Rebuild World - Ch. 71

[shyevsa]

I want to see the slug back unit so much...

 

[nobody2002]

This is a great manga overall. Looks like they are going to be fighting a giant slug robot thing.

Thanks for the upload.

 

[Amariithynar]

Did Akira just get roped into fighting another bounty monster for no pay at all?

As far as I'm aware, the contract he made only covers fighting that one bounty monster and he's not in the contract that's been made to provide extra help. Well, to be more precise, only the leader's name is on the contract as well as 3 unnamed extras so I guess there's wiggle room on how to distribute the reward. Maybe the rank 27 kid won't participate or won't get rewarded but will basically be assumed to be part of the team while Akira gets the reward and none of the recognition? I can definitely understand why the contract wouldn't outright state that Akira's a member because they wouldn't know him and could only base it off of his rank so they'd probably refuse that contract.

I don't think Shikarabe wants to stiff Akira though so I wonder what his actual intentions are. He already says it wasn't worth taking down the bounty they did at 800M Aurum and that Akira would have to be paid too much so I guess he's hoping that the split reward from a better bounty will cover it better? I can't imagine a contract as extra help being worth too much though - and they're mostly out of ammo too so it's not like they'll be able to contribute that much.

Well, I'm curious to see how this turns out.

There seems to be some translation error on page 27, when Shikarabe says that Akira will "ride in our car". I guess he meant "your" and I did think it was strange since what would happen to the car Akira came with then.

I believe that the "extra kid" is not Akira, but the one who was in Akira's car, can't remember his name but the rank 27 guy, yeah- and I think your setup of him getting the recognition while Akira gets the reward sounds plausible for why Shirakabe's setting things up the way he has.

I don't think it's a translation error; remember that Akira's car is remote controlled. No way Akira is going to just leave his car behind and rely on someone else's transportation entirely, but their vehicle is entirely armored, so makes sense to travel in it instead.

 

[Shamz]

One thing im confused by in the story is how people are not having suspicions on Akira having the old world connection or whatever system it is. If i remember correctly, the white sister from the 2 black and white sister group kinda realized that already. It makes me think that maybe its actually easy to find whoever has the connection when theyre weirdly exceptional.

 

[Pyras]

If I understand right, they gonna go after more Bounties to get more money rewards to be able to pay Akira properly, and not be in the red themselves.

Otherwise they would have to offer something else to Akira instead. Highly doubt Akira would agree to just an 'I owe you one' kind of deal with strangers.

 

[Claith]

I'm really liking these B-movie monsters being drawn instead of in my head. Need an iguana with rows of guns along its spine while to moves like a wild train or something. A "kilometer" long tail that swipes, knocking over figurines... I mean soldiers.

 

[Huichelaar]

This has been crawling at a snails pace and the next enemy is a snail, poetry

I feel like I've heard Shikarabe's inner monologue about how his intuition isn't lining up with reality when it comes to Akira's skill level several times already by now.

They also love to put Akira in arguments with arrogant people that mistake his disinterest for disrespect. These scenes are an interesting look at how human communication can go awry, but they're also getting very repetitive.

Overall, I hope they can actually go somewhere with this plot, because it's been meandering for a long time now.

 

[Salfaro]

Was hoping we'd get a bit of a breather after that fight, but I guess not.

Also, it's been a while so I forget the specifics, what exactly is Drancam? I know it's a hunter group, but more that I just don't remember where exactly they're positioned in the plot. Are they just a big hunter group that he's at odds with because Sheryl's group isn't really part of them + it contains Katsuya?

 

[kanaloa]

the gap and time i get to read this and wait for the next is like the amount of time it takes for me to get molested by my wife lmao

anyways..i feel bad because i feel that at some point alpha will pull the rug under him and he's gonna have to muster up everything he's learned without her because she will "betray" him at some point. but to be fair to her, she's not betraying him or anything but rather just acting on some mission she was given and to her she was always on the "right/justified" path. but just like black from black desert online he will want to be friends and think everything is cool even though he tried to kill the main character"we're friends right?" lmao

 

[Moxider]

the gap and time i get to read this and wait for the next is like the amount of time it takes for me to get molested by my wife lmao

anyways..i feel bad because i feel that at some point alpha will pull the rug under him and he's gonna have to muster up everything he's learned without her because she will "betray" him at some point. but to be fair to her, she's not betraying him or anything but rather just acting on some mission she was given and to her she was always on the "right/justified" path. but just like black from black desert online he will want to be friends and think everything is cool even though he tried to kill the main character"we're friends right?" lmao

I doubt she would betray him

Akira was not the first, someone else has already reached the final mission but refused to finish it and was said to be taken care of by Alpha. (Headcannon: that person managed to escape and now hunting Alpha.)

 

[mojo72400]

I hope his suit doesn't get destroyed especially since they're all low on ammo and that thing looks stronger than the Tankrantula.

 

[Kireato]

I don't think it's a translation error; remember that Akira's car is remote controlled. No way Akira is going to just leave his car behind and rely on someone else's transportation entirely, but their vehicle is entirely armored, so makes sense to travel in it instead.

I mean, on page 28 then 32, we can see that Akira is riding in his own car. I can't understand why he would leave it and remote control it once he's arrived at the destination where there's a dangerous bounty monster firing all over the place, so I think he'll stay in his car for this mission. I guess we'll see in the next chapter.

Opposite. The point here is that given the unexpected challenge and in turn extra expenses (lots of extra missiles, wasted beacons etc), along with Akira and "Nergo" performing far beyond expectations, the amount of bounty (800m) isn't enough to both treat them squarely and cover everyone else and expense. Shikarabe and co aren't after the money at all, and even if it's not an official contract they want to treat everyone fairly both for their own reasons and for purely practical ones that reputation matters a lot and they want to keep extremely well performing and unaligned hunters friendly to them going forward. However, they can't afford to just give away hundreds of millions themselves either. Nergo they're not too worried about, because he too is not after money (as readers we can see he clearly has his own agenda even below the cover agenda of connections, but the cover agenda is still cover). But Akira is 100% about the money, though he's not such a putz he'd totally ignore long term interests or be unrealistic about expenses either. He'd still feel negative about not getting a proper reward however.

So now Shikarabe semi-covertly taking another high paying job, except this time he's not in charge of any major expenses at all. It looks like he's basically planning on making up the gap through simple hard work: he can get a 4 man cut of bounty for this other monster, then once again choose to give his up and use it to pay Akira. If it works everything is square.


As was stated directly in the negotiations, the "contract" here is about honor/reputation and practical game theory and such as much as anything, it's outside the hunter office system so it's not "legal" per se. Regardless of the exact warding, if Akira felt ripped off or jerked around, or even if he felt it just hadn't been worth the effort, that's going to negatively affect his attitude towards Shikarabe going forward. Shikarabe now is sure Akira is very strong, curious if he's got something special "more" about him as well (because somehow lots and lots of people who should know better don't recognize the strength, and while once is a coincidence and easy to ignore, for someone looking for it seeing it over and over and over again is going to start to raise questions), and also knows Akira isn't really aligned with anyone already (at least, in that sphere, obviously Alpha is in the background secretly, but it's true Akira has no deep loyalty and connection to a faction Shikarabe knows about). They also already have some level of working relationship. And finally Akira is very young: he's got potentially (from Shikarabe's POV) a long working life ahead during which he can get even stronger and potentially eventually rise to a serious level. That's a valuable combination, well worth going to some extra effort to nurture a connection even if it costs some money.

Edit: also forgot to add, don't forget in the background as well are Elena and Sara. Akira hasn't forged connections to any major faction yet, but he has forged a few connections, and to a few pretty capable people that Shikarabe also respects and wants to keep a working relationship with. Remember back in chapter 61 before actually going to meet about the current job at all, Akira called them up, and Elena explicitly said "Also, let me know if he gave you a bad offer." They take a more than purely professional interest in Akira for obvious reasons, and that would also clearly extend to "let me know if he screwed you on the actual job".

Oh I do agree with you, I don't think Shikarabe will stiff Akira. You've stated very well all the reasons for which that would be stupid.

I understand that this extra job is meant to get extra funds to pay Akira, but here's the thing about what I understand:

• I don't think being added as extra help will make for a very high paying job. The current bounty hunters have a contract to split the bounty between themselves, and now need to reduce the amount of reward granted to each bounty hunter by hiring extra help, because if they fail they're in the red. But the battle has already started, which means that the contribution of the extra help can't be all that high paying unless they manage to contribute a lot. But, they can't contribute a lot because they're mostly out of ammo (and ammo is something that each bounty hunter prepares before the mission and then bills from the bounty.) They're not going to get there and get some ammo, unless some bounty hunter from the other group got himself killed and his weapons and ammo can be used instead.
• Then there's the fact that Shikarabe invited Akira to participate in this mission, so Akira may be contributing himself. Imagine a 5 person team, getting contracted to get the reward for 4 people, but Akira shows off again, and contributes more than the 4 hunters from Drancam which means he should deserve a large part of that reward too and that would leave Shikarabe with no gains to pay off his initial contract with Akira. To put it simply, this only works if Akira just watches and does not contribute.
• 2 of Shikarabe's colleagues have plainly stated that they're fine with their names not being listed for the achievement of the extra bounty but that they want to get paid, so there's a limit as to what Shikarabe can use from the reward of this extra mission to pay Akira.

So the way I see it, this shouldn't work and Shikarabe is potentially doubling down on his debt to Akira. I just don't believe that Akira is going to just watch and do nothing of worth.

But hey, maybe, as you say, Akira just watches, Shikarabe gets the extra money and can pay Akira well while he achieves his political goals (which is worth money in itself in the long run) but without getting paid now.

 

[zanonyn]

I don't think being added as extra help will make for a very high paying job. The current bounty hunters have a contract to split the bounty between themselves, and now need to reduce the amount of reward granted to each bounty hunter by hiring extra help, because if they fail they're in the red.

I think you're making some assumptions/math here that doesn't necessarily hold? First on a direct level: payment expectations. We don't know exactly what all the bounties are right now I don't think, but when we first saw them listed the Tankrantula and Snail were both the same 100 million. Probably even after rising they're still in a similar ballpark, though since the story hints at "even tougher battle" perhaps it's a touch higher, say 900 million or whatever. But going back to the spider, Akira did directly ask about party size as part of his due diligence, and Shikarabe told him it'd probably be 15-20 people, max 30. And expenses would be subtracted first. Even assuming zero expenses, that'd "only" be about 27 million each case at max party size, and more realistically maybe half that. The "based on performance" bit is fuzzy, there weren't any hard promises. But my point here is not to lose sight of the framing, Akira got a huge payout from the city that one special case but that's far from normal at this stage. 10-15 million profit maybe with some bonus is important but also "regular work". In terms of "he performed exceptionally well" maybe that equates to double or triple any of the others, but that's still only another 20-30 mil.

If the group currently going after the Snail is even a few people smaller, then any single person's share would still likely amount to whatever bonus Akira could have reasonably expected. Remember as well that in this chapter they were saying that everything probably would have been fine if it had been at a billion, so just 200 million more (which would amount to maybe 13-26 million each divided evenly, but would give much more headroom to give the high performers a bigger check). Obviously this is all made up scifi numbers but nothing here strikes me as particularly unbelievable in context. Shikarabe doesn't need to make up some desperately huge amount of money, he's just trying to do a solid. And I think Akira would appreciate the gesture too since he doesn't get many of those. "I didn't think you would have gotten paid enough, so here's my total share of this bounty too" is a pretty decent move from one professional to another. Not condescending or anything either, just professional respect. So even if it was at the lower end of the range, not unreasonable to think Akira would respect it to (on a meta level, we know that Akira also has his own agenda here, he wants the bounty monsters gone so he can get back to super profitable Ancient AI directed ruin harvesting and proceeding with Alpha's mission, but Shikarabe of course doesn't have that info).

But the battle has already started, which means that the contribution of the extra help can't be all that high paying unless they manage to contribute a lot

So first, in-universe, that isn't necessarily how this sort of thing works. We don't have any details here granted, but in a lot of classic mercenary scenarios (or modern corporate ones for that matter) bringing in temp help for an emergency actually costs more, not less. Like in hospitals, traveling nurses during the pandemic were often getting 3x the pay regular ones were. You often have to pay through the nose for high skilled help when you don't have much time luxury. The 3 core guys here aren't debt-ridden sketchy hunters, these are pretty serious hunters. They're a valuable addition, and it's not like it's almost over or something. I highly doubt they wouldn't get much. Even without much ammo, it's not nothing and contributions can involve other dangerous tasks that are ammo-lite depending on the circumstances.

Then jumping back to a meta level, come on: Akira is MC here and Shikarabe is a highly skilled fleshed out recurring character. Like, we can probably guess that they in fact contribute something pretty important at a critical moment .

But again given the cost context they don't need to contribute much. Whatever the non-bonus base pay is would probably be pretty reasonable.

But, they can't contribute a lot because they're mostly out of ammo (and ammo is something that each bounty hunter prepares before the mission and then bills from the bounty.) They're not going to get there and get some ammo, unless some bounty hunter from the other group got himself killed and his weapons and ammo can be used instead.

This seems like quite an assumption. In this very past bounty situation, yeah everyone brought some of their own for their own specific guns, but lots was provided (like all of the rockets) as part of the mission (not for free, obviously). Big cargo trucks and ammo cost money but are easier to replenish then skilled hunters. It'd be pretty unprofessional for a big organized group to just leave that as random to everyone vs having some "depots" prepared (again, not for free). We've seen it's not uncommon for outright merchants to follow along big groups with stuff to sell (at extreme wasteland markup granted) too.

Sure it might be something else but it'd be perfectly reasonable if the first few pages of next chapter were "welcome, you can restock a lot of common stuff at 200% regular price over there, then get to the front 1km that way".

Then there's the fact that Shikarabe invited Akira to participate in this mission, so Akira may be contributing himself. Imagine a 5 person team, getting contracted to get the reward for 4 people, but Akira shows off again, and contributes more than the 4 hunters from Drancam which means he should deserve a large part of that reward too and that would leave Shikarabe with no gains to pay off his initial contract with Akira. To put it simply, this only works if Akira just watches and does not contribute.

I'm sorry but this really just makes no sense, it's pure assumption of everything going identically. And Akira would still to some extent owe Shikarabe in that case for even giving him the opportunity, it's not one Akira would have gotten himself it used Shikarabe's intel and connections. Intel and connections are worth real money, both IRL and in-universe with tons of pure infobrokers who don't ever leave safety at all.

2 of Shikarabe's colleagues have plainly stated that they're fine with their names not being listed for the achievement of the extra bounty but that they want to get paid, so there's a limit as to what Shikarabe can use from the reward of this extra mission to pay Akira.

Again though, Shikarabe doesn't appear to me to need anything special out of this. Just a normal share at most.

So the way I see it, this shouldn't work and Shikarabe is potentially doubling down on his debt to Akira. I just don't believe that Akira is going to just watch and do nothing of worth.

Nah, I really don't get that feel at all. This should work just fine, which isn't a guarantee it does of course but it's totally reasonable. And in a story with a lot of professionals even that is worth something all by itself right? Part of the point here is that Akira isn't just some brat, and he knows perfectly well that sometimes things don't go as planned and there is no use crying over spilt milk. There will be more chances in the future so long as you stay alive, and the more connections you have the more chances you get.

Anyway we'll see, and maybe I'm overestimating things, but I'm giving the series more benefit of the doubt at this point then I would for a lot of typical slop.

 

[tonie]

I kinda wish he'd gone home and meet with Sheryl already, her reactions are always cutesy! but can't blame anyone as Shirakabe probably wants to earn just a little bit more money to pay off the debt collector (Akira) before he gets mad...
Thanks for translation!

 

[Kireato]

I think you're making some assumptions/math here that doesn't necessarily hold? First on a direct level: payment expectations. We don't know exactly what all the bounties are right now I don't think, but when we first saw them listed the Tankrantula and Snail were both the same 100 million. Probably even after rising they're still in a similar ballpark, though since the story hints at "even tougher battle" perhaps it's a touch higher, say 900 million or whatever. But going back to the spider, Akira did directly ask about party size as part of his due diligence, and Shikarabe told him it'd probably be 15-20 people, max 30. And expenses would be subtracted first. Even assuming zero expenses, that'd "only" be about 27 million each case at max party size, and more realistically maybe half that. The "based on performance" bit is fuzzy, there weren't any hard promises. But my point here is not to lose sight of the framing, Akira got a huge payout from the city that one special case but that's far from normal at this stage. 10-15 million profit maybe with some bonus is important but also "regular work". In terms of "he performed exceptionally well" maybe that equates to double or triple any of the others, but that's still only another 20-30 mil.

Page 10, Shikarabe states: "If you take out the expenses of the bounty and just hand the money to them, there's no way they'll get an amount that matches their performance. But if you give them an amount that matches their performance, there'll be nothing left for anyone else."
If we trust what he's saying, you're underestimating the payout Akira should be getting based on his performance here.

So first, in-universe, that isn't necessarily how this sort of thing works. We don't have any details here granted, but in a lot of classic mercenary scenarios (or modern corporate ones for that matter) bringing in temp help for an emergency actually costs more, not less. Like in hospitals, traveling nurses during the pandemic were often getting 3x the pay regular ones were. You often have to pay through the nose for high skilled help when you don't have much time luxury. The 3 core guys here aren't debt-ridden sketchy hunters, these are pretty serious hunters. They're a valuable addition, and it's not like it's almost over or something. I highly doubt they wouldn't get much. Even without much ammo, it's not nothing and contributions can involve other dangerous tasks that are ammo-lite depending on the circumstances.

I'm not sure the traveling nurses during the pandemic is a good analogy here; they have to spend time traveling while doing away with the time the patient has to travel themselves and pay for a room in the hospital. That's why they can get paid more.

While people will catch on to that, and your reputation will tank when they do, extra help that is rewarded more than the people who actually accepted the initial job sounds like a setup to hire an insufficient number of mercenaries to do the job and then bring your friends in as extra help. It seems pretty scammy to me, so I assume contracts also define how extra help can be gotten.

Page 24: "If we go after another bounty monster, we can only do some reconnaissance, we don't have any ammo left."
So apparently, that's what they can do, except that I'm not sure what the point of reconnaissance is when the fighting has already started. Are they going to help locate the building sized bounty monster that is being shot at and shooting back? Well, as you say, there are definitely jobs they can do. I mean, we've seen them on motorcycle get near the Tankrantula and place trackers.

I'm assuming, maybe incorrectly, that since the battle has already started and they're willing to contract extra help, it's not going too well. That means they're using more ammo than expected (so those expenses are larger than expected, reducing the part of the bounty that's getting split) and hiring extra help means that the remaining reward is going to be split amongst more participants. Of course, if participants from the initial contract died during the battle (and didn't negotiate pay that can be passed on to family, which I assume would only work for contract made through the guild so that they can confirm payment is made even after death,) then hiring extra help doesn't come at any extra cost.

I certainly could be wrong and they might be paid decently for this too.

But again given the cost context they don't need to contribute much. Whatever the non-bonus base pay is would probably be pretty reasonable.

I don't think they're getting hired as extra help if the mercenary commanding the hunt didn't have plans to make use of them. Or maybe he plans to limit their contributions to whatever is necessary to make sure they don't get too much extra pay.

Which reminds me that Akira has his "run away" clause, which is probably why Shikarabe is not really including him in the contract (besides wanting to prop up the other kid).

This seems like quite an assumption. In this very past bounty situation, yeah everyone brought some of their own for their own specific guns, but lots was provided (like all of the rockets) as part of the mission (not for free, obviously). Big cargo trucks and ammo cost money but are easier to replenish then skilled hunters. It'd be pretty unprofessional for a big organized group to just leave that as random to everyone vs having some "depots" prepared (again, not for free). We've seen it's not uncommon for outright merchants to follow along big groups with stuff to sell (at extreme wasteland markup granted) too.

I'm just going to point out page 24 again. They make their ammo situation seem pretty final.

Clearly, their group doesn't have any extra depots and they haven't thought of buying from a roaming merchant. It might be that there are no traveling merchant willing to risk themselves in the current circumstances with several large bounty monsters roaming around.

Sure it might be something else but it'd be perfectly reasonable if the first few pages of next chapter were "welcome, you can restock a lot of common stuff at 200% regular price over there, then get to the front 1km that way".

Of course, but then I'd think the writing in this chapter is pretty poor; experienced hunters are failing to bring up obvious solutions.

I'm sorry but this really just makes no sense, it's pure assumption of everything going identically.

I mean, in your own words:

Then jumping back to a meta level, come on: Akira is MC here and Shikarabe is a highly skilled fleshed out recurring character. Like, we can probably guess that they in fact contribute something pretty important at a critical moment .

So yeah, the expectation is that Akira is going to be a big contributor.
Still, my assumption was probably silly. After all, as you say, Shikarabe and his colleagues are pretty experienced Drancam hunters; they can hold their own in terms of contributions.

And Akira would still to some extent owe Shikarabe in that case for even giving him the opportunity, it's not one Akira would have gotten himself it used Shikarabe's intel and connections. Intel and connections are worth real money, both IRL and in-universe with tons of pure infobrokers who don't ever leave safety at all.

Akira does not care about that though. He's clearly not interested in this extra job and only following along to ensure he gets paid for the job that's done. He might realise later that he was given an opportunity to show off his skills to other hunters who might want to hire him, but right now he's just annoyed about being forced to take more risk.

Again though, Shikarabe doesn't appear to me to need anything special out of this. Just a normal share at most.

Yeah, you might be right about that. The contract he's making is specifically intended to further his political goals so I don't think he cares at all about even getting paid here; he just wants to keep using Akira to pad up the other kid's achievements. He's probably decided to compromise on the rewards - most of the hunters won't get as much as they'd expect from a fraction of the bounty, and Akira also won't get a reward proportional to his achievements so they'll all be grumbly, but it'll be what it'll be and he might have to pay it back through favours.

Nah, I really don't get that feel at all. This should work just fine, which isn't a guarantee it does of course but it's totally reasonable. And in a story with a lot of professionals even that is worth something all by itself right? Part of the point here is that Akira isn't just some brat, and he knows perfectly well that sometimes things don't go as planned and there is no use crying over spilt milk. There will be more chances in the future so long as you stay alive, and the more connections you have the more chances you get.

Anyway we'll see, and maybe I'm overestimating things, but I'm giving the series more benefit of the doubt at this point then I would for a lot of typical slop.

That's fair. The scenario I put forth was extreme.

On the other points, Akira may not be some brat, but he's still a brat; honestly from how it was presented in this chapter, it looks like he got roped into some new battle without properly discussing any terms. I find this to be really bad, which is why I'm presenting all these situations to show how it could be bad.

I'm also expecting that everything will be fine and that Akira will be satisfied with the reward.

 

[Amariithynar]

I mean, on page 28 then 32, we can see that Akira is riding in his own car. I can't understand why he would leave it and remote control it once he's arrived at the destination where there's a dangerous bounty monster firing all over the place, so I think he'll stay in his car for this mission. I guess we'll see in the next chapter.

Yeah, I don't mean he's with them right away, but when they arrive on scene and actually begin the engagement they'll be in the same vehicle.

 

[Jstar338]

You know, Togami did fine. He had to get saved, yes, but he was able to fire off rockets too help Akira focus on the spiders. I think if the author lets him grow from this he'll be a valuable ally later