Allen the Reincarnated Merchant: A Plan to Get Rich in Another World

A woman stood at the doorway, wearing a worn-out lab coat. Beneath the coat, glimpses of black stockings peeked through, giving off an oddly seductive air… Her languid expression somewhat reminded me of Akira, but unlike her, this woman had a slim build, was shorter, and wore glasses.

In addition to her black-rimmed glasses, she had something like a cigarette dangling from her lips.

After a brief moment of mutual confusion, the first to act was the woman in the lab coat. She pulled out something that resembled a gun from the inside of her coat.

“Er du en av regjeringens håndlangere?”

“Uh… I mean you no harm!!”

The object she held lacked a traditional gun barrel, but its silver, metallic surface gleamed menacingly at its tip, giving the impression it could fire at any moment.

I instinctively raised both hands, trying to show I wasn’t hostile. It was clear now that this place was somewhere unfamiliar, a place I didn’t know. I had no idea how we would communicate, but for now, I needed to show that I wasn’t an enemy.

“Ikke fra myndighetene? En sivilist?”

It seemed my sudden surrendering gesture had at least defused the immediate tension, though the gun was still pointed at me. Slowly, I stood up. As I moved, she quickly adjusted her stance, ready to fire again, but she seemed to realize that I had no weapons.

(To be honest, I could probably close the distance and subdue her if I wanted…)

The woman in the lab coat was clearly an amateur in these kinds of confrontations. The way her hands trembled while holding the gun, and the strained expression on her face, made it obvious. The distance between us was only a few meters, and if I used my full physical abilities, I could close that gap in an instant.

However, if I did that, our relationship would undoubtedly take a sharp turn for the worse. Considering we couldn’t even understand each other’s words, the last thing I wanted was to escalate things unnecessarily.

—

(…Where am I? I get that this is some kind of lab, but this clearly isn’t Earth.)

With metallic footsteps echoing down a narrow hallway, I followed her through an unknown facility. There were no windows, just lighting fixtures on the ceiling and walls. The air felt stale, being circulated by ventilation fans placed at regular intervals.

The reason I thought it was a lab was that, while walking down the hall, I spotted large, non-household machines operating, including some sort of giant incubators and large computers. One of the monitors I passed showed rapid scrolling lines of text, too fast to read.

Still, aside from the woman in the lab coat behind me, gun raised, there didn’t seem to be anyone else in this facility. It felt like something out of a villain’s lair in a spy movie.

“Det er hit vi skal.”

I couldn’t understand what she was saying, but since she had stopped talking and gestured towards a door on the right, I assumed she was telling me to go inside.

*Click…*

I entered a room that felt like a scene from a hacker movie, with multiple monitors glowing in the dim light. The woman in the lab coat quickly sat down and began typing at a speed that suggested she knew her way around the equipment.

『Ar suprantate kalbą?』

“Huh?”

She placed something like an intercom on her head and began speaking into the microphone.

Her voice was soon followed by a similar, slightly robotic-sounding voice from the speakers on the desk with the monitors. It seemed like some sort of translation system.

I shook my head to indicate I didn’t understand, and she quickly typed something else on the keyboard.

『Rozumiete jazyku?』

『Vai jūs saprotat valodu?』

『Înțelegi limba?』

『Do you understand the language?』

“Ah…”

Amidst the various languages she cycled through, I finally heard one I recognized.

She seemed to notice my reaction and began typing again.

『Verstehen Sie die Sprache?』

『Comprenez-vous la langue ?』

『你能听懂这些语言吗？』

『Do you understand Japanese?』

“Oh, that’s it.”

Just like before, when she saw my reaction, her eyes widened a little in surprise, and she quickly typed on the keyboard again.

『A person speaking the old language of the Sakura Empire… To think someone like that would be on this remote resource planet, on the edge of the galaxy. That’s an ancient Earth language… You’re quite unusual, aren’t you?』

“Sakura Empire?”

I heard the name of a country I didn’t recognize, but since we were finally able to communicate, I didn’t want to interrupt the conversation, so I kept listening.

『My name is Nias Altonya, the galaxy’s greatest scientific genius and the number one most-wanted criminal. Now, who are you?』

She introduced herself with the help of her translation device, in what seemed like a boastful manner.