Chapter 137 - Dealing With the Leakers

Unfortunately, it seems like I’ll have to abandon the plan to act like an angry mob boss whose product just got stolen. With them being so upfront and apologetic, I can’t be the only immature person in the room. Darn it! If it wouldn’t make me feel so bad, I’d totally spit some fire lines in an Italian accent like ‘So, we got a couple of rats around here, and I’m not talking about this Mouse on my left.’

“Haah…” I sighed and looked down at the table.

“Eep!” I heard a squeal-like sound and glanced up to see Mary flinching.

What? Why’d she squeal like a mouse? Am I that scary?

I turned to Luna and spoke,

“Mouse, would I be a bad person if I deal with them with my usual antics?”

“D-Deal with us?!” Mary whisper-shouted.

“What do you think?” Luna responded.

“Tsk…” I clicked my tongue and rolled my eyes…Fine, whatever, I’ll just be mature for once, “So, anyways, I’ve got something for each of you.” I unstrapped my leg pouch and placed it on the table.

“Eep!” Mary squealed.

“You’re gonna blow us up!?” Martin exclaimed with wide eyes.

“Hold on just a second, Ms. Raccoon.” Jean said calmly.

…What? What is with these people’s perception of me!? Do I look like someone who would blow something up just because a minor issue!? This must be Luna’s fault! She fed them slanderous info!

“This is your fault!” I turned to Luna and exclaimed with my usual tone.

“What? What’s my fault?” Luna asked, confused.

“They all think I’m like a ticking time bomb! That I’m gonna blow them up just because of an accident!”

“Eh!? You’re not gonna blow us up!?” Martin said.

“See!?” I said to Luna.

“No, no, no,” Luna quickly shook her head, “This is completely your fault, not mine.” She said.

“My fault?” I pointed at myself incredulously.

“Duh!” Luna said, “Have you seen your PR online?! You threatened to blow up an amusement park!”

“That’s true, that’s true.” Martin commented with a nod.

“…That did happen.” Mary whispered.

“Just a joke!” I said.

“Then you threatened to blow up the association!” Luna said.

“I did not! I threatened to blow up anyone who knocked on our door!” I said.

“I remember seeing that too.” Martin said.

“…’Our’…” Mary repeated with a slightly reddened face.

“And that makes it better!?” Luna said, “Okay, let’s for some reason ignore your past history. Let’s think back to when we first arrived; As soon as you entered the room, you yelled that you have a bomb and are going to blow this building to dust.”

“So she is going to blow us up!?” Martin exclaimed.

“Oh no!” Mary gasped.

The other people in the party just silently watched, some of them chuckling occasionally.

“That was a test! I wanted to see if there were any listening devices in here!” I defended myself.

“A test? So, we’re not getting blown up?” Martin asked, confused.

This story originates from NovelPhoenix. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

“No!” I answered.

“Do you or do you not have dynokali potions in that pouch at this very moment?” Luna asked.

“W-well!” I stuttered, “I-I mean…”

“Oh my god! She’s going to blow us up! She said she has something in that pouch for each and every one of us!” Martin exclaimed.

Mary gasped.

“It’s for protection!” I exclaimed.

“Bin,” Luna said, “You do realize you haven’t even explained anything? Right? All you’ve done since the meeting started is sigh like you’re upset and say a cryptic message that could mean ‘I’ve got something to deal with you’.”

“Eh?” I tilted my head and thought back to the beginning of this meeting.

Hm…I gave them my name…Asked if I could deal with them with my usual antics…Then said ‘I’ve got something for you’…Huh, wow, that is not a good look.

Am I the problem?

I completely forgot to explain anything since I was disappointed about not being able to mess with them! And because of that, I unintentionally messed with them!?

The realization dawned on me like a hammer to a nail.

“Ahem,” I cleared my throat, “Nice to meet you everyone, good work on clearing that gate by the way. I heard no one got injured. Plus, it was Mary’s first mid-tier gate? Congratulations.” I said calmly.

“Bin…” Luna smiled and bowed her head in amusement.

It seemed like everyone else didn’t know what to say as no one responded for a moment.

After several seconds of silence, someone belly laughed. It was Martin.

“Bahaha!” He wiped his eyes.

“Um…Thank you…” Mary whispered with a bowed head and flushed face.

“I’ve heard nothing but great things about you all from Mouse,” I tilted my head towards Luna.

“Um, Ms. Raccoon, you’re not upset?” Jean asked.

“Upset? About what?” I asked.

“It’s our fault that your relationship got exposed. People will be prying into your personal life now.”

“Oh, that little thing?” I shrugged and waved it off, “They’ve always done that anyways. Even the association had a stalker looking into me. Nothing new.”

“Well, the association was looking for an unregistered awakener.” Luna commented.

I turned to her and glared, forgetting that she couldn’t see my face due to the mask, though, it seemed like she got my message anyways.

“The association are stalkers.” Luna corrected.

I nodded, satisfied.

“Anyways, don’t worry about that, we weren’t explicitly hiding it. Both Mouse and I don’t care about it.” I said.

“I see.” Jean nodded, “That’s good, but, I still feel bad for exposing it. Even if you weren’t hiding it, you still hadn’t revealed it.”

“Me too!” Martin chimed in.

“…Me too.” Mary slightly raised her hand.

Well! That’s perfect then! It means I’ll get some free labor! Hehe.

“But, if you didn’t want to meet us because of the leak, what did you want to meet us for?” Jean asked.

“Free labor.” I unconsciously replied before covering my mouth.

“Bahaha!” Martin belly laughed.

“Pfft.” Luna chuckled.

“Ahem!” I cleared my throat, “As I said before, I have something for each of you.” I gestured to the pouch before opening it. One by one, I pulled out potion after potion; The potions were blue-green in color and stored nicely in my new bottles.

I paused and gaged everyones reactions. All of their eyes had immediately locked onto the potions like vultures to a corpse. One by one, I saw them widen their eyes.

Even Maren, who had been constantly staring at me had turned to read the potion’s description.

“Bouncy Bouncy Potions!?” Mary let out with a surprised voice.

After they had all read it. I continued to speak,

“Yep. I’ve already tested them out myself quite a bit, but, I’d like to know how other people use them.” I explained, “I have ten of them here, one for each of you; This was why I asked Mouse to set up a meeting with everyone. What’s the word for it? Consumer testing? Beta testing? One of those, I can’t remember.”

“Wait, let me get this straight,” Amelia started, “You want the party who leaked your relationship to the public, to test out your very hidden and gatekept potions?”

“Sounds about right.” I nodded.

“…Aren’t you worried that this will get leaked too? Not that I’m saying it’d be intentional, but, some of us here have loud mouths.” She shot a glance at Martin as she said that.

“Well, if you’ve already leaked something once, that means you’ll be careful the second time, no?” I shrugged.

Plus, even if they do leak it, that’s just more hype and promo for me. If I really wanted to keep something hidden, no one would know.

“That’s right!” Martin exclaimed, “You have more word, my mouth will be zipped shut! I won’t say a thing!” He bolstered confidently.

For some reason, I have difficulty believing that. But, it’s fine either way.

“So, you want us to test out your potions? In combat scenarios? Or in group scenarios?” Jean asked.

“No, no, no,” I shook my head, “I don’t have any specific things I want you all to do with these. I’m simply giving them to you and you can use them freely. All I ask is that you report to me what you do with them and your thoughts. Whether you use them together or alone doesn’t matter to me. Just act like you purchased these from the exchange and now they’re yours.” I said.

“Are these prototypes?” Amelia asked.

“Finished products.” I answered.

“H-Huh!?” Mary let out, “S-So, you’re planning on finally selling these soon?”

“Yep,” I nodded, “Christmas time.”

“Woah, finally.” Someone mumbled.

“Yes!” Someone else whisper-shouted.

Suddenly, Martin shouted and stood up, slamming his palms on the table.

“Wait a minute!” As everyone’s attention turned to him, Martin continued, “The bouncy ball! We can finally see what happens to the bouncy ball!”

Eyes widened and a few excited exclamations were made around the room.

“Is that alright, Ms. Raccoon? Can we use them on bouncy balls?” He asked.

“Up to you.” I shrugged, “Once I hand these to you all, I no longer have any say in what you do with them.”

I cleared my throat, interlacing my fingers and crossing my legs.

“So,” I started, “I’ve given you all an offer you can’t refuse, will you accept?” I asked in an Italian accent.

“Pfft,” Luna chuckled, “You liked that mob boss from the movie, didn’t you?” She whispered.

I totally didn’t ignore her just to maintain my mob boss aesthetic. I just didn’t hear her. Really, believe me.

“Of course!”

“Yes!”

“Easiest decision of my life.”

I couldn’t differentiate who said what, but, they all accepted. The nervousness and anxiousness I saw in Mary at the beginning of the meeting was completely gone replaced by excitement and anticipation.

I tried to replicate a scene I saw in a movie once. Grabbing a potion bottle, I slid it across the table to the closet person.

Yeah, that unbelievably failed. Just as it reached halfway to the person, the bottle tumbled over, falling short.

“Pfft! Haha!” Luna laughed out loud.

“Bahaha!” Martin belly laughed.

Mary hid her laugh behind her palm and Jean softly chuckled.

I stared blankly at the bottle as everyone had an amused smile on their face.

Is it too late to cancel the offer?

…

“Wow, these bottles look cool.” Robert said.

“Yeah, I like the mouse design.” Larry said, inspecting his bottle.

“Mouse? I got a raccoon design on mine.” Robert said, showing Larry his bottle.

“Huh? There’s multiple designs then. Look at mine.” Larry handed Robert his bottle.

Discussions were rampant. Everyone was discussing how they were going to use their bottle. Amelia planned on seeing how they worked in conjunction with her crystal arrows; Martin was going to see what happens to the bouncy ball; Kaela wanted to use it to play with kids in an orphanage. There was a whole bunch of talks.

Suddenly, when Mary spoke, the room went silent.

“Mine has both a raccoon and a mouse design on it?” She said, tilting her head.

Everyone turned their attention to her and immediately recognized that she had gotten a rare bottle, considering everyone else had either a raccoon or a mouse design, they knew it was something special.

“Hey! How about we trade? I’ll give you this mouse bottle for yours, the one you have has a scratch on it anyways, and you’d much rather have this pristine one, right?” Larry immediately said.

Mary’s eyes widened as she realized what was going on and hugged the bottle tightly, “No! Go away you scammers! This bottle is mine!”

“Little Mary…Can’t you give your auntie just one gift?” Jean asked.

Pfft! I internally laughed.

“Shall we go then?” I asked Luna, “Let’s finish that movie and then I’m gonna get back to brewing potions.”

Luna smiled, “Let’s go.” She grabbed my hand and we stood up to leave.

“No! Go away! This is my bottle and no one else can have it!” Mary shouted as we left the room.