Peace Town had a lot in common with Justice Town in many ways.
Built on barren land…
It was also somewhat of a transportation hub, being the last village before Sacramento.
Because of this, the town’s industries were quite similar to Justice Town’s.
20% were primary industry workers like farmers and ranchers.
And 80% were service industry workers targeting outsiders.
Having lived in Justice Town for four years, I knew exactly how to ruin a town mostly reliant on services.
And that was…
“Who told you to run a business here?!”
By causing chaos.
Crash!
I walked into the tavern, flipped a table, and the tavern owner rushed out from behind the bar with a panicked look.
“W-what? What are you doing?!”
Swoosh.
I simply showed him a piece of paper.
It was an official demolition order from the Lloyd Railway Company, approved by the state government.
“Old man, the demolition order came out a while ago. Why are you still here?”
“Y-you think I’d follow some nonsense demolition order? I’ve lived in this town since I was born!”
“That’s a shame.”
Bang!
When he refused to listen, I kicked another table.
Seeing this, the tavern owner, unable to hold back, reached into his pocket to stop me.
“You punk…! I can’t take this anymore…!”
It was a revolver.
But…
Click.
“Wanna shoot?”
“……!!”
Before he could even properly draw his gun, mine was already aimed between his eyes.
“W-what…!”
The tavern owner looked shocked, unable to believe how fast I drew my gun.
“Too bad. If you’d shot first, I would’ve shot too.”
“……”
Just as the tension was reaching its peak…
Rustle.
“…!”
I heard movement from the kitchen behind the bar.
My sharp ears picked up someone trembling behind the wall.
Taverns are rarely run by a single person; usually, it’s a couple.
The person in the kitchen was likely the tavern owner’s wife.
So, I smirked and showed him the other revolver in my holster.
“I’ve got another gun. Want me to show it to the person hiding back there?”
“S-stop it….”
Earlier, I’d learned from a farmer at the town entrance that even the toughest people weaken when their family is threatened.
The tavern owner, who had been resisting fiercely, now begged me as he cowered.
“P-please, not my wife….”
“I’ll be back in a few days. You’d better leave town soon.”
“Ugh… H-huuu….”
I left the tavern, leaving the owner slumped in despair.
“……”
Outside, six other gunslingers were watching my work.
I spoke to them, who were staring with their mouths agape.
“Alright, this is how you do it.”
“Y-you…”
Borg, the self-proclaimed leader of the gunslingers, stuttered and pointed at me, shouting.
“Youngest, you punk—! You’re a genius at this!”
“Ooooh!”
The other gunslingers cheered along with Borg.
“Genius of the trade! Genius of the trade!”
“King of demolition!”
“You’re the biggest piece of trash I’ve ever seen—!!”
…I’m not sure if that’s a compliment, but they were praising me.
Apparently, before I joined, Borg and a few others had visited the town a couple of times but were met with fierce resistance and driven out.
Some gunslingers even quit and ran away in the middle of the job.
From their perspective, I must’ve seemed like a god.
“Youngest! Youngest!”
“Alright, calm down. It’s our first day, so let’s take a walk around the town together.”
The most efficient method would’ve been to spread out and cause chaos individually, but these losers clearly needed more training.
So, like a kindergarten teacher, I led them around the town.
“Where to next?”
“H-how about the fabric shop over there?”
“Good idea.”
When Borg pointed to the fabric shop, I walked right in.
Crash!
“Who told you to run a business here?!!”
“Ahhh! W-wait! Why are you doing this?!”
The work was going smoothly.
The rest of the operations followed a similar pattern.
Crash!
“Who told you to run a business here?”
“W-who are you?!”
First, cause chaos in the shop…
“You threw the first punch, right?”
“Ugh…!”
Use a bit of force to subdue them…
“Kekeke. Your son’s cute. How old is he?”
“Ugh… Please, not my child….”
Then exploit their weaknesses.
Just doing this made the townspeople break down in tears.
If we kept harassing them like this every day, they’d eventually get tired and leave town.
With that in mind, the job would likely finish sooner than expected.
“The sun’s starting to set, so let’s wrap up for today!”
Borg, seemingly in a good mood, shouted as the sun set and it was time to finish work.
“Let’s all go grab a drink! I’ll treat everyone today, so drink up!”
“Woo!”
By the way, the sun was setting.
Emma was probably still waiting for me in the Sacramento inn room. What should I do?
“Boss, where are we sleeping? Are we going back to Sacramento?”
“It takes over four hours to get back to Sacramento. When would we even sleep? Let’s just stay in this town.”
“…Stay in this town?”
“Yeah, the tavern we visited earlier also has an inn. We can drink and sleep there.”
“……”
Drinking and sleeping at the same tavern we pressured to demolish.
How ironic.
As I shrugged, another gunslinger asked Borg.
“By the way, boss, didn’t you say there’s some self-proclaimed sheriff in this town? We’ve been causing chaos all day, but we haven’t seen them.”
“Right. That guy usually charges at us like a mad dog, but they’re nowhere to be seen today. Where’d they go?”
“Guy? Was it a woman? Was she pretty?”
“She’s pretty, but you’d get sick of her fast. She’s a total lunatic.”
As we chatted about the town’s self-proclaimed sheriff, we entered the tavern.
The same tavern I’d caused chaos in earlier.
Creak.
“Welcome… Eek…!”
The tavern owner looked haggard, as if he’d aged ten years in a day.
The tavern owner, who was greeting guests, recognized our faces, especially mine, and immediately backed away.
Borg chuckled at the frightened owner and ordered some food.
“Hey! Seven beers and some warm food! We’re staying the night, so get a room ready too!”
“Ah, y-yes…!!”
The tavern owner, having taken the order, practically ran to the kitchen.
“Wait.”
“…!”
I stopped him as he was heading to the kitchen.
When I called out to him, the tavern owner froze like a condemned prisoner.
I spoke to him, who was clearly tense.
“I’ll have whiskey instead of beer.”
“…Huh?”
“If you have rum, that’s fine too.”
My basic motto is to strictly separate work and personal life.
Since the sun had set, I was now just a guest, not a goon.
But the tavern owner seemed to have trouble adjusting to this sudden change in my demeanor.
“….”
He stared at me like I was crazy, then…
“Ah, w-whiskey…! I’ll bring it right away!”
He quickly regained his composure and went into the kitchen.
Borg laughed at the cowering tavern owner and said, “That guy. Last time I was here, he didn’t even acknowledge me. Did you see how he freaked out just now when he saw our youngest?”
“We’ve got a real gem in our team.”
“Yeah, haha!”
Borg took out a cigarette and lit it, then asked me, “By the way, youngest. You said this is your first time doing this kind of work. What did you do before?”
“Just a regular bounty hunter.”
“So how did you end up doing this?”
How did I end up doing this? Well…
“Money, of course.”
“Oh? So you’re in a similar boat as us.”
At that moment, Borg’s eyes, which had seemed carefree until now, darkened a bit.
“Damn it. My mom’s got some lung disease or something, and we need money for her medicine.”
Once Borg started sharing his story, the other gunslingers chimed in too.
“I’ve got eight mouths to feed at home.”
“My old man’s been farming for over sixty years. It’s time he got to rest.”
Then their gazes turned to me.
They seemed to be asking why I needed the money, so after a moment of thought, I answered.
“I need money to get back to my hometown.”
“Must be pretty far away, huh?”
“Very far. Beyond imagination.”
As we were chatting, the tavern owner brought out the drinks and food.
“H-here’s your food…”
“Let’s eat first. Gotta eat to work hard tomorrow.”
We were exhausted from roaming the village all day, so we ate and drank to our hearts’ content, relieving the fatigue.
It had been a while since I’d been to a tavern, so like the other gunslingers, I drank a lot.
“Ah, I need to pee.”
Did I drink too much?
I woke up in the middle of the night, urgently needing to go.
The restroom was outside, shared by everyone.
After relieving myself and wiping my hands with a handkerchief, I stepped out.
“Honey…! We need to figure something out!”
“Sigh…”
Usually, taverns are quiet in the early morning with no guests around.
Taking advantage of the lack of customers, the tavern owner and his wife were talking in the kitchen.
“We were both born and raised here… If we leave, we have nowhere to go…”
“But what can we do… Those bastards… They’re ready to shoot if we don’t leave…”
Tsk.
I clicked my tongue as I listened to their conversation.
Hearing such pitiful stories just distracts me when I’m working.
I scratched my ear and started heading back to my room.
But then…
“Honey, we have to think about the baby in my belly…”
I couldn’t help but stop at the tavern owner’s words.
The couple was young.
About my age, I’d guess.
‘His wife is pregnant.’
Hearing her husband’s words, the wife burst into tears.
“…Sob, we can’t leave, especially for the baby. How can we raise a child without any money?”
“Sigh… Let’s gather the villagers and come up with a plan. The sheriff will be back soon. Okay? Don’t cry…”
After hearing the tavern owner comfort his wife, I finally moved on.
“Ah… damn.”
The unsettling conversation had completely woken me up.
Instead of going back to my room, I went into the back alley and sat down.
After today, I realized something.
The people of Peace Town… They have nothing and are barely scraping by, living day to day in this village.
But what will happen to them if this village is demolished?
“What will happen?”
I know better than anyone how the beggars of San Francisco live.
…Of course, I don’t think it’s my fault.
Everyone has their own circumstances.
I don’t have the luxury to care about NPCs’ problems right now.
In fact, me getting out of this game quickly might be the fastest way to free them from their miserable lives.
“……”
Thinking that, I pulled something out of my pocket.
It was a cigarette and a match.
I don’t usually smoke much.
‘Boss, don’t smoke.’
‘It’s bad for your health.’
Ever since Emma told me not to smoke last time, I’ve been carrying it around like a talisman, never actually lighting it.
A full eight months of quitting.
I’ve held out this long, but for some reason, today it was hard to resist.
Sss…
As I lit it and inhaled the harsh smoke, I remembered something a black guy I shared a cigarette with in San Francisco once said.
‘Noah, we’re all the same, human beings.’
…Bullshit.
Come to think of it, if I had killed that guy, I might have been able to go home already.
Regretting the past, I smoked the cigarette.
Soon, dawn broke, and it was time to get back to work.
