5
I tapped on the newly appeared window. According to the explanation that had appeared last time I bought the camera, it was able to photograph anything I wished. It was an 'item' that could even take pictures through the wall. Therefore, it'd have no problem taking pictures of the two of them from inside the closet. I had to tap on its item window and then blink my eyes while looking towards the desired direction to use the camera. I only had to imagine in my mind that I was trying to photograph a person, and then the camera would take picture through the closet while focusing on the person/s within the range of the selected direction.
However, before I could carry out the plan, a slight change in the situation happened.
"Want to drink some water?"
"Just how much thirsty are you woman? The hell you're doing going out to look for water in the midst of kissing?!" Thanks to her willfulness, I missed the chance to take pictures of them kissing. Soon I heard the sound of them leaving the bedroom. "Instead of leaving the room for such a thing, I'd rather you get out of the apartment so that I don't have to stay shut in this closet." I thought feeling annoyed.
As I was paying attention to the situation outside, I suddenly heard a voice.
"No… stop doing that, you pervert!"
It was Sakurai moaning in a sensual voice. They seemed to be doing something somewhere around the kitchen. I at once prepared myself to use the opportunity and blinked my eyes towards the backside of the closet; the kitchen was towards the backside from the location of the closet. Just to be safe in case I didn't get a good shot, I turned my head a bit more to the left and took a picture again. The camera could be only used 3 times, so I'd intended to save a try in the case I couldn't get good pictures of them in the first two tries.
After finishing taking pictures, a message appeared before my eyes.
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[Would you like to check the pictures?]
[Ist Picture file]
[2nd Picture file]
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Two files were displayed on the message. I took two pictures from the camera so it was obvious that it'd show two files. I tapped on the 1st picture file. A picture of a naked man and woman "going at it" appeared before me. "Heh, I sure took a good one." I was feeling satisfied at the result when I heard their conversation sound again.
"You see, I want to borrow some more money from you."
They seemed to be kissing, but I could clearly hear the voice of her demanding money in the midst of it.
"Eh? Didn't I lend you some the other day? You want more already?"
"C'mon, it's not like you lack money or anything."
"Why on earth would you need that much money in the first place? Your husband doesn't earn enough for you?"
"He found out about me cheating on him, so we're living apart right now. I'm not able to get consolation money either, so I'm in real need of money."
"Man, you're one heck of a woman. Anyway, I won't be lending any more money unless you return the amount I lent you last time."
"Please darling! I'll do a lot of things to make you feel good. You want to take a shower with me? I'll give you a lot of 'service,' so you go ahead in the shower. I'll be there in a moment with a change of clothes for you."
"Hmm, now it truly made me curious how you're going to give me service."
I didn't hear anything else after that conversation. However, the feeling of vanity crept up from my heart on listening to the content of their conversation. If the husband already knew about Sakurai cheating on him, there'd be no meaning to the pictures I'd taken. I realized that I wasn't thoughtful enough. I did speculate earlier that the husband might have found out that his wife, Sakurai was cheating on him, but I never considered the possibility with seriousness. Feeling of tiredness spread throughout my body as I discovered that I was back to square one.
I heard someone entering the bedroom. She was apparently going to choose some clothes from the closet for the change. I gulped down saliva as I felt very nervous thinking about getting exposed any moment. I had to use [Load] again as soon as the closet opens. I made the [Load] window appear before me in advance as I awaited for Sakurai to open the closet, but I instead heard her closing the door of the bedroom after getting inside.
"Why did she close the door?" I wondered. In any case, keeping the door open or closed didn't change the fact that I was facing a crisis because the clothes were stored in the closet and it would be opened either way. It was a moment of desperation for me.
However, the closet wasn't opened in the end, and I rather heard the sound of her looking for something. Then I heard a sound similar to the tearing sound of the flap of an envelope, but I wasn't able to confirm my guess as whatever it was she was doing didn't make that much sound.
I heard the sound of footsteps and it stopped in front of the closet. "So it's game over, after all." I thought. But to my surprise, she then directly went to the door, opened it, and left the bedroom. Soon I heard the sound of water.
*Shaaaaa*
She did say earlier that she was going to do "it" while taking a shower, and it finally seemed to be the time for it. "So she didn't need to get the change after all? At any rate, I finally got the chance to get out of here." I carefully opened the closet doors.
I got out of the bedroom. There was no one around as I expected. I went to the living room, but didn't see anyone in there either. Only voices from the direction of the shower could be heard inside the place. I ran out of the apartment as I thanked god for giving me the chance to escape.
After retuning to my place, I sat down on the bed. "Eventually, taking pictures with camera turned out to be of no use. It won't serve as the means to threaten her." I took deep breaths several times to relax myself, and then sorted out the information I'd gained by intruding Sakurai's apartment.
"Judging by those notifications of loan default and her asking for money from her lover, there's no doubt that she's in an extreme need of money. In that case, should I lure her with money? For her to use demand notes to get loan and persistently demand her lover for money, she was evidently troubled by her financial situation. If I give her the impression that I've got a lot of money while pretending to be interested in her, it might be her trying to approach me then."
If even money didn't work, I really had no other way to go about it. It was the last method I could come up with after considering everything. I immediately went to the bank and withdrew $4400. "This much should be enough to make her at once take the bait. I mean we're talking about a woman who's going as far as using demand notes to get loan." I thought as I walked out of the bank.
Then I went back to my place and again started observing the front door of Sakurai's apartment. "She must be busy doing "it" with her lover around this time, and once the fun time gets over, she'd definitely come out to see off her lover. That'd be the best chance to execute my plan." I prepared myself.
However, no matter how much I waited, I didn't see any sign of them coming out.
"Damn it!" I shouted. "Is that guy planning to spend the night at her place? I'm seriously lost for words. Even if you're living apart with your husband, isn't bringing home another guy and having him stop over going too far?" I felt really bored waiting but still kept my eyes outside throughout the night in order to approach her and find out the clue to conquering her. But, Sakurai didn't come out in the end, nor did her lover.
There was no doubt now that he'd planned to stop over. Eventually, I could only put the plan on hold till the morning. Her lover should have a job he needed to do, so it was quite unlikely that he'd be staying together with her for two days in a row.
Concluding that I didn't have to stay up any more, I went to the bed. I was quite tired and felt pain in my eyes due to the long-drawn observation and immediately fell sleep.
I suddenly opened my eyes as I woke up. "I was expecting somewhere in my heart for it to be a dream, hoping to return to my world when I wake up from it. But I guess, it was all real after all." I yawned as I stretched my body. I could still see the "game window" in my field of vision. It was around 10 in the morning when I checked the clock.
"I sure slept a lot." I looked outside of the window as I felt surprised that much more time had passed than I expected. Right at that time, I saw Sakurai coming out to dispose garbage. She always used to take care of it during a fixed time period. From the looks of it, the lover had already left while I was sleeping. "I was so close to miss the opportunity." I rejoiced at being able to make it in time.
I immediately got down from my apartment building, carrying the money I'd planned to use. As Sakurai was just about to go back to her apartment, I ran towards her direction with the fastest speed possible, purposely making our shoulders bump against each other and dropping the money on the ground. It was a typical strategy to appear that I was in a hurry to go somewhere and accidentally bumped against her on the way. Then show off my money by dropping it on the ground and let her take a good look at it. I'd created a new "save point" while running to make sure I could redo things if required.
"Ah…"
"Oh, I'm sorry about that."
It went according to the plan. I could see Sakurai's eyes shining as I bent down to pick up the money. She helped me gather the money that had scattered on the ground with eyes full of curiosity and desire, and looked at me in a sexual way as she handed me the money. If not for the fact that I already knew her true nature, that sexy flirtatious glance of hers was charming enough to make me fall for her. But to the current me who was very well aware about her true nature, she looked no more than an extremely greedy creature.
"Are you alright? It's risky to carry around so much money with such carelessness, you know. What if you run into a purse snatcher?"
"Well, I just withdrew some money to have fun, so I didn't care much about it. Anyway, thank you very much for the help."
I indirectly gave her a fake information she was likely to show response to, and surely enough, Sakurai's eyes began to shine on hearing my words.
"Rather than spending money at that kind of places, how about you have fun with me? Fufu, I think I'm pretty good myself as a companion. What do you think?" Sakurai whispered to my ear as she nonchalantly showed off her body to me. She so tightly grasped my hand that was holding money that her intention of not willing to let go of me could be clearly felt. Here I was racking my brain to come up with ideas to approach her, but who would have thought that the issue would be instantly solved in such a way. It turned out money was the 'keyword' to get close to this woman after all. I pretended to be troubled by her words and put on a serious expression on my face.
"Eh, come again? What do you mean by have fun with you?"
Sakurai possibly thought that I took the bait and took her hand away from mine as she smiled.
"When we talk about the fun of adults, there's nothing else but "that," right? We neighbors shall get on good terms with each other, hoho. So c'mon, drop by my house."
She was unexpectedly aggressive with her approach which clearly showed how much she was troubled by money. "Is she going to ask me to lend her money? If I go with the flow and sleep with her, would that be considered conquering her?" Despite the fact that I knew all too well about her greediness, when the thought of the things that were going to happen soon crossed my mind, my heart couldn't help but skip a beat. Ultimately, I ended up getting inside her place, and was told to sit on the couch.
"What about your husband?"
When I asked her looking at the wedding photo, she suddenly made a sad expression.
"We got divorced. That's why, I've been feeling so lonely for some time now."
"Divorce, my ass! Don't make me laugh, you harlot. What the hell do you think you're doing telling me of all people that you got divorced?! For heaven's sake, at least come up with a decent lie. Why the bloody hell would you put your wedding photo on display if you were actually divorced?!" Thinking about her uber big-ass lie, I got up from the couch. I was probably feeling a bit nervous, so I wanted to go to the washroom and calm down myself in there.
"Can I use the washroom?"
"Of course, you can. It's right over there."
I entered the washroom before she could finish her words. "Oh shoot! I knew the location of the washroom beforehand due to my previous visit to this apartment, and ended up thoughtlessly coming in here. Wouldn't it be too strange for someone to know about the location of the washroom on their first visit to a place?"
When I came out of the washroom, I saw Sakurai preparing drink for me. She didn't seem to have any suspicion about me, and her gaze was still directed at the roll of bills in my hand. I put the roll on the table, and her eyes naturally shifted toward it.
Suddenly, the flow of time came to a halt, and everything around me got engulfed in white light. "Looks like the options are going to appear." Just as I thought, two choices appeared before my eyes after the flow of time stopped.
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[Option 1: Intrude the study]
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[Option 2: Have a conversation]
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Previous Chapter
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17 COMMENTS
fukoda
JULY 15, 2017 AT 7:43 PM
Scary i wonder what kind of garbage she throw out every morning maybe her husband was also a garbage
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Eats Candy
JULY 15, 2017 AT 9:12 PM
I was thinking the same! O.o dun dun dun
I bet theres something in the drink too.
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Celica Sylphil
JULY 17, 2017 AT 6:13 PM
It's not his morally questionable choices that annoy me, nope, not at all, actually i'd even encourage taking such decisions for the sake of experimentation but that's just me.
What does annoy me is how he's charging in head-first into the cave he just found, rather than poke around, what if instead of a cave it was a bunch of caves but you chose one path unknowingly? or what if it was an open plain ? you wouldn't know unless you try to find out.
He knows that there are multiple conquest targets possible, he even found one before, that shop attendant or something. So why did he choose to start with this hooker of all things? I mean that is setting the bar pretty low and she should be the easiest to conquer but The first part should be spent trying to find as many targets as possible rather than just focus on one, maybe through the other targets you would find something important.
Another thing is , like every other reality with options, the world is 3d, there are infinite options. What if he chose one thing, like say, knock her out with the sleep spray, but then proceeded to not use the sleep spray? he still chose that option right? what happens then ?
Like dungeon defense did a nice way around it where the choices appear, but they cannot be chosen directly and must be done through actions.
In 'your and my asylum' the protag mocks the same thing that reality is always subjective, you don't have just 1 or 2 options to choose from.
Absolute choice did it the stupid way where he had to choose what he would do before he did it, again walking into the same plothole of what happens if he says something but does something else?
Or am i putting on to much expectations onto him? Cause he did seem like he knew what he was doing but some of his decisions then don't make much sense.
I would be reading more of this since the premise really interested me, hopefully it could match up to my expectations.
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CAL
JULY 18, 2017 AT 5:16 AM
##The reason he chose Sakurai as his first target (besides the fact that he didn't have the composure to look for multiple targets):
1) Had been interested in her before
2) Low difficulty [E-rank]
3) Easier to conquer due to being living in the same neighborhood
4) Had some prior information about her
She was the only person that satisfied all the aforementioned conditions.
##Even if it's a 3D world, he really doesn't have infinite choices:
1) He's bound by the rules of the world. In a sense, this world is even harsher than the world we live in.
2) The game system here is different than most (if not all) of the stuff from this genre available out there. The system acts as the Supreme Overseer, and will impose punishment on him in some way if he doesn't do what he opts. He really isn't free to do anything he wants as can be seen from the sudden appearance of the police.
3) The game system practically dictates how he acts by forcing him to choose one of the options presented to him, but since the forced choices only appear when he takes some specific action, he does have a certain extent of freedom available to him.
4) Unlike other novels of the same genre, the protagonist doesn't serve as the medium to allow the game system interfere with the real world. Here the game is an all-mighty existence that already controls the whole world. It's powerful enough to even control the flow of time itself. So it can make any person do whatever it wants them to, and that person has no choice but to abide by it.
5) In the CN novels you can go against the heaven because it doesn't do much except things like making the protagonist go through tribulations. But in this novel, you can't even move a finger if you try to defy the system (which acts like Heaven in here). He literally can only move his arms unless he makes a choice, which goes to show how controlling the game system is.
Hope that answered your doubts.
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Celica Sylphil
JULY 18, 2017 AT 1:09 PM
It does answer my doubts, in a way.
I wanted the story to bring up these doubts and answer them itself rather than you telling me, but i suppose that's fine.
However, if what you said is true, then the objective of the game becomes even more obscure.
1 -By taking away his choices and the actions he could do, the game is effectively forcing him into 1 path, and that won't be entertaining for say some higher entity that made the game.
2- Or it could be like Youjo Senki where the 'god' wants the protag to believe in something ( in that case to believe that 'god' exists ), but such an aim doesn't seem to apply here since he doesn't seem to treat women as objects or something in the first place.
3-The dating sim part seems lacking too. If it were a normal dating sim type then just 2 stats are way too low, the other stats like intelligence , skill or something. And also the target being solely women would be kinda off too, since there's probably more dating sims for women than for men.
Ah, you reminded me of the age old question in Civilisation games. If you've played them you would understand. At the start you have 2 options, do you use your settler immediately wherever he's standing and build a town? Or do you explore a bit and try to find a better location for a town? it might spend a few crucial early game turns but you might get a better location to settle, which would be more useful for late-game.
My opinion lies somewhere in between, but the first turn i definitely explore for a better possible location. the next turn may vary though.
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CAL
JULY 18, 2017 AT 5:07 PM
Well, the story so far has already hinted at or showed the things I told you, so it's not like I mentioned anything new there. You can deduce it yourself to an extent if you go through all the currently available chapters.
1) You need to understand that what might be entertaining to you could be dull for others. No one knows just who exactly made him enter inside that world, and that/those existence(s)/being(s) is/are still completely unknown to us. Let's assume that it's something like a supreme being, and has a very twisted personality. That being wants to watch and enjoy how the protagonist suffers as he opts the pre-programmed choices by him/her, and isn't that big on seeing what kind of choices the protagonist makes. If that being truly wants to play around with the protagonist and make him suffer, letting him make his own choices would become a great flaw in his plan.
The protagonist still has the freedom to choose the conquest order of the target (as long as he can see the target's 'conquest information'), and can also choose how he wants to go about a conquest (the choices appear based on his actions), so it's not like that supreme being wants him to act like the main character of a pre-written story, though.
2) That being (or whatever) doesn't make clear the reason for throwing the protagonist into such a situation. We might find about it later or perhaps at the end of the story, but the possibility of the game-like world being a means of entertainment for that being could turn out to be the truth.
3) The novel of this story only looks like a dating sims game at first, but is supposed to take a much different direction than other stuff from this genre (the synopsis very clearly hints to this), so naturally, it lacks the usual dating sims elements. His targets are only females because he's a male and a guy would normally want to conquer a female unless he's gay/bisexual.
4) I've played Civilization and you're right about that settler thing, but do keep in mind that people have their own ways of thinking, and most of the time they'd choose the safest and most convenient option in their opinion. Here, the protagonist, who was a shut-in until the day before, suddenly founds out that he has to conquer the opposite sex, something he hadn't even dreamed of before. In such a situation, it's too obvious and natural for him to go for Sakurai, as it would seem the most convenient and safest choice to him. Most of the people wouldn't choose to go to nearby places on foot if they have a vehicle just to save gas (and as a result money) in the long run. That's how humans basically act.
Besides, you comparing the base location of civilization with a conquest mission is hardly understandable. You farm monsters in RPGs to gain experience points and level up. Why would you go to a distant place to farm slimes (unless you need the items they drop) and ignore the goblin farming point nearby so long as you're getting the same amount of experience points.
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Celica Sylphil
JULY 19, 2017 AT 6:07 PM
Its not like i didn't deduce that myself, its just that until any of it is proven, it is in the end just hypothesis with maybe a few leaps of logic, it may be true, but at the same time it might as well be not.
My comparison to civilization is me referring to that, sometimes exploring in the start a bit can lead to better results later in the game, that is a risk i'm willing to take.
I actually meant to mention it earlier in jest but i decided it was kinda inappropriate. But here's the part i removed –
What if he strolled down the street to explore a bit and finds a conquerable target, a cat, and it has a difficulty of F, with the hints being that he had to take the cat home and feed it?
Or a counter example of the RPG one you gave, how about the slimes further away give a better experience ratio than goblins? It may be a very slight difference but one which adds up later, but people would choose the goblins because it requires minimal thinking and/or is more convenient.
It's a fairly proven thing that people don't like to think, they're inherently lazy.
Why do you think youtube added the 'autoplay' feature, and why people don't click away even if they're watching a video they don't care about?
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IExistToo
JULY 18, 2017 AT 11:33 PM
You missed the ENTIRE point of Absolute Choice. He is forced to achieve an action and if he fails HE HAS TO RESTART! He has to do it in! It isn't a plothole! Don't talk about things you obviously didn't care enough about to read!
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Celica Sylphil
JULY 19, 2017 AT 5:45 PM
You know what my favourite part of Absolute Choice was? The starting few chapters. I read around 30-40 but then stopped, it just didn't reach the standard which was already set way too high because of Re:Zero.
What you're talking about, is done much better in Re:Zero, it is unfortunate that i watched that before i started reading Absolute Choice but that's how it is.
Absolute choice wants to be a comedy, not a psychological drama/thriller something. And for that purpose, the setting it chose is unsuitable. A setting which would have you focus more on the psychological aspect, like as you said "HE HAS TO RESTART" But what if he can't, what if he just can't ? Thats what happens in the starting few chapters. He wants to save that guy but he is unable to. But guess what, this very important scene is blasted away by the author's deus-ex-machina just about 5 times after he restarted, even then dying 5 times has 0 effect on his mentality.
Compared to that Re:Zero, Absolute choice fails miserably. Also that part time-travel concept that both novels have, that too seems to have minimal impact in Absolute Choice.
And don't start telling me that whatever i said happens later in the story.
The author himself said that the 'abuse' part would only last the few chapters in the beginning, i was very disappointed when i read that author note. He clearly doesn't want to write such a story then why did he choose that setting? Noucome is a fairly good comparison about how absolute choice could have been based on a comedy rather than a half-hearted psychological thriller.
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Blubbery
AUGUST 14, 2017 AT 7:56 PM
Link me to those?
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MarkP
JULY 19, 2017 AT 3:17 AM
I read a bit and can honestly say that this is pretty unconventional game. It is more of an RPG detective novel that a dating sim. If you expect a huge harem and OP protagonist, this is not it.
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Michael Smith
JULY 25, 2017 AT 10:22 AM
I would have been turned off even if she was easy hooker… and kept looking 8000+ hours. Id look around some more first. And while i think she is a serial killer. I probably would not have given her the chance before that belief was formed.
Also the choices he made are so odd. The only good one was scouter and save. But i would never have broken in or used assult. Even if i had key and sleeping spray. Those would have been escape tools first and formost. I might have bought camera as the second tool but i never been a picture taker so i might not have.
Later after i had some time to figure things out i might have bought more tools however. I probably would not have set the timer off. I dont believe i would have tested the load function, worried it might be a one use tool. Save it for near death or extreme crap postions.