Mezametara Saikyou Soubi to Uchuusen-mochi datta node, Ikkodate Mezashite Youhei to shite Jiyuu ni Ikitai - Vol. 1 Ch. 2

[Kaarme]

I don't know why a 27 years old enterprise employee couldn't come up with anything better than amnesia. If someone else told him that, would he believe it? He was a network manager. Let's say something went badly wrong in the corporation's intranet. He could track it down to the actions of a single employee, but that employee claimed he's suffering from a memory loss and can't explain anything. Would he have believed it? Bollocks, he wouldn't believe a single word of it. But here he's using it as an excuse.

Dude should have told that up until now he was working for a billionaire who really wouldn't want their name to spread around and had made him sign an NDA. After years of working solely for them, he receive his payment in precious metals (because getting it in credits would be the same as announcing the employer's name). Now he's a freelancer. Nobody knows him because he was previously only working for such a rich person privately. He could even tell the lady officer to make some guesses, though he won't confirm anything. I'm sure the high officer in fact could imagine a few suitable billionaires immediately.

Forget it, it's the author who couldn't come up with anything better. Even I could, and I'm not a bloody author.

Just in case anyone wondering why Elma said her name has more character, it is because they were basing it in Katakana, エルマ(Elma) ヒロ(Hiro), would be nice if the scanlator explain this but I understand that feelof wanting to gatekeep against weeblets.

You say that, but I still wouldn't let that elf handle the finances of the mercenary group. I don't trust her head for mathematics.

 

[frostmonolith]

Rereading this made me realize clear as day why he had a warped sense of money, LOOK AT THAT RARE METAL LOOT

 

[electro_neanderthal]

I mean, that is what he's indirectly doing. He's saying that basic groceries or lodgings that you can buy for 100 yen is roughly what you can buy for 1 enel. That's what estimating exchange rates means.

The problem with this is that the value of currency fluctuates over time and the comparison is eventually limited to a Japanese audience who remembers the time period the manga came out in. In 10 years, the Yen will be worth something else, and so will every other currency, so you'd have to be a bit of a historian in order to correctly make the connection.

And it's not as if every commodity remains the same relative value over time, either. The cost of milk today vs 50 years ago is not the same increase as the cost of a washing machine back then to now. Essentially, every time a story makes a comparison to a real world currency, they date themselves like a bad pop culture reference and risk not being (easily) understood in the future.

It would make much more sense if every isekai just went, "Based on the cost of food and a place to sleep, I could live for X amount of time with this." Then everyone can quickly and intuitively get a grasp of the value (even if compared to their own, future, currency, which is totally unnecessary) without needing to hit up ChatGPT in 10 years time. But for some reason most isekai authors seem to share that particular dead braincell.

I'm losing my brain cells reading this. The story feels like your usual low-effort isekai with skin-deep space decorations slapped on top.

I guess? I mean, the tropes are definitely there, but in a few chapters you'll see that things are handled differently.

Imagine a guy riding a cool looking demonic beast into a small border town. Then the town guards stop him to steal his stuff. Then some random potential harem member who is also a big shot in town helps him, then another potential harem member approaches him to show things around. No difference at all.

Except a large portion of the town is filled with other people with cool demonic beasts and some of the town guards do that to everyone (usually hoping for a bribe), and the "rando potential harem member" is actually in charge of the guards and only popped in because she saw a new breed of beast and wants to see what's up with that, then notices the potential corruption that (in a few chapters) is explained as to why she has a special interest in corrupt guards as they are doing this are harming her military objectives.

She also doesn't join the harem for a loooooooong time (probably 3-5 years away for the manga), Hiro resisting her for a long time, and the relationship advancing only after a military social event goes horribly wrong (like, bodies hit the floor bad), and the whole ordeal leads to her premature retirement as a professional soldier (almost an Admiral by then since she's had a good string of big achievements as a fleet commander).

In most other isekai, the reasoning for this chain of events is way more random, coincidental and disjointed.

Space is hostile to humans. It should be big deal to travel and live in it.

Yes, but if most of your population lives in space, it's not the same big deal as it is to us. It shouldn't be a big deal to travel and live in it unless you're from a place like the current day Earth. And even then, if you're playing realistic space games? You are, to some degree, acclimating yourself to that environment.

It was the mid '00s when a US General said that they figured out soldiers who played realistic FPS games pulled the trigger to shoot at real people during their first real combat much sooner than soldiers who did not play realistic FPS games (IIRC, Call of Duty was specifically mentioned).

Games and manga have also helped me acclimate to things IRL when I initially encountered them, as I was not surprised about it happening and more surprised about how everyone reacted to me not being surprised.

So games (and other media) do actually help mentally prepare people for similar environments to said games. Not perfectly, but enough to take a lot of the edge off. Add in the fact Hiro still kind of sees things as being from a game and that, at least in my opinion, adequately explains Hiro's lack of surprise.

 

[dementati]

The problem with this is that the value of currency fluctuates over time and the comparison is eventually limited to a Japanese audience who remembers the time period the manga came out in. In 10 years, the Yen will be worth something else, and so will every other currency, so you'd have to be a bit of a historian in order to correctly make the connection.

And it's not as if every commodity remains the same relative value over time, either. The cost of milk today vs 50 years ago is not the same increase as the cost of a washing machine back then to now. Essentially, every time a story makes a comparison to a real world currency, they date themselves like a bad pop culture reference and risk not being (easily) understood in the future.

Uh, yeah, that's true, but it's not the author talking, it's Hiro, he's comparing with what he knows 100 yen to be worth in the time he came from. It'd make little narrative sense for the character to go out of his way to point out to himself exactly what 100 yen can buy, he already knows that intuitively. I also don't think it really matters all that much exactly what it's worth.

 

[electro_neanderthal]

Uh, yeah, that's true, but it's not the author talking, it's Hiro, he's comparing with what he knows 100 yen to be worth in the time he came from. It'd make little narrative sense for the character to go out of his way to point out to himself exactly what 100 yen can buy, he already knows that intuitively. I also don't think it really matters all that much exactly what it's worth.

Fair, it's not like it's a huge problem.

 

[LianSchrugen]

they still using traditional noble titles?