Chick 259

259

Rather than a “crafting laboratory,” the place was hardly different from a kids’ café.

No wonder—the room was filled, here and there, with all sorts of toys children would love.

Beyond that, the space was divided into various zones: a station for playing with soil, an area for roleplay, a section stacked high with blocks, another for drawing—all tailored for different creative play.

“All of this…”

“It’s all the latest models,” Groo said proudly, rubbing her nose.

To Groo’s eyes, Grandpa looked quite astonished by the dazzling array of brand-new toys.

“This is just a kids’ room!”

“Grandpa! You mustn’t be loud at the company!” Groo scolded, sticking a [Noisy] ticket on Genzo.

But upon reading the note with his translator, Genzo only began to make an even greater fuss.

“Where are the kilns! The potter’s wheel! The anvil! The hammers! Where are they all?”

“…?”

Groo ran over and brought him a toy hammer.

“Here’s the hammer, right here!”

“…Ha.”

Genzo stared in bewilderment at the child waving a toy hammer meant for toddlers.

Paying him no mind, Groo led Genzo over to the block play zone.

Crouched down beside the child, stacking Lego blocks, Genzo heaved a sigh.

……

What kind of crafting lab was this? Clearly, the child had led him into a play zone.

Well, asking a kid—one obviously incapable of sound judgment—to show him around in the first place was his own mistake, not the child’s.

But then…

All of a sudden, Groo pressed the hammer into his hand, drawing his eyebrows up.

“Hmm?”

“Just bang it like this,” Groo instructed.

“Wait, isn’t this a real item?”

[Children’s Toy Hammer (A)]

Whatever you strike, you can drive it in to your heart’s content in one blow. For children—won’t cause harm even if someone is hit.

An A-grade item, handed out as a toy for kids’ amusement? That’s wasteful by any standard.

He looked around, inspecting the information on the other toys.

‘…Are these all enchanted items?’

The grades varied, but every one was a magitech item loaded with options.

Genzo’s face filled with shock.

“Don’t tell me this really is Orchestra’s crafting lab?!”

Groo blinked as though wondering, Didn’t you see already?

“Yesh! This is the place where Teacher and I play and think about what to make.”

“Teacher?”

“Uncle Kazuki!”

Groo grinned from ear to ear.

“Kazuki comes up with magitech designs here…?”

Now that he looked closely, traces of Kazuki’s mana could be seen on many of the magitech items.

“Huh…!”

So that Kazuki came all the way to Korea to make children’s toys?

“These scoundrels…!”

Genzo ground his teeth.

A hot flush of fury rose in his eyes.

Amakusa Kazuki was a treasure coveted by the entire world.

Yet they’d dragged him here just to make toys for kids, acting as a glorified babysitter?

This could only be an insult aimed at Japan!

Just then, Groo pulled gently on his sleeve with a bright smile.

“This one—we’re building together now.”

Genzo straightened his clothes, voice frosty.

“That’s enough. There’s nothing here worth looking at.”

Groo opened her mouth in a round ‘O’ of dismay.

“I should take Kazuki back to Japan as well, once and for all!”

No matter how angry he was at the Japanese government, he refused to let Kazuki remain here, enduring such humiliation.

The prime minister had just changed, after all—now was the perfect time for Genzo to act as intermediary between Kazuki and the Japanese government.

“It’s a good thing I came in person. Shameless rascals!”

Just then, Groo scribbled on a note and applied a [Be Quiet When Your Friend Is Presenting] sticker to him.

“Hm? And what’s this say now?”

Reading the text with the translator, Genzo’s face flushed red.

“Y-you little brat!”

Groo immediately slapped on another [Noisy] ticket and pressed a finger to her lips. “Shh!”

“Hmph!”

Dumbstruck, Genzo clamped his mouth shut. Groo then took out two robot toys to show him.

“Tadaa! These are combining toys! If you join them together, they have different abilities!”

Groo merged the two robots, transforming them into a unicorn.

“As if—at the end of the day, toys are still just toys!”

Groo looked shocked at his dismissal.

“They have these in Japan too?”

“What?”

Groo separated the unicorn back into two robots, then snapped them together again into a unicorn.

“Combine!”

“What the…!”

Words failed Genzo, who struggled to keep his stern expression.

Toy robots were everywhere, but if these combining toys were actually magitech items with changing options—

……

“Ohh, they don’t.”

Groo nodded in understanding, which only made Genzo shout in protest.

“The Inoue family could make things like this anytime we wanted…!”

…Anytime, really? Could they, in fact?

Unable to finish the sentence, Genzo snatched up the unicorn toy.

He could physically join two items, of course. But to create an entirely new option—now that was different.

Creating a brand new option in a merge was a technique commonly seen only in mixed potions.

“So the mana stones at the core create a new interaction during the merge…?”

A merging magitech toy—child’s play maybe, but an utterly novel mechanism.

Click, click, snap, snap.

Genzo separated and recombined the toy again and again, analyzing it with deep focus, until he looked up to catch Groo’s beaming gaze.

“…Ahem. Hm.”

It stung his pride to find himself handling a toy, ensnared by a child, yet as a born crafter he simply could not bring himself to put down this new kind of magitech item.

Clearing his throat in embarrassment, Genzo continued to inspect the toy.

Groo watched with delight and boasted,

“It’s the ultimate combining toy!”

Genzo let out a wry chuckle.

“Ultimate is stretching it.”

“Tch.”

“But it is new. Worth looking into.”

A flexible idea, inspired by a child’s perspective.

And from it, a fresh mechanism was invented.

It was utterly different from Inoue’s systematic, rigorous training that produced precise, delicate results.

Of course, he didn’t mean to deny the Inoue family’s traditions.

Their methods had yielded many S-grade items and the Amakusa Series, after all.

But Genzo wasn’t so close-minded as to dismiss a new technology just because it was unfamiliar.

“Looks like Orchestra’s not such a bad place after all.”

At Genzo’s heartfelt praise, Groo made her mouth into a delighted “O.”

“Oooh…”

With a note of wonder, Groo pulled out her cart and offered him O2 Vitamin Water.

“What’s this?”

“It’s tasty.”

Then, she fetched a camcorder, aimed it at Genzo holding the O2 Vitamin Water, and started filming.

Genzo, unable to resist the expectation in the child’s shining eyes, gulped down the drink.

“Once more!”

Groo set the camcorder on the table, rotated the lens toward them both, and lined up next to Genzo, gulping down their drinks together.

Then, making sure the label was clearly visible, she recited her lines in textbook style:

“For quenching thirst, nothing beats ‘O2 Vitamin Water’!”

“…?”

Leaving the bewildered Genzo behind, Groo scampered over to the camcorder, confirmed the shot, and thrust her thumb up.

“Good.”

“What’s good? Your acting’s terrible. Is this… is this a commercial for a drink?”

“Yesh.”

He’d turned down countless endorsement offers all his life—only to end up in Korea, shooting a tacky ad with a child actor?

“You don’t miss a trick, do you… Tsk, tsk, tsk.”

Genzo shook his head, but couldn’t keep the smile off his lips.

And then—

Beep!

The door to the crafting lab swung open.

[“Grandfather!”]

[“Professor Inoue!”]

It was Haruna and Kazuki, coming through the door.

Joorim followed behind, tilting his head as he found Groo.

Having flown to Orchestra as soon as his call with Haruna ended, Genzo had brought chaos to the Japanese side. Haruna had rushed to find him at Orchestra, and the news that Genzo had gone somewhere with Groo as a guide left everyone in a daze.

‘He seemed like a cantankerous old man…’

Joorim, worried that his problem-child daughter might not have behaved herself, quickly found the answer:

Stuck all over Genzo’s body were [Noisy] and [Be Quiet When Your Friend Is Presenting] stickers.

There was no doubt she hadn’t behaved herself—which made Joorim shut his eyes tight.