When Caelan opened the shop door early that morning, he found Ella already there, sitting on the stone step by the entrance. She jumped to her feet the moment she heard the door.
"Have you had breakfast?"
"Yes. And thank you, boss. For yesterday." She bowed.
"You thanked me like ten times yesterday.
" Caelan waved it off. "Just watch the shop for a bit. I'm grabbing food."
"Okay." She nodded obediently.
Last night had been a whole thing. When Caelan tried to give Ella the food to take home, she'd refused at first. Kept refusing, actually, until he basically forced her to take it.
This morning's breakfast was some kind of porridge that reminded him vaguely of the questionable "cuisine" from that one sketchy place back on Earth
the kind with dubious hygiene standards. But Caelan wasn't picky. He bought a large bowl, ate it with pickled vegetables, and headed back to the shop.
There was already a customer waiting at the counter.
Someone he knew, actually. His first customer from yesterday. Cassius, that was his name.
"Oh! Young Master Cas—" Caelan caught himself.
"I mean, the Young Master of House Everflame! You're here early. Welcome, welcome."
Please don't tell me he got bored of the game already and wants a refund, Caelan thought.
Cassius was standing at the counter with a huge bowl of Cloud Boar stew, slurping it down without even a hint of noble dignity.
When Caelan spoke, he slowly set the bowl down and looked up.
"I need to talk to you about something."
"Sure. What's up?"
Cassius lowered his voice. "Does Elemental Contra have... a simpler version?"
Caelan blinked. "You can choose the difficulty. You know that, right?"
"No, I need something even easier than Easy. You can make that, can't you?"
"Oh!" Understanding dawned. "Is it for kids?"
"...Yes. Exactly. For kids." Cassius's smile looked slightly strained.
"Easy's already pretty forgiving, though. Games need a bit of challenge to be fun." Caelan said this with complete sincerity because that's what he genuinely believed.
Sure, he'd played Contra a million times on Earth and still couldn't clear it with three lives, but that didn't matter. The people in this world had way faster reaction times than Earth humans.
This guy right here had picked it up super quickly yesterday, and he'd never played a game before in his life.
Easy difficulty was just normal Contra difficulty from Earth.
Yeah, he'd buffed the boss HP a bit, but that shouldn't make much difference, right? His own cousin back on Earth had cleared it within a week, using just his free time after school and homework.
Caelan knew he was being a bit presumptuous. Just because people here had fast reflexes didn't mean they could instantly translate that into good gameplay.
After all, the game character had set parameters. Even if you had god-tier reflexes, a level-one character with no items couldn't beat a max-level tank with full build.
"Look, just make me an easier version. I'll pay extra!" Cassius launched a money offensive.
Damn rich people.
Part of Caelan really wanted to scam this loaded classmate. But ultimately, he had some professional integrity.
He flicked his finger. A string of commands materialized in glowing letters in front of Cassius.
"Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, B, A, B, A, Start."
Cassius stared at it. "What is this?"
"Use these buttons in this exact order on the mode selection screen—you know, when you're choosing single player or two player.
Works on Easy and Normal difficulties only." Caelan gave him a knowing smile. "This command will make the game significantly easier."
"Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right... okay, I get that part. But what are these two symbols?" Cassius pointed at the B and A.
Caelan's mysterious expression faltered. Right. They didn't have English letters here.
"This one's called 'B,'" he explained.
"That's the jump button. And this one's 'A'—the attack button. Here, let me show you."
He grabbed an Elemental Contra runestone, walked over to a table, placed it in the frame, and channeled mana into it. After selecting Easy difficulty, he reached the single-player/two-player selection screen and carefully entered the sequence: Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, B, A, B, A.
Ding.
The sound was identical to the one from that old cheat menu back on Earth. Caelan grinned and pressed start, selecting the female character with the exposed legs.
Cassius watched the whole thing, then frowned.
"Doesn't look any different."
"Just wait. Watch this."
Caelan moved the character forward a bit, then deliberately walked her straight into an enemy. The female mage let out a soft cry—"Ah~"—and dissolved into a sparkle of light.
He did it again. And again.
"Ah~" "Ah~" "Ah~"
After three deaths, Cassius's eyes narrowed.
"Wait. You died three times, but there are still four hearts in the corner."
Caelan kept going. Five more deaths. Still four hearts showing.
"The game has infinite lives?!" Cassius asked in amazement.
"Nah, just thirty instead of five.
" Caelan was still making the character die. This was why you put a female character in Contra, right? Besides showing players pixelated legs, you got to hear this sound effect.
Cassius nodded, a smile spreading across his face. "With thirty lives, I can clear it easy."
"Yeah, I'm sure you can. Good luck." Caelan paused. "Though honestly, I think you'll be able to beat it with five lives before too long.
You've got good gaming instincts. Almost as good as this girl I saw yesterday afternoon."
"Which girl?"
"Don't know her name, but people around her were calling her Quinn."
"Oh. Her." Cassius nodded but didn't pursue the topic. Instead, his gaze drifted up to the menu board. There was a new line of text: "Salamander: Five silver marks."
He pointed. "New game?"
"Just finished it last night." Caelan raised his finger and tapped the air. A demonstration video materialized in front of Cassius, complete with scrolling text and dramatic narration.
The sound quality was actually good—the Weave's nerf didn't affect audio illusions.
"On the beautiful planet Grandis, there is an ancient prophecy that speaks of a sea of fire in the cosmos, a thousand light-years from the planet, where a giant fire dragon resides.
When the dragon dances, the heavens and earth will be shrouded in darkness, and evil will descend upon Grandis. As the prophecy foretold, the Salamander army, flying from the sea of fire, launched an invasion.
To eliminate the invaders, the hyperspace cosmos cruiser of Grandis took on the heavy responsibility and set out for the Salamander military base!"
The narration faded and gameplay footage began.
Cassius watched, clearly impressed but also deeply confused. He had absolutely no idea what anything on the screen was.
"What's a light-year? And the 'cosmos'? What's a cosmos cruiser?"
"Think of them as things from another plane," Caelan explained quickly. "Different from our world. Alternate reality stuff."
Cassius nodded, only half-understanding. "Give me three copies of this Salamander thing. Looks interesting."
After the wealthy Young Master of House Everflame left, several more people had already arrived at the shop. Some had heard about it and came out of curiosity.
Others had been here yesterday. By around ten in the morning, the small shop was absolutely packed, with people queuing up in the back for free trial time.
It gave Caelan a nostalgic feeling—like being back in those arcade halls from his teenage years on Earth. Though of course, these games were all NES titles, and they were free to play.
Still. The vibe was the same.
PLz throw Powerstones.