and grip covered in red rubber and the overall design looked more like ‘an enlarged handgun with a longer barrel and a stock’ than something that took the strong points of an assault rifle and added to them. It used .45 caliber rounds instead of rifle rounds. By staying just below the speed of sound, it focused more on suppressing the noise than on flight distance.
Instead of inserting the magazine into the bottom of the grip like with a handgun, there was a separate slot like with a rifle. He inserted the magazine there and loaded the first round.
“Tselika, get in the passenger seat.”
“Will do, master.”
They both climbed into the mint green coupe. Kaname took the driver’s seat on the right. It was unclear how it worked, but Tselika folded up her wings so her smooth back was visible below the short decorative jacket. The weapon would have gotten in the way of his driving, so he tossed it into Tselika’s lap. He inserted the key, stepped on the clutch, and hit the ignition button to start the engine.
A deep, monstrous roar erupted.
He lowered the hand brake, shifted into first gear, placed his right foot on the gas pedal, and then slowly let off of the clutch. The gears smoothly fit together and, despite its considerable specs, the two-seater sports car merged onto the road as safely as a record needle being placed on the record.
Summer City was composed of a pointed peninsula shaped like shark tooth, a few islands in the ocean around that, artificial land such as industrial floats, and a giant looping bridge that connected it all together as it ran in a circle around the coral reef ocean. Kaname and Tselika were on Industrial Float #2 which was a few kilometers long and wide, but they could already see other Dealers sneaking around on that gray land filled with plain factories and pipes.
Now, what were the most surefire ways of coming out on top in a financial deal without gambling?
You could perform some insider trading using advance knowledge of what a corporation would be doing. You could take it a step further and threaten corporate executives or major investors into deals that worked to your advantage. You could spread baseless rumors to reduce the value of a company, steal technical information with a cyber-attack, put the designs for a new technology online to forcibly trigger technological innovation, or even blow up the trailers and freight trains loaded with a rival company’s new products.
Of course, doing any of that in the real world would be highly illegal.
But not so here.
After all, Money (Game) Master was cut off from the rules of the real world.
“Some tabloids are reporting that Asgard Motors, known for its Hunts and Aachen brands, is beginning to work in the arms industry by producing tanks and other armored vehicles. The AI press secretary has responded by saying…”
“We have some news from the food industry. Rainy Girl Research had previously announced plans to efficiently mass-produce edible insects to fight poverty, but it has since been revealed that their management has barely even begun to work on…”
“It was rumored that Rush General Trading Company was going to split along internal lines, but they just announced at a press conference that the board of directors has decided to oust the president. The president has expressed intent to gather military might from PMCs and Dealers, so the conflict is expected to…”
These announcements were limited to the game. When you switched on the stereo, you would find either music or financial news meant to inform people of upcoming events. Win or lose? Would you bet on the AI companies or work to crush them instead? How you chose to conquer this open world was up to you.
“Let’s review the mission.”
“We are currently buying up as much aluminum as we can, which only costs a yen a gram in the real world. Nothing has changed yet, but if the price of aluminum skyrockets within the hour, the amount we have stocked up will increase in value a thousand-fold, if not ten-thousand-fold. We bought all that metal for tens of thousands of snow, but we’ll have a chance to sell it off for hundreds of millions. And in fact, we’ve set things up so that will happen. All by using a company called F. Over which is beginning to go under.”
Pure gold and platinum were attractive since they were worth more than 3000 snow per gram, but aluminum was more useful since it only cost 1 snow per gram. Anyone could buy it and having the price rise by just 1 snow would double your money.
The mint green coupe left Industrial Float #2 and drove along a highway-like bridge. The coral reef ocean was more green than blue. Kaname swerved around the other slower-moving cars as he sped down the gently curving bridge.
The speedometer quickly reached 200km/h, but there was no sense of death hanging over them. It may have been the same feeling as playing a racing game.
“And what do we need for that?”
“F. Over Industries is an AI company that sells cameras, but they’re currently in 10th place. Due to the rising prices of a relatively-unheard-of rare earth called cuccunoid, they’re having trouble with their semiconductors. But if we give F. Over some new tech that a smaller company threw out not knowing its value, they will be able to use ordinary aluminum instead. F. Over will shoot to the top of the industry and the price of our metal will absolutely explode.”
Various windows opened on the windshield to show the predicted amount of aluminum that F. Over Industries would need, the predicted price at which they would buy it, a few routes from the park to their headquarters, the predicted quantity and quality of enemy Dealers, predicted attack points, and more.
“So what exactly do we need to do?”
“Receive the attaché case at the peninsula park and deliver it to F. Over Industries headquarters which is also on the peninsula. But this will be a war between the existing cuccunoid and the new aluminum. If we can’t shake off all interference on our own, this will fail.”
Basically, you can think of Money (Game) Master as a financial dealing game in which all illegal activities were allowed. The players known as Dealers entered the virtual financial city of Summer City and competed to increase their starting funds by any means necessary. With no level up system, strength was directly linked to weapons, armor, vehicles, and other equipment, but all such things could be bought with money. The poor would gather empty cans for pocket change they hoped would help them make a comeback, the honest type would buy land or a store to start gradually earning money with a business while occasionally making financial deals, fighting opposing Dealers, and maybe even blowing up a rival’s building. That was the kind of world this was.
They finally reached the end of the seemingly endless bridge and approached the sharp peninsula that resembled a shark tooth.
There was a white beach, palm trees lining the roads, and hibiscuses growing in the flower beds. And there were towering skyscrapers that reflected the sun like mirrors. That den of money would swallow up and increase all forms of greed, sometimes to the point that the Dealers themselves lost control.
“One last check: are you ready to go?”
“Absolutely, master.”
And with that, the mint green sports car entered the peninsula’s financial city.
At the designated park, Kaname accepted the silver attaché case from an AI-controlled female agent with a too perfect smile and tossed it in the trunk.
They were approximately 15km away from their destination at F. Over Industries headquarters.
He made a U-turn which just about scraped against a large metal dumpster, left the large park, and immediately ran across some enemy Dealers.
He worked the shift lever again and again to shift up to 6th and 7th gear when he normally never went past 5th.
The speedometer shot up to the 300km/h range.
But this was just a daily occurrence in Summer City. The bright sports cars never vanished from the rearview mirror as they continued pursuit. There were plenty of security cameras on the building walls and streetlights, but no one took issue with the racing vehicles.
Tselika viewed the map displayed on the windshield and expressed confusion from the passenger seat to his left.
“Master, this isn’t the shortest route!”
“They’d take us out if we went straight there.”
He drove down a major road, ignored the lights, and took a sharp turn at an intersection. He forcibly shifted down to decelerate and used the hand brake to let the back wheels slide around. The tires drew a large black crescent moon on the road and the car just barely avoided a truck driving in from the side as it completed the right turn.
When he operated the hand brake and shift lever again, the pursuers followed but after a short delay. They were too skilled to be shaken that easily.
Plus, the roof of a red sports car opened up and a man stood up from within. He held something in both hands.
“A submachinegun!!” warned Tselika.
“He can’t hit us with all the shaking.”
There was a short burst of gunfire, but true to Kaname’s prediction, neither the tires nor the gas tank were hit. But it was still not pleasant to see sparks flying from the asphalt so close by.
“If that has a Skill-equipped dot sight attached, he might be using auto-aim. The shaking means nothing if it aims for him!!”
“Why is an AI-controlled Magisterus afraid of bullets?”
“Because it still hurts if it hits me! And a lethal injury will still cause me to ‘freeze’, not to mention this can destroy the car that acts as my temple!”
“Your AI’s main data won’t be erased if the car is blown up, will it?”
“Did you think all these temples were designed purely for functionality? You use the beauty of your car to show off to the other Magisteri! Do you have any idea how humiliating damage to my temple would be!? It would be like having the shower’s frosted glass torn down so everyone on the road out front could watch my sexy shower scene!!”
“What, is that all?”
“Kiiii!!”
“Tselika. Mechanical auto-aim has trouble with shaking. There’s no way it can aim properly with all this shaking and blowing wind.”
Kaname looked calm as he held the steering wheel, but a change came over the red sports car pursuing them. The man must have lost his temper because he ducked back inside the car and stood back up with a different weapon on his shoulder.
Tselika’s eyes bugged out.
“Wait, wait, wait. Isn’t that a rocket launcher!?”
“It’s not guided, so we can ignore it. Even if the flames reach us, it can’t kill us without a direct hit.”
“Are you hoping the auto-aim fails again?”
“It’ll miss. The most it’ll manage is blowing up one of the dumpsters around here.”
“How can you be so sure!?”
“I can smell it. I don’t sense that tingling here, so we’re still fine.”
“You mean your Lion’s Nose? How can I trust something isn’t a real Skill provided by a weapon or clothing!?”
Just then, a thought occurred to Tselika. Some 9mm bullets would be one thing, but what if a rocket flew off target and hit the sidewalk?
Accidents like that were part of the fun of Money (Game) Master, but a Dealer girl who looked like the honest type just so happened to be walking along the sidewalk selling fruit.
“…”
“Hey, master?”
He made a split-second decision.
He slammed his foot down on the brake pedal. The mint green coupe decelerated so rapidly it looked like a giant hand had blocked its way. Tselika had not been wearing a seatbelt and her forehead just about slammed into the windshield.
It felt to them like the mint green coupe had actually been thrown backwards, but the red sports car was rapidly approaching from behind. It ended up driving right alongside them. The man in the driver’s seat and the man on the roof both stared in dumbfounded shock.
Kaname grabbed the Short Spear short-range sniper rifle from Tselika’s lap and smashed the window on the driver’s side.
Instead of relying on auto-aim, he manually aimed at the red sports car’s driver. He aimed right between the man’s eyes.
And he pulled the trigger once.
There was no loud gunshot. With a sound more like a metal clasp bursting open, the other car’s window and the driver’s brains were blown apart. The red sports car lost control and crashed into a traffic light pole with the other man still on the roof.
Also, Tselika was screaming.
“What is wrong with yooooooooooooouuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu!? My temple, my status symbol, my car!! How could you do this, masterrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!?”
“What’d you say!? I can’t hear you over the wind!!”
“Don’t play dumb, master! No matter what you do, that fruit-seller girl isn’t going to thank you. And you had to sacrifice my precious glass for that! Kiiii!!”
“You aren’t supposed to save people because you want some kind of reward.”
While he cut off her complaints with a random argument, something else happened.
A large tanker truck drove in at an intersection and slammed on its brakes to block the way forward. And of course, more cars approached from behind to trap Kaname and Tselika.
“What do we do, master!?”
“We move that big-ass thing up ahead.”
“Ha ha! I appreciate the attempt to sound cool, but one little question: how in the hell do we do that!?”
While Tselika shouted at him and the wind blew in through the broken window, Kaname toyed with the short-range sniper rifle in one hand.
“Can I break the windshield?”
“Don’t – you – darrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrre!!”
Kaname clicked his tongue, stuck his right arm out of the driver’s side window, and aimed the gun with just the one hand. There was no way he could use the scope like this, so he only had his experience to aim with.
He went for the equivalent of a headshot.
For a truck, that meant the gas tank.
No matter how sturdy the vehicle, a hit to that weak point would destroy it. And while the tank on the back of a big tanker truck was too tough to shoot through, there was another rectangular tank below the tractor unit up front.
He only needed one shot.
The gas tank exploded with a deafening boom. The cylindrical tank weighed the back down, but the tractor unit shot up just a bit.
The mint green coupe raced forward at max speed and crammed itself into the gap that created.
After it passed through that space of little more than a meter, the giant metal jaws snapped shut behind them. The pursuing vehicles crashed into the tanker truck one after another, creating a cacophony of destruction.
Kaname glanced up at the rearview mirror and spoke.
“We should be safe for now.”
“Did you somehow miss all these cars approaching us from a different road?”
“Those were waiting over there in case of an emergency. The ones we just crushed were their first string players and these are the second string ones. The quality will be even lower, so it won’t be a problem.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“We’re almost at F. Over Industries headquarters. If the attack were going as planned, they would have positioned their forces a lot sooner than this. Because if they get too close…”
Something happened before he could finish.
After making sure no one was on the sidewalk, he drove the mint green coupe right off the road. He used the gentle accessibility slope like a ski jump to send the carbon-material car airborne. They soared right over the intersection, past the pole-shaped car barriers, and into the F. Over Industries headquarters. But not into the main entrance or underground parking lot. Into the window of a floor partway up from the ground.
“Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!?”
Tselika screamed from the passenger seat, but he ignored her.
The glass shattered. Kaname yanked on the hand brake to shift the car’s direction at a right angle and decelerated using all four of the tires. They knocked away a conference room’s table and chairs and came to a stop just before hitting the AI executives who were hiding over by the far wall.
Meanwhile, the pursuing cars could not stop in time and accidentally entered F. Over’s grounds.
Immediately afterwards, a series of deep sounds erupted. But not from the mint green coupe or the pursuing cars. It came from armored vehicles that looked like masses of composite armor and from the attack helicopters flying between the buildings at high speed. They all focused their attack on the pursuers.
Kaname finished his previous thought with a note of exasperation in his voice.
“They’ll be targeted by the PMC hired to protect the headquarters. Making a direct attack on AI mercenaries without the proper preparations is suicide. Using your limited ammo against an unlimited number of soldiers is not easy.”
The PMC could only protect the grounds of the company it was contracted with, but its firepower was overwhelming. Even if the Dealers could manipulate money and products through any illegal means, blowing up corporate headquarters or factories and otherwise disrupting business was not really an option. Which was why finding cleverer solutions was so much fun.
Anyway.
There was nothing to worry about now that they were on company grounds. The AI-controlled mercenaries would work to protect them…or rather, the attaché case which would benefit the company. The pursuing Dealers who had survived slammed on their brakes when they saw the PMC’s many armored vehicles and attack helicopters. If they did enter the company grounds, they would be blown up as penalty. While still remaining cautious of long-distance sniping, Kaname slowly stepped out of the mint green coupe.
But for some reason, Tselika refused to get out of the passenger seat.
“What’s wrong? Hurry on out, Tselika.”
“Ugh, you know I don’t like other people’s private property. Because Magisteri like us can only use the possessions and money of the Dealer we’re contracted with.”
She could of course still open doors and walk through the hallways, but she could not grab a fire extinguisher and hit someone with it or open a safe and steal the cash within.
Then again, she could sit in the driver’s seat of Kaname’s car and plow through the AI company employees or hold his rifle and shoot up the place, so it was not the most effective of restrictions.
The point may have been to stick the Dealers with all responsibility for their actions.
“I need your help here, so suck it up and get out here.”
“Boo.”
While Tselika reluctantly opened her door, Kaname pulled the attaché case from the trunk. By the wall of the trashed conference room, one AI executive responded with a too perfect smile.
“Excellent work. You have completed the assigned job, so the agreed-upon sum will be transferred to your account.”
Kaname waved a hand dismissively.
The official payment did not really matter. He only cared about the pile of aluminum which was almost worthless at the moment.
“Tselika, check the metal transaction prices!”
“Sure, sure. Everything went as planned, so I’m sure the prices are skyrocketing. Ha ha. In just a few minutes, the 1 snow per gram price has grown to 10,000 times that. Business dealings without an upper limit on daily gains is scary stuff. If we don’t sell it off soon, the management AI might shut down all transactions!”
With a devilish smile, bar graphs representing F. Over’s aluminum and cuccunoid transactions appeared on the surface of her bright green and white race queen outfit: the jacket, the bikini top, the miniskirt, the gloves, and the over-the-knee boots.
Calling it a scent may not have been entirely accurate.
But Kaname sensed something like a strange electrical tingling at the tip of his nose.
“Not yet. 10,000 times isn’t enough.”
“Master? Were you even listening?”
“Wait another 5 minutes. We’re aiming for 25,000 times. So wait until then.”
“A rush of transactions could flood the system! No, if the price goes too high, the buyers will get cold feet! We might have an advantage because we had amassed so much to begin with, but you can get aluminum out of any old empty can on the ground. Once F. Over snaps out of their mania, they’ll start comparing sellers and choosing the Dealer selling at the cheapest price. That mountain of aluminum is worthless if no one will buy it!!”
“2 minutes 30 seconds to go.”
“Transactions are made at a rate of 10,000 per second. Even a few seconds is an eternity in the world of investment. Once the wave recedes, it’s all over! Our pile of treasure will be a pile of junk once more!!”
“90 seconds to go.”
“~ ~ ~!!!!!”
“Trust in my nose.”
“Your Lion’s Nose? The way you’re wrinkling your brow isn’t exactly inspiring confidence!!”
Tselika bit her lip like she was watching a baby crawling across a suspension bridge that could collapse at any moment.
But Kaname waited.
He kept waiting.
And.
The graph on Tselika’s bikini top passed a certain point and the coloring turned to the red of a warning.
“!! It’s past the threshold. It’s at 25,000 times!!”
“Then sell off all the materials we have. There’s no point in holding onto them any longer!”
“Understood. …Phew, that was way too close.”
Several numbers scrolled across Tselika’s body lines.
Countless Dealers swarmed the aluminum materials like piranhas, presumably to resell it to F. Over. That meant plenty of profit for Kaname, but then the graph began to rapidly drop off. The price was already starting to crash.
After just a few minutes of paradise, an aluminum can returned to being no more than trash.
If they had been just a few seconds slower, they would have been caught in the crash themselves.
The tingling feeling on the tip of Kaname’s nose had vanished at some point.
“A ten thousand or so snow of aluminum just produced a profit of 1.7 billion snow, master.”
The AI executives looked entirely unfazed by their company’s future being knocked back and forth like a tennis ball.
Kaname was not too concerned either.
He and Tselika returned to the car.
“That completes the first stage. We finally have the funds we need.”
“So now you’re going to secure a piece of the Inheritance?”
“It’s a special mission. One I couldn’t even get invited to without this.”
“Well, I suppose that is the best possible answer.” Tselika viewed the graphs, values, and transaction records displayed on the windshield. “But are you sure about this? One unit of the snow game currency is worth about as much as a yen in reality. That means you now effectively have 1.7 billion yen as a high schooler.”
Kaname’s answer was simple.
“This is more important.”
(04/01/20XX 10:20)
Money (Game) Master
The world’s biggest online game. It is a lot like an open world financial dealings game in which all illegal actions are allowed. Land, futures, and stock deals are used to increase your initial funds. There is no level system, strength is tied to equipment such as weapons, armor, and vehicles, and all such things can be bought with money.
Summer City
The fictional city in which Money (Game) Master is set. Envisioned as a tropical financial city, it is made up of a pointed peninsula shaped like a shark tooth, a few islands, some artificial floats, and a long looping bridge which connects them together. It is a gun society, but cars drive on the left side and have their steering wheel on the right. Multiple servers exist, but since all data is shared, it does not matter which one you log into.
Snow
Originally just the currency within the game, but as the game population grew, it gained a value (i.e. stability) rivalling that of the dollar or yen, making it a sort of virtual currency. In countries and regions with an unstable exchange rate, the snow is more welcomed than their own currency and the snow is beginning to support economies on the level of continents. Thus, the winners in the game can become quite wealthy and even influence the international economy. The name is said to have come from the idea of it being as rare and fleeting as snow in the tropics, but the details are unknown.
Dealer
What the players are called. Some play for fun, some look at it as a serious business, others are given lots of money by investors, and some national agencies play using the tax money meant for public services.
Magisterus
Originally the term for a succubus who had bound a contract with a human. In the game, they are guides and partners. They talk like humans, but they are AI-controlled beings. There are a few theories as to why this one fantasy element was included, but the details are unknown. In addition to demons, some are modeled after mermaids or elves. A Magisterus shares the money, possessions, and Skills of the Dealer they are contracted with, but that also means they cannot even drive a car if it is not owned by their Dealer. There are some that can buy things with their Dealer’s money if the Dealer has given them a shopping list.
AI Company (Virtual)
Companies in the game that share the names of real companies. From the president to the part-timers, all of the workers are AI-controlled NPCs. Most of the listed companies in the game are AI-controlled, so they have very little negative reaction to the insider trading, threats, malicious rumors, sabotage, and other illegal activities committed by the Dealers.
PMC
The mercenaries who protect the AI companies. The PMCs are also AI-controlled, but they are still separated from the companies by a contract. They can only act within the limitations of that contract, but their firepower is formidable and the average Dealer cannot hope to defeat them in a straight fight no matter how much they fortify themselves.
A legendary Dealer once existed within Money (Game) Master: Criminal AO.
When he fell – that is, died – a few pieces of his equipment got out.
This world has no level up system, so strength is determined by one’s weapons, armor, vehicles, etc. So even a rookie who began playing 10 minutes ago could wield the same strength as Criminal AO if they acquired his equipment.
And that equipment had been customized to the point of some people suspecting hacks. Money (Game) Master is set in a realistic criminal city, but this thoroughly modified equipment acted like the one exception to that realism. It was rumored to break through the upper limits of the physical phenomena in the game, so it became known as an Over Trick – the ultimate magic.
The value of Money (Game) Master’s in-game currency, the snow, grew as stable as the yen or the dollar. If someone earned 10,000 snow in the game, it was no different from 10,000 yen of digital money in the real world. In some countries and regions, a lot of people began buying and collecting houses and jewels in the game instead of storing their money in a bank account. And this went beyond just some eccentric people. Even the banks and money changers an entire country’s people relied on would do it.
Order in the game became directly linked to order in the world economy.
So everyone wanted to wield Criminal AO’s Inheritance.
Some simply wanted to stand at the very top inside Money (Game) Master. Some wanted to reestablish order within Money (Game) Master. Some wanted to be able to tear down that order whenever they wanted so they could threaten companies and countries back in the real world. And there were many reasons besides those.
Each piece of Criminal AO’s Inheritance had been modified to have such brutal specs they felt more like cheat codes.
It might sound silly, but the in-game currency was viewed as a virtual currency and, to the people who could not separate themselves from the real world’s financial markets, those absolute weapons may have been as valuable as nuclear weapons.
After all.
If they fell into the wrong hands, they could summon a great storm across the international economy, reduce a nation’s currency to mere scraps of paper, or bring an end to people’s livelihoods.
This is a story of that Inheritance.
(04/01/20XX 10:20)
Inheritance
A collective term for the equipment owned by the legendary dealer known as Criminal AO. Massive sums of money were spent thoroughly modifying them until they had specs far surpassing the weapons that can normally be bought. The thorough customization can surpass the upper limits of the physical phenomena set for the game world. Due to those brutal specs, the Dealers refer to them as Over Tricks.
Fall
Another word for getting a game over. It refers to dying for any reason within Money (Game) Master. When you fall, you are forcibly logged out for 24 hours and cannot interfere with any financial transactions occurring within the game. When simply logging out, your Magisterus partner can continue making transactions according to a program, but when you fall, those benefits are canceled and the other Dealers can effectively devour your profits. Even a wealthy Dealer with billions of snow can find themselves in a hell of debt after falling just once. In a way, it is even more dangerous than losing your life.
Down
The state of a Magisterus like Tselika after receiving a lethal injury. Their existence is not erased, but they “freeze” for a set period of time. Any lethal injury is guaranteed to make them “freeze”, but the time until recovery varies based on the severity if the injury. A simple cut artery and being blown to smithereens would have entirely different recovery times. Still, it varies from a few minutes to a maximum of one hour, so the punishment is much lighter than from falling. Since they are AI-controlled, some Dealers have their Magisterus make suicide charges to clear a bloody path for them. However, the map guidance, acquisition of financial data, programmed buying and selling, and other data services stop when the Magisterus is down, so that should be avoided unless the Dealer is skilled enough to handle the transactions that occur at a rate of 10,000 per second while also getting into firefights and car chases.
Houses
It is possible to buy land and buildings within Money (Game) Master. However, those buildings are primarily shops or warehouses because there is little reason to build a tasteful home. Houses are less about having somewhere to live and more about making something look nice enough to resell.
Jewels
Just like houses, jewels can be bought as equipment. They are even more limited in use than houses, but they can contain rare Skills and some communities require all members to wear a certain jewel.
Server Name: Alpha Scarlet. Starting Location: Summer City, Industrial Float #2.
Login confirmed.
Welcome to Money (Game) Master, Suou Kaname.
A wild dance of colorful light seemed to stab deep into a boy’s eyes.
He groaned in his throat as the dizzying and nauseating storm eventually formed a certain scene.
It only took a few seconds. Once his vision came into focus, he found himself inside a sports car with a low ceiling and the steering wheel on the right. Kaname sat in the driver’s seat of the parked car and he glanced up at the face reflected in the rearview mirror. He saw silky brown hair, belligerent angular eyes, a baggy dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up, and a loosened red tie. When he looked down at his hands, he saw a smartwatch on his wrist. Below his hands were his legs in thin blue pants with a mobile pouch attached. He was briefly confused, but his understanding finally caught up.
This was his current self.
And he knew where he was.
He opened the door and stepped out.
The bright tropical sunshine carried a dry heat. This was a coastal industrial region ruled by asphalt and concrete. His small two-seater coupe parked at one end of the coast was colored the bright green of mint ice cream.
And a woman brimming with bewitching charm lay face down on the hood.
She occasionally sipped at the contents of a coconut through a straw.
She almost looked like someone enjoying some sunbathing at the beach, but her outfit was not quite a swimsuit. She wore a thin green miniskirt and a short jacket over a white bikini. It was likely modeled after a race queen outfit. Her sexy bodylines were covered in the logos of various companies – Toy Dream, Megalodiver Shipping, Fiamma Securities, etc. – but these were not simply printed on her clothing. They scrolled across them like an LCD screen or projection mapping.
However, something drew the eye even more than her clothing.
She had long, fluffy hair dyed a mint green, two white horns more like a bull’s than a goat’s coming from either side of her head, bat wings spreading from her back, and a pointed tail that split into two at the end like a man catcher or a stag beetle.
Kaname spoke to the relaxed demon.
“Tselika.”
“What is it, master? You really are punctual, aren’t you?”
The race queen smiled without changing her pose.
“What are you doing there?”
“Filming myself with the drive recorder. Not leaving a record of this unparalleled beauty would be an insult to the world, don’t you think?”
Kaname started to say something, but a light tone came from the spots car Tselika lay on. It was more like a phone’s ringtone than a car’s horn.
Text of various sizes began running across the entire car. It looked like a racecar’s sponsor stickers, but it was not. The entire polished surface was a monitor and a large rectangular window opened on the side giving Kaname the best view.
It appeared to be a video message of some kind. After a countdown in a corner of the screen, a short-haired girl appeared in the window with her eyes darting nervously side to side. She may not have been used to the camera.
Her voice was different from normal too. She was clearly tense.
“Umm, Onii-chan? I think I’m going to go see a movie with my friends Mi-chan and Tanya. It’s Kotemitsu Gold Rush. You know, the one based on the Swiss Panic that was ultimately avoided. I wasn’t sure what to do when they invited me, but I can’t stay at home forever and this seemed like a good chance to change that. So can I go? If I can, please send an approval email. …And hurry! There isn’t much time!!”
There were movie theaters in this city too, but his little sister was talking about something else entirely: the real world. Kaname moved his eyes to operate the digital keyboard and send an approval email to his sister’s address.
Meanwhile, Tselika was exasperated.
“You’re too protective of her.”
“I’m aware of that, but it’s what Ayame wants. She gets upset if I just leave her to her own devices. And the fate of my stomach is in her hands, so I can’t just ignore her.”
“Ho ho? Your little sister cooks for you?”
“No, our parents take turns. But when Ayame’s frustration builds up too high, she starts ‘helping out’ in the kitchen to cheer herself up. Simply put, she adds in a ton of ‘secret ingredients’ that ruin the day’s meal. It’s best to do what she wants.”
And that was not the real topic at hand.
With that minor detail dealt with, Kaname checked the time on the smartwatch synced with his phone and got back on topic.
“What’s happened while I was away? How is my car doing?”
“I did everything on your shopping list. Everything from the gas to the tire pressure is good to go. And with a job coming up, I made sure it was spotless on the inside and out. Ideally, you’ll be buying me a drink to thank me.”
“And the weapon?”
“There is a short-range sniper rifle and ammunition in the trunk. I know it was what you requested, but are sure just the one magazine is enough?”
“How are things with F. Over Industries?”
When he asked that, Tselika rolled over on the hood.
She was now lying on her back. That squished her wings below her, but it did not seem to cause her any pain. She exposed the front of her body as she answered him.
Text continued to scroll along the surface of the bikini top and miniskirt of her race queen outfit, but the words “F. Over” were displayed larger than the rest. Several numbers scrolled by and then some graphs.
The logos on her clothes did belong to companies, but they were not sponsors.
In addition to trending brands and stock price indices, data on product and material transaction prices between related companies was displayed in real time.
Tselika ran a finger along her clothes from her chest to her thigh to indicate the graph displayed along her bodylines.
“As you can see, they’re still falling into the red. Because of the skyrocketing prices of the rare earths they use. But if someone gives them a hint leading to a research breakthrough, that could entirely change, right?”
“Good,” said Kaname.
His basketball shoes stepped on the asphalt as he circled behind the mint green coupe and popped the trunk. He found a weapon there just as the demon had said. It was a Short Spear short-range sniper rifle. It had a collapsible stock and grip covered in red rubber and the overall design looked more like ‘an enlarged handgun with a longer barrel and a stock’ than something that took the strong points of an assault rifle and added to them. It used .45 caliber rounds instead of rifle rounds. By staying just below the speed of sound, it focused more on suppressing the noise than on flight distance.
Instead of inserting the magazine into the bottom of the grip like with a handgun, there was a separate slot like with a rifle. He inserted the magazine there and loaded the first round.
“Tselika, get in the passenger seat.”
“Will do, master.”
They both climbed into the mint green coupe. Kaname took the driver’s seat on the right. It was unclear how it worked, but Tselika folded up her wings so her smooth back was visible below the short decorative jacket. The weapon would have gotten in the way of his driving, so he tossed it into Tselika’s lap. He inserted the key, stepped on the clutch, and hit the ignition button to start the engine.
A deep, monstrous roar erupted.
He lowered the hand brake, shifted into first gear, placed his right foot on the gas pedal, and then slowly let off of the clutch. The gears smoothly fit together and, despite its considerable specs, the two-seater sports car merged onto the road as safely as a record needle being placed on the record.
Summer City was composed of a pointed peninsula shaped like shark tooth, a few islands in the ocean around that, artificial land such as industrial floats, and a giant looping bridge that connected it all together as it ran in a circle around the coral reef ocean. Kaname and Tselika were on Industrial Float #2 which was a few kilometers long and wide, but they could already see other Dealers sneaking around on that gray land filled with plain factories and pipes.
Now, what were the most surefire ways of coming out on top in a financial deal without gambling?
You could perform some insider trading using advance knowledge of what a corporation would be doing. You could take it a step further and threaten corporate executives or major investors into deals that worked to your advantage. You could spread baseless rumors to reduce the value of a company, steal technical information with a cyber-attack, put the designs for a new technology online to forcibly trigger technological innovation, or even blow up the trailers and freight trains loaded with a rival company’s new products.
Of course, doing any of that in the real world would be highly illegal.
But not so here.
After all, Money (Game) Master was cut off from the rules of the real world.
“Some tabloids are reporting that Asgard Motors, known for its Hunts and Aachen brands, is beginning to work in the arms industry by producing tanks and other armored vehicles. The AI press secretary has responded by saying…”
“We have some news from the food industry. Rainy Girl Research had previously announced plans to efficiently mass-produce edible insects to fight poverty, but it has since been revealed that their management has barely even begun to work on…”
“It was rumored that Rush General Trading Company was going to split along internal lines, but they just announced at a press conference that the board of directors has decided to oust the president. The president has expressed intent to gather military might from PMCs and Dealers, so the conflict is expected to…”
These announcements were limited to the game. When you switched on the stereo, you would find either music or financial news meant to inform people of upcoming events. Win or lose? Would you bet on the AI companies or work to crush them instead? How you chose to conquer this open world was up to you.
“Let’s review the mission.”
“We are currently buying up as much aluminum as we can, which only costs a yen a gram in the real world. Nothing has changed yet, but if the price of aluminum skyrockets within the hour, the amount we have stocked up will increase in value a thousand-fold, if not ten-thousand-fold. We bought all that metal for tens of thousands of snow, but we’ll have a chance to sell it off for hundreds of millions. And in fact, we’ve set things up so that will happen. All by using a company called F. Over which is beginning to go under.”
Pure gold and platinum were attractive since they were worth more than 3000 snow per gram, but aluminum was more useful since it only cost 1 snow per gram. Anyone could buy it and having the price rise by just 1 snow would double your money.
The mint green coupe left Industrial Float #2 and drove along a highway-like bridge. The coral reef ocean was more green than blue. Kaname swerved around the other slower-moving cars as he sped down the gently curving bridge.
The speedometer quickly reached 200km/h, but there was no sense of death hanging over them. It may have been the same feeling as playing a racing game.
“And what do we need for that?”
“F. Over Industries is an AI company that sells cameras, but they’re currently in 10th place. Due to the rising prices of a relatively-unheard-of rare earth called cuccunoid, they’re having trouble with their semiconductors. But if we give F. Over some new tech that a smaller company threw out not knowing its value, they will be able to use ordinary aluminum instead. F. Over will shoot to the top of the industry and the price of our metal will absolutely explode.”
Various windows opened on the windshield to show the predicted amount of aluminum that F. Over Industries would need, the predicted price at which they would buy it, a few routes from the park to their headquarters, the predicted quantity and quality of enemy Dealers, predicted attack points, and more.
“So what exactly do we need to do?”
“Receive the attaché case at the peninsula park and deliver it to F. Over Industries headquarters which is also on the peninsula. But this will be a war between the existing cuccunoid and the new aluminum. If we can’t shake off all interference on our own, this will fail.”
Basically, you can think of Money (Game) Master as a financial dealing game in which all illegal activities were allowed. The players known as Dealers entered the virtual financial city of Summer City and competed to increase their starting funds by any means necessary. With no level up system, strength was directly linked to weapons, armor, vehicles, and other equipment, but all such things could be bought with money. The poor would gather empty cans for pocket change they hoped would help them make a comeback, the honest type would buy land or a store to start gradually earning money with a business while occasionally making financial deals, fighting opposing Dealers, and maybe even blowing up a rival’s building. That was the kind of world this was.
They finally reached the end of the seemingly endless bridge and approached the sharp peninsula that resembled a shark tooth.
There was a white beach, palm trees lining the roads, and hibiscuses growing in the flower beds. And there were towering skyscrapers that reflected the sun like mirrors. That den of money would swallow up and increase all forms of greed, sometimes to the point that the Dealers themselves lost control.
“One last check: are you ready to go?”
“Absolutely, master.”
And with that, the mint green sports car entered the peninsula’s financial city.
At the designated park, Kaname accepted the silver attaché case from an AI-controlled female agent with a too perfect smile and tossed it in the trunk.
They were approximately 15km away from their destination at F. Over Industries headquarters.
He made a U-turn which just about scraped against a large metal dumpster, left the large park, and immediately ran across some enemy Dealers.
He worked the shift lever again and again to shift up to 6th and 7th gear when he normally never went past 5th.
The speedometer shot up to the 300km/h range.
But this was just a daily occurrence in Summer City. The bright sports cars never vanished from the rearview mirror as they continued pursuit. There were plenty of security cameras on the building walls and streetlights, but no one took issue with the racing vehicles.
Tselika viewed the map displayed on the windshield and expressed confusion from the passenger seat to his left.
“Master, this isn’t the shortest route!”
“They’d take us out if we went straight there.”
He drove down a major road, ignored the lights, and took a sharp turn at an intersection. He forcibly shifted down to decelerate and used the hand brake to let the back wheels slide around. The tires drew a large black crescent moon on the road and the car just barely avoided a truck driving in from the side as it completed the right turn.
When he operated the hand brake and shift lever again, the pursuers followed but after a short delay. They were too skilled to be shaken that easily.
Plus, the roof of a red sports car opened up and a man stood up from within. He held something in both hands.
“A submachinegun!!” warned Tselika.
“He can’t hit us with all the shaking.”
There was a short burst of gunfire, but true to Kaname’s prediction, neither the tires nor the gas tank were hit. But it was still not pleasant to see sparks flying from the asphalt so close by.
“If that has a Skill-equipped dot sight attached, he might be using auto-aim. The shaking means nothing if it aims for him!!”
“Why is an AI-controlled Magisterus afraid of bullets?”
“Because it still hurts if it hits me! And a lethal injury will still cause me to ‘freeze’, not to mention this can destroy the car that acts as my temple!”
“Your AI’s main data won’t be erased if the car is blown up, will it?”
“Did you think all these temples were designed purely for functionality? You use the beauty of your car to show off to the other Magisteri! Do you have any idea how humiliating damage to my temple would be!? It would be like having the shower’s frosted glass torn down so everyone on the road out front could watch my sexy shower scene!!”
“What, is that all?”
“Kiiii!!”
“Tselika. Mechanical auto-aim has trouble with shaking. There’s no way it can aim properly with all this shaking and blowing wind.”
Kaname looked calm as he held the steering wheel, but a change came over the red sports car pursuing them. The man must have lost his temper because he ducked back inside the car and stood back up with a different weapon on his shoulder.
Tselika’s eyes bugged out.
“Wait, wait, wait. Isn’t that a rocket launcher!?”
“It’s not guided, so we can ignore it. Even if the flames reach us, it can’t kill us without a direct hit.”
“Are you hoping the auto-aim fails again?”
“It’ll miss. The most it’ll manage is blowing up one of the dumpsters around here.”
“How can you be so sure!?”
“I can smell it. I don’t sense that tingling here, so we’re still fine.”
“You mean your Lion’s Nose? How can I trust something isn’t a real Skill provided by a weapon or clothing!?”
Just then, a thought occurred to Tselika. Some 9mm bullets would be one thing, but what if a rocket flew off target and hit the sidewalk?
Accidents like that were part of the fun of Money (Game) Master, but a Dealer girl who looked like the honest type just so happened to be walking along the sidewalk selling fruit.
“…”
“Hey, master?”
He made a split-second decision.
He slammed his foot down on the brake pedal. The mint green coupe decelerated so rapidly it looked like a giant hand had blocked its way. Tselika had not been wearing a seatbelt and her forehead just about slammed into the windshield.
It felt to them like the mint green coupe had actually been thrown backwards, but the red sports car was rapidly approaching from behind. It ended up driving right alongside them. The man in the driver’s seat and the man on the roof both stared in dumbfounded shock.
Kaname grabbed the Short Spear short-range sniper rifle from Tselika’s lap and smashed the window on the driver’s side.
Instead of relying on auto-aim, he manually aimed at the red sports car’s driver. He aimed right between the man’s eyes.
And he pulled the trigger once.
There was no loud gunshot. With a sound more like a metal clasp bursting open, the other car’s window and the driver’s brains were blown apart. The red sports car lost control and crashed into a traffic light pole with the other man still on the roof.
Also, Tselika was screaming.
“What is wrong with yooooooooooooouuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu!? My temple, my status symbol, my car!! How could you do this, masterrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!?”
“What’d you say!? I can’t hear you over the wind!!”
“Don’t play dumb, master! No matter what you do, that fruit-seller girl isn’t going to thank you. And you had to sacrifice my precious glass for that! Kiiii!!”
“You aren’t supposed to save people because you want some kind of reward.”
While he cut off her complaints with a random argument, something else happened.
A large tanker truck drove in at an intersection and slammed on its brakes to block the way forward. And of course, more cars approached from behind to trap Kaname and Tselika.
“What do we do, master!?”
“We move that big-ass thing up ahead.”
“Ha ha! I appreciate the attempt to sound cool, but one little question: how in the hell do we do that!?”
While Tselika shouted at him and the wind blew in through the broken window, Kaname toyed with the short-range sniper rifle in one hand.
“Can I break the windshield?”
“Don’t – you – darrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrre!!”
Kaname clicked his tongue, stuck his right arm out of the driver’s side window, and aimed the gun with just the one hand. There was no way he could use the scope like this, so he only had his experience to aim with.
He went for the equivalent of a headshot.
For a truck, that meant the gas tank.
No matter how sturdy the vehicle, a hit to that weak point would destroy it. And while the tank on the back of a big tanker truck was too tough to shoot through, there was another rectangular tank below the tractor unit up front.
He only needed one shot.
The gas tank exploded with a deafening boom. The cylindrical tank weighed the back down, but the tractor unit shot up just a bit.
The mint green coupe raced forward at max speed and crammed itself into the gap that created.
After it passed through that space of little more than a meter, the giant metal jaws snapped shut behind them. The pursuing vehicles crashed into the tanker truck one after another, creating a cacophony of destruction.
Kaname glanced up at the rearview mirror and spoke.
“We should be safe for now.”
“Did you somehow miss all these cars approaching us from a different road?”
“Those were waiting over there in case of an emergency. The ones we just crushed were their first string players and these are the second string ones. The quality will be even lower, so it won’t be a problem.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“We’re almost at F. Over Industries headquarters. If the attack were going as planned, they would have positioned their forces a lot sooner than this. Because if they get too close…”
Something happened before he could finish.
After making sure no one was on the sidewalk, he drove the mint green coupe right off the road. He used the gentle accessibility slope like a ski jump to send the carbon-material car airborne. They soared right over the intersection, past the pole-shaped car barriers, and into the F. Over Industries headquarters. But not into the main entrance or underground parking lot. Into the window of a floor partway up from the ground.
“Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!?”
Tselika screamed from the passenger seat, but he ignored her.
The glass shattered. Kaname yanked on the hand brake to shift the car’s direction at a right angle and decelerated using all four of the tires. They knocked away a conference room’s table and chairs and came to a stop just before hitting the AI executives who were hiding over by the far wall.
Meanwhile, the pursuing cars could not stop in time and accidentally entered F. Over’s grounds.
Immediately afterwards, a series of deep sounds erupted. But not from the mint green coupe or the pursuing cars. It came from armored vehicles that looked like masses of composite armor and from the attack helicopters flying between the buildings at high speed. They all focused their attack on the pursuers.
Kaname finished his previous thought with a note of exasperation in his voice.
“They’ll be targeted by the PMC hired to protect the headquarters. Making a direct attack on AI mercenaries without the proper preparations is suicide. Using your limited ammo against an unlimited number of soldiers is not easy.”
The PMC could only protect the grounds of the company it was contracted with, but its firepower was overwhelming. Even if the Dealers could manipulate money and products through any illegal means, blowing up corporate headquarters or factories and otherwise disrupting business was not really an option. Which was why finding cleverer solutions was so much fun.
Anyway.
There was nothing to worry about now that they were on company grounds. The AI-controlled mercenaries would work to protect them…or rather, the attaché case which would benefit the company. The pursuing Dealers who had survived slammed on their brakes when they saw the PMC’s many armored vehicles and attack helicopters. If they did enter the company grounds, they would be blown up as penalty. While still remaining cautious of long-distance sniping, Kaname slowly stepped out of the mint green coupe.
But for some reason, Tselika refused to get out of the passenger seat.
“What’s wrong? Hurry on out, Tselika.”
“Ugh, you know I don’t like other people’s private property. Because Magisteri like us can only use the possessions and money of the Dealer we’re contracted with.”
She could of course still open doors and walk through the hallways, but she could not grab a fire extinguisher and hit someone with it or open a safe and steal the cash within.
Then again, she could sit in the driver’s seat of Kaname’s car and plow through the AI company employees or hold his rifle and shoot up the place, so it was not the most effective of restrictions.
The point may have been to stick the Dealers with all responsibility for their actions.
“I need your help here, so suck it up and get out here.”
“Boo.”
While Tselika reluctantly opened her door, Kaname pulled the attaché case from the trunk. By the wall of the trashed conference room, one AI executive responded with a too perfect smile.
“Excellent work. You have completed the assigned job, so the agreed-upon sum will be transferred to your account.”
Kaname waved a hand dismissively.
The official payment did not really matter. He only cared about the pile of aluminum which was almost worthless at the moment.
“Tselika, check the metal transaction prices!”
“Sure, sure. Everything went as planned, so I’m sure the prices are skyrocketing. Ha ha. In just a few minutes, the 1 snow per gram price has grown to 10,000 times that. Business dealings without an upper limit on daily gains is scary stuff. If we don’t sell it off soon, the management AI might shut down all transactions!”
With a devilish smile, bar graphs representing F. Over’s aluminum and cuccunoid transactions appeared on the surface of her bright green and white race queen outfit: the jacket, the bikini top, the miniskirt, the gloves, and the over-the-knee boots.
Calling it a scent may not have been entirely accurate.
But Kaname sensed something like a strange electrical tingling at the tip of his nose.
“Not yet. 10,000 times isn’t enough.”
“Master? Were you even listening?”
“Wait another 5 minutes. We’re aiming for 25,000 times. So wait until then.”
“A rush of transactions could flood the system! No, if the price goes too high, the buyers will get cold feet! We might have an advantage because we had amassed so much to begin with, but you can get aluminum out of any old empty can on the ground. Once F. Over snaps out of their mania, they’ll start comparing sellers and choosing the Dealer selling at the cheapest price. That mountain of aluminum is worthless if no one will buy it!!”
“2 minutes 30 seconds to go.”
“Transactions are made at a rate of 10,000 per second. Even a few seconds is an eternity in the world of investment. Once the wave recedes, it’s all over! Our pile of treasure will be a pile of junk once more!!”
“90 seconds to go.”
“~ ~ ~!!!!!”
“Trust in my nose.”
“Your Lion’s Nose? The way you’re wrinkling your brow isn’t exactly inspiring confidence!!”
Tselika bit her lip like she was watching a baby crawling across a suspension bridge that could collapse at any moment.
But Kaname waited.
He kept waiting.
And.
The graph on Tselika’s bikini top passed a certain point and the coloring turned to the red of a warning.
“!! It’s past the threshold. It’s at 25,000 times!!”
“Then sell off all the materials we have. There’s no point in holding onto them any longer!”
“Understood. …Phew, that was way too close.”
Several numbers scrolled across Tselika’s body lines.
Countless Dealers swarmed the aluminum materials like piranhas, presumably to resell it to F. Over. That meant plenty of profit for Kaname, but then the graph began to rapidly drop off. The price was already starting to crash.
After just a few minutes of paradise, an aluminum can returned to being no more than trash.
If they had been just a few seconds slower, they would have been caught in the crash themselves.
The tingling feeling on the tip of Kaname’s nose had vanished at some point.
“A ten thousand or so snow of aluminum just produced a profit of 1.7 billion snow, master.”
The AI executives looked entirely unfazed by their company’s future being knocked back and forth like a tennis ball.
Kaname was not too concerned either.
He and Tselika returned to the car.
“That completes the first stage. We finally have the funds we need.”
“So now you’re going to secure a piece of the Inheritance?”
“It’s a special mission. One I couldn’t even get invited to without this.”
“Well, I suppose that is the best possible answer.” Tselika viewed the graphs, values, and transaction records displayed on the windshield. “But are you sure about this? One unit of the snow game currency is worth about as much as a yen in reality. That means you now effectively have 1.7 billion yen as a high schooler.”
Kaname’s answer was simple.
“This is more important.”
(04/01/20XX 10:20)
Money (Game) Master
The world’s biggest online game. It is a lot like an open world financial dealings game in which all illegal actions are allowed. Land, futures, and stock deals are used to increase your initial funds. There is no level system, strength is tied to equipment such as weapons, armor, and vehicles, and all such things can be bought with money.
Summer City
The fictional city in which Money (Game) Master is set. Envisioned as a tropical financial city, it is made up of a pointed peninsula shaped like a shark tooth, a few islands, some artificial floats, and a long looping bridge which connects them together. It is a gun society, but cars drive on the left side and have their steering wheel on the right. Multiple servers exist, but since all data is shared, it does not matter which one you log into.
Snow
Originally just the currency within the game, but as the game population grew, it gained a value (i.e. stability) rivalling that of the dollar or yen, making it a sort of virtual currency. In countries and regions with an unstable exchange rate, the snow is more welcomed than their own currency and the snow is beginning to support economies on the level of continents. Thus, the winners in the game can become quite wealthy and even influence the international economy. The name is said to have come from the idea of it being as rare and fleeting as snow in the tropics, but the details are unknown.
Dealer
What the players are called. Some play for fun, some look at it as a serious business, others are given lots of money by investors, and some national agencies play using the tax money meant for public services.
Magisterus
Originally the term for a succubus who had bound a contract with a human. In the game, they are guides and partners. They talk like humans, but they are AI-controlled beings. There are a few theories as to why this one fantasy element was included, but the details are unknown. In addition to demons, some are modeled after mermaids or elves. A Magisterus shares the money, possessions, and Skills of the Dealer they are contracted with, but that also means they cannot even drive a car if it is not owned by their Dealer. There are some that can buy things with their Dealer’s money if the Dealer has given them a shopping list.
AI Company (Virtual)
Companies in the game that share the names of real companies. From the president to the part-timers, all of the workers are AI-controlled NPCs. Most of the listed companies in the game are AI-controlled, so they have very little negative reaction to the insider trading, threats, malicious rumors, sabotage, and other illegal activities committed by the Dealers.
PMC
The mercenaries who protect the AI companies. The PMCs are also AI-controlled, but they are still separated from the companies by a contract. They can only act within the limitations of that contract, but their firepower is formidable and the average Dealer cannot hope to defeat them in a straight fight no matter how much they fortify themselves.
A legendary Dealer once existed within Money (Game) Master: Criminal AO.
When he fell – that is, died – a few pieces of his equipment got out.
This world has no level up system, so strength is determined by one’s weapons, armor, vehicles, etc. So even a rookie who began playing 10 minutes ago could wield the same strength as Criminal AO if they acquired his equipment.
And that equipment had been customized to the point of some people suspecting hacks. Money (Game) Master is set in a realistic criminal city, but this thoroughly modified equipment acted like the one exception to that realism. It was rumored to break through the upper limits of the physical phenomena in the game, so it became known as an Over Trick – the ultimate magic.
The value of Money (Game) Master’s in-game currency, the snow, grew as stable as the yen or the dollar. If someone earned 10,000 snow in the game, it was no different from 10,000 yen of digital money in the real world. In some countries and regions, a lot of people began buying and collecting houses and jewels in the game instead of storing their money in a bank account. And this went beyond just some eccentric people. Even the banks and money changers an entire country’s people relied on would do it.
Order in the game became directly linked to order in the world economy.
So everyone wanted to wield Criminal AO’s Inheritance.
Some simply wanted to stand at the very top inside Money (Game) Master. Some wanted to reestablish order within Money (Game) Master. Some wanted to be able to tear down that order whenever they wanted so they could threaten companies and countries back in the real world. And there were many reasons besides those.
Each piece of Criminal AO’s Inheritance had been modified to have such brutal specs they felt more like cheat codes.
It might sound silly, but the in-game currency was viewed as a virtual currency and, to the people who could not separate themselves from the real world’s financial markets, those absolute weapons may have been as valuable as nuclear weapons.
After all.
If they fell into the wrong hands, they could summon a great storm across the international economy, reduce a nation’s currency to mere scraps of paper, or bring an end to people’s livelihoods.
This is a story of that Inheritance.
(04/01/20XX 10:20)
Inheritance
A collective term for the equipment owned by the legendary dealer known as Criminal AO. Massive sums of money were spent thoroughly modifying them until they had specs far surpassing the weapons that can normally be bought. The thorough customization can surpass the upper limits of the physical phenomena set for the game world. Due to those brutal specs, the Dealers refer to them as Over Tricks.
Fall
Another word for getting a game over. It refers to dying for any reason within Money (Game) Master. When you fall, you are forcibly logged out for 24 hours and cannot interfere with any financial transactions occurring within the game. When simply logging out, your Magisterus partner can continue making transactions according to a program, but when you fall, those benefits are canceled and the other Dealers can effectively devour your profits. Even a wealthy Dealer with billions of snow can find themselves in a hell of debt after falling just once. In a way, it is even more dangerous than losing your life.
Down
The state of a Magisterus like Tselika after receiving a lethal injury. Their existence is not erased, but they “freeze” for a set period of time. Any lethal injury is guaranteed to make them “freeze”, but the time until recovery varies based on the severity if the injury. A simple cut artery and being blown to smithereens would have entirely different recovery times. Still, it varies from a few minutes to a maximum of one hour, so the punishment is much lighter than from falling. Since they are AI-controlled, some Dealers have their Magisterus make suicide charges to clear a bloody path for them. However, the map guidance, acquisition of financial data, programmed buying and selling, and other data services stop when the Magisterus is down, so that should be avoided unless the Dealer is skilled enough to handle the transactions that occur at a rate of 10,000 per second while also getting into firefights and car chases.
Houses
It is possible to buy land and buildings within Money (Game) Master. However, those buildings are primarily shops or warehouses because there is little reason to build a tasteful home. Houses are less about having somewhere to live and more about making something look nice enough to resell.
Jewels
Just like houses, jewels can be bought as equipment. They are even more limited in use than houses, but they can contain rare Skills and some communities require all members to wear a certain jewel.
