Information Gathering

To prepare for the fight against B-Class Masters, I'd been stacking up training day after day.

… But the B-Class Masters had surely studied my Garumon lineup down to the last detail and were drawing up a meta build to counter it. Was it really fine for me to keep idly preparing to handle whoever showed up?

"… Couldn't we gather information on the B-Class Masters who'll be appearing in the swap match from our end too…?"

I tried consulting Lyuka and the others.

"Disclosing the details of a Garumon Battle beyond the win/loss outcome is prohibited.

"But the class names of the participating Garumon, along with the win/loss, can be checked through publicly released information."

"… I see. That'd be helpful.

"Where could I find that public info?

"There's no internet here… a library, maybe?"

"There are no institutions in this world that lend books out for free.

"Books are luxury items. With your current finances, though, that wouldn't be a problem. Shall we purchase them at a bookstore?"

"A bookstore, huh…"

Now that she mentioned it, I had a vague memory of being told once that books were absurdly expensive and that I couldn't afford any, which had killed a planned trip to a bookstore.

When had that been, I wondered? Now that I was C-Class, buying books was no longer a problem.

"What kind of book has the win/loss listed? … Oh wait, I'm going to buy one anyway, so I'll just see for myself."

"They're magazines edited by the Garumon press. There are three main Garumon magazines; the relevant ones would be Garumon Weekly Report and Garumon Communications, I believe."

Lyuka answered my offhand quip.

"… The Garumon press? That's a thing?"

"It is. In this world, Garumon Battles are people's greatest interest.

"Wherever there's something people want to know, there's press to convey it.

"Some people even became NPCs specifically because they wanted to report on Garumon Battles."

"Huh…"

Come to think of it, this world had TVs too, but I'd hardly ever turned one on.

True, on Earth I'd hardly watched anything but anime, but given that this was a whole other world, I might've shown a bit more interest.

"TVs aren't always broadcasting. They only broadcast around tournament times.

"When it comes to media for conveying information about Garumon and Masters, magazines are it."

My curiosity piqued, I had Lyuka guide me to a bookstore.

A bookstore, sure, but unlike the mass-produced bound volumes you'd picture from modern Earth, this one had the high-end air of a jewelry store.

No surprise there; books here were quite expensive per copy.

A cheap one ran about 100G a volume. A flimsy magazine of just a few pages going for what amounted to 1,000,000 yen in Japanese money was a bit unthinkable by Earth standards.

The kind of price tag you'd see on a marked-up premium doujinshi…

And that was the tame end. Garumon specialty magazines were even pricier, going for over 1000G a copy.

Apparently, the system itself imposed these restrictions to keep information from leaking too easily.

"Most of a book's price is essentially a tax the system takes. The more useful the information is judged to be, the higher the price."

"I see… so that 150,000G book over there means…"

"It's a useful book with the system's stamp of approval."

"Hmm…"

To think such useful information had existed all along, and I'd been fighting without knowing it…

Heading into battle, intel was supposed to be the first priority. What had I been doing all this time?

I felt a little down.

… Well, 150,000G really was something I couldn't have paid until I made C-Class.

"… Um, should I have explained the books in more detail…?

"In this world, there really aren't many Masters who rely on this sort of thing to fight…"

Lyuka's expression turned anxious.

"Ah, no, no. Stuffing your head full of book learning isn't great either, so it was perfectly fine for me not to know.

"But I've gradually been developing my own approach to Garumon Battles, and I think I can sort through information now… so I figured gathering this kind of info wouldn't hurt."

The most prominent magazine, packed with results from official matches: Garumon Battle Weekly Report

Loaded with abundant specialist articles: Garumon Battle Communications

Mainly featuring profiles of leading Masters and leading Garumon: Garumon Yearbook

Those, apparently, were the major Garumon magazines.

Garumon Battle Weekly Report — 1000G

Garumon Battle Communications — 3000G

Garumon Yearbook — 8000G

After that, there were apparently dozens of autobiographies written by various Masters as a side income after retirement.

100G to 150,000G. The price seemed roughly proportional to the Master's rank; for E-Class and below, an autobiography was only worth about 100G.

The 150,000G one was Fundamentals of Garumon Battle, written by former S-Class Master Lucion.

Fundamentals being the most expensive… was a curious thing.

"Welcome to our shop, the Avion Bookstore. C-Class rank 1 Master, Naoto Akai-sama.

"Our establishment prides itself on an abundant selection…"

The proprietor came over, rubbing his hands together.

At first, his eyes had given me the suspicious look of, "What's with this guy? A scruffy one's wandered in,"

but after he checked me through the system, his palm flipped clean over… Well, fine.

Since I was here, I figured I might as well chat with him.

"I'd like to buy a few Garumon information magazines…"

"Hoho! What discerning taste. As expected of the C-Class rank 1 Master, your eye knows where to look!"

… Was he making fun of me?

"Do you have back issues with the official records of the previous B-Class swap match?"

"Oh, the B-Class swap match! Astounding! Are you considering participating in the next swap match…?"

"Yes, well."

"That's… wonderful!"

The proprietor's reaction was mixed.

He'd probably thought, "this guy looks like he's going to lose."

But on the off chance I won, getting on good terms with a B-Class Master would cost him nothing more than a few bows of the head, so it seemed he'd decided to bow and scrape.

"Haha! Then I'll fetch the back issues right away."

With that, he withdrew.

My funds were enormous. If I felt like it, I could buy anything.

When the proprietor returned, he was clutching a huge stack of books.

… There were that many? It was painfully obvious he was seizing the chance to push as many on me as possible.

"Lyuka… I don't really want to buy here…"

"… My apologies. But no other bookstore has a richer back-issue stock than this one."

… Then there was no helping it.

"These are the back issues containing the B-Class match results."

With that, he held out four copies of Garumon Battle Weekly Report.

"… All right. I'll take them."

The relevant Garumon Battle Weekly Report issues, 1000G x 4.

Then I bought the latest issues of Garumon Battle Communications and the Yearbook.

Then…

"… What's this book about?"

I pointed at the most expensive one.

"Oh, what discerning taste! For a C-Class Master like yourself, my lord, this is essential reading. The content is truly splendid."

"… No, I'm asking what's in it."

"For that, you'd have to purchase it…"

"… Lyuka… I really don't want to buy here…"

"My apologies… But in this world, books are luxury items. The NPCs running bookstores are pretty much all like this…"

It couldn't be helped…

"All right, I'll buy it."

"Thank you very muuuuch～!"

The proprietor's eyes lit up. Well, with someone paying cash on the spot for a 1.5-billion-yen book, of course they would.

I didn't trust this proprietor, but since the system made it impossible to charge an unfair price, the amount itself wouldn't be an issue.

I trusted the system.

Anyway, despite the slightly unpleasant experience, I was looking forward to the contents of the books themselves. I'd start reading right away.

Garumon Battle Weekly Report was…

"Oh, photos."

The quality didn't seem all that far below Earth's weeklies.

The first half had a few feature articles.

… Apparently, B-Class-and-up Garumon Battles all got feature articles, while a few C-Class-and-below battles were picked out as well.

After the feature articles in the first half came a dry, mechanical listing of Garumon Battles.

The first half was rather interesting, but if you only looked at the latter half, with no pictures and just walls of text, the book seemed boring at a glance.

The results of official Garumon Battle tournaments from around the country were listed in rows of text.

"… Wait, then, would the Eora D-Class Champion Tournament we entered have been listed too?"

Being in a magazine would've been kind of impressive.

"There are countless D-Class-and-below tournaments, so not all of them are listed.

"There just isn't enough page space, or enough reporters either.

"Tournaments around the capital, or large tournaments, get noticed, but otherwise it's hard to draw attention.

"When there are A-Class or S-Class battles, the coverage gets even bigger."

Lyuka explained. Too bad. Oh well.

… Lyuka was pretty knowledgeable. Was she actually an avid reader?

"… However, B-Class swap matches are always included."

So I started by reading the feature article on the previous B-Class swap match. It was in the front-half feature section.

"… C-Class Hunter. So those exist, huh."

Just learning that was valuable info.

"But the Garumon info is only their names and classes. It'd help if their elements were listed too…"

"That's just how it is. They're not allowed to list more detailed info."

"Well, having just the class name is enough."

Hmm… still, thanks to buying four issues, I'd been able to do some analysis.

I'd put what I gleaned to use in the actual Garumon Battle.

Next I checked the Garumon Yearbook. S-Class Masters and A-Class Masters were introduced with portraits and articles.

B-Class Masters got just their names. As for C-Class-and-below Masters, only a few were featured, in the form of "promising Master profiles." Most of them seemed to be the children of nobles.

"… I see. With this, I can learn the faces and names of S-Class Masters…"

Not knowing the S-Class Masters who ruled this world would've been like coming to Japan and not knowing the Prime Minister. From that angle, learning them was worthwhile as basic common knowledge.

"… But no matter how you look at it, this is a spoiler for what's to come…"

"… Spoiler? For what?"

… Now I understood why information was restricted.

True, when someone suddenly appeared in front of you and you went, Y-you're…!, that was more exciting.

Knowing in advance "this guy is at this rank" did kind of cut the fun in half.

… Well, the noteworthy Masters were… 1 in S-Class. 1 in A-Class. And in B-Class… 2.

One of the two B-Class names was Kensei Yamagata.

I'll cover the contents of the Garumon Yearbook separately.

S-Class Masters and the like were still way too far off in the story to count as real foreshadowing.

And I wasn't even sure I'd ever reach that far…

Next was Garumon Communications.

This magazine ran a different feature article every issue. Useful Garumon Ranking, How to Train Water Garumon, things like that. They all looked interesting, but the latest issue happened to have a timely feature: an article called The Path to B-Class Master.

Hmm, it pretty much amounted to motivational platitudes.

In any case, this explained why the three I'd seen in Garumon Battle Weekly Report, Lagas, Idosen, and Maizu, kept showing up in C-Class matches.

I see, C-Class hunters, huh…

Come to think of it, I hadn't been told how the four who'd advanced through C-Class were paired against B-Class. So it was a draw.

The easiest one to beat was whoever filled the slot besides Lagas, Idosen, and Maizu.

… That said, with a decisive battle against Yamagata-kun looming, I couldn't afford to lose to a mere C-Class hunter Master.

… Actually, those three were the easiest to fight, since their lineups were already fully exposed.

The remaining slot had been losing every time and getting swapped out, which meant there was no info on whoever filled it at all.

… If I drew that remaining slot, I'd have to play it by ear. I'd worked out countermeasures for Lagas, Idosen, and Maizu already.

By the way… in the most recent three swap matches, almost all of the B-Class Masters who'd advanced were people I knew.

A year and a half ago, the current S-Class and A-Class Masters had advanced. The S-Class one had won by defeating Idosen.

A year ago, Yamagata-kun and Idosen had advanced. They hadn't beaten Lagas or Maizu.

Half a year ago, that guy had advanced, slipping past all three C-Class hunters.

And now… it was my turn. Following in their footsteps left me with mixed feelings, but at least I'd be catching up to those two B-Class members, so I'd take it as a positive.

Garumon Battle Weekly Report also had a feature on noteworthy rookie Masters, and one of them caught my eye.

Reichhardt was being introduced as a rookie Master debuting this year.

… So I ended up reading that article through.

Hmm, big talk wasn't really my thing, but apparently that guy was setting out with that kind of weight on his shoulders too…

If you considered that even his bad attitude came from his frustration at being unable to live up to those expectations… it became a little harder to hate him.

If he came after Adelia again, I'd show no mercy and crush him, but I'd avoid going after his Garumon to claim her.

Last, I read the most expensive book.

"Hmm…"

I read through it. A good book. So I thought, but…

"What kind of book is it? I haven't read it either."

Lyuka asked.

"… It really is a good book. There's a ton of useful info in it.

"But about half of it overlaps with what you and Leone explained.

"… It made me realize all over again how valuable meeting you and Leone was for early-game info gathering."

So the system had judged this 150,000G book to have that much value, and Lyuka and Leone had given me half-plus-alpha of that useful information for free…

I gave Lyuka and Leone good-girl head pats.

"Mn…"

"Hau…"

The two of them looked blissed out.

"And renewed thanks to Adelia for bringing that meeting about, too."

When I patted Adelia's head,

"Nyaa～"

Adelia was happy.

How to acquire Garumon, Garumon ranks, classes, value, the elemental effectiveness chart, and so on.

These were all things I'd already heard from Lyuka and Leone, but for someone who didn't know, they'd be useful.

The representative skills of each element and each class were a nice reference.

That was something I hadn't been able to get into much detail about with Lyuka or Leone, and was exactly what I'd wanted.

Of course, since Garumon skills had individual variation, the book wasn't necessarily the final word. You had to use it with that in mind.

… You had to read it knowing that.

After that came the characteristics of each class.

After that came the characteristics of skills.

Entries like that ran the full range. Things I hadn't known at all, things that made me go "yes, that makes sense," things that made me go "no no, depends on usage," things where ours had evolved into something completely different.

Strategy guides like these were just fun!

I'd have to read it knowing it was ultimately the personal opinion of the author, Lucion-shi, but it was interesting to learn perspectives other than my own.

You could tell he'd written it with sincere thought for new Masters; it was a pretty good book, I felt.

It'd been pricey, but it was a good purchase.

That was how, with these materials in hand, I worked out my strategy.

"… So, did you come up with a plan for the B-Class swap match?"

Yuria asked.

When working out strategy, I'd been consulting Lyuka, who was rich in knowledge, and Leone, who was rich in experience.

But Yuria, our newest companion, could think from a position closest to that of a Master, which made her the best advisor of all.

"Yeah… well, this time I'll have Leone come out too. We've managed to keep her safely in reserve up to now.

"… But other than that, I'll just have to play it by ear in the end. If they want to pull a meta on me, by all means."

At my not-very-reliable words, Yuria gave a wry smile.

"That's true, though. Our team has a rich variety of elements, so we're not easily countered element-wise."

"Yeah, exactly. So if I imagine being the opponent and think about what element to focus on against me…

"I really can't come up with much."

Even with Kanan, Adelia, and Maika making up the wind/fire/ice trio, an element strong against all three was surprisingly hard to find.

The best would be fire. Wind was weak to fire. Ice was weak to fire too. Even so, against Adelia it wasn't super-effective.

Well, this worked out just as I'd intended. With Kanan and Maika equipping Adelia's Spirit Garb, they gained fire resistance, so it stopped being super-effective.

… For B-Class matches, I was prepared to fight with the Spirit Garbs.

Dark was strong against everything except Light. But Dark-element was quite rare. A B-Class Master could of course prepare one, but our team had the even rarer Light-element Lyuka.

Dark was completely weak to Light, so factoring in the chance of fighting Lyuka, including a Dark would be a tough call.

Even Dragon, which was strong against most elements, faced our Ice-element-and-speed-type Maika.

Ice-element Garumon were typically sluggish, so dragon Garumon, sluggish themselves, supposedly had nothing to fear from them. But Maika was a high-speed ice Attacker. Her threat had just been demonstrated at the C-Class Tournament.

Even after preparing countermeasures, the wrong matchup meant defeat.

In 6v6, you couldn't swap members mid-battle, so there was no "I misread, time to switch."

The only way to send out the counter party was for the current one to be wiped out.

In the end, since elemental countermeasures were hard to assemble, I felt the best option was to fight with my own preferred tactics.

The favored tactics of the three C-Class hunters were roughly clear.

"Well, if I had to pick something, our team's weakness is fire-element. It's super-effective against Kanan, Maika, and Haru. The only one clearly strong against fire is Yuria.

"… So I'll have those three covered with fire countermeasures via Adelia's Spirit Garb.

"Beyond that… a buff-nullification skill is essential. After that, guaranteed-hit and piercing. With those, they could give us trouble.

"And if a divine-element comes out, that'd be bad."

"… Buff-nullification aside, guaranteed-hit, piercing, and divine-element are simply matters of being plain strong.

"All things considered, you really do have a flawless lineup, don't you?"

Yuria laughed.

"As an NPC, I've watched many Masters too. I've seen talented Masters bounce off the C-Class or B-Class wall, lose Garumon who were like halves of themselves, and give up their dreams.

"But… you're different. I'll vouch for that with full confidence.

"You won't stop at something like B-Class. You're certainly… a vessel capable of reaching even S-Class."

"… Thank you, Yuria. I'll do my best."

At last… I'd be challenging the B-Class swap match.